News
by Kristin Palpini | Jul 22, 2015 | Articles, Featured, Food + Booze, News, Taste-Off!
It’s round three in our all-Valley pizza slice smackdown. This month we tasted pies from the northern half of the Valley, grabbing slices of cheese from Amherst House of Pizza, Sibie’s, and Sub and Pizza, all of Amherst; Antonio’s and Papa George’s, both of...
by From Our Readers | Jul 22, 2015 | Letters from our Readers, News
The Civil War was about slavery. Deal. I just read the letter from Joe Bialek (“Gun control and the Confederate flag” July 9-15, 2015). His comments and ideas regarding guns and the stars and bars were very reasonable and thoughtful. As for the end of the letter, he...
by Hunter Styles | Jul 22, 2015 | Articles, Featured, Food + Booze, News, Wellness
E veryone has counted calories at some point. Some of us tally them religiously. I only think of them when I’m staring at the side of a cereal box at two in the morning. But given the state of our warming world — rising sea levels, falling bee populations, and all...
by Chuck Shepherd | Jul 22, 2015 | News, News of the Weird
Among the protesters at New York City’s Gay Pride Parade on the Sunday after the Supreme Court’s historic gay-marriage decision was a group of men outfitted in Jewish prayer garments and representing the Jewish Political Action Committee. They carried signs reading,...
by Kristin Palpini | Jul 14, 2015 | Between the Lines, News
Last winter, Eversource increased electricity rates by 29 percent and National Grid jacked their rates by 37 percent. What happened? No one’s really sure. Prices have gone down some, but they’re still higher than this time last year. Maybe it was a supply and demand...
by Amanda Drane | Jul 14, 2015 | Blogs, News, The Uncanny Valley
My curiosity is piqued by a recent Facebook post by fellow Advocate writer Yana Tallon-Hicks in which she documented a creepy, abandoned house complete with a puzzling sign that read, “This is my happy place.” So, I head past the rolling greens of the Amherst Golf...
by Rachel Bellenoit | Jul 14, 2015 | Arts, Leisure, News
Photos by Rachel Bellenoit Though most of the visitors to Ashley Reservoir in Holyoke are joggers, cyclists, and hikers, a few of them are self-taught naturalists and/or photographers. While Whiting and McLean Reservoirs hold as much wildlife to observe as their...
by Chuck Shepherd | Jul 14, 2015 | News, News of the Weird
The enormous compensation CEOs of large corporations receive is justified in part by their bringing prosperity to their shareholders, but last year (an excellent one for most investors), two of the nation’s best-paid chief executives “earned” handsome raises despite...
by Amanda Drane | Jul 14, 2015 | Arts, News, Scene Here, Wellness
I was confident I would find no Ultimate Frisbee going on as I drove into the Wal-Mart plaza in Chicopee shortly after midnight early last Friday — I figured the pouring rain and flood warnings would deter the pick-up players that valleyultimate.org told me gather...
by Hunter Styles | Jul 14, 2015 | MGM Springfield Casino coverage, News
Right Here Waiting: The Massachusetts Gaming Commission will pay Springfield $350,000 to establish a trust that will preserve all historic buildings within a half-mile radius of the casino footprint. These funds match an investment promised by MGM. Ostensibly, this is...
by From Our Readers | Jul 14, 2015 | Letters from our Readers, News
Northampton police and race: Hold the accolades A few years ago, while sitting at my desk, I saw a tall, thin white man dressed in a black jacket, black jeans, and a watch cap, trying to climb into my neighbor’s window. I called the police. A few minutes later they...
by Hunter
Styles | Jul 14, 2015 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Leisure, Music, News
How do a city’s business owners create a nightlife that is not only lively, but built to last? The short answer: by dreaming big. Running an entertainment venue takes daily stamina and quick thinking, of course. But it also requires a deeper, grander feeling to fuel...
by James Heflin | Jul 8, 2015 | News
So look — it may sound like a canard to Northerners, but I get the “Southern heritage” flag thing. When you grow up around Civil War battlefields, it’s impossible not to identify with the locals. Many a monument bears the names of Louisiana regiments, or those of...
by Advocate Staff | Jul 14, 2015 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Leisure, News
There’s a right way and a wrong way to selfie, people. Selfies can either be a silly, fun way to document a moment or the epitome of narcissism. So, please, selfie posters, consider your audience and: 1. Do turn your face towards the light. 2. Do pass the camera to...
by Amanda Drane | Jul 14, 2015 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Music, News
I just wanna dance. The itch comes in the form of a restlessness you’d think I could scratch with a good run, but I’ve tried and it doesn’t quite work. The need to dance comes from the soul as much as from the body. It’s like a primordial drive to shake and sway to...
