“Not me,” SRJC study abroad student Leo Galbraith said when asked if he was feeling homesick. “Maybe soon, but I’m still a little enamored by everything, and California’s great, but not quite ready to go back yet.”

SRJC student Ava Sigala shared a similar sentiment, though she noted she misses smaller comforts like a full closet and a dryer.

“I don’t feel that homesick, honestly,” Sigala said. “Even when my family was here, I didn’t feel like I needed to be home right now with them. It’s never been like, ‘I really am sick and tired of this.’”

SRJC student Jack Johnson was surprised by his lack of homesickness. 

“I definitely thought I would be a little bit in the beginning. I was just waiting for it to hit me, but it never really happened,” Johnson said.

Study abroad students have also settled comfortably into day-to-day life in Florence, even in spite of initial anxiety or a general rejection of routines.

“I was scared of what my routine was going to be like here or how long it was going to take for me to get that routine,” Johnson said. “But it came pretty quick and I had no issues.”

Despite claiming to be “not really a routine guy,” Galbraith confessed to going to the same sandwich spot every day. 

“Lo Schiacciavino, never a line. Delicious, about seven or eight euros, unbelievable sandwich for that price,” Galbraith said.

His go-to is the Oh Mama sandwich, which has cured ham, a pesto tomato sauce and pecorino cheese on schiacciata bread. 

Florence’s location at the northern edge of central Italy, along with the European Union’s expansive rail network and relatively affordable price of short-distance flights, gives study abroad students an excellent opportunity to travel during their semester, both domestically and internationally.

Johnson has traveled to Switzerland by train and to Greece and Croatia by plane through Ryanair. Despite mentioning some initial anxiety with traveling in Europe, he said, “Once you get the hang of it, it’s pretty easy.” 

Johnson continued, “This trip has given me a lot more confidence to do things on my own.”

Other students, like Sigala and Galbraith, have decided to focus primarily on traveling within Italy.“I think I was panicking a lot at the start and being like, ‘I have to go to every country in Europe,’” Sigala said. “I came down from that feeling and I’m trying to soak up as much of Italy as possible.”

In addition to venturing directly north of Italy’s border into Austria, Galbraith has visited Venice and Capri, which he strongly recommends.

Study abroad students universally struggled picking up the Italian language, ironically citing the widespread use of English in Italy as a barrier.

“I came here thinking I would, and I’m a little disappointed I didn’t,” Galbraith said. “I think the fact that everyone kind of speaks English has been a crutch for me, so I haven’t felt forced to.”

“It’s a little challenging when you live in such a touristy area,” Sigala said. “Every time I attempt, I’m being spoken to in English back.”

As the semester approached its end, study abroad students evaluated their relationship with the city and country they had lived in for the past three months. Some, like Johnson and Galbraith see this as only their first visit of many, while others are leaving Florence with a more general taste for travel.

“For Florence, probably not for a long time,” Sigala said. “I kind of want to just do other regions in Italy or countries in Europe at this point.”

Students seemed satisfied with their classes in Italy, particularly since the workload did not detract too much from their free time in Italy.

Students adjusted to life in Italy and left Florence with a greater sense of confidence and appreciation for their faculty. Students were required to take at least one class with their home school and students often mingled with faculty during program trips or events. Some students found a greater appreciation for their faculty during their semester abroad compared to back home. 

 “Shoutout Laura Sparks, SRJC,” Sigala said.

The next adventure SRJC students can take will be to London in Fall 2026. Beyond that, students can reach Barcelona, Spain and Kyoto, Japan in the coming semesters.

The post Florentine Reflections: SRJC study abroad students reminisce after homecoming appeared first on The Oak Leaf.

Now comes the hard part. Not because the ideas themselves are impossibly complicated, but because the system we live inside is so sprawling, so normalized, that imagining an alternative requires explaining several moving parts at once. Currency. Markets. Lending. Governance. Social networks. Incentives. Most people think of these as separate systems because that is how they are presented to us. I no longer believe they are, whether we like it or not. 

Rather than concentrating power and extracting value upward toward the same narrow set of institutional interests, the technology now exists to reconnect many of these functions into a decentralized system that aligns individual incentives with collective resilience. 

One that preserves competition and innovation, but reduces the degree to which survival itself is held hostage by centralized gatekeepers, monopolies, and artificial scarcity.

In this article, I’m going to attempt something ambitious: explain a framework that could merge the key components of our economy into a single decentralized economic architecture — one capable not merely of protesting the current system, but of making most of it obsolete. 

Getting to the CORE

Any system wishing to challenge the status quo would need to replace the store of value, currency, the means of transaction, resource allocation itself, and the marketplace through which people exchange information, goods, labor and attention. And it would need to do so in a way that is more efficient, more convenient, and above all, more trustworthy.

This system I call the Compartmentalized Organic Regenerative Economy, or COREconomy. 

The basis of the COREconomy is a digital currency I call Symbiosis Token, or Symtoken.

Unlike most cryptocurrencies, Symtoken is not designed as a speculative asset to be gambled on. Its value would instead be tied to tangible assets and economic activity within the system itself. Think less “digital gold rush,” more digital infrastructure.

Technically, it would be built using Holochain — an alternative to blockchain designed to perform many of the same functions with a fraction of the energy consumption. More importantly, it allows money to carry instructions alongside value through the use of smart contracts: automated agreements that execute themselves when certain conditions are met, as discussed last time.

