The wasps are back. All winter long, they’d been on the back of my mind, creeping and crawling like bad thoughts across my subconscious. After what happened last summer, I thought they might stay away. Last summer, it was a war — me with my cans of Black Flag, they with their stingers and military-grade […]
Mark LaFlamme
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Talk of the town: Get your stuff and things!
Get dirty Nordstrom is selling a $425 pair of jeans that look like they are covered in mud. That’s weird enough, but what’s even weirder is that people are buying these “Barracuda Straight Leg Jeans” with their strategically placed designer dirt. Perhaps on the next rack over, one can buy a T-shirt with pre-stained armpits. […]
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Street Talk: Down the street from rock bottom
It’s odd how no one ever talks about the Fellowship House. Back in the day, it occupied a low brick building near the corner of Blake and Ash streets in Lewiston. The building is still there. The Fellowship House is not. It was an alcohol detoxification facility, and only God knows how many lives were […]
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Talk of the town: How COULD you!
Blink dance Yes! Perhaps in response to my nightly prayers and/or profane utterances, the city has decided to put the traffic light at Bates and Pine streets in Lewiston on blink mode. The way it should be. Blink dance canceled And because I celebrated so soon and so animatedly, the city has now turned the […]
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Street Talk: A most unbalanced budget
Someday, at a town hall near you, my head is going to pop clean off my neck. It will make a pleasing sound, I reckon, like a cork departing a bottle of cheap champagne. Days later, after the autopsy and a respectable period of mourning and restrained amusement, the death certificate will contain just two […]
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Talk of the town: There is no trail
Chuck’s Garage Here’s an item that was submitted to the paper. Not sure if this was supposed to be funny or not, but after a thorough examination of said item, I have made my ruling. Funny! Part of the directions to the April meeting of the Upper Kennebec Valley Chapter of the Maine Woodlands Association, […]
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Street Talk: Thou shalt not exercise unauthorized control
I think it’s only fair to warn you: I am in possession of a shod foot and I’m not afraid to use it. Forgive my surliness. I’ve been reading through the latest list of criminal indictments, where court folks take exciting local crimes and twist them into confusing, dull and overly long paragraphs of legalese. […]
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Talk of the town: I could’ve been somebody
Story of my life Saw a bumper sticker on a car in Lewiston the other day that made me snort. It said: “I was an honor roll student. I don’t know what happened.” I’d get one myself, but who am I kidding? As far as I know, to get on the honor roll, one has […]
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Street Talk: The weird world of postal delivery
I apologized to the mailman as vehemently as possible, but after a while, it just started to feel weird. I was, after all, standing on the stoop in my underwear, a cigarette in one hand, an ice scraper in the other. I had locked myself out of my apartment, you see, and had been trying […]
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Talk of the town: You’re going out in THAT?
Duck, duck goose Searching some ne’er-do-well’s criminal history the other day, I came across a prior conviction for the charge of “unlawful use of a migratory game bird.” I have no idea what that charge entails, but can you imagine the scene when the accused is leaning against a wall in the prison yard, cigarette […]