Hey, Saw Lady!

Natalia Paruz came to the United States from Israel in 1989. She was 14, already a talented dancer, and she had been accepted as a student at the prestigious Alvin Ailey school in New York City. Two years into her training, tragedy struck. Natalia was hit by a taxicab as she crossed a city street. “The cab came around the corner and didn’t stop. It hit me at full speed,” she recalls.

Natalia would suffer permanent injury to her upper spine. Physical therapy, massage, and acupuncture helped ease the pain, but her nascent career was over before it had even begun. “I feel fortunate because I can walk,” says Natalia. “But I can’t turn my head all the way to the left and right. I can’t bend backwards. And I can’t dance.”

To cheer up their grieving daughter, Natalia’s parents took her to Austria for a tour of the countryside where her favorite childhood movie, The Sound of Music, was filmed. One night, the family attended a concert featuring a musician playing, of all things, a carpenter’s hand saw. Natalia was entranced. The saw moved as if it was dancing. “It was the first time since the accident that I felt excited about something,” she says.

After the show, Natalia went backstage and asked the man if he would teach her how to play the saw.

He said no.

“He told me to go home, pick up any saw for carpentry, and figure it out.”

When Natalia returned to New York, she borrowed a rusty saw from a friend. She was able to make it sing, just a little, creating six distinct notes. Encouraged, she went to the hardware store and tested a few saws until she found one that played a full octave and a half.

Just like Maria in The Sound of Music, Natalia had found her calling. Within a few years, she excelled at this instrument, which produces a sound eerily like that of a soprano opera singer. “It’s amazing that a piece of metal can sound so human,” she says.

“The accident changed my life for the better. When God closed the door on dance, he opened a window into a whole new musical world for me,” she says, alluding to well-known words spoken by Maria in the popular film.

At first, playing the saw was just a hobby for Natalia. She would play the saw while on break from her job selling souvenirs in Broadway theaters. She practiced at home but always worried that neighbors would complain about the peculiar sounds coming from her apartment. Ironically it was one of these very same neighbors who referred Natalia for her first public appearance, playing for senior citizens at a local Salvation Army center.

“I was still new to the saw and I really didn’t know if I was good enough,” says Natalia. But her performance was a hit, and the Salvation Army center recommended her to another center, which in turn led to more referrals. Soon, Natalia was fielding invitations from all over the city.

Photo by Rod Goodman
Photo by Rod Goodman

Since those early days, Natalia has played the saw with some of the world’s greatest musicians, including the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by maestro Zubin Mehta and the Westchester Philharmonic Orchestra. She has been invited to play at Madison Square Garden, Carnegie Hall, and other New York institutions.

Natalia also works in the studio, recording music for television commercials, singer-songwriters, and movie soundtracks. She appeared as a saw player in the 2002 movie, Dummy, starring Adrien Brody. Garrison Keillor of the Prairie Home Companion radio show has named Natalia the show’s “official saw player.”

But her favorite venue is the cavernous New York City subway system, where she performs regularly. “It’s such an honor to fill the artery of this great city with my sound and provide the soundtrack to people’s lives,” says Natalia. [Visit sawlady.com for specific locations, dates, and times.]

In the subway, Natalia can see her audience and talk to them. Many people recognize her and call out, “Hey, Saw Lady!” when they stop to listen or pass by on their way to the trains. “I love the interaction you get in the subway,” she says. “I meet people that I would never get to meet any other way, from homeless to rich people.”

Natalia says it’s difficult to estimate the number of saw players worldwide—perhaps a few thousand—but more are emerging. When Natalia founded the New York City Musical Saw Festival in 2002, four saw players showed up. In 2009, 53 saw players from all over the world performed together at the annual festival and made the Guinness Book of World Records for being the “Largest Musical Saw Ensemble.”

“Most saw players are isolated from one another. The festival is the only place to meet others who share our enthusiasm for this art form, learn from one another, and be inspired by one another,” she says.

As for spreading the word, Natalia rarely teaches saw playing. Just as the Austrian musician told her to figure it out on her own, she encourages newcomers to start through trial and error. “If you succeeded in figuring it out, then you were meant to be a saw player,” she says.

Natalia not only learned saw playing, but she turned her life from tragedy to triumph. Second acts are possible. Just ask the Saw Lady, next time you’re catching a train in the City.

How to Play the Musical Saw

So you want to play the saw? Before you head to your local hardware store, keep these tips in mind:

• Any carpenter saw plays, but you want to find the longest blade possible, with a minimum length of 26 inches. Don’t forget you need a violin bow.

• Place the saw’s wooden handle between your knees for stability, and use your left hand (if you’re a righty) to bend the blade from the tip.

• Hold the bow in your opposite hand and run it along the non-serrated edge.

• Bending the blade creates different pitches. The more you bend the blade, the higher the notes you’ll achieve.

Visit the Saw Lady online at her official website, and check out this video of The Saw Lady story:

To watch more videos of Natalia, visit Play it Again, Saw Lady!

Six Apps for Dining on Vacation

When it comes to finding something to eat while traveling through a strange town or when you’re just not sure what to get for dinner, one four-letter word comes to mind almost immediately: Yelp! Yelp started out as a simple website and now has a life of its own on just about every mobile platform out there.

While Yelp’s a handy little thing, claiming the broadest range of restaurants in its database, sometimes it’s refreshing to try something a little different. We’ve rounded up six of the best food-spotters, including a couple you might not have heard of.

1. Urbanspoon

Urban SpoonAdmittedly, this app is almost as well-known as Yelp, but it comes with such a great gimmick that we couldn’t leave it out. If you don’t know quite what you want to eat, Urbanspoon’s “shake” feature makes the decision for you by randomly picking a restaurant from the area to match your criteria.

In addition to that handy feature, the database itself is well stocked with information on all sorts of local eateries, including reviews from fellow diners and professional critics. Urbanspoon is really the granddaddy of dining apps—it has been around since the iPhone App Store launched in 2008.

Download: Urbanspoon for iPhone, iPad, Android, and Kindle Fire
Price: Free

2. Zagat to Go

This is the most pricey app on the list, coming in at $10 for iPhone and iPad users and $25 for Android users. It’s important to realize just what you get for your money—this isn’t just another variation of the same features offered by everything else.

Based on the best-selling Zagat books (which retail for about $15), this app compiles the same amount of information that you would find in 45 individual city guides. That includes detailed info on each of Zagat’s rated restaurants, of course!

It also features one very, very handy feature that makes it well worth the price of admission: offline mode. When you’re traveling overseas or somewhere without access to 3G service or Wi-Fi, offline mode is invaluable. All of the information you need is stored directly on your phone, so you can search, browse, and choose to your heart’s content.

Download: Zagat to Go for iPhone, iPad, and Android
Price: $9.99 for iOS; free for Android (but $24.95/year after a six-month free trial)

3. Eat St.

Eat St.Taking a slightly different approach to searching for eateries, Eat St. comes courtesy of Food Network, which has created a searchable database to help you find the best food trucks and street food in your city. Perfect for your inner foodie hipster, the GPS-enabled app shows map locations for stationary food carts plus any mobile trucks that pop up from time to time. (It’s worth noting that the accuracy may vary for mobile units.)

Where possible, detailed vendor information is provided, including menus and even Twitter contact details, plus the ever-helpful specials and deals on offer.

