Category Archives: Personal

My doctors

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I wrote about going to the doctor recently. It was about the mole on my head, which turned into a cartoon. But the mole was benign, meaning it was nothing. The doc cut it off and I’m good as new.

This was a new dermatologist because my previous one, the one I had been going to since I was a child retired! As did my dentist. It’s a weird feeling when doctors you have been going to all of your life retire. You think they are always going to be there.

My GP or PCP or whatever you call them changed over the years. Why? Because two of my doctors died, which is even worse than retiring.

One was hit by a deer, or maybe it was that he drove into a deer or swerved off the road while avoiding a deer, while vacationing with his family in rural New England. It happened years ago, so I don’t remember all the details, but I believe the doctor and his kids were killed and only the wife survived. Horrible.

A second doctor died a couple of years ago – from covid! Very shocking and sad. A doctor he worked with told me and was in tears while describing it the whole time.

All of these doctors were mild mannered and gentle. Very quiet and peaceful guys, who made you feel comfortable. All of them.

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Worrying about the wrong things

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I had to go to the doctor’s recently. It was at a place downtown where I had never been and my biggest concern was the parking situation. and finding the location. I even did a dry run drive on a Sunday, to be sure I could find the place on a busy rush hour Monday. I wasn’t worried about the actual doctor’s visit, I was more concerned with finding parking and finding the actual place.

Then there was a follow up for the results. I was nervous about that. I wasn’t nervous about the results, I was nervous about how it would work. Will he call me on the phone? Will I be on Zoom on the computer? I never set up Zoom on my new computer because I haven’t used Zoom since I got the new computer, so what will I do?

That’s what worried me.

I had a recent conflict here at my condo recently. I was supposed to be on the board, the board members begged me for months to run, and then at the time of voting, not one board member voted for me. I did not want to be on the board, but I felt obligated, but yet I was upset.

A friend asked why I was upset since I didn’t want to be on the board anyway, and I was upset because I had gotten psyched up about it. I told him, “I wasn’t psyched up in a good way, like I wasn’t excited about being elected. I was psyched up in the way you get when going to the doctor or dentist.” Maybe that’s why I don’t dread a doctor’s visit since I psych myself up ahead of time into dealing with it. Sort of like being on the condo board.

There’s a cartoon in all this somewhere. Or maybe a Seinfeld episode.

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Getting her bearings

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Cartoonist Liz Climo creates cartoons with animals doing cute things. This one stood out to me because it reminds me of my own mother. I think about her every day and I guess since yesterday was Mother’s Day, I really had her on my mind, but I do think of her every day and one instance similar to this cartoon always sticks out in my mind, and I don’t know why, because I have millions, maybe billions of memories of her.

I must have been 8 years old, maybe a bit older and it could have only happened a few times. It must have been summer because my brothers and I were all home from school. And during that summer, early in the morning, I would go into my mother’s room and wake her up. My father had already gone to work, and it was still quite early.

I would wake my mother up and she would roll over groggily and say, “Good morning, do you want breakfast?” And I would say “yes,” and she would sit at the edge of the bed and say, “Ok, just give me a minute, let me get my bearings.”

She never yelled, she never said, “Get out of here, I’m sleeping!” She woke up smiling and happy to see me and I always remember that. I always remember her saying the “get my bearings,” part.

I’m sure she yelled at me a thousand times in my life, but I only remember her being kind and happy.

I don’t know if it happened once, twice, 10 times or what, but that one summer memory is always in my mind and this Liz Climo cartoon really brought it rushing back.

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Vincent’s photos

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I was wishing someone a happy birthday today on Facebook, and something new came up – past photos of that person with me, come up along with the birthday wish. This reminded me of my friend Vincent.

Years ago, when Vincent would send Christmas cards, he would include photos of you from the past year. I don’t know if he took the photos deliberately or not, but he would have photos of you at a Fourth of July picnic, or a birthday party or a trip we went on together or whatever.

Usually every December, when you opened your Christmas card from Vincent, out would drop two or three photos of yourself with others, including Vincent (0r not). It was usually some event you had forgotten about, nothing grand like a wedding but always a small event that faded from memory.

I was thinking of Vincent’s photos when the photos popped on on Facebook today, the Facebook photos aren’t current because I don’t take as many photos as I used to. I forget or feel awkward when we’re at a party or event or whatever, I think people may wonder, “What are you going to do with that picture?” But truth be told, everyone is taking pictures every minute of the day, so I wouldn’t be the only one. And 9 times out of 10, they say, “Send me a copy of that!”

Many times at events – with family and friends, I’m tempted to go around and get pics of people. Sometimes I’ll hand my phone to one of my cousins and say, “Go around and get pictures,” but they never do either.

