Phil Dirkx

How many school days should there be in a school year: 180, 174, 172, or less or more?

I got good news this week, and so did everybody else who drives in Paso Robles. Our City Council voted Tuesday to award a contract for “refreshing” the striping on some streets.

Another “NO ON PROP 29” leaflet arrived this week in my mail. It was my second. Both are attractive with bright colors and lots of white space. Their pitch includes fretting that Proposition 29 conceals bad things in “fine print.” One leaflet mentions “4,515 words of fine print.”

Wally Ohles died Monday at age 73. I’m too late now to properly thank him.

Iggy and Cal are the two ghosts who haunt the Paso Robles Library/City Hall building. They bubbled up with the steaming sulfur water during the 2003 earthquake, which reawakened the long-dormant hot spring in the building’s parking lot.

Somehow, it made the world seem less friendly. I’m talking about the rule I read last week on the website of the San Luis Obispo County Airport. It said: “Handicapped patrons are not exempt from paying parking fees.”

I saw something new at San Luis Obispo County Regional Airport on Easter Sunday. Mamie and I drove down there to pick up our daughter, Sandy.

My computer sits by a window. Through it, I see a wedge-shaped view of our front yard. On a recent morning, the first thing I noticed out there was that the basin of our birdbath was knocked off its pedestal. It was sitting on edge, leaning against the pedestal.

In the 1870s, this part of California was several years from having a railroad. The Coast Line Stage Co. carried passengers up and down El Camino Real in good weather or bad. And if a stage coach got stuck navigating a hill or low spot, the passengers got out and pushed.

I was in a supermarket recently, having trouble finding my favorite margarine. I looked in the refrigerated display case but didn’t see my margarine’s familiar, bowl-shaped container. All the margarine containers I saw resembled overweight Dixie cups.