It happens that, right at the time I’m visiting San Francisco, the Berkeley Art Museum is hosting the first major exhibition in fifty years on the work of mockduck favorite Kurt Schwitters— master collagist, all-around loon. Belying his tendency to dress like a banker, Schwitters was one of the great eccentrics of the early modernist [...]

We were back in Czech this past week (yep: already) for reasons that are more complex than interesting to relate: basically, I had been under the impression that my proposal for the Jewish Museum identity was due then, so we also made plans to visit my wife’s father in Karlovy Vary, hang out in Prague [...]

Speaking of Congolese mambo… here’s Matthew Wilder! A few comments on this: 00:01-00:17: Mystifying disparity between the number of people on stage doing things versus the overall quietness of sound. There seem to be 95 people dancing, playing various keytars and instruments and pumping out Matthew Wilder’s unique blend of white reggae… and yet I [...]

My friend, it turns out, has three or four manuscripts of his own unpublished fiction kicking around. Now, I know this sounds boring… but before you head over to What I Had For Breakfast, consider the following: One of the manuscripts is titled Vomiting Across America and is based on personal experience A second is [...]

A running diary of the Hooters’ contemptible ‘And We Danced’ video: [Note: if you're looking this and trying to decide whether or not you want to read on, I suggest scrolling down and clicking on the second video clip-- it's the best part.] 00:07-00:14: Opening scenes. A hazy vision of rural, 1950s heartland America, a [...]

Last Thursday I went to see the Norwegian singer-songwriter Hanne Hukkelberg play. I’d never heard of her before Wednesday, but she was recommended by someone, so I took a listen to her Bjorkian dirging on youtube and decided it was worth a go. She sounds a little bit like – to paraphrase my favorite throwaway [...]

My favorite opening sentence of any novel is easily the first line of Dashiell Hammet’s Red Harvest– nothing else really comes close: I first heard Personville called Poisonville by a red-haired mucker named Hickey Dewey in the Big Ship in Butte. I mention this only because each way I consider starting this post, it starts [...]

Around the corner from the studio where I work, there’s a nondescript pizza/pasta place where I go sometimes to pick up take-away food for lunch. The owner, an nice Albanian guy, used to make valiant attempts to engage me in conversation while I waited for my food, but we had nothing in common other than [...]

Yesterday, I went to Brno to take part in the opening of the Brno Bienale, a design exhibition in which the CTP book I spent all last summer and fall working on is being displayed. (Note: there are literally hundreds of works being displayed there, so it’s not like this is any great distinction.) Here’s [...]

A year or so ago, I was having dinner with a few friends, and one of them brought his new girlfriend, a 22-year old professional surfer. This gave me the opportunity to learn about “what’s new with the kids these days.” Being a semi-semi celebrity, this surfer seemed to hang out with other C-listers, and [...]