My mother would have turned 82 this week. My dad would have turned 80 this summer. Both are gone now, so this is the first year both of their birthdays are being noted in absentia. As executor, I am wrapping up their affairs and disbursing the estate’s assets, with the able assistance of an attorney. My parents were not wealthy, but they were thrifty. Of course, I would much rather have them back — living independently well into their 80s or 90s as most members on both sides of the family have done — but it wasn’t meant to be. Instead both declined over years until their deaths, just more...
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I was cruising around South Longview and the downtown area the other day, whiling away time on Memory Lane before a dreaded appointment with an MRI torpedo tube. Dreaded, not because it hurts or I’m particularly worried about the results. The deal is I’m decidedly claustrophobic and have to get legally stoned on Xanax to keep from climbing out of that contraption before the scan is completed. I have abandoned ship before, much to the dismay of the medical staff. So to keep my mind off the impending test, I drove around looking for long-gone landmarks from my youth— until it was time to enter...
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The New Year has gotten off to an inauspicious start, though I remain optimistic. The Hostess company, maker of Twinkies, Ding Dongs and Sno Balls, is about to enter Chapter 11 bankruptcy for the second time in the past 10 years. (To steal a line, I guess that makes it Chapter 22.) Hostess products have been staples of vending machines in newspaper breakrooms in which I’ve toiled over the last 30 years. They appear to remain popular, with 36 million packages of Twinkies consumed in 2010. The fancy-pant equity investors who own — and owe — for Hostess are trying to shed debt to hold on, all the while...
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A harbinger of the New Year unhappily but inevitably arrived when I was back in East Texas over the holiday break. I headed with my wife to jointly risk our mental health by shopping at the Big Box Store during the Dead Week after Christmas, when sales abound. We were not shopping for bargains but simply trying to find a holiday six-pack of bottled Coca-Colas to give someone. No luck. When Christmas ends, for the big-boxers it is out with the old before the eggnog has been digested. Gone are the decorations, cards and artificial trees. In place by New Year’s: Valentine’s Day cards and candy....
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