Top 5 Lists for 2025

My recurring segment on Mornings with Kasie and Kev is “Kasie’s Top 5” — yes, in the spirit of Casey Kasem. Since numbering them 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 sends software into apoplexy, the order of many of the lists is reversed here – 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Not great for the “countdown” vibe (sorry, Casey!) but good enough for a review. And for the record.

Copied and pasted right out of the original Notes file with very little editing. Forgive typos or errors. Also, since I pile them one upon the other in Notes, it starts with the last one and works its way back to January. Scroll down for early 2025 thoughts and ideas.

Here’s the collected lists of 2025:

5 things Spotify Wrapped started that need to stop

1. Your year in review – okay I usually love this but when Goodreads starts showing me all the trashy romance books I read? No thanks. Even our Regal app isn’t sophisticated enough to remind us of all the movies we saw (and popcorn we ate). It knows we don’t want to know.
2. Your number 1: Spotify will tell you which artist you spent the most time listening to and even deliver a little pre-recorded message from the artist thanking you for being a top listener. It’s creepy. Like Cameo. You know they got paid to wish you happy birthday right, dad? Clint Eastwood doesn’t actually know it’s your birthday.
3. The AI graphics and words montage. It’s a weird video that keeps your eyeballs glued in a way that makes Meta salivate. Colors and swirls and graphics and what will it say next? We’re all junkies for the right combination of music, colors, and our own data spewed at us in charts and graphs.
4. Premature year-end stats. Because Wrapped comes out in November, the data it collected ends in October and the last two months don’t count at all. It’s like being on a federal budget where Q1 isn’t real.
5. Share. Share. Share. Everything on social media since the first Facebook “like” has been about sharing. Showing. Pretending – believing – other people give a damn about your year in music. They don’t. They don’t care about your lunch, your diet, your weight loss progress, your fitness goals, or your New Year’s resolutions. Stop sharing.

5 gifts you don’t buy for other people

1. Home decor: floor mats, throw pillows, wall art, lamps. Your taste. Not theirs. We once had a guest bathroom redone via Christmas gifts.
2. Personal health items: sanitary napkins, deodorant, oral care, prophylactics
3. Vacation plans: a cruise for later? A ski weekend? You pick the place and the dates and while you might get to go, maybe not the best gift for someone else.
4. A new car … payment. Thank you Lexus with the red bow and the book of $1200 payment statements.
5. A pet. Cute in the store. Cute in the box. Cute in that ribbon. No so cute when everyone goes home And you have to care for the pet. 

5 Christmas traditions from the Whitener house

1. Christmas card collections: we hand the string on the pantry door and attach the incoming cards to it for display. Then, at the end of the season, we hole punch all the cards and bind them with an album ring. We display the albums every year with stocking anchors on our kitchen mantle.
2. Nutcrackers: every family has their holiday symbol and for us it’s nutcrackers. Our neighborhood stands six of them at the front entrance Thanksgiving weekend and one yard Hollie’s elf led a nutcracker revolution at the North Pole. It failed and we ended up with about 30 refugees. So we’re a house full of nutcrackers.
3. Florence gifts: since Charlie and I got married, we’ve been taking bagged gifts to my extended family in Florence. It’s usually a small loaf of banana bread and a jar of cocoa mix or Russian tea mix. We decorate the bags and for the last ten years we’ve been adding a wine cork craft — we’ve made reindeer, angels, snowmen, toy soldiers, and little Santa’s out of wine corks. This year it’s mice.
4. Love Actually: the last movie watched Christmas Eve is Love Actually. We also watch Rise of the Guardians while baking cookies for Santa. That used to be just before Hollie went to bed. Then MaMa and I would stay up for Love Actually. Last year and this year, though, Hollie has stayed Up for the rated R  Christmas movie.
5. The Christmas Journal. Every year logged back to mine and Charlie’s first married Christmas. It includes when we got our tree and how much we paid for it, what the Tigers did in the post season and how Washington and the Panthers are faring, what we ate, gifts we received and gave, who visited and where we went. 24 years and going strong. 

5 Festivus Grievances

1. Bean Soup people — not everything is for you. Keep scrolling. Touch grass.
2. Cake isn’t health food. But why not? And cookies? Come on. It’s basic math: delicious should equal good for you but noooooo.
3. People airing their grievances. Everywhere all the time as if anyone cares about your discomfort. This might be the GenXer in me but suck it up. Get on with it. Jeez.
4. People who don’t take responsibility for the disasters they inflict upon others. Crushed bikes, tariffs, you know whatever you’ve been suffering from, it’s someone else’s fault and they’re not taking responsibility. Or worse, it’s your fault and You’re not taking responsibility. Ugh.
5. Fitness is an ongoing thing. You have to keep working out. Again and again and again. Why can’t you just get in shape and stay there? And eat cake, too.

5 Christmas snacks for grazing

1. Classic Chex Mix – holiday version with red and green M&Ms sprinkled in? Why not?
2. Pigs in blankets – it is game day after all
3. Vegetables shaped like a Christmas tree — broccoli, carrots, celery, cucumber, red and green peppers for garland
4. Grape-banana-strawberry grinch sticks, add a marshmallow so they’re not too healthy
5. Hot cocoa dip – Swiss Miss packets with cream cheese, Cool Whip, and marshmallow

5 danceable Christmas songs

1. Love has come – Amy Grant
2. Jingle Bell Rock – Bobby Helms
3. Rockin around the Christmas tree – Brenda Lee
4. All I want for Christmas – Mariah
5. Underneath the tree – Kelly Clarkson

5 iconic lines from Rob Reiner movies

1. Stand By Me – too many, so we’ll just acknowledge Stand By Me is a classic
2. Turn it up to eleven. – Spinal Tap
3. You can’t handle the truth! – A Few Good Men
4. I’ll have what she’s having – When Harry Met Sally
5. The American President – I actually included this quote on my Ballotpedia: I’m a fan of the press conference in The American President when Michael Douglas’s character stands up to challenger Richard Dreyfuss by saying America is advanced citizenship and we need serious people to do the work. He says, “whatever your particular problem is, I promise you Bob Rumson is not the least bit interested in solving it. He is interested in two things, and two things only: making you afraid of it, and telling you who’s to blame for it. That, ladies and gentlemen, is how you win elections.” It is not, however, how we actually govern. I’m in agreement that too much of politics is theater. My philosophy is do the work or get out of the way for those of us who can and are willing.
6. Inconceivable! You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means. — that’s for all of you missing “literally” 

5 worst kind of people

1. Those who make fun of things other people love. This is basically all the trolls on the internet: they are joy stealers. Some people think it makes them cool to not like what other people like. It doesn’t. You’re not edgy. You’re a grump.
2. Those who blame the nearest convenient scapegoat for a problem instead of bothering to understand the root of the problem and addressing that.
3. The Bean Soup — what about me-ism where people are having a conversation that doesn’t have anything to do with you and yet, you find a way to make it about you. 
4. Those that gain attention by putting others down or spreading gossip about them. 
5. Those who make excuses or refuse to do the work stuff — obligations and responsibilities, but jump right up when it seems fun or benefits them – Grandpa Joe

5 words that have gone obsolete but we still use them

1. You don’t rewind Netflix except you do. To move it back to a previous playing position. 
2. Clothes line — it’s a violent take down at the neck, but it’s born of those ropes that stretched across your Papa’s backyard. Does anyone line dry anything anymore?
3. Record or “tape” something. It’s how we save things for later, not how we hold things together.
4. Roll down the window — we don’t have hand cranks anymore but we all still roll the window down.
5. Rolodex – it’s your phone book

5 clever commercials with not so subtle messages

1. Google’s vanilla ice cream cones subbing for iPhones. Wow. Ouch. You calling Apple boring? 
2. IPhone “Friendship is a gift” commercial with the forest animals purporting their way through a TikTok on a stolen phone. 
3. Dr Pepper’s kids selling lemonade to raise money for NIL to recruit better players. “This guy’s not willing to do what it takes to win!” Ummmm. 
4. Barking at the boss — UGA – what’s the product? Allstate insurance wants to stop you from making bad choices.
5. Mac in Cheese is the best ever. Did we need a broke food reminder? You know the economy is bad when Kraft starts investing in.

5 great lines from The Princess Bride

1. No more rhymes now I mean it! Anybody want a peanut?
2. True love is the greatest. Except for a nice MLt, a mutton lettuce and tomato sandwich where the mutton is nice and lean, they’re so perky, love those.
3. Mawwage is what brings us together today. that blessed arrangement, that dream within a dream. 
4. Turns out your friend is just mostly dead. Mostly dead is still slightly alive. With all dead, there’s only one thing you can do: go through their pockets and look for loose change. 
5. Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya, you killed my father prepare to die.

5 great Tom Petty songs 

1. Yer so bad
2. Learning to Fly
3. American girl
4. Breakdown
5. I won’t back down

5 podcasts worth listening to this travel season

1. Let People Prosper – Dr. Vance Ginn, an economist out of Texas has guests and breaks down complex economic concepts like tariffs, the Federal Reserve, and corporate welfare.
2. We Made This Political — Lura Forcum and Lauren Hall are researchers and writers on politics and psychology and they break down the political landscape.
3. Frogmore Stew — democrats Grace and Katelyn are focused on South Carolina politics. I like Grace better, she’s more middle of the road,  but mostly I like that they focus on SC.
4. The Gray Area with Sean Illing — this is a philosophy podcast and they address everything from free will to doublespeak, mostly with interesting people who have just written books.
5. What Really Matters with Walter Russell Mead of the Hamilton Center at the University of Florida, it’s a good take on international politics based on his weekly column in Tablet magazine.

5 Christmas parade highlights from Irmo and Blythewood

1. Sparklers flares flames whatever you want to call them on the Irmo “best on show” entry
2. The JROTC units marching, specifically the Blythewood unit that was big and organized and marched well.
3. The dancers! From studios, school teams, and after school programs they kept spirits bright with cheers and tumbling – on the concrete! – and lots of jingle bells.
4. Marching bands! Parades are make for marching bands. The Dutch Fork band earned best performance on Saturday and the Blue Legion was great on Sunday in Blythewood.
5. Santa’s ass in the Blythewood parade. Out there on his mule and playing Santa because Santa is so, so busy this time of year and our pal Snuffy got into the spirit.

5 songs for your parade prep playlist

1. Jackson 5 Santa Claus is coming to town
2. Everybody’s waiting for the man with the bag – Darren Criss
3. It’s the most wonderful time of the year – Brett Eldridge 
4. Have a jolly jolly Christmas – Burl Ives
5. Christmas Can Can – straight no chaser

5 influencer jobs we’d like to have

1. Hotel bed tester – pillows. Blanket weight and warmth, noise levels, room darkness 
2. Scooter model reviewer — those riding chairs that people use in grocery stores, they need reviews and write ups. We could create that content.
3. Movie theater reviewer — what’s the sound like? The picture quality? The seats? How’s the staff? We could travel all over testing theaters.
4. Private jet tester – ride along, feel the buttery leather on the seats, share the behind the scenes of rich people lives. 
5. Five Star Resorts Amenities reviewed – not those all inclusive Spring Break things but the kind Ritz Carlton pays.

5 key elements of holiday rom coms

1. Music – all the holiday songs and if you can, a new one
2. Baggage – holiday related is best, but any baggage will do. Make it hard for the main character to change
3. Presents! Why set your rom com at a holiday if you don’t leverage the present-giving drama it provides?
4. Family — inevitably family messes things up, complicates things, or tells the truth the main character has been hiding. Bring the family in.
5. Holiday Traditions – stockings, trees, mistletoe, without the holiday tradition, the rom com could take place at any time of year, so work that tradition in.

5 stages of Washington Sunday night football

1. We’re still playing Marcus Mariota and no, Chris Collinsworth he’s not Japanese. But he is good for at least one turnover a game. Usually in Overtime.
2. We’ve held them to field goals. Twice. Then we scored a touch down This game might be competitive. 
3. Maybe Terry McLaurin’s comeback will be something. Like Miracle on 34th Street something. 
4. Have we ever stopped anyone on third down? Ever? Come on! If we’re gonna win this, you gotta get a stop.
5. Oh my gosh! We’re gonna win this! Despite Marcus Mariota’s bad decision making and our inability to stop anyone on third down, we’re somehow going to beat the 9-2 Broncos on Sunday night. Oh, wait. There it is. That OT loss that should have been confirmed before halftime so you could all get some sleep. 

5 things I’m grateful for this Thanksgiving

1. A few days off — though I don’t know that I’ve been so productive with them, it’s been nice to be home these three days and has me looking forward to the Christmas break.
2. The means to provide not one but two delicious meals for our family and friends on Thursday.
3. A supporting network that includes coaches — Josh, and cheerleaders — like Anna and Alexa, and compatriots like Geoff and Sara. And Kev, who is all three of those things.
4. For health and wellness, the ability to swim and run and be upright each day. To be able to pray and share joy with others. Blessed. So blessed.
5. My family. My sweet Hollie and bestie Charlie, were on an amazing journey together and I couldn’t ask for better companions.

5 things about the Afternoon Drive show takeover

1. Ed and David are two “opposing” viewpoints but were able to peacefully and amiably hold a conversation.
2. Listeners got to hear the full extent of the guest hosts’ perspectives, since sometimes when they call in, we only get a couple of minutes
3. They opened with global warming which probably shouldn’t have been the least contentious thing talked about — but it was.
4. Callers got to challenge the hosts but then got a swift but fair boot so we could get to more callers and the lines stayed full
5. David and Ed got a sense of what Kev (and others) deal with — specifically the restraint we practice, and the rest a break provides — which might give them more empathy for the host.

5 kinder, gentler football behaviors

We love a good sack and a straight arm Heisman move, but sometimes football could use a little more brotherly love and little less brotherly shove. So here are some ideas to soften the game:

1. More hugs, and not just when tackling but maybe after tackling, maybe in the huddle, maybe a hug is the penalty when a player roughs the passer
2. Hand up – help that player you tackled get up, slap his helmet or his rear end, all in good fellowship, maybe even throw him a compliment.
3. Let’s bring back the handshake line, hockey has kept the tradition, football could do it too
4. More dancing, celebrations are great but dancing could be a real add to the sport – the Savannah Bananas have had success with choreographed dance sequences, the NFL should consider them. 
5. Crowd participant selection. Choose some fan in the crowd and bring them down for a play. They should probably already have a jersey on and probably not be holding a beer.🍺 we suggest you put them on for the PAT but an onside kick might be fun too.

5 angels we think are doing really important work

• Texting and driving Angel – gets you to look up right before that texting really gets you in trouble
• Travel Angel – puts you in traffic or delays your flight when you need to be delayed; removes the line from TSA when you’re too late to make your plane
• Music Angel – the one that matches your specific memories to specific songs
• Friendship Angel – the one puts the right friends in your life at the right time. And whispers to those friends you’re away from that you’re thinking of them and loving them from afar.
• Field goal Angel – the one that makes sure your kicker makes it but the other team’s kicker doesn’t 

5 jobs I’d like to have when I retire

Everyone knows retirement is just a chance to pursue that career you always wanted:

1. Museum docent – learn about the displays, answer questions, talk with visitors; wander around cool quiet places in the summer time
2. Radio weather guy — keep an eye on the forecast, deliver a daily prediction that no one will hold you accountable to. Comin for Cal Moss’s job.
3. Mermaid – Sea World, Pirates Voyage, Ripley’s Believe it or Not,  whatever circus side show will have me. I’ll bring my own tail.
4. Golf course starter – sit in the cart and tell people when they can go. Might be warm out, but I’d probably get to play for free. 
5. US Senator — you know I’ll finally get elected and then just camp out there. Forever. Incumbent advantage + no term limits = forever.

5 things you can’t have ‘more’ of

WFMV – for more victory, but victory is the top, it’s the end, so how can you have more of it?

1. By that same token, defeat is defeat. There aren’t shades here. A loss is a loss. Dignity might have degrees, but a loss is a loss.
2. Peace – peace is just peace, you either have it or you don’t, you can’t more peace.
3. 2nd helpings — can’t have more or it would be third and fourth helpings. 
4. Guilt – you either are guilty or you’re not, there are no shades of guilt here. You might feel guilt in varying degrees – slightly, moderately, totally – but you ARE guilty only one way.
5. Time — it slips away so fast.

5 expectations fully met at the SCLP state convention

Liberty on the Coast was held over the weekend and this ain’t my first rodeo so I went in with some expectations and they were fully met. Here they are:

1. The free market party chafes at competition — ahead of the weekend, there were efforts to organize votes for specific officer roles. Just nominate and vote, why be subversive and politicky. But herding cats ain’t easy. 
2. The beach is depressing in the winter but we had the benefit of the tree lighting ceremony Saturday that made the location pretty vibrant and fun. 
3. Relationship building is front and center. We had karaoke on Friday and mimosa on Saturday morning and we swapped stories and shared photos and it becomes “that thing we did together” pretty quickly which is great.
4. We’re a little adult beverage-y. I can leave at that but maybe add that the group promotes freedom and recognizes the value of extending it to everyone.
5. Campaign caddie Charlie was a rock star. He had me set up and presentable, no lipstick on my teeth, and took all the pictures and packed up when it was over and never complained about the schedule or the work. I expected him to be a great partner but he exceeded even my expectations.

