sundries

Normally, on a Saturday, I'd try to work early to have the evening, but since I have no evenings here, I spent the morning doing some of Other Work and various creative enterprise stuff, and am now going to stroll in the nice day. I need the sunlight and the exercise. And I'm thinking about treating myself to a new pair of fabulous eye-glasses here. I did just get three months of back overtime pay after all, and I deserve a splurge.

Last night I Skyped with my mom for a while, which was really nice. She was all, "Sometimes I think you're prone to hyperbole, but you're really courageous." I told her both can be true.

In exactly one week, I will be picking Patty up at the Zurich airport! I believe she is currently at her Cardiff farmer's market. I feel sad she'll miss both the Friday market here and, I believe, the Christmas market down in Zurich while visitng. We'll see.

Are you an artist with the desire to be a map-maker? If so, I may have a design project for you down the line. It's unurgent at the moment, but I'd like to know who's out there.

Having read more about the Olbermann thing? He fucked up. NBC/MSNBC needs a clearer policy, AND the select enforcement thing is crap or at least needs a clearer explanation. Meanwhile, Rachel Maddow for the win with the fairly accurate spin.

While many of the babies born with HIV in the 1990s did not survive past childhood, there's a generation of teens and 20-somethings who've been living with AIDS since they were born. Their stories are one of the many legacies of AIDS which, in parallel to the virus causes it, keeps changing shape in terms of the marks it leaves on our social landscape.

Friends of mine are running the New York City marathon this weekend. This is one of those things that has great emotional symbolism to me, but that I'll probably never do. I remain conflicted about this -- if it's a failing of desire, will, or simply my flesh; or it it's depressing to say "a life only so many hours and I need those ones for something else." But I think it's a fucking beautiful endeavor, and my heart goes with you. Be awesome.

The tale of a New York tailor.

Only in New York: a banquet for 4,500 rabbis held in a cruise ship cargo terminal.

The opening of Julie Taymor's Spiderman musical has been delayed yet again. The trials and tribulations of making Broadway shows happen is legendary, and I don't follow this stuff closely unless it's a show that involves either people I know or has creatives/narratives I've feel personally invested in (Taymor's Across the Universe is how I got into SAG, and I'm still heartbroken about some stuff that was shot for it that was never used, not because I was in it, but because it was so good). But that said, I suspect the level of "Oh, look, shit's fucked up!" that goes on in the coverage of this show has as much to do with her being a woman whose work a lot of people find very confronting and difficult as much as it has to do with "Oh, look, shit's fucked up!" And let us pause here to remember that not only did she bring us Titus, but she also brought us the Bway version of The Lion King. That's what we call range, while adhering to a core set of creative principles.