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Posts published in January 2014

Valley People (Jan 22, 2014)

THE CLOSING of Laughing Dogs Books is another body blow to the commercial life of central Boonville. Worse, it's a right to the jaw of our town's cultural life. You can also say it's a third blow to the tourism we are now so dependent on because Laughing Dogs' charming proprietor, Loretta Hauck, also functioned as the go-to person for many travelers-through, and so good at it it was almost as if she'd been specially selected for the task.

The Source

Every now and again I will come across an article or a documentary or a book about an artist no one ever heard of until that artist died and it was discovered she left behind paintings or drawings or sculptures or musical compositions or novels or poems or mathematical equations or architectural designs hailed by some authority or another as works of towering genius.

Mendocino County Today: January 22, 2014

WHO COULD HAVE IMAGINED that endlessly sunny days, day-time temperatures in the 70s, could become ominous, oppressive even to those of us who assume rainy winters? We’re writing lots about the drought because it is The Story for California.

Bird’s Eye View

Aquarelle Restaurant in Boonville is re-opening this weekend, Friday, January 24. Like all local businesses they rely on Valley folks for support more than ever during the winter months and, as I’ve said many times, “Eating out is fun.”

Medical Price Gouging

An epidemic of sky-rocketing medical costs has afflicted our country and grown to obscene proportions. Medical bills are bloated with waste, redundancy, profiteering, fraud and outrageous over-billing. Much is wrong with the process of pricing…

The Conference Championships

The San Francisco 49ers game against the Seattle Seahawks at Centurylink Stadium in Seattle was a bare knuckle brawl of a football game. The Seahawks ground out a 23-17 win.

‘Go Ahead And Taze Me, Punk’

Nelson Vose began his life of crime early on, and by the time he was 31, in February of 1998, and living in Willits, he was a seasoned offender, a felon, denied the right to…

Embracing Failure

“I’ve killed more plants than anyone I’ve ever known,” he says with a smile. He learns a lot from failure. But usually the experiments fall somewhere between success and failure and this is much harder.

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