The Happiness of Just Being

Posted on March 9, 2026 by Michael Kane

Hope is being able to see that there is light despite all of the darkness. ~ Desmond Tutu

The Happiness of Just Being

Today was a really wonderful day. First off, the weather was just perfect, seventy degrees, sunny, nice little breeze. My plan for the day was to go into the city and do some walking, knowing how good the weather would be.

Over the last couple of weeks I’d read some reviews on line for the play, Paranormal Activity, based of course off of the movie. I was surprised to see how positive they were and I was skeptical. So I thought to myself maybe I’d check it out if it came to town. Then I noticed, you know, because I’d read the reviews and Skynet hears all, so ofcourse an ad popped up online telling me that it was actually playing here in San Francisco. So I went online and got a cheap ticket for the furthest seat from the stage, literally back wall of the balcony. I was really happy about that seat, it actually gave me some legroom and minimized my human contact. It also gave me the benefit of getting to chat quite a bit with a really lovely young woman who was the usher. We had an amazing conversation about theater and society during the breaks.

It was a matinee and my plan was that if it wasn’t that good, I’d head off at intermission and go get a pizza down at Pier 39. What I was really interested in was how they would handle the technical aspects of the play. If you know the movie, the premise is a haunting, and it’s a fairly typical jump scare film. So blankets move, things fly off of the wall etc… It’s one thing to pull those types of things off in a movie, but so much harder on stage with people twenty feet from the action. The play itself was fine, although there was some predictable aspects to the story, there were some decent twists and connections. The technical aspects turned out to be really spectacular, one in fact was at the level of a high end magic show in Las Vegas.

It was my first time at the theater in some time, I love the theater, there’s something personal and intimate about a stage presentation and a break from the world, no phones, no screens, sitting in the dark just being in the story. After leaving, as I was walking through the city and it really hit me how amazing the weather and the day had been. It brought me back to a simple thing, the pure happiness of those moments of just being.

As a child, we do this really naturally. We sit on swings and stare at the sky, we lay in the grass and watch a lady bug, we sit and marvel at a line of ants, or just lay on our backs and watch clouds. These are the types of things that leave our lives as we get older, we seem to lose the understanding of the value in these moments. I really learned this lesson while hiking on the Appalachian Trail. When you’re doing a thru-hike, you’re out there, day after day after day walking. Time absolutely slows down and you get massive amounts of time to think and crawl into your own head. You slow down, and the longer you’re on the trail the more relaxed you get, the easier it is to grab a log and just observe nature. Stopping at a stream to pull of your shoes and soak your feet, or once it warms up, strip down and take a dip, or a bath, depending on how you look at it. It was in that mindset a month or so out on the trail that I was walking through a park in Virginia and stopped to eat at a picnic table. Like today, it was a magnificent day, temps in the sixties, blue sky and white puffy clouds, lovely sun and a nice breeze. So I ate lunch and then I decided to take a nap on the picnic table. Laying there I was so comfortable and was just staring at the sky, just watching clouds, the level of relaxation was amazing. And so I laid there for two hours just watching clouds. That ability to just be, be in the moment, be in the world and be happy, was absolutely amazing and I’ve carried that day on the trail with me ever since.

Today that day was with me again and so walking out of the theater, the sun on my face and the wind blowing that memory hit me. So I took a long walk up to Hayes Valley and Gioia Pizza for a couple of slices. Took them over to a little park and sat in the sun, ate my slices and was just being happy. While always a good thing, it was especially good today. I can honestly say I don’t remember the last time I felt like that, just happy, unbound, unobligated and easy it was absolutely wonderful and made for a very happy day my friends and one I’ve desperately needed lately. And maybe it was the situation, but honestly, these were the two best slices of pizza I’ve had in years. I hope you can find some time for yourselves to just be my friends. ~ Rev Kane

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French Toast Happiness

Posted on March 1, 2026 by Michael Kane

You don’t need a silver fork to eat a good meal. ~ Paul Prudhomme

French Toast Happiness

So if you read this blog regularly and especially if you know me in real life, you know that I’m just not normal, never have been. So while I’ve done some amazing things, hiking in Himalayas, photographing polar bears in Canada, and hugging a whale in Baja, there are some really basic, normal things that I’ve never done.

