NEWS
December 16, 2011
The climate-transformed planet of 2100 offers, as Mike Tidwell states, little reason for optimism ("The hottest issue," Dec. 15). Further gloom is warranted by the fact that a plurality of Americans have been egregiously misled by the industry-fueled message of triumphant consumerism and climate-change denial prevalent in our media. In the fantasy land inhabited by conservative denialists, the notion of climate change as a liberal conspiracy to enact a one-world government (forced re-education camps for SUV owners!
NEWS
By Nina Beth Cardin | December 12, 2011
Ever since Adam and Eve took a bite of the apple, we have been haunted by Desire, that shape-shifting seducer who promises us beauty, understanding and fulfillment if only we chase after More. On the one hand, that is a blessing. We would still be clumsy, clueless creatures huddling in caves - or naked in the Garden - without it. Desire and appetite drive our ambition, fire our curiosity and lead us to discover in ways that complacency and fullness never can. It is Desire that propels culture forward, urging us to explore, to dare, to persevere so we may uncover all the wisdom, comforts and delights that make life grand.
ENTERTAINMENT
By Mary Carole McCauley, The Baltimore Sun | November 4, 2011
Starting at sunset Saturday, artist Kelley Bell will place Baltimore's venerable landmark Bromo Seltzer Tower at the exact center of the solar system. For at least the next five weeks, pedestrians and motorists will view the four faces of the clock tower alight with Bell's animations every day between sunset and sunrise. The design she's chosen humorously plays off Baltimoreans' affection for the 1911 tower by making the focal point for the sun, moon, planets and stars. "The Bromo Seltzer Tower fills a unique role in this city," says Joe Wall, the tower's facilities manager, who dreamed up the idea of animating the 24-foot-in-diameter clock faces.
NEWS
By Nina Beth Cardin | October 6, 2011
In 1906, as the world's farmers began streaming into the cities, Jules Meline - former prime minister and twice minister of agriculture of France - wrote "The Return to the Land," to "convince the world that the return to the land, and to the work which the land still offers" was the surest way to mitigate the troubles that increased technology, and increased consumer desire, were bringing. Coincidentally, in 1909, Bolton Hall, a New York lawyer, social activist and the father of the "back-to-the-land" movement in the United States, published "The Garden Yard," a beginner's guide for the urban gardener.
NEWS
By Frank D. Roylance, The Baltimore Sun | September 29, 2011
Six months after NASA's Messenger spacecraft began orbiting the planet nearest the sun, scientists have spotted a vast lava field at Mercury's north pole, weird sinkholes around some craters, and reason enough to throw out most theories for how the planet formed. "In-orbit is definitely the place to be," said James Head III, a Brown University geologist on the team. Messenger cameras looking down from a polar orbi have revealed surface details that could not be seen during three previous flybys, or by the Mariner 10 mission in 1974-1975.
ENTERTAINMENT
By Luke Broadwater | September 15, 2011
OK, before you read this, you should know two things about me: 1) Before tonight, I liked meatballs. They were meaty and tasty and they made spaghetti better. 2) I'm generally opposed to bans. I'm usually for individual freedom and letting people make their own choices. That said, after watching tonight's episode of "Jersey Shore," I must unequivocally call for a ban of meatballs. Not just from dinner tables. Or America. From Planet Earth. Meatballs are not longer a tasty treat that improves tomato sauce.