I am writing tonight with a heavy heart. Our beloved friend and priest, Ian Elliott Davies, received the news that his youngest brother, Jason, died unexpectedly today at Prince Charles Hospital, Merthyr Tydfil, Wales. Ray and I are very close not only to Ian, but also his parents, John and Janis, and his brother and…
Year: 2014
A Revision of An Earlier Story: Sadie’s Good-Bye
“But she promised she’d say good-bye,” Max said as he swigged a glass of lager while we sat in our usual back booth at “Let’s Get It On” bar, the last place anybody would ever think to “get it on” unless that meant to get shit-faced drunk before noon on a weekday. That’s what Max…
Pann’s Coffee Shop: Well Worth a Visit
Tonight we ate at Pann’s Restaurant and Coffee Shop in Westchester en route to LAX to pick up some friends at the airport. Pann’s is the diner that was featured in Pulp Fiction and it has been around since 1958. The exterior is a great example of Googie architecture, which is a futurist style designed…
Sadie’s Good-Bye
“But she promised she’d say good-bye,” Max said as he swigged a glass of lager while we sat in our usual back booth at “Let’s Get It On” bar. Just a side note about the bar – it was about the last place anybody would ever think to “get it on,” unless that meant to…
Flash Fiction: An Education
I loved the way she said “balloon.” She said it as if she were blowing bubbles… She was strawberry blonde and had the greenest eyes I had ever seen. There was something about the way she puckered up her lips when she asked for a balloon that night at the carnival that made her look…
5-Star Gingersnap Recipe
Today I modified America’s Test Kitchen’s recipe for ginger snap cookies to fit into my non-refined sugar criteria. That mean basically just substituting white sugar with maple sugar. The results were excellent. The cookies have a real snap and they are filled with freshly ground ginger for a nice little kick. I’m going out on…
A Turkey Burger Worth Eating
Looking for a great turkey burger (or regular beef burger) in LA? Here’s your stop: Astro Burger at 7475 Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood. The fries are also excellent, hand-cut and fried to perfection. Here is the turkey burger I had a few days back. Pardon those bite marks. I was so hungry, I forgot…
Ojai Last Night
We went to Ojai last night and I was unable to post because I had not downloaded the WordPress blog app. I have since done that so I am playing catch-up. Here is what the moon looked like from the darkness of the orange grove last night. We were there to water our trees so…
Writing Advice for Long Projects
A friend called me today and said, “I had been going great guns on a writing project, then I lost momentum and now I’m miserable.” My response, “Welcome to the real world of writing.” It is a fact (at least from my experience), once you have immersed yourself in the creative process and experienced that…
20 Minutes a Day 