This column first was published as the “President’s Message” in the April 2012 newsletter of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists It must have been this time of year in 1999, I was on the phone with my mom about soon flying to Louisville, Ky., for that year’s NSNC conference. “You go there and ‘network’ […]
The Last Irish Soda Bread Recipe
In Food Section World, this long-evolved Irish Soda Bread recipe would be published before St. Patrick’s Day. But in Brick World, I bake a loaf on St. Paddy’s, relying on collected recipes. Brick could schedule the recipe for March 16, 2013, but why wait? Every newspaper every year notes that the original of this quick […]
Fourth and Goal
Completing the book list of 2011 shouldn’t be taxing. Its first entry after all took in the first three quarters. So where are we? Or to quote independent Ross Perot’s 1992 running mate James Stockdale (it IS a presidential year, after all), in a televised debate’s opening statement: “Who am I? Why am I here?” […]
OCD TT
I am not making this up. Nor did I touch the dog or his possessions. He did this. Our 4-year Tibetan terrier Mani, whom we’ve had three years, loves Hopper, the stray young adult TT we adopted last Thanksgiving week. Inseparable. They can quarrel over toys, though. Mani is the alpha although Hopper has 10 […]
This column first was published as the “President’s Message” in the March 2012 newsletter of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. With certainty, the renown physicist Garrison Keillor noted in his radio spot The Writer’s Almanac: On this date [Feb. 23] in 1927, physicist Werner Heisenberg first described his Uncertainty Principle in a letter. In […]
Who’d’ve-Thunks
Copyright 2012 Ben S. Pollock I knew what to expect of The Artist, a “silent” film, meaning no talking, though it did have sound effects and music (and beforehand, ironically, the loudest-volume trailers since those running with Avatar). Still, the teenage box office cashier warned My Beloved and me, while giving me $7 change for […]