The Life in My Years

The Highway 395 Chronicles: Reno – Beyond the Casinos.

Paul

June 1, 2026

After my brief bathroom stop at Bordertown, which is not a town at all but a tacky first taste – last gasp casino just over the Nevada state line I’m driving past Cold Springs. It took only a few minutes of strolling around the Bordertown casino for the stink of a stale ashtray to cling to my clothes.

Traveling this stretch of 395, Cold Springs is the first real town you hit when you enter Nevada. A glance at the sun exploding on White Lake sears the eyes. It’s still about a twenty minute ride until 395 turns into a metro freeway in Reno proper. Twenty minutes through the rolling high desert hills, past the warehouses and fullfillment centers that colonized the hard dry ground seemingly overnight.

After the quickie divorce business petered out, and most of the glitzy resort trade shifted four hundred miles south to Las Vegas, the local chamber of commerce realized that the next big boom would be in these broad, multi-acre, squat, flat top buildings perforated along one or two sides by a row of loading bay doors.

Vast acres of sterile, gray, concrete and steel fulfillment centers sit on the edge of the Great Basin Desert, a region that stretches from the Sierra Nevada to the Wasatch Range of Utah. Big rigs towing sets of doubles, and in some case triples (they’re legal here) flow in and out of the fullfillment centers. The rigs regurgitate and feed, and then depart the Reno metro area towards all points of the compass.

Just east of Reno is Sparks and east of Sparks are more farms of fulfillment centers and then farther east is little Fernley, Nevada. Beyond that, the Great Basin Desert becomes an arid land of desolate beauty. Out there, the towns are small, and few and far between. As a child my parents took me on the drive across the Great Basin to visit the aunts and uncles in Salt Lake City. I didn’t appreciate the panorama then. I do now. I’m also aware that the rugged, parched beauty is shrinking.

On the rough rocky blank strips between fulfillment centers, or on one of the parking lots, one can spot the incongruity of a few wild horses. These beautiful beasts are living history, the ancestors of horses abandoned by ranchers, Native Americans and pioneers. There are lineages that go back to the Spaniards who explored present-day Nevada in the late 18th century. The ages have steeled these horses against the harsh, cold, high desert winters and the blazing summers. But as hardened as the mustangs have become to the severity of nature, there’s nothing in their ancient genes to shield them from human progress. And so they get pushed further and further east.

At the outskirts of Reno it all starts to look familiar as Highway 395 is transformed from a rugged scenic highway into a metropolitan freeway. The peace of the high desert is behind me and I’ve merged into the urban chaos of on ramps, off ramps, honking horns, aggressive drivers, and billboards hawking casinos, adult novelty shops, and local ambulance chasers.

Reno.

It hasn’t changed much since the last time I was here, which was pre-COVID. We arrived at about the same time that the Burning Man Festival had cleared out and some of the local parking lots were packed with denizens that made the place look like a scene out of Mad Max.

Cruising Virginia Street, past the Circus-Circus, the Silver Legacy, the Eldorado, souvenir shops, pawn shops, and far too many vacant lots. The Cal-Neva is still here, a shadow of what it was when my parents used to stay there. Bless its venerable heart, Cal-Neva is still advertising bargain basement steak and egg breakfasts, and steak and lobster or prime rib dinners.

Reno seems like a town looking for an identity after it was all ripped away by California’s Indian gaming casinos and the unrelenting gravitational pull of Vegas.

When I arrive, there’s enough sharpness in the air to realize that it’s October. A month ago, it would have been stifling. By the end of this month there might be a dusting of snow, certainly by Thanksgiving. Today is kind of a tweener.

The sidewalks are desolate if you don’t count the down and outers and the out of towners. The former, scruffy souls, wear long hair, beards to match, and Western wear (it is Reno after all). Their skin is worn to sunbeaten hides, and as you walk past them they look at you, even the younger ones, with eyes that are old, orbs that have seen lives that most of us would rather remain blind to. In fact most of us choose to remain blind to these very people, as most of the time we don’t deign to meet their gaze. They could be any random bit of refuse on the street. They carry their lives in dirty, worn backpacks.

