Prior to moving to Nevada, I was living in Arcata. Every weekend I would jump in my car and zoom up the coast to Crescent City to visit my then-girlfriend Cathy Andre.

One late evening, I was on my way to see her when I had to make a pit stop and use the restroom. I stopped at the Big Lagoon rest area jus’ south of DeMartins Beach.

As I left the restroom, I was suddenly attacked from behind. The person attacking me had wrapped a chord or belt around my throat and was choking me.

My reaction was more than my attacker could handle. I stepped backwards into them as I grabbed their forearms and flipped them over my back.

They hit the asphalt with a thud and I jumped over them and ran to my car. Since there were no lights in the parking lot, I didn’t see what they looked like.

Instead I raced away, heading south towards the Trees Motel. I knew the managers and I also knew I could rely on help from them.

Mrs. Stobert came to the front desk, once I entered the office. I explained to her what happened and she called the Del Norte County Sheriff’s office for me.

A few minutes later, Deputy Lloyd Seats pulled into the motel’s parking lot. He was quickly followed by a California Highway Patrol Officer.

While I explained to them what had happened and they examined my neck, I was immediately accused of having a homosexual tryst in the restroom by the CHP officer. I was completely dumbfounded.

After half an hour of questioning by both Deputy Seats and the CHP officer, they told me they planned to go roust a hitchhiker they had seen along the highway. I suspect that this was a ploy to see what my reaction would be.

I told them to go do it.

Having called their bluff, I was allowed to go on my way. It was real late getting to Cathy’s and she was angry at me.

Worse yet she didn’t believe me either. I was so upset with the whole thing that I decided to head back to Arcata the following morning rather than stick around Crescent City.

Later that evening Cathy called me to say she was sorry for not believing me. I asked her what had changed her mind and she told me that after the police and sheriff’s log were reported over the air on KPOD, where she worked, a call came into the station.

“It was a Mrs. Stobert, who manages the Trees Motel,” Cathy explained, “She wanted to know why the attack on Tommy Darby wasn’t a part of the radio station’s report.”

Nearly two-weeks ago a power supposed failure at F.E. Warren Air Force Base in Wyoming took 50 nuclear intercontinental ballistic missiles, one-ninth of the U.S. missile stockpile, temporarily offline.  The 90th Missile Wing, headquartered there, controls 150 Minuteman III missiles in a tri-state area.

Now, the Pentagon is being dogged by questions about a possible missile launch from Vandenburg Air Force Base or a submarine, that was video taped by a news helicopter. The official claim is that the contrail seen in the video is nothing more than that of a jet aircraft.

During the Warren ABF event, the ICBMs shifted into what’s known as LF Down status, meaning that missileers could no longer communicate with the missiles. An LF Down status also means that various security protocols built into the missile delivery system were offline but that the missiles remained technically launch-able.

It’s believe that a launch control center computer (LCC) began to out of sequence, which resulted in “a surge,” in the system. The LCCs interrogate each missile in sequence and if they begin to send signals out when they’re not supposed to, the missiles receivers send out error codes.

Since LCCs ping out of sequence occasionally, missileers are ready to administer a quick fix.  However as multiple missiles began to display error settings, missiliers decided to take all five LCCs the malfunctioning center was connected to off-line, leaving 50 missiles dark.

The missileers then restarted one of the LCCs, which began to normally interrogate the missile. Eventually, three LCCs were successfully restarted, while the suspect LCC remained off-line.

Admittedly, my knowledge of how the system works, is predicated on 30-year-old information. When I was stattioned at Warren AFB, a $2.98 piece of hardware at NORAD failed, shocking the entire base into a sudden state of alert.

When on alert, the missiles are under the direction of the  U.S. Strategic Command but when not on alert status, they are under the control of the Global Strike Command. The Air Force contends command and control was never lost and that the failure lasted less than an hour and triggered an emergency inspection, sending security forces to verify all of the missiles were safe and properly protected.

A similar hardware failure triggered an event in 1998 at Minot AFB in North Dakota and Malmstrom AFB in Montana, leaving an unknown number of missiles dark. In 1976, Warren AFB was witness to an event that shutdown a series of missile silos in the Wyoming and Nebraska areas and nine years earlier Malmstrom lost communication with ten of it’s Minutemen Missiles, twice in a two week period.

So far no one has officially connected the two incidents. However most current and former Air Force personnel will tell you: there is no such thing as a coincidence in the military.

Why anyone would stand at the edge of a cliff to pee, while drunk is beyond my understanding. Perhaps it’s due to the amount of alcohol in the person’s body, clouding their judgement.

