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: August 20, 2004
August 20, 2004 · No Comment

Sars,
After many many years, I’m finally getting to a place in my life I’m happy with. I’m enjoying being single again, enjoying not needing a roommate and/or a bad boyfriend to help keep the lights …

The Vine: August 19, 2004
August 19, 2004 · No Comment

Dear Sars,
I know that you are a cat-lover like so many of us. I’m hoping I’m not asking you a question that you haven’t already answered a million times. I had a beautiful, wonderful, affectionate …

The Vine: August 18, 2004
August 18, 2004 · No Comment

Dear Sars:
Hey! I wanted to write you just so I could brag about getting into graduate school. Woot!
Actually, no. I have a real question. Two of them.
The first one is, the graduate school I’ve been …

The Vine: August 17, 2004
August 17, 2004 · No Comment

Dear Sars,
I live in a dorm with several other women, most of whom I don’t know. We are in a desert area that is experiencing an added drought, so water is extra-scarce. As a result …

The Show Did Go On
August 16, 2004 · One Comment

It’s the day of opening night, three-thirty in the morning. Your desk is a Brady Bunch card house of drafts and books and Post-Its, and you slump on the couch, twitchy with reheated coffee and …

The Vine: July 29, 2004
July 29, 2004 · No Comment

Oh, wise Sars!
I did it again. Like bargaining in prayer, I promise never to shoot my mouth off again if you tell what to do.
I work in a pharmacy in a fairly small town. I …

The Vine: July 28, 2004
July 28, 2004 · No Comment

Dear Sars,
About a year ago I broke up my two-and-a-half-year relationship. I was sick of dealing with serious relationship-type problems and the headaches they cause. We were fighting every time we saw each other, and …

The Vine: July 27, 2004
July 27, 2004 · No Comment

Hey Sars —
I love your site! My partner and I have a cat with similar issues — he’s just a bundle of love until you need to cut his nails. Our solution was a pillowcase …

The Subheroes Chapter 5: The Kid Enters The Picture
July 26, 2004 · One Comment

The first thing she notices about the bar is that it smells funny. It doesn’t smell bad — but that’s what’s funny about it. There isn’t that fug of slopped beer and secondhand cologne. Everything …

The Vine: July 22, 2004
July 22, 2004 · No Comment

Dear Sars:
I need help with a feline issue.
Our cat, Tabby, has been a wonderful addition to our lives. We adopted her two years ago as a middle-aged stray from the SPCA. She is very loving …