5 innovations I heard compete on Thursday

1. A new LinkedIn connection and winner of the Social Impact award at the Palmetto Pitch competition , Alejandra has a bandage that detects the enzymes present in a wound that is infected. The bandage alerts caregivers through a software platform so remote or telehealth providers can catch infection before it worsens and recommend treatment. This is especially impactful for our rural patients with amputations.
2. A soil monitoring device powered by solar panels shaped liked leaves that transmits data back to the farmer informing them of everything from moisture to alkalinity. More software to help 23,000 farms in South Carolina keep track of their far-flung fields.
3. An updated NG tube – nasal gastric tubes are used to relieve pressure in a patient’s abdomen and deliver nutrition, specifically patients who can’t swallow or have intestinal issues. When it’s kids, they can’t play, can’t hang with friends, can’t really have a normal kid experience because the tubes, when not in use, are stuck with tape to their cheeks. The students who addressed this issue invented a detachable external piece, so the tube is stored when not in use like a nose ring, not easily dislodged, and the detachable part is assembled when the tube is in use.  This is a quality of life solution for sick kids. 
4. At the InnoVision awards last night, a former student, Jordan Fowler, who started a hedge fund in high school, and is CEO of Shaw Circle, a Charleston based investment firm, won an award for applied technology for the work Shaw Circle is doing using quantum computing to bring better insights to investors. They’re so smart. It’s incredible what they’re doing. 
5. Finally, Shrihan Ganesh Babu competed for USC at Clemson and then won the InnoVision award for technology innovation for CuffWay, a product that improves the health outcomes for patients who are intubated. He’s an EMT, has been since high school, and started on the CuffWay product way back then (3 years ago).

5 rejected candy names

1. Lip smacking Goo bombs – Milky Way
2. Red wax straws —  Twizzlers
3. Rabbit Droppings – Raisenets
4. Mint pucks — York Peppermints Patties
5. Nut Jobs — Payday

5 best things about fall

1. Cooler weather — long sleeve shirts under t-shirts, light weight jackets, Ugg boots, and all the festivals and 5ks that take advantage of the cooler sunshine-filled days 
2. Changing leaves — gorgeous Upstate rainbows of deciduous trees viewed from the upper deck at Death Valley
3. Holidays! Halloween and Thanksgiving sandwich a few weeks of candy gluttony and turkey anticipation
4. Football! Even if a five game losing streak is your current skid, maybe, just maybe you’ll get a big win somewhere and feel renewed.
5. Pumpkin spice everything. Lattes, cookies, muffins, pumpkin-flavored-candy-coated-almonds? Yes, please.  It might make me basic, it’s not like I’m wearing LuLu Lemon leggings or anything, but I’m here for the pumpkin spice.

5 things Kev’s coworkers say about Kev

1. Never get in his way at a buffet table, you’re likely to lose a limb
2. He’s a control freak but a great friend to have
3. He’s here at the station so much that Keven Cohen IS the Point.
4. Keven gets animated when he gets the opportunity to help someone and his promises are bankable.
5. Keven is the most loving person you’ll ever know. He lives his work, loves his friends, love the point family and loves his actual family. 

5 problems unique to these streaming times

1. Contract disputes removing ESPN and ABC from You Tube TV delaying Hollie’s access to Dancing with the stars
2. Paying for the Disney+ bundle that includes Hulu and ESPN Unlimited even though ESPN Unlimited is not ESPN. 
3. Trying to find the random channel broadcasting your NFL game. Is it Prime? Is it NBC? Where for art thou, Jayden Daniels? 
4. The precarious mix of live TV and pre-recorded TV. What can you binge? What must be watched at the specific time? And how are you supposed to know?
5. Paying for services and still sitting through ads. Come on, man, the subscription fee is the price I pay so your advertisers don’t get my time! 

5 challenges presented by Daylight Savings

1. Thinking you overslept. If you’re used to getting up when it’s dark and today it’s not, you might be panicking a little bit.
2. Thinking you’re late, if you arrive at work before the Sun and today it was high in the sky when you made your commute, you might be panicking.
3. People who don’t change their clocks. They showed up early on Sunday, and maybe you weren’t ready for them or their bewildered expressions.
4. Thinking it’s later than it is. If you typically ride home at sunset, yesterday’s midnight black commute probably depresses you a little.
5. Going to bed too early. At 8:30 last night we all felt like it was almost 10 and we turned in around 9:15 which felt like staying up late. 

5 thoughts on the end of high school marching band

The SCBDA had this prepared statement at the competition Saturday about all the work and the payoff that marching band gives young people. Got me thinking.

1. Early mornings and late nights are over! For now. HB put in a 23 hour day Saturday! 
2. The commitment is real: two hour class every day, rehearsal every night except Wednesday, Friday football games and Saturday competitions. It’s like 60-hours a week 
3. the music is a celebration! So much fun to learn these tunes and build out these shows. The artistry and creativity are awesome.
4. The self discipline and personal accountability are skills HB will have forever because band required them of her. Part of something bigger than herself, leadership and followership sometimes in the same ten minutes.
5. She cried when it was over. What a gift! To have had the kind of experience that you’re so sad when it’s over. So blessed!

5 last minute Halloween costumes

1. Disgraced Prince: you can wear regular clothes and hold a sign saying, “Will Act Royal for Food”
2. Furloughed government employee — sweat pants and a cup of made-at-home drip coffee
3. 6/7 — black sweatshirt (a nod to the depth of the Internet) with a paper 6 on the front and a paper 7 on the back.
4. A college football coach — wear your team’s favorite branding, carry a laminated map (can buy at the Circle K) and have a sign saying, “Will Coach for food”
5. French jewel thief — black and white outfit and white face paint like a mime, beret if you have one, and a big gaudy diamond necklace (can be fake), may want to throw in the handcuffs

5 ways to win Halloween in your neighborhood

1. Have spooky decorations like the purple lights and black spiders on our neighbors’ walls
2. Have good candy like Butterfingers, Twix, Snickers, or Reece’s cups
3. Have music or spooky sounds that announce the experience
4. Have cocktails for the parents — shots in tiny plastic cups — some spooky color like blood red or black.
5. Be done by 8. Lights out so the parents can go home, sift candy looking for razors, and levy their candy tax. Then jammy up and watch a scary movie.

5 ways to recover from MNF

I checked the schedule and the next three games are at 8:30, 4:25, and 9:30 am and realize football has changed for the foreseeable future. Maybe that will change our fate?

1. Sleep in. Got up at 5:30 this morning instead of 4. An extra hour of football- free sleep.
2. Have a delicious beverage. Cappuccino or latte. No liquor, as much as you may be tempted.
3. Play one of those sad football songs from yesterday’s Top 5.
4. Call your mom. Even if she is a Chiefs fan. Tell her congratulations and it was a good game.
5. Celebrate a birthday with your radio bestie. Where’s the cake?

5 hair band songs that describe this football season

1. Every Rose has its Thorn
2. Highway to Hell
3. Same Ol Situation
4. Don’t know whatcha got till it’s gone
5. Livin on a Prayer

5 best Weird Al songs

1. The Saga Begins
2. Amish Paradise
3. Mission Statement
4. Party in the CIA
5. Word Crimes

5 housewarming gifts for Kev

Honorable mention to those command strip photo frame hangers. They’re pricey!

1. A year’s supply of paper towels. You can put them on Amazon autofill if you want. They’re the thing you underestimate how many you’ll need.
2. Two bottles of pet stain carpet cleaner — it’s a new place for Fin and Adrien, too, they may need some grace and some stain remover.
3. Plants to take advantage of all those new windows and natural light — especially until the blinds are put in.
4. Flight Deck restaurant gift certificates for those nights Kev and Laney are too tired to cook. Maybe not from moving in, but whatever.
5. A massage gift certificate to Spa MD for Laney. Kev wouldn’t use it but Laney will probably be driven crazy today and need some time to decompress.

5 sniglets for midlife 

Charlie’s classic is Fuzz Pacing which is when all the traffic is driving the same speed as the law enforcement vehicle right in the middle of the pack.

1. Plansipation – sense of relief you feel when plans are canceled and you get to stay home. May induce a Couchquake – a sudden involuntary body shudder of joy when you learn you don’t have to leave the couch after all.
2. Follicollusion – follicle malappropriation when the hair on your eyebrows, or your nose or your ear outpaces the hair on your head
3. Yawnpathy – the agreement among adults that no concert is worth being tired tomorrow: runner up “dozeappointment” the regret you feel after falling asleep before halftime
4. Grup – the grunt you make when you stand up from the couch, getting out of the car, the restaurant booth scoot and grup
5. Beenjuries — I’ve been doing something and I’ve been injured: could be anything, walking to the mailbox and pull a hammy, brush your teeth and pinch a nerve, who knows

5 reasons there’s a corn dog shortage in Columbia

1. Lumber tariffs on Canada have created a stick shortage
2. The South Carolina State Fair mafia have bribed grocery stores into keeping them off the shelves. Bribes included ride and parking passes.
3. Government shutdown has stopped the corn subsidies and the farms responsible for cornbread are not producing as much.
4. Corn dog vendors at the State Fair have cleaned out our inventory to supply their corn dog sales. A footlong is two corn dogs, dipped in a second helping of batter.
5. Locals inspired by their State Fair visits have decided to buy boxes of corn dogs and continue the party at home. The inspiration may have been “$9 for one? I can buy a whole box at Kroger for that!”

5 best Kiss songs

In honor of Ace Frehley who passed yesterday, I give you top 5 Kiss songs:

1. Detroit Rock City
2. Lick it Up
3. Shout it Out Loud
4. Beth
5. Rock and Roll All Nite

5 weekday alliterations to plan your week by

1. Margarita Monday – ole’!
2. Taco Tuesday — old El Paso? So senor!
3. Wine Down Wednesday — Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio, have whatever flavor you need. But stop at one bottle or Thursday might be tough.
4. Thirsty Thursday — this is why the Fireflies offered beer specials on Thursday. Get your fill. Rehydrate while you dehydrate.
5. Fried food Friday — French fries, tater tots, chicken tenders, Oreos, corn dogs, funnel cakes if it’s fried, make it happen.

Don’t forget your local restaurants are available and willing to accommodate! Even while the fair is in town!

5 reasons MNF is the worst

1. Starts too late. 8 pm? that’s almost bed time! And the gap between work and game time is stupid.
2. Two games? We couldn’t focus on two games last night! The Bills tanked, but we barely saw it during the commercial breaks.
3. Three turnovers? I know that’s not always MNF but apparently it’s how Washington does it.
4. Troy Aikman. Come on man. More than once he talked about how a play could have gone further if only … we’re not in the game of could have man. Retire already.
5. Joe Buck. If the Phillies had stayed in the playoffs would Joe Buck have been doing baseball last night? Maybe. But he was with Troy wearing me out. And he can Joe Buck anyone but he could t Joe Buck the Bears kicker? Come on.

5 things you learn at your 30th reunion

1. Everyone is fat. At our 20th we cared. No so much anymore.
2. There are some things you’re doing that will surprise folks: running for Senate, for example, or being on the radio.
3. There are some things you’re doing that will not surprise anyone. For example: morning swims, living in South Carolina.
4. There are still some people you don’t want to be friends with. And that’s okay.
5. The further you get from high school, the better it was. After 20 years there were still some scars but after 30, it’s all funny.

5 things we’re looking forward to at the State Fair

1. A fried preservative-filled dessert (Twinkie, Oreo, etc); also turkey legs, funnel cake, and other things we ought not to tell Sono Bello about
2. Playing carnival games we can’t win. They’re not fair.
3. The Gravitron – that human centrifuge, preferably before the dessert eating.
4. Animals! The elephants, the ponies, the hogs. Can’t wait to absorb those stinks and drive our doges crazy when we get home.
5. Beating Rick Henry in the boiled peanut eating contest. Thanks to Bill Shanahan and the Lexington Blowfish for inviting me.

5 ways Trevor Lawrence celebrated his birthday yesterday

Probably with Snuggles with his baby girl Shae Lynn. Probably not after the game, but at some time during the day. But last night, it was all gridiron work:

1. TD pass to Parker Washington in the 2nd quarter
2. 10-yd TD run in the third quarter
3. Pick Six in the third quarter — Trevor sun even on the field but this is a good birthday present from his defense.
4. Cam Little field goal in the 4th and a final, game winning 1 yd TD run with :23 left to play. 
5. Beating the Kansas City Chiefs 31-28 and indicating the Jaguars might have finally gotten their stuff together to actually be a good team. Congrats, Trevor, and Happy Birthday.

5 words used in football that we all act like we know what they mean

1. “Range-y-ness” or the characteristic of having range, players with skills across multiple positions
2. “Firm on the front side” — Tom Brady was talking about not going backwards, especially when you’re at 1st and goal. I think this phrase is silly because of course the o-line is trying to stay firm. 
3. “Quick” have you ever heard a player called “quick” — not fast, because that’s about running, but quick is about running, too, kind of. It’s about the player’s ability to react but it’s basically a better compliment than “he’s good.” How many ways can we say he’s good?
4. Clock management — you can’t manage a clock, typically, but in football you can stop it or let it run and teams that make good use of the time allocated are said to have good clock management.
5. “Trickeration” – a noun meaning the use of trick plays; there’s already a noun for this, it’s Trickery, but apparently not sufficient. So trickeration it is.

5 kinds of showgirls 

In honor of TayTay’s Life of a Showgirl album drop today

1. Vegas Showgirls – skimpy costumes and elaborate headdresses, posture is everything. Marilyn Monroe was a Vegas Showgirl.
2. Broadway Showgirls – same show every day and twice on the weekends, remembering to make it new each time because someone in the audience is seeing it for the first time. Josephine Baker was an original Broadway showgirl.
3. Talent show girls — a little bit of every kind of girl here: baton twirler, tap dancer, piano player. Jennifer Hudson, Christina Aguilera, and Britney Spears were all discovered in talent shows.
4. TV Show girls – from Chrissy Snow to Rachel Green, TV shows let our stars be someone else, someone we know and adore. Maybe we even like their character better than them.
5. BIG Show girls – Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Amelia Earhart, Eleanor Roosevelt, Lucille Ball, Taylor Swift. Women who rise to the occasion, who fulfill their full potential. Who become legendary through sheer will. Congratulations to Taylor for her 12th studio album.

5 things that make you feel better about yourself 

People of WalMart memes; also maybe State Fair Photo Booth Christmas cards 

1. Jerry Springer show baby mamas and DNA dads; likely the same people who put Mountain Dew into a sippy cup for a toddler at the State Fair
2. TSA checkpoint newbies also maybe Wheel of Fortune contestants
3. People’s Court and/or Judge Judy’s plaintiffs and dependents
4. Starbucks Baristas going on strike because they only got two free black shirts for their new uniforms
5. Squabbling congressmen who can’t and won’t do their jobs. Buncha babies.

5 game changing movies

1. Industry impact, societal impact
2. Jaws – first summer blockbuster
3. Jurassic Park – first CGI enabled film
4. Rocky – people quit smoking, 

5 good reasons to shut down the government

1. Natural disaster – hurricane, earthquake, Cowboys Super Bowl win. 
2. Alien invasion — go home and be with your families. Then figure out how to speak Martian.
3. Apocalypse — essential personnel only, military, janitorial staff, everyone else should take up arms and defend their homestead
4. Revolution. We’re just sick of it. All the squabbling and the failing to do their jobs. We just fire them all and start over. Clean slate. Let the people rule. No?
5. How about this: Republicans and Democrats are locked in a theatrical standoff. playing fast and loose with government services and people’s livelihoods. All so they can look strong when really? They’re just making nonsense.

5 ways football teams fake you out

Don’t bother listening to sports analysts predict games. It’s all fuel for the fake out.

1. Bye Week Bluff — we had extra time, we worked hard on specific things, we’re going to right the ship. Clemson is 1-3 after a bye week since 2022.
2. Comparison — “if Carolina held Atlanta scoreless, Washington’s defense should have no problem.” 34 points.
3. Turnovers — four turnovers? Really Kentucky? I mean one you can recover from, two you can maybe make it work but four?
4. Overachieving — when your back up QB scores 41 points, you think he can get the job done. And then …  2 TDs and an INT
5. Kicking game. Punts. Field goals. On side kicks. All the kicks. Unpredictable is being kind. Annoyingly risky is more like it.

5 good reasons to bring 800 high ranking military officials into one room with a week’s notice

1. Everyone needs to sign the Commander in Chief’s birthday card and inter office mail can’t be trusted
2. It’s We Are the World 2025 edition and they’ll be joined by top recording artists like Carrie Underwood, Miley Cyrus, and Keith Urban.
3. Parker Brothers is issuing a new version of Battleship and we’re testing it with real warriors to figure out how accurate it is.
4. It’s the last chance to see Downton Abbey’s film before it leaves theaters and the Department of War wants to make sure the people who need to know know how the series turned out.
5. Hegseth heard that his counterpart in China held a similar meeting with half the people and double the notice so he said, “Hold my beer.”

