Water!

by | Dec 16, 2010 | Standing In The Shadows

Sometimes, the music one hears isn’t music at all. For me, nearing noon on a Tuesday morning, it was the sound of all those construction vehicles I once knew by name (most especially during the tweenager’s toddlerhood, when he was quite obsessed with...
In the Bleak Midwinter

In the Bleak Midwinter

by | Dec 16, 2010 | Stage

Tony Simotes was just getting comfortable in the artistic director’s chair at Shakespeare & Company when he found himself flat on his back. An on-and-off company member since the troupe’s founding in 1978 (there’s a picture of him as a young...
StageStruck: Gizmo Out of Control

StageStruck: Gizmo Out of Control

by | Dec 16, 2010 | Stage

A whirligig is a spinning top, pinwheel or other whirling device, revolving madly in a repetitive cycle. The term has become an idiom for giddy motion: a merry-go-round, the social whirl or, as Shakespeare put it, “the whirligig of time [that] brings in his...

Patrick Picks Sullivan for Cabinet Post

by | Dec 16, 2010 | News

Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick has chosen former Westfield Mayor Richard Sullivan to replace departing Secretary of Energy and Environmental Affairs Ian Bowles, who recently announced his resignation from the post. The appointment gives Sullivan oversight of the...

A Bit of a Break

by | Dec 16, 2010 | News

While Springfield’s mayor and councilors battled last week over the city’s controversial trash fee [see “Round One to Tosado?”], they were in accord over at least one point: lowering the city’s tax rate. Just not in complete accord. This...