Amtrak Trains Will be Full When they Leave Springfield…Soon
The Amtrak train is silent now. We are parked at New Haven, and en route to New York’s Penn Station. I got to the station in Springfield in the dark, the streets empty, and just a few other passengers joined me on this 6 am train. I thought about what […]
Let the Rich Build Bridges. No, Real Bridges
Ok maybe this is a stretch, but how about if just a portion of the 400 richest Americans chipped in and donated to build us new bridges, highways and subway tunnels? In a WSJ story yesterday, Charles Landow and Courtney Lobel put forth exactly this idea, declaring that since there […]
Riding the Ashuwillticook, Inspired about How Much Fun Bike Trails Are
Yesterday’s jaunt through the hills of Ashfield on Rte 112 toward Adams reminded me of the 24-year-long tradition I had with my father every October. Throughout all of those years, we held to the same itinerary, which unfolded in the far western part of the Bay State. To us, in […]
Bum Spurns $1 Donation, Tossing it on the Ground
In an op-ed piece in last week’s WSJ, a man who worked on Wall St. said he was walking down the street with four associates when they were accosted by a somewhat disheveled homeless man. “Hey you fat cats!” he said. “You guys got all the money. You’re Wall Street […]
Brick and Mortar International Video Art Festival in Greenfield: Really? That’s the Movie?
The scene is the ocean….a broad tableau of roiling sea, waves pitching up and back, and the sound is a rumbling indecipherable cacophony. That’s the movie. That’s it. It’s just one of dozens of “cutting edge video artworks from around the world,” which were shown last night in a series […]
WRNX FM Goes Dark after 21 Years of Rock
I heard the news about WRNX last Saturday, while I was in a record shop in Easthampton full of beautiful old vinyl albums. The proprietor there is an old radio guy, who used to have a blues show. He is and was in the loop about the station’s switch from […]
What Am I Doing This Weekend?
It’s a rainy Thursday morning in New England. It’s the day that I begin thinking about what the weekend holds in store for me. Fall is the season with the most events happening in our Valley. Some times it’s hard to decide which one will bubble to the top. What […]
Dueling Laptops: Does This Sound Like Your House?
Do you do this, sit for hours with your partner, each looking at a separate laptop screen? I have noticed how often this occurs…yet my father still goes out and buys a desktop computer that he’ll only use when he’s sitting at his desk in his home office. The generations […]