Tom & Alissa

May books! I did very well this month.

On Writing - Stephen King
Heartily recommended to me by Josh and well worth the read. I haven’t read any of Stephen King’s other books or seen any of the movies based on them, but his perspective is so refreshingly down-to-earth and encouraging, while still focusing on good grammar and good writing - which is often absent from ‘commercial’ fiction. [5/5]

What the Dead Know - Laura Lippman
I read about this in the NY Times Book Review and bought it off the review. It’s a story about a woman who gets into a car accident and claims to be one of a pair of sisters that were abducted twenty years prior. I was totally into it the entire time. I couldn’t tell you if the writing was good (it wasn’t bad), but it was definitely a good read. [4/5]

In Cold Blood - Truman Capote
Awesome. If you’ve seen Capote you know what the story is, but it’s a book that I think most people should read in college literature classes. Capote somehow managed to take the story of a murder than many people were familiar with and spin out a long, entrancing, yet factual novel from it. Must-read. [5/5/]

Breakfast at Tiffany’s: A Short Novel and Three Stories - Truman Capote
I wasn’t too keen on the short stories, but Breakfast at Tiffany’s was delightful, though significantly more racy than the Audrey Hepburn movie version. But, if you like the movie, you’ll probably like seeing where the story came from. And Capote is a master. (Fun fact: one of his first jobs was apparently as a copy boy at the New Yorker, but he was fired when he inadvertently offended Robert Frost.) [4/5]

Mystery and Manners: Occasional Prose - Flannery O’Connor
I just kept reading great books this month. I’ve been a huge O’Connor fan since I first read her work, but this collection of essays and speeches on fiction, geographical region, writing, and religion was accessible and insightful and a bit snarky (at least, for the 50’s). I can’t really believe anyone bothers to write a book about being a writer and a person of faith after this book, because it’s that good and that comprehensive. But as I mentioned earlier, I think all religious publishing houses should make this required reading for their fiction writers. [5/5]

The Mistakes Madeline Made - Elizabeth Meriwether
We went to a production of this last year because someone Tom knew was affiliated with the Naked Angels theater company, which put it up. We had no idea what we were going into, but we left totally amazed. A strong, tight, darkly humorous script about dirtiness and washing and how we forgive ourselves. [4/5]

The Hidden Art of Homemaking - Edith Schaeffer
By the wife of theologian Francis Schaeffer. This book is not about being a homemaker, really. There are no injunctions to “biblical submission” or explanations of how to bake a perfect loaf of bread. Instead, it’s written to encourage everyone (single, married, children, men, women) to pursue art in their daily life. Schaeffer’s basic premise is that everyone, especially if they claim to believe that they’re created in the image of a Creator God, should be living “artistically, aesthetically, and creatively”. Reading the book is like sitting in Schaeffer’s kitchen at L’Abri as she arranges flowers and makes a salad and talks. [4/5]

Sideways Stories from Wayside School - Louis Sachar
It’s a kids’ book, yes, but it made such an impact on me as a third-grader and I couldn’t remember why, so I needed to re-read. It struck me that this is probably the first book I read that breaks the fourth wall. Glad I’ll be able to read it to my kids. :) [3/5]

All the Pretty Horses - Cormac McCarthy
Difficult, but I’m convinced that he’s one of the best writers alive today (and obviously, the Pulitzer people are too, and so is Oprah, and this particular book won the National Book Award). It’s a western that takes place in Texas and Mexico in the 1950s. It lopes along without allowing the reader to see what’s coming next, so you’re blindsided by plot points and it keeps you going. McCarthy’s mastery of dialogue is unparalleled in anything I’ve read recently, though he doesn’t use quotation marks and whole blocks of dialogue are in Spanish. I think this is important work for serious readers. [5/5]

Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith - Rob Bell
So I’d heard lots of people who didn’t like this book and lots more who did, and I just needed to find out what all the fuss was about. I hated it at first (his style of writing is almost broken into stanzas, sometimes awkwardly, which makes it bumpy until you get into it). But the more I read, the more I like it. He has some really great things to say about the church and Christianity that definitely need to be said, and a great grounding in the Jewish rabbinical tradition with some insights I’d never even heard. His main problem, I think, is that many of his detractors probably can’t reason well and take what he says beyond what he’s saying. What he’s saying is good and solid. And a guy who puts footnotes in his books like “Read everything John Piper has ever written” and “You must drop everything now and read Dallas Willard’s Divine Conspiracy” has my vote. [4/5]

