"How to improve your outdoor space!"

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 29, 2019

No other newspaper like it: Skillfully, we barked out this morning's orders to the eager young analysts.

"Bring us the dope on the Times' Ronda Kaysen," we skillfully, yet thoughtfully, said.

As it turns out, Kaysen is an award-winning journalist. We know that because she's willing to say so, at her own web site:

I am an award-winning freelance journalist and longtime contributor to the New York Times, where I write two regular columns. Right at Home takes readers along on my many misadventures in homeownership. Yes, figuring out how to install a home security system is confusing and no, I am not at all ashamed that I am addicted to open houses (I’m not the only one, either!)

[...]

I have won numerous awards, including the 2018 President’s Award for the Best Freelance Collection from National Association of Real Estate Editors.

I got my start at The New York Observer, where I wrote about celebrities, books, wedding engagements and Manhattan neighborhoods...

We like to joke about the way our journalists use the award-winning term, "award-winning." That said, Kaysen's use of the term is perhaps a bit heavy-handed, even for scufflers like us.

At any rate, so what? We issued our orders today because of Kaysen's performance in the Times' daily "Here to Help" feature (print editions only). On this morning's page A3, it starts exactly like this:

Here to Help
HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR OUTDOOR SPACE

Your instinct might be to start with plants, but resist that urge. RONDA KAYSEN

Already, we were hooked! As we greedily perused the feature, we thought Kaysen's best work almost surely involved the enduring importance of shade:

Choose a shady spot for seating. “Shade is hugely important,” said Cara White, the founder of Elevations, an urban design studio in New York. “Where is your best opportunity to create shade?”

But if your only option is to have your seating area beneath the blazing sun, install a shade sail, a retractable awning or a large umbrella. Or, step it up and build a pergola, letting vines grow over it to create a natural canopy.

To her credit, Kaysen wasn't afraid to consult an expert on the question of whether shade is important when you're sitting outdoors. From there, Kaysen proceeded to earn her keep on her own:

Who else would think of erecting an awning, or perhaps even a large umbrella, to block the blazing sun? You simply can't gain insights like these in any other newspaper!

Increasingly, Future Anthropologists Huddled in Caves tell us that the Times' page A3 is the only newspaper page worth reading at this extremely late date.

"Mister Trump's War is drawing near," these disconsolate future scholars have glumly repeatedly told us. "On page A3, we see the remarkable folderol which will soon, at long last, bring the end times to pass."

Also on today's A3, we learned that this hard-hitting news report was "Monday's most read article." If you click, you'll see that it was the news report about Donald J. Trump getting booed at the baseball game.

Is there any way out of this hard-wired mess? Everything is possible, nine out of ten future logicians somewhat improbably claim!