Have you heard of Heart Attack Grill in Arizona? The founder and owner, Jon Basso, used to work for Jenny Craig, encouraging people to eat well and slim down. According to the interview he did with Nightline a couple of weeks ago (you can watch it here), he is...
I've noticed a change in how people respond to my statement, "I don't have kids." When I was in my 20's and 30's, people took this comment in stride, maybe because I seemed young enough to still have children or maybe because they knew I wasn't married, so it seemed...
December is my favorite month. I've been telling people that and I'm stunned by their response. Each person has replied, "Why?" I don't understand this question. We are neck-deep in Christmas decorations, Christmas music, Christmas goodies, Christmas parties and...
Because we weren't conflating food with emotional fulfillment enough.
Images of Halloween invoke death, decay and the unknown. They're the taboo subjects that spooked us as over-imaginative children and that we'll fear again as we get close to our own physical collapse. But the reason Halloween is my second favorite celebration is that...
I'm drawn to horror stories, horror movies and all things dark. When I was seven years old and first learned to read, I started with the ghost story books at the library. I kept going until I had read every ghost story book for my age group in the place. In my teens I...
I am not a vegetarian. I have never been a vegetarian. I have been friends with vegetarians, lived among them and even dated them, but I have never, ever joined them in their meatless way of eating. Yet people think I am one. Friends who have known me for years, who...
Before I saw Sex in the City II, I imagined writing a long, insightful post about it. Instead, I came out of the movie not feeling much of anything. Then I forgot about it.But I made a commitment, so here's as much energy as I feel it deserves. This movie took a stab...
I have run my personal Facebook experiment and it is over. In January 2009, I opened an account because I wanted to see what a friend's girlfriend looked like. I stayed for way too long. It was like a crowded party with all these people I hadn't seen in a long time...
In the summer of 1999, I was a 33-year-old, never-married, dating-fixated, straight woman whose TV got the HBO channel. I didn't have a boyfriend, I was ready for love and, yes, I was hooked on Sex and the City. One of the series strengths was its willingness to...
[I originally posted this on January 5, 2006. I'm running it again because I like how it shows that the heart of Christmas isn't Jesus. There's a long history to this holiday that has included more gluttony and sex than Christ.] Recently the History Channel aired...
This is for Rudy, who asked a couple of questions about the place where I live.Rogers Park, which is on the far northside and borders the next town, is one of the most racially integrated neighborhoods in Chicago and I moved here in 1995. I love being a 50-minute...
On June 20 I posted that Facebook fails to draw me because I'd rather talk to friends in person than online. That was a comparison between blogging/emailing and having live friends in the room with me. But it's damn hard to get live people in the same room with me....
The Special Olympics has declared March 31st a "national day of awareness." They are out to get rid of the "R-word" and so am I. Why do people think this word is okay? I know people who say things like "It was retarded" when they mean to express distaste or disgust....
Yes, Bob and I are big Christmas people. BIG Christmas people.