Some old friends are apparently avid supporters of Ben Carson’s candidacy for the presidency. They are devout, conservative Christians, perfectly nice people, but who clearly have a blind spot where this man is concerned. As far as I can tell, they want us to vote for him because he’s a virtuous man who can “bring […]
You have probably looked askance at the crew occupying a bird sanctuary in Oregon and wondered who the hell those guys are and what the hell they want. You are not alone. Ammon Bundy, son of welfare cheat Cliven Bundy, sums it up for us: “We’re going to be freeing these lands up, and getting […]
As the title says, so what? We have a perfectly serviceable model for placing ourselves in a matrix to define our approach and response to woo. So what? When I proposed the idea, we joked that we could create one of those Buzzfeed quizzes that would ask you 20 questions and place you on the […]
Why do we feel compelled to buy things when we travel? Shouldn’t the experience be enough, particularly if that experience is as glorious as ours was? I guess we want tangible memories to put on our shelf when our world shrinks back to normal, kind of bringing in those exotic threads and weaving them into […]
Uptown Sedona is basically two streets or so lined with shops that vie with each other in their offerings of a) Native American art; b) Native American jewelry; c) tourist stuff; d) trendy clothing; e) variously themed foods; and of course f) HIPPIE WOO! You can buy crystals/gemstones, both little tumble/polished numbers and more elegant and mysterious items like spheres and […]
I’ve been reading Daily Rituals, by Mason Currey, as my bedtime reading. It’s a very simple read: brief descriptions of the daily working habits of scores of writers, artists, and composers. They don’t seem to be in any particular order, and a great many of them were already known to me, but it is nonetheless inspirational in […]
Tomorrow is Nancy Willard’s birthday. (It’s also my son’s birthday, and that of my first girlfriend. Anybody else?) One of the greatest regrets of my life is that I have been unable so far to get William Blake’s Inn produced. Nancy is such a phenomenal writer and artist, but more than that she is such […]
No work on Seven Dreams today, but I have to mention how much fun Scott Wilkerson’s text is to work with! It bodes well for the enterprise. (It also bodes well that he has not complained or even mentioned that I cut about six lines from the “Fly and fall” text…) A couple of weeks […]
Here’s where we are: three old guys who need a schtik, preferably ritualistic, that can be transported across the continent so that we can Participate in the Burning Man Festival. Here’s a funny thing about inspiration and creativity: sometimes—just sometimes—an idea will come to you fully born. That’s great, because then all you have to […]
Not a lot to talk about today, but a little more exciting than I had expected. First, the obligatory road shot: This is I-10, which most of the way seems to be a bridge. A long, long bridge. It did prompt me to think of the extremes through which we’ve traveled. We’ve gone from 7,000 feet above […]