On Friday, Slim completed his six-week reading class at the multicultural center. He logged more than 70 hours of tutoring with me, and by completing computer work and at-home reading. I pushed him hard at the end, hoping to improve his reading comprehension and spelling. I hope he realizes I did it because I care. I can be a hard teacher. I've brought more than a few cute Korean kids to tears...unfortunately you have to show those little demons who's boss.
Seriously, Slim came to me with a children's version of "Huck Finn" in his backpack. At the end, we were reading the DMV manual and working through complicated recipes.
The man from Compton did a great job.

I went to see "Truly Dually: A Musical About Homelessness" on Sunday afternoon. The U.S. Vets -- Las Vegas production featured several formerly homeless veterans, including Larry Cooks who has the most amazing voice. After the play I shook his hand and asked him how long he's been singing in church. With a big smile, Larry said, "all my life."
The play supports U.S. Vets' causes. Contact info: 366-0456 or www.usvetsinc.org

Colum McCann won the National Book Award for "Let the Great World Spin." His book follows several New Yorkers whose lives all interweave and eventually come to ruin on the day of Philippe Petit's tight rope walk between the Twin Towers in 1974. The nation stands in awe of the man. Others find their undoing. I really don't want to say more than that. But it's beautifully wrought, particularly the first person point of view of the prostitute mother.

I signed up for a night class at UNLV, starting in the spring semester. I'll earn graduate credits. But, damn, it's really expensive. I'm hoping the cost will go down once my residence status clears.

So, I'm trying to get through Lorrie Moore's "Gate at the Stairs" which just took a surprising twist. Surprising to me, at least. It turns out Tassie the midwestern Jewish girl studying sufism at a small town liberal arts college has been sleeping with a lone terrorist.

Post 9/11 fiction must contain:
-- The themes of racism, marital unhappiness, religious persecution
-- Self-righteous rich liberals complaining about racism while engaging in marital infidelity and persecuting the religious
-- Fundamental religious terrorists (possibly one hooking up with an infidel)

Now, that's a book!

Last night I drove across town (no joke, the Suncoast is about half an hour down Sahara and up Fort Apache) to see "A Serious Man." The Coen brothers produced an intimate and humorous picture of their midwestern Jewish upbringing. Great characters: The uncle (Richard Kind) who constantly drains his cyst in the bathroom. The South Korean grad student who can't pass physics (??), who then bribes Larry Gopnik, our protagonist, for a passing grade. The orange shag neighbor who sunbathes in the nude. A special surprise is the younger version of Al Franken, who, I was told, grew up with the Coen brothers.
Jefferson Airplane. F Troop. Monthly record clubs. . Getting stoned during your bar mitzpah.
It has the pacing of "Barton Fink" but without the direct images of good and evil. Yet, impending doom stands around every corner (perfectly capitalizing on the Jewish neurosis).
We came in about 10 minutes late, so we missed most of the first scene, in which an old Jewish couple murder a rabbi, mistaking him for a spirit. I think that is what brings the curse upon their descendant, who could be Larry. Great, great movie.

The Whigs weren't that impressive, they performed Friday night at the Beauty Bar. They've toured with The Kings of Leon, who I should listen to a little more. The opening bands: The Dead Trees, Ian Crawford and The Rooks were well worth the cover.

I finished "Rag Time," which I think has to be one of the best novels about turn-of-the-century American life. E.L. Doctorow takes historic characters, such as Harry Houdini, activist Emma Goldman, famous seductress and notorious "swinger" Evelyn Nesbit, and explorer Robert Peary, and fictionalizes them, weaving the stories together. It's sexy. Ridiculous in many places. Swirl in some militant black warfare out of Harlem, which includes a take over of robber baron J.P. Morgan's personal museum, and that's a great story.
One of my favorite scenes is when Emma Goldman counsels a young militant, a former lover of Evelyn Nesbit, about the joy and respect of love:
"Friendship is what endures. Shared ideals, respect for the whole character of a human being. Why can't you accept your own freedom? Why do you have to cling to someone in order to live?"
Some might say there's no one better to give relationship advice than a socialist, militant reformer!

I've been listening to Pearl Jam's new album, Backspacer. "Just Breathe" is a pretty awesome ballad.

My aunt died yesterday. Of course, the news hit my dad pretty hard, since they're close to the same age. I haven't seen her in many years. To get his mind of it, we went to lunch at Town Square and went to see a movie. He picked "2012." There's nothing like world destruction to put things in perspective. The movie was directed by the guy who has done several apocalypse dramas. McCarran airport and the Strip were shown falling into the molten earth. Bye-bye to the Wynn and Encore. I can't say this movie had a solid plot. It was full of holes. Horribly trite and cliche. And I couldn't figure out where all the ethnic world leaders went. Other than our African-American president and a cursory shot of the Japanese prime minister, there was no one of color. But it's entertaining for two and a half hours. Africa was the only country to survive the cataclysmic flood. Sorry, if I just ruined the whole movie for you.

