thx

allow me to end this year by thanking you for stopping by. there are now more than 20 million blogs out there. that you take the time to visit this one humbles me. many of you are friends. however there are some who drop by with regularity who I don't know. I wish each of you a year filld with love & joy.


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"Brokeback Mountain"

it's less of a movie than I was expecting. & it's more of a movie than I was expecting.

altho I have serious issues with it   the film does have an extraordinary performance level.

hit me with a pink gel

Backstage. Brothers & Sisters. Reno Sweeney. how well I recall the nites I hauntd such cabarets. then I longd to be in show biz. I fantasizd my own nite club act. I'd come out in a black tux with an endless white feather boa & sing a lowdown torchy arrangement of "Some Day My Prince Will Come."

"think abt the guest list"

if you don't know the blog of Jack Kimball
check out his pants

Kennedy Center Honors

the only time I was in attendance was a dozen years ago. at the party afterward I had a lovely chat with Suzanne Farrell. so it was sweet to see her being honord in the telecast last nite.

the broadcast of this annual celebration of the performing arts invariably brings me to tears. last nite I startd to tear up when the magnificent Paul Newman honord Robert Redford & again at the end when Tina Turner's life was being reviewd. but the faucet turnd on full during the tribute to Julie Harris. she is one of the most beloved of stage stars with a long career. & she's gallantly fighting back from a stroke.

there weren't many cutaways to the president who seemd either bored or unaware of the importance of those being honord. but I got a tremendous chuckle when k.d. lang came out in drag to perform before perhaps the least compassionate commander-in-chief ever.

welcome Ira Joel

this blog's newest reader is one of my dearest friends   Ira Joel Haber. soon we will have known each other for 35 years. he is a great artist & a great pal.



here we are in my last Kent home. the piece just visible in the back is one of his postcard works.

when I began this blog more than a year ago   I never "announcd" it to friends. I have some friends who don't know abt it & others who do but don't care to read it. whatever works.

anyway I'm happy to have Ira Joel looking in.

leftovers

I've been having an early morning e-exchange with my Texas penpal abt a possible connection between my fondness for leftovers & my penchant for hand-me-down clothes. I cd throw in that I've collectd used books for years & that I'm not above filching words from others in my writing. & I like having reminders of loved ones who are dead around me. I remember Julia Waida every time I use one of her pans or pots. I think abt Aunt Mary when I spread one of her quilts on my bed. I use Uncle John's copper lock from when he workd at US Steel in Lorain at the gym 3 times a week.

listening to Jimmy Scott

neighbor Rita fears I'm heading toward hermithood. so she insistd I collaborate with her on dinner today. she just put the turkey in the oven. soon I'll begin: shrimp/brie appetizer   butternut squash with apricots & ginger   anchovy potatoes   salad of red cabbage / broccoli / carrot. I cheatd on sweetness & purchasd a chocolate cherry cake from Desert Desserts.

other guy's clothes

"Ive always been partial to clothes with a history" I wrote in Postcard Memoirs.

& so today for the first time I'm wearing the Palm Springs tee that Carlos left in my room at Inn Exile. perhaps my fondness for wearing hand-me-downs comes from my boyhood. my parents always shoppd at garage sales (& still do). & I had one older male cousin some of whose things I'd inherit. there is mystery in stepping into clothes of another   intrigue in imagining where those clothes have been   what was done by the men while wearing them.


, 

Henry Walker

when I left Kent more than 11 years ago   Henry gave me this watercolor as a farewell gift. it hangs in my bedroom as a reminder of both Ohio friends & the magic that is LA's train station.

I've just learnd that Henry now has a website.


"Union Station, Los Angeles" (1994) 

purrrrrrrrrrr

if you like smart cats (well has there ever been a dumb one?)   check out Shimmy. altho she lives in Chicago   she cast her vote in the Iraq election -- for Alice Cooper.

& she makes lists too.

dark flower

my Texas penpal e'd to say yesterday's portrait -- esp the hair -- reminds him of Bride of Frankenstein.

the more I look at that picture I took of Kimberly the other nite the more haunting it gets. suddenly I knew one reason: in it she reminds me of Elizabeth Short.


, 

Nichols & Dimes

, 

this weekend

I escapd to where the sands are supposd to be warm.
they weren't.

what sun I saw was in the face of Kimberly Nichols.

T. O.

I'll be in exile this weekend.

I can
not mention
a movie star
if I
want this
to be read
in 2101

we know
Gongyla
because
Sappho
missd her
till the ache
turnd golden

so why
can't I
name
Lila Lee?

touchstone
or touchwood?

if I cd
breathe
immortality
let my lips
touch
Lila Lee

let her
raven bob
throb
thru time

let her
name
last longer
than the
celluloid
that burnd
her face
in my flesh

everything old is new again

Eartha Kitt wearing only ermine poses before a frosty window & purrs "Santa Baby." she delivers probably the naughtiest lyric in any holiday tune: "come & trim my Xmas tree."

this scene is from "New Faces of 1952"   a film which basically preserves the Broadway show. among its writers was Melvin Brooks. it was his first film. & one of the sketches which I presume he helpd write is a parody of Truman Capote. this was over a half century ago. strange that 2 current screen hits are "Capote" & "The Producers."

wowzer

within a 24-hour period this site was visitd by readers in Finland   France   Australia   China   Canada   Iran.

"Short Vincent"

the newest poem in my collection-in-progress Ohio Triangle is curently "poem o' the week" at Deep Cleveland.

thx to Mark Kuhar for keeping the mimeo spirit alive.

another Myers credit

years before playing dummy to James Broughton's ventriloquist in "Jungle Girl" I appeard in another Richard Myers film -- "Akran" (1969).

here's a poem I wrote back in 1983 after seeing the film for the first time since it was originally made & shown:

IN THE BUS

the boy in the seat in front of me
sits behind me a young man

Jake & Mary's kids     grown too
live on two coasts

she in the back is dead
he in front     wives later     lost

in that bus up on the screen
I'm a bearded student riding toward love

but now alone in the dark
I approach 40 barefaced & wambly