“I HAVE FOLLOWED MY INSTINCTS AND TRIED TO USE COMMON SENSE IN MY BEHAVIOR.” Joan Didion said she wanted this quote from Mina Curtiss to be her epitaph. To celebrate the paperback of “The World According to Joan Didion,” Ms. published an excerpt in which I talk about “the California woman.”

Starting today readers who perhaps couldn’t afford the hardbound version of “The World According to Joan Didion” can enjoy the paperback. I’ll be celebrating its release with a reading and signing at 5 in Bayfield, Wi. www.apostleislandsbooksellers.com/events

In 1984 a New York Times article cast shame on Joan Didion’s author photograph for Democracy. Archival research reveals that during the journalistic scuffle, the author answered a question that many have wondered: “Yes, I am a feminist,” she told the gate-keeping Christopher Lehmann-Haupt.

In his latest book “Everything Is Now”: The 1960s New York Avant-Garde — Primal Happenings, Underground Movies, Radical Pop,” J. Hoberman offers a comprehensive overview of an inventive, tumultuous place and time. I reviewed for The New York Times. tinyurl.com/mw4nmst2

The US government is in the process of terrorizing its own people. I wrote this essay a few months ago, after they came for an innocent member of my family. Sadly, its words have become more relevant. magazine.lmu.edu/articles/dis...

On this Memorial Day, I'll take my marching orders from the Queen, the Boss, and the drummer. Read the article: www.randomlengthsnews.com/archives/202... Graphic by Terelle Jerricks

The marine mammals of SoCal have been in mortal crisis for 2 months. I’ve been dealing with the DA event as a volunteer at the Marine Mammal Care Center. I wrote about the crisis and the need for volunteers for the Earth Day edition of Random Lengths www.randomlengthsnews.com/archives/202...

Last night I attended a tribute to the late, great Chilean artist and musician Violeta Parra that was also a celebration of the publication of “Thanks to Life,” a comprehensive scholarly biography by Ericka Verba.

This is written by the bishop who stood up to Orange Voldemort. Everyone should be buying this. It's available on Amazon for $14. I'm an atheist and I'm buying it. #booksky

Joan Didion in "Los Angeles Notebook," 1965-67. Once again, she warned us.

The billionaire bozos who are wrecking today’s newspapers have made more apparent than ever the need for independent media. I’m honored to be a columnist for Random Lengths News and to have my essay about the imperative for a free press be the lead story in their 45th anniversary issue.

Brilliant sunset and super low tide tonight. Our neighbor snapped us walking and our dog running with strangers.

Snorkeling in a California kelp forest is like floating over a tropical canopy, but with brightly colored Garibaldi darting through the leaves. I recently had the pleasure of experiencing this with Michael Marty-Rivera, kelp curator at Kelp Ark at AltaSea. www.randomlengthsnews.com/archives/202...

Waving hi in La Jolla.

There were these crazy ripples in the sky at Cabrillo Beach tonight. Venus lurked among them and a jet navigated their squiggly trails. They looked like water breaking on shallow shores or the sand patterns beneath the waves. The world turned upside down. Anyone know what these clouds are called?

Saturday morning Cabrillo beach

AOC comes out swinging against a Nancy Mace for targeting Sarah McBride. "They're doing this so that Nancy Mace can ... fundraise off an email. They're not doing this to protect people. They're endangering women, they're endangering girls of all kinds. And everybody should reject it. It's gross."

This might explain why Phillips 66 is closing its refineries in Wilmington and Carson. Don't let the door hit you in the a** on the way out! www.dailybreeze.com/2024/11/21/p...

Remastered recordings by the Gits remind us what was lost when Mia Zapata was killed.

Pink sky.

I do like an app named after something in nature.