About 10 years ago, I took up walking as a form of exercise: Both to improve my physical health and in preparation for a walking trip with my son. Like most people, I started slow and built up to the point that the walking trip was comfortable.
Cop Tales are true stories as told by law enforcement officers from all over the country. The stories are told in the First Person. The actual officer’s initials follow each story.
Last Saturday, we went to the snow. For people who live in the valley, going to the snow is like going to the beach. Neither is part of our daily lives, so “going” has a ring to it and that ring sounds like adventure.
Reader: Bakersfield is still a fairly conservative town, but your paper’s language and tone in reporting is substantially skewed toward the progressive (socialist/communist) mindset and is something we might expect in San Francisco.
There is nothing like a leaky roof to focus your mind, a focus sharpened when it happens over the Thanksgiving holiday.
The 68th annual Kern County Sportsman's Night Dinner was held a couple of weeks ago at Hodel's banquet room with over 300 attendees. The honoree this year was my friend, Jim Roberts.
Alan Tandy accomplished a lot in his quarter-century of service as Bakersfield's city manager, and he did it in an era of out-of-control government pension obligations and city services strained by what was, for an extended period of time, one of the fastest growing urban centers in the nation.
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The smart shopper, according to one commonly shared line of reasoning, hits the big-box store the day after Christmas and snatches up holiday bunting at drastically marked-down prices and then stashes it away for 11 months.
The world is swimming with Swedish Fish. Just not here. Not in this house.
Arvin police chief Scot Kimble appears to have had his share of controversy during his career. Kimble became Arvin's top cop in April and before that he was police chief in McFarland. Prior to being hired in McFarland, Kimble worked for the city of Banning Police Department.
Cop Tales are true stories as told by law enforcement officers from all over the country. The stories are told in the First Person. The actual officer’s initials follow each story.
Reader: I just wanted to express my thanks for your timely coverage of Sacramento's plans to eliminate the oil industry here ("Is the end of Kern oil production really upon us? Sure sounds like it," Aug. 11, et al.). California's ever-increasing importation of oil from foreign sources contin…
If life teaches you one thing, it is to let go. This thing might be the hardest thing, but the most necessary.
As the blessed weeks of Advent begin, the stores and websites are already in full holiday swing: deals and sales and special offers, TODAY ONLY! Everywhere we go, there are twinkling trees and reimagined Christmas carols, grande peppermint mochas and matching reindeer pajamas for the whole f…
Reader: In response to your column about the city's street racing problem ("Deafening street racing has southwest Bakersfield residents fed up," Nov. 20): We live in a condo community on Ming Avenue called Piñon Springs. Each Thursday night at precisely 11:30 p.m., the race is on! Some night…
We had younger friends over recently and we really punched it up. Painted the town. Showed them how much fun people 20 years their seniors could be.
Every day is Thanksgiving at the St. Vincent de Paul mission on Baker Street. Every day, that is, except the actual day the rest of us celebrate as Thanksgiving.
The first thing that strikes you are the guard towers, then the razor wire-topped fencing with metal signs mounted along every 30 feet of chain link. The signs depict a black lightning bolt knocking down a lone silhouetted figure. Peligro. Fatal voltage.
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Water managers trying to bring groundwater into balance in the severely overdrafted Indian Wells Valley basin near Ridgecrest laid out a draft plan last month that would essentially mean the end of large-scale agriculture in that desert region.
The first rain. It was heavenly last week waking to the sound of rain, clearing out the thick brown air. The ceiling leaked downstairs but not as badly as it did last year. That’s progress and a price I’m willing to pay for a cleansing rain.
The Cancer Run/Walk was over, and as I was shuttling people in my golf cart from the event to their cars, I saw the elderly couple standing at the bus stop near the parking lot.
Cop Tales are true stories as told by law enforcement officers from all over the country. The stories are told in the first person. The actual officer’s initials follow each story.
I decided to dress up the morning we signed up for Medicare. This was an occasion and seemed on par with choosing your best shirt, suit and shoes before getting laid out in a pine box. You want to look your best in big moments and signing up for Medicare qualifies.
