The Blog:

Unrest in New Paltz by Rachel Lagodka Posted on 7-30-2006

The New Paltzers* are restless. Well at least some of them are restless enough about the war to be out in the pouring rain on the corner of Main Street and North Front St. in front of the Elting Library. Pouring that is until it turns torrential for a few moments and walls of water come down off their umbrellas.

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Secrets, Surveillance, and Scapegoating the Press

by Robert Miraldi Posted on 7-26-2006

“We should not know about it,” the man said, adding, "the press should not tell us; just get the troops in and clean them out. In fact," he said, looking at me, almost as if he knew I was a long-time journalist, "The press should not even be In Iraq. They have no right to be there.”

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New Paltz Nation Editorial Staff Endorses Green Party Candidate Malachy McCourt for Governor of New York State. 
by Erin Quinn  Posted on 6-19-06l

Why Why I Wont vote for the Greens or Malachy: Even though I agree with them by Carole Bell Ford  7-18-2006

Why I Agree with Carole but am still Voting Green by Rachel Lagodka Posted on 7-19-2006

Supreme Court Deals Blow to 4th Amendment
Posted on 6-25-06 by Eamon Martin

Front Row by Nina Shengold  Posted on 7-1-2006

When I was in high school and newly in love with the theatre, I upgraded my hippie delinquencies with a classier vice: cutting school to attend Wednesday matinees.

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NPN Launch Party - Great Success by Erin Quinn

I hate parties. The only thing I like less than parties, is actually throwing one myself. But this time, I got off easy.

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A The Dress
by Mala Hoffman

I suppose it serves me right for only spending $25 on the outfit I wore to their wedding (and feeling proud of it!), but when my brother called that afternoon to ask if his wife could contact me regarding a certain delicate subject, I was taken by surprise..

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Sunflowers in New Paltz: Life and Death in the Village
by Rachel Lagodka Posted on 6-07-2006

Andrew B stars as the size guide.  U.S. Secretary of Defense William Perry stated, "Sunflowers instead of missiles in the soil would ensure peace for future generations."

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Drop The Rock
by Rob Robinson    

There are now well over
15,000 drug offenders in NY's prisons; most of them
minor offenders with no history of violent behavior and it costs NY taxpayers nearly $500 million a year
to imprison these drug offenders.

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The Persecution of Student Association President Justin Holmes Continues
by Rachel Lagodka Posted on 6-07-2006

I am terribly concerned about the SUNY New Paltz Administration's flagrant abuse of their authority to undermine the student government. I am only asking tenured professors to help with this case, but I am urging the untenured folks to support the cause by reaffirming the right of the students to hold their own elections without interference from the administration.

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Got Gay Pride? Posted on 6-07-06
by Erin Quinn

Enough is enough! While President Bush is once again exploiting the issue of same-sex marriage to try and solidify his crumbling conservative base, the death toll in Iraq grows. Millions of Americans are living below the poverty wage, can?t afford health care coverage, and have to debate between gas and food while Exxon and their oil giant cohorts post record breaking profits. 

DON'T YOU BELIEVE IT.
Religion and Ridicule
by Greg Olear

Highland, N.Y., where I live, was founded by the Pang Yangs, a free love cult...

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SUNY New Paltz Administration Persecutes Student Association President Justin Holmes
by Rachel Lagodka                          

Whatever else you may want to say about Justin Holmes, he is a student who is being persecuted by the SUNY administration. Did I really mean persecuted? They sent the police to his office in the middle of the night to arrest him even though he had not done anything wrong. I think that qualifies.

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A Matter of Equity by Kim Ellis

When the time for state tests comes around here in New York, most public schools make every effort to provide the optimum testing environment for their students. Certainly the administrators and teachers want to give the students all possible advantages, which include a quiet workplace with plenty of light and no interruptions.

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Le Tente Rouge
by Erin Quinn

I?m probably one of the few women who did not read The Red Tent. I did buy a used copy at last year?s library fair, but when reaching for it one night I accidentally knocked a full glass of merlot onto its porous pages making it quite red and unreadable.

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Getting off the Target Tit Part 1? Posted on 5-15-06
by Melissa Halvorson

I?m not a writer, I?m a knitter.  I knit so that I don?t have to write;  craft doesn?t have a voice.  Craft has utility; most writing doesn?t, and yet, as s a non-professional writer, not even a writer really, I seem to be collecting editors.  Almost a month late with the next installment of this completely self-indulgent rant against commercialism..

