June 22 – 26, 2015 Wouldn’t you like to know how to work for clicks and not cash? Guest Bryn Nelson collects the wisdom of the online media in list form, and you absolutely won’t believe #73. Michelle profiles/remembers/learns from the biologist Rafe Sagarin, who died too young and who had the choice of moving […]
Miscellaneous
I eat meat. Most kinds. Beef, pork, chicken, bison, turkey.* Dark meat, white meat, legs, breasts. I’m not big on lamb—too much flavor, or perhaps too fragrant. Same goes for goat and venison. And I say no to veal, no matter how delicious it may be. Not that other farm animals aren’t treated poorly, but those […]
June 14 – 18, 2015 We begin with a backward glance to a favorite post of Christie’s about the distance between email and postcard on the spectrum of serendipitous stumblings-upon. I make a case against the multimedia approach to long form writing. It’s spectacular but it invites superficial reading. Cassie plans a camping trip to […]
Sunday is Father’s Day, a national holiday built around the giving and receiving of ugly ties, power tools and camping gear. I’ve always felt that Father’s Day is a sort of second class holiday – an awkward “me too” to Mother’s Day that is just a tick above Administrative Professionals’ Day (4/22/15) and Fairy Day (6/24/15). […]
There are two ways of reading, according to my local primary school teachers. You can sound out the words or you can just look at the pictures and infer a story. Of course, this position encourages exposure to text for non-readers, but the idea pervades adult culture too. Scanning photos and skimming headlines passes for […]
A friend recently sent me a postcard from her overseas trip. The card reached me long after I’d seen her photographs on Facebook. By the time it arrived, she was back home in Washington DC. Still, I was delighted to receive the handwritten note. The thing about Facebook posts is that they’re broadcast to everyone. The postcard was […]
June 8 – 12, 2015 Cameron got so discouraged about California’s annual June Gloom that she went back and revisited an old one; at least she has something to talk to the neighbors about. You know those maps on which you place little markers that show where you’ve been? Helen says the markers should really […]
Recently, I’ve been making my own yogurt. I’m on one of those annoyingly limited diets, trying to get my messed-up gut to cooperate. I can’t have many of the things I love. Noodles. Huge pieces of bread slathered with butter (and then one more piece even though it’s going to spoil my dinner). Cereal—not even […]