I was three pages into Harold Bloom’s celebrated masterpiece, Shakespeare, the Invention of the Human, and Twelfth Night sounded like the dullest play ever written. So I did myself a favor: I put Harold Bloom on the shelf for my annual yard sale.  Then I plowed through the text of Twelfth Night once so I  Read the Rest…

Last week before the lilac fell and Gwen, my neighbor who knows something about just about everything, brought her chain saw over to lay waste both to the tree and to any fragments of male chauvinism in this neighborhood of powerful women, I had written a series of politicizing, sermonizing, sarcasmizing blogs posts which prompted  Read the Rest…

It started out to be a quiet Monday morning with sunshine, a bright blue sky, and the promise of 70 degrees.  I was up early, reading in my sun room, stopping occasionally to look at the downed lilac tree that had keeled over from its roots during a wind storm a few days ago. I  Read the Rest…

I could write a whole post about eating my way through Walla Walla and then put up a few photos of me bloated from days of wheat and sugar.  But I won’t.  At least I won’t post the photos.  But here are some notes from the weekend’s menu: In my Postcard from Walla Walla I  Read the Rest…

I am taking a break from raging against the Catholic church and breathing feminist fire to sing a little song of Walla Walla, Washington.  I am here to do a book signing at Book and Game Co on Main Street and to stay with my college roommate Putzer, the attorney, and her husband, Jim. My  Read the Rest…

Enough time has passed since my computer crashed that I am thinking it wasn’t so bad after all.  It’s like one of those awful vacations that ten years later is described as “that wonderful trip to Spain when our luggage got diverted to Iceland.” It was a Thursday evening.  I had just installed Google Chrome  Read the Rest…

This is a companion to my previous post illustrating how much I am benefiting from having no television. https://www.elenalouiserichmond.com/2011/10/going-to-the-dogs/ .  It stars that well known personage, Gwen, my neighbor who knows something about just about everything. Gwen used to be the head designer Opus 204, an exclusive Seattle boutique from 1968 to 2009.  By day  Read the Rest…

There’s a candy store in Ketchikan called KetchiCandies. “Oh, that’s .  .  . clever.”  I said The owner looked up dolefully, “Yeah,” he said. “I was drunk.” It has a reputation for the rough and rowdy, does Ketchikan. The stormy afternoon we arrived, four ships had already tried to dock, had given up and moved  Read the Rest…

On my recent stint as a water-colorist on board a cruise ship, Nancy, my traveling companion and occasional container for my mental health, took photographs to preserve her impressions.  I wrote.  Here are some vignettes: *                            *                            Read the Rest…

In our entire week aboard a cruise ship (the S.S. Wish-I-Was-Home), Nancy and I did not use the Fitness Center once.  I wasn’t even sure where it was.  However, except for the day we came on board after a cold, wet 8 hours in Juneau, we did not use the elevator either.  We used the  Read the Rest…