For the last two days I've attempted to file for unemployed. I call and the phone just rings busy. I went online and the program told me that I didn't have my mother's maiden name correct. So it kicked me out.

I'm out eight pages in to a short fiction story. I'm really excited about it. But it's difficult to write. It's as gloomy as these days in Las Vegas. My character and her father are visiting North Korea for a day. It's about the clash of cultures and generations in an inhospitable environment. It's based off a trip I took to Kaesong about a year ago. I can't say I have a grasp of my main character yet. She's a sort of privileged Kyopo girl who isn't really aware of the world around her.

I saw Leonard Cohen with Copy Desk Girl and her husband the other night. It really was an evening of entertainment. No joke. He played from 8 p.m. to 11:30 p.m. It did get a bit exhausting after the fourth encore. It was the concert that would never end. But the older gentleman sitting next to me was wearing a heavenly Calvin Klein cologne. And Cohen's voice still sounds amazing.

I have to get a run in at the gym before dinner.

I'd like to blog about this book detached from the knowledge of the author -- Las Vegas art critic Dave Hickey. I've met him -- and he promptly brushed me off. I'm of the Southern ilk who believe all people should be treated kindly, even when you're in a bad mood (yes, it's hard for me to uphold that one as well), even when that other person is a reporter. So, I naturally felt a bit perturbed by Hickey. I've run into many locals who insist that he's a great guy, once you get to know him. I'm sure that's true. But if every person acted like Hickey upon first acquaintance nobody would want to stick around to get to know anybody.

Nevertheless, I'm feeling that high you feel when a head cold starts to pass.

And I've been listening to the Avett Brothers' new album for the last 72 hours which causes the soul to get gummy with the hope of new love and the hard heart to soften like thawed pink turkey sausage.

So...I really enjoyed his collection of essays on art and democracy.

He uses "quotidian" far too much. Three times in the "Air Guitar" essay. But he makes up by using "combobulated" on page 49 and "pastiche" on page 163.

His thoughts on the Gustave Flaubert story "A Simple Heart" were quite insightful. I wish I could have Felicite's attitude -- never feeling injustice, never supposing to have claim on anyone or anything, abused by everyone, she prays for them all.

I also enjoys how he quotes (or paraphrases) others, like Ad Reinhardt: "authenticity is something you bump into while you're backing up to look at something that interests you" (page 53). In this essay he delves into Vegas as the bona fided fake, so loved by Liberace. Hickey writes that Vegas is lens in which to view the real America.

Arrogance throughout. Youthful arrogance in some places, which we all can identify with. He writes that in 1967 his grad school work would have no support "anywhere in the academic world." Perhaps I'm not smart enough to understand his argument, but I find that really hard to believe. But "Dealing" is still one of the best essays in the book, arguing that art has no intrinsic value, just as paper money has no value. Neither piece of paper is worth anything. It's all about investment in what you believe the worth to be and your faith in that investment from one universe to another.

In "Air Guitar" I couldn't disagree with him more. I enjoy good critics. They often fully describe the work to me. Bob Bolien, Bob Mondello, A.O. Scottt and Holland Cotter are critics I often love reading. I find it funny that he quotes crotchety old Harold Bloom, an English critic who is probably the most hated by experimental writers.

"Lost Boys" left me hanging. It could've been great -- but what else did Siegfried and Roy say? We don't find out, Hickey just keeps filling the pages with his own recycled thoughts.

"Godiva Speaks" is awesome -- Hickey just transcribed the interview.

The main point I got from "Air Guitar" is that art only has a value through the process of socialization -- meaning, various investments made in the piece by different parties (journalists writing about it, for example.) Art isn't a community, or a market or a world, Hickey argues, but an intermediate institution of civil society.

It's a wasteful, privileged endeavor through which serious issues are sort out...like in sports, he writes.

I like sports. I like art. I put worth in both because they enrich our lives. Give us something to talk about, watch, explore. Neither is needed. Fiction writing isn't either. But life sure would suck if we didn't have them.

I'm smiling alone in my home, nice and warm with my blanket on the couch reading "Ragtime" and listening to "I and Love and You." This album is everything to smile about.

1. I and Love and You
Brooklyn -- are they singing about the place or is it a woman's name?
Place: The song is about making a change of place when you need it most.
Woman: He meets her in Brooklyn. The three words that become hard to say: "I and Love and You."

2. January Wedding
I look forward to my own sweet and simple wedding day. No longer wandering alone...but together.
I yearn to whisper low to a man who can just hear me.
Don't ever turn it down.
True love is not something you can turn down.