One of my cousins is starstruck and he’s the first to get pics with some famous person or other, whether they want that or not. But I don’t have enough pics of family and friends. I’ve got to make an effort.

I don’t think I have anything from our family Christmas or Easter this past year when we all were together. There was a wedding a few months back, I don’t think I have many from that either.

I’ve got to make an effort to start getting pics of everything.

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I wanna quit the newspaper

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I got this crazy note from my newspaper carrier. No joke.

I only bring this up now because I see the FTC is trying to make it easier to cancel subscriptions to everything. Right now you have to jump through hoops to cancel any subscription and that’s what happened here.

I called the paper to cancel my subscription and rather than just canceling it, they questioned me as if I was on the stand. Why did I want to cancel? “Well,” I said, “I never really read it.

You don’t read it? “Well no, like today. I didn’t read it.”

Why didn’t you read it today? “Well, to be honest, it wasn’t delivered today and I didn’t even miss it.”

It wasn’t delivered? “Well, no, that happens a lot . . . “

And then on and on, I go . . . “A lot of time it’s left out front where people pick it up off the street, other times, it just doesn’t come. It’s late, it’s this it’s that,” and I go on and on.

At the end of the conversation, I asked them to please not use my name and don’t say anything to the carrier, but of course they did, and I got the above note.



After the subscription was finally stopped, I got non-stop calls from the paper asking me to re-subscribe.

One day I was standing out front, very early in the morning, it was still dark out, I was waiting for an Uber to pick me up to take me to the airport.

Up comes a car, I think it’s Uber. It comes right up to me on the front lawn – right up on the grass. It’s the delivery girl! She has her usual music blasting and she hands me the newspapers for the whole condo, says, “Good morning,” backs up into the street and is off.

Since then I’ve resubscribed, but only to the digital version, not the printed paper. But I forget to read the digital paper and occasionally use it to read the tv listings only. I once read up to seven newspapers a day (no really), now I read none. I can read the comics online, which I do, I can get all the news online from social media, where all the stories are posted and I hate to not support the local papers. So maybe I’ll go back to print, soon.

By the way, about showing this letter to her boss. I know her boss, he lives next door to one of my best friends. I have his number in my phone and if I really had a complaint, I most likely would text him, not go through the subscription service.

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Accidental wine

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I’m not much of a wine drinker, I’ve never liked it. But at Thanksgiving I was sitting at the end of the table and away from the kitchen and drinks and all that was in front of me was a bottle of red wine. I was at my cousins’ house.

Me too lazy to get up and get a drink, I didn’t want to ask anyone else to get it, I drank the wine. And you know what? I loved it.

It’s Hess Select from Napa Valley.

When I got home, I started buying bottles, for myself and to bring to holiday parties.

I still don’t drink a lot of wine, so I’ll pour a glass and drink maybe half. Rather than throw the rest out I’ll leave it on the kitchen counter, sometimes for a day or two and then I’ll get around to drinking it. You know what? Leaving it out to breathe, which has always been the thing with red wine, makes it so much smoother. I did this by accident, but now I make sure to let it breathe all the time now.

I’ll open a new bottle and let it breathe rather than leave the glass out as I had done. But now I am loving wine – the first time in my life!

In the photo above you see Yaupon tea. It’s a native American tea, used by Native Americans for over 2000 years. I heard about it recently. I started drinking it due to it’s health properties.

There are different versions – green, fire roasted, lavender-coconut and so on. I’ve been drinking a cup two or three times a day. It’s very mild, too. It’s rich in antioxidants, supports memory and brain function, good to manage blood sugar, cholesterol, blood pressure and more.

I’ve replaced most of my coffee drinking with the Yaupon tea.


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Throwing the tree out

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Got rid of the Christmas tree the other day. It’s artificial, so I didn’t throw it out of the window. But I used to! Well, sort of.

That’s how I got the idea for this cartoon. When I had a real tree, I would throw it off the balcony of my condo and then drag it to the street for recycling or pick-up. I didn’t leave the decorations on, I “undressed it” first. But throwing it off the balcony was the easiest thing to do because it avoided all those pine needles getting all over the elevator.

I would have someone wait downstairs to be sure no one was under it when I threw it down. And you’d be surprised how light the tree is after it’s all dried out! So it was easy to lift up and throw over.

After it hit the ground, I would run downstairs and drag it out to the street.

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Life in a small village

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So I’m starting off 2023 in a quandary. A friend and I were headed to lunch a couple of days ago. We went to one of the most popular places in town but the wait was up to 45 minutes so we left. As we walked passed the restaurant, the restaurant owner came running after us. “Oh good,” I thought, “He’s going to get us a table, slip us in somewhere.”

