THE FIRES. Special edition.

A special edition, unfortunately.

We know now that apocalypse doesn’t happen worldwide all at once; it happens in places it shouldn’t, almost randomly, with no regard for anything in its way. A fireman in Los Angeles said, wearily, to reporters, “It kicked our butts.” Not what you want to hear from the last bastion before death and certain destruction.

 It’s ugly out there.

 Looters are circulating in areas where buildings still stand. They are part of the wreckage, a foul part of the overall horror.

 Lists are circulating too; names and links to aid and help evacuees. Of course the internet is a world like ours; full of BS and downright savage profiteering. So the list that follows will be small. That doesn’t mean there aren’t many, many solid, caring organizations ready and willing to help. But vet them through Charity Navigator, make sure they will help.

 The Salvation Army, known to be first in, last to leave stricken areas is a safe bet for helping; the major part of your gift goes into helping victims. And A.S.P.C.A. will help reunite pets who made it out alive with family.

 And this; your employer may match funds, effectively doubling your gifts.

 I contacted a gallery-owner in Santa Monica, the only gallery that still represents me, and she has opened her home to some evacuees who needed a place to collect their wits and rest a bit. I hope there are a hundred thousand like her out there. That’s a rough count (so far) of newly homeless. A growing list, unfortunately.

 1. Los Angeles Salvation Army Earmark funds for fire victims.

 2. Los Angeles ASPCA The CEO makes a million bucks a year, (I checked) but the organization itself has a high rating in Charity Navigator, so he probably earns it. Again, earmark funds for fire victims.

 3. Another outfit helping is The Humane Society of L.A. Here’s a link showing what one of their arms is doing or has done.

 Thank you.  Stay safe. And warm. (blizzard conditions here in the midwest).

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Kelce Boys’ Cereal Box (It Ain’t Wheaties), Photography Books, Music, Indigenous Chuck Taylors, The Diplomat, more…

The Diplomat will return (Netflix)

Kate Wyler (Kerri Russell) huffs and puffs rudely around London as though she was the PM, the President and the very axis upon which the earth rotates—all while sporting flyaway hair and unkempt pant-suits, and, possibly, deficient overall personal hygiene. She’s kind of a mess. She looks like she tried to get dressed while baling hay. Not at all the polished foreign service operative/ambassador/diplomat/tactician she’s purported to be, yet, oddly, I am content to allow her harridan act to cover for a heart of gold and a razor sharp mind, even though this belief doesn’t pan out much. At first. (Trailer link)

Kate, on the go. She expends more energy going from room to room than she does diplomatting…

She was pulled from a mideast posting in Kabul (where women huffing and puffing get less done than anywhere, but signs of progress are popping up protesting that patriarchal system) and dumped into a hotbed of conspiracy surrounding the possible Iranian (or was it Russian? Or was it home-brewed? Or even us, for crying out loud) attack on a Brit vessel that killed 42 sailors. This is where it gets edge of seatness. And that just grows. No spoilers; it’s worth your time.

I should mention here that Hal Wyler (suavely played by Rufus Sewell), an ex-ambassador and Kate’s husband, is now confined to ambassador’s wife status, but as a master fixer and strategic chessmaster with global tentacles, he’s very much in the game. They actually come to blows over it in a woodsy setting, where her alarmed bodyguards watch through binoculars; it is decided that she is winning and they won’t interfere.

After this epic dustup, she appears before royalty with leaves in her hair. They seem to be getting used to her bedraggledness, so hardly an eyebrow is lifted, but looks are exchanged in her own camp. That group contains actors Rory Kinnear, Alo Essandoh, and Ali Ahn with great performances, and David Gyasi weighs in, handsomely, throughout as Foreign Secretary. For a full listing of actors with pictures, here’s that link.

The women in this thing range from iron-strong to behind the scenes string-pulling devious, and those of us who enjoyed West Wing will welcome Allison Janney as VP Grace Penn in the final crisis episode.