The latter, the visitors, don’t dawdle on the sidewalk. They’re drifting between casinos. They’re wearing Bermuda shorts or Chicago Bulls basketball shorts, even though the only thing they’ve dunked within distant memory is a Krispy Kreme into the morning coffee. They wear shirts that range from alohas to tees bearing classy slogans like “Morning Wood Campgrounds” or “The Cake Isn’t The Only Thing That’s Moist.”

They used to walk around with paperboard buckets filled with quarters to feed the slot machines. Those days are long gone and now the slots have a name; TITO – ticket in-ticket out. The clinking-clanking sound of coins being dumped into a hopper is ersatz now. Coins have been replaced by thermal paper vouchers with a barcode that represents the player’s money. Once the gambler is done the machine spits out a ticket. Or if it’s been a bad day at the slots it spits out – nothing.

My first order of business is to go to Barnes and Noble and buy a highway map of Nevada. I carry maps because I do not subscribe to the motto, ‘In Google we trust.’ I put only slightly more trust in Google than I would a United States Senator.

After my one night in Reno I’m veering off of 395 and going south on a long, desolate drive to the old mining town of Tonopah which is way the hell out and gone in the Nevada desert; where GPS might be a bigger gamble than a tight slot machine. Truth be told, after having checked out the drive on a map, I’m having a few second thoughts about this pilgrimage. I only know the name Tonopah from a Little Feat song called “Willin”. Until I saw it on a map I wasn’t sure the place existed outside of the songwriter’s head. But it’s there, just a bit southwest of dead center Nevada – and pretty fucking far from anything.

It’s still too early to check in so I’m going to grab lunch. I’m headed east past Sparks to a place one usually doesn’t equate with eating . . .

food.

Memorial Day 2026: Beware of the Politicians

Paul

12 comments

May 25, 2026

You walk in reverence, overwhelmed by the sheer number of white markers that shine bright in the midday sun. At Arlington the gravestones go on and on until they disappear over a short rise and continue on, unseen. On a sweltering July day in Gettysburg they march in lines from the bright unrelenting sun, to fade into the dark, under canopies of shady green groves. At the Presidio of San Francisco the departed rest on a bayside hill and keep watch over the Golden Gate Bridge in the distance. At Normandy the markers stand out against the backdrop of blooming white clouds, blue skies and a roiling English Channel.

Every now and then, for no particular reason (unless you are a comrade, or friend, or family), you stop and read; a name, a date of birth, a date of death, and possibly a short description. These are the final resting places of the men and women who accepted the duty to country, the commitment to be sent to a land, maybe one they’ve never heard of, to take arms against young men and women not so different from themselves.

Cora and I have walked the cemeteries at the Presidio of San Francisco, Arlington, Fredericksburg Virginia, Gettysburg, Appomattox Court House Virginia, and Omaha Beach. In the nation’s capitol we’ve touched the gleaming ebony face of the Vietnam Memorial.

For Cora and I they are names of people unknown to us. For so many others they are the never forgotten faces in photo albums and camera rolls. Memories of holidays, graduations, weddings, births, joys and sorrows, and ultimately the last full measure.

It was called Decoration Day when I was a child. When first coined, the name reflected the day’s original purpose as stated by General John A. Logan, who led an organization for Northern Civil War Veterans. “The 30th of May, 1868, is designated for the purpose of strewing with flowers, or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country during the late rebellion, and whose bodies now lie in almost every city, village and hamlet churchyard in the land.”

Lens-Artists Challenge #398 – I Choose Orange

Paul

17 comments

May 16, 2026

This week, Ritva Sillanmäki leads the Lens-Artists Challenge with the topic, Choose a Color. ” . . . select one color (excluding black and white)”. . . “where your chosen color is the prominent hue . . .”

In the hills of Granada is the Moorish district called the Albaicin. It is a free for all of hues. In the Albaicin there is no discrimination against any color of the Pantone – they are all represented in spices, clothing, rugs, pottery, various foods and sweets and anything you can imagine. At one confectionary we saw pyramids of Turkish delights.