No such luck. He says, “Do you want to meet the new commissioner?”

We lost a City of Miami commissioner (a city council person) for our district in the City of Miami, because the elected guy ran for another office in November, and he had to give up his seat, so now they have to replace that seat for the remaining 10 months.

I didn’t want to “meet the new commissioner,” but I followed in hopes of getting an open table.

The restaurant owner brings us to this guy sitting at an empty table. Here we go, I thought, a meeting. Not lunch. I actually knew the “new commissioner,” and I’ve known him for many years. We were just speaking the week before about a village issue. The restaurant owner asked me to sit down. I asked, “Can I order then? If I sit down can I order lunch?” He didn’t answer, so I asked a few more times and finally he said yes, half heartedly.

The restaurant owner didn’t know we knew each other and his reason for bringing us over to the table was so that we, or I, could be talked into speaking up for the “new commissioner” at the city commission meeting next week – so that the commission appoints him to the seat, rather than have an election, which is what most of the residents in the district/village want – a free and fair election. Not an appointment.

What bothers me after I thought about it all later, was that the restaurant owner didn’t know the “new commissioner” and I knew each other. So why did he grab me to speak up at a meeting for a stranger in his eyes? Why doesn’t he speak up for the guy if he is so interested in him getting the seat? Probably because he worries about getting involved in politics because it would hurt his business. But I should get involved?

When the “new commissioner’s” food arrived I could tell he didn’t want us at the table. He wasn’t rude, but when I sked him if we were going to talk politics the whole time he said, “Yes, probably,” which meant to me, “Get out now while you can.” So we didn’t stay at the table to eat, we walked down the block to another restaurant but now I am supposed to speak for this guy at next week’s commission meeting. He has already texted me a number of times regarding this. My goal now is to get out of it, especially since most of my neighbors want an election and not me to speak up for this guy’s appointment.

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Steak or eggplant parm?

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I was watching something on tv about people being polite to waitstaff at restaurants. Not sure why that is even a question, shouldn’t everyone be nice to each other all the time?

I’m always polite to the staff but I do one thing that I think is annoying and I have to try to stop. I ask the waiter what is their favorite thing or what they would order out of two choices. I did it the other day. I’m sure they just say anything and who is to say their tastes are the same as mine. But I do it all the time anyway.

I was with a friend and was going to order the steak sandwich. I don’t eat much red meat, but this looked good. But my friend sort of was questioning the fact that he wanted the same thing and should we both order the same thing. It was a strange request since we don’t share food, so what’s the difference? It’s not like we were going to sample from each other’s plate and needed to order two separate things.

Anyway, I also seemed to like the eggplant parmesan , even though I don’t like eggplant, but for some reason, it seemed good.

So as not to get my friend all in a twist, I asked the waiter, which he preferred, basically, which was a better dish. He said to me, “Well, to tell you the truth, I’m not much of a . . . ” and I thought, oh, he’s not much of a meat eater. He’s vegan. But he said, “I’m not much of a vegetable eater.” Which was the strangest thing. For one thing, he was a guy in his low 20s, maybe 22 years old, don’t most 22 year olds eat healthy?

So in spite of his not eating veggies, I ordered the eggplant parmesan so as not to upset my dining companion. It ended up being good.

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Snowballed

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Wednesday’s snowman/people cartoon really took off. It was liked and shared by thousands of people, it really went viral. You might remember a month or so ago I was having problems with social media algorithms, but it seems to have passed. Many people are back to seeing my work.

I got the idea about the snowballed kids really fast. I had a morning show on, I think the Today Show, and a guy was talking about how his social media post took off. He said it started slow and then snowballed.

And the word “snowballed’ just hit me. I heard the expression all my life, but in that moment, it struck me as something I could use for a comic. I thought of the snow people right away and I drew up the cartoon right then and there.

One of my neighbors and his wife go walking around the neighborhood daily, and I ran into them one day, we started walking together. I asked them if I was intruding and he replied with a funny quote that I think he made up himself. At that moment, I thought it would be good for a cartoon, but I just kept walking and talking and I forgot what the quote was.

A bit later, he asked where I get my cartoon ideas from. I said they just seem to pop into my head. I then mentioned the quote he had said a bit earlier and I said I thought that would make a good cartoon in some way, only I couldn’t remember it. So he repeated it and we laughed.

Unfortunately, I don’t remember it again and can’t use it. But that’s where I get my ideas – hearing things and twisting them around in my mind.

Speaking of the Today Show, Martha Stewart was on the other day, she was making her famous eggnog recipe and last week I ran that cartoon with the witches discussing Martha Stewart’s and Ina Garten’s eggnog recipes. It all comes full circle, I guess.



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