The rest of the casting is also top notch, displaying acting that runs from nuanced to comedic and is thoroughly enjoyable, and the twists and turns are unexpected and, at times, devastating. The ending is as jolting as, say, Kate glammed out in a red, train-dripping evening gown in Paris, which does happen. But wait until the last moments of the final episode—yikes!

I was well entertained by every episode and was sorry to see the last. It could certainly stand another year’s worth. Who knows—popular demand may—wait! I just found out season 3 is now filming! Good news for a smart, crackling series. Meanwhile, Keep Calm, Kate will be back to Kerri on. As will West Wing’s Allison Janney and a host of policymakers and shakers.  

The Kelce Mix Needs Work

Serially successful, cereaiiy lacking…

Travis and Jason seem to be everywhere these days (look to your immediate left at the top of the list for their entertaining podcast) and Jason’s wife knocked out Joe Rogan for Number One, recently. Some of that stardust, it could be argued, comes via Travis’s girlfriend, but that’s on top of it all; the Kelces are serially talented performers all on their own. Jason retired from the Eagles and has been popping up doing some NFL color reporting, while his wife, Kylie just bumped Joe Rogan out of the Number One Podcast position with her own debut, “Not Gonna Lie.” And, of course, Travis has been helping the KC Chiefs win-by-a-hairsbreadth last few seconds of game after game. After game. Cereally, though, I have to say, the boys need work. I tried their “Sweetened wheat oat & corn cereal with marshmallow” (Reese’s Puffs, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, and Lucky Charms) and went Ptooey. Contains notes of sugar, peanut butter and bioengineered color marshmallows with sugar. Did I say sugar? Contains, um, added sugar. Hey, every great athlete should have their own cereal box, but just put Wheaties in it.

Indigenous Hi-tops by Freddie

Freddie’s grandmother was full Cherokee and beading was a tribal art…she didn’t learn it as a child, but discovered her talent for it in adulthood.

 Featured in the last blog for her silversmithing and print production, here she is again; she just did a ZOOM class on beading for groups of people in Chicago, New York and Kansas City through the workplace ERG (Employers Resource Group). I’ve seen her beadwork for years and it occurred to me, hey, I bet the folks who read The View From Wise Acres would like to see some of this. I dug out some Chuck Taylors and gloves she did that I especially liked and here they are. I think the Chucks are in a class all their own and would quite possibly be a sustainable business. Yo, Converse, you reading this? How many you want? What sizes?

For the photographic mindset

I’m recommending two photography books I recently acquired, and think they have a broad appeal to anyone interested in history, and, of course, the discipline of photography itself. Robert Frank’s Trolley—New Orleans is a companion book to his iconic The Americans (introduction by Jack Kerouac), one of the most important photo books of all time, and one, I’m happy to report, that has been recently reprinted in its original form. I’ve been lusting after the original 1950s version, no matter how tattered, on Ebay and Biblio, but it’s a bit out of reach. I will buy the reprint. Both are searing records of something many of us would rather gloss over; they force us to regard racism as it was in the 50s and 60’s. I am jolted anew by these powerful photos.

Photographers A—Z is a compact doorstop of a book, 640 pages of examples of every photographer you’ve ever heard of and many whose work you may not have encountered. A Taschen book, it’s beautifully produced, and a volume to pick up and browse through, over years of ownership. For pleasure, for research, for eye-opening marveling at the creativity on each page, this book was made to open time and time again.

That’s it. I’m done. With this, and with 2024.

No philosophizing. No damn resolutions. Oh, wishes for happy, merry, that sort of thing for all of you. No strings, like in every email that says “Spread joy, buy this” etc. etc. I will now take leave (hear bells in the distance? neither do I, wait maybe I do) of the whole year and odd plane of existence with some music. This is Billy Strings and a guy named Nelson doing “California Sober,” and I hope you enjoy it. See you in 2025, right? xoxx Gman

What the village (silver) smithy is up to, books, cameras, a long lost hard hat reappears, and other stuff…

Gus the striper, this hat, and I go way back. To Butch days.

This hard hat saved me many a headache from Oklahoma to Minnesota to Texas and back to Nebraska. And Gus gave it some style...