by Hunter Styles | Jul 14, 2015 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Music, News
Julia Child said it best: people who love to eat are always the best people. That’s the springboard for our new occasional series @lunch, in which we sit down for a quick and candid midday meal with interesting locals, ready to chew the fat. For our inaugural lunch we...
by James Heflin | Jul 8, 2015 | Between the Lines, News
I write to you from the flaming, rainbow-hued ruins of the state of Massachusetts. Let us be a warning to all of you who are now experiencing the first stage of blowback from the latest liberal policy writ large. It is my hope that what we have seen in the Bay State...
by From Our Readers | Jun 30, 2015 | Letters from our Readers, News
Let freedom explode In addition to New York, in the past 10 years or so, the following states have liberalized their laws relative to the sale and use of consumer fireworks: Arizona, Connecticut, Georgia, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, and Utah....
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 30, 2015 | Arts, Columns, Leisure, Music, News
Thank you to everyone who nominated a band for the 2015 Grand Band Slam. Below is a list of the top 25 vote-getters. The bands are a good mix of the Valley’s musical scene featuring rock, country, hip-hop, reggae, dub, heavy metal, folk, industrial, and “other.” The...
by Amanda Drane | Jul 8, 2015 | News
The backlash was swift and the sorry-not-sorry was predictable in the fallout from the Berkshire Eagle’s decision to print a racist column, “Here’s the solution for black America,” which continues to unfold. On June 13 the Berkshire Eagle, based in Pittsfield,...
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 30, 2015 | Between the Lines, News
A modern Olympics has never made a profit for a host city, though you’ve probably heard otherwise. There have been two Olympics, however, that have claimed such a feat: the 2012 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, and the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Utah....
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 30, 2015 | Arts, News, Scene Here
Not everyone would choose to spend a Sunday morning deep in the woods of southern New Hampshire. The scattered hikers on top of Mount Monadnock at 10 a.m. arrive from all directions — the mountain has dozens of trails — in various states of outdoor preparedness. There...
by Ollie Good | Jul 8, 2015 | Arts, Leisure, News, Wellness
Imagine, dear human, that you emerge from your car, walk across the gravel parking lot and enter a field bursting with roses, gardenia, and phlox. As the morning sun warms the blooms, they spill their sweet perfume into the air, taking aim at your quivering, cold, wet...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 30, 2015 | MGM Springfield Casino coverage, News
On the MGM Springfield casino playlist this week: Highway 91 Revisited: MGM has come up against a hard truth: opening the downtown casino in 2017 would be a majorly-bad move if the extensive construction work planned for the Interstate 91 viaduct has not yet been...
by From Our Readers | Jul 8, 2015 | Letters from our Readers, News
Listen up, lady writers, let a man explain Editor’s Note: This comment appeared online at www.valleyadvocate.com under the article “Stories From All Directions: Tackling the gender gap in publishing.” Where women miss out [in getting their writing published] is in...
by Amanda
Drane | Jun 30, 2015 | Articles, Featured, News
My boyfriend, who is not white, returned home from a shift bartending down the street from our Northampton apartment. Still shaking, he explained he’d just been interrogated by two police officers during his walk home. They questioned where he had been and what he was...
by Advocate Staff | Jul 8, 2015 | Leisure, News, Wellness
MOUNTAIN BIKING IN SOUTHERN VERMONT Vermont is just a stone’s throw away, and three quarters of the state is covered with forest. Mountain biking, anyone? Northern Vermont has the lion’s share of great trails, but several sites in southern Vermont stand out. The Hoot,...
by Hunter Styles | Jul 8, 2015 | Articles, Featured, Leisure, News, Wellness
I ran for my life. It wasn’t fast enough. A paintball came whipping through the clearing as I crossed in a running crouch, shot by the enemy team from 20 yards away. I felt it explode against my thigh. It stung for a few seconds, like someone had whacked me hard with...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 30, 2015 | Articles, Featured, News
A t the end of Bible study on Wednesday night, Steve Powell tells a joke. “This guy is talking to God,” he says. “God says that in his eyes, a million years is like a minute, and a million dollars is like a penny. So the man says: well then, God, give me a penny!”...
by Chuck Shepherd | Jul 8, 2015 | News, News of the Weird
California inventor Matt McMullen, who makes the world’s most realistic life-sized female doll, the RealDoll (with exquisite skin texture and facial and body architecture, and which sells for $5,000 to $10,000, depending on customization), is working with engineers...
