Archive for ‘Opinion’

  • My Irish Up: 2013 — Mission accomplished!

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist It’s 2014 — you heard it here first — and time to review my performance on last year’s New Year’s resolutions. Please keep in mind that my resolutions, like some of yours, will have to be recycled again in 2014, since the word resolution can be broken into re(do again) […]

  • Uppermost House: The same only better

    By S. Peter Lewis BN Columnist The first things that most people want to save when their house catches fire (after the kids, the widescreen TV, and the hamster, of course) are photographs. I’ve always wondered about that. Perhaps, it’s because a lot of us still like to think of ourselves as who we used […]

  • It Dawned on Me: Putting to pen a resolution of joy

    By Dawn De Busk Staff Writer Much like springtime, a new year unfolds before the human mind full of such promise. It is the time and the season to make goals to better one’s own self, to line up objectives to improve one’s community, or perhaps to pledge to do something — or to refrain […]

  • My Irish Up: No sense reading this (secret message to Agent Y)

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist I am sure that you, being a “fellow American,” or perhaps a “gal American,” or a “gay American,” or a “straight American,” or a Native American, or an Afro-American, or even a foreign dignitary with several kilos of something good to sell — oh beans, let’s drop the apostrophe here […]

  • Small World: Desert sands blowing our way?

    By Henry Precht BN Columnist The essential starting point for an effective national defense is to know and understand your enemy(ies). There’s where we — the U.S.A. — are most vulnerable. We ignore, accidentally or reluctantly, those who are threatening to our security. In my — perhaps poorly informed — opinion, the largest danger to […]

  • Small World: Boxing Day blues

    By Henry Precht BN Columnist When you read these sentences it will be, if you live in Downton Abby or live by Wikipedia, “Boxing Day, the day following Christmas Day, when servants and tradesmen receive gifts from their bosses or clients, known as a “Christmas box.” It seems that the fete had its origins in […]

  • My Irish Up: The perfect tree didn’t live on a farm

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist Curse these modern, eternal Christmas trees, lurking around the attic through the warm months, chuckling over their immortality, only their tinsel rusting. A-u-t-h-e-n-t-i-c-i-t-y, people! In the Fifties, we didn’t waste oil manufacturing such artificial bagatelles, we wasted real trees! And at wasting trees, my father was the master, the woodsiest, […]

  • On the Planning Front

    By Anne Krieg, AICP Bridgton Director of Planning, Economic & Community Development Hello to all and best wishes! As I sit here thinking about the work over the last month and for next month, I realize I have not started my personal Christmas shopping — in usual planning style, I will blitz it out this […]

  • Uppermost House: The apple pie butterfly effect

    By S. Peter Lewis BN Columnist I have only a few regrets from fifth grade. One is sitting too close to Lisa Evans who, of course, threw up on me in the cafeteria during lunch. To this day, whenever I think about this tragedy I have to pinch my nose. Another is more of a […]

  • Small World: Mandela and Company

    By Henry Precht BN Columnist The greatness of Nelson Mandela’s achievements has been fully celebrated in the memorial events since his death. One hundred or so heads of state went to his funeral; millions of words have been written about his life. One aspect, however, has been neglected, at least as far as I know: […]