Baseball

“I wrote 63 songs this year. They’re all about Jeter.” Just kidding. The game we love, the players we hate, and more.

Culture and Criticism

From Norman Mailer to Wendy Pepper — everything on film, TV, books, music, and snacks (shut up, raisins), plus the Girls’ Bike Club.

Donors Choose and Contests

Helping public schools, winning prizes, sending a crazy lady in a tomato costume out in public.

Stories, True and Otherwise

Monologues, travelogues, fiction, and fart humor. And hens. Don’t forget the hens.

The Vine

The Tomato Nation advice column addresses your questions on etiquette, grammar, romance, and pet misbehavior. Ask The Readers about books or fashion today!

The Vine: September 15, 2010
September 15, 2010 · 40 Comments
The Vine: September 15, 2010

Dear Sars,
For all of high school, I’ve felt like a fraud. I’m supposedly really, really smart, but I’m lazy and worthless. I scrape by with Bs and A-minuses, but the amount of work I …

Squared Up: Restraint
September 14, 2010 · 2 Comments
Squared Up: Restraint

In the car earlier today, I decided to listen to “The Michael Kay Show” on ESPN. Well, maybe I should rephrase that; I decided not to listen to my iPod (forgot it at home), or …

Recent Calendar Entries Reveal Synapses Burnt Beyond Repair
September 14, 2010 · 35 Comments
Recent Calendar Entries Reveal Synapses Burnt Beyond Repair

Hobey V-E-T / I realized yesterday that I spell out the word “vet” even when typing it, lest His Orange Eminence figure out what’s going on from the acoustics of the laptop keys and disappear. …

At That Time
September 12, 2010 · 18 Comments
At That Time

I live close to Green-Wood Cemetery. I like it there, walking around in all the stories.
Long ago, the stories went right onto the headstones. One young man — I’ll call him “Martin V.B. Thompson,” though …

TN Read-Along #4 Discussion Thread: Bryson’s Dictionary of Troublesome Words
September 9, 2010 · 28 Comments
TN Read-Along #4 Discussion Thread: <I>Bryson’s Dictionary of Troublesome Words</I>

A very informative read, if somewhat discouraging (nearly every page contains a word or phrase I’ve misused for years), and if I had it to do again, I wouldn’t read it straight through; the book’s …

The Vine: September 8, 2010
September 8, 2010 · 29 Comments
The Vine: September 8, 2010

Hi Sars,
You’ve said that we all want to have our exes admit it was all their fault and apologize — I just got that letter and I am not sure what to do about …

The Vine: September 3, 2010
September 3, 2010 · 13 Comments
The Vine: September 3, 2010

I’d love help finding two books, one for myself and one for a friend. Friend’s is a children’s book about a hunter who shoots the tail off a swamp monster and eats the tail. He …

The Vine: September 1, 2010
September 1, 2010 · 21 Comments
The Vine: September 1, 2010

My boyfriend of two years has four cats. He has three of them for almost 12 years and the youngest for four. These are his first pets (we’re both in our late 30s) as he …

Update!: Jerk of Art
August 31, 2010 · 5 Comments
Update!: Jerk of Art

It’s naïve to expect anything in the way of nuanced criticism from The Brooklyn Paper, but the unlubricated Andy Rooneying to which it subjected Work of Art on the front page of the rag’s arts …

Tomato Nation Read-Along #4: Bryson’s Dictionary of Troublesome Words
August 31, 2010 · 7 Comments
Tomato Nation Read-Along #4: <I>Bryson’s Dictionary of Troublesome Words</I>

Our next book, by a hair, is Bryson’s Dictionary of Troublesome Words: A Writer’s Guide to Getting It Right. I tremble to think of all the words I’m about to find out I’ve been using …