To understand how the COREconomy functions, it helps to unpack the name itself. First in general, then we’ll take a closer look at each part.

“Compartmentalized” because it would consist of many interconnected platforms, each serving a different function, community, or sector of the economy at different scales — from a single business or school district to an entire town or industry. Since I love a good acronym, these I call Decentralized Regenerative Industry Platforms, or DRIPs.

“Organic” because the platforms operate on DAO governance methodology and, though compartmentalized, they complement and support one another like organs in an organism.

“Regenerative” because the system would sustain and repair itself through transaction fees that fund infrastructure, operations, and the inevitable inefficiencies and losses present in any economic system.

“Economy” is not an overstatement. Though it could coexist alongside legacy financial systems and future alternatives alike, the COREconomy is designed as a complete economic ecosystem capable of standing on its own.

Deep Dive: The Decimal Economy

DRIPs are easier to imagine than they might first appear because most people already use fragmented versions of them every day — social media platforms, payment apps, marketplaces, gig work platforms, crowdfunding sites — each owned separately, each extracting value at every interaction.

Imagine instead a social network where your profile exists inside a digital wallet, and your data travels with you rather than belonging to the platform. If you leave one DRIP for another, your profile, reputation, contacts, and audience come too. They belong to you because you paid for the currency on which they are stored. It’s a tiny amount, but it’s real and it’s yours.

This is where the extreme divisibility of digital currency becomes important. Bitcoin, for example, can already be divided into eight decimal places, allowing transactions worth fractions of a cent. Symtoken could be designed to divide far further still in order to facilitate economic activity at radically different scales.

For the sake of illustration, imagine a Symtoken divided into thirty decimal places:

SYM1.0000000000,0000000000,0000000000

The first range of decimals could represent ordinary commercial activity between buyers and sellers. The second could facilitate microtransactions — advertisements paying users directly for attention, artists receiving royalties directly, or AI queries compensating people for access to their data. The third could handle nanotransactions attached to social activity itself: posting content, commenting, tagging, liking and sharing. 

At first glance, this may sound absurdly granular. But so is the modern economy. Every click, scroll, interaction, and conversation already generates value. The difference is that, under the current model, most of that value is extracted invisibly by centralized platforms and financial intermediaries.

The COREconomy simply makes those flows visible, transferable, and owned by the people generating them.

Over time, what emerges is something more profound than a payment system. The boundaries between marketplace, communications platform, labor network, and financial infrastructure begin to dissolve into one integrated economic environment. A system in which value increasingly reflects meaning — not in the sentimental sense, but in the cybernetic one. Meaning measured as attention, utility, trust, labor, creativity, reputation, and exchange inside a living network of human activity.

The First DRIP

To understand where DRIPs would fit into everyday life, let’s place one into context.

To plant the seed of the network, the first DRIP we would build serves the health sector — broadly defined as everything from nutrition and fitness to hygiene, medicine, insurance and patient care. If there is any part of the economy that should operate around long-term human wellbeing rather than pure extraction, most people would agree it is this one. I call this DRIP Symto.

Symto begins to make sense the moment you realize how many disconnected platforms already mediate your health. One app tracks your workouts. Another plans your meals. Another stores your medical records. Another handles insurance. Another books appointments. Another processes payments. Another monetizes health content and communities.

Symto would collapse many of those functions into one interoperable ecosystem. It could be where you follow health creators and wellness communities, where you message your massage therapist, schedule a dental checkup, track your nutrition, store your medical records, pay your insurance, and purchase groceries through integrated point-of-sale systems.

Every interaction inside the network — commercial, informational, or social — contributes to the economic activity underpinning it.

More importantly, the technology stack that enables Symto could then be adapted and reskinned for other sectors entirely. Education. Agriculture. Housing. Manufacturing. Logistics. Local governance. 

In this sense, Symto is the prototype organ from which a much larger economic organism could grow, each layer contributing to the maintenance and strengthening of the shared infrastructure beneath it.

At this point, the COREconomy should sound like an attempt to stitch large parts of modern economic life back together. That is essentially the idea. Today, our identities, communities, marketplaces, conversations, and transactions are scattered across disconnected systems owned by institutions extracting value at every layer. DRIPs attempt to reconnect those pieces into networks that users themselves can partially own and help govern.

Priming the pump

By now you may understand how value moves through the system, but an obvious question remains: where does that value originate in the first place? 

The answer is simple: value enters the system whenever people or businesses purchase Symtokens in order to participate in the network — whether to open an account, advertise, process transactions, access services, or conduct trade through a DRIP.

Symtoken is a stablecoin, meaning its value is backed by tangible assets rather than existing purely as speculation. In this case, that backing would come from the currency used to purchase the tokens themselves, held in reserve through non-profit credit unions.

This choice is intentional. Credit unions were originally created as community-based alternatives to centralized commercial banks. Many have since been swallowed by the same consolidating forces affecting the rest of the economy, but some still survive. Serving as custodians of the collateral reserves behind DRIPs could give them renewed relevance and resilient new income streams.

At launch, the first Symtoken might be sold for $1, with that dollar placed into the reserve pool as collateral backing the token. The buyer would also pay a small transaction fee — let’s say 2%. Half of that fee could fund maintenance and development of the network itself, while the other half would remain in the reserve pool.

