Category: Columns

  • The Philosopher and the Wine List

    Bertrand Russell may have looked like God—piercing eyes, white hair, son of the Duke of Bedford, that sort of thing. But he was a philosopher not noted for an enthusiastic belief in the Divine. When asked what he would say when he got to Heaven, he replied in clipped tones, “‘God’, I will say, ‘you…

  • 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…

  • Affirmative Inaction

    Years ago, my father told me a little rhyme he learned growing up in Mississippi. “If you are white, you’re alright. If you’re brown, stick around. If you’re black, get back.” This little ditty seems to capture what happens when Minnesota publishers of white mainstream publications put black people on the cover of their magazines.…

  • Summer Pleasures

    According to Sir Winston Churchill, the Royal Navy has only three traditions, “Rum, Sodomy, and the Lash.” It’s certainly true that until only a few years ago every enlisted man in Her Britannic Majesty’s fleet had the right to a substantial tot of rum every day at midday. It was powerful stuff. The custom went…

  • Road-Tripping Through the Dew

    Last year my friend Terry moved back to Nashville to take care of his ailing mother. Last month, when she passed away, I packed my kids, 11 and 14, in the car and drove an unplanned 820 miles in 15 hours to be with him. We left on a Thursday at 5 a.m. I worried…

  • Do Me!

    It’s not hard at all to kick back and get your nails done. And what you choose to have done to your nails conveys a message to the world around you. What will it be? Buff rimmed ovals just peeking over the edge of your fingertips? Vicious blood-red daggers? The Flojo? The Flojo is true…