Kiddie Capitalism

The rise of the gig economy has made it easier than ever to have a side hustle, even if the focus has changed. In years gone by you might have turned your expertise as a seamstress into making bespoke curtains, or leveraged your passion for baking into making custom birthday cakes. These days it's more likely you'll ply the internet, offering your design skills to redo a website or start a Substack rounding up the local music scene. Either way, the hope is that when you get done with your 9 to 5 that your 5 to 9 will offer some extra bucks, validation for what was formerly a hobby, and a deeper dive into something you enjoy doing.

Then there's the situation that kids face, where their 9 to 5 (actually probably more 8 to 330, depending on when the bus gets home) is not a revenue producing venture. None the less, their main occupation is and should be an education. But since the income potential from that vocation only occurs after the fact, they are faced with sourcing walking-around money. 

An allowance from mom and/or dad certainly is a start, but others turn to outside pursuits as well. Again, that has changed as decades have accumulated. In the past it might have meant cutting lawns or delivering newspapers, while these days it's just as likely to be, well, plying the internet via YouTube videos or Instagram posts. As digital natives, that means you might wind up competing with them on their home turf. The big difference is the audience: while your natural cohort might be Boomers, Gen X, Y or Z'ers, theirs is their contemporaries, the so-called Alphas born after 2013. You may not understand it or get it, but 12-year old kidfluencers are making change, sometimes more than just pocket. 

There is one exception where there is a crossover, where kids market to adults. You see it especially on fall weekends, when folks are out and about in their neighborhoods enjoying the good weather. You can get mighty thirsty from all that leaf watching and bike riding and strolling with friends. And while the first entrepreneurial effort to meet that need dates from shop owners in the 1870's in New York City, it has evolved to become an early entry into the world of capitalism for many a kid in the form of a lemonade stand. 

The setup varies though the elements are the same: an old folding table, a pitcher of drink, a stack of disposable cups, a box for cash, and a handmade sign. Appearing randomly on street corners and front lawns, they are usually staffed by a handful of kids, whether siblings or neighbors. Often a parent is hovering nearby to keep an eye on things, biting their knuckles as they try and keep hands off to  let the budding entrepreneurs figure it out. 

The kids' strong suit is marketing as opposed to execution. Enthusiastically yelling out to anyone going by, they offer a drink at a throw-away price point. Stop to sample their wares, however, and they get all flustered as to how much to put in the cup, what to do with the money and making change. As a side note, the product itself is usually from a store-bought mix, barely drinkable, but that's beside the point. These are not establishments looking to franchise on the basis of positive Yelp reviews. Still, some do sport the trapping of that forementioned gig economy: in a bow to the fact that very few people actually have cash anymore, the most enterprising examples accept Venmo, Zelle or PayPal, complete with QR codes for effortless payment.

Always ready to encourage budding masters of the universe, I stop and praise their efforts, but tell them I'm not allowed to drink the stuff. I offer them a dollar for a cup, but with the caveat that one of them has to consume it for me. Most look at me quizzically, but nod, assent to the deal, pour a serving and quaff it down. And then there are some that agree, pocket the money, then wait till I walk away and keep the inventory in the pitcher, future Sam Bankman-Frieds in the making.

Tomorrow that street corner will be back to normal, as the average life expectancy of these stands is in direct correlation to the attention span of a tween. And while it may be a Norman Rockwell snapshot from a bygone time, it's still a delight to see kids out and engaging with the world as opposed to staring at a screen. So make sure you have a few singles in your pocket when you venture out: Amazon had to start somewhere.

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Marc Wollin of Bedford prefers iced tea over lemonade. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Neighbor Peeping

Some prefer spring with its blooming flowers and warming temperatures, while others relish summer with its beaches and outfits of sandals and shorts. But I love fall. I love the crisp temperatures and the less crowded weekdays around town as people go back to school and back to work. For all of us indoctrinated by the perpetual cycle of education, it's when the new year really starts, when the new seasons for TV, film, music, dance and all the arts kick off in earnest. And from an aesthetic standpoint, it has my favorite look, as the trees and bushes turn from their summertime greens to reds, yellows and russets. Whether it's in the hills and mountains as you head further up or down county or country, in your own backyard, or even the side streets of cities and towns, it's a color pallet that has no equal.

Starting in the far north and working its way south on a weekly rolling basis, the peak of that display is always a moving target. Still, depending on where you live, as you read this you are likely hovering somewhere in or near the sweet spot. While it was in the 1860's that Emily Dickinson penned "The Maple wears a gayer scarf / The field a scarlet gown," credit goes to Vermont's Bennington Banner newspaper in the mid 1960's for originating the expression "leaf peeping." Since then, an entire tourism sub-industry has sprung up to cater to those heading to the mountains to see what Henry David Thoreau called the "the month of painted leaves."

However glorious it is, the season is a short one. The inevitable and eventual conclusion is that those same works of natural art drift down to the ground. What's left is a tangle of bare branches above, and a carpet of crispy crunchables below. In the woods it's merely a noisy coating, while for homeowners it begats a season of raking and blowing to gather up the detritus so it doesn't kill the grass or clog the cutters. 

But that process allows for a new activity. While your nearest fellow neighborhood dwellers may have been more or less shielded from your non-intentional prying eyes for the last 6 months, not so now. Through no fault of them nor affirmative action from you, that veneer of seclusion has been drifting away. And as those oaks and maples and birches shed their leaves, what's left is a see-thru scrim of branches that don't hide nuthin'. And that enables a new activity: neighbor peeping. 

Not to be confused with being a Peeping Tom or Tom-ess, with its connotation of intentional nefarious unwanted spying, this is much more accidental and casual catching-a-glance. Those who live in close quarters have mastered the art of not seeing what is in front of them, of averting their eyes from obviously unintentional exposure by a neighbor. But those of us with some separation as well as natural screening between us and the next haven't had to cultivate said talent. Meanwhile, on the peep-ee side, it doesn't mean that folks lead an exhibitionist lifestyle, just a more lackadaisical one concerning privacy. After all, no need to draw the blinds when the oak tree or hydrangea bush does it for you.

Not so at this time of year. The change of season creates a slow striptease of open windows. Walk through your neighborhood, glance from an upper floor across the street or drive home after dinner, and you are likely to see interiors that weren't meant to be exterior-ed. It might be a new painting on the wall or arrangement of furniture, folks eating dinner or a large screen TV showing "The Real Housewives of Wichita." And it's also likely you will see someone talking on the phone while walking around the living room sans pants, still another lip syncing to Taylor Swift in the front of the bedroom window, both formerly screened from prying eyes by maple leaves. 

We live in an "out loud" society, where so much that once was once private is now public. But with Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube it takes an intentional act to post something. As fall turns to winter and the leaves disappear, we may be posting publicly whether we want to or not. So remember as the natural curtains start to drift open that perhaps it's time to draw yours.

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Marc Wollin of Bedford loves walking and looking around. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

A Chef and His Table

Whipped burrata croustade: Grilled peas and very old balsamic vinegar

Depending on the night, that might be the first of 8 or more courses that Jack Montgomery serves you. A foodie and self-taught cook, Jack created an 8-seat chef's table establishment in Edinburgh, Scotland. Called Argile, French for "clay," the name turns out to be an homage to the custom earthenware and pottery he had created for the restaurant, not to mention the malleable way he uses ingredients.

Steamed Shetland mussels: Dressing of Gordal olive juice and fig leaf oil

I asked him where his passion for food comes from. "The love of restaurants definitely comes from being dragged around France as a child. My parents weren't seeking luxury, but they did have a deep fondness for provincial French restaurants with a certain charm. My sister and I didn't appreciate our luck at the time, but we were quietly being indoctrinated into what the French would call 'les arts de la table.'" 

Ayrshire potato "cacio e pepe": Cured egg yolk, onion ash and red cabbage reduction

Jack moved to France while in university and lived above a market. While there he worked his way through Escoffier's 1903 bible of French cooking, "Guide Culinaire." He made it his mission to toy with ingredients he had never seen nor handled, be it fish, shellfish or spices. That led to some real kitchen experience in two French restaurants – "100 hour weeks were common" – followed up by training as a butcher and front-of-house roles to learn the world of wine.

Slow-cooked egg: 96hr onion-broth, lardo and togarashi

But his own restaurant? "For me it was never a destination I was rushing towards. Rather, I was fascinated by the intricacies of cooking, and my aim was simply to absorb as much knowledge as I could. Reading, dining out and working in kitchens all provided useful angles to learn from, and I literally ate, slept and breathed it." It was only later that the lightbulb lit: "Having lunch at a restaurant in London which sat 12 guests gave me the idea that maybe small is beautiful. This also seemed to provide a more realistically affordable route to opening somewhere of my own."

Dry-aged monkfish: Chamomile-confit tomato and a sauce of carrot and piment d'Espelette

The menu at Argile is a multi-course journey reflecting Jacks sensibilities and history. At its heart it's all about the component parts: "I think it's important that you should be able to identify and it should taste of what it is - ideally the best or most amplified version of itself." As to the cuisine itself, "we take the best Scottish produce we can find, we cook it with solid French technique, and sometimes we inject some global top notes, but that's mainly because I love Japan!"

