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!

We Got The Punk
September 16, 1999 · No Comment

Ernie and I became best friends because we could both derive hours of undiminished amusement from bathroom humor. We became friends in a rather roundabout fashion; we met through our mutual friend The Lip at …

Fear
August 18, 1999 · No Comment

Gary Larson once drew a panel for his cartoon The Far Side in which a kid huddled underneath his bedclothes with a snorkel-esque apparatus attached to his face; the apparatus had a tube that snaked …

Will Work For Cheese
August 18, 1999 · No Comment

This morning, my alarm went off, and when I tried to get out of bed, I found that a microbe or allergen of some kind had once again invited several million of its closest friends …

Dead On Arrival
August 18, 1999 · No Comment

In light of previous rants in this space in which I railed against various no-brow media subjects, not to mention my tendency in conversation to use the words “Joey Buttafuoco” synonymously with the word “contemptible,” …

Happiness Is A Warm Diner
August 18, 1999 · One Comment

I went out of town on vacation last week, and in my travels – all of them at least one time zone removed from the greater New York metro area – I saw a fair …

First, Do No Harm
July 18, 1999 · No Comment

I do not like going to the doctor. Obviously, nobody likes going to the doctor, except little kids, because the waiting room of any upstanding pediatrician has cool stuff like unfamiliar chewed-on toys and other …

Taking The “News” Out Of “Newspaper”
July 18, 1999 · No Comment

When I go home to visit my parents for the weekend, my trajectory when I first arrive at the house always follows the same path: from the back door to the front hall, where I …

What The “Summer Of Sam” Hill?
July 18, 1999 · No Comment

A few days ago, a local TV newscast ran a story on the reaction of Italian Americans to Spike Lee’s latest “joint,” Summer Of Sam. According to the news piece, the film features as its …

Airing My Dirty Laundry
July 18, 1999 · No Comment

It hadn’t happened for a long time – for such a long time, in fact, that I had begun to forget the horror, the pain, the feelings of shame. As the bad memories receded, my …

In Praise Of Villainy
July 18, 1999 · One Comment

Every once in a while, when my friends and I have a refreshing hops-based beverage in hand, the topic of conversation turns to what we would do if we won the lottery. It probably goes …