Hope for the Next Generation?
Several friends recently despaired about the fate of grown children raised by their “helicopter parent” friends. According to them these college educated twenty somethings, including one with a Master’s Degree from Notre Dame, had been coddled from the cradle and were now having problems making it in the real world without mommy and daddy to […]
The Sixth Sense of Canines
Dogs seem to have a sixth sense about coming disasters. Historians and researchers claim they can sense earthquakes coming. Although when one hit Seattle we had to wake my parent’s snoozing terriers so we could get out of the house. But I do know of one case where I believe a dog had a sixth […]
The Museum Piece
The clerk at Massey’s Grocery Store looked down on my curly haired head. Like most five year old boys, I wasn’t tall enough to see anything but the front of the counter, but I could see the shiny dime he was holding out to me. I took it, and knew exactly what to do. When I […]
The Art of Selling
The best sales people don’t rely on a smarmy pitch or underhanded tactics. They find out what people want, and then deliver. I spent one Seattle summer working as the ice cream man, selling my wares from a three-wheeled truck. My best route included Alki Beach a sandy summer hangout on the west side of […]
The Dog on Pogo Sticks
When we took Rascal, our long-legged, cocker terrier mix to dog obedience classes, the instructor took one look and called him, “A cocker spaniel on stilts.” More like a cocker spaniel on pogo sticks. Soon after we adopted Rascal we learned that he not only lived up to his name, but he had a phenomenal […]
Almost English
Years ago I worked on a project for ING Bank in Sydney, Australia. Due to a happy coincidence I lived in a million dollar apartment for the two month duration of the gig with a systems engineer from my company. The apartment belonged to the family of the ING program manager and he made it available […]
Large Pepperoni, but Hold the Nukes
Think about the oddest “wrong number” phone call you’ve received. I remember picking up a voice mail left by a panicked homeowner—who was looking for a plumber. I guess the “Dennis & Laurie can’t come to the phone…,” didn’t make it clear we weren’t the local Roto Rooter. I hope they didn’t drown trying to […]
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