There is an old tradition in the seafaring world of rounding out your roster of able-bodied seamen by slipping them Mickies or knocking them over the head. The sailors would rise in aching confusion in the morning with the ship underway and no escape possible. The Royal Navy would do the same thing at sea- […]

(Katia, the almost former Willow bartender. Photo Socotra.) The office was quiet, with the exception of that Maxim the Russian who is desperate to build his business and who came to talk to me with his eerie pale blue eyes. He looked a little like Vladimir Putin, and I told him I missed the old […]

(Rest in peace, my old companion. The Macbook in better days.) Well, that is what it was, technically, even if the catastrophe actually just meant that I had to fire up the Mac Mini in the guest bedroom where Betty and Bill’s earthly remains look down on me in benign silence. Still can’t believe that, […]

Boats is one of my heros. He may be the last guy around here who actually understands Admiralty law- which is how he came to be at odds with a certain Department around here, but that is another story. I convinced him to stop by Willow for a drink even though it is a bit […]

I ran across something on the top of the files in Mom’s excellent library in the Little House on the bluff above the Bay. It was part of the flotsam and jetsam  of a long life, and an active and playful family. This was a story from Uncle Jim. It was contained on a couple […]

  A groundswell of interest has risen over Mac’s revelation at Willow the other night that he is a past master of the pressure cooker, the mostdangerous single device in the Socotra Test Kitchen. Check that. The pressurecooker is the only device that actually could produce high velocity shrapnelduring the cooking process. The deep-fat fryer […]

  Mac had some back problems last week, but he came roaringback and was ready to hit the bar at Willow on Monday. The weather wasloosening up just like his sacroiliac- unseasonably warm in Arlington, and therising temperature featured the best of both worlds- the ladies shed theircoats to revealing advantage but kept their tall […]

I woke on the farm this morning. I slept on the couch in the great room, listening to the mournful sound of the freight trains sounding their whistles at the grade crossings over by the hamlet of Winston. I thought of my Irish ancestors at work on that very track, heading south and west to […]

    Bobbie got back on Thursday. She had gone to see the elephant. She arrived happy and in good shape, according to my pal Joe, who was beaming with relief and paternal pride. His little girl was out of the war zone. She had been part of the surge of troops intended to knock […]

  (Stacey with an e holding one of Kate’s famous red-velvet cupcakes with butter frosting. Photo Socotra.) I am about done with the hot-button topics of the week. It is Friday, after all, and thank God for that. I was thinking, something I normally do right after mashing the “send” button on the story that […]