The American grocery store, or supermarket as they are sometimes called, is a thing of freakish wonder to begin with. The sheer volume of goods, most of it not real food, is astounding and frightening. The latest trend are the gourmet grocery stores like Fresh Fields and Trader Joe’s. They have aisles of packaged goods marked organic or vegan with a new list of ingredients you’ve never heard of. National soda brands are gone, but there are plenty of fruit juices that will rot your teeth just...
In Defense Of Sarcasm
by David Todd McCarty | Wednesday, June 1, 2016 We, the members of the internet, just wanted to say a few words in defense of you who so diligently keep us informed on Facebook and other social media outlets to all the vital conspiracy theories, racist rants, urban myths, and fear-based flotsam and jetsam. You provide a valuable public service and don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise. It’s takes a special kind of selfless public servant to regularly pass along obviously suspect information...
Death of A Village
It’s a strange thing to lose a town, especially one in which you are currently living, but that seems to be the case for the town I’ve called home for almost 20 years. Many of my neighbors have been here for as many as eight generations. The village of Goshen, New Jersey was first settled in 1693 by Aaron Leaming who raised cattle on the land. By 1710, there was a settlement and sometime around 1725, my home was built. It’s called the Tavern House and was a tavern and stagecoach stop during the...
To Bellplain With Bob
We’d been hearing for several days about the snowstorm. They made it sound like it was going to be quite a doozy. Of course, if it’s going to be more than a few inches in our neck of the woods, they start calling it a blizzard. It comes complete with graphics and a name. As in, “The Blizzard of 2005” or “Storm of the Century.” So, everyone was out buying snow shovels, salt, milk and bread, like we were all going to be holed up for weeks. But while everyone...
A Genius In The Closet
When I was in the fourth grade, we had a genius who lived in my closet and smelled of garlic. He lived on the third floor of our house in Hatfield, Pennsylvania, slept at odd hours of the day, and kept his mail in our cereal cabinet. It’s a credit to my absolute belief in the normalcy of my family, that I didn’t find this strange in the least. The genius and I shared the third floor, which was basically a converted attic. His bed was near a large walk-in closet and that is where he...
Sex And Violence In America
We’ve got our priorities in this country completely out of whack. Conservatives cry about the destruction of the institution of marriage because two people they feel threatened by want to get married, but support everyone’s right to shoot someone in the face if they feel threatened. They complain about sexuality being cheapened if we somehow glimpse the naked human body, but throw caution to the wind when it comes to marring off a man to a hoard of bimbos on reality television. They say it’s...
Twelve Days of Christmas : Day Eight
Santa I didn’t believe in Santa Claus as a kid. Ever. It just wasn’t part of our culture growing up. You might think that’s sad, but I never felt like I was missing out on anything. Frankly, I think I would have been pissed once I found out I was being lied to. I was that kind of kid. My parents were Conservative Evangelical Christians when we were growing up. They’ve loosened up considerably as they’ve gotten older, but in my formative years they felt it was important that we lived apart from...
Twelve Days of Christmas : Day Seven
Christmas Eve Christmas Eve in my parents house was not a time for presents, egg nog, extended family or any particular food item. It was the night before the event, not the event itself. Our main tradition on Christmas Eve was to go to church. We’d grumble a little maybe, asking if we really needed to go, but really, it was the best service of the year. Unlike the Catholics, Christmas Eve service didn’t count for Sunday service. It wasn’t a Mass. It was an extra service. Special. I grew up...
Twelve Days of Christmas : Day Six
Christmas Presents I love packaging, which is why I used to like wrapping presents so much. I would spend hours and hours wrapping each present by hand (how else would you wrap them?), using brown paper and twine, raffia bows and handwritten notes. I hung tags from them and decorated the outside. I think it was my first Christmas with the woman who was to become my wife and her three children, I had spent a lot of time, thought and money buying presents that year. I don’t think I went overboard...
Twelve Days of Christmas : Day Five
Christmas Shopping There is a story that is very much a part of the lore of Christmas in my house. It involves my mother and she doesn’t even remember it happening. She was in Macy’s buying a pair of gloves for someone, presumably by father, and there was a line at the register. It was the height of the season and tensions were high. The cashier was apparently getting frazzled and by the time my mother got to him he expressed his displeasure. “I’m sorry,” he said after snapping about something...