The Rational Ram

As the Steven Morrissey quote above says, “there is no such thing in life as normal”. Ergo, it stands to reason that there is no such thing as a “new normal” either. I know I said that I wouldn’t write about the coronavirus pandemic anymore and this post will not directly address it, but it […]

Unless you live under a rock and/or do not access social media, I am 100% sure my readers are aware of the senseless killing of Ahmaud Arbery in Brunswick, Georgia, shot by two white men, Gregory McMichael and his son Travis McMichael, who confronted Arbery while he was jogging around his own neighborhood on 25 […]

This blog post is a bit of a departure from my typical posts. With this entry, I thought I’d let the poignant and enduring words of a person who’s works I admire speak for themselves with minimal commentary on my part. Earl Nightingale was a radio commentator and author who is widely considered the de […]

Originally posted on 15 Minutes:
I’ve heard this story several times in several variations: An executive is busy working in his home office when his 6-year-old son comes in and starts asking him to play. After much persistence followed by much frustration, the exec pulls out a magazine and opens it to a large fold-out map…

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me… A simple, 13 word truism that far too many people fail to grasp. Even in our modern, technologically advanced society, words seem to offend people more than ever before. Case in point: Now calling a white woman “Karen” is as offensive as […]

I love memes and quotes. I especially love memes and quotes that are a DuckDuckGo search away (I seldom use Google) from being debunked, deconstructed, or discredited when they are disingenuously presented as fact-based. The quote above is ostensibly attributed to Thomas Jefferson (he who is our third president). Given the context of his writings, […]

Regular followers of this blog know how much I love quoting the late American radio announcer, author, and motivational speaker Earl Nightingale. His thoughtful and poignant words not only outlive him (Mr. Nightingale passed away in 1989), but convey a timeless logic that many of us can stand to heed in our personal lives today. […]

Life presents us with teachable moments about ourselves everyday. Unfortunately, most people miss the teachable moment because centuries of cultural conditioning via the media make it difficult to separate fact from sensationalism, objectivity from ideology, and perspective from incredulity. Take the photo that opens this post… Unless you live under a rock or don’t have […]

I let the words of late astronomer and author Carl Sagan from his book “Pale Blue Dot” stand as the main message and the bulk of the text for this blog post, written in response to the photo that opens this post, a photo of Earth taken from the Voyager 1 space probe in 1990: […]

NOTE: Given recent events since I originally wrote this blog post, I am updating and sharing it again because I am deeply disturbed by what I am seeing on social media in reaction to the police malfeasance and racial strife. Much of what we are witnessing is the result of centuries of petty divisiveness. We […]