Wanderings through life, landscapes, and occasional loopiness. So pull up a log and have a bit of a sit-down 'round the virtual campfire.

Slamnesia

Hi, all! Did you miss me? I sure did. I’ve been checking milk cartons to see if my photo appears on any of ‘em, but so far, no. Dang. Where the hell did I put myself?

Does anyone here remember “sniglets“? That’s a term for a made-up word that actually makes a lot of sense. Like, for example, “accordionated,” which means “the ability to fold a map while driving.” Or “squaffles,” which is those individual squares on a waffle.

So I’ve had “slamnesia,” which is my personal sniglet for “the inability to remember what I’m doing because I’m so freakin’ slammed with business/life/whatever.”

Let me update y’all. As some of you know, I’m a writer. My first novel will be available for public consumption on July 10th. Yeah, that’s, like, a week away. And yes, I am sort of freaking out about it. You can find out about that novel on my personal website, on which I’ve posted the synopsis for Land of Entrapment, the first novel,

cover, Land of Entrapment

and State of Denial, cover, State of Denial

the second. That will be published in December. And you’ll find the first chapter of Land of Entrapment there, as well. But because I’m kinda special, here’s the link to that. You’ll also find some freebie stories on my site that you can check out to see if my stuff might be something you’d like to follow up on. And I am published through Torquere Press–some short stories, so you might want to check those out, too. Links and descriptions for those are available on my personal website. Oh, There are cuss words and “adult situations” (that’s a euphemism for you-know-what) in all of the stories, so you can’t say I didn’t warn you.

I’ve also just signed a contract with another publishing house to do a space opera series (think “Firefly” goes to a lesbian galactic bar and picks up “Star Wars” and they get kinda crazy and jack a space cruiser and go have all kinds of adventures). I’ll do the official announcement on my personal website, so check it out, yeah? I mean, if you want to. No pressure. None at all. I don’t mind being a starving artist. No, really. I don’t. Um…can I borrow a quarter for my latte fund?

And I’m about to hit the road yet again for some other stuff, which is relevant here because I’ll be changing the tenor/tone of this here blog. I’ll be doing some updates from the road (and I do tend to end up in some crazy situations) along with some anecdotes about stuff that happens. So expect more “OMG I’m stuck here in Phoenix!” kinds of things.

So I’ll be headed on Monday (yeah, this coming) to Reno, Nevada and from there, about 35 miles northeast to the Paiute Indian Reservation located at Pyramid Lake. Why, you may ask? Well, I’m going to interview a high school girls’ basketball team that’s bound for the NABI. That’s the Native American Basketball Invitational tournament, held in July in Phoenix. As some of you know, I spent January through May of this year doing an internship at an award-winning western-based news magazine that specializes in environmental and public policy issues in the West. High Country News also does stories on the people who inhabit the West. While an intern there, I pitched this story on basketball because I am a basketball fanatic and I’ve always been interested in Indian players and how basketball affects Native communities, because basketball is HUGE in Indian Country. Anyway, the point of my visit to the Paiute is because I’m tracking this team to NABI and finding out how basketball is affecting the lives of the players on this girls’ team.

So I’ll be doing some updates about that, and about other stuff that’s coming up. I’ll be “woman on the scene,” in some respects, and of course I’ll invariably have some nutso story to tell you about, like the woman who nabbed my cell phone in Wyoming recently. Oh, I didn’t tell you? Go here for that little story. A friend of mine in the UK recently asked me, “Andi, how the f*** do you get into these situations?” My response: “I dunno. Just lucky, I guess.”

All rightie. There you have it. Why I have slamnesia. Anyway, hope everyone has a faboo time over the 4th and if you’re overseas, here’s a raised pint to you, as well. Stay tooned ad thanks for stopping by!

Getting my rocks off

I have this weird compulsion.

I know what you’re thinking. But it’s not that. Not even close. No, the compulsion has to do with rocks. I love rocks. I love climbing them, collecting them, and getting hot stone massages. And I especially like throwing them into and at bodies of water.

Any time I’m near a body of water–generally a river or a lake or a pond–I have to skip a stone over the surface. Okay, maybe compulsion’s too strong a word. I can walk away from a perfectly formed skipping stone. Usually. Most of the time, I have to pick it up and feel its weight in the palm of my hand and crook my finger against the rounded surface, noting the way it fits against my skin and determining its potential for distance and number of hops across the water. It’s a meditative thing. There’s just you, the stone, and the water. Nothing else enters my mind as I wind up and sidearm that pup over the surface. Stone-skipping is an utterly “in the present” thing to do and it somehow clears my brain clogs.

