After this coming Sunday (November 6th), I'll be disappearing from the public poetry scene in Southern California for awhile. I learned a few things about poetry--more than I ever thought I would. So glad to have made some friends over the past thirteen years. Will still post poems to Facebook (and on this blog) on occasion and hope to keep books available in stores--and one of them will soon be available online. Sending best wishes to those who remain in the arena.
Monday, October 31, 2011
BIG NOIR OPEN READING this Sunday--part of the NIGHT AND THE CITY noir festival.
Glad to be part of this event. Reprinting from the L.A. Poetry Festival NIGHT AND THE CITY brochure:
Sunday, November 6
3 p.m.–5 p.m.
Big Noir Open Reading—with Features
Come read your favorite Raymond Chandler
Sign-ups 2:30–3 p.m.
Host: Mike the Poet Sonksen
3:00 p.m.–3:30 p.m. Featured readers: Fiction writer Cheryl Klein • Poet, author Pam Ward
3:30 p.m. Kick-off to Open: Terry McCarty
Gemini Manor (a fantastically original house)
1341 N. Mariposa Avenue • Hollywood 90027 Bring your own wine or noir picnic • Soft drinks, coffee, provided • Admission: $10
Sunday, November 6
3 p.m.–5 p.m.
Big Noir Open Reading—with Features
Come read your favorite Raymond Chandler
Sign-ups 2:30–3 p.m.
Host: Mike the Poet Sonksen
3:00 p.m.–3:30 p.m. Featured readers: Fiction writer Cheryl Klein • Poet, author Pam Ward
3:30 p.m. Kick-off to Open: Terry McCarty
Gemini Manor (a fantastically original house)
1341 N. Mariposa Avenue • Hollywood 90027 Bring your own wine or noir picnic • Soft drinks, coffee, provided • Admission: $10
Sunday, October 30, 2011
Here's a great misinterpretation of the current film THE RUM DIARY.
From K. Bowen, commenter on Jeffrey Wells' blog HOLLYWOOD ELSEWHERE:
Count me in the positive column. I like its setting, ambience, and developed characters.
Still, the thing I couldn't figure out was why Sanderson (Eckhart) was the bad guy and Kemp (Depp) was the good guy.
Sanderson is friendly, trusting, loyal, puts up with Kemp's alcoholic shortcomings in good humor and gives him a great opportunity. He's genuinely hurt when things go bad at the end. He only wants to build a resort so that people can have a great vacation and he can justifiably make money from it.
Kemp, meanwhile, is disloyal, unreliable, self-righteous, alcoholic and hangs out with friends he really should kick out of his life before they drag him down. He steals Sanderson's boat, tries to steal his girlfriend, and plays a significant accidental role in putting someone in danger. While he eventually pretends to act out of moral authority, he really acts out of envy. He's a fun fellow,
It is nice to have characters well rounded enough to debate things like this, however. Good job all around!
The complete thread with Wells' original post can be found at:
http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2011/10/rummies.php
Count me in the positive column. I like its setting, ambience, and developed characters.
Still, the thing I couldn't figure out was why Sanderson (Eckhart) was the bad guy and Kemp (Depp) was the good guy.
Sanderson is friendly, trusting, loyal, puts up with Kemp's alcoholic shortcomings in good humor and gives him a great opportunity. He's genuinely hurt when things go bad at the end. He only wants to build a resort so that people can have a great vacation and he can justifiably make money from it.
Kemp, meanwhile, is disloyal, unreliable, self-righteous, alcoholic and hangs out with friends he really should kick out of his life before they drag him down. He steals Sanderson's boat, tries to steal his girlfriend, and plays a significant accidental role in putting someone in danger. While he eventually pretends to act out of moral authority, he really acts out of envy. He's a fun fellow,
It is nice to have characters well rounded enough to debate things like this, however. Good job all around!
The complete thread with Wells' original post can be found at:
http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2011/10/rummies.php
Friday, October 28, 2011
Explaining Southern California poetry to outsiders Part Two: the pressure to conform to majority beliefs.
Recycling a comment made to me last year by an ex-OC poet:
"[SoCal poets' names redacted] and others you have issues with have traveled the country and the world and have performed their words for micro cultures of many different sizes and creeds.. their opinions hold merit, and should really be LISTENED to..sure they should be taken with a grain of salt, but they have experience and have learned things about the poetic experience that you have not, and their opinions hold keys and things to be learned..ignoring that is just stupidity. why would you NOT be interested in their opinions??"
The opinion above is that person's opinion--and I'd like to think I'm free to disagree with it.
But, for community advancement, it's better to not disagree.
Just be quiet, don't argue, make friends--and perhaps, one day, your poetry may be found to have merit.
Even if you haven't already changed it to make it more acceptable to the people whose opinions should
really be LISTENED to.
"[SoCal poets' names redacted] and others you have issues with have traveled the country and the world and have performed their words for micro cultures of many different sizes and creeds.. their opinions hold merit, and should really be LISTENED to..sure they should be taken with a grain of salt, but they have experience and have learned things about the poetic experience that you have not, and their opinions hold keys and things to be learned..ignoring that is just stupidity. why would you NOT be interested in their opinions??"
The opinion above is that person's opinion--and I'd like to think I'm free to disagree with it.
But, for community advancement, it's better to not disagree.
Just be quiet, don't argue, make friends--and perhaps, one day, your poetry may be found to have merit.
Even if you haven't already changed it to make it more acceptable to the people whose opinions should
really be LISTENED to.
The Bob Buchmann era at KLOS-FM is over; DJ Jim Ladd also fired.