3. Head Full of Doubt/Road Full of Promise
Full of contradictions and contrasts.
My life isn't changed by the one who is elected.
If I'm loved by someone I'm never rejected.
Decide what to be and go be it.
Scream the doubts until they are out.
There is a dream and one day you'll see it.


I managed to write that story for BLVDs magazine, despite the fact that I think I've contracted swine cold.

My back aches from yoga. Camilla is merciless.

I bought more ice cream tonight than is good for the body, but light for the soul. Smiths has a sale. I got a Kroger-cheap chocolate truffle with cherries for $1.99 and the ever-favorite caramel delight for $3.99.

I finished "Judgment at Nuremberg" tonight. This is a brilliant film, which won the best writing Academy Awards in 1961 .There is something about the pursuit of justice that just puts a fire in me. The rousing speeches made by the prosecutor and SpencerTracy's Judge Haywood should be studied in schools. It doesn't matter what laws are passed by your country, the goal in any civilized court of law is to promote justice. If a man aids and abets in a murder, than he is guilty of that murder. In a time of crisis, men, even the most respected, can turn a blind eye to justice. The German judges may never had expected 6 million dead...but they were responsible when the first innocent man was unjustly convicted and killed. The film also shows authentic concentration camp video shot by allied troops after the liberation.

Back when I went to church I found fault in myself nearly every day.
It was tiresome.
Soon boring.
Then I grew up.
I left church,
finding some measure of peace with my imperfections because the other method was immature, boring and tiring.
Every so often I find a fault in myself again.
I feel sad
                  and I wish I'd just shut up sometimes.


This past week's City Life literary issue crushed the Weekly. Check out Tod Goldberg's short story "Other Resort Cities." He crafted sympathetic characters with an interesting plot, while using Vegas as his setting, all in the most natural way possible.

E.L. Doctorow isn't as sexy as his novel "Rag Time." Just for the record -- it's the steamiest novel I've read in a long time. I was expecting a dirty old man. So, I was disappointed. Doctorow gave the closing address Sunday night for the Las Vegas Valley Book Festival. I swear he must've dug that speech out of 2002's pile of Boring. The Q&A was a bit spicier. Because of his perfectionism, he admitted having a hard time writing a simple "get out of class" note for his daughter. She missed the bus. That's pretty hot. For a writer.
I bought a few books this weekend. "Homer & Langley," "Restless City" and "Drunk" (the graphic novel).
I'll have to get better at 21 if I want to cover my book habit with gambling earnings.

Again, things aren't going so well at the Ad Agency. It's not anyone's fault. I just don't see where the work is going to come from. If there's nothing for me to write -- what can I do?

I finished "Air Guitar" last week. So, sometimes this week I'll leave my comments. I have some.

Our ocean is choked with trash. Please pass around this story from the New York Times. Let's make this a push for recycling and less packaging! http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/science/10patch.html?_r=1&hp

Let's see if I make my deadline tomorrow. This should be fun.

I've taken a rest from Ugly Casanova and Blind Pilot to listen to some new music, The Sounds "Living in America" and the Avett Brothers' "I and Love and You."
"America" is the Swedish group's first release. I'm not a pop fan, but it's so fun and classic I don't care. You can't help feeling good about the world and your life when listening to "Love and You." It's the antithesis of Noah and the Whale's "First Days of Spring," which I predict will be a top album of the year, but it's still heartbreaking and breathless, though it does end with "my door is always open to you." (Charlie Fink wrote it all after his break up with band mate Laura Marling.) "Love and you" is dewy eyes, fumbling hands and standing as One.

"A woman in love is like a begging dog."
Coco Chanel in "Coco Before Chanel"

I recently finished Bukowski's "Post Office." I found this remark about men and women interesting and true. (Remember, this is the brilliant writer who gave us "Women," and this great poetic line: "it is much more pleasant to forget a love which didn't work as all love finally doesn't work...")

So, from "Post Office," which is a novella about zombified work and relationships.

It's not a new story about how women descend upon a man. You think you have a space to breathe, then you look up and there's another one. A few days after returning to work there was another one. Fay...
She had ideas about Saving the World. If she could Save it for me, that would be all right too.

He goes on to decide, as Fay is giving birth to his child, that she can save the world. He also sees that women were made to suffer, which is why we're so needy for constant declarations of love. Fay leaves him for another man.

It's not just Bukowski. Or men. It's us all. All humanity. We're all looking for someone to save us.

Which brings me to tonight's pot luck. I ventured out to our community dinner with a pot of my turkey meat balls. I met a few cool people who work at Buffalo Exchange. But, it seems like this core group of community-focused residents are all...saved by Jesus. Why, dear god, why do these nice people turn up everywhere? It's so irritating for someone who really doesn't like Christians. They're nice. But that's all they can be, by Biblical mandate. They're all young. With time, they'll tire of this Lover, and move on to another.

