November 20, 2023

The latest culinary shenanigans Chez Stas: pumpkin praline bars. I used fresh pumpkin instead of canned as called for by the recipe -- a little extra work, but worth it. The frosting is pretty amazing, but cuidado: 3c powdered sugar + 3/4c brown sugar + 1/3c heavy cream [sic]. I had a square for dessert last night and YASSS.

 

Overheard afterwards:

 

Head: Did you really need that?

Stomach: STFU Head!

 

November 7, 2023

It's Wellness Week chez moi:

 

(1) Somebunny had her annual boob squish last night. (My left breast still isn't speaking to me.)

 

(2) Somebunny is having a colonoscopy prep party tomorrow (the main event is Thursday morning). 💃🍸

November 5, 2023

The skeptical pre-concert selfie notwithstanding, my first PSO concert of the new season was wonderful. The program consisted of three chestnuts from the orchestral repertoire: Mozart's final symphony ("Jupiter"), Tchaikovsky's violin concerto, and Ravel's "La valse." I have to be in the right head space to appreciate music from the "classical" period, including Mozart's, and I wasn't quite there today, but even so the final movement of the "Jupiter" symphony was pretty exhilarating. I've really warmed up to Tchaikovsky in recent years, and the guest soloist, Bomsori Kim, made it easy to like this piece. (I was reminded again how magical witnessing true virtuosity is.) I think it always helps to have at least a little historical and/or biographical context for a piece, and knowing that Tchaikovsky composed this piece in the aftermath of the dissolution of a train wreck of a marriage (it lasted just three months) and a suicide attempt added a lot of resonance to its passion. This point about context was even more a propos where the Ravel piece was concerned. It's a pretty effing amazing piece of music considered simply as a product of the modernist period, but knowing that it was conceived as a tribute to Johann Strauss and the Vienna of the later 19th and early 20th centuries ("valse" = "waltz"), but wasn't composed until right after WWI, turns the piece into a musical depiction of the cataclysmic collapse of an entire world -- a real revelation! It was by far the shortest of the three pieces on the program at just c. 13 minutes, but to my ear, the most impactful.

 

October 26, 2023

Encore une fois.

 

 

Dear Anastasia Walker,

 

Thank you for submitting "The Monster in My Front Yard." We were glad to have the chance to read your work and were impressed by your writing. Unfortunately we were not able to find a place for it in the New England Review.

 

It’s an important part of our mission to seriously consider writing by new and emerging writers as well as by those we already know and love, so we read each piece with care. Because we are only able to publish a small percentage of the thousands of submissions we read each year, we often have to turn down very accomplished work.

 

If you haven't already, please consider staying in touch by signing up for occasional emails from NER.

 

Thanks again for sharing your work with us. Based on our reading of "The Monster in My Front Yard" we would like to see more from you in the future.

 

Sincerely,

The Editors

New England Review

October 15, 2023

Somebunny went to opening night of Pgh Opera's production of "The Barber of Seville" last night. Excepting some confusing stage business at the end of act 1 (introduced to divert attention from the very 18th century pacing of the aria, I suspect), it was a well done show, and the leads, in particular Figaro and the lovers, Rosina and Count Almaviva, shined, as did the gal playing the maid Berta. Inevitably, I laughed through most of the overture, though I admit I was a bit disappointed that not a single wabbit was killed during the performance.

 

 

October 14, 2023

I now have some necessary though not sufficient evidence that attending a Cello Fury concert at the Oaks Theater in Oakmont keeps the blue meanies at bay on a Friday the 13th.

 

October 6, 2023

When you're cool enough to walk into a place that's too hip for you on a Friday night wearing a Ralph Lauren tee, khaki capris, AND a mask, ask the impatient backwards ball-cap bro for a recommendation for a beer to be used in a soup, and when he describes one option as a triple, reply, "Triple what?" 😎