That means the first token sold would not merely be backed by the original dollar used to purchase it, but by slightly more. If the next person then purchased a Symtoken, they would buy in at the new collateral value of the network, further increasing the reserve pool through the same mechanism.

In this way, the system attempts to reward participation rather than speculation. Symtokens are not designed to be traded on open secondary markets. They function more like access points into an economic network whose reserves strengthen as productive activity inside the system grows.

When users leave the network and redeem their Symtokens, they also pay the fee, further adding to the pool, and the tokens themselves are removed from circulation until purchased again. The goal is to create a system where value remains tied primarily to participation, utility, and economic activity within the network itself, rather than external speculation detached from its real-world function.

Macro-Organism

As the reserve pool behind the network grows, so does its ability to perform one of the most important functions in any economy: allocating resources. In our current system, this role is dominated largely by debt issued through centralized financial institutions charging interest for access to capital. The COREconomy proposes another possibility.

Because the reserve pool itself functions as collateral, a portion of it could be lent out without undermining the value backing Symtoken. The loans themselves become productive assets inside the system. Since transaction fees flowing through the network help absorb losses over time, those loans could potentially be issued at little or no interest.

Deciding how much of the reserve pool should be lent, how much risk should be tolerated, and what percentage of fees should go toward growth versus maintenance are all examples of where DAO governance enters the picture.

Every user would have access to the same governance panel within their account. There, they could vote directly on questions affecting the operation of the network itself. What should transaction fees be? How much of the reserve pool should be allocated toward lending? How aggressively should the system pursue growth versus stability?

Loan applicants, meanwhile, would first need to secure a portion of the requested amount through direct pledges from other users inside the network. The Symtokens pledged as backing would remain temporarily frozen until repayment gradually released them. In effect, the community itself would act as an initial layer of trust verification before larger network resources were allocated.

Beyond that point, AI systems could assist in identifying where resources are most needed by analyzing the broader patterns of activity and conversation occurring across the platform. Not to replace human judgment, but to scale it. Humans establish the rules, set the priorities, and provide the initial signals of trust. The machine simply helps process more information than any centralized institution realistically can.

Over time, the consequences of collective decision-making would become visible in the health of the network itself. Too little risk, and innovation stagnates. Too much recklessness, and growth slows beneath bad debt and poor decisions. Neglect maintenance, and infrastructure decays. Like any living system, balance matters.

If successful, such a model could eventually extend beyond lending into other forms of resource allocation entirely. Aid. Insurance. Emergency assistance. Public benefits.

Economist Friedrich Hayek famously described what he called “the knowledge problem,” the difficulty centralized institutions face in gathering and reacting to the constantly changing needs of millions of people in real time. By the time a bureaucracy identifies a problem, formulates a policy, distributes funds, and implements a response, chances are conditions on the ground have already changed.

A sufficiently integrated DRIP could respond far more organically. Imagine someone unable to afford groceries. Instead of navigating a maze of applications, approvals, and delayed assistance checks, the network itself could recognize eligibility conditions established collectively by its users and quietly subsidize the purchase at the point of sale.

I cannot verify that a system like this would generate enough growth to sustain such models at scale. But the possibility emerges naturally from a network in which economic activity, governance, and resource allocation are integrated into the same underlying infrastructure. The more effectively the system serves human needs, the more valuable participation in the network itself potentially becomes.

None of this removes the possibility of failure, corruption, bad incentives, or poor governance. But in a decentralized world, such failures can be distributed, transparent, and corrigible rather than concentrated and systemic.

Better the devil you know

I am painfully aware of the reputation cryptocurrencies and artificial intelligence currently carry, and here I am proposing a system that incorporates both. Fair enough. Much of what the public associates with these technologies — scams, speculation, surveillance, manipulation, extraction — has been earned.

But these technologies are not waiting for public approval. They are already being integrated into the foundations of finance, media, advertising, logistics, and governance. Hedge funds already use AI-driven sentiment analysis to model and influence behavior at a massive scale. Major financial institutions are actively exploring tokenized assets, digital currencies, and blockchain-based settlement systems.

The question is no longer whether these tools will shape the future of our economy. The question is who builds the systems they will operate inside, who owns them, and to whose benefit they ultimately function.

If decentralized technologies are left entirely in the hands of centralized power, we should not expect decentralization as the outcome. We should expect the opposite: increasingly sophisticated systems of extraction, surveillance, and behavioral control operating behind interfaces designed to feel frictionless and inevitable.

But there remains another possibility. That these same tools could instead be used to distribute ownership more widely, coordinate resources more intelligently, reduce institutional overhead, and return a greater share of economic sovereignty to the people participating in the system itself.

Whether that possibility is realistic remains to be seen. But if we intend to shape the systems that will increasingly shape us, we should probably begin while we still can.

Next time, we’ll get into the plan to make it happen.

The post Fractal Harmonics – Part 4: The Proposal appeared first on The Oak Leaf.

While studying abroad in Florence for the past three months, I have had the privilege of familiarizing myself with a rich and distinct culture of street art that imbues the city with a wholly unique charm. Although tasteless scribbles and lazy tags are found throughout every city, a community of talented and prolific artists has elevated illegal graffiti into an artistic movement central to Florence’s experience.

