fragment

Let’s begin in the desert.

Shotglass was at the top of the wash, a rapidly spinning drum about a meter wide and protruding almost to the top of the weeds. Tongs stuck out of the slanting east side just a little and looked like a stray bit of rebar. Olive and Onion were hair-thin wires squiggling the whole length of the Slot, as everyone called it, although it was supposed to be called the Bar. Anyway it was a desert dry river which had its own issues but we’ll get into that later.

There was a weird curved structure like part of a crane or a bridge, covered in a patina of rust, that jutted out of the rim of the Slot on the west side. That was Shaker. Shaker had to be at an exact angle and height pointing southeast or nothing would come through right, and it was nobody’s favorite.

The last one all the way at the bottom was Bitters. Bitters was a huge heavy son of a bitch concrete slab with 30 or 40 instruments embedded in it, pushed down into the rocky sands in a fiesta of yelling and swearing over two weeks. After that it was steady but we all remembered the install and hated the thing.

There were two boring radar antennas on the east and west ridges, a slow one east and a fast one west. We never named them because they weren’t in the Slot and we rarely even saw their data. So forget them. They weren’t part of the Barware.

There wasn’t much need to go down in the Slot except when Shaker went awry or one of Olive or Onion’s wires got cut. The wires were crazy strong but some desert animals are persistently insane so that happened every few months. Everything else just carried on.

The desert dry river situation was that the river wasn’t dry sometimes. Flash floods pushed stuff around once a year or so and afterwards there was muddy repair work and much discussion of the original decision making process until someone would tell us all to shut up.

About a kilometer out on all sides was an impressive fence. It was three times a person’s height and totally covered in razor wire, with spikes on top. Just inside and outside of the fence the No-necks drove around in Jeeps. The No-necks were heavily armed and had dogs, and some kind of sensors on the fence let them know if a coyote or idiot was bumping the fence. Fortunately there was no reason to go near the fence.

The Slot was booked up pretty tight. Something would arrive and go down or up the wash almost every Monday. The whole crew had to be in the shack for the day making sure everything in the Slot worked and recorded its data, and then go over the data for triple-C which was “Checksummed-Complete-Collected.” This just means that we had the right length of recording and it really had come from the barware in the Slot. As you can imagine in a shop like this there were way too many abbreviations like that.

All kinds of stuff would go through the Slot. There were a lot of trucks with covered payloads. Once there was a tank, and for a while it was a series of normal-looking cars and Jeeps. Helicopters might carry some lump-on-a-chain slowly at a precise height. Often very, very slowly which was a huge bore. Foot traffic was rare but we once had some soldiers carry an oil drum hanging from poles the whole way up. Doubt they enjoyed it, especially since it was July.

Everyone agreed about the weirdest one. A big semi truck showed up accompanied by guys in civilian clothing. The guys were all in big black Suburbans, obvious spooks. The truck was refrigerated, and a blast of condensation made everyone swear when it was opened. Inside was a glass-like box, almost as long and tall as the truck bed. It looked like a giant aquarium. They threw a white tarp over it right away and then we all had to help slowly slide it on to a trailer bed. The combination of paranoid black-Suburban guys and heavy moving work in the desert didn’t suit any of us. Then they dragged the trailer up and down the Slot four times behind one of the Suburbans.

None of us were really okay. What kind of person would live in a shack in the desert in the first place? Much less devote themselves totally to the Slot. Which brings us to the actual story here. Sorry for all the setup.

Are too a feminist.

Sometimes I’ll hear someone, either a friend or just someone in earshot, talking along about political and social issues, say this:

“I’m not one of those feminists.” Or, “I can’t stand those feminists.”

If queried on this, I’ll hear something like “I wouldn’t put myself in that category” or “I’m just not like that, I couldn’t be one of those people.” If the person is male, the original comment was probably “I can’t stand feminists” or “Those feminists, they are bad because of blar blar blar.”

