Guest Column | Wishcycling: What It Is and How to Avoid It
Waste sorting is not a new topic in California. With the state setting new sustainability ambitions to divert more materials from landfills and combat climate change, many residents and businesses have grown accustomed to the idea of placing materials in different bins. However, with...
Window on the World Column | Traveling Post-Covid
I cannot deny that the last several months have been a bit special for the small traveling public of which I was a member. Empty airports, reminiscent of the Tom Hanks movie, four seats per person in coach class and check-in desks where you...
Funny Papers Again Column | You Meet the Darndest People in Prison
By my reckoning 140 years, give or take, of my family’s timeline was spent in prisons; the years accumulated by my parents, a brother and his wife, a niece and myself. And it seems the family occupation within the California Department of Corrections (CDC;...
Worthy to Print Column | Paratrooper Boots
Today is one of those days where the memories came flooding in. I got up and dressed in my usual attire — sweater, light jacket and paratrooper boots. That’s when I saw it, a Jump Certificate from Sky Dive Monterey. The name on the...
Guest Column | Tackling the Commercial Property Crime Epidemic
As the once-owner of Salinas Valley Ford Truck Center in Salinas, I find myself grappling with a profound sense of loss and frustration. For more than three decades, our family business provided excellent service to the local community and government agencies. Then, in the blink of...
Worthy to Print Column | Respect for Our Flag
The other day I had invited one of my best friends to come down from Oregon to have lunch and just catch up. Gordon has a son that lives off the grid up in Oregon, and so he spends a lot of time up...
Funny Papers Again Column | Seniors: Come Learn, Dine, Sing, Dance!
I am a senior citizen. There is no getting around that, no matter how much I attempt to mitigate the fact. I know this because of what society tells me with progressive programs, private sector directives and legislations starting with age 55 years when...
Letter to the Editor | Wake up, America
To the Editor:
I submitted a letter to this paper published on April 2 (“Time for Action”). Please go back and read it. Now I will continue.
Trump: End war in Ukraine on Day 1? Says he ended seven wars somewhere? Everything will be better? Everything...
Window on the World Column | Day in the Life of a Pre-Op Patient
As I sat on the shore watching my old friend and my daughter cavorting on paddleboards in the early morning sun, the North Sea an unusually flat blue millpond of joy, I could not help the envy rising inside and it was not a...
Window on the World Column | Precious Lives
Downtown Soledad on a Saturday can be a bustling little place. People’s comings and goings to the hardware store, the barber or the pharmacy. Getting an ice cream or some Mexican food for the family. Normal life is slowly returning. I had a mission...




















