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: January 23, 2009
January 23, 2009 · 17 Comments

Hi Sars,
My husband just bought new water bottles for us, because the plastic used in our current bottles is apparently the kind that’s leaching some terrible chemical into the water inside. BPH, BPA, BP…something.
Anyway, this …

The Vine: January 21, 2009
January 21, 2009 · 65 Comments

Dear Sars,
I am looking for tips on how to become tougher. I’ve always found it hard to reconcile myself with the idea that some people don’t like me, or disapprove of some things I do, …

The Final Day
January 19, 2009 · 100 Comments

Resident sucker for oral histories yours truly recommends the one on Daily Beast about the inauguration changeover.
I nearly can’t believe it’s finally come: the last day of the Bush presidency.   I watched his farewell …

Sickened: The Memoir of a Munchausen by Proxy Childhood
January 17, 2009 · 19 Comments
<I>Sickened: The Memoir of a Munchausen by Proxy Childhood</I>

An editor walks a tightrope.It’s part of an editor’s job to let and/or to help the writing be what it is.It depends on the content undergoing the editing, of course, and whether a house style …

The Vine: January 16, 2009
January 16, 2009 · 24 Comments

Dear Sars,
My husband and I need help with a hair product dilemma.We have both used Aveda Elixir for years to manage hair that is fine, straight and flyaway (his) and thick, curly and frizzy (mine).We’re …

Plane down in the Hudson
January 15, 2009 · 33 Comments

From what I see right now on NY1, Circle Line boats have come to the crash site to pull survivors from the water.   That’s US Airways 1549 out of LGA bound for Charlotte.
Hope everyone’s …

The Vine: January 14, 2009
January 14, 2009 · 48 Comments

Hi Sars,
Long-time reader, first-time writer.I could really use a relatively unbiased perspective on this one.
I think my husband drinks too much. I’m not an expert on these things, but I think it’s bordering on a …

As promised…
January 13, 2009 · 24 Comments

Sadie The Cat-Tormenting Tomato.
Anticlimactic, kind of, because the padding in the tomato suit radically reduces the risk of   injury, but I said I’d do it, so: done.
And I’d like to tell you my apartment …

Nikolupdate: A word from Captain Sunbeam
January 13, 2009 · 24 Comments
Nikolupdate: A word from Captain Sunbeam

Awww.   The tsar is doing very well; his thyroid is back to functioning at normal levels, and he’s even put on some weight.   Thanks for the update, Leila and Matt.

The Visitor
January 12, 2009 · 28 Comments
<I>The Visitor</I>

I’ve begun the annual Sprint To The Oscars movie-watching turbo-download; I considered not doing it this year, especially when Entertainment Weekly‘s list of movies I should see before the ceremony made it clear that 1) …