Archive for July, 2011

Cutco Knives, Vector Marketing and the Neighborhood Kid

Sunday, July 31st, 2011

A few days ago, my neighbor’s grandson, who recently graduated from high school, stopped by and asked to speak to my husband. He told us he had a new job, and wondered if we’d listen to his sales presentation, for which he would get paid whether or not we bought. I asked him “what’re you [...]

The State Religion

Sunday, July 24th, 2011

Not many people realize that communism–at least as it was practiced in the Soviet Union, and today in North Korea–is a religion. I had scoffed at this concept until I went to the Soviet Union as an exchange student myself many years ago. Over my bed, my Ukrainian komsomol roommate had put a picture of [...]

Did the SJPD Run The Bad Guy Out of Town?

Sunday, July 24th, 2011

Back in May, I was understandably chagrined when our security video revealed a sleazy guy riffling through my car. When Peter looked at the tape, he thought the burglar looked an awful lot like Andrew Clark Bergman, aka Mr. Skeezebag, who had stolen his PT Cruiser in September, and was caught in it by the [...]

Camping at Pyramid Lake in Nevada

Tuesday, July 12th, 2011

Peter chafes at absurd rules, and one of these is the rules that we can’t buy or shoot off fireworks for the fourth of July in our Californian town, despite the fact that budget cuts have also cancelled the annual downtown festival where we had a public display. So, one recent weekend, he drove all [...]

by Carolyn Bickford