Venison "kobujime": Purée of beetroot and cocoa butter; chewy beets glazed in smoked soy

Visit Argile and you are basically sitting with friends in Jack's kitchen. A sleek counter space in the quiet Marchmont section of the Scottish capital, Jack works with minimal equipment, the centerpiece being a Konro grill, a small Japanese indoor barbecue which runs on smokeless Binchotan charcoal. Along with his assistant Elliot, he cooks, serves, explains, chats, teaches and makes you feel like you are in his home. The night we were there we joined another couple from Washington State and one from Genoa, Italy for a three-hour journey, filled with wine, stories, unexpected tastes, conversation and laughter.

Sake lees cream: Strawberries macerated with elderflower,; lemon verbena meringue

I asked Jack why a small, limited-seat restaurant with a tasting menu vs. a more traditional establishment. There are practical considerations to be sure: "We are a small team. For each dish to have more than, say, three components, service would be slowed to the point that we'd struggle. So instead, smaller, more concise dishes - and more of them! - give us the chance to show more breadth across the menu." But it's got an upside as well: "Creating a multi-course menu opens lots of avenues to explore. It means dishes don't each have the same requirement to be 'complete,' but can highlight less-expected elements. For example, we were cooking a nice fennel garnish for a fish dish earlier this summer, and decided to make it a dish of its own."

Black sesame Bakewell: Roasted cherry compote and Valrhona Ivoire namelaka

What does he want diners to come away with? "I want my guests to enjoy something new. Maybe to come away with a changed perspective around some aspect of the food they've eaten. Maybe even just 'I didn't know an onion could taste like that.' We sometimes have guests who tell me at the end of the meal, 'I didn't think I liked mushrooms, but after tonight I think maybe I do.' That can be fun, but I'm not here to educate, challenge or lecture. My job ultimately is to give people an enjoyable night. I want to keep exploring, keep doing what we're doing, and try to make it better." 

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You can find Jack and Argile online at argilerestaurant.co.uk. Marc's column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Skye High

 I had very low expectations for the trip. Not that any international travel can't be exciting and interesting and entertaining. But places like France and Italy and Japan and Australia come with well-known and lengthy pedigrees. Any visitor is bound to be wowed by the combination of culture and scenery and food. Not that Scotland didn't have lots to recommend it, and numerous enthusiastic reviews from friends who have been there and loved it. But I'm not a Scotch drinker, I'm not particularly fond of haggis, I don't play golf, and didn't relish a vacation where I would be driving over 700 miles, all of it on the other side of the road. Just returned, I can report back that I was wrong: in spite of those caveats, it's a destination well worth visiting.

There are numerous reasons. Aside from the road thing (and more about that in a minute) it's a very easy place to get around. They speak English (sort of), most everywhere is cashless, they measure distances in miles, and the people couldn't be friendlier. There were other tourists for sure, but with the exception of one or two sites, most spaces in and out were relatively uncrowded. There was an incredible range of things to see, from historic sites to museums to natural beauty on both an intimate level and way beyond. And while there are numerous places for a quick bite if you wanted pizza or a burger, every meal we had was a winner, some ranking up there among the best we've had, including one that's a contender for that title.

The capital of Edinburgh is a compact place, anchored by the castle in its middle. The most touristy place we visited, it's still worth a stop as it's the reason the city exists. But within a 20-minute walk from there is a top-notch art museum, a bohemian village along a stream, a royal palace and a challenging 40-minute hike up an 823 foot extinct volcano to overlook the city. Add in a wide variety of world-class restaurants, and you have a top tier, yet very manageable urban experience.

Of course, it's hard to talk about Scotland without getting away from the southern population centers and venturing into the Highlands. This sparely populated region (with 1/3 of the country's total land but just 4% its population) seems to contain more sheep and cows than people, not to mention some of the most dramatic scenery on the planet. You quickly venture into a landscape of endless farms and fields, ones that sweep to the horizon. And seemingly around every bend is another loch, freshwater lakes that look like endless seas until you note they do indeed have a far shore, with another just over the next hill.

But it is the poetically named Isle of Skye and surroundings that takes your breath away. A land of soaring mountains, deepest valleys and windswept grasses, the weather turns from brilliant to threatening to sinister and back again all in an hour, with numerous feints and surprises. With few roads, some paved, some gravel, most frighteningly narrow, you spend a lot of time going slowly and peeking around corners for oncoming traffic. When you do encounter another vehicle, it means a real-time negotiation as one of you pulls into a "Passing Place" bulge on the side to let the other go by. That kind of necessary cooperation and congeniality may be why it seems the locals are among the friendliest we've ever encountered. But in the end the scenery makes it all worthwhile, causing you to marvel at the harsh beauty that seems endless. 

Beyond that the rest of the Highlands seem chock-a-block full of castles of every type, from opulent to modest, from restored to ruined, and quaint tiny villages that barely merit a mention. Get away from the more well-known places like the castles Dunrobin and Urquhart, and you find a equal number of scenic monuments and natural highlights requiring some trekking, like the ruins of Skelbo or the falls of Fairy Glen. Yes, away from the few motorways the roads are often single tracked, but with farmland on either side as opposed to the edgeless paths of Skye, the stress level goes down by an order of magnitude.

There is much we didn't get to: the university and golfing seat of St. Andrews. the flocks of puffins off the Isle of Mull, the granite architecture of Aberdeen. Still, even without those attractions we came away with moving Scotland high up our list of sites to recommend. Or to put it in local terms, as the Hogmanay toast goes, "May the best ye've ever seen be the worst ye'll ever see." 

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Marc Wollin of Bedford loves to travel. You can see some pictures from the trip here. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Red House Ranch

 It's not an uncommon situation. We get older and start to have health issues, causing us to reexamine our lifestyle, do some research and make some adjustments. For most of us, that means changing our diets, trying to get a little more exercise, hopefully getting a little more sleep. Ike was in the same situation, but he went all in. He quit his job, got his brother and sister to do the same, moved back to his childhood home, and started a regenerative farm.

Ike had grown up in Van Etten, NY, on land first bought by his grandparents in 1928. They and subsequent generations tried different farming formulations to make a living, including dairy, poultry, crops and even firewood. But it got harder and harder, and his folks decided to stop farming in the mid-eighties. Ike, like many children who grew up on farms, wanted a different life. He left to get a degree in electrical engineering, got married and had kids. He went to work for a big telecommunications firm, got posted around the world from Singapore to Saudi Arabia, and eventually got divorced.

At one point he was in Kansas City and just for fun went to an agricultural conference. Not wanting to pay the extra five bucks to go into one of the special sessions, he stood outside and listened to a talk about what is now termed regenerative farming. In it, animals are raised using a symbiotic cycle of feeding, moving from pasture to pasture as opposed to being centrally fed. And that got him thinking.

Meanwhile, the life he was living was taking a toll. "I was having health and nutrition problems. I was overweight and had high blood pressure. I decided I needed to change my diet. I eliminated all gluten and dairy and started becoming highly aware of how what you eat profoundly affects your health and well-being." He shared his revelations with his brother Dave, a heating and air conditioning technician who was also having issues, including being a type 1 diabetic. Both moved toward Paleo and Keto lifestyles, eating more grass fed and pasture raised meat, eggs, and more vegetables, while eliminating carbs, seed oils, sugar, and other processed foods. It had an effect: both saw dramatic improvements in their health. At the same time they started to grapple with how to care for their aging parents, and the 200 acres that they would inherit. And an idea started to develop.

They attended conferences and lectures, and read dozens of books and articles. They invested in infrastructure like movable electric fencing for cattle, and eggmobiles to house chickens. Ike said, "My whole idea was to make an enterprise where we can actually pay ourselves a living wage, unlike most farmers who are just happy to be able to turn the tractor on and pay their basic bills, not necessarily making income." They put together a business plan, gave up their jobs and moved back home. And Red House Ranch was born. 

That was 10 years ago. The business has developed and grown to offer 100% pastured raised grass finished beef, lamb, eggs and pasture raised pork via their website to buyers in the Northeast. On their land they raise cattle and pigs using natural methods. The cattle graze on fresh pasture daily, a practice known as mob grazing. They are given access to supplemental minerals, including salt and seaweed to help them balance their diet and to assure optimum nutrient density. The pigs are raised using the silvopasture method, a practice that integrates trees, forage, and livestock grazing on the same land. For poultry and lamb they partner with other local farmers who raise their animals the same way. The result is that they can offer a complete menu of farm raised meats in a sustainable and humane manner.

They've also added other offerings based on their interests. Dave raises garlic and packages it as flakes and powder, and they work with a local neighbor to tap their maple tree to make syrup. In keeping with their approach to waste nothing, they offer pet treats, including smoked pork nose and tail. And Ike has developed a charcuterie product line, so it's only a matter of time before those products make an appearance on the website (Spoiler alert: we tried some on a visit and they're great.)

Dave and Ike's sister Chris helps with the marketing and online presence, while their mom helps pack eggs, and like all farm moms, patches their pants. As to the name, the house on the property was red when they were kids, and it's still red, so Red House Ranch was the obvious choice. The not so obvious choice: updating a century old farm to a modern regenerative operation. Says Ike "We've dedicated our lives to this type of farming because we're passionate about sustainability, and we want to help others improve their health, too."

