Meanwhile, very close to home, uh, in the cellar...

All sorts of prep underway for next week's big celebrate-the-2007-wine-with -James-Guido's-Puttanesca-BASH. B & I bottled a couple of cases of each on Thursday.

Fatten the calves, baby, we're gonna have a time.
A few images: the main party image, the Barbera label, and the Sangiovese label.

(Jimeney Pricket: We have a seat reserved from you, SF<==>NY. Want to use it?)

U Utah Phillips

If ever there was a man who stood up and said something, loud and clear and from the heart, it was Utah Phillips.

friday friskiness...

oh, to be sure, one should have a Monkey Room in one's own humble chateau...

more on le Chateau de Chantilly, wee bit more about the Grande Singerie here

reason # 4,687...

to feel a very particular kind of hopelessness:
the recent shenanigans of this insipid fool...


all me can say is "let ME chest bump that dullard..."

me am borink today...

actually,
me been borink for weeks, mebbe months...

now me depressed...

well,
maybe this cheer you up too...

Reggie Watts, Dear Diary 080527, toy theater, rye, & cetera

Reggie Watts is at Joe's Pub on Thursday. Ooohhh, I wanna, but I canna no. Dang.

But, we been seeing the Toy Theater Festival at St. Ann's - and we have passes this year. Can't possibly get enough.

Hey, that comment I left on Joe Pye's post and I said I'd been spoofed on the steampunk NY<==>London telescope - turns out that the same afternoon I diddn't fine it, Lori's occasional colleague, let's call her Valentina, was at the NY end and has photos through the tube of a friend at the London end. So says Lota. But here's the rub: Lota's been telling me about Valentina for years - she's sometimes in NY, sometimes Paris, sometimes the Congo, always having adventures - but I've never met her. Never met her. I've often asked if she's imaginary. So, I don't know.

I read Reggie Nadelson's Red Hook, good Brookly detectivy thing, but I find Ms. Nadelson's sight so annoying I am hesitant to link - oh , screw, here it is, maybe you can figure out how to kill the music. The book is good BKLYN roosky latino cop black journalist real estate red scare screw the republican convention in NY fun.

And now am reading Tom Standage's A history of the world in 6 glasses. My kind of almost history. Am through the beer and wine sections and about to start the spirits section, which I've toasted with some fine Russell's reserve rye, from LeNell's in - dare I say - Red Hook. I love LeNell's. How could one not?

happy happy happy birfdey...

to Andrew A. & his gmtPlus9 (-15) for NINE years of providing quality linky goodness!

personal Hiya Hiya to the MNIDOAILY folks out dere on the other coast, wishin' ye all a very fine three day weekend!

Mais ou sont les neiges d'antan?

DK sends this link to photos of Mt. Washington by Brad Washburn with the note, A long time ago and a far way place was a two ride hitch hike to. And it was, it was. We saw it with our own eyes.

Dante Oblimov responds to Andy Borowitz's "Hillary: Votes of imaginary friends must be counted"

Just a quick note from Dante to Andy Borowitz:

Andy, just read your Hillary: votes of imaginary friends must be counted.  While it is, I know, well meant, it's very hurtful to we imaginary people.  Let me tell you, as one who really knows: Hillary is only imagining she has imaginary friends.  I know the imaginary people, and I can tell you, they are firmly behind Bam Bam.  They hate Slash.  She scares us.  (Most real people with messianic delusions scare us.)  Not even the Mermaid Slaves, who had at first great hopes that Hillary might help free them, want anything to do with her any more.  In fact, the Mermaid Slaves have quietly started a new campaign in which they hope to interest many of the imaginary people of New York in:  .  They intend to put these little stickers on as many of the NYTimes copies sold in NYC Starbucks as possible.  

Mit Milch, Dante.

Stickers here.

Hot knives! Pirogi!

Couldn't spend much time at the 5th Ave fair yesterday - aside from the Atlantic Antic our fave in the home borough. Two highlights were Chris Doogan's linocuts (I think Lota may still be on the hook for his print of the pirogi making ladies), and of course the Watch Your Back NYC image guy,  A few years back we sent their Ike says relax to JumP (or maybe we bought it a few years ago and sent it last year, or maybe we still haven't sent it at all and that's what's in the box downstairs that has jp's name on it).  This year his Hot Knives came home with us (as did a pretty good story of love & loss & how the T-shirt came to be).