As Bukowski put it:

out of the arms of one love
and into the arms of another

it's not pleasant to die on the cross
it's much more pleasant to hear your name whispered in the dark.

Yankees won in game six.
Now... it's time to back Nicole.
Get it, red-haired girl.



















This is how I spend my Wednesday nights...not naked on a horse, but watching "America's Next Top Model." So awesome.

Today Account Manager said my press releases suck. In so many words. They read like articles, she said. We all had a laugh over that. Bittersweet laughter. Last week I was cut from one of the ad agency's big accounts. The client didn't think I was getting their style. And I've been on shaky ground with the principal client, the cash cow. He complained that I'm too factual.

I think I may have to file for unemployment soon. As my faithful readers know, I didn't qualify after I was laid off from the Newspaper. I could qualify now. I don't want to claim it. Let's see, I guess.

I've been feeling a bit bruised and battered over the last year. At work, at home. But, you know, I'm not taking it personally. Sometimes, the work doesn't come. Or things don't go the way you expect them to. That's how it goes. I feel like Bill Murray in "Zombieland." Calmly observing people going sicko mad consuming the world in a freak-out fest. Fun movie, by the way. I saw it Monday night with Phoenix.

The New York Times has an interesting reader poll, you can find it at www.nytimes.com. You click on the word scrolling over the screen that best matches your current mood. I chose "numb." It's meant to reflect your thoughts on politics and the current economic crisis.

My soundtrack is Ugly Casanova's "Sharpen your Teeth." It's the side project of Modest Mouse's Isaac Brock. It's raw. "Smoke Like Ribbons" has a singing saw. "Cat Faces" is also great. Also in my life is "Blind Pilot," which had a breakout debut last year with "3 Rounds and a Sound." The indie folk duo Israel Nebeker and Ryan Dobrowski (from Portland) performed at SXSW this year. They're the ones who did that cross-country bike tour. The whole album is brilliant, but I especially like "One Red Thread," "The Bitter End" and the title song.

The Nevada Day barbecue at Jen Kleven's house rocked. I pinned a paper cut-out of the state seal on my blue shirt. Jen was sagebrush. I'm really comfortable with her art friends. Drinking beer with the young art grads. They're a trip. I talked travel with Rob, from Sweden, who has spent the last 10 months circling the globe. We had stories to swap about couch surfing, hostels, Asia, GM food.

I'm really excited about giving grad school a shot. I'm taking the GRE in mid-December. I'm applying to the MFA program at UNLV and the Berkeley journalism school. I'd be happy with either, to be honest. Finances are another matter. But I'll think about that tomorrow. I have a lot of work to do in the next month, since the Berkeley app is due Dec. 1. I'm calm about everything. We'll just see how it goes. I prefer to stay in Vegas. I like it here. But we'll see how it goes. I just don't want to live my life with any regrets. So, I'll try everything. Why not? I've got nothing to lose except about $60 and my pride if I don't get anything.

I finished reading Mike Kim's  "Escaping North Korea." If you ever want to feel good about your life. Or want some clarity in these "bleak economic times." Just read about North Korea. Where people have to lie, cheat and steal for rice. Where the unemployment rate is more than 90 percent. Where people get killed for speaking out against authority. Government workers must report to the office daily upon penalty of the gulag, but they often don't get paid. And your "god" is partying on your GDP with his 600 elite inner-circle friends.

America is beautiful in so many ways. Tyranny is fucked up.

I recommend seeing "Eldorado." This is a Belgium movie (in French) about a young junkie and a classic car salesman who take a road trip to reunite the kid with his family. Why the unlikely pair? Well, the junkie breaks into the older man's apartment. Feeling lonely, the car salesman befriends him. The cinematography is beautiful. Clouds, clouds everywhere. Foretelling the end, which I won't give away, but to say that it is obscured. With music by Devendra Banhart, the soundtrack is beautiful. Strange people meet them along the way, such as a nudist RV driver.

Finished "Serpico" today after my tutoring session with Slim. Al Pacino drove that performance. I have to admit, I liked the 70's style. It's pretty hot. I can't imagine living in a time or place where police are on the take like that. It's so morally disturbing.

NPR has never led me astray. I checked out "Mates of State" on the recommendation of music critic Bob Bolien...and I almost regretted it. The music is too poppy. Which I don't like. I listened to it once through and felt like I'd just finished drinking a six pack of 7 Up. But earlier this week, I tried it again. And the first four songs on "Re-arrange Us" are catchy. I can't believe I'm saying this. They're uplifting in these dark days.

I'm so happy to hear that Reid is going for it. The public option is in the health care reform bill. I haven't had insurance in seven months, so this  affects me. I know we won't actually have it until 2013 (if it passes). Can you just imagine an America where people DON'T go bankrupt when they get sick? Or who die needlessly without any care. I covered our healthcare system for several years. It's messed up. I think this time, we might actually get reform.