My San Francisco – Chinatown, Joy Luck, Bruce Lee and a Rickshaw – The Redux. Part I

Paul

11 comments

May 14, 2026

My San Francisco is a series of posts that describes my own personal relationship with The City. My San Francisco pieces might be photo essays, or life stories, or commentaries – or a combinations of all three. My impressions aren’t always paeans to San Francisco. It’s a beautiful city, but like any city, it’s dirty, noisy and has its fair share of urban warts. These pieces will always have one common theme; they are expressions of my personal San Francisco experience.

Intro: I first wrote this post in May of 2019, just two months after a pandemic shut down the world. Over the years it became one of the most read posts on this site. After rereading the original piece along with a review of my notes I decided to do a rewrite. Hopefully this doesn’t turn into a lesson in, ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.’

Waverly – Lunar New Year 2019

“My mother named me after the street that we lived on: Waverly Place Jong, my official name for important American documents.” ~ From The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan.

I’m standing at the end of the alley, gawking at a street sign, just before taking a photo of it. Even if you endorse the old saying about a picture and it’s worth in words, a dirty white sign against a typically gray San Francisco morning sky seems pretty damned mute. Tourists swirl about, bumping, dodging, gawking, some probably wondering why this random old fool thinks there’s something special about a street sign. Maybe they figure I’m an eccentric member of their itinerant species, trying to find his bearings in the ocean of activity that’s San Francisco’s Chinatown in February.

In any other off season month, there wouldn’t be such a crush of out of towners. Or locals for that matter.

Local tourists are a year round breed. They come from the suburbs, patiently – or not – waiting out the traffic on either the Golden Gate or the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge (part of which was, on May 6, 2026, officially designated as the Willie Mays Highway). On a clear day the views from the raised vantage point of a historic bridge can be spectacular, unless you have to sit in the shit every day, in which case the classic elevated view of Alcatraz peering through feelers of morning fog has long ago lost its appeal.

The Peninsula dwellers wait out the jam on 101. The crush begins at about Cesar Chavez (likely to be renamed because of recent revelations about Chavez, the man). Traffic creeps past rolling Bernal Heights on the left, and to the right, the vintage sign on The Old Clam House (which started serving seafood the same year that the Confederates fired on Fort Sumter). It’s been four decades or more since I first passed that sign and promised myself that I’d try the place.

I still haven’t. Maybe this will be the year. Yeah – likely not.

These northbound suburbanites will likely as not be held up by a routine (dare I say, obligatory) fender bender where 101 makes a bend at Hospital Curve, named after San Francisco General, which sits just off to the left. I once knew a nurse who worked in the emergency room at S.F. Gen. She told me that if you ever feel the need to visit the E.R, San Francisco General is the place to go. That’s the way of a county general. They see it all; from heart attacks to broken bones, to gunshot wounds, to injured earthquake victims.

Now S.F. Gen is called Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center, and if the nomenclators knew then what they know now they might have chosen a different name; Morally Bankrupt Child Addicting Douchie Billionaire General comes immediately to mind.

The locals often return to Chinatown for old times sake; dim sum at a place that might still be there as they remember it, but has more likely changed hands any number of times. The City, particularly after COVID, is transitory. Just ask anyone who’s tried to keep a business alive on Market Street.

Maybe they’re Bourdain fans, in Chinatown to walk upright into the darkly lit Li Po Lounge and then stagger out after having had one of that little dive’s lethal Mai Tais that got Bourdain magnificently shit faced on an episode of The Layover. The Mai Tai? According to the website, The Search for the Ultimate Mai Tai, the Li Po cocktail is, “a mix of dark, light, and 151 rums, pineapple, and Chinese Liqueur . . . very freely poured” (I assume that “very freely,” translates to a lot”. The article goes on, “The Chinese liqueur used is called Ng Ka Py, a Sorghum-based spirit that is bottled at 48% ABV.”

Or maybe they visit just to see how much the always colorful and vibrant (if you don’t count COVID times) neighborhood has changed.

But it’s early February now, smack in the middle of the two months long Lunar New Year season, and Chinatown is experiencing its annual winter spike.