Download: Eat St. for iPhone and iPad
Price: Free

4. LocalEats

If you’re not a fan of big-name, multinational corporations’ sticking their fingers into your burgers, then this is the app for you. LocalEats only provides information about dining locations that are truly local—not a national chain to be found.

In addition to searching by price range and operating hours, you can even get really crunchy and look for the best local vegetarian eateries. With this in mind, LocalEats is ideal for people who like to try new things, find unique places, and get to know a city’s hidden highlights. If you just want a Big Mac, you’re going to have to keep looking.

Download: LocalEats for iPhone or iPad
Price: 99 cents for iPhone; free for iPad

5. OpenTable

Open TableOne of the more practical apps on this list, OpenTable helps you find restaurants that have tables available at your chosen time. Enter the restaurant name to find out when tables are available, or enter a date and time to find places nearby that have a spot for you.

Well-suited to spontaneous types commonly in a “What’s for dinner?” quandary, OpenTable does have the ability to search in the future, but it’s better suited to people looking for somewhere to eat right now.

Download: OpenTable for iPhone, iPad, Android, and Windows Phone
Price: Free

6. Foodspotting

For fans of Pinterest, Flickr, and food porn in general, Foodspotting is a heavenly combination of social networking and photography, with a handy restaurant-finding app thrown in as well. When you load it up, you’re treated to images of dishes other people have submitted. If you’re in the mood for eye candy, you can simply browse the pretty pictures. Otherwise, filter things to show only the latest uploads, the nearest geotagged spots, or the “best” pictures as voted by the community.

It’s a twist on the traditional food finder, as you’re looking for specific dishes rather than restaurants—but sometimes you don’t realize you’re craving a slice of pie until you see it in front of you.

Download: Foodspotting for iPhone and iPad, Android, and Windows Phone
Price: Free

Looking to go off the beaten path?

After all that, if you’d like to find something a little more unusual for your next meal, turn to the masters of the Travel Channel, Anthony Bourdain and Andrew Zimmern, and your trusty iOS device. Regardless of which chef you’re more fond of, both Layover and The Bizarre Foods Locator will help you find tasty treats around the world.

Bourdain’s app, inspired by his hit show The Layover, shares his personal favorite hotels, bars, restaurants, and hot spots from 10 major cities. The Bizarre Foods Locator, on the other hand, has presented fans with a list of more than 700 restaurants that Zimmern has eaten at, complete with GPS locations, contact details, and menu suggestions.


This story originally appeared on Tecca. More from Tecca:


A Voice From a Truly Violent Year

Journalist Lance Morrow once wrote that the day John Kennedy was killed was the day the U.S. stopped believing it could choose its destiny. Faced with a rising tide of violence, he argued, Americans came to accept the future was beyond their control.

That sense of powerlessness would only be strengthened by the killing sprees that have become more frequent over the years. Since Charles Whitman shot 14 students at the University of Texas at Austin 46 years ago, 22 other Americans have opened fire on strangers in restaurants, schools, and, most recently, a movie theater. From 1990 to 2000, there were four of these shooting sprees. There have been six in the past two years.

When viewed alongside the current wave of political hostilities and mistrust in the country, some Americans have been tempted into seeing an imminent collapse of society. Sooner or later, the thinking goes, this streak of violence in American society will push the country to some disastrous end.

For perspective’s sake, we thought we’d offer some reflection on this subject from someone who lived in a truly violent and troubled year. In a Post article of 1968, Daniel Patrick Moynihan asked, “Has This Country Gone Mad?”

 

When Moynihan wrote this article, he was listed as merely a former Assistant Secretary of Labor. Later, he served four terms as New York

“Violence has rarely been altogether absent from American life… But I think the violence of this age is different: It is greater, more real, more personal, suffused throughout the society, associated with not one but a dozen issues and causes.

“The rise of black violence has been an… ominous and irrational turn… White terrorism against Negroes is an old and hideous aspect of American life, but… now it seems to be becoming a pastime for suburban housewives, taking target practice before television cameras, filling black silhouettes with white holes.

“Protest against war has been an old and honorable tradition in America, but with this war [in Vietnam] the peace movement itself has turned violent, threatening elected officials…

“One group after another appears to be withdrawing its consent from the agreements that have made us one of the most stable democracies in the history of the world.

“The espousal of violence, and violence itself, mount on every hand: private crime, organized crime; civil disorder at home to the point of insurrection, violence abroad on a scale unimagined.”

Students occupy an administration building at Columbia University, 1968.

Keep in mind what was taking place as Moynihan was writing. In 1968, black militant activists were promoting violent resistance to white society. Black Panthers and policemen were trading shots in Oakland, Calif. The war in Vietnam was expanding: the Tet Offensive had brought enemy troops to the gates of the American Embassy in Saigon, and the U.S. began moving troops into Laos. Anti-war protestors became more militant; students took over Columbia University and rioted outside the Democratic convention. The murder of Martin Luther King Jr. and the subsequent riots were barely a month in the past. Just a few months later, Robert Kennedy would be assassinated while campaigning for the presidency.

In 2012, as the media reports (and sometimes promotes) messages of bitter social division, the separation between conservatives and liberals seem wider than ever before. But for all the bluster and threats, it still isn’t as great as in 1968. Back then, reactionaries and radicals were trying to overturn society, while a great number of Americans seemed willing to watch the collapse.

 

Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Killed on April 4, 1968.

“A good many Americans do not hesitate to conclude from all this that American society is doomed, and they make no effort to conceal their great pleasure at this prospect. The ‘lust for apocalypse’… is something formidable to behold, especially in… the Ivy League radicals… [Meanwhile] Gov. George Wallace of Alabama… will have millions of Americans voting for him for President next fall… In East Harlem, a school official advises black children to get themselves guns and to practice using them. On silhouettes of suburban housewives, perhaps.

“Increasingly the nation exhibits the qualities of an individual going through a nervous breakdown. Is there anything to be done?”

Not a great deal, Moynihan answered, but a good beginning would be to abandon the myths that we could either control events or we were helpless. It would help, he said, if we “try to understand our collective strength as a people, and to try to see what is happening to that strength.

“The great power of the American nation…lies in our capacity to govern ourselves.

“Of the 123 members of the United Nations, there are fewer than a dozen that existed in 1914 and have not had their form of government changed by force since that time. We are one of those very fortunate few. More than luck is involved.”

Robert F. Kennedy. Killed June 6, 1968.

What separated us from them was “the ability to live with one another.” America had been so brilliantly successful at this that we no longer appreciated it. It was time to remember what an accomplishment creative harmony was.

“An Englishman, an expert on guerrilla warfare, put it concisely to a Washington friend about a year ago. The visitor was asked why American efforts to impart the rudiments of orderly government seemed to have so little success in underdeveloped countries. ‘Elemental,’ came the reply, ‘You teach them all your techniques, give them all the machinery and manuals of operation… The more you do it, the more they become convinced and bitterly resentful…  as they see it… you are deliberately withholding from them the one all-important secret that you have and they do not, and that is the knowledge of how to trust one another.”

This ability to trust, he continued, would not survive all the reckless talk about dissolution and despair. We shouldn’t come to accept civil hostilities and divisions as the natural state of America. “There must be a stop to this trend toward violence, and in particular, an immediate and passionate objection to any voice that gives aid and comfort to the present drift of events. That is almost a violent statement itself, but one surely warranted in the present state of the American republic.”

 

Classic Olympic Images from the Post

Photographs of past Olympic athletes from the 50s and 60s.


