My Mom’s battle with cancer — Two more weeks until chemotherapy

It’s been over a month since Mom was diagnosed with lung cancer but she still hasn’t started chemotherapy treatments. The biopsy she was supposed to have done this coming week was postponed for a week. Once she has this biopsy done she can finally start her chemo treatments. 
This past week she was a little under [...]

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Gee, I wish I had that song on a CD or an audio file

Today one of my blog readers left some real cool comments on my From Carbondale to Daejeon posting which got me thinking about SIU and the early 80s again as well as music—more specifically, some bands that I liked back then, but whose songs I do not have on any CD or any audio files.
And [...]

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Paul Banging on the Wall & Other Weird Scenes Inside the Gold Mine — Part 2, “Return of the Fly”

I got an email from my very good friend Paul Collin the other day. It’s been awhile since we last exchanged email and it was really good to hear from him. Although he was a bit pressed for time to write a longer email, (he promised he would write again soon) he did mention his [...]

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Milk Money

Milk Money From Mom
left on the table
with bologna sandwiches
wrapped in wax paper,
a Twinkie, a baggie filled
with grapes or Frito Lay
corn chips
in a paper sack, next to
the note with our chores.
We don’t always here
you leave-
sometimes, though half-asleep
we see your silhouette in the pale dawn
as you sit in the kitchen,
sipping a Coke and having
a cigarette
waiting for your [...]

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Meatloaf & Mashed Potatoes

Some days I just wake up craving for some home-style cooking. 
Today it was for meatloaf and mashed potatoes. 
Yesterday, while going through some papers and other stuff that for some reason I’ve been holding onto for the past year, I came across a receipt from HyVee, a supermarket back home in Peru, Illinois. It was for [...]

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On & Bia…again

I wanted to post this photo of On and Bia before, but I wasn’t too happy with how I composed this photo—cutting off part of On’s right hand. 
However, I really loved On and Bia’s smiles as well as him raising his arms up in the air. He is such a hoot.

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When Chester died on “Combat”

The first time I became aware of death—at least in terms of our own mortality—was not learned in Church or by attending a funeral, but by watching an episode of Combat when I was five or six years old. 
In this particular episode, which guest starred Dennis Weaver, who played Chester on another hit TV series, [...]

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It’s Daejeon?

Almost everywhere I go in Daejeon I see a banner, sign, or some other poster with “It’s Daejeon” emblazoned on it.
I am not really sure what “It’s Daejeon” is supposed to mean. After all, it is written in English, but I don’t think it is meant for the small foreign, English-speaking community here.
And would such [...]

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Good-bye AFN: Thanks for the memories

The other day I received an email from one of my former FLI colleagues lamenting the disappearance of AFN from cable service in Seoul.
She went onto to say that she contacted the local cable company in Seodaemun-gu and inquired about whether or not Star TV would be added to programming the cable company carried [...]

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My Mom’s battle with cancer — an update

One more visit with a cancer specialist and one more biopsy in two weeks. 
Then finally, my Mom will be able to start chemotherapy. 
It’s been a rough and emotional past couple of weeks for her, but she’s been holding up quite well the past couple of days and regaining her strength. She was really worried about [...]

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