Investment advisor Brett Walker has been cycling for 20 years and is preparing for the Race Across America (RAAM), a 3,000-mile event that must be completed in less than 12 days. A member of the Granite State Wheelmen, Walker is currently on a 900-hour-per-year regimen. His Web site is www.TeamWalker07.com. He spoke to the Hippo on Feb. 28, a few days after placing first in the non-drafting division of the Sebring 12/24 in Florida, completing 30 more miles than his closest competitor.

You?ve finished art school. People even say you?re talented. So why aren?t your paintings selling?

Art education doesn?t often include business education, say some local artists. It?s an issue that?s just starting to be addressed.

During the cold days of winter, every Thursday, Friday and Saturday local growers, bakers, cheese makers, butchers and a fish monger sell their goods at an indoor location in Salzburg Square in Amherst.

This indoor farmers? market, first in the state, opened last October just as the temperature dropped.

I don?t know what you think, but it?s been a pretty weird basketball season from where I sit. Not that all the stories were bad. Quite the contrary ? there have been some really compelling stories to follow. It?s just that the whole season has seemed out of sync. It started when Lebron James didn?t play a second in his visit to the V and has stayed that way the rest of the year, at least to me. So in no particular order here?s a list of the good, the bad and the ugly from the 2007 basketball season that is winding to a close.

Let?s talk conversion software ? that is, tools that let you change a file from one format to another so a different program can be used to access it.

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