Classic Ads: The Art of Advertising

“Arrow Collars and Shirts” by J.C. Leyendecker

"Arrow Collars and Shirts” by J.C. Leyendecker from November 8, 1930

“Arrow Collars and Shirts”
by J.C. Leyendecker
from November 8, 1930

 

It is striking that ads in the old issues of The Saturday Evening Post often boast artwork worthy of a cover on the finest magazines of the period. An exquisite example is this 1930 ad by the great J.C. Leyendecker for Arrow Collars and Shirts. Leyendecker was about as famous for these ads as for his prolific Post covers, and the “Arrow Collar Man” was the American ideal for 25 years.

“Fisk Tires” by Norman Rockwell

“Fisk Tires” by Norman Rockwell from January 13, 1917

“Fisk Tires”
by Norman Rockwell
from January 13, 1917

 

Although several great illustrators did ads for Fisk Tires, Norman Rockwell did artwork for the company from 1917 to 1925 that appeared in magazines such as Youth’s Companion, Boy’s Life and, of course, The Saturday Evening Post. This winter scene with the boys admiring the cool tires is from 1917. There was always a sign or billboard for Fisk Tires in the ad.

“Cadillac” by T.M. Cleland

“Cadillac" by T.M. Cleland 6/30/1928

“Cadillac”
by T.M. Cleland
from June 30, 1928

 

Did you ever think you would call an advertisement “magnificent”? Artist T.M. Cleland (1880-1964) was a decorative designer, typographer, a well-known printer and, oh, yes, a wonderful illustrator. This 1928 ad for Cadillac is probably a depiction of Monte Carlo, suggesting how fun it would be to tool around Europe in your Caddy.

“Cream of Wheat” by Edward V. Brewer

“Cream of Wheat” by Edward V. Brewer from June 30, 1923

“Cream of Wheat”
by Edward V. Brewer
from June 30, 1923

 

 

We have come across dozens of great old Cream of Wheat ads. Artist Edward V. Brewer developed a series of these ads based on the black chef who appeared on the box (and still does today). The chef with the great smile would show up somewhere in the ad. In the case of this 1923 example, he appeared on the fancy new sign attracting the local children. The original paintings of vintage Cream of Wheat ads now sell for four to five figures.

“Bottles Ad”

Bottles Ad from August 8, 1926

“Bottles Ad”
from August 8, 1926

 

This charming ad from 1926 is touting the health benefits of bottles for your carbonated beverages. “Every bubble holds a heaping measure of health,” claims the text, going so far as to quote a prominent chemist’s assurances that the “average bottle of soft drink has the energy value equivalent to 3 ounces mashed potatoes or ¾ pound tomatoes”. Well, we may question that, but a bottle of pop is certainly easier to consume on the golf course than those food items.

“Hosiery”

Hosiery Ad from April 2, 1927

“Hosiery Ad”
from April 2, 1927

 

“Full fashioned, of course—giving that slender, trim ankled appearance that every woman wants.” How a pair of silk stockings achieves that is not clear, but no matter: this one is a charmer and a good example of late 1920s fashion and hairstyles. Like the artwork in so many of these ads, this one is not signed by the artist, but we have our suspicions. The lighting from below, as if by fireplace, and the large-eyed beauty is remarkably similar to a 1923 Post cover by artist Pearl L. Hill, who illustrated eight Post covers during the 20s (see below).


“Waiting” by Pearl Hill

 “Waiting” by Pearl Hill from April 14, 1923

“Waiting”
by Pearl Hill
from April 14, 1923

 

One of eight Post covers by artist Pearl L. Hill.

We are amassing quite a collection of these wonderful old ads. Let us know if you’d like to see more!

Grilled Lamburgers with Lemon-Rosemary Aioli

Fire up the grill and try a new twist on an old favorite with a homemade aioli sauce!

Grilled Lamburgers with Lemon-Rosemary Aioli

(Makes 4 servings)
Preparation and cooking time: 30 minutes

Lemon-Rosemary Aioli

Lamb Burgers with Lemon Rosemary Aioli. Photo courtesy of the American Lamb Board.
Photo courtesy of the American Lamb Board.

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a small bowl, combine mayonnaise, garlic, rosemary and lemon juice; mix well.
  2. Refrigerate until ready to use.

Lamburgers

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Place eggplant slices in a single layer on a baking sheet; sprinkle both sides of slices liberally with 1 teaspoon salt; set aside.
  2. In a medium bowl, combine lamb, garlic, pepper and the remaining salt; mix lightly but thoroughly. Lightly shape lamb mixture into 4 patties, each about ½-inch thick.
  3. Rinse eggplant slices; pat dry. Brush both sides of eggplant slices and tomato slices with olive oil.
  4. Grill eggplant and tomato, covered, over medium indirect heat 14 to 16 minutes. Place lamb patties over medium direct heat; grill, covered, 7 to 9 minutes to medium doneness (160°F), turning occasionally. Remove vegetables and burgers from grill. Place hamburger buns on the grill; toast 1 to 2 minutes.
  5. Spread 2 teaspoons aioli on bottom of each bun; top each with a burger. Place one eggplant slice and two tomato halves on each burger; top with additional 1 teaspoon aioli and top of bun.


Recipe and image provided by the American Lamb Board.

Calories Count When Keeping Cool

Summer BeverageStay hydrated as summer temperatures soar, but be aware that calories can pile up in a hurry when you drink to cool down.

“Beverages can be an important source of energy, and those calories can add up quickly when the warm weather prompts people to drink more often,” says Richard D. Mattes, M.P.H., Ph.D., R.D., honored as a distinguished professor of nutrition science by Purdue University in 2011.

Fortunately, many affordable and palatable no-calorie and low-calorie beverage options are available to meet the need. The Beverage Guidance Panel, which ranks drinks based on their health benefits and costs, recommends water as your main beverage, followed by unsweetened coffee and tea. Soft drinks, fruit juices, whole milk and sports drinks are least advised.

“

Energy from beverages doesn’t produce as strong a satiety response—feeling full—as solid foods. Consequently, people may consume a large amount of energy before realizing they have done so.

“Because this source of energy has weak effects of appetite and is often consumed at non-meal times, beverages propose a unique challenge to weight management,” 
Mattes concludes.

Cartoons: Truth Be Told

There is a grain of truth in these cartoons. We’re not sure the truth will set you free, but it should give you a chuckle.

“People are living longer than ever before. It’s nature’s way of helping you pay off your student loans.” from July/August 2012

"People are living longer than ever before. It's nature's way of helping you pay off your student loans."
from July/August 2012

“Gracefully? Honey, I’m aging gratefully.” from January/February 2005

"Gracefully? Honey, I’m aging gratefully."
from January/February 2005

from March/April 2012

from March/April 2012

from January/February 1997

from January/February 1997

“We don’t help ladies across the street anymore. Can’t afford the liability insurance.” from July/August 2012

"We don’t help ladies across the street anymore. Can’t afford the liability insurance."
from July/August 2012

“This works a lot better than rain dancing!” from November/December 1996

"This works a lot better than rain dancing!"
from November/December 1996

The Mission Trail

San Juan Capistrano Mission. Photo by Thomas Barrat.
San Juan Capistrano Mission. Photo by Thomas Barrat.

San Juan Capistrano, founded more than 200 years ago, is one of the most visited missions on the El Camino Real. The original church is now mostly ruins.

If I’d had my own car, I don’t think I ever would have received the lesson. But my car was a couple thousand miles away, the rental people had upgraded me to an SUV, and now I was about to pay for lack of fuel economy by running out of gas in the middle of nowhere in a state I didn’t even know had a middle of nowhere.

