BlackAdder Quote of the Day

 

**My last post to this blog was more than three years ago.  woof.  it may be the wine talking but i'm hoping to add a new thing every few days.**

 

I’ve kept cards and letters since I was a little kid.  The oldest personal mail I have is from 1974.   For the last month I’ve been reading through old correspondence.  In an effort to fit in my apartment I’m trying to pare down my stuff.  The idea is that I’d read some letters and consign them to the bin.  I’m going to post a few of them here and then either send them to the pals/family members who wrote them all those years ago or shred them.

There is hilarious, embarrassing, and distasteful content particularly in the high school letters.  I will post the expurgated versions with select names withheld to keep from damaging anyone’s blossoming career in politics or child care.

This first short entry is a short excerpt from a letter from my friend, sc, who was living in San Francisco.  He used to end his letters with a BlackAdder Quote of the Day.  This letter. dated June 8, 1994, didn't have one so i'll add my own at the end of the post.  :)

"After the DMV I went up to Haight Street and walked around for awhile.  I had been there once before.  When Beth and I came down for the Sugar concert, we went to Haight first.  I browsed through the record stores for awhile.  It was fun but in the Rough Trade store I overheard a very strange conversation.  I was standing at a rack, thumbing through some used CDs and thre was a young woman who looked like Courtney Love’s younger sister standing next to me, browsing.  Suddenly another woman came up from behind, tapped her on the shoulder and said, “Hi, Eve!”  the rest of the conversation went as follows:

 Eve:  “Oh, hi Shannon.”

 Shannon:  “Where have been?  I haven’t see you in awhile.”

 Eve:  “I’ve been in a mental hospital.  I tried to kill myself.”

 Shannon:  “Oh my God, girl!  Don’t do it, it’s not worth it!”

 Eve:  “I know.  So what’s up with you?”

 Shannon:  “Well I’m going to get a job as a stripper. 

                      That way I’ll feel better  about life and 

                      men – because I’ll be degrading them.”

I didn’t catch much of the rest of the conversation and I never saw what Shannon looked like because I was afraid that if I turned around to look at her I would be degraded."

BlackAdder Quote of the Day:

"I'm as poor as a church mouse who's just had an enormous tax bill on the very day his wife has run off with another mouse, taking all the cheese."

Of Mice and Men

***this unmailed letter has been floating around my desk for years now.  this morning i determined to post it here then consign it to the recycling bin. ***

Weds 11.25.2009 - just before 6pm
It's the weds night before Thanksgiving.  I am holed up @ Silver Lake Coffee trying to wait out the stupid stupid rush hour/holiday traffic.
I got off work early (woo!) and was full of intent & motivation.  I had 2 goals: 1: visit Sew-LA for some sewing goods, and 2) hit the Glendale Galleria for my twice yearly cosmetics & sock purchasing rip.  (this is the last possible mall visiting day of the year for me.  Thanksgiving -> January are black out dates.)  Stop 1:  I spent some quality time @ the fabric store choosing buttons to put on a dress I'm making (went with 9 small, square purple buttons.  Pretty damn cute. :) ), got a few yards of muslin to use in practicing making a fitted skirt, a hip curve for...drawing hip curves in patterns, and a jaw-droppingly adorable pattern for a bunny toy. (really good.)
As I left the shop, all mall plans were off.  My sewing mojo was cooking.  shifted plans to stop at The Rad Beer Store & bank instead.  Commute traffic along Silver Lake Blvd is notoriously slow:  1 lane each way, lights, etc.  I took an untried residential detour in an effort to circumvent it.  At a crucial crossroads I opted to go back down to SL Blvd just past the traffic.  Well.  Here the title of a Steinbeck novel comes to mind... Tonight there is no point "past traffic."  To get from point A to point B, a distance that one might cover in 3 min by car, it took me 15 min.  or maybe 45.  I don't know.  It was just slooooowww.  When I got to the light @ Glendale Ave (a left turn to take me home) I saw the traffic socked in - 2 lanes wide.  I uttered an expletive, kept straight, I worked my way to this cafe.  I had no cash, no knitting, no writing paper.  I went thru my glovebox & scrounged up some stuff to write on.  (Hence, this brochure :) ).  I'm hopeful that one hour here will be enough time for the residential streets to clear.  Perhaps everyone will be on the highway by that time.  The bummer is that i'd really like to be @ home sewing.  We'll see where my mojo level is when i get home.  (I might just go grab that bunny pattern out of the car to read...


