Monthly Archives: November 2012

TED: A Wandering Mind Is an Unhappy Mind

Posted on November 30, 2012 by Roger Walck

There has been a lot of research in the last few years about what makes people happy, how things like income, education, gender, and marriage relate to it, but one of the puzzles is that these factors don’t seem to … Continue reading →

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Even Retirees Take Vacations

Posted on November 24, 2012 by Roger Walck

Wife and I are leaving soon for a 3-week cruise.  We never took one before but thought we should try one while we are still healthy enough to doze away the day on a deckchair.  A friend at the community … Continue reading →

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TED

Posted on November 23, 2012 by Roger Walck

“TED is a nonprofit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. It started out (in 1984) as a conference bringing together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment, Design.” So says their website.  TED is a California thing.  By my understanding, which may … Continue reading →

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Strunk and White

Posted on November 19, 2012 by Roger Walck

In a recent posting, I mentioned Roger Angell is the stepson of E. B. White, who you may not know.  I  became aware of E. B. White on my first real job in the early 1960s when my bosses, two … Continue reading →

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A Non-Voter Attack

Posted on November 17, 2012 by Roger Walck

I thought my non-voting stance (Nov. 11 posting) was just a personal quirk unlikely to stir up anyone’s ire, but an Internet article described an Arizona woman, 28, who became so infuriated with her husband when he refused to vote … Continue reading →

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Over the Wall

Posted on November 15, 2012 by Roger Walck

“Over the Wall” by Roger Angell.  The New Yorker, 11/19/2012 Roger Angell, New Yorker essayist (mainly on baseball) and stepson of the famous writer E. B. White, writes on the death of his wife six months ago.  (His mother, Katharine … Continue reading →

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A Non-Voter

Posted on November 11, 2012 by Roger Walck

Phew!  It’s finally over.  Did my candidate win?  No.  So I am a sulking Romney fan?  No, again. I take pride in being a non-voter on principle.  A candidate has to earn my vote, and neither did. If only there … Continue reading →

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Piano Legs

Posted on November 8, 2012 by Roger Walck

The Japanese have a disparaging expression “daikon-ashi,” that refers to a woman’s legs (ashi) as resembling a daikon, which is a long, lumpy, white radish with almost no shape other than a taper at the end and maybe a few … Continue reading →

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Close Encounters and Teri Garr

Posted on November 5, 2012 by Roger Walck

The other night I was watching the movie “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.”  I knew it was made in 1977, 35 years ago, but the suburban life it parodied looked perfectly normal to me.  The ranch house with a … Continue reading →

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How the du Ponts Came to Delaware (More Interesting Than You Would Think)

Posted on November 2, 2012 by Roger Walck

When the museums in the Brandywine Valley mention the emigration of the du Ponts from France, they usually say it was to escape political persecution following the French Revolution.  Good spin, but it depends how you look at it. Pierre … Continue reading →

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