So it was a good month. I get two whole entire weeks off work next month and will probably be reading a lot in that time. I’m in the midst of The Corrections, by Jonathan Franzen, and The Practice of the Presence of God, by Brother Lawrence; I’m also hoping to tackle The Yiddish Policeman’s Union (Michael Chabon), The Death and Life of Great American Cities (Jane Jacobs - one of the seminal works on urban planning), and probably A Widow For One Year by John Irving. I’m hoping I’ll tackle more, but that’s a respectable stack.

Interesting discussion at the New York Times about the controversy over children’s menus at restaurants. This is the prompter:

In his early days as a parent he regarded children’s menus as a great thing, David Kamp writes in today’s Dining section, but he has come to conclude that the kids’ menu is regressive, encouraging youngsters to believe that there is a rigidly delineated “kids’ cuisine.”

“It pains me that many children now grow up eating little besides golden-brown logs of kid food, especially in a time when the quality, variety and availability of good ingredients is better than ever,” Mr. Kamp writes.

What do you think of children’s menus?

I’m intrigued. I’d love to raise my (hypothetical) children to be gourmands by feeding them lots of fresh vegetables as soon as they’re able to eat it, but since I’ve never had children I don’t know how learned picky eating is. I could be characterized as a picky eater by some. I don’t drink milk, don’t eat many types of cheese, have only recently figured out how to like eggs (the secret is to not hard-boil them, blech). But it generally turns out I’m allergic in some fashion to the things I don’t eat now, but had to eat as a kid and felt sick afterwards.

Parents? Picky eaters? What do you think?

If you haven’t picked up on it, I’m considering a return to school as a graduate student - at the moment, I’m looking at Gallatin at NYU. Gallatin is a “school of individualized studies”, which means that the student structures his or her degree program by choosing classes and designing research under the guidance of an academic adviser.

Having been homeschooled, I’m really excited by this prospect. It’s not that my parents practiced self-directed learning (also known as unschooling, and to my mind, a bad idea). I followed a very rigid curriculum and probably took way too many subjects (intermediate formal logic in seventh grade? why not?). But on the other hand, the way my parents practiced homeschooling - hands-off when I was in high school, expecting me to do all my scheduling by myself - prepared me for higher education by giving me the ability to schedule work well and develop good work habits. It doesn’t mean that I still don’t push off work until the last minute, sometimes - but at least it’s always in my mind and I rarely miss deadlines.

In any case, now that I’m a grown-up and it’s actually appropriate to practice self-directed learning, the idea of structuring my own degree according to my interests and aptitudes has been totally fascinating me. My undergraduate was earned out of practicalit, rather than interest, and I had only two classes in my entire four years at RPI that I really was interested in - introduction to literature and philosophy of law. I was good at what I did there; I’m just bored by IT in general. It’s interesting enough to keep me awake (mostly the structural and sociological elements) but not enough to keep me going forever. So, recalling those two classes I actually liked, plus my general lifelong obsession with books and philosophies, I thought I’d like to combine literature and intellectual history in some way, maybe with some film thrown in.

But the more I read, the more I realize that I’m really most interested in the twentieth century (including the last seven years; twenty-first century studies wouldn’t fill up a M.A.); the literature, the thought, the people, the diversity, the leaps and bounds that humanity seems to have taken. I think there’s a few reasons this is interesting to me - I was born in the late twentieth century so at least I remember the last twenty years to some degree; the world has changed so much since 1900, and it seems like those changes have been greater than in many of the previous centuries; globalization means that the literature of different cultures has been more readily available; more people in the West from more social classes enter college than previously; and frankly, I have a fantastic grounding in ancient history from the Egyptians through the Greeks and Romans and up through the Renaissance (and of course, American history from the puritans and pilgrims in England through present, though I know nothing of modern Canadian or Mexican history) and so I’m terribly intrigued by everything that’s gone on in philosophy since 1900. I sort of grew up in the bunker, unwittingly, and since much of the twentieth century is scary and “evil”, some homeschooling curriculums tend to skip over it.

