Benjy crawls.

More on Dawn Powell.

From a review of the new Edith Wharton biography, ruminations on why hard-drinking, self-promoting dudes like Faulkner, Hemingway, and Fitzgerald got more respect than women like Wharton, Cather, and Powell:

Tim Page, a Pulitzer Prize-winning music critic for The Washington Post, is almost single-handedly responsible for reviving her reputation. Miss Powell, who died in 1965, was virtually unheard of amongst the wider public until Mr. Page wrote a 1998 biography and arranged for many of her 15 novels to be reprinted, including in the Library of America.

Miss Powell's masterpieces include 1936's "Turn, Magic Wheel," a deliciously satirical but sensitive look at literary life in New York, and 1942's "A Time to be Born," a thinly veiled send-up of Clare Boothe Luce. She also wrote novels, like "Come Back to Sorrento," about her Midwestern roots.

"These are great American novels," Mr. Page declares. Mr. Page, who lives in Baltimore, suggests two reasons she didn't receive more acclaim.

"She upset social conservatives with her characters, who tend to sleep around and drink a lot, and are not necessarily admirable role models for anybody," he muses. "Then she ticked off the left because she was not a utopian. When she was writing, a lot of the literary world was left of center. She never believed in revolutions, she never believed in inspirational literature. She saw humanity in a mess — always was, always would be. ... There are still people offended by her willingness to look at life head on."

My first trip to NYC. By Benjy.

This past weekend, I went to New York City for the first time, and took my first plane ride, too. That was fun. Here I am with my seat back not upright, and my tray table not in the upright and locked position.


Also fun: free TV at every seat! Sadly, the TV proved inedible despite my best efforts.


While staying in Meredith's apartment, I had an encounter with a strange Austrian man named Georg. I was a little offended by his use of the term "schutzie pookie," but I am told that in Austria that is a term of affection.

I warmed up to him.
Still, I was relieved to be back in my mother's arms.

Lynn's wedding was a lot of fun. Here I am in my "formal Bjorn." Dig those reflective stripes, baby!
Then, next morning, the trip home began. Here I am in the Columbus airport. I was not amused.

Ah, Gate C-51. We had some good times together.


It seemed like weeks, but eventually we made it home. By now, everything has pretty much returned to normal, and I have resumed my attempts to fit this large green sphere in my mouth. Wish me luck!

50 book challenge: #11.

Othello, by William Shakespeare. Yeah, I figure this counts as a book. Novels are short nowadays--stop living in the past, old man. Have you ever read Ian McEwan's Enduring Love?

I got the JetBlues

Last Friday, Benjy took his first trip on a plane. My co-clerk, Lynn, was getting married in New york on Saturday. The trip there was great, and we had a wonderful time seeing friends on Friday and Saturday. Benjy even enjoyed the wedding and stayed up till 10 p.m. because he is a dancing fool. The next day, we paid for it.

At 7 a.m., the baby woke up with a fever. Our flight was scheduled for 5:15 p.m., but because of the vicious Nor'Easter blowing through the area, I called to change to the 12:15 flight (a short 15 minutes after the wind advisory was scheduled to begin!). We got to the airport and took off in bone-shaking, eyeball-popping turbulence. About an hour into the flight, somewhere over Pennsylvania, we thought we were home-free. Then the pilot announced that "a part of the plane" had malfunctioned during takeoff, at which point I figured he was telling us to call our families and tell them we loved them. But no. It was merely the plane's de-icer that had malfunctioned, which meant that we couldn't land anywhere rainy/icy. The nearest available runway was sunny, beautiful Columbus, Ohio!

We landed there about an hour after we were supposed to land in Pittsburgh. On the plane, they had told us they might be able to find us a plane from Columbus to Pittsburgh. But it turns out that was just a pretty little dream someone had. Because in fact, all they had was a bus. For which we waited an hour before even boarding. And once on, we waited another hour before even beginning the trip. Three-and-a-half hours later, we made it to Pittsburgh. 12 hours door-to-door. Driving would have taken 6 and a half.

Did I mention the baby had a fever that day? Did I mention the drive to JFK through puddles of water the size of Shea Stadium? Did I mention that the bus took a detour, since the freaking interstate highway between Columbus and Pittsburgh was closed, thus causing us to wend our way through picturesque Mingo Junction, Ohio, not to mention 10 minutes in West Virginia. Did I mention that several times the bus suddenly pulled over to the shoulder, since the side cargo doors kept popping open for some reason? Did I mention that Jetblue gave us a car seat for the baby to use on the bus ride, which was impossible to anchor since the bus had no seat belts?

Still and all, it did turn out our original flight got cancelled, which would have left us in New York for another day with a sick baby, with no guarantee of even making it out on Monday.

Let me note for the record that I have no problem with the decision to land in Columbus. This may be obvious, but some passengers (once safely on the ground, natch) were whinging about how "I talked to my buddy in Pittsburgh, and he says it's totally not raining at all there---we could have just landed there, if only we had a pilot with some balls, etc." Look, the pilot had no qualms about taking off in 40 m.p.h. winds because he knew the plane (and his ability to control it) were still well within acceptable tolerances; I tend to trust his judgment on the whole question of "how best to avoid having your flight surfaces ice up with potentially catastrophic consequences".

I do secretly want to return to Mingo Junction, however.

50 book challenge: #9 and #10.

9. David Crystal, The Stories of English. The early material on Old and Middle English was a little dense for me, but overall a good introduction to English as the mongrel language that it is.

10. Dawn Powell, My Home Is Far Away. I love Dawn Powell. Her work is not especially plot-driven--more character sketches and individual scenes--but she did a great job in telling stories from two very different settings: small-town life in Ohio in the early 20th century, and high society in 1930s New York. For both of these, her stories were highly autobiographical, but this novel, though not published until 1944, was the most autobiographical tale of all. I still like Turn, Magic Wheel the best, and Dance Night is good, also.

How Star Wars should have ended.

I knew I couldn't be the only person to have wondered, "Why didn't the Death Star just blow up Yavin, instead of wasting time by orbiting?"

Thank you, Trader Joe's bagger...

... for pointing out the following resemblance:

Change in the Weather

Helping Daddy fix his bike.



Sunday in the Park.

When that Averylle with his shoures soote...

Margerye Kempe at the Feest of MLA. From the inimitable "Geoffrey Chaucer Hath a Blog," of course. Take thatte, Gowere!