By far the defining member of Florence’s graffiti community is a group of artists known as the 639 Crew, named after the Italian penal code that forbids defacement, disfigurement or dirtying of public or private property. Or in other words, it criminalizes graffiti. The stylized numbers 639 are everywhere in Florence. This tagline can be found prominently displayed on walls, shutter rollers of closed businesses, trucks and public transport – anything really.

The sheer abundance of this collective’s work reveals an irony that speaks volumes about this side of Florence’s street culture. That is, the 639 penal code is obviously not enforced. Some might call it senseless or silly, but I find it endearing. These guys just love to rebel.

However, the political edge doesn’t end there. Symbols of the left are visible on every block, with the hammer and sickle, anarchist A, circle and lightning bolt arrow representing squatter’s rights, and “Free Palestine” or “Palestina Libera” making up the bulk of these symbols and slogans. 

A standout piece of Florentine radical graffiti displays ANTIFA printed in all capital letters, along with the red and black flags of the movement, on a column of one of the Arno bridges. How the artist managed to get down there still puzzles me, but my best guess would be that they rappelled down during the night.

Not all Florentine graffiti is overtly political. The image of particular stylized cats and fish can be found all throughout Florence, but they are most prominently featured in a mural on Via Degli Alfani, affectionately referred to as “the fish wall” by other study abroad students.

Clet Abraham, a French national who has made his home in Florence, is another street artist whose work contributes to the city’s charm. He primarily works with street signs, adding to the existing minimal symbols to make humorous or satirical comments. This piece of his using a 3-way intersection sign to depict a crucifixion is a favorite of mine. Unlike the other artists mentioned, Abraham is not anonymous and more of his work can be viewed on his instagram @cletabraham.

I’m sure to some, the street art of Florence may come across as an offensive affront to the beautiful and historic city, but to me it is part of what makes it special. Unlike some other historic Italian cities, Florence is not a UNESCO World Heritage Site bound to unchanging preservation. It is a vibrant living city whose graffiti scene carries on the rich artistic tradition it has fostered since the Renaissance. 

If you ever have the privilege of visiting Florence, don’t just visit the Uffizi Gallery; keep an eye on the street.

The post Florence’s underground art: Graffiti appeared first on The Oak Leaf.

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Republican Steve Hilton, the former Fox News commentator, has advanced to the November election against Democrat Xavier Becerra.

In a statement from Tom Steyer, he urged voter to unite around Becerra, “It would be a travesty for Steve Hilton to win the governorship, and Californians must unite behind Xavier Becerra to ensure he does not.”

Steyer was also proud of the race he ran, “We forced Chevron, PG&E, Meta, and so many others out of hiding. We forced them to show who and what they have always stood for. We challenged the greed and cowardice that allow them to raise costs, suppress wages, pollute communities and treat workers as disposable.”

The last day to register to vote for the General Election is Oct. 19.

The statewide General Election will take place on Nov. 3.

3 p.m. Sunday, June 7

Former United States Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra will advance to the November election, according to AP. Republican candidate Steve Hilton is in second, with Democrat Tom Steyer trailing in third.

The race is too close to call on who will advance against Becerra.

6 p.m. Wednesday, June 3

Governor of California

With all statewide precincts partially reporting results, Republican candidate Steve Hilton continues to lead in the jungle primary, currently sitting at 27.6%, with Democrat Xavier Becerra at 25.6%. Democrat Tom Steyer is still in third at 19.8%. with over 55.8% of expected votes in, over 4 million votes are still to be counted.

Congressional races

CA District 2

Democrat Jared Huffman will advance to the November election, it is currently too close to call who he will be running against.

CA District 4

Democrat Mike Thompson will advance to the November election, with fellow Democrat Eric Jones looming in second.

CA District 11

The November match up for Speaker Emeritus Nancy Pelosi’s seat is set. Democrat Scott Weiner will face fellow Democrat Connie Chan.

10:30 p.m. Tuesday

Governor of California

With 73.5% of statewide precincts partially reporting, Republican Steve Hilton leads with 26.8%, followed by Xavier Becerra with 25.8% and Tom Steyer with 19.7%. 

At Steyer’s campaign watch party, the mood within the ballroom remained optimistic despite the room thinning out a bit, with Steyer walking around and thanking his supporters with a collection of hugs, handshakes and photos. 

Congressional races

CA District 2

With 75% of precincts partially reporting in Sonoma County, Democrat Jared Huffman maintains his lead with 52.1% of the vote, with Republican Robin Littau still in a distant second with 11.9%, according to the California Secretary of State election results website. 

CA District 4

With 86.1% of precincts partially reporting in Sonoma County, Democrat Mike Thompson preserves his lead with 39.2% of the vote over Republican Ray Riehle with 22.8%, and Democrat Eric Jones with 21.3%, according to the California Secretary of State election results website.

CA District 11

With 30.9% of precincts partially reporting in San Francisco, Scott Wiener leads with 42.7%, followed by Connie Chan with 28.2% and Saikat Chakrabarti with 14.1%, according to the California Secretary of State election results website.

10 p.m. Tuesday

Governor of California

With 55.8% of statewide precincts partially reporting, Republican Steve Hilton leads with 26.7%, followed by Xavier Becerra with 25.9% and Tom Steyer with 19.7%. 

At Steyer’s campaign watch party, he remained optimistic about his chances while addressing hundreds of enthusiastic supporters at the Regency Ballroom in San Francisco. 

