Three things I'm glad I did today

We met up with some friends at the YMCA and went ice-skating - even the reluctant Boy (it's amazing what a child will do for you on the promise of 'something from the vending machine'). Afterwards the Boy was very keen to go and play in the gym, so he and the Girl and I did just that, rushing around playing tag and acting silly until we all collapsed in a heap - and that was the first thing I was glad that I did today.

Next I was glad I insisted on taking the kids to the New York State Museum to see the Joan Steiner 'Look-Alikes' exhibition. We all loved peering at the artist's amazingly realistic miniature dioramas, created out of everyday objects used in unexpected ways. I make no apology for borrowing a link from the Exile to send you towards the excellent Look-Alikes game.

And finally I was glad that we stopped in at Price Chopper on the way home, not only because it means we have restocked in advance of yet another winter storm (coming our way literally any moment now), but because I ran into someone I know. Not a remarkable thing to happen if you are living in, say, Linton, but sufficiently unusual for me here to make me feel happy. It's just one more little sign that this place is becoming home.

The Man has rung from Atlanta, en route back here, but on account of the dodgy weather it remains to be seen if he'll be able to complete his journey tonight.

Sunny delight

The Man writes...at last Albaniana has allowed me to blog from here in California. I think she was worried that rather than tell you about my week in the sun I would bore you about the journey. As if!

But what a journey it was! Albany to the West Coast took 21 hours. You might be thinking it is quicker from London. You might be right.

The cause was a little bit of weather and a missed connection in Chicago. Here the only option was to join a line to be re-booked: three agents dealing with a line of 117 people.(Yes, I counted. I'm strange that way).

For some unfathomable reason this part of air travel doesn't seem to have changed in the 20 years since I first flew. And yet - nearly everyone in line had a mobile phone; a large proportion had laptops; most would be competent to operate a touch screen. Given a tiny bit of information, a few terminals and wi-fi, most passengers could have re-booked themselves.

After further delays I finally got to my hotel room at 4am, only to get up at 7.

Still it is refreshing to see palm trees, trams, and wide boulevards in the dazzling sunlight, and enjoy temperatures in the 60s.

Of course, whenever I mentioned my trip everybody (well, strictly speaking every adult male) asked with faux innocence: "Do you know the way?"

I only hope they've got it out of their system.

Falling about

I had a good little workout this morning, shovelling all the snow off the drive. This job usually falls to the Man, but of course he's in California where it's warm.

Bitter, me?

Met up with the Exiles this evening down at the YMCA. The Girl was there for her first proper skating lesson, as was 5 year-old Exile #3 who was actually stepping onto the ice for the very first time. As she inevitably fell down almost immediately, the instructor shouted 'Good fall!!!' without a hint of irony. A fine example of wonderful American positivity. In England if our little friend had glided out and executed a faultless triple toe-loop I bet the best she'd have got would've been a 'Hmm. Not bad.'

The skating students were all requested to wear helmets. If only their friends and family members watching from the bleachers had been given similar advice! The Boy managed to fall backwards off a bench onto his head, and in the process of recovery accidentally kicked baby E5N1 in his head. Luckily there was no serious damage to either party (both were more surprised than hurt). Still I'm hopefully assuming that Exile #2, like me, is not the suing type.

Snow bored

With snow forecast for later in the morning, I scurried out and made a few local journeys soon after waving the kids off on the school bus. Post office, library, then YMCA to sign the Girl up for some skating lessons. One or two flakes of snow were flittering, but nothing alarming, so I drove on to a shop where I actually managed to make a decision and bought guest towels and bedding. OK then, just a bed still to get (and a fridge. And a dining table. Perhaps a sofa? Come to think of it, we could use a couple more bookcases. A camera would be useful. And the kids are petitioning hard for a TV… Not that we're embracing the consumer culture or anything).

The snow was still half-hearted, so I called in on Exile #2 for a cup of tea. Her husband, like mine, is away this week – even further away than California (some people will stop at nothing for the sake of their blog – Konnichi wa, Exile-san!).

After lunch the snow really set in for the rest of the day. The Man rang. His flight had been long and much delayed and he’d had virtually no sleep. But before you start feeling too sorry for him, bear in mind that at least he is now swanning about in sunny San Jose in his shirtsleeves. Meanwhile his nearest and dearest back in Albany are expecting to wake up to eight inches of frozen whiteness. Again.

