Stashes of Stuff
Blog
The Devil’s Advocate Post
In the first edition of the Daily News, this reporter has covered the Seven Deadly Sins: we've got Greed in the Business Section Sloth in the Leisure Section Gluttony in the Restaurant Reviews Lust in the Movie Reviews Envy in the Gossip Column Pride in the...
A walk in the park plot twist
Life is not a simple walk in the park, is it? There's all those people and opinions plotting the demise of happiness from the vagary of their human nature. While "a walk in the park" is an idiom, people can just be idiots. As you know from my tag line, I write when I...
There’s Always an Upside
It’s easy to understand UP, meaning toward sky and heaven or at the top of the list, but when we awaken in the morning, why do we wake UP? At a meeting, do you listen UP when a topic comes UP - and never, never cut UP? When should we speak UP? You get written UP as...
No good deed goes unpunished
I first heard this statement in the summer of 1997. A wise mentor gave it voice after I'd written a ground-breaking grant and determined to shepherd its project to fruition. Naive person that I was, I learned its lesson hard. Eight years later I was diagnosed with...
Bullying vs. Teasing
Within 20 minutes, I'd smoothly transitioned onto my fifth freeway, so locals can guess what day of the week it was and where I was. It was Saturday morning in central Orange County. I was headed from Irvine to Cal State Fullerton to attend the annual Stuttering...
The Great Recession
"The Great Recession officially lasted from December 2007 to June 2009, but it sure seemed longer" was the lead line of a story in the AARP (yes, I am old enough to be a member) Bulletin last month. I know, first hand, because I lost $16,000.00 when the state of...
Fourth Grade
Fourth grade marked my life with three events that vibrate in my heart and mind to this day. I wish I had a better eraser. I moved to a new school. Friends were hard to make. While I'd moved when I was two years old, then again when I was six, this one was more...
Stage 2b
I was working my network to be a back-up singer for John Mellencamp, another Hoosier transplant to crazy California, in 2005. I was giving it my best shot when it hit me: a cancer diagnosis on this date, that year. 'Twenty feet from stardom" was not going to be a life...
Blend an UPside
One of my friends has an ulcer, a condition now known to be a disease. She's on a medication that brings relief and cure; back in the day, it was diet-controlled 100%. I know because my family endured the dietary constraints of my father's ulcer treatment: bland and...
Contact Me
Get In Touch
PJ would love to hear from you. Do you have a question about PJ's books and musings, don't be shy!