Tom Faranda's Folly

Author: Tom Faranda

  • Kayak has arrived

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    Tom Faranda
    in

    Brigid’s big birthday present finally arrived (please ignore the rest of the garage!) yesterday – eight days late. Here’s what it looks like, wrapped up in it’s shipping mummy. Will unpack it over the weekend.

  • Note to Msgr. Shelley, my A.P. history teacher

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    Tom Faranda
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    On Tuesday the local Gannett newspaper had a nice feature story on one of my former high school teachers, now Monsignor Thomas Shelley. the article was about his just-published history of the NY Archdiocese. It’s a good article – A new history of the Archdiocese of NY tells the Catholic story of the last 200…

  • Fr. Benedict Groeschel on Religious life

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    Tom Faranda
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    Fr. Groeschel is kind of the Faranda Family Guru. Brigid and I have known him since about 1990, Tom Faranda’s Folly: The official Guru of the Faranda family, featured in NY Times article although we’ve only seen him a few times since his near-fatal accident a number of years ago. We were involved in a…

  • Extensive article on a father seeking cancer cure for his son on the “edge of medicine”

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    Tom Faranda
    in

    The past weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal had a long front page article about a family working with many physicians to extendthe life of their son. It’s really a great article, which unfortunately is not available unless you are a Wall Street Journal subscriber. I am putting the link in, because sometimes these…

  • Darfur Update

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    Tom Faranda
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    The Washington Post has an editorial today, highlighting the intransigence of Sudanese Dictator Bashir, and the failures of Europe and NATO in the situation. Stuck on Darfur – washingtonpost.com WHEN THE United Nations Security Council approved an expanded peacekeeping force for the Darfur region of Sudan last summer, some Western politicians may have concluded —…

  • The NY Times Travel section does Tikal

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    Tom Faranda
    in

    Tikal is the ancient Mayan city in northern Guatemala. abandoned by the Mayans around 900 AD, it was more or less re-discovered in the mid 19th century. In 1978 while I was living and teaching in Jamaica, I spent my Easter break on a trip to Panama and Guatemala. I visited my brother Jim, who…

  • Two quite different visions of Catholic Faith

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    Tom Faranda
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    One is from a recent article in the Washington Post, the other a recent editorial in the independent National Catholic Reporter. Which vision will last? I Report you Decide. Here’s the two thousand year vision – Buzzworthy Sisters in Habits Headed to Va. School – washingtonpost.com She is Sister Mary Jordan Hoover, principal of Northern…

  • Noonan eviscerates Huckabee and the Clintons

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    Tom Faranda
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    Another fine Friday column by Peggy Noonan (whether you agree or not is a different matter) in the WSJ. The Pulpit and the Potemkin Village OpinionJournal – Peggy Noonan … In my lifetime faith has been a significant issue in presidential politics, but not the sole determinative one. Is that changing? If it is, it…

  • How to postpone mental aging

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    Tom Faranda
    in

    The NY Times science section over the last two weeks had a two part series on memory and mental agility s you age. The first part wasn’t very useful – clever stuff like write yourself messages on post-it notes (duh!) but part 2 was interesting. Mental Reserves Keep Brains Agile Memory – Aging – Medicine…

  • Health update

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    Tom Faranda
    in

    Well, there isn’t any, I postponed yesterday’s appointment with Dr. Zelenetz on account of the weather. It was re-scheduled to January 3rd, but I’m hoping to see him before then, if someone else cancels an appointment. I told the scheduling people I could see him on short notice. Since I had the CAT scan two…