Columnists

April is National Poetry Month and I unintentionally celebrated it last week with a visit to Manhattan. -more-

The more scientists learn about non-human cognition, the blurrier the boundary between the human mind and various animal minds seems to become. And I’m not just talking about tool-making, intention-guessing, empathetic chimps. Some remarkable findings have emerged from the study of birds—and not necessarily the kinds of birds you’d expect. -more-

Unless Democrats win control of either the House or the Senate, nothing is going to change in Washington. There will be no meaningful shift in Iraq, ethics, or economic policy until there is real debate on Capitol Hill. The good news is that the Dems have a reasonable shot at winning a majority of House seats. -more-

For our 150th UnderCurrents column, let’s return to an old subject: the failure of the city of Oakland to address the problem of violence in an adult manner (I originally wrote “inability” instead of “failure” but crossed that out; inability means you can’t do something, while failure means you could, but don’t, for whatever reason; I also put “city” with a lower case “c” in order to make the point that we’re not just talking about the people at Ogawa Plaza as a source of this failure—it’s a citywide problem, not a city government problem). -more-

Nature as science or nature as art? There’s no need to choose. Left and right sides of the brain combine their efforts heralding California’s native landscapes and wildlife at the Oakland Museum. The Natural Sciences shine in the comprehensive Permanent Gallery, unique art exhibits and the museum’s multi-tiered outdoor gardens. -more-

Seth Paris Babson (1826–1907) was one of the most eminent Victorian architects on the Pacific coast. A native of Maine, he set sail for San Francisco a year after the discovery of gold in California. Having rounded Cape Horn, Babson arrived in the spring of 1850. -more-

Buying houses is an expensive proposition as anyone who has ever done it can tell you and it doesn’t stop when you pay the closing costs and put your boat in the backyard (you really have a boat?) -more-

Flowerland Nursery is the corner store of local plant shops. Evidently it’s been there for generations: the friendly worker there told me that that the current owner, Bob Wilson, has had it for some 30 years and the previous owners had run it “for, oh, 30 to 40 years” before him. -more-