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 30, 2015 | Articles, Blogs, Featured, News, The Uncanny Valley
You’ve probably seen the signs — “Fast $$ for Houses,” “We Buy Ugly Homes” — tacked onto telephone poles or scrawled onto yard signs by the side of a main road. The advertising doesn’t inspire confidence. The hand-scrawled, occasionally misspelled signs scream scam....
by James Heflin
Photos by Jerrey Roberts | Jul 8, 2015 | Articles, Featured, Leisure, News, Wellness
On a recent Thursday at the Ludlow Fish and Game Club, things were abuzz. The skies were repeatedly ripped through with the blare of engines as aircraft traveled the skies around Westover Air Force Base; gunfire crackled from the firing range nearby. Amid that din,...
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Amanda
Drane | Jun 30, 2015 | Articles, Featured, Leisure, Living By The Stars, News, Wellness
In the work-driven culture we live in, self-care is sometimes lost in the abyss of work, chores, sleep. To make matters more complicated, we all have ways of taking care of ourselves that are strikingly different from one another. Yoga, while good for all, can be...
by Kristin Palpini | Jul 8, 2015 | Articles, Arts, Featured, News, Scene Here
A thin man in a red basketball jersey and nylon shorts strides down Dwight Street in Holyoke, arms swinging, a smile on his face. His thick black hair is slicked back, and his ankles look like saplings sprouting from his foam slippers. He reaches the intersection with...
by Chuck Shepherd | Jun 30, 2015 | News, News of the Weird
Gregory Reddick, 54, and his employer, SJQ Sightseeing Tours, filed a lawsuit in June against New York City for “harass(ing)” them and hampering their ability to rip off tourists, specifically, interfering with their “right” to sell tickets for $200 or more for trips...
by James Heflin | Jun 23, 2015 | Between the Lines, News
In Monty Python’s sketch “The Upper Class Twit of the Year,” the competition gets fierce. The commentator, voiced by John Cleese, runs down the lineup: “Vivian Smith-Smythe-Smith has an O-level in chemo-hygiene. Simon-Zinc-Trumpet-Harris, married to a very attractive...
by James Heflin | Jun 23, 2015 | Arts, News
British/Pakistani writer Kamila Shamsie, who wrote her first novel “in Northampton in a studio ’round the corner from Joe’s pizza,” has lately stirred up certain quarters of the literary world with a provocation: She’s called for 2018 to be a year in which publishers...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 23, 2015 | News
Last week gold-plated angels blew diamond-encrusted trumpets to herald the coming of “the greatest jobs president God ever created,” billionaire luxuriating enthusiast Donald Trump. Reaction was swift: Liberals crowed, conservatives kvetched, and a pool appeared...
by James Heflin | Jun 23, 2015 | Arts, Leisure, News, Wellness
Rail trails are a dime a dozen around these parts, but Easthampton’s Manhan Rail Trail is, for me, the finest of them. In the middle of its run, it dissects a nondescript end of town, crossing busy Union Street beside a stripmall, a melancholy ATM, and a gas station....
by Hunter Styles | Jun 23, 2015 | News
Last week, Superman stopped by Crocker Farm Elementary School in Amherst. He crashed library hours, where the kids had gathered for a special screening of short films they had made in school. The costume fooled no one — turns out it was special education teacher Alvie...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 23, 2015 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Music, News, Stage
Bernice Kwade lives in two worlds at the same time. “When I’m at home, it’s a totally different environment than when I go out,” she said. “My parents are trying to instill traditional African values in me, but we live in America now. I want to have a more liberal...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 23, 2015 | Articles, Arts, Featured, News, Scene Here
Stage lights shine down on a legion of beards. They sprout from Ashfield men young and old, tall and short. Some beards are just wiry tufts, some fluffy and soft like cumulus clouds, some as thick and full as a field of wheat primed for harvest. The beards are black,...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 23, 2015 | News, Wellness
Wissam Abdul-Baki leans forward in his chair. “Try it,” he murmurs. “Say ‘Allah.’ ” I do as he instructs, drawing out the second ‘A’ into a long “aww” sound. I think it sounds pretty good, but he pats his chest. “Start from here. Let it come from the bottom of your...
by James Heflin | Jun 23, 2015 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Leisure, News, Wellness
So this, it turns out, was the Father’s Day I had Cheetos up my nose. Not in a funny way, but more a sort of philosophical reverie way, like that glazed look you get after you’ve had seven ice cream sandwiches and a heat stroke. This was the latest result of my...