My response is a series of questions. For women: Do you have a college degree? Do you drive your own car? Do you have a career, or plan to have one? Do you have your own bank account and credit card? Do you wear pants when you feel like it? If you are with a man and you can’t stand him, can you leave? Do you like the fact that you can leave?

For men, the questions are more fun. Do you have a girlfriend? Do you and your girlfriend share an apartment or house? If so, does she pay half the rent and utilities? Does your wife or girlfriend work, and contribute to the family finances? Do you like being able to date women without marrying them? Do you like being able to earn an income and keep it without being obliged to marry? Do you like getting sex retail instead of having to buy it wholesale? Do you enjoy participating in hobbies, sports, and work activities with women? Are any of your customers or clients women who pay you for your services?

Folks, if you answered any of these questions “yes” then guess what! You are a feminist. You are benefiting and profiting from the increasing equality of women in society over the last hundred years. “Feminist” does not mean “angry castrating lesbian who wants you to use awkward pronouns”. It means someone, male or female, who believes that women should have financial, political, and sexual freedom, and that these freedoms require protection and extension.

Next time you benefit from the F-word you should remember it’s not an insult, it’s a badge of pride.

Note: this was originally posted on my “Content Goes Here” blog in 2003.

Late Additions, SXSW Interactive 2012

Folks:

We know you’re just as pumped as we are about all the rockin’ events, speakers, sessions, and performances at this year’s SXSW Interactive. But it’s even better now. We’ve squeezed in some more items that kick ass so hard that we’re flyin’ here! Check out:

FRIDAY:

Mobile Karaoke for NGOs: Sharing Stories, Sharing Licensing, and Sharing the Love.

Getting Passionate About Kickass Brands the Buick Way.

SATURDAY:

The 411 on 311: Legendary band shares their social media comeback mojo.

Buddha and the Burn Rate, a spiritual comedy celebration of venture capital finance with Chip Asahara.

Extreme Architecture: Pairing in concrete with Ruby rockstars Ozzy and Manny Diaz.

TUESDAY:

Building Conscious Brands With Inmates

Jakob Nielsen’s Pontiac Experience Lounge.

THURSDAY:

A passion for passion: Igniting and monetizing the fire within. Brainstorm session led by rockstar passion entrepreneur “Corky 2.0.”

SATURDAY:

TeleJam 2012 is back! Interpol, Bono (via iPhone), Eddie Money (via Hankook Fire Lizard Tablet PC With Droid), Jack White, and black guy TBA (sponsored by Microsoft Urban Initiatives). Other surprise musical guests are on deck and off the hook!

Make sure to experience any and all of these and much, much more! Rock on, kick-ass rock stars!

For Black History Month: Bob’s Homecoming

This is Bob Trout’s story and not mine, so I’ll do my best to transcribe:

When we came back from Vietnam, the protesters were waiting for us. It wasn’t just yelling and a little spitting, it was a lot of throwing stuff. We had nowhere to go and no way around it. And these cabbies, all black guys, just came in and rescued us. They were taking bottles and shit. And they just rolled on in and took the guys to the strip clubs and bars and whorehouses, wherever they needed to go, without any complaint and at some real personal risk. I want everyone to know about that.

And as usual, we get a different perspective on everything from Mr. Trout.

On Foot in Los Angeles

The village of Hollywood was planned according to the notion
People in these parts have of heaven. In these parts
They have come to the conclusion that God
Requiring a heaven and a hell, didn’t need to
Plan two establishments but
Just the one: heaven. It
Serves the unprosperous, unsuccessful
As hell

– Bertolt Brecht, “Hollywood Elegies”

Espere la luz.

– Los Angeles bus door

Los Angeles on foot was a different place. I had a decade in that city. I can go back there in a moment, but it feels remote from the city I’m writing in today.