Which was not exactly the day I’d had in mind.

I’d come to California a few days earlier to follow El Camino Real, the Royal Road, which links together a chain of 21 missions spread from San Diego to north of San Francisco. Built from the mid 1700s into the early 1800s, the missions were not just churches. They were ranches, military outposts, trading posts, schools, houses, dorms, entire towns: self-contained worlds all of their own, converting the Natives with one hand on the Bible and one hand on the gun.

And they were built to be roughly a day’s travel apart by horse and foot. By car, I’d figured, planning the trip at home, I could do the whole thing in five easy days.

Except now I’m about to run out of gas and get eaten by vultures near the end of day three. I’d left the last mission, San Miguel, more than 40 miles back. The nearest gas pump is maybe 30 miles ahead, and the low-fuel warning bell is bonging with increasing frequency. Oh, and dark is coming down fast.

I should have stayed in the quiet chapel of San Miguel and prayed a while longer.

The interior walls of the San Miguel Arcángel church are filled with colorful murals. Photo by Anton Foltin.
San Miguel Arcángel. Photo by Anton Foltin.

The standard mission chapel is quite simple in its construction: a long, fairly low building, wide enough for two rows of pews and a center aisle. Most are dark inside, since adobe walls made the placement of windows somewhat tricky, and most are plain. This is a bit of a surprise, since before these California missions were going up, architects throughout Mexico and Spain were going wild with the churrigueresque style in which every square inch of every available surface is decorated with cherubs, angels, and whatever else the artisans felt like carving that day.

But apparently, that’s not what California needed. A few of the missions get a bit ornate—Dolores in San Francisco is elaborate enough to make your eyes hurt—but for the most part, these are the churches of people who work hard, people who don’t need the idea of God to overwhelm them in endless scrollwork and bleeding saints.

And a lot of work it was. California State Parks has taken over La Purísima Concepción, near Lompoc, and they’ve tried hard to show what the compounds were like in their prime, when populations were in the thousands and herds of cows and flocks of sheep ran over ranches that stretched past the curve of the earth. Among the restored outbuildings are a blacksmith shop, a kitchen, the priest’s quarters, the soldiers’ quarters (rather less luxurious than where the priests lived), and more. Everything needed to bring the local Chumash under the sway of the King of Spain.

The motivating force behind the California mission trail was Father Junípero Serra, a Franciscan monk, who came to the New World from Spain in 1749. Serra was one of those great men who don’t seem to exist anymore: Whether you needed a roof fixed or were in the mood to argue the finer points of St. Aquinas’ Summa, Serra was your guy. Unless of course you wanted to have any fun, because he was pretty much dead set against that. Biographers of Father Serra write that he believed “laughter was inconsistent with the terrible responsibilities of his probationary existence.” In other words, life is a dress rehearsal for the afterlife, so take it seriously. “Not a joke or a jovial action is recorded of him.” And just in case he was having too much fun having no fun, “he considered it his duty to inflict upon himself bitter pain. He often lashed himself with ropes, sometimes of wire.”

San Francisco de Asís. Photo by Steve Heap.
San Francisco de Asís, also known as Mission Dolores, is the oldest surviving structure in San Francisco.
Photo by Steve Heap.

But the man got stuff done. He founded the first nine missions on El Camino Real, from San Diego de Alcalá in 1769, to as far north as San Francisco de Asís, just a bit west of the Bay, in 1776. Before he died in 1784, he had run a total of 15 more, some on the trail, some not, as far south as Baja. Even today, the Museum of the City of San Francisco says his missions “were the first settlements of civilized man in California.” Which opens up certain problems of interpretation, Native history vs. European history, etc., but that’s not the point of this article.

At the mission in Carmel, which Serra had founded in 1771, there is a glass case near the altar. Inside the glass case lie some very old pieces of wood, the remains of Father Serra’s coffin. Sooner or later, the man is going to be made a saint—he was beatified in 1988—and when he is, this tiny, very beautiful mission by the sea is going to be even more a site of pilgrimage than it is now. “We get about 300,000 people a year,” I’m told, as I buy my ticket. Make him a saint, and I figure that number will double.

But it’s quiet right now. I stop in the courtyard, try to imagine the place as it was when an outpost on the edge of the world. Can’t do it; I’m too aware of the very expensive suburb that now surrounds the mission, the distant sound of traffic. Call it a failure of either faith or imagination. I’m not sure which.

A sign by the doorway of the chapel points out that San Carlos Borroméo de Carmelo, the mission’s full name, is in an earthquake zone, and adobe doesn’t always hold up so well in earthquakes, especially not 300-year-old adobe. I watch a couple people read the sign, peek in, then walk around to the small graveyard at the side of the church, where the graves are outlined in abalone shells the size of dinner plates, their nacreous colors catching the afternoon light and throwing it back at the church like incense.

Inside, the pew creaks, just a little, when I sit down. And that’s about the only sound I hear until I stand up again, an hour or so later, hesitant to get back in the car and back on the road. But I have more missions to see.

In all, El Camino Real stretches about 600 miles. As a practical matter, for the modern pilgrim, this means a whole lot of driving along Highway 101. By the end of the second day, I’d developed a routine. Leave one mission, set the GPS for next, never forgetting a quick prayer to Saint Christopher, because if the GPS fails, I’m going to need all the saintly intervention I can get. Drive through traffic. Repeat. But then, somewhere north of Santa Bárbara, I leave what I think of as California­—a very long line of cars surrounded by pink roofs—and enter something entirely different. An emptier world, one moving at a slower pace. One where the missions still fit.

This twin-towered church of Santa Bárbara. Photo by Linda Armstrong.
Santa Bárbara, or Queen of the Missions, was completely rebuilt after an earthquake destroyed it in 1925. Photo by Linda Armstrong.

I get to three or four missions a day; each has its own unique moment of beauty. The gigantic tree in the courtyard of the mission at Santa Barbara. The smell of incense at San Buenaventura, when I walked into the chapel right after a funeral. It was the only time I went into a mission while it was being used, and for just a moment, it was as if the missions were still holding their communities together.

Over the centuries, some of the missions have become the center of towns. San Luis Obispo is huge, and, unlike the usual long, low building, is airy and L-shaped. Others, like Santa Inés, are so far off the beaten track that if the mission trail did not create a track of its own, they would have slipped completely from history. And still others, like Nuestra Señora de la Soledad, are threatening to return to the elements: The old adobe walls have melted from two centuries of rain, surviving only as stubs, like broken teeth.

I don’t see any swallows flying around San Juan Capistrano, which, of all the missions, is the one that’s most figured out how to make tourism work for it. The highest admission price, the biggest gift shop, and signs that point out the best place to watch swallows—when there are swallows to watch. And that’s the only reason most people come here, or have even heard of the place, swallows flapping back on the same day each year.

With the actual old church at Capistrano nothing but a ruin, the mission has consecrated a small chapel for prayers: And here, it’s the usual long, low box of a room, two cramped aisles of pews. But there’s also the most elaborate altar of any of the missions, and the racks of burning candles make the gold reredos glisten as if wet with new rain.

It is after visiting San Miguel Arcángel—founded in 1797 and now the most complete original chapel—that I find myself in trouble. The chapel is so beautiful, so peaceful, not another person inside, that I linger maybe a bit too long. And when I finally leave, I discover that my plan—buy gas near here before going on to San Antonio—was a bad one. No gas stations. Okay, fine. Map shows a town down the road, they’ll have gas.

