I feel I must qualify this entry by writing that I know it’s corny and ridiculous, but it’s still great perhaps because not despite of being corny and ridiculous. I’m writing of “The Mephisto Waltz”, no not the musical piece composed by Franz Liszt...

I do a lot of thrift store shopping. It’s always been kind of a weird passion of mine from the time I was a child. I have Celtic gypsy roots and a love of rag-picking is in my blood. Growing up I lived near two amazing flea markets: Mary Fisher’s in...

It happened when I was eleven years old. I had struck out on my own (sort of) after sharing a room (and sometimes a large bed) with my sisters for my entire childhood and commandeered the loft space above our living room which my father build lovingly...

There are many mysteries about the human brain still untapped, so why aren’t we tapping them? Does it ever occur to us that we can change the paradigm at any time? I observed an interesting and distressing pattern when I was teaching at a public school...

When I was working as a teacher (which now feels like a hundred years ago) I was always amused when one of my students would shout to someone who was rude or who in particular ignored them, “Why you gotta be ignorant!” When I would try to correct...