But that was the call Dad and I got one early evening. It sent us scrambling to the fire station and southbound on Highway 101 to the south side of the Klamath River, where the old highway used to run.

It took us nearly half-an-hour to arrive at the spot where a man had allegedly fallen after getting up on a stone wall with the intent of taking a whizz over the edge. We drove fairly slow because we didn’t want to miss the person who was there to flag us down.

One of the first things we did after parking, was to go to the wall and look over the edge. It was so dark, that neither of us could see beyond a few feet.

Dad pulled out a large lantern and shined it down the cliff side and still we couldn’t see anything. We were planning to wait for the National Park’s high angle rescue team, but because it was starting to get cold and a delay in first aid could cost the man his life, it was decided I’d rapple down to him.

While I secured my harness and pulled on my first-responders backpack, Dad tied a line off the front of the rescue truck. It took me only a few seconds to rotate the line through by carabiners and set myself for the first step over the wall.

In less than 30 seconds I dropped into the darkness, passed several branches from close standing trees and to a semi-flat surface. It took me a few more seconds to find the victim as he was jus’ a few yards further down the slope.

Much to my surprise he was conscious and talking. His chief complaint was having pissed on himself as he fell, though I could tell by the mangled shape of his legs, he had worse problems.

It took us two hours to secure him in a litter and hand crank the man to the old highway. I was on belay and therefore the last to leave the site.

By the time I reached the top of the old stone wall, the ambulance had already left with our patient. Later I would find out, while he was in a double-hip cast for three months the man would eventually walk again.

But still I wonder — why the fascination with peeing off the side of a cliff?

He had been an outstanding member of the track team I had coached over the summer, and now I was reading his name in the paper. George Smith, age 19, was dead.

He and a couple of friends were spending the day on the Truckee River, rafting and swimming. Authorities say their inflatable floatation device, perhaps an inner tube had struck a sharp submerged rock and developed a fast leak.

While two of the young men were able to swim to safety, George wasn’t able to get to the bank. His friends, though cold and frightened, searched the banks of the river for their buddy, they couldn’t find him.

George’s body was found down river a couple of days later somewhere near the town of Lockwood. An autopsy showed he had drown and it was concluded that this happened because he had been drinking alcohol earlier in the day.

Every once in a while I think about George, the shining young trackster, and I feel a terrible stab of grief over what he could have been and what he’ll never be. Now all I have to remember him by is a newspaper’s obituary.

Mom used to say, “Quit running around like a chicken with its head cut off,” all the time. Much to my terror, I discovered that old adage is grounded in reality.

All of kid’s were out back of the duplex at the end of Sander’s Court including Goldie, Jeannie and John-Paul Arnold and Adam and me. We were playing tag, running from one place to the other to avoid being caught.

It was early evening and getting close to dinner time. That’s when Mrs. Dorothy Arnold came outside and went to the family’s chicken coup.

She returned with red-colored hen and without fan-fare, grabbed the hatched buried in the old chopping block at the back door, and dispatched the chicken. Much to my shock the headless bird dropped to the ground and took off running.

The bodiless-hen dashed into the garden, disappearing amid the rows of Lima beans. It fell to John-Paul to chase after the chicken and retrieve it for his mother.

Later that night, Adam would climb in bed next to me and complain he had a nightmare about the bird. At nearly seven-years-old, I thought I was too old to admit I was awake because of a similar nightmare.

In our garage we have a large wire-mesh dog kennel. It is no longer being used for its intended purpose, so we have taken to storing stuff in it, including a couple of suit cases, a box of photographs and a couple of containers of seasonal clothing.

Now, I knew my housemate, Kay was home as I had jus’ spoken to her prior to my getting in the shower and readying for work. When I got out of the tub, I could no longer hear Kay knocking about in the kitchen or anywhere else in the house for that matter.

I continued getting ready for work.

Once dressed, I went to the front room to see if Kay was jus’ simply sitting quietly. She wasn’t in her bedroom, nor her bathroom and she definitely not in the kitchen.

That’s when I noticed the garage light was on. It’s one of those automatic lights that turns on when it senses movement.

I concluded that Kay must be in the garage.

Upon opening the door, I saw her in the kennel, rummaging about in a container of her summer cloths. Her back was turned to me and I could tell she was trying on different blouses as she was naked from the waist up.

I couldn’t resist.

Next to the automatic light sensor is the button to open the garage door. I pushed it.

Kay’s reaction was immediate. She screamed, “Oh, sh*t!” and tried to duck behind the containers and suit cases.