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You can find the farm online at https://redhouseranch.net/. Marc's column can be found weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Cutting the Cords

If you get new socks, you can keep the old ones or throw them out. Likewise for your underwear, your shirts, your pants, your entire wardrobe. Same goes for the pots in your kitchen, the phone in your pocket, even the vehicles in your garage. There is virtually nothing in your life that, when it gets old, needs updating or you just feel like a new version, you don't have the option of hanging on to or disposing of by one means or another.

Except the wires in your house.

While the watchwords of technological progress are "computing" and "cell" and of late "AI," perhaps one of the most foundational is "wireless." We have come to expect that almost any device we use is available in a form factor where it can go anywhere untethered. For power there are batteries, rechargeable and one-shot, while for connectivity there is WiFi and Bluetooth in multiple flavors. For sure, wires are still needed to go from the centers of the universe, be they power plants or data centers, to our own bases of operations. But once there what we need is packed into cells or tossed into the ether, waiting to be accessed as needed. As time goes on each is getting stronger and faster and increasing capacity, enabling us to go further and further from our own mothership for longer periods of time.

That means that the infrastructure that took it the last mile is now obsolete. No need to plug in a strip of rubber encased copper to make that final connection. In many cases you couldn't do that even if you wanted to: more and more devices are doing away with headphone jacks, network connections and even dedicated power ports. Wire-less might more correctly be called wire-none.

They were all necessary and essential at one time. Electrical to be sure, but also telephone, TV antenna, cable, intercom and more. Each was carefully installed by the original builder, a licensed professional or maybe even you. Each made perfect sense when it was put in, enabling appliances to power up or speakers to be heard. Wall plates were matched to décor, while any extensions were carefully nestled along baseboards to be as invisible as possible. 

But now? A look in your basement or closet or under your desk reveals a rat's nest of wires in different colors that used to be the circulatory system that connected you to the outside world. Now they sit fallow and forlorn, terminating in a forgotten menagerie of connectors, carrying nothing at best, decaying at worst. Were it any other aspect of your life, you would rip them out by the root, clear cut them to the bone, and toss them out or offer the best to charity. 

Not so here. The reasons vary. For one, they were likely installed in such a way that to pull them out would result in collateral damage. Unless you fancy repairing and repainting a strip of wall, better to just leave the wall plate as is and put a vase in front of it. And perhaps more alarming, it's possible that the butterfly effect of cutting a single seemingly useless wire might result in your entire system becoming unstable. 

I offer myself as an object lesson. On the outside wall of our family room is a bundle of wires that used to traffic sound to speakers inside and outside. Useless now, they were replaced with small Bluetooth versions that can go anywhere. I could, rather should cut them and spackle the holes. Yet I don't, as I'm no longer sure what they are actually connected to.  Meanwhile, in our basement there is a central point where all the old phone wires come in, a rainbow of coated copper that provided multiple lines. Obsolete since we switched to fiber years ago, I should be able to rip it all out with no effect. But I am afraid, very afraid, of the unintended consequences of a little tidying up. 

At some point we will sell our house and the new owners will come in and start fresh. Good for them. But until that time our walls shall remain intact with their contents slowly decaying within, testament to ancient technologies that required Point A to be connected to Point B. Rather than take a chance, I will leave it all alone, treating it as a shrine to some long-forgotten deity I don't wish to anger. 

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Marc Wollin of Bedford installed cable connections never used. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Father, I Hardly Know Ye

Father William Bausch is 96 years old. 

I have known him for 5 months. 

That means I have a lot of catching up to do.

I first became aware of him several years ago when we were moving my mother at the senior community where she lived into assisted living. As we were cleaning out her apartment she asked me to donate an art book she had to the facility's library. While I was walking there I noted a piece of paper sticking out: "In honor of Father Bausch, one of the kindness people I know." I asked the librarian about it. Turned out he was a retired priest who lived there, did services and gave lectures. Interesting, and I assumed that was the end of the story.

A year later when my mother died we were planning a small service. I recalled the note, and asked if Father Bausch was still around. He was, and I reached out. I knew I liked him when I got his voicemail: "You have reached the House of Bausch. The House is in. Bausch is not." When we connected I explained that my mother had passed, and though we were Jewish, wondered if he might be willing to officiate at a graveside service. He offered his condolences, recalling that when he gave lectures that my mom attended, and mentioned something about Jewish traditions, she always gave him a thumbs up. He continued: "Son, before we were religious, we were just people. I would be honored."

After the funeral we kept in touch: I sent him this column, he sent me some of his writings (turns out he had written more than 40 books). At one point I was going to be in the area, so I reached out and asked if he would be interested in having dinner. And so we began a conversation. 

Of course I asked about his history.  One of six children, he was a depression baby. His father was a baker with a great reputation as a decent man: "He was the Atticus Finch of New Brunswick. He never sold anything over a day old, and took all his leftovers to the Salvation Army at a time when Catholics weren't supposed to deal with other religions."

He got thrown out of high school and eventually enrolled in a seminary in Baltimore. Classes were few and poorly taught, and he was bored. But he discovered a huge library on the top floor of the building, and started reading, averaging a book a week. "In effect, we were learning nothing in class, which was good, because I didn't have to unlearn anything. And a negative turned into a positive."

He was ordained in 1955, and one of his early postings was as Chaplin to a lay movement within the church. One of their rules was that he couldn't talk until the meetings ended. "I was never so humiliated and humbled in my life. I was forced to be silent, and to listen, really listen, to their stories of how, day after day, they struggled to be good Christians." As he listened, a revelation came over him: "I began to realize what a privileged, innocent life I led. I knew I had found my priesthood's core: that they, the laity, would teach me, not the other way around."

From that day on he let the people of his parishes lead him, and became a staunch opponent of clericalism, which he describes as priests acting as "the father who knows all." He wrote about it in a magazine: "I just found that intolerable, and I was unwise enough to write about it, and they had a major fit over that view. They wanted to throw me out. I got called on the carpet so much that I wore the carpet out. But they made a compromise and sent me to the farthest parish until I couldn't go any further."

Luckily, it was a progressive parish which embraced his views. He kept writing, and discovered an audience that appreciated his approach. Of course, not all did: one website posted an article "How To Destroy Priesthood with the Help of Father William Bausch." But he kept preaching, kept sharing, kept letting his parishioners tell him how they wanted to be led. And he kept it up until he retired as an emeritus priest, and until recently, led services, lectures and storytelling in his retirement community for people of all faiths.

Sadly, serious health issues are slowing him down, not to mention just being 96. Yet he still wants to talk and share and listen and learn. It's selfish, I know , but as we get older we so infrequently get the chance to make a new acquaintance who has so much history and so much to offer. So if he's willing, the conversation will continue, and dinner is on me.

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Marc Wollin of Bedford is still trying to understand faith. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Award Winning

Most people like it when someone else recognizes their efforts. It might be a small thing: your boss tells you you did a good job, a friend remarks on how cool your outfit is, a neighbor says she likes your garden. Those little affirmations bring a smile to your face, a puffing out of your chest and a warm feeling to your heart. And then there are the times when the results are stellar, going above and beyond, taking the effort from good to great. In those cases, it's possible the work will be recognized by a wider circle, with the result going beyond just an "attagirl" or a "you rule!" And in that instance, the award is, well, an award.

While it or may not be an actual goal, being singled out and handed a trophy as the best in anything is heady stuff indeed. Doesn't matter if the winner is an individual, a group or a company: it indicates to all who care that the named recipient gave their all. The most well-known examples are very well known indeed: everyone knows the names of some of the winners of the Emmys, Grammys, Oscars, and Tonys. And the best are recognized across all of those platforms: 21 people to date have won been honored with one of each, the so-called EGOTs. 

But that's probably way above your pay grade. After all, the vast majority of people and organizations will never be in the running for those high-profile honors. It's not that their efforts aren't exemplary and worthy of spotlighting, but rather the arenas they play in are more self-contained. But within those closed ecosystems the standouts are no less standoutish. And while the awards given there might not carry the cachet of the aforementioned statuettes they are rightly coveted and crowed about.

So while the English Professional Footballers Association just announced that Mo Salah had won his third Player of the Year award, Bonnie Pollack was winning the Milken Educator Award, the "Oscar of Teaching." Created in 1987 by Lowell Milken, the award is the nation's preeminent teacher recognition program, with nearly 3,000 educators being surprised with individual unrestricted $25,000 prizes. "Despite my students' request, I will not be splitting the money up evenly for them to share," she said, but she has paid off her car.

Likewise, the American Water Works Association just named Dr. Karl Linden the recipient of its coveted A.P. Black Research Award. A professor at University of Colorado-Boulder, his research "investigates advanced and innovative UV systems for inactivation of pathogens and degradation of emerging contaminants." Translation: he focuses on using light as a way to disinfect water. Like many winners, he credits the team with whom he works: "The work we have done together has truly changed the water industry, supporting public health protection, and it has been such a privilege to be a part of this inspiring One Water community."

