America’s Next Top Model The week may have started out on a sour note, but it ended on a sweet one. Megan’s birthday is next Saturday, but we celebrated her birthday yesterday. Our friends Rik and Lu, who are both EMS workers, are so busy that it’s hard to find a day when they are [...]

Well, the heat wavelet turned out to be wishful thinking. We’ve been blasted by temperatures in the high 80s for the past four days, which is about four days too long. True, we don’t have the bone-crushing humidity they have back East, and unlike that side of the country, it actually cools down at night [...]

But it hasn’t all been divorce and (melo)drama. A couple of weeks ago, we had a lovely Friday evening. Megan and I went to the Village to look for books for Jessica’s birthday, which, as every right-thinking person knows, is every April 15. Originally we were looking for books on Hindu mythology, but we struck [...]

On Friday, I wrapped up some work and some presents for Jessica and headed over to the family property for Jessica’s birthday BBQ. It had been a while since I’d been over there, and things are rocking and rolling in the garden: Those are onions and garlic in the foreground, with a new frame for [...]

Nothing takes a girl’s mind off divorce paperwork and restraining orders like a drive down the coast to see a burlesque show, n’est-ce pas? After work on Saturday, Miss Scarlett and I drove the serpentine road to the south coast. The scenery was breathtaking and I wished more than once that I didn’t have to [...]

In case you didn’t know, my brother totally rocks. He has been a volunteer firefighter for many years (yes, he runs into burning buildings and fought the terrifying wildfires of 2008 for no money) and is a Captain in the fire department. He is a teacher and works with the mentally handicapped. He is a [...]

Every month at the jobette, we feature a different artist and try and have a theme for First Friday, the day we and other downtown businesses stay open late and pour wine and serve nibbles, alomg with book signings and meeting artists. This month, we featured the fine woodworking students’ work from our local college, [...]

For a small coastal community, there are a lot of fun things to do around here. Sometimes it’s hard to choose which one to attend, like when I went to Sallie’s choir recital instead of the tree lighting ceremony and lighted truck parade in the Big Town. Weather can also play a part. The Festival [...]

Well, the weather did come in, with days of storms, battering us with thunder, lightning, pouring rain, and hail. But I woke to a sunny day on Christmas Eve, the garden glittering with last night’s rain. Somehow, it took me all day to get the cooking and cleaning done. By the time the house was [...]

Decisions, decisions! Last Friday, there was the tree lighting ceremony in the Big Town, to be followed by the Lighted Truck Parade. It was also First Friday, the day that shops and galleries stay open late, and I should have stopped in to see my colleagues, but I had other plans. Going to church. It [...]

The day after Thanksgiving, inside… …and outside! So much has happened since I last wrote that I hardly know where to start. It was a really wonderful Thanksgiving. My little house was overflowing with friends, family, and food. Good thing we had the outdoor seating area as well as the indoors. The turkey cooked a [...]

The secret to surviving Thanksgiving – as with most things – is to plan ahead and prepare as much as possible. The jobette very sweetly gave me yesterday off, so I started off by roasting chestnuts (for stuffing) and pears (for the salad). While they were roasting, I dug up potatoes from the buckets of [...]

Just two short days after the election, I set off in the deep rural darkness to see a political thriller. You’d think I would have had enough political thrills and chills that week, but you’d be wrong. My brilliant co-worker at the jobette – the same one who predicted the election results and the Giants’ [...]

I guess I – and you – should just get used to the time lag between things happening and my reporting on them, if you haven’t already. I am now writing about a long, long time ago, about last Friday. In fact, it was last Friday. One of the many things I love about our [...]

Our Beautiful First Family First things first yet again- it’s been a momentous week or so. Despite the predictions of a friend who called the President’s re-election almost perfectly at 304 electoral college votes versus the actual 303 (he also accurately predicted the Giants’ world-series winning sweep of Detroit last month), I was pretty nervous [...]

Halloween dawned appropriately gloomy and sinister looking. By late morning, it was, as my late, great stepmother used to say in her rich, plummy voice, “simply tipping it down.” The rain gauge later informed me that we got more than an inch of rain that day. Erica tried to bribe Jessica into staying home that [...]

First things first: the Giants swept the Tigers to win the World Series on Sunday night! Coit Tower was orange in honor of the momentous occasion: For those of you not in Northern California, or not in the know (or both), the Giants’ team colors are orange and black. Perfect for Halloween! You may recall [...]

A foggy evening at the Community Center On Friday night, Megan and I met up with Lu at the Caspar Community Center for a Farm to Table Benefit Dinner and Pie Auction. All the food was grown and donated by local residents, including my family – we gave onions, basil, lemon cucumbers, tomatoes, and the [...]

Back in the golden days of our youth, my siblings and I were all golden-haired. But when puberty reared its ugly head, mine went from gleaming to drab, seemingly overnight. “We’ll take your blonde hair and swap it for decades of menstrual hell and pregnancy scares! Enjoy!” This was about the time I began to [...]

Sometimes it’s hard to believe that this is actually my job. Well, jobette. And that they pay me to do this! A few days ago, I left work around 11:00 am to go on a tour of artists’ studios. This is a new local business, and the tour operator wanted to take around some people [...]