I pushed the button once again, stopping the door from rising any further.

Kay was squatted down, covering herself up with whatever piece of garment she had at the time. She turned and looked back at the garage door button and saw me standing there.

I nearly pee’d myself laughing at her predicament.

Later, I had a second good laugh when she told her daughter, Lyn what I had done to her. Lyn seemed to miss the major point of the story somehow.

“You mean to say,” Lyn asked in disbelief, “you keep your clothes in a dog cage?!”

There appears to be some confusion between Nevada Senator Bill Raggio and U.S. Senator Harry Reid. This comes after Raggio announced he was stepping aside after 28-years as the republican caucus leader. Raggio told the Las Vegas-Sun he wants to avoid problems caused by endorsing Reid

“There is a lot of dissatisfaction among the tea party, hard right,” Raggio says. “I don’t want that kind of discord.”

Meanwhile, Reid responded to Raggio’s resignation, saying ,“In this election Nevadans, Republicans, Democrats and Independents voted to reject extremism. That some of Senator Raggio’s Republican colleagues even considered punishing him for being on the side of a majority of Nevadans shows that they clearly missed that message and are not listening to their constituents.”

Maybe Reid should have thought to speak with Raggio prior to issuing his statement. But that’s probably one of the many reasons why Nevadan’s re-elected him — he doesn’t think.

It’s been a long day.  I worked until 0315 hours this morning, compiling Nevada election results.

Then I had to be up by 0730 hours to make it to court.  This because I witnessing a drunk driver on my way home.

What was supposed to be a simple hearing, turned into a full-on deposition.  By the time everything was done, I felt like I should have had an attorney representing me.

I didn’t dot my i’s properly or cross me t’s as I should have and she took full advantage of this.

And while it was rough on me, it was worse for the deputies and officers involved in the case.  I found myself getting angry at some of the questions being asked.

Finally, I was insulted when the court-master handed me some forms to fill out, telling me I would get paid $25 for being a witness. And here I was naive enough to think doing my civil duty was payment enough.

I have to do this again in December too and now I’m not looking forward to it.

As I was on my way to work, I passed a woman in a Chevy pickup truck. We smiled at each other and I thought nothing more of it.

Then as we were stopped at a traffic light, I looked in my rear view mirror, where I saw her behind me. She appeared to be fumbling around with something in the cab of the truck.

I thought maybe she was searching for something in her purse.

Suddenly she got out of her truck and rushed up to my truck window. She handed me a slip of paper and said, “Call me!”

I looked at the paper and saw a phone number, scribbled underneath the name Shannon.

The light turned from red to green as I tucked the piece of paper in my shirt pocket. I put the incident in the back of my mind to concentrate on driving.

Later at the station, I remembered the slip of paper and pulled it from my pocket. I looked it over and let my “teenaged brain” skip for joy at the idea of Shannon, a woman half my age, wanting me to call her.

Then I allowed my “old man” body to return me to reality. I smiled at Shannon’s flattery, then tossed her number in the trash can.

More than a few people have made comments about poor in-depth media coverage of Nevada’s midterm election cycle. Well, it’s not for a lack of trying on my part.

I broke a story that should have been on par with any national news item out there. I discovered that Senator Harry Reid held a political rally out side the polling place of the Joe Crowley Student Union on the University of Reno, Nevada.

It is illegal to hold political rallies in, near or around polling places in Nevada. But according to Nevada Secretary of State Ross Miller, there are no voting irregularities.

Furthermore, it appears all media outlets, local, regional and national, chose to ignore this news item.

That aside, I have created an in-depth list of items of interest in this year’s midterm election. While I’ll create the dots, I’ll let you connect them.

• Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is closely aligned with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN.)
• ACORN leaders in Nevada have been linked to voter fraud, even going so far as to register the Dallas Cowboys as Nevada voters.
• SEIU holds the contract in Clark County, Nevada to service the county’s electronic voting machines.
• That contract was authorized by the Clark County Commission, which is chaired Rory Reid.
• Rory Reid is the son of Senator Harry Reid.
• Recent polling data shows Harry Reid is unable to carry rural Nevada, while he is expected to carry more populated Clark County.
• Reid’s son Rory, is a gubernatorial candidate in Nevada and is behind in polls by 19-percent.

And before you beat me up over assailing the Reid’s, SEIU and ACORN, remember I was fired from a newspaper job after blasting a Republican judicial candidate for trying to silence the press over his failing campaign. Finally, if I got here, where are the rest of the media-types?