Mark Knows It All

Every now and then it is fun to dust off an old chestnut, and they don’t come any older and dustier than Lerner and Lowe’s Broadway tour de force, My Fair Lady . Pittsburgh was the opening salvo of a national tour celebrating the 50th anniversary of this melody filled classic, which premiered on Broadway on March 15, 1956. (Hard to believe, isn’t it?) This is a British production based on a British 2001 revival. It is “smashing”. When I was 12, My Fair Lady was one of the first albums I purchased when stereophonic sound hit my household. My grandmother had several 78 rpm records on which parts of the score appeared on what were early Broadway compilations. The problem is that over the years I have never seen a serious production of the musical. Mostly it went from barely mediocre community theater to perfectly awful high school productions. The music was sung ad nauseum by every choral group I ever belonged to, and we sang it badly. I reached the point where I wanted to shoot that old...

Reprinted without permission from the Cleveland Plain Dealer Merge Cleveland State and U of Akron? That's the buzz Posted by Janet Okoben September 20, 2007 23:42PM Categories: Education , Impact An idea to shake up the state's college system could combine Cleveland State University and the University of Akron and bring a medical school to downtown Cleveland. Some of the talk involves moving the Northeastern Ohio Universities Colleges of Medicine and Pharmacy, known as NEOUCOM, from Portage County or expanding its Rootstown-based campus. • Compare the three schools. Combining CSU and UA would eliminate overlapping programs and administrative jobs, and the two schools would then function under a single leader. The two people with the ability to make these ideas happen, Gov. Ted Strickland and his higher-education chancellor, Eric Fingerhut, would not comment Thursday on what others familiar with the discussions say has a real chance of happening. Fingerhut is in the midst of de...

This is my Letter to the Editor in response to an editorial appearing in the Youngstown Vindicator in which Betram de Souza, Vindicator columnist, says Youngstown State University should become a satellite school of Ohio State. My apologies for those not from this area. Dear Editor: I am absolutely flabbergasted at Mr. de Souza’s editorial relating to Youngstown State University. First of all, this is the second news article I have seen where those attending the OSU/YSU football game were portrayed as a bunch of rubes seeing the big stadium and all the people for the first time. How insulting. My son is a senior in Youngstown State’s outstanding business school, which we chose over several other so called name schools after side by side comparisons in quality and accreditation. My wife and I are both Ohio State graduates. But I attended YSU for 2 years in addition to numerous hours of post graduate work. My wife got her Masters from YSU. I can tell you that the course work and quality ...

A friend of mine excitedly told me over lunch that he and his wife decided to do something special this past weekend. He got some wood and lit a small fire in the backyard. Then they sat and toasted marshmallows. I thought about for awhile, and realized that I haven’t toasted a marshmallow in 30 years, if not longer. S’mores are an even more distant memory. You just don’t do that with gas grills. What does one consider special today? When I was small, a second car was special. Ours was an old 1956 Plymouth with no carpet or radio. It had heat, and the heat was considered to be special. Of course, we had a one car garage, and could still walk to the bus line. In 1956, eating out was special. Once each month we would go to the Sunday buffet at the Pick Ohio Hotel in downtown Youngstown, or maybe to the Mural Room. From time to time we would go to Howard Johnson’s or to Shott’s on Market Street. But mostly we ate in. When fast food came down the pike, going to the walk up McDonald’s or ...

I have been writing this weekly blog for more than 2 years. I have tried to present thoughtful commentary on subjects that are important to me, take complicated issues and simplify them, and balance those with levity and hopefully funny stories about daily life in modern America. I have never, however, been so angry that words fail me. Pictured is the ad that appeared today in the New York Times. It is disgusting, and beyond my comprehension that anyone would want to run such an ad in these troubled times, or that the New York Times would accept it in the first place. It is sponsored by Moveon.org. That is the George Soros group. It demonstrates the total hate of America's left wing. Our troops are dying on the battlefield right now. What are these people thinking? This crosses the line when serious debate and thoughtful discussion are needed. Shame on Moveon.org, and shame on The New York Times.

September is here, and the catalogs be a’comin’. With only 14 shopping weeks left until Christmas, and Christmas in July on Home Shopping being over for more than a month, I started to shake when the Williams-Sonoma catalogue arrived in the mail today. By the way, did anyone see the Christmas Tree in a Pizza Box on Home Shopping? That Colleen Lopez babe whipped that sucker out of the pizza box by the twinkling star and I almost wet my pants. Pre-lit and everything. I digress.. Williams-Sonoma is a high end kitchen store found in most shopping areas outside of Mahoning County (we have Zabels). They have all sorts of wondrous contraptions to make your kitchen and cooking experience worth experiencing…not that anyone does much cooking these days. But the stuff really looks good on your granite countertop next to your Subzero Freezer and Viking Range. Or in my case, next to the white formica and Kenmore appliances. Goes with my vinyl floor. So this week I thought I would offer to you what ...

Today is Labor Day, and I am happy to say that some world organization is reporting what we already know. American workers are the most productive in the world. We work more hours here than in any other country. For each hour worked, we produce $35.00 worth of goods. That is second only to Norway, which produces $37.00 worth of goods for each hour worked. Hoorah for us. Now I know why we are so tired. By any standard, the American economy is humming along at a clip that my 1970’s economics teacher would have said was impossible. Our unemployment rate is 4.6%., both before and after the 9/11 recession, showing that this is the new norm. When I studied economics, I was told anything under 5% was considered full employment, and full employment was unachievable. So much for economic theory. To add to the mix, the rich may be getting richer, but so is everybody else. It has been fun watching the media try to grapple with the economy. First they said the figures were wrong. Then they said th...