“Gladice, Brooklyn, New York”
“So, we’re gonna be famous, you’re gonna make me a star, right?” (photo Donato DiCamillo)……
Dispatches
Sticking It: Food Edition
Food is a basic human need that can be filled fairly basically—some starch, a nugget of protein, a squeeze of lime to stave off scurvy. But notions about our food get heaped on it, like mangled bacon and garbanzos at a salad bar.
Consider food as a test (Eden); food…
In Praise of Not Going Viral
In the foodie world, as in most worlds now mediated online, there is intense pride at having a recipe “go viral.” Samin Nosrat, the delightful author of Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat and the ensuing Netflix series based on the cookbook, admits as much in her recent confessional-recipe (it is a…
The Exact Moment Chris Pratt Realizes He Is Rich
You will remember the scene, near the end of the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie, when Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) admits to himself, as much as to Nova Corpsman Dey (John C. Reilly), that he is the leader of his gang.
“They’ll be fine, Dey,” he says. “I’m gonna…
Frogs get a hop on noise pollution
In an increasingly noisy world, it may seem impossible to find peace amongst the cacophony of busy roads, blaring sirens, and roaring machinery.
That is, unless you are a wood frog.
New research from Pennsylvania State University shows these pocket-sized pollywogs are becoming immune to the stresses…
Mapping the Desire Lines of Family
Nishta J. Mehra (Credit: Lauren Schoen)
I first met Nishta J. Mehra in 2005 when we studied creative nonfiction at the University of Arizona’s MFA program. Her prose was, and is, agile, buoyant while being direct, and strong. She also routinely brought baked goods to our class workshops, and, honestly,…
death comes like an iceberg between the shoulder blades
Johnny was a mess—snide, sneering, insubordinate, a liar—and impossibly old, maybe even 24 or 25. None of us really believed him when he said his previous job was carrying nuclear bombs around on his back. We should have.
After Vietnam, the US Army was a mess in general. Johnny was…
Highway to Hell
Most mornings do not begin by walking across a snow-covered campus as a young man in flame-colored pants and an intergalactic backpack—think the cosmos meet tie-dye—blasts AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell.” Is the music emanating from his phone, I wonder? A portable bluetooth speaker placed just so? Am…
A Shade of Blue
Blue is one of those mystical colors which has long inspired artists and cultures around the world. Pablo Piccasso’s Periodo Azul lasted for three years, from 1901 to 1904, whereby he painted the world in monochromatic melancholy. Many artists before Picasso, and after,