Beat a Red-Light Camera Ticket in Philly

What to do when that VIOLATION envelope arrives in the mail.

According to data released by AAA Mid-Atlantic this month, 33,627 drivers were issued a ticket last year by the red-light camera at the intersection immediately south of City Hall on Broad Street. Unfortunately, I was one of them. Fortunately, I never had to cough up $100 to pay the fine.

Alleged Comcast Robin Hoods Might Not Be So Robin Hood-y

According to these text messages, they weren’t brilliant criminal masterminds either.

If Robin Hood had flown first-class to Miami, popped bottles with strippers and coated his arrows with gold paint, would the fine people of Nottingham still have celebrated him as a hero? That appears to be the case here in Philadelphia, where people are jamming comment sections and message boards citywide to praise ringleader Alston Buchanan and 22 others, after they allegedly bilked Comcast out of $2.4 million in the last year.

Temple Students Think North Philly’s a Wasteland They’re There to Rescue

In between tossing Solo cups on the sidewalks.

As a former Temple student who lived in off-campus housing, I apologize to the residents of North Central Philadelphia. Not necessarily for my actions (although I lived in and visited many a party house before graduating in 2010), nor the actions of the majority of the student community. No, I mainly apologize for those among us who are basically asking you, North Philadelphia, to have a seat and take your medicine.

Living Without Corn Syrup and Peanut Butter: A Suburban Childhood

They’re taking candy from the babies.

Little Jimmy, age 8, approaches the microphone and looks around at all the strange grown-ups smiling at him. He smiles back at the ones in the suits sitting behind the long table and notices a few have faces like they're stuck in traffic. Now I know why mommy calls them bored members, he thinks. Jimmy clears his throat, rocks back onto his heels and twiddles his toes, and begins to speak. "Hello. My name is Jimmy and I am in second grade. I don't think the school should serve cookies."

Not In My Suburban Backyard, You Don’t

Sometimes taking a hit to your property value is the just the right thing to do.

During my junior year at Temple, I had an elderly professor who was memorable for three main reasons. The first was that over the course of the 50 minutes, a small puddle of drool would slowly accumulate in the left corner of his mouth, precariously pooling there as the class looked on. Around the 30-minute mark, it would begin to visibly quiver as he spoke, and by the 45th minute, students were violently ducking out of the way as he walked by, for fear of entering the splash zone. Occasionally, we were fortunate enough to see it drop by the end of class, our faces twisting in horrific amusement as it soaked into his sweater.

Is This a School Board Meeting or Fight Club?

Philly’s suburban helicopter parents lack perspective.

There’s nothing quite like the first breath of cool, night air after a three-and-a-half-hour school board meeting. It’s a zen moment for those working in local news, and I found myself enjoying a particularly good one last week, sucking in that sweet oxygen and walking off the folding chair-induced pain in my ass, thoughts turning to what mediocre TV entertainment awaited me back at the apartment, when I heard a school administrator call my name after coming out of the building’s doors.