Today, I saw my first flu mask. A fellow wearing one stopped next to me on a downtown Boston street corner to wait for the sign to say “Walk.” I’d heard masks were useless against the Swine Flu unless they prevent air from getting in around the sides. His mask didn’t do that. It was too lose fitting. I was tempted to say something, but I just thought, “another victim of bad information.”

After the light changed and we went our separate ways, I was momentarily gripped by doubt. What did he know that I didn’t? Was there an outbreak hereabouts? Should I think about wearing one? Not the inadequate one he was wearing, but a good, close-fitting mask? Maybe, at that very moment I was breathing it in. [Read more →]

Tags: health & medical, trusted media & news by Mark Guerin
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One of America’s great qualities is our willingness to give a second chance, but the universal celebration of Kobe Bryant is weird. Yes, he was acquitted of rape, but it wasn’t like the case of fellow NBA player Juwan Howard. After a grand jury rejected even indicting him — an impressive feat considering grand juries are known for their willingness to indict ham sandwiches — he sued his accuser for defamation, seeking only $1. When the judge found the charges to be so flagrantly false that he awarded him $100,000, Howard pledged it to the D.C. Rape Center. The married father Kobe ultimately reached an out-of-court settlement with his 20-year-old accuser. Did he do anything criminal? Probably not. Really frickin’ sleazy? Hell, yeah. [Read more →]

Tags: sports by Sean Cunningham
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March 16, 2009
I dream I am still in graduate school and living in a boarding house. Elderly people start hanging out in my room during the day. They are all around and in my bed. This annoys me. I call the landlord’s office to complain and a man I can barely understand says “Blah Blah Blah three seventy-five.” I say, “I can’t understand you,” and he talks more slowly. I complain and complain and then, when I can’t complain any longer I ask “By the way, what did you say about three seventy-five?” He says “This conversation is $3.75 a minute.” I hang up and vow to get these people. [Read more →]

Tags: Fred's dreams by Fred Siegel
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A while back I wrote about organ donation; but what happens after that part is sorted? And I am not talking about the spiritual, but the physical. If I don’t make sure that my preferences are known then I will be stuck in the ground with some (relatively) pretty stone indicating my born-on and deceased dates. I have two issues here, 1) I think I may want to be cremated because I don’t like the thought of bugs crawling through my eye sockets (even if I am dead) and 2) All of the cemeteries I have been to are crammed together with a bunch of dead people. [Read more →]

Tags: religion & philosophy by Amy Boshnack
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The Ultimates, Volume 1 is a re-imagining of superhero groups within the Marvel universe. It’s also thievery. 

And it is crap, utter crap that they repackaged to sell to children and hardcore collectors who can’t resist any comic with “Issue 1” on the cover. It’s crap, from the hackneyed dialogue to the shameless display of super powers, when the heroes prance around and test out how strong or big or small or generally powerful they have become following the experiment/accident/crash/whatever. [Read more →]

Tags: books & writing, just fantastic by Steve Mazzeo
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Captain James T. Kirk does not believe in no-win scenarios. As a cadet at Starfleet Academy, when faced with the Kobayashi Maru simulation, Kirk reprogrammed the test to change its conditions and thus became the first cadet to defeat the Kobayashi Maru. He “cheated” but he received a commendation for original thinking. Star Trek director J.J. Abrams and screenwriters Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman found themselves in a similar situation. After six films and numerous television spin offs, what more could be done with a franchise whose original characters and cast are beloved, but the lead actors are approaching eighty? Like Captain Kirk, they cheated, but the result is original and thrilling. And, it is well worth the $12.50 ticket price to see Star Trek in an IMAX theater. [Read more →]

Tags: Gail sees a movie, movies by Gail D. Rosen
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In a past religious studies course, my instructor discussed with the class that certain anthropologists believe that a genesis for establishing religion occurred when our ancestors confronted the biological inevitability of death. The mysterious phenomenon undoubtedly conjured many emotions: fear, curiosity, sadness, among many others. [Read more →]

Tags: religion & philosophy by Nathan Cushing
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It’s pea season everybody! For just about 2 weeks each year we can go out and find the very best fresh, sweet peas at the local grocery store. Peas don’t love the hot weather, so eat them now before they all end up in the freezer section.