Stones are beautiful things. They’re perfect objects, no matter their shape, because they are utterly zen, completely intact within themselves. I’ve gotten to the point where I can skip a stone that’s flat on one side and rough or pointed on the other, but the best skipping stones are those that are flat on both sides, worn smooth by water and the elements, ovoid or round. There are lots of people out there like me, who admire a stone for its skipping capabilities. I know this because there are places that sell bags of skipping stones.

bag of stones

And no, I have never, ever resorted to buying a bag of rocks for my odd compulsion. I’m a purist. I find my own freakin’ rocks.

Skipping stones is as old as human bipeds. I’m not the only one who carries the species’ compulsion to pick up a rock and try to skim it over the surface of a body of water. Every culture has a word for the activity, and in some quarters, it’s considered an organized sport. The North American Stone Skipping Association was founded in 1989 and includes a list of trivia about trying to bounce your stones across water. Like, for example, Shakespeare included a stone-skipping reference in the original version of Henry V. I’ve also suspected that Washington was actually trying to SKIP that coin over the Potomac rather than just fling it to the other side. I mean, it was probably the perfect weight and shape for that. Here’s a site that touches on these deep and abiding mysteries.

Sometimes it’s not good skipping weather. If water’s choppy, you can’t really see how many times the stone hits the surface. On a smooth water day on a pond or lake, I’ve counted up to 17 touch-downs on one of my tosses. Kinda cool, but not the best. Not even close. World records are set all the time. In 1994, it was 38. In 2002, that record fell to a count of 40. But even that was broken in 2007: 51 skips. Whoa. Even the BBC covered this event, providing, in BBC fashion, a discussion about technique and the physics of stone and water surfaces (I so love the British!).

World record attempts on rock-skipping have to be videotaped so that you can play the film in slow motion to count the number of touches a rock makes with the water. This is serious business, after all, this skip-count thing.

For some.

Me? I just like the way a stone feels in my hand and the satisfaction that comes from watching a stone hop across the surface of a body of water after a great sidearm toss. And then I find another stone and do it again. And probably again.

Try it. If you’ve had a day that just isn’t sitting right with you and you need to clear your head and re-connect with something primal, something ancient and resonant, go to the closest body of water (excluding swimming pools) and toss a few stones and see how you feel. There’s something to it, something that reconnects you to the natural world, to the cosmos, that re-aligns your inner energy flows and puts you entirely in the moment. You, the water, the stone.

Seriously. There’ something to this rock stuff. So try it out. Join me in my compulsion and see if you don’t find yourself counting the number of times your rocks hit that water on their journeys and see if you can actually quell that “YESSSSS!” as you improve on your previous count. Go on. Get out there. And be your own rock star.

Bad Carma

Buenas tardes, mis peeps fabulosas/os! Estoy muy ocupada. But we’re all bizzy. Whatevah!

So here I am on my way to LA for the faboo Book Expo America. I’ve heard as many as 37000 people go to this thing, so maybe I’ll be able to do some networking. Holy hell, one HOPES I’d get some of that done at a venue like this! DUH!

All right. So I left my base camp around 12.30 PM MST and la la la I’m driving along U.S. 285 headed south through Alamosa, Colorado. Things seemed fine. Then about 20 miles outside Española, New Mexico the car I was driving started making a most heinous noise and I got a Very Bad Feeling. I said to the car: “20 miles, pal. Get us to Española.” The most heinous noise increased, as did my Very Bad Feeling, which had progressed to a Holy Shit What’s Happening To My Car feeling.

The car did get me to Española, and I pulled into the parking lot of a Motel 6 where I discovered that somewhere between Alamosa and where I am currently writing this, all of the car’s transmission fluid had disappeared. Like this country’s budget. POOF. Well, the car had just been serviced two days ago and the mechanic had said he’d drained the transmission fluid.

uh-oh.

Pray tell, sir, did you remember to 1) replace said transmission fluid? and 2) tighten the bolts on that pan thingie (technical term) where the filter sits?

