down the cape
Jun. 17th, 2009 | 11:57 pm
My father's sister Laurie rents the lil cottage above for a week every June. Last week was the week. I was there from Saturday through Wednesday. Did a lot of visiting, even more eating, and a good bit of running. I also took some photographs. Now, I'm here at Bennington College in lovely southwestern Vermont. There's a ton to say about the goings on here, but I haven't the time now.
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family pride
Jun. 2nd, 2009 | 01:17 pm
Also, if you're wondering, I was a bad employee today and watched Conan's first appearance on The Tonight Show on Hulu at my desk.
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but now I need a little give and take
Jun. 1st, 2009 | 05:22 pm
Speaking of New York, I believe I'll find out this week if I got myself a spot in the New York City Marathon this November. I just read (on my new obsession, the New York Times's marathon-themed blog, "Run Well") that only around 5600 of around 57,000 applicants get spots via the lottery, which is a much, much smaller percentage than I realized. I'm not very good at lottery, so don't hold your breath.
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a chorus of smiles
May. 28th, 2009 | 09:17 am

My pals John and Rachael got married on Sunday at the F.U.E.L. House here in Philadelphia. I was a groomsmaid and I had the pleasure of reading John Ashbery's "Some Trees" at the ceremony. It was a fun night. I took some photos of both the rehearsal dinner and the reception, which you can see here.
Off to New York today for a work event, followed by a few days visiting some pals there. Also, I'll be running a half-marathon in Brooklyn on Saturday morning. I've recently learned that there's a giant hill that we run at least twice along the way (the course loops 2-3 times around Prospect Park) and that the New York Road Runners are issuing heat warnings for the day. Gulp.
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caller from schlepping, new hampshire
May. 22nd, 2009 | 12:08 pm
KING: Epping, New Hampshire. Hello.
CALLER: Hi, Dave.
LETTERMAN: Yes.
CALLER: I'm 13, and I've watched your shows for two years, and I've written letters to you, and I was just wondering if, you know, since you're the most powerful man in broadcasting today --
LETTERMAN: You would like me to adopt you?
CALLER: Yeah, that would be pretty cool.
LETTERMAN: All right, fine. Just send along the forms. We'll have them notarized.
KING: What's your question?
CALLER: Also I was wondering if you could lower the age limit to come see your show, because I've written letters, and they've sent me post cards saying you have to be 16.
KING: You have to be 16 to see your show?
LETTERMAN: Yes.
KING: Why?
LETTERMAN: And you're 13 right now?
CALLER: Yes.
LETTERMAN: I want to tell you something. The kind of show we do gets better and better every day, so you're really in a much better situation waiting three years, because as good as it is now, in three years you won't be able to stand it.
KING: Why won't you let a 13-year-old into the show?
LETTERMAN: It's not my decision.
KING: Oh, cop-out.
LETTERMAN: Because I love kids, and the kids love me, as evidenced by this call from -- where is it, Epping?
KING: Epping, New Hampshire.
LETTERMAN: I think we're missing a letter. It can't just be Epping.
KING: Schlepping?
LETTERMAN: Well, Yes, that's right. Very good, Larry.
KING: Why don't you let 13-year-olds --
LETTERMAN: It's not my decision. It has to do with child labor laws. That's all I can say.
KING: They're not working.
LETTERMAN: Well, we'd like to see them pulling cable, you know, get them in a pair of work gloves.
KING: So you're telling this poor lady wait three years.
LETTERMAN: Yeah, and I'm sorry about it. It's out of my hands. It's the FCC. It's the network. It's Ed Sullivan. It was an Ed Sullivan thing. He wouldn't let kids in the theater and we have to -- it's a grandfather clause. There's nothing we can do about it.
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text haiku
May. 14th, 2009 | 10:38 am
6:33 PM: Wow. Free drinks!
8:03 PM: Like 8 drinks free.
8:22 PM: I am so drunk.
8:26 AM: Ugh. Stupid free booze.
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born to run
May. 3rd, 2009 | 04:48 pm
As usual, John took great photos, including this one of me literally killing my competition. Here's a shot John got of Seth, who is, in my opinion, an extremely photogenic runner:

ps - regarding the title of this post, did i mention that i found my way into the 11th row of Bruce Springsteen's concert at the Wachovia Spectrum earlier this week? crazy stuff. at first, i though, "wow, i really feel more like a philadelphian being here." that was quickly revised to: "no. i feel more like an american." but, not in a bad way.
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horsies!
