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The Foolest Month, Celebrating Our Humanity

Open Mic

Mar 31, 2026

The Foolest Month, Celebrating Our Humanity

Given our publication date for this edition, I’ll admit I had some dastardly April Fool’s Day plans—like printing definitive proof that Petaluma Junior High is built on top of a portal to Hell and that my entire tenure in local media is a prolonged performance art piece by conceptual artist Kit Fergus.

And though I’m deep in the trickster hero phase of my professional aspirations, I couldn’t fathom publishing stories that could be perceived as a willful indulgence of “fake news.” That’s not to say I don’t think we all need a laugh right now, given the profound absurdity and horrors of our present moment. As they say, laughter is the best medicine so long as one doesn’t overdose.

Yes, laughter can kill. The most common way is through laughter-induced syncope, in which a person loses consciousness while laughing and then dies by some other means, i.e., falling, choking, or if they happen to be laughing at ICE.

A famous case from antiquity occurred to Chrysippus of Soli, the noted stoic philosopher active in Greece late in the second century BC, who spied a donkey eating some figs and joked that someone should give it some wine to wash them down. He found his own joke hilarious—guess you had to be there—then proceeded to laugh, until he was shot by ICE. So much for being “stoic.”

The fact that we have an April Fool’s Day at all betokens some hope for humanity. We are the only species on Earth that can laugh at itself, we’ve decided, which speaks to the humility of anthropocentrism as we steward this planet and all its living creatures into the apocalypse.

And though we only reserve one day a year to celebrate our foolishness with jokes and pranks predicated on deception (which we are sooo good at), the truth is many of us are fools every day of the year, if not every day of our lives. Today is the day we celebrate that commitment. It takes a lot of guts to say, “Get in the handbasket, loser, we’re going to hell.”

And for those of us who can’t, the least we can do is laugh about it. Crying about it will only contribute to sea level rise.

Daedalus Howell is editor of this paper, host of ‘The Drive’ on 95.5 FM, director of ‘Werewolf Serenade’ and a newsletterist at dhowell.com.

Roots in the Community: Dorrances Make a Difference

Food & Drink

Amber Turpin

Mar 31, 2026

Roots in the Community: Dorrances Make a Difference

Proprietors of BloodRoot Wines, Kelly and Noah Dorrance have been organizing an annual music and wine festival called The Ramble, as a fundraiser benefitting GIFFORDS, a national organization dedicated to preventing gun violence.

The partnership began as a way to honor the memory of their niece who was killed in the shooting at The Covenant School in Nashville. Since 2023, The Ramble has raised more than $250,000 for GIFFORDS.

“As hospitality junkies, we find fulfillment in creating joyful spaces where people can connect, celebrate and share in community. We created The Ramble to honor our niece Evelyn, transforming a painful moment into an experience that brings people together while supporting a vital mission… This is how we know to make a difference, through hospitality and the joy of community,” says Kelly Dorrance.

Tickets just went on sale for the fourth iteration of The Ramble, taking place on Saturday, June 6, at Abel de la Luna Community Center Fields in Healdsburg. The event will feature headline performances from award-winning musical artists Spoon and Lucius, plus many more nationally acclaimed musicians.

Expect a ton of local food vendors, the debut of a new culinary stage featuring local chefs doing interactive cooking demonstrations, as well as representatives from local wineries, including the Overshine Collective.

Amber Turpin: How did you get into this work?

Kelly Dorrance: A little bit of kismet, a little bit of passion and a lot of initiative. We assumed we would eventually move back to the Midwest and thought a try at the wine industry would be fun before we did so. That was 2008, and we’ve never looked back. Noah worked at a custom crush facility in San Francisco and made some wine on the side.

With collaboration from friends in the industry, Banshee Wines was formed. We then went on to form Reeve Wines (our son’s name), BloodRoot Wines and Remy Saves The Sea Wines (our daughter’s name).

Did you ever have an ‘aha’ moment with a certain beverage? If so, tell us about it.

Nothing quite beats an Aperol Spritz under the Italian sun. Sun in the glass, sun overhead—la dolce vita all around.

