Al's Blog-o-Sphere

The following is a collection of the posts to Facebook in the next 48 hours Continue Reading…

December 16th, 2014. Joe DeMarco posted this photo of us in the Wings plane shortly after our trip.

When Frank called me, he was unsure what to do next. The hospital wanted us to get there quickly, but also mentioned getting on the road and driving. Reading between the lines, this told me that the donor organs were probably not yet “harvested” and still in someone who was clinically dead, but on life support. They’d be able to stall while we drove the 6-7 hours to get there. Continue Reading…

…sitting in a hospital waiting for things to start to happen.

Frank as he arrives in Teeterboro, NJ

In case you don’t know me or read this blog, back in 2008 I was in a similar situation in UPMC in Pittsburgh when my eldest son, Albert, had a double lung transplant.

I’ve gotten away from blogging here recently, having been lured away by the instant gratification of Facebook. I think that it’s time to get back on here now though, because I’m here again supporting my second son, Frank, as he faces the same situation. I think serious matters require a serious platform. I’ll link to FB, of course. Continue Reading…

I do. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t. In fact, while we may disagree about what particular type of music we like, I would find someone who doesn’t like any music weird.

I sometimes listen to music when I can’t get to sleep. I have a small MP3 player that I plug some tiny earbuds into and relax while listening. I put it on shuffle and lie there amazed by the random mix I get. It’s seldom produces any jarring transitions and sometimes plays songs that go together better than I could arrange them if I tried myself. Of course, the first part of the formula is that the only songs on the player are songs I like, otherwise I wouldn’t have put them there.

This is the second Zen V Plus I’ve owned. I left one in a hotel room once and was kicking myself so bad, that I went online and searched another one out. Even back then, it was an obsolete model and I had to go through third party sellers to get one. But I like the small size. It’s like a fat book of matches. And it’s pretty easy to put music on it. I don’t use special software anymore. It shows up in Winamp (another lost cause) and is easily loaded from there. Continue Reading…