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So I was right about the reopening of the federal government but wrong about the book – The Gold Coast turns out to be extremely well written and vastly entertaining.
The few remaining bricks and mortar bookstores struggling to survive have the disconcerting habit of separating out "Fiction" from "Literature," and I'm not sure that The Gold Coast would make it into the "Literature" section – it's a little too breezy and conversational. But if I were teaching a freshman college seminar on The Great Gatsby, I'd assign it. It's a look at all those Gatsby mansions and flickering green dock lights 50 years after the crash and burn of the people who built them, kind of a "Look on my works, ye mighty, and pay those back taxes" cautionary tale. I'm enjoying it.
And I suppose technically I was off about the fed reopening – but only by a few minutes.
What's nutty about that is that even though I absolutely knew the whole thing would soon blow over, wasn't even a minor blip on the vast, oscillating, celestial LED screen, I started overreacting: What if the federal government doesn't reopen for weeks or months? Then what will you do? Because, of course, there is no Plan B. In fact, I'd been thinking that after the (hopefully) successful completion of this mission, I might like to continue on with Plan A for another term – possibly in New Mexico since it would be fun to live close to Jeanna for a year, or maybe in New Orleans since it's a city that's always intrigued me, or Chicago where I could figure out a way to hole up at the Art Institute and live there after dark.
Anyway, I spent the early part of last week staving off a series of increasingly severe panic attacks, which were not fun and catapulted me straight back to the last black year when the Little Store was going d-o-w-nnnnnnnn. The world right now is not a hospitable place particularly for those of us who are news junkies. But as I've always said, every age has its own visions of apocalypse -- 50 years ago, it was the Bomb; 20 years ago, it was AIDs. Today, it's the ever-widening income gap between the haves and have-nots.
The truth is, whatever one's own situation, over time, individual life seems to improve. Mike Davis notwithstanding, I suspect one might be able to argue convincingly that even the residents of Makoko are better off than the Kings and Queens of medieval Europe.
But, of course, I'm one of the marginal people living unprotected on the front lines of all those sweeping economic changes. Really, I'm surprised I've made it this far without going d-o-w-nnnnnnnn.
All's well that ends well, though. The Feds have promised to pay me everything they owe me on October 24. I was so excited, I went out and cut my hair.
My God, I look more like Aunt Jane every day. And that's a really horrifying thought.
The few remaining bricks and mortar bookstores struggling to survive have the disconcerting habit of separating out "Fiction" from "Literature," and I'm not sure that The Gold Coast would make it into the "Literature" section – it's a little too breezy and conversational. But if I were teaching a freshman college seminar on The Great Gatsby, I'd assign it. It's a look at all those Gatsby mansions and flickering green dock lights 50 years after the crash and burn of the people who built them, kind of a "Look on my works, ye mighty, and pay those back taxes" cautionary tale. I'm enjoying it.
And I suppose technically I was off about the fed reopening – but only by a few minutes.
What's nutty about that is that even though I absolutely knew the whole thing would soon blow over, wasn't even a minor blip on the vast, oscillating, celestial LED screen, I started overreacting: What if the federal government doesn't reopen for weeks or months? Then what will you do? Because, of course, there is no Plan B. In fact, I'd been thinking that after the (hopefully) successful completion of this mission, I might like to continue on with Plan A for another term – possibly in New Mexico since it would be fun to live close to Jeanna for a year, or maybe in New Orleans since it's a city that's always intrigued me, or Chicago where I could figure out a way to hole up at the Art Institute and live there after dark.
Anyway, I spent the early part of last week staving off a series of increasingly severe panic attacks, which were not fun and catapulted me straight back to the last black year when the Little Store was going d-o-w-nnnnnnnn. The world right now is not a hospitable place particularly for those of us who are news junkies. But as I've always said, every age has its own visions of apocalypse -- 50 years ago, it was the Bomb; 20 years ago, it was AIDs. Today, it's the ever-widening income gap between the haves and have-nots. The truth is, whatever one's own situation, over time, individual life seems to improve. Mike Davis notwithstanding, I suspect one might be able to argue convincingly that even the residents of Makoko are better off than the Kings and Queens of medieval Europe.
But, of course, I'm one of the marginal people living unprotected on the front lines of all those sweeping economic changes. Really, I'm surprised I've made it this far without going d-o-w-nnnnnnnn.
All's well that ends well, though. The Feds have promised to pay me everything they owe me on October 24. I was so excited, I went out and cut my hair.
My God, I look more like Aunt Jane every day. And that's a really horrifying thought.
