ashetlandpony | Recent Entries

It was 40 years ago today that I first visited Humboldt county: an event that ultimately changed the entire future course of my life.

Back then, I published a national newsletter that focused on the conservation of river otters. For the next issue, I wanted to write a lead article about otters in California, and the only person studying them at the time was a grad student at Humboldt State University. I'd actually met Kent Reeves at a research workshop in Florida two years before, so when I wrote and asked him if I could interview him for this article I was planning, he said come on up!

Long story short, I fell in love with Humboldt at first sight. Everything about the place was a revelation. Only disappointment was that I didn't get to see any wild otters, but Kent said you'll just have to come back this summer and we'll camp out on Redwood Creek and we'll see otters then for sure. I did, and we did! And only 14 months after that first visit, I made Humboldt my new home. Ended up studying wild otters myself here for 25 years, and living happily ever after. 🙂

I used to really enjoy Valentines Day when I was a kid. At my school, it was like a class project. Everybody gave (almost) everybody a little valentine card or some of those heart-shaped candies. Even boys gave each other valentines. It wasn't a "homo" thing as we used to say, it was just a sign of friendship, that's all. But I really liked getting valentines from the girls. I was so homely, they mostly didn't play with or even talk to me, but they'd still give me a card, and it was always a thrill when they did.

When I got to sixth grade, though, I decided to Go Big with one girl in particular. I thought she was really something, so I talked my mom into taking me to See's Candies and buying one of those heart-shaped boxes of chocolates, like grownups gave to the special ladies in their lives.

Then V-Day came and while everyone else was exchanging cards, I walked up to the girl and gave her my heart. I don't remember the exact moment, probably because I was so nervous I couldn't even look her in the eye and could barely mumble whatever it was I had prepared myself to say. But I do remember it made her happy, so I considered my big play to have been a success... at least for a few seconds.

Then, disaster struck. From the other side of the classroom, handsome Jeff Fisher walked over and gave her an even BIGGER See's Candy heart! I couldn't believe it. If I were a cartoon character, you could have seen and heard my jaw drop and hit the floor with a loud "CLANG!" when this other boy one-upped me. (And yes, even at that age, I was able to grasp the simple concept of "size matters.") 😉 From triumph to humiliating defeat in less than a minute. So yeah, perhaps needless to say, that was a moment and a lesson I never forgot.

But all was not lost! A couple of days later, I received a very gracious note from the girl, thanking me for the candy. I showed it to my mom, and she put it in my "baby book" as a memento, along with one of the notes I wrote to put on the box. (I guess I didn't consider my writing on this one to be perfect enough, so I tore it up and wrote another.)

Anyway, that was my most memorable Valentines Day! And it turned out all was well that ended well. Tracey was never my actual girlfriend, but she was nice to me all the rest of the years we were in school together, and she was even my neighbor up the street for a while. I was happy to see her at our 40-year reunion in 2012, too. She'd barely aged a day, and still had that smile that was as big and beautiful as the day was bright. 😃

Our class picture from 1965-66. Tracey is the tallest girl in the back. I'm the buck-toothed bespectacled boy two rows down in the blue checked shirt. And my rival Jeff Fisher is in the front on the far right.

So Happy Valentines Day everyone! I hope you liked my story. ❤️

Twice in the last 3 days, Mister Hairy Houdini Husky here managed to escape from the back yard through a rotten fence board, completely unbeknownst to me until my next-door neighbor, Meghan, called to tell me he was outside my front gate waiting patiently to be let back in.

I found his escape route soon enough, but despite me blocking it with a piece of plywood and a deck chair, he managed to push all that aside and escape again. Then yesterday, thanks to my neighbor in back, Steve, the fence was finally secured, so Sneaky-Pete will hopefully be staying put now; at least until he finds another way out in future.

Nice to have neighbors looking out for my dog and me. :) I do worry about Zigzag getting out, though, because he is not car-savvy at all and just dashes out into the road without looking. He also bears grudges against a couple of other male dogs in the area and I'm concerned he might get into a fight with one or both of them if he got the chance. But, not this time, and hopefully never if I can help it.

For no real reason other than perhaps boredom, this afternoon I decided to go through some old file folders. I found one that was unlabeled, and discovered it contained poetry I wrote back when I was in my twenties. Right in front was this little handmade booklet that, according to the inscription, I gave to my mother as a late birthday present in 1977. I'd completely forgotten about it, and the poems, too, until I read them, then all at once they became familiar again, like meeting an old friend.

