Opinion

Happy October! We have officially entered fall in October, the best time of the year, and here are things we are celebrating this month. 1. The Inktober Challenge! During the month of October, we challenge anyone and everyone to pick up a pen or pencil...

Greetings and congratulations to those of you who have completed the prescribed course of academia and have now, or soon will be, granted a diploma from your respective Salinas Valley schools. As has been pointed out to you all, your graduation is an important...

The headline reads simply “Funny Papers June 18 2025.” Below the headline there is a blank page where on the left margin, expecting to go to work, the cursor waits, and waits, and waits. A quick glance at the clock on the wall lets...

(Part III will finish up this story of the early days of grape growing in King City. We continue with the drive hauling grape rootings from Coalinga to King City over State Route 198.) About two miles westward out of Coalinga there begins an incline...

There is something about eye contact that lets two people know that for just a split second, just a flicker of time, there has been a meeting of minds, a very brief acknowledgment of each other’s existence. I had just such an encounter last...

Editor's Note: We welcome Letters to the Editor of local and general interest to our readers. Letters should be typed and include the writer’s first and last name, home address and phone number for verification. No anonymous letters will be printed. Letters may be edited...

“Honey, did you forget to write your column?” She uses the tone of voice that brings me back to earth from my revere. I had been sitting here staring at the blinking reminder that I wasn’t doing what I knew I had to do....

One of my earliest memories was my mother’s voice. I was on her lap and she was reading to me. We were likely in our cottage by the sea with a fire blazing in the hearth. She had a good strong reading voice with...

Driving into the Correctional Training Facility at Soledad and you are reminded of how a secure institution can be. Acres of barren land, no trees, double high-wire fences, guard towers. And that’s how it should be, we know that. But head over to the...

It all begun in regular fashion. You are getting ready to go on a trip; so, therefore, things get really het up at work — not in a good way — and you are putting out fires, like California in summer — why does...