Remember how miserable I was when I found myself ukulele-less in Salt Lake City? My withdrawal symptoms gave me the shakes. I was determined not to let that happen again, and yet, I didn’t want to lug my concert-sized uke to Peru.

Luckily, one of my new UK friends, found through George Formby fandom, recommended that I purchase a tiny Kala pocket ukulele, created just for that purpose.

Which I did!

And so if you were in Peru the first week of May, you’d have found me holding my uke aloft at Machu Picchu …

… along the Inca Trail, in front of a backdrop that seemed perfect for a performance of “When I’m Cleaning Windows” … (more…)

As our Peru trip tour bus made its way through the streets of Ollantaytambo last week on its way to the Inca site known as the Fortress, I spotted … the Batmobile!

Well, not the Batmobile. More like a Batmobile—a small taxi with a rear window in the shape of the Bat symbol. I wasn’t quick enough with my camera to snap a photo, however, and when we headed back after our climb, even though I was vigilant, I didn’t spot it again as we meandered through the small town. And that, I thought, was that.

But later in the week, as we bussed toward Cuzco after our stay in Machu Picchu, I spotted five other similar vehicles with Batman decorations in small towns along the route. I was only fast enough snap a shot of this one, but it’ll give you an idea of what I mean.

But those half dozen vehicles weren’t all. (more…)

It’s that time again, though slightly delayed by our Machu Picchu trip. Let’s see what poetry last month’s dreams might achieve when my daily tweets are gathered together in one place.

April’s night-time guest stars included Woody Allen, Paul Witcover, Stubby Kaye, Nick Nolte, Tom Disch, Gene Wolfe, and … well, you’ll see.

APRIL 2012

I dreamt I was on a bus heading toward Machu Picchu. Oddly, the mountains were as snowy as Everest. Good thing I’ll find out for real soon! 28 Apr

I dreamt an actor took ill in a Shakespearean play my friend Allan was directing, and I had to suddenly fill in. Also subbing — Janis Ian. 27 Apr

I dreamt I woke from a nap in my 1976-1982 Brooklyn apt., sunlight streaming through the windows. But when was it? I reached for my iPad! 26 Apr

I dreamt @Annaleen and I were walking across the Golden Gate Bridge on the way to our jobs as copywriters at Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce. 26 Apr

I dreamt I wandered Avenue P with Irene, pointing out all that changed since I was a kid. But then I blinked, and everything was as it was. 25 Apr

I dreamt I searched for someone in a hospital along with @EllenDatlow. Don’t remember who we were looking for but we never found him or her. 25 Apr

I dreamt I delivered a satchel filled with cash, and once I made the handover, was accused of stealing one of the $10,000 bundles. I hadn’t. 24 Apr

I dreamt old friend Kate Stone handed me a file to underwrite a mortgage application, and I thought — do I still remember how to do that? 24 Apr

I dreamt I followed deer tracks along the soggy bottom of a riverbed … until the water rose and the tracks could no longer be seen. 24 Apr

I dreamt I was an old black man interviewing black kids while Woody Allen watched through one-way glass deciding which to cast in new movie. 24 Apr (more…)

Sure, Peru—and especially Machu Picchu—was a magical, mystical experience. But I know what you’re really interested in.

How did all those guinea pigs taste?

And before you accuse me of barbaric behavior for dining on animals which have been domesticated as pets in the U.S., all I can say to that is, when it comes to guinea pigs—or cuy, as they’re called in Peru—the question I always ask myself is … what would Jesus do?

And what Jesus would do is—eat the guinea pig!

Want proof? Check out this 1753 painting by Marcos Zapata from the Cathedral of Cuzco showing Christ and the Apostles about to dig into some cuy. And if it’s good enough for them, it’s good enough for me.

I ended up eating cuy four times over the course of our week in Peru. Which restaurant prepared it the best? You’ll find that out below. (more…)

If you’ve wondered why I’ve been unusually silent for the past week and a half, I have a very good reason. I was on vacation.

In Machu Picchu!

And while I was there—and at the fortress at Ollantaytambo, and by Intipunku, the Sun Gate (from which you can, below, see Machu Picchu way off in the distance)—I oddly found myself thinking The Great Gatsby.

I’ll have more to share about the experience later, once I’ve recovered and had time to process it all, but for now, I just want to say—remember that passage a few paragraphs from the end of The Great Gatsby, the section that speaks of finally finding a thing “commensurate to his capacity for wonder”?

And as the moon rose higher the inessential houses began to melt away until gradually I became aware of the old island here that flowered once for Dutch sailors’ eyes—a fresh, green breast of the new world. Its vanished trees, the trees that had made way for Gatsby’s house, had once pandered in whispers to the last and greatest of all human dreams; for a transitory enchanted moment man must have held his breath in the presence of this continent, compelled into an aesthetic contemplation he neither understood nor desired, face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate to his capacity for wonder.

Though the analogy made there isn’t an exact match for what I felt as I clambered over the ancient stones and walked the Inca Trail, I was indeed feeling a sense of wonder, and also feeling that here was something truly worthy of that wonder. We so often say that things are awe-inspiring when they’re not really inspiring awe. But in this case, I was filled with awe, positively gobsmacked by it.

Didn’t expect to be thinking of Jay Gatsby as I fought off altitude sickness. But there you have it.

More thoughts and pics to follow later!

(And, yes, that is a ukulele in my hands.)

I just ran across a post Eileen Gunn made on GEnie—remember GEnie?—back on October 28, 1994. I’d printed it out on a sheet of paper—remember paper?—so I’d be sure to remember it.

She shared two quotes she kept taped by her computer back then, and since she passed them on to us all in 1994, I don’t think she’d mind if I passed them on again in 2012.

First, here’s what Gertrude Stein had to say about art, as given to Eileen by Avram Davidson:

Art has no function. It is not necessary. It has nothing to do with what anyone wants you to do or wants it to be, nothing but you and itself. The work generates itself and ideas and progress and learning come out of doing the work in a particular way. Creative art is a learning process for the artist and not a description of what is already known.

An audience is always warming but it must never be necessary to your work. The work needs concentration and one is often exhausted by it. It takes so much effort just to begin and although going on is mostly a pleasure it is also a great effort. The only thing for a creative artist to do is to do his chosen work.

But really there is no choice. Nobody chooses. The only thing left for a creative artist to do is to do his chosen work in spite of everything and regardless of anything because when living draws to its end there are no excuses he can make to himself or to anyone else for not having done it. Either he did do it or he did not do it and very often he did not. Alas very often he did not.

Quote number two comes from Bruce Sterling: (more…)

I bought a ukulele five months ago today, and to the dismay of some, I’ve been letting you all share in my progress (or lack thereof), checking in at three months (with “Teddy Bears Picnic“) and four months (with “Side by Side,” “Why Don’t Women Like Me?,” and “Five Foot Two, Eyes of Blue“).

For my five-month performance, I’ve decided to go with George Formby’s “When I’m Cleaning Windows,” even though I’m in no way ready for it, because a) I’ve fallen madly in love with Formby, and b) I’ve read that, “If you play the ukulele in England then everyone who sees you will ask if you can play ‘When I’m Cleaning Windows.'” So I’d better start figuring it out then, eh?

A word of warning for those familiar with Formby—there’s no attempt at a solo below, as I’m a long way off from taking a stab at that. But let this be a testament to how far a guy can get in his first five months … plus something to look back on and chart my progress with once I’ve really figured out what I’m doing.

And so, here’s my first ragged stab at a classic.

Artist Tony DeZuniga needs your help.

DeZuniga, who co-created Jonah Hex and has been responsible for thousands of beautiful images, is in critical condition in a hospital in the Philippines, and his family has reached out to the comics community.

His wife Tina has said:

It’s really tough since Tony doesn’t have insurance here. The medication is very expensive and hospital bill is paid cash 90% Our daily bill is around $1,500 even if we have some money it’s drained out already. I have a house here but the process of getting a loan would take time and I can’t be gone long away from the hospital.

As for Tony’s condition, I will give you a brief history and update – he had a stroke in the morning of Tuesday last week (we’re 16 hours ahead) The stroke damaged the brain. it has bleeding inside and they need to open up the brain but with so much medication they were able to stop the bleeding but the brain was swollen so they need to take the pressure out so they need to insert a tube to release the pressure but since I don’t want them to open up it created an hernia. His condition is so unstable. He got infection that they need to treat, his pneumonia, need to be watched because he’s having problem breathing and blood pressure on top of the heart. With too much medications his stomach bleeds. One on top of the other. Anyway. Any little help will be greatly appreciated.

Here I am with Tony, a great artist and a great guy, back in 2008. (more…)

I’ve been resting my head on these guys for decades. Well … not continuously. I do have other pillowcases, you know!

But I only noticed last night—after many, many years—that these other guys were on the flip side!

How is it that so much time has gone by without me ever noticing this before?

I say it’s all Wendy and Marvin’s fault!

The 200th issue of the Paris Review features an interview with Terry Southern (who, among many other things, wrote the screenplay for Dr. Strangelove) that’s been in the works for 35 years. Southern was interviewed in 1967, but never got around to approving the transcript, and since the magazine allows its interviewees that privilege, it never saw print.

The interview has only recently been discovered, and I find these thoughts of Southern’s prescient:

In five years television screens will be half the size of a movie screen, they’ll occupy a whole wall. And people will just sit there. They’re not going to leave the house except to see something groovy, something that they can’t see at home.

The great future, not for creative writers, but for professional writers, is in television, because pay television is going to come in, and that will take the place of the art movies that exist now, and ordinary television will take the place of what now exists in movies. In twenty years, the movies that compete with TV and pay TV will have to be pretty far out. Otherwise people will simply hang with the tube.

So not only did he foresee the coming age of quality pay television—with Breaking Bad, Mad Men, and the like—but also the massive screens on which we’d watch them all.