Here are a couple of photos from my days as an aviator. The reason I don’t fly any more, and many of my pilot buddies don’t fly any more, is that it has gotten much too expensive. Part of that is the panicky idiot mentality of Americans after 9/11, which was incorrectly laid at the…
Continue reading →I’ve seen my share of dead bodies in my 26 years shooting news, and today was another one of those occasions. This accident happened today a few miles south of Ada, not far from where Abby works. A teenage driver, going too fast, passed a large truck, colliding head-on with a full-size pickup. The driver…
Continue reading →Forget round pizza! It’s squizza, the square pizza! I make this with soy cheese and either soy sausage or soy crumbles. Both taste a little like meat. Also in the topping is green peppers and onions over a marinara (I think it tastes better than plain tomato sauce), topped with soy mozzarella. Also this: A…
Continue reading →At about 8:30 tonight, there was a close lightning strike, and we were plunged into darkness. For a few seconds. We Barrons are a little weird about flashlights – we collect them like some people collect stamps or coins. In spite of the nearly-instant re-lighting of our lives, the computers shut off, as did the…
Continue reading →Yesterday my doctor told me what I already knew: my blood pressure is too high. Technically, I have stage 1 hypertension, which is high, but not scary high. He started me on Diovan, a popular and effective medication that has few side effects. He also took blood and did a finger stick to check my…
Continue reading →As I got dressed for work this morning, I noticed Sierra the Chihuahua whining and clawing at the China hutch. She whines and claws at stuff sometimes, so at first I ignored it. Then I noticed that the sound of the clawing didn’t match the movements she was making, and decided there must be something…
Continue reading →This happens a lot: we spend a few days at Christmas in Florida, and lose all concept of what the outside world might be like. (This happens to me when I am hiking in the desert, too.) Yesterday we were picking oranges in Palm Coast, and today I woke up to see this outside our…
Continue reading →Now that winter is here, it’s wildfire season again. The last two winters were under burn bans due to dry weather in the months prior, but it has since been lifted. It is dry and windy again today, despite a nice rainy spell last week. A few minutes ago I heard a call on the…
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Updated December 2018 “All I want is what I have coming to me. All I want is my fair share.” ~Sally Brown, A Charlie Brown Christmas When I was a kid, these were the joke lyrics… “Joy to the world The school burned down And all the teachers too They’re looking for the principal He’s…
Continue reading →As many of you know, Santa Claus has a wife, a red-headed spitfire named Jessica. In magic North Pole Land, she and Kris stay eternally young, only dressing up as jolly old elves one day of the year. Let me just say that Jessica is insanely hot. (Sub-topic: My childhood is punctuated by crushes on…
Continue reading →The process of culling the garden and throwing it to my ruminants continues. I find the experience a little sad as I stand in the chill air, remembering the huge harvests; the bushy green tomato vines that smelled so good, the giant stands of bright marigolds, the crisp bell peppers that turned orange and red…
Continue reading →Pray and fast Fetal/fecal/fatal position Elvis movie marathon Wish I were still in college/high school/junior high/grade school/kindergarten/womb Get head stuck in honey pot Act like I give a crap I’d rather have a pre-frontal lobotomy than a free bottle in front of me See the writing on the (bathroom) wall Listen to Duran Duran until…
Continue reading →After a long, great growing season which saw my garden simply explode with produce, a freeze finally came, and as always, the garden is dormant for the year. It’s at this point that I pull up all the brown tomato and pepper plants, and whatever else is left, and throw them to the goats, who…
Continue reading →Okay, let’s play “What Would God Do?” Make Eskimo Pie Frogs frogs frogs Daytime TV Elephantiasis of the nuts President Bushton Karl eating ribs “This is not meat loaf! It is kabab!” Seven year coma for guy who loved “Family Ties” but missed every episode Unexplained emergency dookie Strip down to bra and panties for…
Continue reading →Good news! We are not like our fathers. The biology is obvious: take good genes, subtract cigarettes, alcohol and baloney salad. Add the internet, clear soda and “Family Ties.” Subtract Korea and Viet Nam. Add brown rice and three months experimenting with weed. Subtract Gulf War Syndrome. Add motor skills and a national championship. Subtract…
