Your Screen is a Bad Dinner Date

Regular shared meals are important for parents and children who still live at home, but also for people who live on their own. Too many lonely cubicle meals prompted me to start having “family dinners” with my roommates and friends. It is difficult to plan so that my roommate and I can sit at our kitchen table and eat together, but it’s worthwhile even if only for 15 minutes.

Read More
Slurpees and Shotguns: How American Portrayals of Russian Characters in TV are Bad for Diplomacy

By capitalizing on real-world political fears and national stereotypes, directors can elicit feelings of dread with villains who are flatter than their own crew cuts. But besides simply producing bad art, the writers who rely on manufactured Russian hitmen for their thrills influence real-life relations between Russia and the West—and not for the better. 

Read More