2008 favorite albums, in descending order:


Beach House - Devotion


The Walkmen - You and Me


Vampire Weekend


Raveonettes - Lust Lust Lust


Portishead - Third (This might be a tie with Crystal Castles, have to think about it more)

Best? Don't know about that...

...but I'll be compiling the music I listened to in 2008.

Stay tuned for an edited post.

It was oddly beautiful in Fells Point today, probably because it was so very quiet.

Have you forgotten what we were like then
when we were still first rate
and the day came fat with an apple in its mouth

it's no use worrying about Time
but we did have a few tricks up our sleeves
and turned some sharp corners

the whole pasture looked like our meal
we didn't need speedometers
we could manage cocktails out of ice and water

I wouldn't want to be faster
or greener than now if you were with me O you
were the best of all my days


[1950]

Poem by Frank O'Hara. Born in Baltimore in 1926.

New favorites from 20x200:

The pivotal scene of Swann's Way - once you are enthralled by this, perhaps there's no going back-


Many years had elapsed during which nothing of Combray, save what was comprised in the theatre and the drama of my going to bed there, had any existence for me, when one day in winter, on my return home, my mother, seeing that I was cold, offered me some tea, a thing I did not ordinarily take. I declined at first, and then, for no particular reason, changed my mind. She sent for one of those squat, plump little cakes called "petites madeleines," which look as though they had been moulded in the fluted valve of a scallop shell. And soon, mechanically, dispirited after a dreary day with the prospect of a depressing morrow, I raised to my lips a spoonful of the tea in which I had soaked a morsel of the cake. No sooner had the warm liquid mixed with the crumbs touched my palate than a shudder ran through me and I stopped, intent upon the extraordinary thing that was happening to me. An exquisite pleasure had invaded my senses, something isolated, detached, with no suggestion of its origin. And at once the vicissitudes of life had become indifferent to me, its disasters innocuous, its brevity illusory - this new sensation having had on me the effect which love has of filling me with a precious essence; or rather this essence was not in me it was me. I had ceased now to feel mediocre, contingent, mortal. Whence could it have come to me, this all-powerful joy? I sensed that it was connected with the taste of the tea and the cake, but that it infinitely transcended those savours, could, no, indeed, be of the same nature. Whence did it come? What did it mean? How could I seize and apprehend it?

I drink a second mouthful, in which I find nothing more than in the first, then a third, which gives me rather less than the second. It is time to stop; the potion is losing its magic. It is plain that the truth I am seeking lies not in the cup but in myself. The drink has called it into being, but does not know it, and can only repeat indefinitely, with a progressive diminution of strength, the same message which I cannot interpret, though I hope at least to be able to call it forth again and to find it there presently, intact and at my disposal, for my final enlightenment. I put down the cup and examine my own mind. It alone can discover the truth. But how: What an abyss of uncertainty, whenever the mind feels overtaken by itself; when it, the seeker, is at the same time the dark region through which it must go seeking and where all its equipment will avail it nothing. Seek? More than that: create. It is face to face with something which does not yet exist, to which it alone can give reality and substance, which it alone can bring into the light of day.

And I begin to ask myself what it could have been, this unremembered state which brought with it no logical proof, but the indisputable evidence, of its felicity, its reality, and in whose presence other states of consciousness melted and vanished. I decide to attempt to make it reappear. I retrace my thoughts to the moment at which I drank the first spoonful of tea. I rediscover the same state, illuminated by no fresh light. I ask my mind to make one further effort, to bring back once more the fleeting sensation. And so that nothing may interrupt it in its course I shut out every obstacle, every extraneous idea, I stop my ears and inhibit all attention against the sound from the next room. And then, feeling that my mind is tiring itself without having any success to report, I compel it for a change to enjoy the distraction which I have just denied it, to think of other things, to rest refresh itself before making a final effort. And then for the second time I clear an empty space in front of it; I place in position before my mind's eye the still recent taste of that first mouthful, and I feel something start within me, something that leaves its resting-place and attempts to rise, something that has been embedded like an anchor at a great depth; I do not know yet what it is, but I can feel it mounting slowly; I can measure the resistance, I can hear the echo of great spaces traversed.

Happy 75th anniversay of the repeal of Prohibition. Go celebrate!

Another photo (well, at least part of another photo) from 20x200 that I'm fond of.

Feeling pretty swamped and ready for 2008 to be over, so perhaps it's apt.

November 2008 - the books.

November seems to be a great month for reading for me, especially when last year's November count is taken into consideration too. Blame it on the change in weather? It only really got wintery-cold this month...