On the way

The kids were back at school and I spent most of the day out on errands, including dropping the Man off at the airport. He's on his way (as I write) to California for a week, but the journey isn't going smoothly - but I'll let him tell you the story in due course.

Other tasks for the day included taking the car in for its 5,000 mile service, and some attempts at guest-related shopping because my parents are coming out to visit in a couple of weeks and (don't tell them this) we still haven't bought a bed, let alone any bedding. Not to worry, we'll soon be sorted. Weather permitting, that is, for although it has been a really beautiful sunny day today we're forecast yet another winter storm from tomorrow...

I scream, you scream...

...we all scream for ice cream! Especially at an International Ice Cream for Breakfast party. The rules of the party were that kids could eat all the ice cream and toppings they desired, until 12 noon when they would be back under the 'control' (however nominal) of their parents.

So, ice cream for breakfast, meltdown for lunch - well, that's was what I was expecting anyway. But it all remained pretty civilised. Turns out even kids realise there's only so much ice-cream you can eat of a morning, and they were able to burn off the sugar-rush with some sledding down a precipitous slope. Meanwhile the adults hung around drinking coffee and chatting, as adults tend to like doing.

On leaving, our hostess informed us that as initiates into IICFB we are now committed to continuing the tradition in perpetuity, wherever we may happen to be, on the first (or thereabouts) Sunday in February. So, who knows, the ritual may come to a house near you one of these days... Or, heck, why not just adopt it yourself? It's kind of fun.

Less fun is spending most of the day trying to understand US Tax Return forms, which is what we left the Man doing at home. To cheer him up we managed a trip to Five Rivers (hooray!) which was looking pretty in the snow.

Rock 'n' roller

We spent most of the day at the Exiles' house, having lunch and hanging out. Also along for the party was another of the Boy's special friends from school and her Mom. It must have felt rather weird for them, being so out-numbered by Britons in their own country. The Mom took the opportunity to get a British perspective on current US politics, health services and education. For what they were worth, we enjoyed sharing our opinions - and we had some good laughs in the process.

There were even more laughs when the Exile and Exile #2 introduced us to the joys of Rock Band - an X-box video game where up to four people get to 'play' guitar and drums and/or sing along to heavy rock songs - sort of karaoke plus. We played so long and hard that I came away with a bit of a headache (see, there's always a price for fun, that's why I generally try to avoid it). As my brains were turning to mush after too many attempts on the drums I began daydreaming of special interest alternatives to Rock Band. 'Dance Band' would be nice, I thought: play along to jolly hits of the thirties and forties. Or 'Big Band', if you really had a lot of friends...

Some of the children had a go, too. The Exiles' youngest, who in bloglife goes by the name of E5N1, is still on the small side for rocking. But he sure can roll.

Settling

It snowed all day today - pretty, sparkly snow, like in a snow-dome. It settled of course - about four inches deep.

The Boy had his classmate to play and the Girl invited her friend from along the road, so everyone was happy. After all the socialising was done and we were by ourselves again we settled down to watch a DVD of the live-action (with real humans!)feature film, Thomas and the Magic Railroad. Eighty-four baffling minutes as far as I was concerned, though the Boy claimed it was 'the best movie I've ever seen', and even the Girl enjoyed it, in spite of all the trains.

Finally, look what can happen if you leave a property unattended: bloomin' squatters!

On crossing the Atlantic

As the half-term-like week off school draws to an end, I realise my life here has been growing more similar to the one I left behind. Until recently I've had the role of main provider of entertainment for the kids out of school hours. Now I'm back to being their social secretary.

The Girl had a skate-date today with a classmate, and later two more friends came to play. Tomorrow the Boy has a train-related playdate with one of his classmates, and he'll be hanging out with a couple more of them on Saturday. On Sunday both kids are invited to an International Ice Cream for Breakfast Party, again with school friends... And so it goes merrily on.

And I'm even getting involved in the nearest thing I can find to a children's book festival - the school's celebrations for Read Across America Day, coming up next month.

It's a bit like I've been rowing in a little boat for six months and suddenly reached land.

Total eclipse of the half

Nothing witty to say about today, so I won't even try. It has been pleasant. We played and made in the morning, whizzed out to buy craft supplies after lunch, had fun round at the Exiles' place for a couple of hours, and hung out at home for the rest of the day.

