The other day I was down at Kaiser picking up some of my medications. I’m on several these days, none of which get me high and for the amount foe money I’m spending the very least they show do is give me a pleasant buzz that lasts all day.

On the… Read full post »

There is a button on every web site. It’s over there on the wall and it says “Don’t Push,†just below it. I always assumed it was put there by those cold war guys back when Russia was evil and the internet was in the hands of the CIA… Read full post »

“’I was a bully, and I want my kid to be a bully too,’ says Jimmy Dale Embree Sr., who is now a 55-year-old long-haul truck driver with a front yard filled with his prize-winning collection of rusted-out junk cars. ‘If we are going to prepare our kids to compete in

… Read full post »

Dear Mr. President and Congressional Representatives,

Meet Hunter. He’s a cross between a yellow lab and a beagle. Hunter has better health care than everyone in the United States, except for you folks. His diet is better than everyone in the United States, including you folks. Hunter has li… Read full post »

There was a time not long ago when I had plenty of time on my hands. Entire days were savored through the pages of a novel. Or a short story for breakfast, poems for lunch, a novel for dinner. And swear to God the hours went by more… Read full post »

The Vile Ms. Palin stormed the stage at The Tea Party this weekend to spew her anger and speak with clenched teeth as she told lie after lie about our President.  I really don’t understand why she and others bother to lie about Obama.  The Civil Rights act was the last… Read full post »

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So I can claim this blog as mine.

Well, it looks as if Apple was wise in changing it’s name from Apple Computer, Inc to Apple, Inc. a few years ago.  The last few weeks there have been rumors flying all over the internets about an Apple tablet.  Today, an hour or so ago, in San Francisco Apple made… Read full post »

I’ve always been perplexed by teachers and others who see writing as a three step product-driven process.  They talk in terms of brainstorming, writing a draft, and revising into a final essay.  What utter and complete nonsense.  And worse of all it allows people to think that there is somet… Read full post »

On the way 

from breakfast

I walk by a poem

three men stand

waist deep lotus pads

tree shadows ripple

a net folded 

hands clasped chest high

wait watch the circle

on the way

a perfect haiku Read full post »

For the last couple of years now whenever my brother Sam and I talk it seems like he’s in his car, driving to one place or another in the bay area.  Maybe conversing with someone on the move is a common occurrence for most of us these days.  Ideas in motion,… Read full post »

Well…yes…indeed…as Hunter S. Thompson used to write at the start of many an article.  I was at the Mission Viejo City Council meeting last night and I could help but wonder what Thompson would make of this semi-literate, pre-fascist country we have become; he certainly noted… Read full post »

Doesn't occur in the halls of congress or at the White House.  It occurs in th

e morning shower, while staring out a window on a c0mmuter train, late nights in a darkened kitchen, in bed while lying in the light of a street lamp; it's an internal debate the afflicted… Read full post »

In this country, we elect a person to office.  Usually, it's nobody I voted for.  And then we wait until that person's term is over and we either vote him out of office, or in the case of Nixon, Regan, and Bush we elect the moron for another term.  I usually… Read full post »

In his "Letter From The Birmingham Jail" Dr. Martin Luther King used redefinition artfully to further his argument.  Of course Dr. King's was a moral cause and he had a passion we've rarely seen in a leader.  Redefinition has long been an excellent rhetorical strategy, but unfortunat… Read full post »

I grew up with Hubert Humphrey and Walter Mondale signs on my front  lawn.  All my friends had Goldwater and Nixon signs.  Back then the distinctions were clear.  And the Democrats actually stood for something. 

My friend Don Wile and I were talking about those days just las… Read full post »

I’m from Minnesota.  The environment up there teaches compassion in a myriad of ways.  For one, homeless people will die on Washington Avenue if you don’t give them some shelter.  Moral questions become very real when it’s 40 below zero at three o’clock in the a… Read full post »

Dear Mr. President and Congressional Representatives,

Meet Hunter.  He’s a cross between a yellow lab and a beagle.  Hunter has better health care than everyone in the United States, except for you folks.  His diet is better than everyon… Read full post »