Right Ho, Jeeves, P.G. Wodehouse

Cleopatra's Nose: 39 Varieties of Desire, Judith Thurman

The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck

Kitchen, Banana Yoshimoto

The Book of Other People, Zadie Smith, ed.

Staying Alive, Neil Astley, ed. (poetry anthology)

The Accidental Masterpiece: On the Art of Life and Vice Versa, Michael Kimmelman

Proust Was a Neuroscientist, Jonah Lehrer

My Mistress's Sparrow Is Dead: Great Love Stories from Chekhov to Munro, Jeffrey Eugenides, ed.

Wodehouse was a wonderful discovery this month courtesy of a bookish friend. Lighthearted and humorous - I'm looking forward to reading more about my new favorite butler.

teri versus the pate

Yesterday afternoon was...interesting.

Since I'm not a turkey person, I thought I'd indulge in Thanksgiving goodies I actually liked.

And you know that means a Dangerously Delicious cherry pie. Worth all the hype, I tell you. This pie defies hyperbole.

But then I got this brilliant idea...to grab some of Morris Martick's famous French country pate. Thus the adventures began.

• bribe boss to cut out of work early with me with promise of lunch
• attempt to locate Martick the pate guy....thwarted initially, no pickup of phone or answering of doorbell as previously agreed upon
  
• almost get mugged, for reals....eek
• get in touch with Martick...my attempts are not successful
  
• sadly give up for own safety
• take boss to lunch, obsessively worry about lack of pate
• pick up my pre-ordered DD cherry pie...easy peasy (looks like they make out like bandits with Thanksgiving orders)
• one last ditch phone call to Martick.....and he picks up!
• speed-racer dash back to the gnarly part of Baltimore
• finally pick up precious, precious pate from grumpy-yet-lovable Martick
• give half of pate to fellow food-loving friend Noel (we went in on it together - it's a lot of pate)

(pate shown at right in tin foil; as it turns out, a slab of various meats is not especially appetizing until you slice it thinly, place it on a plate and surround it with slices of french bread. Cornichons are encouraged but not required.)


A Thanksgiving feast with a start and finish that I can be proud of providing.

My Sorrow, when she's here with me,
Thinks these dark days of autumn rain
Are beautiful as days can be;
She loves the bare, the withered tree;
She walks the sodden pasture lane.
Her pleasure will not let me stay.
She talks and I am fain to list:
She's glad the birds are gone away,
She's glad her simple worsted gray
Is silver now with clinging mist.
The desolate, deserted trees,
The faded earth, the heavy sky,
The beauties she so truly sees,
She thinks I have no eye for these,
And vexes me for reason why.
Not yesterday I learned to know
The love of bare November days
Before the coming of the snow,
But it were vain to tell her so,
And they are better for her praise.

-Robert Frost

Have you seen Zadie Smith's worthwhile piece for the New York Review of Books?


Versus


Interesting reading.

"The color of truth is gray. "

-Andre Gide

My New Yorker subscription is unfortunately defunct but I had to buy this issue when I was passing through the train station.

Courtesy of the very talented (and Massachusetts-dwelling!) Bob Staake.

It's been wet and rainy, and so I really want wellies.

According to this NYT article, I'm not alone - recessionistas are flocking to sturdy, proven goods right now. Maybe it's the hardy New England Damn Yankee in me but I feel comforted by things that other people have for ~20 years.

Here's my top 3, of the Hunter boot variety:


Aubergine

Black

Midnight Sparkle

Patent Pending

More posters to fall for...

Forget the dresses....there was history to be made.

New pretty dresses from Anthropologie:











The 3rd and the 5th are my favorites - of course.

October 2008 - the books.

The Omnivore's Dilemma, Michel Pollan

The Tapestries, Kien Nguyen

How Proust Can Change Your Life: Not a Novel, Alan de Botton

Perfumes: The Guide, Luca Turin and Tania Sanchez

Austerlitz, W.G. Sebald

The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Diaz

Consider the Lobster and other essays, David Foster Wallace

Appropriate for Halloween:

I'll definitely be wanting to see this:

As always (but perhaps especially now), this is the place to be for all your insanity/drunken debauchery needs.

Happy Halloween!

Aren't these just gorgeous?


Laboradite bookend


Agate cheese plates (the petrified wood version is quite nice, too.)

Jayson Home & Garden is a dangerous website.

I'd been thinking about attending since the first time I'd heard of it. Before the exhibit closed (ahem, today) I knew I had to see it for myself.

