Transit of Venus TOMORROW, Tuesday, June 5

Tomorrow a rare alignment of the orbits of Earth and Venus will take place, allowing people who happen to be on the right spot on Earth a chance to see Venus pass across, or transit, the face of the sun.

Unless there are some breakthroughs in longevity in the next few decades, this will be the last Transit of Venus in our lifetime. The next one won't take place for over one hundred and five years. The last one actually took place just eight years ago, and the last one before that was in 1882.

For all the details on when, where, and how you can see this event, go here:

Bad Astronomy: Everything you need to know about next week’s Transit of Venus

Scenes from the Arts On Fire Festival, Saturday, June 2 2012

As I left the house to go to the weekly gathering of the Northeastern Pennsylvania Writers' Collective, I realized I had forgotten to grab my camera, just in case we decided to head out to the Arts On Fire Festival in Scranton afterwards. "That's OK," I thought. "I can just use the camera in my phone!"

So. Sorry about the poor quality of these photos.

Some of the vendors and the crowd.

Professor Jared Jaffe of Keystone College and some of his RAKU ceramic creations. On the left are ladybug and chicken whistles, while on the right are "RAKU Rocket" teapots. I thought the blue one in the front row resembled one of Lovecraft's Elder Things, while the green one brought to mind a stirge!

One of the most popular exhibits was an interactive art booth. For a few dollars you could buy a hexagonal blank mold made of soft brick. You could then scratch a design into it with a nail, and then molten iron would be poured into the mold, creating a positive image of the negative you had created. On Sunday, all of the cast iron hexagonal tiles will be assembled together into a collective art project! 

Pouring the molten iron into the molds.

Some of the molds. The one on the right in the second row was made by NEPWC member Laurel.

Pouring molten iron into a larger and more complicated mold.

"Arts On Fire," literally: after the molten iron was poured, impurities continued to burn off the surface of the iron for several minutes. This image captures a small flame on the left edge of the rightmost mold.

Who needs Instagram when you have a low-resolution phone camera with a dirty lens and low-light conditions? This old-timey-looking scene was just across the street from the iron furnace.

The Arts On Fire Festival continues through tomorrow, June 3 2012, and will run from 11:00 - 5:00.

Arts On Fire Festival this weekend in Scranton!

The Arts On Fire Festival in Scranton will be going on this weekend! Festivities kick off Friday, June 1. You can read all about it on their blog and their website.

Next weekend is the Scranton Zine Festival! Stay tuned for more details!

I think Anonymous founded a religion or something

Another member of my writing group, Leslee Clapp, pointed this out a few weeks ago. Inscribed on a wall near the Scranton Courthouse as part of a tribute to our armed forces is this quote: "Greater love hath no man than this, that he should lay down his life for a friend." It's attributed to "Anonymous," but it sounds suspiciously like this wandering Jewish fellow I read about in a book somewhere. Specifically, it sounds like Jesus, as quoted in John 15:3. Was it too much trouble to look up the source of the quote? Or was attribution avoided for some other reason?

If we're putting up anonymous quotes around a courthouse, maybe they should consider this one: "Do what thou wilt; that is the whole of the law."

The Northeastern Pennsylvania Writers' Collective

This Saturday marked the final gathering of the Northeastern Pennsylvania Writers' Collective at the 119 Penn Avenue location of the Vintage Theater.  Since long before I joined, the members of the NEPWC have been the "writers in residence" at the Vintage Theater. But with the Vintage Theater moving from the 119 Penn Avenue location and relocating to an address yet to be determined, the NEPWC will be holding its meetings in a new - temporary - location, the upper room of the Northern Light Espresso Bar at 536 Spruce Street, Scranton, every Saturday from noon to 2:00 PM.

We are a very diverse group, with a wide range of experiences and influences. Today's meeting, our largest in a long time, featured several poems, two totally unconnected science fiction pieces, a monologue on the private life of Ben Cartwright, the latest chapter in a continuing story, two rousing prose pieces, and the first act of a play written by someone who's never written a play before. In this final meeting at this location we also welcomed two new members, both of whom read for the group.

As I have stated before, the Vintage Theater isn't really closing - it's just going away for a little while, and will come back in another location sometime soon. In the meantime, the Northeastern Pennsylvania Writers' Collective will also go on - at Northern Light.

Next steps for the Vintage Theater

While it may sound dramatic to declare that "the Vintage Theater in Scranton is closing" (as I did) and to refer to the final First Friday celebration on June 1 as "the Last First Friday" (as I do), the truth, as always, is somewhat more nuanced.

The Vintage Theater is moving out of its current location at 119 Penn Avenue. (This isn't even the original location of the Vintage Theater. I discovered last night that I was correct in believing that it was originally housed in the old Ritz Theater where I used to see dollar movies when I was in college.) But that doesn't mean that the Vintage Theater is going away.

The idea of the Vintage Theater is what's important. It has been a multi-purpose art space where specific events - concerts, art exhibits, poetry readings, plays - brought the people in, and the synergies between the various art forms sharing the same space brought people back. That idea will be maintained, regardless of where the next incarnation of the Vintage Theater sets up shop.

