Settle in; this is a long one... I've never told this, but the story of Charlie didn't technically begin with Charlie. The beginning even predates the Story of Trevor by many years; it all goes back to a dog named Yahtzee, son of Beebe. Beebe was one of the four Mt Rushmore figures, iconic dogs of the Casa. He came along at a time that I was as obsessed with duck hunting as I am…

100٪ True story: John Brown Canyon is a 9000' pass in Colorado that leads from the incredible town of Gateway west towards Moab, Utah. As a matter of fact, the very first words that I ever wrote just for the sake of writing were tapped into my phone after my first trip down Hwy 141: "Gateway is a fortress so impregnable that even negative thoughts can't enter". The views are incredible, but the chance encounters…

One of the most awesome dogs to ever pass through the Casa del Whackos was a tiny chihuahua named Bull Taco. He came into my life the first day of my last incarceration in corporate Amerika; I went to lunch that day with my new boss(the same as the old boss), and when we returned there was this scrap of a dog hobbling on a broken front leg around the freight yard. First day. New…

Happy Charlie Bravo Day! Dad here; It's an unseasonably beautiful morning at the Casa del Whackos. I had a large home inspection reschedule until next week, so I took that as a sign direct from heaven above that I was meant to go for a bike ride. By bike, I mean on my bicycle, my usual twenty mile loop down on the Arkansas River Trail. But there's a problem: the inmates all possess an uncanny…

Crazy times at the Casa; after an amazing recovery from her last downturn, Oba has taken another drastic turn for the worst. I've been through this before, when my dad passed due to some crazy combination of Alzhiemers and dementia. You have no choice but to keep on living life, but the reality of it is that the whole house keeps subconsciously listening for a clock that keeps on ticking. But this time it's different,…

Today was a good day. Yeah, I know; it was another gray day at the Casa. Winter can't make up her mind if she's coming or going. It seems like there's nothing but hatred and division battering us from every angle; you know, the whole "When I would do good, evil is present with me" thing. I feel like all of us are tired of being called sheep if we believe in one thing, or…

MacDuff finds his hops When I found The Duff ambling aimlessly down on the Arkansas River Trail, he was such a mass of matted fur with a gimpy gait that I assumed the he was an old dog. I even described him to Mom as an "old man with a broken leg" when requesting her to bring the CRV down to Medflight him back to the Casa. She was actually expecting that I had found…