A September 11 story–excerpt from my memoir
On the morning of Sunday, September 9, 2001, precisely 48 hours before American Airlines Flight 77 would fly this same airspace, I was on an Alaska Airlines flight making its final approach to Washington D.C.’s National Airport. There I would catch a shuttle bus to attend a week’s training at a federal facility 50 miles west of the city. It had been an uneventful but [...]
A Winter’s Diary
To my wonderful subscribers, thank you. This braided essay was recently published in Rainshadow Journal, but I also wanted to share it with you. Dec 31, 2020: It was foggy this morning, and temps have not dipped below freezing in a long time. There was a thick frost a couple weeks ago, but the days blur and it’s impossible to recall when. I remember that [...]
Making Sense of All the Abuse.
As I write this, a new president and vice-president have just been inaugurated, and like many, I’m emotional about it. There’s relief, of course, but also much more. Four years ago on election night in 2016, I was sitting with a group of friends, at first encouraged by the polls and then, in utter shock. My shock went beyond the political to the personal—the man [...]
Goodbye, Godzilla.
I wish whoever said, “May you live in interesting times” was alive today, to get a nice big gulp of his own advice. Fun fact: Does anyone remember it was a leap year? It had 29 days in February, 200 days in March, and five years in November. It can now be confirmed that 2020 was misery’s firehose. Each day we had our choice on the [...]
Blogging vs Blargging
According to the Urban Dictionary, the term “blarg” is one of those unique words that can mean anything you want it to. It reminds me of that well-known meme where a dog is trying to drink out of a high-pressure lawn sprinkler and the caption is "WHARRRRRGARBL." Thus, the word blarg, which can be lengthened with more r's and g's depending on one's level of [...]
Weltschmerz and Schadenfreude: Twin Horsemen of the Apocalypse
There are times when I want to flee into the wilderness to a place with no cell or internet service and stay there. This is one of them. There are also times where I try for a mood lift, maybe by drawing some cartoons skewering tone-deaf politicians. This is not one of them. But what the heck, here’s a cartoon I drew awhile back anyway. [...]