***the letter ends there without the close-parens.  nothing like the frustration of not being able to ride the wave of motivation.
yesterday morning i was going through a stack of postcards and come across one that i'd written to my friend md in oregon last may.  i put it in the mail without any note about the delay.  the card was about getting my new car and having a new basket put on my bike.  the car is still fabulous.  the bike basket is too heavy, though and has shifted the balance of the bike.  i had a bit of a accident, not a crash but i still ended up bleeding and have some cool scars that will forever end my career as a foot model.  still trying to work things out with my bike.  i don't want it to gather dust this spring.***

echo park & kc accidental

alternate title: saturday in detail

i've been logging a lot of hours at work. long, long days and weekends spent sitting at the editing console. when a day off rolls around i do my best to do as many things that i love as possible. as this is the beginning of autumn, the quality of the sunlight and the color of the sky are particularly striking. a couple of weeks ago i had a couple days off (in a row! novel!). i was feeling particularly open-hearted and wanting to connect with anyone in the same mood. on that saturday (the one listed in the last post with the photo of the zapatista cyclist) i wrote this letter to my pal l. in kentucky.

*****
10.8.11
l,
i'm just off my bike, sitting in the breezy shade of Fix cafe. we had rain last week and he temperature dropped for a few days so the sky today is that amazing clear, vivid blue we see when there is no haze.

i'm in the midst of one of those days when i've got - not a crush, but a mad affection for the neighborhood. riding through town on a gorgeous day listening to broken social scene will do that. (BSS might cast the same enchantment over I-5 between LA & SF. they've got that knack :) ) some days i maintain a pretty solitary body language when i'm out. i just want to be in my head. but today is a day for fleeting moments on social connection with people on the street. maybe it's the weather. more likely it's the coffee.

there are murals along retaining walls along sunset blvd. btwn silver lake & echo park. today i saw a plaque under the paint that stated the wall was built by the Works Projects Admin in 1940. thoughts in response: 1. it's still standing and in great shape; 2. most of the retaining walls on that stretch of sunset were probably built by the WPA, putting people to work.; 3. why is the idea of a contemporary version of the WPA decried as socialism & folly? what perspective point do people have that they forget the intent of public education? the US post office? solid infrastructure? gah. you can tell the BSS ended. :) point being: i took a photo of the plaque. i'm far from being a architecture nerd but am a fan of good work & stuff built-to-last. do you remember the stamps in the concrete sidewalks from the neighborhood? there are a few on Rowena from 1926. men, because they were assuredly men then, poured that concrete, leveled those walks, and 85 years later they've still there. that is badass.

i attribute part of this glowy-saturday feeling to my decision to not go into work today. i may regret it by next weds. or so, but today it was the right way to go. :0 the job is going very well, as well as i could hope reall. my work has been well received across the board, which is a relief. i'm not up to the speed of the seasoned editors, so i'm putting in some long days. before i turned in the Editor's Cut for my first episode i worked 12 days. the last one ending at 5am with the director due in @ 10:30a to watch the cut. i got 2 hours of sleep & did my best to talk myself out of throwing up from the nervousness. as it turned out, the director loved the cut! he made some changes then 3 hrs later called the exec producer in to watch a couple of scenes. they elicited some big laughs from the EP and nice words of confidence voiced to the man who wanted to hire me (my mentor/editor dave) woo! and whew!

i just started getting footage for my next episode. it was in the interest of preventing those crazy hours that i considered going in today. current plan: go in early on monday. we'll see how that works out...

oh! did you know that hugh laurie recorded an album? i was surprised when i first saw it, then remembered all the singing & piano playing he did on "jeeves & wooster" and "bit of fry & laurie". turns out the songs are all new orleans blues-based songs and the album was produced by joe henry. i love joe henry. he may be my favorite song writer out there and his band is always stunning. so his working on the album gives it some cred. what i wanted to tell you pre-tangent was that hugh l. did a show at the Mint (!) last week. the crowd was 1/2 great, 1/2 chatty people but the show was great fun. hugh l. was witty & charming (natch) and getting his sea legs performing as a musician. early in the set he noticed that he'd been introducing every number by saying, "we're going to play a song..." so he worked at finding a variation. :) the highlight of the show, though, was during the encore when hugh l. introduced his guest: Tom Jones. really. at the Mint. bananas. they performed a song together from the album, the tom j. sang 2 jerry lee lewis songs w-Hugh l. on piano. riotous! by that point the chatters had stopped conversation to sing along. the closer ws "great balls of fire" of course. unreal. science fact: tom jones has pipes. boy howdy no diminished tone or verve on that dude.