At this point, nobody’s sure. All I know is I hoofed it a while to get to a place that actually had some t-fluid to sell. So I poured 3 quarts in, thinking the guys just hadn’t replaced the fluid. I waited a few minutes, checked the car. Seemed okay. Tried backing up and driving forward a little bit. Nope. Still the most heinous noise. I got out of the car and as if the vehicle had been in some kind of Butch and Sundance showdown, where it had hunkered in a canyon as the sheriff’s posses opened fire and a spreading pool of pink fluid stained the parking lot under tire and the car gasped out, “Ah took a direct hit, Andi. Ah cain’t make it. You go on without me” and it bled its fluid onto the asphalt.

I patted it on its tender fender. “It’s okay, ol’ paint. You did what you–HEY! Wait a minnit! I CAN’T go on without you! DAMMIT! HOLD ON!”

So I went into the Motel 6 lobby to chat with the woman behind the desk. She’s older, and looks like she can probably trace her ancestry back to the first Spanish conquistadores who settled this valley. Now, Española isn’t that big a city. Maybe 12,000. So, given my experience with places like this, I figured she had to know somebody who would know somebody who would know somebody else whose cousin could fix my car, maybe even on Memorial Day.

And sure enough, she got on the phone and called her husband who gave her the number to Augustino. She called up Augustino, who still speaks Spanish and Spanglish mostly, and she explained the problem, infusing her conversation with terms like “ese” (”buddy” or “homie” in northern NM-speak) and phrases like “sí, soy esposa de TONY. (Yes, I’m Tony’s wife!–she rolled her eyes at me at that one and mouthed “MEN!”) in the sing-song, rolling accent that colors this part of the state, whether speaking Spanish or English. And then she called her sister-in-law who called somebody she knew, who always take their cars to Raymundo. I don’t really care who Raymundo is or even what his last name is. All I know is that he fixes transmissions and he might be open on Memorial Day. And chances are, María’s in-law’s friends aren’t going to steer her or me wrong. That just wouldn’t be bueno.

So a la mañana, we’ll see if Raymundo can help me out. Meanwhile, I’m chillin’ in this part of New Mexico and you know what? I’m just so happy to be back that even a bloody transmission isn’t gonna freak me out. I love the rounded, melodic accent in this lowrider-ridden bastion of New Mexico and the ties that bind the community to its historic Spanish past. I love that just 15 miles or so up the road I’ll be cruising through Pojoaque (po-HWA-kay) Pueblo and Tesuque (te-SOO-kay) Pueblo and about 10 miles past that, I’ll be in Santa Fe. And then Albuquerque.

A nice piccie of Pojoaque:

Pojoaque Pueblo

It’s true what they say about New Mexico. It gets under your skin, like the layers of dust that blow in from the high desert and leave a film of grit on your windowsills. New Mexico is as much a state of mind as a state, and I feel a strange fiery peace for the first time in 4 years.

No, I don’t have much luck with cars when I start on a journey. But that’s all right. As Garrison Keillor says, “nothing bad ever happens to writers. It’s all material.”

I hope y’all are having a nice 3-day weekend if you’re in the States. If not, I hope you had a great weekend. Take it easy and thanks for joining me vicariously in Travails of the Transmission. And for those of you in the path of those scary storms across Kansas and Missouri and on into Illinois, hunker down and stay safe.

Catch yuh on the flipside, yep.

Is that a parrot on your shoulder or are you just happy to see me?

WOOOOOOO Nelly!

Greetings, mis peeps, from the other side of the mountain. Mountains. Uh…continental divide. Or something.

Suffice it to say that I have finished something and am now embarking on other things, one of which involves a major-ass road trip to LA via the entire state of New Mexico on the way out and the entire state of Nevada on the way back. What sort of insanity is this? The usual.

So today, I’m thinking of pirates. But then, I’m generally thinking of pirates. All kinds. High seas. High deserts. High flying. Emotional, physical, and spiritual. Pirates, rogues, bandits, and outlaws. The stuff of which dreams and amazing novels and stories are made. The reason maps to scores of buried treasure are drawn, followed, and stolen. Ah, yes! Pirates! Behold, Anne Bonney:

Anne Bonney

Now THERE’S a tale. Bonney was born in Ireland sometime in the 1690s. Her parents immigrated to South Carolina, where they managed to scare up a plantation. But Bonney was a restless soul and she bailed from landed gentry life, hooking up with a small-time pirate named James Bonny (or Bonney–spellings vary). The two ended up in New Providence (Nassau, in the Bahamas), a veritable seething pit of pirate heaven. There, Anne dumped James and sailed with Jack Rackham, the pirate allegedly responsible for inventing the skull n’ crossbones and thus spawning myriad bad tattoos.