But mostly, I’m totally entranced by the most recent of literature. Tomorrow is my books-I-read-this-month post, but I have read books by Truman Capote and Cormac McCarthy and this morning I started on The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen which has me thoroughly entranced and wanting to grab people on the street and asked them if they’ve read this book and then wax eloquent over the first thirty pages, which is all I’ve read so far because it’s that good. (In a subway ride and a lunch time, I usually would have hit at least 70 pages in most books.) I’ve read many of the old books and they’re close to my heart, but there’s something about this later literature that has me so excited about reading again.

What could I get out of studying the effects of modern philosophy on modern literature? Frankly, I’m not sure yet. But what I do know is that literature has the power to affect culture in a shorter timeframe than most of the other arts, maybe all, and I want to know what that means and what to do about it. And I love thinking and academia.

Maybe I’ll be a professor.

I chuckled at Josh’s description of my mad editorial skillz when I saw it last night. I didn’t think I was that brutal, but on the other hand, man, you asked for it. Anyone else want to have their book torn to pieces? I am especially good at lambasting excessive use of the infinitive.

I went to the dentist on Friday; no cavities and my gums are healthy (which I feared), but I will need to have my wisdom teeth out. Only on top, as I have no bottom wisdom teeth and probably never will. Also, either dental technology has gotten very good lately, or Albany is way behind the times; the hygienist took X-rays that were sent directly to the computer. I feel it is hickish of me to be as impressed as I am.

I took some work calls and headed northward to the Cloisters - the photos are now labeled and tagged - and spent most of the remaining sunlight there. Came back down to the Village and met Tom on set to go to dinner at what I thought was the Spotted Pig but turned out to be the Little Owl. Pricey, but oh so tasty.

Tom worked through the weekend and I spent Saturday mostly at home, editing photos, cleaning, trying to stay cool, then headed out to the Bowery Poetry Club to shoot the first installment of the Zoae Series which was fabulous and drew an audience of nearly one hundred. Pictures will probably show up on the Zoae site soon (as in, when I finish editing them).

After church on Sunday, I had lunch with Annie and Carey, then went to Joe to work on a feature I’m writing and struggling with.

People talk to me randomly much more when I’m alone; at Joe, several people just struck up conversations, including one of the baristas who was pretty sure he knew me from someplace I work (not bloody likely), Chicago (I’ve been there twice, see previous comment), or maybe Portland (a place I’d like to visit, but haven’t). Another guy wanted to know what camera I use. People at the Cloisters kept coming up to me and asking me random questions. I think I’m not imposing, maybe.

Anyhow, on Monday morning we had brunch at our favorite finer diner in Park Slope, then stopped into Barnes & Noble on the way home, which was a mistake. We bought three books and came home and ordered eight more, but some are necessary and the rest should keep us busy through the summer. And last night Tom shot portraits of friends with a new baby in Prospect Park and we had dinner with them and watched a very old and very slapsticky Woody Allen movie.

I finished All the Pretty Horses on the way to work today. Oh, wow. I have much respect for this Cormac McCarthy fellow.

There’s a lot going on that I can’t even keep track of; this is one of those times when life swirls about my ears and I can only really watch helplessly and keep my fingers crossed.

I spent the day at the Cloisters yesterday.

Besides my seasonal allergies, who staged a fierce and unexpected comeback, I had a lovely time.

I cross the Manhattan Bridge on the D train every day; today, in the sunlight, with two bags balanced between my legs, I half-twisted to look out the window at Chinatown and read the graffiti for the first time:

CHINATWON

I transfer trains one stop from home; a very tan and tall man gestured enough to distract me from the Coldplay in my ears and signal that I could have his seat. I declined since I was nearly home, but smiled and thanked him. His shirt read:

THE BIG CHEESE

I have an unexpected and joyous day off tomorrow, and after my first dental checkup since moving to New York city almost two years ago, I plan to spend the day at the Cloisters with a camera and a notebook. I do like being around others (and I love being with Tom), but I value solitude when I get it, and what better place for a bit of rejuvenation than a centuries-old reconstructed monastery?

We visited the Cloisters last year, but it was a bleak and rainy day. Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny, breezy, and just about 90 degrees.

