Roger O Green

Did I jinx my mother-in-law?

a certain familiarity

Did I jinx my mother-in-law?

On Wednesday, October 1st, I went for my annual physical with my primary physician. They call it a wellness check, covered by Medicare for old people like me. Can I remember these three words? Apple, table, penny. Draw the clock face for ten minutes past 11.

Then I talked to my primary care physician, who asked whether I’d had any falls. I said no, though my wife had three weeks to the day earlier. “I haven’t fallen since…” “DON’T SAY THAT!” The implication was that I would jinx myself if I had stated it. In fact, I do remember that it was before I retired in June 2019, but I shan’t say when.

I had taken buses to see my doctor in the past, to three locations in suburban Delmar and one just outside Albany. The location in Rensselaer would take two buses and 90 minutes, but it would also require a walk along a busy highway. So my wife had dropped me off before she went to work.

I called an Uber to get to the train station because I didn’t want to pay the full price for a ride home. The bus costs 65 cents from the train station to a block from my house. I saw a couple of people I know, and they thought my plan sounded complicated; I didn’t think so—it’s just logistics.

Making plans!

After a stop at the grocery store, I said, “OK, I’m going to work on all these projects”—a call for church, library stuff, and finishing a blog post I started the day before. I can do that because my wife has a meeting tonight. Sometimes, getting your stuff done when you’re alone is easier.

But less than an hour later, my wife calls me and tells me that my mother-in-law, who’s at an elder care facility, had fallen and was taken by ambulance to the hospital, specifically St. Peter’s Hospital, where my wife had gone when she fell. She picked me up, and we went to the ER.

Only one person is allowed in the space with the patient, so I stayed in the waiting room and read the newspaper. Eventually, my wife wanted something to eat. Nothing was available at the hospital, so I got a couple of slices of pizza at a nearby restaurant and chargers for our phones from CVS because they were running out.

A couple of hours later, my mother-in-law was discharged with no significant damage done. I waited with her while my wife got the car, and we chatted. Then we took her back to her facility because it was locked up after 11 p.m. We got home around 11:30, which was not my wife’s best time of day.

So talking to my primary physician that day about falling led to my MIL falling. Sorry, Joyce.

The New York Times games

Spelling Bee

Wordle 1300 I will note the New York Times games my wife and I play daily at our house. As I’ve mentioned, I play Wordle and have a decent streak; my wife does, too, although not as long as mine. It’s the game we play first; sometimes, I play right after midnight.

In the last report, I thought I could get 100 2s before I could get 100 6s. That didn’t work out. Still, in the previous 100 games, I got zero 1s (and it may always be thus because I start with the same word), eight 2s, 49 3s, 31 4s, 10 5s, and two 6s fairly early on.

The Connections game involves grouping “words that share a common thread.” We play it together after she comes home from work. Our strategy is to figure out all four groups – yellow, green, blue, and purple in increasing difficulty before entering any of them. We’re seeking the reverse rainbow, with the purple first. Sometimes we only know what three of them are. So we try the fourth one blindly; more often than not, it’s purple.

Trying to get them all minimizes the misleading clues—Harp, Chic, Grouch, Marx—which suggested the Marx Brothers but were not.

Spelling Bee

But the thing that takes us the most amount of time is the Spelling Bee. There are seven letters, one of which you must use, and you’re supposed to make words of four letters or longer.

There is always at least one pangram, which is a word that uses all seven letters. A perfect pangram uses only the seven letters. My wife is very good at finding pangrams. The only pangram I remember getting was genealogy, which I saw right away, only because I’ve been doing genealogy recently.

She is generally better at word games than I am, so it’s her game; I’m just the helper. There’s no way I would ever finish it, but she has finished it on her own. We spend way more time on Spelling Bee than Wordle and Connections combined.

I suppose it is a team-building project, and we learned many more words. One of the things about Spelling Bee is that you need to remember the words that popped up a few days ago because they’re likely to reappear. They like Greek letters.

Working on prefixes and suffixes and building them onto existing words is essential. But it’s also helpful to look at possible three-letter words that you can extend, or words that end in E, when it’s not a chosen letter, but the expanded word works. For instance, CHANGE isn’t an option, but CHANGING could be.

No Kings Day 2.0 – October 18

particularly concerning

Here’s a comment about a Boston Globe opinion piece, Will Americans let [FOTUS] slide the country into dictatorship? “Where are all the protests we saw earlier in the year? No Kings Day, Hands Off, and others. I went to several of these and would go every weekend if there were more of them.”

Good news! “On Saturday, October 18, millions of us are rising again to show the world: America has no kings, and the power belongs to the people.” The map shows the hundreds of events scheduled in the US and Europe.

“A core principle behind all No Kings events is a commitment to nonviolent action. We expect all participants to seek to de-escalate any potential confrontation with those who disagree with our values and to act lawfully at these events.”

That said, activities have been taking place regularly. I receive regular emails from my local Indivisible.org organization, letting me know about letter-writing campaigns and local protests taking place at various sites every week.

I understand that people have different points of view, even the Globe’s readers. One opined that FOTUS and “dictatorship are a figment of the media’s imagination. The media has lost its credibility so thoroughly that it has to create an artificial boogeyman to justify its existence.” Another suggests that opposition to Metamucilini is “unhinged, over-the-top rhetoric.”