Except they don’t. “We like it that way,” says the man in the lone business in the town of … well, I can’t exactly tell where I am, because what I thought was a town on the map was really just a crossroads, and the GPS kind of gave up in disgust a half hour ago. “But the military base might sell you a few gallons.”

The air outside smells like onions, like farms. Back when the missions were first built, all of California was this empty.

What we forget, rolling along so easily in our cars—what I’m about to remember as my car sucks the last fumes out of the gas tank before the military base really does take pity on me and sells me enough fuel to get to the next mission and the next town—is that it wasn’t long ago, not long at all, when the world was a much bigger place, a place where you needed to know there was something familiar at the end of the day. A star to point yourself toward.

Father Serra saw all this space as a clean slate—never mind the people already living there—and thought, yes, I can do something with that. I can do something that lasts, that matters. I can make something beautiful.

And so he started building missions. A place to rest from work. A chance to touch something bigger than even the vast emptiness of the landscape.

I light a candle of thanks in San Antonio, throw a little extra light on the world, climb in the car to the sound of screeching chickens. The mission waits for its next visitor.

 

Gallery: El Camino Real, the Royal Road


Ten Handy Vacation Apps

Couple taking pictures of themselves with mobile phone. Courtesy of Shutterstock.
Couple taking pictures of themselves with mobile phone. Courtesy of Shutterstock.
Traveling with sufficient resources used to mean carrying a lot of books, guides, and other documents, but now you can bring all that information on your portable device. From checking your flight itinerary to finding the best places to eat to sending postcards, it call all be done from your smartphone or tablet. And you don’t have to spend a bundle to have it all at your fingertips.

Kayak app icon.

 

1. Kayak

Kayak makes it easy to search for flights, hotels, and car rentals. And features a packing list maker. Track your flight, convert currency, and check out tours or attractions around your destination all in one app.

Download: Kayak for iPhone and iPadAndroid, or Windows Phone.
Price: Free

TripAdvisor app icon.

2. TripAdvisor

Find travel information, customer reviews, and travel forums at TripAdvisor. You may find a bunch of Facebook friends are already on TripAdvisor writing reviews! Know before you go which restaurants and hotels are worth visiting. TripAdvisor posted reviews are delayed for verification, to minimize suspicious content and keep everyone honest. TripAdvisor also alerts the owner or manager of any establishment that receives a negative review.

Download: TripAdvisor for iPhone and iPadAndroid, or Windows Phone.
Price: Free 

Tripit app icon.

3. TripIt Travel Organizer

TripIt organizes your itineraries so there is no need to print them out. Just link your email account to TripIt, and TripIt will pick up every confirmation number you receive into your inbox. Whether it is a flight, hotel, or dinner reservation, as long as it contains a confirmation number, TripIt will organize everything into one easy-to-access itinerary. If there are any flight delays or last-minute changes sent to your email account, they will also be updated automatically.

Download: TripIt for iPhone and iPadAndroid, or Windows Phone.
Price: Free 

Where app icon.

4. Where

Eat. Drink. Play. There’s an app for that. Where uses the GPS chip inside your smartphone to create an all-purpose tool to take with you when you travel. Walk, drive, or fly, and Where will find your location and give you on-the-spot information on where to get cheap gas, what the weather will be like, movie showtimes, the best places to eat, traffic conditions, or news headlines. Browse the Yellow Pages or the Yelp directory.

Download: Where for iPhone, Android , or Windows Phone.
Price: Free 

MapQuest app icon.

5. MapQuest

Even if you’re not venturing far from home, it’s always good to have a GPS system with you just in case, and MapQuest is the best free app for that. MapQuest makes it easy to find hotels, restaurants, gas stations with prices, and coffee shops at your fingertips. Use the text search option to find less popular locations such as campsites. All locations are labelled along your route to make pit stops easier on the go.

Download: MapQuest for iPhone or Android.
Price: Free 

Google Translator app icon.

6. Google Translate

Google Translate saves you from not only buying a library of language books but carrying them around, as well. Google Translate offers over 50 languages, from Afrikaans to Yiddish. Type in a phrase or a word, and have it translated on the spot. Google Translate will give you the written translation and the option to hear the phrase spoken. Newer versions of Google Translator Toolkit use human translators to translate entire documents.

Download: Google Translate for iPhone and iPad  or Android.
Price: Free

XE Currency app icon.

7. XE Currency

XE Currency calculates the conversions between more than 180 worldwide currencies. Access live foreign exchange rates, up-to-date currency news, and historical rates. You can also choose to receive email updates with currency rates and news or follow the economic indicators calendar. Use XE Currency to create and track comparison charts and to calculate prices even in remote areas.

Download: XE Currency for iPhone and iPadAndroid, or Windows Phone.
Price: Free

Urbanspoon app icon.

8. Urbanspoon

Shake up your next great meal, literally. Just give your mobile device a shake and watch nearby restaurants fill your screen like a slot machine. Urbanspoon uses the GPS on your smartphone to pick popular local restaurants throughout the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and Australia.

Download: Urbanspoon for iPhone, iPad, or Android.
Price: Free

Wikitude travel app.

9. Wikitude

Wikitude turns your smartphone into a virtual tour guide. Point your smartphone camera at a monument, landmark, or street view, and the augmented reality guide overlays user-contributed content onto the image, putting a wealth of information about the view at your fingertips. Wikitude matches your position to the landmarks you point the camera at and tells you about them.

Download: Wikitude for iPhone and iPad  or Android.
Price: Free

Postagram app icon.

10. Postagram

Postcards for a new generation, Postagram turns sending touristy postcards with clichéd phrases into a cool piece of mail for your family and friends to receive while you’re gone. Just take a photo using your smartphone, and the Postagram app does the rest. Postagram prints your photo onto a postcard along with the mailing address and message you provide from your device, then sends it through the mail. Without even doing so much as buying a stamp, you can send Postcards from all over the world.

Download: Postagram for iPhone  or Android.
Price: Free plus 99 cents per postcard

This story originally appeared on Tecca. More from Tecca:

Judging the Supreme Court

Few people would argue that we need a Supreme Court—a panel of knowledgeable judges who (among other things) determine whether laws are consistent with the Constitution. There’s less agreement with the way the Supreme Court is structured and how it operates. Americans have long been troubled by the fact that we give a small group of judges the power to overrule the elected branches of government. And we give them lifetime appointments, which protect them from recall by voters. A justice can remain on the bench as long as he meets the one requirement set by the Constitution: “Good Behavior.”

To date, 112 men and women have been appointed to the Court and only one has been impeached (Salmon Chase in 1804, and he was acquitted by the Senate). The chances that justices could be removed are extremely small.  No matter how unpopular, or biased, or misdirected their decisions might be, they are free from the wrath of voters.

Essentially, we ask the Supreme Court to protect representative government by operating outside of it.

One hundred years ago, a Post writer questioned the privileges and powers we grant the Court justices. The author, Melville Post, claimed the Founding Fathers had intended—

to create a government in which the people had the last word. They created three independent departments, all equal in dignity … but all subject to the will of the people as the ultimate sovereign.

They were not so much concerned about the judicial department. It could neither tax the citizen nor quarter soldiers in his house, and besides that no one had ever heard of a judicial despotism … Nevertheless, they confined the judicial department to its own affairs, as they had done with the others.

