The (New & Improved) HYENA KITCHEN

  As a young man I read Joseph Conrad. I dreamed of going to sea. Instead, I ran away to join the circus, the day I sat on a rowboat shaped bench, in a museum, looking at a Turner, with three other seafaring men, and I wished I’d chosen the sea.                                                                                                                                                                               Photo: Francis James Mortimer

       A friend of mine recently sent me a Harvard study on “what makes us happy in life.” Now I don’t know if he felt, for some reason, that I needed to be happier (although the great Stinky Wizzleteat song about a whale – The Happy Happy Joy Joy Song – did come to mind. “I don’t think you’re happy enough. I’ll teach you to be happy.”) or, was he merely looking out for my “social fitness” – the study’s suggested “Number One Key” to happiness achievement – as any friend would do.  Now, if the recent pandemic taught me anything, it’s that anti-social behavior is extremely beneficial and is a concept that I’ve been perfecting (or attempting) for years – therefore my “social fitness is in tip top condition – and directly responsible for my happiness.                                                                                                                                              Not to belittle or make light of this 85-years-in-the-making study, but - well, it’s me, so here w

    I saw an article yesterday on a prominent news website referring to the public’s inability to buy their “dream phone.”   Now I’ve often fantasized about my “dream car” and “dream home,” even once or twice about a “dream vacation.” But a “dream phone?” Seriously, this is an indicator that something is wrong with our dream society. My dream phone is one that never rings, no one has the number too, and that I can forget to turn on – or, perhaps a red reproduction of the Bat Phone, complete with glass dome – yeah, baby.   Everything else, well. . .I’m just shaking my head.                 Hello, you’ve reached me, I’m now in right now, so at the tone. . .