What makes this extra special is that Mother died 32 years ago today.

A gift returned in remembrance of something precious that I'd lost.

Gratias tibi, Mater, et requiescant in pace eternam. Amen.

More car work today, so I went walkabout in Arcata again. Had breakfast at the same place as before. Great meal, and another super server got a super $10 tip! Took a picture this time that didn't show the scaffolding so much.

After that I decided to walk to my old neighborhood where I lived for 15 years. Hadn't set foot on the place since I moved out in 2001. I lived in the little cottage in the back; the one with the truck parked in front. Knocked, but nobody answered. (Didn't really expect they would; I wouldn't have answered an unexpected knock at 9 in the morning, either.) ;-) Spent the prime years of my life here - age 32 to 47 - so the place is of no small significance to me.

Anyway, by the looks of all the plants they had on the front porch, the current resident might have lived there just as long as I did or maybe even longer. It's a cozy place. Nice view and great neighborhood, too, but eventually I simply outgrew it. Wanted my own house, anyway. Tired of paying rent, wanted a dog, etc. It was just time to move on.

That was about it. Car was finished by the time I walked back to the shop. :-)

Made a batch of homebrew with a friend back in 1990. Worst beer ever! The label was kind of cool, though. I stole the graphic from an otter conservation group in Italy. 🙂

True story: about 10 years later, an out-of-town friend found a bottle of this stout in my fridge and drank it without asking first. He soon announced he needed some 'fresh air' and wandered off on his own in the darkness and ended up hallucinating in a ditch about a half mile away. Moral of the story: beware of strange foods and beverages!

Had a very enjoyable morning yesterday. I had 3 hours to kill while my car got worked on, so I went walkabout in my old home town of Arcata. Lovely day and perfect weather for it!

First stop was a restaurant in an old converted Edwardian that used to be called the Blue Goose. Different owners now but they still serve an excellent breakfast. I probably hadn't eaten there since the mid-Nineties. Told that to my hostess and she said she hadn't even been born yet. That made me feel a little old! Anyway, she was very nice to me so I tipped her $10 for the $15 meal. :)

Next I decided to do a little scavenging along the abandoned Northwestern Pacific Railroad tracks on L Street. Was mostly looking for a loose rail spike, but also any bits of old glass or pottery that might be lying about. Didn't find a thing, but I saw a lot of pretty dogs being walked along the right-of-way, so that was nice.

Still had more than an hour to wait, so I thought I'd walk to Safeway and do a little shopping. I don't generally like walking through the main part of town anymore because of all the street people, so I stuck to side streets through residential neighborhoods. I continued hunting for detritophile treasures in exposed sections of dirt, and found this piece of pure copper flashing and what looks like part of an old drinking glass in front of a house from the 1870s.

Couple doors down J Street is the Selvage House, also built in 1874-75. This was actually the second house I ever stayed in in Arcata, back in February, 1983, before I even lived here. My biologist friend, Kent, was housesitting for owner Alex Fairless who was out of town at the time, and when I came up from LA to visit him, I stayed in the front bedroom upstairs. The cypress tree at right was known as the Night Heron Tree. During nesting season, it used to be full of Black-crowned Night-Herons. Unfortunately, it got severely pruned several years back and the birds never returned.

Cutting over in the direction of Safeway, I walked past my first apartment, which was upstairs on the left in this converted 19th century carriage house at 754 5th Street. One of the present occupants arrived while I was taking the picture. I told her I lived there in 1985-86, and asked if Monty and Mary were still the owners. Mary is. That was all I could get from the young lady, though, as she rushed inside and slammed the door. People used to be a lot friendlier in this town, but that was a long time ago.

This of course is the Safeway in Arcata. Virtually unchanged these past 40 years. I actually prefer the shopping experience here versus the one where I live. This store is better stocked, and the customers and employees seem nicer at this Safeway, too. Worth it to drive the extra few miles in my opinion. But, I was on foot today, and probably still wouldn't get home for an hour, so I only bought room-temperature stuff.

Some of the changes in this town just blow my mind. On the way back to the garage, I did a double take looking up I Street. Almost unrecognizable to me. On the left used to be a car dealership, and homes on the next block. Now the Ford place is a dope shop, with those godawful high rise apartments going up, joining others in the distance built a few years ago. I guess that's what they call progress.