The original idea of the Court’s work, according to Post, did not include reviewing legislative acts. No court in the world had ever had such power. The Court had slowly gained power until the present day, when—

nine men, holding their offices for life, are able to annul the will of nearly a hundred millions of people, the president of the United States, and both houses of Congress.

In 1916, a judge of Ohio’s Supreme Court wrote in the Post that, regardless of what the Founders had intended for the Supreme Court, what we now had was—

a political body passing on political questions—not partisan ones—great questions of public policy affecting not only national interests but state and even municipal interests, all the while exercising over them the right to veto, the right to supervise, the right to modify, the right to destroy.

While some have criticized the Court, others have strongly defended it. Some have even gone so far as asserting that the Supreme Court is above reproach. They regard any criticism as an attack on its independence. Responding to this attitude, Indiana senator Albert Beveridge, writing for the Post in 1923, quoted this refreshing opinion from turn-of-the-century David Josiah Brewer:

“It is a mistake to suppose that the Supreme Court is either honored or helped by being spoken of as beyond criticism. On the contrary, the life and character of its justices should be the objects of constant watchfulness by all, and its judgments subject to the freest criticism.

The time is past in the history of the world when any living man or body of men can be set on a  pedestal and decorated with a halo. True, many criticisms may be, like their authors, devoid of good taste, but better all sorts of criticism than no criticism at all. The moving waters are full of life and health; only in the still water is stagnation and death.”

"Justice Black, on the court since 1937, has long championed underdog causes."

Behind the criticism of power without accountability, was the fear of partisanship. The Court justices, free from restraint and immune to recall, would become political activists and make decisions that promoted their own views. This is what Merlo J. Pusey feared had already happened in 1962. In his “Struggle Inside The Supreme Court,” he said the judges were “gravely divided” and nearing a “showdown.”

The “activist” bloc on one side of the doctrinal gulf that divides the court is led by a cool and affable Alabama lawyer, Justice Hugo L. Black.

"Guaranties of liberty must be interpreted in the light of the Constitution as a whole." Justice Felix Frankfurter

Black and his allies have tried to write into the court’s decisions their belief that the guaranties of freedom of speech, press and religion, as contained in the Bill of Rights, are “absolutes,” subject to no qualification whatsoever.

The Black doctrine has been resisted by a more conservative group of Justices who for want of a better word are often called “traditionalists.”

These men highly esteem the guaranties of liberty in the Bill of Rights but insist that those guaranties be interpreted in the light of the Constitution as a whole.

The most effective spokesman for this group … was Justice Felix Frankfurter [who] led a majority in rejecting the concept of “absolute rights.”

Earlier that year, the “activitists” had produced the decision banning state-sanctioned prayer in public schools. Pusey believed this marked the beginning of vast changes that would sweep across the country.

The activist view of Freedom of Speech, Pusey wrote, would protect groups that advocated the violent overthrow of the government. It would destroy public order “because irresponsible people would presumably be free to indulge in perjury, obscenity, … false advertising, and even solicitation of crime and subversion.”

It is tempting to predict new Court rulings will profoundly change the country. But, just as in 1962, they probably won’t produce the revolutionary changes that some pundits fear. The Court may operate beyond the influence of American voters, but this allows it to be more consistent than the electorate.

Sneakiest New Scams

Illustration by James Yang
Illustration by James Yang

Those self-described “African kings” who offer to make you a millionaire by helping move an overseas fortune into the safety of your bank account are old hat. Really old. For at least 40 years, they’ve been sending the so-called “Nigerian Letter”—first by U.S. mail, then as the first mass email scam of the Internet Age that remained the top scam throughout the first decade of the new millennium. Sure, postage-free email, the easy availability of cyber address lists, and hard-to-track anonymity provided by free Hotmail, Yahoo, and Gmail accounts all help explain why it remains a common con today.

But, as consumers finally learned to be wary of out-of-the-blue offers of untold riches, clever Nigerian letter scammers found ways to adapt. These days, instead of just masquerading as monarchs, some also pose as wealthy foreign businessmen on dating websites, asking cyber sweethearts for money for a plane ticket to meet them or help them out of a jam. Others claim to be bank lenders who “approved” two percent loans in a tough economy—after the requested application fee is paid. Still others have been known to pose as FBI director Robert Mueller or even Hillary Clinton, threatening arrest or offering political help to get a hidden inheritance (depending on the letter) unless upfront fees are paid to keep you out of jail or put you on Easy Street.

The very latest spin on all of the above scams has been to abandon email (too common, too much competing spam) in favor of the old-fashioned fax. As with email, faxes also can be sent en masse, with “predictive dialers” that call thousands of random phone numbers per day; if a fax tone is reached, the transmission goes through.

Sigh! Just goes to show you, some old scams never die. Instead (and often after well-publicized warnings), they just get tweaked. So be aware—and beware—of these creatively sinister newly rewritten rip-offs, hustles, and cons:

Telephone Scams

Misleading telephone offers date back almost to Edison. Here are the most common and their newest incarnations:

1. Fake Lotteries. The classic approach is to say “you have already won” a lottery that, in fact, you never entered. (One tip-off: they’ll ask you to pay advance fees­—never part of legitimate winnings—in order to claim your prize.) Or, they call to ask for donations for phony charities (often in the wake of recent disaster) or to promise government grants, low-cost medication, or a “free” vacation (any of which they claim requires your personal information and credit card).

The New Twist. Now fraudsters who work the phone try to get you to call them. For example, you receive a mailed letter for any of the reasons above, or stating there’s a UPS package that cannot be delivered, or that you’re entitled to cash from a special (secret) government program. You’ll call what seems like an American area code, but is actually the number for a Caribbean country. Dialing that number may cost as much as $5 or more per minute. So, the scam is actually two-pronged: As an operator tries to weasel your personal or financial information for identity theft, you’re simultaneously running up sky-high phone bills—thanks to a series of transfers, long holds, and lengthy small talk to keep you on the line as long as possible.

2. Distress Calls. Another classic phone scam is the call to targeted grandparents. Scammers pretend to be a grandchild in need of money after being arrested or hospitalized while vacationing abroad. They often try a generic greeting such as “Hi, Grandma, it’s me, your favorite grandson!” with hopes you will reply, “Billy? Is that you?”

The New Twist. Now, scammers are increasingly identifying themselves with the specific names of grandchildren—as in “Hi, Grandma, it’s Billy, and I need your help!” They get grandkids’ names from Internet searches on ancestry websites, Facebook accounts, online telephone directories, or reading recent obituaries of the target’s spouse.

3. Timeshare Resale Agents. Timeshares have a tendency to lose value. For years, distraught timeshare owners have been barraged with offers to help unload their unwanted units by self-described “resellers.” These sleazy profiteers promise they already have an interested buyer. All they need is their fee—upfront, please—to make the transaction occur. (Of course, the buyer is nothing more than a figment of the scammer’s imagination.)

The New Twist. Timeshare owners who’ve been swindled of upfront fees by phony resellers are now being re-contacted by so-called “fraud recovery” specialists. Guess what they’re being offered? Help with recouping that lost money—for another upfront fee, of course. Sometimes, it’s the same “resellers” now calling as “recovery” specialists, according to FBI reports. At best, pay a “recoverer” and you’ll get little more than forms or instructions to file complaints with investigating government watchdogs—all of which you can get for free at websites for the Federal Trade Commission or your state Attorney General. At worst, you get nothing but a smaller checking account.

