The Fourth of July, as we all know, is Independence Day. Hurray for George Washington and the revolutionaries, down with King George and the British. That sort of thing. But have you ever wondered what…
Posts published in “Essays”
Produced in 1981, playwright, Paula Vogel, has created a smart script. It lays down the newly defined economic world, now known as “Reaganomics,” onto the fabric of the oldest and the most defamed of professions, prostitution. Conversely — perhaps perversely — Vogel also places prostitution, the most common of denominators, onto the metaphoric fabric of America's economic and social spectrum just as if it was as respected and established a profession as being a doctor, a minister or merchant.
Last week President Obama ordered three hundred Green Berets to Iraq. Why? The Islamic State in Syria and the Levant (ISIS or ISIL — take your pick) has taken over western Iraq, gleefully lopping heads…
If forced to choose between a close-range battering from the vuvuzela—the infamous plastic horn that pierced the global eardrum during the last World Cup held in South Africa—and the current batch of World Cup songs,…
If you’re an old timer around these parts, you know the Ford family, and the four Ford boys, Steve, Patrick, Robben, and Mark. The brothers are locals and have played music around Mendocino County and…
We're at that time between the Comptche Volunteer Fire Department's Father's Day picnic and the similar one put on by the Albion-Little River Fire Department. The Macdonald Ranch lies within the boundaries of the latter,…
Prior to television taking over virtually every home in America by the end of the 1950’s, there were several hundred weekly and monthly magazines in America publishing multiple short stories per issue and paying thousands of writers good money for those short stories. And there were also hundreds of daily newspapers publishing short stories and serialized novels and paying well for the privilege. Before 1960, the vast majority of American novelists, playwrights, and humorists developed their talent by writing short stories and submitting those stories for publication.
At dawn I’m in the grassy roadway just a few yards away from the Caspar cemetery, a peaceful and rustic spot surrounded by a venerable stand of Sitka spruce: the bluish, lichen-bearded grove briefly visible…