I got some great news Friday night in an email.
Whistler in the Dark, as part of their Whistler Wednesdays stage readings, accepted Red Dog for a staged reading, scheduled for March 3, 2010.
I'm so excited (and honored) to have my play accepted by a group who is giving new voice to theater in Boston.
Stay tuned.
Monday, August 3, 2009
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Ah, the blogsphere
Ah, the blogsphere.
I used to write on this blog sometimes five and six times a day. I was steeped in the digital world, but more so, I was sitting in a cubicle bored to tears most of the time with thoughts and ideas and impressions rattling around in my head and this space was the best outlet for them.
But more and more I'm just living life right here in the "real" world. Not that I'm still not fascinated by the digital space. I still am, probably more than I've ever been. It is my little window to the world. I'm still unemployed, and while for some crazy reason I'm really not worried--how can you worry about something that is so far out of your control, like this financial crisis, as the Europeans so eloquently call it? It's like worrying about the weather. So, while I keep myself so busy sometimes it's almost laughable. I'm out of work yet there still aren't enough hours in the day for me to get everything done, from looking for work to taking care of the apartment and the meals to writing and continuing to just improve myself as a human being. Yes, that last one takes up a lot of time and energy. (That's a joke, son.)
And sometimes I feel a little guilty that I don't write here more. I know there are followers; some people subscribe, some people lurk, and others drop by occasionally to see what's up in my life--idle curiosity, perhaps, but it's nice that people are thinking of me. Just as I think of people in the periphery of my life.
It's not an excuse for not writing here, but I'm busy trying to figure out what to do with my life, how to do the things I want to do, how Sue and I can live our lives the way we want to. There are classes I'm considering including more acting classes and writing classes and auditions. Thursday I have a job interview for contract work that I have to prepare for, which would be great if I could land it because it would be the kind of work I used to do before I quit freelancing and went back to the agency. I loved the freelance life, the freedom, the stimulus from meeting new and interesting people, and learning about new subject matter and details for things I already know about.
Red Dog is out in a few hands now, hopefully being read and not just taking up space on a hard drive somewhere. It's at a few theaters for consideration for readings, and I'm hard at work on another play now that deals with all my favorite themes: abandonment, trust, family. That's all I'm going to say right now, because you don't want to show something to the world when it's still in such a formative state. The air seems to shrivel things. But I'm just as excited about this play as I was about Red Dog. I love the pure joy of simply writing.
And right now I have four pieces of chicken marinading in the 'fridge that I'll cook on the grill later and put back in the 'fridge for a meal later of cold chicken and salad when Sue gets home. I tell you, when she walks through the door, my heart just sings, and I love seeing the look on her face, too, when she sees me. I say I'm lucky, and she says she's lucky.
I try to keep things open. For the longest time I had my Facebook page closed up only to friends. But then it occurred to me that one of the things I like so much about the digital world is the idea of its openness. Again, that shared experience that we all have, whether we want to admit it or not. Being closed is not the way to go in the new world, and so I opened my page up to the world, and have had some good results. I've "met" new people, musicians and artists and actors and others in my field and though we've never met face-to-face we've shared ideas and personally, I've learned and grown from them.
But openness can be a bit creepy, too. There are those who will always abuse anything. I have a lurker on this blog, someone in Australia, and all the signs of a creep are there. He hits the blog pretty regularly, and he seems to be searching for anything relating to Sue. For a while he'd keep going back to pictures I posted of her and used the keyword, lanka, as in sri lanka where Sue lived for awhile. It was weird to see the connections. I removed the pictures, and it seemed when he realized they were missing he immediately used the keyword "sex" to look for things on my blog, which I thought was a rather poignant, primal, word association. Now he sits on the blog for a good hour, pouring over the posts date by date. Anyway, this is the dark side of the Internet, and just like all new things in the world, we have to adjust and learn, which is the one thing I love doing.
As I started with this post, ah, the blogsphere.
I used to write on this blog sometimes five and six times a day. I was steeped in the digital world, but more so, I was sitting in a cubicle bored to tears most of the time with thoughts and ideas and impressions rattling around in my head and this space was the best outlet for them.
But more and more I'm just living life right here in the "real" world. Not that I'm still not fascinated by the digital space. I still am, probably more than I've ever been. It is my little window to the world. I'm still unemployed, and while for some crazy reason I'm really not worried--how can you worry about something that is so far out of your control, like this financial crisis, as the Europeans so eloquently call it? It's like worrying about the weather. So, while I keep myself so busy sometimes it's almost laughable. I'm out of work yet there still aren't enough hours in the day for me to get everything done, from looking for work to taking care of the apartment and the meals to writing and continuing to just improve myself as a human being. Yes, that last one takes up a lot of time and energy. (That's a joke, son.)
