This poem makes me feel young. It also makes me feel what Owl Chatter maybe is all about. Are words magical, or what?
On someone else’s estate
running through it to avoid
the outdoor wedding there is a grave
in a little copse of trees
so panting we hide out there
How beautiful to lie down
not to be the dead ones there
whose eye sockets are filled with dirt
nothing is theirs anymore
you pass me a crumpled joint
swaying a little like a poem
while black birds wail in the air
and the commuter train wails
all we have to do is make tacos
tonight and be friends
Matthew Rohrer, “Poem for Friends”
You think you’re having a bad day?
Yesterday, in 1890, Vincent van Gogh died. He had shot himself in the chest in a wheat field two days before, and managed to make it home to his own bed. His brother Theo rushed from Paris to Vincent’s bedside and reported that van Gogh’s last words were “The sadness will go on forever.”
Ouch! Lighten up Vinnie. Not helpful!
On the plus side (very plus), Owl Chatter’s style and culture director, ANA de Armas popped by the puzzle yesterday at 47D (“Actress de Armas”). Darling! So good to see you! Gorgeous as ever. George! — see if Phil left any of that hummus for us, with the pine nuts. And a cold Fresca! Sit, sit — how’ve you been? You like Harris?
Yesterday’s puzzle? It is what it is. That is to say, it contains phrases that double back on themselves. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH, SORRY NOT SORRY, NEVER SAY NEVER, and LITTLE BY LITTLE. I like how each of the connecting words is different: is, not, say, and by.
Rex was unimpressed: “Just a depressing offering, all around. The theme concept isn’t restrictive enough to be interesting in the first place. FIRST THINGS FIRST. HEART TO HEART. BLONDE ON BLONDE. GAME RECOGNIZE GAME. I’m not even trying yet and I can rattle off alternative themers no problem. For days. What are we doing here?”
Then he shared an Eddie Rabbitt song: “Step by Step.”
Game recognize game? That’s new to me. Here’s what it means: It’s when someone who “has game” sees it in someone else. This is from the Urban Dictionary: “An esoteric catchphrase of the urban male pimp, playa, rapper or wannabe that carries the weighty implication that only someone who has their game tight can have the appropriate respect and admiration for someone else’s doubtlessly tight game.” But it has spread to have a wider application as an appreciation by anyone who has his sh*t together that someone else has theirs together too.
– Person A: “I can’t believe how well Sarah handled that difficult customer.”
– Person B: “No doubt, game recognize game. She knows how to handle any situation with grace and professionalism.”
There were some cool folks in the puzzle, in addition to our ANA. SARAH was clued via “Comic Silverman,” and DANA via “Agent ___ Scully of “The X-Files.” I’m watching her in the creepy “The Fall” now. Still a knockout.
But ENOS was clued from the bible instead of as ENOS Slaughter, baseball Hall of Famer who played for the Yankees in the 1950s, but mostly for the Cards. A ten-time All Star, he scored the winning run in Game 7 of the 1946 World Series for STL with a famous “mad dash,” and had a lifetime batting average of .300.
“My Father As House Builder” is by Robert Peters. It’s from today’s Writer’s Almanac. I had an English professor (Josef Summers) who said that when poets get together they talk about sounds.
Cedar poles skidded by horse
from swamp to highland, stripped
of bark, hauled to the house-site
on a knoll near the county road.
A pattern in the sand
for two rooms and kitchen, drawn
with a sapling and a string.
Cedar poles adzed flat,
other Poles notched for walls.
We chinked logs with swamp moss
secured by slats, then plastered.
We puttied the windows.
Scrap lumber for the roof and floors.
A cellar hole in the living room,
the sand fetched up by buckets
and dumped in a marsh hole
filled in for a garden plot.
The upper story, hip-roofed, low,
built without plumb lines.
Tin smoke-pipe leaning north,
tied by guy wires to the roof.
We nagged Dad to finish the walls,
but he never did.
The studs, he said,
were good for hanging pots and clothes.
The walls we insulated
with flattened cardboard boxes
and decorated them with pictures
cut from Hearst’s American Weekly Sunday News.
In today’s puzzle, at 6D, ANNA was “Soprano Netrebko.” She’s an opera singer from Russia who was branded a traitor by Putin for a statement she made supporting Ukraine. She lives in Austria.
Son Volt shared this neat old song with us, in her honor.
The puzzle had one of the best clues of the year in it: “Use non-lead pipes?” The answer was SING BACKUP. Get it? Using your pipes is slang for singing. And if you’re not the lead singer, you’re backing up.
VING RHAMES was also an answer (for “Actor who plays Luther Stickell in the ‘Mission: Impossible’ franchise”). He was great as Marcellus in Pulp Fiction. Here’s what Rex says about him in that role:
“what I remember most about his performance in that movie is the back of his neck. The first time you see him, the camera is trained on the back of his very thick neck and bald head for a very long time, as he sits at a table in a bar. Makes him seem very cool and imposing. His neck has a band-aid on it, which apparently inspired a ton of fan theories (“the devil takes your soul from the back of your neck” “he cut himself shaving” etc.).”
You must know these very important additional facts about him:
His given name is Irving. I am not kidding. He studied acting at SUNY Purchase. It was fellow student Stanley Tucci who shortened it to “Ving.”
He has appeared in a film in 34 out of the 38 years from 1986 to 2024.
Now get ready for me to blow your mind: It’s his voice saying “We have the meats” in the Arby ads.
Here’s my Pulp Fiction story:
I saw Pulp Fiction late in its run, in a seedy theater near Times Square. I was alone and there were only about 8 of us in the place.
At one point in the movie, Willis and Travolta meet in a bar and Willis says something that I just missed. I couldn’t hear it. There was no one near me I could ask. But Travolta says to Willis on the screen: “What did you say?”
Great! What luck! He’s going to repeat it!
But Willis just glared at Travolta and said: “You heard me.”
D’oh!
See you tomorrow!
The Wellington Files 