“People in communities along the coast, and in the valley, and in the foothills, and everywhere I went, I heard the same thing,” he said. “People are fed up. They know what’s happening, they see it with their own eyes, they know who the villains are, they know they deserve better, and they’re willing to fight with everything they have to win it.”

Steyer took a defiant tone for much of his speech. “We’ve done the hard work, and we did it together. Together, we put the corporations on notice,” he said, noting that corporations had donated a collective $55 million to oppose his campaign. “Together, we demand more and better for the best state of them all. And now, we just have to be patient.” 

Gallery • 6 Photos

Nick Vides

Gubernatorial candidate Tom Steyer addresses a crowd of supporters at his primary election night watch party at the Regency Ballroom on Tuesday, June 2, 2026 in San Francisco, Calif. (Nicholas Vides / For The Oak Leaf News)

Congressional races

CA District 2

With 69.4% of precincts partially reporting in Sonoma County, Democrat Jared Huffman continues to lead with 52.3% of the vote, with Republican Robin Littau in a distant second with 11.9%, according to the California Secretary of State election results website. 

CA District 4

With 84.8% of precincts partially reporting in Sonoma County, Democrat Mike Thompson leads with 39.2% of the vote over Republican Ray Riehle with 22.8%, and Democrat Eric Jones with 21.3%, according to the California Secretary of State election results website.

CA District 11

As of 9:45 p.m., no precincts have reported in San Francisco, according to the California Secretary of State election results website. Multiple outlets, including NBC and CNN, have called the race for Scott Wiener to advance to the general election, while Connie Chan leads Saikat Chakrabarti for the second spot. 

9 p.m. Tuesday

Governor of California

Early ballot returns show Xavier Becerra leading the governor’s race with 25.8%, followed by Steve Hilton with 26.2% and Tom Steyer with 20%, with 33.7% of statewide precincts partially reporting, according to the California Secretary of State election results website. 

Although the initial results have been underwhelming for Steyer, his campaign isn’t worried early into the night. “We know that a lot of the early deciders, people who handed in their ballots early, are going to be disproportionately Republican. So, when you see the first tranche of ballots that are going to be released between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m., we expect the Republican numbers to be higher than they will end up,” said Anthony York, a senior advisor for Steyer’s campaign. 

San Jose Mayor Matt Mahon and former Speaker of the California State Assembly Antonio Villaraigosa have conceded their gubernatorial races.

Congressional races

CA District 2

With 34.3% of precincts partially reporting in Sonoma County, incumbent Rep. Jared Huffman holds a commendable lead with 62.3%; no other candidate is within immediate reach, according to the California Secretary of State election results website. 

CA District 4

With 59.1% of precincts partially reporting in Sonoma County, incumbent Rep. Mike Thompson leads with 41.2% over Republican Ray Riehle at 22.8%, and Jones with 20.9%, according to the California Secretary of State election results website.

CA District 11

As of 9 p.m., no precincts have reported in San Francisco, according to the California election results website. 

Gallery • 3 Photos

Nick Vides

Kat Taylor, middle, converses with guests at Tom Steyer's primary election night watch party at the Regency Ballroom on Tuesday, June 2, 2026 in San Francisco, Calif. (Nicholas Vides / For The Oak Leaf News)

8p.m. Tuesday, June 2

Governor of California

For several months, more than 60 candidates have battled to replace term-limited California Gov. Gavin Newsom, with former United States Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra, billionaire and philanthropist Tom Steyer and conservative political commentator Steve Hilton becoming the frontrunners in the days before the primary election. Due to California’s nonpartisan primary system, the two candidates with the most votes, regardless of political party, will advance to November’s election.  

Congressional Races

CA District 2

Democratic incumbent Rep. Jared Huffman is facing a primary challenge from Republican Robin Littau and Independent Nicolette Hahn Niman.

CA District 4

Democratic incumbent Rep. Mike Thompson faces progressive challenger and longshot Eric Jones. Thompson, a 14-term juggernaut in Congress, is relying on his steadfast approach to opposing the current White House administration and his track record of securing relief for farm workers and residents in his district during natural disasters. Thompson also sits on the powerful Ways and Means Committee, the oldest tax-writing body in Congress. 

Jones, a self-described progressive, hopes to bring new blood into Congress and is focusing his campaign on family care and ending corruption in Congress.

CA District 11

In San Francisco, the congressional seat held by former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is up for grabs, with California State Senator Scott Wiener, San Francisco Supervisor Connie Chan and Saikat Chakrabarti, the former chief of staff for Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, contending for the position. Despite being the frontrunner throughout the primary, Wiener did not receive Pelosi’s endorsement, while Chan did from the retiring congresswoman. 

The post Hilton advances to November election against Becerra appeared first on The Oak Leaf.

Yet overlanders seem to believe that any excuse to modify a car and take it off the paved road is a good one. And it’s hard to disagree when so much natural beauty is locked behind a little bit of ground clearance. Amazon, Temu and TikTok Shop all hound you with deals for parts that cost as much as snacks. It was more than my psyche could bear. I had to cash in.

There are countless guides on the internet for recovering yourself if you get stuck off-roading. A core part of this hobby is making a major mistake and fixing it right then and there in the middle of nowhere (provided you spent the loot on the solution beforehand and bolted it to your vehicle.) Whether you have a hi-lift jack, a bottle jack, a winch, traction boards or a friend, there is a way to get home.

To that I say one word: Boring.