May. 3rd, 2009 | 04:38 pm

Oh, yeah. I went to Assateague Island, Maryland last weekend with Aaron and a bunch of his pals for some camping. They've got wild horsies there who just roam around the campground, beach, etc. It was pretty sweet. I took a bunch of photos of the horsies and the camping-ness. Also, Aaron's pal Sue took some even better photos, as that is her deal, photo-takin'.
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through the valley
Apr. 14th, 2009 | 11:14 pm

I have emerged from Death Valley. The more appropriate thing to say is that I emerged from Las Vegas. Not exactly my kind of place. Sure, the Venetian was lovely. We had an incredible room, er, suite and got to hang out in the hot tub. Of course, there was also an over-the-top-ness to the place - they, um, have canals, complete with gondolas inside. Seeing all the hotels and goings-on was the spectacle you'd imagine. But, overall, I was not all that interested in the Vegas aesthetic. (Read: gambling scares me.) That said, I was glad to get out of there and to the middle of nowhere on our second full day. Death Valley was everything I needed it to be. We camped in four places. We went on at least six hikes, each on a radically different terrain: the wildflower-covered hills, a winding canyon, the Eureka Dunes (my favorite), a crater (at the bottom of which we played frisbee), a joshua tree-lined mountain, and a rock face complete with two waterfalls.
Through all this, the catastrophes were kept to a minimum. No rattlesnakes, scorpion, or tarantulas were seen. Just some lizards and a coyote (from the car). We did hear some coyotes conversing from not too far a distance at our campsite one night though. We did get a flat tire on our SUV on the first day in Death Valley - the ol' stick-in-the-sidewall trick. I was useless, despite my father's profession, but luckily Aaron knew what he was doing. As he located the jack, I was figuring out just how many days we'd be able to survive on the granola bars, tortillas, and veggie burgers we had with us. There were a few hiking/climbing moments when personal safety came into question. Loose rocks sure are scary.
In addition to our hikes, we saw some cool sites: Devil's golf course, the Racetrack, and the adorable Teakettle Junction. You can view Aaron's photos starting here. And then there are mine.
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deserted
Apr. 3rd, 2009 | 10:43 pm
- I've enrolled in the Bennington Writing Seminars. It's a 2-year low-residency Masters of Fine Arts program, which means that I'll attend workshops and lectures for ten days in June and ten days in January and will otherwise be here in Philly working less at the Writers House and (a lot) more on my own writing and reading work. Hurray!
- Joan Didion was at the Writers House this week as our second Fellow of the year. I was pretty much beside myself the whole time. (See photo.) John took other photos too.
- I got plaid pants! (Aaron got 'em for me as a, "Hey, you got into grad school gift!" Shucks.)
- On Monday, Aaron and I are departing for just under a week-long jaunt out west. We'll be spending two nights in Las Vegas, staying at The Venetian (yowza), eating at buffets and I suppose doing a bit of gambling (Bennington, unfortunately, doesn't pay for itself). Then, we'll rent a car and drive out to Death Valley National Park, where we'll camp and hike for the rest of the week. I'm feeling like this vacation is much-needed. And I've never seen the desert. Let's just hope I'm able to fight off the scorpions, rattlesnakes and mountain lions.
- I was in DC a few weeks back to run in the National Half-Marathon with Naomi and her pal Chris. Had a good race - took 29 seconds off my personal record for 1:49:28. I feel like I could have been faster, but due to stomach issues in the latter part of the run, I didn't push too hard. Probably wise. Finished in the top 25% overall and the top 15% of women. Can't complain there.
- I fell off my bike today. I hate trolley tracks and their slickness in the rain. Ripped and bled on a pair of jeans. Took a day off from running. Sigh.
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and how!
Mar. 10th, 2009 | 04:57 pm
Oh, Don Hertzfeldt. I've been thinking a lot about this gem these days.
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who says three strikes make an out?
Mar. 3rd, 2009 | 10:41 am
You probably thought I jumped ship again. Not quite. Busy times around here with work, various social engagements, fretting over what I assume is a doomed attempt at getting into grad school, taking care of my cat, etc. About a week ago, I coordinated the first Writers House Fellows event of this year, which featured Robert Coover, an experimental-y writer who teaches up at Brown. As usual, John took some photos, including the one above, which proves that I was actually there, clipboard in hand.
Bob Coover is very much involved in a digital writing project at Brown known as "The Cave." For more, check out this video.
