Dec 21, 2013 | Community |
It was a rare slip when Sujay Kawale lost his grip while climbing a difficult route at Planet Rock in October. Though his belayer caught him safely, many other climbers at the west-side gym were watching–and Mike Wilkinson...
Read MoreDec 20, 2013 | Community |
There’s a “meteoric rise in the numbers of turkeys we’ve been finding lately,” says Jacco Gelderloos, who compiles local data for the Audubon Christmas Bird Count.The count has been going on for 114...
Read MoreDec 17, 2013 | Community |
Clarity comes in winter. The trees shed their leaves, the breeze brushes the ground bare, and a quieter kind of beauty is painted in almost monochromatic earthy tones.This clarity is particularly evident along the Huron River....
Read MoreI was working in our office studio above the garage one evening when my husband, Miles, came back early from a bike trip to Kroger.”How was your ride?” I asked, without looking up. He didn’t reply....
Read MoreDec 11, 2013 | Community |
On a brisk October day, more than 100 volunteers helped Waterloo Recreation Area staffers fill three enormous dumpsters with debris, old bunk beds, damaged wood, and overgrown vegetation and removed stacks of old...
Read MoreDec 11, 2013 | Community |
“If you ever buy a box of granola bars and you don’t like the flavor, bring them by,” says Jennifer Martin, social worker and director of the Education Project for Homeless Youth. On shelves around the...
Read MoreDec 5, 2013 | Community |
A year ago, who’d have guessed that Ann Arbor might become a basketball town?Last fall, no one anticipated Brady Hoke’s football team would look so woeful this season. And certainly no one predicted Michigan...
Read MoreDec 4, 2013 | Community |
“These two barns are on Ellsworth, just east of Stone School,” says Judi Taylor. Her husband works nearby and “recognized them instantly.” “The driveway to the city garage runs behind” them,...
Read MoreNov 24, 2013 | Community |
“Thanksgiving isn’t all that old a holiday,” says Beth Israel rabbi Robert Dobrusin. And because of Thanksgiving’s comparative youth–Abraham Lincoln declared it a national holiday in...
Read MoreNov 23, 2013 | Community |
Thousands of low-income kids got a break last month when a state-funded dental insurance program expanded into Washtenaw County. Administered by Delta Dental, the program pays private dentists to provide cleanings and treatment....
Read MoreNov 22, 2013 | Community |
“This is Ann Arbor,” says Marguerite Grabarek. “Gotta keep the dog on a leash.”With dry humor, Grabarek is explaining why a rope connects two bushes in her front yard on Virnankay Circle–one...
Read MoreNov 21, 2013 | Community |
Author John U. Bacon had 2,014 Facebook friends in mid-October–and some 600 “pending requests,” most of them from people he doesn’t know. Suspecting that “some just want to get access to the...
Read MoreWhen I worked at the Chelsea Standard in the 1980s, I often covered events at Chelsea High School. It was not a single building, but a campus of one-story structures that students scurried between in all types of weather. I was...
Read MoreNov 12, 2013 | Community |
“Boots was the first pet at the Majestic Pathway Garden,” Wanda Hagan says. “I wanted him near me.”Since opening in 1928, Ann Arbor’s forty-acre Arborcrest Memorial Park on Glazier Way has been...
Read MoreNov 11, 2013 | Community |
After World War II, many Washtenaw County veterans returned home with a strong craving for adventure. In awe of the pilots they watched help win the war, a good number were attracted to daring pursuits like flying. Lucky for the...
Read MoreNov 6, 2013 | Community |
“Apples are pretty tough,” says Dale Lesser, who’s grown them commercially for more than forty years at Lesser Farms in Dexter Township. “It’s amazing that you can have an apple tree with...
Read MoreNov 6, 2013 | Community |
In May, Michigan’s women’s basketball coach Kim Barnes Arico flew to a Big Ten coaches’ meeting in Chicago at the last minute. Afterward, the second-year Wolverine coach showed her practicality by asking MSU...
Read MoreNov 5, 2013 | Community |
Q: We exit our neighborhood at Pittsfield Boulevard and Washtenaw Avenue. For as long as I can remember, cars stopped at that light (going west toward downtown Ann Arbor) are turning left from Washtenaw onto Pittsfield, then...
Read More