Sometimes it's hard to name just one top dog. For the 17th year, Iowa Farmer today named 6 families as winners of the "The Way We Live Award." Each in their own way "demonstrated their dedication to agriculture and strong Iowa farm values." Typical of these was the Kutzli family, which operates Whitetail Farm, which specializes in vintage, antique and red-fleshed apple varieties.  In the fall, they sell the fruit, as well as use it to make wine at their Whitetail Valley Cellars Winery. Carrying on an ancestral Swiss faming tradition, their goal is to place quality above quantity. "Klein abver Fein," small but excellent.

The trophies don't stop coming, they just don't make it to the front page. The American Society of Human Genetics named Dr. Mike Talkowski at Mass General as the winner of its Scientific Achievement Award. The Bellevue Arts Museum in Bellevue WA published its Award of Excellence winners, including Carole Grisham for jewelry and Erin Pietsch for ceramics. And the Institute of Classical Architecture & Art announced that Nansledan, a development in Newquay, Cornwall, England, is the distinguished recipient of the 2025 Gindroz Award for Excellence in Affordable Housing. Congrats to all.

Like talent, excellence can occur anywhere and does; it's just that you usually don't hear about much about it. So while Billie Eilish might have swept the field with 4 Grammys in 2020, it was just last week that Pastor Mike Jr. won all 9 of his nominated categories at the 2025 Stellar Gospel Music Awards in Nashville. Say "Amen" to that.

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Marc Wollin of Bedford is hoping this column will be nominated for something. It appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Lies, Damned Lies and Recipes

I dare say that both my wife and I are competent cooks. Still, over the years the responsibility for putting that skill to work in the service of weekday dinners has shifted. When the kids were growing up and I was more out and about working, it mainly rested on my wife's shoulders. I would pitch in when I could, but the onus of getting a family meal on the table on school nights fell mostly in her lap. That continued even after the boys moved on, since my projects usually required me to be away for longer hours than her work, and so it just made sense that she still handled the lion's share of the cooking. The pandemic shifted that, as we were both home all the time, and I started to take on more of the load. More recently, as I have streamlined my work schedule, the balance has shifted the other way, to where I am the default workaday cook unless circumstances dictate otherwise.  

As a person who is very project oriented, cooking fits squarely within that sweet spot. You need a goal, a plan, certain specific elements and a timeline, and off you go. In musical terms it's part classical and part jazz: you have a leader following a score with each piece playing its part, but you gotta be ready to improvise and follow the beat where it leads. Sometimes you make Bach, other times, well, it sounds more like a second grader with a violin

That approach is more the state of play these days because, like everything else, the barrier to entry is non-existent for both chefs and recipes. In the past you might have learned from your mother or an experienced cook, while recipes were tried and tested, handed down over generations and/or collected in tomes like "The Joy of Cooking." Now food influencers range from an experienced chef such as Gordan Ramsey with millions of followers, to a pay-to-play content creator such as Lorenza Nicholas from South Africa who charges $50 for a post promoting a product. Meanwhile punch in "apple pie recipe" to Google, and you get 241 million results, including ones that don't even use an apple. You better be ready to pivot as the butter sizzles.

Still, since good ideas can come from everywhere, I keep a running file of recipes from multiple publications and platforms. But the more you read, the more discerning you get, and the more discerning you get, the more you realize that most recipes are lying to you. They promise easy, fast and effortless when they are anything but. Or as Christopher Kimball, who created the PBS shows "America's Test Kitchen" and "Cook's Country" put it, "A recipe is a vague suggestion about how to do something. If you had the proper ingredients at the proper temperature, the proper cookware, you've read the recipe and you have enough time." The bottom line? "Cooking times and recipes are utterly totally worthless."

You get that if you read the comments. It's a great recipe if you substitute this, replace that, use a smaller pan, use a bigger pan, increase the temperature, decrease the temperature, cook it longer, cook it shorter. By the time you get even part way through, the caveats outweigh the original instructions. It's back to the musical metaphor: yes, there's chicken and onions and spices and a pan, but it's just a starting point. That casserole you make was never one that Beethoven had in mind.

Perhaps no better example exists than Sam Sifton's "No-Recipes Recipes Cookbook." In it, the founding editor of New York Times offers more than a hundred recipes that contain a list of ingredients without specifying amounts, and some general guidance on cooking. For instance, one includes the instruction "Make rice, as you do." Another says "Add a couple big glugs of milk and a couple drops of maple syrup." The point being: do what feels right.

It's a place to start, but you gotta start somewhere. For me, that generally means picking recipes based around what we have in the house that has been around the longest. I will open the freezer and see what has the oldest date, see what vegetables in the fridge are starting to lose their luster, and off I go. Tonight could be a shrimp and broccoli stir fry with lemon, or a white chicken chili. Should I set you a place?

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Marc Wollin of Bedford loves play around with recipes. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

You! Yes, You!

By now we've all grown used to the constant barrage of forecasts, warnings, capabilities, pitfalls, cautions, examples, experiences, trials, offers and more about AI, and how it will take over and remake our very existence. This virtual companion is coming for your job, your kids' teachers, as well as your therapist. That said, most would agree with author Joanna Maciejewska's post that "You know what the biggest problem with pushing all-things-AI is? Wrong direction. I want AI to do my laundry and dishes so that I can do art and writing, not for AI to do my art and writing so that I can do my laundry and dishes."

Indeed, the first wave of AI that we all got familiar with was its ability to generate stuff out of thin air that felt very much as if it had been created by flesh and blood humans. We give it a prompt for an essay, picture or video, and off it goes. Now as we are getting more comfortable with it, we're starting to ask it to do more compound tasks: write this and then send it out and get reactions, or find this info, organize it and then present it back in a specific way.  For most of us, we only see the results when we ask for it or go looking for it. But it goes the other way as well: it can come looking for you.

That's what Greg found out. A longtime friend and associate, he's no stranger to technology and the ways of the modern world. As part of that, he is adept (as are many) at quickly weeding through his email inbox, deleting countless "targeted" notes to him which are supposed to capture his eyeballs, but which he sniffs out in a second with their generic come-ons. 

But then there was this one. The sender meant nothing to him, but the subject line caught his attention: "MPI WestField President's Award + Waldorf Events + Myuser." While the last phrase meant nothing, the first two were specifically related to personal things from his past. As such he opened it: "Hi Greg. Your recent President's Award from MPI WestField caught my attention – well-deserved recognition for someone with your event production expertise." Well, yeah, not so recent, but he did win that award a bunch of years back. And who doesn't like it when people recognize your accomplishments?

And so he read on: "That three-week orientation at the Waldorf+Astoria must have been quite the production to coordinate!" Again, a legit reference from a past project, and while not unknown, not something that would have been common knowledge. And it wasn't done trying to cozy up to him: "The real reason for my outreach, however, is about your real estate photography business." This was a sideline Greg started, but had never promoted, advertised or mentioned on any of his accounts. He did do some online research, but nothing traceable to him (or so he thought). 

What followed was a more generic marketing pitch for outreach services, one which, had it been up front, Greg would have immediately ditched. Turns out the key was in that last subject word, a company called Myuser. They offer a service wherein they scrape the web for any and all information about a person, then use AI to craft an approach letter that seems like they know you. And they had trained their servers on Greg.

In thinking about it, much of what was there was hiding in plain sight. While the award was from 2017 and the production gig from 2015, Greg had mentioned them in a now abandoned Twitter/X stream. As to the research on real estate photography, while he usually poked around in incognito mode, certainly he might have left some breadcrumbs somewhere online. And as we've seen in countless examples, if it's out there someone can find it. In the past it might have been a conspiracy theorist sitting in a dark basement clicking around for a few weeks. Now, all it takes is a Myuser account, and a buck fifty per head with a minimum one-month order, and Greg is yours for the taking. Or as Clay Shirky, a professor at NYU put it, "It used to be expensive to make things public and cheap to make them private. Now it's expensive to make things private and cheap to make them public."

When Greg related this story to me, as with many, I was interested because it was something not in my world. But it turns out that "they" weren't done. The email to him closed with this: "P.S. Your work on that National Townhall with live audio streams in Pasadena shows you understand the power of technology in professional services!" That turned out to be a gig that I had hired him for to cover for me. Uh huh: guess it's only a matter of time till they come knocking on my door.

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Marc Wollin of Bedford, for better or worse, has left lots of online tidbits. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

New! Improved?

Doesn't matter whether it's clothing, electronics, automobiles or sporting equipment, there's always a new way or approach popping up to make it better. In most cases it's a modification of an existing item, tweaking a little bit around the edges to hopefully get a more improved product. We're talking Windows 11 over 10, Air Jordan 40 over 39, "Mission: Impossible" whatever version we're up to over the last iteration. In far fewer examples it's a radical reimaging of the existing space, that rare breakthrough that either succeeds wildly or fails miserably. Think iPhone vs. Google Glasses, Diet Coke vs New Coke, Elon Musk vs Elon Musk. 

