Monthly Archives: September 2009

Perez Moving To Westport

Posted on September 24, 2009 | 3 Comments

Let’s say you’re a TV news anchor in Miami.  Your performance review changes from “too anchor-like and too ‘Brian Williams’” in delivery to “too soft” and not “main anchor-like” the moment you’re outed as gay — and you’re fired.  You file a discrimination suit against your employer, WPLG-ABC 10.

As the case works its way through court, what do you do?

Charles Perez

Charles Perez

If you’re Charles Perez, you come to Westport, get married, and go house-hunting.

This Sunday, Charles and his boyfriend — Miami accountant Keith Rinehard — will tie the knot.

“We just want to be normal people and not work in places where they say ‘Don’t have kids, don’t get married,’” Perez told the Miami Herald.

Tomorrow “we’re going to Westport, Conn.  Saturday we’re going house shopping.  And Sunday we’re getting married on the beach — in linen and flip-flops.”

Keith — a partner in a Miami accounting firm — will commute between Westport and Florida.  As for Charles:  We probably won’t see him replacing the legendary Tom Appleby at News 12 anytime soon.  But whatever he does, we hope he and his husband find a friendly, happy — and non-discriminatory — community here in Westport.

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Posted in People, Totally random

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Top Dog

Posted on September 23, 2009 | Leave a comment

Who is Westport’s top dog?

That’s a question Westport Animal Shelter Advocates is asking.

The non-profit organization is running an essay and photo contest.  100 percent of the $20 entry fee goes to improving the town’s Animal Control Shelter off South Compo Road.

I have no idea which bitch — or son of a bitch — will win.  When I hear “Westport’s top dog,” I think of someone with incredible power — like the superintendent of schools, who on any snowy morning is either the most or least popular person in town, or the fire marshal or health inspector, either of whom can shut a business or building in the blink of an eye.

But this contest is about man’s best friend.  The question couldn’t be simpler:  “Why should your dog be selected as Westport’s top dog?”  Entries must include an essay and picture (no people in the photo, please!); the human’s name, address and phone, and the dog’s name and age (in dog years? — unspecified).  Winners will be chosen based on “creativity, composition and interest.”

The top 12 winners will be included in the 2010 WASA fundraising calendar.  The top 3 winners will receive prizes and recognition “at an exciting event in October.”  Westport’s top dog photo will also be featured at Town Hall.  Entry deadline is September 30.

Arf.

(Entries, including fee, should be sent to: WASA, 606 Post Rd. East, Suite 610, Westport, CT 06880. Click here for more information.)

Top dog -- or merely most contented?

Top dog -- or merely most contented?


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Posted in Organizations

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Vote For Luke

Posted on September 22, 2009 | Leave a comment

Teen InkStaples senior Lucas Hammerman has written a history-based short story, “Two Brothers, One War.”  Set in the Civil War, and available online, one reader called it “very cinematic in its visual descriptions and dramatic pace.”

Another said:  “I can’t believe a high school boy wrote this beautiful story.   From the very beginning I was pulled into it.”

The website — TeenInk — publishes student writing.  But each piece must be voted on by users.  To read — and vote for — Luke’s piece, click here; then register, and click “tag as favorite.”

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Posted in People, Staples HS

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Sailing Off To College

Posted on September 22, 2009 | 2 Comments

Brown University

A couple of years ago, Marilee Jones spoke in Westport.  As dean of admissions at MIT and (according to the New York Times) “guru of the movement to tame the college-admissions frenzy,” she had strong words for parents.

Let the college process be theirs, Jones said.  Don’t steal it from your kid.

She bolstered her message with a vivid analogy.  Your college-searching child is in a boat.  He’s on his own; you’re walking along the shore.   You can see the boat; you know he’s safe.  You can wade in, straighten the bow or do anything needed to help sail the boat — but if you do, you might tip it over.  This is your child’s journey; if you take it from him, you will remove the first really big thing he does as an adult.

Jones’ words resonated with many parents.  She is no longer on the lecture circuit — she resigned after MIT officials learned she fabricated 3 academic degrees when she applied for her 1st job at MIT — but Westport parents continue to grapple with how to manage the college application process.  And how to let it go.