When cooking fresh peas, don’t let them turn to mush! Pour your peas into a small saucepan and add just enough water for them to move around in- you don’t want to cover them with water. Then add some salt, pepper, and a little butter. Cook them until they are no longer hard, but still have a bite left in them, kind of like pasta. You will never want to eat canned or frozen peas again!

[Read more →]

Tags: recipes & food by Jessica Alfreds
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Who better to talk about celebrities than Dr. Drew? For more than 25 years he has co-hosted Loveline on the radio and, for 4 years, on MTV. On VH1, he produces and hosts Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew and Sober House. He is definitely an expert on celebrity behavior, and this book is full of anecdotes and descriptions of the famous and the famous-for-being-famous. But where most of see spoiled, self-centered celebrities acting like brats, Dr. Drew sees damaged, suffering people. It’s an entirely different take on the bad behavior of our favorite stars, as well as a look at what it might be doing to us and to our children. [Read more →]

Tags: books & writing, Lisa Reads by Lisa Hura
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The new Star Trek film does an excellent job of paying tribute to the existing canon while freeing itself from all previous content to explore strange new worlds, seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no one has gone before. And nerd-dom has a new captain.

[Read more →]

Tags: movies by Steve Mazzeo
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“Dear World, I am leaving because I am bored.”

So began the note actor George Sanders left behind when he committed suicide in 1972.

It is, one might say, perfectly phrased. Notice that Sanders didn’t complain about anything being boring, only that he was bored. So he was being serious. Boredom inheres in the person who is bored, not in others or things or circumstances. It is not boring You are bored. [Read more →]

Tags: that's what he said, by Frank Wilson by Frank Wilson
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Grey’s Anatomy (Thursday, ABC, 9PM) — Let’s be honest. Grey’s Anatomy has sucked for the past 2 years. It’s been boring, whiny, repetitive and the off-screen drama hasn’t helped. However, they did a really good job this week… season 1 good. [Read more →]

Tags: television by Lauren LaBumbard
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Evidence of its being possibly the finest novella of the 20th century, Thomas Mann’s Death In Venice has inspired more than a few offshoots: the gorgeous, haunting Visconti movie (with music of Gustav Mahler), the Benjamin Britten opera, the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s 2007 presentation of the ballet by John Neumeier, Robert Coover’s fantastical Pinocchio in Venice, most recently Geoff Dyer’s novel Jeff in Venice, Death in Varansari, plus various graphic novels and even murder mystery spin-offs.

Within the first few pages, you know you’re reading something special. [Read more →]

Tags: books & writing, now read this! by Christopher Guerin
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The big news of the week was Manny Ramirez of the Los Angeles Dodgers, who tested positive for performance enhancing drugs. The drug he was reportedly taking was HCG, which is a female fertility drug. Yes, you read that correctly. [Read more →]

Tags: sports by Alan Spoll
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10. A siloful of Pampers

9. A five-gallon baby bottle with an octopus-shaped nipple

8. An in vitro sterilization kit

7. A birth video (extended director’s cut)

6. A gigantic shoe with room for 15

5. A copy of Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal

4. Free spaying or neutering by Bob Barker

3. Name tags for all the kids

2. Four wet nurses

1. An inflatable Octodad

Tags: Bob Sullivan's top ten everything, trusted media & news by Bob Sullivan
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I’ve read only the first 200 pages, just 1/5th, of Jonathan Littel’s The Kindly Ones, but so far it has all the art, seriousness, and structure of a great, great novel. The New York Times‘ hard-to-please Michiko Kakutani, in a bitter (even for her) condemnation of the book, calls The Kindly Ones, “a voyeuristic spectacle — like watching a slasher film with lots of close-ups of blood and guts” and “a pointless compilation of atrocities and anti-Semitic remarks, pointlessly combined with a gross collection of sexual fantasies.” She couldn’t be more wrong. [Read more →]

Tags: books & writing by Christopher Guerin
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If I had become a film buff in my youth instead of my adulthood and pursued an educational and career trajectory similar to that of my film-loving peers in this town (Hollywood), I might have learned to become more critical about the films I see and far more cynical about the industry than I actually am.