The proprietors of the Vintage Theater are looking for a new home. Something affordable, something within the footprint of Scranton's First Friday celebrations, something accessible, something that is capable of serving the needs of all the different artists who present their creative works within the theater. They have made a list of seventeen different possibilities, and last night an eighteenth was presented - one that no one realized was even on the market.

But they're not rushing into this. They want to do this right. So during the transitional period, we will all have to be patient.

In the meantime, they have needs. Immediate, medium-term, and long-term needs. In the immediate future: they will need to be out of the 119 Penn Avenue location after the June 1 First Friday celebrations. That means that by June 1 they need to be 99% moved out. So in addition to being patient, anyone who really cares about the Vintage Theater should be prepared to lend a hand in some way - now, tomorrow, during the transition period, or in perpetuity.


The immediate needs:

- A plumber capable of doing the disconnection work on a very expensive and delicate European espresso/latte machine. I doubt that my own ham-fisted plumbing skills are up to the task.

- A carpenter with a portable saw to disassemble the very large and heavy countertops.

- An electrician to help with removal of light fixtures.

- General moving help to get stuff off the premises. This includes vehicles for hauling things away.

- Storage space for stuff that's been removed from the premises.

To reduce the tonnage of stuff that needs to be moved there will be a rummage sale on Monday, May 28th starting at noon. Books, chairs, art materials - almost anything that's still around on Monday will be up for sale. (So, FYI, if you're reading this and happen to have stuff that you kind-of left sitting around the Vintage Theater, you might want to reclaim it before Monday.)

After the hard (and frankly, heartbreaking) work of vacating the 119 Penn Avenue location is over, then the next stages will continue in earnest: identifying the needs of the next incarnation of the Vintage Theater, and making it a reality. And after that happens will come the really hard point: doing what needs to be done to keep the theater going.

The Vintage Theater is closing. The Vintage Theater will be back.

End of an era: The Vintage Theater in Scranton is closing

(Note: I originally intended to use this title on a post about the end of my run of weekly appearances on WBRE's PA Live!, presenting the NEPA Blogs Blog of the Week every Tuesday. But that ship sailed long ago, and I haven't gotten around to writing that post yet. So this post gets to claim the title.)

The Vintage Theater in Scranton will be closing after the upcoming First Friday event on Friday, June 1, 2012.

I first heard about the Vintage Theater (I think) shortly after it opened, in an article in the Scranton Times. I skimmed it, and somehow managed to convince myself that the theater that had been rehabbed and refurbished and reopened was the old Ritz Theater, where my friends and I used to catch dollar third-run showings of films like Out of Africa and Who Framed Roger Rabbit? back in college. But I was wrong.

I found out how wrong I was the first time I went to the Vintage Theater. It wasn't that long ago - just last September 15th. I had been invited to take part in a Bloggers' Roundtable being held at the Vintage Theater. It was a Thursday night, which seemed like an odd time. I went into the event knowing very little about what I was getting into and prepared for anything. Well, almost anything. After actually locating the venue, I met with the three other bloggers who would be taking part, and then we sat in a line across a stage (no table involved, round or otherwise) and discussed blogging.

Towards the end of the night I noticed a trickle of people coming into the theater and looking at us on the stage with some surprise. They didn't seem to be there for the Bloggers' Roundtable, but migrated to a smaller room in the back of the theater. Some of them did take seats in the audience, and one even asked a question or two.

As the event came to a close I discovered that we were sharing the Vintage that evening with a poetry reading. I hadn't been to a poetry reading in many years, and decided to stick around and take it in. The group was called the Northeastern Pennsylvania Writers' Collective, and they presented a wide range of poems and even some prose pieces every third Thursday of the month. I found out that they were a writing group that met every Saturday at the Vintage. I was about to start working again on a very irregular schedule, so I wasn't sure when I'd be able to meet with them, but I was definitely interested.

One person stepped up to do a "commercial" - her name was Kait Burrier, and she would be presenting dramatic readings of her work that coming Sunday at the Vintage. I saw this as an opportunity to get a taste of the cultural offerings of Scranton, a place that was at once familiar and brand-new to me.

Before the Bloggers' Roundtable broke up I was approached by the people who had arranged for it to take place, and I discovered that this was the opening shot of the Scranton Pages & Places Book Festival, which would take place Saturday, October 1 at various locations throughout Scranton - including the Vintage Theater. I was presented with a pass to the festival. It would be my first full day off after working my first rotation of night shift, but I was determined to make it there.

And I did. I took in the workshops on Non-Fiction Writing and Fiction Writing being presented at the Vintage. In between the two, I became re-acquainted with the Northeastern Pennsylvania Writers' Collective, who were having their weekly meeting in the back of the Vintage. I also met a writer and blogger whose posts I'd been following for several months - a startling and seemingly improbable encounter for both of us, though in retrospect it seems perfectly reasonable that I would encounter her as a part of a writing group.

I began going to the weekly meetings of the writing group at the Vintage just as soon as I could - which, from my old work calendar, looks like it would have been sometime in November. It was around this time that I was asked to take part in another event taking place at the Vintage Theater - the Scranton Bluekey Tweetup, an event designed to raise awareness of the plight of refugees. This event was organized by blogger Mandy Boyle, who I had first met in person at one of the Pages & Places writing workshops at the Vintage! Michelle, my co-administrator at NEPA Blogs, was also there (and had persuaded me to go in the first place), as were other local bloggers.