The souvenir shops, always brilliant with brightly colored gewgaws and imported junk, are now packed with the red and gold lucky money envelopes called hóngbāo, and all manner of little piggy dolls (it’s 2019 and this new year celebrates the Year of the Pig). Lion dancers enthrall knots of visitors, and the unexpected staccato of a bursting string of fire crackers frightens the blood out of even the most seasoned Lunar New Year visitor.

A French Journey: On The French Road Part II. Brittany – The 14th Century Castle

Paul

10 comments

May 5, 2026

An American’s observations of a first time trip to France.

“Brittany has something of Ireland’s melancholy and Spain’s passion, with its cliffs like fortresses and its villages like sanctuaries.” ~ attributed to Victor Hugo.

Every July, year upon year, almost without fail, I cruised the French countryside. I rumbled over the narrow cobblestone streets of quaint country villages, where I marveled at the centuries old churches that seemed to want to grasp the very heavens above. I traversed rolling hills, and cut through vast vineyards where row upon row of vines stretched so far that only the birds above could appreciate their boundlessness . I marveled at the magnificence of chateaus tucked in green valleys or perched on rocky hilltops. I journeyed on winding roads that snaked up mountains or provided panoramas of crashing coastal waves.

Every July I did that, and year after year it never dawned on me that I should take the time to see those sights in person. You see, every year I saw France through the eyes of the commentators covering the Tour de France. There really is no better travel video than a stage of Le Tour. And there’s a different episode nearly every day of the month of July. This was my annual journey to France until the long hiatus that came when the truth about Lance Armstrong emerged. The truth that cyclists like me wanted to believe was all vicious rumor – until there were no denials left to find in the bullshit bag.

During all those years, why did it never dawn on me to see the beauty of France, learn its history, and experience its culture?

In the end, it wasn’t even Le Tour that inspired us to go. Early in June of 2025, Cora and I, both of us history buffs, were watching a documentary about D-Day. As the film was winding down I turned to Cora and said, “Fuck it, let’s go to France.”

Done.

We started in Paris and then drove to Normandy (both documented in previous posts).

I’ve locked up the rental house in Ver-sur-Mer that was our Normandy home and we’re headed six kilometers up the coast to Courseulles-sur-Mer, one of the many little seaside resort towns that eighty-one years ago were the first to be liberated from the German Army.

Breakfast of pastries and coffee at Boulangerie du Port – Maison Trihan. Because when you’re in France you don’t pour yourself a bowl of Sugar Frosted Flakes. Even Tony the Tiger would concede that compared to a French croissant, Sugar Frosted Flakes are not so grrrreat!

We’ll be driving southeast today, slicing across the bottom of the Cotentin Peninsula and into Brittany. But not so fast. Just outside of Courseulles-sur-Mer is the Juno Beach Memorial where, on June 6th 1944, 14,000 Canadian soldiers landed. It’s a last brief stop to pay my respects to Normandy, and to take a few photos to share with Eden, my Canadian friend.

Below: The Signal Monument of Juno Beach. Designed to represent the bow of a ship coming from the Channel, this is one of ten similar monuments erected on the Normandy Coast.

Below: The “1 Charlie” Tank Monument is a Canadian AVRE (Army Vehicle Royal Engineers). At nine in the morning on June 6th, “1 Charlie” landed on Juno Beach. It soon became mired in a 65 foot crater. Of the crew of six, four members were killed and two badly wounded.

The tank was buried until 1976, when it was recovered and refurbished and placed as a memorial.

Bill Dunn, the driver of “1 Charlie” gave an account of what happened that day. Dunn described how the design of the tank restricted his vision. Because of his restricted view, and because the Germans had flooded the entire area, Dunn didn’t see a culvert in front of the vehicle before the vehicle plunged in. As Dunn tried to drive the tank out, the track snapped. The vehicle began to take on water.

Dunn said, “For me being in the front I was the last one out.” He continued, “The bullets were flying all over the place. I was the last man out and I started to swallow water. I was the last one out and as my co-driver got out he put his knees on both sides of my head . . . as he came out he dragged me with him.”

Dunn went on to describe how the crew took cover in the dunes. Shortly afterwards a mortar round struck, killing three of the men outright. One of the wounded attempted to crawl to get help but died after making it 100 yards. Dunn rolled to a place that he thought was safe but that turned out to be a minefield. With one leg fractured in five places, Dunn managed to run to safety.

