On a Saturday afternoon visit to an ice cream parlour, I saw a flavour that looked absolutely disgusting: mushroom. Feeling unadventurous, I ordered chocolate instead. But my husband went for the mushroom, and it was delicious. “It tastes like waffles,” the server told us. The ice cream was pale yellow, with a flavour more complex […]
Nature
Tonight, if we can remember the words, we might be singing about auld acquaintance. And we have many: several People of LWON–Heather Pringle, Erika Check Hayden and Thomas Hayden–moved on in 2013 (and Virginia Hughes just before that). We miss them all. So I thought I’d try to bring at least one of these fine […]
Dear Yosemite: I am a long-time user of your fantastic park, stunning natural resources, and free public bathrooms. As a recreational rock climber, I have frequented your grounds (and used your clean and welcoming bathrooms) many times over the past 20 years, often dodging payment by coming in late at night and sleeping in odd […]
Here at LWON we’re celebrating the holiday week by bringing back some of our favorite posts. This post originally appeared in July 2013. The Ramsay family has lived at the Bamff estate, 1300 acres of heathery hills and woodlands in eastern Scotland, for nearly eight centuries. Today, environmentalists Paul and Louise Ramsay share the property with three families of […]
Before dawn on October 3, 1932, in the small Columbia River town of Bingen, Washington, an 82-year-old man walked to the depot to catch the morning train to Portland. Under circumstances that remain unclear, the arriving train struck him down, killing him almost instantly. The man had lived in town for more than half a […]
Several years ago, I splurged on a gorgeous red hardcover edition of Strunk and White’s classic book on writing, The Elements of Style. Illustrated by Maira Kalman, the pages are filled with fanciful depictions of punctuation and grammar rules. To demonstrate the use of the apostrophe in the phrase “Somebody else’s umbrella,” Kalman drew a […]
I have been to see the National Zoo’s Sumatran tiger cubs, and I have important news: They are adorable. The twin cubs, a boy and a girl, were on display for the first time yesterday at the zoo here in Washington, D.C. A little after 10 a.m., keepers opened the metal door at the bottom […]
Fear of insects is so common that it’s hardly worth remarking on. It’s those of us who don’t fear bugs who can seem a little odd. Science and nature illustrator Maayan Harel told us recently that while she’s acquired an appreciative fascination with her insect subjects, acquaintances still ask, with a shudder of disgust: “Are […]