And sometimes I feel a little guilty that I don't write here more. I know there are followers; some people subscribe, some people lurk, and others drop by occasionally to see what's up in my life--idle curiosity, perhaps, but it's nice that people are thinking of me. Just as I think of people in the periphery of my life.
It's not an excuse for not writing here, but I'm busy trying to figure out what to do with my life, how to do the things I want to do, how Sue and I can live our lives the way we want to. There are classes I'm considering including more acting classes and writing classes and auditions. Thursday I have a job interview for contract work that I have to prepare for, which would be great if I could land it because it would be the kind of work I used to do before I quit freelancing and went back to the agency. I loved the freelance life, the freedom, the stimulus from meeting new and interesting people, and learning about new subject matter and details for things I already know about.
Red Dog is out in a few hands now, hopefully being read and not just taking up space on a hard drive somewhere. It's at a few theaters for consideration for readings, and I'm hard at work on another play now that deals with all my favorite themes: abandonment, trust, family. That's all I'm going to say right now, because you don't want to show something to the world when it's still in such a formative state. The air seems to shrivel things. But I'm just as excited about this play as I was about Red Dog. I love the pure joy of simply writing.
And right now I have four pieces of chicken marinading in the 'fridge that I'll cook on the grill later and put back in the 'fridge for a meal later of cold chicken and salad when Sue gets home. I tell you, when she walks through the door, my heart just sings, and I love seeing the look on her face, too, when she sees me. I say I'm lucky, and she says she's lucky.
I try to keep things open. For the longest time I had my Facebook page closed up only to friends. But then it occurred to me that one of the things I like so much about the digital world is the idea of its openness. Again, that shared experience that we all have, whether we want to admit it or not. Being closed is not the way to go in the new world, and so I opened my page up to the world, and have had some good results. I've "met" new people, musicians and artists and actors and others in my field and though we've never met face-to-face we've shared ideas and personally, I've learned and grown from them.
But openness can be a bit creepy, too. There are those who will always abuse anything. I have a lurker on this blog, someone in Australia, and all the signs of a creep are there. He hits the blog pretty regularly, and he seems to be searching for anything relating to Sue. For a while he'd keep going back to pictures I posted of her and used the keyword, lanka, as in sri lanka where Sue lived for awhile. It was weird to see the connections. I removed the pictures, and it seemed when he realized they were missing he immediately used the keyword "sex" to look for things on my blog, which I thought was a rather poignant, primal, word association. Now he sits on the blog for a good hour, pouring over the posts date by date. Anyway, this is the dark side of the Internet, and just like all new things in the world, we have to adjust and learn, which is the one thing I love doing.
As I started with this post, ah, the blogsphere.
Monday, July 20, 2009
Time Bandits play at benefit for Parkinson's Disease at Marlboro Fish and Game
Yesterday, just off Rte. 495 North, heading west on Rte. 20, through three sets of lights and a right onto Boundary Street, and after a scant 50 yards turning right onto Elm Street before going a quarter-mile onto Muddy Lane, a good thing was happening in the world. Good people go together for good times and music and food to raise as much money as they could to fight Parkinson’s Disease. It was at the Fish and Game Club in Marlborough, Massachusetts, a place not many people frequent. It's a small club made up of people who are not members of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Boston Symphony, or Club Passim. They enjoy hunting and fishing and family. The lead singer of the band, Time Bandits, a group of friends who play '60's and '70's covers, organized the benefit because one of her parents has Parkinson's. So Time Bandits got a gig (it was their first or second, depending on how you look at things) and it was a beautiful summer Saturday and I wish I could have spent more than the hour and a half that I did spend there because it truly was fun: Fun to see the band up and going, fun to see people enjoying themselves in a very simple way with food on the grill including pulled pork made by the lead singer, and kids having fun, particularly one who's father is the drummer in the band and it must be amazing to see his father playing, and it's even more tender to see the unadulterated love the little boy has for his father, and to see my friend, Joan, wowed by her husband (he's in a real band, she confided to me) who she hadn't seen play yet. Sometimes the world is pretty simple, and when it is, I love it.
Check it out.
Friday, July 17, 2009
Growing up, and the importance of not owning a Blackberry
My father used to tell me to stay in school so I didn’t have to do what he did for a living. He was blue collar, and unloaded trucks for his whole life. He came home dirty and tired every day, and never made more than $10,000 a year. Ten thousand a year was squat even back then when a loaf of bread cost a quarter. So, I went to school and worked in offices most of my life, and didn’t come home dirty and tired like he did. And he would have said I did all right for myself.
And now I tell my kids the same thing my old man told me. Go to school so you don’t have to do what I do. Or more, what I did. I always had good jobs, until recently anyway when this depression has pulled the rug out of every one in five worker. (Those are my numbers and I don’t have any proof of them other than I what I can discern from the media.) But I worked for a lot of companies that I really didn’t like, didn’t like a lot of the people or what the company stood for even though my father would have thought they were pretty cushy jobs.
