Dead air dynamics
For a DJ, the worst possible disaster is dead air, the agonizing moments of silence when you should be filling the airtime with words or music and there is just nothing. It doesn’t matter if it’s a technical glitch or human error, you can almost feel the impatient audience “tuning out” with each second that goes by. They’re [...]

That’s a stretch
This is Patterson Pass, a winding road that connects Tracy with Livermore, California.  It snakes through windmill farms and dry pasture, often narrowing to just one lane, and the view from the peak is incredible.  It’s kind of like those desolate roads you see in halftime commercials, where the luxury sportscar whooshes by, stirring up [...]

Hey thanks
So many people are spreading thanks around this time of year.  I see digital shouting in facebook, broadcasting thankfulness to family and friends.  I can also sense silent reflection on what we have… not what we don’t have. It creates a collective epidemic of joy that is having an infectious effect on me. However, with unemployment [...]

One tree hill
I’ve been drawn to trees since I was a young kid, mostly as a climber.  This old tree caught my eye on a hill that I drive by on my way to work.  The tree is interesting because there are no other trees around it.  It’s all alone on this hilltop, struggling against the elements [...]

Impossible is overrated
Philippe Petit does the impossible… just because it SEEMS impossible. You may recognize the name of the man who walked on a tightrope between the World Trade Center towers in 1974, a story you should see in its entirety in the Academy Award-wining documentary “Man on Wire.”  My son Evan and I just had the [...]