Two Gents' Worth
November 22, 2024
“Over the river and through the woods To Grandmother’s house we go…” I’ve heard the words to that delightful song almost all my life, and they express a wonderful sentiment, indeed. In fact, I’m pretty sure that every time I’ve listened to them, I’ve visualized being in a horse-drawn sleigh at Thanksgiving. My dad’s piloting…
Read More about Thanksgiving ThoughtsIt’s not supposed to happen around these parts. But it has happened, and it has shocked folks in this great Heart of the American Heartland, Ames, Iowa. The talk of this town today — and in many nearby towns — is the killing of 22-year-old Iowa State University student and star golfer Celia Barquin-Arozamena, whose…
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I met Iowa’s newest — and one of its only — neighborhood ice cream truck drivers this past Friday night. I was out walking on that lovely evening through the Roosevelt neighborhood in Ames — where we had lived decades ago — when I heard what sounded like music from an ice cream truck. Surely,…
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We went back to the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines this past Friday to see if things had changed much since we had last been there. Considering the last time we were there was back in 1979 or ’80, you might think things would look a whole lot different. And they likely did —…
Read More about State Fair, Iowa StyleTraveling across country was incredibly difficult back in the early 1800’s. Just imagine — and it’s not easy to do — driving a covered wagon across rutted dirt trails that stretched thousands of miles from the Midwest to the West Coast. It took months, and many of those 19th-century travelers never made it. They had…
Read More about That Midwestern Feeling, AgainThis week back in Fresno — several months after we moved to the Central Coast in retirement — has been busy, indeed. Some of what made it hectic were great get-back-togethers with old friends Al and Bud. Al is one of the people I’ve known longest. We go way back to Hamilton Junior High days…
Read More about Old Gents, Still GabbingLet me tell you a story. The first time I moved away from Fresno was around Valentine’s Day in 1973. I piloted my hotshot blue ’71 Ford Pinto up Highway 99 to Sacramento – then motored east on I-80 and over the snow-capped Donner Summit into Reno. I headed north on the 395 and –…
Read More about Farewell, FresnoI spent nearly four decades in broadcast journalism – both TV and radio. Right after I graduated from Fresno State, I moved to Susanville to become a radio news director and then – nearly bankrupt, since radio paid no money – made my way back to Fresno and somehow became the youngest TV reporter in…
Read More about My Biggest StoryOne method to revise history is by omission. Take the hugely successful movie, “Dunkirk;” writer-director Christopher Nolan’s engrossing version of the last-minute evacuation of 330,000 allied troops, mostly British, surrounded and trapped by Nazi Panzer troops on a wisp of beach at the very northwest tip of France. Across the English Channel lies safety, 26…
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