Fewer Than 43 Things

Paul Ryan has a widow’s peak, reminiscent of Ronald Reagan and Eddie Munster and Ayn Rand.

As it turns out, a widow’s peak signifies youth, vigor, and an appealing physique when running around shirtless after a P90X workout.

According to James C. Penney, “The best way to stop a bad habit is never to begin it.” It’s for that very reason that I never have and never will shop at his stupid store.

Are you a painter if your pieces don’t sell? Are you a carpenter if you build your own home and no money exchanges hands? What does it take to claim the title of the thing you think you do?

It’s 6 a.m., and I’m wearing a sweatshirt and slippers while staring longingly at that little magic wall switch that pours heat through the vents. What up, Denver?

The evidence against Lance Armstrong looks pretty damning. Damn.

I saw the following folks onstage at the New Yorker Festival: Junot Diaz, Marilynne Robinson, Chris Adrian, Nathan Englander, Julian Barnes, + Lorrie Moore.

I also saw actors Fred Armisen, Carrie Brownstein, Jennifer Ehle, Dan Stevens, + John Slattery.

Most humble: Marilynne Robinson
Most eternally fabulous: Jennifer Ehle
Most charming: John Slattery
Most charmingly old school: Julian Barnes
Most like your old friends from high school: Fred Armisen + Carrie Brownstein (tie)
Most likely to stand the entire time: Junot Diaz

“Authors aren’t good at action. Car chases–not so good. Interiority? We kill that.” ~ Junot Diaz

Matthew Crawley from Downton Abbey is one of the Booker Prize judges. For real. Kind of.

I’m writing a piece on new taprooms for a major Denver pub, and the owner of one of them said he’s too busy to chat. Can you call back in a couple weeks, he asked. Yeah. Sure thing.

Chinese author Mo Yan won this year’s Nobel Prize for Literature. It was announced today.

Bookfox believes Cormac McCarthy won’t ever win. Big sigh.

At the DMV yesterday, three clerks were on hand to serve 50+ people. One of the three clerks spent 40 minutes with a couple that had apparently visited this clerk umpteen times before in continually failed attempts to get license plates. By all indications, it’s hard to get plates for your car when you have in your possession zero evidence that you’re legally permitted to drive or that the car in question exists. License? Stolen. Title? Can’t find it. Registration? Not sure what that is. Insurance? Yes, but we can’t remember the name of the company.

Let me reiterate, the clerk spent 40 minutes arguing with this couple, who demanded that the clerk write out the unduly complicated steps they needed to follow in order to get plates for their car. At one point, the woman shoved her cell phone in the clerk’s face and said, “This [pointing to the screen] is my car!” Well, so long as you have a photo …

Last night, I heard Loretta Notareschi debut her new piece, Bordone. About her piece, Loretta notes,

Bordone is a new type of composition for me in that it ventures beyond the acoustic. I’m excited to be “debuting” as an electronic musician and “re-debuting” as a violinist. … Mark [Davenport] will be improvising on the laptop using a dynamic program I wrote that layers rich violin, bassoon, and electronic samples with old-school Moog synthesizer sounds. I’ll be responding live by improvising on the violin. The musical landscape conjured is both familiar and otherworldly.

My thanks to Loretta for such a lovely, thought-provoking, musical evening.

And that, folks, is fewer than 43 things.