Month: January 2024

  • Ode to the Cowboy Fan

    Did you see that game yesterday? That humiliating game where Dallas shit the bed to the Green Bay Packers? That game? Yeah, that was awful, and embarrassing.

    Ung… here comes another few years of rebuilding. Possibly a new quarterback and a new head coach. Which sucks.

    I get why all other NFL football fans hate Cowboy fans. Yes, we are cocky with nothing really to show since 1996. But we sure act like we will win the Super Bowl every year, and there is an endless joy in watching us Cowboy fans break down in tears in the first round of the playoffs, year after year, after year, after year…

    And I was angry at that Cowboy team yesterday. I sat through 18 weeks of a season, with solid play from the defense and uneven play from the offense. But through all of it, at least that team didn’t lose at home. Home field advantage meant something, and coming into the playoffs in ranked 2nd, all of their games, save possibly one, would be at home. No, nope, not at all… they choked. Time came to show up, and they all ran away…

    My friend had the best line last night; “Green Bay better go on to win the Super Bowl, proving that no team stood a chance.”

    I can respect that logic.

    But here I am, Monday morning after the worst loss in Dallas Cowboy Playoff history, and I am forced to muster the energy to mutter, “Next year… We’ll get ‘em next year.”

  • ODDS and ENDS: Gym, Dallas Cowboys, and Being a Bad Drummer

    (In case you haven’t heard… Joe Walsh is my Spirit Animal.)

    Made it to the gym today. That would be my first gym visit for 2024. I know that I wanted to go, like, on January 1st, but I am rather lazy. So, making it in the joint by the 12th is like a win. I didn’t do anything crazy, just ran on the treadmill for thirty minutes. Also, I went later in the day, and not at the crack of dawn, as I wanted to miss the “Getting Back in Shape for the New Year” crowd. Yeah… most of these people will be gone by March. I’m not perfect either, but I do at least hang in there until June. I’m back in the gym by September, and then when it’s November, I’m done for the year. So, I really only work out seven months, and skip five. Now this year, I plan on being in the gym for eight months, and out for four.

    Hey! The Dallas Cowboys play on Sunday, against the Green Bay Packers. It’s the first round of the playoffs, and I am ready with hopes to be dashed! Dallas plays great at home, so it is conceivable that they will win this game and the next. Then for the NFC Championship, odds are that could be in San Francisco, which is just trouble. But it is the Cowboys, so there could be a meltdown, and dreams crashed before that. In the end, I picked the wrong month to quit drinking.

    I don’t think about this often, but today was a day when I had the overwhelming feeling of missing being a bad drummer in a not so great band. I don’t think we ever thought that we were going to be a huge rich and famous band, but we did like being loud and obnoxious. I did have trouble keeping in time, and I never mastered a stutter-step on the bass drum, but smashing the hell out of a kit was therapeutic. Lot of aggression got worked out. Another wonderful side effect of being in a not so great band was that we did listen to so much music; different artist, forms, styles, genres, ages, everything… I don’t listen to as much music as I used to. It was worth being in a garage band.

  • Artist Books

    Over Winter Break, our little family went to the Museum of Modern Art here in Manhattan. Part of the reason to go was to kill an afternoon, but also the kid really is loving her art class at school. They were studying Picasso before the break, and she remembered that MoMA has several of his very famous paintings, and was excited about seeing them. For the wife, she hadn’t been out in the City in a while, you know, to actually enjoy this place – so she was hip on going. Me; I love going to museums – any museum: historical, art, kid, whimsical, yarn, whatever…

    So, up on the top floor, MoMA is holding a retrospective on Edward Ruscha. I was vaguely aware of his work, especially the gas station stuff, but I didn’t know a whole lot about the guy. Let me say this, if you are available, you should go check it out. His work covers several different mediums, and is a very interesting digestion of Post War America, and the growing of Pax Americana.

    Out of all his works, the one I was most drawn to were his artist’s books, the first being “Twentysix Gasoline Stations.” There was something to the simplicity of the work in the book, and the efficacy of the design on the whole. Ruscha went on do many other artists books, all keeping with the same design theme. What these books reminded me of was two things; gallery books my uncle would make, and other artist’s sketchbooks.

    I am aware that Ruscha’s artist books were not sketchbooks, but a complete work unto itself, but I have been to other artist’s shows were they make a single sketchbook into a work. Some of the most interesting I have seen, sadly I have forgotten names, were books that had cut out pictures from magazines and newspapers, or were a combination of text ant drawings/paintings.

