A speculative mind

  If you have ever played Monopoly, you have at least a grade-school level idea of what deeds are. In the real world they are a little more complicated. If you own property, chances are you have a deed or deeds for it. There are other ways to acquire property but in America, most property transactions involve deeds. But what does all that language on a deed mean? People go through a realtor and/or a title company when they buy property, and they know a deed is one of those many pieces of paper (or electronic screens) that have to be signed.   What I saw a lot in my career as a Cartographer for a county Assessor’s Office is that mistakes were made because people did not understand what was on a deed. And when I say “people” I am including lawyers. There are lawyers who specialize in property matters and they are generally very good at what they do. The problem is when lawyers who do not specialize in property matters step outside their lane. You would not necessarily want a ...

  Last week my wife and I vacationed in Ashland, Oregon and attended the Oregon Shakespearean Festival. Ashland is close to the California border and close to Medford, Oregon where I was born. When I was about seven years old, we moved away from Medford, but we would return to see friends from time to time. It was during one of those visits that my parents took me to Ashland to see a Shakespeare play (my first one). A couple of years later they took me to see another play. That first time in 1972 I instantly fell in love with live theater in general and Shakespeare in particular. My mother had prepared me by reading me the synopsis of the play we were going to see, The Taming of the Shrew . I liked the fact that I could follow the story well even though they were talking with fancy archaic words. I found it funny. I also did not mind seeing pretty actresses in low-cut costumes (I was nearly a teenager after all). My father was hard of hearing, so my parents paid for us to sit in ...

  The first time I stepped on stage, it was a Christmas show. I was in second grade. I don’t remember the name of the show, but the basic premise was that there was a Santa’s helper, an elf, I assume. This elf boy was always getting in trouble, not because he was bad, just because he messed things up. The last mess-up is when he feeds the reindeer candy. The reindeer all get fat and can no longer fly. I was a reindeer. I was Prancer. The elf boy then redeems himself by inventing a reducing machine. He puts each of the reindeer through it and thus is able to save Christmas. I don’t remember the rehearsal process. It couldn’t have been much for me; I didn’t have any lines. But I remember I was called to the office because somebody decided I would be the model for the reindeer costume. I was standing there in a side office being fitted and pinned, when someone else was called into the office. This boy was not being fitted for a costume. He was there because he was in trouble. I don’...

  At the peak of the Roman Empire, the empire stretched from the Persian Gulf to Brittain, from northern Africa to southern Germany. But the great conquering emperors like Trajan learned that conquering land was easy compared to holding on to it.   In fact, Trajan’s successor, Hadrian, was known for shrinking the empire and consolidating Trajan’s gains into a more defensible set of holdings. This made him not popular among his generals who wanted glory and spoils. But he understood if you stretch yourself too thin, you can wind up with nothing. To consolidate the Empire’s holdings in Brittain, he had a wall constructed from Solway Firth to the Tyne River. Construction began in the year 122 AD. The Empire had never been able to subdue the highland Scottish tribes, so this wall (Hadrian’s Wall) divided the “barbarians from the Romans.” It was a solid piece of engineering with forts and towers scattered along it to keep the “barbarians” out. Hadrian’s successor, Antonius Pius...

  I have a pet peeve. This is a practice I have been noticing lately among certain writers. I call it punching a sentence to death. It involves writing something that should be a full sentence, but instead the writer has chosen to put a period after each word. You. Know. What. I. Am Talking. About! The intention is to give bold emphasis to each word. I started noticing this in a novel I read about ten years ago. I thought it was a one off. It was not. I saw it in another novel, and then another.   Each time I encounter this, I cringe. It seems overly dramatic and artificial. It is a gimmick.   There are other ways to demonstrate emphasis. Without. Resorting. To. This. It is kind of like certain newspapers or tabloids that felt it necessary to put an exclamation point at the end of every sentence. If you need an exclamation mark at the end of each sentence, then the story is not as dramatic as you are trying to make it out. I feel the same way about punching a sen...

  Was there a more important piece of residential furniture in the Twentieth Century than the sofa? The sofa was where you entertained guests, you watched TV, read, and napped. If you were a kid, you pulled the cushions off to make a fort. Some of them turned into beds. It was where you had intimate or philosophical discussions with your friends. Not to mention teenage make out sessions. The quality of your sofa indicated your status. Sofas were around before the Twentieth Century and are still omnipresent today, but I think that century was its heyday. But what is the difference between a sofa, a couch, a davenport etc.? Davenport – A davenport was simply a high-end sofa that was manufactured by the Davenport Furniture Company of Massachusetts in the 1800’s and early 1900’s. The company is no longer in business, but the name davenport became a generic term that is still sometimes used. Chesterfield – The first Chesterfield sofa was commissioned by the Earl of Chesterfield in...

  We have a bird feeder. We are pretty good about keeping it stocked, though sometimes I get so bothered by the mess that I don’t fill it for a week or two. Birds are messy eaters. They flick seeds away while they are trying to get down to the good stuff. Before long there are seeds all over the back porch. It will need to be swept before the feed can attract any of the critters that we don’t want to attract to our back porch (the night foragers). Also on our back porch are pots with various plantings: potatoes, peas, and flowers. Sometimes after the potatoes, peas or whatnot have been harvested, the bird seeds will have landed in the pots and begin to sprout. We had a mystery plant growing in one of our pots this summer which we originally thought might be corn (there is corn in the bird feed). As it developed, we decided it was millet. Now the tassels of the millet have developed enough so that the birds have noticed them and are feeding off the seeds. It is oddly satisfying ...