happiness, hiking, appalachian trail
My Polar Bear Selfie
happiness, everest, be happy, hiking
Rev Kane and a hiking friend
snow, winter, happiness
photography, travel, adventure
Aurora while photographing Polar Bears in the Arctic
polar bear, arctic
polar bear

Over the last year or so I’ve tried to tick off some of these things. So for instance, about a year ago I had my first macaroon, I had my first true croissant, and a big one, I made and ate some of anyway, my first bowl of Kraft Mac and Chesse, I was not a fan. And that’s not snobbery, I grew up poor, a blue-collar kid and so every once in awhile I’ll make a bowl of Spaghettios for dinner, some Top Ramen or hell even a Banquet Pot Pie.

A long standing habit from childhood has always been a big Sunday breakfast. Big of course meant we got donuts, or my favorite, crumb cake from the local bakery via the corner store when I was sent out to by the sunday papers. For me typically that means cornbeef hash with my eggs, not much but a little something extra on a Sunday morning, sometimes I get ambitious and make biscuits and gravy. It hit me last night that I was out of cornbeef hash and it was late and I was too lazy to go out and get some. Then it hit me, I had bread. As a diabetic, I usually don’t have bread in the house, so this was a bit unusual, and an idea hit me. And the idea came from all the way back in third grade.

As a child I was a really picky eater and it’s led to some weird things in my life. To this day I still hate raw onions and can’t stomach big pieces of cooked onions either. I ate my first mushroom at my sixteenth birthday dinner. My family took me out for a steak dinner, the owner heard it was my birthday and came by the table to say hello and happy birthday. He asked me where my mushrooms were and I told him I didn’t like them. He said, “I’ll make you a deal, I’ll have the chef make you some mushrooms in brown butter sauce, try it, if you don’t like them, I’ll comp your family’s dinner.” So a little while later they came out, and were amazing, to this day one of my favorite dishes to make. When the owner came over and I was eating them he smiled and said he was glad I liked them and they were his present to me. My father was pissed, he looked at me and said, “great, you’re a pain in the ass who won’t eat anything your whole life and the one-time it can save me some money you like something.” There’s a reason he and I aren’t close.

Being a picky eater, there were a lot of things I didn’t eat. I wasn’t a big fan of eggs as a kid, I ate pancakes but I didn’t like maple syrup, so I ate them with jelly. As such pancakes, waffles and french toast weren’t really on the menu for me. In fact, I still have never had a waffle. So last night I remembered third grade. In third grade, we went to another class for science lessons or some other reason to Mr. Conti and Mr. Webster’s rooms. One of the things we did one day and I have no memory of why, was that we were taught to make french toast. I was excited for the lesson and the knowledge, I was just starting to do the cooking at home many nights. After learning and telling her about it, my granny asked me to make it for her and she liked it. Of course, it was my granny, so of course she did. But it’s my sister’s favorite breakfast and I even made it at home a couple of times, but I never ate it. I seem to have an ability to make some things really well that I don’t consume. As a bartender, in a variety of situations, I’ve come to know that I make a mean bloody mary. Of course, I really don’t like tomato juice, so I’ve never actually drunk one.

So this morning, I made french toast for the first time for myself, the lovely slices pictured above. I decided to make them with vanilla and cinnamon and they were pretty good. My opinion on syrup has changed and I covered them in cinnamon and vanilla infused maple syrup. In eating them, I realized something about french toast and that for me, it’s in the same category as tortilla chips. These are not food, what these really are, are delivery systems for a topping. While my sister eats french toast with nothing but butter, most people are really just using it as an excuse to eat syrup, I sure was. Just like we only eat tortilla chips to consume guacamole and salsa. I mean come on, who eats a bag of plain tortilla chips.