5 reasons to go to college

A residential, 4-year bachelor’s degree is expensive and falling out of fashion. But don’t give up on it just yet.

1. Get away from home — it’s a safe move out; everyone on campus wants you to be successful and you’ll never have that anywhere else.
2. Get discipline knowledge — in your chosen field, learn the foundational thought and theory that informs the work you hope to do.
3. Get access to scholars and visiting professionals — guests and awardees and even the faculty you get access to are experts with experience that will help you get a broad exposure to topics and ideas.
4. Make lifelong friends — the people you’ll show up for to weddings and baby showers just not during football season. 
5. Be part of something bigger than yourself — whether it’s a football game or the alumni network, our college connections are a broad and wide advantage in your career and in life.

5 Tuesday two-fers that ought to happen

1. Taco Tuesday – Two Tacos for $2
2. Tuesday double feature — two movies for the price of one
3. Half price — or two for the price of one — wine bottles with purchase of a meal
4. Two dozen donuts 🍩 in two dozen flavors
5. Two for Tuesday domestic draft beers – they’re $1 a piece 

5 teams I will now be cheering for since Clemson is terrible

1. Phillies — usually I don’t pay attention to baseball that runs this deep into football season, but, sure, why not?
2. Navy — I always cheer for Navy but now they’re 3-0 and are real contenders for my favorite team. Especially because they didn’t play yesterday so …
3. Clemson soccer — they’re 4-2-2 and 2-0-1 in ACC play. Good things on the horizon for the tigers. While we’re out there recognizing there are other sports besides football, maybe we take a look at soccer. Maybe.
4. Washington Capitals – NHL preseason underway right now. Regular season isn’t until October, but might as well get to know the team now. 
5. Of course anyone playing Carolina. It’s never hard to cheer for tigers of any kind and Carolina plays three teams of tigers. This weekend Missouri took care of business, October 11th LSU will take up the fight. Between now and then, Kentucky Wildcats which aren’t Tigers but might as well be.

5 great songs about pirates

1. Drunken Sailor — this is a kids song
2. Yo Ho Yo Ho a Pirate’s Life for Me
3. Pirate Flag by Kenny Chesney
4. A Pirate Looks at 40 by Jimmy Buffet 
5. He’s a Pirate from Pirates of the  Caribbean 

5 ways I’m still useful to Hollie

It’s not getting out of traffic tickets but I do have my uses. Here are a few from Tuesday:

1. Buy stuff — I paid for the graduation regalia yesterday. Cap, gown, tassel. Sigh.
2. Listen — over chips and salsa she spilled the tea on marching band politics, student council’s battle of the axe 🪓 efforts and I sipped my margarita and listened 
3. Pick up prescriptions — sat at Walgreen’s drive thru for ten minutes before guessing maybe they couldn’t see my little car. I get the alerts, I pick up the drugs. 
4. Put money in her account — so she can put gas in her Jeep. We’ve graduated from me having to follow her to the gas station and pay at the pump. 
5. Kill bugs. She tries, she does, and we’re not shrieking anymore, it’s a very calm, “Mom can you come up here please?” Nevertheless, find and kill the bug is mom’s job. Still.

5 lessons from Darla Moore (2025 edition)

1. Higher education has a cost problem – people see the sticker price and don’t think it’s worth the price. Higher Ed is bloated, the operating costs are staggering and unsustainable. 
2. Higher education has a reputation problem — this actually benefits USC because it’s mostly the elite universities suffering from a bad reputation meanwhile we can lure all those good applicants who may have aimed elsewhere before the recent reputation crisis.
3. Higher Ed has a relevance problem. What are we offering that is actually relevant to the current or modern workforce? We need to see the gaps and fill them, not hang on to legacy programs that aren’t relevant.
4. We need to be AI everything, teaching our people the skills they need not just in the discipline but in managing AI platforms that will complete tasks humans used to do. So they need to know What the tasks are and oversee the performance of AI but also need to know how to craft prompts and questions to get the most out of AI. It should be part of every class.
5. The need for resilience and adaptability cannot be overstated. The world is changing MUCH faster than academia can respond to. Students must be able to adapt and they must be resilient in the face of these challenges. Those are skills that can be taught and should be taught and coached.

5 road trip wins

1. Windshield time – that quiet alone time that is conducive to thinking and pondering and working on big complicated stuff you can’t think about just on regular short burst drives.
2. Podcasts — catch up on episodes or listen to some big idea podcasts to encourage deep thought and contemplation
3. Audio books — make progress on some texts I haven’t had a chance to sit and read, more big ideas and deep thoughts. 
4. Different bed, different shower — makes you grateful for your own bed and your own shower. 
5. Strangers — new people, new faces, and learning new places. No purpose in the introductions just conversation. 

5 reasons Thursday night football is the worst

1. It’s a short week for the team. We played Sunday and then flew to Green Bay a couple days later. There’s no chance to watch film or self correct before having to get back at it on Thursday. I can’t blame the loss on that, Green Bay’s defense is really good and our offense couldn’t compete. But it’s still a quick turnaround.
2. It’s always a night game. Eight pm! That’s too late for a coin toss. Doesn’t end till almost midnight? Ridiculous.  Only west coast teams should play that late.
3. Makes for early mornings. If you’re normally in bed by 10 and asleep by 10:05 (like me) then that 4:30 awake time comes way too early with a 11 pm sleepytime.
4. Early morning means limited drinks. Normally in a loss like that, I’d be self soothing with yummy shots that leave me bleary eyed but the early wake up meant I watched that sadness sober. Thanks a lot Thursday. 
5. There’s nothing to look forward to on Sunday. Might as well just drive home from West Virginia listening to audio books. Sigh.

5 solutions for seasonal allergy sinus issues

1. Drugs – Sudafed, Zyrtec, whatever over the counter thing you can get while still having to show your drivers license
2. Clear Out Your Head — a concoction of powders and herbs you hang in your shower and steam the snot out. Thank you, Tzima.
3. Hall’s menthalyptus — not candy but the suck-on-them remedy for congestion, also soothes a sore throat
4. Flonase — the prescription nasal spray to coat the inside of your nostrils so those pesky allergens never even get to you. 
5. Stay home — the better way to prevent them from getting to you; just be sure you take off your shoes before entering, change out your filters, run an air purifier, and keep the windows closed.. hibernate. Basically hibernate.

5 GenX phrases that you just don’t really hear anymore

1. Cool Beans — I’m not sure where this came from but it probably wasn’t Blazing Saddles
2. Rad — which should stand for radical as in unconventional or disruptive, but actually just subbed for “cool”
3. Talk to the hand — a sign of disrespect, a way of dismissing someone, and it turns out, more aggressive than we ever really thought 
4. Homey Don’t Play Dat — a refusal to engage, a refusal to participate in foolishness.
5. All that and a bag of chips — meaning you’re extra

5 things we all think we’re experts in but we’re not

1. Psychology – everyone can trace their current emotional hangups on their childhood trauma. Thank you, internet psych influencers.
2. Traffic – wherever you live you know traffic and if it doesn’t seem like there’s much traffic here, that’s because you used to live somewhere with crazy bad traffic. Doesn’t mean we leave earlier or drive with more caution, but we all think we know traffic.
3. Films – we know better than the Oscars, the Golden Globes, even Sundance what makes a good film. We watched Parasite last not, Oscar winner, and all kind of shrugged.
4. Parenting – we may just be doing the best we can but we all have a bar, at least I never (insert your mom’s sin here) gave Hollie soda in her sippy cup. Licked my thumb and wiped her face.
5. Football – armchair quarterbacking is a real thing. We all do it. We all know what should have happened. We all know what the coaches should have done. What call should have been made.

5 animals worth celebrating on National Wildlife Day (next year)

1. Elephants – how cool are elephants? Can any other creature get away with being that big, slow, and dopey looking? And just not care? Love it.
2. Manatees — maybe the elephants of the sea? I know Kev and Laney love them some manatees, and aren’t they just the sweetest?
3. Red Wolves – did you know they were extinct in the wild in 1980? But through intentional efforts, conservationists reintroduced them in 1987. There are now fewer than 25 roaming North Carolina and their habitat is shrinking.
4. Sharks — Jaws week, whatcha gonna do? Gotta remind people that sharks aren’t actually predators.
5. Monarch Butterflies — one of North America’s most iconic species, they make a multi generational 3,000 mile migration traveling each fall to Mexico and then back to Canada in the spring. There’s been recognition of their declining population – up to 90 percent in recent decades. 

5 songs about work

Honorable mention to “Working Man” from Rush

1. Allentown
2. Working 9 to 5
3. Working for the Weekend
4. I don’t wanna work
5. Livin on a Prayer

5 great things about being back at Clemson

1. Meeting someone who had never been to Clemson and hearing how impressed they were with the fans, the place, and the unique opportunity of a BIG game at Death Valley,
2. The view from the Upper Deck concourse overlooking the vast west side of campus athletic fields and the lake beyond and a beautiful sky.
3. The view from the Upper Deck in the stands – Tigers in script, the drone show, the stadium being full, the 4th qtr video, all the things.
4. Tailgating with family, fried chicken and brownies. 
5. The pre game concert by Tiger Band in the amphitheater, the twirlers (Sophia and the Fire!), the dancers. Being there with Hollie — who insisted we hike from Uncle Wesley’s tailgate and make it on time. Running across campus to get to class will not be a problem for her.

5 name brands that were verbed

And yes we just verbed verb

Honorable mention to Photoshop catch-all term for any alterations of images.

1. FedEx — some people ship stuff but in our Joe Gibbs Racing house, we FedEx things
2. Velcro — fastener for shoes and straps of all kinds. Who doesn’t love a good Velcro 
3. Zoom — this is the general term for all video conferencing regardless of Microsoft’s power play.
4. Google — H pointed out that in a recent Google ad, Google themselves don’t use the verb, they say, “ask Google” which is dumb. No one talks like that, Gemini.
5. Xerox — it means to make a copy but it’s the brand name of the printer company that made the copier machines.

5 great things about college football coming back

1. Budweiser and fried chicken is considered an appropriate breakfast on Saturday morning.
2. Reacquaint yourself with those folks you only see six times a year – your season ticket neighbors. 
3. There’s nothing better than a two minute game-winning drive. 
4. The marching band’s background hum, a soundtrack you only get with college football. 
5. It’s a different kind of opposing camps. No one’s asking who you voted for, just who you pull for. Happier rivalries. Mostly.

5 things you can expect this fall now that Taylor and Travis are getting married 

Maybe we can all start believing that Joy is an infinite resource. It renews when we share it.

1. Football season will once again be full of whiney babies complaining that Taylor got :06 of air time during a Chiefs game. Only now maybe the glint off her ring will temporarily blind them. And it will be officially true (not just anecdotally true) that friends don’t let friends get married during football season.
2. Invitations will be like Wonka golden tickets with recipients waving them in front of social media post cameras indicating everything from “I’m chosen” to “you’re not.” Expect fakes and a creepy Slugworth-like dude offering invites to would-bes.
3. Brands everywhere will be claiming to be official selections for the power couple’s fairytale wedding: shoes, dresses, flowers, liquor, snacks, transportation, music — all the brands will be Taylor or Travis’s picks.
4. Tough guys have permission to gush over the super cool women in their lives, it’s always been the classy thing to do but now a big time Alpha male is modeling the behavior.
5. We have a neutral topic for upcoming family holiday gatherings. Who doesn’t love a love story? 

5 characters we never see on screen

Honorable mention to Charlie from Charlie’s Angels.

1. Ugly Naked Guy from Friends – the peeping Toms of Monica’s apartment all get their fill of this dude and any of his naked visitors from across the alley. Until Ross moves into that apartment which has already been established as visible.
2. Maris – the ever suffering mouse of a wife from Frasier. The reason she’s hidden? No one can be as frail and yet overly treated through the miracles of science as Maris. 
3. Howard’s mom – the shrieky needy New Yorker from Big Bang Theory. The reason she’s hidden? NO one could live up to the wild things that character says. 
4. Wilson from Home Improvement – he’s the fence-faced neighbor that always talks Tim off the ledge. The reason he’s hidden? Just comedy — all the ways they find to keep his face obscured 
5. Charlie Brown’s parents — the mumbling distortion of adult-speak has become a cultural icon. The reason they’re hidden? They’re not the focus of the story. For once.

5 best concerts I’ve ever seen

1. Mumford and Sons — Charleston was good but Charlotte was better
2. Maroon 5 and Kelly Clarkson — also in Charlotte, such a great show
3. Tom Petty on the Wildflowers tour in 1995 at the Patriot Center in Northern Virginia 
4. U2 Zoo TV in 1993 was amazing and the Pop Mart Tour was cool at Death Valley but the 2017 30th anniversary of the Joshua Tree was the best I’ve ever seen.
5. Counting Crows at Red Rocks. Everything is better when Charlie is part of it.

5 ways to be a great campaign caddie

1. Show up early and be willing to run errands – Charlie went to Lowe’s while we were on the air with Write On SC and bought bungee cords for my banner and weights for the tent.
2. Prompt and prod the conversation back toward your candidate’s stances on the issues. Like teeing up a monologue, it’s a great conversation skill.
3. Keep track of the candidates hygiene, I shook hands with a candidate who had lipstick in her teeth, campaign caddie fail. 
4. Set up the table, pack up the table, carry stuff in, carry stuff out. Know how things go without needing direction.
5. Be a super handsome contributor to any conversation and a great sense of humor for the whole experience. 

5 things the US has over England

In Downton Abbey, Maggie Smith says she loves spending time with Americans because it reminds her of the value of the English. So this top 5 is a reminder that we’re actually better than England at least in these five ways.

1. Football — 🏈 American football with hard tackles and all the math and no roving gangs of hooligan fans. Except in Philadelphia.
2. A clear distinction between potato chips and fries. 🍟 let’s be clear about how we’re treating our potatoes, shall we? Same with cookies and biscuits. Sheesh.
3. Uber. Lyft. A free market for public transportation. Oh, sure there’s the New York subway and the L in Chicago, but London has a government protected union that keeps cabbies in business and keeps Uber out. Booo.
4. Free speech — England has been arresting and jailing people for what they say on social media. Jail for speech? Not in America.
5. They drive on the wrong side of the road. This is a risk to everyone else on the planet because we’re all on the right side. Everyone else.  Except England. Take a hint, weirdos.

5 first day worries

I know a lot of other people already went back but these are the worries I’m taking into my first day:

1. All my jokes will fall flat — first day is about intros and I establish rapport with some dialogue which is often jokes. Sometimes they’re funny.
2. My syllabi are wrong or something has a contradiction — inevitably there’s a deadline or value on the syllabus which is not the same on the assignment in the classroom.
3. The tech won’t work in the classroom, pulling up the website, logging in, any thing I need the computer for.
4. I didn’t pack enough food to get through the day. Breakfast, lunch, afternoon snack, gotta get through the day somehow.
5. I’ll get a parking ticket. My new pass is in my on campus mailbox. I have a temporary pass but it expired on 8/18. I guess they figured I should have been on campus Monday to get my new pass. We’ll see.

5 reasons I bought a lottery ticket Saturday

1. Stopped for gas and the CircleK screen advertised the jackpot at $525M. I’m very susceptible to marketing.
2. I had cash in my wallet. I don’t usually but someone gave me a $20 after I covered a tab.
3. Talking about winning is a fun pastime. It’s a fantasy game. We like to fantasize about everything from paying off the car to paying off Hollie’s college.
4. You can’t win if you don’t play. It’s a volunteer tax I’m willing to pay.
5. I’m running for office and my opponent has a $15M war chest. I gotta raise some money.

5 best songs from the first 5 albums

Some people may be surprised this is Taylor’s 12th album. You might love them all but here’s a just 5 songs to take a listen to.

1. Taylor Swift – 2006 – Should Have Said No; but I like Our Song and teardrops on my guitar
2. Fearless – 2008 – You Belong With Me
3. Speak Now – 2010 – Back to December
4. Red – 2012 – State of Grace (HB) but All Too Well original is here too
5. 1989 – 2014 – New Romantics on the Deluxe Edition but Shake it Off, Blank Space, Style? I mean it’s a masterpiece in its original state. I’ll pick Wildest Dreams.

5 rejected names for the Fireflies

Many people are unaware but the Fireflies had several possible mascots before deciding on Mason and the fireflies. Here are some of the rejects:

1. Columbia Potholes — as a nod to our roads and the preservation of the grand tradition of not fixing them.
2. Columbia Swamp Rats — the Upstate has the Swamp Rabbit trail and the PeeDee has the Swamp Fox Francis Marion. In Columbia we have rats. Real and figurative.
3. Columbia Stars for the State House stars marking the places the bombs hit the building during the war of north aggression.
4. Columbia Blue Wrens — the state bird and the fact we’re the only Blue county in the state.
5. Columbia Red Flags — a nod to our heritage? Or an admission that perhaps people ought to know better.

