The Loop Newspaper - Tehachapi's Online Community News & Entertainment Guide

I had a total knee replacement in February and once again I am reminded that it takes a village to care for the single living-alone senior citizen (i.e. me) who has to have major surgery. I would real...

Mother's Day is right around the corner, which reminds me once again of how I lucked out as far as mothers go. Mine was really something special. I write this column about looking on the bright side o...

Wonderful little stories keep coming my way and I just keep wanting to share them with you. Here's one sent to me by a reader via email, a story with no author credited but with a very fine message:...

As the granddaughter of Josephine Larimer, who was, coincidently, born Josephine O'Neil on March 17, 1898 – and who loved a good ol' Irish birthday celebration for the whole month of March -- I just...

Picture this: Saturday morning, after a wild week at work, you and your sweetie shoveled snow (again); that afternoon you cleaned house and later in the evening you met up with a couple of other...

As I'm sitting here trying to write my column for this issue of The Loop, and instead fretting about my upcoming surgery and all the stuff I haven't gotten done in preparation for being laid up for a...

First Friday in March will be a special thank you to Dawn Callahan and Steve Headrick for all that they done to make Tehachapi Treasure Trove the success it is. They will be leaving us sometime in...

In one of the movie versions of "Robin Hood," our hero is told by a friend that he will know when he is really in love because he will be willing to die for the woman. Sure enough, later on in the...

Something about new beginnings and firsts have always delighted and fascinated me. Which is one of many reasons I always look forward to the New Year, every year. Jan. 1 signals a great time to start...

Just in case you need a little levity as you celebrate the Christmas holiday, here are a few Christmas giggles... and a few groaners: A small cute little boy regularly went to Sunday school where he l...

As a child, thanks to my mother’s never-ending desire to learn all about other peoples and other religions, I found out that while I was totally and enthusiastically (and sometimes single-mindedly)...

The other day a friend sent me an email with "questions that can't be answered" and some of them made me laugh out loud. Like the first one: Who was the first person to look at a cow and say, "I...

Every year around this time I like to write about enjoying dark and scary thoughts. It is Halloween time, after all, and I love the whole month being full of scary movies on TV and in the movie...

Here's another of those little gems, a story called "Shipwreck" with a great message: A voyaging ship was wrecked during a storm at sea and only two of the men on it were able to swim to a small,...

I was born into a Christian family and raised mostly in two non-controversial protestant denominations: Presbyterian and Methodist. Neither church was on the fringe, and I learned a lot of good stuff...

Time to share another one of those little stories that shows up every now and then on my computer screen (by that prolific writer known as "Author Unknown"). I especially loved this one the minute I r...

I was stressed and tired one night. Things were crazy at the store, my car was acting funny and I'd had a fight with a friend the night before. My dogs seemed particularly demanding that evening, and...

Anyone who knows me knows I don't really like to watch "reality" TV, with one exception: "Survivor" is my one guilty pleasure, as it has been for the past 20 years. I've tried other "reality" shows...

A friend and I were discussing politics the other day -- the good, the bad and the ugly. Too many issues, too many things going on, we agreed. How do we keep up with it all? How do we stay on top of...

This story I'm offering up today – actually a story and a little story within the story – is one of the favorite ones I've received lately. I don't know who wrote it (that "Author Unknown" is...

I admit it, I'm not real big on housework. I do it as little of it as possible. Okay, okay, really, I HATE HOUSEWORK! But houses need work, and every now and then I find I have to do some (more)...

Some years ago I shared a funny email with my mother titled "Things my mother taught me." She laughed as hard as I did because, after all, mothers are also daughters (my mother had the same sort of...

Usually I'm a pretty optimistic person, but sometimes I worry about things both big and small. Take world peace, for instance (a really big thing) – I sometimes worry that no matter how noble a...

I read somewhere that every time you learn something, your brain gets a new wrinkle in it, suggesting that the more wrinkles your brain has, the smarter you are. Sometimes I just don't want to waste...

It's St. Patrick's Day – the day when everyone is a little Irish. And why not? If this is a holiday that brings us closer to a feeling of togetherness and camaraderie through green colored...