And so it is in the world of state fair foods. This sub-genre of gastronomy is showcased around the country every summer. Heavily reliant on frying as a cooking technique, humungous as a portion and sticky as a topping, it varies fair by fair, though the basic building blocks and form are the same. It's all about cheese and sugar, turkey legs and dough, sticks and paper plates - often all at the same time – combined with their offshoots and cousins in new and different ways. Sometimes it succeeds wildly if inelegantly. Other times it's just a sloppy mess that isn't worth the 120,000 calories per serving. But as with any artistic endeavor, one man's Pizza Curd Cheese Tacos is another's Deep-Fried Tofuego Bites: beauty (as it were) is the eye of the eater.

You need look no further that the upcoming Minnesota State Fair to see this play out in real time. For sure there are the usual favorites and standard bearers, such as Australian Battered Potatoes (battered and deep-fried sliced potatoes with toppings such as spicy chipotle sauce, sweet chili and hot honey), Mancini's al Fresco (Italian egg scramblers, including their signature Messy Giuseppe) and Sara's Tipsy Pies (including Boozy Blueberry Lemon infused with alcohol). But because having just Sausage Sister and Me with their Twisted Sister on-a-stick (Italian sausage wrapped in breadstick dough) is never enough, this year there are 33 official new foods plus eight new vendors. And it is in this laboratory of progress that new icons are either born or licked off quickly.

What are the contenders? O'Gara's leaned on the Saturday Dumpling Company to create their new Pot of Gold Potato Dumplings, described as cheesy garlic mashed potato dumplings accompanied by a chive-onion dip. BABA's is showcasing its new Fawaffle, which is falafel batter pressed into the shape of a waffle, then topped with tahini butter, tomatoes, hummus, green sauce, and mint. On the sweet side the West End Creamery is showing Grandma Doreen's Dessert Dog, a coffee cake ice cream sandwich skewered on a stick and drizzled with house-made strawberry rhubarb jam. And going sweet and savory are Fluffy's Hot Honey Jalapeño Popper Donuts, which are yeast-raised doughnuts frosted with homemade jalapeño cream cheese, and topped with crumbled bacon, pickled jalapeños, and drizzled with hot honey. One man's ceiling, and all that. 

Those are just some of the contenders for your stomach. There's also the Croffle Cloud, croissant batter done in a waffle iron, topped with whipped cream, fruit puree, and a cloud of cotton candy. Or how about the Tandoori Chicken Quesarath, which is an Indian riff on a quesadilla, but with paratha bread topped with tandoori chicken, then layered with a blend of Monterey Jack and mozzarella cheese and a mixture of sauteed onions, mixed bell peppers, jalapeños, corn, cilantro, and green chilis.  And if you want in on the pickle juice craze, you can try the Dill Pickle Iced Tea, garnished with a rim of chamoy, Tajín, salt, and dill. Check, please.

It remains to be seen if any of these will survive till next year, let alone achieve the lofty status of the favorites of the Fair, such as the Juicy Lucy, a hamburger patty with the cheese cooked inside rather than on top. It's a tall burrito to climb, but will the Triple Chocolate Mini Donuts, made of chocolate mini doughnuts with chocolate icing and chocolate sprinkles and chocolate chips in a bucket rimmed with chocolate icing make the cut? See for yourself: the fair starts on August 21 and runs for two weeks, so you best book your tickets now lest they run out of Pimento Cheese Puffs.

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Marc Wollin of Bedford likes to see new food combinations, usually. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Turn Turn Turn

In the words of Carole King, did you feel the earth move? Not earthquake-like, whereby stuff is shaking and falling from shelves, but speeding up and slowing down, kind of like the moving walkway at the airport jerking every now and again? It happened. Or was it just another Y2K-like moment, when the tech geeks raised a huge red flag that caused all of us mere mortals to run around like chickens with our heads cut off, and all for naught?

Let's back up.

Of the very few things in this world we can count on is that every day when we wake up the earth is still spinning. For sure, there are innumerable dystopian tales where something affects that motion. But absent any super-duper alien weapon or an asteroid hitting London, that daily cycle will repeat itself for the foreseeable future. It is true that the earth is slowing its turning, but it will take billions of years for it to have any noticeable effect. And probably by the time it becomes an issue the sun will explode, making the earth's speed the least of the worries for whomever is left at that time. Bottom line: on the list of things to be concerned about, Netflix chiding you for sharing your password should be far more worrying.

However, it turns out we are experiencing some anomalies in that rotational speed right now. On July 10 we spun a bit faster, making it the shortest day of the year so far, clocking in at 1.36 milliseconds less than the usual 24 hours. Likewise, July 22 was 1.34 shorter, while August 5 is expected to come in 1.25 milliseconds light. In the grand scheme of things, that acceleration is nothing to worry about from an extinction perspective. A variety of factors, from the pull of the moon to seasonal changes in the atmosphere to how the liquid in the planet's core is sloshing around all contribute to how fast we spin. Climate change is also a factor, as the spreading of water from the formerly frozen ice caps changes the weight distribution and how we turn. But none of it is life altering, so there's little chance in the short term of your glass of iced tea sliding off the table.

Your electronics, however, are another factor. That little variation makes a difference in the atomic clocks that provide the measurements for things like GPS and navigation. If they're not exact, your Google maps might direct you to the pet store as opposed to Target, or worse, off the bridge as opposed to on it. And so just as we have a leap day every 4 years to align the calendar to our orbit around the sun, at irregular times scientists have added a leap second to smooth things out. Since 1972 when the practice started, 27 seconds have been added, with last occurring in December of 2016.

The key word there is "irregular." Unlike leap year, which occurs like, well, clockwork, leap seconds are inserted as needed. And that means that systems can't always account for them. After one was inserted in 2012 Reddit crashed, while some systems at Qantas Airways went haywire, causing long flight delays across Australia. And after the 2016 addition systems at Reddit, Gawker and Mozilla all went blooey. Now that we're seeing more speeding up, there is talk of taking time away, a so called "negative-leap-second." Does that mean your future cell phone payment might happen in the past? Possibly: no on has any idea what might actually happen if they put it into play.

As such, the experts who keep tabs on these things are saying we should do away with those random fixes entirely by 2035. That doesn't mean the problem will go away, just that we'll avoid tinkering with the clocks for a bit. It does mean that at some point in the future they may need to add a bunch to make up for it. And so there is a very good chance your great-great-great grandchildren may suddenly feel more mature when a leap hour is inserted into their lives.

But that's a ways off. Until then, engineers are hoping that some software "smears" will cover over the issues, and no further seconds will need to be inserted. As the production engineering folks at Meta posted "we are supporting a larger community push to stop the future introduction of leap seconds - which we believe will be enough for the next millennium." Translation: Waze should still be able to get you to grandma's house, for at least a little while. 

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Marc Wollin of Bedford is fascinated by time. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Comfort in a Bowl

As Iga Świątek was marching through the women's draw at Wimbledon, she engaged in that time-honored tennis tradition, the post-match on-court interview. After winning her third-round contest, interviewer Annabel Croft asked her the usual stuff about the win, the court, her attitude, and so on. Świątek said that she was "in the zone" and not focused on other things, like what she might have for dinner. Croft followed up and asked her that now that she had won, had she indeed decided what to eat? Świątek said that fish and chips was too heavy, and she was craving her childhood favorite, pasta with strawberries. As the crowd tittered, Croft tried to bring it back to a Wimbledon staple: "Oh, that's strange! With cream as well?" Świątek then described a Polish summertime treat of pasta, strawberries and yogurt. "It's just great. You should try it guys!"

The Pole may have a more powerful and spin-heavy forehand than you do, but gastronomically speaking she is no different. In times of stress it's not uncommon to turn to the things that bring us comfort. Most of us have given up on stuffed animals and blankies, and have to be content with well-worn jeans, sweatpants or slippers. But one carryover from our childhoods that we can still enjoy are the foods that calmed us down when we were five. It might be mac and cheese or mashed potatoes, spaghetti and meatballs or meatloaf and gravy. Doesn't make any difference if you're a mom or dad with a toddler, a neurosurgeon or both: Cheez Whiz and crackers might be just the thing to take you to your happy place. How else to explain that NFL teams easily go through at least 80,000 Uncrustable peanut butter and jelly sandwiches a year?

Those options are ones with which most in this country are familiar. There are of course regional favorites: if you're in the south, biscuits and gravy might remind you of home, while those in the southwest might crave grandma's tacos, and New Jersians wax rhapsodic over Taylor ham. And then there are specific examples that are mothers' milk to the locals, but cause raised eyebrows to those outside the area code. In most of the country chili is a stew of beans and meat and tomatoes in some combination, comforting on a cold day. Fine, but in Cincinnati it's more of a Mediterranean-spiced meat sauce, and generally served over spaghetti or hot dogs. Better not to ask.

Go beyond these shores, and like Iga's pasta and berries, while the favs might be strange to us they might be oh-so-calming to the locals. Years ago I was in Hong Kong with a colleague who was Asian, and all she wanted was some congee, a rice porridge like her mother used to make. But you don't have to go that far. Head just a bit north to our Canadian neighbors, and the way to settle the masses is with a serving of poutine, assembled by topping a heap of French fries with cheese curds and gravy. Meanwhile in Scotland the national dish is haggis, a savory pudding containing sheep's heart, liver, and lungs minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and traditionally cooked in the animal's stomach. And lest you think that only foreigners have strange tastes, our fellow countrypeople who live in Alaska enjoy what is referred to as Eskimo ice cream, a mixture of animal fat, berries and sometimes fish. 