On October 15, 22 and 29, plus November 5, Positive Directions offers a “Taming the College Process” workshop for parents of 9th through 11th graders (senior parents are also welcome).  It’s an important recognition of the fact that we often focus so much on preparing our kids academically for college, that we forget the importance of emotional maturity.

Navigating the headwinds of college is not easy.  But it helps to know who should steer the boat, and who should watch from shore.

(“Taming the College Process” meets at Positive Directions, 420 Post Road West [across from Whole Foods].  The fee is $195, and registration is limited.  For more information click here, or call 203-227-7644, ext. 132.)

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Posted in Education, Organizations

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Writing The Mark Kramer Way

Posted on September 21, 2009 | 1 Comment

What do a public radio reporter, former press secretary to the Maine governor, Buddhist priest and Wall Street Journal Pulitzer Prize winner have in common?

Mark Kramer

Mark Kramer

All gather every Sunday, in Mark Kramer’s Massachusetts living room.  For the next few hours they share stories, discuss their work and prepare to publish non-fiction books.

They’re living proof that you’re never too old to learn.  All mid-career professionals, they know plenty about writing.  But they want to know more.  Under Kramer’s guidance, they do.

Kramer — who before retiring spent 3 decades as a writer-in residence at Smith College, Boston University and Harvard’s Nieman Foundation — was born to write.  His father, Sidney, co-founded Bantam Books in 1945; he’s been in the business ever since, and at 94 still practices publishing law.

Kramer’s mother, Esther, started Westport’s beloved Remarkable Books (the shop’s name spells “Kramer” backwards — who knew?).  Esther and Sid still live on Bluewater Hill, and remain active in town affairs.

Growing up here, Mark Kramer considered himself an outsider:  “Jewish in a Christian town, ultra-liberal in my beliefs.”  Not until high school did he find kindred spirits — other students who also read Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg.   With “fellow outsiders” Deb Fortson and Betty Boulware, Kramer edited Soundings, Staples’ literary magazine, in 1960-61.

Yet he flunked high school English.  “My teacher did not allow more than 3 spelling errors,” Kramer recalls.  “I was completely ADD, and not very interested in spelling.”  Three years later, he had a part-time professional editing job.

After a long career as a book and magazine writer, editor, speaker, teacher and consultant, Kramer retired.  Now, his Sunday seminars keep him involved in writing — and offer inspiration to experienced, yet non-non-narrative-book-savvy, writers.

“They’re very skilled people who have not structured book-length projects,” Kramer says.  “This is like a piano teacher teaching professional musicians who have spent their lives playing non-solo instruments.  I feel very privileged to spend time doing this.”

Kramer doesn’t say it, but the implication is clear:  He works with very “remarkable” writers.

(For more information on Mark Kramer’s seminars, click here.  Email:  kramernarrative@gmail.com)

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Posted in People

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Challah Shame

Posted on September 20, 2009 | 5 Comments

challahAs Rosh Hashanah approached, a local baker was besieged by customers asking for challah.  Because he can produce only a few loaves of the traditional bread at a time, he limited them to folks who called in orders ahead of time.

One customer did not like the policy.  Why, she demanded, could she not have someone else’s challah?

The woman at the counter patiently explained the policy, and the reasoning behind it.

“You’re a challah Nazi!” the customer spat back.

On one hand, that’s an almost comic overreaction.

On the other — considering the holiday — it shows an embarrassing ignorance of history.  Or perhaps a willful misuse of it.  Either way, the customer never apologized.

Perhaps that’s something she might think about a week from tomorrow.  It’s Yom Kippur — the Day of Atonement.

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Posted in religion, Westport life

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Swimming Against The Tide

Posted on September 19, 2009 | 1 Comment

Some people swim laps for fitness.

Elizabeth Fry swims around Manhattan for fun.

