Bel Canto

The best parts of Bel Canto by Ann Patchett:

“The room was filled with the pleasant smell of candles just snuffed, a smoke that was sweet and wholly unthreatening. A smell that meant it was late now, time to go to bed.”

“The room was sugared with promise.”

“They were early [to the opera], but other people were earlier, as part of the luxury that came with the ticket price was the right to sit quietly in this beautiful place and wait.”

“Certainly he knew (though did not completely understand) that opera wasn’t for everyone, but for everyone he hoped there was something.”

“In his day, Oscar himself had made too many girls forget their better instincts and fine training by biting them with tender persistence at the base of their skull, just where the hairline grew in downy wisps. Girls were like kittens in this way, if got them right at the nape of their neck they went easily limp.”

Solid

At the bar, Laura leans against a column to reach for her purse. The column falls against the wall with a plastic thud.

L: So that’s not attached to anything.

B: No, it’s not so much a structural element as a…

M: Big plastic column, made to look like a structural element, that will actually fall over the moment someone touches it.

B: Yeah, every bar needs one of those.

L: Good for drunk people.

M: Keeps ’em guessing.

Joyous

The best part of Cry the Beloved Country by Alan Paton:

“A boy salutes as he has learned in the school, and cries umfundisi. He waits for no response, but turns away and gives the queer tremulous call, to no person at all, but to the air. He turns away and makes the first slow steps of a dance, for no person at all, but for himself.”

Last Call

L: Do motorcycles run on gasoline?

M: Yeah.

L: Where does the gas go?

M: … In the gas tank.

L: Well, yeah, of course.

M: You asked.

L: But, I mean, where? Like does it fill up into the handlebars or something?

R: That doesn’t seem like it would be safe.

M: What did you think it ran on?

S: They should make bikes that run on pee.

L: Like you’d pee into a tube and the bike uses it as fuel?

M: Yuck.

R: I want a car that runs on pee.

M: You’re a dreamer, baby.

From Rapacious to “Agressive”

Starbucks Unveils Aggressive Growth Plan

Now the chain stores will simply gestate in human bodies and eat their way through the wall of the stomach when they’ve reached maturity.

Class

This businesswoman is waiting for the bus. She wears a slim black suit with kitten heels, and her hair is pulled into a neat bun at the nape of her neck. She removes a dark compact from her pocket and peers at herself in the mirror, then begins picking at a zit on her chin.

Getting Helpful

The Morning News just published my second article in the Virtue series. It’s called “Virtue: Volunteering from Home.” Read it and go do good.

Multicultural

Bryan and I are going to Amsterdam later this year, so I need to pick up a Dutch phrasebook. I want to learn a few key phrases like, “I seem to be bleeding from my ears,” and “I don’t speak Dutch.” Bryan points out that it’s funnier to use a more complex phrase when you’re telling someone you don’t speak their language. We kicked around a few ideas. “I’m terribly sorry, I can’t understand you. Dutch is, most unfortunately, not my native language,” and so on. We finally settled on, “I offer a halfhearted apology for not understanding Dutch. I’m American, so I didn’t bother to learn your little language. Where is the nearest McDonald’s?”

SxSW Memories

Our flight out of San Francisco was delayed and we had to go through multiple security check points before we finally got on a plane. At said checkpoints, they make you drink any fluid you have in your carry on to prove it’s not bomb-related.

Bryan: Do you have the flask on you?

Me: I packed it. I didn’t want to have to swill vodka before 8a.m.

Bryan: Until tomorrow.

Me: Exactly.

Goth Talk

Stumbled across a goth grooming guide. Number 5 is a classic. From “Makeup Tips for the Bleak”:

5. If you have scars on your wrists from suicide attempts, by all means display them proudly. The same goes for bruises, cuts, and track marks. Abscesses, however, should always be coyly veiled in filmy black fabric.