(re-run) “I like the way you dance,” he said to me last Saturday afternoon. Margo and I had gone to Vino Godfather, a cool little winery in an old Victorian house on Mare Island in Vallejo. The island used to be a naval base, judging from the abandoned barracks on the way to the winery.… Continue reading Cut Loose on a Saturday Afternoon
Category: California
Let it Rain
(re-run from 2019) If you live in California, it’s the time of year that you pray for rain. With no precipitation since May, the hills are bone dry, so brown they are white. I hiked the hills yesterday. Not one green sprout of anything could be found anywhere. The trees are green, but that is… Continue reading Let it Rain
Laugh More, Worry Less
(re-run) The state is on fire, again. It seems that three of the last four years have been off the charts for wild fires. 2017 – Napa and Santa Rosa burned. Santa Barbara County, too. 2018 – Paradise, the town, was wiped off the map. 2019 – Because of heavier winter rainfall, the fires weren’t… Continue reading Laugh More, Worry Less
A Giants Date
(re-run) Tom, the contractor, was a Giants fan. He found a similar-minded woman on Match.com. Tom’s friend had given him the tickets, field level seats at the third baseline, near the players’ wives. Tom asked his date to meet him at his place so they could drive over to the stadium in San Francisco together.… Continue reading A Giants Date
Street Dance
(re-run) After hiking six miles with the senior group called DASH, which does not dash at all, but rather hikes slowly through the woods with plenty of stops for bathroom breaks, snack breaks, or count-up-and-regroup breaks, I was too pooped to go out dancing. But my friends were going, it was close (just one town… Continue reading Street Dance
Fear of Bridges? Me, Too
(re-run) Gephyrophobia is the anxiety disorder of fear of bridges. The Bay Area might not be the best place to live if you have it. To get to San Francisco, you either have to take the San Mateo Bridge or the Bay Bridge. To get to Sausalito and Marin County, you have to take the… Continue reading Fear of Bridges? Me, Too
People Watching
(re-run) An 80s band was set to play in a small park one town away. I’m not a big fan of 80s music, but it was the last concert of the summer in that town, so why not? My girlfriend agreed to meet me there. I got there first and chose a corner of a… Continue reading People Watching
The Tree Trimming Post
(re-run from 2021) The beach town where I have an almost -100-year-old house has Draconian tree removal laws. In other words, you can’t. You can trim your tree up to 25%, but good luck trying to remove it. I found this out the hard way when I applied for a tree removal permit ($181.00) and… Continue reading The Tree Trimming Post
The Tree Whisperer
(re-run) I walk my neighborhood once or twice most days while walking Dog A and Dog B (I can’t walk them together since the newest little weirdo is nuts). Because I am a tree hugger and have planted more than sixty trees at my various houses over the years, I will free a distressed tree… Continue reading The Tree Whisperer
Pyracantha and the Path to School
(re-run) When my kids were 14, 11 and 6, we moved into a house that bordered the school district’s property. The middle school sat to the right of our backyard, and the high school sat to the left. Only a chain-length fence and a hedge of Photinia separated its property from ours. I called the… Continue reading Pyracantha and the Path to School
FIRST DATE, WORST DATE EVER! 