FYI, I didn't know: Urban Dictionary hot knives.

Dear Diary, 080518

It all comes slowly together.

First, that frightening fiend Milady Clarick is dead.  I feel good about that.  I don't know how I feel about D'Artagnan's later friendship with Rochefort (epilogue), but, whatever, I'll get over it.  I wasn't quite over Dumas, though, so I downloaded one of his true-crime pieces, his biographical sketch of Karl Ludwig Sand who murdered August von Kotzebue, about whom and which I previously knew absolutely nothing, and expect to forget everything in a year or so.

Sand / Kotzebue / murder / revolution isn't so relaxing, so I went looking for further diversion.  Lori reminded me that alternate side of the street parking is going to be suspended in Park Slope for a few months.  Neither the Times articles (& the 2nd article) and the DOT site say anything about why the amazing boon of a neighborhood-wide multi-month suspension is happening rather than simply a block-by-block changeover to the new rules.  Printing new signs?  Ahem.  Have I mentioned before that I live on the same block as my City Councilman here in Park Slope CB6, who would like to be the next Borough President of Brooklyn ?  Why, Bill had an open-house meet & greet just this weekend...

One of the NT articles reminded me of Calvin Trillin and Tepper Isn't Going Out, which I kindled last night.  Now I'm happy.  I love the way he takes the piss out of that nut who used to be the il Duce of NY, Amerika's mayor, and thought he'd be the Republican nominee for president this year.

But wait, here's where it all comes together:  

Chapter 4, in which Tepper is parked across the street from Russ & Daughters, and the discussion turns to whitefish, a nice whitefish, just like the whole smoked whitefish I bought there last week and took to my Bro's for Mothers' Day brunch.  It was delicious. 

Write Your A** Off (Part 2)

Today I participated in the 2008 Write-a-Thon, a day devoted to writing (by the seat of your pants) to raise money for the New York Writers Coalition. The event was held in a most lovely and interesting space -- the library and classrooms of the The General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen, a charitable organization founded in 1785 to provide cultural, educational, and social services to families of skilled craftsmen.

I knew if I went wandering early in the day I would never get to my writing -- there were too many cool things to look at: old prints and artifacts that lined the main staircase, a collection of various antique locks on the balcony. So I spent the morning writing a poem about yesterday's lunch:

Friday Lunch

That was the best lunch ever.
Five of us, wedged tight in the corner
beneath a wall of wine bottles,
one of them open on our table.

Tapas! Patatas bravas,
tasty tidbits of things we'd never eat alone.
Lamb tongue and ramps!
"Oh, go on and try it -- it's good.
You just need to pretend
you don't know what it is."

Outside the pane glass:
Spring-soaked Irving Place,
swarming with ghosts.
Inside, the same sweet song
of food and friends
that we've sung for a hundred years.

Shared stories of mother, of son,
of a girl once dated.
Stories about work and the weekend to come.
Then coffee and dessert.

Check paid, cigarettes smoked
under the awning while debating
whether to walk or cab it.
A decision, a parting,
the lingering comfort of
Rioja and the rain.

********************

At today's lunch, Colson Whitehead gave a talk about writing and being a writer. Basically he said he went into writing because he was too lazy to get a real job and wanted to stay home and avoid people and drink beer and smoke cigarettes. All the same reasons I wish *I* were a writer! He was great! And very funny and sincere, I think, in his advise to us.

Later in the afternoon, I took a writing workshop where I composed the beginnings of what I might try to turn into two short stories. There were only two of us in the workshop and my classmate wrote and read a snippet that I hope she will shape into a more expanded story. Jeanne writes a food blog, which was perfectly serendipitous given that I spent the morning writing about yesterday's lunch.

JuJu Pongo for President!

ai yi yi !
dat be frightening, no?

truly, yea and verily...

now because we here at MNIDOAILY are all about things O -
here be interview by Jeffrey Goldberg with the esteemed senator from Illinois, courtesy The Atlantic Online.

Not a plug, more of a salute to someone who is kinda blogger pal of ourowndarnedself, someone also out there on the other coast, Kevin Murphy, who has been plugging along at Ghost in the Machine for as long as mine own bloggin' memory goes back. Hie thyselves there and increase thine awareness...