Finally getting around to the meme that SuperFastReader aka Annie-from-church tagged me for.

The rules:

1: Each player starts with 8 random facts/habits about themselves.
2: People who are tagged, write a blog post about their own 8 random things, and post these rules.
3: At the end of your post you need to tag 8 people and include their names.
4: Don’t forget to leave them a comment and tell them they’re tagged, and to read your blog (I won’t do this because I’m pretty sure the people I tag read my blog regularly :D - clearly, I’m that vain).

Eight random facts you probably don’t know about me if you’ve mainly read my blog:

1. I play five instruments (piano, flute, violin, organ, and I’ll count cello and guitar each as a “half” as I’ve never taken lessons on either); if you count recorder as an instrument, then six. I was very nearly a music major; piano is my first love, and I played in a handful of juried competitions as a high schooler.

2. When I was 14, my family moved to the country - we’re talking about as rural as you can get and still be in driving distance from Albany. I had a dozen laying hens (and two roosters, but that was a mistake). I didn’t like the country.

3. I was homeschooled for sixth grade through high school graduation, and in the meantime skipped the eighth grade.

4. I was originally accepted to RPI as an arts major, with arts scholarships, but chickened out at the last minute and switched to information technology.

5. I still haven’t seen Titanic.

6. When I was a little kid, I was squeamish about touching pictures in books that freaked me out; giant bugs with ugly eyes, gooey gross things, etc. But I liked to play with worms.

7. For a very long time, all my hobbies had to do with the “womanly arts” - and as a result, I’m a fairly accomplished sewer/knitter/crocheter/embroiderer. I don’t do much of any of those any more, but I do like to knit. Though not in the summer.

8. My very first chapter book series was the Little House on the Prairie books, followed by all of Beverly Cleary’s books. I have odd gaps in my reading that I’m trying to fill (I’ve never read Lord of the Flies, and I was 21 before I read Catcher in the Rye and I really didn’t like it at all), but I become more and more hopelessly in love with the literary fiction of today and who knows if I’ll ever catch up.

And I tag:
Laura, Tracy, Amanda, Alisa, Josh, Katherine, Tala, and Dwight. Just kidding. But wouldn’t you like to read that one?

I’m doing research in my “spare time” for projects; in the process, I’ve run across a few things too good not to post.

First, Flannery O’Connor:

If you shy away from sense experience, you will not be able to read fiction; but you will not be able to apprehend anything else in this world either, because every mystery that reaches the human mind, except in the final stages of contemplative prayer, does so by way of the sense. Christ didn’t redeem us by a direct intellectual act, but because incarnate in human form, and he speaks to us now through the mediation of a visible church. All this may seem a long way from the subject of fiction, but it is not, for the main concern of the fiction writer is with mystery as it is incarnated in human life.

. . .

There is a great tendency today to want everybody to write just the way everybody else does, to see and to show the same things in the same way to the same middling audience. But the writer, in order best to use the talents he has been given, has to write at his own intellectual level. For him to do anything else is to bury his talents. This doesn’t mean that, within his limitations, he shouldn’t try to reach as many people as possible, but it does mean that he must not lower his standards to do so.

- From Mystery & Manners, “Catholic Novelists and Their Readers”

And Linford Detweiler:

The Gospel According to Helena

Damn
She loves to write
She knows she may not even be that good
What does it mean when somebody
Loves to do something
So much
She
Doesn’t care
Whether or not
It makes any sense to the world

What does it mean when somebody
Does something just because
It makes her feel more alive

What does it mean when somebody
Does something just because
It opens her eyes

What does it mean when somebody
Does something just because
She’s missing God

And knows she always will

I was at the Princeton Club last night for a Christian Union benefit. Can I just say that one of the side benefits of being around Ivy Leaguers is that they generally show signs of recognition at the mention of RPI. Seriously! The only other group of people who consistently know that are engineers.

Anyhow. Off to the races.

It’s been very busy; Tom got an assistant directing job at the last minute for this week, so he’s been busily preparing for the shoot which started today, and I’ve been finishing editing Josh’s book (no small feat, as it was 296 pages when I got it, though it’s a teensy bit shorter now) and various other projects which seem small but pile up fast.

