PORTLAND

50 ways to leave 2009
Get your New Year's Eve down to an Auld Lang science - BY JEFF INGLIS

Portland’s wishes for 2010

New Year’s resolutions
Ah, these fresh moments of the new year, when our hopes and resolutions are unsullied by the rough ravages of time, politics, and the Maine winter.

By DEIRDRE FULTON | December 30, 2009

The pressure to hook up on New Year's Eve is immense. Take it down a notch, and you may embrace 2010 with locked lips.
I had no New Year's kiss last year. I had fun, friends, a bonfire, and a bellyful of delicious food, but no kiss.

By DEIRDRE FULTON | December 30, 2009

Hot, hot heat

New Year's Eve is just a warm-up
Is New Year's back? It seemed to have been taken away from us, by a general and hard-to-pin-down sentiment that it ought to be some kind of family holiday. Fuck that.

By SAM PFEIFLE | December 30, 2009

Start tasting

New and renewed flavors in Portland's food scene
The events of the last decade have spoiled our taste for speculation.

By BRIAN DUFF | December 30, 2009

Into new worlds

Theatrical journeys for the year ahead
The New Year opens with a duo of two-man, many-character comedies.

By MEGAN GRUMBLING | December 30, 2009

Hope and energy

Looking ahead to Maine's art scene in 2010
As we launch into the next decade with a collapsing economy and apocalyptic themes bleeding into every facet of culture, it's particularly hard to be optimistic about the arts, as yes, they are often the first to go.

By ANNIE LARMON | December 30, 2009

Nobody dies

The Department of Economic and Community Development dodges the axe
Some things in life are essential — beer, the MLB Network, caller ID — and some things aren't — tofu, Jay Leno, the Maine Department of Economic and Community Development.

By AL DIAMON | December 30, 2009

Let’s recap

Balls, Pucks, and Monster Trucks
With the decade drawing to a close, it's fitting to reconsider the moments and developments of the last 10 years that forever changed sports in Portland and New England.

By RICK WORMWOOD | December 30, 2009

Booked solid

A hefty season of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry
The holidays are over — time to hit the books.

By BARBARA HOFFERT | December 29, 2009

Beyond Dilla and Dipset

Can hip-hop deliver in 2010?
With a semi-sober face I'll claim that hip-hop in 2010 might deliver more than just posthumous Dilla discs, Dipset mixtapes, and a new ignoramus coke rapper whom critics pretend rhymes in triple-entendres.

By CHRIS FARAONE | December 29, 2009

The future is now

No teleportation, but lots of rad new albums
Even with all the promise of the new year ahead, it's hard not to feel a little stiffed in the Future of Mankind department. Here it is, 2010, and there's nary a flying car to be seen.

By MICHAEL BRODEUR | December 29, 2009

2010 preview

Music Seen
What’s coming to the clubs

By CHRISTOPHER GRAY | December 30, 2009

People, Get Ready

Sibilance
What folkie force Moore, Wild, and Lynch have been up to

By PORTLAND PHOENIX MUSIC STAFF | December 30, 2009

Lite at the end of the tunnel?

Fun and games in post-apocalyptic Hollywood
If you had enough of the end of the world with 2012 , you might be relieved when it comes to 2010.

By PETER KEOUGH | December 30, 2009

Winter wonderland

Video games start the new year right
Do not adjust your calendar. Christmas has not been moved to March this year.

By MITCH KRPATA | December 29, 2009

Complaint Department

Letters to the Portland Editor, January 1, 2010
Can we have a benefit show or something in the coming year to save up enough money to buy three ghosts (preferably the ghosts of local rock's past, present, and future) to visit Sam Pfeifle in his dreams to tell him the following.

By PORTLAND PHOENIX LETTERS | December 30, 2009

Happy New Year 2010

Hoopleville
Hey, ya know what's great?

By DAVID KISH | December 30, 2009

Growing Maine culture

A look back at the highlights of the decade
As the first decade of the millennium winds up (and as we mark the first decade of the Portland Phoenix 's existence), it's worth a look back to see where we came from. We asked our sharpest minds — our arts writers — to consider the last 10 years and pick out the high points that still stick in their minds, in many cases almost an entire decade later.

By PORTLAND PHOENIX CONTRIBUTORS | December 22, 2009

Ten years of great sports

Boston's road from Loserville to Title Town
Moments after Adam Vinatieri's field goal split the uprights as the clock expired in the Louisiana Superdome on February 3, 2002, the streets of Boston were in bedlam. Drunk people dangled from trees and hung off lampposts. Motorists leaned on their horns. I saw a guy hug a cop

By MIKE MILIARD | December 22, 2009