Continue reading →Percentage of people at the Kent State Massacre who were actually CIA operatives or extraterrestrials: 95. Percentage of CIA operatives who are actually extraterrestrials: 95. Percentage of this morning’s stool sample that was actually CIA operatives, extraterrestrials, leather, or Quake III Arena railguns: 102. Fun fact: It has been widely debunked that “tin foil” hats…
Continue reading →Tonight while I was power washing the front of the house, I saw this little guy poking his head out of a small hole in the siding. I think the hole was from one time when I was trimming the photinia and almost fell off my ladder into the bush. Anyway, I called my family…
Continue reading →My wife drove through KFC the other day on her way home from work. She just wanted a piece of chicken, a little bowl of mashed potatoes, and a small drink, which she ordered. When she got to the window, the clerk handed her a bucket of chicken, a tub of mashed potatoes, and a…
Continue reading →08-27-06: Aunt Carol Peterson (Dad’s sister) is dying. We drove to the Blue Springs, Missouri area to join the family. The drive up was smooth. The dogs traveled well and Abby had a long nap. 08-30-06: Carol died at 12:45 pm at age 66. 09-02-06: This evening in Blue Springs feels like late October in…
Continue reading →There was a short call from my sister Nicole, who lives in New Orleans, saying she is alive and fine, waiting for Hurricane Katrina to pass so she can to get out of Hattiesburg, Mississippi and push on to Mom’s in Palm Coast, Florida. Abby went to Wal Mart and bought summer closeout items for…
Continue reading →My sister Nicole has fled New Orleans to Hattiesburg, Mississippi in advance of Hurricane Katrina. (Hear the Katrina and the Waves hit “Walking on Sunshine” in the background.) She has her dog Griffin, her laptop, and high hopes. Worst case: New Orleans is f*cked. National Weather Service Notice: URGENT – WEATHER MESSAGE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE…
Continue reading →In February 2005, David Martin decided to write a poem every day for 100 days. (Photos by Richard R. Barron) * * * poem 001 02/07/05 I find it perplexing, this corn god How can it be so clever? it makes us think we have progressed so far but really we are just like its…
Continue reading →Caution: graphic descriptions Friday, February 18, 2005 My sister Nicole called this morning to say that Dad is near death. He had been vomiting when the emesis turned bloody. EMS took him to the hospital in Ormond Beach (where he had a bypass in 1996), where he coded at least once and his kidneys shut…
Continue reading →Abby and I got married at the amazingly beautiful and iconic Delicate Arch in Arches National Park near Moab, Utah, October 12, 2004. I had hiked to Delicate Arch on two previous occasions, but until the day we actually got married, Abby had only seen my photographs of it. Abby’s daughter Dawna Michele “Chele” Milligan…
Continue reading →Abby and I met at our office and had dinner at Papa Gjorgjo next door to our office in downtown Ada. I invited her to see the house I am considering buying from Ann Kelley. When trying to get into my car, the door wouldn’t open – probably since it was very cold and I…
Continue reading →By Minimus 7 / M7 dadblastit, Guitar-picking, sandal wearing hippie gets run over by tractor-trailer rig driven by reverse Okie (parents moved to CA during the dust bowl, he brought the family back to OK during the oil boom). Gather the cadres, Che’ has escaped. An unshaven Big Dick McGillicutty enters the disco. Perspectives shift…
Continue reading →by Minimus 7 / M7 shrift, Should I send these in? daft cooters 3.8 billion years of ennui duck my sick brutish odors uncle clyde and the fluff girls it’s the fart that counts two dicks ferguson lava twat chung rectilinear smile any excuse for trephination vacu-peen unsolicited enemas jactitations of the saints circulator of…
Continue reading →by Mimimus 7 / M7 grackle, “I offer nothing but confusion.”–throwing muses “Spank me!”–kafka time after time we face a certain esprit d’etat when it comes to our illustrious holidays. this state of being includes generous quantities of mysticism and cynicism and schism. never forget that the surface is all there is to it. “This…
Continue reading →By Minimus 7 / M7 shteb, replicants all around me, where is Deckard when we need him? tongue of silver, heart of pain I have escaped my fear of MEANING. It was about time. It is so difficult to lose the fear of a thing which doesn’t even exist. Existence implies effect….except when you watch…
Continue reading →Love Letters by Richard R. Barron I stood in the same spot in the wind for what seemed like 30 minutes. It was very cold. Maybe it was the wind and the cold that kept me from moving. That was my excuse, anyway. I had those six letters in my hand, six identical white envelopes,…
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