On board that ship, Anne met fellow woman pirate Mary Read, who was sailing disguised as a man. Legend has it that Read and Bonney became friends and raised holy havoc across the Caribbean. To which I say, “you GO, girls.” Pirate lore, however, says that both ended up captured by the Bahamian governor’s pirate-hunters. Rackham hanged. Both Read and Bonney were apparently pregnant and escaped the noose because of that though Read died of a fever in prison, waiting for the birth of her child after which she would be hanged. Nice. “We can’t hang a pregnant pirate, but gosh darn it, we’ll hang her AFTER!” That’s probably where baby pirates come from. Imprisoned mothers treated badly. Anyway, Bonney disappeared and the record remains unclear as to where she ended up or what she did.

See what I mean? Fascinating stuff, pirate-teering. Nasty, brutish, vile, evil, heinous people, most pirates. So why, then, do they capture the imagination of so many people? I mean, I don’t want to string somebody up and remove their entrails through a hole in his or her neck. Nor do I particularly want to pull people’s fingernails out in order to acquire yet another treasure map to yet another deserted island where the damn iron chest is buried under the 5th palm tree at the foot of the dormant volcano beneath the shadow of the monkey-king idol 19 paces from the crossed sword emblem chipped into the boulder beneath the idol. Or wherever the hell it was stashed.

pirate treasure map

But what if…

What if pirates weren’t so bad? What if a couple were kinda good? What if they were sort of sexy, too? And dashing and interesting and…well, okay. Roguish. But in a sultry or maybe debonair way, depending on your proclivities. And what if they became pirates because they were forced by circumstance to do so and they try to steal only from evil British or French government ships and give some of the loot to the poor. Like seafaring Robin Hoods or something.

Yeah, what if? And that, my friends, is why pirates embed themselves in the wandering souls of writers. That’s why they dig at the buried psyches of our own internal treasure chests, reminding us that there’s a world outside our windows.

So I spent today thinking about pirates. And about Anne Bonney and Mary Read. And Calico Jack Rackham and maybe even Blackbeard. And I thought, “what if?”

May you live more of your life asking just that question.

She’s a doll

All right, so I’ve been working on this goofy-ass project for about a month and it requires that I get some action figures (as opposed to get some “action,” which is a whole ‘nother kind of thing). That is, the 12-inch articulated kind of action figure. You know. Like GI Joe only not.

So I’m thinking “hey, okay. Let’s see what’s out there.” I needed action figures that aren’t affiliated with movies or TV shows. Just some “generic” kinds of action figures. Granted, I grew up playing with action figures. Stereotypically, my sister went for the Barbie variety while I gravitated toward the Luke Skywalker/Han Solo kinds of action figures. It always kinda pissed me off, though, that female action figures were basically like barbie dolls with limited range of motion, lame-o vacuous expressions, and clothes that just did not lend themselves to saving the galaxy, invading secret Mayan strongholds, or doing some international ass-kickin’.

Well, slap my booty and call me a mass-produced chemical composition. Things sure have changed since 1975. I discovered that there’s a brave new world out there with regard to action figures and FINALLY female figures kick ass. There’re also a ton of clothing and accessories you can buy to fully outfit your kick-ass female action figure and prepare her for her myriad adventures. These are definitely NOT your grandparent’s action figures. Check it:

female action figure, Triad estore

The outfit she’s wearing is called “Saturday Nite Fights” and you can find it and others at Triad Toys, which provides clothes for action figures. Mostly female. And these are some bitchin’ threads, all. Behold “Knight Runner,” here:

Knight Runner outfit, Triad Toys

Or how about THIS one?

Female ninja, Triad Toys

“Yeah, I may be plastic and 12 inches tall, but I am going to KICK YOUR ASS with my tiny ninja sword!”

And this s*** ain’t cheap. That Knight Runner outfit? That’ll set you back about $25 U.S. And a ninja outfit? About $32 U.S. It costs almost as much to outfit your action figures as it does to buy yourself clothing. I did a little price check and found some tiny sunglasses (modeled after Oakley and Ray-Bans and that kind of thing) for $5. TINY PLASTIC SUNGLASSES, friends. Five bucks. Hell, you can buy those for yourself at one of those cart vendors in Venice Beach for that price.