So, what does all of this have to do with happiness? Not a damn thing, but my life is stuck in limbo, the world’s gone fucking crazy, the weather is insane, bombs are dropping on little girls, so today, I decided to eat something sweet and write about it. I hope you find something as equally satisfying today and have a happy day my friends. ~ Rev Kane

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Happiness: When Reality Meets Expectation

Posted on February 22, 2026 by Michael Kane

It’s a good place when all you have is hope and not expectations. ~ Danny Boyle

Happiness: When Reality Meets Expectation

We’ve all had the experience of being excited for something. We’ve heard everyone talk about how great the movie or book are, we’re really excited for a meal because we’ve been craving it, or you’ve met a person on a dating app and the chatting has been wonderful and your excited for that first date. Then, the movie is boring, the book is a terrible read, dude orders for you and then forgot his wallet, it just goes wrong and we feel massive disappointment because our expectations have not been met.

Today was a good day, early in the week the forecast basically said rain all weekend, but then it changed and today was not warm, but sunny and pleasant. So it meant I could do a city walk in San Francisco. And while my singular focus normally, is that my walks in one way or another end up passing one of a number of quality pizza places, today was going to be a bit different. I’ve been jonesing for Indian food for some time, more specifically I’ve been jonesing for some vindaloo. I live in the Bay Area and in my town, you can find just about every possible kind of food. I always laugh when folks come into town and say they want Asian food. While that is often few choices some places, that is not the case here. Do you want Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Filipino and it doesn’t stop there. They often say Chinese – mainland or Taiwanese? Mainland – what city or region, Xian, Bejing, Peking Duck, Shanghai. Because you literally can almost pick the city in China as a type of food where I live. However, I’ve yet to find a really good Indian place here, there’s a pretty good Pakistani/Indian place but it’s not spectacular.

So today I made the focus of my walk today good Indian food. I did a little research online and set my sights on Trisara on Kearney near Sutton. So I made the stroll and settled in and ordered my favorite combination Chicken Vindaloo, garlic naan and a coke. They of course ask how spicy and I always say Indian medium spicy, not white people medium spicy, because friends, these are different levels of spice. This always leads to the cook, owner or waiter immediately checking in with me when I get my food, because they have great amounts of experience with white guys who want spicy hot and have no idea what that means if they really get Indian spicy hot.

I have to say today, it may partially have been that I’ve been jonesing for some time, but today really met my expectation. The vindaloo sauce was perfect, absolutely delicious and spicy enough to make me sweat but not enough to vacate my sinuses. The chicken was was fall apart tender, the potatoes firm but able to be cut with a fork. Perfectly cooked basmati rice and of course a Coke is a Coke. The biggest joy was the best garlic naan I’ve ever had. Really spectacular naan is soft and fluffy at the edges and nearly crunchy toward the middle. And a lot of places miss on the level of garlic, either barely tasteable or overpowering. This was absolutely perfect, soft and fluffy edges, crisp in the middle, you could taste the garlic but it wasn’t too much. It’s been a while since I’ve had a meal that so perfectly met my hopes and expectations, so today was a very happy day.

What this wonderful meal did today, was get me thinking about happiness and expectations. There is a meme that flies around on social media, it says something to the effect of, if you want to be happy, lose your expectations. I really hate this meme. I saw a post today where someone said there therapist said that people who are in pursuit of happiness are always less happy than those who just focus on surviving. So let’s dive into both of these.

The pursuit of happiness gets a bad rap and it’s because the idea is misunderstood. People often take this mean to chase perfect happiness, creating an expectation of bliss, where happiness floats around you like you’re walking on clouds and everything is perfect. Chasing that will tear you to shreds because the expectation is completely unrealistic and reality will never meet your expectations. One of my favorite song lyrics by Sting from Consider Me Gone is:

To search for perfection. Is all very well. But to look for heaven is to live here in hell.

A much more poetic way of relating what I just stated.

The other extreme is the idea that if you have no expectations you’ll never be disappointed. And that’s not incorrect, because as usual with fortune cookie wisdom it’s not the whole picture. The real wisdom behind that idea is that the real trick is not to have expectations, but to still have hopes. If you just never have expectations, without hope or aspirations, well then you’ll very often get the least of whatever you’re after. But having hopes means you can still aspire to having really good things but by not expecting that you’ll always get them, you can be happy with what you do have.

