read a good poem: love song

richard, teresa, and kevin, at the corner bookstore, madison ave, nyc. the word on the street is that scenes from "the princes of tides" were filmed here.

cheers to my friend, mr. kevin c. fitzpatrick on the occasion of the publication of his 3rd book: the lost algonquin round table. The book is a collection of writings (including previously unpublished works) from 16 members of the round table, including robert benchley, alexander woollcott (who inspired the haughty, creepy "waldo lydecker" character in the noir masterpiece, laura) and one ms. dorothy parker.

you can purchase the lost algonquin roundtable and kevin's other book, a journey into dorothy parker's new york, on amazon...

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here's a little ms. parker for you and me:

love song

suppose we two were cast away
on some deserted strand.
where in the breeze
the palm trees sway--
a sunlit wonderland:
where never human footstep fell
where tropic love-birds woo.
like eve and adam we could dwell,
in paradise, for two.
would you, i wonder, tire of me
as sunny days went by,
and would you welcome joyously,
a steamer?...so would i.

suppose we sought bucolic ways
and led the simple life
away--as runs the happy phrase--
from cities' toil and strife.
there you and i could live alone,
and share our hopes and fears,
a small-town darby and his joan,
we'd face the quiet years.
i wonder would you ever learn
my charms could pall on you,
and would you let your fancy turn
to others? ...i would too.

between us two (suppose once more)
had rolled the boundary deep;
you journeyed to a foreign shore,
and left me here to weep.
i wonder if you'd be the same,
though we were far apart,
and if you'd always bear my name
engraved upon your heart.
or would you bask in other smiles,
and, charmed by novelty,
forget the one so many miles
away?...that goes for me.

--dorothy parker (1921)
from "the lost algonquin round table
copyright © 2009 edited by nat benchley and kevin c. fitzpatrick

***

more of my friends:

richard and teresa, aka film snobs

cheers!

bringin' da noise: canon g10

cash bar

cap'n cool

color strand

face to face

pieces of work

i recently purchased a canon g10 to serve as my every day, on-the-go camera. i've used it on three separate occasions so far, and i'm not loving the results. granted, i've been maxing out the zoom, and trying whenever possible not to use a flash. but there is a disappointing amount of noise and i don't know what to do...

i took the photos above at a book event at the fantastic jan larsen art studios in dumbo (hosted by gelf magazine). see what i mean? the only shot that isn't affected is one of the quilt...

sometimes i like grainy-ness in photos, but i don't want to see it in every shot.

i'm thinking about returning it. but what should i replace it with? a friend was happy with the results from the panasonic g1 he tested (while snowboarding, no less). but it looks from this review like that will present a similar problem? i should ask to see those photos.

i'm usually good about researching equipment before pulling the trigger (i loved the results from my canon A95, great saturated color, beautiful quality with a surprisingly robust zoom--and i bought it for around $250), but i was in a bit if a hurry this time as i needed a good back-up camera...thank goodness i didn't need to rely on this for my friend's wedding photos--there's no comparing the quality of the images between this and the xsi.

i'm going to take it for another run this weekend up in beacon, and then at home. maybe i just need to do a bit more fiddling around. fingers crossed.

but i remain open for suggestions...

more shots from the fun and fascinating gelf magazine series: "geeking out," here .

vacation plan...

go-go's vacation.

original record release date: august 1982.

right around 5 o'clock today, i started to panic. i had just wrapped up a couple of projects, but still had one awaiting. i sussed out the piles (newspapers, magazines, printouts, manila folders, binder clips and paper clips...why so many CLIPS everywhere?) all over my cubicle and thought, god. this could be a long night.

by 6pm, all but one of my co-workers had left, though i could hear my friend teri, in the cubicle next to mine, typing more maniacally than i'd ever heard before--there was no way she was going to be there much longer. i started to get a little bluesy. feeling a little bluesy on a friday night isn't new or unusual, but tonight was to be the start of my vacation.

it seemed very far away.