At least Chris Carter's BREAKFAST WITH THE BEATLES--the only program I listen to on KLOS--is unaffected by this wave of downsizing.
http://www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/industry/legal-and-management/more-layoffs-at-cumulus-ladd-buchmann-leave-1005441562.story
http://www.ocregister.com/entertainment/kabc-324171-director-program.html
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/radio-323981-new-oct.html
http://www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/industry/legal-and-management/more-layoffs-at-cumulus-ladd-buchmann-leave-1005441562.story
http://www.ocregister.com/entertainment/kabc-324171-director-program.html
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/radio-323981-new-oct.html
Thursday, October 27, 2011
SLATE's Dahlia Lithwick makes it perfectly clear what the people protesting with OWS want.
Highlighting by me:
For the past several years, while the mainstream media was dutifully reporting on all things Kardashian or (more recently) a wholly manufactured debt-ceiling crisis, ordinary people were losing their health care, their homes, their jobs, and their savings. Those people have taken that narrative to Facebook and Twitter—just as citizens took to those alternative forms of media throughout the Middle East as part of the Arab Spring. And just to be clear: They aren’t holding up signs that say “I want Bill O’Reilly’s stuff.” They aren’t holding up signs that say “I am animated by toxic levels of envy and entitlement.” They are holding up signs that are perfectly and intrinsically clear: They want accountability for the banks that took their money, they want to end corporate control of government. They want their jobs back. They would like to feed their children. They want—wait, no, we want—to be heard by a media that has devoted four mind-numbing years to channeling and interpreting every word uttered by a member of the Palin family while ignoring the voices of everyone else.
And there’s this. The mainstream media thrives on simple solutions. It has no idea whatsoever of how to report on a story that isn’t about easy fixes so much as it is about anguished human frustration and fear. The media prides itself on its ability to tell you how to clear your clutter, regrout your shower, or purge your closet of anything that makes you look fat—in 24 minutes or less. It is bound to be flummoxed by a protest that offers up no happy endings. Luckily for us, #OWS doesn’t seem to care.
The entirety of Ms. Lithwick's article can be found here:
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2011/10/how_ows_confuses_and_ignores_fox_news_and_the_pundit_class_.html
For the past several years, while the mainstream media was dutifully reporting on all things Kardashian or (more recently) a wholly manufactured debt-ceiling crisis, ordinary people were losing their health care, their homes, their jobs, and their savings. Those people have taken that narrative to Facebook and Twitter—just as citizens took to those alternative forms of media throughout the Middle East as part of the Arab Spring. And just to be clear: They aren’t holding up signs that say “I want Bill O’Reilly’s stuff.” They aren’t holding up signs that say “I am animated by toxic levels of envy and entitlement.” They are holding up signs that are perfectly and intrinsically clear: They want accountability for the banks that took their money, they want to end corporate control of government. They want their jobs back. They would like to feed their children. They want—wait, no, we want—to be heard by a media that has devoted four mind-numbing years to channeling and interpreting every word uttered by a member of the Palin family while ignoring the voices of everyone else.
And there’s this. The mainstream media thrives on simple solutions. It has no idea whatsoever of how to report on a story that isn’t about easy fixes so much as it is about anguished human frustration and fear. The media prides itself on its ability to tell you how to clear your clutter, regrout your shower, or purge your closet of anything that makes you look fat—in 24 minutes or less. It is bound to be flummoxed by a protest that offers up no happy endings. Luckily for us, #OWS doesn’t seem to care.
The entirety of Ms. Lithwick's article can be found here:
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2011/10/how_ows_confuses_and_ignores_fox_news_and_the_pundit_class_.html
Monday, October 24, 2011
Uh-oh: Steve "flat tax" Forbes endorses Rick "chasing Herman Cain's flat tax" Perry.
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-forbes-perry-20111024,0,6701998.story?track=rss
Safe to conjecture that this is the beginning of the end of Rick Perry in the GOP Presidential candidate
horse race.
And, somehow, this Don Henley song comes to mind (couldn't find Henley's version on YouTube, but here's a karaoke cover--be patient, intro lasts a minute):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PrfkoJ7jF8
Safe to conjecture that this is the beginning of the end of Rick Perry in the GOP Presidential candidate
horse race.
And, somehow, this Don Henley song comes to mind (couldn't find Henley's version on YouTube, but here's a karaoke cover--be patient, intro lasts a minute):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PrfkoJ7jF8
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Some notes on Barnes and Noble--the last national bookstore chain standing.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jacketcopy/2011/10/barnes-noble-cfo-joseph-lombardi-resigns-.html
Went into the Calabasas, CA store Tuesday night and noticed that, before closing, the only place to pay for book/other purchases was through the cashier in the coffee/food area.
Was at the store in Woodland Hills last night and noticed that, like Borders, B and N is staking a fair amount of store space on selling to perceived "hot" consumers. In B and N's case, it's children (whereas Borders in its latter phase was feverish to sell TWILIGHT and other teen-goth romances).
Guessing that B and N will announce more store closings in 2012.
[UPDATE 10/26/11: I was prescient. The B and N at the Westside Pavilion in West L.A. will close by the end of this year: http://www.laobserved.com/archive/2011/10/barnes_noble_westside_pav.php]
Went into the Calabasas, CA store Tuesday night and noticed that, before closing, the only place to pay for book/other purchases was through the cashier in the coffee/food area.
Was at the store in Woodland Hills last night and noticed that, like Borders, B and N is staking a fair amount of store space on selling to perceived "hot" consumers. In B and N's case, it's children (whereas Borders in its latter phase was feverish to sell TWILIGHT and other teen-goth romances).
Guessing that B and N will announce more store closings in 2012.
[UPDATE 10/26/11: I was prescient. The B and N at the Westside Pavilion in West L.A. will close by the end of this year: http://www.laobserved.com/archive/2011/10/barnes_noble_westside_pav.php]
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)