Greetings, earthlings! I am your host, Doug Richard, a.k.a. “The Great White Shank”, one of the “Founding Fathers” of Goodboys Nation, an elite group of 30-odd golfers who have participated in the annual Goodboys Invitational Golf Tournament, held for the past 21 years in various places throughout New England. 55 years old and a native of Massachusetts, I was once called to be a priest in the Episcopal Church many years ago but the bishops in Massachusetts and Kentucky didn’t quite see it that way. But that’s OK and water under the bridge, so these days I try and content myself with serving God as a recently-converted Roman Catholic, trying to do the best I can as a human being, husband, son, brother, friend, and a PMP-certified project manager for a global healthcare IT software company.

My primary interests are religion in the Anglo-Catholic tradition, anything mid-century modern, surf music and surf culture, exotica, and tiki culture, anything New Orleans, the Boston Red Sox, and the California Myth (as perpetuated by Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys – especially during their 1966-67 Pet Sounds/SMiLE era). Once a registered Republican and now an Independent, I consider myself a conservative, yet quite capable of free-thinking and particularly resistant to any particular political dogma. I have a passion for Mexican and Italian food done right.

I presently reside in Gilbert, AZ (30 mi. SE of downtown Phoenix) with my wife of 25 years, Tracey, and our six rabbits (2 of which belong to my sister-in-law and wife’s twin): Cosmo, Peanut, the pair of Butterscotch and Geronimo, and, last but not least, the “Beastie Boys”: Sherman and Cookie (short for Cookie Dough, who, strangely enough, is not the color of cookie dough!).

Because I love to write and spend my existence as an observer of any and all things, Goodboys Nation weblog is my outlet for keen (and sometimes not-so-keen) observations and commentary on various sundry items political, cultural, religious, and sports-related, whenever and wherever the spirit leads.

I hope you enjoy your visit to Goodboys Nation weblog. Y’all come back now often, y’hear?

Picture courtesy of Septuagenarian-Sarah.