5 great shows that’ll have you thinking in a British accent

Honorable mention to game of Thrones.

1. Grand Tour — was Top Gear — there’s 328 episodes of that show. Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May with repeating gags like The Stig and the celebrity in a tiny car.
2. Downtown Abbey — there’s a new movie coming out and there are like 10 seasons so get on that binge watch so you’re all caught up.
3. Outlander — despite the Scottish accents leaking in, the British accent of the main character Claire and the voiceover, it’s enough. 
4. Bridgerton — this is a binge show. Watch the entire season in one day and you’ll be using not just British vocabulary but also vaguely posh like Julie Andrews — whose voiceover for lady Whistledown is charming.
5. Ted Lasso — it’s an American in London and the language is fantastic. You’ll go to bed dreaming in British accents. 

5 questions I have after watching the DCI finals performance of the Blue Stars

1. How many hours did they rehearse to get the precision they have in the performance?
   1. — answer: hundreds
2. Who designs these drum corps performances and what qualifications do those designers have?
   1. — answer: professional marching band show designers (yes, it’s a thing)
3. How do they fund these teams? Uniforms, travel, food, equipment all without sponsors?
   1. — answer: the performers pay to participate, about $6000 per member
4. What is the future for these performers? Other than looking back on their glory days in Drum Corps and wondering why life ever since has been a tremendous disappointment?
   1. — answer: many of them are music majors planning to go on to teaching music and perpetuating the DCI tradition by sharing YouTube videos with their high school marching band students
5. What’s with the mustache? Our nephew, Hollie’s cousin, Chase, is a baritone player and he had the solo in the Blue Stars show, his third and final season — they age out — and he was awesome, played The Winner Takes it All (yes, ABBA) in the show called “Spectator Sports” which struck me as the greatest irony to have band kids performing a show about athletes. And in his close up, Chase was rocking a full blonde stache. Which was our primary response to Charlie’s sister Caroline when she asked us what we thought of the show.

5 television theme songs that live between afternoon cartoons and nightly news

Honorable mention to Laverne and Shirley

1. The Jeffersons 
2. Three’s Company
3. WKRP in Cincinnati
4. Taxi
5. M.A.S.H. 

5 pieces of advice to Hollie as she starts her senior year

1. Friends matter but these aren’t the only ones you’ll ever have. So don’t compromise to keep them.
2. It’s okay to be challenged. You might be almost done here but you’ve still got work to do. Face it and master it even if it means working harder than you want to.
3. You can’t and won’t do this alone. Look people in the eye and thank them for helping you. Your teachers, safety officers, custodial staff, they are caring for YOU. Thank them.
4. Help others. You were a freshman once. You were a newbie, a rookie, you struggled and someone helped you. Give a kind word, encouragement, or even just a smile. Be a person they can look up to.
5. Look around. Life moves pretty fast and before you blink this year, too, will be gone. Be in the moment and enjoy the memories while you’re making them. They’ll last longer that way.

5 indications I was adulting HARD this weekend

1. I interviewed a weight loss menopause coach and decided the money was better spent on Hollie’s Future Scholar account.
2. Sunday morning I spent three hours with HB looking up scholarships for the spreadsheet. Then I baked banana bread, went to the grocery store, and made dinner for the family.
3. Friday night we ate Forest to Table and didn’t even tell the restaurant that ducks don’t live in the forest. Nor do lambs. We just ordered and ate.  Like grown ups.
4. I volunteered for an event next weekend and paid a bill that wasn’t due until Thursday.
5. Had tickets to a Mumford and Sons show in the rain and sold them. 

5 surprise delights from the weekend

1. Got my new MacBook from the Moore School on Friday. It’s sleek and fast and fun. Can’t use it for campaign stuff, but everything else is a go.
2. The Hollow – Forest to table is a weird concept restaurant but the food was great and even though my reservation was for Saturday, they seated us and fed us. 
3. Saturday morning at the 50501 rally at the Statehouse I got invited to speak and had a crowd tell me they’re excited to learn more about me and my campaign.
4. Saturday afternoon HB and I watched The Eras Tour on Disney+ again and I was reminded how much I love TayTay and how incredible she is on stage.
5. Saturday night Kris and I attended the Edgar Allen Poe speakeasy and learned, to our delight, that there are dozens of people around here who like pop up speak easy entertainment events like listening to performers deliver Poe iRL. Delightful!

5 reasons to NOT change the name of the Kennedy Center to Trump

Do your job, Bob Onder (Representative from Missouri), and let the legacy wait till history. 

1. While he’s a performer, to be sure, the Kennedy Center renaming is just more theatrics in lieu of actual governance.
2. There are no gold toilets in the Kennedy Center.
3. He hasn’t ever performed there. He doesn’t even visit that often.
4. He hasn’t gifted it any money. Despite naming himself Chair, while the previous Chair gave $111 million,.
5. He’s not dead.

5 stories heard at writers group

1. Someone went on a girls trip where they stayed in cabins on private land and went out two nights in a row to hunt wild boar. She killed one. With her own gun. Write that story.
2. Someone was in a John boat, racing across the swamplands near Beaufort after midnight with some drunk teenagers. After they had (maybe) killed someone. Short story. Maybe based on true events. Already written. Got some good feedback.
3. Someone visited a family cemetery plot and stretched over an ancient grave to take a photo of the headstone and fell through the grave. The grass collapsed into the grave. Like a sinkhole. Write that story.
4. Someone once got kicked out of book club. Actually three times. And is now forming her own book club because she can’t play by other clubs’ rules. That’s me. I’m that story.
5. Someone walked his crush home one summer at age 11 and followed her into the backyard where her brother’s cross bow was laying unattended. To show off, he lifted the weapon, aimed, fell off balance, and ended up shooting the girl, not the target. He did actually write that story.  No children were harmed.

5 dumb things that deserve public shaming

1. Faculty senate. Every meeting. Theater seating in the auditorium and everyone sits on the end seat. So the people who arrive after them have to climb over to get into the middle of the row. Move in or show up later. This happens at church, too, and you know who you are. If you’re the first person here, do NOT sit on the end of the aisle. That’s dumb. Assigned seating was created because of you idiots.
2. When I worked at Southend Brewery in Charlotte, I had a family come in and as I was working my way around the table asking what people wanted to drink, one mom kept asking her toddler what he wanted to drink. Until she finally waved me off and when I came back, with everyone else’s drinks, the toddler had finally decided. Milk. Duh. So I asked what the mom wanted and she didn’t know. I took one of her husband’s beer tasters and handed it to her, “that’s the blonde,” I told her, “I’ll have that,” she said, “and I JUsT met you. You gave birth to that kid and didn’t know what he wanted?”
3. At Harbison theater when we went to see Ghost and stood in line for 45 minutes at the concessions and when we stepped to the front the couple in front of me didn’t know what they wanted. What have you been talking about for 45 minutes? Also, no, your kids don’t need $9 large sodas. Ever.
4. Airport baggage claim renders even the brightest human a total moron. Your bag won’t get here sooner because you’re standing up against the carousel. 
5. At the Pendleton High School band competition last year, one team was the only one competing in a specific class. Nevertheless, the awards announcers read each and every award separately and let all the competitors stand in the heat waiting for the obvious outcome. Come on, man.

5 great things about being married to Charlie (PG version)

In honor of our 24th anniversary.

1. Everything is better when Charlie is a part of it. He’s fun. He’s silly. Loves to dance and play and whenever I call an audible, he’s game. He’s proud of me and I’m proud of him and supporting each other isn’t always fun, but he manages to make being married the most fun I’ve ever had.
2. He’s a hero. Last night he caught the ding dong ditchers but he’s also volunteered for Band Camp, taken H to see her favorite band, worked on Clemson home game Saturdays, and made my friends feel welcome whenever we’ve had visitors to the driveway or for the whole weekend. He’s a great wing man.
3. He’s a good manager — when I try to get out of something I said I’d do, he requires a good reason or he’ll encourage me to meet my obligations. He’s good at holding me accountable.
4. He loves music — all the time in the house we have music playing; it’s rare he says no to going to see live music and he likes a lot of varieties of music so it’s not all Bob Segar 😉
5. He’s a great cook. I know I’ve said this about him before but from a marriage perspective this means he cooks a lot and it’s delicious. It also means he doesn’t like to eat out that much which is kind of the down side but hey, every sunshine has shadow.

5 songs about tequila

Yesterday was National Tequila Day and since I wasn’t here to talk about it, I figured we could Top 5 it today.

1. Ten Rounds with Jose Cuervo is about how the more tequila you consume the more carefree you’ll be.
2. Jose Cuervo You Are a Friend of mine — reminding us that the relationships that last are usually with a strong spirited I’m mate.
3. Straight Tequila Night talks about a woman taking her therapy to the bar
4. The Eagles had the Tequila Sunrise which is about day drinking from the wake up to first nap
5. The Champs made the original and it’s been remade a dozen times

5 junk foods you’ve probably been fantasizing about since Monday

1. Ice cream novelties — sandwiches, nutty buddy cones, snickers, Klondike bars
2. Fat Girl Sunday foods — frozen egg rolls, chicken nuggets, Totino’s Pizza bites
3. Cheeses — velveeta shells and cheese, macaroni and cheese, any fried cheese, slices in plastic wrappers, string cheese
4. Potato fantasies — fries, skins, chips, tots fry it to remove the nutritional content
5. Processed meat — bologna, hot dogs, spam, jerkey

5 takeaways from the 50501 open debate in Lincolnville

1. The same old programs – free healthcare, free college, increased minimum wage, and the rich being taxed to pay for it all (their fair share)— are alive and well in Democrat talking points. I don’t hear anything new, innovative, or game changing.
2. The consensus in the room was that everything would be better when Democrats are winning. There exists evidence to the contrary but don’t bother them with evidence.
3. There seems to be a disconnect between the national debt (bad!) and the cause of said debt (all these free government programs).
4. Democratic socialism is a euphemism for jealous of rich people. One candidate was really angry at rich people.
5. Republicans didn’t show up. Granted this probably wasn’t their crowd but one question was about appealing to social conservatives and there weren’t any good answers. If they’re thinking about how to appeal to Republicans, why aren’t Republicans trying to appeal to them?

5 things we do at 10 pm the night before

1. Field trip forms and band camp forms and all the forms; these are classics. Show up ALL the time. “I need this form signed” but it’s not just signed, it’s also my insurance card, contact info, and releasing the school district of any responsibility for anything
2. Jam for french – anything you were supposed to supply the classroom – cupcakes, paper plates, a case of water, whatever it is you could have gotten MUCh earlier in the day, had you (and your kid) remembered
3. Write emails to my teachers — correspondence on everything from planned absences to disputed grades, some how those emails don’t get written until right before bed time.
4. Reading log in elementary school — for the entire week. 
5. Talking about all the things the next day when it gets busy to organize schedules — planning the week, especially on Sunday. We’ve had all day but it’s usually 10pm when I say I’m going to bed that the family starts asking what the week ahead holds.

5 songs with summer vibes

Honorable mention to Sandy and Danny and the whole Grease cast for Summer Nights. It’s a classic for sure but these vibes are great, too.

1. Summer of 69 — and then there’s the summer romance you thought would be the forever kind but turned into the best thing about that time or place.
2. Cruel Summer — Taylor Swift reminds us of summer love and the possibilities of those short affairs that never last but, oh, those summer nights, amiright?
3. Summer Nights by Van Halen – Charlie’s nominee, which I had to be reminded about but is in fact a killer tune.
4. All Summer Long — Kid Rock, has that high school doin stuff you shouldn’t be doing vibe to it
5. Cruel Summer — Bananarama singing about being left alone all summer and how doggone hot it is too

5 best dinosaurs

1. After seeing Jurassic Park where the premise is that dinosaurs just live in the world, we decided to think of the best ones. 
2. Dino-Nuggets. Clearly the best dinosaurs because you can eat them.
3. Inflatable dinosaurs — like the Internet viral kind or the giant blue inflatable outside Breakaway Honda on Killian Road. Rawr! Buy a Honda! Rawr!
4. Stuffed dinosaurs – the kind you buy in the museum store or win in the claw machine. Snuggle up with a t-Rex on the ride home from a long day at the natural history museum. Hint: hit the store on the way IN and let the kid carry the thing all around the place. You’ll get your money’s worth.
5. Action figures — like the characters Rex and Trixie from Toy Story. Name them, act out Shakespeare with them. 
6. Movie dinosaurs – from Jurassic Park to Land Before Time, we love watching dinosaurs have personalities and nefarious intent. Character arcs, tragic outcomes, cutesy names, what better way to fake science than a movie that pretends we can Frankenstein them back to life?

5 ways karma can punish the ding dong ditchers 

1. Caught by the police and strung up by their Buster Browns
2. Poison Ivy in their shorts.
3. Have a bird poop on their heads
4. Chased by an angry dog 🐶 
5. Trip over their shoelaces — face plant on the concrete driveway

5 ways Carowinds upsells your trip

1. Ticket purchase with the $10 service fee, for buying online. Tell me who is processing that sale?
2. Food (expected?) $16 minimum for anything lunch-like; water was free but soda ain’t 
3. Lockers at the water park $25 to keep your phone safe while you’re swimming
4. Parking $35 — and there’s no where else to park of course
5. Paid games — $10 to aim a water gun, $25 to shoot a basketball

5 movies that should never be remade

But probably will be

1. The Princess Bride — CGI would ruin that film now. The shrieking eels, the cliffs of insanity, the rodents of unusual size. 
2. ET – definitely, aliens + social media these days? No way Elliot keeps that secret.
3. Goonies – like kids play outside? Go on adventures? the premise is unbelievable.
4. Casablanca – even if it had the right time and location, the urgency wouldn’t be there. People don’t expect Rick to put Ilsa on the plane. The self sacrifice of Ilsa, Rick, Sam, even Laslow, working for something bigger than yourself; would people even get it?
5. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid – 1969’s machismo meets 1890s lawlessness, there are era films and then there are era films — the ones that perfectly capture TWO eras at the same time.

5 film trilogies that are worth the binge

Honorable mention to Iron Man. Great series but overshadowed by the Avengers movies.

1. Tom Holland Spider-Man — Homecoming, Far From Home, No Way Home wherein they bring Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield in to seal the deal, recognizing that Spider Man has existed in other iterations.
2. Deadpool  — these movies actually get better as they go, might be the bigger budget, might be the cameos. 
3. The Original Star Wars — episodes 4, 5 and 6
4. Christian Bale — the Dark Knight trilogy where we get backstory and Liam Neeson, then Heath Ledger and Harvey Dent played by Aaron Eckhart, and last the lady villains Anne Hathaway as Catwoman and Marion Cotillard as Miranda who sneaks up on us. The lowest low point of the three movies.
5. The Godfather — everyone loves the first one and hates the third but as a binge, they’re a satisfying six hour experience, get the full Michael Corleone character arc.

5 things left to do this summer

After talking about being in the second half of the summer of 25 I needed to make a list so we don’t forget to do these things:

1. Family picnic! 🧺 I’m tabling at the Charleston Republican Party family picnic but you should find one and go to it. Games, drunk uncles, sunburn, MAGA, the whole list of excuses for not doing it again until next summer.
2. Concert — live music at a venue that feels like it was built on the face of the Sun? Sure! We get Mumford and Sons at Credit One in Charleston on July 27th.
3. Road trip! Summer isn’t summer without a trip out of town. C and H get to go to Atlanta this weekend and I’m heading to a Greenville next week. Hit the road!
4. River floating — go straight to the natural lazy river and tube down the Congaree and Saluda. Drag a bag of beverages but be sure to sunscreen up!
5. Water park – something big like Carowinds or small like Ft Jackson, get a slide 🛝 and a hose if need be. Nothing beats a lazy river.

5 simple machines that got us (somehow) to where we are now

A trip to the SC State Museum will remind you that we’re decades, centuries even, where people had nothing. 

1. Radio — how cool is this? Electromagnetic waves transferring sound across miles and miles, through air and sky, encoded and received and decoded by receivers. It’s some kind of sorcery! 
2. Airplanes — for all our complaining about air travel from security lines to lost baggage, air travel really is a miracle. Lift, gravity, thrust and drag are the basic physics of airplanes. Do you know how they work? Me neither. They’re a miracle.
3. Cameras — they use LIGHT and read the variations in light, transferring those variations to film, light sensitive material, that saves them and then reproduces them. Except digital cameras, like on your phone, they translate light into electricity. Electrical signals that exactly replicate what they’re seeing. I mean come on. This is insane.
4. Telephone — once again, capturing sound waves only this time converting them to electricity and then translating them back into sound waves you can hear on the other end. It’s miraculous. 
5. Phonograph – recording sound waves on a disc and then playing them back? It’s miraculous! And we’re all digital streaming like that’s some kind of magic but the real magic is capturing sound waves into a physical thing and then releasing them again on demand. 

5 July 4th wins

Since yesterday we gave you the downers, today we’ll tackle the wins. July 4th is my favorite holiday.

