Another Week: Number 151

With snow in the forecast, I wanted to get the Buick waxed ahead of salt season, so on Sunday morning, I took it to Rocket Wash – and then used that opportunity to walk the Pike River Pathway in the gloomy wind as the storm approached. My last walk there was with Amy, 26 months ago. Bundled up in my puffer jacket, I crossed paths with a couple of other walkers, but mostly I saw a lot of new benches and tables, all memorializing dead locals. One woman was killed by COVID-19.

Once the car was safely stuffed into my little garage, I watched the New York Giants @ Chicago Bears game on delay, and it was another white-knuckled thrill ride, scraping past misery to another win.

Meanwhile, for reasons being kept murky, eight Democratic senators — none facing reelection in 2026 — caved on Day 41 of the government shutdown, allowing Republicans to significantly sabotage healthcare.

Anywho … in the wee hours of Monday morning, the snow arrived — a freight train of precipitation barreling south down Lake Michigan and ultimately dumping on us folks near the shore. When it finally moved on around 7:00, I went out to shovel for two hours. It was nasty stuff: wet and heavy — but worst of all, sticky. My situation requires me to throw large quantities of snow some distance onto my front lawn. This becomes aggravating when the snow clings to the shovel and yanks your arm like a Donald Trump handshake on every heave.

I remember one significant snowfall on Thanksgiving when I was a teen, but never anything this early. Normally, even a “white Christmas” is a 50-50 bet.

On Wednesday, alongside the vote to end the government shutdown, a slew of Jeffrey Epstein emails were released, locking in news coverage for at least the next week.

 The snow was almost completely gone by Saturday, when we reached a high of 69° F.

I walked 6.11 miles this week.

Jimmy Kimmel’s eulogy for Cleto Escobedo III

On Tuesday night, Jimmy Kimmel devoted his opening monologue to a eulogy of his lifelong best friend and his show’s bandleader, Cleto Escobedo III.

This was one of the most astonishing and moving monologues I have ever seen, and I have been watching late-night TV since Johnny Carson was based in New York.

The childhood friendship, the mischief, the sex, the two careers, the steadfast loyalty, the family love and affection — this is food for your soul. Kimmel is so human and so honorable, despite his deep grief.

David Letterman was my hero too, when I was a young man. Now I’ve got another one.

What to Eat Now: nutritionist Marion Nestle on Fresh Air

Early Wednesday morning, I listened to food policy expert Marion Nestle on NPR’s Fresh Air. She’s a plainspoken woman with a lot of knowledge, making for a very engaging interview.

I was wary when I heard her initial optimism about Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s policy proposals, then reassured when she expressed her disappointment with him.

Her insights into the grocery business were fascinating — including the way dollar stores have taken over the locations that supermarkets have abandoned.

One day soon, I want to read her book, What to Eat Now: The Indispensable Guide to Good Food, How to Find It, and Why It Matters.

Frankenstein (1931)
Young Frankenstein (1974)
Frankenstein (2025)

I spent both Friday and Saturday evenings at my mom’s apartment, and we had a little Frankenstein film festival.

Guillermo del Toro‘s new version has just been released on Netflix, and I loved Terry Gross’s interview with him on Fresh Air — but I wanted to preface that movie with the original, and also with the Mel Brooks send-up, which my mom had never seen.

The 1931 movie is visually stunning, and watching it refreshed all the tropes — like the little girl Maria and her flower-tossing — in a quick 70 minutes.

Young Frankenstein is a pure delight. My mother, the Glenn Miller fan, cracked up at the “Pardon me, boy,” line pulling into Transylvania Station — but she could not recognize Gene Hackman as the old blind man, even after some staring. “Puttin’ On the Ritz” made her laugh out loud some more.

The new version is two and a half hours, and it’s a wonder to behold, like most of del Toro’s movies. Sometimes, he doesn’t quite make a full mythological or emotional connection, but I personally related to the creature’s pain in lacking a companion, and his desire to be rid of his pointless life.

Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel has sometimes been considered an allegory for maternity, with the parent eventually afraid of the offspring — but thinking about the film later, another metaphor occurred to me: The various obligatory roles and masks we don with other people as stiched-together body parts instead of a true self.

It was an entertaining couple of evenings.