The friendship was instant; we were both aspiring artists, and both hot rodders and custom car enthusiasts. Gus, Bob Gustafson, was already well-known to Omaha car culture for his striping expertise. I was working in Ashland, Nebraska, near Omaha, on a bridge for Massman Construction and we had friends in common. We were on our way to an Omaha bar for a beer or two, and Gus saw a hard hat in the back seat of my car. He picked it up and brought it into the bar, along with a striping kit he had with him. Gus striped everything.

This I.D. button was inside on the hatband. It's an antique now. Me too. If the hard hat fits, wear it...

While we BS’d and sipped cold ones, he decorated my hard hat. I was still going by “Butch” back then. It was a name given me as a child due to the low-maintenance haircut I preferred. Anyway, I thought this hat was long gone but just found it in a box moved by furnace repairmen. Funny how objects can whirl you back in time. It was a hard-partying summer and a time of big decisions. Go back to school, or take them up on a foreman position? Construction is hard work. But the foremen I’ve seen, they just walk around and tell people what to do. I must admit that had its appeal. And people would always need bridges. But art?

Hat-wise, however, I opted for the fedora of the Mad Men era, and a Borsalino at that, once the paychecks got a bit larger. But, Gus, if you’re looking down, had I gone the other route, I’d have worn your striping proudly on jobs from Taiwan to Tucumcari. The much dented and scuffed hard hat will always remind me of you from a prominent spot in my office. R.I.P. sir.

Converting a Nikon to pure infrared was not a snap decision.

The Nikon J5 is a small but powerful ebay find and I'm itching to discover what it'll do as an infrared conversion...

I wouldn’t do it to my Canon T7, which I’m slowly learning as my go-to camera, but I did try some IR filters without much success. I researched various infrared methods and watched a few hours of turorial advice (all good, by the way—most of the camera advice I encountered online was serious and helpful) and set out to find my perfect IR point-and-shoot. I had narrowed my search to a Nikon J5, the last of a series of small cameras they made, then discontinued.

 I won’t go into all the good stuff packed into this aptly nicknamed pocket rocket—the info is easy to find if you’re interested. On ebay I found one in Japan, camera body only, near mint, and priced well within my range. Then I sent it to Kolarivision for its IR conversion, specifying infrared on the 720mm scale, which will allow some color in the sky and foliage. I’m waiting, bated breath, for the Nikon like I used to wait for a cereal top Lone Ranger secret compartment ring from Battle Creek, Michigan. The conversion takes three weeks and it costs more than the camera did. Meantime I bought a used Nikkor wide angle lens, an extra charger and a 140 page J5 user’s manual I found on ebay.

For an explanation of what IR photography is all about, here’s a pretty good link.

I read one of these twice just to see if it said what I thought it said. It did.

Twice-read first; In Plain Sight is one of the more definitively researched books on UFOs, now UAPs, and it begins to explain just why the military/intel community has cast the vast (more vast than ever) majority of those who see things in the sky as tinfoil hat-wearers, even threatening them, illegally. Ross Coulthart’s book (link) is not wild conjecture but based on fact and improved radar surveillance and more testimony from police, physicists, Navy pilots and commercial airline employees, plus FAA reports and military whistleblowers. A rarely bipartisan Congress is even fed up with the BS mil-feed and has enacted (2023) a law targeting the situation. Hang on to your hats folks, even if they’re tinfoil. (I’m keeping my hard hat handy)

 Willy Vlautin’s The Horse, shouldn’t be confused with Horse, the Pulitzer winner by Geraldine Brooks. Vlautin’s books have never given me a feelgood afterglow, but he sure can write. Joe Hell says we need him like we needed Johnny Cash. Jess Walter called The Horse “the literary equivalent of a classic album by Tom Waits or Townes Van Zandt.” Fair enough. Warning: It’s a heartbreaker, but, again, he sure can write. Essays One, by Lydia Davis, is 500+ pages of erudite precision and essays on artists, writing and writers that is, to me, oddly absorbing; I bought it to help me explore the intricacies of true essays, but it’s making me forget that, it’s so well done. Davis’s Collected Short Stories caused Rick Moody to call her “The best prose stylist in America.” Just sayin’, I don’t think I’m wasting my time with any of these.

