Witticisms, Criticisms, From the Best Writers In Lamorinda - You!

On our story "," there were 13 comments....

"How about combining Phairs with Country Club Plaza and replacing both with retail below residential. You can have your Copenhagen without going to Burlingame. Phairs is 14,000 square feet, a little large for a bakery. A better location for a bakery is Coldwell Banker's space next to Casa Orinda. Capture the morning traffic, easy store front parking and close by the time Casa opens for business. Take some pressure off Peet's. Maybe use the Casa lot during the day for customers parking." - Spencer

"Moragans need more of a choice for bakery items. Safeway and 7-11 are okay in a jam if your craving a donught but come on!" - Dean Tanti

"Please don't offer me my coffee in a soup bowl. The rate of evaporative cooling is ludicrous.*

* Please don't tell me I should approve of this custom because it is European. Thermodynamics works just as well over there." - Our Lafayette Curmudgeon

"There's nothing better than a big bowl of latte goodness in my book. This ex-Seattleitte shudders whenever someone hands him a tall clear glass...that's for beer, not coffee." - Michael

"I'm a longtime fan of "Specialty's" in SF, especially of their raisin-free, pumpkin walnut muffins, and almond scones. While I'd love to find those locally, I would push harder for a purveyor of a heartier, tastier quality whole wheat (sliced) bread. I have tried many loaves from Diablo Foods, Whole Foods, but find them bland and unworthy of the $4+ price tag. Ugh." - Eileen McPeake

On our Fiona Artiaga's story "," there were 6 comments - 

"There is something fishy about the claimed magnitude of the reductions in state funding. In the prior Patch item, it was reported that Moraga had a $2580/kid cut in state aid since 2007-08. But, according to public disclosures, Moraga only got ~$3000/kid from the state in 2007-08. Was total state aid really cut by >85%? I know the school funding system is complicated, but something doesn't add up." - Chris Nicholson

"Very informative article. The 2004 parcel tax was a big one, did not have a sunset, and was in a general election year. The 2011 parcel tax will be smaller, should have a sunset, and will be in an non-general election year, which should help its odds.
I think these consultants have done a good job at marketing themselves and their formula, but the whole thing, especially in light of the well-known facts about donations and parcel tax votes in this school district and neighboring districts, seems like we're paying $30K to someone who has promised to bring back the sun tomorrow morning. There hasn't been a poll since 1998, but there have been parcel tax (elementary and high school) votes, and years of increasing contributions to PTA and MEF. Prediction: 55 to 60 percent of those surveyed will say they favor a parcel tax of $150 to $175 if that is what it takes to preserve small class sizes, restore or preserve music, aides, technology programs, and the funds are monitored by a citizen's committee, with a senior's exemption." - T. Rodriguez

On Lance Howland's piece, "," there were 9 comments...

"I live in Orinda and one morning about a month ago I heard some rustling in the leaves on our hillside and suddenly a small coyote came running up the hill. As he went by I heard more rustling and up that same hillside here came a doe chasing him. Must have come just a little close to her fawn and she was protecting her young. Last week I heard a murder of crows making a lot of noise and stepped outside just in time to see a small coyote running up the driveway. I volunteer at the Lindsay Museum and love to see these kinds of animals in my yard. Susan is right, the coyote is more interested in avoiding contact with humans." - Jim Lautz

"I believe the increase in sightings is due to the development of Wilder. A couple months after excavating began, we started seeing an endless flow of coyotes. Our neighborhood has lost over 10 domestic cats and we no longer have a feral cat population. We do, however, have a substantial gopher, mole and vole population now. We have a 17 year old lab that doesn't go more than 20 feet from our front door and barks when it smells deer or coyotes in the yard. (She can't see them anymore.) On two occasions a coyote has come after her and both times I brought our dog inside in the nick of time. I have two young children that love to play outside, but I live in constant fear of the coyotes. I confronted an Orinda policeman and was told legally, they can be shot by homeowners if "protecting your property." - Victoria

On our Mom Talk column "," there were 7 comments -

"Interesting. There are many things to agree with here - great learning does happen in groups and divergent thinking is lacking in our schools systems. The batch system doesn't work, children get shuttled through and eventually left behind. He suggests college isn't always the answer to success however both the divergent thinking and group settings can be found in college settings. I'm a huge advocate of teaching out of the box as I imagine "you" all are. But when do you, can you start the socratic way of teaching - to early and you may miss the building blocks and foundation that leads you from step one to step two, to late and you've lost many creative thinkers.