Protect Yourself from Phone Scams. Hang up on any unsolicited phone call seeking personal or financial information. To avoid the phone bill trap, be cautious about calling back anyone with an area code you don’t immediately recognize. The most commonly used Caribbean area codes are 876, 809, or 284 (Jamaica, the Dominican Republic, and the British Virgin Islands). Also be wary of Canadian area codes, which are also three digits long.

Illustration by James Yang
Illustration by James Yang

Debit Card Scams

The invention of the ATM has not just made banking a greater convenience: It’s been a source of unlimited inspiration to the criminal mind. Top scams include:

1. ATM Skimming. Portable “skimming” devices—sold online for as little as $100—are placed over or behind the card slot to record information encoded in the magnetic strip of debit cards. With miniature spy cameras placed nearby to record PIN numbers used to make cash withdrawals, crooks are able to make duplicate cards and score fast cash from multiple machines. Without a PIN, they can make fraudulent online purchases.

The New Twist. Automated card machines at gas pumps have become an even more desirable target. Reason: With only a couple of manufacturers of gas pumps, a single key—in the hands of a scammer who gains employment at one gas station—can open pumps at multiple stations to install the sinister skimmers.

2. Fake “Out of Order” Signs. In bank vestibules with several ATMs, crooks place “Out of Service” signs on non-tampered ATMs in order to get customers to use a neighboring ATM on which they already placed a skimmer. Such was one recent case that resulted in $390,000 in skimmed withdrawals—until the Secret Service nabbed the culprits.

The New Twist. In a newer spin, no skimmer is even needed. Instead, crooks apply adhesive to certain buttons—“enter,” “cancel,” and “clear”—to prevent keypad-using consumers from completing their cash withdrawals after they’ve already inserted their card and typed PIN codes. As frustrated customers leave the machine to report the problem (tin foil is sometimes used to prevent cards from being returned), lie-in-wait crooks use a screwdriver to release the keys to complete the transaction—and get cash.

Protect Yourself from Debit Card Scams. Before using an ATM, wiggle the card slot—if it’s loose, avoid that machine. Also ensure a light emits from the card slot; if obscured, that’s a sign of tampering. Inspect keypads to ensure buttons aren’t stuck and always cover the keypad as you enter your PIN. At gas pumps and checkout counters, a credit card is safer—federal laws limit your liability against credit card fraud to no more than $50 (it varies with debit cards, depending on when the fraud is reported). When using a debit card to buy gas or anything else, it’s safer to choose the “credit” screen prompt instead of “debit” so you don’t have to enter your PIN. The purchase amount will still be deducted directly from your bank account, but it’s processed through a credit-card network—providing greater protection in the event of fraud.

Classic Covers: Earl Mayan

“Yogi Berra”

Yogi Berra from April 20,1957

“Yogi Berra”
from April 20,1957

 

“It’s like déjà vu all over again!”

What a career! Yogi Berra spent almost 19 years with the Yankees as an outfielder and catcher, was named American League Most Valuable Player three times, and participated in 21 World Series (as a player, manager, and coach).

And he’s one of the most quotable people on the planet.

Earl Mayan posed Berra in Yankee Stadium for this 1957 cover. Most of the yelling, cat-calling, complaining fans behind the catcher were friends of the artist who, editors assured us, “were real nice-looking people till he asked them to look like baseball fans.”

The “fans” are keeping an eye on the action, heeding Berra’s advice, “You can observe a lot just by watching.”

Berra is playing his part well, concentrating on that high, fly ball because, “baseball is 90 percent mental—the other half is physical.” But, actually, we don’t know how much of this is true, since, “I didn’t really say everything I said.”

Gotta love the guy.

“Saturday Rain”

Saturday Rain from April 25, 1959

“Saturday Rain”
from April 25, 1959

 

“Mr. Moore” to the left isn’t overly concerned with nature’s bounty. He had one little bloom and let it get all droopy.

Although the sign on the house says “Moore,” he doesn’t fool us: As our cover artists sometimes liked to do, the part of the disappointed golfer was played by illustrator Earl Mayan himself. A Long Island buddy of the artist posed for the part of the happy gardener.

“Madame Forty-Four”

Madame Forty-Four from October 5, 1951

“Madame Forty-Four”
from October 5, 1951

 

Mayan illustrated 10 Post covers and over a hundred fictional stories that appeared in the magazine in the ’50s and ’60s. The stories ran the gamut from spy thrillers to detective mysteries to this gem we found from 1951.

A saloon singer in the gold mine camps of 1853, Prudence Ledyard, came out with two revolvers blazing when she came across some toughs trying to jump her claim. Turns out they weren’t as tough as they thought they were, and thereafter the demure saloon girl was known as “Madame Forty-Four,” which was the title of this 1951 story by Michael Foster.

“Wedding and Rehearsal”

Wedding and Rehearsal from June 2, 1956

“Wedding and Rehearsal”
from June 2, 1956

 

One thing we can say about the slackers in the first panel: They clean up good. The groomsmen are slouching, the bridesmaids are yawning or applying make-up and the flower girl is yo-yoing. But a magic wand was waved and somehow this group materialized into a proper ceremony. And it was an actual wedding that Mayan painted.

Editors noted “when Mayan felt sorry about having to paint the Very Rev. Albert Greanoff’s back view, he then put him in the pews a couple of times, front face. This may surprise the rector.”

“Traffic Jam”

Traffic Jam from April 28, 1956

“Traffic Jam”
from April 28, 1956

 

In the post-war ’50s, urban sprawl created problems such as traffic jams. Or perhaps it was just pretty girls.

Frustrated drivers are understandably irate as the traffic cop lingers in a female-induced coma, but we get a terrific view of the mid-1950 automobiles.

“Plowed-Over Driveway”

Plowed-Over Driveway from December 18, 1954

“Plowed-Over Driveway”
from December 18, 1954

 

Geeze! Dey complain if you don’t plow, then complain if you do!

Okay, we know you’ve heard this story before, but isn’t it nice seeing all that snow during the summer sizzle?

“Sleepy Inning”

 Sleepy Inning from April 23, 1955

“Sleepy Inning”
from April 23, 1955

One more, because this is one Earl Mayan cover I can’t resist. It’s the top of the ninth, the score is tied, and there are two strikes on the board, for crying out loud.

What I love most is the “what can you do?” look on dad’s face as he hauls away the little fan who couldn’t last any longer.

Five Ways to Use Blueberries (and Why You Should)

July is National Blueberry Month, which makes it a great time for reminding ourselves of the many great ways they can be consumed.

The more you know about these powerful little berries, the more you will want them to become a bigger part of your family’s life.

“Blueberries have been loved in this country since the beginning, really,” explains Chef Scott Jenkins, the executive chef at Arlington, Virginia-based Extra Virgin restaurant. “They are delicious, versatile and healthy, so what’s not to love about a blueberry?”

According to the North American Blueberry Council, blueberries are a native American species. We produce roughly 90 percent of the world’s blueberries, making this country the leader in blueberry production. While blueberries are grown in over 30 states, with the harvest running from mid-April through October, the harvest peak is July.

Blueberries, according to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, are one of the fruits with the highest amount of antioxidants, which are important in helping to fight aging, cancer, and heart disease. They are also high in dietary fiber, as well as Vitamins A and C. Although they ripen in warmer months, they can easily be frozen and used throughout the year. For the best results, freeze them unwashed, in a single layer, in freezer bags. When you are ready to use them, take out just what you need and wash them.