1. Proud — we are the home of the free and the brave. Our history includes the courageous adventures of westward expansion, the brave efforts of the Greatest Generation in World War 2, and the people who planted an American flag on the moon. We are resilient and audacious in our faith that America is the greatest nation in the history of mankind. For all our flaws and failures, our imperfections and strife, still we persevere toward greatness. And we should be proud. On July 4th and every day. Proud to be Americans.
2. Dressed — deck thyself in Stars and Stripes, 🇺🇸 Pom poms optional, hair bows a must! Ball caps off for the National anthem but otherwise, get those God Bless ‘Merica togs on
3. Fired — blasts in the sky, colors and lights, fireworks are the best! Add a John Philips Souza soundtrack and now you’re rockin and rollin!
4. Grilled — all you non-smokers out there shouldn’t feel left out. Dads everywhere will gas, infrared, or charcoal grill burgers and dogs. Add a watermelon, some strawberry shortcake and you’ve got a heckuva picnic! Or cookout. Or barbecue. Whatever yall call that outdoor eating event.
5. Smoked — Charlie will fire up the smoker for the weekend and we’ll get pulled pork and a 3-cheese jalapeño bacon mac n cheese. The smoker going is a thing of beauty and Charlie’s contributions to our neighborhood gathering are his love language.

5 July 4th downers

Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both died on July 4th, 1826 and if that doesn’t wet blanket your picnic, here are five others:

1. Places are crowded – beaches, pools, grocery stores. People ain’t workin’ so all the places are packed. 
2. Fireworks are awesome UNLESS you have nervous dogs and with the 4th being a Friday, you can expect extended fireworks. Thursday. Saturday. Get your doggie Zanex ready. 
3. State budgets are in, so hopefully you got your projects and expenditures approved. Fiscal year starts today.
4. If your trash collection is Friday, like ours, collection is pushed back a day. So that means a FULL can. 
5. Travel is likely to be a beast this holiday with it being a Friday. Plan to drive when others won’t be or just prepare yourself for the possibility of traffic.

5 small changes that can make a big difference

Changes in your environment are sometimes hard to make. But the opportunity to improve can be irresistible.

1. Your routine. Wake up a little earlier, a little later, add in a workout or a splash of a different creamer in your coffee. Try something small. Maybe one small change a day? 
2. Change out the decor. Refresh your space with new wall hangings — artwork can liven up a room. Can’t afford new stuff? Just rotate stuff to the left. Everything in this room moves one room over.
3. Upgrade your electronics — we had a 65 inch TV in our room and a 56 inch in the living room. We moved the big one down stairs. It makes a difference. 
4. Move the furniture around — we do this every Christmas when we have to make room for the tree but other than that we rarely move furniture. It’s disorienting in the best way.
5. Add a game to the space — we hung a dart board but you could get a video game console or start a puzzle.

5 things you can learn in a new project

1. Algebra is actually used in real life — Y=Mx+B is a thing. We saw evidence of it in the algorithms used to determine risk for an insurance policy. People are mathing. Every day. And saving companies money, and jobs, and keeping businesses in business: standard binomials are keeping businesses in business: and that means people have jobs and families have homes and kids get to take ballet classes.
2. Along those same lines, there are REALLY smart people in the world who have ways of getting to the actual evidence we need to make decisions: so stop with your stupid speculation crap. Find the data supported decisions, not your gut/echo chamber garbage. Your feelings are not evidence.
3. Data and mathematics create black and white answers, not subjective speculation, but actual provable stuff.
4. Your way might not be the right way. Adding everyone else’s experience here to get the best practices is a good thing. Have humility and accept that there may be a better way.
5. Other people actually know stuff — when you have a team, sometimes there’s redundancy but sometimes other people have mad skills.

5 Bad company songs

In honor of Mick Ralphs who died recently at age 81, may he rest in peace.

1. Feel Like Makin Love
2. Bad Company
3. Can’t Get Enough 
4. Shooting Star
5. Rock and Roll Fantasy

5 Star Search success stories

People you maybe didn’t know got their start here, and maybe dropped their last names?

1. Britney 
2. Usher
3. Beyoncé
4. Sinbad
5. Aaliyah

Honorable mention to Drew Carey, Justin Timberlake, Dave Chappelle and Leann Rhymes.

5 road trip worthy things that also turn 50 this year

Because Jaws turned 50 this summer, Martha’s Vineyard is having a heckuva summer tourism event. Here are 5 other anniversaries that could inspire your summer road trips.

1. Rubik’s Cube was patented in 1975. 500 Million cubes have been sold worldwide. Go see the National Toy Hall of Fame, located at The Strong National Museum of Play in, you guessed it, New York. Rochester this time, but might as well add it to the trip. 
2. Saturday Night Live turned 50 this year. Gotta get to NYC to see a taping of SNL. 
3. Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Maybe visit Scotland and Doune castle where a good bit of the film was shot? Or NYC to see Spamalot on Broadway?
4. The Kool-Aid man was introduced in 1975. Maybe visit the Museum of Modern Art in NYC to see David Hammons art that includes an image of the Kool Aid man.
5. Bruce Springsteen’s album Born to Run turns 50 this year. He’s from Long Branch, New Jersey. Maybe start there on your summer vacay.

5 best scenes in Jaws

1. The Indianapolis monologue where Quint describes the fear and terror of hanging in the water after the Indianapolis went down and the sharks came to feed on the sailors. 
2. The opening scene — Krissy wants to go swim. It’s a moonlit night, the water is calm, she’s playful and fun until !!!! 
3. The build up to Alex Kitner’s death, watching Brody get more and more anxious, Pippet the dog disappears, and then the dolly zoom where Brody figures out the shark is here.
4. The holiday roast — drags the dock into the water, human slides in
5. Mrs. Kitner confronts Brody after the Tiger Shark is caught. She says “you knew.” And he doesn’t deny it. He takes responsibility for the loss of the kid. It’s heartbreaking and really tells you what’s at stake here.

5 great things about Jaws

Honorable mention to: the pulley system used to enable the first scene — they wanted the shark to jump up and swallow Krissy but the animatronics weren’t good enough so they used a pulley system to yank her around side to side and make it look like the shark was messing with her.

1. Stephen Spielberg named the mechanical shark Bruce after his lawyer.
2. The author, Peter Benchley, spent the rest of his career in shark conservation work because he blamed himself for popularizing the myth that sharks are man eaters. 
3. Over 67 million people went to see Jaws in the theater, a third of the nation, making it the first summer blockbuster.
4. Roy Schneider ad-libbed the line, “you’re gonna need a bigger boat.”
5. Dolly zoom — the scene when Chief Brody realizes there’s a shark in the water and the camera zooms in on him. They pioneered that.

5 SNL duos

1. Steve Martin and Martin Short
2. Dan Akroyd and Bill Murray, Chevy Chase, and John Belushi
3. Tina Fey and Amy Pohler
4. Mike Myers and Dana Carvey
5. Chris Farley and David Spade

5 SNL alum on the big screen

Inspired by yesterday’s conversation about The Blues Brothers. 

1. Will Farrell — Elf, Old School, Talladega Nights, The Lego Movie, Anchorman, Blades of Glory.
2. Steve Martin — The Jerk, LA Story, Parenthood, Three Amigos
3. Chevy Chase — Fletch, Vacation, European Vacation, Christmas Vacation, Caddyshack
4. Adam Sandler — Happy Gilmore,  50 First Dates, The Wedding Singer, Murder Mystery, The Wedding Singer
5. Eddie Murphy — Coming to America, 48 Hours, Beverly Hills Cop, Boomerang, Shrek, Harlem Nights, Dreamgirls

5 Father’s Day expectations

1. Dad jokes — let them rip, dudes! Best one of the day? What time do ducks wake up? The quack of dawn.
2. A phone call — if you should have called and didn’t, shame on you. In our house, we called.  My sisters and I called dad together. 
3. Food — breakfast in bed is a mom’s day thing, lunch at Beef’s was free for dads yesterday. Dinner was steaks and dads all cook those themselves. 
4. A card — the funnier the better. Hollie’s to Charlie said, “for the boss of our house,” and then inside, “sorry, that was Mother’s Day, thanks anyway, Dad.”
5. A gift — preferably one that can be used for the household or by the household.

5 key behaviors of good talk radio guests 

Whether you’re a call-in, a scheduled guest, or a wannabe professional, there are some things that make great listening experiences

1. Have fun! The audience can hear the smile in your voice so if you’re having fun, they’ll have fun, too. They might even laugh when you do.
2. Be interested, not interesting. Your natural knowledge and experience are enough. You don’t have to try. Just be yourself. And ask questions. Talking on the radio is also about listening.
3. Hush and let the other person talk. This deserves its own number because monologues are the enemy of good conversation. Know when to wrap up your part — like when people start looking around, looking away, or visibly losing interest. 
4. Be concise – you don’t have to say the thing five ways, just say what you mean and then hush so the other person can talk.
5. Answer the question – the host asks it and you have three choices: answer directly and succinctly, add some context or redirect to get to the context first and then answer the question, or monologue indefinitely without ever answering — which is awful.

5 alternative names NoDa Lil Slurp

Better beer names

1. 2nd Choice IPA — I only drink it when my first isn’t available, so this will let NoDa know where they stand
2. 89.9 WDAV iPA — that’s the classical music station out of Davidson college.
3. Coin Flip IPA – 🍺 could have chosen the other NoDa beer on draught Hop Drop and Roll
4. Sunny Delight IPA — a little citrus flavor that’s not too sweet but a good balance 
5. Cloudy Day IPA — 🍺 it’s a New England IPA and it’s got some cloud to it

5 travel snacks for a road trip

1. Dairy Queen blizzard — don’t risk the DQ curse by saying it aloud, but quietly think it and then break up the road trip with a delicious ice cream.
2. Twizzlers – another good gnaw on them snack
3. Goldfish crackers – good one-at-a-time munchies. Stretch them out over a long time. Bet with some M&M’s scattered in there.
4. 7 Eleven Slurpees — something sweet like a treat but cool on a hot day and a good destination treat. 
5. Beef jerky – there’s a reason Buc-ee’s sells it.

5 states we’d vote out

Hollie was listening to a podcast where they talked about going back to the original 13 colonies. So we have to get rid of 37 states. So here’s the first 5.

1. Ohio – the state of quitters – like during Western Expansion the ones headed to California got as far as Ohio and said, meh, this is far enough. Also killed the most Native Americans. Jerks.
2. Georgia — it stinks, they keep claiming peaches even though we produce more of them; rattle snakes, 🐍 all the bads in Georgia.
3. Utah — no one likes a bunch of self righteous do-gooders. 
4. North Dakota — we just can’t think of a reason to keep it. Let Canada have it and maybe we can work something out on lumber.
5. Connecticut — expensive, bougie, so small, not worth it. Bye Felicia.

5 songs about being 17

1. Dancing Queen by ABBA 
2. Sixteen going on Seventeen from the sound of music
3. Betty from Taylor Swift
4. I saw her standing there by the Beatles
5. Seventeen by Winger

5 great things about Hollie

Yesterday she spoke at the State School Board still fighting that Free to Focus cell phone ban. Tomorrow is her birthday. So here’s 5 great things about her to celebrate.

1. She’s a HUGE Clemson fan. Like beyond indoctrination. She follows all the sports and band instagrams and grins from ear to ear when she steps on campus. It’s truly home for her. It’s also a huge part of her wardrobe. She’s planning to apply the day the application opens.
2. She’s a good leader. Her classmates look up to her and depend on her. She takes initiative, she’s not afraid of hard work, she’s someone that leads by example and looks for opportunities to lead.
3. She learns software easily and is truly one of those digital native kids you read about. She works on both a PC and a Mac, she’s been producing Write On SC podcast for years.
4. She has a GREAT laugh. Hollie will watch videos and get giggling and listening to her laugh makes us laugh. It’s awesome.
5. She loves to read. She read The Great Gatsby before it was assigned and she was reading Revenge of the Sith during the Clemson bowl game. During a football game, ya’ll.

5 catch up tasks after vacay

1. Groceries. I know emptying the fridge is a thing before you go. BUT that means you come home to nothing fresh. AND after eating out all week…
2. Email. Related but way worse given the throw-out percentage. So many emails to respond to and send for this week. Ugh.
3. Mail. Collected by our pet sitter but accumulating over a week. Mail is a hill that needs tackling.
4. Floors! We were gone but the dogs were not. So yikes! Hair and fur and such. Floors.
5. Laundry upon laundry upon laundry

5 lessons from vacation

1. Spending time with family for happy occasions is a gift. 🎁 be grateful for it.
2. Not all hockey romance novels are created equal. 
3. There are some people using Apple Maps instead of Waze and you shouldn’t follow them. you should follow your Waze. 
4. Chat GPT will overestimate how many rotisserie chickens you need to feed ten teenagers tacos.
5. “Tiki Bar” is a subjective term. Don’t fall for the marketing. Get pictures and read reviews.

5 things to do before leaving on vacay

1. Change the sheets on your bed. After a week away in a strange bed, you’ll be glad to come home to yours and even happier if it’s fresh and clean.
2. Pack the essentials: liquor, snacks, beach towels, party games, sunscreen, woobies.
3. Let your neighbors know you’re leaving. So they can keep an eye out for weird cars, arrivals, or lights on.
4. Finish the milk and other dairy in your fridge. Anything that might go bed (leftovers!) should be used or thrown out.
5. Put in the Hold Mail request. USPS can execute them within 24 hours. It’s easy to do online.

5 doll pageant categories

To be truly accomplished, she must have a thorough knowledge of music, singing drawing dancing and the modern languages to deserve the word.

1. Future careers — what will your doll show as her future occupation? Physicist? Astronaut? Teacher? Lawyer? How will she represent her profession?
2. Talent — what can your doll do to differentiate herself? Play a music instrument? Dance? Speak a foreign language? Solve a complex mathematics equation? Juggling?
3. Fitness and athletics — from hot yoga to marathon running, our dolls are fit and healthy, they should show ability, technique, and endurance.
4. Dress to the theme — can she wear the theme? If it’s Carnivale, will she sport a feather headdress? If the theme is Winter Wonderland will she have boots and earmuffs?
5. Doll house decorating — curtains, furniture, accessibility — whose house is the best.

5 things about rowing

1. The best part of a rowing workout is the stretching afterward. Actually, it’s being on the water and watching Hollie row, but that stretching afterwards, that’s money.
2. The alternative to the easy workout is the moderate workout and it can mean 4 or 6 or even 8 minutes of workout at a time. That’s like swimming a 200, a 300, or a 400. Except harder.
3. The key to an easy workout is distance per stroke, so a good glide. But the glide requires balance which is hard to attain.
4. Carrying the boat is a team effort. Unless you’re shorter than everyone else.
5. The river has a current and you may spend most of your workout fighting it.

5 ways Disney shows death without showing death

There’s the classic fall to your death: Mother Gothel in Tangles, Gaston in Beauty and the Beast — they had it comin, didn’t they? Not exactly the good guy’s fault, but a fitting end to a villain nonetheless; but then Bing Bong launches Joy on the wagon and falls away into the abyss, to be forgotten by Riley, sacrificing himself for his kid. But here are some other creative ends:

1. A Bug’s Life: Hopper, illustrating a point, yanks the plug on the supply of grain, all the grain spills out and buries Axel and Loco and we don’t see them again in the film.
2. Finding Nemo: Sinister music, barracuda fish predator, Marlin gets knocked out, when he comes to, there’s only one egg left. 
3. Finn McMissile explodes an oil rig with a dozen or so lemons on board — they might be lemons, but did they deserve to be murdered at sea?
4. Syndrome’s cape gets sucked into the jet ✈️ turbine (a death foreshadowed by Edna: “no capes!”) and the resulting explosion 💥 must have killed him.
5. Bambi’s mom disappears off screen, we hear the shot and she never comes back.

5 things Ovechkin can do now that the Caps are out of the playoffs

Honorable mention to a visit to the cosmetic dentist. Again.

1. Fill in at Starbucks while the baristas are on strike. I bet Ovie has a dozen plain black shirts. And he’s used to wearing a uniform without complaining.
2. Visit the White House and give Trump some advice on tariffs. Maybe host that Trump-Putin sit-down in his Washington-area mansion.
3. Get on some hockey podcasts to talk about his record breaking year and how disappointing the first round exit from the playoffs was.
4. Visit a professional salon to color his gray hair so he doesn’t LOOK like he’s been playing 21 years. Maybe Just For Men will sponsor him.
5. Ding dong ditch his neighbors. Ring the doorbell and run. 🏃‍♂️ giggling and laughing about how noisy their dogs were.

5 points of wisdom from an unexpected source

President Trump delivered the commencement address at Alabama recently and it was full of the usual – brags about how big he won, hyperbole around his first 100 days – but it also had ten points that speak to what we need from GenZ. Here are five of them:

1. You have to love what you do. If you love your work then you’ll love TO work.
2. Think big. All work is tough even small work so why not do BIG work if it’s gonna be challenging anyway?
3. Work hard. Never ever stop. “The harder I work, the luckier I get,” Gary Player golfer said that. 
4. Trust your instincts. Common sense. 
5. Believe the American Dream. It’s real. 