As with anything, nothing is an absolute. Only maybe the Buddha or some other perfectly self-actualized human is at this level. But what we can do is to strive to reduce our expectations from perfection, but not lower them so that you have to accept less than you deserve. If you can find that sweet spot, you’ll have happier days my friends. ~ Rev Kane

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Happiness is finding your way back to you!

Posted on February 18, 2026 by Michael Kane
rev kane, slower pace of life, relaxing

To give real service you must add something which cannot be bought or measured with money, and that is sincerity and integrity. ~ Douglas Adams

Happiness is finding your way back to you!

I love this picture of me for a lot of little reasons. I like the smile on my face, the mood that it belies, I love the spots of light caused by floating bits of ice. I love that I’m so committed to the photography that I’m doing that I’m standing in the arctic with no gloves on. This was the day after I had just had one of the most amazing nights of my life, my first time seeing the northern lights and it was an incredible show. People in Churchill said it was the best light show they had seen in fifteen years. I’m starting here tonight because the moment in that picture is someplace I’m working hard to get back to, I need to feel like that again. I’ve had that feeling many times, that day photographing a polar bear from 15 feet, the morning my brother was born, holding my niece Maddy hours after she was born, my granny’s hugs, a shot I made in a basketball league game at Eastern Kentucky University, a goal I scored in an indoor soccer league game at SUNY Plattsburgh, the night I met her, the day I hugged a 40,000 pound whale and ran my hand through it’s baleen plates, my first night on the playa, squatting behind a cobra in Jemaa el-Fnaa square in Marakesh, my first sight of the Southern Cross on a floating bar in the Amazon, sitting on a rock above the third sacred lake in the Gokyo Valley in the Himalayas, a night on the Appalachian Trail sleeping by a stream and being serenaded by Spider Chai the night before my 1000th mile on the trail and every single bite, of every single piece of Pizza Pit pizza I ever ate.

The last year has broken me, broken me more than I have been broken in decades, hell I’ve even, for the first time in years, considered drinking and using again, I won’t but it’s been tempting. So many goddamn things have piled on me that it’s like being buried at the base of an avalanche. Health, family, lost friends, shit job, relationships crashing and burning an unholy sense and realization of how alone I am and in the middle of it, no way or time to get back to the feeling in that picture. That quite simply has to change, and over the last couple of days I’ve had a bit of a realization, not quite an epiphany, I don’t want to go that far, but it’s been a start. That realization quite simply has given me hope, but I have always said, hope is a four letter word.

That realization came after my HR department completely shit on me, again, followed by the bosses shitting on me, again and one of my shit employees deciding to go to war with me. My boss then had the unfortunate luck of following that up with a call to give me just one more final bit of bad news and I was an asshole. The kind of asshole I am at my core, the kind that doesn’t take being run over and used and treated badly without speaking up with my full chest and throat. I snapped a little bit, not enough to get over the line, not enough to get me disciplined or fired, but enough to leave my boss quietly apologizing. It broke the crust of this shell of shit I’ve been surrounded by, the funk that I’ve been living under, it took the muzzle off. So today I had a meeting and it was one of those meetings, at least meeting number four over the last two years, the third starting over of the partnership where every time we tweak the goals and the plans because two new people have been thrown into the mix. I know this meeting, I’ve had this meeting dozens and dozens of times over my career and I know it will go on for another year and nothing will ever come from it. The meetings are always kicked off by people far up in the chain of command who’ve had a grand idea without knowing a bloody thing about how the operational details, the only things that truly matter, actually work. So today, I said pretty much exactly this in the meeting. I was the asshole I truly am at heart, I told the truth and everyone in the meeting was incredibly grateful. I also offered to explain the operational realities of what the project entailed to their board members and senior leadership so we could either decide to move forward or not, and stop wasting hours and hours of time for the people who have things to do, because we’re the people who actually do the things. I felt free and good, I felt like me for the first time in a year.

