Definition of potpourri – 1: a mixture of flowers, herbs, and spices that is usually kept in a jar and used for scent. 2: a miscellaneous collection. The second definition above pretty much describes today’s blog, a collection of miscellaneous thoughts and info that I’m sharing because I don’t have anything else to talk about today.
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I have been busy getting some blog posts written and dusting off some old ones to repost so I don’t have to take much time away from my kids when they are here. This will only be the second time in over 20 years we will all be together at the same place at the same time, and I want to enjoy every minute of it.
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Several readers have asked when the next Big Lake book will come out. I have a few chapters done now but am putting it on hold for the next two weeks or so to enjoy our little family reunion. I hope to have it out sometime in July, but experience has taught me to never give an exact date because I never know myself when it will be.
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Speaking of my books, I have good news for people who prefer printed books over e-books! The paperback edition of Fresh Out Of Mojo, the 9th book in my John Lee Quarrels mystery series, is now available on Amazon at this link https://amzn.to/3fdRxax
The paperback edition of Boom and Bust, the third book in my Tinder Street series, is also now available on Amazon at this link https://amzn.to/3oGtLH8
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Someone asked in an online genealogy group I frequent what happens to graves if a cemetery closes or if something is built on the land where a cemetery is located. This does happen sometimes. When I was at West Point we discovered an old unmarked pioneer cemetery from Colonial days when we were building a rifle range. The graves were moved to the cemetery on the main post. The original cemetery on Mackinac Island in Michigan was relocated to make room for commercial buildings along the waterfront. According to both a tour guide at the old fort on the island and a friend who has deep connections on the island going back several generations, some say they moved the headstones but not the graves. When we visited the Old Burying Ground in Boston, the tour guide said that at some point in the past the gravestones were moved and lined up in rows to make it easier for the caretakers to mow the grass and do not reflect where the actual graves are located in the cemetery. So the next time you go to pay your respects to great-great Aunt Sarah, just know that she may or may not really be there.
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There is a lot of talk lately by people saying employers can’t find workers because they are lazy. A business owner here in town was complaining online that he has reopened his convenience store and his night shift person won’t come back to work because she is getting a $300 a week “handout.” I know both the owner and the employee from a local Facebook group. She worked for him for almost three years before he closed down during the worst of the pandemic, giving her no notice or severance pay. She is a single mom, and before all of this happened, after paying a babysitter to watch her kids at night while she worked and another to watch her kids while she slept, she was clearing $108 a week. Meanwhile, he admits he has never given her a raise in those three years because “that’s all her job is worth and all he can afford to pay.” But he is always posting pictures of his many vacations and scuba trips, his two Harleys, his Corvette and new pickup, and his huge boat. Loyalty is a two-way street, and if you don’t have it for your hardworking employees, don’t expect it in return.
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Today is your last chance to enter our Free Drawing for an audiobook of Big Lake Scandal, the fifth book in my Big Lake mystery series. To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn this evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with U.S. addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.
Thought For The Day – Sorry I got drunk at your party and said and did everything I have been wanting to say and do.
Nick Russell
World-Famous, New York Times Best Selling Author, and All-Around Nice Guy!
Your comments about the business owner brought to mind this advice re: politicians that I first heard in the 60’s.
“Be careful voting for a Republican that runs a small business, or a Democrat who never has.”
I’ve found a certain amount of truth in that.
There’s an old cemetery near me that has been turned into a city park. It fell derelict and the city took it over, they took out all of the gravestones (but left the bodies) and put in a large bronze plaque with the names of the deceased on it. You would never know just by looking at it that it was ever a cemetery.
My Great Grandparents and a few of my grandfather’s siblings were buried in Monument Cemetery in Philadelphia. This cemetery housed 20,000 graves and the city didn’t want to maintain it. The land was valuable so they sold it, to Temple University for parking lot. Most of stones were dumped in the river and many of interred were moved to another cemetery… or so they say. You can read about it here:
http://thecemeterytraveler.blogspot.com/2011/05/how-monument-cemetery-was-destroyed.html
You can see the stones around the river in that article.
Big pat on the back for the paragraph on people “too lazy to work…” Working in a restaurant is hard work, never for the lazy and those people who found something else to do because they were suddenly without employment — more power to them! One of local restaurants in Cocoa Beach kept all his staff employed.. they even sold drive up groceries, so he could pay his staff what they were accustomed to making with tips. That restaurant and that owner aren’t looking for employees now.