All about me.
“Now look, baby, ‘union’ is spelled with five letters. It is not a four-letter-word.” (Dorothy Parker) For anyone who believes in progress, equality, or the idea that America’s greatness expresses itself in ways other than the accumulation of wealth and power by the bosses, last night’s recall vote in Wisconsin …
“Walk in my footsteps. It’ll be easier.” François Truffaut’s conundrum about the impossibility of making an anti-war film has been reheated and turned over until it’s become inedible; a fresher tidbit for us to chew on is how national cinemas portray war based on their own experiences of it. In …
For someone who has written an exciting new collection of short humor that you should buy immediately, I’ve never been particularly adept at writing, or even telling, jokes. Jokes are rigidly formalist and require a kind of ingenuity in the telling that I’ve never quite been able to master. You’ll …
Hello, friends and readers! I’m extremely pleased to announce the arrival of my newest book, Moods from Marbletown. It’s a collection of short humor pieces collected from my previous writings as well as some brand-new material to make it worth the jingle. If you’re a fan of smart, literate written …
Hello friends, readers, and worldwide strangers! If you’re reading these words, it’s because you’ve stopped by on the day I launch a major overhaul of my home on the Internet. It’s the biggest, most ambitious, and most complex upgrade to the site I’ve ever made in ten years of blogging, …
I cannot remember much, I cannot feel much. Maybe erasure is necessary. Maybe the human spirit defends itself as the body does, attacking infection, enveloping and destroying those malignancies that would otherwise consume us. (Tim O’Brien) On Veteran’s Day, we are told only to honor those who have served this …
If you credit the arguments of those on the comfortable center of the divide between rich and poor, we are currently locked in a life-or-death struggle between radical Republicans and a thin blue line of heroic Democrats who alone champion the liberal values of civilization against the rapacious hordes of …
The bosses of our mass media — press, radio, film and television — have their aim of taking our minds off disaster. Thus, the distraction they offer demands the antidote of maximum concentration on disaster. (Ernst Fischer) Just a quick one tonight, inspired by Sony Pictures’ firing of Dan Harmon. …
Nineteen Eighty-Four is not often thought of as a useful text for illumination of the art of criticism, but like all great writers, Orwell contained multitudes of meaning in his writing, leaving great lessons barely concealed for application to whatever subject needed them. At the book’s very beginning, Winston Smith opens …
When I was young, like many idealists, I still believed that America was exceptional. I still believe that this country is an exceptional one; there is still no nation that so fiercely enshrines the rights of man in its very foundational document and so vociferously defends them as part of its …
Hello, friends and readers! As you probably already know if you are strangely obsessed with the financial peculiarities of people on the internet, I am a full-time freelance writer, and at the moment, 100% of my drastically tiny income is derived from writing. And although I would never suggest that …
Some time ago, a friend of mine was discussing the painful direction criticism has taken in the internet age. He suggested, in a bit of phrasing that has struck me as extremely perceptive ever since, that part of the problem is that people no longer approach art with any sense …
I’m glad you asked! My very good friend Cori and I just returned from a week-long trip down into Cajun country, and while I know no one comes here for my travelogues, sit through this one, and I’ll return to the pointless political griping and obscure 10%er comedy in a …
If only the eliminated contestants would disappear forever. If only I had written this in March when it had a tiny amount of relevance. If only I hadn’t filled out my actually NCAA brackets based on which team had the guys with the funniest names. So many regrets. Cultural Conference, …
I am a proud father of none, and all my children have been raised with the same care and thoughtfulness with which I monitor my own dietary and alcohol intake. As such, I have some advice for anxious young parents who may be considering some of the more extreme parenting …
