Past Articles

More than one person here told me this week that it was 1848, not the more well-known 1849 that a gold discovery brought hundreds of thousands of men to this part of the world.  It was 98% men and just two percent women. In Sacramento we toured Fort Sutter, where […]

Sacramento is one of the most leafy cities I’ve ever visited. I was told that only Paris has more trees than this Sycamore bedecked city.  Street after street had huge Elm or Sycamores running their length, providing a green cover from the sun.  It is on one of these shady […]

We dined last night at Arnold’s favorite Italian joint, in an airy former garden center a few blocks from Sacramento’s Capital Dome.  There is even a photo on the wall of the governor, proclaiming Luccas as his own personal place when he’s in town, doing his governing thing. A man […]

Want to know a word that will haunt us in the next twenty years? Pensions.  Many don’t realize that public sector workers, from teachers, to firefighters to cops, have been promised far more in pensions than the rest of us, and now it’s bankrupting us. Mort Zuckerman wrote a piece […]

I haven’t been this ready for a trip in a long time. Usually the dates just push up against me;  all of a sudden it’s the night before and I freeze thinking about all of the stuff I’m supposed to get done. But with a slimmer travel schedule so far […]

Most people will admit that they are shy. Up to 95% of people admit to being shy in some situations. “Shyness is people walking around as if they are in front of a mirror all of the time,” explained Shyness Researcher Bernardo Carducci, in an article in today’s WSJ. The story […]

At the supermarket today, I got to thinking about how different some stores are than others. It has to do with the age of the people who work there, and how many of them there are.  I was at family-owned Fosters Market in Greenfield.  When I went to ask the […]

“CHINA 1926 . . . Ravaged from within by corrupt warlords . . . oppressed from without by the great world powers who had beaten China to her knees a century before . . . China . . . a country of factions trying to unite to become a nation […]

I began the day with a recap of last night’s very successful firepit launch at Cindy’s. The primeval attraction to a fire at night is spreading; more and more of my friends are discovering the joy of sitting by a backyard fire.  We created an impromptu patio to rest the […]

Finally it’s a spring morning that feels like, well, spring!  It’s been the usual cruel spring in New England, barely getting warm and with real sunshine only briefly popping up.  But it’s always like this, I should remember.  Last night we met in Northampton; the city was so busy at […]

One of my favorite things to do is open up itineraries when they are sent to me for my next adventure. It’s like they’re wrapped up little gifts, with the details of all of the things I”ll do and the people I”ll meet in a place I’ve never been.  I […]

The New Yorker had a long interview with the teenager creator of Chatroulette.  Below is the ending of the piece by Julia Ioffe. She follows Andrey Ternovskiy as he almost misses a plane to the US and scowls at his overprotective mom, who’s worried he’ll forget his backpacks. “When he […]

Another chilly wet day in May. Ugh, how cruel our climate is, even in mid-May we huddle in our houses and wonder where the sun is.  I was up before the sun hanging with Sofie downstairs feeding her Cheerios and bananas. I met with some fellow business owners in Deerfield […]

We packed into a cozy, art-filled apartment on Cottage St. in downtown Easthampton last night, invited by my Facebook friend Mo Ringey to an Ethiopian food dinner party. Our hostess had ordered injera, the staple Ethiopian bread, from a Kansas City outfit, and as we arrived she was wrestling with […]

This morning as I lay in bed I got a text message from my old friend Ed Bryant.  We don’t talk that often…his message was in his signature way, out of the blue and off the wall. “Did you see the cover of the New Yorker this week?” came the […]

I opened my mouth in astonishment at the story I read in today’s Daily Hampshire Gazette. It’s such a cool and wonderful idea, I can’t believe I never thought of it.  The state has worked out an agreement with the Department of Conservation Resources to rig up wireless antennas on […]

When was the last time you opened up a phone book and found someone’s number?  To many people, this is a throw-back, an anachronism. To Verizon, it’s a big old waste of millions of dollars and something they’re trying to avoid delivering to everyone in New York City with a […]

If you own a million dollar yacht and register it in Rhode Island, the tax would be $600.  In North Carolina you’d pay $1500, South Carolina a mere $500. But if you docked your Hatteras yacht in Florida, you’d have to pay a whopping $60,000 in tax.  Wonder why 8 […]