expand_moreexpand_lessexpand_moreexpand_less
|
 |
John BostonSanta Clarita Valley Signal |
DEAR PRESIDENT TRUMP — Hi! I don’t think we’ve met. I’m Bob. Bob Ali. Subordinate Holy Lance Private and The People’s Most Blindingly...
On any given day, there is a given day. Every blank space on the calendar comes with some sort of “National” or “Official” warning on the...
I’ve been driving up and down Santa Clarita’s longest-existing typographical error since I was a kid. Bouquet Canyon Road would unofficially shut...
Once I had the neatest conversation with Chuck Norris. You know. Karate guy? Movie and TV star? One of Earth’s toughest people? I was sports editor...
Years ago, I borrowed a wonderful and highly recommended book from my daughter’s teacher. Ken Lavner was light years beyond a gifted mentor —...
I’ve always been a night owl and find peace in small hours when milk men and vampires stir. The Saugus Café was sanctuary, back when it was famous...
I wonder how I’ll do this year. It’s 2026, just a couple days into it. My New Year’s Resolutions are still sporting the “WET PAINT” sign....
The year 2026 is right around the corner and I know I am paid to rend flesh and entrails over the myriad of civilization-ending issues facing us....
It’s almost Christmas and I’m happy. I used to go complete robot cattle stampede when it came to celebrating. I’d purchase a new, live tree...
One of my dear, childhood friends is Curtis Stone and the heavens haven’t molded a kinder guy. You know? Me, too. I’m a kinder guy. We’re both...
George Bernard Shaw once offered a toothy observation about Christianity. He said it was a great religion. Maybe someone should try practicing it...
I, JOHN BOSTON, am happier than a puppy with two you-know-whats, to present today’s column. I think it’s important that the citizens of SClarita...
There’s a website that I worship in this twisted, love/hate relationship. It’s the Babylon Bee. I’d add a “dot.com” to it, but management...
Antaeus was the Greek king and giant who fought Heracles and lost. His name is the root of the prefix of “anti,” meaning, “opponent,” or, “I...
It’s actually Halloween smack dab today and I thought what better 5-pound box o’ See’s Candy (the no-nuts version) treat to give my two loyal...
I need a monkey. A small one. A can-do monkey who doesn’t mind getting his paws soaked in white vinegar, dish soap and Windex. No. That’s not the...
When I was 6, I was pretty upset with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics’ First Secretary Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev. The shoe-pounding...
Many years ago, I took an acting class. Missing was any delusion that I’d be the future Brad Pitt. I just wanted to improve my writing by bringing...
Something wrong has happened to us. It’s never any one event. Rather, death by a thousand paper cuts. In the same week, I spotted essentially the...
I cannot recall owning a sharp-clawed Bengal tiger cub. Or, taking a part-time job as an underbrush-slashing jungle guide. I’m not currently seeing...
DEAR PRESIDENT TRUMP — Humbly I throw my hat (the one with the moose antlers, human eyeballs, spikes and barbed wire?) into the ring. I understand...
If someone told me when I was a scrawny, scared student at Placerita Junior High in the early 1960s that I’d grow up to become many things,...
One million B.C., coincidentally the same time to the minute Raquel Welch appeared as that shapely Neanderthal babe in the movie of the same name, I...
Much to my undying shame, I recently discovered I was not doing my part in being an American. Oh, I vote. And when I do, whether it’s for dog...
“Ow?” I have a dear doctor pal who has this intriguing habit of looking up not just the meaning of words, but their origins. It’s both...
This is not exactly a new idea of mine. I was a teen when it first hit me that what my riparian community desperately needed — besides shoes and...
Byron Wardlaw and I were close chums in high school, Hart, to be specific, Forever Home to The Mighty Indians and not those nuevo bird flu hawks...
I am miffed at yet another cherished American institution that has fallen by the wayside. I’m talking about the Chinese fortune cookie. My...
The other day I was trying to figure out if ever, in my lifetime, I had to sprint back into the house three times for things I had forgotten. I...
Dear City o’ SClarita City Council — Pals! I write today to beseech you to cease and desist in your search for a new planning commissioner. Why?...
My first run-in with war was when I was 5. I was playing in the living room and my handsome young father was in the overstuffed chair, reading the...
Once, I snapped at Ruth Newhall. In the newsroom. Strangest thing? I am here, alive, and able to talk about my death-inviting stupidity. It was...
I’ve grown fond of publicly writing the phrase, “as I begin to approach middle age.” It irritates many literal thinkers with sound math and...
Hardly a day goes by where I don’t think of my dad. One of the great gifts of my lifetime was being able to spend time with him his final […] The...
Today my column is about ugliness. When we bandy about the word, “ugly,” we’re not talking about You-Know-Who’s wife and what she actually...
I shan’t shed a tear over the Colorado Rockies 21-0 loss recently to San Diego. After all. The Padres were on a sugar high from getting a new pope....
DEAR STEVE GORDON, DIRECTOR, CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF MOTOR VEHICLES — I place my 10 little adept digits to keyboard this fine May morn, Steve, with...
Normally, being a male suppressor, or, as we used to call ourselves, “a guy,” I would not discuss belly dancing in public, certainly not with a...
My godson’s son’s birthday was last week. Riley turned 13 and those with kids know that years shrink to minutes when nostalgia raises its weepy...
DEAR KEVIN A. KLOCKENGA, CEO & MOST HIGH HOLY MUCKY-MUCK CEO OF HENRY MAYO NEWHALL HOSPITAL — First, Kevin, phew. I wish The Signal paid me by the...
DEAR MR. SANTA CLARITA VALLEY — I place digits to laptop to protest the current sorry state of local Santa Clarita Valley water, how it’s being...
JOHN BOSTON NATIONAL NEWS SERVICES — In a major upheaval of the three branches of federal government, a lone dog catcher in Santa Clarita, a yuppie...
So. I had an embarrassing moment the other day. I was lunching at Whole Foods, a dangerous proposition in itself. Sometimes, the buffet is a...
Funny how much I’ve been thinking about my dad lately. I used to keep my trophies at his acreage and, one day, we had a minor earthquake. Boxes fell...
I’d attach a kind estimate that 99% of the dear citizens of Santa Clarita know not a thing about that old, beige building on the northwest corner of...
My dad, dear, lovable angel of a person, Walt Cieplik, died crazy. There was a never a kinder man. The twin devils of Alzheimer’s and dementia took...
login
who are we?
contact us
qosheapp