All this comes to mind as I talk to my two daughters about their summer jobs, and about money. One daughter loves her job, but doesn’t make any money. The other one hates her job, but makes good money. Sounds like the plot of a fairy tale, doesn’t it? And the one who doesn’t make any money decided to buy a Blackberry and be an adult and wants to start paying bills, and the other one texted me the other day to say she now understands why I hated sitting in cubicles all my life.
I said to the one who bought the Blackberry that paying bills isn’t all what it’s cut out to be. That what most “adults” do is simply work to pay bills. All that hard work goes to taking money in one hand and handing it off to someone else with the other. And the more money you make the more you buy (or in the recent past—charged) and you got into a terrible millstream of simply working to keep your head above the water. I told the one working in the cubicle I guess it was best she learned that lesson for herself, as much as I hate knowing she has to learn that lesson.
I wish I could simply put my two kids on a path that I felt was best for them, but we can’t live other’s lives for them, even our kids. The point on this path both my kids are on is pretty standard for white middle-class kids raised in the suburbs. They start out pretty much buying into the status quo--or what used to pass for the status quo. I’m afraid I’d freak my kids out by telling them it’s all gone now, just like I used to tell them the reason not to drink or do drugs was because we know where those roads lead. Be creative, I told them, and make new mistakes. If my kids were really smart they’d do that now: forget jobs and school and bills and Blackberrys and sit back for awhile on some mountaintop or some beach somewhere and figure out where this new world is going, then go there and meet it coming around the bend. But of course, that’s easy for me to say. It’s always easy being an armchair quarterback.
And now I tell my kids the same thing my old man told me. Go to school so you don’t have to do what I do. Or more, what I did. I always had good jobs, until recently anyway when this depression has pulled the rug out of every one in five worker. (Those are my numbers and I don’t have any proof of them other than I what I can discern from the media.) But I worked for a lot of companies that I really didn’t like, didn’t like a lot of the people or what the company stood for even though my father would have thought they were pretty cushy jobs.
All this comes to mind as I talk to my two daughters about their summer jobs, and about money. One daughter loves her job, but doesn’t make any money. The other one hates her job, but makes good money. Sounds like the plot of a fairy tale, doesn’t it? And the one who doesn’t make any money decided to buy a Blackberry and be an adult and wants to start paying bills, and the other one texted me the other day to say she now understands why I hated sitting in cubicles all my life.
I said to the one who bought the Blackberry that paying bills isn’t all what it’s cut out to be. That what most “adults” do is simply work to pay bills. All that hard work goes to taking money in one hand and handing it off to someone else with the other. And the more money you make the more you buy (or in the recent past—charged) and you got into a terrible millstream of simply working to keep your head above the water. I told the one working in the cubicle I guess it was best she learned that lesson for herself, as much as I hate knowing she has to learn that lesson.
I wish I could simply put my two kids on a path that I felt was best for them, but we can’t live other’s lives for them, even our kids. The point on this path both my kids are on is pretty standard for white middle-class kids raised in the suburbs. They start out pretty much buying into the status quo--or what used to pass for the status quo. I’m afraid I’d freak my kids out by telling them it’s all gone now, just like I used to tell them the reason not to drink or do drugs was because we know where those roads lead. Be creative, I told them, and make new mistakes. If my kids were really smart they’d do that now: forget jobs and school and bills and Blackberrys and sit back for awhile on some mountaintop or some beach somewhere and figure out where this new world is going, then go there and meet it coming around the bend. But of course, that’s easy for me to say. It’s always easy being an armchair quarterback.
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Son Volt--Medicine Hat
Today, one of my Facebook status lines was that I think I'd take Jay Farrar over Jeff Tweedy.
This song is the reason I said that. I had just heard it, and while I love a lot of the innovation that Wilco did/does, I guess deep down I'm just a traditional mofo. I love good, clean, solid American roots music. And I love Farrar's voice.
There will be droughts and days inundated
Unveilings free from saturation
Departures raised with no masquerading
There will be teachers that die by their own hand
Pundits that push headlong for atonement
Friends and followers devoted to living
There will be watchers that ply for new confines
Those committed to society's circles
Unwary cogs with no cadence of virtue
There will be right
There will be wrong
Drop of the hat, and it's already started
Just like that, and the deed is done
What I'd give for that hat to be medicine
The time is now to be on the run
There will be machinations unforeseen
Sleepwalking sense from a bad dream
No promenade walk in the parkway
There will be catchwords filled with infection
Circulars to prop up occasion
No golden mean to prop up the footsteps
There will be levels on high hills that appraise
There will be unchanging certainties
Barometers that follow the stampede
There will be right
There will be wrong
There will be signposts of indication
Semaphore go signs and warnings
Hailstone halos and country-blues wailings
There will be strains that break out of straight time
To pave with grace different roads to the same place
No consequence to repay what's been given
There will be layers of means to an end
Drawn-out days before resolution
Dregs will rain down from all directions
There will be right
There will be wrong
This song is the reason I said that. I had just heard it, and while I love a lot of the innovation that Wilco did/does, I guess deep down I'm just a traditional mofo. I love good, clean, solid American roots music. And I love Farrar's voice.
