["Extra-Ordinary" is the title of my never-finished, never-published memoir, or is it an autobiography? The title is a play on the word extraordinary, which denotes something anything but ordinary. By putting in the hyphen my intent is to communicate that the only thing exceptional about my life is that it has been ordinary to the... Continue Reading →
Best of the ‘Gest … Today is Truck Day
Fans write messages on the truck before it leaves Fenway Park to deliver equipment and supplies to the Red Sox spring training site in Ft. Myers, Florida [I can't help myself. Here we are mired in the depths of winter, but I can't resist the siren call of spring. The truck has now left Fenway... Continue Reading →
Spiritual Cheese
[These lessons come via Claudia of Recomendo, via Twitter, via Cory, via the monks ... and probably several others in-between. For the record, I do NOT do Twitter. SB SM] from Cory Muscara on Twitter 36 lessons from Buddhist monks Cory Muscara meditated 15 hours a day for 6 months and wrote a list of 36... Continue Reading →
It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like …
You're Invited! [This was originally published during the Holiday Pandemic, 2020. Now, it's three years later. That's not going to stop us from doing our best to share the holiday spirit. I'm putting Silverback Digest on Holiday Hiatus for the twelve days of Christmas, but we invite you to share our family's Christmas! SB SM]... Continue Reading →
The Prank at THE GAME
[Everyone knows that THE GAME is not THE EVENT that the people participating in it make it out to be. But, reality aside, it's still can be cool in its own pointy-headed, effete, nattering-nabobs-of-negativity-kinda way. In 2004, for instance, Yale pulled off a prank that has set a new standard for nuttiness in college football... Continue Reading →
White Crosses … a Veterans Day Special
[White Crosses (lyrics by Greg Morrison, music by Roy Nelson) also find its way into Grendel: The Four-Chord Opera. It's also a fitting song for Veterans Day as we salute the men and women who serve in the armed forces, although in The Jungle the armed force are those attached to the great apes. SB... Continue Reading →
Casserole Blues
An excerpt from Part 2 of Grendel: The Four-Chord Opera: The summer was magic. Days at the beach with Cassandra, then nights playing in clubs. Grendel became a semi-big deal, for Rhode Island, that is. Then, another twist of fate, but not a cruel one! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gU0Bh8PL7Jw
A Quiet Cadence
[You won't find me listed in their yearbook, but I have been accorded the privilege of being an honorary member of the Mount Saint Joseph Class of 1964. If the MSJ folks updated their yearbook today, they would point to Mark Treanor as being one of their most illustrious members. Here's what some reviewers on... Continue Reading →
The Economics of Garlic
The Economics of Garlic (It's official ... my garlic for 2023 is now in the ground, patiently waiting for next spring. Meanwhile, the 2022 crop will continue to nourish and inspire us even as the earth is frozen. SB SM ) by Stephen Morris Photo by Nick Collins on Pexels.com There are lots of reasons... Continue Reading →
Next Year in the Garden
[Yeah, you've seen bits and pieces of this before in Silverback Digest, but here it is in all its epic glory, very appropriate for this time of year when the garden is mostly in the rearview mirror. SB SM] A Year in Review by Stephen Morris Part 1 ... Spring Part IāSpring Next year in... Continue Reading →