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Homestead
"Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend."
- Melody Beattie
Because not everything about life is travel. The majority of early retirement is spent here, at home, with the person you love.
Here you will find random stories of home and life in no particular order.
Stupidly Happy
July 20, 2025 “ Beside the river there are two things you never forget, that the moment you look at a river that moment has already...
gldobbs
Jul 204 min read
A Really Good Boy - A remembrance of Charlie
Charlie July 7, 2025 “You think those dogs will not be in heaven! I tell you they will be there long before any of us.” -Robert Louis...
gldobbs
Jul 84 min read
In My Eyes
May 2024 “We said we'd walk together, baby, come what may That come the twilight, should we lose our way If as we're walking, a hand...
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May 4, 20244 min read
A Wedding Toast
“Always remember there was nothing worth sharing Like the love that let us share our name” - The Avett Brothers It is not often that a...
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Apr 29, 20232 min read
A Christmas Poem
December 27, 2022 So this is Christmas And what have you done? Another year over And a new one just begun And so this is Christmas I hope...
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Dec 27, 20221 min read
In the meantime
May 26, 2022 “….But this is what I’m finding, in glimpses and flashes: this is it. This is it, in the best possible way. That thing I’m...
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May 26, 20222 min read
Naming Day
“(We) Talk of poems and prayers and promises and things that we believe in How sweet it is to love someone, how right it is to care How...
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Apr 11, 20223 min read
A Thanksgiving to Remember
“You’re wrong Jenny….I know what love is….” - Forest Gump Yes I know Thanksgiving has long since past. However, the holiday was unique...
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Jan 6, 20225 min read
Catahoula Days
“Old dogs can be a regal sight. Their exuberance settles over the years into a seasoned nobility, their routines become as locked into...
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Aug 8, 20219 min read
Overhead Flights
“It’s very liberating” - Former President George W Bush after receiving his second vaccine injection. After Flash’s passing things...
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Apr 26, 202111 min read
Chasing Fireflies
“And again, a few minutes later, a whisper to himself under the sky’s collapsing cobalt: Look the color! There are colors in his spectrum...
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Mar 5, 20214 min read
A Nice Round Number
“Age. Age brings wisdom and the fine clarity that one gets at midnight on the tracks looking into the lights of an oncoming train. It...
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Feb 28, 20215 min read
A Ghost Story
“Never tell too much. The monster is always scarier when it is still under the child’s bed” Stephen King Recently, I was looking for...
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Jan 23, 20216 min read
Between Two Needles
“So it's an absolute lie that has killed thousands of kids. Because the mothers who heard that lie, many of them didn't have their kids...
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Jan 11, 20215 min read
Today, the Confederate Flag flew in The United States Capitol
"It's going to be wild...." "...Remember this day forever" - Donald Trump “We’re in! We’re in! We’re in! We’re in! Derrick Evans is in...
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Jan 7, 202110 min read
The Dobbs' 2020 (Vague &Unsolicited Anecdotes Issue # 35)
“Among the 41 confirmed cases, there has been one death. This death occurred in a patient with serious underlying medical conditions.” —...
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Dec 20, 20206 min read
Something besides Netflix to Watch
“The chicken strode the field as if it was hers. Every worm in the rich brown soils was hers for the taking and she was utterly focused...
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Nov 17, 20206 min read
Occam's Razor
“Abraham Lincoln said it best when he spoke “A house divided against itself cannot stand”. We are amid that historical lesson now my...
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Nov 15, 20207 min read
It's Morning Again
"With malice toward none with charity for all with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right let us strive on to finish the...
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Nov 7, 20203 min read
The Shadows of Mordor
“….(He) needs only this ring to cover all the lands in a second darkness” -J.R. Tolkien “There's got to be a morning after If we can hold...
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Nov 4, 20203 min read
Tomorrow
"(Is America the greatest?)........It sure used to be… We stood up for what was right. We fought for moral reason. We passed laws, struck...
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Nov 2, 20205 min read
They BETTER lay eggs!
"Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order,...
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Nov 1, 20204 min read
I wasn't going to...but
"This sums it up pretty nicely...done by some else. I just think this election, apart from corruption stuff comes down to these issues....
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Oct 16, 20206 min read
A Grace Note on the Heath
“Dying is easy. Comedy is difficult” -Edmund Gwenn “I regard the theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in...
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Sep 13, 20205 min read
Postcards from the Edge (Notes on a Pandemic - Part 16)
“To get back up to the shining world from there My guide and I went into that hidden tunnel, And Following its path, we took no care To...