This silversmith/jeweller is a multifaceted gem.

On her way to work in Chiefs gear in case she got tangled up in the parade last year.

She holds down a full time, very time-consuming job as Print Production Manager of a rather large global company, overseeing print production, color management, press runs, and much more beginning with the job’s onset and following through to delivery deadlines. This can involve client brochures, company items, banners, posters, books, all manner of swag and wearables, pop-ups, mailings, boxes, custom one-of-a-kind items and a big etcetera. She’s done this since I’ve known her and was a legend in the advertising community for it even then. How long? Years. Before we got married thirty-five years ago.

Twenty or so years ago, Freddie took up silversmithing in her “spare time,” and her devotion to detail and precision, plus an artist’s mind and eye, have served her and her customers well in this profession—I won’t trivialize it by calling it a hobby. She often spends a few hours each weekend learning from award-winning silversmith Genevieve Flynn, who holds classes on all facets of the profession, from casting, repousse, mounting, joining and more. Silversmithery is a precise art and the learning curve is forever. It makes sense she would gravitate to such a challenge. I’m so freaking proud of her and that’s an understatement. She makes astonishing museum quality jewelry and art pieces using copper, gold, silver, precious and semi-precious stones, and has taken courses with Thomas Mann and other renowned designers, like Ms. Flynn, who is right here in KC, and who often flies other luminaries in for week-long workshops at her studio. Freddie attends all of those she can.

She's wearing a silver pueblo pin, one of her first works. Photo by daughter Rhonda, at an ice cream stop a couple of weeks ago.

Above is a screenshot of some random pieces I have pix of; that large one on the left is a work in progress, silver with matte finish, about six inches long,with catalin and silver “framed” in the bottom. This is to be a necklace and will have gold “wires” extending from the three tubes with rounded bead ends so it won’t catch on a sweater. I’m excited to see this in finished form.

The (wedding) ring, at bottom, is cast white gold, diamonds, with a stone supplied by the person who commissioned it. Bracelet above it is silver, diamonds, gold beads, also a commission job. Far right is a necklace/bracelet combo.

Above middle is a bracelet, silver, blued somehow, irish motif. These are just a few of many more and it makes me realize we need a record of all the pieces in one place so people can see and appreciate the range of design and materials. (I’ll get her to do that in her spare time)

 

I’ll leave you with Ry Cooder, “Prodigal Son.”

I was looking for Paris, Texas, an old favorite of mine, and came across this which is a bit more bouncy and nice weekend listening. I hope you enjoy it. Here’s the link. Happy Fall. xxo G

 

 

 

Two canes, ten Cadillacs, ten books and a trifecta of lit rag acceptances…

These sticks were made for walkin’…

An accident put me in surgery, then rehab. From bed to wheelchair, to walker, to cane. And now I forget where I put my cane(s) and have to look for them. Progress! But the canes are the story here. First, the one that Freddie bought me; a wonderful item with a spring-loaded tip that serves as a probe (it depresses slightly, maybe a half-inch, and this helps me to control it somehow) and I recommend it highly. Its brand name is Upperstate. (link) It’s stout, light and quite ergonomic.

 I call the other cane my dress cane—for times when I wear white tie and tails, or a cape and top hat against the infrequent Kansas morning fog. Or to the barber, or when I just want a cool, elegant item in hand to impress the septic tank guys when they come to snake the cleanout. Aahh, country living.

The Kevin Lee dress cane. Lower right: rabbit jumping through an ouroburos—etched by artist. Note details in other pix.

 This latter cane is pure art, as well as useful. Museum-grade art. Sleek, strong chrome/molybdenum alloy with brass fittings, rubber tip and the doorknob handle is etched. This one was made by Kevin Lee to aid his get-arounds after a motorcycle accident. He is a fine artist, and a serious one; nothing is halfway with this man. Whether a lamp, a painting, or a full motorcycle rebuild, the end result is (always) stunning.

