Bats Looking for PR Boost Could Learn Lesson from Squirrel Community

A strange illness is devastating bat populations throughout the Northeast, and few people seem to care. Some wildlife experts believe the lack of research dollars going toward the problem is due to the fact that, well, people generally don’t like bats. In a recent Boston Globe article, Beth Daley writes: Despairing bat biologists want to […]

Answer key for mix-n-match movie taglines

And here are the answers from the previous post, where we invited readers to see how many famous movie taglines they could correctly identify.  1.     “They’re young … they’re in love … and they kill people.” (Bonnie and Clyde, 1967) 2.     “This is Benjamin. He’s a little worried about his future.” (The Graduate, 1967) 3.     […]

Bostonist.com Plugs Our Web Spots

We were really psyched to see a mention today in the Bostonist.com about our new Web spots for Down:2:Earth. See below for a snippet, or read the whole piece here. With MBTA hiking fares and the threat of rising gas prices, everyone could use a shorter commute to work. But living in your office? Down […]

The Hired Pens gets props from Green Cotton

Thanks to Shana Yansen who owns Jute & Jackfruit, an up-and-coming organic and sustainable clothing and accessory company for women, for giving us a plug in her latest blog entry about Down:2:Earth. Of particular interest to Eco-Fashion Gurus will be the two Eco-Fashion Shows to take place throughout the weekend: one at 4:30 on Saturday April 4, 2009 […]

What this Hired Pen does when she’s not writing

She has an art show … and writes about herself in the third person. The Somerville Journal wrote a nice article about the show so you can read all about it here or just come by True Grounds and see it for yourself.

Introducing The Hired Pens Productions

That’s right, The Hired Pens is now writing, shooting, editing and producing Web spots. Why? We wanted to add a little BOOM to our life of nouns and verbs. (Get it, boom?! If you were also making Web spots, you would.)  Read all about our new venture and watch our latest videos here. Or, if you […]

The Brilliant Seth MacFarlane

I typed “The Brilliant Seth MacFarlane” into my search engine and 11,000 entries came up. So how brilliant is the creator of Fox’s hit show Family Guy? Not yet 40 and still looking like he’s about 15, MacFarlane is the highest-paid television writer in Hollywood. But is this what makes him brilliant? No. It’s the […]

Feeling Over-Stimulated

This morning I drove by my neighborhood Mexican restaurant to see their marquee now reads: “Our Stimulus Package: Buy One Lunch, Get a Second for Half Off.” A minute later on the radio, some car company was advertising “our version of the stimulus package.” And when I arrived at my destination, I saw a store […]

Ads That Obsess Us: Amish Electric Fireplaces

As I recently skimmed Parade magazine (learning about “the world’s top 10 worst dictators”), the headline immediately caught my eye: “Amish mantle and miracle invention help home heat bills hit rock bottom.” Of the several dozen items I find fascinating, the Amish and miracle inventions are near the top of the list. Now, here was […]

My Bet for 2009 Word of the Year

Most word nuts know Merriam-Webster named “bailout” its 2008 Word of the Year (for obvious reasons). I’ve got a leading contender for this year’s honor: transparency.   When I was growing up, I associated transparency with ghosts — usually the friendly kind. After I gave up cartoons, I learned a more negative connotation for the word. […]