By Jim CHASE As I mentioned several weeks ago, my family has been waiting expectantly for our daughter and son-in-law to give birth to their first child, our fourth grandchild. The big event happened last week, and … it’s a girl! Welcome to the world and to our family, little Bailey Brooke Kuehn. It may […]
» Jim Chase Our daughter and son-in-law will be having their first baby just about one month from today. Although it will be our fourth grandchild, it will be the first to live within an easy drive from us. You see, our other three grand-munchkins live heart-wrenchingly far away in Hawaii. My wife and I […]
When I was a kid, I knew that Dial hand soap tasted terrible, but that Irish Spring was even worse. And don’t even mention the aptly named Lava brand. You see, my siblings and I got our mouths washed out with soap for certain verbal infractions that included swearing and/or talking back to our parents. […]
By Jim CHASE Because we added onto our house sometime during the last century, we have two separate attics. In our original attic, stacks of boxes reach to the rafters in places, filled with accumulated family history that archeologists from the future are sure to go through with collective awe and reverence. Or not. You […]
By Jim CHASE Even being the cold weather, dark clouds, rainstorm addict that I am, I admit to having a special appreciation for this time of year. Spring, especially after a winter that brought such impressive rains to the Southland, often takes my breath away, quite literally. Of course, I’m partially referring to the curtain […]
My Thoughts, Exactly –Jim Chase I spent the better part of two hours a couple of weeks ago waiting for my wife’s delayed flight to come in to LAX. At least I think it was two hours. Like so many people these days, I stopped wearing a wristwatch years ago. Who needs one? Every cell […]
By Jim Chase I may have been overexposed to the Winter Olympics. As thrilling and fun to watch as these Vancouver games were, as I watched the NBC credit crawl at the end of the closing ceremonies I was left with acute post-event let down (similar to the melancholy I feel waking up every Dec. […]
Jim Chase The hills are alive with the sound of … dump trucks. Honestly, did you have any idea there were so many of the dirt-hauling, diesel drinking heavyweights around town before they all started cruising the streets of the Crescenta Valley? I didn’t. But ever since the ongoing efforts to empty out the debris […]
My Thoughts, exactly » Jim Chase If you’ve seen a friendly, middle-aged guy around town the past week or two with a ginormous grin stretching from ear to ear, that would most likely be me. Why? Because it has been raining, of course. A lot. And as my wife, kids, relatives, neighbors, UPS driver, people […]
By Jim CHASE Once, when I was in not yet in my teens, I spent a precious dollar of my meager allowance to buy a 45 rpm record of the Beatles’ “She Loves You.” I lovingly carried it home from Grayson’s Tune Town like I had purchased the Holy Grail itself. I played that small […]