As the end of the semester rapidly approaches for my Website Development class, I am turning toward my final project proposal. I plan to use this course to force myself to design, develop, and go live with a portfolio-of-sorts website: a showcase for my art, illustrations, paintings, photos, sketches, design projects, etc. Problem is, I'm stuck on what to call the website. Continue reading

Sunday afternoon, I found myself at one of my favorite intersections in Boston: Boylston and Newbury, right by Copley Square. The weather was all wrong for being there, but I had a long-overdue appointment to match my winter-bleh to my summer-golden haircolor, and my salon is directly across from the Public Library. Athena Salon, formerly Linea Aveda. Continue reading

This can't be copyediting because this isn't English. How do you generate a template for text that does not conform to any known linguistic patterns, a stylesheet for an anti-grammar? I'm taking a break from a massive freelance-consultant project to bemoan the fact that techies cannot write. This is a dangerous blanket assertion, and one that begs proving-wrong. Continue reading

In my last post, I promised a movie review, and delivered a tangent. You only might get the movie review today, but I'm entering it through a tangent, and bonus book review or two. My friend Emily had the most religious upbringing of anyone I know. This is in part because Floridian black Baptists and Irish Catholics were vying for her soul. Continue reading

I watched a dark and whimsical film over the weekend, of the sort that most reviewers would call a "romp." I'm not going to call it that, despite the self-aware (and, at times, even self-righteous) rollicking. One of the things I find incredibly intriguing is the extent to which culture impacts popular culture, and how ignorantly unaware most people are of this. Continue reading

It's only four or five weeks into the semester, but my 'Writing for Marketing and Public Relations' class is already affecting the way I read.For example, only because of this class, I was curious enough to open and read a fundraising letter from my undergraduate college. It was excruciatingly well written (with the exception of the phrase "behooves us." Nothing behooves in fundraising. It "is essential that we.") Continue reading

So, this summer, I'm going to try to learn how to play the accordion. Or maybe just concertina.That sounds completely silly, right? Even to me. Maybe I've just been listening to too much Nick Cave and PJ Harvey and Ute Lemper and Judy Henske lately. Maybe I have too soft a spot for Tom Waits and the Klezmatics and One Ring Zero. Continue reading