Features (Good Living)

Article - Good Living; by Dr. Darlene Treese - 2/14/13

How to Fall in Love with Ms or Mr. Right

Good news: You can upgrade your love template

People seem friendlier. Colors are brighter. Food tastes better. The world is transformed with shimmering newness. What causes the rush of good feeling we call romantic love? Scientists have learned that lovers are literally high on drugs. Natural hormones and chemicals flood their bodies with a sense of well-being, as the brain releases neurotransmitters dopamine, norepinephrine and serotonin as well as endorphins and enkephalins. These produce a rosy...

Article - Good Living; by Sandra Lee Anderson - 2/14/13

How I Met Your Father

Our match was made, not born

“Count these records,” said Charlie after introductions. The year was 1969. The records were five-inch vinyl-printed cardboard squares recorded by our candidate in the Northern Virginia district where I lived with my parents. The square records would be dropped off at every house to deliver his campaign message. Hundreds were loose in each big three-foot-square box. I started counting. I was fairly nimble at age 26, but the older lady next to...

Article - Good Living; by - 2/7/13

Bay Weekly’s Annual Groundhog’s Guide to the Movies

13 Films to Inspire 2013

Punxsutawney Phil has prognosticated an early spring, but it doesn’t feel like spring in Chesapeake Country. Like many a cold-hating human, Bay Weekly’s movie-loving groundhog Chesapeake Chuck remains hiding in his burrow. To get our rueful rodent — not to mention the rest of us — in a better mood, Bay Weekly movie-lovers suggest waiting out winter with inspirational movies. Some inspire us to believe in a better world, others to join a movement and...

Article - Good Living; by Michelle Steel - 1/3/13

Christmas Tree Roundup

A second life for Christmas trees

After you take your Christmas tree down, recycle it for a second life. In your own backyard, recycle your tree by placing it near a bird feeder. The tree’s branches shelter smaller birds. Throw unsalted, unbuttered popcorn into the branches as free-form birdfood. Branches also provide a good place to hang pinecones smeared with peanut butter and rolled in birdseed. When it’s time to say goodbye to your tree, both Anne Arundel and Calvert...

Article - Good Living; by Margaret Tearman - 1/3/13

Taking the Leap

The greatest risk would be to pass up the chance to do something that will make you happy

You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. You can’t get there by bus, only by hard work and risk and by not quite knowing what you’re doing. What you’ll discover will be wonderful. What you’ll discover will be yourself. –Alan Alda Brian Wrabley stands at the edge of a cliff. Below the Gunnison river churns through a deep canyon. The river is almost impossible to reach, accessible only by a few billy goat trails:...

Article - Good Living; by - 12/27/12

Winter Fun in North Beach

With the Polar Bear Plunge New Year’s Day and a portable ice skating rink set up for fun the first weekend of the New Year, North Beach become the winter capital of Chesapeake Country. On New Year’s Day, weather-defying swimmers plunge into 2013 and earn a certificate for braving the elements at North Beach’s Polar Bear Swim. Go as far as you can whether knee-deep or all the way under. Wear a bathing suit or a Santa suit in (G-strings banned) and bring a...

Article - Good Living; by Michelle Steel - 12/20/12

Christmas Tree Roundup

The most beautiful tree of all, yours

Every tree has a story. Whether it’s the tree, the trimmings or the decorator, you can bet your family, friends and neighbors would be happy to tell you why they chose their own special tree. Live or artificial? Thirty-four percent of Maryland households buy a real Christmas tree each year, according to the University of Maryland College of Agriculture and Natural Resources. That’s my family tradition. I...

Article - Good Living; by Ashley Brotherton - 12/20/12

The Christmas Runaround

For multi-family kids, the holidays mean more of a good thing

Serene, peaceful, harmonious — three words that do not describe Christmas in the life of a child of divorced parents. It’s more like hectic, crazy, running like a headless chicken. I remember the day my parents sat me down on the couch to tell me the news. “Ashley, sweetie, Mommy and Daddy are going to live in two separate houses …” My six-year-old translation: Yes! Now I will have two houses like Elaine, the childhood friend whose vacation...

Article - Good Living; by Michelle Steel - 12/13/12

Christmas Tree Roundup

Barking up the Christmas Tree

As a field of expertise, Christmas trees — like medicine — has generalists and specialists. Generalists decorate their trees with the collections assembled over lifetimes by inheritance, early childhood artistry, gifts and outright purchase. Specialists prefer a theme. A pair of animal-themed trees won our hearts this Christmas. After all, animals have a time-honored place in the Christmas story. They gathered at the manger...

Article - Good Living; by Sandra Olivetti Martin - 12/6/12

Build Your Own Tradition

Lessons from Build-A-Bear to the magical Chesapeake Christmas tree

When its lights went on, the Christmas tree seemed suspended above the Bay like magic. The suspension was an illusion. The tree stood on the solid base of the Fairhaven community swim platform in Herring Bay. But the magic was — and remains — real. This season marks the 30th illumination of Ed Becke’s and Mark Manders’ Herring Bay Christmas tree, which began with a real tree to light up the last Christmas in the life of a neighbor, Tommy Hoyle. The...