Michelle daringly recommended another Decemberists' album after the cold reception "Picaresque" drew from me. I wasn't sure what to expect from the experience, and I was hesitant at the start, but the Hazards of Love was an album I did slowly warm to....

Do you see this square old yellow Book, I toss I' the air, and catch again, and twirl about By the crumpled vellum covers, — pure crude fact Secreted from man's life when hearts beat hard, And brains, high-blooded, ticked two centuries since...

1) My NaNoWriMo novel hit 50,000 words! Go me! It is by no means 'done', but the chapter I wrote to top 50,000 was designed so that it could sort of provide closure, because I don't expect to get much more writing on this done until probably February....

You know, I never wrote about the New York City Opera's Don Giovanni, which I attended last weekend. -First, the renovations. The David Koch Theater, which I keep thinking of as the New York State Theater because name changes rarely sink in...

Probability of getting a conviction should not be the standard by which we decide whether military tribunals are the measure of American justice.