Texting: Urban Depressive Signals

Only in New York

Sometimes I remember why I came here. Today: the crowds spilling out of that annoying restaurant on 7th and A that isn't 7A; What is their cuisine? What is their concept? All types of people, riveted to a screen. I ducked in a dark bar a bit beyond to see what the game was: Mexico versus Argentine. By Houston they were celebrating: boys came out of nowhere, wearing Argentinian soccer jerseys, cheering.

Last Saturday, Laurie Anderson in the park for three dollars. Can't beat that with a stick. "Only an expert can see the problem. And only an expert can deal with the problem. Sometimes an expert is part of the problem. But only an expert can deal with the problem."

Thursday, in a beautifully proportioned room in the main branch of the Public Library, Malcolm Gladwell going at it with Ariana Huffington. In celebration of 10 years of Slate, a panel on the Internet and the future of journalism. It was partial, necessarily. While bloggers were cast as feasting on the carrion of the Times, parasites, the increasing symbiosis (the Times validates, a bit late, online trends and personalities; Times journalists become ersatz television journalists in the "multimedia" recaps of their pieces)...was not discussed. Nor do-it-yourself music, film broadacting, podacsting, mashing up...

Favorite moments: Michael Kinsley, after asking the panel about the future of tangible reading material, magazines, newspapers, shoots a knowing smirk-wink toward his wife in the front row as Malcolm G takes the bait and expounds on his failure-of-the-death-of-paper theory. Ariana Huffington, the only woman, holding her own, emphatic but refusing to be shrill, more personal and emotional against the default mode of deatxhed irony, knowing references, and dry asides -- the male dominance/discourse of the 21st century cultural elite.

Only in My Apartment

I'm supposed to be heading to a loft party. But I'm having trouble leaving my iTunes, which has been channeling some sort of ur-DJ. I rented and watched Iris. Sad. Gorgeous acting. Clicked the iTunes, and on came the Magnetic Fields, the one that goes "there'll be time enough for talking when we're old.. so tongiht I think I'd rather just go dancing...' Then Terrence McKenna, an audience recording of a lecture series, In Search of the Original Tree of Knowledge. 20 minutes that reminds you of what thinking is for. Am I the only one who gets Marshall McLuhan, Malcolm McLaren, and Terrence McKenna all mixed up?

Then came David Holmes'original version of 69 Police. Great. Then Kathy Acker, a track from "Redoing Childhood." I was once trapped by a thunderstorm in Kathy Acker's rental apartment with her in Boulder, Colorodo. Then "Happy Times" by Idaho. Now, strangely, Duran Duran's acapella version of White Lines. OK, what would be beyond perfect if now came on.... Liquid Liquid's Cavern... No, Findlay Quaye's Sunday Shining cover.

Most of this excellent music is an audio legacy of my boyfriend, who is to DJ at this loft party. And whom I love despite everything.