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Posts published in “Essays”

Measure B Wins Big

Most voters may have stayed at home but nevertheless Measure B, a one-half cent tax to improve abysmal mental health services in this county, won going away with 83 percent approving basically the same initiative…

Redwood Valley Man Dug A Hole To Survive

When getting ready for bed around 11:30pm Sunday night, October 8, 2017, my 87-year-old dad heard loud noises from outside, 60-65 mph winds. He looked out his bedroom window. He saw dots on the hill behind his house and thought there was a fire.

Flashbacks: A Memoir By Jim Gibbons

My old friend Gibbons sent me a copy to review for – what else? – the AVA. Jim and I are AVA old-timers, and my first exposure to the paper was in 1988 at his…

El Diablo In Wine Country

Jerry Brown’s California enters this new age with a halo over its head. We “get” climate change and thumb our noses at the mad denialist in the White House. Our governor advocates the Paris standards…

Strangers On A Train

We first spotted him when we came up the stairs to the second deck. He was hard to miss. We were still in the station in L.A. on a gorgeous sunny morning, all-aboarding the Coast…

Then & Now

A couple of months ago at a family dinner party, a high school sophomore from my son-in-law’s side of the family walked into the room, taking time out from her texting long enough to say…

Deregulation, PG&E, and the Fires

PG&E is now under investigation by state authorities trying to determine whether the electrical monopoly’s power lines played a role in igniting Northcoast wildfires that destroyed thousands of homes and killed 43 people. Both the…

Fort Bragg Ad Hoc Committee Goes Dark

I showed up Friday afternoon at the Hostility Center (Old Coast Hotel) down on Franklin Street looking for a story. I wanted to ask what Hospitality Center knew about this year's Emergency Winter Shelter. The…

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