Suck on it, Clintstones

The last paragraph of this Fake Steve post is why, even if you don't care a bit about technology, you might want to be visiting his blog often. Brings a tear to the eye.

Willa Cather

Scout Report notes the Willa Cather archive today. Death Comes for the Archbishop stands out in my dimming memory as a book that was important to me. (If I could only remember why... damn. I'll have to read it again.)

Full text of DCFTAb, written 78 years ago, is on line in Austria. Willa Cather died 61 years ago. You will go blind, become sterile, and be an enemy of the state if you were to read the book at this not-in-America site while sitting at a computer in these United States. So don't. Ever. Because someone is still squeezing blood from that stone. Mickey will find you.

the mysterious Big O...

and we all know you wanna know more 'bout dat, eh Binky?

credit for the heads up on that bit of linky goodness goes to the fine minds over at Boing Boing where MUCH linky goodness abounds...

Chapter LIV, Third Day of Captivity

LIV: All right, it's been a lark up until now and I've been enjoying the heck out of it all the way, but there is something about this Felton that strikes me as familiar and I will be so friggin pissed, really revolted, if Milady Clarick destroys him. Stop her!

warm here on the left coast today...

and we speaking specifically 'bout the Northern Califa part of the left coast where we're expecting it to get much warmer tomorrow...

a nod of our increasingly salt&peppery shaggy head in the direction of Esteban's mention of E. Morris, as we came across this very interesting interview via those clusterflockers we made mention of last time around. Be sure to visit the source site, as Seed Magazine is mighty good brain food.

some linky goodness out of the pages of the local fishwrap, one noting the passing of local literary lion, Oakley Hall along with very affectionate tribute courtesy Leah Garchik; here's something about a beverage most of us consider an important part of our day, mornings in particular, Roast With The Most.

Alright, basta basta, datz enuf, we can feel your attention spans shortening muy pronto quickly. One last item, via Political Irony, something about that despicable waste of space in the white house, and jessferdahalibut, inspired by my bottomless pit of dislike for this shitehead, some fun to have with his visage provided here...

Standard operating procedure

We were at NYPL last evening for the discussion with Errol Morris and Philip Gourevitch of their film & book about Abu Ghraib, Standard Operating Procedure. It was moderated by Carne Ross (founder of Independent Diplomat). The take-away question was, Why have the soldiers who were led to do what they did (and didn't) been punished, but not the leaders who have led them to do it and who have established torture and humiliation as standard American operating procedure? Well, it wasn't really a fun evening, but it was quite something.

We had arrived a bit early and found seats near the front, settled in, and I noticed that the seat next to us was reserved for Jon Kalish. (Here and here.) I've heard Jon on the radio now and then over the years, and once knew him, but had not seen him or spoken to him for maybe 34 or 35 years. Lo and behold, he got there, he was still him, and we had a nice chat.

Dear Diary 080510 (BKLYN)

Carrie Rodriguez at Freddy's this evening at 9 PM. We've seen CR a few times over the last few years but, gee, never at one of our favorite no cover dives! Freddy's is one of those vortexes like out at Sedona. When (if) Ratner tears it down the Earth will go off it's axis and we'll all be phukt. But Bruce will have gotten his money.

Were at the Brooklyn Design show earlier today - and it's still going on tomorrow - and saw our friends Palo Samko and Nancy Nicholson We have a book case, armoire and bench from Palo, and a beautiful stained glass urban landscape in our window from Nancy. We be lucky.

fun stuff on friday...

well, a bit of fun at least, with a touch of something with a bit more, uhhhh...
gravitas - ?

first up, from the wonder that is Bifurcated Rivets (along with a sidelong glance in the direction of El Stumperino) we present to thee Jazz Ukes. Be sure to enjoy a lengthy perusal of all the offerings there at B.R., there is Much Linky Goodness.

yestidday, ourowndarnedself was walking around all morning with Bobby D's Ballad of a Thin Man as constant interior musical accompaniment, so whilst enjoying some moments of quietude here at the j - o - b, we cast out some lines into the murky ether and hauled back in a couple of yummy things to pass along, firstly The Hype Machine where we found an Elliot Smith cover of Bobby's tune, and that happy accident led us to link for site where much more wonderful musical linky-ness resides, Ryan's Smashing Life. Good Stuff, Maynard!

okay now, from Esquire online, the Cynic and Senator Obama;

alright you other coasters, we here on the left one salute ye and wish you a marvelous weekend!