    And then there are the gallery books that my uncle used to make. He was a painter/artist who spent time in New York in the late 50’s and 60’s and then relocated to Houston. When he had a show in a gallery, books would be printed for the event, but my uncle took extra time making these limited-edition books individual and unique. Some of the books he would personally swipe paint across the cover, and I think one he would rip the corner off of the first page, to make each book feel “used.”

    And for the past week, in the back of my head, I have this “artist book” idea-thing kicking around in my head. Not sure what to do with it. About six months ago I started farting around with the idea of making a limited run “zine” that would feature crayon drawings and poems with my kid, but that never materialized. (I think my daughter was never on board with the idea.) But I like the idea that writers should adopt artists books as part of their medium to work with. This would be more than a chapbook, as it would incorporate more visuals and play with format and style. For a writer not only works with words, but also the form that books can take, right?

    I’m going to play around with this some more. Even though I might just be describing chapbooks…

  • Short Story Review: “The Beach House” by Joy Williams

    (The short story “The Beach House” by Joy Williams appeared in the January 15, 2024 issue of The New Yorker.)

    (I will SPOIL this story.)

    Illustration by Mia Bergeron

    Of all the storytelling tricks that are out there, the “MacGuffin” is my favorite. If you don’t know, a MacGuffin in a story is any object, device, or person that is essential to the plot and motivation of the characters. Think of the Ark in Raiders of the Lost Ark; it’s the object everyone wants and is also what drives the plot. And the beach house in Joy Williams “The Beach House” is a MacGuffin, but the rest of the story doesn’t play along.

    So, in the story, Amber’s elderly father is near death, and he owns a beach house which he is planning on willing to a charity that save dogs. Amber finds this charity suspicious, but more importantly, if the house is not willed to her after her father’s death, she will be homeless. This is about as textbook as you can get with a plot, and motivation and the whole thing. He wants one thing, she wants another, and the stakes are high as she has a desperate need to get her hands on this beach house.

    But this story never seems to get its dramatic act together. It plods along with little urgency. Amber seems resigned to talk about her plight, but never take action. And the father, though its hinted at that he might be suffering from early dementia, doesn’t seem very interested in his daughters situation of near homelessness. I feel that there are other issues simmering under the surface between these two, but I also think I am giving the story the benefit of the doubt here. When the climax of the piece occurs, the father falls and the daughter wants to take him to the hospital, it in no way affects the plot, the motivations, or the MacGuffin. Nothing is resolved or concluded with this action – the issue of the beach house is still there.

    It’s not a badly written piece, but the aftertaste I am left with is that “The Beach House” might be the first chapter of a novel. Again, all the pieces are here for a good story, and like I also pointed out, there seems to be a subtext between the characters that could be richly explored. But, with the story in this state, Williams introduced a gun and then didn’t fire it.

  • A Project Manager for My Family

    I know we are on the second week of the new year, but is it too early to feel overwhelmed with everything that me and my family want to accomplish in 2024?

    Yes, it is too early to feel overwhelmed in this new year. I would say the start of February is an acceptable time to feel overwhelmed with 2024.

    “Overwhelmed” might be me overreacting a tad.

    There is a lot we need to do, and starting around November, I said that we’d tackle it at the start of the year…

    Yeah…

    I mean, I gotta finish sound damping our bedroom wall, patch some holes, paint the living room, find a new dentist for the kid, make summer travel plans, get new glasses… honestly, I could go on forever. Oh! I gotta find a new storage space for us that’s closer to the apartment and less expensive.

    And then I started thinking that I should use a project management software, or platform, to help me organize everything. Help me find a faster way to work, use my time better, follow up on tasks. That would help, right?

    I did some searching, and I found out two things. One, if you are looking to project manage your family, you could use any PM platform and even use Google Calendar and Tasks. And two, there aren’t many people who do this with their family.

    I actually found that rather odd.

    I would have thought more apps would be out there to help you organize all the tasks and goals a family has. Our little family has so many balls up in the air with playdates and birthday parties, school events, and teacher conferences… Then then there is the stuff I also mentioned above. Seems like there is a goldmine waiting to be explored and exploited by making people feel like their families are disorganized, and that the PM app is what will solve all their problems.

    The trick is that you have to follow through on completing the tasks. You know, if you don’t at work, you get fired. In a family, you just get made fun of because you disappointed everyone, but you get to hold on to your job.

    Huh?

    Still – I need help organizing all of this stuff.