Suddenly the skies opened up this week and we had a taste of high summer. No better time to get out on the bike and find out how rusty the muscles became over winter. It is pretty bad but not irreparable. On the waterfront I encountered the art work that represented my body, the rusty … More The Rusting Seagull
What a dork! Off to the Junior Prom in the mid-1970’s, he has his whole life ahead of him, believing everyone more or less lives by the same template; get an education, find a girl, marry, then settle down raise children. Repeat in the next generation. With this presumption on board I got to college, … More American Pie- Fair Comment
It is 50 years ago. My sister and I sit on the Coca-Cola ice water chest in front of the Atlantic Richfield service station watching the cars emerge from the heat shimmers off the highway, then disappear into them again. It is about 100 degrees and really dry. Occasionally we have to get off … More Summers in Idaho
For once I thought I might escape if only for a moment my hopelessly bourgeois life, so I brought my guitar to the annual Newton Kight summer picnic this year to host a sing along. Wow what a terrible venue. Silver Lake picnic shelter next to a four lane. We shared our cheeseburgers in paradise … More I Would Really Rather Be Jimmy Buffett
Five years ago while visiting family there, we happened to take exit 82 off the Garden State Parkway and find ourselves in Seaside Heights, a beach resort on New Jersey’s central coast. As it turned out, this was just weeks before Hurricane Sandy devastated the island. This summer I packed my digital recorder and we … More Hurricane Sandy and the Resilience of New Jersey
The Whole Foods checker and her bagging clerk talk to each other as if I am not standing there. One says to the other “When we get done with ‘this one’ ” referring to me. She then goes on to describe what task they have before them next. It was an existentialist experience. I am … More When We Get Done With This One
It just occurred to me the initials of leading Republican candidate are the same for a nervous system disorder brought on by too much drinking over an extended period, then sudden withdrawal; Delirium Tremens. Symptoms of the disorder include hallucinations, which is evident from the success of the candidate. A significant number of American’s think they … More America: You have the DT’s
A man is interviewed in his living room in Aleppo, Syria about the war. On the wall behind him hangs a velveteen painting of dogs playing poker. He wears a North Face jacket. The BBC interviewer seems oblivious to the odd aspects of this scene, and really wants to know more about how the man has survived … More The Absurd Optics of Globalization
JANUARY 2016 UPDATE: The Raccoon’s have occupied Ballard and have learned how to defeat the latch that is supposed to hold secure the food scraps we are instructed to save for some Green Reason. A neighbor has literally seen this happen, and all his extra effort to secure his bin has failed. Wednesday night as … More Garbage Cops: Seattle
I grew up in a village called Immaculate Conception Parish in the 1960’s. We had a fundamental narrative about how life was supposed to be, where your place in the universe was, and a sense of right and wrong. Ultimately this was shattered by a remarkably critical world that tossed that narrative aside without much thought and … More But it is 1978!
Lawyers Road Review 