Long before I became a film buff, if I saw a movie with a friend and he criticized the plot, theme or dialogue of a flick I found entertaining, I’d reply something like, “It’s just a movie. It was entertaining; that’s what matters.” I reserved my critical judgment for literature. So, now, while my cinematic critical capacity has increased, I still retain another important capacity, to enjoy a well-made movie with a weak (or contrived) story, provided it keeps me entertained.

[Read more →]

Tags: movies by B. Daniel Blatt
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Have you ever wondered what would happen if you could go back to a particular moment of your life and do something differently? What if you hadn’t taken a job you’d accepted, married someone you’d broken up with, said “no” when you’d previously said yes…or vice-versa? What if we were all allowed one do-over?  Would your life be completely different than it is now, or would events have conspired to put you in pretty much the same place? By continuing to explore the concept of the variable, “Follow the Leader” brings up these very same questions, and if you’ve been paying attention, it’s already given us the answers. [Read more →]

Tags: religion & philosophy, television by Marc Oromaner
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My mother began her “higher learning” at a later age than most. I was in junior high school when she attended Sarah Lawrence studying philosophy and I was in high school when she attended the school of anthropology at the University of Virginia. I got to meet a lot of interesting people associated with academia: students, professors, writers, thinkers and do-ers. Generally at that age, I was bored by their discussions, uninterested in their high-art movies, theatre, and book readings, but there was one morsel of media with which we all could concur, one passive activity which satiated a teenager’s desire for adventure as well as an anthropologist’s hunger for discovery, a sociologist’s curiosity about humanity and a philosopher’s quest for truth — we could all agree on Star Trek. [Read more →]

Tags: movies, television by David Alfreds
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We have woodchucks.

I see them everywhere lately, rootling around in the the grass. It must be some sort of seven-year cycle or something. On Tuesday, driving home down a busy stretch alongside a vast trainyard in our utterly urban part of town, I counted four groundhogs (one on his hindlegs looking like an upended meatloaf), as well as a coal-black squirrel, a bunny, and a dead mallard in the grassy boulevard (the only casualty). [Read more →]

Tags: advice, family & parenting by Ruby Mac
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Author’s note: For 10 months I traveled to work in New York City from my home in southeastern Connecticut. Notice I used the word “traveled” and not “commuted.” The difference, to me, is mileage and duration. My daily “commute” was three hours each way, including a 45-minute drive, an hour-and-40-minute train ride, and subway rides across and uptown. Occasionally, I took notes on the people sitting around me on the train. What follows is the third of several stream-of-consciousness entries I made in an untitled journal.

Thursday, June 26, 2008

“How long until the train is above ground?”
Maybe he’s waiting for daylight to throw himself off.

[Read more →]

Tags: diatribes by David A. Brensilver
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I’ve been invited to try brevity for a change in this space; and it seemed like a novel idea. So here’s a brief aperture on the past. Last fall, I was campaigning for Barack Obama in the northern suburbs of Philadelphia. I was deep inside enemy territory, and I knew it. I was in a red state — Phillies red. Worse yet, the Phillies were in the World Series — a New Yorker’s nightmare. I’ve been a Mets fan (“ardent” would be a polite understatement) for about 45 years, which is two ballparks ago.  Yet despite the threatening environs, I was so enthralled with the prospect of change that I let myself go. Approaching a house with a Phillies sign in the yard, I found myself saying to the occupants: “Go Phillies!” It may have cost me, but it helped Obama carry Pennsylvania. Now, however, I must get right with the baseball gods. So for the record, I said “Go Phillies,” and not “Let’s Go Phillies,” which would have had far graver implications, since I’ve been saying “Let’s Go Mets” all my life.

And just as crucially, I didn’t specify where the Phillies should go.