Seventy years later, Bill Dunn’s ashes were scattered at Juno Beach.

Further down the beach I come across the remains of a German pillbox.

It’s enough. Time to go back to the car. Walking the beaches of Normandy you could shed enough tears to float a ship. You’re at once awestruck by the heroism, while saddened by the sacrifice and loss. You’re also left shaking your head at so-called leaders who are so ignorant that they feel that they can start a war on a mere whim. Because it’s not they who will be asked to kill, or to risk being killed.

A Hungarian Lesson

Paul

13 comments

April 24, 2026

An authoritarian has been toppled in Hungary. The rise and fall of Viktor Orban should provide a lesson for nations in the grip of authoritarians, and those struggling with creeping authoritarianism. And that especially goes for

the United States.

Viktor Orban was in power for sixteen consecutive years. His total stay in power was twenty years. Up until he lost the recent Hungarian election by a landslide, Orban was the North Star for right wing populists. His rise to power, and subsequent iron grip on Hungarian politics and society was the primer that guided budding dictators in Europe and

the United States.

In the late 1980s, Orban was himself a liberal dissident, a brave individual who championed the Hungarian, anti-Soviet movement. He was the Viktor Orban who, during his brighter days, stated in a speech,”The best weapon against tyranny is to steel oneself . . .” Orban’s benefactor during those days was none other than philanthropist George Soros, who was, and still is, perceived by the right wing, worldwide as the bane of civilization. If it isn’t Obama, or a Biden, or even Hillary, then it must be George Soros who’s behind some sort of Satanic globalist plot.

Orban’s first political shift came in 1998 when he moved from liberal to center-right conservative, a position that earned him his first term as Hungary’s Prime Minister. As they say in basketball, “no harm, no foul.” In this first term, Prime Minister Orban was pro-Western and pro-NATO.

Four years later Orban was defeated by Hungarian Socialist, Peter Medgyssey, and Orban and his Fidesz Party made a radical hard right turn and in 2010 Orban won re-election as Hungary’s Prime Minister. By now Orban had repudiated his former liberalism and Soros, his former benefactor, and was proceeding on a corrupt, despotic path that would lead to the downfall of Hungary, the ruination of its economy, and the putrefaction of Hungarian society.

Lesson one: Never assume that the lust for power won’t eclipse integrity and long standing beliefs.

“I go back and forth between thinking Trump is a cynical a–hole like Nixon… or that he’s America’s Hitler”. ~ J.D. Vance in 2016. J.D. Vance who has shown that he will march under any flag that he thinks will propel him up the power ladder. J.D. Vance, who maligns immigrants while being married to the daughter of

immigrants from India.

“NATO is an important alliance. If NATO didn’t exist, we’d have to create it.” ~ Marco Rubio, who, as recently as 2023 co-authored a bill that would prohibit any President of the United States from withdrawing from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) without Senate approval or an Act of Congress. The same Marco Rubio who was once taken seriously as having expertise in foreign policy. The Marco Rubio who has now become a full fledged member of the Trump cult and has taken to disparaging NATO and our (once) European allies.

Monochrome Madness: It Begins With P

Paul

16 comments

April 22, 2026

The blog site Travel With Me, published by Sarah Wilkie is one of my favorites. There’s an old country song titled “I’ve Been Everywhere,” recorded by various artists (I’m most familiar with the Johnny Cash version). The lyrics of this novelty song lists the various places the singers have (purportedly) visited. Sarah could record her own version and literally put the other travelers to shame. This week Sarah hosts Monochrome Madness and the subject is, “Begins With P.”

Banner photo is the Pantheon of Paris. I do love the old ceilings.

Below: A Plant that I can’t Place. This unknown, to me, flower is naturally purple, but in monochrome it takes on the appearance of parchment.

People at a Parisian Patisserie (say that fast three times)

While in Paris I shot a lot of images of patisseries and outdoor cafes. I particularly liked this one because (for me) it illustrates a classic Parisian scene (said the man who’s been to Paris – once).

A French Journey: On the French Road Part I. Driving Madame Cora.

