Past Articles

We visited many wineries and wine shops today in Austria, and I came across a huge bottle in one of them. Not sure what to call it, I found out this: Standard Wine Bottle Sizes: These are traditional standard bottle sizes for Champagne. Split1/4 bottle 18.7 cl Half1/2 bottle37.5 cl […]

We drove into the Styrian countryside today, it was a bright clear day, sunny and bright, the kind of day where you want to spend as much time as possible sitting in the sun, like the cows we passed enjoying their corner of a hilly pasture. Our first stop was […]

“It’s not a potato…It’s a bubble,” said Klaus, as we stood outside the Kunsthaus Graz, a futuristic bubblish looking building that sits beside the Mur river. It’s an enormous museum filled with art you don’t understand…but that’s okay, you simply experience it. This building dates back to the 1800s and […]

Today was a classic full press trip day. We began at 7:45 am, when Latti, Adam and I walked to the farmer’s market in Graz center city. There were rows and rows of cheerful Styrian farmers, most of whom offered homemade schnapps in addition to the bright flowers, kohlrabi, celeriac […]

Last night we had a fine dinner at an old restaurant in the city. It was Landhaus-Keller, which means ‘government building’s cellar’ and the food was excellent. It included Austrian specialties like boiled beef, super tender beef raised up in the mountains that comes with a cream sauce. Also, we […]

We checked into our hotel in Graz and had lunch, then despite our jet lag, we went for a tour of the city. This is a farmer’s city, much of the land in Styria is used for farming, there is a market every day beginning at 4 am.  There are […]

In the NY Times today, columnist David Leonhardt makes valid points about health care. His point is that good health is priceless, and we’re all lucky to have it in spite of the fact that it is taking more and more of our paychecks. He compares today with the 1950s. […]

I found that taking various methods of mass transit to JFK airport made a lot of sense. Tallying up the total, so far I’ve spent about $60, including a round trip ticket on a Peter Pan bus. It was as Sam would say, inspiring to spend about half of what […]

Today I loved Google. Hell, I’ve always loved them, especially when the direct deposit goes into our bank account for their ads on GoNOMAD, but it’s really more than that. I love that I typed in such simple questions to them and out poured such perfect, easy to use, and […]

We have been sweating it out recently when GoNOMAD went down and we had many upset people who could not get email. We worked with our Texas-based host and we got it back working, and now I can breath a sign of relief. Just in time because tomorrow at 6:05 […]

   These parking spaces will become a farmers market next May. We’ve already got four farmers and an entire community interested in participating!

We joined our friends Rick and Susanna and went out to dinner last night. Our first stop was to the Delaney House, we thought we’d give it a try after seeing their ads that said they had ‘lightened up’ a bit. We were hoping there would be a new, casual […]

We receive a lot of great books at the GoNOMAD.com office, simply by asking for them. Among this week’s crop was a wonderful little volume called the Field Guide to Snowflakes. It is a close-up look at one of nature’s wonders, those geometrically perfect creations that sprinkle down from the […]

Thomas Friedman is on a roll. He’s just plain right about using sugar cane ethanol (and rolling back our prohibitive tax) and now finds something to celebrate about Uruguay. Four years later, TCS Iberoamerica can’t hire workers fast enough. When I visited its head office, people were working on computers […]

In New York, big things are happening at the ex-prez’ gathering of luminaries.  Here is an account of a late afternoon session today. “Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, Fernando Cardoso (former president of Brazil) and Hernando de Soto, the visionary economist from Peru. Clinton proudly announces “we are on schedule!” Then […]

The AP reported today about plug-in hybrid cars, that dramatically improve mileage–and the car companies are not yet interested. “Toyota and other car companies say they are worried about the cost, convenience and safety of plug-in hybrids ? and note that consumers haven’t embraced all-electric cars because of the inconvenience […]

Reading Sheryl Hunter’s ‘Sounds Local’ column in the Recorder’s Arts and Entertainment magazine and came across a story about a band called The Kennedys. At one time Pete Kennedy was a member of Nanci Griffith’s touring band, and Maura his wife was in a band called the Delta Rays; they […]

My meeting with the selectboard in Deerfield went well. All three members expressed enthusiasm for our nascent farmer’s market plan. But it took forever to get to my turn, and that gave me a chance to watch the town’s finance committee in somulent action. God, how long these committees take […]