The View from a Drawbridge

Author: The View from a Drawbridge

  • Caught up in Captioning

    Most bridgetenders watch at least a dozen movies a week at work. There isn’t much else to do. On any given week I’ll watch anything from Fellini’s “Amarcord” to “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes”. (Tell me I’m not well-rounded. I dare you.) And when you have to drown out the roar of traffic and the…

  • Government Conspiracy: The Great Oxymoron

    I have a basic philosophical difference with someone I love very much. He thinks that large scale governmental, or even global, conspiracies are possible. I on the other hand, think that’s doolally with a capital doo. I suppose it boils down to which you think is more powerful: government evil or government stupidity. Having worked…

  • Finding your Truth

    People often make the mistake of thinking that truth is like some kind of moral binary code. It’s either one or zero. Fact or fiction. Yes or no. Right or wrong. Good or evil. Black or white. But most of us, if we’re honest, navigate the grey areas more often than we have perfect, unarguable…

  • Lightning Strikes and Other Unforeseen Events

    The other day I was lying in bed, in the desperate pursuit of ever-elusive sleep (which is the life story of every graveyard shift worker on the face of the earth), when BOOM!!!! Lightning struck the house, and I instantly had two very terrified dogs on top of me. I went without internet for three…

  • Andy Johnson is Back on the Radio. Heaven Help Us.

    Yes, it’s that time again. My quarterly rant about Andy Johnson, the man who stole thousands of dollars from me and refuses to pay it back, despite my winning court judgment and my lien on his house. If you want to get the full, ugly story of what this man did to me, check out…

  • Mental Illness and the Internet

    Sometimes I really think that cyberspace is not the healthiest place to be. Every once in a while I encounter someone who is clearly in need of help, and since I’m not a mental health professional I am definitely not the go-to girl in situations of this nature. Generally all I can do is the…

  • If You’re Critical, You’re not Critical to Me

    I have a dear friend whose relatives have criticized her all her life. If it’s not her appearance they’re attacking, it’s her life choices. There is nothing, apparently, that she can do right. Even whom she chooses to love, and whom she chooses to leave, comes under their negative scrutiny. Because of this, even though…

  • The Amazing Coelacanth—Talk about a Fish Story!

    Of all the unique creatures on this fantastic planet of ours, my absolute favorite is the Coelacanth (pronounced see-la-kanth). I love a good backstory, and this is a fish that most definitely has one. Back in 1938, Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer was asked to come down to the docks to check out a strange fish that a…

  • The Evil Eye

    Location: Some Nameless Godforsaken Village in Northwest Spain Year: 1986 So I’m with a friend, sitting in a café that overlooks a green slimy swamp. To say we were in the middle of nowhere would be generous. You couldn’t even see nowhere from where we were sitting. I had no freakin’ clue how this restaurant…

  • No More Fried Chicken for Breakfast and Other Self-Imposed Rules

    Since I work graveyard shift, I tend to eat very strange things for breakfast. I get off work at 8 am craving hamburgers, and after eating them, I go to bed for the day. Recently I found this fantastic 24 hour fried chicken place on my route home from work. The only problem is that…