Historical comparisons

On CBS Morning on September 26, 2025, historian Douglas Brinkley, a sober rather than reactive person, broke down the legal charges against former FBI head James Comey.

He compared FOTUS with Andrew Jackson, who, because of his controversial loss in the 1824election due to the “corrupt bargain.” After his election in 1828, Jackson took vengeance against his opponents, such as Henry Clay, and the Second Bank of the United States.

Richard Nixon had his enemies list, but generally sought retribution against his political foes by surreptitious means, such as IRS audits.

However, according to Brinkley, the current White House occupant has openly recommended indictments against his enemies, essentially directing them to take place, which he considers particularly concerning.

For those worried about democracy versus dictatorship, go out and choose democracy, not just on October 18 but whenever you can..

Sunday Stealing Looks Back on September

booze, cookies and hair dye

Welcome to Sunday Stealing. Here we will steal all types of questions from every corner of the blogosphere. Our promise to you is that we will work hard to find the most interesting and intelligent questions. Cheers to all of us thieves!

We’re stealing this meme about last month – it looks back on September – from Life of a Fool. This blogger maintains this meme has “been seen everywhere.” The questions only require a yes or no, but if you’d like to elaborate, we’d like to hear what you have to say. (That’s good because this would be very short otherwise.)

In the Past Month Meme

During September, did you …

1. Drink alcohol? I don’t believe so. I had suggested to my wife that we could have a glass of wine from the bottle sitting on the kitchen counter, probably for the last few months, but it’s never gotten beyond that. It’s interesting how alcohol which was such a wonderful thing to discover in my 20s, has largely fallen by the wayside.

2. Try a new recipe? No I don’t really look at recipes and I only make the same six items anyway.

Shop Around

3. Go shopping with friends? I avoid going shopping at all. The only thing I bought that wasn’t groceries in September was at Lodge’s, the oldest department store in Albany, and I purchased a couple of pairs of slippers to walk around in the house.

I really don’t like shopping with other people. I have stories. One time this past decade, my wife was going to buy me a winter coat for Christmas, so we went into JCPenney’s. I looked at two coats and liked the second one. I tried it on; it fit, and I said, “Okay, we’re done.” She said, “Don’t you want to look at some others?” “NO!”

I like buying books and music because I generally know what I want. Grocery shopping is okay.

4. Eat an entire box of cookies by yourself? No, and don’t think I ever did. I ate a whole package of oatmeal raisin cookies in September, but there were only two cookies.

5. Dye your hair? If I’ve ever dyed my hair, I have no recollection. I might have done so for Halloween many years ago. When I was in high school stage crew, a young woman named Mary, the lead in a production, sprayed my hair blond.

Thank you for playing! Please come back next week.

Hot Adult Contemporary #1s for 1985

Beverly Hills Cop

Here are the Hot Adult Contemporary #1s for 1985. The category went from Easy Listening in 1965 to Adult Contemporary in 1979, to Hot Adult Contemporary with the 20 October 1984 Billboard.

There was a lot of crossover between these and the pop and soul charts.

Cherish – Kool and the Gang, six weeks at #1. It was #2 for three weeks on the pop charts.

Careless Whisper – Wham!, featuring George Michael, five weeks at #1, three weeks at #1 pop.

Say You, Say Me – Lionel Richie, five weeks at #1, four weeks at #1 pop

The Search Is Over – Survivor, four weeks at #1. It went to #4 pop.

One More Night – Phil Collins, three weeks at #1

Who’s Holding Donna Now – DeBarge, three weeks at #1. #6 pop.

Saving All My Love For You – Whitney Houston, three weeks at #1, one week at #1 pop

Part-Time Lover, three weeks at #1. “It was the first single from his twentieth studio album, In Square Circle. The song reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100, R&B, dance, and adult contemporary charts, becoming Wonder’s final number one hit to date.”

Separate Lives – Phil Collins & Marilyn Martin, three weeks at #1, one week at #1 pop

Two weeks at #1

All I Need -Jack Wagner. He was on the soap opera General Hospital. Madonna’s Like A Virgin kept him from reaching #1 on the pop charts

You’re My Inspiration – Chicago. #3 for two weeks pop.

Too Late For Goodbye – Julian Lennon. It was released in September 1984 in the UK, but not until January 1985 in the US, where it reached #5 on the pop charts. Sam Peckinpah directed a music video for the song, but I don’t know for certain that this is it.

We Are The World – USA for Africa, #1 for four weeks pop. This is the radio edit.

Suddenly – Billy Ocean. #4 pop.

Smooth Operator – Sade. #5 pop.

Axel F – Harold Faltermeyer, two weeks at #1. This is the “theme tune to the film Beverly Hills Cop, its eponymous character played by Eddie Murphy, and the film franchise it is based on.” It became an international number one hit in 1985, but only went to #3 on the pop charts for three weeks in the US. I believe it’s Faltermeyer in the video.

Every Time You Go Away – Paul Young, two weeks at #1, #1 for one week pop

The only song to top the AC charts in 1985 for only one week was Rhythm of the Night—DeBarge. It went to #3 for two weeks on the pop charts.