Finally made it back to the repair shop. Only had a few minutes left to wait. Been bringing my car here forever, and already have another appointment set up for more work three weeks from now.

Just an ordinary day for some people, but I get out of the house so rarely anymore, even mundane things like this become special. 🙂

Updated life weight graph. Remember not too long ago when my weight dropped precipitously two years straight? Well, that turned around in 2020, and last year I averaged 10 pounds heavier than the year before. Goal now is to keep it right about where it is now. (Just below the penciled line of my adult lifetime average weight.) Can you picture skinny me weighing over 200? I can't imagine it myself anymore, but I did! 🙂 Never want to be heavy again, or even close.

¡Adiós! to my most excellent year in two decades! I'm living my very best life right now, and I couldn't be happier, or more thankful. 🙂 Here's hoping everyone's New Year will be awesome, too!

After 38 years of having to use laundromats, I finally acquired my first washer and dryer, just in time for a Christmas present to myself!

Why did this take so long? For one thing, I lived in rentals for my first 18 years here. Then, when I bought my house 20 years ago, I of course assumed I was going to be able to use the laundry hookups in my garage. Unfortunately, the builder neglected to make a vent for a dryer, which meant I couldn't have one. I could get a washer, but I would still have to take my clothes to a laundromat to dry them, so why bother. It was discouraging, looking at those laundry hookups all these years and knowing I could never put them to use.

But when I had an appliance repairman over to fix my oven a couple of months ago, I just casually mentioned my dryer vent predicament, and he said, "Oh, they make ventless dryers now." *jaw drop* "Really?" "Yeah. Give the store a call and we'll fix you up with one." So that's what I did!

I actually got the dryer a while back, but supply chain issues delayed the arrival of the washer until just yesterday. And I haven't done a load yet; I want to read the instructions thoroughly first. This is the first time I've had 'options' for washing and drying! At the laundromat, you select your temperature, put in your quarters, and that's it. I have to actually study things this time. It's an adventure!

This is the 36th time now that I have foregone any formal celebration of Thanksgiving. It's not simply that this is a family holiday and I have no family left, but because my father died on Thanksgiving in the most tragic of circumstances, and that's not the sort of event that any person respectful of their past would feel is appropriate to celebrate with a feast. (This should be a day of fasting for me, if anything.)

But I do give thanks on this day for one thing: that of all the couples in the world who could have adopted me – a baby cast aside and abandoned at birth – Ed and Lillian Shannon were the parents I ended up with. It's only because of them that I had the chance to live the amazing life I did. I owe literally everything to these two extraordinary human beings, and for that, I am truly thankful, every single day.

To those who are celebrating a traditional Thanksgiving today, I wish you Bon Appétit! And, as I always remind people: don't forget to thank the turkey, too! 🦃

I've been completely immersing myself in the XVIII. International Fryderyk Chopin Piano Competition that's been streamed online these past couple of weeks. I've never actually seen a piano competition live before, and to have one devoted entirely to the works of my very favorite piano composer is like a dream come true for me. It's so wonderful to be able to see others perform these Chopin pieces I love about a million times more exquisitely than I ever could play them!

I took 11 years of piano lessons when I was growing up, but I only performed in front of an audience one time, when I was 13. :) It was a junior high talent show, and because I loved the comic strip Peanuts so much, I dressed up as Schroeder with a red striped shirt and black short pants. I remember striding pompously onto the stage and performing this Chopin polonaise. (N.b. This was recorded at home, not at the talent show. And yes, I did post this here a while back, so you can skip it if you heard it then. I'm not going to subject you to it twice.) ;)

https://soundcloud.com/user-553167216/piano-recital-piece

Pretty terrible, I know, but I played it way better onstage; perfectly, as I recall. But what really surprised me was, after the show, several of my fellow students came up to me and expressed amazement at my piano performance, even girls, who practically never spoke to me. They all said, like, "I didn't know you could DO that!" My social status shot up overnight. I wasn't just the skinniest geek in school anymore who everybody looked down on or pushed around. After playing in that talent show, I was never bullied again. So, thanks, Mom! I guess I got some good out of those lessons after all.

