Weekly Musings

Memorial Day Memories By...Erik Schuman Today is Memorial Day. I stated my thoughts about this a few weeks ago. Memorial Day is a day to remember all those who died in active military service. We should not be spending one day remembering those who died fighting for our country. We should spend 365 (or 366) days remembering them. My father and all of my uncles were drafted and thus served. Kudos to all of them. I decided to dedicate this entry to my family. And to point out the one moment I most remember with them. I was going to include my grandparents but instead I will wait until September when it is Grandparent’s Day and remember them that way and in their own space. I am doing this age-wise except the spouses of my siblings is done right after the sibling and not age wise since my B-I-L is older than my S-I-L but my brother is older than my sister. Father : My father is a real “people person.” He loves being around as many people as he can. He doesn’t care abou...

Happy Birthday to Me...30 days later By...Erik Schuman Our birthday is the day we were given life on this planet. For me that is April 20. I addressed this in a previous entry. While April 20 is the day my life began, May 20 is the day I was one of the few people fortunate enough to be given a second chance at life. It was 366 days ago that my mother, brother and sister joined me in the doctor’s office to be told the results of a PT Scan I had done four days earlier after my third round of chemotherapy. My doctor said he hoped 100% of the cancer was gone. I was hoping for at least 60% and would have been happy with that and I didn’t expect for much more than that since the back of my right leg was still tender and I had almost no feeling in it. I later found out that was scar tissue, something I still have and might have for the rest of my life. When Dr. Minh Nguyen of Keck USC Medicine told us the scan showed NO CANCER, meaning he was right and it was 100% go...

Time to Vent By...Erik Schuman Gonna do something different this week. Instead of covering one main topic, this week I just want to “vent” air comment on a bunch of topics. Also, next week instead of posting a new entry on Monday, May 18 I am going to push it back a few days until Wednesday, May 20. There is a reason for it. Trust me, it is worth the 48 hour wait. ***TERM LIMITS! When I first started doing this, I set only one ground rule: No Politics! I have stuck to that and even though I am about to discuss politics it is not being political. Milk is great. No one will argue that. There are many options from: Cows to Soy to Almond to...countless other choices. But even milk goes bad after a certain amount of time which is why even milk has an expiration date on it. As great of an athlete as someone like Michael Jordan or Wayne Gretzky was, at some point in time they hit their “expiration date” and have to retire. Our Founding Fathers never meant for politician to be ...

Happy Cuatro de Mayo...but NOT Mother’s Day By...Erik Schuman Sometimes the calendar smiles upon us. Sometimes it does not. This time it is both. Today is May 4. For Star Wars fans this is one of the greatest days of the year. Today you will hear them all saying, “May the Fourth Be With You” which is a take-off on “May the Force Be With You.” It sounds amusing and it might be. The first few times you hear it. The next 450-Billion times you hear it the humor wears off. Today is also “Cuatro de Mayo.” Living in California we have it ingrained in us from a very early age how important “CINCO de Mayo” is. Cinco de Mayo is an annual celebration held on May 5. The date is observed to commemorate the Mexican Army’s victory over the French Empire at the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862, under the leadership of General Ignacio Zaragoza. Contrary to popular belief it is not a day to be celebrated getting hammered on Corona Beer (which, from what I have been told, is nast...