“30 Rock” achieves the impossible: the perfect series finale

When it comes to last acts, no medium is judged by so high a bar as television. The last chapter of a novel isn’t perfect? You can still enjoy the majority of the book. The closing minutes of a film don’t perfectly tie up each plot strand of the previous two hours? You can still speak of the film glowingly. But if a television show’s series finale delivers anything less than perfection, there will be blood.

Walking into the closed-down Ioka Theater is eerie, but maybe not in the way you may think. First, and most importantly, it’s cold, damn cold, too cold to get spooked.

Winter will add some punch to your workout, but it shouldn’t slow you down.

For those days when you just can’t bring yourself to face the elements, there are alternatives to running. Gould suggests snowshoeing. “Generally, it’s a little less impact and a lot of fun.” Snowshoes are available to rent from the University of New Hampshire recreation department, located in the Whittemore Center. There are plenty of local trails that will give you a workout while allowing you to enjoy the local landscape. Near UNH, try Kingman Farm in Madbury or Wagon Hill Farm in Durham for starters.

at 70, the best-selling novelist and Exeter native returns to the Seacoast

“I try to create people I love, then hope you will too, then decide which of them will suffer,” said John Irving, speaking to a full house in the warm Music Hall on a cold night. He quoted often and easily from many of his works, as if he had just been having a conversation with these characters in another room.

When operators on the Sarah Mildred Long bridge tried to raise the lift span over the Piscataqua River on Wednesday, Jan. 23, the routine exercise did not go as planned. It took four days in bitterly cold weather to make repairs and get the bridge in service again.

The retail book giant Barnes and Noble recently announced that they plan to close roughly 30 percent of their stores over the next 10 years. It’s not that those bookstores are losing money, because they’re not; it’s just that management imagines that they probably will be some day. So basically, the biggest bookstore in the world is giving up on the book now, pre-emptively. Thanks, guys! Thanks for systematically driving local, independent bookstores and smaller bookstore chains out of business for the past 20 years, and now throwing in the towel.

The N.H. Production Coalition, an advocacy organization for the New Hampshire television and video industry, has worked with Rep. Jeff Goley (D-Hillsborough) to introduce legislation that would use the state’s Business Profits Tax to increase incentives for film, television and media production in the state.

The economic forecast for 2013 is—only just—more hopeful than last year

Ross Gittell, Chancellor of the New Hampshire Community Colleges, has good and bad news for the New Hampshire economy in 2013. “It’s going to be a better economy, but it’s not going to be a strong economy,” he said at the Chamber of Commerce annual economic forecast at the Exeter Inn on Jan. 23.

Proposed gun laws, locally and nationally, are leading to a widespread conversation for the first time in generations. 

“If you all are reading the newspaper, our rights are being attacked again,” N.H. state Rep. Al Baldasaro (R-Londonderry) tells the crowd gathered in front of the capitol building in Concord. “Representative Shurtleff has filed a bill to repeal your right to protect yourself, wherever you have the right to be.  ... We need to make sure we load the State House to protect our rights. We will not give up one inch of our rights here in New Hampshire.” His rallying cry is met with hoots, cheers and applause from the crowd gathered in front of the State House at the “Gun Appreciation Day” event on Sunday, Jan. 13.

While a polar wind forced temperatures below zero and city workers to steam icy hydrants, those trying to stay warm in Portsmouth Book and Bar on Wednesday, Jan. 23, were thawed by the heart-melting harmonies and luxuriant, literate tales shared by Boston’s all-star band, Session Americana.

Debate continues over divesting the UNH endowment from fossil fuel companies, with two educational events planned

Since September, students at the University of New Hampshire have been calling on the administration and the UNH Foundation to divest the school’s endowment from fossil fuel corporations. In November, the group delivered a petition requesting divestment that was signed by 1,000 students to President Mark Huddleston’s office. Huddleston will meet with the group on Jan. 29, and a teach-in is planned for Jan. 24 in advance of the meeting.  Meanwhile, the university is planning its own presentation on Feb. 11, hosting a campus dialogue on “Investing for a Sustainable Future.” “We look forward to a comprehensive discussion on the university’s portfolio management,” says Tina Sawtelle, vice president and treasurer of the UNH Foundation.

Rated R: Based on the novel “Flashfire” by Donald E. Westlake, “Parker” follows the adventures of the eponymous thief (Jason Stratham) with a very exacting professional code as he tries to get back his share of the Ohio State Fair by buying a house from Jennifer Lopez. Or something like that. There is a heist at the beginning involving a lot of clowns (including Michael Chiklis) and some hay, and then after that they shoot Stratham but not very well because he wakes up in the hospital and hoo-boy, is he mad.

I’ve put my time in. Before I swore off reality TV, I was as deeply entrenched as one can get. I did 15 tours of MTV’s “The Real World” (jumping off between Philadelphia and Austin), all the “Road Rules,” the first eight “Survivors,” “The Mole” (before Anderson Cooper was “Anderson Cooper”), “Iron Chef” (Japanese and American), and many more. Then I quit cold turkey.

Miramax/Film Four Productions, 1999: In 1971 Lancashire, England, a Pakistani immigrant father and an English mother are raising a young, rambunctious brood. Their modern-fun-loving sons and daughters think they have it made, but as the children come of age, George expects them to adopt Pakistani ways. They rebel, and their rejection of Pakistani customs of dress, food, religion, morals, and general lifestyle lead to rising tensions in the house.

Fermented foods exist in cultures around the world. Among other benefits, fermentation helps take fresh food and add flavor while extending its life—think of pickles, yogurt, pepperoni, and tasty beverages like beer and wine. I especially think fermented flavors give winter meals some welcome zing.