It’s so lovely out today. I passed the FIT graduation at Radio City on my way in. Two incredibly long lines of parents with flowers in hand on 50th and 51st streets. I bet they’re glad it’s not raining.

Did I mention we’re spending two weeks vacationing in Boston in June? We leave on June 8 and will be housesitting for my aunt & uncle as they go on vacation. My Dad grew up in Braintree, just south of Boston, and all my relatives live within a stone’s throw of the city, so I’ve spent a fair amount of time there, and Tom went to Emerson so he lived there for two years. I’m looking forward to two lazy weeks of no responsibilities besides the cats and the goldfish. And at the end, my brother is graduating from high school in Albany (!!!!), so we’ll drive out with my grandmother.

I feel like I should have more to say, but I don’t.

New Releases
1. The Wind that Shakes the Barley
2. The Lives of Others
3. Paris Je T’aime
4. Zodiac
5. The Good Shepherd

Of Years Past
1. In the Mood for Love
2. The Long Goodbye
3. Blow Up
4. The Apartment
5. The Rules of the Game
6. Network
7. The Third Man
8. The Science of Sleep
9. La Moustache

Reruns
1. In the Bedroom
2. City of God
3. Million Dollar Baby
4. Closer
5. Me and You and Everyone We Know
6. The Bourne Supremacy
7. The Bourne Identity
8. Batman Begins

Most Despised
1. Red Road
2. Private Fears in Public Places

This pudding is from the Sweet Serendipity: Delicious Desserts & Devilish Dish cookbook (yep, that’s the restaurant in that John Cusack/Kate Beckinsale movie). I made it around Easter and it was so amazingly yummy; light, fluffy, sweet but not too sweet, and very coconutty - it’s a lot like whipped cream, but lighter and with coconut in it. This makes a huge amount, but you can halve it to make much less.

7 teaspoons (2 envelopes plus 1 teaspoon) unflavored powdered gelatin
1/2 cup milk, cold
4 large egg whites, room temperature
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup confectioner’s sugar
3 cups heavy cream, cold
5 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 cups flaked, sweetened coconut (was about one bag for me)

Combine gelatin with milk and heat it in microwave in 10-second bursts until the gelatin dissolves; do not boil. The mixture will appear to have curdled a little as the milk solids separate due to the heat. Allow it to cool a bit, but not so much that it re-solidifies.

In a clean medium bowl with clean beaters, beat the egg whites with the salt. (Note: I used my only blender, a Cuisinart “magic stick”, and it worked beautifully.) Slowly add 6 teaspoons of the confectioners’ sugar and whip until stiff, glossy peaks form.

In a large bowl, beat the cream and vanilla with the remaining confectioner’s sugar just until stiff peaks form. Fold the egg whites into the whipped cream. Don’t overmix - it’s okay to stop when there are still some streaks. Add the gelatin and fold just until incorporated. Fold in 2 1/2 cups of the cocounut.

Spoon the mixture into eight 1-cup ramekins. (Here the recipe notes: “If you have fresh coconut shells, use them in place of the ramekins” - I just left it in the bowl as I had neither.) Cover wiwth plastic wrap, then chill until completely set, at least two hours. Toast the remaining 1/2 cup coconut in a wide skillet over low heat, stirring occasionally. Top each pudding with a tablespoon of coconut. Serve chilled.

This blog must have become very popular in the very recent past; in the last 24 hours we’ve had nearly 1,500 spam messages caught in the Akismet filter (which anyone running Wordpress should definitely install). Overall we’ve only had around 7,500 spam comments. Interesting. :)

I’ve found my reading list to be invaluable so far this year when I can’t remember what I want to read.

But my brain lately feels like it’s finally re-congealing after the complete slop it became during college (just in time to consider graduate school, but we won’t discuss that right now, and besides, nothing could be as difficult as my undergrad experience) and I’m adding more books to this list that have lately come to my attention or come back to my attention.

The Road - Cormac McCarthy
Had been planning to read it before it got on Oprah’s list and subsequently won the Pullitzer. Am I good or what?

The Yiddish Policeman’s Union - Michael Chabon
What an amazing writer. Heard him speak recently at the 92nd Street Y and my brain has been on fire since then.