A little more than a month after the Tweetup Michelle and I were heading back to the Vintage for Pecha Kucha Night, another event that Mandy Boyle helped bring into being. This event was huge. The Vintage was crowded, more crowded than I had ever seen it before. But that would change.

My involvement with the writing group ramped up as the year went on. I had managed to miss all of their Open Mic Poetry Nights since my first chance encounter in September. The March one was going to be something special, focusing on just one of our writers for the second half of the show. I nominated myself to serve as group photographer, and manged to take some halfway decent images. A month later the spotlight turned on another of our writers, and I improved upon my technique somewhat - taking pictures indoors in a low-light situation with a tiny snapshot camera and not using a flash. (A tripod and an understanding of how your camera's Sports mode works are essential for this.)

But before the April Open Mic Night there would be one other event at the Vintage: the Scranton StorySlam.

I hadn't planned to go. It was right after Blog Fest, and the same day as the birthday party of the daughter of some of my friends, and I would be starting out more than eighty miles away. Michelle would be going as one of the judges, so I felt that her presence kept NEPA Blogs involved. Surely we didn't both have to be there! But the organizer had made a point of coming out to Blog Fest. And in a strange, freak coincidence, as soon as I began following the StorySlam on Twitter I found that I was the hundredth (or was it the thousandth?) Twitter follower and had won free admission. So now fate had decreed that I had to go, whether I wanted to or not.

That event was the most crowded I have ever seen the Vintage. It became standing room only long before the start of the show, and at halftime I had to retreat to the safety of the little room in the back where the writing group routinely met just so I could breathe. But overall, the StorySlam was a resounding success.

So we had the April Open Mic, and began making plans for the May one. This was a big one. It once again featured one member of the Northeastern Pennsylvania Writers' Collective - but it was Jennifer Diskin, a member who had passed away in December, after a long and epic battle with cancer. I had never met her; I had only just started coming to meetings when I learned that she was very ill, and then that she had died. I didn't know her, but I knew that this was going to be an event not to be missed.

It was beautiful. The Vintage was crowded again - not like it was for the StorySlam, but in a manner appropriate for a memorial poetry reading. Friends read poems by her, or about her, or inspired by her, or even works that had been her favorites.  Through it all I clicked away with my camera, capturing some of my best pictures yet.

That was Thursday. Today Conor, the proprietor of the Vintage Theater, sat down with our writing group (after a particularly raucous session) and let us know that he would be vacating the premises following the upcoming First Friday event on June 1. He's planning to re-establish himself somewhere else in Scranton, using lessons learned from this venture, re-imagining the venue with a focus on art space and performing space.

We support him in this, of course. But it will take time. And in the meantime, the Northeastern Pennsylvania Writers' Collective needs to find a new - temporary - home. We appear to have found one, though I'll hold off making the announcement until it's official.

The Vintage Theater. I've had a lot of history with it in just the last eight months. It was a good place, and it served us well. I will be forever grateful to Conor for all the good times we had there.

Unillustrated Instructional 2: How to boil an egg

OK, first a clarification: this isn't really about how to boil an egg. You'll find plenty of advice on that elsewhere. Someone came up with a clever new way of doing this a while ago - bring the eggs to a boil in a pot, then shut off the heat and leave them, covered, for fifteen minutes - and I found that this resulted in an egg with a mostly-uncooked yolk. That's fine if you're into that sort of thing, I suppose. My advice there: cook the eggs long enough to be hard-boiled, but not so long that you start to remove the water from the egg white, resulting in a tough egg white with a waffle-textured surface.

Also, start by gently heating the water with the eggs already in it. Heating the water too quickly, or adding the eggs to already-boiling water, may make the shells crack.

But enough of that. This instructional is meant to address a more serious issue: distinguishing hard-boiled eggs from uncooked eggs.

When we were kids my mom would mark hard-boiled eggs by drawing smiley faces on them. The problem was, if she did this using a marker, the marker ink would bleed through the shell and get onto the egg white. If she did it with a pencil, the markings would be so light that it would be possible to mistake a hard-boiled egg for a raw one - and sometimes the mistake would go the other way.

A few years ago I remembered something I had heard from the nuns back when I was in grade school, about how in the days of the Great Depression people would dye their Easter Eggs with things like coffee grounds or onion skins. It hit me that adding a piece of onion skin to the pot while boiling eggs might cause some of the color to leak onto the shells. And whaddya know, it worked!

(I recently learned that there's a term for these eggs - pace eggs, though these are associated with the Easter season, and appear to be much more darkly dyed than the eggs I make.)

To boil an egg so that it can be easily distinguished from raw eggs in the refrigerator, add a small bit of onion skin to the pot. That's it. I use roughly a 3/4" x 3/4" bit of onion skin, though whatever size you grab will probably be fine. You're looking for the dry outer skin of the onion, the stuff that ends up left over in the bag. The larger the piece the darker the color of the boiled eggs. A small piece will cause them to turn beige, a moderate piece will give a buff color like those fancy expensive eggs at the supermarket (so this is an inexpensive way to fool any snoopy friends who might judge you by the color of your eggs), and a lot of skin will turn the eggs a mottled brown.