Oh, by the way, somewhere during all the birthday kerfuffle at the weekend we passed the first half-year mark of our American Experience. And as I write this we are part way through the last total lunar eclipse before Dec 2010. But that's true back in Linton as well of course.

The Gingerbread House: Gothic Horror or Fairytale Fantasy?

Today's guest blogspot goes to Kevin Mcloudshirts, presenter of Channel 4's Awesomely Expensive Designs:


Despite the simplicity of the basic structure (too traditional, perhaps, for some), the development of this build was far from straightforward. There were tears and there were tantrums. More than once the chief contractor threatened to down tools altogether. And yet amazingly it came in on time and within budget - though it will be interesting to see how the eco-friendly bio-degradable building materials (gingerbread with sugar and candy trimmings) will withstand the rigours of the local climate.

Though the completed 'chalet' may not be to everyone's tastes, what this project teaches us is that sometimes - just sometimes - the irreconcilable artistic differences of two contradistinctive designers can be married successfully to form a uniquely exuberant decorative style.

Would I call the Gingerbread House a success? Well, beauty is, as they say, in the eye of the beholder. But the proof of the pudding [significant pause] is in the eating.

President Chill

The Man was off work for Presidents' Day. After all the excitement of the weekend we mainly just chilled out.

The kids had a friend to play this morning, one of the Girl's classmates. He's a lovely boy and very tall. Standing next to him our Girl and Boy, small by anyone's standards, look like they just fell out of a cornflakes packet. But none of them are bothered by their contrasting heights, which anyway go unnoticed when everyone is sitting round a computer giving themselves matching square eyes.

In the afternoon the Girl went off for another playdate, and the rest of us went to a furniture shop and played hide and seek, *sigh*.

Caption suggestions for this, please - taken as we were leaving Build-a-Bear on Saturday:

About a Boy's birthday, Part T

Well, did you ever? What a swell party it was.

Fortunately the Boy's class is actually quite a small one, and in the end four weren't able to come, though their places were taken by siblings of other classmates. At the final headcount there were 16 children and about 11 adults.

It was more-or-less a freestyle event. We'd provided some making activities for the crafty ones, but those just wanting to play trains or chase each other round the basement happily got on with that. The only 'organised' element was the sit-down picnic in the dining room (so glad we haven't got round to buying a dining table yet) and pass-the-parcel.

Now pass-the-parcel, as most readers know, is pretty well obligatory at English birthday parties, and children are required to learn the rules even before they can say their own names: it's part of our cultural heritage. But the game was a complete novelty to our American guests.

It was like introducing snow to people who have grown up in the tropics. What a joy to see the looks of mystification on their six-year-old faces as they reverently passed the parcel round (no-one thinking to deliberately pass it e-x-t-r-a s-lo-w-l-y so that they could be next to unwrap a layer), and politely waited until everyone had finished before they scoffed the sweets they found during their turn.

So, pass-the-parcel, tombola... what other gems of British culture can we bring to our host nation?

Welly wanging, perhaps?

About a Boy's birthday, part I

The Boy came into our bedroom very excitedly pre-dawn. More than pre-dawn, actually, it was about 11:30pm. But once he'd been shovelled back into his own bed he let us 'lie in' until a quite respectable half past seven.

Presents, playing and then after breakfast the major treat of the day - a trip to the Build-a-Bear Workshop. This is a place where bears get stuffed and fluffed and dressed and parents get fleeced. The kids thought it was wonderful, and the Boy came away with a cat sporting a pink shirt and red skirt, with a purple dress for parties - brave colour decisions, it has to be said, for an orange-furred tabby.

According to her name-badge, the person at the checkout was called Bethanylotsofhugs. Isn't it extraordinary that her mother should have named her that, almost as if she knew her daughter would end up employed by a cuddly toy emporium.

Then on to stuff ourselves at Build-a-Belly, our local creamery, with its scarily generous ice-cream portions.

The rest of the day was devoted to preparing for tomorrow's great event, the party. The Boy has invited his whole class, and terrifyingly everyone can come! Maybe they are all curious to know what happens at a British birthday celebration - hope we don't disappoint them too much.

The Never Ending Story continues

We were up all through the small hours looking after a puking child - yet again. This time the Boy. When will it all end?