What I know about myself is that in order for me to get back to being who I am, to get back to being happy, I have to be that asshole. Turning fifty ten years ago was a revelation for me, it freed me to cut a lot of things loose in my life, people who were draining my happiness. It allowed me to cut loose things in my life that were bringing down my happiness. I think to get back to where I need to be, to get back to the core of me, it’s time to cut things and people loose again. I’ve been working on the big one, cutting loose this damn job and making a move which will allow me to change a lot of things in my life. I’m working on that, but in the time that I’ve been working on that, with everything else that went on I ended up in suspended animation, limbo, whatever the hell you want to call it. And I allowed myself to be muted and muffled, and the last few days have taught me that, that situation absolutely has to end and I believe that this is the beginning of that end. So here’s to me being be me, to me cutting loose and god help the poor bastards who get in my way.

So the message in a broader sense tonight my friends is to remember to not lose who you are, that when you get sideways in the world. When the world crashes down on you like a ton of bricks, make sure to remember who you are, to be who you are, and to not lose that, hang on to it no matter what. Hopefully that will help bring you happier days my friends. ~ Rev Kane

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A Happy San Francisco Day

Posted on February 8, 2026 by Michael Kane

San Francisco is a lot like Amsterdam – free, open-minded and casual – though I expected better weather. ~ Marcel Wanders

A Happy San Francisco Day

I often walk in the city on the weekends. For a lot of reasons, a death in the family, lots of travel, a chilly winter season I haven’t been in the city much lately. For me a great walking day in the city includes a few things. First, some nice weather and of course good food. Additionally, although this has absolutely never been a problem, some interesting and/or weird things to see or experience. Yesterday was a good walking day.

Today the Superbowl is happening at the 49ers home stadium, and while technically that’s a San Francisco game, the stadium is almost an hour south of the city. However, San Francisco is officially the host city, so there were a lot of Superbowl events happening and signs everywhere including the official host site near city hall, hence the sign in the picture above.

The weather yesterday was perfect, high 60’s, lots of sun, a little breeze just really perfect walking weather. My first stop of the day was Tommy’s Joynt, an old school, long standing San Francisco restaurant. I’d known about Tommy’s for a long time but had never gotten up there before last year. Both of my heart procedures, the catheterization and my open-heart surgery happened at Kaiser near Tommy’s. Both procedures happened insanely early in the morning so I booked a hotel near the hospital in Japantown for both procedures. Before each procedure I walked down to Tommy’s Joynt for dinner the night before. It’s a perfect comfort food kind of place, their dinner plate with some roast beef, mash potatoes, salad and a roll reminds me of a really good dinner from my childhood. Topped off with a funky atmosphere inside and really great free pickles I really love this place. Having eaten there before both procedures has also given me a real emotional connection to Tommy’s and so it was my first good city food for the day.

On the way on my walk up to Tommy’s San Francisco didn’t disappoint. There was supposed to be a rally for the March for Billionaires at Civic Center, it was a bust, literally no rally. I really hope the march was a prank. But on the way up Van Ness there was an anti ICE rally that was really well attending and growing the whole time I was eating at Tommy’s and the image below really epitomizes how San Francisco makes protests their own.

After Tommy’s I needed a little dessert so I headed over to Hayes Valley and got myself a little dessert, it will not be shocking for regular readers to see what it is.

Finally, a few images of the interesting things I saw along the way including the former president enjoying a beverage in front of City Hall and a little bit of street art. Have a happy day my friends and get out in the sun and walk. ~ Rev Kane

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What’s the hardest thing you carry?

Posted on February 8, 2026 by Michael Kane

We have normality. I repeat, we have normality. Anything you still can’t cope with is therefore your own problem. ~ Douglas Adams

What’s the hardest thing you carry?

There is a really interesting classroom activity that flies around the internet every couple of years, it’s called the baggage activity. It’s a really interesting idea, the students write on index cards anonymously the hardest thing they are carrying emotionally. The thing that keeps them awake at 3AM, the thing they don’t know how to handle or just weighs them down. The cards are then read to show everyone in the class that others are dealing with big things as well and that no one is alone in having troubles. The activity is said to help build a deeper and more empathetic community within the classroom. It’s a neat idea, but in doing a little research on it for this piece I read a very interesting perspective form a long-time teacher.