The motion blur of driving resolves. Asphalt pushes up lumps and gravel, concrete is a failing glacier. Waiting for the bus at night, the intersection in front of me presents a moonscape. A surprising amount of car junk sits in the gutters. Rusty auto bits, melting plant material, and street oil mix with night jasmine to create a unique smell.

Poor parts of town are dark. There are fewer and weaker street lights. Even their color looks dirty and strangled. A troubled neighborhood looks dark at noon, maybe from the memory of its night dress. Keep moving, it says. You can’t necessarily see what’s wrong here, but watch yourself. The street has scars.

On a long city walk, details reveal themselves. In childhood, I’d lie face down on the playground grass and look into the forest under the flat green field. Close and slow, the city blooms. There are twice as many closed storefront businesses than I’d thought. Little office buildings are crammed with hopeful tenants with names like Sweet Power Productions, Agape Counseling, Tremendous Events, New Sun Clinic. People have left odd little offerings and blazes. Fresh flowers are tied to a bus bench, once , and there’s a sticker on a news box that just says “hope.” Someone has written on a transit shelter with a permanent pen: HE IS HERE FOR YOUR NEED. Someone else tried to open a gift boutique too close to the liquor store. A dead record store can be carbon-dated by promotions for hits from two years ago. A travel agency has become the Mary Celeste, frozen a year ago in the midst of offering great rates to Guatemala.

Every neighborhood has residents, local homeless poor, and a set of poorly defined denizens. Some of these people orbit and pace all day. They never quite leave or stay any one place. A man will sit at a Starbucks patio for an hour or two, then walk down the street a few blocks, pass through a park and a business or two, and then return to his table. Their wealth and mental status are indeterminate. Every part of the city has Flying Dutchmen on foot. It’s not a good idea to engage these people in conversation or even meet their eyes. They’re faeries and tulpas. Avoid.

The more normal pedestrians are friendlier than drivers and greet each other. On buses and benches, at street lights I had dozens of conversations with strangers. I met an archeologist who’d gone mad researching Hell. The short-order cook who was in Spielberg’s first student film. A six foot six guy built like Superman, twitching and shrugging too much, told me he had no worries about the streets because he’d been in the Rangers and Uncle Sugar taught him how to open a can of whoop-ass when he needed one. I was told I was an angel, that I should avoid black marks on white papers as tools of the devil, that I should buy stock in WD-40, that it was tiring to ride a bicycle naked through the swamps of Louisiana on assignment hunting KKK for the FBI. With fewer pedestrians, we all get to know each other eventually.

Walking won’t get you from Westwood to Van Nuys, so here comes the bus. The bus was soul murder.

Buses smelled like drunk guy: sweat, smoke, stale beer, urine, a little vomit. The emotional memory is harsh. It’s lonesome and demeaning to wait for the late night bus, knowing that the wait for the transfer is just as long. I hated everyone who got somewhere on time and could get groceries or do errands without a huge plan. Only the poor, the very old or young, the disabled, drunks, addicts, and unsuccessful criminals ride the bus. A decade with them is humbling.

We’d all rather be on foot, or flying, or just home. Years later I still felt urgency and a little despair when I heard a bus throttling up to pull away from a stop.

Arriving at a social event from the street, I punched through an invisible wall into the world of the living. Everything seemed brighter, people more relaxed and jovial. Hey, how are you? You okay? Have a drink. I hadn’t marched a trail of tears to get there but I looked it. I’d always wonder if I still smelled like bus, but I probably just had my game face on for bums and petty criminals. It would take a while to be properly social, like coming in from snow to warm up.

One day I went to Disneyland with some friends. That place is always lysergic, but this time I felt a tremendous sense of calm and relief. What did this mean? I had gone to Disneyland a hundred times growing up next door. What was new?

For the first time in months, I was on foot and protected. There was no bus to miss. Nobody begs for money or cigarettes at Disneyland. Nobody paces you just closely enough to set off fight-or-flight. There aren’t any mysterious puddles of don’t-get-it-on-you to step around. It was not until I was free of it that I knew how hard the stress of the streets had pushed me.