Koons on the Roof:







It was totally worth it.

This past weekend, I did.

With the help of my friends.

Thank you so much.

it's never too late for greatness.

New Yorker article here.

field museum sue

Perhaps my first purchase from 20x200.

inspiration

The most beautiful dining room...

Just done in aubergine, instead.

I've become that person...

...the one that always has earplugs in their pocket en route to a show.

At least I'm about to. I was seriously regretting not having any at the Nick Cave show Sunday night.

I suppose it had to happen at some point.

One more book ...

From the mid-sixties, I'd guess - another of my favorite Bostonians.

An excerpt from the introduction (staying as true to the written word as possible):

Miracles are to come. With you I leave a remembrance of miracles:they are by somebody who can love and who shall be continually reborn,a human being;somebody who said to those near him, when his fingers would not hold a brush "tie it into my hand"-

nothing proving or sick or partial. Nothing false,nothing difficult or easy or small or colossal. Nothing ordinary or extraordinary,nothing emptied or filled,real or unreal;nothing feeble and known or clumsy and guessed. Everywhere tints childrening,innocent spontaneous,true.[...] Nothing believed or doubted;brain over heart, surface:nowhere hating or to fear;shadow,mind without soul. Only how measureless cool flames of making; only each other building always distinct selves of mutual entirely opening; only alive. Never the murdered finalities of wherewhen and yesno,impotent mindgames of wrongright and rightwrong;never to gain or pause,never the soft adventure of undoom,greedy anguishes and cringing ecstasies of in-existence;never to rest and never to have:only to grow.

Always the beautiful answer who asks a more beautiful question

September 2008 - the books.

The Enchantress of Florence, Salman Rushdie

Gods Behaving Badly, Marie Philips

Einstein's Dreams, Alan Lightman

Ship Fever, Andrea Barrett

A Natural History of Love, Diane Ackerman

my best friend's wedding

Song of the weekend?

wild card

Really want this limited edition print from Binth.

The Queen of Hearts is a close second:

I wouldn't know anything about this. Not a thing.

dfw

Please check the McSweeney's link on the right.

When you're in a new music dry spell, and there doesn't seem to be a way out until the show schedules really start picking up for fall, try going in the way back machine -



Mr. Scruff- music from college days. Still keeping it unreal.

affaires du jour agenda

Sounds much cooler in French, doesn't it?

Via the nice little site Present & Correct.

AA

Elusive, notorious, sold out or not shipped yet Tri Blend Deep V-Neck t-shirt in tri-black...



...you will be mine.

"Technique is just a means of arriving at a statement. "

Kriss, this one's for you...

August 2008 - the books.

Back on track for August!


Freakonomics, Steven Levitt

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Haruki Murakami

The Undercover Economist, Tim Harford

Up at the Villa, W. Somerset Maugham

Rules of the Wild: A Novel of Africa, Francesca Marciano

Mrs. Bridge, Evan S. Connell

Mr. Bridge, Evan S. Connell

Napoleon's Buttons: How 17 Molecules Changed History, Penny LeCouteur and Jay Burreson

3/8 of this month's books were read through the kindness of my friend Noel - he owned them, I borrowed them. Merci beaucoup!

New obsession...

...champagne grapes. So diminutive and sweet!

Thanks for a truly excellent cheese plate, Peter's Inn.

Found today while record shopping with a new friend.

Perhaps it's from growing up near the beach, and the few too-short perfect Cape Cod summers of freedom I had, but there's a feeling I get at some point each summer ever since...that this is the pinnacle. Love it, feel it, take it all in, for this is as good as it gets.



This summer's moment would be the Beach House show at the Creative Alliance.

From the talented Krisatomic

Dreaming of desks

I think I'm in need of a desk. Yes, I've gone without since moving to Baltimore. There's something inspiring about a proper work space that I am really craving now.

First, a couple of dream desks:

Skram - Wishbone Slab Desk


Anthropologie's Intelligentsia Desk

And I will never forget my true love, my very favorite:

A George Nelson leather home office desk, spotted long ago at Oakenshawe in Hampden. If anything it was better than the pic above - the leather was a stunning greenish grey that contrasted perfectly with the warm wood and metal. I climbed the stairs to the store's second floor and my heart skipped a beat at first glimpse. Alas, it was not meant to be.


And now on to some more practical choices:


West Elm's Sawhorse Worktable
has such nice simple lines.

West Elm's tapered frame desk...in my favorite color.


But check out this Parsons in silver. I haven't seen that before (it's a new color), and I think it looks sharp.