Okay, so yeah. I had to get my action figures some outfits. After all, I’ve got to keep up with the plastic Joneses, here, and make sure my little plastic charges look good AND can kick some ass. But they’re gonna have to make do with just a few outfits each. And only one pair of sunglasses each.

This girl’s gotta eat, after all. And save up for some more action figures.

Blog, Schmog

Ever have one of those days where you get kinda frustrated because you’re trying to figure out how to deal with new blogging software and you kinda know intuitively what you need to do but the coding sort of escapes you and you try all different combinations and your head starts to feel like it might explode because you’ve tried every conceivable angle except the one that works and before you know it you’re writing these massive run-on sentences…

Yeah. Like that. What IS it about wanting to get a blogsite set up that can consume almost all your life, time, day, resources, and natural-born children? If you had any, that is. Or resources, for that matter.

So I spent the day wrestling with WordPress, which is sort of like “Dancing (-es) with Wolves” except I would have had better luck with the wolves.

Now, let’s not get too carried away. These here blogs run off WordPress and that’s fine n’ dandy. I like using WordPress to do the actual blogging, since it’s pretty easy to figure out. It’s the dinking around with templates and &#^*&^%&*#* like that…THAT makes me a little tired. Okay, a LOT tired. And when you spend a good chunk of your day dealing with the SAME little issue–a matter of trying to figure out how to code a link–rgh.

Yeah, I know. I’m doing something wrong. I know that. I accept that. Because HEY I’m good enough and I’m smart enough and darn it, people LIKE me! Or something. Anyway. Yeah, blogging. Wooo. The greatest thing to hit the internet since Al Gore invented it. Well, Al, if you’re not too freakin’ busy, could you stop by this week and code this (*^@&*&*%^(*#&%( link for me?

Anyway. May you all have a fabulous week and remember, the most interesting things can happen when you least expect it. Like, maybe me figuring out this software…

molehills to mountains

All right, I don’t pretend to be the world’s greatest mountaineer. That’s a job I leave to qualified professionals and assorted wildlife. However, I am a pretty outdoorsy and active person, so I figured I’d be okay on the hike my colleagues dragged me on yesterday.

Bless my heart, as they say in the South.

First, I haven’t done a hike like that in about 4 years, because the hills in Middle Tennessee look something like this:

rolling hills of Middle Tennessee

Look beyond the bovine-type wildlife. See how the ground kind of slopes up? Okay. Now compare to this:

Mt. Lamborn, Paonia  CO

Just sayin’.

Not to diss some of the hills in Middle Tennessee. There are some good ones. And of course the Smoky Mountains in East Tennessee are another matter entirely. Anyway, my point is this: I’m in pretty good shape. I’ve been running out here since January, getting acclimated to the altitude again. I ain’t no pushover. But holy hell, yesterday kicked my ass! I made the summit–dragged my happy butt up there, after several pitched battles with scrub oak, mud, snow (yes, snow still lingers up there), and a pissed-off cactus.

But by god, I did it. Me. Fifteen years older than my outdoor-livin’ and lovin’ colleagues. So damn right I got up there and did a serious butt dance to commemorate the event. And then we went down. A hell of a lot faster than we went up. So every muscle I ever thought I might have in my body got put to good use. Today I feel like somebody hitched me to a team of sled dogs and ran the Iditarod. Without a sled. SO not a special feeling.

So here I sit, popping ibuprofen like pez, wondering if it’s possible to sprain your butt. And I think “what the hell was I doing up there?” And then I remember the astonishing view across the North Fork Valley, where the border between earth and sky is marked by mountains and on a clear day, like yesterday, you can see the San Juans and maybe, if you look really close, you might even see the deep-down parts of yourself, and feel how the wind can knife right through your clothing and your skin and sandpaper across your bones. And you might see the way life and death close a circle, in the carcass of a deer melting into the hard mountain soil and the track of a cougar on the summit’s ridgeline.

