Columns

Prize Patrol Sorry I haven’t written in a while. I’ve been busy planning my imminent retirement. I’m just waiting for that Publisher’s Clearing House van full of balloons to arrive at my house. I’ve never been involved with Publisher’s Clearing House other than watching the television commercials where the Publisher’s Clearing House Prize Patrol van rolls up on someone’s house …

Remembering 9/11 The September 11, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center is the “Kennedy assassination” moment of my generation. Let us take a moment and remember it together. Where were you? What did you do that day? Looking back over the past 10 years, have the events of 9/11 changed your life? Log in and share, or e-mail me …

Radio Contest Withdrawals I didn’t win KLPZ’s iPhone giveaway contest. It was probably all for the best, I mused as I sat dejectedly in my lifeless Jeep. I didn’t need another expense. I turned the key again. Click. Dagnabbit. Then the hood latch release broke off in my hand. DAGnabbit! I wandered back to the house and turned on the …

As many of you know, I’m not real fond of going to the movies because there are too many idiots who are fond of going to the movies. The cell phone talkers, the “Hey I’m in my living room so I’ll just speak my mind during this movie” people, the people who bring babies and the rest of the moronic …

AM Radio Fun Remember the movie “American Graffiti” about life – and hot rods – in a small California town? I grew up in that one-horse town. We had exactly one local radio station, KFIV “K-5” AM and it formed the soundtrack of our lives. I remember as a teenybopper lugging around a tape recorder and radio and recording songs …

Class Action I’m not what you would call a frugal person, although I will certainly take something that is offered for free. However, unlike my wife, I will not stop dead in my tracks when I see a penny on the ground nor will I pull to the side of the road to grab an aluminum can. My wife can …

My wife went to a conference recently and returned with all sorts of cool stories and references that she picked up from the guest speaker, who was a mortician. Don’t ask what kind of conference, because I’m not even sure. I just know my wife works with deceased people’s estates and deceased people’s relatives, so going to a conference where …

Busted…? A long, long time ago in a yard far, far away… My summer job was watering desert plants and looking after my snowbird neighbors’ homes while they were off enjoying cooler climes. My work vehicle was a bicycle, the basket stuffed with water bottles and house keys. My uniform was portable shade — a wide-brimmed straw hat, long sleeved …

A powerful monsoon storm slammed into my neighborhood three miles northwest of Bouse Sunday evening, July 11th, 2011. Wind toppled tall trees, smashed windows, blew out metal garage doors, plucked coolers from rooftops, ripped awnings from houses and tore off a roof from a stick-built home. “The wind was blowing the rain so hard it hurt,” reported that homeowner. “I …

My World Now that the Casey Anthony trial is over, I can comment on it without unduly influencing the jury. Like the rest of the media in this country, I’ve avoided the subject up until now. Obviously, I’m kidding. There were so many things wrong with this entire Casey Anthony story, the worst of which is that a little girl …