I went out of town last week with great plans for what I would accomplish. I would care for and play with my granddaughter, of course, but babies take naps, and surely I would have some down time. And then I got to the security line at the airport in […]
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New Technology: Short-Term Loss of Productivity for a Long-Term Gain (I Hope)
I’ve written several times before about setting up new computers and other digital devices. (See here and here.) I was at it again last month. Before the pandemic, my then-three-year-old laptop had started having battery problems. These problems took two forms. First, the laptop only held a charge for a […]
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Learning to Dictate, Then and Now
I have a love-hate relationship with dictating. I think best with a pen in my hand, and second-best with my fingers on a keyboard. Far behind comes turning my thoughts into spoken words. As a law student and young attorney, I had to write many memos and legal briefs. Most […]
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Working Across Time and Across Generations
My husband and I recently were fortunate to have visits from our two adult children. Our son came for a few days at the end of April, and our daughter was here over Mother’s Day. I remember my mother telling me one time how nice it was to have her […]
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Lent: Too Old to Fast . . . At Last!
The Catholic Lenten obligations prohibit eating meat on Ash Wednesday and on Fridays during Lent and require fasting on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. As our pastor reminded the congregation recently, “A Catholic fast isn’t a real fast. We get to eat three times a day.” Which is true—the Lenten […]
Continue readingTwo Fortune Cookies
I keep two fortune cookie messages on my desk. They were in cookies I got from Chinese restaurant meals I’ve enjoyed since I began writing a few years ago. (I’ve received many more fortune cookies from many more Chinese restaurant meals, but these were the only two fortunes worth keeping.) […]
Continue readingThe Dailiness of Writing
When I first decided to spend my time writing, I read everything I could on writing. Five years later, I still try every few months to read a book on some writing technique or on what other writers say about life as a writer. Most recently, I read Making a […]
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