Should Ms. Świątek be back next year to defend her title at Wimbledon, I would not be surprised if you are able to buy a bowl of "makaron z truskawkami" at the concession stand at the All England Lawn Tennis & Croquet Club. And should they sell more than a few servings, it just might start a new tradition of offering snacks themed to the favs of the champion. Coco Gauff loves potato chips, while Carlos Alcaraz craves sushi. Perhaps once Kwon Soon-woo, the highest ranked South Korean on the men's tour completes his compulsory military service and returns, he'll make a run up the standings. Should he win at Wimby, next to the fish and chips and scones with clotted cream you might find beondegi, a South Korean favorite, which is boiled or steamed lightly seasoned silkworm hatchlings. It's said they taste like wood. Comfortable now?

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Marc Wollin of Bedford finds peanut butter works in times of high or low stress. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Ride On

Ever since our kids were little we have always had bikes at our house. In recent years mine was a drop handlebar Raleigh that I got in 1983, while my wife's was a Walmart cruiser she got when we upgraded the kids' from training wheels to mountain bikes. All were long in the tooth, still usable if not exactly up to date. 

Several years ago, with the kids long gone, we gave away the two they no longer used. As to hers and mine, it was only a matter of time before something snapped at the most inopportune time. So my birthday present a few years back was a new hybrid, one which enabled me to take long rides and not feel like I was on borrowed time. This year we did the same for her, enabling us to start a new activity of going out for a short ride in our neighborhood after dinner, and longer ones when the opportunity presented itself. 

Like any new hobby or activity, it was also an opportunity to buy all kinds of stuff, some necessary, some not so much. A solid helmet is a given. Likewise a bag to put stuff in, and a front and back light to make us more visible. It's handy to have something to hold your phone for mileage, maps and music. And while it harkens back to streamers on your handlebars and a squeezy horn, it is much nicer to have a bell as opposed to yelling "On your left!" every time you pass a person.

Were we to only ride out from our house that might be the end of it. But venturing further afield means putting a rack on the car and hitching them up. It took a little doing to find a model that works with my vehicle, not to mention a collection of bungee cords to secure that whole thing. Problem solved, and now we can drive to one of the numerous local rail trails and start our journey there. 

That's for day trips. Our next adventure is to bring our bikes on some upcoming long weekends to visit family and friends, adding a day at the beginning to ride elsewhere. But that means leaving our bikes in public spaces like parking lots, as well as out overnight, and so we need a way to secure them. So time for yet another accessory, a lock.

Where you ride and where you leave your bike helps to define the best model. Reports say that many bike thefts are crimes of opportunity, when they are left unattended or lightly secured with a simple cable that's easy to cut. Like anything regarding security, whether it's online or your house, it's a balancing act involving multiple factors. And since this solution is one you have to carry, to effectiveness and ease you have to add weight, portability and packing.

In forums and lists online, users dish the best options and the pros and cons of each. For city riding a steel "u-lock" is deemed the best: hardest to break and quickest to deploy. Some prefer a heavy-duty chain with shackle, but carrying it is an issue: you often see riders with them slung over their shoulder bandolier style. For our purposes, both seemed overkill and inconvenient. That's said, I was tempted by one called the "V2 Heavy Duty Deterrent Bike U Lock with Anti-Theft Chemicals." Its form factor is a u-lock, if a little thicker than some. The reason is that the steel tube is hollow, and filled with the "anti-theft chemical" referenced in the name. Cut it, and it releases its contents on the cutter. As to what that chemical is, it's best defined by the brand name of the device: Skunklock. Or as described by one unfortunate purchaser who experienced a leak, "I know what this lock can do and how my living room smelled after that last lock made me throw up. I pray God's mercy on whoever cuts it." You almost want to buy it and hope someone tries to steal your ride. 

I opted for a simpler solution, a folding steel bar thing that is heavy but packable. Hopefully its mere appearance will ward off any casual thefts, and the pros will look elsewhere. In the meantime, I think we strapped enough stuff to ourselves and the frame to get back to riding. But I have to say: those gloves look cool.

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Marc Wollin of Bedford has loved pedaling since he was a kid, if you'll have it. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Cold Economics

There are literally hundreds of pages in the new tax act, 900 or so depending on your printer. Not wanting to rely on just the headlines, I downloaded the actual bill and scanned the text from beginning to end. In it I see lots on tariffs and taxes, on prices and payments. There are references to housing and energy, to agriculture and health. It would seem that almost every corner of economic activity is mentioned, except one that touches us all. 

You may come down on one side or the other as it relates to investing in clean energy or domestic chip production, but it's summer. And in this season, if there's a singular topic that unites left and right, it's our key consumable. While we may disagree, indeed, quibble passionately about the best variety, delivery system and embellishments, I am frankly amazed that the bill's writers didn't include protection and controls for the only ICE that really matters at this time of year, ice cream.

We're talking a market worth over $18 billion last year, one expected to grow nearly 4% annually over the next 8 years. It's a product consumed enthusiastically by every demographic regardless of gender, age, ethnicity or geography. It covers every type of manufacturing entity, from corporate conglomerates to mom-and-pop shops. And while we produce 1.3 billion gallons of the stuff every year, we have a trade imbalance, importing more than we export. All of those factors should make it as least as important as those other economic segments. Yet while the tax bill put aside $10 billion to go to Mars, it made no mention of subsidizing a cone with sprinkles.

The economics and options make it ripe for oversight. Start with variations. Doesn't matter whether you are from Durham or Dallas, Chicago or Chattanooga. Walk into your local grocery store and there's a dizzying array from Moose Tracks (vanilla ice cream, chocolate peanut butter cups and fudge swirl) to Chunky Monkey (banana ice cream with fudge chunks and walnuts) to New York Strawberry Cheesecake (cheesecake ice cream with a swirl of strawberry sauce and spiced graham cracker crust pieces). Look a little harder and you can find Bubble Gum, Mac n'Cheese and Bacon, flavors which require a rationale but no explanation. All of that in spite of the fact that survey after survey shows that vanilla, chocolate and strawberry are America's favorite flavors. Yet if you are lucky you'll find those on the bottom shelf behind the Dulce de Leche. 

The pricing is equally disparate. A container of Breyers vanilla will cost you $4.00, or 8 cents a fluid ounce. Meanwhile, a tub of the same flavor from Turkey Hill works out to 11 cents a fluid ounce, while the Ben & Jerry's version costs triple that. And that's in package form. Go to an ice cream emporium, and the cost goes up yet again. Since your local King Kone doesn't sell anywhere but at their stand, it's hard to make a direct comparison. But go to current darling Van Leeuwen and you can match it up. The cost of a typical serving at the storefront is about the same a pint at the store, while containing three quarters or so of the volume. If you throw in the cone for free that's a 50% premium. Yes, you can argue that there's a difference for all those brands and form factors, just as there is between a Fiat, a Ford and a Ferrari. But if it's 90 degrees out, do you really care about the fat content? And will your eight-year-old appreciate the distinction once she covers it with hot fudge and jimmies?

Still, while I might sneer at the increasingly bizarre flavors, or grouse about the price of a cup or cone at the shore, I've never not bought one when the opportunity presented itself. For while there is no rule against consuming gelato or sorbet or ice cream in February, once the calendar ticks past Memorial Day, and certainly after July 4th, it is all but a staple. And using a metric of "satisfaction per dollar spent," whatever the serving, it's hard to go higher on the scale. So just lick it up and buy the cone. Or as runner and writer Don Kardong put it, "Without ice cream, there would be darkness and chaos."

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Marc Wollin of Bedford has a Turkey Hill chocolate peanut butter jones he can't kick, and doesn't want to. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Not So Bon Voyage

Doesn't make any difference whether you are heading to the shore to cool off, to a city you've never been to before or to the mountains to take a hike. It's peak travel season, and before you go you've got to get your ducks in a row. That might mean a rolling suitcase and packing cubes, an extra phone battery and a hat with the floppy brim, not to mention that list of restaurants from your bake sale buddy. If you do your homework you can anticipate most of the issues and needs you're going to run across, and lay in the goods and knowledge to navigate most of them.

Most, that is, except for the people. No matter how much you pack, how much you research, how much you prepare, the one thing you can't account for is your fellow travelers, and there will be a lot of them. Domestic travel is up, with some reports indicating an over 200% increase over last year. International bookings are up as well, by some reports up over 170%. And while recent developments in Washington have some saying that international arrivals will be chilled, even that category is up 5% over last year for the first quarter. All that means that going there, being there and leaving there will bring you face to face with way more human beings than you encounter at home. 

Those people come in all flavors. There are those toting suitcases and those slinging backpacks. There are loud ones and pushy ones, fast ones behind you and slow ones in front of you. And all seem to have a phone out and are more intent on looking at the screen than what's in front of their face. Most are harmless if no less annoying. But all can make navigating restaurants, museums, airports and even just plain old streets a challenge. 

You can't avoid them, but you can recognize them and try and steer the other way. It might be one who gets on the plane late and then tries to cram a too-big carryon into an overhead bin, crushing all the other bags in sight. Or those that decide the best place to stop and have an extended conversation about where to have dinner is in the middle of the doorway to the next gallery. Or the person with a cough or other obvious malady which should have kept them in their hotel but rather is out and about infecting others. Other than holding your tongue and your breath, not much any of us can do.  

