Tonight we ate at Pann’s Restaurant and Coffee Shop in Westchester en route to LAX to pick up some friends at the airport. Pann’s is the diner that was featured in Pulp Fiction and it has been around since 1958. The exterior is a great example of Googie architecture, which is a futurist style designed…
Category: Flash essay
A Chronicle of My Day
I am sitting with my student, Oona. We are doing a quick write. I am tired today. Ray and I sat up until almost 2 am watching the last episodes of Orange is the New Black. This was Season 2. It is a new experience for me watching episodic television in this free-form approach –…
Insight from Max Perkins and Hemingway
The famous editor Max Perkins wrote: I think, in truth, that the best writing of all is done long after the events it is concerned with, when they have been digested and reflected upon unconsciously, and the writer has completely realized them in himself. It is good journalistic writing that is done quickly while everything…
The Moon, Planets and Labor Day Weekend
I can hear the crickets chirping outside. The waxing crescent moon has two planets clearly visible below it: Saturn and Mars. Ray and I walked around the block with the dogs and got a great view of the moon and the two planets as we walked. I noted that many of the house we passed…
Five Items I’d Grab if My House Were On Fire
If my house were on fire, then here are the things that I would grab as long as I knew all people and animals were safe: 1) My family photographs. I am calling that one item, though there are hundreds of photos. This reminds me to put them in one box that could be easily grabbed….
Running Behind…
Ray and I have been busy handling two estates, which means that we have been researching, then selling items on eBay. This is a slow and meticulous process and takes lots of time. Today, I was photographing various pieces of vintage pottery while Ray was researching their origin. We got more pieces listed, but it…
Heading to Ojai
Ray and I are heading out for Ojai to spend the night in the orange grove. The sky is clear – no rain in sight, unfortunately – but the good news is the stars should be shining in abundance tonight. So, it will be a treat to be out in the “wild” for a bit,…
A Few More Thoughts on One of the Best TV Series Out There
Ray and I have been slowly working our way through Orange is the New Black. I have to say that this is the best show I’ve seen on television that describes with stark clarity what prison life is like for women. There are the good cops, the corrupt ones, along with the ones that are decent, but have…
Ten Things That Have Been On My Mind Lately
1) The world seems to be falling apart: Gaza and Israel; Ferguson, Missouri; Syria; Ebola outbreak in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea; girls stolen in Nigeria; women sleeping homeless on the streets of the United States (not to mention the men); Russia and Ukraine conflict; stalled out politics in the U.S. Congress; people divided over…
New Addiction: Orange is the New Black
My children and several of my students have told me that I must watch the new Netflix’s show “Orange is the New Black.” Ray and I began today and watched two episodes. I must admit that the first five minutes of the first episode had me muttering, “Hmmm…I don’t know if I’m going to like this.”…
20 Minutes a Day 