Locator: 49330DIARY.
I'll get around to blogging later. No sense of urgency.
I just got back from Portland, Oregon -- my annual Halloween trip to see the twins who were born in March, 2020, literally the first month of the Covid-19 lock-down.
Except for what I see while riding the light rail from the airport to their house out in east Portland (Gresham), I don't see much of the area whenever I visit. %But, wow, the fall colors are/were gorgeous.
The trip out and back on American Airlines was the best I've had. Not one delay. The TSA line was incredibly long in DFW on the day I flew out; no airline delays. The return trip out of Portland, even better. There were more TSA security folks than passengers being screened. We literally walked right on through. I have found no airport with better TSA screening than that at Portland. They were all in a great mood; all very, very friendly. One would never guess they haven't been paid in 30 days and nothing to suggest that will change this week.
I blogged a bit while flying overnight and will start my usual schedule of blogging soon. No sense of urgency.
I think it's going to be a "down" day for Wall Street. I just took a glimpse of the indices for a moment. Then read a bit of non-financial news on the digital edition of TWSJ.
I turned on CNBC (via Hulu) for the 11:00 a.m. CT show with "the judge." The show had just started but "the judge" apparently has/had the day off. At least he wasn't presiding. Immediately turned off the television.
So, here I am.
May's birthday is today. She's old enough to remember rotary-dial phones and the introduction of the first commercially-produced computer, UNIVAC. That was in 1951. Had she or her dad been interested in technology she would remember the news of UNIVAC that year, but she has no recollection. I just said she's "old enough to remember...", not that she actually remembers that. In 1951, she had other things on her mind, like sailing to Japan with her mother. Her dad, retired US Army, was already there, part of the "Occupation Forces," I suppose.
The Allied occupation of Japan occurred from 1945 to 1952, beginning after Japan's surrender in World War II and ending when the Treaty of San Francisco took effect, signed by 48 nations.
Although a multinational Allied effort, it was primarily led by the United States under General Douglas MacArthur.
- Start date: September 2, 1945, following Japan's surrender.
- End date: April 28, 1952, when the Treaty of San Francisco went into effect.
Why would 48 nations need to sign that treaty? I figure maybe five at the outside. AI prompt / reply will answer that question. Countries like Yugoslavia were invited to sign but did not; they wanted to sign their own peace treaty with Japan. Okay.
My wife and I celebrate our "150-year-birthday" this week. The 150 years is our "combined" ages. I am 74 years old. It's not appropriate to mention a woman's age, so I won't.
I think that's how they did it in the Bible -- why some men reportedly had such long lives at the time of their death -- they added the individual's age to the age of his wife (or wives). That would explain a lot. Not everyone did that. Methusela, reportedly 969 years of age when he died, must have had a lot of wives (more likely it was a typographical error by his scribe -- should have been 69 years old; or perhaps an inside joke).
My wife and I always celebrate her birthday for a full week. It will be a short "week" this year; in four days she flies to Portland, Oregon.
This year, the week-long extravaganza (by the way, coincidentally, a word I introduced to the twins yesterday) begins with donuts from our favorite Japanese bakery just up the street. My wife's mother was Japanese; her dad, Mexican.
Whoever said / wrote that Halloween would be a bummer this year because of the cost of chocolate obviously never participated in Halloween festivities.
I'm waiting for TWSJ article telling us it was a record year for chocolate sales. The 40+year-old white women need a lot of comfort food with Trump in office. HSY is down 4% ($7) today. So, I guess I'm wrong on the chocolate sales. Silly me.
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The Book Page
This may be my last day of re-reading The Wooden Horse: The Liberation of the Western Mind, From Odysseus to Socrates, Keld Zeruneith, c. 2007.
I've read it twice through -- but scanned much of it at the original readings. Now I go back and read a few chapters at a time over the course of a week or two. An incredible book.
