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STEPHEN DUNLAP (Fort Bragg): Another brisk 37F under clear skies this Monday morning on the coast. Overnight temps will slowly warm up thru the week. Clear & dry thru Wednesday with rain now forecast to arrive a bit sooner on Wednesday evening. Then more rain the next 7 days in a row?, C'MON MAN !
DRIER and colder weather is expected to last through Tuesday. Light rain return from south to north Wednesday into Thursday, followed by a frontal system with moderate to locally heavy rain, high mountain snow and gusty winds on Friday. Bouts of rain and gusty winds are forecast to continue into the weekend. (NWS)
RACHAEL LEIGH RABANO
With profound sadness, we say goodbye to Rachael Leigh Rabano (Ukiah, California), whose vibrant spirit touched the lives of many. Rachael left this world on December 20, 2025 at the age of 53, leaving a void in the lives of so many people. Leave a sympathy message to the family in the guestbook on this memorial page of Rachael Leigh Rabano to show support.
In the vast expanse of eternity, may Rachael find peace everlasting, cradled in the gentle embrace of the universe. And as we stand on the shores of remembrance, may her legacy inspire us to live each day with purpose, passion, and profound gratitude for the gift of life itself.
IF FEDS WANT POTTER VALLEY DAMS, THEY SHOULD BUY THEM
President Donald Trump’s California derangement syndrome is back as his administration tries to prevent PG&E from removing aging dams in the Potter Valley Project.
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins has moved to intervene in the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission process to determine whether PG&E may tear down two dams and a mothballed powerhouse. Rollins wants FERC to deny the application.
Agriculture secretaries often get involved in these sorts of proceedings. Major changes to watersheds can impact farmers, after all. What is unusual in this case is that in supporting irrigators, a supposedly pro-business administration undermines private enterprise.
PG&E wants to surrender its license for the hydropower system on the Eel River because it now costs more than it is worth. The dams and powerhouse are more than a century old and are nowhere close to meeting modern standards. They require costly repairs and upgrades to remain safe. PG&E absorbs those costs, and no doubt passes some onto ratepayers.
Scott Dam, the larger of the two, is a particular liability. In 2023, PG&E reported that the dam faces previously unacknowledged seismic risks. It sits near the Bartlett Springs Fault, which can produce a strong earthquake. If the dam fails, the water behind it in Lake Pillsbury could flood downstream, causing untold damage.
Removing the dams would please environmentalists. The Eel River would become the longest free-flowing river in California. With time and habitat restoration, it could once again welcome salmon and steelhead trout runs. Meanwhile, an agreement is in place to ensure continued water diversions into the Russian River, which supplies farms and towns in Mendocino and Sonoma counties.
If the Trump administration genuinely believes these dams should remain in place, there is a straightforward solution: Buy them. PG&E tried for years to sell them off but could not find a buyer. That the feds also do not want to take on the liability is telling.
Free-market conservatives often advocate private acquisitions when it comes to preserving natural spaces. Rather than dictate what private property owners must do with their land, nonprofits raise money and purchase valuable parcels. Then they donate them to the public or run them as conservancies. No such effort has surfaced, probably because of the steep remediation costs and liability involved.
Secretary Rollins frames this as a battle between radical California environmentalists and hardworking families. That cliché is as tired as it is wrong in this case.
A diverse coalition of stakeholders negotiated a deal to ensure there would be water for city dwellers and agriculture for decades after the dams came down. Irrigation districts, Mendocino and Sonoma counties, the local Round Valley Indian Tribes and environmental groups are all part of that two-basin partnership.
The problem is that even if the locals agree, FERC still has to approve. That review process left the door open for holdouts and the administration to undermine the deal and try to score a narrow political victory while sticking PG&E ratepayers with the bill. Farmers, who rely on diverted water for irrigation, and communities around Lake Pillsbury oppose dam removal.
The most likely outcome will be that FERC becomes tied up in bureaucratic knots until a new administration takes office. That will leave uncertainty that serves no one on the ground.
Trump frequently attacks California’s water policies, but this dispute is not about state rules. The interested parties are PG&E and stakeholders trying to make the best of a tough situation. The administration should let the local partners finish the hard work of building a sustainable future for the Eel River.
(Santa Rosa Press Democrat Editorial)
ASSIGNMENT: UKIAH - PROMISES, PROMISES
by Tommy Wayne Kramer
Going back further than any of us can remember we have listened to political candidates telling us in loud, plain, repetitive language that their Number One priority is to bring good jobs to Ukiah and Mendocino County.
Lacking employment opportunities that rival those in other towns and counties, they say, means Ukiah will continue to see generation after generation of young adults pack up for elsewhere.
It has always and forever been about the economy, stupid, and every one of these wannabe office holders has promised to make more jobs a reality.
How would the newly elected leaders accomplish this? Why, by sweet-talking people they’ve never met into bringing mostly imaginary high paying clean industry to the area. Why? Because Mendocino County and Ukiah need the jobs, that’s why.
Oh, say the entrepreneurs and business owners. Right. Don’t call us, we’ll call you.
And those promises all get shelved until the next election.
Meanwhile, back in the land of reality for a long a time, and a lot of elections cycles, there has been a one-man local job creator. Through the years, and without bragging about it or running for office, Ross Liberty has built a modest empire just north of Ukiah on the acreage formerly home to Masonite.
(Note: Masonite was once, and for many years, a mill that employed plenty of workers in the lumber industry and in the various businesses that supported it. But the arrival of uninvited hippies to the area starting in the 1970s doomed the thriving timber industry. The jobs have never come back. The hippies all took jobs in government agencies and have now retired to Hawaii and Arizona via fat taxpayer-funded pensions. You’re welcome!)
For years after the old mill buildings had been scraped to the ground the land lay barren. Ross Liberty had the idea he could return the acreage to a thriving spread.
He went to work. Soon the barren earth sprouted fresh new growth, and already emerging are vigorous new businesses hiring workers with, as far as I know, no assistance from the politicians who will probably try to take credit, come the next election cycle, for all the clean industry and great jobs they brought to the area.
The scorecard of Liberty’s new operations thus far:
1) Amazon is already building a 70,000 square foot center on the site.