One note: this doesn't seem to work with the purple outer skins of red onions. If you're feeling adventurous and want to experiment with marking your eggs red, you might want to add some beet juice to the water when you boil the eggs. This might (or might not) change the taste of the eggs - I have no idea.

Unillustrated Instructional 1: How to use a notebook

For years I've wanted to share some of the hard-learned lessons in my life with my blog readers. I figured I would write up a series of simple instructional posts to cover hints, tips, and solutions to everyday annoyances. Why, I could even illustrate them with photos! All I had to do was get around to taking the photos.


And so I waited...and waited...and waited...


...and finally I thought, Fine, I'll go without the photos!


Which brings us to here.

My first instructional is on something most of us have probably been doing, off and on, since first grade: How to use a notebook. I've spent the last few weeks in a training course for a new job (yes, amazingly enough, some employers are still willing to train new employees for their jobs - and pay them during the training, too!) and have filled several notebooks with notes. That's a lot of notes, covering a lot of subjects, taken over a lot of days. By observing how other people have been taking notes. I've developed some new notebook management skills that have been very useful.

1. Put the date on every page. In grade school I got into the habit of putting the date at the beginning of each day's notes. This made it easy to flip back and see what information was covered on which day, and to review information from a specific day. But after observing a fellow trainee putting the date on the upper outside top line of each page, I realized how much easier it would be to locate a specific day's notes, or to tell which day each page of notes was from, if the date was included on every page.

2. Use the top margin space on every page for broad subject headers. As in a textbook, this makes it easy to flip through the notebook and find which topic was being covered on each day.

3. Use the outer margin areas on every page for specific topic guides. This is the left-hand margin on the left pages, and the right-hand margin on the right pages. You could also use this space for the broad subject headers, but that might be redundant. Instead, focus on what's specifically being covered on that page. Write this information however it works for you. I find it most effective to write it so it can be read when the book is held sideways. I write the words so they are all properly aligned, regardless of what page they are on, when the notebook is held sideways with the spine at the top.

4. Leave plenty of room for future notes. I used to like to fill in notebooks very neatly, or cram them full of information. But you should allow for the possibility that you will be adding notes to your notes somewhere down the line. Maybe this will be an expansion of the notes you have taken, maybe a clarification, or maybe just notes about the notes. Whatever the reason, you may find yourself adding notes to your notes.

And that's that. Whether you're filling a notebook with information for a class, or are just writing poems and stories for your own amusement, following these steps may help make your notebook more useful to you.

Do you have any hints and tips on using a notebook? Let me know in the comments, and maybe I'll add them to this post!

Blog of the Week!

I'm really excited - I feel a little silly at how excited I am! - to have been the NEPA Blogs Blog of the Week on WBRE's PA Live! this afternoon. I knew that it was coming, but I didn't know when. The original plan was for a hand-off between me and Michelle: I would end my time as host of the Blog of the Week segment by featuring her blog, and she would begin hers by featuring mine. But things became complicated when Michelle found herself unable to take over the segment, and our Plans B and C fell through. When blogger Shannon Nelson (who was already doing a spot on PA Live!) came forward and was willing to take over the segment for us, Michelle and I (mostly Michelle) went into overdrive getting Blogs of the Week ready ahead of time. (Shannon is not able to come in every week, so she tapes several segments ahead of time.)

Still, I didn't know when my blog might be featured, and I was super excited when I found out it would be this week! The timing was perfect, since I've just begun my ninth year of blogging. That's close to a record for this area - Mark Cour has been at it longer, first on the various incarnations of Wilkes-Barre Online, and then on his (relatively) new Circumlocution for Dummies.

Click here to see Michelle's Blog of the Week post on NEPA Blogs. And click here to see Shannon presenting Another Monkey as the Blog of the Week on WBRE's PA Live!

Eight years

As of today, I've been blogging for eight years. My first post came out on May 14, 2004, and I've been at it ever since.

Eight years ago I could not have imagined all the changes that would be documented in my blog. I bought a house. My father died. I lost my job. I made weekly appearances on television for seven months. I joined a writers' group. I became involved with a community I never even knew existed before.

My output has dropped a lot in recent months, but that may change. I'm still trying to reorient myself to the reality of having a job once again, and trying to give other projects the attention they deserve.

Most of the bloggers I was reading back in 2004 have closed up their blogs and moved on. A few I keep in touch with. Some have intentionally put themselves out of reach. I have no plans to shut down Another Monkey. I certainly haven't said all I have to say, and I know that there are many more things to blog about just over the horizon.

Coincidentally - at least I think this was a coincidence - my ninth year of blogging will start off with my blog being spotlighted as the NEPA Blogs Blog of the Week on PA Live! tomorrow! Tune in tomorrow to WBRE between 4:00 and 5:00 to see, or watch the segment online once they post it!

An Encounter in Scranton

This is a work of fiction, a response to a perversely difficult writing prompt. As it is my custom to insert writing prompts verbatim into my works, the perversity of this prompt was especially herd to work around. But I did it. More commentary after the break.

"What are you reading, a book?"

It was an idiot's question, asked by an idiot, and I was already having a hard enough time with one of those. I looked up from my reading at my uninvited inquisitor. He had the appearance of a frat boy, a pampered rich kid, spiked dyed hair and popped collar, glassy fish-eyes and a softness from too much beer and not enough labor. His pink shirt and mint green jacket would have looked ridiculous in any other era, but were the height of fashion for 1987.