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i thought you should know
Feb. 6th, 2009 | 01:25 pm
I was at the Queen of Sheba in West Philly last night, just a block and a half from my house, to help celebrate the birth of my pal and former co-TA Melanie. I've been pretty sleepy this week, so I promised myself I'd only stay for an hour, tops. Two and a half hours later, this photo was taken. I was singing Alanis Morissette's "You Oughta Know" as a serenade to Mel in honor of her bday. I got pretty into it, evidently.
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that's the last person you leave open on the court
Feb. 4th, 2009 | 06:13 pm
Celtics: 100
Sixers: 99 (final)
Above are the highlights from the last 30 seconds of last night's game. After a strong start, the Celtics battled it out with the Sixers for most of the game with the Sixers being ahead for the most part in the third and fourth quarters. But, as you see above, Ray Allen tied it up with 30 seconds to go with a big three-pointer. Now would be an appropriate time for me to apologize to the young Sixer-supporting children who were sitting in the row behind us - I should never have used such language in front of you. The Sixers answered back with a jumpshot, but then with a mere 6 seconds to go, the Celtics got it back to Mr. Allen in the corner. My throat is sore today from all my obnoxious I'm-Rooting-For-The-Away-Team antics.
As for the All You Can Eat antics, here are my stats for the night: 4 hot dogs, 1 nacho tray, 1 popcorn, 2 ice creams, 2 Pepsis. Disgusting, yes. Yet, I feel fantastic today.
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all i can eat
Feb. 3rd, 2009 | 02:58 pm
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a backpack and a mandolin
Jan. 21st, 2009 | 06:40 pm
I have to say, I feel a tinge of envy when I hear about friends of mine doing crazy, awesome things like this. But, then I remember the concrete reasons I'm not quite able to embark on my own blog-worthy journey (i.e. $$$$ and young Alfie, who must be cared for) and also the not-so-concrete reasons for my remaining here, at least for the time being.
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so much depends
Jan. 4th, 2009 | 01:46 pm
I have to say, there was something problematic about this trip to the Forum Gallery though. Here I was on Fifth Avenue, in a gallery literally nestled betweeen Bergdorf Goodman's and Louis Vuitton. I overheard a man ask for a price list and was told that all the pieces went for the same five-figure amount. I was shocked at first, but then I remembered where I was. Since it was the final day of the show, many of the pieces had red dots next to them, indicating that they'd been purchased. I wondered about the kinds of homes these paintings will soon be hanging in. Why do people who can pay this much for art want dirty snowbanks and gas stations? Or, why wouldn't they? Is there an element of "slumming" here? What does Frederick himself think about all this? He keeps it somewhat real, as far as I know, still living and working in the modest town of Belfast, Maine. I suppose what is dissonant about all this for me is that this art depicts real, unmanicured scenes that we all see (no matter how much money you have, there will always be dirty snowbanks, after all), but they were being displayed in an unreal place and sold at an unreal price. It's about the question of access, about form following function, in a way. It makes me think about my own writing work, I suppose, and about myself generally. After all, I'm someone who grew up in Frederick's dirty-snow New England who is now traipsing about Fifth Avenue galleries and feeling "moved" by these rundown, working class scenes. Is there anything irresponsible about this? I'm not sure. "Dissonant," is the most accurate word I've come up with so far.
But back to the art itself. I didn't realize that William Eggleston's photographs would complement Frederick's paintings so well. (Blake was the one to urge us to check out the exhibit - otherwise, I wouldn't have known about it.) First, on a technical level, the two artists are interested in drawing out color and light in their work in order to enhance the overall focus of the piece. Frederick's paintings use light - either the haunting purples of dusk or his seemingly magical depiction of man-made light: a lamp turned on inside a house, a street light, those aforementioned tail lights. Eggleston literally altered the color in his work, being the first to experiment this way with color photography and the technique of dye transferring. His reds become redder, a brown field becomes yellowed, a kitchen sink scene is somehow practically all the same shade. But it's Eggleston's idea of democracy in photography that mostly links him to Frederick for me (you know, in addition to the fact that I happened to spend several hours yesterday looking at their work). Eggleston throught, particularly late in his career, that no scene, image, or detail was any more important than another. I imagine Linden Frederick feels the same way. After all, why paint a gorgeous rocky Maine coastline when you can instead paint a falling apart sign on the side of the road?