2) U-Haul truck and storage rentals is shifting to the new facility.
3) Rhys Winery, a super high end winemaker is up and running.
4) Reuser makes soil amendments from mill waste, purchased 17 acres.
Plus Ross Liberty’s own Factory Pipe, fabricators of high end exhaust systems used in Polaris and other vehicles.
Way to go Ross! Maybe the city and county will have a parade for you.
A LEMON FOR THE AGES
Isn’t a point of industry to improve and refine products over the years until the models from, say 2025, are superior in every almost every way when compared to similar products from, say, 1955?
Don’t businesses aim to improve their reputations by building better mousetraps and better widgets than they built in the past, and superior to their competitors? Wife Trophy and I recently bought a new appliance that fails every category.
Take Amana washing machines. Please. Pretty please.
Friends advised us what we already knew: Pick a model with the least number of blinking lights and soft chimes and automatic sensing and any of a dozen other alleged improvements in washing machines.
If our new machine had any fewer options it would have been a washboard. And I wish it was a washboard, starting with the $500 price tag and (so far) merging with a $465 repair to the computer dashboard that activates what few blinking lights, automatic sensors, remote door locks, Blue Tooth enabled Tide pod-casts, turbo reverse rinse and exclusive Fast Forward Enhanced Malfunction capabilities.
Our shiny Amana is a 2023 model. When it came off the assembly line it should have gone straight to the crusher instead of allowing it to take the scenic route through our house.
The day it was repaired our new (purchased in North Carolina, 2021) microwave oven rolled over and coughed up a nasty blast of metal-on-metal shrieks. I hastily departed the kitchen, fearing radioactive contamination.
Neither of us have gone near the toaster all week.
(Tom Hine and TWK say Happy New Year to all, and promise to be back for more hot column action in 2026. And we hope Factory Pipe will buy Amana and begin making washing machines here.)
LOCAL EVENTS (this week)
THE CITY OF FT BRAGG is conducting a survey regarding the annual fireworks display. If you want your opinion to count please fill out the survey linked below.
English Survey https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/DFNX55F
A. Stenberg, Fort Bragg
MENDO LOCAL WEEKLY NEWS WRAP-UP for December 28, 2025
Compiled by Elise Cox, Mendolocal.news
https://www.mendolocal.news/p/weekly-news-december-28
MARCO MCCLEAN:
I'm at Juanita's place a hundred miles away. The power flinked once yesterday morning that I know of because my computer reset and the microwave oven chirped, but other than that brief moment the power has been good.
In other news: This morning I dreamed about a guitar amplifier, and this afternoon while I was working on my web project Juanita's mother called from Sacramento. She's cleaning out her storage area to get free of the expense, and she offered me the Fender whammy-bar Squire guitar I gave her for her birthday about 15 years ago and the little Fender Champ tube amplifier with it, that I had forgotten all about. In the early 1990s when Juanita and I still lived in Caspar there was a man whose name escapes me unless it was Charles, who used to walk up and down Highway 1, back and forth between Mendocino and Fort Bragg in all weather, banging on a battered acoustic guitar. One day, just before we had to move away from Caspar, Charles came to my door with a Fender Champ guitar amplifier, and said, "Can you keep this here for me for awhile?" I said, "Okay, but I'm not sure how safe it'll be." He said, "Just take it," put it down, turned around and marched away. How far do you suppose he had to carry it from, to get it there? It wasn't big, but it was as heavy as a solid, stuffed suitcase. Anyway, that's where I got it, to give it to Juanita's mother 15 years after that.
Around the time Charles came with the amp, I was in Harvest Market in the Boatyard Shopping Center. They had a line of like restaurant booths along the inside of the front of the place, for people to sit and eat food from the deli or the salad bar. I had doughnuts, or buns, or something like that. He was sitting in the next booth, on the opposite bench, drinking coffee, talking to himself and glaring at me. I offered him a bun. He said in a voice halfway between Humphrey Bogart and Bugs Bunny, "Ehhh, go back to sleep!"
I remember seeing him in Down Home Foods a few times, too. I had the impression that Stan was kind to him.
WENDLING/NAVARRO HOTEL AINSLIE for Deep-end Mill workers (via Ron Parker)
THE ANDERSON VALLEY RAILROAD THAT DIED
Contributed by Katy Tahja (with info. gleaned from Jeff Burroughs ‘Good Old Days’)
Did you know there once were plans for a railroad from Anderson Valley to Dry Creek near Cloverdale joining the North West Pacific Railroad there? After the 1906 earthquake there was a great need for lumber from the Wendling/Navarro lumber mill to rebuild San Francisco. From the existing railroad from Albion to Christine at Mill Creek the planners hoped to continue to Yorkville, then through the Dry Creek headwaters near the ghost town of Hermitage. (It wasn’t really a town but a continuation of farms with a post office. The first hop crops were planted there in 1858).
In 1910 it was understood it would cost $30,000 a mile to build with an overall budget of three million dollars. People dreamed of train travel from Anderson Valley to Eureka and hopefully all the way to Portland OR some day. It never happened because funding never developed. By 1910 San Francisco had been rebuilt and the demand for lumber was gone so connecting the coast railroad to the Russian River valley railroad never happened
"HAVE YOU EVER WONDERED what happens to the Christmas cards you send out year after year? Many are hung on friends’ and families’ refrigerators, while some make their way to historic archives. The Kelley House Museum archive is home to numerous Christmas postcards, written in a variety of languages and spanning decades, from the late 1800s to the 1930s."
— Averee McNear, Kelley House Museum Curator
CATCH OF THE DAY, Sunday, December 28, 2025
RYAN CRANFORD, 39, Ukiah. Paraphernalia, probation revocation.
SAUL GARCIA-CHAVEZ, 38, Kelseyville/Ukiah. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.
ADAM JANA-HECHMIMI, 31, Barcelona, Spain/Ukiah. DUI.
JAYSON JOHNSTON, 35, Fort Bragg. Disorderly conduct-alcohol.
JACOB NEUER, 22, Ukiah. Domestic battery, controlled substance, probation revocation.
DERRELL SCRIBNER, 40, Covelo. Burglary.
WILLIAM TRAILS, 21, Willits. False information firearm registration prohibited.
