More Comfortably Numb
There are days when I'm looking at my life through thick glass. I think you know the feeling. There are days when you care, and days when you... don't. Can't?
There are days when I'm looking at my life through thick glass. I think you know the feeling. There are days when you care, and days when you... don't. Can't?
Kerstin and I camp in a pony pasture and chase the solar eclipse across Texas.
We popped out into the sun-bleached streets, and there beside us were Corrin and Dafne, rising up the BART escalator. “Hey! You dressed up!” Corrin lit up and Dafne ducked behind him. With eight minutes to curtain, we walked briskly in the summer breeze. Kerstin nearly started skipping, a will-o’
I guess it was my fault. Kerstin would like the karaoke condoms to be accessible, right as you’re running out the door. In case of a karaoke emergency. I moved them, in a fit of spring cleaning, to the champagne bucket under the table with the car keys and
It’s less than subtle that Saltburn, a movie about social media envy, is set before Instagram or TikTok invaded our lives. Every scene is a perfectly composed snapshot of wealth porn. A thirst trap. Of course, Saltburn does not wish to be subtle, in any way, at all. Much
Fifteen years old, in 1998, I desperately wanted to play with the other boys, and they all wanted to play Golden Eye. I have very fond memories of Golden Eye, but I was terrible. I always chose Oddjob and proximity mines. All that kept me from being too annoying was
Slower on my feet, but stronger, I suppose. A few of those pounds, at least, got added to my lats and chest. Started going to the gym with Agent Coulson that first year in San Francisco, and just never stopped. It’s hard, trying to be in my body. But
There’s always some urgent, instinctive thrill, hiking along the edge of the continent. A subliminal understanding of just how much of the planet extends out from those cliffs. I think that’s why, when we’re feeling really shriveled up, we run for the Headlands. For the past eleven
"All ready!" In the four-inch heels, Kerstin stood taller than me, and I felt suddenly off-kilter, like how the newspaper-reading public 100 years ago must have felt when Darwin or Einstein made their big splash. Fleetingly, uneasily, not at the center of my own universe. I put on
It’s searing and too bright. First the crowds. Turn the corner past the movie theater and see the shining, shimmering throngs nosing between stalls. Always a shock, from the still of our living room and out among these hundreds. Our first priorities are berries and bread, most weeks. Get
However you measure the gristmill of time. An ocean between, or eight miles of it, at least. Lapping at concrete shores, spraying the pylons and the sea lions. An empty stretch of sky. Blue today, thank god, with the conveyor belt turning in the fog, gulls swooping from the towers
"Why do you think you're so cautious about getting into serious relationships?" I've been dating a new girl, and that's a question you really DON'T want to hear three or four weeks into something. The night was warm, and we
Six years ago I wrote an essay titled "Please Don't Sell the Lake." As a rhetorical device, I wrote it to my grandparents. Twelve pages, double-spaced, on the profound attachment I felt to the house on the shore of Lake Almanor where my family had spent
I am lying on my back in a field and I see the leaves jouncing in the sun. I see the Teletubbies too, and the slutty jungle cats, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Mexican wrestlers, the Roman gladiator boys making out. Everyone jouncing, jangled. Someone hands me a tallboy in a
After arguing with the poor girl for a while, I dug into my email archives and realized Corin had booked us at the Hyatt. I checked quickly on my phone, and the Hyatt was only a block and a half away, so I decided to just walk over. Only the
Unless they're watching hockey videos with their noise-cancelling headphones on. Then I guess they need some space. I spent my 30th birthday with some of the people I love. Diego, St. Frances, Ash, Rocco, Astana, Agent Coulson, Roy, and Kendrick. We rented a cabin in Tahoe, spent one
Ash
I was at The Mill this morning with Ash, Diego and Xander, gulping down Guatemalan pourover and munching cinnamon-sugar toast. We were laughing about haircuts, rom-coms, and how childhood injuries might prevent us from engaging in various acts of love, when all of a sudden— "Who's dog
growing up
That's not it, really. It's more like this: I'm terrified that I'm nothing except smart, and to make up for that insecurity, I try to get a lot of juice out of my smarts. If you met all of us at a
Monday Movie Review
If there's anything that makes Silver Linings Playbook a better movie than Argo, which just won Best Picture, or Django or Lincoln or Zero Dark Thirty, it's that it truly surprised me. I was surprised at each turn, I was surprised by the characters, and I
living in SF
Could Hank Williams and The Clash get along? At The Mill, my neighborhood's newest coffee shop, they shared time on the speakers as a dozen focused craftspeople mixed flour and water, and carefully prepared pourover drip. Alright, The Mill is no mere coffee shop. They serve Four Barrel
drinking
She's naked right now. She always sleeps naked. Hot breath on your neck. She'll work up your appetite, then take you by the hand down Clement.
banality
The first time we went, he lent me his newest, best pair of boots. Last weekend, he had me try the old ones, which strangled my feet. So when Diego stopped at Mtn Mike's, across the street from the Squaw Valley parking lot, to rent a board, I
FOMO Friday
Today I'm launching a new semi-regular feature on the blog, similar to my Monday Movie Review posts: FOMO Friday. Partly, these posts are designed to overcome a common obstacle of blogging everyday: when the weekend rolls around I want to be out doing stuff, not inside blogging about
banality
Saw this on the sidewalk around the corner: That's worse than a spiderweb. These things are too fragile.
drinking
Last week I got this email invite from one of my favorite Internet writers, Charlie Jane Anders from io9 and Tor: You cannot handle the subversive raptures of February's Writers With Drinks! Your buffers will overrun. You will be dividing by zero! Luckily, we serve alcohol, which helps
overheard in cafes
"Hey! What are you reading today?" Some guy at Bean Bag was asking the woman sitting across from me. It was crowded around lunchtime last Wednesday, so she and I had split up our table: me with my laptop and coffee and she with her paperback book and
girls
San Francisco is a jealous harlot and after seething at my blog posts from Texas for four days, she flashed me a little skin to remind me what I was missing. I'd been back less than 24 hours, and it being a warm, blue-sky day, Scott and I
Corin
We walked into the Thirsty Nickel because we thought we heard good music and we didn't leave for three hours. Nirvana, STP, Alice in Chains, Pearl Jam, Gin Blossoms, R.E.M. and all the standards from our adolescence.
food
"Jay-Z didn't like walking out the front and around to the side. So he paid to have a door put in. He had that door built it in one day."
drinking
First they lure you in with a young, beautiful girl who seems to want to hang out with a group of five 30-year-old guys all night at a salsa club. She walked over to us. Tall, glowing, maybe 23. We were at the front table in a bar, rocking out
Corin
We got in a cab to go to Chuy's today and asked our driver what we HAD to do in Austin. "Drink Lone Star beer!" he said, in a booming Caribbean accent. "Yeah?" asked Corin, "We were drinking that last night!" "
kittehs
Glinda and Jake just got two new kittens, Holmes and Watson. Here's Watson: They're brothers, about 5 weeks old, and they look exactly alike, except Watson only has half a tail. Here they are fighting, but you can't tell where one begins and the