In those years the streets were lined with the poor. Pedestrians and the homeless did not feel much apart. After some initial awkwardness I got to know the regulars on my walking routes. Some of them I had to shut down every time to stop madness or aggression, others became acquaintances. One guy got my newspaper every day because he was a Calvin & Hobbes fan. A regular who did constant crazy-guy kung fu moves would stop long enough to greet me before resuming his war with the trees and the mailboxes.

There’s little to miss about a decade on foot in Los Angeles. It was dirty, degrading, exhausting, dangerous. I never looked right or felt right around the automoted classes.

But there are still some things to celebrate. The total calm of a deserted West L.A. bus stop in the moonlight, with an asphalt sea receding into a big diagonal intersection, is flat out beautiful. Little details of the shops and houses are still in my head when I blur by them. I won’t give back all the characters and stories I gained, either.

It’s hard to tell where you’re going on a long walk. Later on, it turns out, you may have picked things up and not noticed.

In Praise of Hipsters

First, for those of you not stuck in the pop culture tar pit, a definition. Hipster: a youngish person, comfortably middle-class, with a strong interest in current popular music and a defined set of tastes in fashion, food, and other cultural matters. Unlike some youth cultures, their look and tastes have been static for a long time. A lot of them look like their long-ago scenester ancestors from the 1980s.

nice scarf asshole — A typical example in the wild

The word is universally an epithet. Everyone hates these people. Let us recount their sins:

Privilege: predominantly white middle to upper-middle class college students or graduates with disposable income
Classist: ironic use of workers’ clothing, self-conscious love for bad cheap beer, endless mockery of white trash culture, disdain for culture genuinely enjoyed by lower-class white people, “ironic” appreciation that simultaneously others lower classes while appropriating their culture.
Borderline racist: Blaxploitation obsession, appropriation of hip-hop and soul music culture, hilarious afro haircuts
Pompous about pop culture: See the Pitchfork website for examples
Politically hypocritical: wealthy kids with carefully chosen causes unlikely to affect their privilege
Trendy fashion clones
Hypocritically rejection of their own culture: they claim to dislike all of the above.

Wow, what a bunch of assholes.

They’re partly exonerated by #7. Much of the hating comes from their own tribe, for obvious reasons. “It takes one to know one,” and almost nobody outside the group even cares. Exceptions are: people older than 30, fashion-hating music nerds, people with strong feelings about social class, people who feel left out of a scene, doormen at nightclubs, people who would like to have a lot of fun and can’t afford it, and people who are very focused on art and taste and never like what a mass of people are doing.

Since it’s very important that everyone know my opinions about youth popular culture, I present a revolutionary alternative: these people are great.

I grew up with high culture. My family went to theatres, museums, classical music performances of all kinds, opera, dance, and that entire spectrum of stuff that meant being quiet and dressing nicely and appreciating a dead person’s art.

These events are overwhelmed with wealthy and old people who will drive you crazy. Old ladies snap and unsnap huge handbags, remove candies, rustle wrappers, and bray at each other. Ignorant people clap in the middle of a performance. A hard of hearing couple explains every new thing to each other. Only a few people, it seems, are there for the art. They get grumpy as hell. But it’s all tolerated, and everyone treats these art-ruining cringemonsters with respect. Because they’re paying for it all. Their names are on all those plaques on the seats, the foyers and halls, entire wings. Whatever their failings as fellow connoisseurs, they’ve made this business possible. The true fans have bought season tickets. Great! Not nearly enough.

That’s hipsters. Tiresome, ignorant, loud, hypocritical, painfully classist, boorish, overbearing, and necessary. To all my friends, true music nerds, homebrewers, urban gardeners, cyclists, ukulele players, cult film aficionados: you’re stuck with these people and you should be glad. Without patrons of the arts, we’d all be stuck with forced unironic appreciation of not very much at all. You can’t fill a concert hall with the true and pure fans, or sell enough craft beer and fixies to make it possible for the determinedly unfashionable to enjoy them.

