Personal

Guy stuff.

An arm with a tattoo: "I was made for the library, not the classroom."

When in doubt, follow Frank’s lead

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wl95eDA_uR4]

…and do it YOUR way.

ETA: Okay, I hate posts of videos with no real content, especially on a day Seth Godin challenges everyone to blog something interesting.

I woke up this morning with Sinatra’s “My Way” stuck in my head on repeat and it was a good thing. A timely reminder to clearly know what you stand for; know when to compromise, when to hold your ground and when to simply walk away.

It’s an especially timely reminder in light of the economy and the sense that having a job is the new merit raise.

It also reminds me of one of my favorite poems, one of the first “personal narratives” I wrote as I was moving past my initial ranty political phase, and the one that I most often get random emails from teachers or students about, informing me that it’s been used in a school performance.

Breathless

(more…)

Continue ReadingWhen in doubt, follow Frank’s lead
An arm with a tattoo: "I was made for the library, not the classroom."

Let’s Go Mets! Let’s Go…Knicks?

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QRZnGEjNvQ]

I’m thrilled that the Brett Favre fiasco is officially over and I can look forward to being a 100% Jets fan again, but right this minute, I am so ready for Spring and the baseball season to get started!

Matthew Cerrone of MetsBlog.com has been whetting my appetite the past few days with his great on-field reports and video clips of the early days of spring training as Jerry Manuel puts the team through their paces with an emphasis on a “Team First” mentality. The last two seasons have ended in huge disappointment, but I don’t believe there’s any question that the Mets go into 2009 as the frontrunner again, not just for the NL East pennant, but the League Championship, too, and Manuel’s upbeat personality is a big part of the reason why.

No disrespect to Willie Randolph, but his Zombie Joe Torre impersonation just wasn’t the right fit in Queens — just like it wasn’t the right fit in the Bronx once Torre had to stand on his own two feet and actually build upon what he’d inherited from Buck Showalter and Gene Michaels — particularly because he was never able to develop the same rapport with the media and turn them into drooling sycophants like Torre did. Manuel loves talking to the media, and the media loves a good Manuel quote, so I think the “collapse” meme will be relatively muted in comparison to last Spring, especially with A-Roid hogging the spotlight and having zero acting ability to spin the moment to his advantage.

(more…)

Continue ReadingLet’s Go Mets! Let’s Go…Knicks?
An arm with a tattoo: "I was made for the library, not the classroom."

Spindle: New content for February

I had a productive day off from the 9-to-5 yesterday, and in between DVDs of Diners, Drive-ins and Dives and Throwdown with Bobby Flay (along with a shark jumping new episode of iCarly), I posted another round of great content to the site yesterday, including poetry and fiction by Aaron Bair, Lawrence Clayton, Jessica Colley, Jane Flett and Joanna Hoffman. I don't like to play favorites because everything I publish over there is a favorite by definition, but in light of how difficult good micro-fiction is, I'm particularly excited about Clayton's El Rey del Taco. In fact, I've got a…

Continue ReadingSpindle: New content for February
An arm with a tattoo: "I was made for the library, not the classroom."

Garden Photography, Writing and Planthropology

I went to the Frelinghuysen Arboretum a few weeks ago to check out Ken Druse give a presentation of his amazing new book, Planthropology: The Myths, Mysteries, and Miracles of My Garden Favorites, and took my wife’s fancy new camera with me to take pictures.

After the presentation, I wandered the snow-covered grounds of the Arboretum and took a few pictures before heading over to Greenwood Gardens for a rare tour of the grounds and took a ton more pictures. While far from the level of Druse’s work, I think I did pretty good for the first time, while also realizing I’m more of a tree, statuary and structural person than plants, though the time of year could have had something to do with that. Check them out on Flickr (plus a few below the cut).

Speaking of Druse, if you asked him what his favorite plant is, his answer would most likely be “whichever one I’m looking at. Every plant has an incredible story.”

In Planthropology, he proves his point, engagingly bringing plants of all kinds to vivid life with entertaining and enlightening stories that will intrigue gardeners and non-gardeners alike. It’s a visual feast that will make waiting for warmer weather to return more bearable, and it’s not just inspirational reading for avid gardeners, but also an ideal gift for helping family and friends get a better appreciation for your own passion, perhaps even inspiring them to get outside and join you.

My second stab at garden writing for Horticulture came out of this trip, too, along with a whole new appreciation for gardening and gardeners themselves.

 

(more…)

Continue ReadingGarden Photography, Writing and Planthropology
An arm with a tattoo: "I was made for the library, not the classroom."

Submissions: Know Your Market… and Medium

Spindle Magazine: A New York State of Mind
Spindle Magazine: A New York State of Mind

The most basic advice usually given to writers looking to submit their work to magazines or literary journals is to know the market, aka read the guidelines and pick up a few issues before wasting your time and the editors’ by sending something that’s totally inappropriate for a publication.

With the increasing popularity of online-only publications, it might be time to suggest another piece of not-so-basic advice, and that’s the importance of knowing your MEDIUM.

There’s a number of differences between writing for print and writing for the web, no matter the format or genre, because the former is much more contextual than the latter.

In a print magazine, each page is designed, and the articles on them are laid out, with an intent to establish a steady flow from page to page, to carry the reader from cover to cover so they don’t miss anything, including the ads. An issue may have a specific theme, or have a number of different departments, each with their own themes, that can act as a subtle prop for the articles, stories or poems to lean on. While an online publication can mimic many of the page design elements of print, an article, poem or story has to be able to completely stand on its own, as it may be accessed in any number of ways that have nothing to do with the context of the site that published it. (aka Google, StumbleUpon, Twitter, etc.)

Online, a title is arguably even more important than usual, but especially for Spindle.

(more…)

Continue ReadingSubmissions: Know Your Market… and Medium
An arm with a tattoo: "I was made for the library, not the classroom."

Free Chapbook: Crazy White Devil

Download a free copy of Crazy White DevilIt’s been years since I created a chapbook.

Six, to be exact.

I released Selected Squares of Concrete — a de facto “best of” poetry collection of new, revised, never-before-released and old favorites — back in March of 2003, smack in the middle of the razor-thin slice of time between my return to the NYC poetry scene after living down in Virginia for a year, and my walking away from it again about three months later, more or less permanently.

I’ve wanted to create a new chapbook for a little while now, just for myself, to collect in one place the handful of newer poems I’d written over the past few years, for those random times I end up at a poetry reading and want to get on the mic. Like last night, for example, when I decided to check out my local poetry reading and had to dig through a pile of random poems, several of which were 2-3 edits old, to find something I liked.

It was interesting reading in a totally unfamiliar setting with only one other person I knew in the small audience, and there were a couple of poets there I would have liked to have had something to give, partly to promote Spindle, but also to establish myself in the scene since I’m a terrible self-promoter.

That’s when the idea hit me; an experiment in social networking: offer a free chapbook and see how big my platform, and what my social “reach” is!

(more…)

Continue ReadingFree Chapbook: Crazy White Devil
Newer Posts
Older Posts