Time to watch the second game of the World Series.

"Bullets over Broadway" is the perfect movie for a young (struggling, poor, yada yada yada) playwright. It was written by Woody Allen and Douglas McGrath. They had fun toying with the theater, its pretensions and bi-polar disorders. It was like watching a well organized argument. On Saturday I finished editing three scenes of my play, my first long dramatic piece. It's a series of monologues that explores identity after unemployment. I really would like to see it performed. Like David Shayne I will have to decide if I'm an artist...or a woman!
Chazz Palminteri and Dianne Wiest were brilliant.

Some stress at the ad agency today. One of my clients said I'm not really getting what they do.  I'm not capturing their voice. So she dropped me. But she loves me and thinks I'm a great person.
I wasn't offended by this. Strangely enough. A couple weeks ago I probably would've been.

Even a writer wouldn't work for that
I spoke to a woman today who would like to hire a writer for her memoir. She wants someone for 40 hours a week. She's paying $7.50 an hour.

I'm getting worried about my budget again. After a weekend of spending money, I've decided to stick a little closer to home for the next few weeks. Went to Mike Zigler's memorial on Friday night. He died in his garage from carbon monoxide poisoning. All his friends swear it couldn't have been suicide. It was really quite sad. I met him for the first time only a few weeks ago and, unfortunately, he was a drunken, mean guy that night. I'm sorry that I have to remember him that way. His friends and family were torn up, of course. It makes you want to do everything you can to make sure that your friends and family know how loved and appreciated they are.

John Walker and Richard Ryan's works are at the Donna Beam gallery at UNLV until Oct. 31. Walker paints abstract landscapes, often incorporating mud into the oils. It was partly the mood I was in, but his "North Branch Light" made my eyes misty. I thought of walking alone on a road. Surrounded by dark chaos. And, every so often, seeing aurora-type flashes of bright red and yellow. Ryan paints still lifes on a flat plane. Really quite interesting.

I've agreed to go out on a blind double date Friday night, organized by an old high-school friend. I'm looking forward to meeting her boyfriend, and somebody new.

Tonight I had a farewell beer with my good friend Nicky Watts. I met Nicky several months ago when I interviewed her about an international art project she is working on called "Wear Recycle." Nicky plans to take her recycled paper sculptures around the world. It works like this: she creates a plaster cast from the body part of a model (she's done rock bands, local community leaders, the founder of Zappos!), and then creates a recycled paper sculpture from it. She then photographs the model wearing the sculpture. She leaves tomorrow for a six-week grand tour of the Mid-West and East to raise funds for the project.
It's great talking to Nicky. She is honest about the difficulty of starting a grass-roots art movement. We swapped stories about love, sex and art. We drank a few beers at Kelley's Pub on Trop and Pecos. I watched the end of the Colts game. We don't get to hang out often, but when we do, it's fun.

Musicals
"Reefer Madness: The Musical" ends Oct. 4 at the BackStage Theatre at CSN's Cheyenne Campus. See it before it's gone. The production is fun and the players pull it all together with a cloud of herbal smoke. Copy Girl and I especially loved "The Orgy" scene. I have some friends in the cast -- Leah and Dana Kreitz -- and they looked hot dancing around in black bras and green wrap skirts. The appearance of a patchwork jean-wearing Jesus (director Chris Mayse) was also a highlight. My only compliant is that the sound system was off, so it was almost impossible to hear the lyrics to the songs. And it's so funny, that's what you want to hear. Turn the band down, stabilize the actors' voices. So many productions make that mistake.

I'm getting to it late, but "Cannibal The Musical" was the highlight of my summer. I think it closed this weekend. Silly, funny, disgusting. Everything it should be. Director John Beane put his own touch on the Trey Parker musical. We especially loved the Cartman character and the interaction with the audience. Sound wasn't a problem here. But I would like to see a musical that makes more of the female characters. Here they were either sexpot dancing girls used as icing or the Puritan do-gooder who "saves her man."  Strippers or Saints. Is that the only thing women can be on the stage? Sometimes it feels that way.

Watching Vegas perform
A few weekends ago I watched two short plays by local writer Sean Critchfield at the Katherine Gianaclis Park for the Arts. It's amazing to see local artists putting it all out there for (a very small part of) the world to see. He touched on a few emotional issues in "Headlights," and "King's Corridor," but they're themes that are tough to make original. A guy gets upset that his best friend is dating his sister. A son is angry about his father's death. The latter was given a fresh spin because the son was also facing his own mortality, and the expectation of leaving a wife that he loves.