"Yes. Yes, it's a book," I replied, looking at him coldly over the top of my glasses.

He chuckled, shaking his head. "That's one hobby I could never get into," he said, and shuffled away towards the doors that led to the platform where the buses arrived and departed. I watched him go with a mixture of loathing and gratitude. Then I returned to my book.

"The last time I read a book," came an accented voice from nearby, "my family was destroyed. By an asteroid."

I looked up again. Obviously a bus depot in downtown Scranton, Pennsylvania was a poor choice of location for reading Dostoevsky. This particular voice belonged to a man so ancient and withered I could have mistaken him for a desiccated corpse. He was sitting in the row of molded plastic seats opposite me, maybe ten feet away. I hadn't noticed him before.

"We lived in a village along the Podkamennaya Tunguska, the Stony Tunguska River," he continued without any encouragement from me. "Early one morning fire came from the sky and left destruction in its wake. Our village was reduced to ashes, the people burned to cinders. I was not there when this happened, of course." No, of course not, I thought, staring at him over my book. His watery blue eyes seemed fixed on a point ten feet past my right shoulder.

"I was in Irkutsk," he offered in response to absolutely no prodding. "I had already set out upon my quest, the quest which had been laid upon my shoulders by another who had grown too old to continue. I did not seek it, nor did I even believe I was the one truly intended to take up the burden. But once I had taken it up, it was impossible to put down."

Why me?, I thought. He went on.

"I was there in Irkutsk to sift through the ashes of the great library, destroyed in a fire nearly thirty years before. But there were precious few ashes to sift. So I allowed myself the pleasure of a book - one written by the very man whose words you are reading now."

I closed my book. The adventures of Prince Myshkin and company would have to wait until later. I glanced at my watch. My bus should be here soon.

"The universe permitted me to finish my reading, to enjoy my moment of truancy. When I had completed the book, I received word of the great disaster that had befallen everyone I had ever known, the great rock from the sky that had blasted away all traces of my past. I took this as a sign that I was to keep my feet upon the path, to be steadfast in the performance of my duty. To continue my quest without diversion or distraction."

He stopped talking. I thought maybe he was done. Or maybe he had simply died. As far as I could tell, he hadn't blinked during his entire monologue. But then he continued.

"The quest has led me across five continents, over mountains and across deserts and through jungles. Now, after more than eight decades, it has led me here. My journey is nearly at an end. But the quest is far from over." Finally, a blink - I was starting to wonder if he was blind or something. But now his eyes were fixed directly on mine.

"The time has come to pass on the quest. I bid you farewell." There was an odd note of finality to these last words.

The man at the counter loudly shouted out the arrival of the 4:17 from New York City, continuing on to Wilkes-Barre, Hazleton, and points south. I was still looking at the old man across from me when a crowd of passengers swarmed in, eager to use the facilities, buy some snacks from the vending machines, or get on with whatever business had brought them to Scranton. In a few minutes the bus would be ready to depart, and I would be on it. I hoped the crazy old man from Tunguska would not.

A dozen or so passengers trampled noisily through the depot directly between me and the old man, dragging their luggage behind them. When they had moved on, the row of seats opposite me was empty.

There was a matchbook on the floor under where the old man had been sitting.

OK, I thought. I've seen this a thousand times. Jim Rockford finds a matchbook with the name of a bar printed on the cover, and a phone number written inside. He pieces together the clues and solves the crime. So I was going to go and pick up the matchbook and look in it and find something, some message or code or secret symbol, some clue that would indelibly mark me as the next bearer of the old man's quest. And I would be stuck, and my life forever changed, and I would find myself wandering over mountains and across deserts and through jungles in pursuit of some something the old man had never gotten around to mentioning.

Or maybe I would draw "Tippy" and be well on my way to becoming a professional artist.

Screw that. I just wanted to get back to Wilkes-Barre, maybe finish my book. I gathered together my things and tucked them into my backpack. I put on my coat. Those buses were usually cold.

I slung my backpack over one shoulder. Then I walked over, picked up the matchbook, and pocketed it. Just for the heck of it.

I stepped out of the depot and onto the platform, closing my coat against the cold Fall air. The driver was just scrolling the destination sign on the front of the bus from "Scranton" to "Wilkes-Barre." I reached into my pocket for my ticket.

"Yo, chief," came an all-too-familiar voice, "you got a light?" I turned to look at the speaker. The glassy-eyed frat boy had a hand-rolled cigarette dangling from his mouth. He was holding a small paper-wrapped package he hadn't been holding before.

I reached into my pocket, pulled out the matchbook, and handed it to him.

"Keep it," I said.

Jen Diskin Memorial Poetry Reading

This Thursday, May 17, the Vintage Theater in Scranton (119 Penn Avenue) will be hosting an evening of poetry by, about, and inspired by the late Jennifer Diskin. I never had the opportunity to meet her, but she was a much-beloved member of the Northeastern Pennsylvania Writers' Collective, and I know from the memorial posts at the time of her passing that she had touched the lives of many of my friends.


See the Facebook page for this event here.

