St. Patrick’s party … salvage of the sea!

My Sense and the City column this week is about this wicked cool party that’s happening next week at Sarasota Architectural Salvage (one of my favorite places in this city) — and the party is all for a good, make that a GREAT, cause — to help Mote Marine (sea) animal hospital! Read the complete story by clicking on the photo below … and tell ’em MC sent ya! (p.s. get your tickets early to save up to $10 easy!)

Hard words … easy listening: poetry abounds in Sarasota

My Sense and the City column in today’s Sarasota Herald Tribune is all about poetry, local poetry readings, and what’s going on at Booker High School Performing Arts … .

Read it online at http://www.ticketsarasota.com/2011-03-02/section/nightlife/hard-words-easy-listening-poetry-abounds (more…)

Sarasota farmers markets mean fun

My Sense and the City column this week is all the local farmers market in Sarasota.

You can read it online at: Farmers markets mean fun or or pick up a free copy of TICKET at news boxes all around the city and find it on page 10E.

Men of Midtown — my V-Day date with Sarasota firefighters!

Could my Valentine’s Day have been any sweeter? I got to get kind of up close and person with some of the men who keep my city safe.

Sarasota County Fire Department Battalion 1 Lieutenant Craig Gerardi, Firefighter/EMT J.W. Boyette, Firefighter/Paramedics Stephen Willhoite and Todd Tedder, and volunteer Justin Miante.

Chickens … or dogs … fur or feathers in the backyard?

My Sense and the City column this week is all about dogs — why I love ’em, why their owners sometimes bug me, and why I’ll take fur over feathers!

You can read it online at: Which do you prefer in your backyard — chicken or dogs?

Photo courtesy of engnr_chik on Flickr (some rights reserved)

or pick up a free copy of TICKET at news boxes all around the city.

Come as you are …

As you know, I adore Beethoven’s music (and have a serious crush on the man as well). I was flattered to learn that the Sarasota Orchestra wanted to quote one of my blogs about Beethoven in their advertising for the Masterworks Hero — all Beethoven — concert March 10-12. (more…)

Up Close and Personal with Poverty

In my Sense and the City column today in the Sarasota Herald Tribune TICKET, I wrote about Greg Mortenson, Pulitzer Prize for Peace nominee and author of Three Cups of Tea,

Courtesy of Sarasota Herald Tribune.

Mortenson’s simple presentation of himself, his extraordinary dedication to helping others, really impacted me … and I wrote about it. You can read the story on page 10E of today’s Sarasota Herald Tribune TICKET section, or you can pick it up — FOR FREE — in TICKET/CL boxes across the city.

If you want to read it online, visit Up Close and Personal with Poverty.

If you’re enjoying my new Sense and the City column, feel free to let the editors know! You can send an electronic Letter to the Editor by clicking here: Letter to the Editor at Sarasota Herald Tribune.

Beyond gun control

My column in today’s Sarasota Herald Tribune talks about the recent spate of gun violence in Sarasota and Manatee counties and discusses MLK’s idea of the “violence of spirit” that is really behind physical violence.

You can read it in today’s TICKET — in today’s newspaper or tomorrow for FREE in the old Creative Loafing newsstand boxes found throughout the city.

Or, you can read it online here — Tackling Internal Violence.

Making Paid Parking Palatable … if that’s even possible!

My Sense and the City column this week is all about the paid parking — using meters downtown — situation in Sarasota.

“I get that the city needs money and is hurting financially. But here’s a news flash: so are the rest of us.”

You can read the column on page 7 of today’s TICKET (available for FREE at newstands throughout the city where the old Creative Loafing boxes are) or read it online at Making Paid Parking Palatable.

She’s baaaack! Reality Chick is back — in the Sarasota Herald Tribune

What a way to end a year … and start a new one!!

When the announcement came earlier this month that the Creative Loafing newspaper publication was closing up shop and the Sarasota Herald Tribune was taking over its branding rights, I smelled opportunity … opportunity to return to my roots and get back to writing in a style more akin to my old “Reality Chick” days at the Pelican Press.

Reality Chick is back!!

I’ve enjoyed the last month or so of writing the After Hours column for the TICKET section of the H-T — heck, I finally forced myself to get out and have some fun –but my interest, and I think my strength, lies in writing observational essays — columns — about what’s going on around my town. People, places, events, the zeitgeist of our little corner of the world. Luckily for me, when I pitched the idea to the editors — they agreed!

That new column starts today — it’s called Sense and the City and it will be my weekly “reality” take on whatever’s topical or at the top of my admittedly sometimes “Sideways in Sarasota” perspective.

In this week’s column I touch on Sarasota Mayor Kelly Kirschner, the Second Line street gang, and Sarasota’s semi-obsession with dirty dancers. I hope you’ll check it out at Sense and the City.

This is all actually a huge deal for me personally. I haven’t had a regular, weekly opinion column in a newspaper since May 2008 and I’m thrilled to be back writing the beat I know best.

If you like what you see in Sense and the City, don’t hesitate to let the editors know — it’s always helpful for them to know whether writers have a healthy readership or not — you can send an electronic LTE by clicking here.

Thanks for sticking with me as readers — whether I was in print or online — and I hope you enjoy this new column!!
HAPPY NEW YEAR, INDEED!