5 fruits to look forward to this summer

1. Peaches — perfect!
2. Watermelon! — hurray!
3. Strawberries! — YUM!
4. Cantaloupe — delicious!
5. Pineapple — yesssss

5 things that will earn you an especially painful place in the afterlife

There’s the usual stuff like hurting kids or old people and being racist, but these are microaggressions that might also land you in the wrong side of purgatory:

1. Leaf blower. Morning. The rev up, the blowing, the idling, the blowing, the fact he’s wearing ear protection and we’re trying to sleep. Come on, man. It’s Sunday.
2. Destroying art in some weird environmental protest. It’s not okay to desecrate something priceless. 
3. Barking dog. Really? You can’t get that dog to relax? He wants back inside. You say you love him so let him in!
4. Putting chewed gum anywhere other than the trash can. Come on, man, the sidewalk? Under the desk? You’re a heathen.
5. Crowding the luggage carousel at baggage claim. No one wants your bag, man, it’s okay to hang back and wait until you see it to step forward. 

5 great gifts for graduates

You can probably google this to find a list but I figured I’d share from personal experience:

1. Vacation – take them with you to the beach, they may not get another high class vacay or even time off for a while.
2. Money — cash. Dolares. moola. Green. Don’t ask how they’ll spend it, just give it to them.
3. Pay off their car – or make the next payment — this if for the big gift folks but if it’s less than $1000 and they can get out of school without that debt at least, consider it.
4. A meal delivery service — if you didn’t pay for it for them while they were in school, just trust they’re gonna need it.
5. Photo album — the old school kind that makes them print their digital photos and put them in the book. You can get them started by printing a few college pics for them.

5 more things to celebrate about charlie

Since its nurses week (his profession) and graduation and tomorrow is his birthday, we figured we should think of some other things to celebrate about Charlie:

1. The number one thing to celebrate about Charlie is his sports 🏈 life. He’s a Panthers fan, a hurricanes fan, and a Tigers fan. All sports for the Tigers. He loves the Army-Navy game, and NASCAR races, he’s watched cycling with me and bull riding and if you offered him tickets, I think he’d go watch curling. Sports are our love language.
2. His blue eyes. It’s the first thing a LOT of people notice about Charlie, his blue eyes. He’s very handsome.
3. His drumming! At our Clemson visit the percussion director, Dr. Buyer asked Charlie, “so you’re a percussionist?” And Charlie said, “no, I’m a drummer. Hollie is a percussionist.” H and her friends think it’s weird that Charlie being a drummer is what attracted me to him. Among other things. Which brings me to #2
4. His excellent taste in music! Charlie is into everything from Van Morrison to Fever 333. He’s a music enthusiast and also a musician. Which brings me to #3
5. His cooking! Everyone who listens knows Charlie is an excellent chef and what better way to celebrate Charlie than to have him cook for me?

5 commencement speech cliches

I haven’t been asked to give a commencement speech (yet) but I’ve watched my fair share. From the Admiral telling you to make your bed to Taylor Swift saying don’t lose faith in your dream, commencement is the time to inspire and most speakers take the job seriously.

1. Follow your passion.  Every speaker thinks you can jump off into your passion and be successful. And … maybe? But really, most of you need to follow the money, not your passion. 
2. Don’t be afraid of failure — because it’s coming. For real. And for some of you sooner than others.
3. If I could offer just one piece of advice … isn’t the whole speech advice?? Why stop at just one piece?
4. Everyone here has such incredible potential — do they? Look at your classmates. Which ones are bound for a cubicle life? Be honest.
5. The dictionary defines (insert word here) as …. Be it perseverance, steadfast, or dedication, speakers love to start with that Webster callback.

5 surprise party insights

1. Remember the purpose of every party — to celebrate! Have fun and even if they figure it out, it’s meant to be fun. 
2. Be okay with lying to your loved one (victim) for weeks. 
3. Have your guests fully understand the window for arrival and the SURPRISE factor. When they arrive early, they help set up! Put them to work! And they brought a LOT of food.
4. Don’t overestimate your victim’s observational skills – we had about 30 giveaways and Charlie didn’t pick up on any of them. Four heads of lettuce?
5. Master the ruse — nothing is more suspicious than an unrealistic ruse — the decoy or the distraction. 

5 things about visiting family

Honorable mention to Remembering that they knew you when you were a snotty kid, a pimple faced teen, or an awkward young adult. Whatever their image of you it’s likely not the whole picture or even your favorite one.

1. All the eating. Food. Rest. Talk. Food. Talk. More food. More talking. 
2. All the hugs. Hold them close and tell them you love them.
3. Settling on old stories and shared memories until you hit one that you don’t share: and deciding if you want to push that or just search for something else.
4. Working to find something to talk about after you’ve caught up and before you’ve talked politics. Getting a quick glimpse of their politics and going back to looking for something else to talk about.
5. Reminding them of what you’ve been up to. Not everyone is seeing your Facebook feed.

5 best moments in Revenge of the Sith

We need the extended cut to be able to see Padmay have more agency. But that’s not likely to happen anytime soon. Honorable mention to the scene where Anikin arrives at the Jedi Temple and the young fling says, “Master Skywalker…” and then murder.

1. Padmay witnessing Palpatine seize control of the senate and remarks, “this is how liberty dies. To thunderous applause.” 
2. Battle of the heroes — Anikin and Obiwan fighting in the lava planet, Mustafar. During which we see Anikin slipping further and further into his anger and hatred and Obiwan’s reluctance to destroy Anikin. 
3. Opening flight scene — the battle of Coroscant — great aerial action scene showing off the full extent of the CGI. Small moments where Anikin tries to win us over by offering to help others and stay with Obiwan.
4. Anikin and Padmay reunited and she tells him she’s pregnant. There’s so much joy. We’re happy for them. WE like Anikin and though we know this isn’t going to turn out well…
5. Yoda and Palpatine light saber battle and then kinetic energy battle in the senate chamber. Palpatine using the senate against Yoda.

5 things about After December

My first novel is the featured book at the Lancaster Literary Festival tomorrow. The talk back is at 11:00 at Mural Court in Lancaster.

1. Because I spend a lot of time around authors, I think it’s nothing to publish a book but actually, in the United States, less than 1% of adults have published a book and the percentage is even lower for traditionally published books, like mine. So it’s pretty elite.
2. My publisher is local, Alexa Bigwarfe, Chrysalis Press is an imprint of Kat Biggie Press. We met in the swimming pool at Columbia Country Club on a Saturday after I’d just done the Write On SC show.
3. The book doesn’t have chapters. It’s told in days, beginning on Tuesday and ending on Sunday. I once read a Michael Crichton book that did that and loved the intensity of it. This is such a raw emotional book because it’s so condensed.
4. There are a lot of real locations in the book: Reston Towncenter, Amphora Diner, Herndon High School. The authenticity of that DC suburbs GenX experience has really resonated with some readers. So much about the book is real. No one else could have written it but me.
5. The first version of the book was written when I was in 7th grade and we’d moved away to California. The second version of the book was written at Clemson in 1995-96. The third version of the book is what finally got published. 26 years after the Clemson version.

5 reasons it’s great to be a sports fan right now

1. Baseball again! Great plays by the Tigers last night. Real athleticism on display. It’s also Savannah Bananas week!
2. Playoffs! Hockey in the best part of the season now. Records aside, this is about the win.
3. Baseball! Watched the Phillies play baseball last night. 100 games changes the urgency and it’s still early.  Bohm is finally out of his slump for now. But it’s a LONG season.
4. Softball! Clemson knocked off number 1 Tennessee last night.
5. Baseball! Live games at the Fireflies now or the Blowfish starting in May. It’s a good excuse to eat peanuts.

5 ways to celebrate Earth Day

1. Eat a chocolate cupcake with a gummy worm. Ya know? Like a dirt cake! 🍰 it’s Aunt Michelle’s birthday so Happy Birthday Aunt Michelle and I’ll be having a cupcake for you.
2. Watch a documentary about the planet. I suggest Planet Earth narrated by Tom Selleck or The Americas narrated by Tom Hanks
3. ♻️recycle something — just remember pizza boxes can’t be recycled.
4. Plant a tree or a garden or some flowers 💐 
5. Learn more about composting and consider starting it at home.

5 great sports movies about actual sporting events

1. Miracle about the US hockey team at the Lake Placid Olympics.
2. Ford vs Ferrari about the win at LeMans.
3. A League of Their Own — the World War II drama with Geena Davis and Tom Hanks
4. Remember the Titans about the integration of the TC Williams high school football team in 1971
5. Boys in the Boat about the Washington rowing team competing at the Olympics.

5 Easter 🐣 things that transcend religion

1. Redemption is about asking for and receiving forgiveness. Most of the time, it’s from yourself. So give this weekend a chance to work on your soul health too. Forgive yourself. Seek and receive the love available to you. It’s everywhere.
2. Six weeks till swim suit season. Time to double down on the diet and exercise approach. Ramp up the work outs and drive down the calories. Sucks but you shoulda thought about that in February when you were chowing down chicken wings.
3. Deadline to book your beach house. Where are you going? When are you going? Where are you staying? Get those plans firmed up!
4. Countdown till school ends. Summer break is just around the corner now. Time to get those last efforts in to tug the grades up.
5. Spring is a time of renewal and new beginnings. Everything blooming, new plants going in the ground, baby chicks and bunnies. It’s a new start.

5 pieces of advice for a friend who’s moving away

1. Be a joiner. Book club at the library, master swim, whatever community organization you can contribute to — this is where you’ll make friends so be a joiner! Get online and find the meetups and make it a point to go — even by yourself — you’ll be glad you did. Relationships start with small gestures, small seeds, and YOU have to plant them.
2. Don’t jump right in to the old set up. Consider alternatives to furniture locations, utility subscriptions, even which side of the garage you’ll park on. No reason to move your bad habits with you.
3. Schedule a visit back to Columbia and put it on the calendar. Then when you’re feeling particularly disoriented you have some “back to Kansas” time upcoming to look forward to.
4. Meet your neighbors. Walk over and introduce yourself. Don’t wait for them to come to you, they may not.
5. Make a game of finding new stuff: a new way to work, a new way home, a new pizza place. It’s a great time of discovery in your new town. Have fun with it!

5 based on a true story movies

1. Argo — the rescue of the six American foreign service workers via the Canadien embassy
2. Apollo 13 — the astronauts failed moon mission but successful safe return
3. Ford vs Ferrari — the film about Ford wanting to win LeMans
4. The King’s Speech — King George’s speech impediment overcome with the help of Geoffrey Rush.
5. Hidden Figures — the story of the black women mathematicians who helped achieve the moon landing

5 things about competition

1. Resilience: the real victory is Rory getting his green jacket on his 11th try. Persistence. Resilience. When you compete, you learn about yourself and the more you know about yourself, the better you compete.
2. Which leads to #2 if it’s not fun, don’t do it. The winning is fun, sure, but the competing is fun, too. Trying your best. Pushing yourself. Being in the game. Love the play, not just the win.
3. Teammates matter. The Fireflies were down 10-0 when one of their guys hit a home run in the 7th. No one left the dugout to celebrate. Alternatively, Clemson was down 10-3 when they started to rally and every hit, every run, earned a dugout celebration. What’s the difference? Teammates make competing fun.
4. Sometimes you lose. When you put yourself against others, sometimes they come out on top. But ya know what? Justin Rose is still a helluva golfer.
5. It’s hard. And it should be. If you only enter the contests you’ll win, you miss out on the chance to push yourself.

5 reasons to stop reading a book

1. When you get to the part of the plot where things have gone terribly wrong and you just don’t care if or how they resolve it. 
2. You recognize the story, predict the outcome, and realize you’ve probably already read this.
3. The main character does the fourth thing that makes you go, “Really?” Either she’s a Mary Sue or the plot is contrived. If her voice is annoying and she sounds like a whiner, ditch her.
4. You decide playing a game on your phone, rewatching a show, or going for a run is a better option than reading.
5. You forget the title, the characters, or the premise of the book. If you’re 20 pages in, but you’ve lost any of those things, this book isn’t connecting. Put it down.

5 reasons streaming isn’t better than OG TV

1. Local — we’re commoditized and that’s probably okay but the local info we need isn’t getting to us like it could and should. Streaming despite its data Omniscience cannot prioritize local or maybe it’s too expensive.
2. Data — the clicks likes and all the other digital reporting that shows proof of performance determines what actually gets shown and talked about. Advertisers control the narrative — always have — except in a broader market it wasn’t saturation.  The ultimate managing by reports.
3. Live — what happens when it happens, not the repackaged and contextualized stuff, the LIVE stuff.  The six second delay is a six minute six hour six day delay. Everything is packaged.
4. Blackout/blockout — despite all the apps, when a game is blacked out, you cannot access it. Except on your phone. For static updates. Yay.
5. Apps — who is carrying what? Must we subscribe to them all? Downloads. Passwords. Access. It’s exhausting/ and expensive.

5 things that take a lot of practice that I didn’t spend the time to get good at

Two economists walking down the street and see a violist playing on a street corner. One says to other, I always wanted to play violin,” the other says, “no you didn’t.”

Honorable mention to software coding because man! That would be a great skill to have and I have never even tried. Also cooking.

1. Foreign language — had Spanish in grad school and loved it but never immersed myself and didn’t ever achieve proficiency
2. Horticulture — plants inside and out just flee when I come near, they cower under my watering pot, certain I will murder them
3. Piano — had lessons and not much practice. Might have wanted to play but didn’t want to learn to play.
4. Dance — ballet, tap, ballroom dance; I’ve tried them and enjoy them but I never pursued them to the level of mastery.
5. Chess — having watched The Queen’s Gambit again, for the third time, I’m reminded of the hours upon hours of study it takes to get good at.

5 ways to spend a spring weekend

Honorable mention to strawberry picking which is what Josh and his tax deductions did this weekend.

1. Baseball! Opening day a few weeks ago. make your way to the ballpark and enjoy some peanuts and cracker jacks before it gets too unbearably hot.
2. Spring cleaning — could be the garage, could be the closet, maybe the porch, maybe a yard sale. Just clear things out and be ready for what’s next.
3. Golf! Time to hit the links? It’s Masters week, maybe get inspired by the Augusta azaleas? 🌺 
4. Yard chores — if your allergies can take it, maybe it’s cut the grass, maybe it’s plant flowers, maybe it’s trimming shrubs. Just shaping up the foliage. 
5. Prom. That’s a whole day thing. Set up, hair and make up, pictures, dinner, the dance, the after. It’s whole day. 

5 rules for time travel

1. The means are almost as important as the ends. Machinery like Dolorians and phone booths aside, how you get to the past matters. I’m prone to the Outlander method – places on the earth that are basically portals to the past. Fall right through. Easy enough. It’s MAGIC not physics. Don’t overthink it. 
2. The only thing you’ll have with you is what you have on you. Unless you stash something for your future self — another lesson Ted taught us. 
3. Historical figures are actually cool with time hop interruptions — if you know you know — as evidences by Abraham Lincoln being a well-visited historical dude and always chill about it
4. Any change you make in the past could have ripple effects for the future but despite a very different upbringing — Marty McFly was the same old Marty when he got Back to the Future.
5. Don’t interact with yourself — despite Ted doing this in Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, it freaked Jennifer out in Back to the Future 2. Just not a good idea.

5 Val Kilmer films

Honorable mention to Heat — great to see him among the royalty – Pacino and Deniro

1. Top Gun and Maverick — Tom Kasanski was a great character
2. Tombstone — I’m your Huckleberry
3. Willow — fantasy films are tough but he was great in that one
4. The Doors — listened to the Doors this morning
5. Real Genius — lasers and popcorn and indoor pool parties

5 headlines from yesterday’s animal round up

1. Unicorn rampage at concert venue results in three trampled, two impaled; authorities suspect foul play
2. Floppy eared dragon detained when neverending story actually ends, fraud suspected
3. Teenaged dork live stream: “I invented Liger” investigation underway
4. Lizard man resurrected! Claims Crocogator as pet.
5. Sheriff’s Deputy Suspected in jailbreak: Bald, skinny gremlins overrun farmhouse

5 exotic animals causing SC animal control fits

Not monkeys, but these animals come in as pets and get released when their owners can’t care for them any more. They’re in the wild and they’re dangerous!

1. Unicorns — total jerks. Jaywalking. Pushing old ladies down. Inherently evil. Can’t be trusted. Just go the other way if you see one. And call animal control.
2. Falkor — giant dogs that can fly, white fluffy fur, long floppy ears, paws the size of Volkswagens.
3. Crocagator — head of an alligator on one side and a crocodile on the other. Ask “how does it go to the bathroom?” It can’t that’s why it’s so mean!
4. Magwai — fuzzy little snuggle bugs. Totes adorbs but don’t get them wet and don’t feed them after midnight. 
5. Liger – kind of like a cross between a tiger and a lion but with sick wings.