Back from the (almost) dead

Friday night I went out to see a friend's band in Scranton. To hear them, too, though I wish I had followed my own advice and taken earplugs with me - they were good, but loud, and standing directly in front of one of the speakers didn't help.

Within an hour of getting home from the event I managed to unleash a virus onto my computer.

In retrospect I think I know what happened. A pop-up window appeared while I was bumbling around the internet and asked me if I wanted to install a certain program. I was given options of "Install" and "Cancel" - and like an idiot, I clicked on the one marked "Cancel", instead of x-ing or Ctrl-Alt-Deleting the browser out of existence. As I have just learned, when these pop-ups pop up, often the entire thing is one big button, and clicking anywhere in it will install the program.

The first sign something was wrong was when I was attempting to open some trusted sites in Chrome and was informed that the sites - like Facebook, Twitter, Blogger, and even Google - had suspicious-looking authentication certificates. I decided something was wrong with Chrome, and had to open IE to get to Google so I could research the problem. The official Chrome support sites were less than helpful, consisting mostly of people posting precisely the same problem I was having, followed by requests for more details from the Google techs. It took a lot of digging and a lot of false leads, but I finally came across one explanation that should have occurred to me from the start: malware.

Not to worry. I had Malwarebytes, and I had (had being the functional word; I don't see either of these now!) Spybot Search and Destroy (I think that's what it was called), and I had a top-notch antivirus program...which should have protected me in the first place.  Malwarebytes revealed a collection of suspicious-looking things that I removed. Spybot spotted a few others. My AV was able to target one program as the source of the problem, but couldn't remove it.

Fine. Screw it. I had a virus problem almost exactly a year ago, and took my computer to one of those big box electronics stores to have it deloused, and while I was electronically pouring money into their pockets,  I decided to spend a little more for the extended protection program. So I knew I was covered. Unfortunately, I didn't haul my computer up there until Sunday afternoon, and they told me that turnaround time would be about 48 hours, as I expected. But they didn't actually get things wrapped up until late Tuesday night, so Wednesday was the earliest I could pick it up.

In the meantime I had online obligations I was shirking. I should have written up the NEPA Blogs Blog of the Week for Tuesday, but I didn't, and dumped it in Michelle's lap. I also should have changed the NEPA Blogs header image on Wednesday, but I had had the foresight to send a bunch of header images to Michelle a few weeks ago, so she was also able to take care of that - and get the story behind the image from the person who submitted it.

Meanwhile, the weather conspired against me. We have had copious rain the past few days, but Wednesday started off sunny and clear - perfect grass-growing weather. I was in work during the day and couldn't do anything about it, and the forecast had suggested that rain would be coming later in the day. But it stayed dry into the afternoon, and conditions were perfect after work for mowing the lawn. So I did. By the time I was done, I really didn't feel much like taking a trip to pick up my computer. So I let it go until today.

Now here I am. Hundreds of emails behind, dozens of Facebook updates and tweets and blog post updates to catch up with. Several deaths have passed without my comment - George "Goober" Lindsey (whose hat on Hee Haw was a prime example of the lost art of repurposing a used-up fedora - and a real-world version of the "crown" worn by Archie's friend Jughead), Maurice Sendak (who was haunted all his life by the fact that he accidentally brought about the death of one of his friends as a child during a simple game of catch, when the friend ran into the street to retrieve a ball Sendak had thrown too far - and was hit by a car), and Vidal Sassoon (who had the most amazingly kickass biography you could imagine - how many people were both anti-Nazi street fighters and revolutionized women's hair fashion?) I also failed to commemorate the anniversary of the passing of Franco Kossa, the founder of the Sideshow Gathering. My own blogiversary is in here somewhere - either I have just missed it, or it's just about to happen.

So now I'm back. It will take some time for me to catch up. I've just re-installed Malwarebytes on my system, and a scan came up clean. Spybot Search & Destroy is installing as I type these words. This post is (almost) my first signal to the world that I'm back online. We'll see what I missed in the past few days!

Reintegrating

Well, I expected to be back to a regular posting schedule, but I haven't gotten there yet. I started a new job three weeks ago. We're still in training, and it's pretty intense, more intense than I imagined it would be. The commute is a bit of a shock - 5-6 miles (depending on what path I take) and around 10 minutes, instead of 33-36 miles (it increased by three miles over the twenty years I worked there) and anywhere from 45 to infinity-minus-one minutes.

It's weird having "afternoons" again. When I was on salary these really didn't exist, though I would sometimes stop at a store on the way home. When I was working a twelve-hour schedule these didn't exist either, but that was offset by the four days off - though one was always a recovery day. (Eventually I expect to be put on an afternoon-into-evening schedule, so my "afternoons" will be before work.)

It's also weird having weekends. You might imagine that being unemployed is one long weekend, but it isn't. Your time is not your own, and you must be prepared to account for every minute (of the workweek, at least) to the government. You were sick? Very sorry to hear that, but since you weren't available to work, you weren't eligible for unemployment. You were off somewhere having fun? Again, ineligible. You weren't applying to n jobs each week, despite the fact that the only jobs available are ones that pay a fraction of what you were making before, actually pay less than unemployment, and have prerequisites that you don't have? Tough. No unemployment for you.