Peter Stampfel @ Jalopy

Met four of my professional peers at an uptown rooftop bar early last evening and as we were leaving asked if they wanted to come to Brooklyn to see Peter Stampfel. This was decidedly not a Peter Stampfel crowd (I described who PS is) or place and two of the five are deep Jersey and one a northern Westchester, so I was sure of them not saying yes. Then something happened, I don't know what, and the three outlanders and I were in a cab and we got to Jalopy just as PS and friends were tuning up. And now there are three more people in the world whose lives are simultaneously more meaningful and absurd.

The thing I like most about this blog (so far)

are the Labels!

Supertouch...

Just been in touch w/ Cuz K who is in London headed either to Paris or Chile - plans are loose and coming looser - and who says, for a glimpse of some fun, check out http://www.supertouchart.com/. S'yeah.

it just shouldn't be so painfully obvious...

but as our esteemed partner/s in crime here contend, Ms. Clinton should drop out of the race pronto quickly (in our own not so humble opinion she ought to have done so months ago). The difficulties that lie ahead for any new administration (let alone a democratic one --- yah, and who can really tell the difference between these political wildebeasts these days anyway...) to rectify some of the damage done over the last 8 years are monumental enough as it is. Many voices are offering up the opinion that it be time for H.C. to move along, we hope she takes heed.

linky bit that seconds that emotion from clusterflock, hillary is 404.

Levitate Hillary Now!

Fake Steve says Slash bows out tomorrow. I'm old enough to remember that the Pentagon did not really levitate, so I'm not sure. But if we all start chanting...

The first Star Wars movie I've ever really liked

Other people have already seen this three quarter of a million times. But maybe you're as close to the back of the curve as me:

Press: complete the vision

Dante at the front of the room, half behind, half beside the podium. One hand in his jacket pocket, smiling.

The press corp, relaxed.

[Dante]

I have time for one more, folks. Yes, Reticent Will of Sherry Art Lall?

[Reticent Will of Sherry Art Lall]

Mr. Oblimov, what about this issue of not being a real person? Don't Vice Presidents need to be real people?

[Dante]

You're asking me about Vice President Cheney, Reticent?

Laughter throughout the room.

[Dante]

Reticent, the Poop lady couldn't couldn't rattle Senator Bam Bam, and the realists won't rattle me. I'm here to complete the vision. Now folks, if you'll excuse me...

Mike Daisey - how the theater failed America

Do you all know this guy, Mike Daisey?  I don't.  But I just listened to the opening of his monologue How the theater failed America, and I think I want to go see him @ Joe's Pub.  May 11, 7 PM.

Does Slash really have three?

Following on the statement of James Carville noted by Ms. Dowd in her May 4 column (if Hillary gave Obama one of her vehicles of testicular fortitude, “they’d both have two.”), I contacted the folks at fold US candidate to see if they had any interest in making an anatomically correct / politically incorrect puppet of Slash.  No word back yet.  We have the necessary craft skills, should they be needed.

Apologies to the authors

(And why hasn't BAMBAM posted yet?)

Alexandre Dumas' face

Eco is killing me, as I continue to read the books he's speaking about in his Six Walks. But it's great fun. A semester's schooling for the cost of some paperbacks and downloads.   And without the school, which is a giant plus for me.  So now I've jumped into Dumas' The Three Musketeers.

The copy of the Musketeers I picked up is the Penguin edition, translated by Richard Pevear and with cartoons on the cover by Tom Gauld. Gauld's has a caricature of Dumas on the back cover, from a photo of Dumas the taking of which Gauld draws & writes about on the back inside flap of the book. I looked at that drawing and I realized, I saw a print of this photo two weeks ago! It was at the AIPAD show. And I remember that when I saw the photo at the show I said to myself, That is one funny looking dude!

Wine... and the stars align!

NR and I went out to a lovely wine bar last night, "Wined Up," which is the upstairs of "Punch." (Sorry, I can't seem to link to Wined Up directly, but there's a link on the Punch site's navigation.) It's been a couple of weeks since I've chatted with Nancy, and I was catching her up on things going on in my life, the most exciting and interesting of which is that I recently tracked down some friends of mine that I had fallen out of touch with over fifteen years ago, my friends Paul-Jacques and Anita.