 He had to shorten it a bit for me, but it retains its full elegance. It came by way of Freddie Express with a note from Kevin, which read:

 “Bottom to top it’s a length of 4130 Chromoly, stack of washers alternating brass and stainless…and an old doorknob I scavenged from someplace I’ve forgotten. I drew the rabbit jumping through an ouroburos. Couldn’t tell you what it means exactly—assign your own meaning I guess.

 “The words are from a Jawbreaker song, “Accident Prone.” (link) It’s a great band and Blake Schwarzenbach is a hell of a writer IMO…but I know telling someone to listen to music you like rarely ends well.

 But backing up, I made this after my motorcycle accident. The thought was to, one time, walk into a place I’m familiar with, using it. I’ve checked that box. I no longer need it. The hope is for you to get that same window of use from it. From there, do whatever you feel is right with it.”

 It will be a wall piece. In a place of honor. And thank you, Kevin.

 

Ten books…

 …I’m reading now or have read recently. Graham Greene’s Comedians. I reached back in time for a re-read, and it was worth it—can he write! Takes place in Duvalier’s corrupt Haiti and presages today’s mess. Michael Herr’s Dispatches. A classic of reportage from the Vietnam quagmire. Masterful. Breathtaking. Then and now. Greene’s Our Man in Havana. Another re-read. He called this one “an entertainment” as opposed to his more serious books, and it sure is. And just as well written. American Cosmic. D.W. Pasulka, professor of religious studies at UNC Wilmington takes a spiritual look at the UFO commotion. Quite interesting viewpoint. Basquiat. Graphic novel by Paolo Parisi. A respectful, interesting take on the prolific artist’s short life and sad end. The Freaks Came out to Write, by Tricia Romano. Fascinating. She gives new voice to The Village Voice with actual interviews and oral history. My Search for Warren Harding.  My high hopes were dashed by Robert Plunkett’s mean-spirited “humor” touted as “a comedic masterpiece.” Erasure by Percival Everett. Found a new vein of gold in the authorial mine. I am captivated. He wrote a lot of books and I guess I’ll have to read them all. Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey; at times annoyingly glib but smart in many ways. Bite-sized life lessons. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong. Had to see what all the high praise was about, and found it to be deserved. And that’s ten. More next time.

 

Ten Caddys…

 Time to revisit The Cadillac Ranch. I’ve been under the spell of Caddy Stonehenge for years. What a vision. Those iconic zoom-tailed cars stuck in the ground, one after another, changing slightly with time. Now they’ve been rattle-can colorized, grafitti-ized, and it hasn’t hurt them a bit; it may help preserve this desertlike installation. May it always reign where it rarely rains, and time to rein in the puns, right? Right. Drop in for the latest look at these canted Caddys. (link)

 

Meet Angel Otero…

 I’m glad I did. In this short, informative video (link), he discusses his “First Rain in May” show. Toward the end of the video he explains the naming of the show, and it’s a charming story; it has to do with playing in the rain, which his grandmother bade him to do for good luck. It seemed to work for him. Angel has a studio in his native Puerto Rico and in New York and he shows his work in some impressive venues like Hauser & Wirth where he shares his thoughts and stories with a group of young people.

Music I encountered and liked: Waxahatchee

Without further adieu or is it ado? Without any more of it, anyway, here’s the link to “Right Back To It,” a restful sorta cooling swamp floaty tune.

Last, and not least (at least for me): The trifecta of lit rag acceptances…

 Like a lot of writers, I send my stuff out—months later the rejections come back. This time was different. On the same day of the third leg of the 2024 Triple Crown race at Saratoga (usually Belmont, but that track was under construction of some sort), the only three horse races I watch (and consistently lose money on) are the Derby, the Preakness, and Belmont Stakes. This habit stems from Derby parties in the past, and from knowing a Derby winner, and all the attendant adrenaline this stuff brought to the fore in those fun heady days. Anyway. On the day of the third race, I was notified that an essay of mine was accepted. Then another, a few minutes later. Then another later that day as my monetary loss (a sort of rejection) had come in. Trifecta!

