• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • HOME
  • ABOUT
  • BLOG
  • WRESTLING WITH GOD BOOK
  • CONTACT

Barbara Falconer Newhall

Veteran journalist Barbara Falconer Newhall riffs on life as she knows it.

  • A CASE OF THE HUMAN CONDITION
  • MY EVER-CHANGING FAMILY
  • WRITING & READING
  • MY ROCKY SPIRITUAL JOURNEY
  • WIDOWED
  • FUNNY BUTTON

A Case of the Human Condition

I’m Barbara Falconer Newhall and I’ve got an incurable Case of the Human Condition. And since you do too, I’m counting on you to laugh and cry along with me as I riff on life as we know it . . . Below you'll read about my creaky, old fifties house, my forays into home gardening, my shopping stories, my spectacularly low-fashion wardrobe -- and more.

Bouquets to Art at the de Young — Where Poppies Dance and Cactuses Are Petit Fours

March 20, 2013 By Barbara Falconer Newhall

bouquets to art -- a floral arrangment that looks like a cake. Photo by BF Newhall

It’s not too late to catch a bus – or a plane – and head out to San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park for the annual Bouquets to Art show at the de Young museum — including a flower arrangement that looks like a cake. It’s on till Saturday, March 23, 2013, but if you can’t make it to the real thing, here are some fun photos I took the first day.

Photo Op: It’s Blooming Springtime on Our Hill — In March

March 16, 2013 By Barbara Falconer Newhall

Varigated camelia blossom with foliage. Photo by BF Newhall

It’s spring in March and the daffodils are going strong on the local hillsides in the San Francisco Bay Area. So are the camelias, abutilons and iceland poppies in our front yard.

Real Snow in Minnesota . . . and Real Warm in My Real Austrian Walkjanker

February 8, 2013 By Barbara Falconer Newhall

Snowplow clearing snow in a snowstorm in Eden Prairie, MN. Photo 2013 by BF Newhall

 

My authentic Austrian Walkjanker jacket has hung forlornly at the far end of a plastic garment bag for decades. It had no place to go till my son got engaged to a Minnesota girl — and I had a chance to show it a good time on a snowy weekend in Minneapolis.

The Luscious Lip, Skinny Lip Quiz — And the Answers!

January 25, 2013 By Barbara Falconer Newhall

Oprah Winfrey's lips up close.

My Upper Lip and Other Sorrows

January 18, 2013 By Barbara Falconer Newhall

Lucille Ball with red lipstick and hair

I feel bad about my lip. My upper lip. Nora Ephron felt bad about her neck, a body part she made famous back in 2006 with her book I Feel Bad About My Neck. Nora also felt bad about her frizzy grey hair, parched skin, incipient mustache, flabby upper arms, and tendency toward belly fat. She was getting older.

 

Sue Johnson’s Lamps and Shades — Works of Art From a Little Shop in Berkeley

November 9, 2012 By Barbara Falconer Newhall

A hand-blown glass lamp by Lindsay Art Glass. Photo by BF Newhall

On Solano Avenue in the far north reaches of Berkeley, California, a modest storefront softly glows, luring me in every time I pass by. It’s Sue Johnson’s custom lamp and shade store.

Amazing Clay — More Wonderful Stuff from the Berkeley Art Center Show

October 3, 2012 By Barbara Falconer Newhall

Massive ceramic figure by Wanxin Zhang, "God Bless You." Photo by BF Newhall

Some more wonderful stuff made of clay by three artists featured in the show, "Local Treasures: Bay Area Ceramics," at the Berkeley Art Center through Nov. 18 — Wanxin Zhang, Ted Fullwood and Clayton Bailey. Read more.

  • « Go to Previous Page
  • Page 1
  • Interim pages omitted …
  • Page 36
  • Page 37
  • Page 38
  • Page 39
  • Page 40
  • Interim pages omitted …
  • Page 52
  • Go to Next Page »

Primary Sidebar

GET MY Riffs on Life BY EMAIL

True stories often told through a humorous lens–because you just can't make them up!

We respect your privacy and do not share your email with anyone.

 

LET’S CONNECT

ON THE FUNNY SIDE

Is That a Fibonacci Blooming in Our Yard?

Purple columbine blossoms in our rock garden in spring. A fibonacci number expressed. Photo by Barbara Newhall

Is ours a strictly mathematical universe? Are those columbines blossoming in our garden just a string of fibonacci numbers? Read more.

MORE "ON THE FUNNY SIDE"

CATEGORIES

  • A Case of the Human Condition
  • My Ever-Changing Family
  • On Writing & Reading
  • My Rocky Spiritual Journey

 
Need some levity? Push my Funny Button!

TO MY READERS

Please feel free to share links to my posts with one and all and to quote briefly from them in your own writing, remembering, of course, to attribute the quote to me and to provide a link back to this site.

My Oakland Tribune columns, btw, are reprinted by permission of the Trib. With the exception of review copies of books, I do not accept ads or freebies of any kind. Click on the "Contact" button if you have questions. Enjoy!

 

DON’T MISS!

moderna-vaccine-patient

I’ve Got Covid Arm. Good News? Sheltering at Home Week 48

Little girl with broken arm & chicken pox marks. Photo by BF Newhall

Help! My Kids Aren’t Perfect After All

white blossoms of flowering tree up close

Nature Giveth and Nature Taketh Away

Simeis 147, a faint supernova remnant with a tangle of filaments. NASA image.

The Somethingists — They Don’t Believe in God, but They Do Believe in . . . Something

MORE DON'T MISS!

© 2009–2026 Barbara Falconer Newhall All rights reserved. · Log in