Month: July 2002

  • Jim Heynen

    As a tongue-in-cheek chronicler of Upper Midwest farm life, it’s impossible to avoid comparing Jim Heynen to that popular juggernaut over at Minnesota Public Radio. And indeed, fans of Garrison Keillor will find much to enjoy in the work of this Iowa-born storyteller, who chronicles rural life and boyhood in a voice wistful, spare, and…

  • Schoolhouse Rock 30th Anniversary Edition

    Saturday morning, curled up on the braided rug, parents still sleeping or having coffee. From the scratchy little speaker of the “wood-look” television comes the melancholy ode to the journey of legislation, “I’m Just a Bill.” We knew they were really singing about what it’s like to be a kid, trying to advance various agendas,…

  • Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring

    Sword-and-sorcery tales are not easy to pull off. Perched over the twin chasms of Ludicrousness and Pomposity, it’s all too easy for a ham-handed filmmaker to fall prey to that terrible Dark Knight known as Dorkiness. And so Peter Jackson’s first installment in the three-part film version of J.R.R. Tolkien’s 1,000-page Middle-Earth trilogy is a…

  • The Running of the Bears

    The Funniest President traveled to Wall Street recently, on a mission to kick shins and take names. Since entering public life W has scattered behind him a string of linguistic pearls the likes of which many older Americans still recall fondly from the TV show Kids Say the Darnedest Things. “I know how hard it…

  • The Bod Mod Squad

    I went out for coffee with my daughter the other day and the guy behind the counter sported a spike through the bridge of his nose. I couldn’t take my eyes off it. Get this—later, my kid said I was rude for staring. Well, isn’t that the point? Tattoos, scarification, piercing. You can’t tell me…

  • Enlightened Self-Interest

    In life, where you stand very often depends on where you sit. And when it comes to the police, I have usually taken the stand that they have to be monitored very closely, especially when it come to relationships with black and brown people. I have a lot of personal and collective history that bred…