A perhaps infortuitous collision between my iTunes Work Shuffle mix and the subject of the July issue of Ken Writes About Stuff."Serpent People ( Read more... )

Rather than expound on my latest Vegas adventure (Shortest Form: GTS up) I think I'll noodle on about two experiences, of roughly equal length, from the last couple of weeks.

I saw Lohengrin at the Lyric Opera (with a ticket hookup from bunj) and watched all five Fantômas films in a row (thanks to a Christmas gift of the new DVD set from righteousfist). One was ( Read more... )

It's time for another roundup post! Links ahoy!

* Silvia Moreno-Garcia of the Innsmouth Free Press interviews me on Divers Topicks, including the squamous ones.

* Leaving Jeremy L.C. Jones to ask me writerly stuff at Booklife, not excepting the rugose side of things.

* Breaking things up, Andrew Girdwood of Geek Native interviews simonjrogers about my ( Read more... )

I extended my stay in the Greater Minneapolitan Area by a day to hang about with John and Michelle Nephew, friends and publishers, and as a great bonus, got to share two meals (one of them the Mandatory Breakfast) with jtidball. Before then, Michelle and I strolled through the Science Museum of Minnesota studying its devolution (common to museums of the ( Read more... )

Tonight, mollpeartree and I went to see the Chicago Chorale's performance of Bach's "Passion of St. Matthew." This is, as all will recognize, one of the absolute Musts of the Western cultural canon -- and I got through all three hours of it. I was even whistling a little of it while making grilled cheese, so it must have sunk home somewhere ( Read more... )

Last night, thanks to his_regard's eagle eye, he and I and the redoubtable Mazzy hit the Music Box for Julien Temple's latest doc, Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten. One might describe it as an elegy with rough edges; it mentions, but does not dwell upon, Strummer's various machinations and personal betrayals -- the famous "Clash Communique" is ( Read more... )

This last weekend, I was blessed with the mellifluous company and smooth jazz stylings of yukon_jack, who immediately fell to work at his twin gifts of keeping my blood alcohol (we were drinking mostly Moscow Mules at home) and my cultural intake elevated ( Read more... )

So tonight on a lark I hooked up with gnosticpi, voxel, and heathey (to the latter two of whom great thanks for saving us seats) for a free Decemberists concert, backed by the Grant Park Orchestra, at the Pritzker Bandshell in the lovely (and only a wee bit over budget) Millennium Park here in the greatest city in the world ( Read more... )

So tonight, on a perfect June evening in the greatest city on God's green Earth, his_regard, gnosticpi, and myself hit the Park West for an evening with Richard Thompson ( Read more... )

On an impulse, I bought Derek McCulloch and Shepherd Hendrix' graphic novel Stagger Lee (available from Image) and this, my friends, is How To Do It. It purports to tell the story of Lee "Stag Lee" Shelton, who killed Billy Lyons on Christmas Eve of 1895 in a fight over a Stetson hat, and who became the subject of the folk song "Stagolee" aka " ( Read more... )