So let’s see…

-I got a new hip on April 7th, and I’ve been mighty lucky in my recovery. It’s good to be able to walk again. Joni Mitchell was right when she said that you don’t know what you got till it’s gone, and I’d add to this: you don’t truly know what you’ve lost until you get it back. The older I get, the better I’m getting at finding happiness in small things, such as, you know, being able to walk.

-I spend the bulk of my time writing, reading, listening to audiobooks, music, and podcasts, watching stuff on streaming networks, and playing my uke.

-I’ve been getting my website the way I want it, and refining the way I send letters to people, which has become my favorite activity.

-I’ve been watching “Mad Men” again. I forgot how good it was. It takes me back to one of the last times that people all bonded over something that was on television. Now, it seems as if there’s nothing that everyone watches and talks about but religion and politics, which I find depressing.

-I’m also watching “Trust Me: The False Prophet” on Netflix, a deeply disturbing documentary about bad, bad things going on in the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints community.

-I just finished reading "Original Sin,” about all the efforts by Joe Biden’s inner circle to cover up his mental slippage. Depressing, depressing, depressing.

-I also just finished “Post Office,” by Charles Bukowski, about, you guessed it, his experiences in the The United States Post Office, which he depicts as soul-crushing. Good, but depressing.

-I’m in the middle of “Ham on Rye,” also by Bukowski. Equally good, equally depressing.

-I’m also reading “The Bear,” by Andrew Krivak, which is the book The Beverly Public Library is trying to get the city to read so that we can all discuss it. It’s a simple parable about a post apocalyptic world that’s oddly idyllic. I’m enjoying it so far.

-I’ve been listening to The Lemon Twigs, two brothers from Long Island with more talent than any two people have a right to have. So far, I have yet to hear a bad song by them.

—A fragment I wrote: “if the devil is in the details, then the angels must be in the big picture.”