Of course, come six thirty in the morning the poor little fellow was feeling all fine and chipper, sitting up in our bed and cracking jokes while his parents crawled around barely conscious from lack of sleep. He did at least have the decency to conk out for a couple of hours later in the day.

He'll be up at the crack of dawn tomorrow, too, ready to enjoy every available second of his sixth birthday. So it's an early night for me.

Have a nice day...

...is a phrase that is much used here. Before leaving England more than one friend mentioned it, with rolling eyes, as being 'typical' of 'American insincerity'.

But you know, I don't dislike it. Even if, deep down, the checkout girl at Price Chopper doesn't really much care what sort of a day I have, when she wishes me a nice day I can say 'You too!', and I actually do mean it. I can't imagine that her day working at the supermarket will be anything special, but it might turn out to be, and the more people wishing her well the better her chances, I reckon.

As a phrase 'Have a nice day' is no more insincere than 'How are you?' (in situations when a detailed reply is not expected or desired). It's just local custom, and it's fine by me. Having said that, when the call-centre guy who'd just topped up my cell phone limit exhorted me to 'have a wonderful day' I did think he was going a bit far. It was hard to wish him a wonderful day in return without sounding smirky.

And now here's some nice ice from the start of our day:

There's no answer to that

I'd ear-marked today to finish painting the sitting room, but woke up to find it was a snow day. More of a slush day, really. The alarmist winter storm forecasts of the previous couple of days weren't realised, except with a brief spell of freezing rain. But it was bad enough, apparently, to merit closing all the schools.

Optimistically I pressed ahead with my painting plans, against a background whine of 'We don't know what to doooo!' Thankfully the Exiles stepped in and invited the Boy and Girl round to watch Finding Nemo, so that I could get on with all the fiddly edge bits without having to stop every thirty seconds to tell one child off for whingeing and the other one to for goodness sake stop trying to lick her brother's ear ('Why do you want to?' I asked. To which she replied, 'Because I can't lick my own.')

But oh, all the things you vow as a parent never to say! Click here for the full repertoire. The other day the Boy had committed some minor misdemeanour at school which he claimed a friend had put him up to. And out it came, the classic 'So, if your friend told you to jump off a cliff, would you do it?'

Next day the Boy, looking pleased with himself, took me to one side and said: 'If my friend tells me to jump off a cliff, I'll tell her to jump first. Then she can catch me.'

Thoughts from home #3

And now for another occasional guest blog-spot. Today April Fool shares some ideas for half-term holiday activities. Here in the US we might be using them next week during Presidents' Week vacation. Please feel free to add your own suggestions...

I think I’ve finally cracked it: how to make those long half-term days pass painlessly. Get them to re-enact their favourite film in its entirety, the longer the better, complete with full dress rehearsals with numerous costume changes. My elder two spent most of the day engrossed in The Sound of Music: B as Maria (with a brief cameo as a nazi soldier), and S as all of the von Trapp children plus their father. (I did try hard to get their little brother a part, but was told indignantly that ‘there isn’t a fairy playing a drum in the film’.) We even managed to get some healthy outdoor exercise into the proceedings: the Gog Magog common proved a perfect setting for the opening ‘Hills are alive’ sequence.

I’m thinking of trying for Chitty Chitty Bang Bang on Thursday. Just think of the possibilities: Harry Potter could keep you going throughout the entire Easter holidays. But I’m sure I’m preaching to the converted here: the Girl has been starring in shows for as long as I’ve known her.


We spent the first two days of half term doing a spot of great-granny-sitting, which was quite eye-opening in some ways. Just as, when you have a baby yourself, the whole world seems to be pushing a buggy – when you are in charge of an elderly person, there seems to be another wheelchair user round every corner. And a couple of steep steps, that normally you would have hardly noticed. We have selective vision.

And I have spotted a business opportunity. The high streets are teeming with opportunities for purchasing the latest designer pram or potty for the very young: where do you go to try out the new ‘Rock-an-oldie’ wheelchair, or choose a floral pattern for your hearing aid case? Maybe in the States they already have the concept of a granny emporium? Thirty years time, we’re going to be outnumbering those newborns, we the generation brought up on ‘retail therapy’. And I want something to look forward to.

Like listening to paint dry

We were woken this morning by an all too familiar sound. I'll spare you the details, but suffice it to say the Girl was off school again today. Possibly food poisoning, but who knows?

While she recuperated I got on with painting walls. And I decided to do penance for all my past sins by tuning into the WAMC fund-drive.

