The 43

As this life progresses, I'm continually stunned by things that occur annually, with the last occurrence not seeming so long ago when, in fact, an entire year has passed. My annual summer solstice blog post is an example of this. First days of school, last days of school, big swim meets, Independence Days, vacations, Halloweens -- the days that make lasting impressions burn into the memory, so the next occasion seems sooner than it actually was. However, there are the less significant events that feel so recent but were actually a year ago. I wrote about one of these moments in 2009 , and I'm guessing we approach the first anniversary of the COVID-19 lockdown, I'll be marveling how the weeks and months zipped by (the year of coronavirus is a topic for another post).  Every January, I experience the expedited passage of time in something not so monumental and, really, should be mundane: taking down the Christmas tree. We wait to get a tree every December until after Michael...

As a condition to play sports while preventing the spread of COVID-19, all high school athletes in Utah must be tested every two weeks. After a fall in which seasons were canceled because of unchecked cases and rumors surfaced of coaches telling their players not to get tested if felt symptoms, the state clamped down by instituting this testing protocol. So far, it's worked out well -- the message is getting through to athletes that they need to be smart or risk ruining the season for their teammates, and the rate of positive tests for these students has been low. The boys have been tested three times, including twice via the rapid testing their school is offering. This morning, they needed to go in at 6 a.m. to be tested -- in order handle about a hundred students in a couple hours (and allow them to practice after school), the school had to start early. So far, we've heard of no positive tests -- at least nothing that would cancel Michael's games this week or force a quar...

Lori and I started dating in 1993, and that first fall and winter, I usually had Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday nights off. Although we weren't planted in front of the television during all our free time, naturally, we watched some TV. Amid "Seinfeld" and "Frasier" episodes, we gravitated toward "Mad About You." I had watched episodes off and on during the show's first season, and I thought it was OK. As a single person, it didn't quite resonate yet. That changed when we started watching NBC Thursday nights together. I must admit, Lori brought me around to appreciating and enjoying "Mad About You." She saw something I had yet to realize: Paul and Jamie Buchman felt a little like us, in that they were a young couple navigating a new relationship, albeit a few years ahead of us.  The episode that really struck a chord with Lori told the story of how Paul and Jamie may have encountered each other as grade schoolers. It reconfirmed for...