Inspiration
Today’s the day (in 1997) when Paul McCartney became a knight. Now we’re supposed to call him “Sir Paul.” Call me blasphemous, but Sir Paul bugs me. It’s that story about dreaming “Yesterday” that gets my goat. In his biography Many Years from Now (published just a few months after he became a knight), Sir…
On this day (Dec. 30) in 1999, a mad man broke into George Harrison’s house and nearly killed him. The attacker stabbed the former Beatle more than 30 times. If not for his wife, Olivia, joining the fight, George probably would have died. Gruesome, terrible, serious business… …and soon after, George was cracking jokes. After…
I’ve discovered my spirit animal… …thanks to my daughter Maddie who’s in Africa this week on safari. She’s been sending photos and videos of creatures great and small. Elephants. Giraffes. Cheetahs. Rhinos. Impalas. Impressive animals. But they’re just not ME. And then Maddie sent this… That is a pair of beetles with a tennis-ball-sized dung…
Ripped from the headlines in Nevada: In girls high school basketball action last week, The Del Sol High School Dragons squeaked by the Cheyenne High School Desert Pigs (yes, the “Desert Pigs”). The final score 104-1. Reminds me of the time I coached the 8th-grade boys basketball team at the secondary school where I taught…
I’m sitting on the terrace at the Ritz-Carlton TiburĆ³n in Naples, Florida, sipping fresh-squeezed orange juice and getting ready for day two of the two-day “Elite Mastermind” with Dave Dee. Our group meets with Dave every Monday morning for one hour on Zoom. Every quarter, we have two-day retreats — two times on Zoom, two…
I woke this morning in a house that isn’t mine. A rental house. The place we’ve been staying since May… …when an EF3 tornado (160 mph winds) ripped the roof of our house and leveled our yard. It’s been a rough year. We fired the first contractor. We’re waiting on the second to begin repairs.…
A long, long time ago, the great orator Daniel Webster served as auctioneer for the sale of a New Hampshire farm. Here’s Webster’s pitch: āNeighbors, weāre not auctioning Tom Brownās good milk cowsā¦ or 80 acres of fine landā¦ or a sturdy home thatās seen 20 winters. “No. Iām offering you the chance of biting…
A few years ago, I went fishing with my son, Jake. He caught 37 trout. I caught two. When I asked him how he did it, he said, “I put my fly on the water.” While I spend too much time analyzing the water, determining which insects are buzzing, flipping through a box for just…
Back in the 1950s, Schweppes was a tiny player in the US tonic water and mixer market. And then legendary ad man David Ogilvy introduced America to this guy: That’s Commander Edward Whitehead who served in the Royal Navy during World War II and then became the President of Schweppes (USA). Ogilvy launched a series…
Remember that Leonardo DiCaprio movie “Catch Me if You Can” — the one about the con man Frank Abagnale? After running away from home when he was 16, Abagnale posed as a Pan Am pilot. Free airplane rides. Hotel stays and fancy dinners charged to his airline “expense account.” No one caught on until he…