If everyone is making the same content – the same guide – then nobody stands out. Where’s the intrigue in getting home safe?

With this in mind, last semester I set out in my RWD 2010 Ford Explorer XLT to make the ubiquitous guide on how to get stuck off road. I had everything I needed. No 4WD.  No lockable hubs or differential to speak of. No jack, save for the one from the factory. No winch. Radial tires.

My only recovery gear was Amazon traction boards tacked on to my roof rack and my friend, Finn, who I dragged into my shenanigans. No other vehicle joined us. The stage was set to get stuck – add in an atmospheric river and one whole hour of past off-roading experience, and we were set.

At first, it seemed like I would have no material to write about. The first open “trail” we found was the parking lot for a hiking trail. While rocky, it was no issue for my rig and it gave us an inflated sense of confidence for what came next.

We then turned down another offshoot from Highway 166 and met what should have been our first clue to turn around: cows! We, unknowingly, had turned onto private property – not an outdoor recreation area as we’d thought. We did light mudding: another boost to our confidence. The first time we bogged down, careful throttle application and the rear traction control clawed us out.

Little did we know, that was magic – more of a fluke than a baseline. Back on the paved road, we noticed another offshoot. “One more?” “Yeahhhhhhhh.” A fatal error of hubris. Amongst the list of famous last words, nestled between “Are you recording?” and “Let’s get Buzzballs!” is “Just one more.”

Sometimes in life you make a decision because you feel like it’s what you have to do, not because it’s what you want to do. During this misadventure, I was attending Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo. This was the lone CSU that had accepted me, and rather than rot in Santa Rosa for another who-knows-how-long, I figured I’d better buckle down and chase that degree. What I failed to account for was that I, personally, had to be alive and present to finish that degree. I didn’t just get to blow through it in a fugue state, but rather had to viscerally experience each and every day.

I lived alone in a studio apartment. It was sunny every day. The ocean was a 30-minute drive away. The school had thriving business, engineering and agriculture programs. Frats practically ruled the city. At all times of the

It simply was not my scene. That alone nagged me to no end. I attended to a school that I had been (inexplicably) wary of since middle school and I saw it through because, in my mind, I had no good reason to deny it. In fact, I owed this institution my attendance because they had the good grace to accept me. Imagine the prestige.

Yet I found no matter how many organizations I joined, how much intramural softball I played, how many hours I spent loafing in the radio studio: I felt awful. I could barely leave my bed by Thanksgiving break.

The truth is that you don’t owe any university anything. Intrapersonal relationships with instructors, classmates, family, friends, your community: these things are forever. These are lasting. The nameless and faceless institutions that seek to control us are owed nothing. A nation-state, a university, a church. Anything with massive sums of money attached to making its gears turn has a corrupt core. I debased and depressed myself at the altar of expectation like an ascetic monk in hopes that deliberate suffering would somehow free me. It didn’t. Much like my stupid car, I was stuck in the mud, and the rain was only coming harder.

We goosed it as hard as we could up a dirt road towards, unbeknownst to us, a locked gate. We never saw that gate because we barely got halfway up the road. Our speed ensured that we buried the boat in mud, beaching ourselves on the air dam, splash guard and the frame of the vehicle itself. Wisely, I opted not to pack a shovel.

Finn and I spent most of our energy finding rocks to stack and gently attempting to dig out the car to no avail. After several hours, we had a cartoonishly stranded SUV with two bright orange traction boards wedged beneath the back tires and a smattering of stones placed with zero finesse. It was cold, it was raining and we hadn’t seen another car the entire time. Better yet, AAA was not coming to save us. Our options were calling members of the off-road club at Cal Poly or camping in the car until the rain stopped.

On the horizon, through the dumping rain and dark night, we saw a white glow. Whether the lord had finally arrived to rapture us or a nuclear warhead had detonated, something good was on the way. To our joy, it was a neighbor in a Ford Fusion. She was out searching for her dog and said she “did this all the time with my husband back in the day.”

A seasoned four-wheeler, she was not looking to shoot us for trespassing and was in fact so sympathetic to our increasingly helpless situation that she had already called the property owner (whoops) and went on to bring us blankets, coffee, tea and quesadillas. Within the hour, the farmer returned from the city, analyzed that our situation was worth $200 of his time and rescued us with relative ease via tractor.

It was embarrassing all around. To recap: we were stuck on his land with a 2WD soccer mom car attempting mudding seasoned vets would avoid, I was $200 in the hole for an avoidable situation, the rain reached a fever pitch just in time for our windy descent home and every single piece of our clothing had adopted an earth tone. The worst part? I had to be grateful to a Dodge RAM owner. I was lucky enough to pick the funniest person I know to suffer with, so the ride home was far from silent.

I did not yet know that I would drop out of Cal Poly. That took another month or so. The moment my family offered me the choice, I fled home. But in a much more real sense, I knew already that it wasn’t the place for me. Despite the charming faculty, I couldn’t bring myself to attend classes; I had friends in the newsroom who I struggled to connect with outside, I didn’t go out: I was alone. I knew when I graduated high school that waiting until I was sure of what I wanted to do was better than rushing into something. It’s why I attended Santa Rosa Junior College in the first place, and why I’m back. It was tough to relearn that lesson, but I’m immensely grateful for the educational safety net this college provides.