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Pandora's Joke
by Kim Ellis

?Where is that cat?? I ask myself, peering once again out the glass door in the kitchen.  Ziggy, the furry cat, showed up right on time.  But where is Pandora?

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US Department of Justice Stonewalls Investigation...
by Maurice Hinchey

US Department of Justice Stonewalls Investigation into who Authorized, Approved and Oversaw the NSA?s Warrantless Domestic Spying Program.

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They're Not My Kids
by Kim Ellis

Exactly one year ago, just before the school budget vote, I wrote an article in the MWTA News about the crowded conditions in the Smith Clove school building.  At that time I was teaching English as a Second Language (ESL) on the stage above the cafeteria.

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Climbing Like Sex - Part II
by Susan E.B. Schwartz

In my last column, I posed the scientific question of how climbing was like sex, and posited equally scientific answers.  But I am not the first to ponder this socially pressing issue.

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I Hate College by Greg Olear

The Electoral College, that is. Out with it. Let me explain. I am, and always have been, an elitist. Elitism is part of human nature.

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Flow in Swimming...and in Life
by Terry Laughlin

What sets Total Immersion apart from traditional swimming? The most important distinction has less to do with your muscles than with your mind.

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The Drug Czar Strikes Again
by Rob Robinson    

Well the Drug czar is at it again. The Bush administration's point man on drug policy wants random drug testing in every child's school.

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Abortion Blog
by Rachel Lagodka                          

Before I used to let my students write about abortion I made them look at this website...

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Health Care and Profits Don't Mix
by Greg Olear

Recently, the state of Maryland passed a law that, in effect, forced Walmart to pay more towards its employees? health insurance.  While I admire Maryland?s attempt to redress a glaring problem, the solution they came up with is unfair.

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Waxing Update and the North West Shutdown
by Erin Quinn

You can imagine that the post-waxing growth isn?t a pretty situation. I find myself rubbing up against hard edges in public places unconsciously. Sometimes it gets so bad that I have to stick a capped pen into my pants pockets and scratch while attending meetings.

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A Trip to Bountiful: The Tasty Challenge of Joining a CSA
by Mala Hoffman

For some, becoming a member of a Community Supported Agriculture farm [CSA] is a chance to enjoy the bounty of the season while participating in the preservation of an important local resource. For me, it?s a culinary challenge and a race with time.

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Beeped Into Submission
by Jeff McGowan

Why is it every time you do something you are not supposed to do, there is a little beep to remind you to be a better citizen? If you don?t put on your seat belt, a series of beeps occurs, until you comply by buckling up...

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Getting Off The Target Tit Part 1
by Melissa Halvorson       

My business partner (owners of The Year of the Goat yarn and knitting shop) and I recently made a pact that when the new corporate taco place opens up in the Ariel space, effectively destroying any dignity that may have been left on that corner, we will commence to eat all three meals of every day at Mexicali Blue in peaceful protest.

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Another Vote for Idol: After Years Without Television, A Return To Reality by Mala Hoffman

In the six years we?ve lived in this house without it, there?s little on television that I?ve missed. Shows I?d loved, like ?Homicide,? are either long gone or, like ?Law and Order,? have mutated far beyond my original interest. Must-see t.v. for me, such as the Oscars, I?ve managed to watch through the kindness of colleagues.

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How Swimming is Different From Running-And How to Make the Difference Work in Your Favor by Terry Laughlin

The world's best swimmers move through the water with grace, economy and flow, while novices are awkward, clumsy and inefficient. But the rest of us can learn to swim well if we take the time to master swimming as an art before tackling it as a sport.

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Is Climbing Like Sex?
by Susan E.B. Schwartz

Climbing is a favorite activity for many in New Paltz, as well as around the world. But so is sex. To some inquisitive minds, this raises an inevitable and eminently logical train of thought:  Coincidence? Or not?

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My Friend Bart
by Jeff McGowan

Two weeks ago, the best dog I ever had passed away at the ripe old age of 15. My dog?s name was Bart and he was a cute little balck pug. I didn?t buy Bart, he came to me through my relationship with my ex-partner Billiam...

