I am from a long line of orphans. Perhaps the line isn’t that long, but abandoned babies don’t have the luxury of genealogy. My...

I wrote the following essay in a workshop on the literary essay. The constraints were to use the words mountain, turkey, and Carolina...

A few weeks ago I took a workshop on the literary essay, led by Perrin Kerns (image below). I didn't know what a literary essay was when...

The hotels industry reopened this week in Monterey, so I booked a room at the Spindrift Inn on Cannery Row. Situated on the beach, the...

Today I took a drive down the coast from San Gregorio to Capitola. When I passed through Santa Cruz, the temperature had risen to 80...

For decades, differently abled people have been fighting for the right to participate in society. Accommodations for wheelchair users are...

One of the benefits of working at Apple for 22 years was that I was on the forefront of all new technologies. I was required to try out...

When the shelter-in-place order began in March, 2020, I starting writing a blog post a day. Back then, it seemed all we had to do was to...

There are forty six countries or dependencies in the world whose entire population is less that today’s USA COVID-19 cases....

I started the year reading a nonfiction book—Squirrels: The Animal Answer Guide, by Richard W. Thorington Jr. and Katie Ferrell. I bought...

The day-over-day increase in COVID-19 cases in the USA from November 1 to November 2 was about 83,000 people. The day-over-day increase...

I started taking Spanish lessons in the fall through Pimsleur. It's an approach that relies heavily on listening, repeating, and then...

A friend called me to find out how strangers could attend a Zoom even uninvited. Uninvited guests are photo bombers. In her case the...

I’m not the only one who is looking for alternatives to Amazon. A person in Canada is way ahead of me with the launch of Not Amazon. Not...

“Nothing will stop us … they can try and try and try but the storm is here and it is descending upon DC in less than 24 hours … dark to...

Hello to a New Year and goodbye to Trump and Amazon Kindle. I'm ditching both of them. I thank the 74+ million other Americans who...

I completed several courses and workshops in 2019, including two weeks in Durham, North Carolina for documentary studies intensive...

Many people, like me, discovered their inner chef this year. What choice did we have? Between sheltering-in-place and living 20 minutes...

When shelter-in-place started in March, I was determined to make exercise a priority. To do that, I had to devise a workout that would be...

Earlier this year I enrolled in a documentary studies course at the Center for Documentary Studies, Duke University. Called Traditions,...