Thanks to Tony DeValle's recommendation, a friend and I made it out to McMullan's pub this week to see "Durty Nelly's Lullaby," a contemporary dance piece performed on the pub floor not six feet away. Joel Howard stars in "Love," so it was amazing to see a Cirque performer balancing on chairs and flipping off the bar for only $8, not the typical Cirque price of $100. He was incredibly alluring. Anastasia Weiss moved like light, so delicate. Except in the fight scene. That was classic. The projections and the choreography made this the best dance/acrobatic piece I have seen in Vegas. I almost cried when the young lovers viewed the projected photos of his travels abroad. It reminded me of my own travels far away and the love I left behind. And as love always seems to go, their story was only a day dream.


The addiction

Recently finished Colum McCann's "Let the Great World Spin." Also loved Jim Jarmusch's "Night on Earth," and "Broken Flowers." Great movies. You'll really enjoy the Rome scene in "Night on Earth."

I bought one of Brian Porray's collages at Trifecta Gallery this weekend. I seem to have a problem. I keep buying art. I'll have to stop soon. I'm running out of space.

ping test

I should be transcribing interviews. Writing a story. Working on my play.
But all I want to do is rest...and watch Miss Marple. Tonight it will be "Towards Zero."
Tonight I'm eating ice cream with raspberries before my dinner.
But I did get to weight lifting class (about 20 minutes late) so I think that makes up for it. At least in my head, it does. And yoga was awesome this week, as always with Camilla.

Heather, a friend from Korea, is back in the states again for a bit and called to catch up. She is one of those naturally sweet, good people. She's heading to Amsterdam soon for a long vaca. So, I can't wait to hear her whole story, since we haven't spoken in more than a year.

Feeling a little under the weather. Always tired.

All I've been doing this week is writing about social networking and marketing. It's fun learning about these different online sites....but I'm starting to get my fill of Twitter. And LinkedIn. And Ning. And Ping. And their long load times. And I'm even starting to hate Facebook. Which is strange.

Leah Craig's painting "Dialogue" is hanging in my living room. The sky blue looks amazing in my (mostly) brown room. Leah is a genius. She gave me a tour of her home at a going away party Saturday. Full of local artists! I met Brian Porray, his girlfriend Kyla Hansen (both UNR grads!) and Rebekah Just. I really love Brian's work. Leah and her boyfriend, Thomas Willis, left for Boston today. She starts her master's program at Tuft's University in the fall. It's sad to see such great people always leaving Vegas.

What an awesome twist in "Witness for the Prosecution"! Agatha Christie was such a talented crime writer. Great performances by Tyrone Power and Marlene Dietrich.

Thanks to artist Alexander Huerta for this new addition to my home (the painting is actually vertical. I just can't get the pic to rotate). His peaceNart studio is downtown in the Arts Factory.

Phoenix and I visited a few openings there tonight and at Newport Lofts. That girl can coordinate. And she's strong. If I ever need to take it to the mattresses, I'd want Phoenix on my side.
Some interesting tattoo art. Ran into graf artist Gearboxxx again. And Jen Kleven, who I really like. Trapped into several long convos. Nice night, but my head is pounding. Tomorrow is Friday...

The TV has got to go. This week I haven't been able to fully enjoy all the brilliant dialogue in “Manhattan” (Woody Allen) or “Witness for the Prosecution” (Billy Wilder). With a subpar sound quality and sans English subtitles, I’ve had to watch them with the French. It’s fun to challenge my French comprehension…but I know I’m missing a lot.
I may have to give up my dreams of an iPhone to get a nice Samsung, LG or Toshiba flat screen TV. It must happen soon! In the queue I’ve got “Scoop,” “Love in the Afternoon,” “Stalag 17,” and some recycling documentary that seemed like a good idea at the time. I'd like to be able to hear them.

Anyone have a post 9/11 TV I could have?

I found the Katherine Gianaclis Park for the Arts. The playwrights and actors are quite talented. I could tell that after one night. I probably won’t workshop my play there for awhile. I really sense that I can learn from everyone there. And I do enjoy listening to others’ work. I’m far from having a complete play.
I’m taking my “life after the layoff” series and turning it into a dramatic work. I haven’t been involved in theater since my sophomore year of college. I have a lot of issues to work through. And I’d also like to start a short story soon. And I have another assignment for the Weekly that must be completed in the next few weeks. Oh, I had a piece come out this week http://www.lasvegasweekly.com/news/2009/jul/30/can-criminals/. I really wanted to get a few more quotes, but I just ran out of time.

Jerry F’n Misko is on the cover of this week’s CityLife. It’s funny because he looks like a bad ass. He’s really not. A bad ass.

I will pick up my painting, “Dialogue” by Leah Craig, this Friday. It’s coming off exhibition at the Winchester Cultural Arts Center. The blue sky and shattering satellites will uplift my living room.

