Thanksgiving with the gang from Cheers

 
One of my favorite sitcoms back in the 80s and early 90s was NBC’s Cheers. I liked the ensemble cast and writing and it was a fun show to watch whether it was the ongoing love spats between Sam Malone (Ted Danson) and Diane Chambers (Shelley Long), Carla Tortelli’s (Rhea Pearlman) [...]

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“With every Christmas card I write…”

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas, well maybe not too much, but with November almost over, and with the holidays just around the corner, it is time to think about shopping, Christmas trees, decorations, and Christmas cards.
Although these days it doesn’t seem that as many people send Christmas cards as they did in [...]

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Armistice Day

“The Eleventh Hour of the Eleventh Day of the Eleventh Month”
When I was a young boy growing up in America’s Midwest back in the 1960s, I spent a lot of time with my grandparents who lived about a mile east of LaSalle, Illinois a town approximately 90 miles southwest of Chicago.
I was there first [...]

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Pimping a Post

With Halloween two days away, I thought I would pimp a post, in this case a Halloween short story I wrote about Tipping Outhouses on Halloween. Take time to read it and vote.
Happy Halloween!

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Tipping Outhouses — A Halloween Short Story

Back when I was growing up in Cherry, Illinois often heard stories about kids tipping outhouses on Halloween. It was a popular Halloween prank that sometimes backfired.

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The Great Korean Pumpkin Carve-Off

Some Western cultural events or customs like sending Christmas cards or giving chocolates on Valentine’s Day have traveled well in Asia—in terms of how well they have caught on, with a few modifications here and there.
Halloween has also caught on in places like South Korea, Japan, and Thailand where the influx of Western [...]

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Popcorn Balls

Popcorn Balls
Gee lady,
is that all I get;
a stale popcorn ball
dyed with red
food coloring—
when the folks
next door
are handing out
mini Snickers
and Butterfingers
Copyright 2009 ©  Jeffrey Alan Miller

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Wax Teeth

Wax Teeth
I never could understand
the novelty and appeal of
cherry-flavored wax teeth.
You know, the buck teeth
and vampire fangs—
or the bright red thick
wax lips
to fool friends or
provoke teachers
when worn in class.
Once the Halloween fun
was over
and what little flavor
had been chewed out,
they were just
a soggy, tasteless
wad of wax.
© 2009 Jeffrey Alan Miller

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Hunkering down for Chuseok, again

It’s Chuseok time again in Korea and for the next three days the country will be on vacation mode with around 20 million Koreans heading back to their hometowns to be with families or others just staying put. (With the Swine Flu scare, many Koreans are doing just that—staying at home and avoiding crowded buses [...]

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Knee-high by the 4th of July

I wrote this blog post a year ago and the other night, I looked at it again after a friend had mentioned “knee-high by the Fourth of July.” Like a fine wine, it reads so much better now than when I first wrote it. I like this essay a lot. It’s one that I feel [...]

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