Here are five ways that you can incorporate blueberries into your diet:

  1. Baked goods. Blueberries are great in pancakes, muffins and pies, whether for breakfast or dessert.
  2. Sauces. Create your own sauce for pancakes and waffles, or use them in a savory sauce for your meat dishes.
  3. Add-ons. Top a salad with blueberries or add them to grains, such as couscous or quinoa.
  4. Dried. Blueberries that have been dried make a great addition to trail mix.
  5. Soups and smoothies. Drinking blueberries is also a tasty way to get their benefits. Add them to soups, smoothies and fresh juices.

“Blueberries are sometimes overlooked, but they shouldn’t be,” adds Chef Jenkins. “They can add a lot to your dishes, and they offer a lot of health benefits. Using them is a win-win!”

Extra Virgin has an olive-oil-inspired menu and décor, and specializes in modern Italian cuisine. The restaurant, which is located in Arlington, Virginia, hosts a variety of live entertainment acts, featuring jazz music, and offers late-night dining. The restaurant options include such specialties as wood-fired pizzas, pastas, meat, poultry, and seafood, as well as vegetarian options. The restaurant offers lunch specials, as well as new weekly menu specialties.

Try Chef Jenkin’s Special Chilled Blueberry Soup

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Use a blender to puree the fresh ginger.
  2. Leave the ginger in the blender and add blueberries, honey, lemon juice, sugar, balsamic, and soda water.
  3. Blend together and chill.
  4. Serve garnished with a slice of lemon.

To learn more about Extra Virgin, visit their website at: extravirginva.com.

Cher Murphy, owner of Cher Murphy PR, covers a variety of interesting fields, including health and wellness, education, restaurants, travel, and entertainment.

Grow 2.0

You’re not going to replace the shovel, the rake, or the garden hose with smartphone software. On the other hand, what these new gardening apps offer is a massive amount of gardening info at your fingertips—er, glove-tips. Put them to work to improve your gardening know-how and to get consistently better results.

Landscaper’s Companion

With 15,000-plus pictures and information on more than 25,000 plants, this app is a virtual encyclopedia of gardening. Want the specifics on a plant’s sun exposure, water usage, growth rate, and bloom times? Comprehensive search tools make these facts easy to find. The app currently lacks information on tropicals and orchids, but we expect this to be remedied soon, as the developer periodically adds additional plants and images for free.
Price: $2.99 for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch and $4.99 for Android devices.

Grow Your Own

How do I know when my blueberries are going to be ripe? How can I keep aphids away from my roses? This handy app from the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) provides essential advice for part-time farmers. Grow Your Own steps you through the growing process month-by-month, recommending the best times to plant, prune, weed, mulch, and harvest, depending on the crop. And if you need to buy seeds and supplies, the app’s “Buy Now” button links directly to the RHS Online Plant Shop. Hey, the app is free, and they’ve got to earn a living somehow.
Price: Free for iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch.

Bugs in the Garden

Blast those infernal bugs! If you need help ID’ing the creepy crawlies devouring your daffodils, Bugs in the Garden can help. With more than 40 photos and illustrations of beetles, moths, aphids, caterpillars, grubs, and other common bugs, this app helps you spot troublesome and beneficial insects alike. It also includes tips on how to attract helpful bugs (like ladybugs) and send the bad ones packing.
Price: Free for iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch and Android devices.

FlowerPedia

If you’re a flower person, this app’s for you. There are three versions of FlowerPedia. The free “lite” version has 100 high-resolution flower photos and limited information on flowering plant families from around the globe. The iPhone edition is far more comprehensive: 2,800 flower images; a search tool for finding flowers by common name, Latin name, and country and state/province; and the ability to identify flowers by their anatomy. The $9.99 iPad version is the most beautiful of the trio, with larger, dazzling photos that turn your tablet into a coffee-table flower book.
Price: Free “lite” version; $4.99 for iPhone; $9.99 for iPad.

Moon Gardening

This visually appealing app is useful if you want our nearest celestial neighbor (i.e., the Moon) to guide your gardening practices. Lifeware Solutions’ Moon Gardening brings this ancient practice to modern times by offering time-tested growing tips, such as the best times to plant, prune, weed, and harvest crops based on the current Moon phase in your area. It’s a bit scant on details, though. For instance, Moon Gardening has too many links to outside sources on the topic, rather than providing the information itself. It’s fun to use, however, particularly if you’re curious about the Moon’s phases.
Price: $1.99 for iPad.

Garden Plan Pro

As gardening apps go, Growing Interactive’s Garden Plan Pro is a tad pricey, but its planting toolkit is much more comprehensive than most garden-variety guides. The app’s extensive design tools let you create a simple garden with single plants—or far more sophisticated projects with fruits and vegetables planted in multiple rows and/or squares. Garden Plan Pro has detailed growing information for more than 140 plants, and offers sage advice on how to rotate crops. The app takes a bit of practice to master, however, so be sure to watch the tutorial video before getting your hands dirty.
Price: $19.99 for iPad.

Build an Herb Spiral

From the shape of the nautilus shell to the arrangement of seeds in the heart of a sunflower, the spiral form is much used in nature. Gardeners can take advantage of this natural shape to create optimal growing conditions for herbs of all kinds.

Some Like It Hot

In an herb spiral, climate varies from arid Mediterranean at the top to moist and subtropical at its base. Heat-loving herbs, such as rosemary, thyme, oregano, marjoram, and sage, bask in the dry, sunny upper region that is 2 or

3 feet above ground. Bricks or stones placed along the spiral capture the noonday heat, storing it to keep herbs toasty at night. In a “trickle-down” effect, water drains down into the lower levels, leaving the arid-loving plants high and dry, while the middle and lower levels stay progressively more moist. The varied environments provide an ideal growing medium for tansies, chives, garlic, parsley, and chamomile in the middle level, and lemon balm, coriander, and moisture-loving mints at the base. Some gardeners place a small pond at the lowest level for watercress and other water plants.

An Upward Spiral

Start with a sunny spot in your yard or garden within an accessible range of your kitchen. Clear an area about 6 feet in diameter. (If grass is present, use a spade to remove any sod.)

Find the middle of the plot, then drive in a stake. Using a 2 ½-foot string with a loop placed around the stake, mark out the desired diameter of your circle with a pointed stick or screwdriver.

Using bricks or rock, lay out the spiral either from the center out or from the outside in. Position the bottom end of the spiral on the south side. You can “eyeball” the spiral, but for more accuracy, place a two-gallon plastic pail upside down in the center. Tie a 4-foot string around the base of the pail and secure with duct tape. Place a weight on top of the bucket, then measure out the desired radius. Hold a pointed stick or screwdriver at that point on the string and mark the ground as you go around the pail. Keep the line taut. You will end up at the pail with a nice spiral.

Build the spiral until it is 2 to 3 feet high at its top. Fill the middle with stones, sand, or brick pieces, leaving about 8 inches at the top to fill with soil. Mediterranean herbs that will thrive at the top level prefer poor soil. As you descend the spiral, add more compost for herbs planted in the middle and base.

Consider the growing habits of each herb when planting. Shade-tolerant plants will grow best on the east, west, and north sides of the spiral. Rosemary can become large, so place it at the top. Creeping plants such marjoram and thyme may be planted so they can cascade over the edge. Situate herbs from 1 to 2 feet apart. To fill gaps, plant parsley, kale, calendula, or nasturtium throughout your spiral.