I’m not sure what lies beyond the horizon for me or where I’ll find myself next semester, but I’m out of the mud and have a clearer idea of what I want out of life. I’ve figured out what kind of community I value, where I want to live and what kind of terrain my car can handle: all extremely valuable lessons for the future. Paramount amongst these myriad lessons was the understanding that I don’t owe anyone my suffering. Making major life decisions based solely on the rationale that, “I have no reason not to” is a hazardous line of logic to follow. “Because we might as well,” is not a good enough reason to attempt an off-road obstacle. When you have a feeling in your gut before you take that turn into the sludge, the hungerlike pang asking “are you sure?” just might be worth listening to.

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The weightlifting room received a full makeover, complete with new weight machines and sound system.

“The surround system is super nice. I love it a lot,” SRJC student Gavin Early said.

The sound system is just the tip of the iceberg. Students also reported vast improvements with the equipment.

What I like about [Tauzer] is the variety of machines, a lot of options for weightlifting. A lot of nice benching equipment,” SRJC student Daniel Bertal said.

Gallery • 5 Photos

Pacific Jeremy

The Tauzer Gym renovations were highly anticipated at Santa Rosa Junior College. Construction began in May 2024 and was completed in early 2026.

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Dr. Don Wright, a Santa Rosa-based certified chiropractic sports physician, would first ask you one simple question: Have you ever tried grounding?

Grounding is the practice of connecting an electrical circuit to the earth, allowing a pathway for electrons to flow if the circuit shorts. The earth is an electric sponge. Grounding is an essential safety measure electricians use to prevent damage.

“Our bodies are electric,” Wright said. “As an applied kinesiologist, as I treat people, I’m checking that electrical continuity. That’s how I derive my plan to fix them.”

He began to use grounding as medicine in 2001. He saw a patient who traveled from Chico in debilitating pain. After crawling into his office, Wright discovered the man was severely imbalanced, with an asymmetrical pelvis, a short leg and spots of pain all across his body.

If the patient breathed through his right nostril, he was strong. If he breathed through his left nostril, he was weak. If he counted numbers — a left brain activity — he was weak. If he hummed a song — right brain activity — he was strong. Dr. Wright believed he had an ionic imbalance.

His prescription? Grounding. The patient crawled outside to a PG&E grounding rod and held onto it for about three minutes. (Kids, don’t try that at home.)

The patient was able to stand up immediately after, Wright said. “Every symptom he’d initially presented was gone. And then he was upset because he said, ‘You’re telling me that if I just held onto a metal post in Chico I would have gotten rid of all this and not had to drive all the way down here?’”

Grounding does not need to be done with a rod. Standing on a wet lawn or swimming in a natural body of water can allow for electron transfer, which relieves ionic pressure. But what is this actually doing?

“Inflammation is nothing more than positively charged ions,” Wright said. “When you ground yourself, you’re hanging onto a negative charge. That negative charge neutralizes the excessive positive charge in your body.”

Last year, Wright went through a stressful experience. His wife suffered a stroke, which she recovered from, but he sat with her in the hospital for hours. As he waited, he listened to a family grieving over the impending death of their loved one. These emotions carried with him, and left him with a knee ache hours after.

He was completely debilitated the next day. He underwent various tests, and while the doctors could see the inflammation, they couldn’t find a cause, nor a solution. So there he was, stuck in bed, an ice pack on his knee, when YouTube recommended a documentary on grounding. “I watched it and realized, could it be that simple?” Wright said.

He limped over to Sonoma State University with a thermos of water, poured it on his feet and took a nap under a redwood tree. He woke up 90 minutes later and walked back to his car. Only after a couple of steps did he realize that 90% of his pain had vanished. The next day, it was completely gone. But how did his stressful experience translate into physical pain?

“Our emotions carry electromagnetic charge,” Wright said. “The feelings in our brain affect our electromagnetic field, and when we get supercharged, there are physiological effects.”

The electric fields produced by our emotions are well-documented. Studies have found that different emotional states produce different waves. They can be induced by controlled electric stimuli. This shows that emotions and electricity are directly linked.

In this modern era, we are exposed to more stress and electromagnetic frequencies than ever before and rarely have the time to connect ourselves back to the earth.

“Part of the problem exists because of fashion,” Wright said. “We have these rubberized soles that insulate our bodies from the earth.”

It can be hard to find the time to ground ourselves. School, work and locational challenges can contribute to stressful energy and prevent us from dissipating it. However, if you allow it, grounding can change your life. To ground yourself, all you need is time and a conductive medium connected to the earth. It’s important that the soil is wet. Dewy grass, a stream or even a puddle will be enough to connect you.

There’s no such thing as grounding for too long; just five minutes a day provides an outlet for your electrical system. In the meantime, it’s a great opportunity to practice mindfulness. Your body and your brain will thank you.

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Video editor Archibald Henderson, and yours truly, open this motor show with a couple 2001 Toyota Camrys — which aren’t the most glamorous car but they make up for their basic nature with shocking efficiency.

“Usually my needle is hovering around 1/16 of a tank to empty, and that’s enough to go to work for the week,” Henderson said. Gas prices are unrelenting. I remember when choosing a car, the one thing I refused to budge on was its gas mileage. I needed something that could run for a while and was cheap to fill. Lucky for me, the Toyota Camry is one of the best in that field.

Henderson has tested the car’s limits, taking it on trips long and short. He managed to cruise it through Bodega Bay in a storm before taking it on a quest to White Castle in Las Vegas, with an engine light or two.