Then there's Turkish Airlines. They've chosen a more direct approach to combating one particular scourge, the so-called "aisle lice." Those are the folks that, regardless of the pleadings of the cabin crew to remain in your seats until parked at the gate, and then let those in front of you get up and disembark first, jump up immediately. They grab their bags and push towards the front, generally clogging up the aisle for all.

But do that on TA and it could cost you. According to a notice from the Turkish Directorate General of Civil Aviation as detailed on HalkTV, a national broadcaster, "Passengers who act contrary to the rules set forth in the circular may be subject to an administrative fine of 2,603 TL" which is about $67. Crews are now supposed to warn passengers right after they land that they should "Yerinizde kalın yoksa!" (Stay seated or else!)

As the carrier that serves the most countries in the world, there's a reasonable chance that the policy will spread. And not just to that situation, but to other infestations as well, such as the related "gate lice" that swarm boarding areas before their group is called. If it's successful it might set a new precedent, enforcing civility and good manners with a stick instead of a carrot. 

Assuming you're not one of those offenders (you're not, are you??) the best thing you do to cope with all these types is to chill out and roll with it. After all, in 99% of the situations it's not a zero-sum game. There will be plenty meals left to be had, coffees to sip, pictures to be taken and quiet to be found after they move on. And no matter when you get on the plane, everyone on it leaves at the same time and lands at the same time. So put your earpods in and take a deep breath; you'll be there before you know it.

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Marc Wollin of Bedford loves to travel, preferably off season. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Time to Talk?

It is not uncommon these days to have business associates, friends and family across the country and across the world. Thankfully, electronic forms of communication such as email and WhatsApp make it possible to have asynchronous interactions with them all, regardless of geography or time. Write a birthday note in New York at 2PM, and your buddy in Hong Kong can see it when he wakes up and thank you at his leisure. Your associate in Paris can annotate your PowerPoint over lunch, and you're able to review the suggestions in Los Angeles when you sign on after breakfast. True, events can overtake the exchange, rendering your reaction moot. Comment in the evening on the latest buddy that President Trump has gushed over, and by morning your comeback makes no sense as he is Elon non grata. 

That said, there are times when you find it is better to actually (perish the thought) converse. I know, I know, it's an old fashion notion to have a conversation where one person talks, the other listens and responds, and round and round it goes. But it does cut to the chase and gets to a resolution quicker, not to mention saving your thumbs from all that pecking. The plus side is you get plausible deniability ("Well, do you have an email where I agreed to that proposal?"), while the downside is that there is the possibility of he said/she said ("I'm absolutely sure she said that they would make the reservation."). Even with those caveats, however, it cuts down on the back and forth, and gets issues resolved in real time.

The one challenge is that you have to find a singular point on the clock that works for both. Depending on where you are, dinner in Boston might be coffee in Seattle, while breakfast in San Diego might be lunch in Charlotte. Jump over an ocean, and the goal posts get farther apart: Amsterdam to Dallas is 7 hours, Chicago to Tokyo is 14 hours. That means that while one caller is hunched over their laptop with the annual budget the other is either stepping out of pub or slipping on their fuzzy slippers.

Most folks recognize this modern challenge, and roll with it as best they can. It might mean an early AM call after the gym, or one done in jammies just before bed. It's especially acute for connections in Asia, where no matter how you slice it's either extremely early or insanely late for one party or the other. On the plus side some folks are morning people, other night owls, and they can try and organize the timing of the conversation to hit their own personal sweet spot. That works about 50% of the time and then the situation reverses, making it alternately fair/unfair for each side.

You can have those challenges even within the same zip code, where the differentiator is not geography but rather age and habit. I had offered to connect a young woman with the folks at one of the nonprofits at which I work. The daughter of good friends, she is a high school student and was interested in joining me as a volunteer. Being a teenager, she texted me to chat about it in the middle of her most productive window, 1053PM. But I'm a slightly different demographic, and was busy snoring at that time. When I woke up I was tempted to text her to see if she wanted to talk, but 630AM was not likely a clock time she even knows exists. We eventually connected when our lives overlapped, talking after she woke up around lunch.

Writer and political commentator Tom Friedman wrote a book in 2005 called "The World is Flat." In it he postulated we live in a level playing field where countries, companies, and individuals can see eye to eye. Recent moves out of Washington take issue with that theory, but in terms of time it is more or less true. For while the clock might read differently depending on where you are standing, you can be reached effortlessly anywhere anytime. We just have to learn to roll with it. Or not. As the great comedian Henny Youngman put it, "I was just in London - there is a 6 hour time difference. When I go to dinner, I feel sexy. When I go to bed, I feel hungry. I'm still confused."

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Marc Wollin of Bedford is increasingly earlier to bed and earlier to rise. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Too Much Help

Like many of you, I have ridden the wave that is progress as much as my understanding and wallet will allow. While I may not be the first on the block to adopt every new technology that presents itself (I'm looking at you, Google Glasses), I have tried to keep abreast of those cutting-edge developments that migrate into the consumer landscape, and adopt those that offer some unique appeal. Some had staying power, others not so much. And the castoffs stuffed into the corners of our basement are a roadmap detailing successes, failures, and just as likely, the oh-so-short lifespans of those advances.

Most have been evolutionary if not revolutionary. Take a simple thing like my address book. I first had a little black book in which I dutifully kept track of friends, family and business connections. That went from a hard bound diary with scribbles, barely legible notes and cross-outs, to a miniature loose-leaf binder, whose neatly printed pages came from a computer program where I easily updated the data. Then I got a Zaurus, which was a kind of miniature electronic Rolodex that I could put in my backpack. After that came a Visor, the same basic thing in a smaller package. Eventually all that info moved to a phone, first a flip version, then a smart one. Check the box in the back of my office and you can find all those predecessors, useful if you need to look up the phone number of the plumber we had it in 1992.

So many of those advances seemed almost wonderous when we first adopted them. To go anywhere you used to have to consult one of the many maps you had acquired. But GPS? Plug in an address, and turn by turn instructions guided you directly to that never-before-been-to restaurant or store. To watch a TV show you were going to miss you had to figure out how to program a VCR. But streaming? Anything you want to watch is available at any time with a click, and increasingly, by just saying it out loud. To get a hold of someone not home you could ping their pager and then stand by for them to find a phone to call you back. But text? Asynchronous conversations now go on and on across time zones and geographies, complete with animated accents.

But we may be hitting saturation, defined as the point where nothing else can be added or absorbed. We each have probably more electronic gadgets and associated apps than we should, to the point that they're stepping on each other. We get up in the morning and ask Alexa the weather, then check our phone for the same, punch it up on our iPad, while noticing the readout on the smart thermostat as we pass by. It's like we're doctor shopping for a diagnosis, asking around to find a forecast that matches the outfit we want to wear. 

It's almost as if we don't believe the tools we've been given. That's because each is based on a unique system sporting similar yet different inputs, and so the outputs vary. None are wrong, but none are the empirical truth. It's the same as cooking. When I go to make a new recipe I can find literally a hundred variations of the same. Just this week The New York Times published an article entitled "Our 21 Best Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipes." Best? Doesn't that mean that there should be just one? So much for being the preeminent paper of record.

And now I have multiple electronic assistants that, if not fighting with each other, at least have different opinions on everything, even the time. I wanted to set a clock for the cake I was baking, and due to my mumbling and stumbling, I inadvertently set three devices a'counting down. However, each was slightly different from the other, so at (roughly) the appointed moment they all chimed, not in union but in succession. It sounded as if the kitchen was nuclear attack.

Right now it's Siri and Alexa offering suggestions, but soon it will be Gemini and CoPilot not asking but telling. And in that environment there can only be one leader.  Writer and visionary Isaac Asimov's "Three Rules of Robotics" were 1) Don't Harm Humans, 2) Obey Orders, and 3) Protect Yourself. Right now those guys can only open the car door. But once they take the wheel? Let's hope they remember the right order of those rules. 

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Marc Wollin of Bedford has too many things with keyboards and screens. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Bad Good Bites

Both my wife and I support numerous charities in our community, all organizations that do good work. Be it scholarships for deserving students, organizations that offer food and clothing to those in need, or help for those newly arrived in this country, we offer financial support and in some cases our time. And when our schedules permit, we gather with like-minded others to celebrate those groups and the work they do, some times as a way of raising money, other times to see the results of those efforts, and still others to socialize with fellow travelers.

The venues for those affairs vary widely, from private homes to tents to event spaces to restaurants. There's usually a program of some kind showcasing the organization's work, sometimes a sit-down meal, and occasionally an after party with dancing and more. But take a poll of those attending, and I'd venture that most would gladly pass on any or all those (and still offer the same level of support) if it stopped after the cocktail hour. And more specifically after the nibbles that we don't generally allow ourselves to have when we're on our own.