CODY WILLIAMS, 35, Ukiah. Concealed dirk-dagger, probation revocation.
GRETA GETS IT
Editor,
British authorities arrested Greta Thunberg on Tuesday on terrorism charges for sitting outside the building of an insurance company holding a sign which read, “I support Palestinian Action prisoners. I oppose genocide.”
Greta Thunberg opposes genocide and travels with flotillas in their attempt to feed starving human beings at the risk of being abused and incarcerated. And for these peaceful acts of bravery, Greta is labeled an eco-terrorist. But who is Greta terrorizing? I would guess she’s terrorized far fewer people in her life than the insurance company she was protesting.
There are few countries left in this world that tolerate free speech anymore, particularly dissent. Not even in America can we freely speak our minds without being subjected to ridicule, threats and abuse, if not get fired from our jobs.
I oppose genocide and I support free speech, including the right to dissent. Our country was formed nearly 250 years ago based on this premise. However, I do not believe our leaders will celebrate these principles during next year’s Semiquincentennial, making it necessary for us to terrorize this government in November with our votes if we are to have any hope of restoring the values for which our ancestors fought so hard.
Mitchell Goldman
Richmond
“I WAS ABOUT HALF IN LOVE with her by the time we sat down. That’s the thing about girls. Every time they do something pretty…you fall half in love with them, and then you never know where the hell you are.”
— J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
THE BUDDHIST ON THE DELL
Warmest spiritual greetings from a cloudy cool Washington, D.C.,
Am sitting downstairs at the Fabrication Lab of the Martin Luther King Jr. Public Library on a Dell computer, while also watching the Browns-Steelers game on the huge sports screen. Still digesting the previous afternoon indulgence at the Yard House, having inhaled a Paulaner Oktoberfest, an Elysian Space Dust, one shot o’ Glenlivet 14, and a Kurobuta pork sandwich with onion rings. (Left a tip, so that I would be welcome next time.) Awoke early at the homeless shelter and went to Whole Foods on H Street using the EBT card, to score a sushi volcano roll, plus tofu smothered in portobello mushrooms with a dollop of feta cheese, and a cup of coffee served by Constance, the district’s finest barista. Otherwise, am doing nothing of any particular importance here. Have gotten all of my senior social benefits in postmodern America. I am ready to go anywhere that I need to go and do anything that I need to do. And that is my retirement plan! Feel free to contact me if you wish to join with me intervening in history.
Craig Louis Stehr, [email protected]
CALL THIS 49ERS’ STUNNING SEASON WHAT IT IS, ‘MISSION: IMPROBABLE’
by Ann Killion
Improbably, stunningly, the San Francisco 49ers will play for the right to be the No. 1 seed in the NFC next Saturday night.
That one-time slim possibility became firm reality when Caleb Williams’ pass to Jahdae Walker fell short and incomplete in the end zone as time expired.
“It’s huge,” Kyle Shanahan said, after Sunday’s wildly entertaining 42-38 victory over the playoff-bound Chicago Bears. “I’m so proud of the guys… It’s a hell of an opportunity to get to play for the one seed.”
The 49ers have had some big surprises in recent years. Brock Purdy was a surprise. Going 6-11 on the heels of a Super Bowl appearance was a surprise. And this season is absolutely a surprise.
It’s not what anyone expected. Even though, in the locker room after the game, there was talk that getting the No. 1 seed has been a long-held goal.
“It’s what we set out to do in OTAs,” linebacker Luke Gifford said.
Sure, all athletes have big dreams. But realistically, this scenario didn’t seem like a possibility.
Not when the team had discarded so many veterans in the offseason, resulting in an inexperienced defense. Not when they lost their two best defensive players to season-ending injuries, first Nick Bosa and then Fred Warner. Not when they were without Purdy and George Kittle for long stretches of the season. Not when it became public that they had a bitter dispute with top receiver Brandon Aiyuk and the team had voided $27 million in his guarantees. Not when the 49ers stood pat at the trade deadline instead of trying to bolster its defense with another pass rusher.
None of that seemed like a recipe for making it to the last game of the season with a chance at the division title, the NFC top seed, and a path to the Super Bowl that never leaves Santa Clara.
Yet that’s what’s at stake Saturday against long-time nemesis Seattle.
Shanahan didn’t want his team to even talk about the playoffs until after they had clinched a spot, which they did last week. Now he wants them to revel in the moment.
“We’ve earned this,” Shanahan said. “It’s a game that we want, we love that it’s here, we love to have the opportunity to never leave here again this year. We’ve got that opportunity Saturday night.”
But Shanahan doesn’t love that it’s Saturday. The NFL dealt the 49ers the short straw and the short week, their second consecutive one. They opted to take Ravens-Steelers for the AFC North division title as the premiere Sunday showcase game, pushing the 49ers to Saturday. Seattle can’t be too thrilled either: they were on the road at Carolina Sunday and now have to fly again on a short week.
On Sunday, Levi’s Stadium was in a sort of dry run for the Super Bowl, which will be held on February 8. There was more security. There were more canine teams doing sweeps. There was a light show at halftime, with pulsating wrist bands for the fans.
Both of the teams playing at Levi’s on Sunday night have clinched playoff spots and have the possibility of making it to that February 8 extravaganza. But neither the 49ers nor the Bears look like teams with the defense to make a deep playoff run.
Sunday’s game was a rollicking shootout, with 11 touchdowns, 936 combined yards and just five total punts. The Bears scored 15 seconds into the game when Purdy took the first snap and threw a pass that was intercepted. The opportunistic Bears – who lead the league in interceptions – ran it back for a pick-six. The 49ers marched down and tied the score and the slugfest was on.
It seemed clear the defenses weren’t going to get a stop. Shanahan had regret over punting early in the fourth quarter, on fourth-and-7 from the 43, a decision he said was “on the fringe.”
“I thought we lost the game when we punted there,” Shanahan said. “But we held them to a field goal and that was huge… it was a tough one for me.”
After the Bears edged ahead with the field goal, the 49ers took the lead again with a touchdown pass from Purdy to Jauan Jennings. But it looked like they may have scored too early. The Bears took over with 2:15 on the clock and the chance to add to their league-leading six comeback victories when trailing in the fourth quarter.
