A friend recently asked me what I think about during the many hours a day when I’m not very busy with my writing or cooking chores. And surprise, surprise, I said: Donald Trump, a person I have no nice thoughts about whatsoever. He is a bad man and a bad president. I don’t want my life to end before we have gotten rid of him. I also think about death. I equate my death with two things: keeping safe from the coronavirus and keeping safe from Donald Trump. In my mind, they go hand in hand. In fact Donald Trump is the reason the people of our country have been so affected by the virus – Donald Trump lied that it was a problem when it first came to the forefront. He didn’t want a nasty thing like a virus pandemic to wreck his chances of getting reelected. So he pushed questions and information about it away. Even now when we have had over one hundred thousand deaths in the United States, he still won’t talk about it. He says and does anything he can to divert our attention away from … [Read more...]
Erasing an item from your Bucket List is OK!
I started my Choices blog in November 2007, and one of my very first posts was entitled The Bucket List. And first on the list was climbing down into the Grand Canyon. For the life of me I can't tell you why that was such a prominent item. I do know after finally completing the climb down to the bottom of the Grand Canyon, spending the night at Phantom Ranch, and then climbing back up this November 16 and 17 2016, it would have been much better to erase that item from my list and move on to less rigorous and dangerous endeavors. One of my friends completed the climb a few years ago. She warned me not to take the steeper though shorter trail, Kaibab, but to go on the so-called "less steep" Bright Angel trail, which we did. She mentioned the steepness but not the trail's narrowness and the very rocky and slippery terrain (perhaps when she was at the Grand Canyon the trail was less rocky). It goes without saying how close the trail is to massive cliffs on one side. Though none … [Read more...]
One more bucket list item ready to be checked off
When I started this blog way back in November 2007, it was all about checking off things on my bucket list. And in the years since, I've kept at it pretty well - except for the elusive hike down the Grand Canyon, which was the very first thing on my list at that time. That is until today. We finally got reservations at Phantom Ranch - the place at the bottom of the canyon where we'll stay the night in between the hike down and the next day's hike back up. There is no way we could do the hike down and up in the same day. Unfortunately it's not until next November - November 16 - coincidentally one day plus nine years since I wrote that blog post. Well, I'm just as excited as if I were going to go on that hike tomorrow. Just think - I have a year to train. And yes, okay. I'll be realistic. Anything can happen in a year. But having the reservation - not an easy thing to come by - makes it seem very real even now. … [Read more...]
