

BIG RED
The greatest athlete of my time...was a horse. I have followed many sports--my beloved baseball, football (college and professional),...


WORDSWORDSWORDS#11 ("Brand" new)
I was listening to a commercial the other night and heard the phrase "brand new" used to describe the appearance of an object after the...


The Popular Song: COMPARED TO WHAT
In the mid-70s, among the many jobs I undertook while I was working my way through college and grad school, I tended bar at Gilly's, a...

The Popular Song: MISS OTIS REGRETS
I will be adding a series of posts about popular (or obscure) songs composed and performed in the age of popular song (by which I mean...


THE LIT PRIZE
Now that I am officially retired, one of the traditions I will miss is acting as a bookie and taking bets from my students on the Nobel...

The Scratchy Line-R. O. Blechman
Few illustrators have had such an impact in a variety of media forms for so long and remained so largely unknown as R. O. Blechman. The...

ST. PATRICK's (Part III)
Above: In my First Holy Communion white suit with my brother Stephen and my parents. My father was about to turn 63 and my mom (here...

ST. PATRICK's (Part II)
The picture above was taken before my time at St. Pat's, but the feeling it evokes is very much in my memory. The regimentation depicted...


ST. PATRICK's (Part I)
For my schooling, I was a charge of the priests and nuns (and an occasional lay teacher) at St. Patrick's School in Glen Cove, Long...

WORDSWORDSWORDS # 10 (Based on or off/Whoa or Woah)
Sometimes, the language issues I raise in this series of blog posts are widely discussed by usage experts like Benjamin Dreyer (whose...