There will be droughts and days inundated
Unveilings free from saturation
Departures raised with no masquerading
There will be teachers that die by their own hand
Pundits that push headlong for atonement
Friends and followers devoted to living
There will be watchers that ply for new confines
Those committed to society's circles
Unwary cogs with no cadence of virtue
There will be right
There will be wrong
Drop of the hat, and it's already started
Just like that, and the deed is done
What I'd give for that hat to be medicine
The time is now to be on the run
There will be machinations unforeseen
Sleepwalking sense from a bad dream
No promenade walk in the parkway
There will be catchwords filled with infection
Circulars to prop up occasion
No golden mean to prop up the footsteps
There will be levels on high hills that appraise
There will be unchanging certainties
Barometers that follow the stampede
There will be right
There will be wrong
There will be signposts of indication
Semaphore go signs and warnings
Hailstone halos and country-blues wailings
There will be strains that break out of straight time
To pave with grace different roads to the same place
No consequence to repay what's been given
There will be layers of means to an end
Drawn-out days before resolution
Dregs will rain down from all directions
There will be right
There will be wrong
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Don't keep NXR's Shh quiet. Great new theater in Boston.
I checked out Shh!, New Exhibition Room's latest production, free at Playwright's Platform. Go see it, and not just because it's free, which is amazing. Normally you'd be shelling out somewhere around 25 bucks for theater of this caliber.Shh! examines censorship. It's all, as they say in this Web 2.0 world, original content. NXR auditioned an ensemble and together they collaborated to write and make this show. Original content, to my way of thinking, is the way to go in this world. I mean, do we really need another production of Best Little Whorehouse in Texas? How about breaking some new ground, people?
Shh! is not the end-all word on censorship. I don't think they meant it to be that. Shh! is a series of skits that are very fast-paced, high-energy, and very entertaining with the idea of censorship sometimes obviously and sometimes-not-so obviously holding them together. Sometimes the role of censorship in our society is right out there, as when Shh! lays out the history of censorship in America. And sometimes it's a bit more subtle, as with a series surrounding a nudist, that seem to address the idea of self-censorship. Almost always, though, Shh! goes for the humor, which makes for a very entertaining night. Shock isn't the intent here at all.
Since it is theater and it was written by the cast and producers, Shh!, as you'd expect, has quite the liberal viewpoint toward censorship. Except for one skit where a conservative suburbanite gives a quiet, impassioned, serious argument towards censorship, never does Shh! explore whether censorship has its place in our lives, which might have been an interesting take, given the obvious talent that appears in the show. One wonders what the ensemble, given its obvious intelligence and creativity, would have come up with when challenged with that question.
Bottom line? Go see it, and not just because it's free. At the very least, Shh! is highly entertaining. Prepared to be entertained (there's that word again), and maybe shocked or challenged depending on your own sensibilities.
NXR represents some of the new, younger voices in theater that seem to be growing in the Boston area. Just like years ago when young comics like Jay Leno, Steven Wright, Denis Leary, and Lenny Clark were honing their skills at area clubs and later defined the Boston comic, groups like NXR seem to be doing the same with their performances. If anything, for free, you just might see a bit of Boston theater history in the making.
Shh! is free, but you still need a ticket to get in. Get them here.
Monday, July 13, 2009
The Grateful Dead--Mexicali Blues
This song always makes me smile. It's just a guy/tequila-drinking/dusty boots kind of song.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
New Exhibition Room: Shh!! -- orignal theater in Boston
From Nora Long, one of the founders of New Exhibition Room in Boston. Hey Everyone I know (pretty much)
I wanted to take this opportunity to personally invite you to my theatre company’s first show. We’ve worked fairly hard over the last 6 weeks to make a quirky, frenetic exploration of censorship. Everything in the show is true or an abstraction of something true, so I think the show is equal parts hilarious and terrifying. There will likely be nudity, gratuitous violence and definitely adult language and content, so this might not be the best show to bring grandma to. It would be great to see you. For those of you who are too far away to come, I thought you might be interested in what I’ve been up to.
Also, it’s free, it’s T-accessible, and there will be cookies afterwards – what more could you ask for in a night at the theatre? Get tix here.
You are, of course, welcome anytime, but it would be particularly awesome to have some friendly faces (and voices) in the house opening weekend (July 9-11). A few members of the press will be coming, so we want to make sure they see the best possible show, which is, in large part do to the audience.
