The Daily Reviewer | Everyday People

I Love Earthships but This Is Even Wilder

Mar 14, 2010 4:06pm

My nominee for most incredible, interesting and imaginative home ever. Period.I stumbled across it on a green homes for sale site.Yes, there is a little voice in my conscience that wonders if it's appropriate to build a home in a former Anasazi village. But it was a dwelling....

Which Way Blow the Prevailing Winds?

Mar 11, 2010 7:06pm

I can't figure it out, I tell you. There's been a definite shift in the universal winds, a movement after months of stagnation, a scent of change in the air.And most of it is forward motion - something I've hoped and worked for.But just as I take a deep breath,...

Toyota: Mistake After Mistake

Mar 11, 2010 4:57am

Toyota, it's a small world, especially when something is shocking. Word gets around.So after initially downplaying the danger of the Little Cars That Won't Stop, you put a good face on it, expressed remorse, admitted that the company had begun to put market share before quality and promised to...

Canada, You're Better Than That

Mar 9, 2010 7:16am

We have a visitor here in the Hudson Valley...and he's cute as hell. Marine rescue experts say he's a young Arctic harp seal, probably wandering south looking for some fish and a comfortable place to molt.We're delighted to have him. People are lining up along the shore to...

Roasting on a SleepNumber Bed

Mar 8, 2010 5:08pm

We went on a road trip this weekend, my daughter and I. She had to make a fast trip to Baltimore to meet with a young representative of an overseas program she wants to do next year. "I'm in!" I announced. "Road trip.""Really? I didn't want...

Deep Thoughts at the Diner

Mar 5, 2010 7:15pm

We found ourselves having dinner at the local diner tonight, my guy and our friend the sensitive musician. We were celebrating a little; my guy's new songs are nearly ready for airplay and the local radio station jumped the songs past a boxful of hopeful CD submissions. Our...

I Confess - I Watch "Idol" - And I Have a Question

Mar 4, 2010 7:07pm

I'm a little embarrassed to admit that I watch American Idol. It's a stupid show, a show that admits that presence, personality and marketability can trump talent. It makes me so angry sometimes as I watch someone with remarkable, raw talent get pushed to the side as some...

Gotta Love Canada

Mar 1, 2010 4:57am

photo; nhat meyerDid you see the Olympic closing ceremonies? I was absolutely delighted. It was one of the silliest things I've ever seen. Please don't be offended if you're Canadian, I mean that with admiration.China gave us amazing choreography, high-tech magic and a cast of...

The Feminine Curve Gone Awry

Feb 27, 2010 5:02am

I first noticed I was crooked five or six years ago. I had a Zero Balancing session with a friend who is also a ZB teacher; I'd heard it had done wonders for a boy I knew who'd had a huge accident while skiing.I woke up the next morning...

The Morning After The Storm

Feb 26, 2010 7:09am

We're in a strange little pocket of calm in the midst of Nature's fury. All around us are reports of highways closed, more than a foot of snow, power lines sizzling across the roads. Here, at the foot of the Catskills, we've got fluffy, gentle little flakes that...

Gale Force Winds

Feb 25, 2010 6:24pm

"...And like a never-dying force, the windRoared till we shouted with it... " 'The Wanderer' John MasefieldWild weather this February has brought. Yesterday's snows were so heavy that they left close to two hundred thousand people without power in just two Hudson Valley counties. Then came the...

One of the Best Parts of Getting Old

Feb 24, 2010 10:46am

Imagine this: you're sitting in your office, on the telephone with the host of a radio show that's heard in four states, on the air live. You have had one cup of coffee so far and you're not fully functional before the third cup. You're expecting a...

Time: A Doctor Who Acts Like It Doesn't Exist

Feb 20, 2010 7:27am

When I was a kid, I remember the doctor made house calls. Not the pediatrician; there wasn't one. He was our family doctor. And I remember being very angry indeed that he once was allowed to come into my candy-striped bedroom, stick a tongue depressor in my...

Again, Ruth Says It Better Than I Can - Ring That Bell!

Feb 17, 2010 6:36am

I love this blog.And because I'm whirling like a dervish today, don't have time to explain but want you to know, I'm going to ask you to go see Ruth and read why you need to be ringing a bell tomorrow.Ring The Bell For All of Us...

The View From My Window

Feb 16, 2010 5:32am

It hasn't looked a lot like winter this year. It's all fallen to the south or the north of us, and the Catskills, which used to be snow country when I was a kid, had bare ground just yesterday.This morning, it's winter.Very, very pretty....

Who Did You Used To Be?

Feb 15, 2010 8:46am

I saw myself this morning. Not who I am, but who I was.I was out walking, jogging a little, hoping to fry those creepy little Lyme spirochetes into vapor when it happened.I passed a home that I believe is someone's summer cottage. It has a huge field in...

Happy Valentines Day

Feb 14, 2010 5:49am

Ernest Becker: When we understand that man is the only animal who must create meaning, who must open a wedge into neutral nature, we already understand the essence of love. Love is the problem of an animal who must find life, create a dialogue with nature in...

Things Open Up When You Let Go

Feb 13, 2010 6:09am

I've spent the past couple of years worrying. I used to be a recovering worrier, but I've fallen back into old patterns. Money, the future, my kids, health, our world's future, am I doing what I'm here to do (whatever that is)?And the vise tightened a little bit every...

Does What We Eat Define Us?

Feb 12, 2010 4:40am

I'd like to discuss this without a firestorm. I have questions.The Judeo-Christian ethic teaches that the world and all its creatures are here for Man's use. Based on that logic, we have used this world's resources, abused and depleted them. Among the problems we have created is...

How Could Anyone Sort It All Out?

Feb 11, 2010 4:31pm

I wish I could explain better. I can't. All I can tell you is that I have seen clear evidence of how deep some of our society's problems go and I'm feeling both sad and disheartened.How is it that within our cities live people in neighborhoods that operate...

I Need Co-Conspirators

Feb 11, 2010 5:30am

This is just for fun - but you can make my daughter laugh with very little effort, which will tickle me as well.She's turning 21 this year, she's a gifted writer who thinks she can't write and she started a blog just because I nagged her into it. She...

Is It Really The End of the World or Just A Snowstorm?

Feb 10, 2010 4:48pm

Apologies, first of all, to those of you who are truly in a blizzard. Washington, Virginia, New Jersey, Long Island, I get it. This is some serious snow.This is directed at the media. Wolf Blitzer was so excited by the snow that he donned his hat and...

Why Are the Dogs In Cages Instead of The People Who Hurt Them?

Feb 9, 2010 4:59pm

I'm angry tonight, angry at a world where people can abuse animals and get away with it. We went to see Mellifer/Amy/Nancy/Cupcake tonight, the dog I met the other day and who I was hoping could become part of our family."Someone's beaten the hell out of her," I'd been...

Decision Postponed

Feb 8, 2010 2:03pm

Through no fault of ours. Mellifer, as I've been calling her for the past hour, or Clarisse, as KB seems to be leaning toward, or Big Sweet Thing, the abandoned dog who has been languishing in the local shelter for the past two months, is still there.We tried. ...

Heaven On Earth

Feb 7, 2010 1:36pm

It's blizzarding in some parts of the US, sunny and cold in others (like here in the Catskills), god only knows elsewhere. But it's probably gorgeous in Saba.That's where I took this photo. It was six years ago but it feels like yesterday; this is an island in...