By Declan McCabe By December, foliage season is long over for us humans, but it’s peak season under the water. Last month, as the last bus of tourists departed for home, fallen leaves accumulated in our streams and rivers, starting a process that’s critical for the nourishment of everything from caddisflies on up the food…

Dec. 11 was a day for reflection. It was a day where I left behind my usual psychotic musical diet of Beatles and metal, and cranked up Desmond Decker and the Aces, The Specials, English Beat, and even some Rancid and Timebomb Tim. It was a day where I remember who I am, and why…

By Daris Howard I always look forward to our family reunions, not only because I get to see all my family, but because I get to check out the newest technology. My brother David works in the tech industry, and one of his assignments is to test the newest computers to determine what items his…

Editor’s note: The following is the second in a series of reviews of randomly selected, low-quality, made-for-TV Christmas movies. In the first scene of “The Mistle-Tones” (2012), our heroine—running late for an audition—slips in the shower, tumbling into a pratfall that deposits her uninjured on the bathroom floor, the torn-down shower curtain handily covering her…

By Dom Cioffi Years ago, when I was between the ages of 10 and 12, I attended an overnight summer camp in northern Vermont. It was affiliated with our church. Along with the requisite games of capture the flag, swimming in the lake and s’mores by the campfire, there was also a light smattering of…

By Cal Garrison, a.k.a. Mother of the Skye This week's Horoscopes are coming out under the light of an Aquarius Moon, with aspects that make it easier for me to understand why the Hermetic Axiom always applies, and why the world appears to be coming apart at the seams. Let's look at the main aspects,…

By Brady Crain I won’t go so far as to say you get a bad rap, Texas.  You are the purveyor and exporter of so many things that I neither care about nor need. Football, exceptionalism to excess (exceptionalism that is exceptional even for American Exceptionalism). For example, there is a myth that Texas is…

By Rachel Sargent The oyster mushroom: delicious, frequently spotted on veggie pizzas, and predatory. That’s right. The hyphae of many fungi, including the oyster mushroom, attack and paralyze prey. Then, as R. Greg Thorn of Western University enthusiastically described, the fungi “grow down their throats and digest them from the inside.” Oyster mushrooms live in…

The following is the first in a series of reviews of randomly selected, low-quality, made-for-TV Christmas movies. The most disconcerting element of the fictional universe of the 2011 ABC Family movie “12 Dates of Christmas”—the tale of a Manhattanite named Kate (Amy Smart) who goes on a blind date on Christmas Eve with the Perfect…

As I look back at some of the foolish things my friends and I did in our youth, I can only say, “What was I thinking???” One of the pranks many of us pulled was calling people and asking, “Do you have Prince Albert in a can?” Without even giving them a chance to answer,…

By Cal Garrison, a.k.a. Mother of the Skye The Moon has just slipped into Scorpio, and this week's Horoscopes are coming out under a series of aspects that are bound to make for an interesting time. With the Scorpionic vibe putting a twist on things, and the Festival of Lights, and the Advent Season giving…

If you spent 44 years with the same employer, you must love the company. If you’ve been in the same profession for 60 years, you must really love what you do. Both of these statements are true and apply to Doug Gray, the lead vocalist of the Marshall Tucker Band. Don’t miss your opportunity to…

By Dom Cioffi In retrospect, I should have warned my son about the “scene” he was walking into. But then again, sometimes it’s better to let life unfold and talk about it later. I could see his eyes widen as we made our way through the hallway: long, dimly lit and with a faint smell…

By Michael J. Caduto There was a time in the waters known by the Abenaki peoples as Kwenitegok, “Long River,” when migratory fish moved in such multitudes that their backs appeared as a living bridge from shore to shore. After the glacier melted, shad and alewives returned to migrate up our rivers for 10,000 years,…

Br Brady Crain So, Dallas. I love Dallas. My family is in Dallas. Five uncles and aunts, 15 cousins, uncounted first cousins twice removed. All of these people migrated from the scene of the original crime in Newton and Wichita, Kansas (GO SHOCKERS), and they are now strung out between Norman, Okla. (GO SOONERS) and…