The beast is back and this time he’s hungry — so hungry, in fact, that he tried to eat a house. Forgive the drama. You know how I get when there’s a beast afoot. Let me calm myself and start from the beginning. The woman’s name is Kit and she lives in a nice house […]
Mark LaFlamme
Talk of the Town: Please silence your children for the duration of this column
Marcy’s Diner People have been asking me all week where I stand on this breakfast brouhaha. I thought I was on the side of the restaurant owner. Then I read this lady’s screeching Facebook post in which she speaks of a 2-year-old like a dog in need of a kick. This is the kind of […]
Street Talk: Grill a burger, play Whiffle ball, start a revolution
In a quiet neighborhood off Farwell Street in Lewiston, I witnessed the beginnings of revolution. It wasn’t a violent uprising with guns and bombs, screaming and bleeding — it was the soft kind. The good kind. They say in an age when self-sufficiency is discouraged, planting a single seed in your backyard is an act […]
Talk of the Town: Get out of pork belly futures if you know what’s good for you
NYSE suspends trading Sometimes I like to walk around with my phone pressed to my ear and pretend that I’m engaged in some high pressure stock trading. “Get me out of pork rinds at once, Barney! I can’t take that kind of hit! And sell everything I’ve got in Spam futures, I don’t like the […]
Street Talk: How to give up smoking even if you’re stupid
Contained within the Sun Journal photo archives are roughly 6,000 photos of yours truly taken over the course of the past 20 years. Here’s me brooding at a crime scene. Here I am getting my face painted (I was a kitten) at the Balloon Festival. Here’s me leaning against a post, sitting at my desk […]
Talk of the town: Stepping on spent sparklers just for fun . . . again?
I hate waiting This is the message scrolled on the light signal box at Sabattus and Main streets in Lewiston, where the traffic lights can keep a dude captive for long minutes. This guy apparently had the time to jump out of his car, scribble his message and probably grab a cup of coffee at […]
Street Talk: Inconsiderate E.T.s never show up on time
One recent evening, on the woody outskirts of Lewiston, I drove past a group of people who had their eyes upturned to the darkened skies. I recognized the scene at once. The fingers pointed at the heavens; the low-hanging jaws, the wide eyes … What we had here was a UFO sighting in progress. I […]
Talk of the town: Cats and clowns and the muscle-bound
Give me 10 What woman will we see on the 10 dollar bill? The debate is on. Frankly, I never saw the honor in having one’s face on U.S. currency. I mean, think about what we do with our cash. We fold it up, stick it in our wallets and then sit on it all […]
Street Talk: Waving the Confederate flag in surrender
George Orwell said: “He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past.” Well, to be fair, Orwell himself didn’t say it. His beleaguered character, Winston Smith, thought it. He thought it in relation to the government willfully erasing the facts of the past and replacing them with convenient […]
Street Talk: Just another night in the city jungle
The Pool Hall Hustler comes around a couple times a week, always looking for a quick bite, always slick and sly as he passes through. Although I’ve never personally heard his shtick, it is easily inferred through his mannerisms. “Hey, hey. How ya doing? Is anybody going to eat that? Nah, nah. Nobody wants that […]