WAMC is the local station that brings us National Public Radio programmes, and three times a year it does a telethon thing to raise money from listeners. Not just for a day, but for a whole week. If you can imagine Children in Need on the radio without any of the remotely entertaining bits and for an entire week, that's how awful it is. The presenters start off chirpy enough, but as the hours pass their voices begin to crack with desperation as they cajole, beg and attempt to bribe people to phone in (as in 'Pledge us enough money and we can end this fund-drive and let you have the real programmes back!').

Much as I loathe the fund-drives (this is the second I've endured since we came here) I do love this radio station and listen to it nearly all day and often through the night. My life here would be a whole lot less good without it.

Cat napping

A good thing about Andrew Lloyd-Webber musicals is that you can doze off for a bit and not miss out much on plot. This is especially true of Cats which doesn't really have a plot at all.

The performance was at Proctor's Theatre in Schenectady, where I hadn't been before, so I was happy to go along with the Girl on a trip arranged by her friend's mom. It's quite a large, grand theatre with a good view of the stage even from the back of the gallery where we were sitting.

The production was fine, but in the first half we could only catch about 25% of the words which was a shame for a musical based on poetry. Things picked up in the second half, though the Girl's friend put her head down and snoozed through the slower numbers.

'Expensive nap!' remarked her mother, with feeling.

Keen as mustard

We went to the Mall and the library, but mostly we stayed indoors out of the snow flurries.

We employed a couple of willing child labourers to paint the sitting room. Here they are in action.

Hippie hip hooray

Busy, busy day. Up to school first thing, where there was further confirmation that the place is a bona fide hippie establishment. Where else d'you get to sing 'Puff the Magic Dragon' in assembly?

Then a complete change of scene at the Q.U.I.L.T. auction. Great fun. Not just an auction of quilting paraphenalia, but also a raffle and 'door prizes'. The auction was conducted by a local pharmacist with no knowledge of quilting, so he enjoyed himself making quips about low-shank feet and strip piecing as he took bids for antique quilts, sewing machines and cutting boards. There were lots of goodies in the raffle - baskets of fabric, quilting books and the like. Fabric featured heavily amongst the door prizes too. These were handed out to people fitting various random categories, such as 'anyone in the room who has had a knee or hip replacement'.

I actually won a door prize myself (for being the 87th person to sign in that morning, not for being 87). I even won a raffle prize, for the first time ever, so that was pretty neat. I hurried home for lunch clutching my freshly won bundles of fabric. You can never have too much fabric.

Back up to school to chauffeur kids to skating. After that, some shopping. Then I collected the Man from work and caught up with our kids at a friend's house, where we were also invited to dinner. Our hosts had had an oven fire earlier in the day, but seemed remarkably unruffled ('beyond hysterical' was how they put it) and still served up a delicious meal. We had a lovely evening.

Mellow yellow

Well, I feel a bit bad for laying into scat singers yesterday. How often have I said to a certain member of the family 'If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all'? Maybe I should heed my own advice.

Today I started painting the sitting room. Even as the first brushstroke hit the wall I realised I was recreating our sitting room in Linton. Also the sitting room in our first house in Oxford. I guess we must really like gold-ish yellow.

We had heavy rain most of yesterday and I actually saw the back yard minus any snow for the first time since we moved in. By this morning, though, we'd had snow again and there's more expected next week, so I won't be gardening any time soon. The trees looked very beautiful this morning, covered with tiny icicles. By afternoon it sounded like rain again, but it was just all these millions of icicles, dripping.

Skidaddle

I thought I had all sorts of things to blog about today, but now I sit here writing they escape me. The only idea that sticks in my mind is 'Wouldn't the world be a better place without scat singers?' - this because I switched on the radio just before noon and yet again (seems to be every other day) there was a scat singer on the daily live music show 'Performance Place'. I snapped the radio off sharpish. I'm sure scat singing is very hard to do and all that, but really - just because you can, doesn't mean you should. Especially before lunch.

So, your nominations please for similar irritations which we would be better off without.

To any scat singers who might be reading - sorry. And, I guess, goodbye.

Don't mock

A few days ago the Man was claiming in this blog that there's not much sign of election fever round here - but that's not true. It's just about the only topic of conversation, and especially today. Most of our friends are Democrats. They are still reeling from the fact that Bush managed to get re-elected last time and are desperate to get their own candidate in this time round. The problem is, which candidate? It's still too close to call between Clinton and Obama, and probably still will be even once today's Super Tuesday primary votes are all counted.

