Lastest Stories by John Harrington

Summer may be over but with the price of gasoline falling and the holidays approaching,  Americans, to quote Willie Nelson, are going to be on the road again. To help make long road trips tolerable,...
A powerful snowstorm moved through the northeast this week, shutting down travel and commerce in several states. Places in higher elevations experienced several feet of snow, while other areas were...
At one time, at least in theory, the music industry offered the chance for anyone to be a star. That was the premise for the movie “That Thing You Do,” about a fictional American band in the...
In the last 25 years or so, the artisanal bean-to-bar movement has responded to the American public’s demand for richer and more vibrant-tasting chocolate, competing with chocolatiers who in some...
Movies and music go together like peanut butter and jelly. There is no genre that hasn’t had a memorable song associated with it. Sometimes there’s a symbiotic relationship and both are...
Capturing a capital city or a nation’s largest urban center is the ultimate trophy attained in war. Some cities have had to suffer that indignity more than once. (Here are 26 cities that have been...
The holiday season has arrived, and for parents that means trying to track down the hottest toys of the year. (On the other hand, if you’re the nostalgic type, these are 25 discontinued classic...
Chocolate has had an almost mystical hold on people since at least 1500 B.C. when the Olmec people of Mexico first used cacao beans. The scientific name of the cacao tree translates to “food of the...
Christmas is by far the most famous holiday of the winter season, followed closely by New Year’s Eve and Day. Retailers count down the shopping days to Christmas (though they are sometimes loath to...
As the colder temperatures chase us indoors, we’ll be hunkering down in family rooms and dens to watch movies provided by streaming services such as Hulu. In December, Hulu is offering a host of...
If you look at the movie offerings of Amazon Prime for December, you might think the streaming service is taking a few pages out of the Turner Classic Movies channel’s playbook. Among Amazon...
The perfect date film? That’s easy. Couples have chosen rom-coms as their preferred movie genre for decades. To determine the best romantic comedies to stream this week (and for the rest of...
For all the talk about the issues that divide Americans, there are still institutions that tie this vast nation together, and the United States Postal Service is one of them. Besides delivering mail,...
Arguably the most iconic fast food item of all time, McDonald’s has had the Big Mac  on its menu since 1968. During the commercials of the 1970s, company marketing recited the burger’s...
The pioneering streaming service Netflix, which received such a boost in subscriptions during the pandemic, is under siege. Competition has been ratcheted up from rival streaming services like...