A Widow for One Year - John Irving
We saw The Door in the Floor and so now I need to find out what happens next.

The Tipping Point - Malcolm Gladwell
I have avoided this book studiously (I don’t know why, exactly) but now I must read it.

All the Pretty Horses - Cormac McCarthy
Tom is reading it currently, and keeps reading sections aloud to me.

Voicing Creation’s Praise - Jeremy Begbie
I met him at the IAM Conference in February. Delightful, talented, and so brainy it makes my head spin.

The Death and Life of Great American Cities - Jane Jacobs
I’m starting to care more and more about the idea of city and community and neighborhood. And I think Mako wrote about her a while back. Good place to start.

The Great Good Place: Cafes, Coffee Shops, Bookstores, Bars, Hair Salons, and Other Hangouts at the Heart of a Community - Ray Oldenburg
I’m an aficionado of the “third place” (and harbor dreams of running one someday).

I think it was Tala who was asking about photographers’ portfolios & sites; it’s not a portfolio, but I found this site today which has some great basic photography how-tos and such.

The fun part (from the article about street photography):

The Artist Pursuing Inspiration

Props: Black clothes, rings under eyes, long hair, intense look.

Camera: Anything black. Medium-format or vintage equipment for extra credit. Big is preferable to small, unless it’s a Leica or a Voigtländer.

Location: Anywhere s/he won’t get thrown out of.

Mannerisms: Stare enrapturedly at utterly commonplace things. Photograph things from odd angles (camera held overhead or tilted at a wild angle is good). Crawl under objects, climb on them, glower at people who get in your way, otherwise pretend they don’t exist.

Advantages: You might make interesting friends.

Disadvantages: You might make interesting enemies.

Tom and Angela both needed me to get them into the Jeff Wall exhibit at the MoMA today, as it’s the last day. (I wanted so much to see it as well, and consequently I hate my job today.)

But anyhow, I had to run up the three blocks to grab tickets and let them in (somehow it seems ironic that it’s my corporate membership that lets them in, haha), and when I came back, there were photographers and some kind of red carpet thing going on outside Radio City Music Hall, which is adjacent to my building. Flashing bulbs and press interviewing pretty people and everything. Trouble is, I didn’t recognize the pretty people. Wonder what’s going on?

This article (”Searching the Alps for Haute Comfort Food”), in the Times, actually had me salivating. The first bit:

THE first thing to do with a tartiflette is to ease your fork through the crust of cheese. If the casserole is done right, that cut will release a whiff of milky steam infused with a suggestion of onion and garlic.

The best moment, though, comes with a perfectly proportioned forkful. A chunk of cream-soaked potato and a smoky bit of lardon will be married with a smooth coat of reblochon — cheese made from the milk of one of three breeds of French cows that march to Alps meadows in the spring and return to hay-filled barns in the winter.

Spent the weekend upstate with my family, celebrating my brother’s 18th birthday (which is actually today), Mother’s Day, all that good stuff. For me, going home is relaxing, just reading, talking, eating out on the deck, hanging out with people that I’ve known all my life - much-needed rejuvenation.

We got home from Albany late last night and finished watching L’Avventura, which I tried and failed to enjoy. But I get the point, I think. All desolation and loneliness and lack of meaning. Still, I don’t have to like it.

Moving on. I’ve had the delight of reading Mystery & Manners, a collection of essays by one of my all-time favorites, Flannery O’Connor. I’ve read nearly all her fiction - one of the prouder accomplishments of my life was finishing her Complete Stories - but Mystery & Manners is flooring me with its incisiveness and discernment and wit. I’m pretty sure that all Christian publishing houses should mandate that their editors and writers read this book before they are allowed to get their first check. It would certainly cut down on the crap that gets published.

I’ve also been reading The Hidden Art of Homemaking by Edith Schaeffer (wife of Francis), a book I’ve encountered many a time but apparently never read. It’s not about homemaking so much as pursuing artistic, aesthetic, creative living in every facet of existence. And it’s a gentle read.

I love early summer. Iced tea, fresh vegetables, strawberry lemonade, eating bread and cheese and prosciutto and wine on the roof, sleeping with the windows open, the trees that bright green before the leaves mature, jazz floating up from the apartment below us. Nothing like it.

