A Life of Words

A guy who used to be on this show I watched as a kid turned 90 Monday. You may have heard of him: William Shatner. The Canadian-born actor played this cool, always-in-control character on a science fiction series called Star Trek. His name was James Tiberius Kirk, he was born in Riverside, Iowa, in 2233 … More Happy 90th birthday to the starship captain of my childhood, Capt. James Tiberius Kirk, aka William Shatner

We have happy bird news and sad bird news today. First, the happy: I called Rogers Wildlife Rehabilitation Center in Hutchins this morning to find out how Bird, the injured pine siskin we brought in Tuesday morning, is doing. The young lady I spoke to — who, when I asked if she’s figured out male … More Our Bird’s on the mend, but another one met a sad fate

Last week, we had a young, tiny, injured bird in our backyard that we believed to be a pine siskin. I had attempted to catch it to bring it to a rehab center but it hopped away, under the fence into the neighbor’s yard. It was clear it had an injured right wing, holding it … More The backyard adventure, and rescue, of a tiny, hurt pine siskin

On this 60th birthday, I’m grateful for so much. You all know how long-winded I can be? That’s how I’d be if I were to ramble on about all the good things in my life. But this post, which I promise to keep (relatively) short, is all about my big brother Crys Workman, who shares … More To my birthday twin, my big brother, lots of love and happy wishes for many more to come

Seventy-five years ago today, my dad, Clark Lindsay Christlieb, turned Sweet 16. He was having a blast as a sophomore at Murray High, directly across from his house on Grantham Street in picturesque, serene St. Anthony Park in St Paul, Minnesota. Dad played basketball and ran track that year (1945-46) and was a placekicker in … More Happy 91st to ‘a pretty cute and swell kid’ who grew up to be Dad

“Is this the craziest thing I’ve ever done?” I asked Kay. “Yes,” she said, without hesitation. “That’s just because you never do anything crazy,” Alex, the 16-year-old, chimed in. Two days later, it is done. This afternoon, I spent over an hour at a cool place in Arlington called Kelly’s Haircuts, which I found through … More With 60 just days away, taking an un-Frank-like leap for a new look

Today’s the day!! It’s the day we *finally* escape the subfreezing captivity that has gone on for what seems weeks — but has been only 10 days. The day we finally start to see some of the snow that has blanketed North Texas since Sunday begin to melt. The day we can look up and … More A week of bitter cold, lost power, boiled water and hot Texas tempers over outages

This is taken from a Facebook post I wrote six years ago today, Feb. 9, 2015 — coincidentally, almost exactly four years before I started this blog. Although it wasn’t the last time I would be in Dad’s house in Missouri City — I did go back later for the grandfather clock — this visit … More 6 years later in my memory, Dad’s red jacket waits for him

Don’t ask me why I have zero pictures of my first car, a 1980 Ford Fairmont that my parents bought for my 20th birthday in February 1981, when I was a sophomore at Texas A&M. Who the heck doesn’t take photos — lots of them — of their first car? I came home from school … More There’s something perfect about our first car, isn’t there? For me, it was an ’80 Ford Fairmont