So unto you this day in the city of ann arbaugh, er, ann arbor, glad tidings of a savior wearing khaki dockers and a torn 49ers' jersey, he shall be called recruiter of 5 star talent, kicker of buckeye and spartan hiney,
anyone who knows anything about me understands that i'm referring to the hiring of jim harbaugh to the position of head football coach at the university of michigan which happens to be my alma mater. the football program enjoys a strong football tradition but has slipped in recent years. so a lot of the fan base does in fact see harbaugh as a savior of sorts,
when his name first surfaced as a candidate for the position., i was not enthusiastic about the choice for reasons that i now suspect are largely unfounded after watching the news conference announcing the hiring. overall, while there was a lot to be impressed with concerning his manner and speech, while artfully dodging a number of provocative questions, harbaugh made one observation that sticks with me. the issue in question involved harbaugh comparing the academic standards of stanford and michigan. harbaugh responded by acknowledging that he made a mistake there and he'd learned from it, comparing two things leads to diminishing one of them. there's a lot of wisdom in that.
Tuesday, December 30, 2014
Wednesday, December 24, 2014
Christmas
up until a couple of days ago, i was having a severe case of holiday blahs. money has been tight and last week my car required transmission repairs i really can't afford. what made it worse was that i was still having problems with the stickshift and not knowing how much it was going to cost was prompting a lot of anxiety. in other words, i couldn't see past my own problems.
i took the car back to my mechanic monday morning and got the car back shortly after lunch; my mechanic handed me my key and said i could go. told me i needed to replace the shifter bushing eventually, that i should go find one cheap, bring the car back in and he'd care of it. didn't charge me. that was nice. then on the way home, i stopped by the supermarket and the butcher (who knows that i cook for the homeless once a week) saw me and told me he had a lot of stuff marked down. i told him i was hoping to find a ham i could make the next day. he had one marked down 30%. he said that he'd re-wrap it and mark it down 50% which he did. so i managed to get a 10 lb ham for about $.99 cents a lb. for some reason, that seemed to have flicked a switch for me.
celebrated last night at the park with about 35 folks who shared my ham, glazed carrots with star anise, rice salad with dried apricots, cranberries, toasted slivered almonds, red onion (i forgot the cilantro) with a dijon-tarragon dressing. kale/apple slaw with a honey mustard poppy seed dressing. coffee (no cream or sugar, but they were happy adding hot cocoa mix) & cookies. i'm not cooking like that twice in one week; that was my christmas dinner. am probably going to go out for chinese food tomorrow.
there's a regular named mike. he comes off as kinda slow and naive most of the time, he always barks whenever he sees a dog and can be something of a huisance much of the time, but every once in a while he (IMO slips and) says something extremely perceptive and profound and/or uses vocabulary that leaves me wondering just how much of that is an act. he used to complain how he hated vegetables until i pointed out that the chili i serve is vegetarian, at which point he began asking for 3rd-4ths-5th on the salad and pretty much polishes off any salad that's left. anyway,/ he was the only person to give us a christmas card last night. a few other people signed it, but mike brought it and he clearly signed it first.
i think i'm finally starting to live life a lot more like i should have been doing all this time. i'm grateful to know that i matter, and while i don't seek a lot of attention about what i do on tuesday nights, it's nice to know that the people who are aware support what i do and help in any way when they can. so even though most of my immediate family will be celebrating christmas thousands of miles away tomorrow, i feel connected in a way that brings lot of comfort. i suspect that anyone who makes the effort to do things for people who can't be expected to repay you in any way understand this.
i took the car back to my mechanic monday morning and got the car back shortly after lunch; my mechanic handed me my key and said i could go. told me i needed to replace the shifter bushing eventually, that i should go find one cheap, bring the car back in and he'd care of it. didn't charge me. that was nice. then on the way home, i stopped by the supermarket and the butcher (who knows that i cook for the homeless once a week) saw me and told me he had a lot of stuff marked down. i told him i was hoping to find a ham i could make the next day. he had one marked down 30%. he said that he'd re-wrap it and mark it down 50% which he did. so i managed to get a 10 lb ham for about $.99 cents a lb. for some reason, that seemed to have flicked a switch for me.
celebrated last night at the park with about 35 folks who shared my ham, glazed carrots with star anise, rice salad with dried apricots, cranberries, toasted slivered almonds, red onion (i forgot the cilantro) with a dijon-tarragon dressing. kale/apple slaw with a honey mustard poppy seed dressing. coffee (no cream or sugar, but they were happy adding hot cocoa mix) & cookies. i'm not cooking like that twice in one week; that was my christmas dinner. am probably going to go out for chinese food tomorrow.
there's a regular named mike. he comes off as kinda slow and naive most of the time, he always barks whenever he sees a dog and can be something of a huisance much of the time, but every once in a while he (IMO slips and) says something extremely perceptive and profound and/or uses vocabulary that leaves me wondering just how much of that is an act. he used to complain how he hated vegetables until i pointed out that the chili i serve is vegetarian, at which point he began asking for 3rd-4ths-5th on the salad and pretty much polishes off any salad that's left. anyway,/ he was the only person to give us a christmas card last night. a few other people signed it, but mike brought it and he clearly signed it first.
i think i'm finally starting to live life a lot more like i should have been doing all this time. i'm grateful to know that i matter, and while i don't seek a lot of attention about what i do on tuesday nights, it's nice to know that the people who are aware support what i do and help in any way when they can. so even though most of my immediate family will be celebrating christmas thousands of miles away tomorrow, i feel connected in a way that brings lot of comfort. i suspect that anyone who makes the effort to do things for people who can't be expected to repay you in any way understand this.
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