5 ways to serve your country

1. Volunteer — get out in the community, clean up the roads with Adopt a Highway, deliver meals for Meals on Wheels, serve through your church community or your school, but serve others.
2. Join the Military — overseas, combat, family sacrifices
3. Be a First responder — police, firemen, EMTs
4. Run for office — whatever you care most about, learn who decides about that, and run for that position. 
5. Vote — show up and let your voice be heard. 

5 great Caseys

Honorable mention to Billy Cayce, general store owner and the town’s namesake. His family’s business was at the heart of Granby and when the town incorporated in 1914, the name Cayce was chosen to honor Billy’s dedication to and service for the town. He was known as Uncle Billie. So, you know, not a REAL Casey.

1. Casey at the Bat — the classic poem by Ernest Lawrence Thayer, the Mighty Casey was the last hope for the Mudville team in the bottom of the ninth. With two runs on, he could have won the game. But, alas, he struck out. Same swing, different pitch.
2. Kacey Musgraves — singer/songwriter known for starting as an indie artist (3 self released albums in the early 2000s) and her major label debut Same Trailer, Different Park. That won a best country album Grammy in 2013.
3. Casey Kasem — top five for me is great but Casey Kasem had the American Top 40 from July 4, 1970 until 1988. It was then Casey’s Top 40 from January 1989 until February 1998. Then American Top 40 from 1998 until 2009 for a total of 36 years of broadcasting.
4. Kasie Hunt — journalist, currently working for CNN but formerly of NBC news as a Capital hill correspondent.
5. Drew Barrymore: she played Casey Becker in Scream (2022) She also played Casey Roberts in Mad Love opposite Chris O’Donnell (1995) and Casey Brodsky in Irreconcilable Differences (1984) with Ryan ONeil and Shelly Long; so she’s an honorary Casey.

5 potential buyers for the 23andMe DNA database

1. The IRS — jump right over that fingerprint ID to the DNA evidence before signing your tax return, also maybe they’ll can predict how much you’ll make and owe in taxes.
2. Netflix — they have always been well ahead of customizing experiences, perhaps they’ll leverage DNA to determine what shows you’ll want to watch. A la Black Mirror.
3. Jurassic Park 5.0 — someone is planning to construct a zoo made up of versions of you. Well, not all of you, just the prettiest ones.
4. Larry Ellison — Oracle founder who predicted AI will predict who has cancer based on DNA; maybe they’ll build a pay-with-DNA system and your DoorDash will only cost you a glimpse of your genetic makeup.
5. Data miners — they won’t keep your DNA, they’ll duplicate it and sell it. To everyone. Until it’s not valuable at all. 

5 things you might not know about the Mark Twain prize

People who won it before Cosby – Bob Newhart, Steve Martin, Neil Simon — people who won it after — Carol Burnett, Eddie Murphy, Conan O’Brien, this year’s winner who claims to have won it not for comedy but for his work as a riverboat captain. If you know, you know. Notable exceptions include: 

1. There’s no committee and no criteria. It’s a “consensus” award decided by the Kennedy Center’s Board, so it’s really the ultimate insider’s award. Which is fine, that’s fine. 
2. It was awarded to BillCosby in 2009 but rescinded in 2018. So in a 27 year history with 26 prizes, one of them was a take back. Six women and 19 men.
3. It’s been awarded every year since 1998 except 2020 and 2021 because Covid wasn’t funny. 
4. It’s supported by a dude named Cappy McGarr — an entrepreneur and U of Texas alum, who serves on the Kennedy Center’s Board of Trustees and also created the Gershwin Prize for Popular song.
5. It’s relatively new — the first one went to Richard Pryor in 1998

5 ways art can open your mind

1. Talk it out — gives us something to examine, consider, and discuss. To think through and share. To understand.  To put those critical thinking skills to work. Analysis – English assignments 😀
2. Beauty can be inspiring and moving and can make us feel connected and engaged — music does this, too. Sway together, sing together, remember your best times even if they weren’t together. From Disney musicals to Taylor Swift concerts, music connects us.
3. Rearranging concepts – let you consider “what if?” With alternate versions, or unique details like Chris Jackson playing George Washington or Hamilton rapping his story.
4. Empathy – show you others perspectives and help you to empathize with them. Humanize them.  Wonder as an example.
5. Contextualize history – show the story of people experiencing historical events, remind us how things worked out and what we should be mindful of in our current experience. Cabaret.

5 things the astronauts did this week (as reported to DOGE)

(Don’t forget to shout out Blythewood winter guard for state championships happening Sunday)

1. Submitted their response to the annual “best places to work” survey for NASA.
2. Updated their Midwest bracket since Clemson lost in the first round.
3. Filed their expense reports including the updated mileage calculation and including overtime pay.
4. Managed to splash down safely in the Gulf of America. Still not a typo, but that step on their printed instructions has been scribbled out and handwritten in.
5. Cleaned out their lockers on the space station.

5 things that are probably different now that the astronauts are home

1. They now have to spend about 20 minutes on Friday afternoon typing up what they did this week. But they might have been doing that from space, anyway.
2. Your tax bracket is the same, but your travel expenses have been rejected. Specifically the mileage claim. 121 million at $.63 cents each? Come on. That’s $76 million. Also, you’ve been designated nonessential so you can decide to take the buy out if you want.
3. Trash pickup is the same day, but recycling will now only come every-other-week, so that’s an adjustment.
4. You’ve landed in the Gulf of America. That’s not a typo. Just something we did while you were gone.
5. Missed a couple of maybe important things: the egg prices went up but now they’re back down and there was a ceasefire in Gaza but that’s over too. 

5 great things that came out of Ireland

1. U2 – with Sunday Bloody Sunday and New Year’s Day being some of their earlier political songs referring to the strife in the 80s between the Catholics and the Protestants 
2. Halloween was invented in Ireland, based on the Celtic festival Samhain, celebrated the end of summer. Bonfires and costumes and believed the veil between the land of the living and land of the dead was thinnest. Irish immigrants brought the traditions of costumes and can claim ownership of Halloween.
3. Bailey’s Irish Cream makes a great coffee even better. 
4. Beers- Guinness — we used it to cook the corned beef and cabbage on Saturday.  And Harp — a good Irish lager and my beer of choice on Saturday. Thank you very much. 
5. Leprechaun ☘️ — the idea of an imp with a pot of gold? This is storytelling genius. So much you can do with rainbows and magic.

5 desserts on the Jedi cafeteria menu

Honorable mention to Darth chocolate cake, 🍰 and Wookiee Cookies! Ahhhhhh!

1. Obi-wan-cannoli — crisp outer shell and ooey gooey center that reminds you he was once a Jedi, like your father. 
2. Flan Solo — gelatinous but easily storable in carbonate for a save-for-later treat
3. RtorteD2 – a little sassy, requires you pretend to understand a series of random beeps as language
4. Kwi-ganache — slender, rich, and likely to crumble under a sith attack.
5. Jabba Cake – like lava cake but rubbery and oozing something greenish yellow 

5 great pies

Honorable mention to Humble Pie which we’ve all had a bite of especially after turning 40 and which is best served to someone else.

1. Pizza pie! Yum! Pineapple and ham, pepperoni, stuffed crust, however you like it, whatever your brand that’s a good a pie
2. Sweetie pie — you know that term of endearment from waitstaff and retail clerks that reminds you people are generally lovely
3. Key lime pie — especially if it’s yellow, that’s a delicious cocktail, too.
4. Pie charts — easily convey data in proportion, it’s a great tool
5. Pumpkin pie — maybe just because it says Thanksgiving? But this pie is perfect. If it wasn’t they wouldn’t have make coffees, candies, and cookies after it.

5 jobs we’re glad someone else is doing

1. Riverbanks Zoo reptile house manager. Hard pass.
2. Septic tank and Port-a-Jon services — glad to have these people out there, always grateful for the convenience of “the box” but glad I don’t have to be the one to empty it.
3. Sewage treatment plant worker — again with the smell but also the visuals, just ew. It’s an important job and I’m glad it’s not mine.
4. Garbage dude — the smell alone is a deterrent but the exposure to the weather and the thanklessness of the job, just glad it’s someone else
5. Funeral director – yesterday was National Funeral Directors day — and we’re grateful for those folks and all their compassion

5 early spring warm weather mini-joys

Small things to savor the day

1. Drive home topless — convertibles were made for this time of year. Before the great swirls of pollen move over the roads like a grinch-colored dustbowl. Drive like the pollen has to chase you.
2. Buy spring plants — ferns for the porch, bulbs for the flower bed, browse the local nursery and commit to color this spring.
3. Go for a walk — take a hike. Leash the dogs and go out for a mile or so. Wave at neighbors, be out in the world.
4. Have lunch outside — pack your lunch and pic-a-nic or find a patio with lunch and pollen — not too bad yet
5. Open a window — let that sunlight in, a breeze, some pollen — it’s not too bad yet.

5 ways your local gets even better

1. They hang Clemson jerseys and Washington Redskins posters on the wall. Lamont Evans, former Tiger and Redskin, bought in with our bartender Michelle and my local is now a Tigers and Redskins bar. Amen and thank you Jesus. Take me to church.
2. They invite you to their grand re-opening and other VIP events. Can’t tell you how great it is to be identified as special by your local. 
3. They keep your favorite beer on tap.  Or they bring your wine in onto the menu.
4. They have a table for you every time you show up – points of it’s in the same place. Your table. 
5. They add your favorite food item to the menu — Jersey Boy sub with provolone, turkey and roast beef all melty on a hoagie UGH

5 reasons to turn off the State of the Union

1. This isn’t governance, it’s theater.  It’s performative. It might make good headlines and create soundbites and online drama but it’s not actual work. I’m only interested in actual work. That would be worth the price of admission, but the theater? I’ll pass.
2. I didn’t sleep well on Monday night so I was dozing off. 9 pm is a late start time for anything in my house.
3. Lawmakers acting like children. Behave yourselves. The childishness was too much.
4. It wasn’t called the State of the Union, it was President Trump addressing a Joint Session of Congress. So … it should be visionary, right?
5. Rhetoric that was divisive and accusatory, he wasn’t even trying to pretend he would work with the whole body, he made it clear who the “winners” were. 

5 things to give up for lent – if you do that kind of thing

1. Profanity. For real. I’ve gotten better being on the radio so much but I’ve really curbed my language in the last year and I think I’d like to be even more intentional about it. Clean up that vocabulary. Get more specific and less predictable. Give up the f bombs. I’ll miss them but it’s time to try life without them.
2. Social media — stay off the apps. No scrolling no posting no midday rage 😤 over the morons you went to high school with defending DOGE, just cut the cord. You’ll be healthier within a week. I promise.
3. Garbage television — real housewives, Beastgames, anything that pits humans against one another in some crass behavior showdown, let it go. Honestly. Feeling better about yourself by watching trash humans do mean stuff is not healthy.
4. Sugary beverages — morning cappuccino, midday sweet tea, afternoon milkshake, soda with dinner. Replace them all with water.
5. Chocolate – candy, milk, cookies, you name it, if it’s chocolate it’s got to go

5 awards the Oscars should have given out

1. Best run time – took exactly as it needed and not a minute (or an hour) more
2. Best pairing of actors — teammates matter and some are better than others. Obviously Ariana and Cynthia would have won
3. Best sequel – let’s not pretend Dune Part 2 stands alone. These movies deserve their own category because they’re dependent upon a predecessor.
4. Best montage — you know that music-backed quick succession of scenes that show time passing, protagonists training for a big fight or completing a big project, the jump-to-the-action thing
5. Best animal costars — Arthur the King, right? 

5 old school tech that’s still cool

Honorable mention to pagers – you can reach me anywhere, but I get to decide if I call you back. 

1. FM radio. Free broadcasts to anyone with a tuner. Still some listeners who choose the old FM airwaves. Reliable in emergencies.
2. iPod – it just plays music. That’s it. Pick a playlist, pick a song, just play the music. That’s it.
3. Pinball machines, skeeball, and laser tag – low tech but still engaging and useful. Might mostly live in retro bars but still fun.
4. Walkie talkie cell phones – direct connect. No need to text, I got you right away. 
5. Toaster oven – our air fryer has a Toaster Oven setting because that doggone thing was so useful. 

5 advantages of the Garnet Bites program

So much food waste on campus and now we have an effort to do something about it.

1. USC addressing both food insecurity and food waste with one program. Good idea and glad to see it executed.
2. Event planners can register the event as sustainable and the non claimed leftovers will be composted, not destined for the landfill
3. Registered people can bring containers to pack up food for later
4. Campus community is alerted to come and make use of the leftovers
5. Online form to complete specifying the event, the menu, and the time when the extra will be available

5 things federal employees can learn from Waffle House employees

Honorable mention: government employees should work for tips.

1. Always open: Waffle House meets customers needs all day and night all year long. Government can and should meet its customers needs as well. Even if that means 24-hour hotlines and Saturday hours. No one should have to take off work to make a compulsory visit to a government agency.
2. Cost controls: Free refills have limits; top off the coffee, bring out another soda, but charge for a second chocolate milk. Cost consciousness saves jobs. Know where the expenses are and control them. 
3. Standard offerings: stick to the menu, know the menu, execute the menu. Value is found in consistency and meeting people’s expectations.
4. Resiliency: drunks, non-tippers, complainers, all kinds come to the Waffle House and they serve them all. Take what you get and make the best of it. 
5. Efficiency: Shorthand for recording orders and code for calling them out, its jargon that cuts corners but still accurately communicates

5 things I did Saturday instead of selling books

1. Hung out with Hollie. It was perfect letterman’s jacket weather and HB and I hung out talking books and hanging with Rex and she was my DD home. Also she had a delicious hot dog which is one of her favorite things. 
2. Shared some Write On SC postcards told a dozen or so people about our show and podcast. More listeners!
3. Ate food truck food. I rarely do this, I’m kind of a snob about wanting an actual kitchen and server, but the cheese steak from Parabellum was good.
4. Drank beer. Columbia Craft has a good selection and we tried four of them. 
5. Met and chatted with the organizer of Hops and Shops, Brandi, a community organizer and entrepreneur. Look for more events from this gal.

5 things that SHOULD have happened at the hockey game last night

1. The arena announcer in Boston asked the crowd to respect each other’s national anthems and after a few boos, there were some US fans singing along with O Canada. Which was as it should be. We love those crazy canucks, eh.
2. Mike Eruzioni from the US Miracle hockey team, Lake Placid Olympics 1980, was the US captain, he should have posed with Wayne Gretzky for a selfie. Also consider wearing lifts so he wouldn’t look so tiny. That’s social media gold.
3. The little kids lined up for the national anthem should have taken the puck drop.  And immediately thrown punches.
4. The US national anthem should have been played by a BIG time American band. Like Lynard Skynard. They did play Freebird when we scored. So that’s something.
5. The giveaway should have been Justin Trudeau bobbleheads. Sure, we’ll bulk up border security. Bobble bobble bobble. Sure we’re still close friends. Bobble bobble bobble. Make America (and Canada) Great Again. Bobble bobble bobble.

5 ways to start the “I think our government might be corrupt” conversation

Not to get political because that’s not what the morning show is about.  But after yesterday’s Moore Impact, it’s worth talking about how you can have this conversation in your own home. So here are some starters:

1. We get the government we deserve. Voter turnout is lousy, candidates are lousy, the system is expensive and rigged and we can’t be bothered to fix it: we deserve what we have.
2. What do you know about presidential pardons?
3. You know what you could do? you could apply for federal aid. I hear they’re funding all kinds of kookydukes stuff.
4. Answer me this: if punching an orangutan is illegal, then why can’t we get regulations around data brokers? Why can every digital footprint we make be sold again and again? Government doesn’t protect citizens from political donors: Facebook, X … if you’re not paying for the product you ARE the product. 
5. Just saw on my LinkedIn in that the guy dismissed by USC for mismanagement of state funds was named by Governor McMaster to head the South Carolina Research Authority which handles about $1.15 billion in investments in SC businesses each year. That seems safe.

5 true things about prom dress shopping

1. Going with friends and having an audience is the best. H and I went Sunday just us but yesterday there were four moms and four girls in the rooms where we were and they included us in the oohing and ahhing and we took Kris too so it was a lot of fun.
2. It’s a little too early for this, even six weeks out. A lot of the dresses are still winter colors and materials so if you’re not finding what you want, just be patient.
3. Take high heeled shoes so you can see the drape of the dress around the ankles and floor because they’re all long.
4. Spaghetti straps, sparkles, and cutouts are all in fashion so modesty, apparently, is not.
5. Prices vary but $130 seems to be the median for reasonably priced dresses.

5 things about US vs Canada hockey on Saturday

First three fights in the first 9 seconds of the game. Puck drop – fight. Puck drop – another fight. This puck drop, Canada went straight to the goal and another fight broke out. Five players in the penalty box in the first nine seconds.