After all, the kind of people that support these organizations are at least conscious of the idea of eating a healthy diet, and try to practice it. Go out to dinner one-on-one with any of them, and they will just as likely order fish as steak, a salad as fried mozzarella sticks, a side of broccoli as a potato with butter and sour cream. That's not to say that they (and by they, I mean me) don't splurge occasionally on things they know aren't good for them. But open the cupboard at their homes, and you're more likely to find wheat crackers than cheese doodles. 

But go to one of these events for the cocktail hour and all bets are off. I've never seen data matching mini pulled pork sliders with bigger donations, but it must be out there. For while there are an assortment of foods to please all palates placed or passed, there is usually no waiting for the mini kale Caesar salads, while the line for the deep-fried bacon wrapped jalapeno poppers never seems to dwindle.

Makes no difference which organization nor how they stage the event. At one end you might have a food truck like Melt Mobile with its grilled cheese variations, while black-tie mainstay caterer Abigail Kirsch offers “Suspension Grilled Cheese” which is... wait for it... grilled cheese in a suspended wire tray. But whether it's trucked in or hanging over, the item in question is far more likely to clog your arteries than a chickpea tortilla chip.

And that's how we want it. (Note I've just given up on the third person pronouns and taken ownership of the behavior.) We have nothing against the buffet near the bar with carrot sticks and pepper strips accompanied by a nice yogurt dip. But a quick circle of the room locates the charcuterie board with its bounty of pepperoni, prosciutto, salami, and mortadella. Were I in the supermarket I would gaze wistfully at those items arrayed in the deli case while ordering half-a-pound of the store baked turkey breast. But at the reception? It's MAHA be dammed as I fill my plate with processed, cured meats. And go back for seconds. And dare I say, thirds.

Even being behind the curtain on these kinds of happenings doesn't change the equation. I have worked numerous high-end events which include A-list names on the stage. The contracts of those individuals enumerate multiple details, including the hospitality to be set up in their individual dressing rooms. Generally I am too busy working to eat beforehand, and so wait till the event ends, sating my appetite post-show by scavenging their spaces after the stars have left the building. And while some dressing rooms sport crudité platers and hummus, others have barbeque and mac and cheese. It's no contest where I finally get my fill.

I guess the good news is that I'm not wealthy enough to be invited to so many galas as to ruin my health by overindulging on a regular basis. And so at home I eat my fish, grill my chicken and use low sodium soy sauce. But if you invite me to your celebration, make sure the pigs-in-a-blanket trays are filled to overflowing. You know where to find me.

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Marc Wollin of Bedford loves finger food. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Winged Intruder

Every year at this time nature make its spring comeback. The trees behind the house fill in, while the bushes in front plump up like third graders. Flowers of all types open up and show their colors. Meantime the wildlife does the same: we see deer, squirrels and chipmunks, not to mention the occasional fox. Flying critters of all types flit around, some splashing in our birdbath, some buzzing around the flowers, both building nests in nooks and crannies high and low.

And one damn bird always tries to break into the house.

Both our living room and dining rooms have large bay windows with uninterrupted plates of glass with no screens. They offer an unobstructed view of the front gardens, lawn and street. But from the outside they appear to offer unencumbered access to the rest of the house. Any human would know by looking that it's not an actual opening, that there is a clear obstruction in the way. 

But not all the locals are human. And so without fail this time of year, from the front of the house we hear a thump, a pecking, a fluttering, a pause, then the sequence starts again. And if you sneak to the edge of those rooms and look out, you see a feathered intruder trying to gain entry through brute force. 

It's not even like it's the same bird. Last few years it has been a robin, and since their life span is two to six years, it's possible it was the same one over multiple seasons.  But this year's trespasser is a gray catbird, and he or she seems dead set on barging in to join us. 

Simply scaring it away is a waste of time. We jump out, yelling incomprehensible gibberish and bang on the window.  It has some effect, as it immediately retreats into the bushes. Bang a few more times, and it flies off into the trees. We usually stand there waiting for it to return, and when it doesn't, figure maybe it got the message. But we are no sooner upstairs or down then we hear that telltale "THUMP" and it starts all over again. Including our yelling. Us: 0, Bird: 1.

Research says that best explanation is "territorial aggression." Birds see their reflection in the window and perceive it as another bird invading their territory. Their pecking and repeated attempts to "get in" are an aggressive display to drive away this rival.  And so perhaps our friend could be forgiven for merely policing his turf. Except its ours, not his. 

Search for others who have fended off similar attempted home invasions, and a number of solutions are offered. You can make the window less reflective, adding decals or milky solutions like soap streaks. You can also add visual deterrents, like hanging CD's or other shiny objects, as well as more aggressive looking obstacles. We have tried it all, including propping up a Halloween scarecrow and a lifesize cutout of a terrier (don't ask why we have that). Other than making our neighbors wonder what is happening in our house, and probably giving the bird a good laugh, nothing seems to work.

And so this year we decided to try an exterior solution. I took an old mesh tarp and nailed it up over the window in the dining room. Then I stood back to wait. Sure enough, after a while, he made a return appearance. He perched in the bushes in front of the mesh, tilting his head this way and that, as if trying to figure out what was going on. He flew up and grabbed onto it, but didn't peck. He tried a few different spots, all with the same effect. After a while he flew off, heading up into the trees. I headed to the kitchen to get a celebratory snack. Us: 1, Bird: 1.

And then I heard the usual pecking in the living room.

I guess he figured if one entrance is no good I'll work on the other. But I had a demonstrated solution. So I got a piece of burlap, and did the same with that window. And the pecking stopped. All good, except that if you are driving past you might think we were attempting to wrap our house as Christo did to the Reichstag.  But it seemed to work, and demonstrated that being at the top of the food chain, having opposable thumbs, and a larger brain than a bird is worth something. Us: 2, Bird: 1.

And then we heard pecking at my office window. Us: 2, Bird: 2. The contest continues. 

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Marc Wollin of Bedford likes wildlife, as long as it remembers who is the boss. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.

Tariff Time

If you were going to schedule a trip in three months, you might say that you would do it in a "quarter." It's simple math, since three months is 25% of the twelve that make up a year. But it seems we have a new option. As part of President Trump's on again/off again trade reset, he has raised tariffs, lowered them, paused them, then done it all again multiple times with multiple players. And regardless of the amount, the direction or the target, the unit of time he seems to have settled on for each is 90 days. And so let me in this space be the very first to suggest we name this unit of time after the events that inspired it, and call a floating 90-day period a "tariff."

I can do this because English is built for hacking, unlike a language such as French. Since 1635 the Académie française has served as its gatekeeper, not allowing foreign phrases to infiltrate the sanctity of the French tongue. And so while a modern term such as "hotline" might be readily absorbed and used, the Academy mandates that (at least officially) the term of choice should be "numéro d'urgence."

Not so here. As captured in a standout "Saturday Night Live" sketch, Nate Bargatze as General George Washington told his troops why they were fighting: "We will live through the battle ahead because we fight to control our own destiny, to create our own nation, and to do our own thing with the English language. I dream that one day, our great nation will have a word for the number ‘twelve.' We shall call it ‘a dozen.'" A solider asks what other numbers shall have their own names. "None," he replied flatly. "Only 12 shall have its own word, because we are freemen."

So as a freeman I suggest we create the aforementioned calendar increment, something for which there is ample precedent. A textbook example: in November 2003 New York Times columnist Tom Friedman wrote, "The next six months in Iraq — which will determine the prospects for democracy-building there — are the most important six months in U.S. foreign policy in a long, long time." Friedman would go on to make variations of the same statement some 14 times over the next two and a half years. As such, that time period – "the next 6 months" – got to be known in certain circles as a "Friedman Unit," or just simply as an "FU."  

The FU joined a long line of specialized units of measure. They span literature, science and everyday life. Some are highly specific and exact in usage and measurement, while others are a bit more elastic and can encompass multiple areas of endeavor. Often they are named for their creators, other times for the individual that inspired them, still others for the relevant reference.  And it won't take but a New York Minute to enumerate some examples.

We'll start with astronomer Carl Sagan, whose ground-breaking science show "Cosmos" included his catchphrase of "billions and billions of stars." As such, a "Sagan" is defined as a very large quantity (at least 4 billion) of anything. Then there's the "Mickey." It's not about the cartoon character, but rather the smallest unit you can move your computer mouse, either horizontally or vertically. The "Waffle House Index" indicates the severity of a hurricane, and reflects how many of the 365 day/24 hour branches of the restaurant chain have to close. Likewise the "Jimmy Griffin Snow Index" is a measurement of how deep a lake effect snow is, named for the Buffalo, NY mayor who suggested it. It is defined as the number of cans of Genesee Beer you should lay in for consumption while you are waiting to get plowed out. And the "Wiffle" is equal to a sphere 89 millimeters in diameter, and used to measure corals. Turns out marine biologists use a wiffle ball as refence in underwater photos, as it is cheap and the open design means it doesn't get crushed by the water pressure. 

And so I say that henceforth 90 days shall be known as a "tariff." Time till fall? About a tariff. How long does it take to get over a breakup? Experts say it takes a tariff. How long should your prescription for Lipitor be? Your doctor will usually give you one for a tariff. Scoff if you must, but "horsepower" had to start somewhere. 

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Marc Wollin of Bedford has been filling this space for over 4 dog years. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot and as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.