Bunkhouse Chronicle

I had the opportunity to interview a couple of fascinating people last week, for the up-coming Sisters Oregon Guide.  One of them was Kirk Metzger, a world-class kayaker who counts numerous solos of the Colorado River amongst his accomplishments, but who also spent 34 years working for the Forest Service in almost every conceivable capacity. ...

*This column originally appeared in The Nugget News, 3.8.2016 I’m a movie buff, all-in, but while I love the experience of a good film—in a theater, particularly one as comfortable and inviting as our own Sisters Movie House—I confess that I have become increasingly tired of the people making them. The yearly, over-anticipated, under-compelling pomp ...

I’m going to warn you ahead of time.  This post, and Gunny Walgren’s speech, contain bad words.  A lot of them.  I don’t care.  I’m going to share it anyway, with adults, and for those of you who haven’t seen it, or can’t find a way to understand the fire, the camaraderie, the solace of ...

I spent most of Saturday in the barn, cleaning up, oiling leather, trying to hang a gambrel in the rafters on a pulley, and talking to Barnacles, the sole remaining barn cat.  I don’t know what happened to the other one.  He, or maybe it was a she, has vanished into the night. Maybe it ...

In an ancient incarnation I taught english composition to college freshmen and sophomores at Lassen College.  I had all kinds of theories about how to deliver the information, how to haze these kids into communicating information by means of pen and paper, and the mere thoughts in their head–and how to do it well.  I ...

Here I go again, down the road of melodrama and romantic subjects no one should write about, but I can’t help myself.  I’m in a rage.  I’m so damn mad I can’t even work up a spit.  See, friends, the suited, perfumed, airy, pencil-necks who rule the game of baseball from their ivory towers, that ...

*This piece originally appeared in The Nugget News, February 24, 2016 Next month I have the distinct privilege of traveling to Arizona with Sisters-based Warfighter Outfitters, and the occasion has caused me to think deeply about my service, and some of the larger characters who inhabited that world. I was a Marine, with Bravo Company ...

This morning I have received my first “Dry Gulch Project” submission, and I can tell you that it is fabulous.  It’s funny, it’s short, and it introduces a fabulous new player to the ensemble.  Get after it, Chroniclers, the competition will be stiff.  And fun.  Wouldn’t it be something if we could make a thing ...

When I was kid, and we were visiting my grandparents in Hollywood, my grandfather told bedtime stories.  These weren’t your run-of-the-mill, get the kids to sleep, halfhearted stabs at storytelling.  They were, in fact, an interconnected serial of considerable complexity, and interest, full of plot twists and jokes and three dimensional characters.  The series was ...