Every week, I heave open a supermarket skip and find therein a more exotic shopping list of items than I could possibly have invented - Belgian chocolates, ripe bananas, almond croissants, stone-ground raisin bread - often so much it would have fed a...
When I was 11 or 12, I was really bored with everything on my summer reading list. It was all happy, middle-grade kinds of books. I was getting frustrated, because I liked to read. My mother went to the library and got me a copy of 'The Other Side of...
An elegantly crafted novel, "The Reluctant First Lady" clearly documents author Venita Ellick as an exceptionally accomplished writer able to skillfully weave memorable characters into a riveting story line from beginning to end. As engaging as it is...
Beyond the queues, the vacancy screens listed jobs in a multitude of languages. Invariably, they were low-paid and short-term dead-ends. Nearby, people in headphones sat at a bank of machines: the blind and the illiterate force-fed with ‘opportunit...
On the front end it (Sabbath) hurts. Leaving my to-do lists alone. Trusting the universe will continue its forward motion without my intervention. Demonstrating that it is God who sustains me and not my own efforts. Sabbath is like the scary free fal...
'Rigoletto' has long been one of my favorite operas, and it was on my short list way back when I first talked to Peter Gelb. I started thinking about what I could bring to this masterpiece, which has been seen all over the world for so many years.
It's always on everyone's list, like, 'What's New Orleans like?' I think people have a pre-conceived idea, like it's just Mardi Gras and Bourbon Street. But really, there's so much culture, the music's great, the food's great. It's not good for the w...
I'm going to guess Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, all want clean air to breathe and clean water to drink. I'm sure most people think women should be paid the same as men if they're doing the same job. I think we all want good ...
Life was so much simpler in pre-video days when everyone refused invitations because the 'Forsyte Saga' was on. Now we all just have a long list of unwatched shows, all of which, it seems, our friends are raving about. I feel as outdated as if I wore...
Don’t fall in love with the idea of someone being in love with you; fall in love with a person. Don’t fall in love with the idea of being in love with someone else; fall in love with a person. Don’t fall in love with a concept, an idea, a theor...
In the old days, you would have one lawyer to handle everything: speeding tickets, buying a house, contracts, litigation, real estate, copyrights, leasing, entertainment, intellectual property, forensic accounting, criminal offenses... the list goes ...
Christmas! The very word brings joy to our hearts. No matter how we may dread the rush, the long Christmas lists for gifts and cards to be bought and given--when Christmas Day comes there is still the same warm feeling we had as children, the same wa...
Stock up your pantry and your freezer with things that aren't perishable: Your favorite jar of tomato sauce that lists 'tomato' as the first ingredient, lots of grains, olive oils, vinegars, tomato pastes, onions, shallots. When you go to the store, ...
You know, back in the 1950s and '60s, when J. Edgar Hoover was making the FBI the respected organization it used to be, oftentimes they would find a fugitive and basically have his house surrounded, and then put out a press release saying he was on t...
The history of prescriptions about English ... is in part a history of bogus rules, superstitions, half-baked logic, groaningly unhelpful lists, baffling abstract statements, false classifications, contemptuous insiderism and educational malfeasance....
A man who reads a book for no particular profit becomes, while he reads, a gentleman, a man of leisure, a dandy of a sort; one would hate to see this dandyism entirely squelched, whether by the analytic mills of the universities or by the scarcely le...
Mr. Lowenstein: I am an essential worker. First S.S. Guard: Essential worker! Mr. Lowenstein: Yes! I work for Oskar Schindler. First S.S. Guard: Essential worker for Oskar Schindler. Mr. Lowenstein: Yes! Second S.S. Guard: A one-armed Jew. Twice as u...
Oskar Schindler: [addressing two unco-operative Nazi officers at the train station] Gentlemen, thank you very much. I think I can guarantee you- you'll both be in Southern Russia before the end of the month. Good day.
TV Director: Roll the rescue stations! TV Producer: We just got a report that half those stations have been knocked out. TV Director: Then get me another list. TV Producer: Sure, I'll just pull one out of my ass, right?
[Rob has just placed "Smells Like Teen Spirit" on a top five list] Barry: Oh, that's not obvious enough Rob. How about the Beatles? Or fucking... fucking Beethoven? Side one, Track one of the Fifth Symphony... How can someone with no interest in musi...
Westley: I mean, if we only had a wheelbarrow, that would be something. Inigo Montoya: Where we did we put that wheelbarrow the albino had? Fezzik: Over the albino, I think. Westley: Well, why didn't you list that among our assets in the first place?