What is your favorite thing to drink at home?

Honestly, we do get high on our own supply, mostly Reeve Wines Pinot Noir of varying degrees.

Where do you like to go out for a drink?

So hard to choose. Madrona, Little Saint, Lo & Behold and Geyserville Gun Club are our favorite cocktail spots. Location depends on mood, and whether or not you want to be seen or hide in a dark corner.

If you were stuck on a desert island, what would you want to be drinking (besides fresh water)?

Emphatically—rosé. It needs to be light, bright, vibrant, which is typically a rosé of pinot noir or grenache.

BloodRoot Wines, 118 North St., Healdsburg, 707.387.7058, bloodrootwines.com.

Ring Thing, Seeing What We Want

Jeff Burkhart

Mar 24, 2026

As Charles Bukowski wrote in his novel Barfly, “It’s not that I don’t like people. I just feel better when they’re not around.”

But Bukowski was a bar customer, not a bartender. And we bartenders feel exactly the opposite.

The two women sitting in front of me were fairly well gussied up. In olden days, people dressed for dinner, but it’s much rarer to see that now. If someone is dressed for dinner, it usually means they have plans for after dinner, or even before.

Since it was slow, I struck up a conversation. And while Oscar Wilde famously said that men and women can’t be friends, it would be wise to consider who Oscar Wilde was, and why he said that.

The three of us chatted for a while. “What are you up to tonight? That sounds interesting. Are you from around here?” All the usual small talk.

But then we got around to flirting. Harmless friendly funny flirting. We were all in the same age bracket, so the same cultural references landed, the same musical artists were noted, and the same jokes registered.

It was all good harmless fun. They had on wedding rings. I had on a wedding ring. We all knew where we stood, and we could have fun with it. One of the great things about being a bartender is that bartenders are non-threatening, meaning that we are expected to engage with everybody.

Over the next year or so, I saw the two women several times. They were on their way to the concert, or they were just out for a hike.

But it was always good harmless fun.

When one reaches a certain age in life, one usually takes things a bit less seriously. However, also when one reaches a certain age, there are some things that one does have to take a little more seriously. And when one reaches a very particular age, one must take tests to see just how seriously.

Luckily, my doctor was funny, which certainly helped. I think he even asked me if I was “anal retentive.” He laughed, and I laughed. It was all good fun surrounding a relatively unfun procedure.

I made my appointment and went through all the steps. My wife supportively tagged along as my driver.

Then the nurse announced my name to the waiting room. She looked at me, and I looked at her. She was one of the two women.

“Is that your wife in the waiting room?” she asked in the hall.

“It is,” I said.

“I didn’t know you were married,” said she.

“Well, I am,” I said.

Which was followed by a rather uncomfortable silence broken only by a seemingly unnecessarily terse, “Change into this, and leave the back open.”

Ten minutes later when she came to collect me, I was painfully aware that I wasn’t wearing any pants. Which was only made more painful by what she said.

“I never noticed your wedding ring,” she said, her own wedding ring being as obvious as mine.

“I never take it off,” I said.

Not really the kind of conversation one wants to have standing in front of someone pantsless when one is going to be unconscious and pantsless in just a few minutes.

When I walked into the procedural room, my doctor noticed my discomfort and made a little joke.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ll be gentle.” Leaving me with these thoughts:

• It wasn’t the doctor I was worried about.

• Anal retentive describes a psychological state, not a physiological one.

• Jokes are only funny if both people think they are.

• A little harmless flirting can sometimes bite one on the rear end, metaphorically speaking, of course.

Jeff Burkhart is an award-winning writer and bartender.

Virtual Reality’s Role in ‘Marjorie Prime’ at 6th Street

Caitlin Strom-Martin

Mar 24, 2026

Virtual Reality’s Role in ‘Marjorie Prime’ at 6th Street

Quietly disquieting, spare and at times delicious in its ambiguity, Jordan Harrison’s subtle sci-fi play Marjorie Prime is anything but uninteresting.

It’s one to mull over afterwards, thinking about its themes of loss and mortality, and the inherent tragedies of family. Now running through March 29 on the Monroe Stage at 6th Street Playhouse in Santa Rosa, this is a play well worth one’s time.

