Category: Uncategorized

When ChatGPT let me know that I could describe an image and it would produce a picture, I couldn’t resist. My ask was for “a picture of an ‘old’ lady with a great idea.” In a few blinks of my eyes or maybe a whole minute, the photo below appeared on my screen: Please note: …

Our older son often referred to Peter and me as his “classical-music-loving- parents.” And with good reason.  All our household listening devices were pre-set to Boston’s one classical music station. The New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall was one of out favorite in-person performance venues.  Last Sunday I attended a concert by Boston’s Civic Symphony there.…

Let’s see…is there anything worse than sitting at the Toyota dealer waiting for your car’s annual service checkup?  Maybe losing your smart phone? Maybe the sound of your dentist’s drill approaching your open mouth?   After two hours of waiting in the Toyota dealer’s “lounge” last week, I learned that my 2016 Prius with only…

I don’t know how it came to mind, but it did.  I think it was while chatting with two friends about summer camp.  The subject turned to camp songs, and although from three different camps, we all remembered “Oh Dear, What Can the Matter Be…?” And we burst into song.  Here’s how it goes: Oh…

I have visited Spain a few times, although not recently, and I would happily visit again.  But unlike an increasing number of U.S. citizens, it never occurred to me to move there permanently. In 2019, forty thousand Americans lived in Spain.  Last year, that number had risen to sixty thousand.  Some say it is because…

The first time I visited San Francisco, Peter and I had just learned that I was pregnant with my first-born son, Seth.  Last week when I visited San Francisco, Seth joined me from Brazil with his pregnant wife. We did what most visitors do–the crooked street, the “pretty ladies” houses, the Tenderloin and more. We…

I hadn’t been in San Francisco in years, but in my visit last week, I found it has not lost its charm. The cable cars are still a great attraction. However, the city has a striking new mode of transportation.  It’s called Waymo. It was very cool to watch sparkling white Jaguar SUVs weave their…

Boston Globe columnist Beth Teitell had some wonderful advice which I hope to take and want to share with 80-something readers. Teitell writes that her 93-year old father is a proponent of “The ‘What the Hell’ diet.”  He eats whatever he wants. According to an expert consulted byTeitell, “When you get to be 85-plus, your…

Normally when I am sitting in on the classes I audit, I concentrate on the professor.  But the other day I was distracted in my political theory class. Directly in front of me (on an unusually warm March morning) was a student who caught my attention. Her caramel-colored back was bare except for an orange…

(Source: Stop Filling You Mind With Digital Doritos (3/29/26 NYTimes) Have you given any thought to how your brain is doing recently? An article by Professor Cal Newport of Georgetown University quotes a study about artificial intelligence that revealed a “significant negative correlation between frequent AI tool use and critical thinking abilities.”  Other studies have…