March 2020: Covid left the global populace struggling to fill the isolating void of shutdown. Many learned new skills. Others fired up their streaming channels and shot-gunned film after film and television series after television series. As a suicide-prevention and crisis-intervention counselor, I broke overtime records after our volunteers had retreated to the safety of […]
This Saturday moves slowly by,A wriggling flyEntrapped within a spider’s web.A girl, just wedLast month, got caught while going pastA cop too fast,Her husband hanging off the hood.It’s understoodWe can’t enjoy the full details,Because we’ll failThe test if our instructor can’tExploit his chanceTo bore us with recondite stats.I’d love to chatA while with that healthy […]
The slightest gasp had brought him to her bedWith tissues, pills, health regimens prescribedAd nauseam. Still, she mimicked life, imbibedHis youthful fuel while staying “almost dead.”Adults had questioned why he’d never wed,This tweedy neuter closely moored besideHis ever-ailing mom – he could have thrived,But chose to be a mama’s boy instead. His image comes back […]
Another latte doesn’t kill the thirstResiding in their breasts. No pastry creamsToday? Biscotti only, so it seems,A taste defining boredom at its worst.The afternoon unfolds like those rehearsedIn countless cafés petits where people dreamBeyond a clean, well-lighted place, but leanInstead toward making life a restless curse. And elsewhere, women firing shattered criesFor voiceless children maimed by […]
In 2023, two major histories of goth hit shelves. Both contain considerations mainly about music, but they also include literature, art, and political history, since goth as we know it today feeds from many inspirations, finally becoming a fully realized movement and aesthetic celebrating macabre sensibilities. One author co-founded a band that provided immense influence […]
For decades, Jillian Venters, the Lady of the Manners, has been cultivating better deportment among goths, which is important because individuals should resist reacting to harsh societal judgments about this subculture with equal venom and thus inviting perhaps even worse abuse. There are additional perks as well: There’s an added benefit to being a Goth […]
Professor of History and Food Studies at the University of Toronto-Scarborough, Jeffrey M. Pilcher explores the taco and the overall history of Mexican cuisine, a much more complicated topic than casual readers might expect, with his Taco Planet: A Global History of Mexican Food. Conquest, globalization, appropriation, and industrialization have all played roles over centuries […]
Certain institutions in Campbell, California, have lasted many decades, although ownership has changed hands. Jerry’s Barber Shop still occupies the same strip mall suite where my dad took me for haircuts. Jerry has retired, but the shop remains active. Freddie’s Liquor has moved, but only across the street. Most impressive, however, is Taco Bravo, in […]
A certain figurative language about Hollywood has been circulating through human discourse since cinema first entered the world. “Hollywood magic,” for instance, refers to special effects or related techniques employed to illustrate desires and fears across the “silver screen.” This fantastical imagery occludes the malevolence behind the curtain, the industry itself, which receives metaphorical treatment […]
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