 These essays, The Reflecting Pool And Other Brushes With The Unexplained, After Basquiat, and Beware of Winning, will run in some pretty darned good lit mags in late 2024 or early 2025. I will notify on social media at that time. Sure will. Three cheers. 1.Yayyy. 2.Yayyy. 3.Yayyy.

 

That’s all I got. Stay coolio en Julio. XXOO  G

 

 

Are “Lalannes” art or furniture? Remembering Barsotti. Lowrider—the catchy iconic hit from WAR. Other music, books, and much more; May blog…

The pup also appeared on one of three United Kingdom postage stamps featuring Barsotti's cartoons…

(Surfeit of superlatives warning [some people just attract them] as in highest degree of respect) Charles Barsotti was an exceedingly creative and charming fellow and an amazing chronicler of human feelings, often through cartoons of animals, talking pasta and, sometimes, snails, hot dogs and St Peter; I was privileged to meet him at his home for a sunny afternoon of relaxed talk and not a little laughter. I remember him fondly and so do generations of his many fans, readers of The New Yorker and a dozen other publications. Here’s a June, 2014 NYT obituary (link) which examines his delightful humor and some of his past life. RIP, sir. (If you encounter a paywall, you can sign up for a freebie with your email address as I did)

(photo: Peterson Automotive Museum)

  Lowrider. The voice in this version hails from Olathe, Kansas…

This album also contains Summer, another of my WAR favorites…

This song has always been a day-brightener for me, (link) with its clicks and catches and horns; a bit like Mongo Santamaria’s (and Herbie Hancock’s version of) Watermelon Man (link) which was credited for bringing Afro-Latin jazz into the mainstream. Lowrider combines an addictive percussive musicality with a driving bass line, and alto sax and a harmonica riff by vocalist Charles Miller (he also performs a siren-like sax solo toward the end--and this is a guy who downplayed his abilities on these and other instruments—he merely said he plays some other stuff). I hope it makes your day better—it has that effect on me.

Prime ribs of desk—my kind of office furniture

Sculptures you can use. Mirrors, chairs, desks, candelabra, settees; all manner of often useful items that are also eye-stopping sculpture. Francois-Xavier and Claude LaLanne, the husband and wife team who made these unusual pieces, said “Museums don’t know where to put us. (I would know. Everywhere. The Palace of Versailles knows. All over the place.) Their work just captivates me. Downgraded for years as decorative arts sales and such pigeonholed auction descriptions, their work has come into its own in recent years, sadly years after their death. Discover their art at Artsy (link) and Kasmin Galleries (link), two links with lots of information depth and stunning photos of more of their magnificent sculptures.

Two fairly lengthy book reviews, and then I’m outa here…

In the main, a “pretty good” review and a “quite good” review…

Burn Book, A Tech Love Story, (link) by Kara Swisher, and Sing To It, (link) by Amy Hempel—these reviews will have to be the “much more” I referred to in the main headline. I have big lawns to mow, chores to do at WiseAcres that I can now, thankfully, perform, not being confined to a walker anymore (graduated to a cane! and walking all over the place) thanks to a great support team (Freddie, her daughter Rhonda, and the visiting physical and occupational therapists at Enhabit) and some positive, “want to” thinking. I have miles to go (thank you Robert Frost).

No Burn Baby, Burn Book, but an informative, entertaining “Burn Book. A Tech Love Story” (!)

The parenthetical screamer above is mine; maybe too much of a love story, actually, is what I’m commenting on there. Burn Book’s author, tech journalist Kara Swisher, names names, but with a big wink. Even an affectionate wink. She doesn’t tell us anything we didn’t know about the self-congratulatory yet often self-loathing nerds of Silicon Valley and points east, but some of the shenanigans are exposed and ugly. Ugliest of all are our so-called lawmakers, who sit thumbs-in-butt while the tech billionerds clearcut the info forests for their own gain. Could it be the fat envelopes are making their way to these inactive folks’ accounts in digitized form? I’m just asking. If ever lobbyists existed, they would be an art form viz-a-viz SV nerd protection.