by Amanda Drane | Jun 23, 2015 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Food + Booze, Madame Barfly, News
The Ale House on Worthington Street in Springfield is surrounded by boarded-up buildings that loom ominously up over the small, cozy one that the bar occupies. But inside, the vibe is warm and welcoming. “It’s somewhere you can go in Springfield where you don’t have...
by From Our Readers | Jun 23, 2015 | Letters from our Readers, News
The S-word Bernie Sanders’ presidential candidacy has brought the “s-word”— socialism — back into the American political vocabulary. But what does it actually mean? Dictionary definitions are useless. Tea partiers call President Obama a socialist. The third letter in...
by Chuck Shepherd | Jun 23, 2015 | News, News of the Weird
Researchers studying the human-brain-eating Fore tribe of Papua New Guinea reported in a June journal article that they have identified the specific “prion” resistance gene that appears to offer complete protection against mad cow disease and perhaps other...
by From Our Readers | Jun 16, 2015 | Arts, Letters from our Readers, News
This week instead of letters, the Advocate is featuring Facebook comments recently posted on our page. You all are poignant and hilarious; keep commenting and sharing. Everyone else, like us on Facebook and join the discussion. Sometimes protesting is a lonely job....
by Amanda Drane | Jun 16, 2015 | News, Scene Here
The three men who staff The Friendly Barber Shop in West Springfield — James Pagan, Jeff Vample, and John Pellegrino — don’t care two bits who you are. You can be a Red Sox fan, a Yankees fan, or a Mets fan — and the three jerseys hang side-by-side at the front of the...
by Kristin Palpini | Jun 16, 2015 | Between the Lines, News
by Chuck Shepherd | Jun 16, 2015 | News, News of the Weird
Apartment buyers in ridiculously expensive Hong Kong are now eagerly paying up to the equivalent of $500,000 (U.S.) for units not much bigger than a U.S. parking space (and typically physically self-measured by the applicant’s wing-span). An agent told The Wall Street...
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Hunter Styles | Jun 16, 2015 | Articles, Featured, News, Wellness
“I always knew that I wanted to be a dad,” Joey Mella tells me. “Then I got married and we had three children very quickly. Now I’m kind of maxed out.” The middle child, two-year-old Ati Mella-Reiss, pushes a miniature shopping cart across the wood floor of the...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 16, 2015 | MGM Springfield Casino coverage, News
On the MGM Springfield casino playlist this week: As Time Goes By: MGM’s agreement with the city to complete all construction within 33 months — in other words, by the end of the summer of 2017 — may not be as iron-clad as it once seemed. What’s the challenge now? A...
by Amanda Drane | Jun 16, 2015 | Articles, Featured, News, Wellness
Soon-to-be parents Amy Mathers and Paul Kearney, of Limerick, Ireland, were in Florence recently visiting Mathers’ family. Mathers and Kearney are expecting their first child in September. The two said they talk about moving to the U.S. to raise a family, but Ireland...
by Hunter Styles | Jun 16, 2015 | Articles, Featured, Food + Booze, Leisure, News, Taste-Off!
Now that summer is almost here, we’re reaching for one of our favorite ice cream combos to get us through the work week: thick ribbons of fudge and belts of peanut butter cups in sweet vanilla ice cream. We’d call it Moose Tracks, except that name has been owned by...
by Jeff Good | Jun 16, 2015 | Arts, Leisure, News
My son came into the world with hair to there. The nurses marveled at the sandy helmet framing his cheeks, running their fingers through at every chance. At the hospital nursery window, the grandparents of other newborns would coo at their offspring’s wisps of down...
by Micaela Bedell | Jun 16, 2015 | Leisure, News, Wellness
There’s nothing more amazing than walking to your own theme music. As a nearby high school marching band lifts flutes, trumpets, and saxophones to their mouths, and the drummers behind them start to tap out a more insistent beat, I can’t help lifting my feet in...
by Abrahm Lustgarten, David Sleight, Amanda Zamora and Lauren Kirchner, ProPublica, and John Grimwade, special to ProPublica, | Jun 16, 2015 | News
We use a LOT of water. Americans use more water per person than almost anywhere else in the world — more than three times as much as Chinese and 15 times more than the Danish. The highest domestic water use is in the driest Western states; Arizona residents use 147...
by Amanda Drane | Jun 9, 2015 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Music, News
At the Waterfront Tavern in Holyoke, a rap battle between Hoodie Cruger, who is black, and Petey Mitch, who is white, turns racist. “I got rap sheets to rival my rap sheets,” spits Petey. “For your life, somewhere someway, had to pay two cents a day. That’s not what I...
by James Heflin | Jun 9, 2015 | Articles, Arts, Blogs, Columns, Featured, Leisure, Music, News, Nightcrawler
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