Caveat lectorem: When readers submit comments, they are asked if they want to receive an email alert with a link to new postings on this blog. A number of people have said they do. Thank you. The link is created the moment a posting goes online. Readers who find their way here through that link can see an updated version by simply clicking on the headline above the posting.

I turned 76 today, and my portrait is now hanging in a place of honor, just outside the restroom door in Sausalito’s No Name Bar. The drawing was done without my knowledge by a prolific artist, Georgina Stout, apparently while I was sitting on the back patio where folks go to smoke, but what a kick.

The Michael Aragon Quartet performing at the No Name.

Drummer Michael Aragon, the bandleader, has had the Friday Night gig at the bar for 36 years. Sax player Rob Roth has played with him for 25 of them. Keyboardist KC Filson and bass player Pierre Archain have been with him for the past 10. Alas, Michael, 75, will retire after this coming Friday’s performance.

At the No Name. (From left): my wife Lynn, poet Paul LeClerc of Sausalito, and Inverness architect Jon Fernandez wait for the music to start.

Jon Fernandez and I, sometimes accompanied by Lynn, drive from Point Reyes Station to Sausalito and back every Friday for the music, as regular readers of this blog know. Last night, Aragon ushered in my birthday an hour early by having the band perform Happy Birthday to You.

That was almost as much of an honor as having my picture hanging opposite the restroom door. Lynn says that’s actually a good location. There’s only one restroom for customers, so lines can be long, and people will have plenty of time to look over the portrait, she says. I fear, however, that anyone recognizing me from the picture will immediately be reminded of having a full bladder.

By the way, writer Paul Liberatore had an excellent piece about Aragon in Friday’s Marin Independent Journal (click here). Among jazz aficionados, his drumming is legendary.

I’ve noticed that when friends my age get together, the conversation often becomes an organ recital: “I’m seeing the doctor Monday about problems with my eye….” Or, “My foot’s been bothering me, so I’ll probably have to have it examined….” Or, “I hear aging also affects our memories, but I can’t remember how.”

Caveat lectorem:  When readers submit comments, they are asked if they want to receive an email alert with a link to new postings on this blog. A number of people have said they do. Thank you. The link is created the moment a posting goes online. Readers who find their way here through that link can see an updated version by simply clicking on the headline above the posting.

The big fundraiser every year for the Point Reyes and Inverness Disaster Councils is a pancake breakfast at the Point Reyes Station firehouse followed by a raffle. Unfortunately, the blackout two weeks ago forced organizers to call off this year’s breakfast. The food, refrigerated during the outage, was donated to our local food bank at West Marin Community Services.

The raffle was postponed until last Saturday when it was held at the firehouse. Displaying a photo Carlos Porrata of Inverness donated as raffle item are: (from left) my wife Lynn, coordinator of the Point Reyes Disaster Council; Cindy Morris, a neighborhood liaison to the council and a member of the council’s radio-room team; firefighter Ben Ghisletta, senior captain at the firehouse.

Nora Goodfriend Koven of Inverness looks over some of the raffle items, which included gift certificates from various merchants.

Continuing on… It was a pleasant surprise to look up from the dinner table and find I had a gray fox for a dining companion.

Also a surprise but a less welcome one was looking out my living-room window into the eyes of a pair of roof rats, which were nibbling birdseed off a picnic-table bench. Around Mitchell cabin, the roof rats try to nest in everything, and we’re forever finding them in our car engines and in of the wine barrel halves we use as planters. Just this week it cost me $25 to have a large nest cleaned out of my car’s engine compartment and have the rats’ damage to the wiring repaired. I leave the rats in our woodshed alone but trap the ones that get into the basement.

At this time of year, sunset is often accompanied by the honking of flocks of Canada geese heading to Drakes Bay.

Come nightfall raccoons inevitably show up to drink from the birdbath on our deck and snooze atop the railing. As long as there are no blackouts or disasters in Point Reyes Station, life is pleasantly peaceful.

Finally, let’s take a closer look at Russian President Vladimir Putin. Is he really a serious adversary? All he wants is the Ukraine. Click here and see what you think of his rock’n roll offensive. Right off you’ll notice in his audience the French actor Gerard Depardieu (who has taken up Russian citizenship), American comedian Goldie Hawn, and American actor Kevin Costner. 

Caveat lectorem: When readers submit comments, they are asked if they want to receive an email alert with a link to new postings on this blog. A number of people have said they do. Thank you. The link is created the moment a posting goes online. Readers who find their way here through that link can see an updated version by simply clicking on the headline above the posting.

PG&E vs. LSD. Overheard outside the Point Reyes Station post office during the blackout a week ago, one Sonoma County evacuee grimly commenting to another: “Reality is like acid! It’s intense!”

At Mitchell cabin, thankfully, the absurdity was far more gentle. In time, we got used to leaving a candle burning in the bathroom all evening. (For safety, we placed it in a corner of the acrylic shower stall.) We briefly stopped using the woodstove because of a red-flag alert and couldn’t use our large, electric space heater. I therefore had to turn our propane furnace on for the first time in 15 years.

All that, just because of earlier wildfires elsewhere, which the President says are all state government’s fault.

President Trump expressed his contempt for California Gov. Gavin Newsom in a tweet, “Get your act together, Governor.” The President claims that California’s failure to “rake” its forests has been causing its wildfires, and now says he’s going to withhold emergency wildfire aid from the state.

The President holds Russian President Vladimir Putin in higher regard, calling him “smart,” and saying that Putin “has done an amazing job.” So four months ago he offered Russia aid in its battle against wildfires in Siberia. Putin hasn’t yet decided whether the aid is needed. No wonder House Speaker Nancy Pelosi last month observed, “All roads seem to lead to Putin with the President.

Lynn with our cornucopia. The decoration is a harvest-season tradition in Mitchell cabin. Having worked for several days on the Point Reyes Disaster Council’s response to the blackout, she’s now hoping to get some rest and forget about the disaster in Washington.