In addition to the show, there will be a reading of a new play each Saturday at 4PM. The writers include John J. King, Theo Goodell and Rachel Kelsey. These readings are also free, and a great opportunity to hear some new work by some of the most talented local writers we know.
Feel free to forward this email around.
Hope to see you there.
Lots of love,
Nora
PS. If you haven’t seen it already, my baby sister made a couple of killer videos of our rehearsals. Check them out.
New Exhibition Room presents Shh!
July 9-25, 2009
http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/69085
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
The Lemonheads at Newbury Comics today at 6:00
The Lemonheads are going to be at Newbury Comics over on--where else?--Newbury Street today at 6:00. If I wasn't going to see Lori McKenna tonight at the Lizard Lounge (tonight she'll have her backup band, so that means she might be playing Monday Afternoon) I'd check these guys.
They were kind of a cult band, who did covered a bunch including Mrs. Robinson and this sweet number from Gram Parsons: I Can't Take It Anymore.
They were kind of a cult band, who did covered a bunch including Mrs. Robinson and this sweet number from Gram Parsons: I Can't Take It Anymore.
Monday, June 29, 2009
More Than This--Lucy Kaplansky
Lyrics by Bryan Ferry. You usually hear Roxy Music's disco/synth sound, which is cool. But the lyrics are so pretty that I think Lucy Kaplansky does it the most justice with just her acoustic accompaniment.
Sue's been working on this one. I'll tackle it soon, but we know I'll put a country spin on it. God knows what that will sound like.
I could feel at the time
There was no way of knowing
Fallen leaves in the night
Who can say where they're blowing
As free as the wind
Hopefully learning
Why the sea on the tide
Has no way of turning
More than this you know there's nothing
More than this tell me one thing
More than this ooh there is nothing
It was fun for a while
There was no way of knowing
Like a dream in the night
Who can say where we're going
No care in the world
Maybe I'm learning
Why the sea on the tide
Has no way of turning
More than this you know there's nothing
More than this tell me one thing
More than this no, there's nothing
More than this nothing
More than this
More than this nothing
Sue's been working on this one. I'll tackle it soon, but we know I'll put a country spin on it. God knows what that will sound like.
I could feel at the time
There was no way of knowing
Fallen leaves in the night
Who can say where they're blowing
As free as the wind
Hopefully learning
Why the sea on the tide
Has no way of turning
More than this you know there's nothing
More than this tell me one thing
More than this ooh there is nothing
It was fun for a while
There was no way of knowing
Like a dream in the night
Who can say where we're going
No care in the world
Maybe I'm learning
Why the sea on the tide
Has no way of turning
More than this you know there's nothing
More than this tell me one thing
More than this no, there's nothing
More than this nothing
More than this
More than this nothing
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Real relationships, not the digital kind...
I haven't been blogging that much. Staying away from Facebook as much as I can, too. Remember, I'm pulling back from the digital world, and funny, just when it's starting to be kind of fun.
But I'm getting back into the real world, with real-world face-to-face connections with real people, rather than this jerking off that happens in the digital space.
My cousins, who I haven't seen in 16 years and with whom I was just about inseparable between the ages of about 11 to about 21 came to visit...and we all had a blast reconnecting. I don't know about Cousins Jerry and Doris (yes, where I come from we call each other Cousin this or that; and yes, I do have relatives with two first names--get over it) but there were times when I was 17 years old again, and it was fun and it was alive and it was living, and living good.
I was in a play a couple of weeks ago, with two stupendous actresses (yes, they are stupendous to work with, very giving and open and free on stage) and we had a blast on stage, going out every night and just having fun.
But funny, the digital world is starting, for me, to pay off the way it does for other people. I'm starting to "meet" new people and have reconnected with people from my past--someone from school, 29 years ago, and someone who I acted with but lost touch with. There are musicians I'm slowly starting to connect with, which is so cool because music for me is such a new and exhilarating experience, and I'm not exaggerating in the least when I say I'm still alive today because of music, because of the day Baxter walked into my apartment and handed me Lulu and said, Here, this is yours. You need this.
All this is playing against the death of the King of Pop, a person who people are mourning but frankly I can't seem to even conjure up more than a simple, Ah, that's too bad, because I at least understand digital relationships but I don't for the life of me understand people who cry for famous people who they never met.
Finally, here are two videos I grabbed at Club Passim last Wednesday night when Noe Venable opened for Blame Sally. I posted these on my Facebook page, but if your not one of my "friends" maybe you didn't see them. Two wonderful artists--well, one artist and one group--from San Francisco, and what is going on out there with the music scene? First The Bittersweets come through Club Passim, now Noe and Blame Sally, all twisting music but making it all so enjoyable at the same time.