Reader: I don’t mean to seem like a dick, but you’re a joke — I tell it how it is ("Deafening street racing has southwest Bakersfield residents fed up," Nov. 20). You are in the media so you are supposed to report fairly, is that not right? Well, I didn’t see any (quoted) opinion from any of…
Our cars have been failing and rather than drive one of them to visit our oldest son, Herbie, I took the advice of a friend:
Readers may remember a column I did a few weeks ago about my friend William Davis, who was a brilliant artist and sculptor.
Talk about incongruence.
I knew it could be a problem. I put it in, I took it out. It was like doing the print version of the hokey pokey.
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In the two decades since Californians first started debating a high-speed rail system along the state's long spine, one stubborn but ever-growing camp of voters has always considered the undertaking too pie-in-the-sky, too remotely distant and, especially, too expensive to be anything more t…
The Kern High School District recently hosted Principal Partners Day, in which each campus invited community members to spend a day learning about their programs. My wife and I participated, and we were able to get a good look at the district's Regional Occupational Center and Career Technic…
Cop Tales are true stories as told by law enforcement officers from all over the country. The stories are told in the first person. The actual officer’s initials follow each story.
A rare convocation of statewide leaders in higher education assembled Friday in a city that needs their guidance and commitment perhaps more than any in California: Bakersfield.
Reader: There would be less homelessness if people were taught that they are responsible for the choices they make ("It's cold, they're homeless and we'll study it," Nov. 10). Now, people who become homeless rely on other people to help them and rely on compassion and the willingness of othe…
There are no clocks in tech hell, only the maddening drip of eternity as what remains of your life ebbs away.
Awhile back I wrote about the pleasures of going to a barbershop. How the experience should not be rushed, squeezed and wedged between 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. obligations. Of it, I wrote:
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Weatherby's almost made it to 100 years.
It might be instructive, amid all this discussion about homelessness and emergency shelters, to get the perspective of the world's best-known homeless advocate, a man who was briefly a transient himself. He was not available for an interview, but a spokesman, Matthew son of Alphaeus, did pro…
This is the best time of year in Bakersfield. We hit the lottery today and tomorrow too. Fall is good everywhere, but there is something about a Bakersfield fall, a valley fall, that is especially delicious.
Cop Tales are true stories as told by law enforcement officers from all over the country. The stories are told in the first person. The actual officer’s initials follow each story.
Driving toward the east side of town, the Telemundo news photographer wasn't quite sure what to expect. Esteban Flores had been sent to this particular street to shoot video of a neighborhood where a fugitive from justice was thought to be living. The Kern County Sheriff's Office had sent ou…
Stephanie Wilcox doesn’t have to talk loud for her students to play good. The 25-year-old director of instrumental and choral music for McKee Middle School looks at them from behind her steel-rimmed glasses and they play. Play harder and better than they have in their entire 10- to 14-year-o…
Reader: It's a shame that true nonpartisan and independent news is a thing of the past. This article about suicides and isolation cells at the Kern County jail ("A sane and innocent woman went on suicide watch at Kern County jail. It nearly broke her," posted online Nov. 5) was clearly produ…
Ah, the soundtrack of my morning: the 10 a.m. Roomba call. Five musical notes that sound like they’re being played on a ballpark organ announce its impending rounds. The Roomba is the unmanned drone of house-cleaning tools.
Mark this date on your calendar for next year: Nov. 2. Celebrate Dia de los Muertos, a day to remember people who are no longer with us.
Well, here we go again. Just like dove season, 67 years and counting. It sure doesn't seem like nine months since I was picking up decoys from my pond and storing them away.
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Louis Gill recognized that the occasion was auspicious enough to demand precisely the right words, and those words weren't coming. "You mind if I walk? It helps," he said, and he spun out of his chair to pace and compose. Except his office was so jammed with furniture and files, he couldn't …
We had a dinner invitation last Thursday from Lauren, our daughter-in-law.
She could easily have been mistaken for Bea Arthur from the "Golden Girls" television series. She appeared to be in her early 70s. She was walking alone and leaving the event as fast as her cane would allow her.
Cop Tales are true stories as told by law enforcement officers from all over the country. The stories are told in the first person. The actual officer’s initials follow each story.
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Russ Nightengale doesn't look to me like the type of guy who would drive an electric vehicle. He is young, a bit grizzled, wears his ball cap in the flat-brim "bro" style and professes no love for intrusive government.
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