Friday, August 2, 2013
(Note: This will likely only be of interest to my local friends and social network buddies. It's a response to Concerning The Suburbs, Their Raison D’etre, And How It Is Reflected In Their Planned Public Spaces, prompted by a discussion on Twitter earlier today. If you're curious, or want the context, go read that first. So, I've been staring at that essay for a good 30 minutes trying to figure out what my thesis is here.Tuesday, January 29, 2013
I was a guest on today's episode of Where We Live on WNPR. The topic was on Connecticut Startup Culture. Give it a listen, and let the mocking commence ("Check it out, it's awesome!" groan). One thing we didn't get to on the show (and, let's be honest, there are probably a dozen conversations wrapped into this wax ball of a topic), was the demographic differences between CT and NYC or San Francisco.Friday, December 14, 2012
On a normal Friday of a normal December, a bunch of families said goodbye to their kids and sent them off to school. Announcements. Meetings for the Principal. A normal Friday. Then the abnormal sound of gunfire. Of violence. Of death. And now, the sound of tears, of sadness, of remembering and loss... of fears and nightmares past and future. I keep imagining what it must be like for the parents of the victims today, especially of the young children.Thursday, July 12, 2012
Like many towns, West Hartford has a advertising supported, free weekly paper that's mailed to everyone. The latest issue arrived today with this as the front page article: Fire, police overtime nears $3 million in 2010 The Town of West Hartford paid nearly $3 million in overtime compensation in 2010 to police and fire department personnel, according to data released under a Freedom of Information request. … Town administrators this year combed through expenses, trimming nearly $1 million from the original proposed budget before approving a 2012-13 spending plan.Thursday, April 19, 2012
Where We Live ran a show today on why younger people (25-34) are leaving the state. I ended up missing the show (listening to it now!), but caught a very lively discussion on Twitter. One side conversation (you can see it on storify here) that I joined in on was about how hard it is to convince people to move to CT. Let's be honest. It's hard. Harder than it should be, quite honestly, considering how nice it is to live here.Monday, November 7, 2011
(I should point out, coincidently, and in testament to how obvious the headline choice is, the Courant chose a similar headline. I started writing this before I saw the Courant article, for the record. :-) ) I had a rather animated conversation with a friend today about CL&P's performance during this most recent storm. I won't bore you with the whole thing, but there are a few things I wanted to open up to a broader conversation.Friday, November 12, 2010
I attend each Connecticut Forum event hoping to leave smarter than when I arrive. This is usually a slam dunk, no doubt it’ll happen thing for any given Forum event. Except, that is, for last night. The topic was Our Great Education Challenge. The panel consisted of: Davis Guggenheim, the filmmaker behind Waiting for Superman & An Inconvenient Truth Lily Eskelsen, VP of the National Educators Association (NEA), the largest teachers' union Joel Klein, the current and outgoing chancellor of the New York City public schools Deborah Gist, Rhode Island Commissioner of Education Jon Schnur, CEO of New Leaders for New Schools The panel was moderated by MSNBC correspondent Norah O'Donnell.Sunday, October 3, 2010
I wanted to briefly expand on a few tweets I made during last night's Connecticut Forum. The topic was "The End of Civility?" and the panel featured David Gergen, Stephen Carter, Christopher Buckley, and Gina Barreca. It was a good discussion, and what I'll address was only one aspect of it. The rise of the political blogs is as much about a shift of power as it is about technology. Having a panel of elites decry the rise of blogs is a bit one-sided.Sunday, September 12, 2010
It's hard to find time to blog or write or do much of anything aside from take care of our new baby, but I've been itching to write this post since we left the hospital last week. When you're expecting a baby, you can tour the hospital. They show you the rooms in labor and delivery and in maternity and the nursery wing. They tell you about the amenities, the security, and medical technologies they have available.