The Return of the Sunday Times

It is true that reading news on the web is convenient - and efficient.

These days, most news organizations have staffs that update breaking news, financial stories, and of course Internet readers' favorite: the news of the weird. For some reason, maybe because people associate the Internet with a lack of seriousness, a lot of web sites include features about people doing stupid things.

But the web (in my opinion) is not the best medium for serious, thought-provoking journalism, nor is it a place where people read for long periods of time. Web readers - mostly - want nuggets of news, in digest form, the headlines and maybe a little more, maybe two paragraphs.

Which is one of the reasons why I recently resubscribed to the Sunday New York Times.

I had subscribed to nytimes online for years but I've never held my ipad in my hand for two hours to flip through the sections of the website. Maybe others can, but reading on a screen is not that pleasurable.

I want paper.

So now my Sundays consist of coffee, food of some kind, and reading 10 or 12 articles, columns, essays,and features. The Times has arguably the smartest writers on its staff, and, even if you don't agree with them, they arouse thought.

Our local Sunday paper, the Hartford Courant, just isn't cutting it. While the potential is there to report on interesting Connecticut stories, there is no edge to the paper's writing, and the story selection is boring. The writing is tired, except for a few reporters. This is probably the case at many mid-size daily and Sunday papers.

The Sunday Times reports on science and psychology, has great, thoughtful sports features, insightful columnists, and - you can tell - editors and writers who spend a lot of time thinking about angles to stories, and each sentence they will write.

This is what I want in a paper. In a 'paper' paper, not the online version.

Since I don't have the time to read it every day, the Sunday paper will suffice. It usually takes a few days to get through it anyway.

For 4 dollars a week, not a bad deal to have this delivered to your driveway.