i'd intended to write you a note in re: finally getting around to sending you the old letters i told you about but got off topic early on. :) are you doing much writing? do you write at home? from your posts it sounds like you go out. i can't work @ home. sooo many distractions. there was an announcement in the newsletter of skylight books that a YA author was doing a reading there and i thought of you. shapes of things to come, l!

i'm sending you more of these letters than i'd planned. each of them had something in it, maybe just one or two lines that i thought you'd find funny or interesting.

the really angst-y letters are from my jr. high days. the high school notes and letters are funnier. those jr. high days must have been the first whiff of boys, wanting autonomy, pot, etc. lots of "i didn't know you liked him" type missives. i went to an all-girl high school, so there is none of that drama in later letters. just the standard parents-don't-get-it content. :)

i'll put a note on the letter stack to give you some context.

ok. time to wrap this up. i've got to bike home (30 min maybe) and get this stuff in the mail.

i'm seeing nick lowe @ largo tonight. not a bad saturday. :)

hope you're fab!

ps. did you know that the knit nook in the highlands has shut? last time i was in town i saw that they'd called it a day.
alas.

*****
post script: that nick lowe show was fucking fantastic! thanks to flanagan for the rad poster, too!
and more context: in my continuing efforts to keep myself from out-growing my apt i have shedding stuff when i can. i'd told L. about the box of letters i've been posting about here. i sent a small pile of the old letters to her. sociological interest, don'tchewknow.
follow up: a couple weeks after the hugh laurie show, joe henry perfomed at largo. (he has a new album out and it is a stunner.) hugh l. introduced joe. cross-pollination!
HEY! joe henry is doing some shows, including 2 nights in NYC!!

while posting this:
beverage: stone pale ale drunk from a chilled mirror pond ale pint glass.
audio: mitch hedberg: "mitch, all together" until it got too distracting then i put on broken social scene "you forgot it in people" which is what i was listening to the day i wrote this letter. <3

last bit: when BSS ended, brownsville station's "smokin in the boys' room" came up on the itunes. it starts like this:

how you doin' out there?
you ever seem to have one of those days when it seems like everybody's gettin' on your case
from your teacher all the way down to your best girl friend?
well, you know i used to have them about all the time
but i found a way to get out of it.

when i was a kid i had a 45 of this song that skipped right after the line, "but i found a way to get out of it." it would play that groove over and over. i had to stand by the record player so i could tap the needle past the skip. even now when i hear this song i still hear that skip.

and this: i hung a couple of posters tonight: a my morning jacket poster from a show in salt lake city from january 2007, the other from their radio city show in june of 2008.

CAN YOU DIG IT?!

alternate title: "The Orphans are a heavy outfit."

when i was in jr. high the movie "the warriors" came out on laser disc and probably played endlessly on cable tv. my brother & his wife had a laser disc player so i logged a LOT of hours watching "the warriors" and "the blues brothers."
this letter is from a girl i knew in jr high: corrine. we first connected over our shared love of cheap trick. in the two years we went to school together (1979 - 1981) she turned me onto the talking heads, the pretenders and b-52s. (that first pretenders album kicked so much ass. man.) you can tell by her choice of stationery, corinne had punk leanings at a tender age. :) i read a bunch of letters tonight from girls in knew when i was young. among the adolescent-dazed, confused, mad-crush letters this one was a bright bit of comedy.

notes for context:
- foo is my family nickname. for a while i tried to shake it. (it did not work. my family calls me foo to this day.)
-nylon shorts were VERY big in california in the summer of 1981
-i didn't want to attend the high school in my district and was campaigning with my mom to attend Lincoln High
-i was visiting my sister in Nebraska when corrine sent me this letter
-i had a boyfriend in 8th grade whose last name was Hoffman

here is her letter:
**********************

punk power!!
7/25/81

dear foo (just kidding),
Hi! How's life in Nebraska? I played Alien Invaders at Macy's. Space Invaders is way better. Well, life the slums is very boring. i got my shorts yesterday night: blue stripies, red & white 50/50's and the white nylon ones ( I found a large) I sure hope you're with your "new summer clothes," i'm not. (just kidding) Me & my mommy went to Beverly Fabrics. Guess who i saw there? No, not Sal, Michelle M!! YUKK!! It was a disgusting and riscue [?] sight. You know something? she looks like a bubba! i mean it!!!
Did you see any babes on the plane? You betta. I heard Dirty Deeds last night...done dirt cheap!!-->