Set in the near future and focused primarily on how humans replace their deceased loved ones with “Primes”—that is, holographic AI models of said loved ones—the story feels easily believable. Indeed, the sci-fi nods aren’t sensationalized; they are simply part of everyday life.

Director John Browning has a nice cast at work here. Actually, there are two: the “Saffron” cast (featuring Laura Jorgensen, Marty Pistone, Bronwen Shears and Amir Ghazi Moradi) and the “Seasons” cast, which includes a fantastic David L. Yen (does he ever miss?) as Jon and a deeply touching Tamar Cohn as Marjorie. Bohn Connor, as Marjorie’s Prime husband, Walter, is both kindly and a bit unsettling in his non-human mannerisms. Mary Samson, as the conflicted Tess, is a standout as well, and has a strong stage presence. In fact, all the cast members are very nuanced and grounded.

They float about the beautifully appointed set by Laurynn Malilay, often lounging on the floor and drinking tea, while sharing family stories (or their perceptions of stories) with Marjorie and her Prime, so that the 85-year-old dying woman won’t lose her precious memories. It’s sad and poignant, and Cohn is so moving that one wants to give her a hug. Her smallest mannerisms and sounds are wrenching, but Marjorie is a force of nature despite her diminishing state.

There are some pleasant surprises (for me at least; I’m never one to quickly guess the twists), and the play unfolds breathlessly until the finale, where silence takes hold and settles over the audience in a delightfully satisfying way that definitely doesn’t neatly tie up anything. I adore that the fraying edges of humanity, and the messiness of human relationships, are given their due in this play. It’s what makes live theater so very remarkable too, as we see the audience grappling with their questions in real time.

I hope many conversations were had on the journey home, because Marjorie Prime offers plenty of fodder for discussion.

‘Marjorie Prime’ runs through March 29 on the Monroe Stage at 6th Street Playhouse, 52 W. 6th Street, Santa Rosa. Thurs-Sat, 7:30pm; Sat & Sun, 2pm. $27–$48. 707.523.4185. 6thstreetplayhouse.com.

Roadside Attraction, a Braggadocious Billboard

Daedalus Howell

Mar 24, 2026

Roadside Attraction, a Braggadocious Billboard

I have been scaling my media biz. Like, literally. I am—for seven seconds in a rotating loop—a billboard. Or at least an image of my face is—and by face, I mean the one made for radio, and by radio, specifically The Drive 95.5 FM, which I host from 3 to 6pm, weekdays.

As a concept, the billboard predates the advent of the ever-shrinking American attention span. Ancient Egyptians carved public notices into stone—arguably the first “out-of-home media buy.” By the 1830s, ur–Mad Man Jared Bell was plastering New York City with oversized posters to hawk circus acts like Barnum & Bailey, thus inventing what we’d recognize as the modern billboard. These were large, loud and impossible to ignore. Which is to say: Not much has changed.

My particular incarnation, glowing over Rohnert Park in crisp LED glory, lasts roughly as long as a TikTok clip, but bigger. A lot bigger. It’s a sideways, 48-foot-wide by 14-foot-tall social media post. It’s what multinational ad and PR firm Publicis Groupe’s Rishad Tobaccowala calls “Instagram on steroids.” In my case, this tracks: The board gets 220,144 weekly impressions, while my actual Instagram posts seldom crack two.

I know these billboard numbers because the company that runs my particular “digital bulletin,” Veale Outdoor Advertising, has a promo page for the spot, complete with a spiffy drone video that pinpoints the location (101 near Golf Course Drive—Latitude 38.357514º, Longitude 122.712764º, if you’re feeling cartographic).

Lady Bird’s Law

Advertising legend David Ogilvy observed, “Billboards are like outdoor theater; they speak to the world in a language of visuals.” Sure. But at 70 miles per hour, you’re covering roughly 100 feet per second, which means you have about 700 feet to enjoy my shit-eating grin before I’m replaced by personal injury attorneys and casino buffets.