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What More?
by Greg Olear

When Bush won the election in 2004, I decided to withdraw from the political process.  The idiot majority who had allowed him to remain in office deserved what they got, I thought at the time.  As for me, I was going to enjoy watching the wheels fall off.

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Everyone's a Winter
by Rich Gottlieb

My motto is, ?Everyone?s a winter,? that is, if you want to get in touch with your arctic side. Packing the car with all the imaginable cold weather gear in my arsenal and driving up east of Qu?ec City has...

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Life in the shadows...
by Eamon Martin

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The Waxing
by Erin Quinn                          

One of the upsides of winter, even a mild winter, is the lack of waxing that needs to take place on the more sensitive parts of the female anatomy...

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Why Do People Climb? 
by Susan E.B. Schwartz

Not everyone in New Paltz, of course, is a rock climber.   You can look west from Main Street and be perfectly happy to admire the Shawangunk cliffs  from afar... 

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Boobs
by Rachel Lagodka                          

Jugs, rack, boobs, or ?mammalian protruberances? as Frank Zappa once called them on his album ?Joe?s Garage,? (also famous for the quote, ?anything over a mouthful is wasted),? whatever you want to call them: breasts are man-bait... 

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I Have Questions!
by Jeff McGowan

When Brokeback Mountain came out, I went to see it on the first day. I, like many gay people, was excited about the movie and the buzz that its release caused. Anyone who has seen it, I believe, will acknowledge that it is a finely made film? with beautiful landscape shots and excellent acting.

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It's Not Easy Being Green        by Rachel Lagodka 

When he says that it?s not easy being Green, Kermit the frog is making a vast understatement: really, it?s darn near impossible. The Green Party is about values. It is about the ideals of social justice and environmental conservation. These issues have very few footings in the current political climate...

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A Woman's Place in the Pool
by Terry Laughlin                                    

In teaching Total Immersion weekend workshops, we have discovered an interesting predictability to one aspect of our instruction. Although women make up only 30% to 40% of a typical class, they are chosen nearly 80% of the time when our coaches need to select a class member to demonstrate fluent, beautiful execution of one of our skill drills...

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Menopausal Hedgehogs
by Kimberly Quinn Smith

Today I would like to tell you about our discussion on menopausal hedgehogs. Last night, I took our oldest daughter to her first 4H meeting. This is my kid that does her own thing.

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Features:

One Book One New Paltz: Susan Avery Reviews The Dewbreaker by Edwidge Dandicat

 by Susan Avery Posted on 7-26-2006

Last year inspired by Dean Gerald Benjamin, New Paltz launched its own “One Book One New Paltz” and in the first week of November 2005 we all read The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time by Mark Haddon. It was a great success...

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Susan Recommends III
Review by Susan Avery Posted on 6-30-2006

"Many will ask why this is happening," the company said. "The reasons are many and complex. The simple answer is that the book buying market has moved on...

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Upstatin’ It: The Crystal Clear Path to the Adirondacks
by Teresa Thompson

School’s out and it’s time for…Road Trip!

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FLASHBACK By Penny Coleman  reviewed by Gerald Sorin Posted on 07-7-06

On Tuesday, July 4, 2006, in a speech marking Independence Day, George W. Bush, exuding confidence and still talking about “winning” the war, thanked American troops for their service in Iraq. Inches from this news item on the New York Times website was another story suggesting the vacuousness of the President’s appreciation: “Homelessness a threat to Iraq Vets...”

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On and Off the Beaten Path: Basel Pizza, Fountains, and Magritte By Carole Bell Ford

Last fall we visited our friend David Vogt in Switzerland, in Basel. But first, the short version of a Steve Ford shaggy-dog story.  

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Susan Recommends II
Review by Susan Avery Posted on 6-30-2006

When a bookstore opens its door, the rest of the world enters, too, the day's weather and the day's news, the streams of customers, and of course the boxes of books and the many other worlds they contain...

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A Coat of Many Colors: Immigration, Globalization, and Reform In New York City's Garment Industry
edited by Daniel Soyer reviewed by Gerald Sorin Posted on 6-24-2006

"What's the difference between a Jewish clothing worker and a Jewish psychiatrist?" an old joke goes. Answer: "One generation."

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Susan Recommends
Review by Susan Avery Posted on 6-19-2006

Perhaps now I have more books than I need, but it is with books as with other things; the more one gets the more one wants.  Yet, there is something special about books. 