The book; not great, not bad, much better than “meh” with a mid section of family photos and those taken at All Things Digital events, and many including the Silicon Valley…humans. I say humans because their failings are, well, totally, disappointingly human.

They may not be the skull-sucking fangbats and soulless feral pirates that Swisher now and then hints at, love affair notwithstanding, but more like failures of the most banal kind, they succumb to absolute power and mountainous big bucks abso-frigging-lutely, (and quickly) the jury still out on some; like Gates who has shown an interest in improving worlds that sorely need it. Jobs, we know, was cool genius with quirks.

Elon gave the book this blurb, “Kara has become so shrill at this point that only dogs can hear her,” perhaps before proffering this one: “You’re an asshole.” (Oh, Elon…) Both adorn her book. My sense is that Musk is simply undergoing a pronounced, all too public mid-life crisis and will pull out of it in plenty of time to helm his impressive empire with fewer self-defeating tweets and/or odd mega-purchases. I am reminded here of when the Hunt Brothers (yes, those Hunts, the oil rich Texas non-techie Hunts) got bored and tried to corner the world market on silver; it didn’t work. But the Hunts are still in the game. As is Elon Musk.

Unlike some other SV mega-nerds, Musk’s kingdom is not a symphony with but one or two violins; rockets, cars, space exploration, Starlink, tunnels, implants, solar energy, batteries, chips, interconnections and subsets of each—it’s the way his mind works. A restless genius. We count him out every week or so due to his vitriolic X blurts. How we love to trivialize accomplishment. Burn Book, on the other hand, bows in respect to billions, trillions. Dollars, it would seem, are still the mile markers to great achievement. Fine. But responsibility lags. The “data-rapacious” (another great Swisher term) are also libidinous about compiling the dollars. “Anything that can be digitized would be,” is a recurring Swisher mantra; unconscionably digitized with no regard for ownership, authorship, or what used to be referred to as privacy.

This is where the book fell somewhat short for me and my thirst in this area was far from slaked; I wanted a seething, countercultural kickass outrage with Klieg lights on the slimier corners of SV and our own bicameral bodies, the house and senate, presently occupied by preening, smug, oddly coiffed (have you seen that guy from Kentucky? What is that perched on his head? Put it on a leash and give it a bowl of milk) people who all look vaguely unhealthy and pasty, yet oddly pleased with themselves as they march from one hall to another in a group to seek impeachment. Impeachment of whom? It doesn’t seem to matter any more to the impeachment impaired. This time it was an official in Homeland Security, unimpeachable by law.  I digress. So do they. Heigh-ho, heigh ho, it’s off the charts we go (in chipmunk helium-sing).  

I wanted more than just that mushy old softball “Truth to Power,” which is meaningless in today’s mouth-breathing polarized atmosphere. Trump/Biden (that’s a choice? RFK? I mean, no shit, really? Is that the best we can do? If so, well, quit reading right now, and start soaking up Revelations and Nostradamus and buy yourself an empty nuclear missile site and a 26kw Generac. I mean, let’s get some phonies that, at least, fool us some of the time.)

Do these people not know that a rather large percentage of voters are sick to puking with these smirking house and senate dickheads? That the vitriol level is bubbling over? That it’s patent that “public service” now simply means offshore accounts? (Digitized, now—so much easier.) I’m just reporting, here. Write to your “representative” and you get treacly non-answers from AI and interns that thank you for your interest and your valued input.    

So, Swisher’s heart and head seem in a better place; I do take minor issue with her grokking locutionisms but not with their etymology (Stranger in a Strange Land—it has gotten at least that weird out in SV and the Beltway and Murdochville.