Elizabeth Fry (Photo courtesy of New York Daily News)

Elizabeth Fry (Photo courtesy of New York Daily News)

The 50-year-old Westporter set a record yesterday.  She took just 11 hours, 41 minutes and 5 seconds to circumnavigate the island clockwise against the current, starting and finishing the 28.5-mile course at the Willis Avenue Bridge over the Harlem River.  She beat the previous record — set in 1995 — by (get this) more than 6 hours.

Oh, 1 more thing:  Fry has asthma.

How does she do it?

“You just keep swimming,” she told the New York Daily News, channeling Dory, the singing fish from “Finding Nemo.”  “Swimming at night, with the city’s lights on the water, it was terrific.”

She also trained by swimming against a rush of water as it was released from a dam.  Damn!

Fry was aided by a crew of volunteers — including her sister — who indicated the best route, cheered her on, and provided energy drinks and snacks.

Fry — a 1976 Staples graduate — spends her days as a financial consultant.  She has swim the English Channel 3 times, finished 5th in this summer’s Manhattan Island Marathon Swim, and competes regularly in Westport’s Point-to-Point Swim.

Fry also organizes the annual Swim Across the Sound, a fundraiser in honor of her mother who died of cancer.

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Posted in People, Sports

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Do Talk To Strangers

Posted on September 19, 2009 | Leave a comment

The internet is amazing.  You could buy Sarah Palin’s executive jet on eBay (though no one did).  You can provide important financial assistance to the widow of a Nigerian oil minister who is down on her luck.  You can find the infant from the bassinet next to you, and reminisce about your first day out of the womb.

Now, you can also chat in real time with complete strangers.

Omegle is the brainchild of someone with far too much time on his hands.  Click on the bare-bones site and you’re instantly connected with someone, somewhere, as random and bored as you.

I tried it out.  The first connection, in Holland, spoke better English than I, but had nothing interesting to say.

The second person’s first question was “m?”  (Are you male?)  When I said yes, he — I’m assuming it was a guy — disconnected me.

The third was in “Binghanton, NY.”  I had no desire to chat with someone who could not spell his own hometown correctly.

But I started thinking:  Why not bring Omegle to the micro — Westport — level?

Imagine connecting with another Westporter you might otherwise never know.  Instead of cutting him off in her SUV, a young mom might converse with an 80-year-old retiree.  A laid-off banker could talk to a laid-off store clerk.

A kid named Finch could become friendly with an older woman who calls herself Stifler’s mom.

On second thought, go answer that email from Nigeria.

Stifler's mom

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Noting A Notary

Posted on September 18, 2009 | 3 Comments

UPS storeTwo months ago, “06880″ praised the UPS Store next to Dunkin Donuts for its above-and-beyond customer service.

Now comes another service of note:  It also functions as notary publics.

Like most people, I seldom need something notarized.  Most recently, it was an insurance claim.  I did what I always do:  I asked everyone, “Do you know a notary public?”  No one did.

Google finally turned up a treasure trove:  UPS stores nationwide offer notarization.

Once again, Don next to Dunkin went way out of his way to help. 

The next time you need a notary, note UPS.

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Posted in Local business, Totally random

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Cookin’ For A Cause

Posted on September 18, 2009 | Leave a comment

No one has ever confused bbq with health food.

But this month the Downtown Merchants Association invites Westporters to cook for a cause.  Teams of 2-4 backyard chefs can enter any of 3 categories — chicken, ribs and chef’s choice.   Winners receive a prizes — and the money raised from each team’s $100 entry fee is donated the Connecticut Food Bank.

blog - bbqThe event — set for the Levitt Pavilion — is part of the 2nd annual Blues Views and BBQ Festival.  “Cookin’ for a Cause” setup begins at 6 a.m. on Saturday, September 26.  Judging is at 3 p.m., leaving plenty of time to get the meat and sauce just right.  (Charcoal or wood heat sources only; no gas, electric grills or open pits.  And teams supply their own food.)

All day Saturday and Sunday there’s a craft beer showcase, activities for kids and families, a food court — and of course music.  What’s bbq without blues?

So forget the calories.  The hell with cholesterol.  It’s time to start cookin’ some meat for a cause.

(For more information, including an application form, click here.)

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Posted in Downtown, Entertainment, Organizations

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