Still, as Warren Buffett said, “I like billboards. They’re a terrific business; people see them whether they want to or not.”

This inevitability is perhaps why First Lady Lady Bird Johnson championed the Highway Beautification Act of 1965—“Lady Bird’s Law”—which imposed limits on billboard size, lighting and spacing along federally funded highways. North Bay locals will note a similar impulse closer to home: Marin County has no billboards, thanks to Sepha Evers and the Marin Conservation League, who in 1935 pushed for Ordinance 226 restricting signage within 500 feet of the highway.

In the grand tradition of circus posters and personal branding writ large (looking at you, Angelyne), I have joined the skyline. Not permanently, not even reliably—but enough to say I was there.

Seven seconds at a time.

Subscribe to Daedalus Howell at dhowell.com.

Painter Anna Simson and Slough City Studios Baffle and Uplift

Michael Giotis

Mar 24, 2026

Painter Anna Simson and Slough City Studios Baffle and Uplift

The thing that makes art different from other economy-driving activities is that it is free to bare its teeth and snap at those who consume it.

Art can be beautiful, inspiring, motivating, encouraging, discouraging—really anything a creator wants it to be. Just as often, it has an effect the artist did not plan.

Local painter Anna Simson’s current exhibition at Petaluma’s artistic haven Slough City Studios calls viewers in this way, at least those who do not scamper away with their tails between their legs. The walls of the gallery sport an array of dark, mysterious works which are so light and direct in their composition that the room absolutely flutters with them.

The abstract/figurative paintings, mixing pencil, gouache, acrylics and more, mostly on paper, some on canvas, form color-hints more than bold, declarative strokes.

There are a few critiques happening at the same time through the work, each of them humorous while cutting to the bone … or withering man flesh, as in the rendering of a series of male nudes in a row, reminiscent of the familiar repeated image of evolution from ape to man, each penis more sad and erect than the last. Title? “Not Yours, Motherf***ers.”

“The work to me doesn’t come from a linear, rational place of critique,” said Simson after the opening. “I’m not coming at it and saying, I’m gonna make a critique of patriarchy or power.”

Instead she allows “whatever comes out … to just be.”

The busy cluster of paintings in the exhibit bewilders at first, then rewards further reflection. Take a group of paintings which recall smooth, nonfigurative design art of the ’80s, but torn through the middle with jagged edges, like splinters.

Upon closer inspection, the images reveal themselves to be repeated renderings of “Falling through a Floor, #1–4.” Taken with thoughts of motherhood conjured by the show’s title—On Motherhood in a Time of Monsters—one feels the horror of parenthood looking at that gap, the obsession of a mom on safety.

“All of those stories are just in me, and then I’m letting them be when I’m making them. I don’t have any of it scripted,” said Simson when I asked her about the apparent yet allusive characters and narratives.

Slough City Studios has become an uplifting destination for the lonely hearted artists among us.

“At its heart, Slough City is a safe space for people to come express themselves and share what they’re passionate about,” said Slough City co-founder Ani Bonani.

“I see what they’re trying to cultivate,” reflected Simson with a glint of admiration. “They’re on target; they’re kind. They’re courteous; they’re professional.”

Simson began working on these paintings right about when things went sideways in 2016. Ten years in the making, it is a show that feels up to the challenge of the times, while not exactly being oppositional.

“I think the moment is about trying to be authentic and be real,” said Simson. “The work is not organizing work, and I fully own that and actually value that about it. I feel like it’s an offering. It’s something that I make that is coming from a real place.”

“Art is essential to the health of humanity,” added Bonani. “Anna’s work is a great example of this. On Motherhood in a Time of Monsters is such a powerful show and really speaks to the turbulent times we’re living in.”

The stories, the essence of what she seeks to allow to BE, the work itself is a continual call to the artist.

“The next paintings are in my studio,” said Simson, “and they’re sitting there, like, ‘OK, what are you gonna do? What’s your next move?’”

Anna Simson’s exhibit, ‘On Motherhood in a Time of Monsters,’ runs through Saturday, March 28 at Slough City Studios, 409 Petaluma Blvd. S, Suite C, Petaluma.