May 31st, 2024 | Boston, Changes, General, on shipboard, transportation, Travel
It was there on Sumner Street, just a couple short blocks from my home. A fine old steamer trunk that may have been new around 1930. I hadn’t noticed it when I headed out. Who knows in which house it had been stored, in which deep closet or dusty attic. My Godmother...
October 9th, 2023 | Europe, General, transportation, Travel
When I traveled with Dan, my chief focus was his comfort. Car rentals, hotel choices, itineraries: all decisions reflected our very different tourism styles. Inefficiencies, inconveniences and the unexpected don’t rattle me but they could easily discommode him. Rent...
March 31st, 2021 | General, Shopping, Time Passes, transportation
It seems you now have to own a smart phone in order to buy a car. I guess it happened after we bought Ruby, our Toyota RAV4 in 2017 and replaced her with Garnet, another RAV4, on March 25, 2021. Four years ago, the cars seemed to function on their own. These days,...
October 18th, 2019 | General, transportation, Travel, United States
I have learned that I need to open up my Surface Pro tablet, my travel device, several days ahead of time and make sure everything is working. Specifically, I must check that Microsoft OneDrive is working properly. Once home, I booted the thing up and tried again....
May 29th, 2018 | Europe, General, literature and poetry, Memory, music, Politics, Popular Culture, Time Passes, transportation, Travel
According to the introduction, Mary McAuliffe produced “Twilight of the Belle Epoque: The Paris of Picasso,Stravinsky, Proust, Renault, Marie Curie, Gertrude Stein, and Their Friends through the Great War” (Rowman & Littlefield, 2014) as a sort of conclusion to...
May 13th, 2018 | Europe, General, transportation, Travel
We were in the car—mostly the only time I listen to the game shows on National Public Radio—and Ask Me Another with Ophira Eisenberg came on, broadcast from Orlando, Florida. This and that bit went by and a new contest started. The object of the game was to identify...