She pointed out a couple of potential serious problems with the activity related to trauma informed education concepts. First, it might be possible that the reading of the cards, even though they are anonymous could trigger people, either the writer or someone who has had a trauma related to what’s being read. Second, and this one falls into a legal category, is that something on the card may cross into the territory of something that would require a teacher, as a mandated reporter, to act and that would certainly blow up everything the activity is attempting to do,

But I do think there is a good lesson in all of this and it’s about sharing our struggles. No one should carry anything alone, although we all do. Whenever possible and obviously with someone you deeply trust, you should share the thing you’re carrying, share the load if you will. The nice thing about a mental load, unlike actually physical weight, is that sharing someone else’s load doesn’t necessary add the same amount of weight to your load. In fact, the sharing can actually end up lightening both of your loads.

The thing about shouldering the load alone is that it will almost always catch up to you. I am a master at hiding what’s actually going on with me day to day. And at the lowest and worst part of my life I was still going to work every day, doing what I was supposed to do. In fact, I won manager of the year that year at my college. But one day I was walking down the hall, and a chemistry technician, an older woman that I really didn’t like, nor that I interacted with very often was walking past me in the hall. As we were about to walk past each other, out of nowhere she says, “are you ok?” It was this deep concern and she was looking me dead in the eyes. I muttered something and quickly moved on, because somehow she’d seen through all my masks and all of my defenses and saw my pain. I left campus and completely fell apart, if it was not for my good friend Kara really being there for me over the next month or so I really don’t know what would have come of me. It was sharing my burden with her that allowed me to come back to sanity, I almost typed normal, but if you know me, you know normal is never been a word anyone has used to describe me.

So my friends, take that heavy burden and share it with someone, be willing to share theirs, if you do, you’ll have happier days my friends. ~ Rev Kane

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Happy Cooking: Red Chimichurri

Posted on February 2, 2026 by Michael Kane

I think careful cooking is love, don’t you? The loveliest thing you can cook for someone who’s close to you is about as nice a valentine as you can give. ~ Julia Child

Happy Cooking: Red Chimichurri

So I’ll start in a really odd place for this post, I really don’t like the food chain Chipotle. It’s not that their food doesn’t taste good, what I’ve had there has been pretty good. However, I have two complaints. First, I don’t like onions and really don’t like raw chunks of uncooked onions and Chipotle is onion happy as hell, especially in their guacamole. Second, I have had intestinal distress about 50% of the time I’ve eaten there, now that’s like two out of four times but that was enough of a sample size for me. Not sure if it’s an ingredient issue or from their ads, the fact that they don’t have any freezers. Makes me wonder if they are using ingredients that have gone bad from time to time, or maybe it’s just me. If you like Chipotle and it doesn’t impact you the same way, enjoy.

Even though I don’t like the chain I have to give them credit for one thing, their ads are great. And lately they have been advertising their red chimichurri sauce and it looks fabulous. It looks so good, a couple of weeks ago I almost went to Chipotle just to try it. Instead, I looked up the recipe online and it’s been on my mind for a time. The nice thing is that nothing in the recipe is out of bounds for a diabetic, so as I’m working towards getting my blood sugar back in line, it’s a perfectly good sauce to use.

So after it gnawing on my brain for a couple of weeks today I went to a couple of stores to find roasted red peppers in a jar. I could have roasted my own but I was being a bit lazy and I liked the idea of the red peppers being stored in olive oil, which I could then use as the oil in the recipe. It took maybe ten minutes to get the ingredients together, put them through the food processor and mix it all up. At the first taste I was blown away, it’s amazing! I of course have never not doctored a recipe and this was no exception. First, I didn’t use red wine vinegar but I used what I had on hand, pomegranate balsamic vinegar and I think it added some sweetness to the mix. I didn’t have red pepper flakes, but once a year I roast, dry and smash up some Thai chilli peppers that I use in place of red pepper flakes which are a bit spicier. Finally, as I mentioned, the oil I used was a mix of the oil from the peppers and some extra virgin olive oil.

