Happy Birthday!

yokohatgab
Originally uploaded by BarrettJ.

Happy Birthday to my best friend companion partner-in-crime soulmate! I hope you have a wonderful day and that the coming year brings fun, positivity, enlightenment, and fulfillment. I am sure that it will.

The bliss that condo ownership brings

yoga
Originally uploaded by BarrettJ.

Part of an ad for a new condo development on Carroll Street in Takoma.

Drinking at the Hirshhorn

This past Friday night, yours truly accompaniedStereogab to the Hirsshorn's After Hours (scroll down, their web site sucks) shindig. There was some art somewhere but our main focus (besides getting beers) was to check out Ian Svenonius on the decks (has anyone read his new book?)

The music was kinda low and the lights were way too bright but it was cool to hang out in the museum at night. It felt like a hipster office party, with all the security guards and tuxedo'd bartenders.

Arthur is Dead

Word is that Arthur Magazine has bitten the dust. Like the Beatles, or my first marriage, it starts out fun and ends up in court. Awhile back I got into an online tussle with Arthur publisher Jay Babcock over a CD that had been included with a recent issue. The CD was one of those creepy hip advertising things, a Tylenol ad campaign promo disguised as a "freak folk" sampler featuring bands like White Magic. Babcock argued that more advertising money was good for the health of Arthur but I saw it as a bad sign that the same folks who put out the Golden Apples of the Sun comp (also featuring White Magic....hmmm) would stoop to allow their name to be used to promote corporate ibuprophin. I now wonder if Laris Kreslins had similar doubts. But a five year run is about average for a rock band, a restaurant, or a magazine. Still, I'm sad to see Arthur go.

UPDATE: Arthur came back and is now available in select stores everywhere...

Forty Years Ago Today

On March 6, 1967 my mother,my father and yours truly departed from Dulles airport outside Washington D.C. bound for Saudi Arabia. My dad had been assigned to the American embassy in Jeddah. We did not know when we would return to America.

We flew on Pan Am 2 to London, then Frankfurt, then Istanbul, then Beirut. We landed in Beirut in a heavy rainstorm after lightning hit one wing of the plane. It took us so long to get our things together we went into the airport on the crew bus. We arrived in darkness and rain at the Phoenicia Hotel where we were staying. The next day we woke up to the beautiful Mediterranean sunlight.

You Did It!

You persevered, you didn't lose hope,

and you made it happen. This is just the beginning. Doesn't it ROCK?!