RIFFS, YEAH RIGHT!!! Warriors, come out to play, Warriors, come out to play, WARRIORS COME OUT TO PLAY!! WARRIORS...
C'mon...C'mon...HAHAHAHAHAHA the baseball scene...the bathroom scene...Cyris...the baseball furies, Rogues, Riffs, the farmboys & the WARRIORS!!!!!! Why? Becuz you SSUCK!!!!
Well, any ways, guess what's happening (QUE PASA) next month? Their [sic] gonna have a Showtime Preview!! Guess what's playing?:
1. Brubaker
2. Cookie Goes To the Hospital
3. I'll Cry Tomorrow
4. No Deposit No Return
5. Laff-a-thon #3
6. Friday the 13th
7. Sensuous Nurse
8. Up the Academy
9. Running
10. Rascal Dazzle
11. The Forbidden Planet
12. Players
13. The Wacky World of Jonathan Winters #3
14. Blue Fire Lady
15. All That Jazz
16. Best of Bizarre
17. THE SHINING!
18. Mulefeathers
and that's all...
Maybe you could spend the night at my house that day and come with me to guard the next morning [she was going to be in Color Guard the next fall at Lincoln High]...that is, if you want to if not, it's cool. so tell me how Nebraska is treating you... I hope you can go to Lincoln even though your friendly friend Elizabeth is going, you just betta come to Lincoln. Have your mom call sometime in August. I'm sorry if this page is so sloppy but nobody's perfect. right? right?? Well, Guess who's on Kids Are People Too? BROOKE SHIELDS... "@%&#!!!!" Well... -->
I think that this is gonna be my sign-off page. so i will talk to you a little bit more...did you get any more clothes up in Nebraska? i got a pair on lay-a-way at the Pruneyard. They are really cute. they're gray corduroy straight let pleats. i like em!! I'm gonna buy some gray moccasins for school. i don't give a shit of what anybody thinks of them. Well, you know that really cute tube top you bought? i tried one on but it didin't look right on me. Well, i'd better be jamming now. try to get a flight home on August 9th ok? alright. well, i'd better sign off now...BYE!!

love, corrine flores

later mrs. hoffman..."baahaa"

ps. please write back!!!

pss Sorry about the sloppiness...


**********
that list of movies, etc. playing on the cable preview kills me. "sensuous nurse!" ha!
also, her last name wasn't Flores. clearly she had a thing for a guy with the last name Flores, but i can't remember who he was.

snacks of note: bottle of red wine (Rook from jill's fab wine shop on melrose...), boursin & pita chips (dinner of champions!)

31 years ago tomorrow

four months after my last blog post the topic that compels me to post again is the content of that letter box. i spent the summer alternately working crazy hours and road tripping so i never finished clearing out that box. tonight i took another crack at it.
a few years ago i read some entries in the diary that i kept from january 1979 - march 1981. much page space was devoted to the crushes that i had and which of my friends were getting along. dull stuff. but! there are some entries that pretty entertaining.
it's a Hello Kitty diary, so all the entries begin, "dear kitty."
here is my entry from september 2, 1980

Fair!
tuesday september 2, 1980
Dear Kitty,
today ASB [Associated Student Body - i was in student gov't in 8th grade] had a meeting at school. We have a new Vice-Principal (Mr. Butler). GET THIS! He came from Markham [another Jr. High School] and Mr. Jay got transferred to Willow Glen High! [the H.S. i wanted to attend.] When BC & I found out we were trippin' way out! he knows Pat M. very well! I would guess so! (cute kitd that he is!) We (BC, Mary & Me) walked to Mary's baby sitting job then Karen drove us home.
I'm beginning to dig my stereo. Its sound is cool! Pat Benatar sounds excellent on it! (courtesy KSJO! #1!) love it, love it, love it!!
Don & Mom took me & Biz to the show and saw "Smokey & the Bandit II". It was sooo excellent! Jerry Reed saves the day! He's sooo cool!
This school year is gonna be a trip. "Sailing" just came on. I almost changed it then didn't cause it sorta keeps thoughts instead of bringing back memories. It's been 1 day since we left. Uvas [campground] now seems like a super great dream & we woke up when we drove through the gates. I thought about me & Herb smoking a "j". I wonder what {all the guys we met while camping} thought of me. I mean: ok kid, pesty twirp, ugly but nice. stupid personality. or something else like that. I wonder. Good to know? Bad to know? (Where on Earth shall we go? Is there anyone on Earth who will care? Is anybody out there?)
No, yes, maybe, I don't know. Can't tell. (what's with all the poetry? huh?!) this is too strange for me. G'nite.
Rock Rules