Seriously, though, I really do have to say "Thank You, Mother," for making me take piano. I hated a lot of it – having to spend all that time practicing when I'd rather be playing with my friends – but it gave me an appreciation of music that enhanced the rest of my life tremendously, and for that, I am truly grateful. :)

PS: I'm sure either Liu or Garcia is going to get the Gold Medal this year. :) Both are absolutely brilliant interpreters of the maestro!

One less item on my 'grail' list now. :-) I've wanted one of these slick puppies since trig in high school (and that's a lonnng time ago!). Keuffel & Esser made the best slide rules in the world, but they cost way more than my mom was willing to spend, so I had to settle for a Pickett, instead. Still not bad, but the Picketts were aluminum, not mahogany and celluloid like the K+Es. I used to seriously covet Mr. Boesen's Model 408x in trig and physics class, fondling and caressing it lovingly when he wasn't looking. 😉

Serial number dates this one to about 1958, but it's so well preserved it looks like it came out of a time machine. Got it for a steal, too. Retail price penciled on the end of the box is $25.50 (about $250 now). I snagged this one the other day for $19.99. ^^

Today was my parents' 70th wedding anniversary. :-) They got married in Phoenix, Arizona, this day in 1951. Why they went to the trouble of going out of state to get hitched, I don't know, but Dad also married his first wife in Arizona, so maybe at the time it was a place to go for 'quickie' marriages? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Whatever the reason, it was the third marriage for both of them, and third time's a charm as they say!

The betrothed couple were accompanied to Phoenix by Dad's brother, Bill, and his wife Lila. I know from photos in the family album that they drove there in two separate cars: identical 1951 Fords, in fact, doubtless both purchased from their eldest brother's Ford agency in Ontario.

Strangely, there was no official wedding photo. (At least I never saw one.) There's only this day-after picture of them where they stayed, at the Desert Inn in Phoenix. Perhaps not the most glamorous place to spend their first night, but I suppose it served its purpose.

The newlywed Mr. and Mrs. Edward Shannon by the pool at the Desert Inn, Phoenix, Arizona, October 1, 1951.

The Desert Inn, 950 West Van Buren in Phoenix.

And according to the black-and-white postcard, after the ceremony, they had their wedding dinner Sunday night at the Green Gables Restaurant.

The Green Gables. The verso of the postcard reads (in Mother's hand): "This is where we had our wedding supper, following our wedding Sept 30, 1951, Sun - at 8:30 PM. Bill & Lila Shannon were our witnesses."

I only learned just yesterday that this was one of the earliest-ever 'theme' restaurants: sort of the 'Medieval Times' of its day. Cars were greeted in the parking lot by an armored knight mounted on a horse, and the servers all wore period costumes. (I can imagine my father hated every minute of this, but endured it for the sake of his new Anglophile bride.) The building still stands today at 24th and Thomas Road, but it's an office complex now. (At least it was spared the fate of becoming a Starbuck's.)

All my mother ever told me about her and Dad's honeymoon was that they went to Havana, Cuba, but I now know – also based on dated photos in the family album – that they swung up to Las Vegas on a roundabout way back to LA. There, they stayed at the old Last Frontier, one of the first resort hotels on The Strip. (Long gone, of course.)

Hotel Nacional, Habana, Cuba. It hosted a legendary casino in Batista's time.

Then, I suppose, they returned to LA and got ready to fly to Havana. I know from this telegram that they were at the Hotel Nacional on October 9. It surprised me to learn that this is still in existence; indeed, it appears to be THE place to stay in Havana to this day.

No idea who 'Pat' was - a secretary, I imagine. Couldn't have been my half-brother of that name because he was only 5 at the time.

Not sure how long they stayed in Cuba. Probably just long enough for Dad to gamble his money away in the country's famous pre-Castro casinos.

Anyway, the next 3 years until I came along would be a disaster for my father. He would lose his post-war fortune in a series of bad business deals his partner made with the Federal government, underbidding on contracts they were bound to fulfill, and adding insult to injury, the government also levied a $599,635.00 penalty on the partners: an absolutely crushing debt. (About $6.5 million today.) Those must have been dark days for my parents. I can only guess how dark, because those times were never ever spoken of in our house. (I only know about them because of surviving papers that attest to the circumstances.)

In any case, with Mom's help, Dad did get back on his feet eventually, and they lived happily (more or less) ever after!

PS: Today is also my mother's mother's 105th wedding anniversary!

