Globe coverage of major women's sports: Foul play

Loosely Speaking by Nancy Gaines

LOOSELY SPEAKING

The Boston Globe likes to talk the talk about its non-sexist policies and coverage, but it blatantly fails to walk the walk, at least when it comes to sports. The Globe's sports pages have set back what is fast emerging elsewhere as one of the most enjoyable fields of parity by relegating coverage of major women's events to its "weekly page devoted to women and sports." A recent case in point was the paper's coverage of the NCAA basketball championships. Features on the UConn guys' victory were plastered all over the March 31 sports front and succeeding pages. Coverage of the Purdue gals' win over Tennessee -- which, as the Globe reported, earned ESPN's second-biggest audience ever for a college basketball game, men's or women's -- was sent to its segregated corner.

Separated at typecasting? In the ads for his new movie, Clint Eastwood's striking resemblance to former Boston mayor Kevin H. White is pure coincidence. The film, after all, is called True Crime. What remains to be seen is how closely Robert Redford's rumored future treatment of the brothers Bulger will resemble anything real. One thing's for sure: the actor playing Billy won't.

New club on the block

The Financial District, which has lately enjoyed a resurgence as a locus for fine dining and fancy nightclubbing, will soon boast another example. Vertigo, on the edge of Faneuil Hall at 126 State Street, is scheduled to open in early May, says promotion director Joe Toto. Owned by Frank Borriello, a Lynnfield real-estate developer, and Vinny Morris, a Melrose caterer, the two-level nightspot now under construction in a vacant office building will offer a "Mercury Bar-like" atmosphere, says Toto. DJs and dancing will be the primary attraction, he says, with occasional free hors d'oeuvres -- but, unlike its two-year-old neighbor, the Exchange (at 148 State), Vertigo will not be a restaurant. "We're looking to attract an upper-crusty crowd," says Toto, adding that he intends to hire promoters to lure both international and native clubgoers, plus an "after-theater crowd and, we hope, the stockbroker set."

Robert J.: The inadvertent plagiarist

Now, our minds here in Boston may be schooled on cheats and lies -- and certainly, given the journalistic misadventures of the past year, our lips (and pens) must be aware -- but the habitual pirating seems quite beyond control. (With apologies to any and all who might have written something similar, anywhere, anytime.)

And so we learn from the Weekly Standard magazine (which was alerted by reader William Porth of Charleston, West Virginia) that WGBH-FM classical-music host Robert J. Lurtsema, in a 1991 book of poetry, appropriated a 1920 poem by fabled newspaper columnist Don Marquis. Last week, Lurtsema apologized, saying the plagiarism occurred when he found the ode to the travails of sobriety among his old notes, with no attribution, and thought it was his own. He also evidently thought -- either way back then or when he compiled his Pocketful of Verse -- that the original wasn't quite good enough, because he changed words here and there and rearranged the stanzas.

Here are selected comparisons:

Our minds are schooled to grief
	   and dearth
	Our lips, too, are aware,
But our feet still seek a railing
	When a railing isn't there
. . . . .
No stein shall greet my straining eyes
	No matter how they blink
Mine ears shall never hear again
	The highball glasses clink, --
. . . . .
My heart is all resigned and calm,
	So, likewise, is my soul,
But my habituated foot
	Is quite beyond control!

Now, our minds are schooled on grief
	   and death
And our lips must be aware . . .
But our feet still seek a railing
When there is no railing there

My heart is all resigned and calm
So likewise is my soul,
But my habituated foot
Is quite beyond control.
. . . . .
No glass shall greet my straining eyes
No matter how they blink
My ears shall never hear again
The whiskey glasses clink.

Ecumenical eats

There were more than a few dropped jaws at the recent Camellia Ball fundraiser at the Ritz-Carlton to benefit Girls' Town of Italy when the predominantly Roman Catholic crowd, invited by a monsignor and welcomed by priests, noticed that the menu -- on a Friday night -- featured veal. Granted, many Catholics don't adhere to meatless Fridays anymore; then again, it was Lent. But after saying grace, lest the benefactors be fazed, Father Cogo offered a group absolution to all those wishing to partake.

Time to cut out

The Newbury Street salon set is abuzz over the recent defections of several major players in the clip crowd to form a new operation on the same block. Cindy Kenefick, formerly of the Salon at 110, has opened the 119 Salon Group, bringing with her from 110 Roberto Echevarria, Jon Paul Prunier, and Bill Zecco. Joining soon will be Jamie Kilroy, a lead stylist at Ecocentrix, who left there less than a year ago for a short stint at Ibelle. Kenefick says the rising cost of "renting" a chair from a salon owner had become too onerous. "It was time to have a proprietor interest," she says.

Bid for attention

Last week, Phoenix writer Brett Milano reported that the current CD by the local band the Lothars had been offered for auction on the Internet's eBay, fetching about twice what it would have cost if bought from the band. This week, we've got something better. Someone auctioned the recent issue of the Phoenix with the Dropkick Murphys on the cover (somewhat falsely billed in the description as an interview with the singer), and, at press time, it was going for close to $6. That's four times what someone could have paid for it less than two weeks earlier, and more still than the zero dollars it would have cost to access the article online.