A Quality of Mercy

There was an excellent article in yesterday’s nytimes about Philadelphia youths who were given life sentences under cruel and aggressively punitive DA Lynne Abraham, and who have now had their sentences reduced under the more enlightened leadership of Larry Krasner. We’re talking about people who were clearly guilty of their crimes, not wrongly convicted, so … Continue reading A Quality of Mercy

Barbara Gittings Way

    On my walk back from Trader Joe’s yesterday I went past Barbara Gittings Way at 13th and Locust where they have newly laid out rainbow crosswalks. The city has painted rainbows on the crosswalks several times previously, but they’ve always faded quickly, so this time they used a different technique using thermoplastic that’s … Continue reading Barbara Gittings Way

The Primary

Today is the day of the Primary Election here in Philadelphia and it couldn’t have come a moment too soon. As I’ve previously mentioned, I voted for Helen Gym for mayor and I certainly hope she wins. But now that the Election Day is here, I should finally stop getting those infuriating text messages from … Continue reading The Primary

It’s Gym Time

I just dropped my ballot in the mail for Philadelphia’s primary election for mayor. Given that the city is overwhelmingly Democratic, the winner of the primary election for the Democratic slot for mayor is a certainty to win the general election. There are more candidates on the ballot than I can count on the fingers … Continue reading It’s Gym Time

Joey

I went to Trader Joe’s again yesterday morning right at 9:00AM when they opened. I was anticipating a line, and sure enough, there was one, stretching around the corner into the alley. It turned out that they had already opened and this was the overflow line, waiting to get in after some others came out. … Continue reading Joey

Mark Reed

Mark Reed was apparently quite a character.He was my great uncle on my mother’s side, my grandmother Tillie (Reed) Zellers’ brother. View fullsize Philadelphia City Hall And here’s the thing. I don’t know if I remember him or not, as he died when I was not quite three years old. They used to tell me … Continue reading Mark Reed