The Bears 15-play drive took them down to the two-yard line with four seconds to play. And then Williams’ pass fell short of his target. And the 49ers’ hope of staying home for the playoffs remained intact.
It was the 49ers’ 12th win of the season. Their first came back in September against the Seahawks, when a late touchdown by Purdy started this unlikely journey on a winning note.
“It’s just been one of those kinds of years,” Purdy said, “where you have to focus on just the next day, the next man up, finding a way to win each Sunday.
“And then at the end you can look up and see where you’re at.”
Now, at the end, the 49ers can see where they’re at.
It’s improbable. Stunning. And an incredible opportunity.
49ERS GAME GRADES: Offensive fireworks, a defense in trouble and a No. 1 seed to be had
The San Francisco 49ers were under the gun from the first snap until the last, but somehow survived and beat Chicago behind the remarkable efforts of Brock Purdy and Christian McCaffrey.
OFFENSE: A
The final 59:45 of the game made it tough to remember how terrible the first 15 seconds were for the 49ers. Brock Purdy threw a pick-six on the first snap and left tackle Trent Williams was forced from the game with a hamstring injury. After that, Purdy was sensational. He completed 24 of 33 passes for 303 yards and three touchdowns and ran for two more TDs. His loop-de-loop scramble on his second TD pass (to Kyle Juszczyk) brought to mind — depending on your age — Fran Tarkenton or Steve Young. And lest we forget, Christian McCaffrey was brilliant. Pushed to the point of exhaustion, he ran for 140 yards (and a TD) and added 41 receiving yards. In their past three games, the 49ers have piled up 127 points.
DEFENSE: F
The 49ers better hope All-Pro linebacker Fred Warner comes back for the postseason. The defense they rolled out Sunday night is not Super Bowl-caliber. Before the game-ending play — with Yetur Gross-Matos forcing Bears QB Caleb Williams into an off-balance throw — Robert Saleh’s unit had the strength of a wet paper bag. The Bears rolled up 440 yards, averaged 6.9 yards per play, and the Niners didn’t intercept a pass or sack Williams on any of his 42 passes. The blame goes around: Ji’Ayir Brown was burned on a 35-yard TD pass; Tatum Bethune lost coverage on a 36-yard score; Bethune was flagged for an unnecessary roughness penalty that pushed the Bears into go-ahead field goal range; and Chicago converted both fourth-down tries for first downs and picked up three of its 26 first downs courtesy of 49ers penalties.
SPECIAL TEAMS: B+
Eddy Piñeiro wasn’t called upon to try a field goal, but was 6-for-6 on extra points. The last one was ultra critical as it forced the Bears — having reached the 49ers’ 2-yard-line for the game’s final play — to try for a TD instead of a chip-shot, overtime-forcing FG. On a less-dramatic note, Thomas Morstead was finally called upon to do his primary job: punt. He did so twice — his first kicks of December — and in doing so became the 28th player in NFL history with 1,000 career punts. Skyy Moore averaged 23 yards on kick returns and 5.5 on two punt returns, but was an afterthought in the shootout.
COACHING: B+
A tale of two coaches? Kyle Shanahan was a wizard again and Robert Saleh has to be wondering if his defense — as currently constructed — is strong enough to make a deep postseason run. Shanahan, perhaps sensing the offense-heavy nature of the night, eschewed a 55-yard FG try on a 4th-and-3 and succeeded on a 14-yard pass to Ricky Pearsall that led to the Niners’ fourth TD of the first half. The play that turned into the game-winning TD was beautiful to watch as Jauan Jennings — targeted just four times — broke free on a left-to-right dash across the field that had the NBC broadcasters gushing that Shanahan had “seen something” that opened the door for that play to succeed.
OVERALL: A-
By any means necessary, right? The Bears’ last drive had the feel of heartbreak in the making for the 49ers, but somehow the Niners dodged the last-minute score and in the process kept alive the improbable dream of being the NFC’s No. 1 seed. The NFL — aka: TV networks — did San Francisco no favors by giving the 49ers another short week before playing Seattle on Saturday. But San Francisco has seemingly done nothing but climb uphill all season. So why should Week 18 be any different?
(sfchronicle.com)
(260)
I'm Nobody! Who are you?
Are you - Nobody - too?
Then there's a pair of us!
Dont tell! they'd banish us - you know!
How dreary - to be - Somebody!
How public - like a Frog -
To tell your name - the livelong June -
To an admiring Bog!
— Emily Dickenson
ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY #1
I am not a Bible reader. I know a few quotes but, as my senior class in high school back in 1962 was asked the question "Is man inherently good or bad?" I was the only one to say inherently bad…my rationale was that we would not need rules if man were inherently good. I have an automatic negative reaction to people who presume that those who belong to an organized Christian religion are automatically good. I am suspect of anyone who quotes the Bible chapter and verse….paraphrase without the chapter and verse, no problem.
DOES CHAMPAGNE REALLY CAUSE WORSE HEADACHES THAN OTHER DRINKS?
by Catherine Ho
If you’re like millions of Americans, you may soon be ringing in the new year with sparkling wine.
And if you’re unlucky, you may also be bracing for what some call the “Champagne headache” — throbbing pain following the consumption of sparkling wine but, curiously, not other types of alcohol.
It’s not clear how common this phenomenon is, “but it is a thing,” said Dr. Morris Levin, a neurologist and chief of the headache medicine division at UCSF. “I hear it every year at this time of year. My patients say, ‘I’m looking forward to it but I’m dreading my headache I get every time I drink Champagne.’”
The question of why sparkling wine may cause headaches has not been widely studied in medicine. But medical experts, wine chemists and a couple of small studies suggest a few potential explanations.
The carbonation in sparkling wine appears to speed up or enhance the body’s absorption of alcohol, which may lead to people feeling the after-effects of Champagne — such as dehydration and headache — faster and more acutely.
It’s not clear if the rate of absorption is much faster with carbonated alcohol compared to flat alcohol, or just marginally faster. It’s also not clear why this happens, but it may be related to the way the stomach and other parts of the gastrointestinal system process carbonated ethanol versus non-carbonated ethanol.
