Welcome to A Dash of Paprika, my split-personality blog!

After years of trying to figure out how to write about work and non-work related topics without creating two different blogs, my designer partner-in-crime wrangled a solution through the magic of tagging and design.

You can read my freewheeling take on work- and content-related topics in the Dash of Business Paprika. I’ll write about my adventures in New York City and beyond in A Dash of Fun Paprika. No matter which path you take, I hope these posts brings a little zip into your day as you take a break in between meetings, get stuck in a subway, or wherever the words find you.

A Dash of Business Paprika A Dash of Fun Paprika

Provincetown in Winter

March 16, 2015

Picture this vacation: Four nights in a fabulous one-bedroom condo for less than $80 a night. No traffic in the streets, plenty of seats in the restaurants and coffee shops, free parking at any spot in town. And since I stayed in the center of town, all that free parking was at most a five-minute [...] Read More

Three Days in Philadelphia

February 9, 2015

I love the City of Brotherly Love! I’ve had a couple of lease-signing stints there, so when a relative recently emailed me to recommend places to stay, it inspired this “36 Hours” rip-off post. My list has a half-assed geographical order to it, but you could easily skip or combine any of them into a [...] Read More

Stuck in the East Brunswick, NJ Hilton

January 12, 2015

I think I’ve driven past the Hilton Hotel on the New Jersey Turnpike near New Brunswick—you know, the one with the giant, glowing red “H” just off exit 9—at least a million times. It always emitted a roadside-misery vibe to me every time I drove past it, so I had built up a pretty strong [...] Read More

Taking the Bus to Northampton to See the Pope of Trash

January 5, 2015

“What’s your name, beautiful?” If this is how Greyhound bus drivers greet passengers as they check tickets, I’m giving up my frequent flyer miles. How to get from A to B when you have no car: my new eternal question. Back in March I bought tickets to see “A John Waters Christmas” at the Calvin Theater [...] Read More

Getting My Irish up: Irish Stick Fighting in Mississauga, Ontario

December 28, 2014

Who the hell knew Ireland had a martial arts tradition? I sure didn’t until I went on one of the wildest rides I’ve ever been on, all courtesy of a graffiti-dream Caddy that I didn’t even sit in, because it never left the hotel parking lot. Mississauga, Ontario, is about a half an hour away [...] Read More

26 Minutes of Scientology

July 14, 2014

Three hours after I landed in LA, I hopped into a Zipcar to check out LA. Wherever I travel to big cities I try to take subways to get around but this was LA and I needed to drive a bit. I was jazzed to see that the concierge gave me a route that took [...] Read More

For Lady

June 9, 2014

One of my favorite things about travel is seeing how other cultures try on random English words to use them to their advantage. My favorite? Lady. Growing up I remember my mom telling me, her tomboy little girl, to “Act like a lady” on more than one occasion, and I’m glad she did. The true [...] Read More

Siena: I’m Waiting for the Crema

June 2, 2014

Siena’s where I spent a semester abroad in college, and it’s always going to be a really special place to me. It’s where I made some of my best friends, fell in real love for the first time, and learned more about myself than I ever could have had I spent the semester stateside. It’s [...] Read More

From the Pope to Pasolini

June 1, 2014

Sciopero! No vacation in Italy is complete without a strike, and I got my fill on day 2. There was a public transportation strike on May 30, which meant that the buses and the metro weren’t running. Except for the lines that were. “Oh even when there’s a strike the Metro runs,” said the barista [...] Read More

Neorealism Memory Lane in Pigneto

May 29, 2014

Time to light up this blog with some fun vacation posts! I used some airline miles to book a last-minute trip to Rome, Florence, and some Tuscan hill towns in between. It’s all working out so far and I’m at the end of day one, in the land between exhilaration and exhaustion, making good on [...] Read More

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Emily is an amazing analytical human who can turn verbal diarrhea into pithy copy that cuts through the noise and makes an impact.

Calum Kilgour | Slingshot Edge

I’ve had the pleasure of working with Emily in several message development workshops. The workshops are intense and a lot of work, but made fun and exciting by Emily and her team. They are masters of pulling out the significant details and helping craft a message that communicates the true value of your products and services. Emily in particular is very astute in assigning value to ideas making it possible for the true message to rise to the top.

Michael Rocco | Power School

Emily is among the best writers I had the privilege of working with, during my nearly-20 years in marketing. Not only is Emily a great pro and a wonderful writer, who knows how to capture the essence of a story and pass it to the reader in a clear and precise way, but she is also a fun person to work with.

Ilan Vagenshtein | Marketing, Sales Enablement & Business Development

Emily worked with my team at iCrossing as a freelance Content Strategist for about 7 months and became an invaluable member of our team. Once she’s immersed herself into a project she becomes a go-to resource, retaining even the most minute details. I felt extremely comfortable when Emily took responsibility for a piece of the project because I knew it would be done well, on time, and she would be able to speak to any questions that our clients may have had.

Charlie Chapin | Associate Director of Operations, Essence

Emily is one of the most astute, analytical, and strategic forward-thinking executives I have worked with in a marketing capacity — all helped with a keen creative mind and an exceptional sense of humor. Her ability to synthesize complex business needs and devise a creative win-win solution for her clients truly sets her apart from her competitors. I would not hesitate to use her services when the need arises.

Jeffrey Hirschberg | Writer-Director/Film Professor