**************
post script
--the Don who took us to the movies was a family friend. he was from Michigan, living with us while he was getting cancer treatment at Stanford.
--My dad is a truck driver (still at age 76!) so "Smokey & the Bandit" was a big deal around our house. Also, during the 1970's my dad was a dead ringer for Jerry Reed. Really.
--from the time i was a tiny kid, every summer my family camped at a place called Uvas Meadows near Morgan Hill. my mom and i would spend weeks and weeks there. my grandparents also had a camp spot there. the month before this entry was my 13th birthday. my parents let me take 3 friends to Uvas for a week of camping and carrying on. a boy i'd met the previous summer was there with his cousins. we girls spent a lot of time walking past their camp, etc. anywhoo, for my 13 yr old self, this was a BIG week. i didn't have sex or anything, i think i just got a taste of hanging out with guys without being a silent wreck (i've read those earlier entries).

here is a bit of another entry:
Tuesday, January 13, 1981
...Uvas Meadows was sold. That means I'll never go back there for vacation again. Just to move the trailer. It has to be out by Feb. 15th. I just hit me. All my memories, 13 yrs of them, all left behind. Just gone. I don't know what to do now. (I should go to bed.)...

a bit melodramatic, but i was headed straight into surly-teen territory. *shudder*

Box Full of Letters

i've had "toss out old letters and diaries" on my list of things to do for at least a year. i'm trying to keep from out-growing my apt and weeding out the letters i wrote and received in grade school is a good place to start.
i've got one box of letters labeled, "letters 1974 - 1980?" it's got valentines from my parents and graduation cards and many, many letters from junior high school. most of them are dull notes about shopping, homework, boys, feuds and late 70's AOR radio. but they are short! so, on their way out, i thought i would post a few here. they aren't letters i've written (the impetus for this blog), but have received.

here our first entry: from my friend who signs her letter by here middle name, Buu:

3/4/81

Thanks for the letter. I missed them. I can't wait til Friday. Oh yeah! Kim's coming too. It'll be neat. I don't think we'll be able to go shopping tomorrow. My mom isn't planning to go, so I don't know. Boomer's going friday, if you and Carrie want to go with her.
I've been so blah lately. Everything bothers me if I'm not busy. I've got such bad cramps I think I'm gonna die. I mean it. Man. Barfomatic! Ha! Ha! I'm just kickin' back against my bedrest. It's comfortable! Guess what's on KOME? "Back in the Saddle!" Owww! Back...back" ha! ha!
Well, gonna jam now. Write back okay? I can't write really good right now. I'm on some kind of guilt trip. Well, gonna jet now. Taking off! Bye!

**even without the date i think her use of barfomatic dates this letter but perfectly. we were in 7th grade. i know this b/c by 8th grade we didn't hang out anymore. she sealed the note with a wax impression of a peace sign :) **

ok, i just found one dated july 1978. it's from my next door neighbor, susan. we grew up together. she sent this to me while i was visiting my sister in nebraska. i can only guess i told susan about the acres of corn there. we're about 11yrs old**

Dear Evonne,
Hi corn makes me wako anyways. The game of cards sounds weird but fun. Nicole is the cutest thing you ever saw she is getting big.
4 tom cat kittens. weren't there any females in the litter?
your stationery "bits & pieces" is cute. this is Leslie's but i'm using it anyways. she left it here. jenny left today. She's been here for 2 days. that wrap you up thing is cute. I tried to help him but i couldn't. i'm eating a cheese cake dessert. it's good. i'm going to Great America tomorrow. is it fun there?
well by. love & stuff

**at a certain point she left off writing "I" and drew picutres of eyes instead. awesome!**
Leslie is her big sister. Nicole is one of my nieces, then about a year old.
for the record, i also cleared out a journal i had to keep during one of my Theater classes. good lord. i will not be posting any of my ruminations about Brecht or acting.

while posting: heard Billy Bragg: "Don't Try This at Home" and Eef Barzelay: "Bitter Honey"
now leaving b/c it's getting close to 80º in my apt.

don't you need zoning for a day care?

