Happy birthday / April Fool’s day to Chip Delany! Thank you for keeping faith in my abilities as a publisher, long after a sensible man would have given up.

A podcast about books, art & life — not necessarily in that order
Happy birthday / April Fool’s day to Chip Delany! Thank you for keeping faith in my abilities as a publisher, long after a sensible man would have given up.
I bought a Flip Video Ultra last week, so expect more dumb movie-clips like this one of me and Rufus fighting over a toy we bought him 10 minutes earlier:
What I’m reading: Desolation Road by Ian McDonald
What I’m listening to: Odd Couple, Gnarls Barkley
What I’m watching: NCAA hoops
What I’m drinking: nothing, after reaching double-digits in Hendrick’s & tonics last week in Philadelphia
Where I’m going: no traveling this week!
What I’m happy about: Amy & Rufus didn’t kill each other while I was away last week.
What I’m sad about: Davidson fell 3 points short of reaching the Final Four. But this post about the sheer joy on display in Western Kentucky’s first-round buzzer-beater win helps me get over the sadness.
What I’m pondering: How to write a convincing evocation of a place I’ve never been.
I was going to post this column by James Carville just so you could read his defense of his “Judas” reference to Bill Richardson’s endorsement of Obama. I mean, it’s a pretty entertaining read:
Heck, I give myself some credit for managing to get the Clinton and Obama campaigns to agree on something — that neither wanted to be associated with my remarks.
But then I got to the end and was struck by this phrase:
Most of the stuff I’ve ever said is pretty insignificant and by in large has been said off the cuff and without much thought to the potential consequences.
“By in large”? I always thought it was “by and large.” This conversation would seem to confirm that (well, since it’s derived from nautical terminology, they propose “by and larrrrrrrge,” but still), but since my just deserts mistake a few months ago, I’m gunshy. Maybe this is just how you say “by and large” . . . Cajun style!
Any insight on this?
Even my conference travels can’t keep me from serving up some Unrequired Reading links to while away your Fridays, dear readers! Enjoy!
Continue reading “Unrequired Reading: Mar. 28, 2008”
Was the Giants’ Super Bowl win over the Patriots as big an upset as Buster Douglas over Mike Tyson? I remember getting the news about Douglas’ win the morning after, and it was as if the earth had started rotating in the other direction.
Sorry for the postlessness, dear readers! I’m down in Philadelphia for the Interphex conference and been busy getting things set up.
I’ve been attending this annual event since 2000 and this is the second time it’s been in Philly; all the other years have been in NYC. Not sure why it got bumped this time around, but hey.
The “fun” thing about these conferences is finding out what state our booth is in. Every company has horror stories about their booth materials (their stand, handouts, etc.) being lost. In this case, all of our things arrived, but the conference administrators forgot to tell the decorating company that we were supposed to have carpeting, two tables, and four chairs. Which is to say, I arrived yesterday to find our stuff — a pop-up booth in its crate and 24 boxes of magazines — sitting in the middle of a 10′ x 10′ concrete square.
So that took a little time to get resolved.
I always marvel at the scene on an exhibit hall floor 12-15 hours before an event begins. It’s absolute chaos, but somehow it all gets put together in time for a 10am opening.