But I'm getting back into the real world, with real-world face-to-face connections with real people, rather than this jerking off that happens in the digital space.
My cousins, who I haven't seen in 16 years and with whom I was just about inseparable between the ages of about 11 to about 21 came to visit...and we all had a blast reconnecting. I don't know about Cousins Jerry and Doris (yes, where I come from we call each other Cousin this or that; and yes, I do have relatives with two first names--get over it) but there were times when I was 17 years old again, and it was fun and it was alive and it was living, and living good. I was in a play a couple of weeks ago, with two stupendous actresses (yes, they are stupendous to work with, very giving and open and free on stage) and we had a blast on stage, going out every night and just having fun.
But funny, the digital world is starting, for me, to pay off the way it does for other people. I'm starting to "meet" new people and have reconnected with people from my past--someone from school, 29 years ago, and someone who I acted with but lost touch with. There are musicians I'm slowly starting to connect with, which is so cool because music for me is such a new and exhilarating experience, and I'm not exaggerating in the least when I say I'm still alive today because of music, because of the day Baxter walked into my apartment and handed me Lulu and said, Here, this is yours. You need this.
All this is playing against the death of the King of Pop, a person who people are mourning but frankly I can't seem to even conjure up more than a simple, Ah, that's too bad, because I at least understand digital relationships but I don't for the life of me understand people who cry for famous people who they never met.
Finally, here are two videos I grabbed at Club Passim last Wednesday night when Noe Venable opened for Blame Sally. I posted these on my Facebook page, but if your not one of my "friends" maybe you didn't see them. Two wonderful artists--well, one artist and one group--from San Francisco, and what is going on out there with the music scene? First The Bittersweets come through Club Passim, now Noe and Blame Sally, all twisting music but making it all so enjoyable at the same time.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Thinking outside the (pizza) box
The Green Box (US Patent 7,051,919), a pizza box manufactured from 100% recycled material. The top of the Green Box breaks down into convenient serving plates, eliminating the need for disposable plates. The bottom of the 'Green Box' converts easily into a handy storage container, eliminating the need for plastic wrap, tin foil or plastic bags.
The perforations and scores that create this functionality allow for easy disposal into a standard-sized recycling bin.
Made from a standard pizza blank, the Green Box requires no additional material or major redesign and can therefore be produced at no additional manufacturing cost. e.c.o., Incorporated owns the utility patent on the Green Box.
Check it out.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Pass the Buddha--Blame Sally
Blame Sally are going to be at Club Passim in Cambridge, Mass. on Wednesday, June 24. Check them out.
Friday, June 5, 2009
Say it aint' so, Neil: Neil Young's Music Archives: Vol. 1 retails for $200.00
Don't you just hate it when your favorite musician sells out? Like when you see a favorite song shilling a car? Or the cost of a decent concert seat, not one in the nose-bleed section but somewhere where you really don't need the Jumbotron, costs more than what you pay for a month's rent?The first volume of Neil Young's archives is out, and the reduced price on Amazon.com is $199.99, reduced from (I'm guessing) the artist's suggested retail price of $249.00. Now, this just isn't any set. It's 10 DVDs. There are concerts and pictures and lyrics and I guess it's a whole digital experience, but man, I don't even know what I'd play it all on?--my laptop I guess. (There is an 8 CD set for $70, but even that price kind of rocks me in the current free world.) I mean, I guess it's pristine quality. But, right now as I type this, I'm wearing an old pair of patched jeans a la Neil Young and After the Goldrush, and I'm just wondering if Neil has left his roots behind.
Is this all worth it?--and this is only the first volume. (Neil, you do know there's a depression going on, don't you?) You start to wonder just how much money anyone needs in the world, and when people like Young and name you're famous, rich musician who used to sing about life and the poor and the workers and all that, and now something like this comes along and he seems a little out of touch with the common man, kind of like Steinbeck sounded in Travels with Charley.
To get an idea of what you'll be getting, you can check out a vid here. It's all cool, all real Neil and the reason we love him so much, but it's way out this fan's price range. I don't know Neil, maybe it's time to just say, Hey, Hey, bye, bye.
9.4% of nothing is still nothing: Unemployment rate is not easing off...
The unemployment rate "jumped" to 9.4% in May, and thank God the media is now starting to include the point that if other factors are taken into account--people who have stopped looking, people who are working for a lot less, seasonal workers--the unemployment rate would be around 16.4%. I've been saying that all along, but since I don't blog for the Huffington Post, what the hell do I know, huh?
Okay, big time media gurus, here's another little factoid from the trenches that you in your ivory towers wouldn't know. Remember folks, you heard this first from Action Bob Markle.
It's reported that the pace of job reduction is slowing down. First, I don't know why the difference between pace and rate is so important. I'm sure someone good at splitting hairs can explain this, but frankly, it doesn't mean anything. What's happening is there are fewer people being laid off as we roll through 2009, and that's taken as a good thing. And this is where you don't listen to the experts.
