She dials, listens to the ring tone, and as soon as she hears the click that shows someone picked up, she says, “I’m leaving. I just wanted you to know that. You don’t even care. I’m walking out the door right now and I left the kitchen a mess and you don’t even care.” A…

“So, how long have you been playing that thing?” “I don’t know. Since I was a kid.” “Well, you’re pretty good.” The man who says this looms over the guitar player, looks like a biker. He’s big, leather jacketed, bandanna topped, bearded, tattooed, heavy booted, decorated with patches and pins. The biker points at the…

My two dogs sit comfortably in the living room. Jake sits on the seat of a wingback chair. He has a thick coat of mostly black fur, Border Collie bones, and a wolfish head. Zoey, a mutt, also has mostly black fur, graying in the face. She has kind eyes. Both are about 60 pounds…

I have the smart phone that can do lots of things that I don’t understand. And I forgive its quirks, as I’m sure it forgives mine. But then we have a problem. She wouldn’t charge up. In fact, I could watch her battery run down. I wasn’t doing anything unusual, and I thought we were…

Only in Minnesota. It’s odd enough to celebrate winter in any way and even odder to have a winter carnival, in January, outdoors. It’s an old tradition here, fueled by alcohol and hubris and, admittedly, a certain amount of hardiness. One of the more recent events has been the Beer Dabbler. It sounds like a…