Lone Pine – Day One
Saturday, April 4th, 2009
I was rather surprised with the weather in California when I awoke at the Courthouse Motel in Independence on Friday, October 10, 2008. It had dropped down to 45 degrees overnight. I knew it got chilly up in Northern California so I had my Amsterdam sweatshirt with me, but I was hoping the it would warm up during the afternoon. Bob and I headed out at a little after 7am and headed into Lone Pine which was about 15 minutes south. Read the rest of this entry »
Okay, I’ll admit I was always a bit uncomfortable whenever Cousin Geri would show up at Leland Girls School on the TV series The Facts of Life. Her character was the cousin of teen socialite Blair Warner. Geri looked different and acted different because she had cerebral palsy…for real. But I can’t help but admire the producers of the show for bringing this disease into the public eye and at the same time give a chance to a talented comedienne with an alarming disability. 
Rob Bradford was certainly one of the nicest guys in the whole elementary school. In fact, he was probably a little too nice for the likes of me. But that notwithstanding, I went through periods of time during my days at Fairbrook Elementary when Rob and I were the best of friends. In fact, I’d say that he was probably about my best friend during our fifth grade year in Mrs. Owens’ class, where we had become the two resident chubby boys. And with the short similar names, people were always getting us confused with each other. 
So who doesn’t love The Brady Bunch– either openly or secretly? I was actually a little later than some of my friends at getting into the series, not having watched my first episodes after school until about 1983 or so. But I quickly got hooked on the corny adventures of America’s favorite family with afros. I felt like I was right there being cool with Greg, being a loser with Peter, getting in the way with Bobby, drooling over Marcia, wanting Jan to fail miserably, and being protective of little Cindy.