To use the mix I made some pinto beans and brown rice that I also fried some pork into with a little bit of homemade taco seasoning. I then mixed the red chimichurri into it all and it was absolutely delicious. So folks, give it a try, I think you’ll like it, it’s remarkably tasty and oddly sweet which I really didn’t expect. Honestly it’s so easy, I think I’m going to be making and using it a lot. Have a happy day my friends. ~ Rev Kane

Recipe from Evergreen Kitchen

Ingredients

  • ▢ ½ cup roasted red pepper (from a jar, see note 1)
  • ▢ ⅓ cup flat leaf parsley (packed, see note 2)
  • ▢ 2 tablespoons cilantro (packed)
  • ▢ 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
  • ▢ 2 cloves garlic
  • ▢ 1 teaspoon smoked paprika (see note 3)
  • ▢ ½ teaspoon cumin
  • ▢ ½ teaspoon fine sea salt
  • ▢ ¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes
  • ▢ ¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil

Instructions

  • Combine: To a food processor, add ½ cup roasted red pepper, ⅓ cup flat leaf parsley, 2 tablespoons cilantro, 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar, 2 cloves garlic, 1 teaspoon smoked paprika, ½ teaspoon cumin, ½ teaspoon fine sea salt, and ¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes. Pulse until red pepper is finely chopped but not pureed.
  • Add oil: Transfer mixture to a small bowl, then stir in ¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil. Taste and adjust seasonings if needed. Serve or refrigerate.
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Sunshine, freedom and a little flower!

Posted on January 31, 2026 by Michael Kane

Just living is not enough… one must have sunshine, freedom, and a little flower. ~ Hans Christian Andersen

Sunshine, freedom and a little flower!

I’m happy to say that the last two weeks have seen my state of mental health improving, by no means am I yippy skippy happy, but I’m doing better and the weight or haze that was hanging over has seem to lifted. Continuing to work the basics does wonders for you and some other really simple things have helped, all described in the quote above.

Sunshine. One of the beautiful things about living in California is that right now, while the rest of the country is absolutely freezing we’re starting to see consistent days in the 60’s. It’s still chilly at night, tonight will be in the 30s, but for a lot of the country 30s would be the daily high. As I talked about in my last post on the basics of happiness, one of the things I’ve been making sure to do is to get at least 20 minutes out in the sun every day. Happily the weather has cooperated and here in the normally overcast Bay Area we’ve had sunny afternoons almost every day. This has allowed me to get at least 20 and some days even 40 minutes out in the sunshine. It’s amazing in the winter how much of an impact that sunshine can have on your mood.

Freedom. I think most people see and understand the insanity of the political situation happening in the United States right now. Freedom, something we take for granted is now in many ways in doubt. So it definitely warmed my heart today to see students on our campus participating in the January 30 walkout and protest. It’s starting in some ways to feel like the 60’s all over again.

Flowers. The beauty of the end of January and beginning of February in California, at least along the coast, means that trees and flowers start to bloom. We are lucky to really see spring here by mid-February so only a few more weeks of cold nights and mornings. Of course this type of weather only solidifies the reality of dressing in the Bay Area. In the mornings it’s in the 40’s, so hats and gloves and big sweatshirts, by noon time it’s in the 50’s so gloves and smaller jacket, by 2PM it’s low 60’s and light jacket time and as the sun starts to go down you reverse the process. But the upside of the weather is that when I’m out for my walk the citrus trees are full of ripening fruit and everywhere there are flowers. So below are a series of some of the recent flowers I’ve seen, enjoy. ~ Rev Kane

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The Basics Bring Back Happiness

Posted on January 25, 2026 by Michael Kane

Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony. ~ Mahatma Ghandi

The Basics Bring Back Happiness

I’ve said it dozens of times on this blog, and I make no claims that I came up with it. It’s very old Taoist philosophy, to be happy you must secure the basics first.