It was Alexander Calder that tied this all together for me, with the help of my ol' pal William Carlos Williams, who's always tumbling around in my mind. Calder's art is quite, quite different from Eggleston's and Frederick's. He worked a lot with wire sculpture and eventually, after some conversations with Mondrian, moved to large-scale mobile-like sculptures that rely momentum and gravity based on the weight of the structure itself. This lead me to Williams: "So much depends upon ..." It makes sense, after all, since what I admire in these guys is their modernist quality, their ability to make beautiful what would ordinarily be passed over. In the case of Calder, so much depends upon the weight of the ball at the end of the wire, or upon the angle at which the small ball hits the can. The art literally hinges on itself. In the case of Eggleston, so much depends upon the redness of the child's sweater or the contrast between the woman's hair and skin. And for Frederick, so much depends upon the car's tail lights on the dark dirt road or upon the light at dusk and the lamp on inside the house or upon where the snow meets the sanded road. This art also hinges on itself, in a sense.
On the bus coming home last night, a big truck crept past us and I smiled in admiration at the glow of the tail lights. This occurred to me: has Linden Fredrick done to tail lights what William Carlos Williams did to broken green glass?
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a day of ... culture?
Jan. 4th, 2009 | 10:48 am
Speaking of photos, I actually remembered to take some this time!
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over the river, through the woods, and back again
Jan. 2nd, 2009 | 07:55 pm
Well, I'm back home now. (Until tomorrow morning, when I leave for a day trip to New York. But more on that later, perhaps.) I was in New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Maine from the 23rd through the 30th, then back in Philly for various New Year's debauchery. Once again, I kind of failed in the photography department, but I did get a few shots of the various happenings. For some reason, I tend to feel like I'm interrupting/bothering people if I take my camera out at gatherings. It might have something to do with the flash. Or, I'm just overly conscious or timid about these things. Maybe my New Year's resolution should be to take more photos. Nah. So far, the only resolution I've come up with is to read more of the New Yorker every week. Oh, and to get a full fellowship with stipend to a graduate program in nonfiction writing. But that one's somewhat out of my hands.
She was known as Crafty Barbie at the summer camp where she worked in high school. Our house was full of things she’d made: crocheted plant holders, the ceramic Halloween figures she and I painted, her afghans, Christmas decorations. Of the Christmas decorations, the snow dudes were always my favorite. I don’t remember who started calling them snow dudes. Someone had given her a set one Christmas and it wasn’t long before she took them apart to see how they were made. The torso was a coffee can wrapped in cotton batting. Their heads were formed on top of the coffee can by shaping the batting and filling it with fluffy stuffing. Their arms, hats, and scarves were also cut out of the batting. Either red or green ribbon lined the hat, scarf, and the muffler (the female snow dudes, or snow dudettes, had mufflers). Their eyes were cut out of black felt, their mouths, noses, and buttons out of red felt. The final touch was a dab of my mother’s blush to make their cheeks rosy.
One year, everyone was getting snow dudes for Christmas. Our living room had become a factory. Batting, felt, and stuffing were everywhere. We’d been saving coffee cans for months. I’d come home from school and my mother would be sitting Indian-style on the floor gluing eyes onto a newly made set. The finished sets were sitting in pairs in various parts of the house. “You talk to them when no one’s home, don’t you?” I chided her.
She smirked. “They’re my new friends,” she said. We laughed. I went into the kitchen to get a snack. She followed and we talked about when we’d next go Christmas shopping. A little while later, I picked up my backpack and headed to my bedroom. I stopped when I saw what had happened in the living room. I gasped.
“Mom,” I said. “There’s been a massacre."
“Huh?” She came into the living room and stopped behind me. She put her hands over her mouth. Our eyes were probably equally as wide. Tisha was vigorously shaking what was left of the newest snow dude in her mouth. She paid no attention to us as she positioned him between her paws and tore the cotton off the coffee can and continued to shake her head furiously back and forth. My mother had left her newest snow dude on the floor.
She couldn’t salvage that one, but the others survived. At Christmas every year, snow dudes are displayed in almost all of my relatives’ living rooms. Most of them have a set, a male and a female. We have a pair lined with green ribbon. We also have the stockings she knit us one year and the Christmas tree wall hangings she crocheted.
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jingle pup, jingle pup, jingle all the way
Dec. 23rd, 2008 | 11:48 am

I bought John a Jingle Pup from CVS for Christmas. Alfie was quite a fan. So much, in fact, that he took Jingle Pup hostage the other day. Luckily, I was able to negotiate a deal. I got Jingle Pup, Alfie gets to vacation at my pal Michelle's house for a week while I go to NH for the holly-days. But Alfie's tryst with the Jingle Pup has been documented, luckily.
Off to NH with Aaron (!) tonight. I'm there, with many fam-filled moments, through next Tuesday, the 30th. I hope to see many of you -- that is, if you've unburied yourselves from the snow/ice/crud.







