Next time you see some gushing twit handing out a load of bullshit at the Academy Awards about the power of movies to 'change the world,' consider Dr. Strangelove.
Posts published in “Essays”
It is Valentine's Day and I will not be receiving any cards. There will be no phone calls, no visits, declarations of love everlasting, because I — wait for it — got no sweetie. I know, hard to believe, right? I'm sure that not a few of you singletons out there are thinking, jeepers, if a jamoke of his radiance and fabulosity can't wrangle a dame, then what chance have I got?
I got involved early on with protesting the aerial spraying of herbicides GP and Masonite in the late seventies to kill the hardwood so the softwood would grow up faster. We took over the radio station over on the coast… Peter Bergman from Firesign Theatre was a neighbor of mine and a celebrity that spoke… Barry Vogel, Nat Bingham… we spent the day on the radio educating about herbicides, Agent Orange with Vietnam Vets, and it helped end it. As the forest was being overlogged we watched as the future of logging went away and was replaced with vineyards and wine in terms of creating jobs for this county.
I became an EMT because of natural disasters I witnessed in the Bay Area. In 1989, I was in an office building near the epicenter of the Loma Prieta earthquake, and saw things happen to…
Leonard Nimoy, known to hundreds of millions of people as Spock, died recently at the age of eighty-three. My brother was a huge fan of Star Trek, the television show, and is a gifted impersonator of movie and television celebrities. In high school, he founded the student club STUD—Star Trek Underground Devotees. STUD meetings were essentially showcases for my brother to perform his original wacky versions of Star Trek episodes in which he imitated with uncanny verisimilitude every member of the crew of the starship Enterprise. His Spock was virtually indistinguishable from Nimoy’s Spock.
Our “educational” tour of Cuba in early February 2015 was celebrating the “lifting” of the economic blockade by President Obama. When we landed and saw the devastation of a small island that we Americans had…
In 2010 I was experiencing a period of sobriety and employment and so consorting with my sober friends, one of whom is local (Fort Bragg) man-about-town bon vivant and impresario Joseph Sverko. Joseph is the motivating force behind the annual Footlighters show and as such its writer, director, producer, costumer, and star. In addition to using an established group of amateur thesbians, he regularly enlists his friends to both act in and labor for the production although perhaps “enlists” does not really capture the spirit of force majeure that Joseph employs in his hyperzealous conscriptive efforts; “Shanghai” comes to mind, or maybe “press gang.”
The blanket of snow lingers on into March, with nights dipping below zero, so I have temporarily abandoned the plan to construct a solarium on the south side of an old concrete block shed behind…
Thomas grows crops in several areas around Mendocino County including his main crop, Lavender. You will find him almost every Saturday with his kids during the season at the Ukiah Farmers Market selling the products he makes from lavender.