Well! It's a treat to return here and read entries long forgotten, vivid pictures I now mostly remember as sketches. This could be healthier and more fulfilling than the online channels that have emerged since 2009. Paragraphs feel fuller, more vulnerable, more open, and better written than my writing on Twitter, which I joined right at the start ( Read more... )

Sita Sings The Blues: at the Siskel this week and streaming here:
http://sitasingstheblues.com/

The Dark Side or Nixonland for non-fiction
Lush Life or The Lazarus Project for fiction
No Prize, Ruined, or Reasons to be Pretty for drama
Wathing The Spring Festival or Colosseum for poetry
Frank Rich for opinion
Terry Teachout for criticism

Most everyone I know and remember well is on Facebook now, from my elementary-school best friend to a new singing partner, so much so that the exceptions really are exceptions ( Read more... )

1. 16 years old, summer between junior and senior years of high school. My friend Atom suggested we get rush tickets to a Wednesday matinee at the Guthrie, in Minneapolis. Beautiful summer day. Besides a grid of twisted metal hanging above the stage, what I remember most about this production was how the second act, the one in which ( Read more... )

When I was 20, I lived in Seattle, renting a studio apartment on Capitol Hill and working an office job. I was 2,000 miles from my hometown, and so that year spent Thanksgiving there instead of with my family. My friend Renee and her boyfriend were house-sitting at her boss's house, a funky place with a piano, and eight or so of us spent the full ( Read more... )

Five years ago, December 2003, back when the dollar was still strong, Binny's had a crazy two-day Champagne sale right before New Years' Eve. I bought a '93 Veuve Clicquot La Grande Dame for a song, stowed it away through a few moves and a few summers, and was never sure when to open it. Thought it might be good for an engagement, or a wedding, ( Read more... )

Men's room graffiti re Vampire Weekend:


( Read more... )

The baristas at my neighborhood coffeehouse, until today, have always played the same mix CD when I'm here: some mix of Jason Mraz, Melissa Ferrick, and others. Today, though, instead they're playing the three same Blue Joni Mitchell songs over and over and over and over: "All I Want", "A Case of You", and "Carey". If they're going to limit ( Read more... )

Best of both worlds: on one hand, in rehearsal with two actors, no stage management, conversation and then read-through and then conversation and then read-through, all good, and at the same time on a real stage instead of in an apartment or borrowed office.

The short play I'm directing alludes to the Cronulla Riots of December 2005. Who knew ( Read more... )