I’ve commissioned some work from one of my favorite young local artists, Bettie Page. Yes, she’s as beautiful as her namesake. I’ve been consuming a lot of art lately. I can’t seem to stop myself. This must be what crack feels like...and looks like on your living room wall...

I have bamboo on my kitchen table. Three stalks are for luck.

Ex-BC Reporter (I haven’t thought of a new pseudonym for her yet) and I are going to see Emiliana Torrini at the El Rey in LA later this month. It’ll be a short two-day trip, but I’m really excited. The theater is beautiful. Emiliana’s music is ethereal (akin to Bjork and Ani). We plan on visiting the Getty and the MOCA. I’ve never been to the Getty and I last visited MOCA in summer 2000. I’d also like to hit the Shakespeare festival in Cedar City before it closes, but that one is still up in the air, what with finances and all.

Speaking of Ex-BC Reporter, I spent the last weekend at her home in Kingman. I just filled the car with gas, spent nothing else (except $3 to get a root beer float from A&W on the way down) and lounged in her pool all weekend. I came home in a shade of pink in some places. We played tennis one morning (0-6). Toured downtown Kingman (even sadder than Ridgecrest). I finished “Cannery Row,” which is now one of my favorite novels. Watched a few movies. I was disappointed by “Notorious.” I waited months for it from the library. I’m just not down with most of Hitchcock’s work. I really liked “Psycho.” And “The Birds” wasn’t bad. “Rebecca” was good. That's it.

Vegas during a recession: a sad place. I see it at the coffee shop. Couples spending evenings there stealing Internet that they can’t get at home. Men scavenging recyclables from our neighborhood bins.

I (finally) got a call from the Multicultural Center. I’m going to start tutoring ESL students again, a couple Saturdays a month. Demand is high, I guess.

Mild panic today about not having insurance. If I have to get stitches. I would not be able to pay the bills, which can be $1,000, according to an NPR story. If I get rear ended…dear god. I’m listening to this news about the gov health care plan and just praying that THIS TIME IT DOESN’T GET CANNED BY SPECIAL INTERESTS.

Talked to Mrs. Salty a few times this past week. She’s talking about having a baby in less than a year. Which is just incredible. Not entirely surprising. I still think of her as a wee lass. Soon with a wee lass (or laddie) of her own.

Squeak is really in love with her new squeeze, a kayaker and future business owner who I’ll call Scruffy. I have to hold the phone about five inches from my ear. Her days and nights are consumed by her love.
Do people fall in love in Vegas?

Camilla heart heart heart
Camilla is the Tuesday night yoga instructor at LVAC. She's from Poland. Camilla is wonderful. She has erased all bad memories of the god-awful class I had on Sunday. Proper sweat. Proper stretch. For an hour I nearly forgot about the tension in my head. I clench my jaw when I get stressed, or upset, or bothered, or something. I haven't done it in awhile. But recently I started feeling it again. It's like a giant chisel against my jaw, which ricochets up into my brain.
But, tonight was a great workout.

Work is
sometimes fun. We had a client present a new product recently. We sat in our executive board room. The client spread out some conceptual pictures. It's A light-up console thing. One button lights up when a person should be in this room. Then the person must push this button. Then you know where you should be. Then everyone else knows where you are. I nodded my head. This is the image that popped into my head: Connect 4. But lots more complicated. And not as much fun.

The newsletter is done. And it's awesome. It's the best fucking newsletter you're ever going to read. I wrote an article about green business. And lots of stuff about social networking. I'm sick of social networking. If I have to write one more thing about Twitter...
Today I also wrote a humorous script explaining Twitter to our Web visitors. It was fun to write. The agency is going to set it to animation.  I made it creative and interesting. I even put a little Vegas twist in there. But I'm just so sick of Twitter...please, let the next trend come soon!

I turned a 900-word story about recycling theft into the Weekly today. I was missing a vital quote, but I just ran out of time. The ubiquitous sound of crushed cans still rings in my ears. I'll post the link when it's up, which should be this week.

'Artichoke face'
I finished two movies. "La Strada" is a classic Fellini tragedy about Gelsomina, a curious looking circus performer (Fellini's wife, Giulietta Masina), and her love of the brutish traveling strongman Zampano. Despite his abuse and indifference she loves him and refuses to leave. Zampano makes a decision, and seals Gelsomina's fate. He never truly understood her. Nor can we, really.
Woody Allen's "Broadway Danny Rose" is really funny. Mia Farrow did a great job portraying a gangster moll in dark glasses and a blond bouffant. If you think it's strange for rail-thin Farrow to play a Jersey girl, you're right. She padded herself. There's a bit of a connection to Vegas in this movie. It gives homage to nostalgic lounge acts.

