Overheard in a Cambridge bar

I'm back in the Boston area this week on a work trip. After a couple of long days here, I went to a club about the size of my living room last night to catch a Portland band I'd never seen in concert. Blitzen Trapper (above, though fuzzy; blame the iPhone's crummy camera) was worth the wait even though they didn't take the stage until midnight, but what I heard while standing in line for tickets was what I'll remember most.

A group of college-age friends were packed into a booth by the door. One of them, a woman, amid a lull in the death metal barraging us from the club next door, said: "Librarians are so hot. If I could find me a librarian I'd..." Then the death metal returned and drowned her out.

Only at Harvard, I thought. Certainly not something I ever heard in college back home.

Pregnant

We're expecting. (Hoping the kid's not so poorly focused come roundabout late September.)

ID theft

My favorite living author, Sherman Alexie, pops up again. An excerpt from a LA Weekly piece well worth reading in full, available here:

And then I turn the corner and see him, the Indian guy onstage. He’s taller than me. His skin is much darker. His black hair is twisted into perfect braids. I’m jealous. I mean, yes, I’m a handsome guy, but the man onstage is gorgeous. He looks far more Indian than I do. Everything about him screams Indian. I feel inadequate in his presence. How am I going to read my poems after he has already read my poems so well? But then he sees me. He stops performing.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” he asks me. “You’re not supposed to be here.”

Training wheels

Eight years in, Portland's really rubbing off on me. The latest proof: Got a new bike today. I am about as excited as I was when I got my first real bike as a little boy. Which is to say very excited. Here's what it looks like: As soon as warmer weather decides to stick around, I'm going to start riding at least part of the way to work. If I don't ride the full 10 or so miles in, I'll at least ride to the MAX and go from there. Either way, soon I won't be sitting in traffic on I-5, burning gas, wasting money and losing time. Plus, I'll be healthier, too.