Answer me this: You have 100 apples in a basket. And each month I want you to take away 10%. The first month you take away 10. The second month you take away 9. The next month 8, all the way to the tenth month where you'd take away one. The rate is the same, but the pace is slower, for the simple fact there are less apples in the basket. There are simply less people to lay off. Companies can't lay off everyone, for land's sake.
Just a good way of showing how numbers can be manipulated, and you can't believe everything you read. Or at least, you have to still be able to think, and not be spoon-fed everything that's in news.
Okay, big time media gurus, here's another little factoid from the trenches that you in your ivory towers wouldn't know. Remember folks, you heard this first from Action Bob Markle.
It's reported that the pace of job reduction is slowing down. First, I don't know why the difference between pace and rate is so important. I'm sure someone good at splitting hairs can explain this, but frankly, it doesn't mean anything. What's happening is there are fewer people being laid off as we roll through 2009, and that's taken as a good thing. And this is where you don't listen to the experts.
Answer me this: You have 100 apples in a basket. And each month I want you to take away 10%. The first month you take away 10. The second month you take away 9. The next month 8, all the way to the tenth month where you'd take away one. The rate is the same, but the pace is slower, for the simple fact there are less apples in the basket. There are simply less people to lay off. Companies can't lay off everyone, for land's sake.
Just a good way of showing how numbers can be manipulated, and you can't believe everything you read. Or at least, you have to still be able to think, and not be spoon-fed everything that's in news.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
A Cantabridgian moment
I was waiting for the elevator at the Holyoke Center in Harvard Square to take me up to the Passim marketing meeting. A woman approached the elevator and we smiled at each other.
Don't I know you? she asked.
I don't think we've met, I said.
You look familiar. I've seen you somewhere.
By this time the elevator had arrived and we got in.
I"m certain I've seen you. Are you an actor?
Uh, yes I am.
Then I've seen you in something. What have you been in?
Lately I've been doing small shows in the South End.
Not the ART.
No.
Then I've seen someone who looks like you, she said, stepping out. Then, over her shoulder she said, He was very good looking.
Don't I know you? she asked.
I don't think we've met, I said.
You look familiar. I've seen you somewhere.
By this time the elevator had arrived and we got in.
I"m certain I've seen you. Are you an actor?
Uh, yes I am.
Then I've seen you in something. What have you been in?
Lately I've been doing small shows in the South End.
Not the ART.
No.
Then I've seen someone who looks like you, she said, stepping out. Then, over her shoulder she said, He was very good looking.
Runner's high
Today I laced up the running shoes and went for a run for the first time in about three years. Actually, I did go for one short run this spring that scared the bejesus out of me, I was so tired an winded. Three years ago, though, I was running 15-milers. Then my back went out, then I went to work at an ad agency where I basically sat at a desk all day. Offices have always been places where my health went right out the window. But today the doctor gave me a pretty clean bill of health. Cholesterol, pulse, weight, sugar, and a few other numbers were a little higher than I wanted them, but all in all it doesn't seem I'll collapse face-first if I push it uphill.
Not that this run today was anything special, forgetting that it was the first one in three years. Like a lot of starts, it was pretty inauspicious. But I do so much better when I'm running. At some point on later runs, my mind will just unhinge, and then I can't tell you the things I'll think about. Who needs drugs when you got endorphins? But great things, along with bile and all kinds of negative shit, will just rise up and every time I'll wonder, where did you come from?
Mind and body will be energized. It's all related, work, home, family, friends, the world, your apartment, and when I'm running and really active, it all just fits together. Or maybe I'm just more aware of it.
Anyway, what do they say?--a long journey always starts with a single step? I've been a runner since I was about 13. That's forty years. There have been a few hiatuses in there, like the one I just went through, but I think we're back on track again. Work is starting to pick up, and it's a simple matter of working it into my day here at home.
And happy trails to everyone.
Monday, June 1, 2009
New Exhibition Room: Shh!!
New Exhibition Room is the company that producing the project, Shhh! being developed by A. Nora Long and Dawn Simmons, two really creative, "thoughtful" theater people in Boston. FYI, that "thoughtful" crack is an inside joke in the play that I'm writing.
Anyway, check out their video, create some buzz, and then go see the production when it comes out in the summer.
"Since we can't tell you what the play is about, we thought we might show you the first few hours of rehearsal. Maybe that will help. Video shot & edited by Kendra Long."
Shh!: It Begins
Anyway, check out their video, create some buzz, and then go see the production when it comes out in the summer.
"Since we can't tell you what the play is about, we thought we might show you the first few hours of rehearsal. Maybe that will help. Video shot & edited by Kendra Long."