Here’s to hipsters, who bring us all good things.

Party Girls at Gatsby’s, or: Avoid a Modeling Career

Wrong number email and text messages are a joy. I’ve had email addresses with just a first name or simple word and received everything from a detailed thank your for a weekend-o-sex to a nauseating consumer complaint about a yeast infection remedy.

Sometimes it’s just Kismet, though.

Years ago I got a mistaken invitation to an actor’s birthday party. He’s a B level guy who’s been in two good movies.

It was a decade birthday and they’d gone all out. The venue was an estate in a rural but aristocratic setting.

The invitation presented necessary information: location, parking instructions, notes about food and pets for those with allergies, etc. Directions were given for those driving, arriving by airline, or flying in on private or chartered planes to the closer local airport. Hotels were listed for those staying multiple days in the area.

And then the kicker. The last set of “resources” was a list of local escort agencies, followed by modeling agencies including the nearest local branch of probably the world’s best-known modeling agency.

I’ll set aside for now my opinion on someone who puts prostitution options in his birthday invitation. Plus, for a call girl in Nowheresville, a gig at B-level celebrity’s big shindig is at way better than the usual.

But let us pause to consider the life of those on the roster of BigModelingAgency in a town that isn’t even Sacramento, much less New York. Young and driven, aiming for the bright lights and adoration of high fashion, always the most dazzling kid in school, and pumped with excitement at this new opportunity to move up with the reknowned agency… …and you get those phone calls. What the hell do you do? What happens if you do, or if you don’t? Is this job explicit, or do you just find out at the party, or afterwards? What’s the role of the agency here? What are the stories, and what do they sound like from each of the parties involved? Holy crap!

So that’s the wrong number email I remember the most, not because of the weird celebrity connection, but because of that window into the world of an aspiring fashion model out in the sticks. It is, to paraphrase David Foster Wallace, a double-handed forehead clutcher.

A Regular Guy: For Peter Brayman

I’ll start by asking you as a personal favor to read this whole thing. I know that the Internet is TL;DR, but it’s important to me that everyone read this. Thanks.

This is about my friend Peter Brayman.

Pete grew up in a small rural town in New York. He was a New York State firefighter EMT, an amateur radio operator, a graduate of SUNY Buffalo, and a computer nerd. It was in that last capacity that we met. We were both “Guides” on America Online, a half-paid half-job, half cop and half tech support. Pete and I hit it off immediately. We shared ham radio, computer nerding, and medical jobs. Partly because of the medical background we shared also a dark, dark sense of humor: the slang of those who see death and injury, the shocking little jokes, the deadly funny banana-peel stories

We were close friends for years. We spoke daily, sometimes almost all day over instant messaging. After our AOL activity, we went into parallel careers connected to the Internet and its technologies. We helped each other out learning new things, gave each other tips and leads, hosted each others’ projects. I can think of at least five running gags that we shared over the years that no other person on Earth would have appreciated.

Our closeness was deepened by our differences. I am verbal, a natural writer, knowledgeable about many varied things, judgmental, snobbish, hypercritical of myself and others, and sexually frustrated. Pete was a terrible speller, very focused in his education, tolerant, accepting of others’ faults, and successful with women. Our politics differed, but he listened politely to my little rants and never offered anything in response but what we shared. Especially in those days I flew into little rages too often, and his anger was rare and not much spoken.

Pete died too young, three years ago today. He left a fiancée, a beloved uncle, some good friends, and me. It’s a cliché to say that you think often of someone who’s died, but it’s true in this case. Frequently I want to share something with him, or think of something he’d say right now.

So far, so conventional. Why am I writing an everyday story of an everyday life?