Tags: ends & odd, sports by Jeff Scheuer
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At Last Comes Love is the third book in Mary Balogh’s Huxtable series, and by far my favorite. Margaret Huxtable has told a bounder to her former love interest (whom she waited for while he was away at war, only to learn he has married another woman) that she is engaged. Rushing out of the ballroom before he can question her further about her fiance, she literally runs into Duncan Pennethorne, Earl of Sheringford, who must marry within the next fifteen days or risk losing his flow of income. [Read more →]

Tags: books & writing, romancing history by Katie Colvin
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Ha-ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! I’m sorry. I meant to write a serious commentary here. I’m trying… ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Sorry, again. It’s just that some senators considering ways to help the ailing newspaper industry said “they wanted to figure out how to preserve ‘the core societal function that is served by an independent and diverse news media.’” Ha-ha-ha-ha! It’s hard to maintain composure. Independent and diverse news media. And when I finally calm down and try to keep reading with a straight face, there’s this: “‘I’m afraid we’re going to lose that watchdog if we don’t figure this out,’ said Sen. Amy Klobuchar, a Minnesota Democrat whose father was a journalist for the Associated Press and the Minneapolis Star Tribune.” Ha-ha-ha! There’s nothing like a really good farce to start the day.

Tags: trusted media & news by Scott Stein
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Far too much historical analysis falls into two questionable schools of thinking, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt is the perfect subject for both. The first is the great man theory, where one man single-handedly changes the world because that is what he was put here to do. It suits the American outlook nicely, since this is the John Wayne view of life: a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do, no matter how many injuns or cattle rustlers stand in his way. [Read more →]

Tags: books & writing, politics & government by Sean Cunningham
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April 14, 2009
I dream I’m just outside of New York City on the day of Dumbledore’s wedding and there is a strange plant growing in the fountain at the reception site. The plant troubles me, but Dumbledore just looks at it knowingly. Obviously, evil forces are planning something bad. A few days later frogs confirm this and Dumbledore and I have to evade an enormous underwater monster who is out to flood the world. Meanwhile, in the city, some officials complain about the drought. Mickey Mouse, who has become incorporated into some nearby skyscrapers, bends the buildings over causing some residual water to pour from the rooftops into the center of town. This saves the city from drought. [Read more →]

Tags: Fred's dreams by Fred Siegel
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Wednesday, May 6, 2009, is Hump Day for our national Teacher Appreciation Week, a week we appreciate only on weekdays — May 4 to May 8 — according to the Yahoo note which informed me of such week last night.

So I arose this morning not with the alacrity, wit, and wide smile of some of my favorite educators; rather, I experienced an acute anxiety attack as I understood I had not yet done enough to appreciate teachers this week. [Read more →]

Tags: diatribes, education by Alex Kudera
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I’ve only ever read two of Mary Gaitskill’s story collections: Bad Behavior, her first (published in 1988), and Don’t Cry, her latest. Both are highly charged works of fiction — strong, full of sexuality, intensity, and intelligence. After reading both of these collections, I have come to the conclusion that if I ever had the chance to meet Mary Gaitskill I would be quite intimidated. Her writing is tough and confident, somehow masculine and feminine at the same time, which doesn’t make it feminist — it makes it authentic. [Read more →]

Tags: books & writing by Season Evans
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The Yankees are dead to me; they have been for a while. I think it started when they acquired Randy Johnson instead of Carlos Beltran. But this off-season and first month has just been too much. The Yankees just don’t get it anymore. They care about the fans and real baseball about as much as Big Oil cares about the environment. [Read more →]

Tags: diatribes, sports by Terrence Cheng
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After appearing in more than one hundred films, Sir Michael Caine dropped his usual fee to star in the low budget Is Anybody There?, because it was the only screenplay he had ever read that made him cry.  Films about vital people experiencing aging and dementia tend to provoke that reaction. This film is somewhat predictable, but the magical setting and stellar performances by leads Michael Caine (Clarence) and young Bill Milner (Edward) turn what could be a clichéd tearjerker into a life affirming meditation on death and aging. [Read more →]

Tags: Gail sees a movie, movies by Gail D. Rosen
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