Shh!: It Begins
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
A blog in the moment
In the moment here. I have no idea what I'm about to say. Sue is practicing Lucinda Williams, Side of the Road. I just worked out a sticky part of Act II of Red Dog. That's how I've been writing it. Bit by bit and it's coming along. It's almost writing itself, which, as any writer will tell you, is pure heaven when a piece does that.
I'm excited. I haven't been this excited about a writing project in a long time. I've handed Act I over to one person, and she liked it. I'm hoping to finish Act II this week, at night after coming home from this little contract I have. My goal is to have a staged reading in the fall.
I've been going to this office for the past two weeks now. It's really quiet there. People just sit at their desks and do their work. Intent. I guess that's the way an office should be, but any office I've ever worked in has been bloody noisy. Ad agencies and marcom departments. I did a couple of stints in a news room. Try telling reporters to shut up. You'd get a knuckle sandwich.
I'm excited. I haven't been this excited about a writing project in a long time. I've handed Act I over to one person, and she liked it. I'm hoping to finish Act II this week, at night after coming home from this little contract I have. My goal is to have a staged reading in the fall.
I've been going to this office for the past two weeks now. It's really quiet there. People just sit at their desks and do their work. Intent. I guess that's the way an office should be, but any office I've ever worked in has been bloody noisy. Ad agencies and marcom departments. I did a couple of stints in a news room. Try telling reporters to shut up. You'd get a knuckle sandwich.
Monday, May 25, 2009
The digital world: Back in the cage...
It's been over a month since I've blogged. The digital world and I are slowly parting ways, even though the work I've been able to scrounge of late is all Web work.
I last blogged about a week before we left for Spain and Morocco. That last week was pretty hectic. I purposely didn't take a laptop or even a cell phone with us, and the two times we stepped into an Internet cafe it was reluctantly and only because I had to get messages to Allison. Those two weeks of not constantly glancing at a cell phone for messages that either were or weren't there, not thinking about a status line on Twitter, not wasting 45 minutes at a crack on Facebook, just randomly clicking with drool coming out of my mouth, were golden. Then, on returning to the States, I got a small contract working for two weeks on-site where they block Facebook, MySpace, and all that.
All those digital tools are great. I wouldn't want to live without Google, or something like it. Just today I was talking to Johnny, and wondered which band Peter Frampton was in before he went solo. Johnny Googled it, and the quick answer came. I'm not going to say the answer; that's for you to find out. And just this week I connected on Facebook with an old, old friend. But in the two years I've been on Facebook, this has happened exactly once. Yeah, it's a nice service, but that's about it. It's not much more than a time suck, that I can see, and I've been meaning to hit the delete button for a while now.
I actually leave the apartment more and more without a cell phone. I like being untethered. I like being untethered in so many ways.
I'm writing a play, and think that communicating that way might be a better way than even this blog, which I still think is super, but...I know people read it, I know some read it consistently (because they tell me and I also run some pretty decent analytics on it, so you can run but you can't hide) but I miss the face to face. This weekend we went to a friend's 50th birthday party (happy birthday, Joan!) where we saw some old friends and new people. Yesterday we went to Sue's niece's graduation party (congrats Jenn!!) and it was great to see some of Sue's family and just sit around and talk and laugh--in person.
I last blogged about a week before we left for Spain and Morocco. That last week was pretty hectic. I purposely didn't take a laptop or even a cell phone with us, and the two times we stepped into an Internet cafe it was reluctantly and only because I had to get messages to Allison. Those two weeks of not constantly glancing at a cell phone for messages that either were or weren't there, not thinking about a status line on Twitter, not wasting 45 minutes at a crack on Facebook, just randomly clicking with drool coming out of my mouth, were golden. Then, on returning to the States, I got a small contract working for two weeks on-site where they block Facebook, MySpace, and all that.
All those digital tools are great. I wouldn't want to live without Google, or something like it. Just today I was talking to Johnny, and wondered which band Peter Frampton was in before he went solo. Johnny Googled it, and the quick answer came. I'm not going to say the answer; that's for you to find out. And just this week I connected on Facebook with an old, old friend. But in the two years I've been on Facebook, this has happened exactly once. Yeah, it's a nice service, but that's about it. It's not much more than a time suck, that I can see, and I've been meaning to hit the delete button for a while now.
I actually leave the apartment more and more without a cell phone. I like being untethered. I like being untethered in so many ways.
I'm writing a play, and think that communicating that way might be a better way than even this blog, which I still think is super, but...I know people read it, I know some read it consistently (because they tell me and I also run some pretty decent analytics on it, so you can run but you can't hide) but I miss the face to face. This weekend we went to a friend's 50th birthday party (happy birthday, Joan!) where we saw some old friends and new people. Yesterday we went to Sue's niece's graduation party (congrats Jenn!!) and it was great to see some of Sue's family and just sit around and talk and laugh--in person.
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