145 stages

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p.s. RIP: José Esteban Muñoz. ** David Ehrenstein, Merci to you! Ah, nice about the Sondheim, or, err, God doc. ** Gary gray, Hi, Gary. Good to see you. You're still in Chicago. That's wild. Sounds like you made the best of the situation. Or creative use of it with noble purpose. Or something. Acid notes are the best. Aw, thanks for getting him 'Guide'. I like the name of that cassette. I miss my player. Laptops should really come with a cassette port. I'll see if I can find something about Alex Halsted. Things are good with me, thanks, just busy on the borderline of too busy, but the borderline is okay and exciting. ** Sypha, Glad you liked. Twenty years older is nothing, ha ha. Right, the Process Church. I have friends who are really into that/them, but I've never gotten further than noting the references to them in cool things. I have a fairly limited interest in Manson, but maybe because I grew up with it all around me, and I think I like the solitary, confused, confusing 'bad guys' better. Because they're more like me maybe? ** Brendan, That's what I thought! ** Etc etc etc, Cool. Yikes about Mao's theatrical corpse and display. Good yikes. The only preserved famous corpse I've seen is Lenin's in Moscow. He looked like a dirty popsicle stick. The electronic novel, yeah, wow, I remember when that was 'the future' and all that. Too much of that stuff just ended up seeming like a very boring, overly egg-headed video game. Fun idea, though. Letting tech play god is pretty risky. It's like asking an 8 year-old to promise he'll still delight your life with his childish antics when he's 14. Cool about the potential 'Vice' thing. Let me know what happens. That's kind of like the place to be seen these days, it seems. Have a day of days, man. ** Steevee, Thanks for sharing the Hoberman list. Man, I just do not understand the appearance, much less the high placement, of 'Gravity' on these lists by generally smart critics. ** Tender prey, Hi, Marc! How's it? You kind of should maybe put those photos up somewhere, or I'd give them traffic. Thanks about the post and about the book one too. What's going on? Are you doing Xmas in any particular shape or form? ** Misanthrope, I've been wondering where you were. I guess you have been too, ha ha. Maybe the new med isn't meant to be, vis-à-vis George? Or is the 'getting used to' phase sometimes this rocky and at length? You sound like you're really a lot like I was like back when I couldn't sleep for 6 weeks and walked off the metro station platform, kerplunk. I kind of liked that state in retrospect. I was so daring and footloose. But, yeah, right yourself somehow. I'm good. ** Creative Massacre, Dude, you sell yourself short. That buche looks really, really good. I've seen many buches in bakeries' windows here that don't look half that good. Sweet! You're magic, my pal. Everyone, the awesome Creative Massacre handmade a bûche de Noël! Read this account and then click the blue words to get a mouthwatering effect. Here's CM: 'Well, I managed to sort of make a bûche de Noël. Like any first attempts, I experienced some problems but it was really fun to make. My roulade was undercooked so it didn't roll properly and the first attempt at making the filling ended in disaster when my chocolate curdled my egg mixture, so I ended up with chocolate scrambled eggs. HaHa. All in all, it was a cool experience. It tastes a lot better than it looks! bûche de Noël'. ** Kyler, Hi, K. I'm into Xmas over here 'cos it's basically just the way it looks. No obligations or ceremony or X-Day plans. Just the pleasure of buying some presents. The sound of your family jaunt makes me tense. I think I remember the unpleasantness you faced down there last Xmas. Concentrate on mom and eating. I don't think the interview with Ed White ended up being very interesting at all, as far as I could tell. Kind of disconnected and blahdiblah. I'll be surprised if it ends up getting published, but I'll let you know if it does. ** Bill, You actually went to Haw Par Villa? Wow. Does that early experience explain certain aspects of your interests in the way that it seems like it might? If only we were that traceable and simple, sigh. Anyway, you went there! There seem to be a inordinately huge number of best of 2013 lists this year. Either that or my FB friends are particularly on list finding rampages right now. I'm about to make my list and add to the useless clutter. Cool about Dodie's event. I saw a bit of the reading that KK posted. How was Thursday? ** Okay, I guess that's it. You get my newest stack today. Uh, yeah, that's all I can think to say about it. Enjoy? I hope? See you tomorrow.