Right Now I’m Digging:
It Hit Me Like A Ton of Bricks
by » Catherine Lloyd Burns
This is a memoir about the author’s relationship with her mother and how that relationship is changed by the birth of her own daughter. It sounds boring, but it isn’t. Cathy Burns’ insights are mercilessly honest and funny, and the book feels very fresh and crisp. I know the author (she was an actress in Los Angeles – I used to see her at auditions, and we did an episode of Ned and Stacey together in the 90’s!), but all of the people to whom I recommended the book (and who weren’t on an episode of Ned and Stacey with her) loved it, too.
Esther Pearl Watson
——–this is a painting by one of my favorite artists, esther pearl watson. it’s called “virgin land”. esther works out of pasadena, california, and is married to artist mark todd. a lot of people have compared her paintings to early 20th century folk (or naive) painters like grandma moses– but she has a sense of humor that sets her apart (a series of her recent paintings involve a giant tin “space ship” built by her father in their garage in texas in the 1980’s!). esther and mark are also successful illustrators– as if that weren’t enough, they’ve made a lot cool zines– one of my favorites of esther’s is called “unlovable”– mark has a really funny one called “bad ass”– check out all their stuff below.
ESTHER’S WEBSITE
MARK’S WEBSITE
Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman: Vol. I
(Sony Pictures) This was my favorite TV show when I was in high school – it was the weirdest show I had ever seen and I couldn’t believe they let it be on TV in Oklahoma City. A soap-operish comedy about suburban despair starring Louise Lasser (Woody Allen’s ex) and a young Mary Kay Place. It still seems pretty weird.
Some Recent Obsessions
(HOWEVER FLEETING OR IRRATIONAL)
I LOVE NEW YORK (VH1) – I wouldn’t even know where to begin – run don’t walk.
CHARLES GIBSON (ANCHOR, ABC’s WORLD NEWS) I hear he used to be on in the morning, which explains why I have never laid eyes on the man. I know it’s sad, but he has a reassuring quality which makes me feel like maybe we’re not really rocketing toward apocalypse after all. This newscast is sort of old-fashioned (and maybe other things) but I like it.
JUDY HENSKE (EARLY 60’S FOLK SINGER) A cult favorite – I just found out about her recently – totally tripped out, ahead-of-her-time folk singer, singing murder ballads and dirty double-entendre blues songs – vocal forerunner of Janis Joplin – she’s still around and making records.
LAUREL AND HARDY – the best. They’re both brilliant, but I love Oliver Hardy so much. I remember my dad used to watch them on tv when I was a kid and laugh his ass off. I recently watched a bunch – the sequence in The Music Box where they spontaneously start dancing is so funny it makes me insane.
JOHN LENNON’S VOCAL ON “TWIST AND SHOUT” - I was recently cleaning out the iTunes and even though I’ve heard it a thousand times, all of a sudden john Lennon’s vocal completely flipped me out. It’s so rock! I looked it up on about.com, and apparently that whole record (Please Please Me) was recorded in one day, and that song was last. Lennon was a little under the weather, so he had to kind of power it out, which sounds unbridled and cheeky. I was just imagining the other guys in the band being kind of rattled by how cool that vocal was.
WALKING + AUDIO BOOKS – I’ve been listening to audio books in the car for years, but then I realized I could put one on my ipod and go out for a walk. Audio books are very dependent on the quality of the narrator – if it’s a bad narrator, they’re kind of unlistenable – I usually buy the ones with someone I’ve never heard of, because, for some reason, the celebrities are almost always bad (sorry, celebrities) – Some good ones:
- The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
- Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safron Foer
- A Man in Full by Tom Wolfe
- Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld
- Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
I SAVED THIS ONE FOR LAST: TELEVISED GOLF ON SUNDAYS! For the last few weeks, I have to watch golf on Sundays, or I’m just not the same. There’s something soothing about it. I can remember golf games playing in the background when I was a kid, but beyond that I’ve never given a flying f*** about golf, so your guess is as good as mine. I even love the 4 trillion golf commercials. It’s a whole other world. A world of golf!
Cool Links
ineedtostopsoon.com
this guy does something really creative and funny everyday–
1000journals.com
such an amazing idea– a guy in seattle who calls himself “some guy” made 1000 blank journals and distributed them randomly– people all over the world have expressed themselves on a page before passing the journals along, often to total strangers– you can check out the contents of the journals and track their progress at this site—
dethpsun.com
a great young, affordable artist–
creativegrowth.com
a site that features and sells art by physically, mentally, and developmentally disabled artists—
giantrobot.com
just check it out– now all the good t-shirts will be gone for sure–
