Haiku 1 - 3

a once mighty tree
standing tall in the forest
falls down helplessly

the ocean comes in

taking me far far away

I have peace at last

a father and son

with the warm sun behind them

quietly it sets

Party Haiku

another party
at the next door neighbor’s house

never invited 

under a gray cloud 

it is much like a gray shroud 

I rest here in peace 

despite our efforts 

fate always has the last word

life is preordained 

Gold Medal

The Olympics are here! Rah, rah, wave the flag! Yeah like I’m supposed to care whether some young, or in some cases not so young, brat wins a medal for my country. USA ! USA! USA! I don’t and I get tired of all the jingoistic banter you have to listen to when the ‘Games’ come around. Some of these athletes are fine and anonymous. They train hard. I wish them well. I get these other countries wanting to beat the big, bad, Americans. But these spoiled professional amateurs who have done nothing in their lives but sponge off the government (and probably taxpayers) for years or even decades and ‘overcome adversity’, and wait, I’m supposed to care whether these skiers and others like them win? Not at my house! They’re not heroes, at least to me. I wish the Olympics were once every twenty-five years so I wouldn’t have to hear about them so much

Super Bowl Shenanigans

Super Bowl Sunday is coming which means Super Bowl parties. There’s a good chance that you might be having or going to one. I’ll bring soda, or chips and dip, or something easy. Let somebody else provide the meat. They usually draw a pretty good crowd albeit an odd one. There’ll be people there wearing football jerseys they just got the day before at the mall and have to be told what team the jersey represents, most of whom look really out of place in one. There’s people who just come for the food, mostly office types who have no clue who is actually playing in the game, but are mostly interested in ‘networking’ or gossiping. Then there’s the non-sports guy who doesn’t care about the game, but just wants to see the lame, overblown, overpriced commercials that get shown during ‘The Big Game’. Who invited that guy? Then there’s the couple hardcore football people who are actually trying to watch the game and thinking they should have stayed home and avoided all these other types.

How To Write An Obituary

Nobody likes writing an obituary. But, if you have to write one, try to make it good. If the person ran their own business and enjoyed it and truly loved their work, fine, but putting that they worked 30 years as a clerk at XYZ company is uninteresting and damning with faint praise, like that was the most important thing about them. Don’t write something silly either like they ‘lit up a room’ or that they were a ‘force of nature’ or that ‘everyone loved them’. Too hokey, too ridiculous, and too disingenuous. Nobody believes that stuff. There was surely somebody out there who didn’t ‘love’ them. Write instead about where they traveled to, or things they were interested in. If the person was a lifetime Pittsburgh Steelers fan, put it down. It gives more depth to the person you’re writing about, makes them more relatable. If they played in a band, say so and write what instrument they played, even something like second clarinet. Not everybody can be Charles Dickens, but try to give the deceased a real, personalized, and nice send off in print