Frankly . . . .

"I can never get over the way liars use the word frankly." from The Devil's Home on Leave -- Derek Raymond

Hollywood snapshot

Three people at a patio table, at a Beverly Hills restaurant with a celebrity chef. One has her laptop open, on which a screenplay is open. On the table is the book "Napoleon for Dummies."

2014 Reading List

In reverse chronological order --


Kill My Mother -- Jules Feiffer
The Great War -- Joe Sacco
I Take You -- Eliza Kennedy
The Lost Daughter -- Elena Ferrante
Babel-17 -- Samuel R. Delany
If The Tabloids Are True, What Are You? -- Matthea Harvey
No Man's Nightingale -- Ruth Rendell
Diary of the Dark Years: 1940-1944: Collaboration, Resistance and Daily Life in Occupied Paris -- Jean Guehenno
Scissors -- Stephane Michaka
Journey by Moonlight -- Antal Szerb
Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder: Pronged Ants, Horned Humans, Mice on Toast, and Other Marvels of Jurassic Technology -- Lawrence Weschler
Artful -- Ali Smith
Tiny Sagas of a Former Girl Scout -- Jamie Virostko
All The Way -- Robert Schenkkan
The Bone Clocks -- David Mitchell
To Say Nothing of the Dog -- Connie Willis
The Mad and the Bad -- Jean-Patrick Manchette
The Hanged Man of Saint-Pholien -- Georges Simenon
Nigerians in Space -- Deji Olukotun
Just Mercy -- Bryan Stevenson
10:04 -- Ben Lerner
The Blue Room -- Hanne Orstavik
The Most Dangerous Book: The Battle for James Joyce's Ulysses -- Kevin Birmingham
My Struggle: Book 3 -- Karl Ove Knausgaard
Hallucinations -- Oliver Sacks
We Only Know So Much -- Elizabeth Crane
Willie Masters' Lonesome Wife -- William H. Gass
Cold Comfort Farm -- Stella Gibbons
The Crossword Century -- Alan Connor
Notes to Boys -- Pamela Ribon
A Spy Among Friends -- Ben Macintyre
Dept. of Speculation -- Jenny Offill
Percival Everett by Virgil Russell -- Percival Everett
Airships -- Barry Hannah
There Goes Gravity -- Lisa Robinson
Bright's Passage -- Josh Ritter
Of Kennedys and Kings -- Harris Wofford
Bleeding Edge -- Thomas Pynchon
Happy -- Grant Morrison and Darick Robertson
Shadow Play -- Jody Bolz
Fighting for the Press -- James C. Goodale
Madame Bovary -- Gustave Flaubert (Davis, tr.)
A Fatal Inversion -- Barbara Vine
Rocks Off: 50 Tracks That Tell the Story of The Rolling Stones -- Bill Janovitz
My Struggle: Book 2: A Man in Love -- Karl Ove Knausgaard

What I Found While Shopping

Country song

I've gone left
And I've gone right
And I've gone wrong.

All I have now is this old and worn-out song.

I've gone left
And I've gone right
And I've gone wrong.

Why We Fight

More fun with advertising:

Free guacamole for veterans on Nov. 11.

Happy hour

Reading the ads on an electronic billboard in order, as the board changes:

Hamas is dedicated to the destruction of Israel.
The party starts at 8 p.m.

Overheard at Eagles of Death Metal concert:

He: Know where we need to stop after the concert? Walgreen's. Cause I think that's where they carry the shampoo I like.

She: Okay

Seen at DMV

Nice to see a man who gives thought to what will appear on his driver's license photo -- a man waiting to have his license renewed was wearing a t-shirt saying the following:

"I'm not an alcoholic. I"M A DRUNK. Alcoholics go to meetings."

One of the top 3 or 4

“Incredibly entertaining,” said Bruce Arena, the former national coach who is now with the Los Angeles Galaxy. “A lot of goals have been scored. This has been one of the best World Cups in the last 12 years.”

from L.A. Times

Life Lessons

Little Kid: Look. Come look.

Mother comes to look.

Little Kid: Look at the bug in the water, moving his legs. It is like he is dancing.

Mother: He isn't dancing. He's dying.

Bar talk

He's a Gemini, so he's a very serious. On the other hand . . . . He's a DJ. He's a professor of economics, but he goes, "I want to be a DJ."

My Computer Has Become a Zen Master

"The path does not exist."

Overheard in Hollywood

But my client is showing her breasts. She needs a credit.

Overheard

"Where are you calling from? I keep hearing Chinese in the background."

"Chinatown."

New Poem: The Man in the Hat

The man in the bowler hat
Looked at the painting and said What is that?
That is no painting and I have no hat.