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Sep 2, 20208 min read
In the Frozen Earth (Notes on a Pandemic Part 15)
“I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information...
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Jul 13, 202011 min read
The Worst Year Ever? (Notes on a Pandemic part 14)
“Through it all the angry, blustering tweets issued from the White House like panicked bats fleeing flames in the smokestack.” - Peggy...
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Jun 26, 20206 min read
I used to be one
“This is an awful man, waving a book he hasn’t read, in front of a church he doesn’t attend, invoking laws he doesn’t understand, against...
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Jun 8, 202014 min read
A Bad Week (Notes on a Pandemic part 13)
“In our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom...
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May 30, 20206 min read
Talk of Poems, Prayers, and Promises....
“Life is only real, when shared” -Christopher McCandless The past few days Colleen and I have been remodeling my office in the house. ...
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May 25, 20203 min read
Ättestupa - Notes on a Pandemic (Part 12)
“Ättestupa (Swedish for 'kin/clan precipice') is a name given to a number of precipices in Sweden. The name supposedly denotes sites...
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May 7, 20206 min read
There's Something About Mary - Notes on a Pandemic (Part 11)
“History does not repeat itself. But, it does rhyme” -Mark Twain “Cooks work sick. They always have. Most jobs, you don’t work, you don’t...
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Apr 29, 20209 min read
Rocketman
“And I think it's gonna be a long long time 'Till touch down brings me round again to find I'm not the man they think I am at home Oh no...
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Apr 27, 20206 min read
Notes on a Pandemic (Part 10)
"Any country can follow a series of measures that are very cheap and can dramatically reduce the epidemic: mandate wearing home-made...
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Apr 26, 20202 min read
Notes on a Pandemic (Part 9)*
“I think the message is that, clearly, this is something that is hurting from the standpoint of economics, from the standpoint of things...
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Apr 23, 202013 min read
Notes on a Pandemic (Part 8)
“For the first time in history there is a fully signed Presidential Disaster Declaration for all Fifty States. We are winning, and will...
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Apr 12, 20208 min read
Notes on a Pandemic (Part 7)
"I knew everything. I knew it could be horrible and I knew it could be maybe good….I don’t want to be a negative person. I’m a...
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Apr 9, 20206 min read
The Folding
“With enough butter, anything is good” - Julia Child At the end of our last episode I wrote a piece called “The Moments of Happiness”....
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Apr 5, 20205 min read
Notes on a Pandemic (Part 6)
“This is nothing. The flu kills more people every year” A friend of our family who is a resident at a local nursing home “Pain is...
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Apr 1, 20206 min read
Notes on a Pandemic (Part 5)
“I don’t believe you really need that many ventilators” - Donald Trump during an interview with Sean Hannity last night “It’s going to...
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Mar 27, 20204 min read
Notes on a Pandemic (Part 4)
"Netflix has been asked to limit services for fear of breaking the internet" - News report yesterday afternoon "I will follow you into...
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Mar 20, 20204 min read
Let's Hope Not
“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people...
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Mar 14, 20203 min read
Notes on a Pandemic (Part 3)
“Oh F**k……” - Donald Trump caught on a hot mic moments before he addressed the nation Ok, last night we were treated to the following 9...
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Mar 12, 20206 min read
Notes on a Pandemic (Part 2)
"I like this stuff. I really get it. People are surprised that I understand it. Every one of these doctors said, 'How do you know so much...
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Mar 10, 20203 min read
Bath time
"I think it is important to try to get to know someone before you think about bombing them" - Rick Steves I try not to write to much...
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Jan 7, 20203 min read
Snowflakes & Air Hockey - A Christmas Letter
“These modern productions are all very well, but there nothing to equal, from what I hear tell…that moment of mystery….” Gus - the...
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Dec 22, 20194 min read
I let time go lightly
“Time it was And what a time it was It was . . . A time of innocence A time of confidences” - Paul Simon “If you live to be 100, I hope I...
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Dec 1, 20193 min read
California Dreamin' - A Thanksgiving Story
"Dad, when I go to Stanford I am going to get you a boat!" - 13 year old Stephen Dobbs "Today was the best day of this entire trip" -...
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Nov 27, 20195 min read
Some thoughts on 'The King'
"We few, we happy few...." - Henry V in William Shakespeare's play WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD I know, I know, it is a little odd to be...
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Nov 14, 20194 min read
About those revels
It seems silly not to say something about it. ‘Bard Fest’ - the Shakespeare festival I produce each year finished it’s fifth season...
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Oct 31, 20192 min read
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