There’s something else about Pete that everyone noticed first. He was born with a dreadful disease called Neurofibromatosis-2. This causes tumors to grow on nerves and is uniformly fatal. From childhood he knew that he was permanently ill and that this could not get better. Since his mother was affected with the same disease, he could see his future in real time.

Pete had occasional surgeries his entire life, ranging from a trim of some lump on an extremity to invasive brain surgery. He lost mobility, became deaf, lost use of a hand, and suffered through another hundred failures of the flesh. Because of deafness and the effect of the disease on his appearance he appeared to be mentally handicapped and was treated as such. Past a certain point in the process he was clearly in discomfort all the time.

Because he was on full disability, he could not work full time, although he had a successful consulting business. Too much success and he would lose his medical benefits and therefore die. Survival required subtle skill with government paperwork. As with other handicapped people he had to fight every social obstacle to those with mobility and hearing problems.

On top of all this, Pete had a family that was unworthy of him. I won’t go into details, because he wouldn’t, but I am to this day gravely disappointed in everyone except his uncle, who is a fine man.

Now here’s the thing: Pete lived an ordinary life.

He achieved as an EMT and a college graduate. He worked hard and well at a technical profession. He dated a few women and was engaged to a wonderful one. He had moderate conservative politics and moderate religious views. He liked ice cream and loved Disneyland. He was proud of being a firefighter and embarrassed at his bad spelling. He was, unlike all my other friends, a moderate and ordinary man who sought out and led an uncomplicated life.

How the hell did he do that?

His attitude toward life’s giant sack of bad luck was perfectly sane. He didn’t deny the disease or pretend to others that it was okay. Everything about it was monstrously unfair and awful; it hurt; it made him feel different and separated from others; it frightened him. There wasn’t any sentimental heroism in Pete. He didn’t give out false hope or encourage others to do so. When he was frustrated or scared or in pain he would talk about it honestly.

Somehow he also avoided making the disease his life. A typical conversation with Pete was honestly about ice cream or car crashes or the hilarity of AOL management without any bit of that awful darkness leaking through. He was genuinely sympathetic to my own life problems. Pete never pulled the “my life is worse” card even though perfectly entitled to do so. He would help others and do nice things for his fiancée in the manner of any other guy with good values.

Despite a ridiculously awful childhood, a loathsome and deadly progressive disease, social barriers, and every bit of crap luck that goes with any other person’s life, Pete was an ordinary guy with a good heart. His natural resilience made you forget in a moment that you were talking to someone this profoundly unfortunate; it was just Pete. It wasn’t heroic, or some feat of overcoming to be patronized by the sentimental, or a great success at denial. He recognized and acknowledged the huge disaster and at once led a life that paid no rent to Death.

Pete just wanted a regular life, and he worked harder to get one that anyone I’ve known. I won’t insult him with a romantic picture of his life and say that he won. The disease won and tortured him to death in his youth. But here’s what he knew: a terrible misfortune is no reason to turn your life upside down.

So here’s to Peter Brayman, an ordinary guy and a great friend. May we all come this close to winning.

END OF YEAR LIST: OUR BIG 15!

15. Joe Mantegna’s facial hair. Just squeaked in this time!

14. The five pound jar of Nutella.

13. Drakkar Nöir. The Baku metal scene had its high water mark in the late 90s, but nobody told these guys the grim grind party was over. We especially liked “Shashlik Midnight” but don’t stop before you get to the hard-bashing Turkic reinvention of “Little Wing.”

12. Kevlar’s. Last year this New Culver City treasure was a top 10, but since star pastry chef Lucas DeBeers defected to a revitalized nearby IHOP the brioche hasn’t been the same. Still the place for a weekday brunch in the Furniture District.

11. Dressing, The Orgone Trail. If you haven’t seen Dressing live, you’ve missed a projected screen game of Myst and a lot of M&M throwing, but not too much music. Where they shine is on record, and this flaming puu-puu platter of psychotronic gamer nostalgia will mark 2011 more than any number of on stage beach furniture auctions.

