A Raft is his Ritz

Welcome to Blue Springs Creek, in the Ocala National Forest, where Lee Allen Young lives on a raft he calls the Huckleberry Finn with a faithful mutt he has named Becky Thatcher. A barefooted man of 59, he says he is looking for Tom Sawyer — that is, he is looking for the kind of free and irresponsible life all but gone in modern Florida. He has no bank account, no credit cards, no telephone. “Civilization,” Mark Twain once declared, “is the limitless multiplication of unnecessary necessities.” Young has no spouse, no commitments, no immediate plans except to fry a few fish for supper.

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For Coupon Overreachers, A Chance to Recoup

In the next two months, Laurie MacDougall needs to eat 10 pizzas, take two beading classes, get at least one picture framed, have her car washed twice, drop off $30 of dry cleaning, visit the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum with three friends, eat at Johnny’s Luncheonette in Newton and Deep Ellum in Allston, and schlep over to Burlington to buy books at the Used Book Superstore. Otherwise, $250 of discount coupons she bought from Groupon and other online daily deal sites will expire, unused.

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Gloomy Dramas Are a Hard Draw This Film Season

Beaten down by the recession? Want a sunny respite from the dreary weather? Need two hours to get away from the holiday stress? Hollywood has the answer: movies about a crumbling marriage, a 4-year-old’s death in a car accident and a single father dying of cancer.

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Soup is Good Metaphor

Last week, my daughter wrecked the family van. The bank stamped our checking account “Overdrawn.” The neighbor sent another nasty e-mail about our dog. And my hairdresser took me seriously when I said I was kinda bored with my hair. This is why I make soup.

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Monster Gator to Leave Comfort Zone

Charlie is the stuff of legend – a huge, old, “tame” alligator with a belly like a whale and an appetite like an ogre. He’s been fed for decades with mess hall scraps, roadkill, chicken wings, submarine sandwiches and anything tossed over the retention-pond fence behind the gate at the Joint Base Charleston Weapons Station. Now, somebody has to move him.

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Clinton Wedding Maestro

There’s busy, and then there’s Bryan Rafanelli. The Boston-based event planner chosen by Bill and Hillary Clinton to oversee the super-secret nuptials of their only child, Chelsea, isn’t returning calls.

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We Needed Some Rafa-tainment

After a tumultuous week for sports, it was comforting to see a neon-colored Rafael Nadal flopping around in the red French clay.

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