One small 2003 study compared blood alcohol concentration of 12 people who drank regular carbonated Champagne and Champagne with the carbon dioxide removed, and found that regular Champagne produced significantly higher BAC than degassed Champagne — leading to the conclusion that carbon dioxide may accelerate absorption of alcohol and cause more rapid or severe intoxication.
Another small study, published in 2007, found that some people who drank vodka with carbonated water absorbed the alcohol faster — and thus had a higher blood alcohol level — than people who drank vodka with still water. The study included 21 people who drank three types of vodka — neat, with water, and with carbonated water — in five minutes and then had their blood alcohol measured over a four-hour period.
Two-thirds of people absorbed the carbonated drink at a faster rate than the still drink; one-third showed no change in absorption between the two.
This suggests that people may have individual differences that affect how their body absorbs carbonated alcohol drinks.
“Carbonated beverages have been shown to release its gas into the gastric lumen, causing distension of the stomach,” the study said. “This distension is thought to increase gastric emptying rates, which would consequently affect alcohol absorption rates. The degree of distension caused is likely to vary between individuals.
“However, this is only speculation and further research is needed both to confirm the nature of the results and to formulate an accurate hypothesis,” the study said.
Experts noted this is very different from the culprit behind “red wine headaches,” which researchers believe is due to the high levels of quercetin in red wines.
Quercetin is a substance in grape skins. The reason there are high levels of it in red wine is because the skins are left on during the fermentation process, whereas with white wine, the skins are removed and don’t get dissolved into the wine, said Andrew Waterhouse, a wine chemist and professor emeritus of viticulture and enology at UC Davis who has studied red wine headaches.
When you absorb quercetin, your body converts it to a metabolite that inhibits an enzyme responsible for breaking down acetaldehyde. Acetaldehyde is a toxin that, when accumulated in the body, can lead to headaches, hangovers and other unpleasant effects. People of East Asian descent are at higher risk of red wine headaches because an estimated 40% of the population have an enzyme variant that cannot eliminate acetaldehyde.
“The amount of quercetin in sparkling wines is tiny, so our hypothesis about red wine headaches should not apply to Champagne,” Waterhouse said.
Full-bodied red wines like Cabernet tend to have more quercetin than lighter reds like Pinot Noir, said Levin, who has researched red wine headaches.
Another reason behind Champagne headaches, Levin posited, may be that Champagne tends to go down easier, so people may be drinking more of it, faster. This can lead to headaches and other side effects of drinking like dehydration, a jump in blood pressure and heart rate, and overall inflammation in the GI system.
“Champagne feels like less of an intoxicant than a thirst quencher,” Levin said. “I’ve noticed people really put it away. When you drink a lot, you get higher alcohol levels pretty quickly.”
To avoid or mitigate headaches — if you don’t want to give up Champagne altogether — drink slowly, have water alongside each drink, and eat something, Levin and Waterhouse said.
“Have a little bit of food when you drink,” Waterhouse said. “Don’t pass up the appetizers. Any amount of food helps reduce BAC so that’d be a good remedy if you want to limit your BAC.”
Levin added that anecdotally, some of his patients have told him that higher-quality Champagnes don’t seem to cause headaches as severe as cheaper mass-produced versions.
“I’m wondering (if) the more affordable varieties have sweeteners or other things that may make it taste nice but might themselves be toxins and lead to headaches,” he said. “I tell people to spring for a better bottle, hopefully it will be easier on your system. And drink it slowly. Eat along with drinking. And drink a lot of fluids.”
(SF Chronicle)
REMEMBERING PAPA: NORTHERN CALIFORNIA’S ELDERLY FACE HIDDEN EPIDEMIC OF GUN SUICIDES
by Ana B. Ibarra
By the early afternoon of her 59th birthday, Kelly Frost had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She had lunch with girlfriends near her home in Douglas City — a rural community nestled among the ponderosa pines of the Shasta-Trinity National Forest in Northern California. But she kept thinking about her “Daddy-o,” Jeffrey Butler, her 81-year-old father. He was not returning her calls.
As she drove home around 4 p.m., she stopped to check in on him. Her dad lived in a two-bedroom cabin just up the road from her place. “I was kind of feeling angry with him because he hadn’t answered all day,” Frost said.
When she opened the door, she glanced at the “Papa chair,” his favorite recliner, the spot where she usually found him. He wasn’t there. That’s when she noticed his feet on the kitchen floor. He was slumped over on his right side, a pool of blood around his head.
Frost’s first thought was that her dad had taken a fall. She blew an air horn that she and her dad kept around in case they ever needed help. A neighbor met her promptly, and it was he who noticed the revolver.
“He said, ‘No, Kel, there’s a gun on the counter,’ and then I realized that he had shot himself,” Frost said.
Butler died on Dec. 18, 2024 from a self-inflicted gunshot to the head. His death is part of a dark reality — a public health crisis that often goes overlooked: older adults are increasingly turning to guns to end their lives.
In California, 5,825 adults aged 70 or older died by gun suicide between 2009 and 2023, according to mortality data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provided by the Gun Violence Data Hub. The numbers are especially stark among older white men in rural areas.
In Trinity County – population just over 15,600 – at least eight men 70 or older, including Butler, died from an apparent firearm suicide between 2020 and 2024, incident reports from the Trinity County Sheriff’s office show.
Trinity County isn’t alone. Rural Northern California counties have some of the nation’s highest rates of gun suicides among older adults. Over the course of 15 years, the gun suicide rate of adults 70 and older in Trinity, Tehama, Plumas, Lassen, Glenn, Calaveras, and Amador was 35.6 deaths per 100,000, more than triple the statewide rate.
Across the country, adults over 70 have the highest suicide rate of any age group. Experts say these deaths may get little attention because society empathizes with struggling older adults who want to control how their lives end.
“I think we sometimes don’t talk about them because I think people sort of brush it off as like, it’s understandable or it’s not preventable, and I think that’s the real piece of the narrative that we need to change,” said Dr. Emmy Betz, an emergency medicine doctor and a firearm injury prevention expert at the University of Colorado School of Medicine.
Behind the deaths are a number of factors, according to research and law enforcement incident reports. These include loneliness and social isolation, depression, financial struggles, illness and pain, and feeling like a burden.