Yes, it's true. Not one downward facing dog. In a YOGA class. Crazy, I know. In the 70-minute class (I left after an hour, and I don't know how I managed that long) the teacher directed us through, maybe, about four poses. She mostly kept us on our backs or on our knees (no crude comments, please.)  She told us a rambling eight-minute story about her dead parents. She ordered us on where to place our mats. The instructor even moved one girl's cell phone out of view. Why? Perhaps she was scared it would distract the girl from the "practice," I don't know. I arrived ready to get a good sweat and stretch. Little did I know, you barely move in "therapeutic yoga." To her credit, she did show us a new way to move into triangle pose. But I didn't need the five-minute discourse on why this is the best method.
SUGGESTION: avoid the 2 p.m. yoga class at LVAC central, unless you want to listen to a lecture.

Grease...or something
So, I've just spent the last hour and 20 minutes cleaning the kitchen. Most of that time was taken up with scrubbing a new (gross!) discovery. And the scary thing is, I've lived in this apartment for 11 months and just figured this out. Since the day I've moved in, I've noticed the handles on all my kitchen cabinets are...gummy. I guess that's the right word for it. I thought it was the wood varnish. Or something. I don't know what I thought. But I give my kitchen a good cleaning every two weeks and I always scrub the doors and the handles. And I've always been mystified by this gumminess. Handles are the one thing everybody forgets to clean. But they're the dirtiest because you touch them the most. (Clean your front door, too, that's a big one.) Anyway, I was scrubbing the cabinet handle closest to the oven burners when it finally hit me. This is grease! The grease was so caked on there, it was almost a sticky layer. After I revived myself, I took out a butter knife and scraped scraped scraped. Alas, what about all these other handles? They're gummy, too. And they're not near the oven burners, where grease splatters.
Gross. Even though I clean them often, the person who lived here before me didn't.
It's years and years of "hand grease" that has accumulated on the cabinet doors and handles.
Dear god save me.
Needless to say, next week's chore will be to take the knife to the rest of the cabinet doors in my kitchen.
SUGGESTION: clean your cabinets doors bi-weekly, and don't forget your oven dials.

I'm going to go on a short run (since I really didn't get any exercise earlier).
I'm full of () tonight.

I'm going to need a Miss Marple movie this week.

SUGGESTION: If you want a (surprisingly)  uplifting movie, check out "Frozen River." It's also playing at the Clark County Library on Tuesday night.  If you're a writer and want to fall in love with the written word conveyed through a great film (does that even make sense?) check out "The Lost Weekend," a classic Billy Wilder film, based on the Charles R. Jackson novel.

Some weeks, I swear, the cord stretches all the way to my bedroom. Other weeks, it can't even make it across the living room. It's one of those "missing sock" conundrums.

After I got laid off...
I had Thai food this afternoon with Aaron T., who will be the last interviewee for my radio piece: "Life After the Layoff." I'm taking five interviews with Las Vegans and mixing their comments on life, the economy and the future with my own observations on joblessness. It'll be my personal project until I can find the contacts to place it with PRI or NPR.
Aaron T. was a pretty awesome interview. Intelligent guy. Culturally astute. Great comments about the media and the state of journalism (he was laid off from CityLife earlier this year). Great quote: "I always wanted to be a journalist, be on the front lines, but I can't anymore. So I'm getting out of the country."
Aaron leaves for Degu, S. Korea this weekend. I gave him some advice. At the top of the list of things I told him to bring: condoms (let your mind imagine why, e-mail me and I'll let you know how close you are.)

Writing
My graffiti piece came out in the Las Vegas Weekly about two weeks ago. I have another one coming out on the downtown loft condo market. Short sales abound....but can anyone afford even $130k for 900 square feet? http://www.lasvegasweekly.com/news/2009/may/28/urban-kings/ let me know what you think.

I've been offered a teaching position in July. It's only about eight hours a week. Yes, I know, that's not going to cut it. But what can I do?

I had another one of those disturbing dreams that my teeth were turning black and falling out. I don't have them too often, but when I do, I remember them. I often have to wake myself up for the assurance that it's not true.

"If feelings of loss of control, helplessness or powerlessness accompany your tooth loss dream, the dream is typically acting as a mirror of a situation in waking life. Dreams of tooth loss coupled with anxiety reflect a fear of change, fear of transition. Ask yourself if there is some transition that you are fearful of making."

Yes. I really need to decide on a job. External forces are pressuring me. Sometimes into things I don't want to do. I want to take my time to decide. But circumstances and people aren't really allowing that. I'm scared I'm going to get into a job situation that I regret later.

"Tooth loss dreams may also symbolize a fear of abandonment, of being left behind with no recourse. Look at your relationships and see if any of them are leaving you with feelings of insecurity."

Hum. That's something to think about. Everything is in a little tumult right now, which is what happens when you aren't working and not around co-workers at all anymore.

Dream interpretations are from "BellaOnline."