1. Looks like early regular season hockey, not the flow and coordination of the playoff hockey we love.
2. Empty net goal 3-1 with 1:19 to go. Americans clenched a spot in the finals with the win in regulation.
3. The Canadiens booed the US national anthem. But it’s not like we hate one another, it’s more like rival siblings. 
4. The speed of Canada versus the physicality of the Americans, but both seemed to demonstrate speed AND physicality.
5. Carter Hellebuyck in goal for the US, of the Michigan Hellebuycks

5 Valentine’s Don’ts

It’s a Friday night and rookie night out – people who rarely go out are out tonight and they won’t be patient with a waitlist and they won’t tip like regulars. 

1. Dismiss it as a Hallmark holiday and not do anything at all. Even if it’s just an acknowledgement of the day, an “I love you,” 🥰 realize the people you love are gifts. They’re special. And this is a day to remember that.
2. Tickets for something six months from now. That’s a commitment your valentine might not be willing to make. Don’t get out over your skis.
3. Live animal. Bunny? Kitty? Puppy? No, no, no. Animal adoption needs thought and planning. Don’t gift someone a pet.
4. Singing telegram. It causes a scene, it’s annoying, and it doesn’t last after the two minutes it’s delivered. 
5. Black licorice. Smells bad, tastes bad. Good n Plenty is a no. Don’t do it.

5 things about Laney – happy birthday, lady!

1. She puts up with Kev. The first time I met her, I stopped Kev on the street at Soda City and hugged him and she didn’t blink, grit, or glare. She grinned. She puts up with Kev.
2. She’s a great mom and her kids say really sweet things about her. They also look just like her. Especially Hayden, luck girl!
3. She makes two kugel – one with raisins and one without because she knows Kev likes it with raisins.
4. She likes margaritas and dances more when she drinks one.
5. She likes live music and will DANCE if you take her out to see it.

5 cheap, easy last minute Valentines

1. Love coupons – vouchers for future stuff like a date night, a back rub, a foot massage, walking the dogs or being nice to your in-laws. Can substitute tickets for a live music or Broadway event here, if you find $200 in the couch cushions.
2. Frame a picture of the two of you – you can still print photos at Walgreens. Upload them using the app and maybe buy a frame from WalMart.
3. Take the car to get washed and maybe the oil changed. Little tree scent – their scent not yours. 
4. Cook them a meal. Then you can source the ingredients and control the costs. Just don’t make eggs.
5. Tiny potted cactus 🌵 while this might be interpreted as giving your valentine work, it’s a cactus. Ain’t much work.

5 surprises from Super Bowl LIX

1. Six sacks on Mahomes. Makes you wonder if they played another defense that was as tough as the Eagles this year. Fourth quarter fumble by Mahomes. Not exactly the experience he expected to have. 
2. Saquon Barkley more effective as a pass receiver than a runner. Chiefs probably thought if they shut him down they’d be good.
3. The half time score. When was the last time the Chiefs went into the locker room with 0 points? 
4. Samuel L Jackson playing “Uncle Sam” in a patriotic-themed halftime show. Entertaining. 
5. Two first half turnovers by the Chiefs. They were pretty good at taking care of the ball but the Eagles specialize in turnovers. Cooper DeJean, the rookie, with a pick 6. Just awesome.

5 commercial jingles that stick with you

1. Say goodbye a little longer, make it last a little longer. Give your breath long lasting freshness, with Big Red.
2. The best part of waking up is Folgers in your cup.
3. I want Baby Back Baby Back Baby Back ribs.
4. Rice-a-Roni, the San Francisco treat!
5. My bologna has a first name, it’s O-S-C~A~R

5 best soups

1. Charlie’s clam chowder – bacon, nuff said.
2. French onion soup with the croutons and the melted (burned?) cheese
3. Kristen’s leftover Thanksgiving turkey soup with a tomato soup add in that rocks.
4. Broccoli cheese – when Charlie decided to make this from fresh broccoli, it was over
5. Italian Wedding soup – mini pasta, meatballs, spinach, a chicken broth base. So good.

5 new things to try if you haven’t before

This morning in the gym, two women talked about trying a swim workout for the first time and a teammate of mine invited them to join the Masters. She said we were a good group of people and that made me jealous of people who try something new. I told her I’d been swimming since I was five, it’s the only thing I know how to do. Here are five things I think we should all try:

1. Lectures at the museum or the library. The write ups rarely do the talk justice but these visiting experts are SO interesting: the events are usually free and you might actually learn something. 
2. Running or walking with a club. It’s usually a solomente kind of thing but having a club provides support and encouragement and even tips on gear, form, and stretching and recovery. Join the club. You won’t be sorry.
3. Yoga. 🧘 I like yoga and I’ve done regular, prenatal, and hot yoga. But Fit Columbia offers yoga with baby goats. So there’s a kind of yoga for everyone and you’ve never done it all. Breathe. 
4. Baking class. You might be better at this and you might think you have nothing to learn. But cooking classes are always worth the time and money and baking classes end up with cupcakes so yay!
5. Axe throwing. You’re not going to be good at it. It’s like bowling for the first time. But it’s fun and good training for your eventual horror film experience. You probably need to bring friends.

5 great SNL classic sketches

1. The Village’s Dish on National Public Radio. Every talk radio nerd loves this Molly Shannon skit with the quiet low tone variation and guests like Pete Schwetty of Seasons Eatings.
2. Patrick Swayze and Chris Farley in the Chippendales audition.
3. Nate Bergatze explaining how and why the US adopted the metric system while dressed like George Washington
4. Pretty much anytime Justin Timberlake is on, right? But he had some classics including “Bring it on down to Wrappingtown”
5. Jeopardy — who doesn’t love a Sean Connery Alex Trebek rivalry invented by SNL

5 things to add to the declassify list

RFK, JFK, MLK, assassinations seem to be our government’s jam. But here are some other secrets we think they’re keeping:

1. Is it too tin foil hat to ask for transparency on COVID? Big Pharma? The food pyramid? How can we believe anything we’re told if we know we can’t trust the government? Let’s declassify it all. The NSA is listening, the CIA is double crossing, the FBI is instigating. It’s all corrupt, man. Why isn’t this a golden age for investigative journalism? Why instead are we all stuck with randos on podcasts claiming expertise? Tell us the truth about everything. 
2. Bermuda Triangle – ships go missing? Planes go missing? People go missing? Someone knows something and it starts with the national weather service’s technology. That we paid for.
3. Underwater cities? Naval accounts of odd shaped structures and unnamed species might be logged as potential King Triton and Ariel habitations.
4. Amelia Earhart – her disappearance is now being investigated by Deep Sea Vision but their images have been disproven
5. Epstein Island – the flight logs in and out should give us a good idea of who the clients were

5 TV comedy romances

1. Ross and Rachel from Friends
2. Jim and Pam from The Office
3. Eleanor and Chidi from The Good Place
4. Niles and Daphne from Frazier
5. Sam and Diane from Cheers

5 great cakes

Yesterday was National Chocolate Cake day and while I’m not much of a cake eater, I do admit to loving the occasional indulgence. So here are my top 5 cakes. Honorable mention to cheesecake which is debatable as to whether it actually is a cake.

1. Except birthday cake. It’s that sweet funfetti version of cake that we use to flavor ice cream and cake pops. So good. Number one is birthday cake ice cream. Maggie Moo’s did it best back in the day it was my every Sunday treat after the Redskins lost.
2. Vanilla cake – I know it’s boring but I love vanilla and if it’s got a good creamy vanilla flavor (lookin at you, Publix) there’s nothing better. Their marble cake is good, too.
3. Red velvet cake — so good with the cream cheese icing. It was my Nana’s favorite and is my mom’s favorite
4. German chocolate cake — love the coconut icing. It’s a perfect upgrade from regular chocolate cake.
5. Carrot cake — weird, I know and it would be better if it was also a serving of vegetables, but I like a good carrot cake.

5 good things about losing the NFC championship 

Honorable mention to my sister’s team making the Super Bowl.

1. We didn’t match the spread. We weren’t even supposed to be there. Washington might be the reason we believe Vegas doesn’t control ALL of the NFL outcomes.
2. The NFC East is a strong conference. Two of us in the championship? It’s thrown the gauntlet down for the Giants and the Cowboys. Get better. Spend the money. Get better.
3. Fan humility – look, we aren’t that good. Winning is great but being a winner is different. Let’s all pump the breaks and remember we sucked last year.
4. More resources – Coach Dan Quinn doesn’t have everything her needs – a loss reinforces the lack of resources.
5. Jayden Daniels is not immortal. Chance for him to reevaluate what he wants a la Deshaun Watson

5 reasons to watch the NFL conference championship games this weekend

1. You never know what’ll happen out there, and it’s that “maybe” that makes it worth it. 
2. Maybe, just maybe a rookie will make it to the Super Bowl. 
3. Maybe, just maybe the refs will call a fair game. Just do their jobs and not let their Vegas overlords’ influence shine through.
4. Maybe, just maybe Washington will keep Saquon Barkley from running wild in Philly. 
5. Maybe, just maybe the Bills will keep the Chiefs out of the Super Bowl. And we’ll get a glimpse or two of TayTay.

5 mom things I think Melania Trump probably did or does

Even being a European supermodel doesn’t save you from the indignities of motherhood. Princess Kate celebrates them but something tells me our First Lady had a specific kind of scowl when she had to do these things. 

1. Said, “because I said so,” when one of her decisions was questioned.
2. Dug in her bag for something — matchbox car, bouncy ball, keychain, crayons, a snack? — for something to entertain that kid when something (a ceremony? A flight?) took longer than it should have.
3. Bought cupcakes at 10 pm the night before Barron had promised they’d be at school
4. Signed permission slips at 11 pm or 6:50 am because Barron forgot about it
5. Wiped schmutz off Barron’s face

5 fun things about a snow day

Honorable mention to white knuckling it on the roads from the Upper East Side to downtown. 😳

1. All the people who get to decide for us whether we work, or go to school, or the gym, or whatever. Some weird kind of risk analysis math. Probably oughta get a Moore school economist to investigate that.
2. All our neighbors and coworkers worrying about traveling in the weather. Stay home!
3. Foot prints in the driveway, the yard, the deck. 
4. School cancellation. No busses, no car rider line, no soggy boots.
5. Flurries. The ones that look like a Peanuts sketch.

5 things to do instead of watching the Natty

1. Bark at phantoms at the front windows (Duke and Atia) but really, any of us could have been doing that and been more engaged than we were in the football game.
2. Watch a movie with the kiddo (me)
3. Snuggle with mom (Hollie)
4. Take down the Christmas tree (Kristen)
5. You Tube food tutorials (Charlie)

5 crazy food crossovers

The soup drops inspired this. Honorable mention to Chocolate covered bacon.

1. Chicken in a Biscuit crackers. Salty and yummy but who thunk that up?
2. Frank’s Red Hot shredded cheese. Maybe for chili? 🌶️ 
3. Crab stuffed mushrooms – why? These are not complementary flavors. Seal that crabmeat in with cheese and it’s delicious. But sea creature meets forest food? Weird.
4. Goldfish graham cracker cookies. First, they’re not shaped the same, they’re much denser, and second they’re not supposed to be sweet.
5. Biscuits and gravy flavored potato chips

5 loser anthems

Save for later – Washington didn’t lose.

1. Blaze of Glory
2. I’m a Loser, Baby
3. Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For
4. So Long, by George Strait
5. Winner Takes it All

5 great NFL wins

It’s playoffs and it’s win or go home and while not all games all season have those stakes, the wins are still really meaningful. Especially these five.

1. Jan 8, 2000 – wild card game, win or go home and Brad Johnson and Stephen Davis get it done. Washington 27, Detroit 13
2. Nov 4, 1990 – a blowout victory for Mark Rypien, Washington 41, Detroit 10
3. Oct 7, 2007 – I remember it well – I was pregnant and not drinking! Defense shuts down the opponents offense and Jason Campbell has a career day. Washington 34, Detroit 3
4. Nov 5, 1989 – everyone’s buying turkeys to the backdrop of a thrilling overtime game. Washington 41, Detroit 38
5. Sept 22, 2019 – snapped a losing streak with a late game field goal – Washington 19, Detroit 16

5 top sandwiches 

Yesterday was national pastrami day. Kev mentioned Groucho’s makes a good pastrami sammich so we thought we’d think about good sandwiches.

1. Jersey Boy sub from Jimmy G’s in Northern Virginia. Roast beef, turkey, provolone, steamed together add lettuce and mayo on a sub roll.
2. Monte Cristo – best one was in the Philippines – made with egg bread deep fried Swiss and ham on French bread. So stupidly good.
3. French baguette with butter game and cheese, this is how the French eat their sandwiches and I love it. Everyone else I know hates it.
4. Club sandwich – bacon, ham, turkey, mayo, lettuce, quartered and staked with a long tooth pick. Toasted bread. Best one is on croissant with avocado. California Club. Delicious.
5. Peanut butter and honey — an oldie but goodie. Great breakfast, sticks with you, and can be made ahead of time as needed. The versatility here is awesome.

5 day 1 amusements

1. Had quite a few students who have taken classes with me before who signed up for another class with me. It’s very flattering. Two of the students have had me for three classes. Suckers.
2. When Dr Ozturk asked, “who’s on the first episode of Moore Impact” on the radio? I said, “you are!” 
3. Saw another, Laurel Ray, who pouted because I’m not teaching the class she’s taking. Glad to reunite with her. 
4. Saw one of my favorite students in the hall, Eagles fan, and exchanged congrats and caught up. Glad to see her.
5. When we did introductions, we played would you rather — watch football or a movie? For the football fans, who stood, I asked who their teams were. As they named them, Panthers, I said, “sit down,” Steelers, “you guys lost this weekend, sit down. And the Washington fans? You already have an A. You’re good.

5 things true about old friends

1. They’re glad to see you. No matter the circumstance, being with people you’ve known for a long time is a joyful experience and they’re glad you’re here.
2. They know you. It’s a comforting place, the arms of people who know you. Especially if you spend most of your life meeting strangers, like I do, or having to prove yourself over and over like sales reps or entrepreneurs, being with old friends who know you and like you already can be such a safe place.
3. They’re better dressed than they used to be – no hoodies or t-shirts, polis and slacks, nice jewelry, they’ve earned their parents’ wardrobe.
4. They’re more mature than they used to be. Fewer cuss words, no smoking, waiting patiently and respectfully for their chance to speak.
5. They’re older than they used to be. Grayer and rounder and balder and wrinklier. Older.

5 reasons to be excited about the snow

1. All the bread and milk and toilet paper we need for like two weeks
2. Great Excuse not to go anywhere
3. Snuggle up under blankets and watch movies
4. Work from home
5. Half day of school

5 things people keep trying to get me to do while I’m trying to stay on vacation

1. Reply to all those circle-back-in-2025 emails. Except I’m still not ready to commit to your thing, send you that updated thing, or nail down a date. I’m on vacation!!
2. Post syllabi to the online classroom. Students want to buy books. Want to get their calendars ready. But whyyyy???
3. Process payments. Unpaid invoices. Check requests. Approval signatures. Ugh.
4. Have meetings. Mornings? Midday? Afternoon? Evening? What works for you? None of it.
5. Take down Christmas decorations. But that admits it’s over. Don’t make me. Not yet. Stockings are still hung. Empty, but still hanging.

5 best “I Want” Disney songs

1. Let it Go — Elsa decides to live alone in a frozen castle rather than hide her powers. She has to be herself is very specific kind of “I Want.”
2. How Far I’ll Go — from Moana, Lin Manuel Miranda at his best.
3. When Will my life begin — Tangled makes painting the walls have so.many.meanings. 
4. Part of Your World – the Little Mermaid – thank you, Howard Asan for reinvigorating the Disney musical
5. I’m almost there — Tiana thinking about her restaurant, imagining how she’ll work hard enough to earn it.

5 great things about awards shows

1. Building a list of all the things I should be watching based on the honors earned. Still haven’t watched The Bear despite it winning nods for the third year, I’ll have to watch Emilia Perez even though Netflix hasn’t promoted it to me for some reason, need to get back to Hacks and Only Murders in the Building. 
2. The older veterans who seem to know the ways of the game and have a kind of cynicism that only comes with repeated experiences. I also love the newbie winners. Bonus if, like Demi Moore, they’re both veterans in the space and newbie winners.
3. The praise they heap upon one another — especially when it’s genuine — about how much they love each others work and the art that’s being created.
4. The little jokes and smiles they share that make you think there’s some stories that haven’t been told simmering in the room.
5. The fashion – I love seeing these folks dressed to the nines and made up looking glamorous and otherworldly

5 things to look forward to in 2025

1. Charlie is set to graduate in May. 
2. Hollie’s getting her class ring and her letterman’s jacket this spring.
3. Write On SC will have its 300th episode in February.  
4. We plan to see Les Miserables at the Koger Center this spring.
5. A new Marvel film with the crazy sister from Black Widow played by Florence Pugh — it’s called Thunderbolts and looks pretty funny

Thanks for reading all the way to the end. It’s a LOT of work when it’s accumulated like this. But just day-in / day-out it’s not so much. I enjoy the recurring segment and it’s taught me to be succinct in summing up my thoughts on various things. A skill, I think, that will come in handy in 2026.

Cheers and Happy New Year!