Remember last week when I was so happy that the onslaught of political ads would finally cease since Election Day had passed?
(Clicking that link and looking back.)
Well, that was Election Day 2023.
Now I’m already getting ads (text messages, actually) for the next gubernatorial election.
(Pause to reflect how far away November 2024 is.)
Uh, no, it’s actually November 2025.
Sadly it was not satire.
Over the weekend my son suggested to me, out of the blue, that an interesting list would be one which associated a beverage with every month of the year.
My son.
Clearly I have raised him well, if I do say so myself. And I do.
Here’s what we came up with.
January–hot chocolate
February–champagne
March–Shamrock Shake
April–coffee
May–tea
June–beer
July–Pepsi
August–lemonade
September–apple cider
October–Pumpkin Spice Latte
November-Sprite Winter Spiced Cranberry
December–egg nog
A decade ago I started posting at “the web home of Michael O’Connell,” my little corner of the Internet labeled mikeoconnelljr.com.
Among other things the first post noted the “non-pecuniary benefits of having one’s own blog.” I can pretty much say this for everything I’ve ever done: books, TV shows, music albums, podcasts.
Well, such is life.
And for a description of my latest one-off vanity project at my ongoing vanity project, check out today’s episode of Math and Musings.
One of the greater themes of my life has been if no one is letting me do this I’m just going to do it myself. Can’t get a job at a newspaper? Start your own. Can’t get a job on a TV show? Start your own!
I have no handyman skills, though I am Mr. DIY. No one has bought you the gift you want? Buy it yourself. No one has planned your birthday party? Do it yourself! I’ve self-published books, printed my own CDs, and funded my own concerts. Like, an unholy number of times.
For years I’ve been trying to get my biography included as an article on Wikipedia. I may be in the minority on this, especially among teachers, but personally I think Wikipedia is the greatest source of information on the Internet. It’s basically the encyclopedia I would have eventually written myself, amirite?
Well, I don’t need to write the whole encyclopedia, just the one article I want to see. And now it’s here, on my own website, the one I produce myself. Mike O’Connell, maker of content.
My Wikipedia page now lives not at Wikipedia but at the top of the blog I’ve published for nearly 10 years. That it took me 10 years to think of this is a bit disappointing, but hey, I’ve been busy.
Election Eve and I’m damned excited.
(Pause.)
Excited I’m no longer going to receive any solicitation about this damned election.
Today on Math and Musings I’m a bit all over the map. I begin with recounting a few animal encounters, segueing into cocktail parties which then morph into Christmas parties. This is what happens when I don’t have a guest there to ground me.
Pretty much everything I do in life I like to log here as some sort of backup diary. Some day as I’m writing my memoirs if I’ve misplaced all of my books, articles, CDs, actual diaries, and episodes of the podcast, well, I’ll have the archives of mikeoconnelljr.com.
I’ll want it noted that I’ve really enjoyed the first few episodes of the Frasier reboot. I’ve been a fan of Dr. Frasier Crane for over 30 years and this newest incarnation has not changed that fact. Sure, there are some haters out there, but Frasier-haters gonna hate.
Me? When it comes to the voice of Frasier Crane…
I’m listening.
Two weeks ago I was alerted to an anniversary. A fiftieth anniversary, as a matter of fact, for one Peter Jenkins and his walk across America.
Yeah, Peter Jenkins, author of A Walk Across America, began said walk on October 15, 1973. Started in upstate New York, actually, though in the book he insists on calling it “upper” New York. (That little detail bothered me the first time I read the story and it still does, but I digress.)
The first time I read A Walk Across America was in the early months of 2006, when I was making a similar journey myself. Well, not exactly, similar, as I wasn’t walking from place to place. But I did put away my college degree and live the tramp life for a few months a la Peter Jenkins. I too started in “upper” New York, made my first stop in Washington, D.C., then worked for a time in North Carolina. A year and a half of walking brought Jenkins to New Orleans, and that had been my ultimate destination as well, though I’m afraid my journey fell a little short.
Last week I started rereading Walk and am enjoying the reminiscing.
However many years it’s been.
Running the risk of playing second banana on my own show, I’ve got Franklin O. on the podcast today discussing all things fall.
Even though it was like 80 degrees yesterday and will be again today.
This was the World Series no fan nor studio executive one wanted.
Shoot.
Diamondbacks-Rangers? Snakes and lawmen? Sounds more like the plot of an old Western.
And speaking of movies and things that are terrible…
Monday I referenced Netflix’s #1 movie this week, Bill Burr’s Old Dads. Let’s just say I’m glad I saw it for free.
In a similar vein is another of Netflix’s Top 10 this week, the Jennifer Lawrence vehicle No Hard Feelings. That would be Oscar-winning actress Jennifer Lawrence, who is apparently hard up for money these days. Seriously, that can be the only logical explanation for at this point in one’s career making a raunchy sex comedy. This is the movie you make when you’re young, then later do the take-me-seriously-as-an-actor bit. I’m trying to figure out in the cast and crew who’s dating whom and who is somebody’s nephew or who owes who a favor or any plausible explanation for this movie being made.
Funny thing is, if it weren’t Jennifer Lawrence and just some random hot chick I’d think it was hilarious. Coulda saved ’em a lot of money too, though really they didn’t get much of mine.
Most importantly, the world would make sense to me.