"Listening to this knowing we are in one of the most sophisticated school districts, one can only imagine how much worse it is in the inner cities and areas where both kids and parents are less educated then here in sunny Lamorinda. We live in the most creative and innovative part of the country yet there is still a very elite group who are actually succeeding in the truly innovative thinking department - think Mark Zukerberg, Steve Jobs ...

While long on explanation of our systems problems, perhaps Ken can do another video with suggested solutions - he seems to understand the problems as we all do, it's the solutions that trip everything up and leave people to do nothing because they can't see a better way." - Elizabeth Lampert

"Great point about the essay question on the SAT. The kids have the most trouble with this section of the test. The College Board wants to see (other than correct grammar and structure) that the kids can provide insight and analysis of the question and the supporting evidence. The kids get so frustrated because they want to get the CORRECT answer to a question that is open-ended and does not have a right or wrong answer." - Runner Mom

"Parents, not ADHD, are usually the problem. Lives are so busy & hectic that parents aren't teaching their children behavioral skills. Then, when the parents (or schools) identify a problem, everyone assumes the child has ADHD.

For example, few parents play board games with their kids. My twins are 4 & we play various board games every day. These games range from the well-known classics such as Candy Land to more specialty games such as Build a Village. Playing board games teaches kids to focus, pay attention, take turns, etc. Some games, such as Build a Village, can be constructed in a way that children work together (collaboration). Even if we're doing mundane chores around the house, we'll incorporate a game of Simon Says - which teaches kids to listen & pay attention. Focusing, paying attention, working together cooperatively, & listening are not skills that come naturally to most children. They must be developed & practiced.

"While there were problems with the study (sample size being one of several), I'm a fan of the marshmallow experiment. The kids who were successful in waiting the 15 minutes for the second marshmallow were the ones who could use their imagination to distract themselves. There were very few items in the room so the kids really had to rely on their imagination. When my kids are getting antsy from waiting in line, we usually play I-spy or something similar in an effort to teach them distraction techniques." - Kenny Tuckerman

On our Letter to the Editor, "," there were 47 comments...

"I'm not sure that larger districts equal more savings - look at some of the largest school districts in the country and you find mismanagement writ large. The larger the district, the more layers of administration are tacked on, and the spending on all kinds of non-classroom related stuff starts to increase as accountability to parents decreases. Just today I read about a large Illinois district that has parents up in arms due to a staff development trip - to Las Vegas - that occurred while services to special ed students were getting cut. The local school districts here are generally very tightly run - the biggest expense is teacher costs which is what you'd expect from a well-run district." - Julie Carlson

By far the most heated commentary of the week came in on a surprising little "non-story" we did about anti-government petitioners, "" which logged a whopping 30 comments...

"This little rag has no shame in trying to fan flames of ignorance. The article says nothing about the petitioners who set up a stand. So you essentially know nothing and yet have to post a pic of a patriot who attended a politcal rally in some underhanded way to get some bloggers speculating and kvetching. Weak journalism. Get of your laptop in the coffee house and earn your AOL money and go see them and do an article with facts." - CJ

"Two guys. Folding table. Hitler mustache on the President's picture and talk of impeachment. I was surprised they got as much response as they did, most people brushed past them, and then I saw CJ's post!! Moraga is a pretty conservative place when you get down to it." - Danielle

"Funny. Despite my barbs, in defense of JD and Patch, this item was labeled an "Alert" (looks like it was later categorized "Police & Fire" for archiving). It was also clear that it was a breaking item with a lot of unknown details. In that context in particular, I think it is far better for Patch to get the info/story out ASAP rather than scrub down for political correctness and/or loose grammar that allows for nonsensical parsing. If we hold the standards for original local reporting too high, Patch will become a blog-bot with pass-through syndicated content and one local feature per week. I prefer the current mode of "local dog struck by car" and "weirdos in front of Post Office"--- obviously along with the more thoughtful reporting also found here (e.g., the original reporting around the police chase / crash). - Chris Nicholson