“I’ve had several extremely close calls on account of a failing suspension and less-than-optimal brakes,” Henderson said. There is no denying that any 25-year-old car is going to suffer through some detrimental maintenance problems, a reality I am grimly aware of.

From ripping out my dashboard to pulling half an engine apart just to replace an oil pump, my car, “Kurtis,” has survived many trips to Pick-n-Pull, a beautiful junkyard heaven built for every motorhead.

Despite how much old engines wear out, the Toyota Camry still holds its strengths, working as a valuable daily commuter.

Editor Rosemary Cromwell has also managed to make “The Exploder,” a 2010 Ford Explorer work — despite a few attempts of self-destruction.

“I had to replace everything: the compressors, all the hoses and the water pump,” Cromwell said. “I was driving to NY Pie once and the whole car started shaking. My thinking at the time was that I’d get the pizza and then roll back down to the shop.” No matter the problems, Cromwell still gets the most out of the Explorer in the four years they’ve had it.

Another entry into the fleet is podcast editor Kevin Terlizzi’s 1993 Lexus SC400 “Lexy,” which has seen better days.

Having received the car from his father, it boasts a grand 276,949 miles and lost the inner lining of its passenger side door somewhere along the way.

“I have dragged it everywhere, from the freeway to the tops of mountains,” Terlizzi said. “Once I took it to the top of Glass Mountain years after the fire for a trip up there and slept in the car.”

Although he has owned the car for six years now, Terlizzi has been on the hunt for some- thing a bit more reliable, hopefully with a fully intact door.

Stepping away from some everyday vehicles, ad manager Nick Vides’s 1973 Chevy Camaro LE named “Pearl” is a bonafide movie star.

The wineberry pearl colored car was featured in “The Haunting of Hype House,” a movie directed by Matt Farren, a friend of Vides. “We needed an era car for it. I have one from 1973, so why don’t we use that?” Vides said.

Vides and Farren stuck Pearl out in the middle of a green open field in Cotati to shoot a few scenes. Despite the 30-degree weather, and the car struggling to start after an hour of letting it sit, they still made it work. “It was beautiful to see on the big screen,” Vides said.

Despite its long run, the Camaro is not quite the oldest car on this list, with reporter Megan Brown’s 1968 Volkswagen Bug beating it by five years.

The coffee colored Volkswagen Bug named “LaFawnda” has been with Brown for around 13 years, surviving with the help of her brother who used to work at Viking Auto Parts and Repair in Novato.

“He worked on old Volkswagens there for several years and now does it out of our garage,” Brown said. “We have maybe 12 cars in front of our house right now.” There aren’t too many cars as iconic as the Volkswagen Bug; these decades-old cars are a staple of the classic car world.

Brown crossed paths with many other Volkswagen owners on the road, each happy to retell their Bug’s journey.

“One of the guys said that his windshield wipers stopped working in the snow and they had to tie strings around each of the wipers and pull it through the window of the car,” Brown said. While some of the newer cars might be safer or far more efficient, there is a unique feeling that comes with driving an older car. “I feel a tad more attached to my car because it’s older,” Brown said. “I feel so in tune with it; it’s an extension of myself.”

The Oak Leaf has also been a longtime home to our own apocalypse chaser, Mark Fernquest, who used to drive his dream truck, a two-door 2003 Nissan Frontier named “Zoom” for its supercharger. Zoom eventually turned into the “Little Beast” after Fernquest heavily modified it, adding a high-end K&N air filter. Sadly, a couple of years back, Fernquest was mid-drive when the engine seized up and stopped working.

“I had people laughing at me when I was asking $3,000 for the truck,” Fernquest said. “I still got $2,500.” Now he is once again driving a 2003 Nissan Frontier, this time a four-door, which he has named “The Outlaw,” but it just doesn’t feel the same.

“I feel like a dad driving it,” Fernquest said.

Still, he hasn’t lost touch with his adventurous nature and plans to drive “The Outlaw” to the Badlands and the Crazy Horse Memorial in South Dakota.

At the head of the fleet roars adviser Anne Belden’s car, “Ruby,” a 2023 Toyota Highlander hybrid. However, Belden still mourns the loss of the previous Highlander, “Rosie,” a 2004 model.

“Rosie made many trips across the country and back. She got to see the world, stayed and slept in many states.”

Belden owned the car for 11 long years and took it absolutely everywhere. A long-lasting car can often feel like an old friend, so it becomes quite difficult to say goodbye, even when the engine tells you it’s time to go.

“I put in my ad that I was looking to ‘rehome’ Rosie and it made her feel like a real person,” Belden said. “I got a lot of women wanting her. I would highly recommend that when you’re selling a car to personalize it.” Ruby has also made quite a few trips at this point, crossing the country three times and surviving upwards of 16-hour drives.

Yet, no matter how far Belden takes Ruby, the memory of her first Highlander lives on. “I love Ruby, but Rosie was my soul car,” Belden said.

These metal machines may not have lungs or eyes, but an engine is pretty close to a heart if you think about it. Our cars become companions to us, carrying us on our travels to distant places, creating memories with every new leak and worrying sound that emanates from under their hoods.

For the Oak Leafers with cars and everyone else with a box on wheels, firing up that engine can be just as soothing as stepping into your own gas-fueled home.

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