Paul

15 comments

April 13, 2026

An American’s observations of a first time trip to France.

“You’re driving in France?” That’s my friend Jenny’s response after I’ve told her that I’ll be renting a car during our trip to France. Her reaction is troubling. Not the question so much as the tone. Her inflection could’ve said, “oh how exciting,” or “what fun.” But it doesn’t. It’s more like, “have you lost your blinking mind?”

Jenny was born in France, has spent a fair portion of her adult life in France, and has driven in France. And so, her alarm is, well, alarming.

In heated tones she tells me about the nightmares of driving in Paris, and then she cools off when I tell her that I’m not driving in Paris, I’m driving in France. That said, her level of agitation goes down from a five alarm conflaguration to a sputtering birthday candle.

Once we get to Paris, and I get a look at Parisian traffic, especially the (barely) controlled chaos at Place Charles de Gaulle (home of the Arc de Triomphe), I understand Jenny’s concern.

I’ve pre-booked an Audi with Sixt at the Paris airport. I usually rent with Sixt whose slogan is, ‘Don’t rent a car, rent the car.” And If I’m driving in Europe, I want the car. I want to be Sam, Robert DeNiro’s character in the movie, Ronin. Seriously, I don’t plan on driving through vegetable stands, or dodging oncoming traffic while going the wrong way down a highway, and I have absolutely no gun play in mind. All I want is to drive a car that enhances the adventure. Not unlike driving a 1963 Corvette Sting Ray on Route 66.

In Spain, I rented a Mercedes. From the moment I started up the car, I told Cora, “I want one.” She said, “We have money, buy one.” The woman who gives me grief when I buy a 25 Euro souvenir T-shirt was giving me permission to spend at least $65,000 for a Merc. I could’ve asked her to repeat that statement while pressing record on my phone. She has a history of conveniently forgetting such permissions when I dredge them up later. I immediately passed on the notion of a Mercedes.

For a trip the previous year through Austria and Bavaria I had prebooked a BMW. Because on the Autobahn, you don’t want anything that says Honda or Nissan. Sixt didn’t give me either of those. Nor did they give me the BMW, or an Audi, or a Mercedes. They gave me a

Volvo?

Not the car –

a car.

On the Autobahn I pushed the poor dear to 115 miles per hour and eased up when it seemed like she was getting the vapors and shuddering. Meanwhile, an Audi R8 sped by in an electric blue blur.

We’re at the rental counter in Paris and I’m ready to pick up my Audi when I get buyer’s remorse, or, more accurately, a jolt of fiscal responsibility, because in six Parisian days we’ve already blown through the budget. I end up choosing a VW Polo. It’s definitely

a car

and not

the car

What would Sam/DeNiro say? It would probably be a one word answer, beginning with “p” and ending in “y.”

Monochrome Madness: The Beauty of Minimalism

Paul

19 comments

April 8, 2026

This is my first foray into the Monochrome Madness Challenge. The topic is Minimalism.

I tend to be long-winded but in keeping with the topic, I’ll keep my comments to a

mimimum.

Opuntia cactus needles. Shot through a hole in one of the pads

All three images above and the banner image were taken during COVID, when going out meant

the backyard.

Lens-Artists Challenge #392: Framing Your Shots

Paul

25 comments

April 4, 2026

This week Patti Moed has issued the challenge to share images using the technique of framing. But Patti’s challenge is a little more, uhh, challenging.

She writes, “This week, we’re focusing on one technique: framing the shot using the 3 grounds (or layers)—the foreground, the middle ground, and the background.

Foreground: the part of the scene that’s closest to the camera. Think of it as the introduction to the scene and an invitation for the viewer to explore the image.
Middle Ground: the central area of your image, between the foreground and the background. It’s often where the main subject is located.
Background: the farthest point from the viewer. It provides the context and completes the visual “story.”

Not quite so simple as just shooting through an arch at a distant building. It took some searching but I think I managed to come up with three.

I got out of our hotel before dawn to capture some photos of Old Quebec City before the hordes came out. The photo below uses Saint-Jean Gate as a frame. The middle ground is Rue Saint-Jean and the old buildings, and the background is the yellow light of dawn.

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