newspapers: Philadelphia Metropolis

Wretched Excess

We all end up with adjectives attached to our names.  Penn State football Coach Joe Paterno had a number of them -- beloved and legendary are two. He added another on Sunday, when he died at age 85.  He is... (Comments)

Public Is the New Private

Best of VovPop» Remember Steve Martin's line when people asked if he would mind them smoking? He smiled politely and replied: "Mind if I fart?" Today, though smoking is banned in most public places, no one would bother to ask permission to fart; they would just break wind. That's because private is the new public. Functions, which used to be performed in homes, beauty salons, doctor's offices and even bathrooms, have now become spectator sports. Nowhere is this more obvious than on public transportation where people are crammed together like galley slaves for the duration of their trip. When I lived in the Bronx and commuted to Manhattan on the subways, people were content to read their newspapers or books in relative silence. Occasionally, I encountered a groper, a loud talker or a nose picker or an annoying straphanger who hung too close to a seated commuter. These days, no matter what form of public transportation I take, someone sitting next to me is either eating something incredibly stinky from a (Comments)

My Philadelphia: Spring Garden

We hadn't particularly meant to move to Spring Garden. In fact, we lived here for months--surrounded by drop cloths and buckets of joint compound and the implacable seepage into everything of the dust and grit produced when you demolish or repair walls made of plaster and horsehair, or so somebody said at the time--before we knew we had. (It's bounded by (Comments)

Crimes & Misdemeanors

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How Hot Is It...?

...It is sooo hot that a friend emailed me a piece I did five years ago about how the media handles heat waves.  It was true then, it is true today. Here it is.... I don't get this weather. It's... (Comments)