Columns

If you ask people what kind of age we live in today at some point most people will at least mention the information explosion that’s occurred via the internet. Today we know more than we ever had before. Average human knowledge doubles about every 13 months. Pretty amazing isn’t it? Obviously no one can keep up with this accumulation of …

“I can’t believe how fast this year is going!” I’ve both heard and said that a number of times lately. I hear people say that about all sorts of things. How fast their kids grow up, how old a certain celebrity is or how long ago a big event in their life happened. I find myself thinking and saying it …

So far this has been a pretty weird winter on the River. It seems like a lot of odd things have been happening, especially this flu bug that’s going around. I don’t recall ever seeing so many people catching a bug like this and then keeping it for so long. Not to mention everyone I know who’s gone two or …

Have you ever wondered where the ideas that pop into your mind come from? I do, quite often in fact, but usually can’t really figure it out. The other day, though, I did manage to remember where I had first encountered an expression that will probably sound odd to you. I was thinking about how difficult it is for most …

So it’s another new year and it seems like I’ve seen quite a few of them actually. Given what always happens every year I thought this might be a good starting place for 2016: “I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes. 

Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, …

Spray-painting, boats sinking and fake skeletons: there’s no place like Parker, Arizona, and nobody covers it the way Parker Live does! Dear readers: The Parker community is huge, and includes a ton of people who come and go from our shores all year long. Most of you don’t live here on a permanent, year-round basis, but consider yourselves river people …

One of the odd things about language is how certain words start out one way and end up another and do so in a fairly short period of time. How and why that happens fascinates me and I want to talk about one such word this month. The word for the month is “judge”, or “judgmental”. When I was young, …

I remember hearing on the news a couple of weeks ago about an “important new finding” in a study. Of course my immediate reaction went something like this, “Oh no, not another stupid study!” I don’t know about you but it seems to me as if a large segment of our population must do nothing but conduct studies and report …

As you may or may not have heard, John Boehner announced that he would resign as Speaker of the House at the end of October and it was speculated that Kevin McCarthy was favored to take over the position. However, McCarthy announced that he was not going to seek the position, throwing the mainstream media into a frenzy of speculation …

I love reading quotes. Not just ones I agree with either. In fact I believe the best quotes are the ones that make you think. Here’s a good example and the catalyst for this column. [Note: there are several versions of this quote – as there are many well-known quotes – I’m using the one most familiar to me.] It …