Posted inSalem

Capitol City Cycleshare aims to get bike sharing going in Salem

Yesterday I met Evan Osborne fortuitously at a get-together in our neighborhood. I was walking our dog around the community lake. When I got to the picnic area Evan recognized me and we had a nice chat about the Capitol City Cycleshare he's working to get going.   His dog was with him, so ZuZu (our canine) and James got to meet each other and play a bit. James is prominently featured on the Capitol City Cycleshare web page, as you can see above. Here's a description of what Capitol City Cycleshare is about. (Great logo, by the way. Their Facebook…
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Posted inBooks

“But What If We’re Wrong?” Great question. Great book.

Browsing through the terrific bookstore in Sisters, Oregon -- Paulina Springs Books -- I knew that I'd buy Chuck Klosterman's newest literary offering as soon as I saw the upside-down title on the front cover. But What If We're Wrong?  I've been wrong about so much, so many times, over so many years, this theme immediately resonated with me. Turning the book over, the subtitle was almost equally appealing: Thinking About the Present As If It Were the Past.  I already do this in a certain sense, since I'm unable to keep up with the magazines that we subscribe to.…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Philosophy

Common facts are the bedrock of democracy — which Trump is blasting away at

There's a lot of reasons to detest what President Trump is doing to our country. What's most concerning, though, isn't any specific outrage -- destroying health care, denying global warming, tearing apart the social safety net -- but his general attack on shared reality. If people can't agree about the basic nature of the world we all live in together, it isn't possible to even discuss the problems we face, much less agree about what needs to be done about them.  About a week ago I wrote about "On Tyranny," a little book that packed a big punch. This is…
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Posted inSalem

Photos of 2017 Salem WillaMutt Strut — adorable dogs!

Here's what my camera captured at last Sunday's Willamette Humane Society WillaMutt Strut event at Riverfront Park. The family dog, ZuZu, and I completed the 5k walk, though not in anything approaching record time. But if I could subtract all the moments ZuZu spent sniffing dog pee (and who knows what else) instead of walking, our performance would look a heck of a lot better. 
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Posted inBooks Current affairs

“On Tyranny” is a disturbingly great read for these Trumpian times

On Tyranny by historian Timothy Snyder is a small 126-page book that I read in about ninety minutes. But it's impact on me was huge.  Yes, good things come in small packages. And in this case, only cost $5.26 (from Amazon).  Snyder never mentions Donald Trump by name. But his frequent references to "the president" make it clear about the tyrant he's warning us about.  This is the most astounding thing about Snyder's book: that he wrote it.  Now. After Trump's election. To alert Americans to the danger of tyranny arising in our liberal democracy that, until recently, was generally…
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Posted inHome life

Hines home as seen by a drone

Recently we had Exos Aerial Imaging take some drone photos/videos of our rural south Salem property. I've shared the images in an Adobe Spark page. We realize that one day a city house likely is in our future. But if you look at these images, you'll realize why it's tough for us to imagine living anywhere but the place we've called home for 27 years. 
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