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Burning Rainbow Farm: How a Stoner Utopia Went Up in Smoke by Dean Kuipers
Review by Rob Robinson Posted on 6-19-2006

Right before 9/11 in rural southwest Michigan, Tom Crosslin and Rollie Rohm's, dreams of a peaceful
utopia were shot dead by snipers bullets.

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Water Babies

by Nina Shengold  Posted on 6-14-2006

When my mother's wallet was stolen on a New York City bus, the thing she missed most was a dog-eared black and white snapshot of her only daughter, age two and a half, charging into the waves on a Cape Cod beach.

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It Can't Happen Here ... Can It?
The Plot Against America by Philip Roth
reviewed by Gerald Sorin Posted on 6-12-2006

Fascists are in power at the very top and ordinary life is virtually crushed by a juggernaut of mass hatred; antisemitic mobs are roaming the streets, and Jews are hunkering down in their flats, some ready to arm themselves. No, this is not happening in totalitarian Germany, but in Weequahic, a lower-middle class section of Newark, New Jersey in democratic America.

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Toys in the Attack
by John Bridges
Posted on 6-10-2006

The Army Men Project is an ingenious and biting tactic in The War On War?. It's an easy, subversive, inexpensive, and LOCAL form of protest. The surreality of these little green irony bombs will get people to take notice. The medium is the message:

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A Supermarket in Upstate NY
by Barbara Adams
Posted on 6-07-2006

Felicia wears a used mink jacket, especially when she?s near the door her name tag pinned to the ShopnSave dark green shirt underneath her mink jacket stretched over her swollen belly but she can?t sit down like supermarket cashiers I?ve seen in Europe. But she smiles all the time at no one.

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Racing to St. Croix: A Triathlete?s Perspective by Teresa Thompson
Posted on 6-04-2006

My husband is an avid triathlete. For those of you non-athletes like myself, a triathlon is an unfathomably sick exertion, called a sport where the participants engage in a race that includes running, cycling and swimming long distances consecutively.
 

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On and Off the Beaten Path by Carole Bell Ford Descending into Spring: Chincoteague and Assateague Islands By Carole Bell Ford

We did a lot of traveling in Europe last year. This Easter, neither my husband Steve nor I were ready for packing and unpacking bags, or even getting on a plane. It was Steve?s idea, instead, to pack up our camper and re-visit one of the places in Virginia that we?ve always enjoyed?Chincoteague and Assateague Islands.

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2005's BEST REVIEWED BOOKS BY HUDSON VALLEY AUTHORS

Dog Poaching, Magic Potties, and Kicking Bird by Kimberly Quinn Smith 

We landed in Memphis in time to head to the indoor pool for fifteen well-earned minutes. In fact, after repeated arrivals at hotels where the pools closed by 10:00 pm, that fifteen minutes spent the right way could do wonders after a long journey.

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Conquering the Great Indoors: Family Fun at the Great Wolf Lodge
by Teresa Thompson

The buzz began late last summer when we received the first promotional piece in the mail. A few weeks later, the television ads started popping up. Then, my children and I drooled over the website. Soon, parents were talking. ?Did you hear about Great Wolf Lodge??

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A Tribute to William Gottlieb: Jazz Photographer Extraordinaire
by Rich Gottlieb

My father didn?t have a pious bone in his body, although he did read the New York Times religiously. You won?t be getting any men of the cloth today although I, like my dad, am a man of the paper.

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On and Off the Beaten Path: Final article in a Special Three-Part Series on Poland and the Holocaust
By Carole Bell Ford

If you?ve been following this series, you know that I have been involved with research related to a particular group of women, Holocaust survivors, mostly from Poland. And it was a conference on Women in the Holocaust that took me to Poland, where I told ?Lusia?s Story?.

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Stalagmites, Chevy Chase, and Leopard Skin by Kimberly Quinn Smith    

My husband turned forty this year and to surprise him I planned a trip across the country. He had been talking about seeing the Grand Canyon since we met in college, and as life is too short not to live one?s dreams, I bit the bullet and began an intimate relationship with priceline.com.

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On and Off the Beaten Path: Part 2 of a Special Three Part Series: The Vanished Ghettos of Warsaw and Ł?ź
by Carole Bell Ford

As a result of her work as a travel agent and consultant to many top entertainment industry figures, my daughter Julie has contacts all over the world. For our trip to Poland, she put me in touch with an agency, located in Krakow, which customized our trip. One of their agents arranged for our car rental and for our hotels in Warsaw, Ł?ź and Lublin.