Attended the Becket Fund Award Dinner last night at the Metropolitan Club. I’d never actually attended anything black tie before, so that was fun. We were there into the wee hours of the morning, and had a splendid time.

And now, we’re heading up to Albany for the weekend, so you probably won’t hear from us. Happy mother’s day!

Totally fascinating on Brewing Culture today: CCM changing their definition of Christian music, starting with the May 2007 issue.

“This month marks a historic step for our magazine, and, as a result, the fans and the industry we serve,” said CCM Editor Jay Swartzendruber. “We’re going to start mixing indie and general market Christians such as The Fray, Mary J. Blige and Sufjan Stevens in with artists with traditional Christian label affiliation. Rather than define ‘Christian music’ just by its label or distribution, we’re now defining it as Christian worldview music.”

This is pretty huge.

My reviews of Coeurs (English: Private Fears in Public Places) and Paris, je t’aime (a new favorite and totally worth seeing) are up at Relevant.

• Interesting post at The Master’s Artist about Alice Munro and writing good fiction.

• Summer Pierre writes about the Artist at Work, and encourages all of us who lead double lives.

• Virb? Vastly superior to MySpace and nearly any other social networking tool out there. You might even be able to find me on there. (Psst.)

• I had lunch with the lovely Tracy yesterday, as she was in town, and you should read her blog.

To clear up confusion I generated in my last post - I do know where the Angelika is on the street (I’ve been there a lot!) but it’s not on the list, which kind of surprised me. Not my favorite cinema (I think that would be BAM), but we’ve seen some great movies there.

The New York Magazine Everything Guide to Movies landed in my feed reader this morning. Most notably:
• How to Have a Movie Night at Home
• Outdoor movie lineup in DUMBO (so, with Manhattan as a background)
• Moviegoing etiquette (Can I talk during the movie?)
• And my personal favorite, A Guide to NYC’s Indie Theaters (we frequent all but two of these, and also, where is the Angelika?)

Did I talk about Coast of Utopia? I don’t think I did. We saw the first part, Voyage, on a whim Thursday night. It was pretty amazing. Tom Stoppard is on some other level entirely from the rest of us. If you understand a little bit about the history of philosophy, you’d probably enjoy it; on the other hand, if you don’t, you might be bored out of your skull. I’m not a philosophical expert by any means, but I enjoyed it. We hung out at the stage door afterwards because one of the actresses was in Tom’s movie this summer and we wanted to say hi; in the meantime, Ethan Hawke and Billy Crudup wandered out. (Jennifer Ehle was also in it, and a host of other venerable actors.)

We had a handful of people over for dinner on Sunday. Seis de Mayo, if you will. We jointly put together (way too much) gazpacho, seasoned meat for tacos, and strawberry lemonade. It was a great success and we now have a refrigerator packed with leftovers we’ll try to eat this week.

Currently reading: In Cold Blood (Truman Capote), which is making me want to watch the movie again.

This weekend, so far, has included Lady in the Water (much better than expected - I really liked it, and I think the critics missed the whole point), two old episodes of the Daily Show, Spiderman 3 (good and enjoyable but not as great as the other two - still, worth seeing in the theater), and then we found ourselves at a pizza joint near us in Brooklyn watching the De La Hoya/Mayweather fight (in which we saw Tobey Maguire in the front row, so in a way, it’s all come full circle).

Also, today (or Saturday, I guess) was my mom’s birthday.

Last night after the movie, I somehow ended up ordering a three-book set of Sideways Stories from Wayside School. Remember those books? I can’t wait till they show up.

When you’re at work, or you’re at home, and you’re sort of just . . . daydreaming . . . what do you most wish you were doing, or could do?

Short-term, long-term, I want to know.

For me, it goes back and forth, but these days I have two main daydreams; one is that I’m a full-time writer who actually can make a living at it, and therefore I’m justified in doing it, and the other is that we run a very artsy but kind of L’Abri-style place out of a brownstone or two in the West Village, and I get to do all the fun stuff like curating the library and booking the speakers and running a cafe and maybe a theater.

What’s yours?

I can wonder, tongue in cheek,
(By living a life that I actually sort of like),
Will I add, (so to speak),
Five days to each week?
- From Second Hand Smoke, by Linford Detweiler