In rural areas, easier access to guns is also a key contributor.
Unresolved pain
For more than a year before his death, Butler had been in pain. It radiated through his abdomen, making the simple act of urinating an ordeal, Frost said. Last year, in February, a CT scan revealed the problem: a crystal blockage in his urethra. He found a urologist in Redding, one county over. Each visit to the specialist required navigating the hour-long descent down Highway 299, scenic but winding. Frost drove him to the appointments.
A Bay Area native with Oklahoma roots, Butler had retired early to Trinity County, nearly 40 years ago. He had worked for large companies, including Hanes and Hostess, and done well in the stock market. Alongside the Trinity River, renowned for its steelhead trout and salmon, he bought cabins for himself and his daughter.
It’s here where Frost’s kids grew up. Butler’s granddaughter Michaela Frost grew up to be a horse lover like her Papa. His grandson Jake Ritter said he could spend hours talking and fishing with his grandfather. His Papa was happiest fishing.
But the last months of his life brought Butler little joy.
In July of 2024, Butler had surgery in Redding to remove the blockage in his urethra. But the pain and discomfort continued through the summer. In September, he was admitted for three days to the emergency room in nearby Weaverville with a severe urinary tract infection. Frost said that during this time she tried to call her dad’s urologist several times to reschedule a follow-up appointment he missed while in the hospital, but she could only reach an answering machine.
Butler’s physician assistant in Weaverville called several times too, but no luck, Frost said. The physician assistant “literally threw her hands in the air and said, ‘I can’t get any response.’” That was one of the few times Frost saw her dad cry. “My dad never cried. He was a cowboy.”
After his death, first responders found an undated note in Butler’s home. It began:
The pain???????
!!!!!!!!!!
To much to stand
No Help
By mid-fall, the infections, desperation and heavy antibiotics use were changing her dad’s mental state, Frost said. He wasn’t interested in fishing. Or watching his 49ers. Or spending time with his wild mustang, Spade, or with the guys down at the Tangle Blue Saloon, where he would order a shot of whisky with a coke back.
His cabin grew darker; he no longer drew his camo-print curtains open. Frost estimates that in the span of about a year, Butler lost almost 100 pounds, transforming him from a stout 230-pound man to a fragile version of himself.
Older adults are likely to plan suicide more carefully, and their attempts are more likely to be fatal, according to the National Council on Aging. In California, older women are more likely to overdose, while most older men will use guns, according to state public health data.
Pain and health issues are a common thread among older adults who die by gun suicide. State data show that 55% of people 70 and over who died this way had a contributing physical health problem, and 27% had a diagnosed mental health condition.
Among the eight older men that died by gun suicide in Trinity County between 2020 and 2024, two struggled with respiratory conditions. One had recently discovered a bladder tumor. One man’s antidepressants were found near his body, and another had reportedly been speaking about suicide for some time but did not meet the requirements for an involuntary psychiatric hold, according to incident reports.
The Rural Divide
Trinity County holds a deep beauty: the rush of the Trinity River, the rising fog on a chilly morning, the sprawling pines that make the rugged mountain sides their home.
But large supermarkets are a county over, a steep and twisty road away. And so is most of the medical care.
“We have more limited access to essential services and resources compared to the rest of California,” said Cathy Tillman, a health services program manager at Trinity County Health and Human Services. “We have to travel further for all services, which plays a role in the ability for people to get their needs met.”
California’s rural counties have more older residents: about 25% compared to the state average of around 17%, according to the SCAN Foundation, an advocacy and research organization for older adults. By 2040, the 85-and-older population in rural California is expected to grow 50 times faster than the working age population. But access to medical and social services for seniors lag significantly when compared to larger, urban regions.
Trinity County has one 25-bed hospital, and a handful of clinics, largely in Weaverville, the county seat. But even reaching Weaverville from other Trinity County communities could take 30 minutes to an hour. For anything more specialized, residents here usually travel an hour to Redding, or two hours for providers in Eureka and Chico. With a small population, Trinity County can’t easily support specialists — like a neurologist or urologist — setting up practice.
Going further for care means people often miss appointments, or delay them, and live longer with pain.
Arina Erwin, deputy director of the county’s health and human services agency, said even some general practitioners who come to Trinity don’t stay long.
“Living in a small community and a frontier community can be a challenge on its own,” Erwin said. Doctors and specialists have student loans to repay, making cities where they can earn a significantly higher income seem more attractive. For years, the hospital and clinics in Trinity have reported trouble replacing retiring doctors. Even virtual care here can be a challenge, because broadband is spotty, especially in pockets with only a few dozen residents, Erwin said.
People who live in rural areas also foster a cultural barrier — a rural spirit of sorts. Tillman said they tend to be more independent, and used to doing things on their own terms; they may also be less likely to seek help.
Frost said that sounds familiar. She saw first-hand how her proud, self-reliant, sometimes stubborn father lost his independence as the pain took hold.
Remembering Papa
In Frost’s living room – with the sun shining through the large windows on a December afternoon – memories of Butler, called Papa by his grandkids, stirred both laughter and tears.
As a kid, grandson Jake Ritter would get up before sunrise to go fishing with his Papa — sometimes begrudgingly — but by lunchtime they’d be happily eating their catch. He remembers cruising on Butler’s riding lawnmower and watching old westerns with him.
Ritter and his sister, Michaela, loved listening to his stories, like the time he shot a bobcat as it launched toward him while he was out deer hunting. He had the bobcat stuffed to prove it. Or how, as a teen in San Pablo, Butler chased and tackled a man trying to rob the Lucky store where he worked. The family still has the news clipping.
Michaela is glad her papa got to meet her first-born, Blake, and wishes her three-month-old, Daniella, could have as well.
Butler’s suicide left his family in turmoil and with so many questions. Ritter felt angry at his papa for the way he decided to go. Why do this on his mom’s birthday? Frost often wonders: What were her dad’s last thoughts?
After a suicide, families are more likely to experience a complicated grieving process, with feelings of guilt, confusion, shame, anger and trauma, research shows.
In the year since Butler’s death, Frost’s family has largely relied on each other through their grief. Ritter said his anger at his grandfather has subsided; he is now coming to terms with his Papa’s decision.