More family discoveries in old newspapers! When I was a year-and-a-half old, we were in a car accident in Charter Oak north of Covina. Of course me being that young, I don't remember it at all, but I do remember that just about every time Mom drove through that intersection, I'd get to hear the story about how this teenager ran the stop sign and hit Mom's car, breaking Nana's leg, and sending her to the hospital. No car seats in those days, but I was told that I wasn't hurt because I was wedged tight between Mom and Nana in the front seat. Nana had her leg in a cast for weeks, though. Here's a picture from the time.

Me, Nana, Rascal and Scamp in our back yard in Glendora, June 21, 1956, which just happens to be Nana's 68th birthday.

So anyway, yesterday, I'm searching my mother's name in that newspaper archive, and lo and behold, I find this mention of the accident. The way it's worded, it sounds like Mom actually hit the other car! OMG, Mom! Wouldn't be the only fib she ever told, but this is a pretty big one, since she told me the same story about us getting hit by that teenager about a hundred times over the years.

It's also interesting for me to see Nana's age in the paper and realize that I'm just as old now as she was when I was born. She would live another 20 years. Me, I'm pretty sure that the world being what it's become, I won't make it anywhere near that long...

So, I recently subscribed to this online newspaper archive for my Covina history project, and discovered scandal in my family's past. Turns out my father was involved in a fairly messy (and publicized!) divorce.

Virginia Lucas and Ed Shannon, date and place unknown.
The way she's looking at him...

I knew my father had been married before my mom, but Dad rarely spoke of his ex, and practically nothing about the details of their relationship. I did know first-hand that Dad had a problem with betting/gambling, though. Mom almost broke up with him over some heavy losses at the craps tables in Vegas in the Sixties.

I also knew Dad liked horses, and liked to go to the races, but we didn't go very often. Three or four trips to Caliente when I was little, and that was about it.

However, as you can see in these newspaper articles from 1941, betting on horse races was apparently quite a big issue with his first wife! I can imagine Dad was furious over these write-ups. They do make the affair sound pretty salacious.

What I can't figure out are the accusations of wife beating. I think that's just outright divorce court slander, because my dad was the most even-tempered man I've ever known. I know for a fact he never laid a hand on Mom, because she would have left him on the spot. (She had already divorced one husband before him because of physical abuse, and she was not the kind of woman who would tolerate shit like that again in any way, shape or form.)

What really negates those claims, though, is that after the war, Virginia ended up remarrying Dad, and this time having a child with him. Dad had become quite wealthy as a defense contractor during WWII, and acquired even more wealth after it as an oil wildcatter, so I guess all that money caused Virginia to have a change of heart and conclude that Ed Shannon wasn't such a bad guy, after all. ;-)

And not only were horses apparently not a problem for her anymore, she even partnered with him in actually racing horses at Santa Anita! Dad bought himself a real thoroughbred filly who he called "Who Dat" – a picture of whom was hanging on the wall in my bedroom the whole time I was growing up. This isn't that picture, but I like this one because Who Dat looks like she's grinning at the camera and Dad looks a little miffed as she seems to be getting a little pushy at the moment.

Anyway, there was a sad end to Dad's brief fling in horse racing, when Who Dat fractured a leg while training one day, and had to be put down. The only times I ever saw my father cry was after his little brother died, and the times he spoke about what happened to Who Dat.

Things eventually went south with Dad's second marriage to Virginia, too, though this time, HE divorced HER over her drinking. They parted ways for good in 1950, and Dad married my mom in 1951.

So now I know the whole story behind what Dad meant when he once cryptically told me, "I had to give up horses to marry your mother." ;-)

...to Zigzag! He came to live with me 6 years ago today. 🐕 He was 2 then, so he's a middle-aged gent of 8 now. Time does fly...

The very first pic of my scruffy new pal, June 1, 2015. He was definitely in need of a bath.

I don't think I ever told the story of how he got named "Zigzag." He was called "Spirit" before, or at least that's what I was told, but he never answered to it. I'd call him that and get no response at all. Pretty quickly I concluded that the name was probably just as fake as the one the previous owner used for herself, and I'd have to come up with a new one. But what?

Pretty boy! Happy Zigzag after his first visit to the grooming parlor, June 9, 2015.

