My kid is in San Francisco with a Northwood High musical group. Among the chaperones is the school principal. We don’t like her. More on that later. “Avoid the temptation to push her in front of a cable car,” I advised the boy. “Why?” he asked. “Well . . .” Now I had to think of something. “Because her fat ass would derail the thing, costing innocent people their lives.” Read more →
Author Archive: Paul Epps
EppsNet Book Reviews: The Odyssey by Homer
The author displays a lively imagination. The cast of characters includes both gods and mortals, and the story builds to a thrilling climax. I can’t wait to see what this promising young writer comes up with next. Read more →
Selling Typewriters
“My son just finished college last year. He wants to write but he’s selling typewriters until he gets started,” his mother said . . . the woman across the aisle said in a loud voice, “Well that’s nice. Selling typewriters is close to writing. He can go right from one to the other.” — Flannery O’Connor, “Everything That Rises Must Converge” Read more →
Four Months Left
We went to a Cal reception for incoming freshmen. Move-in day is mid-August. That’s four months from now. The reality of what’s happening here is starting to grab me by the throat . . . Read more →
Checking Out
“Thank you for shopping at Staples.” “Oh, thanks. That was easy. Has anyone else ever said that?” Read more →
Skittles
I just noticed on Facebook that 16 million people like Skittles. I hate Skittles. Worst of all, they look like M&Ms, so you think you’re going to get some delicious M&Ms and it turns out what you’re really getting are Skittles. Read more →
Why is Obama a Bad Politician?
The answer is distressingly obvious: Obama’s the biggest affirmative action baby in history. When other pols are trying, failing, learning, while climbing up the middle rungs of the ladder, he got a pass. — Mickey Kaus Read more →
Predators 4, Ducks 1
Who will hoist Lord Stanley’s cup? Not the Ducks, if they don’t play better than they did tonight . . . Read more →
Laughter is the Medicine of Life
It’s All White Kids
This screenshot is from the Yale University home page. It’s refreshing that, unlike most schools, they don’t even pretend to care about diversity. Read more →
Hawk Cam
I’m mesmerized by the Hawk Cam. It’s amazing to me that hawks and other critters have all this knowledge programmed into them . . . when, where and how to build a nest, laying the eggs, sitting on them for a month, raising the hatchlings. Red-tailed hawks are monogamous, so the male stops by several times a day. Sometimes he brings a delicious rat. The nest is on the 12th floor ledge of a library at NYU. More info at the New York Times City Room blog. Read more →
Where Is Everybody?
Friday @ 6:30 p.m. Read more →
Baggage Buddies: How to Save $3,500 on a Flight from OC to SF
A large group of kids from the music program at Northwood High School are traveling to San Francisco next week. Half are flying up on United and half are flying on Southwest. As you probably know, Southwest doesn’t charge for checked luggage. United does. Each kid on the United flight will give his or her suitcase to a “baggage buddy” on the Southwest flight. Each Southwest kid will check two bags while each United kid will check none. Using this arrangement on both legs of the trip cuts the travel cost by $3,500. Read more →
An Irrevocable Diameter
I was just tangent to the Great Circle of Life, of which I am one irrevocable diameter. — Grace Paley, “An Irrevocable Diameter” Read more →
I Won’t Be Living Here Anymore
Somewhere in America, a boy — a high school senior, college bound — says to his mom, “You don’t need to renew my magazine subscriptions because I won’t be living here anymore.” His mom, who already knows this but is momentarily stunned by the clarity of it, starts to say, “When you have a three-day weekend, come and visit us” but can’t get through it without crying . . . Read more →
Everything Must Be Replaced
Uh oh, it looks like the wireless connection here at EppsNet headquarters just went down . . . “NOTHING MAKES ME ANGRIER THAN AN UNRELIABLE NETWORK CONNECTION!” my son yells. “WE NEED A NEW ROUTER! WE NEED A NEW MODEM! WE NEED A NEW SERVICE PROVIDER! WE NEED NEW COMPUTERS!” “We don’t need new computers,” his mom says. “YES WE DO!” Read more →
My Kid is Going to Cal
I always kind of assumed that the boy would follow in his pappy’s footsteps at USC, but he just sent in his intent to register at Cal, thus ending (effectively) a journey that started on his first day of kindergarten last week. It wasn’t last week? It was 13 years ago? It seems like last week. I picked him up after school and he sat in the back seat of the car sipping a juice box while we talked about his day. I have a video of it. There are three schools in California that you could plausibly go to ahead of USC: Stanford, Cal Tech — two small, private schools with ultra-low admit rates — and Cal. Cal has a better academic reputation than USC. USC has cranked up the academics over the last 20 years, and especially over the last 10 years, to the point where if you… Read more →
Pushing the Avocado
The girl at Subway was really pushing the avocado today . . . the third time she asked someone, “Do you want anything else on your sandwich? Some avocado, maybe?” I asked her, “Does the avocado cost extra?” “Yes,” she said. “Do you want some?” “No, but I was thinking if it was free it would be a good deal. If I liked avocado.” Read more →
The Price of Taxing the Rich
Nearly half of California’s income taxes before the recession came from the top 1% of earners: households that took in more than $490,000 a year. High earners, it turns out, have especially volatile incomes—their earnings fell by more than twice as much as the rest of the population’s during the recession. When they crashed, they took California’s finances down with them. — WSJ.com Read more →