By Bill Shein February 5, 2016 Our brief, abbreviated, far-too-short presidential campaign (sarcasm heavy) has finally entered the brief, abbreviated, far-too-short (sarcasm heavier) phase where voters have their say. Where the oft-repeated, cringe-worthy claims that “the only poll that matters…
Money Honey
January 28, 2016 By Mickey Friedman Clyde McPhatter and The Drifters sang: “Well, I’ve learned my lesson and now I know/ The sun may shine and the winds may blow/ The women may come and the women may go/ But…
Help Mel Help
By Mickey Friedman January 18, 2016 Those of us who live in the Western end of the Commonwealth have long felt we’ve gotten the short end of the stick. The Boston Globe’s analysis of the 2014 Census data shows that…
Terror is Terror is Terror
By Mickey Friedman December 27, 2015 It is almost always the innocent who suffer. Whatever the cause, those who inflict terror invariably target the innocent. Those who shop in Baghdad, take the train in Spain, listen to music in Paris.…
Want/Need
By Mickey Friedman December 3, 2015 “Want” and “need” often get confused. Webster defines “want” as “to desire or wish for (something)” and “to need (something)” or “to be without (something needed.)” But for me there is an important difference,…
The Dark Side
By Mickey Friedman December 16, 2015 Probably the worst thing about The Trumpster’s reality TV posturing is that he has turned all things upside down, fiction into fact. Telling lies, big and little. Moving from an amusing bluster to a…
Time is a River, Housatonic
By Mickey Friedman November 17, 2015 Not surprisingly, after all this time, politics prevailed. And the Environmental Protection Agency will allow General Electric to leave great quantities of PCB contamination in our Housatonic river system. Even though with every additional…
One Man’s Save, Another’s Bye-Bye
By Mickey Friedman October 30, 2015 Eileen Mooney’s NEWSletter, the remarkable compendium of all things Great Barrington, has a comprehensive report on the planned demolition of the Searles School and the construction of the Mahidas’ 95-room hotel. This project, on…
From Can to Pan
By Mickey Friedman October 17, 2015 Over a bowl of Campbell’s Chunky Mushroom, Chef Bertram deMincemeat shared his plans and daring menu with local movers and shakers at NewBar&Grill@YeOldeFirehouse, the innovative retro-eatery due to open at 20 Castle Street next…
Time Capsules Unearthed in Great Barrington
by Bill Shein October 14, 2015 “Five hundred years, a thousand years. Who knows?” – Paul Joffe, developer of the old Methodist Church site in downtown Great Barrington, on when 100 time capsules being buried in cement under the restaurant-and-retail…