And talking to friends and colleagues afterward, watching antelope steaks and salmon cooking on a grill, I raised my glass and toasted the way the rhythms of predator and prey and seasonal changes feed me, body and soul, and I breathe deep and smell spring in the new buds of trees and the rich odor of wet earth and I remember that cougar track and I know that maybe on some other day, I’d be like that deer carcass, leaching my blood and body into the dirt of a snow-carved wash.

Yeah, it was a hard-ass hike. And yeah, I almost didn’t go to the summit of the peak. But something made me do it, something made me haul my butt up there. And in the wind and cold and on the cloud-shadowed spine of that microcosm of the world, I think I saw some of the deep-down parts of myself.

Thanks for stopping by and happy hiking, y’all.

Now and zen

Bienvenidos, mis peeps, a mi casa loca.

This week’s “deep thoughts corner” deals a bit with acceptance, freak out, and inner weirdness. In other words, pretty much what most of us do all the damn time. I’ve been thinking a lot about things like the past and how heavy it can get if you carry it around all the time and I thought I’d explore that a bit here. So if you’re expecting a stroll through my usual zombie-fied corners and intergalactic portals, you may be disappointed. However, it is a little skip through allegory-land, a place I’ve been visiting quite a bit since that whole hoo-ha with the imaginary friends (refer to “Fake Friends” blog).

All rightie. C’mon, Grasshoppa!

Read more…

Unidentified Freaky Objects

MIS PEEPS! How are you? Here’s hoping you have a fabulous week.

Some of you may have to do some traveling. Business, pleasure…for the hell of it. Well, it has come to my attention that I am currently living in a part of the country that offers an alternative to those annoying travel websites. No longer do you need to call up _________[insert annoying travel website here] and slog through endless options, trying to find just the right price only to realize that there are 14 connections involved and that you’ll be routed through Argentina to get from Denver to Boston.

Helpful tip from yers truly, livin’ large in da holla: interdimensional portals. Yep. Right here in western Colorado. Avoid those annoying “extra fees” tacked onto your plane tix. The “security fees.” The “what the hell can I and can’t I take in my carry-on?” The long security lines. And don’t EVEN worry about how many tiny-ass bags of peanuts you’re gonna get.

>p?Because you can bypass all of that and access a portal to…well, we’re still working out the kinks on that. But I’ll bet wormholes are cool this time of year. Anyway. I’m always looking for travel bargains and cheap fares. Why? Because I AM cheap, dammit. Less money on actually getting some place means more money to enjoy yourself when you get there. Whether it’s food, drink, a place to stay or…well, whatever.

So I think I might be checking out these “portals.” They don’t ever go down for “maintenance.” They aren’t ever delayed (no word yet on how often and where they’re open–hmmm, kinda like airlines…), and no matter what you take through it, you’ll probably end up butt-ass nekkid on the other side, anyway. Did you see the original Terminator? Any time you make a leap through some kind of portal, you’re nekkid on the other end. And in the Sarah Connor Chronicles. Same thing. Nekkid on the other side of a portal. Think of the money we’d save on security if we implemented interdimensional portals at airports. I’ll bet they’d let you take those bigger-than-3-oz.-tubes through.

So if you’re looking for a bargain and you don’t really care where or when you end up, join me on Grand Mesa. At the very least, it’s a nice view of the night sky. And no, you don’t have to get nekkid BEFORE you go through.

“Uh, you first, Jim. You look better nekkid then Vulcans do…”

Fake Friends

Greetings, mis peeps.

The web can be a powerful tool. And as with any kind of tool, it can be used for good or for not-so-good things. I’m sure everybody here has some kind of story about somebody “freaky” they met online. And also some stories about some pretty cool people they’ve met there, as well.

Writers use the web quite a bit. Not to suggest you don’t if you’re not. But in the changing world of publishing and promo and networking, writers tend to be online a hell of a lot. And because we all want to believe the best about people, maybe some of us take a little too much for granted when we’re cruising around out there in the ether as “virtual selves.”

This is a tale, dear readers, about love, loss, and life. It’s got a little of everything. And I hope it serves as a warning, reminder, and maybe confirmation about the importance of following your instincts and doing your homework.

So get yourself a cup of coffee or tea or whatever you feel like drinking. Settle in. Put your feet up. And let me walk you through some dark corners of the net. Click the link below. It’s a convoluted tale, a little longish, and not as “blog-like” as some people might like. Not so much “sound-bite” culture as it is “about culture.” Online and offline, I suppose. Anyway. My tale awaits below.

Read more…