Two Gents' Worth
June 13, 2026
The other night Sharon and I were watching one of our favorite police procedurals on CBS when one of the main characters uttered a line so ridiculous — I knew I had to steal it. This character is the nerdiest of the nerds. He was trying to sweet-talk a young lady into letting him into…
Read More about Birthday thrill-seeker?Yes, Sharon and I plan to spend this Christmas in a yurt on the Central Coast of California. After all, everything was going just fine last year, when we “yurted” for the first time — until the pellet stove stopped heating inside our yurt on a quite-cold night — and until the bathroom building outside…
Read More about Another Yurt ChristmasI’m pretty sure my long-time buddy Albert would have enjoyed the walk I took through our old Hamilton Junior High neighborhood in Fresno a few weeks ago. It was a beautiful Saturday morning in early November — sunny and not too warm or too chilly. The neighborhood trees were reflecting autumn’s glory, with red and…
Read More about Walking Alone
It took nine days and more than 2,000 miles, but we are back home in Madera County and happy to be here. Our long driving trek from Ames to Madera was exhilarating, fattening and, ultimately, wearying — and it was immensely rewarding. We left Ames on Thursday, June 23, and headed down I-35 to our…
Read More about California Once More
We have come back, one last time, to this great Heart of the American Heartland — Ames, Iowa — the home of Iowa State University; Hickory Park, the best barbecue place anywhere in these grand United States; and Cafe Diem, surely one of the finest and most hospitable coffee places you’ve ever been in. Yes,…
Read More about In Ames, One Last Time?
What is it about small, cute dogs? Why do they always take all the attention, and suck all the oxygen, out of a room? I was reminded of this small, cute dog thing the other day when Sharon and I were having lunch outside the Patio Cafe at Fig Garden Village in Fresno. There were…
Read More about Wanted: A Small, Cute DogI had a really crazy fantasy recently. In this one, I was walking around downtown Fresno near Courthouse Park when The Guy I Used to Be drove up. He looked about 25 years old, maybe 150 pounds, with longish light-brown hair, a mustache and gold-rimmed glasses. He was driving the same bright blue ’71 Pinto…
Read More about The Guy I Used to Be
A few weeks ago, an old friend in Paso Robles emailed me a great series of cartoons dealing with aging. He does that a lot, and those cartoons are often quite amusing – even if they hit way too close to home. The best cartoon he sent in that batch showed a woman of indeterminate…
Read More about Another Birthday, on the WayA week or so ago, I wrote about why I had gone into broadcasting. I mentioned that it was because of NBC Radio’s incredible weekend-long “Monitor” program — which I fell in love with and never got over — and because of KNBR Radio in San Francisco, the great-sounding NBC owned-and-operated station that boomed its…
Read More about My Favorite TeacherThe other day, someone asked me why I had gone into broadcasting and spent most of my career there. There are two reasons: NBC Radio’s extraordinary weekend-long program “Monitor” — and KNBR Radio in San Francisco. Soon after I started listening to “Monitor” in 1963 on KMJ Radio in Fresno, I discovered KNBR (an NBC…
Read More about Broadcasting. Why?