Speaking of 'primary votes', the school held a mock election today, and even the Kindergartners had the chance to cast their ballot. Both our kids have proudly announced that they voted for Clinton, though not so much because of her policy pledges. The Girl chose her because 'Hillary's a girl and she looks nice' and the Boy because 'in Linton my friends' mum is called Hilary'.

Ballot sheets were sent home so that parents could vote too, which was very gratifying for the Man and me because we really feel we're missing out not having a real vote. Unfortunately we couldn't find the darn bits of paper until after the children were on the bus this morning, so I ended up driving to school to hand them in. Which was mad and environmentally irresponsible, but I seriously value the concept of democracy. Though our mock votes today may have been meaningless in any wider sense, they still meant something to me.

Top dogs

Capital District 'top hot dogs', according to the Girl:

1) Grafton Lakes (on a REALLY cold day)
2) Our local Creamery
3) Local outdoor pool (after swimming in REALLY cold water)
4) "Hotdog Charlie's", Crossgates Mall
5) Hancock Shaker Village (though the bread wasn't soft enough)

Next week, the region's best rice crispies, as surveyed by the Boy.

Many happy returns

Today is Groundhog Day...

Ok, no it isn't. That was quite an enjoyable film though. But today was another special occasion, the day when by tradition the Man sticks his head out from under the duvet and looks at the shadows under his eyes to see if he is still 37.

He is! Again! The family rejoices.

It is (or was) also Norman Rockwell's birthday, though we didn't realise that until we visited the museum of his work in Stockbridge, Massachusetts later in the day. It happened that the children had been invited to the house of friends over in that direction, so they got to play there all afternoon while the Man and I visited the art gallery in peace.

Norman Rockwell is like Garrison Keillor on canvas - portraits crammed with revealing detail and plenty of humour, too. Rockwell himself never claimed to paint Fine Art, and I'm sure his pictures are too sentimental for many, but he did what he did with incredible skill and accomplishment. We enjoyed our visit.

When we went to pick up the children the Boy greeted us with 'What are you doing back here?' They hadn't missed us too much, then.

Apparently New York won the Superbowl. Go Giants!

Groundhog Day

Today is Groundhog Day. Punxsutawney Phil (apparently the original and best forecasting groundhog) saw his own shadow this morning and predicts that there will be six more weeks of winter.

According to his guardians, Phil is more than 120 years old. Remarkable.

I don’t know anything about Punxsutawney except that it’s in Pennsylvania, but having an immortal and talented rodent certainly guarantees attention from the big news syndicates, once a year at least. It’s something Linton could consider instituting: a yearly appearance by Linton Lizzie, the weather weasel perhaps? Or Freddy the flood-forecasting ferret? A sure-fire way to get a mention on BBC Look East.

The kids were invited to a glow-in-the-dark mini-golf birthday party today, which was very…glowy. I managed to avoid going round the course with them (the Man had that privilege) but stood about talking Presidential politics with some other moms (the women here, unlike the men, aren’t so distracted by the Superbowl).

Super Choose Day

The Man writes...We are of course only days away from what CNN calls "super duper Tuesday" where voters in 24 states, including New York, finally have their say about who will contest this year's presidential election.

Despite record turnouts so far this year, there is little evidence of election fever in Albaniana land. Almost the only roadside signs you see are for rank outsiders like Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich - a man who seemed to have some interesting things to say but is primarily known for claiming to have seen a UFO and for having a wife from Essex who is less than half his age but more than twice his height.

In fact, having watched hours of debate (online) and listened to hours of commentators' pontificating about the demographics of each candidate's supporters, I am really non-the-wiser about any of these guys' (and gal's) policies. The Republicans want to make massive tax cuts (Huckabee wants to end income tax altogether), increase spending on military and infra-structure, and yet balance the budget. How exactly? The Democrats want to end poverty and extend health care to the millions who currently miss out, but again the details are hardly discussed.

To be honest, around here it's Superbowl not Super Tuesday that's on most peoples' mind. Sunday's game will be contested by our two most local teams: the New York Giants and the New England Patriots. To show how popular football is here: a colleague at work told me today he has been on the waiting list for a Giants season ticket since 1982.