**this from an unfinished letter to my sister. it's on what is possibly the most adorable stationery i've ever used.
after more than 2 weeks of it sitting unfinished in my back pack, i'm putting it in the post tomorrow.**


4.2.10 Friday, 1pm

Today is a union holiday: Good Friday. I decided to spend some time @ a cafe that I usually visit on the weekend. It's in an old residential neighborhood in Echo Park. I have to drive here.
On the weekend it's pretty quiet. The patio out front has a tall bamboo hedge along the sidewalk which helps temper the bus noise & stuff. The week days, however, are proving to be a different story...something i'd not noticed before: there is a pre-school across the street. or maybe it's just day care. (some of those kids are at least 7 yrs. old.) They are all running, playing and HOLLERING. In the house next to the cafe (directly behind me) there is a small dog who has been barking for at least 20 min, and who shows no signs of stopping.
Usually in this situation I have headphones on, but i've been reading a book. (oh my god, one of the kids actually just said this, "nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah." i'm going in for a coffee refill, then coming out to put my headphones on.)
{ok, i'm back w-a fresh hot cuppa joe. and as if by miracle, the children have gone indoors! hooray! also, the little dog is quiet. perhaps the two were linked.}

There is a young guy working in the cafe, I've not seen him here before. When i went in for my 1st cup I ordered drip coffee and asked him what the difference is between the 2 they have brewed. When I chose the one he described as "lighter but stronger" he actually had a "yes!" reaction that was really funny. It felt good that the cafe guy thought i'd made the right choice. ha! i'm a dork. but he is cute.
I'm in a bit of a weird state today. I blame 3 things:
1. this is a holiday wknd but i may have to work tomorrow, but don't know yet.
2. I'm starting to get crampy
3. i'm doing a dance with fed-ex to receive a pkg. I paid for 2 day shipping, but it will be 4 days before I can get it. it's my fault: i thought the pkg was being sent via US Post, so i gave them our mail room address @ work, not the office address.
Also, my job ends in a few weeks and i haven't made an effort to find my next one. This is b/c i've got a short road trip planned at the end of April. I don't want to back to work right away.
I am really hoping that "Mercy" gets picked up for another season, or my old boss' pilot gets picked up for series. Either way I could take a couple months off knowing I have a job to come back to. Next week i'll whip up an "i'm looking for a gig" email and send it out. That will do for now. :)
(wow, the temperature has dropped about 10˚ since I got here. And the clouds are rolling in. am now lamenting my decision to wear flip-flops, not sneakers. hmmm. I'm also learning that trying to write a letter w/o wearing my headphones is difficult b/c i am easily distracted by other peoples' conversations.)
How are things in Yuba City? Are you feeling settled? I'm hoping that since you've been there for awhile drama and newness are starting to taper off. :)
i've been loosely formulating a road trip up north to see family. I don't have any dates yet, but would like to hit the Bay Area, Sacramento, Yuba City, see some baseball...Again, i'm hoping to have some time off this summer. :)
~~~~~~~~~~~~
now 4.18.10, sunday night-- i never got back to finish this letter. thought i'd send on what i'd written. 3+ pages and i feel like i was just ramping up...

**if all goes well, i will have this in the post tomorrow.
beer of note: rogue dead guy
radio: gary calamar just played "white girl" by X**

inaugural!

sunday night, post al wazir.

i don't like to spend much time on the phone. when the weather is nice, i'm never home. i can be remiss in returning email. unless there is a concert ticket involved, i'm reluctant to make plans. one thing that keeps my friends and family from thinking i've dropped off the face of the planet: i'm an avid letter writer.

i always carry a few postcards and writing paper in my backpack or stuck between the pages of whatever i'm reading. my letters tend to be a bit stream of consciousness, rambling affairs. my favorite places to write are cafes where i can sit outside.

cutting to the chase: often after i write a letter i think i'd like to share some of the bits with more than one person. so.

i'm going to transcribe some of my letters and cards here and see what comes of the whole thing.

for the record: the title "sweet cracker sandwich!" was written by darby conley, and appears in his comic strip, "get fuzzy." i had considered using as a title, "bologna sandwich on fire" which is a paraphrase of another of his lines: "setting a bologna sandwich on fire is not cooking." (damn. am now regretting not using the roz chast line, "little duck falling off a ladder." alas.)