“I’m sad that he didn’t get the help that he needed, and I’m sad that he felt so strongly that this is the road that he chose,” Ritter said.
Frost said she gave herself a year to navigate the feelings on her own, but now with the encouragement of friends is considering seeking professional help.
Warning Signs And Storing Guns
In Trinity County, health officials are preparing to launch an injury and suicide prevention program, said Tillman, the county health services program manager. A big component of the county’s strategy will be education to help reduce the stigmas associated with suicide and mental health. Tillman said the plan is to find and train trusted messengers in the small pockets where people live.
Dr. Amy Barnhorst, a psychiatrist and associate director of the Centers for Violence Prevention at UC Davis, said that recognizing a sense of independence and self-reliance common to rural communities is essential to prevention programs. Education around safe gun storage is also key, she added.
“You can’t discount the fact that having access to a firearm, period, all other things being equal, increases the risk that somebody will die by suicide by a factor of more than three,” Barnhorst said.
She helps lead a state-funded curriculum at UC Davis called The BulletPoints Project, which trains health providers on how to identify at-risk patients and speak to them about gun safety.
The project also trains people applying for and renewing concealed carry weapon permits. Under state law, that category of gun owners must complete at least an hour of mental health training.
The course aims to help these gun owners identify a mental health crisis. People who already own guns – like Jeff Butler – never had to take a course like this.
Kelly Frost said she doesn’t know if her dad would have accepted mental health help. It was not something they talked about. His will to live wrestled in the words found in his house, the note she still clings closely to. It ends:
What would you do?
End it???
The pain not life
Since her dad’s passing, Frost has had many sleepless nights, pondering questions and thoughts. She feels she tried her best to get him care, but wishes access had been easier. What signs did she miss? But mostly: Why hadn’t she taken away the guns?
Growing up around guns, it never crossed her mind that her Daddy-o would one day turn his revolver on himself.
“Had I known that he was capable of this, I probably would have worked a little harder to make sure that the guns were not accessible,” Frost said.
This Dec. 18, the one year anniversary of Butler’s death and Frost’s 60th birthday, she had a shot of Canadian whisky from the last bottle she gave him. His guns are now in a safe.
(calmatters.org)
ON-LINE COMMENT OF THE DAY #2
Gerrymandering on its face seems undemocratic. Manipulating districts for the sole purpose of political gain doesn't fit easily into a democratic electoral process. Both parties are guilty. The fact that the Supreme Court court, other than prohibiting gerrymandering on racial lines, has never taken a principled stand on gerrymandering by either side, except to say its not judicially feasible to create a judicial standard which, IMO, is an abdication of its authority, not to mention spineless. It would seem that every election becomes more about winning and less about participating in a democratic process where citizens have the real freedom to choose.
“I HAVE FOUND in my young career, that there are three ways to whip the other guy. One is to get him all riled up, so he loses his temper; the second is to make him think you're a wreck; and the final trick is to punch him full of holes.”
— Max Baer
ON DECEMBER 26, 1972, Harry S. Truman—the haberdasher from Independence, Missouri, who never attended college yet made the loneliest decision in human history when he authorized the atomic bombs that ended World War II—passed away at age 88 in Kansas City's Research Hospital, nearly two decades after leaving the White House as one of the most unpopular presidents in American history, only to be redeemed by time as one of the greatest. When Truman left office on January 20, 1953, with approval ratings hovering around 32 percent, he and Bess drove themselves home to Independence in their own Chrysler with no Secret Service protection, no pension beyond his old Army stipend of $112.56 per month, and such modest means that he had to take out a bank loan, prompting Congress to finally establish presidential pensions in 1958. What makes his story transcendent is how this plain-spoken Midwesterner who once wrote 'the buck stops here' on a desk sign spent his retirement years taking daily morning walks around Independence, answering his own phone, personally replying to thousands of letters, and watching with quiet satisfaction as historians began recognizing his Marshall Plan had saved Europe, his Truman Doctrine had contained Soviet expansion, his desegregation of the military in 1948 had advanced civil rights by executive order when Congress wouldn't act, and his firing of General Douglas MacArthur had preserved civilian control of the military at enormous political cost. On July 30, 1965, in a moment of beautiful symmetry, President Lyndon Johnson traveled to the Truman Library to sign Medicare into law and handed the first two Medicare cards to Harry and Bess, honoring the man who had first proposed national health insurance in 1945 only to be defeated by the fierce opposition he faced, and when Truman died seven years later, the nation finally understood it had lost not just a president but a man of unshakeable integrity who proved that greatness doesn't require polish—only courage and principle.
BUTCH WARE:
Politico recently published a piece that told the truth about the dismal state of the California Democratic Primary: https://www.politico.com/newsletters/politico-nightly/2025/12/22/the-incredible-shrinking-california-democrat-00704012
The governor’s race is packed wall to wall with Democratic candidates who sound interchangeable because they court the same corporate donors, recycle the same empty phrases, and promise nothing beyond managing a slow collapse of their own making.
The article tried to frame this as a talent problem.
It is far more serious than that.
It is a corruption problem.
Every Democrat running for governor knows exactly who their party serves first and foremost (hint: it’s not working people) and they know they haven’t a prayer in changing that. Which is why none of them will step out of line when it comes to their big donors, especially those tied to the ongoing genocide in Palestine.
Add to this corporate servitude the fact that decades long supermajorities have driven the Democratic Party into a state of abject mediocrity, producing the most uninspiring and unimaginative candidates and officeholders.
Over time, what we’ve gotten is a herd of feckless, gutless careerists who differ only in résumé formatting while governing like identical servants of the same corporate masters and brazenly ignoring the voices of our communities.
And you can see the horrific consequences of this brand of politics everywhere in our state:
Corporate landlords price people out of their homes while a housing crisis deepens inside one of the wealthiest economies on earth.
The for-profit health insurance industry continues to gouge the public on premiums and copays while denying coverage and forcing medical bankruptcy.
And the ultra-rich hoard unimaginable fortunes while politicians refuse to pass even the most basic wealth taxes.
The Politico piece is filled with party insiders who admit the party lacks philosophical challenge.
