b.rox

OK, so those were gunshots I heard Thursday morning. I got the direction wrong, though. Here’s the relevant excerpt from the 1st District Crime Activity Report for June 26, 2008, reproduced verbatim and without editorial comment: Type: Automobile Burglary Location: 3200 block of Bienville Gist: At 2:225am, the victim was awakened by loud noises outside [...]

We hosted a baby shower today for our friends DJ & Daisy. I think this is the fourth or fifth shower we’ve hosted in this house. Showers are weird to host because the guests are friends of the pregnant party and may be unknown to you. But they can still be fun. Especially with the [...]

One of the young volunteers asked me a pertinent question yesterday: “So, when we get done painting your house, are you going to help other people with their houses?” I confessed that I hadn’t thought about it. I’ve been so focused on our own renovation for almost three years now. “That’s how some people I’ve [...]

I heard gunfire early this morning, about 2:30 AM. A dozen shots. It sounded like it was coming from around the corner, the 3100 block of Iberville. I wish I could say it was the first time I’ve ever heard such sounds in the night in our neighborhood. Unfortunately it’s a sound I hear far [...]

As I noted a few days ago, this is the first day of my new year, and the first year of my new era. This is not a day for celebration, not a holiday. We just had four or five of those in a row. Today is a day for returning to work, returning to [...]

Today is Midsummer. It’s just about the biggest holiday of the year in Sweden and Finland and I’m assuming the rest of the Nordic countries too. It should be a big holiday here too, but alas, it isn’t. Nevertheless I shared some pickled herring with Thomas and Ben from ACORN. Then a huge crew of [...]

You are starting to reach out and grab things. It’s not quite coordinated or entirely voluntary. But a couple weeks ago you stretched out your arm, and your tiny hand hit my face. You laughed, and then you did it again. And again. About ten times in a row. That was cool. I took three [...]

Anne McKinley phoned me this afternoon to let me know that our mutual friend Scott Speake quite unexpectedly died over the weekend. We all knew each other through our book club. Anne sent this e-mail to our discussion group: I have just been informed that Scott Speake, one of the founding members of the Octavia [...]

Don’t tell Xy, but I’ve got a surprise in store for her when she returns from Indiana. I spent the day installing fourteen aluminum mini blinds throughout the lower level of the house. Dull avocado blinds in the green room, metallic silver blinds in the blue room, and metallic gold blinds in the orange room. [...]

I almost missed this story in today’s paper… There’s supposed to be an accompanying slideshow with audio on nola.com but I can’t find it here.

The astronomical solstice snuck up on me again.

When we first moved to New Orleans in 1999, we saw flyers in the Quarter warning tourists not to be suckered into making any wagers on the provenance of their footwear. Over the intervening years, I’ve been accosted by any number of fine gentlemen who’ve assured me that they know where I got my shoes, [...]

I bought 20 gallons of primer and packed the wife and daughter off to Indiana, but somehow the prospect was still so unreal to me. I felt certain something was going to go wrong. Work was supposed to start on Tuesday, but I didn’t hear from them. My contact person didn’t return my call. But [...]

I wrote a letter to the owner. I talked to him too. I made a video about it. I wrote an editorial about it. I talked to my City Council rep about it. I went on the evening news about it. But nothing seemed to happen. I’m talking about the infamous grocery at 3126 Bienville, [...]

Our household has been diminished by one. He doesn’t look sick, does he? But this is the last picture ever taken of Milo. He was lethargic and not eating much, so we took him into the vet just after this picture was taken. They confirmed he was having some serious issues, and kept him over [...]

Boss Lady’s out for the rest of the month, at an AP reading and then a conference. Olivia’s brother passed away, so she’s in Alabama. Janice is heading out to Las Vegas for a conference. Tomorrow morning I pack the wife and girl off to Indiana. Gonna be mighty lonely ’round here for the next [...]

I’ve managed to stretch my first Father’s Day into a whole weekend. It started Friday night and with any luck I’ll still be celebrating Monday morning. But in the midst of all this raucous debauchery I wanted to give a shout out to the women who made all this possible: my mom, my wife, my [...]

I was sorting through some old photos the other day, and I came across a set taken on October 16, 1999. As I looked at them I was overwhelmed by a sense of bittersweet melancholy. (Is there any other kind of melancholy?) This was the first coherent group of digital pictures I ever took. I [...]

Title: Glasshouse Author: Charles Stross Published: 2006 There’s usually a point in most novels where I feel the hook, where I no longer feel the effort of pushing forward and making myself read, but suddenly (or not so suddenly) find myself being pulled forward, intrigued, under the spell. I’ve noticed this usually happens somewhere around [...]

I guess I’m in a very small minority with this opinion, but I actually support our Louisiana state legislature’s efforts to give themselves a huge salary increase. It’s not because I think they deserve a reward them for a job well done. It’s not because I like big government or higher taxes. It’s because when [...]