But I do value my weekends. I treasure my time with the Northeastern Pennsylvania Writers' Collective every Saturday from 12:30 - 2:30, and I wish I could spend more time with them. Perhaps I'll be able to rearrange some things to make that possible. I also need to find the time to write more - I haven't written any new fiction or poetry in weeks. Yesterday I read my blog post from September 11, 2008, complete with a multimedia component courtesy of another member. It was a little...intense. I think I may read another older (but less intense) piece next week.

One weird side effect of working so close to home: When I worked very far from home, I never went out with friends after work because of the long haul I would face when it was time to go home. Now that I work close to home, I never go out after work because anywhere we might go would increase the distance I would have to travel home! I'm hoping for lousy weather so I have less reason to head straight home after work.

The arc of my work life so far:

1989: Graduated with B.S. in Physics, second major in Philosophy, minor in Math
1990-1991: Solar Cell manufacturing
1992: CD Plater
1993-1995: Statistical Process Control Coordinator, CD manufacturing and pre-production
1996-1999: Statistician, Data Analyst, CD manufacturing and pre-production
1999-2007: DVD Asset Manager
2007-2010: DVD Mold/Bond Operator
2011-2012: DVD Mold/Bond Operator (temporary, part-time)
2012-?: Travel Agent

And where to next...?

Endangered Susquehanna

For the past year, the Susquehanna River has enjoyed the dubious distinction of being at the top of the American Rivers list of Most Endangered Rivers in America. In a few weeks a new list will be released, most probably not featuring the Susquehanna. This is not because the Susquehanna is any less endangered than it was when it made the list (for the second time this decade), but because there are other waterways that need the attention that being on such a list affords.

At the request of Don Williams, the undaunted and tireless defender of the river known as the Susquehanna River Sentinel, I will be posting the banner that commemorates the Susquehanna's status as the #1 endangered river in America. Don was the prime mover behind this recognition.

The threat goes on. The damage is being done daily. Anyone who lives downriver from Pittston knows the sort of damage unregulated and unchecked industrial pollution can do. Natural gas extraction now poses a threat to the Susquehanna that could potentially dwarf the damage done by coal mining and illegal chemical dumping into the Butler Mine Tunnel. While it would be nice to think that we can always count on folks like Don Williams to keep up the fight for us, it is up to every one of us to take responsibility for our environment - and our river.

Segue

No, this post isn't a segue. I'm still working on the third of the Three Blogtastic Days posts. But I have recently gotten my hands on a paperback dictionary - The Merriam-Webster Dictionary, New Edition, copyright 2004 - to replace the several that I've misplaced, because I don't trust online dictionaries any more than I trust online encyclopedias. And I was reminded of some fun facts about dictionaries - specifically, things missing from dictionaries.

"Cilantro," for example. It's a common word, an herb derived from the leaves of the coriander plant, distinct in taste from the seeds that are commonly referred to as "coriander." At least in the U.S. In England, where running shoes are known as "trainers" and popsicles as "iced lollies," the word is unknown - and therefore unworthy of addition into the Oxford English Dictionary, or any dictionary derived from it. "... anyone who claims not to know that 'cilantro' is merely a recent american name for the native european herb 'coriander' (p.511) is not fit, in my humble opinion, to act as a referee for this excellent book!" says one commentor on the Amazon.com page for the Shorter OED, demonstrating that they really should look up the definition of the word "dictionary" sometime.

Another word of interest is "segue." It's pronounced SEG-way, and refers to a transitional mechanism in speech or music. I think. The problem is, many dictionaries - including the one in front of me - do not contain the word "segue." Why? I have no idea. The word is defined in various places online, including Wikipedia (where the definitions restrict its use to music and journalism), dictionary.com (which will attempt to sell you all manner of stand-up scooters), Merriam-Webster online (loaded with pop-up ads, and apparently allowing the term only for music), and the online dictionary freedictionary.com (powered by Farlex, a name synonymous with...something?)

Most of those sites I do not trust. But most paper dictionaries are crap, too; the name "Webster's" passed into public domain long ago, and now anyone can claim to have created a Webster's dictionary. Really, anyone can publish any dictionary at all, with no more authority than the most recent person who edited the last Wikipedia article you read. But eventually the more respected printed dictionaries, for all their flaws and omissions, will go the way of the Encyclopedia Britannica. After that, you'd better hope that the definition you've found online is accurate. Because you won't have anything to check it against.

Three Blogtastic Days, Day 2: NEPA BlogFest

FRIDAY, MARCH 29, 2012:

I was late, as usual. I really, really meant to be there early, but I got wrapped up with some yard work on what was threatening to be the last dry and beautiful day for a while, and then had to make a detour to buy some tickets for the Mega Millions lottery. (I am so glad that is over. Somebody let me know the next time a lottery is over $200 million or so, and I might consider buying another ticket or two.) I wanted to be there at 5:30, but it was closer to 6:20 when I pulled up.

Things hadn't gone off exactly as planned. We had intended to have the Arts SEEN Gallery, two doors down from Rooney's, open that evening for the benefit of everyone at BlogFest. But there was an issue of the doors being locked, and the keys (and keyholders) being unavailable. Then there was the issue of the coffee shop between Rooney's and the Arts SEEN Gallery. While I had done what I could to persuade the owner to stay open for BlogFest, he had made the decision to close at 5:00, as is his custom on Fridays. (Which would explain why, during the previous four BlogFests, I wasn't even aware that there was a coffee shop there.) So he lost out on a considerable amount of business. Oh well.

