Seasonality is a big deal in Northern California. We greedily anticipate the first Gravenstein apples, the olive crush, the almond blossoms, the salmon runs, the chanterelles under the oaks. Perhaps because there’s not all that much of a change of seasons around the San Francisco Bay, we fetishize the farmer’s market as our connection to [...]
"Off Hours" Archive
Life beyond the keyboard.
Au Revoir, Mademoiselle
Words, like a scent or a song, can remind you of a different time in your life. But outgrowing certain words that once defined you can be bittersweet.
A Procrastination Tool for Any Communicator: PassiveAggressiveNotes.com
The old adage “Write what you mean” does not apply to the communications featured on this website, one of the author’s favorite online procrastination tools (next to shoe shopping, of course) …
So a Copywriter, a Carpenter, and a Chiropractor Walk Into a Bar…
Is it a stretch to see parallels between shingling a wall and writing copy? You be the judge.
Want to Make Reading More Fun for Your Kids? Ease Off.
You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t force a first-grader to love reading…until you let her find her own way.
How to Maximize Self-Marketing Opportunities at Family Weddings
Spring: when a young man’s fancy turns to…. Well, shoot. I just glanced at my calendar, and today is actually the first day of summer. I guess I was thrown off by all the unseasonably cool weather this year. But I think I can still salvage this blog post. If spring is the season of [...]
The Need for Seed
I chuckled when I read the “June To-Don’t List” in my June 2011 issue of Health magazine. Topping the list: growing your own food. The snippet explains, “We’re all for knowing where your eats come from, but it’s OK to let those who are good at growing things get their hands dirty if you’re better [...]
Lundberg Rice: From Flooded Fields to the Chip Aisle
How does the most elemental of foods become the stuff of specialty markets? A thriving California family farm has thoughtfully plotted that course for the past 75 years. “Rice has a very long history of supporting humanity,” says Grant Lundberg, third-generation rice farmer in northern California’s Sacramento Valley and CEO of Lundberg Family Farms. [...]
The Hair Poets and Others: Seven Things Not to Do When Reading in Public
I write poetry, and I publish it. Which means that I’ve been witness to a lot of bad poetry readings over the years. Great ones, too—but that’s not what this post is about. The problem with poetry, when read in public, is this. As with any art, there’s a lot of it out there. Some very [...]
Food for Thought: Snacks We (and our Brains) Love
Writers are notorious noshers, especially those who work within striking distance of the kitchen, as do many of our Content Bureau team. What we eat and drink can profoundly affect our mental capacities—caffeine and chocolate are only the most obvious examples. To research this phenomenon, I asked my Content Bureau colleagues what they reach for [...]
