Funny Things About Serious People: Son House, Skip James, and H.C. Speir

Unlike most bluesmen, Son calls each of the standard tuning keys by their right names, save for C, which he calls F. (Booker White calls E G, C cross-G, and A Ab or Db; Robert Pete Williams, Rubin Lacy and Skip James all refer to E as C natural.) However, in other matters Son approaches the delta blues norm. For instance "minor" means any note or chord on or above the fifth fret, and "major" any note or chord below it. . . . In addition, Son uses a rather vague system of string classification, using soprano, alto, tenor and bass. Skip is more definite; from the sixth string to the first they are 6) bass or subtone, 5) baritone, 4) alto, 3 + 2) tenors, 1) soprano. Skip also refers to triplets, 16th, 32nd, and 64th notes, tonics, subdominants, and 2/4 and 4/4 time, all incorrectly. It turns out he bought an "Exegesis of Musical Knowledge" from H.C. Speir in 1931 and skimmed it.

-as told by Al "Blind Owl" Wilson, 1960s

Something like Something: The Face of Shame

Even people in Mexico City are talking about Anthony Weiner. It might have something to do with his name.

But the incident reminded me of this old post about the face of shame in America. Same face! Is there some Manual of Press Conference Facial Expressions for Modern Political Figures that these guys are all reading? Do they all have the same publicity coach? Is it instinctive? Cultural? Ladies, if your man—employees, if your boss man—people in emergency rooms, if your doctor man—comes to you with this face, prepare for the worst. And try to hack his email account because he's probably still hiding something.

Antiquariana: Mexican Industry

It is almost incredible to speak what some write of Mexico and the cities adjoining to it, no place in the world at their first discovery more populous.... We have the same means, able bodies, pliant wits, matter of all sorts, wool, flax, iron, tin, lead, wood, etc., many excellent subjects to work upon, only industry is wanting.

-Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy, 1621

Mexico City: Scenes—Mexican Humor

Yesterday I was leaving my building when a neighbor whom I had a met a few times stopped me.

You look very serious, she said in Spanish.

Oh, I said. She was almost middle-aged, which I hadn't noticed before.

Phlegmatic, she said. That's what we say.

That's funny, I said. We don't really say that in English.

About the English, she said. We say they're very phlegmatic.

Actually I'm not English, I said. I'm American. We're happy.

Yes. But we say they're phlegmatic, the English.

Well, I said. I'm not English. Goodbye!

Mexico City: Scenes—Pico de Gallo

At some point during the last month the next-door neighbors acquired a rooster.

He sounds bored.

Something like Something: Comedians...with Strings!

200-something.


1962.


1944.

On the Street: La decadencia romana

My neighborhood is definitely on the brink of something. Walking home tonight, the grocery store was full of tall foreigners and girls in orange leggings. The unannounced opening at the new Museum of the Object of the Object brought a crowd of young men wearing denim shirts and middle-aged socialites with heavy glasses and pomaded hair, while outside the scent of marijuana smoke wafted picaresquely in the air a block away. And around the corner from my apartment, the only man in Mexico City I have ever seen wearing booty shorts in a non-professional capacity was out in his most sparkly gold pair.

On the Street: Heart on the Street

My neighborhood is fast on the way up. About every other week I see a new bar or restaurant opening. This trend has been heartily confirmed today: the telenovela Entre el Amor y el Deseo is shooting on my block.

Antiquariana: Memories of the Middle School Library

Just found this entertaining blog. As I've long suspected, ugly and possibly misinformative books have always been in vogue.

Mexico City: Scenes—Red Water

For the last three days the water in the fountains of Mexico City has been running red. At first I thought maybe there was something wrong with the water supply, but then I noticed the water coming out of my shower and sink were normal.

It turns out the fountains of red are the latest manifestation of the "No Mas Sangre" ("No More Blood") campaign, led by Mexico's famous cartoonist, Rius. The campaign has produced a lot of demonstrations, sign waving, and supportive Facebook posts. Its purpose is to protest the violence created by Mexico's drug war, and combat people's indifference to said violence.

Something like Something: Take a Stand

As we know, Hemingway enjoyed claiming: "Writing and travel broaden your ass if not your mind and I like to write standing up."

And others remembered of him (and his room): "On a shelf by the bed is the Royal portable he uses, typing standing up."

Antiquariana: Have a Sit

A friend from high school who is a science writer recently told me that a study had concluded sitting is toxic.

Everything is toxic, I said. Living is toxic.

Then today I heard this story, which says that we need to program our computers to tell us when to get up and stop looking at our computers. This will keep us from dying.

On the Street: Passover

Was back in New York for about twenty-eight hours. New York is a place where construction workers own iPhones to play Tetris on the subway, and websites deliver soap to your apartment.

On the Street: Nature is In

Hipsters on the seawall in Stratford, Connecticut.

Stranger with You: Outer Space Awaited

Sometimes I think that my roommates are annoyingly weird, but then I remember that I'm a foreigner, I own a typewriter, and I spend all day listening to recordings of Glenn Gould played at high volumes.

Spanish Lesson: Drugs or Booze?

In Spanish, "GNC" and "Hennessy" sound the same.

Everyone's a Critic: Spanish or in Spanish?

Yesterday in a small bookstore I came across the latest copy of Granta. It was a collection of stories by "The Best of Young Spanish-Language Novelists"—the next Llosas and Bolaños, as the back cover put it. Of the twenty or so writers included, eight were from Argentina, six were from Spain, and only one was from Mexico.

It occurred to me that this was the first time I had seen a copy of the literary magazine in Mexico.

Adventures in Rhythm / Something like Something: Dramatic Walls

Glenn Gould playing "Lord Salisbury's Pavan and Galliard," by Orlando Gibbons, filmed 1974.

El Camarón de la Isla singing a Seguiriyas, filmed ca. 1980 (?).

Mexico City: Scenes—Shady Slim

Today, Forbes magazine announced that the U.S. has the most millionaires of any country in the world, but that the richest man in the world lives in Mexico.

Stranger with You: A Year in Mexico

Today I've been in Mexico for a year. I don't know what happened. Having lived my entire life in temperate climates, I have serious trouble noticing time pass here, because there are basically no seasons.

I had been thinking that this blog should have more entries on "life in Mexico," or something like that. But I prefer the imaginary description of my life in the D.F. that I received in an email from a friend in New York:

...Avi, who is hiding in a bunker while Mexican drug lords shoot there [sic] six shooter revolvers, one in each hand pointed sky high, wearing sombraros [sic] and ponchos.

So I guess this could also be filed in an "Antiquariana" post about ye olde Mexico, which I suppose many people imagine to have looked like this: