If I told you I watched a movie about an old man, a young woman, and Paris, entitled Last Love, you might very well think it was a reboot of Last Tango in Paris.
And you would be wrong. This movie is not that. No, not that at all.
Posted in Movies | Tagged clemence poesy, Gillian Anderson, Jane Alexander, michael caine, movie reviews, Movies, paris, Secondhand Lions | 5 Comments »
I do not care for the heroic couplet.
daDa-daDa-daDa-daDa-daDee,
daDa-daDa-daDa-daDa-daDee.
It’s fine for a short poem or sonnet, but when you stack one atop the other for stanza after stanza, it gets predictable, monotonous, and boring. It’s why A Midsummer Night’s Dream is my least favorite of Shakespeare’s plays, as a huge portion of it is written in heroic couplets.
What does this have to do with writing prose? Plenty.
Posted in Writing | Tagged creative writing, editing, heroic couplets, novel writing, sentence structure and rhythm, Writing, writing techniques, writing tips | Leave a Comment »
Seattle has its idiosyncrasies. It’s what makes this city unique. It’s what gives the city its specific “feel.”
In general, we don’t use umbrellas. We’re more a head-down-and-face-the-weather sort of town.
In general, we’re polite and courteous. Drop your wallet and chances are someone will help you retrieve it (9 out of 10 times, according to a Reader’s Digest study). We say good morning and thank you to the bus driver. We rarely honk our horns at each other, except for a polite little “bip” when the guy in front hasn’t noticed the light’s turned green.
And, in general, we don’t jaywalk. As evidence of this, I supply a recent video that shows Seahawks fans waiting for the light to turn green before they cross the street to revel in their team’s recent victory over the Broncos.
Posted in Culture, Seattle | Tagged jaywalking, jaywalking in Seattle, polite, rain, seahawk fans wait for crosswalk, Seattle, umbrellas, walking in Seattle | 2 Comments »
I don’t really believe in luck.
At least, I don’t believe in luck as something we can affect. Things happen; sometimes they’re good, sometimes they’re not. People who we think have “good luck” are just folks who make better decisions than others. People who have repeated “bad luck” are usually not paying close enough attention to what’s going on around them. Beyond that, it’s just the randomness of life. Stuff happens.
So, why do I have a “lucky penny?”
Posted in Writing | Tagged believable characters, building believable characters, Characters, creative writing, luck, lucky penny, Writing | 4 Comments »
Yodeling is not often connected with courtship. Nor humpback whales.
The fact that I employed both in pursuit of love may, in part, explain my somewhat spotty record at wooing women.
If you grew up around San Francisco Bay and remember rotary phones, you know who Pete Seeger was. Pete, who passed away yesterday, was a fixture of the SF and Berkeley folk music scene. Pete Seeger and the Weavers, Arlo Guthrie, Joan Baez, Judy Collins, Buffy St. Marie, Peter Paul & Mary…these were the minstrels of my youth, and Pete was the revered elder, the crafter of anthems, the troubadour whose clear clarion voice would sing us out of troubled times.
His singing style–head up, chin out, a smile on his face–gave me hope, and made me happy, even when the words were sad. I sang his songs around campfires. I listened to his banjo and 12-string riffs with joy. His music was simple, uncomplicated, poetic, and was always there in the backdrop of my youth, like wind in the trees, like the gloaming song of crickets.
Still, not really the stuff of romance.
And yet… Continue Reading »
Posted in Culture | Tagged Arlo Guthrie, Berkeley, courtship, creative writing, humpback whales, Marin County, memoir, mixtape, Pete Seeger, remembering pete seeger, Sausalito, the weavers, Yodeling | 3 Comments »
If you were born before 1980, it’s likely you are writing in code.
That’s right. Cryptic code.
We have a young houseguest staying with us. She’s nineteen. I literally have t-shirts older than she. Needless to say, having her with us has been an education, on both sides.
The other day, she watched with fascination as I sat down with pen and paper and slowly, over the course of the day, wrote a letter, by hand.
The fact that my correspondent and I had never met didn’t seem to faze her–in this day of social media, it’s commonplace. Nor was the idea of sending a letter by snail mail particularly foreign; presumably she’s sent a bill payment or a birthday card in her lifetime. She was curious about the slowness of the process, that it took several sessions at the desk to complete a single letter, but that wasn’t the big issue.
No, what really puzzled her was something much more basic. Continue Reading »
Posted in Culture, Hi Tech, Low Tech | Tagged creative writing, cursive handwriting, handwriting, handwritten letters, letters, letters vs email, love letters, pen and paper, pen pals, snail mail | 12 Comments »
During our last trip to Bath, we stopped in at Same-Same but Different, a little bistro on Bartlett Street. It had a distinctly Parisian feel to it, but with an English twist–sidewalk tables and chairs, but wicker and steel, not wrought iron; creaky floors of dark wood, but well-lit from lamps and windows; a laid-back, unhurried tempo, but with attentive service.
It also had an eclectic menu, which intrigued us both. I had a Caesar salad with duck and a poached quail’s egg, while my wife had an old standard: macaroni and cheese.
Mac-n-cheese is a comfort food for many. Personally, I never warmed to it, but after tasting the version we had at SSBD, I knew I had lived a deprived life. I talked to the chef at SSBD, and he graciously gave me the basics of his dish, which I fleshed out and kitchen-tested myself. Mac-and-cheese is no longer on the menu at SSBD, so I feel comfortable posting my interpretation of his recipe.
I’ve kept chef’s original “single serving” proportions, which make it easy to multiply for as many mouths as you wish to feed.
Posted in Food, Recipes | Tagged Bath, comfort food, mac and cheese, macaroni and cheese, recipes, same same but different cafe | Leave a Comment »
Kurt R.A. Giambastiani 