Essays & Stories

“Sentimental Tool”- TNB

February 18, 2010

There are two kinds of people: Keepers and Throwers. I’m a Keeper. I can’t throw anything away. This epiphany came while editing a recent story that my editor had called, “unwieldy,” a polite way of saying, “Get to the bloody point.” His version of the piece was five-hundred words. My original was nearly two-thousand. His [...]

“Party Genealogy”: How We Fix Everything in Politics

February 15, 2010

What if your party affiliation, Democrat, Republican, whatever, were treated like your personal ancestry? This is my plan for how to fix everything partisan. Just change the language. I want it to be like you’re asking somebody where their family comes from. It’s a perfect model, because coming from somewhere else is a very American trait. Every American carries a [...]

“Cats Know Where The People Poop” – TNB

February 10, 2010

One of my cats has started following me into the bathroom. Most of the day, he sleeps under the bed, while I am on the couch. At night, we switch. As I see it, I respect his territory and he respects mine, with only minimal crossover for such necessary exchanges as food-in-bowl and pet-on-head (he is, after [...]

When You’re “Off The Hook!”

February 10, 2010

I can’t reconcile this phrase, “Off the hook!” It means two totally separate things. A few minutes ago, I was texting with a colleague who was wondering if she was going to have to work tonight or not. She wasn’t, so I texted her back, “Just found out…you’re off the hook.” My phone froze up [...]

Alternatives to, “What With The Economy and All…”

February 9, 2010

“Well, you know, what with the economy and all…” Everybody says this. You’ve said it. The “economy” is the beginning and end to all problems, right? It’s the panacea of excuses. The trouble with its ubiquity as an excuse is that it doesn’t really mean much anymore. Even if it’s relevant, it’s dull. So in an effort [...]

Why I hate DJs

January 27, 2010

There are simply too many goddam people calling themselves a DJ. My basic feeling is that DJing, like masturbation, should be done discretely and with a healthy sense of embarrassment. When did this become something anyone could call themselves in public? The DJ as a mythic figure would be written like this: A girl whispers [...]

“The Bottom of Humanity” – TNB

January 13, 2010

One of the first things you might notice about people at the DMV—besides the most obvious, superficial aspects of race, class, and station—are the bottoms. It’s not that you’re into people’s rear ends – though maybe you are – but that there’s a kind of taboo to looking. At first, you tell yourself, it’s just a [...]

“Why I’m Allergic to Mint” – TNB

November 5, 2009

I tell people that I’m allergic to mint. I used to tell people the simple truth, that I just don’t like mint, except that it turned out not to be so simple. “What? Wait, you mean like mint, like the wonderful, fresh leaf?”

Bummer on the Swine Flu, Dude.

November 4, 2009

So I might have the Swine Flu, aka, the H1N1 novel influenza virus. There’s no real well to tell without getting tested and most places aren’t even bother to test.

“Praying” as a Hobby

October 28, 2009

I’m pretty sure that praying is not the same thing as thinking. Some people are using the word “Pray” where others would normally use the word “think,” as in, ”Yes, that is a difficult issue. I’ll have to pray about that for a while.” It’s even happening in Congress on issues as important as the national [...]

What Makes a Bad Kisser?

October 19, 2009

A friend told me last night that she went out on a date with a bad kisser. Normally, I’d want to correct her, “You mean, you went out on a date, and he turned out to be a bad kisser. It’s not that he was a bad kisser, and you knew this, and you went out [...]

“The Domino Fort” – TNB

October 14, 2009

Marty couldn’t hear my father. Historically, all the men in my family seem to have a difficult time relating to some children. Nobody has ever quite figured it out, either. Some say it’s the baritone voice, others say it’s because we tend to talk to children like adults, rarely raising the pitch of our voice, [...]

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