I met Paul-Jacques back in college when he came from Paris to study at Hunter College. Anita, his girlfriend, followed him over and they lived with me (on and off) for the duration of the couple's stay in NYC. For the next decade we stayed in close contact and visited each other often. I have the most amazing stash of memories from my visits to France (a birthday party for PJ in Les Tuileries, a trip to see Anita's grand-maman in the Loire Valley). I stopped through Paris to see them on my way to meet my husband at his Tuscan home the summer I was married (this photo was taken by Anita while we were waiting for my train to Florence. Paul-Jacques is wearing the Edie and Andy shirt I bought him in New York), and they drove under the Alps to visit me at Casa Rotelli two summers later. At some point they relocated to Montreal and that is where I last saw them. My son was a toddler and Anita was pregnant with her first. After they had a second son, they returned to France -- this time settling in Marseille -- and that is when I lost track of them.

Last month, I finally found Anita through Google and over the last two weeks have been corresponding with her and Paul-Jacques (they are not married anymore) and planning to visit Paris at the end of June. I am SO HAPPY that I've found my friends again! In his most recent email to me, Paul Jacques mentioned that he would be coming to NYC in August and would like to visit with me and also Joshua Hakimi, another one of our Hunter classmates and a dear friend of Paul-Jacques. I hadn't thought about Josh at all since college. He had gone to live in Prague right after school and we were never as close to each other as each of us was to Paul Jacques. In my response to PJ's letter I asked about Josh -- where is he now, what is he doing?

I sent that note on Wednesday night. My question was answered last night when the Wine Director for Punch/Wined Up came over to ask us if we wanted help selecting a wine. It was Joshua Hakimi!

hallo me leeetle preeteeze....

ya know, Esteban mentioned 'em in his first post hereabouts, and if we don't see the Mermaid Slaves, Stumpy D., Hellcat Maggie and the rest of that olde crowde, we gonna be missink 'em bigtime...
so,
we gonna get to know one another and be really good pals, eh?
you betcha!
here be a handful of linky bits just chock fulla chewy nougats of hyperlinky goodness to share with thee...
the clusterflockers;
the coolhunter;
appears to be on hiatus at the moment, but ye ought to familiarize yourowndarnedself with the futility closet;
what we are all (well, most of us anyway) yearning for,
more intelligent life;
lastly, but not leastly, good magazine;
and nice to meet ya, too...

YIPES!!!
almos' forgot to mention (this be Left Coast News Alert) -
the Maker Faire's in San Mateo this weekend,
and more about that here

laura splan lauras plan

Laura Splan.  Some fun (Vigilant), some creepy (Underneath), some titillating (Trepidation).  Via Rhizome, where smart things are said at greater length.

Hair

A friend invited me last evening to a cooking demonstration at De Gustibus by Fabio Trabocchi of Fiama. (This is the rich pig version of me that demographically loves BAMBAM, though clearly my roots are in the Old John / Slash Clinton soil). It was great. Fabio, Fabio, Fabio... Seriously, it was a really nice experience and something I'd like to do again. But that's not what I'm posting about.

We were a party of five, and two of the guys I haven't seen in a dogs age. One a little younger than me, one a little older, but all of us what Juju Pongo used to call silverbacks.

I noticed right away that both of them had hair longer than I ever remember their hair being before. Me, on the other hand, my hair used to be a joke amongst my co-workers (mad scientist - that sort of thing) but for years I've been cutting it short: I really don't like having to comb or brush it. Or dry it. Or think about it much. I do really love hair (here, Baby, there Mama, everywhere Daddy Daddy), but it's become something I admire on others and would rather keep out of the house.

Anyway, one of the guys says: What happened to your hair?
And I just didn't know what to say.

hello... testing 1 2 3, can anybody hear me?

hiya!

leftcoaster jp here at the invite of the fine mind behind MNIDOAILY, El Stumperino Stupendo! Oy! and it very nice to see MellieMel here too, HI MEL!

okay, my contribution here and now will be brief, somewhat of an introduction, in a roundabout way, by defining (somewhat) location of leftcoaster jp physically and (in a way) metaphysically:

Berkeley, California: A City of Firsts

Our problem father, RIP Albert Hofmann

Don't know how I missed it.  Thank you Willy Wac for pointing out:

• Blogrunner: reactions from around the world
  
• NYT Jan 2006: Nearly 100, LSD's father ponders his 'problem child'