10. The oxygen bar at Raoul’s. Like it or not, the number of people in the scene “ironically” huffing is rising fast. Whether it’s just a giggle with a palmful of marker ink or a full gold paint overnighter, Raoul’s is the one spot to get a lung rinse without a crowd. Be safe, kids. The enamel kills even if you’re just joking.

9. Punch & Judy at Patch Park. Sunday morning isn’t just IHOP and regret now. Those in the know drag themselves down to the Merkin District for the marionette beatdown that’s too good for kids. Remember to stay in the back few rows and keep the smoking down or the whole delicious business is done.

8. The Beatles. Seriously!

7. Pressed Turkey. Remember brining and whole frying? Okay, we laugh now, it was dumb. But it’s not just Miley Cyrus and the Gypsy Kings ordering those big turkey presses this year; we’re all in on the act. Try David Lee Roth’s “Mushroom Mashup” version from August’s GQ if you dare!

6. The Barry Gibbs. Four of the same Bee Gee, singing nothing but classic Motown Soul. Only in this town, only Wednesday nights, and only at the IHOP on Technology Parkway West. Look carefully and you’ll see a “unique” celebrity guest most nights.

5. Virago State Prison Ballet Company. Probably the only maximum security dance company in the world, and certainly the best. Don’t mind the razor wire, but stay for the limeade and the heartbreakingly beautiful annual production of The Nutcracker Suite. Remember: there but for the grace of God the show must go on.

4. Balalaika Jones, Nightmares in Flax. We knew him as Fabrizio from the IHOP in the Lamination District. The whole world knows him now as the guy with the orange stuff on his balls. The two worlds meet in this two-fisted doubleheader, full of city pride and suburban swagger and that simpering cough we all knew would someday be the signature sound of a star. We want to put it on the list twice, and not just because our own Advertising Manager Jennifyr DeBeers sits in on percussion for two tracks.

3. AAA Art Supplies & Accessories. Don’t be shy, admit it. A lot of us end up in the Solvents District on Friday night, and there’s no shortage of places to to grab a quick “art break.” Tim and Broennwynn will remember your brand and color and even your bag size after just one visit, and their spacious alley is perfect for “jamming.” And don’t forget, Raoul’s is just a quick stagger west!

2. Badwater Grill. Just when the Dhaka was getting a little too damp, the latest “environment spot” hit our spot this year, spot-on. Lance DeBeers took this former IHOP on McMansion Parkway and turned it into a 130-degree Death Valley ultra-lounge that has the whole scene sweating like happy pigs. If you can brave the Sebum District after midnight, reserve the Scotty’s Castle table and order a Gatorade keg.

1. Pfft Gallery. Tucked into the armpit of the Resistor District where I-400 dead ends is the epicenter of an artistic earthquake. By now the phrase “infrastructure expressionist” sounds tired, we know, but when you see those blown-out transformers, bent girders, and huge jagged sheets of polyurethane, you’ll get what everyone from the Times-Record-Leader’s Ashok DeBeers to Christina Ricci already got: broken stuff. As cynical as we are here, we’re overcome every time we visit, and not just because our own Circulation Assistant Ashlii Redacted is the paint can girl. This year’s #1 and last year’s too. See you there!

Dept of Amplification & Correction: “The Wave”

On further investigation, big chunks of the story about my father’s crib book and its effects were completely inaccurate. In particular, the meat of the thing is rotten: Fred’s life arc began with books and also with collecting, and he was all along a bibliophile. The original post has been edited to reflect this; please read it before repeating my own error.

Also, I used the word “partner” to refer to his wife, and this has been corrected as well.

Like my father, I make stories in my head and defend them against the world, even when this is disastrous. I apologize to Fred for wedging him into one of my stories, especially when it was his story to begin with.

Hell of a good story, though. Hope it happened to somebody.