Over the Weekend: Don't Feed the Seals a Twinkie and Other Stories
Counting Seals ... An annual count of seals in the northeast took place a few days ago. Estimates are that as many as 3,000 winter in the Sound, and some are now breeding here. Here’s a good account, from the Journal News, which has some stories about dumb people treating the seals as if they were as docile as stuffed toys.
Citizens Summit ... A reminder: the subject of this year’s Long Island Sound Citizens Summit, scheduled for April 8 in Bridgeport, is global warming, which threatens to overwhelm everything that's being done to restore the Sound. Scott Carlin, a professor at C.W. Post, talks about the local implications of global warming here, in Newsday.
Papa Needs a Brand New Boat ... A preservationist from Mystic Seaport is going to Cuba to see if he can restore the Pilar, Hemingway’s boat.
McMansions ... I wonder if people in places like New Canaan and Greenwich will eventually develop a nostalgia for McMansions and try to establish historic districts. New Canaan’s Oenoke Ridge Road would be a likely candidate. I happen to think that on a planet faced with the prospect of global warming, huge, oil-burning houses surrounded by vast plains of lawn that require once-a-week mowing and blowing are immoral. The reviewer in yesterday’s Times of a new book called House Thinking: A Room-by-Room Look at How We Live had some other thoughts on McMansions and the people who live in them:
It would have been interesting to explore the McMansion problem, the design world's correlative to the obesity epidemic. Is there something about a need for status that's overshadowing a need for coziness? Is there a great insecurity about new money that leads to these enormous facades? Is it braggadocio or simply confidence that's expressed in the McMansion's size? Are we building mighty fortresses? Is the divorce rate falling because people can live separate lives in the same house, phoning from one wing to the other to negotiate bedroom visitation?
Wild & Scenic ... People in eastern Connecticut are working to have the Eight Mile River watershed designated a National Wild and Scenic River. The Courant has a good story about it.
Legalize It … The always-interesting Michael Pollan, who wrote about killing your own food in yesterday’s Times magazine, says hunting feels a bit like getting stoned.
Citizens Summit ... A reminder: the subject of this year’s Long Island Sound Citizens Summit, scheduled for April 8 in Bridgeport, is global warming, which threatens to overwhelm everything that's being done to restore the Sound. Scott Carlin, a professor at C.W. Post, talks about the local implications of global warming here, in Newsday.
Papa Needs a Brand New Boat ... A preservationist from Mystic Seaport is going to Cuba to see if he can restore the Pilar, Hemingway’s boat.
McMansions ... I wonder if people in places like New Canaan and Greenwich will eventually develop a nostalgia for McMansions and try to establish historic districts. New Canaan’s Oenoke Ridge Road would be a likely candidate. I happen to think that on a planet faced with the prospect of global warming, huge, oil-burning houses surrounded by vast plains of lawn that require once-a-week mowing and blowing are immoral. The reviewer in yesterday’s Times of a new book called House Thinking: A Room-by-Room Look at How We Live had some other thoughts on McMansions and the people who live in them:
It would have been interesting to explore the McMansion problem, the design world's correlative to the obesity epidemic. Is there something about a need for status that's overshadowing a need for coziness? Is there a great insecurity about new money that leads to these enormous facades? Is it braggadocio or simply confidence that's expressed in the McMansion's size? Are we building mighty fortresses? Is the divorce rate falling because people can live separate lives in the same house, phoning from one wing to the other to negotiate bedroom visitation?
Wild & Scenic ... People in eastern Connecticut are working to have the Eight Mile River watershed designated a National Wild and Scenic River. The Courant has a good story about it.
Legalize It … The always-interesting Michael Pollan, who wrote about killing your own food in yesterday’s Times magazine, says hunting feels a bit like getting stoned.
posted by Tom Andersen at 7:45 AM
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