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Feeling Lucky at Mohegan Sun: Connecticut's Casino Comes To Life       by Teresa Thompson

People laugh when I tell them I take my family to Connecticut?s Mohegan Sun Casino for a vacation. But, to be completely honest, we all love it there. And by ?we?, I mean the four generations of my family.

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Our Lady of Guadeloupe, Carburetors and Telephone Cards by Anne Quinn

I?m having a love affair with Mexico.  I?m in love with the butterscotch countryside, colors of bronze and gold dripping like frosting over a light chocolate cake.  I?m in love with the people who are often golden themselves, small, sweet and sensuous.

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On and Off the Beaten Path: Introduction to a Special, Three Part Series: Luisa's Poland-Not the Usual Travel Story
by Carole Bell Ford

The earlier writing bleeds through despite layer upon layer of new script?and like a palimpsest, for many elderly survivors, memories of the Holocaust bleed through layer upon layer of experiences. A lifetime of layers that should have obscured the earlier ones...

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Kickin' It Up in the Amish Country: Pennsylvania's Warm Welcome for Families
by Teresa Thompson     

It?s never too early to start planning your summer vacation. In fact, you should already have it planned. Travel experts agree the best time to plan summer travel is during the doldrums of winter. The explanation for this is two-fold.

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Will Iran Be the Next Iraq?
by Erin Quinn

We Are Going to War with Iran?Scott Ritter, former UN Weapon?s Inspector in Iraq from 1991-1998 and author of Iraq Confidential. ?And going to War with Iran can not only be characterized as bad behavior by the part of the Bush administration but suicidal behavior.

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The Temptation of Belief: A Buddhist Enters the Christian Realm    by Bethany Saltman

Last month I went to southern California to visit my cousin K., the born-again Christian who promised to show me around the church scene there and take good care of me in the seventh month of my first pregnancy...

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High-Tech Boxes in Drag: The Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College in Annondale-on-Hudson
by Ray Curran

This April will mark the third anniversary of the opening of what almost certainly remains the most noteworthy new building in New York's mid-Hudson River valley in recent years. Designed by Frank Gehry, one of the leading 'star-chitects' today, I believe that as architecture it deserves only mixed reviews...

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Dog Shit in My Bagua:
Thoughts on Feng Shui and Panic Attacks
by Erin Quinn

It had been six years, six beautiful long years, since I had my last panic attack. Okay, maybe not every moment of those six years was beautiful?there were the usual trials and tribulations...                                                                                                    Read the entire article.

Vermont Wonderland: A Great Ski Vacation for  the Non-Skier
by Teresa Thompson

I don?t like to ski, but I love to go skiing. Let me explain. Every winter I make the obligatory pilgrimage to Vermont?s picturesque Green Mountains to satisfy my husband?s basic need to strap a snowboard onto his feet and pummel down steep terrain.

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On and Off the Beaten Path: Puglia
By Carole Bell Ford

Steve and I met when we were teaching at a Junior High School in Brooklyn, in the late 1960s. During those years we and our colleagues-friends, other young schoolteachers, used to frequent an Italian restaurant in Little Italy called Puglia?s...

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  Excerpt from Into the Unknown: The Remarkable Life of Hans Kraus
by Susan E.B. Schwartz

The following excerpt describes the 1941 first ascent of High Exposure by Hans Kraus.  Rock and Ice Magazine, Senior Contributing Editor, Matt Samet, said the section contains...

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A Tale of Two Cruises:
From Canada to Cozumel, One Family's Adventure On Two Very Different Ships
by Teresa Thompson

I love to travel?anytime, anywhere?but I?ve never been a big fan of cruising. It all began when my parents took me on my first cruise during my senior year of college...

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On and Off the Beaten Path: Tuscany and Umbria
By Carole Bell Ford

Unlike Bologna?s elusive center, we easily found our way back to the autostrada. Soon we were headed southwest into Tuscany where the cypresses became more prominent...

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The Affair
by Kimberly Quinn Smith    

I would strongly advise that anyone with even a hint of Attention Deficit Disorder in their system, or anywhere along their ancestral line not attempt to throw a surprise party...

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