it's funny and frustrating how much there is to do before taking any significant amount of time off. at work, you either have to wrap it all up or delegate (which always takes longer than i anticipate). and then there are all the terrifically forgettable tasks (turning on the out-of-office notifications, changing the voicemail message--it only took me 6 takes this time). even at home, you have to arrange for the mail, suspend the newspaper delivery, rid the fridge of perishables (milk gone bad? oof), and basically clean the whole place, kitchen to bath, so that you can have a happy, chore-free homecoming.

but i don't have to worry about that last part--the homecoming--since i'm going to be, for the most part, at home.

and perhaps this is contributing to my bluesy-ness. because as delighted as i am about the break from my job, i also intend for these next 12 days to be...productive.

you friends of mine know that i can while away nearly whole days listening to music and dancing around this apartment in my stocking feet. or drinking coffee and tearing (literally) through my favorite magazines. all of that will be part of my plan. and i will take myself out for breakfast, meet friends for lunch and dinner, COOK! take photos, swim, sleeeep, read the books i borrowed from the library about 6 weeks ago (whoops. think i can finish up pictures at a revolution and get through the rest is noise? hmmm)...

but then i'm also supposed to fix my life. not totally change it in less than a fortnight. that would be crazy!

i aim for clarity and action.

hence, the panic.

i really do want to make this time good...

but first, i'm going to finish my glass of wine and start the conversation.

cheers...

"love me or leave me alone"

the view from the floor of kgb bar...

i check my email compulsively. it doesn't matter how slow or frenzied my day is, or where in the world i am, if i am near a computer, i will check my (multiple) email addresses for hellos (hint, hint), news (nytimes, washington post, mediabistro), sales (jcrew...adidas...), "green tips" (ideal bite!) and goings on about town. (bully for me if these goings on are inexpensive--or free--since that means i can spend more money on food and wine!) in any case, i wind up attending film screenings, gallery exhibits, food tastings, and many, many book events.

yesterday, in the middle of a maddening tuesday, i read about this six word memoir event, via flavorpill, and i decided to alter my thrilling plans (gym....laundry...) and head downtown to kgb bar. in lo the many years i've lived in ny, i'd never been to kgb bar. i was prepared to be the only non-hipster/intellectual in the room.

the bar was predictably packed with smart-looking folk. i shimmied my way past the bar, found a little bit of breathing room, right near the mic and makeshift dais. i was pleased with my position, until i realized that i (along with a few others) was obstructing the view of the super-smart folks that got there early enough to secure table seating.

they asked us to sit down. on the floor.

as a measure of my enthusiasm for this whole six word memoir idea, i obliged and plopped myself down--in my cute little black jersey dress, and my favorite vintage ivory cashmere coat--on the floor. of the bar. in the east village.

but i was rewarded. the editors, larry smith & rachel fershleiser were disarming as they read from the book's introduction, and offered some backstory on some of the submissions (the contributor of "I still make coffee for two" --zak nelson--has a new girlfriend; the woman behind "many miscarriages. cousin will carry baby" is now the mother of 2...) and i was amazed and inspired. i've been a fan of short short fiction for a while, but the challenge of using a mere six words sent my mind reeling...

my own six word memoir of that evening is banal, but true:

"sat on floor. my hips hurt." hurt so much, in fact, that i left before the "audience participation" portion of the evening.

ah well.

i spent the rest of the evening, at home, stretching my legs, thinking out loud and counting words on my fingers ("boy i want pays no mind," and lots of other lovelorn nonsense not worth writing down or repeating). it was a fun, challenging little exercise, to try to distill an idea or feeling, strip a moment down to its essence...

i think if you take a moment to read a few of the submissions on the site, you won't be able to resist giving it a try.

so register there! send them here! tell me what you think!

i'm going to keep at it. but i'm not sure i'll come up with anything better than this current favorite of mine, which i think rachel and larry said was scrawled in a ladies bathroom somewhere:

"love me or leave me alone."