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Posts published in “Essays”

Speech Made Us Human

New books on “the brain” are being published every week, it seems, with many of them purporting to explain virtually everything about human behavior, health, follies, and the future.

Exploring Garberville’s Transient Problem

Following a Sheriff’s Office-escorted tour of Garberville’s transient camps and hangouts, Southern Humboldt Supervisor Estelle Fennell has reported that an effort to launch police foot patrols is underway. Fennell toured the Garberville area’s streets and…

Taylor Stoehr

My good buddy Taylor Stoehr just died and I’ve been leafing through the bulging file of his letters to me, reading passages at random and marveling at the clarity of his prose and the generosity of his spirit.

Bongo Bill

Editor: My name is William Joseph Newport CDCR#K14307, aka “Bongo Bill.” This letter has been a long time coming. I was a homeless man who had a more or less meager form of existence in…

‘Personalized Medicine’

Technology rules our lives, or rather, those who develop and sell it want us to believe that. Those who are peddling all manner of genetic testing really want us to take it on faith that…

River Views

A year ago this week I wrote about a then obscure independently produced documentary called Searching for Sugar Man, about a Detroit singer/songwriter who disappeared into the dustbin of the American corporate music business in…

Life & Death

Marcia and I had breakfast on Wednesday morning at Ravens’, the wholly vegan restaurant at the Stanford Inn, our meal courtesy of a gift certificate Marcia received for officiating at a wedding. I especially enjoyed the coffee and orange juice and the view of Big River Beach.

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