Then, four days after I got him, I'm taking him for a walk, and, still curious about his new neighborhood, he pulls me hard over to the left to check something out, then he pulls me hard over to the right for something else, then back to the left, then right, then left, right, left, right, and pretty soon I say out loud, "Wow, you really zig-zag!" *ding!* "Zigzag"! I liked the sound of that, and I guess he did, too, because he started responding to it right away.

So that's how he became Zigzag: the husky who can't walk a straight line. 🐕

Those baby blues, November 18, 2015.

Well, I'm back from my third and most likely last medical trip to LA with good news: I do NOT have glaucoma (although I am a candidate to develop it at some point), and the visual field defects in my right eye which have been troubling me for years are NOT sight-threatening. Whew!

A week ago today, I saw this brilliant eye doctor at Cedars-Sinai, and he explained what's wrong with me with truly amazing clarity and thoroughness. Turns out what I have is not actually an eye problem specifically but a defect in the way that my body delivers blood to tiny blood vessels in general, and it's related to other problems I've had for decades, like migraine, low blood pressure, cold extremities, insomnia, tinnitus, and a new thing I've noticed lately, an absence of thirst.

It's called "vasospastic syndrome" or "Flammer syndrome." Funny to have had a condition my whole life that didn't even have a name until recently! Anyway, it's not life-threatening and shouldn't affect my longevity, so I'm relatively unconcerned, it's just something I need to be aware of. I mean, I've lived with most of these problems all these years, and they've just been minor annoyances, never anything major, and now I know even the relatively new manifestations in my eyes aren't serious, either.

Finally, eternal thanks to Richard and Yona Rudolph who made it possible for me to see these specialists in the LA area and finally get closure for all my eye problems. There's no way in the world I would ever have gotten the kind of medical care here that I was able to there without the Rudolphs' help.

"Home is where your stereo is."

A truism once spoken by a college roommate. 🙂

So it was in line with that rule of thumb that, 20 years ago today, I moved my stereo into my new house here, and officially made this my home sweet home.

Here's to 20 more!

It's 20 years ago today that I first set foot in the house where I would end up living happily ever after. :)

By early 2001, I had become a moderately successful internet entrepreneur; successful enough, anyway, for me to finally take the plunge and buy my own house, and to buy it free and clear, to boot. Although not custom-built and nothing much to look at, it was brand new construction and very affordable: a 3-bed/2-bath house on 1/8 acre located just 1,000 yards from the ocean as the crow flies for only $128.9k. A steal, even in those days!

My real estate agent was the same fellow with whom I'd been housemates when I first moved to this area 18 years before. Rick (seen in profile below) called me with the news two nights before; so late that I didn't answer at first. Then the fateful words came from my answering machine: "Scott! Pick up your phone! I FOUND YOUR HOUSE!" What he told me sounded so promising that I dropped what I was doing and drove to see the place as soon as we hung up.

I was quite familiar with the town where the house was, but not the neighborhood, and not this particular street at all. Driving there, I remember feeling a bit dubious, because there are a couple areas in this town where you couldn't pay me to live. But when I first laid eyes on this place, and where it was situated, it was definitely a "Eureka!" moment. I had a strong sense that my search was over, and this was the house that was meant to be. Two mornings later, I toured the inside for the first time, and made an offer on the property the same day.

Suffice it to say, the purchase was problem-free, and the house (and its location) turned out to be ideal in every way. It was just like the neighborhood I grew up in: unincorporated county, semi-rural, horses and hills nearby, lots of empty-nesters and retirees, and all of my neighbors were friendly. I felt right at home from Day 1. I could not possibly have found a better place to settle down and spend the rest of my life. :)

What would turn out to be the center of the center of my universe: my bedroom (center) and my office space (adjacent, left) where I'm sitting this very moment.

Profile

ashetlandpony

Otters.net

February 2022

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
		1	2	3	4	5
6	7	8	9	10	11	12
13	14	15	16	17	18	19
20	21	22	23	24	25	26
27	28

Syndicate

Page Summary

Style Credit

Style: Neutral Good for Practicality by timeasmymeasure

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags

Page generated Oct. 8th, 2026 06:44 pm

Family matters...

Recent Entries

Coming home to a place I'd never been before

Size matters

Hairy Houdini

A gift returned

Arcata again

Toxic brew

Walkabout

Weight update

Happy Old Year!

Laundry time!

Thankful

Competition

Nerd alert!

Platinum

Wreckoning

Scandal!

Happy Cani-versary!

Closure

May 3, 2001

Twenty years home