That might be the understatement of the year.
This groveling, permission-seeking style of politics, where politicians operate by explaining limits instead of fighting power, is exactly why voters feel alienated, angry, and done with the duopoly.
Millions of Californians have become politically unaffiliated with both major parties because they recognize a rigged game when they see one.
A crowded gubernatorial race does not mean a real choice when (nearly) every option bootlicks the same donor class.
People want leaders who will name the problem, pick THEIR side, and welcome the opportunity to fight entrenched power.
Our campaign exists because breaking this cycle requires independence from the corporate interests that have bought out Sacramento.
The Green Party does not owe its loyalty to corporate landlords, the health insurance lobby, or billionaire portfolios. Greens serve the people whose hands, skills, and care build our economy and our communities.
This is the time for Californians to put people power into the ONLY national political party that is un-bought.
A party that offers an electoral arm to a people's movement.
We organize with working people who understand that power never gives up ground unless it is forced to - and together, WE can be that force.
We believe California deserves leadership willing to confront the powers that have robbed our state of resources, jobs and potential rather than aid them in the heist.
https://butchware4gov.news/p/corporate-donors-run-sacramento-and-everyone-knows-it
EVAN DAVIS:
I don't trust Tucker Carlson, or Candace Owens, or Marjory Taylor Green. I don't trust their motivations even as they occasionally speak the truth, criticizing Trump and the Republican Party's policies, acknowledging Israel's genocidal nature, or giving a nod to the seriousness of climate change. They are opportunists, first and foremost.
But the fact that these kinds of people - former darlings of the far Right are flirting with views that contradict the far-right's orthodoxies shows that they feel there is political capital to be gained from jumping ship and, at least topically, aligning with positions long held by the Left, and even some Democrats.
That should send a signal to Democrats that the empty platitudes of centrism will no longer inspire loyalty, and that it is time to abandon the Clintonian geometry of least-change.
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JUST IN: Trump appeared to give nonchalant confirmation of the first US land strike in Venezuela. Speaking to radio host and billionaire John Catsimatidis, who was filling in for 77 WABC host Sid Rosenberg during the holiday, Trump made the bombshell suggestion that US forces have already started conducting land operations in Venezuela.
BRANCH LIBRARY
I wish I could find that skinny, long-beaked boy
who perched in the branches of the old branch library.
He spent the Sabbath flying between the wobbly stacks
and the flimsy wooden tables on the second floor,
pecking at nuts, nesting in broken spines, scratching
notes under his own corner patch of sky.
I'd give anything to find that birdy boy again
bursting out into the dusky blue afternoon
with his satchel of scrawls and scribbles,
radiating heat, singing with joy.
— Edward Hirsch (2003)
TWK’s revisionist history strikes again. He blames the demise of the timber industry on “uninvited” hippies, of which he was one. Of the original 640,000 acres of Mendocino redwood forests approximately 1,000 original acres remain. The vast majority of those acres were logged well before the first hippie arrived. Indeed it was some Humboldt hippies who saved the Sally Bell grove in the Sinkyone. He should go back to writing bar reviews.
Agreed.
“Another hippie dream, capsized in excess, in an ether filled room of meathooks” Neil Young
MRC, by itself, has 250 thousand acres of Redwood Forest.
Yes they do, it’s all second and third growth. Of the original redwood forest lands they own, there is virtually no old growth. Humboldt and Del Norte have state and national parks, Sonoma has Armstrong, Mendocino has Montgomery Woods and a few small groves including Hendy. Only 4% of old growth remains, less than 1% in our ravaged county.
Does that mean when I say an automobile just drove by, that necessarily means a Model-T?
by Tommy Wayne Kramer
In order to have “good jobs” one has to have educated employees available. I had a young fellow help me at the Ukiah Costco gas station. After thanking him I asked him if he was going to school. He said he wasn’t. I told him there were plenty of good jobs available but you needed to have some training. Plumber, electrician, medical tech. Try and find a young Asian person that is not in school or employed in a good job. Very hard. The truck driving jobs will be gone in twenty years. You can’t pump gas all your life.
True. But educated does not necessarily means college educated. To be any good as a logger, or mill worker it requires many years of learning. Those who learn well, get paid well. That is the same in farming. A person off the street with no experience farming would do poorly picking fruit, pruning, discing, etc. This poor person would end up exhausted and looking for the nearest exit. These are skills that can not be learned in a classroom.
How did the hippies doom the timber industry? Was it not the rapacious and destructive timber industry itself? Are hippies responsible for the loss of the salmon fishery also?
It’s their anti-business, pro-tax, high regulatory mindset. Even worse though is that mindset still exists in the Ukiah City Council and the Mendocino Board of Supervisors and a large chunk of westside Ukiah and the coast.
First of all, changes in salmonid populations are independent from logging activity. The popular correlation fails if tested. Environmental ideology activism destroyed many timber towns across the West, including here in Mendocino County. Look at Covelo.
“I WAS ABOUT HALF IN LOVE with her by the time we sat down
J.D. Salinger faced accusations of exploiting and grooming young women, some of whom were teenagers when their relationships with the significantly older, then-famous author began.
Maureen Dowd has yet to apologize to Joyce Maynard for attacking Maynard’s criticism of Salinger who exploited her and others.
RE: AV Railroad. I do not know about this railroad idea. However, I know there was a serious proposal in the early 1900s to run Highway 28 (later to become Highway 128) from Healdsburg via Dry Creek to near Ingram Creek, just east of present-day Yorkville. The proposal was so serious, some maps were published in the 1910s and early 1920s that showed the route.
The Albion Lumber Co railroad ended at Brush Creek and Reilly Heights. The intent was to continue on to Healdsburg. The railroad would have reduced the cost of shipping by schooner, and be more reliable. The plan was buried by the Depression, construction of Hwy 128, and trucking. Linking the coast with highways to Hwy 101, changed the economy on the coast by more than just ending the railroads. Consumer goods were trucked in as lumber was trucked out. Small farms and farmers went out of business. The local work force became more specialized. Electrification was another significant change. Bulldozers, and gasoline powered chainsaws revolutionized how logging was done, and who did it. All these changes happened between 1930, and 1950. Wow.