The Rogovoy Report 4.8.24

From around the corner to around the globe...

Apr 07, 2024

I’m Retired, and I Still Won’t Let Myself Read in the Daytime. Why Not?

(WaPo) - Why is the act of reading in the daytime considered so disruptive to life’s predictable, often unnecessary routines? It’s almost as though people would rather write than read. Millions of books, including self-published titles, are issued every year. But, according to an Economist/YouGov poll, 46 percent of Americans did not read a book last year. There are any number of explanations for this statistic, but one in particular stands out based on my experience. Although I am retired, I find it hard to allow myself an afternoon with a book or a long magazine article. Just the thought of settling onto the sofa in daylight hours, especially on weekdays, smacks of laziness and stirs up guilt. If I must sit at all, it should be at a desk or a countertop to do something “useful” — answer an email, write a grocery list, look up a recipe, what have you. Even procrastination is more socially acceptable than reading, as long as you eventually complete the day’s to-do list.

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Crying myself to sleep on the biggest cruise ship ever by Gary Shteyngart (The Atlantic)

The age of cultural stagnation (TNR)

So you think you’ve been gaslit (New Yorker)

FASCIST TAKEOVER WATCH:

Will there be blood? (New Statesman)

The government isn’t ready for the violence Trump might unleash (The Atlantic)

If this Trump warning on 2024 doesn’t scare you, you’re sleepwalking (TNR)

BSO principal flute player Elizabeth Rowe is making an unusual career move by leaving the orchestra after 20 years to pursue a full-time career as a leadership coach (photo Suzanne Kreiter/Boston Globe)

Pathbreaking BSO Flutist Elizabeth Rowe Landed the Dream Job of a Lifetime at 29. At 49, She’s Walking Away

(Boston Globe) - For most of her career, Elizabeth Rowe hadn’t had a clear sense of what life outside the orchestra world might be like, because she had never needed one. She clinched the principal flute chair with the BSO in 2004 at age 29, less than a decade after her graduation from the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music. In August, after Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 ends the summer at Tanglewood, Rowe, 49, will take her final bow with the orchestra, which will probably also be her final bow as a professional flutist. Then, she’ll devote her days to her newly chosen career: leadership coaching. Given the flutist’s profile and tenured position with the BSO, she knows her decision to leave the music world now is an unorthodox move. Among her colleagues, there’s “understandably some wondering” about what her new career entails and why she’s leaving, she said. In 2018, Rowe made headlines when she sued the BSO under the Massachusetts Equal Pay Law, which is intended to ensure equal pay for “comparable work” between employees of different genders. The suit, which was filed in Suffolk County Superior Court one day after the law went into effect, claimed Rowe’s work was comparable to that of principal oboe John Ferrillo, but that she was being paid less. She settled the case in early 2019. Rowe declined to comment as to whether the lawsuit and its aftermath specifically influenced her decision to leave the orchestra.

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NEWS FROM THE BERKSHIRES

‘A Fantastic Event’ But a Risk for Eye Damage: Western Mass. Preps for Partial Solar Eclipse Monday

(NEPM) - As the Northeast prepares for a total eclipse of the sun on Monday, many are billing it as a must-see, once-in-a-generation event. Hundreds of thousands are expected to travel to places in Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine that are in the eclipse’s “path of totality,” where the moon will block the sun entirely for around three minutes. But for those sticking around western Massachusetts for the eclipse, there are still plenty of opportunities to see the moon block as much as 95% of the sun. Experts are urging eclipse viewers to use eye protection before looking up at the sun, with some school districts even releasing students earlier in the day and canceling after-school activities as a precautionary measure.

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Clear skies and seasonable temperatures are expected for Eclipse Day in the Berkshires. How long will it last? (Berkshire Eagle)

Anxiety, bedtime and mating: How animals may react to the eclipse (NYT)

Markey, Warren join voices against GE relying on trucking for removal of toxic materials from the Housatonic (WAMC)

Three-way ‘bidding war’ for Ryan Salame’s Olde Heritage Tavern in Lenox (B Eagle)

A public meeting on Monday will allow residents of Pittsfield’s West Side neighborhood to weigh in on upcoming zoning changes (WAMC)

Pittsfield OKs car wash at former Dakota Steakhouse, adding to new ‘Automobile Row,’ potential traffic woes (iBerkshires)

North Adams’ move to consolidate elementary schools will mean almost 30 layoffs (WAMC)

Williams College admits 7.5 percent of record-high 15,411 applicants, rejects over 10,000, setting new record for selectivity (Williams Record)

New Jersey earthquake vibrates through region (iBerkshires)

Last 4 months were the wettest on record for parts of New England (NEPM)

Adams officials review Greylock Glen budget (iBerkshires)

Plaine’s Bike Ski and Snowboard in Pittsfield is looking for a new home (B Eagle)

With GE’s split, the last chapter of the Jack Welch era is over (Axios)

NEWS FROM THE HUDSON VALLEY

Together with his cousin Anthony Montano Ed Montano Jr. co-owns Montano's Shoe Store in Saugerties, the oldest shoe store in the US continuously run by the same family (photo David McIntyre)

Navigating Succession in Family Businesses: Montano’s Shoe Store

(Chronogram) SAUGERTIES, N.Y. - As the oldest shoe store in the US continuously run by the same family, Montano’s in Saugerties is a Hudson Valley example of what it takes to cultivate a family succession plan that sticks. Founded in 1906 by Louis Montano, Sr., a shoemaker who emigrated from Italy, Montano’s has occupied the same storefront on Partition Street for 118 years. “Obviously family businesses can be good and bad, and some family businesses don’t go well,” says co-owner Ed Montano, Jr. “We have a family that gets along and works well together, and it’s probably been the saving grace for our longevity in business.”

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Columbia County gets ready for solar eclipse (HV360)

High clouds might offer blurry view of eclipse Monday (ATU)

Columbia County residents raise enough to reopen their clinic in Copake (ATU)

The Hudson Valley's childcare crisis (TRN)

These independent bookstores in the Hudson Valley are delightful (HVMag)

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