Happy 4th. Quick update for those interested. I hope that you had a great July 4th. I had some good news yesterday that, unexpectedly, my kidney function labs came back much (relatively) improved. Again, normal kidney function, measured by gfr (glomerular filtration rate), is >60. I started in January 2019 at 4. Dialysis must be…

Ristretto Rain goes to the presses next week and will be available in bookstores soon after. Here is a blurb: Halem, one of Seattle’s finest coffee roasters and baristas, comes to a gorgeous but remote harbor in Washington’s San Juan Islands to escape her dark past. One day, a mysterious and handsome man comes rowing…

I called this meeting, between Sensible and me. It has been a while and, as they say, a lot of water under the bridge. Knowing that Sensible is always punctual. . . to the second, I arrived early to prepare. I had something to say. Questions to ask. I had some bones to pick. I…

First I must ask, how are you doing during these quarantine? I hope you are doing well. Okay, this is a cancer update, but unfortunately, I don’t have much to add. That itself is the story. I was due to return to the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance the first week of June for my one…

There was a time in my life, where I imagined that writing books would be a lot of fun. In my very first book (A Kernel in the Pod), which I wrote back in the mid nineties, I describe how my perfect life would be a children’s book writer, living in Zermatt, Switzerland, earning six…

I am a product of the south. There are many things that a true southern should be proud about. . . our Confederate history, not one of them. The code name that we southern’s like to use for the support of the Confederacy is “our heritage.” Putting it within that narrative makes it sound like…

What would it be like if you had no mental filters? Whatever you thought, you said? I knew a man who had this problem, due to a traumatic brain injury. I will never forget the first thing he said to me, ‘Your breath stinks like coffee.” I would have taken offense, but I knew his…

Some good news is that my son Ramsey got tested for the COVID-19 virus and was negative so he could come home from Seattle to stay in our house. Because of my precautions, I cannot have contact even with my own children. Now, he is here to isolate with me. I’m excited today because I…

This year has brought to the forefront, of my mind at least, this age-old question of what is the value of a human life. Two issues have forced me to spend time thinking about this, one personal and the other political. I was told as a child that a human life is invaluable. That to…