Here’s a headline I saw recently while scrolling through my godawful email: TikTok Mishandled The Data Of Hundreds Of Top American Advertisers. No surprise here. None. But Jesus, lawmakers, make some laws and enforce them. Or resign, if the task of PUBLIC SERVICE is just too daunting, woke or unwoke. The law heading toward the books now signifies nothing other than a deep distrust of the New China Syndrome, or “Horrors—a big country is pulling our kind of crapola now.”

More than once in Burn Book, Swisher alludes to the fact she could have used empirical knowledge of billionerd behavior and certain “tells” to make a few bucks of her own, but didn’t. No slouch in the earnings department, she and cohort reportrepreneur* and mentor Walt Mossberg did well with their All Things Digital conferences, seminars and talks, under WSJ’s banner, then under NBC/Windsor Media as Shut Up And Listen, LLC.  The behind-the-scenes machinations moving from one entity to the other were far from simple, and attest to the Swisher/Mossberg match being right people, right time.

The book is, for any of its minor faults, a trove and a must-have for any and all SV and technophiles, and anyone with the slightest twinge of alarm in their sensing mechanism about the tipping point (hint: we passed it at high speed like it was sitting up on blocks, years ago—and here comes another wave called AI).  On that note, remember the Swisherism, “Anything that can be digitized will be.” With impunity.

*(another Swisherism—you’ll find many peppered throughout, and you may, like me, find them delightful. She has a way with words.)

(End)

When danger approaches, sing to it. I snapped up this book when I saw it; Amy Hempel’s “Sing To It.” After reading her “The Collected Stories” I was an entrenched fan. On one hand her stories don’t often make me feel very good; on the other, “It’s the language, stupid!” and it feels quite good.  She inhabits her language, her contract with it. The contract must read, in part; thou shalt not make of a dog shelter’s euthanasia program a tawdry tearjerk; thou shall make the words a bridge to hope and affirmation and searing humanity where the dogs count every bit as as much as the humans, or thou shalt not write it.

Upon reading some of “Collected Stories” a year or so ago, I wrote this poem. (I’m a poet, a writer, and though this might be simply a sneaky way of linking my name with Hempel’s, I’d much rather like to think it’s solely a paean to her and Didion, another heroine of mine.

So, these two gifted women have admittedly made me lightheaded, damn near swooning at their language, at their word combinations, reading and re-reading sentences over and over (I did that, also, with Nabokov and Proulx and McGuane trying to discern what made some mind-spinning word-glomerates so magical, so lyrical and attractive, so much more than the sum of their parts, but came away with a half-baked crossroads theory, that, like Robert Johnson and that guitar, there may have been another contract. Or, perhaps they simply wrote and rewrote until the zaps and sparks appeared.)

Not many can do this, not with any regularity or musicality; think of all the pianists in the world (and the thousands of books written weekly), think of Ahmad Jamal, then think of Amy Hempel. Chords. Music. Fill your mind. Arrangements of words like no other.

The book offers one-page stories, micro to novella length, and in all her subjects, she truly sings to them. (When danger approaches, sing to it is an Arab proverb, as she explains in the twelve-line title story, all twelve lines pulling at you like a poem I wish I could write.)

Hempel inhabits her stories, as did Didion. She reports back to you from within. You are made aware of more than the moment she somehow describes without overt description, there is often no “then this happened,” or particular reaction on anyone’s part—in fact a lack of reaction defines one, or…it’s hard to explain. Good writing is so hard to explain. Look up Hemingway; many “explain” his writing. Hard-ass work, I think—that’s my assessment. There’s so much of the not quite good out there. And the lesser than that; it makes me shrink from buying new books at high prices just to throw them across the room. And I’ve done that. My own books have found flight. Propelled by me. Some day I’ll write a really good one.

I choose at random. She bridges one paragraph from another with; “In an unshaded city park I walk through sometimes, a young woman I have seen and said hello to before tells me that her divorce has finally gone through. We had never spoken of a pending divorce; I didn’t know she was married. But I congratulated her…”

Just a small gem like that keeps me glued to her pages. I reread passages. The book is slim. I don’t want it to end. And that is my highest praise. I sing to it. And learn. And thoroughly enjoy.

  That’s it for May—see you in June. xoxo G