John Delach

Author Unknown: Presented by John Delach

Presented by John Delach

September 2023

1. The Wall Street Journal is read by the people who run the country.

2. The Washington Post is read by people who think they run the country.

3. The New York Times is read by people who think they should run the country and who are

very good at crossword puzzles.

4. USA Today is read by people who think they ought to run the country but don’t really understand The New York Times.

5. The Los Angeles Times is read by people who wouldn’t mind running the country if they could find the time and if they didn’t have to leave Southern California to do it.

6. The Boston Globe is read by people whose parents used to run the country.

7. The Philadelphia Inquirer is read by people who’d rather be part of a brawl at an Eagles home game than run the country.  

8. The New York Daily News is read by people who aren’t too sure who’s running the country and don’t really care as long as they can get a seat on the train. 

9. The New York Post is read by people who don’t care who is running the country as long as they do something really scandalous preferably while intoxicated.

10. The Chicago Tribune is read by people that are in prison that used to run the state and would like to do so again as would their constituents who are currently free on bail.

11. The Miami Herald is read by people who are running another country, but need baseball scores.  

12. The San Francisco Chronicle is read by people who aren’t sure if there is a country or that anyone is running it: but if so, they oppose all that they stand for. There are occasional exceptions if the leaders are gay, handicapped, minority, feminist, atheists, and those who also happen to be illegal aliens from any other country or galaxy provided, of course, that they are not Republicans.

13. The National Enquirer is read by people trapped in line at the grocery store.

14. The Seattle Times is read by people who recently caught a fish and need something to wrap it in.   

Mary Ann and I purchased our vacation house in 1984 from Joe C., the man who built it in 1972. Mary Ann christened it, “Little House”. Over the years we’ve had contractors add a deck, a porch, a Four Seasons type room and finish an upstairs bunkroom that sleeps five and a second bathroom.

Some things became problematic. The Four Seasons type room is one of them. The contractors poured a concrete base in 1988 and assembled the structure on top of it. We love it, but it’s been less than a total success. The room is uninhabitable during summer days when it turns into an oven. Years later I ran into the contractor who helped build it. He assembled it and remarked: “This was the first glass room we erected and we really didn’t know what we were doing. See how close to the ground the windows go?  They should be at least a foot above ground. Also, there isn’t any insulation to protect it from the severe changes in temperature. But we live with this as we do many other quirks that come with having a vacation house in rural New Hampshire.

Marlow is a small town of 750 people as of the 2020 census. Unfortunately, most of the businesses that populated the town when we bought Little House have ceased to exist. The gas station and general store became a victim of obsolete underground storage tanks that could  leak. But we did re-gain a seasonal ice cream and luncheonette called Aaron’s. Unfortunately, it is only open from May to October.

Marlow has been called the icebox of Monadnock County and some winters have lived up to this nickname. Regardless, it has been our family’s vacation home and I expect it will remain so after we are gone.

We have witnessed many different happenings over the years. One, worth remembering, was when the presidential candidate came to town. The year was 2007 and the early hunt to make a good showing in New Hampshire’s January primary scheduled for January of 2008 was on. Candidates from both parties spent a good deal of their time that summer in Iowa and New Hampshire.

George W. Bush could not run because of term limits. So both the Democratic and Republican primaries were wide open. Candidates crisscrossed the state seeking support. One of the curators of the Marlow Historical Society realized that no presidential candidate had ever made a stop or made a speech in our town. The challenge was taken up by The Keene Sentinel, the newspaper that covered Monadnock County. Bill Richardson, then the Governor of New Mexico, accepted the invitation which was scheduled for mid-July.

The Historical Society secured the auditorium at the town’s Odd Fellows Hall, one of three classic white clapboard wooden buildings that frame the center of Marlow behind a scenic pond. The other two structures are the town church and the old town hall.

Luckily, we were in Marlow with our daughter, Beth, her husband, Tom, their infant son, Cace and their four-year old daughter, Marlowe. (Yes, she was named after the town.)

We actually ran into Governor Richardson when he arrived and somewhere we have a photograph of him holding Marlowe in Marlow. It was a hot July day and I was amazed to see that Richardson was dressed in a woolen, three-piece suit and sporting an upscale tie fashioned with a perfect Windsor knot.

Many citizens turned out and gave him a standing room only ovation.

We arrived late just before the governor was introduced having stopped at a nearby ice cream store to buy Marlowe a cone. We brought her into the back of the Odd Fellows Hall to enjoy her cone while we participated in this minor part of the election process.

Richardson began his delivery and all was going well when all of a sudden, Marlowe took a lick from the side of her cone that dislodged the ice cream from its resting place propelling it down onto the old wooden floor.

For an instant, there was silence. Then she screamed! We moved as quickly as we could not looking back. Overnight, this became part of the lore of Little House.

Richardson finished fourth in the Democratic Primary behind Clinton, Obama and Edwards

Marlowe is now a sophomore at Syracuse University.

Richardson went on to be a splendid negotiator with foreign despots gaining the release of  several Americans held in their prisons.

He died this September at 75. The New York Times ran an excellent obituary, except they failed to include mention of Marlowe and her ice cream cone.          

I am glad to be back and I look forward to sending you my weekly blog on Wednesdays beginning today. However, I will miss next week, “On the Outside Looking in” will return on September 20^th.

A decent part of the summer was consumed by my prostate culminating in a diagnosis and a recommendation for treatment in late August by my Urologist, Dr. L.  He confirmed that my biopsy did reveal that I do have cancer, but it appears to be a minor and stable diagnosis. Given that and my age, 79, he recommended that we follow the treatment of watch and wait or as Dr. L put it, “Active Surveillance.”

Active Surveillance, indeed, I wonder where on earth doctors come with these terms? It seems to me that the doc who coined this term probably watches too many cop-shows like Blue Bloods, Chicago PD and Law and Order. 

 Active Surveillance calls for PSA tests every six months and possibly an MRI once a year. This sure beats any alternative treatments so Mary Ann and I signed on for it in a New York minute.

See you again on September 20. Have a great autumn and Go Giants.