Teen ice cream scoopers looking up to journalists: Am I on Candid Camera or Punk’d?

So, there I am craving ice cream in Times Square at 9 ‘o clock at night and Cold Stone Creamery is staring me in my neon-basked face. Now before all you Zagat-carrying Manhattan zombies chastise me for not going to an independently owned shop, is there such a thing in Times Square any more?
I [...]

Hurricane Katrina aftermath includes urban myths, tacky souvenirs

CULTURE SCHLOCK – By Darren Garnick
The Telegraph
October 6, 2005
**
In case you were under the delusion that our tacky culture couldn’t possibly get any tackier, check out your local supermarket newsstand this week. Shelved next to the latest dieting magazines and word search puzzles, you’ll find copies of “Remembering Katrina,” the official Hurricane Katrina souvenir program.
The [...]

“Crashing to earth in Vanuatu’s Air Force One (Part 2)

CULTURE SCHLOCK — By Darren Garnick
The Telegraph
August 24, 2001
EDITOR’S NOTE: Columnist Darren Garnick recently returned from a documentary film shoot in the South Pacific islands of Vanuatu, located 1,200 miles northeast of Australia. Here’s what won’t make it in the film. (Part 2 of 2)
Had we burst into flames over Sydney International Airport, [...]

Confessions of an international turkey jerky smuggler (Vanuatu adventure 1 of 2)

CULTURE SCHLOCK — By Darren Garnick
The Telegraph
August 17, 2001
**
EDITOR’S NOTE: Columnist Darren Garnick recently returned from a documentary film shoot in the South Pacific country of Vanuatu — via Australia. Here’s what won’t make it in the film. (Part 1 of 2)
Fearing I might otherwise be nibbling on tree bark in the middle of [...]

Leave Boy George alone: Why do you really want to trash him?

THE WORKING STIFF – By Darren Garnick
“Do you really want to trash me?”
The Boston Herald — August 2, 2006
**
What impact does humiliation have on employee morale?
You know the answer. I know the answer. But the supervisor of New York
City’s 7,000-plus sanitation workers is inexplicably allowing his
department to be used as a petri dish for criminal
rehabilitation.
Fallen [...]

Corpse Action Figures: Mad scientists coming to a museum near you

THE WORKING STIFF – By Darren Garnick
“Where are all the protestors at Body Worlds?”
The Boston Herald — August 16, 2006
**
Boston’s human rights activists go ballistic whenever a sneaker
company pays overseas workers only a gazillion times their country’s
minimum wage. But when a prestigious city institution is linked to a
Chinese sweatshop that makes corpses into life-size action [...]

Costa Rican Sloth Adventure: Parking Lot Security in Paradise

THE WORKING STIFF — By Darren Garnick
“Parking Lot Security in Paradise”
The Boston Herald — December 6, 2006
**
Sometimes being named “Employee of the Month” and getting a “kudos” in the company newsletter just isn’t good enough.
I have no idea how a Costa Rican hotel parking lot attendant was
honored after I originally reported his act of heroism, [...]

24-Hour Diary of a Pregnant Guy — (Postscript with competing bellies)

(Originally published in July 2007)
The Empathy Belly is still by far the most dominant pregnancy simulator on the market, but a dramatic recent price cut indicates that the Pregnancy Profile (the Pepsi or Avis to the Empathy Coke and Empathy Hertz) is making up ground.
I wore the Profile for an hour — I wasn’t going [...]

24-Hour Diary of a Pregnant Guy — (Part 3 of 3)

(Third of three parts chronicling my 24-hour pregnancy simulator field test, launched in honor of my wife Stacy’s second trip to the maternity ward — Originally published in the Boston Herald — July 2007).

8:30 p.m. — Chili’s Restaurant
Stacy tells the hostess that we are both pregnant and need a table instead of a booth. She’s [...]

24-Hour Diary of a Pregnant Guy — (Part 2 of 3)

(Second of three parts chronicling my 24-hour pregnancy simulator field test, launched in honor of my wife Stacy’s second trip to the maternity ward — Originally published in the Boston Herald in July 2007. Photos by Ilya Mirman)
10:45 a.m. — On The Road
I’m in the passenger seat of photographer Ilya’s SUV and I’m feeling [...]