Eat right

Get enough sleep

Drink enough water

Exercise

Get sunshine

Make sure you are safe

The last four months since I returned to work, still recovering from open heart surgery have been some of the hardest months of my adult life. I’ve been over all of it on the blog over the last few months, so I won’t go over it again. It’s taken a toll on both my physical and mental health. The two are of course interconnected. When my mental state goes to shit I find comfort in foods I shouldn’t eat, mostly carbs and cokes and that leads to bad blood sugar numbers. I’ll get my test results Monday and expect shortly after a call from my doctor that will not find her very happy. The good thing about me, is no matter how bad things get, I at least continue to exercise.

So, one of the benefits of writing this blog for so long is the obligation of being the Minister of Happiness. It forces me to have to walk the walk, no matter how bad I feel. So over the last few weeks I’ve really been trying hard to work on the basics. My eating has gotten better, I’ve been getting back to more regularly using my CPAP and giving myself enough hours of sleep, water is never an issue for me, neither is exercise but I’m being more consistent and regular, I’m working hard to make sure to get out into the sun for at least a half hour each day. Safety, usually an easy one is a little harder to come by right now in this insane country.

The good news is it has worked. Honestly, three weeks ago it was an absolute effort to even get out of bed, especially because it just meant going to work and dealing with shit every day. The worst thing, was this absolute constant feeling of numbness, nothing felt good. Not even a great slice of pizza and a coke. The world was absolutely dull in every way and felt like nothing more than a string of obligation, failure and disaster one after another, again and again like some groundhog day in hell. After three weeks of being diligent it’s better, not good by any means, but better. The numbness has burned off, the world is a little bit clearer, I still can’t seem to catch a break right now, but at least it doesn’t feel so shitty.

The lesson tonight is simple, we all fall into the well, some times, deeper than others, but there’s always a way out and you always need to start with the basics. Once those are consistently secured, then you can try some of the more sophisticated things we’ve talked about, but first the basics. ~ Rev Kane

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Happiness is a day off!

Posted on January 20, 2026 by Michael Kane
flowers, super bloom, travel
Rev Kane in the Antelope Poppy Reserve

Make the best use of what is in your power, and take the rest as it happens. ~ Epictetus

Happiness is a day off!

As I’ve gotten more and more into coaching higher education administrators and the concepts around work/life balance I’ve landed on a really important core idea. It’s the idea that you should never work seven days in a row. It’s a simple idea, there is no such thing as only seven days in a row. As soon as you work seven, you’re into the next five day week and now you’re at twelve days in a row. It’s amazing to me how much of a revelation this is for a lot of people. So my advice is for folks to make sure there is one twenty-four hour period a week where you don’t work, no emails, texts, phone calls or work of any kind. It really is a powerful idea and technique for helping prevent burnout.

In our real life however, we’re not always so fortunate. I’m living in one of those periods right now. I’m still dealing with finalizing my mom’s estate, taking care of bills, making notifications, running down insurance policies etc… And that doesn’t include dealing with the house she lived in that I own. As the executor of her estate and person on her bank accounts there’s a lot. I’m grateful for the help my sister has provided, she’s been really great through all of this.

So right now, it may not be a work day but I still have estate related things to do. On top of that I’m looking for a new job, so I also on my “days off” doing job searches, writing cover letters etc…

On top of everything else, we’re living in an insanely tense time in America. Our government has released waves of ICE officers into Minnesota and other places. We’ve deposed the leader of Venezuela, threatening to bomb Iran, resuming war in Gaza, and even invading Greenland who is a NATO ally. Throw on top of that the Epstein file saga and there’s a constant level of noise in the background. For anyone informed and paying attention, there is a constant undercurrent of anxiety. But it’s not like a hum, a constant hum is like white noise, you can filter it out. Instead this is like a cat scratching at the door. You’re doing something and scratch, scratch – damn cat, you think. And that scratching is the madness in the world, nibbling at you throughout the day. The worst part is of course, that at the end of the day, when you finally stop running and take a deep breath -SCRATCH, SCRATCH, SCRATCH at an insane level.

All of these things make it an incredibly stressful and anxious time for most of us. So it’s hugely important to find that day off, or at least, a block of a few hours each week where you can do something you enjoy, or just be. Work hard to find that time and you’ll have happier days my friends. ~ Rev Kane

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