(The mystery of the hanging chads from 2000. Photo AP). Michelle is not peering at me from the banner to the right of my email screen. It is over. I had hoped it would go like this, either way: a clear, clean kill. Well, it was neither, in the practical application of democracy, but it […]

(Julia Childs would approve, as would Anthony Bourdain would approve. It ain’t rocket science, just like the election). Cold was the night. First decent cold of the year, the first sneer of the winter wind that cuts deep. There is going to be a lot of crap going down today all across America. I am […]

It is Monday and I feel like I am almost home, don’t you? It has been a very long bus ride with people who really need a shower. What a long, strange trip this has been to arrive right back in the middle of the road, the signposts ahead pointing boldly to the Right and […]

(It was picture perfect at Refuge Farm on an early November day. The sky was North Carolina Blue, if I may be permitted the geographic anomaly. Photo Socotra). I think we should just let the clocks alone. I have been up since “0300” and this is an affront to nature. it was lasagna with the […]

(Happy Hour White, a peach martini and candlelight at the Willow Halloween party. Photo Socotra.) Now that time is getting short. There is not much television time left before this electoral circus is in the lap of the Gods, I am not buying any advertising, and will let this thing play out on its own. […]

(The Socotras flank Mac earlier this month. Photo ONI.) Mike had the little brass box that contained his Dad’s earthly remains. Mac was in place on a low table in front of the Sanctuary at the Lutheran Church up Rt 50. He was punctual, and the Color Guard from the Office of Naval Intelligence was […]

(RADM Donald “Mac” Showers at Pearl Harbor last June. Photo Dave Showers). It was Halloween yesterday and All Souls Day today. It is an appropriate one for Mac’s memorial ceremony at the Faith Lutheran Church down Route 50. I am really disoriented- Admiral Paul stopped by Willow yesterday afternoon at cocktail hour and Old Jim […]

(General Carter Ham, USA. Photo US Army). There is nothing particularly spooky about this Halloween, though it was painfully close when I rolled home from Uncle Julio’s last night. Willow had given up and was closed, so the Mexican place was jumping with deferred energy. It was strange watching the bartender mixing chocolate milks for […]

(The view from the balcony at Big Pink. The wind is starting to rise this morning as the capital braces for shock. Photo Socotra). Alrighty, then. Yesterday was the day to get organized and maybe feel a grim, tingling sense of predestination. I have eggs, batteries, alcohol and a bad attitude all in place, ready […]

The Russians were over for dinner at the farm last night. It has been two weeks since I was on the property and a lot has changed. The scarlet leaves out the kitchen window have dropped from the branches and their color is a forlorn brown in a heap near the roots. Fall fell. So […]