I met with Michelle Hryvnak Davies and Mike Burnside outside of Rooney's. We hung out and talked for a while, but I was eager to get inside and unpack the things I had brought, which included special "BLOGGER" nametags and a blogger sign-in sheet. Once I got inside I immediately saw Gort and Joe Valenti, the political-blogging duo who came up with the idea for Blog Fest. At a table inside I saw Karla Porter talking with Justin Vacula and someone else I didn't recognize, but would much later discover was Stephen Albert from Not Cease From Exploration.

As the night went on the bloggers continued to pour in: Chantal Rich from Crafternoon Tea, Steve Urbanski (whose blog is currently on hiatus, but who writes for examiner.com), and Brent Pennington and Mandy Boyle. Later still I saw Tom Borthwick of NEPartisan and someone I didn't recognize at first, but who I later realized was Cheri Sundra with a different hairstyle! Leslie Stewart of Darling Stewie came bopping in, unmistakable in her style, accompanied by a blogger we don't have linked yet - Daz aka DKSaxton. Dave Yonki came in and immediately called me Tom, apparently missing my name tag. (But at least this time he didn't call Michelle "Jen Wade" in his post!) James O'Meara stopped by briefly - he was there as a blogger and on the job as a political aide!

There were plenty of politicians in attendance for all or part of the night. I recognized Gerry Mullery, Matt Cartwright, and Bill Vinsko, but there were quite a few others - see Gort's post for a complete list!

Gene Stilp was the hit of the night. He brought along a big enough posse of young, enthusiastic supporters to fill several tables alone - if they ever sat down! He was a ball of energy throughout the night, singing and dancing and posing for pictures. But what really stole the show was someone he brought along with him - Pignelope the Pig! This giant inflatable pig occupied much of the sidewalk in front of Rooney's, and has appeared in everyone's photos from the night.  Whatever happens, we'll have to make sure that Gene Stilp and Pignelope show up at future events.

Pignelope, looking dashing in a Blogging Hat

Several non-politicians and/or non-bloggers showed up just to see what was going on. My friend Betsy came in early (well before I showed up), and Susan Prywara and Sonibet Diaz of the Wilkes-Barre CareerLink came by along with several members of the Job Club to see if it was really as good a networking opportunity as I had made it out to be. I was able to connect Susan with Gerry Mullery as a potential Job Club speaker, and directed some friends who can benefit from the services of CareerLink and the Job Club to speak with Susan throughout the night. A blogger who I know through my writing group, Leslee Clapp, also stopped by to see what I've been talking about the last few weeks.

As the night wore on I noticed that two bloggers had signed in who I had never met before - Nathalie Sousa of Casa de Lola and Brian Fanelli of All the Right Notes. I was able to locate them quickly by looking for people who hadn't been there earlier. Brian also runs a monthly poetry reading, and I excitedly told him about the 570 Writers site that is a combination blog and events calendar for writing-related events. He pointed out that he already knew about it, since he actually co-administers the site.

(I probably missed a few bloggers throughout the night. I know that one aspiring blogger was in attendance, though his blog is currently without content. If you were there and I missed you, let me know!)

UPDATE, 4/2/2012: I took a look at the picture below to see if there were any bloggers that I missed. I started off by saying, "OK, at the bar there's Big Dan and Mrs. Big Dan, and..." So, yeah, I missed the bloggers from Big Dan's Big Blog and the Politics in Healthcare Blog!

As the night wound down I flopped into a chair at a table with, variously, Michelle, Karla, Duke from Dallas (who doesn't have a blog, but should), Cheri, and Justin. We exchanged pleasant conversations until the band - a four-piece electric act - started blasting out the greatest hits of the 60's and 70's at such a deafening volume that the conversations quickly devolved into "WHAT DID YOU SAY?" "I SAID, 'WHAT DID YOU SAY?'" "I SAID, 'I CAN'T HEAR YOU!!!'" At that point I could have really, really used a quiet coffee shop to use as a refuge and a source of coffee and pastries. That place would have seen a steady stream of business throughout the night.

People standing and talking. Many of them could have spent a few minutes sitting and talking in the closed coffee shop next door,
especially once the band decided to rock out at full volume and made it impossible to have a conversation.

So the "BLOGGER" name tags worked really well, helping to distinguish bloggers from non-bloggers, and identifying bloggers by name. The sign-in sheet worked well, too - not just as a way to keep track of who was there, but as a way to alert us when new bloggers walked in when we weren't watching.

The coffee shop being closed was a definite problem, a problem we've got nearly six months to resolve. The band was another problem. I love live music, but for an evening of mingling and networking, perhaps something more subdued would be more appropriate. I know several acoustic acts in the area who might be willing to play at the next BlogFest. Alternatively, we could incorporate the music into the event itself. Three words: BLOG FEST KARAOKE. See your favorite bloggers sing their hearts out!  Thrill to candidates for political office trying to make it through versions of "Brandy," "Horse with No Name," and "Sister Golden Hair" without screwing up badly enough to lose any votes! ...hey, it could work!

Gort has posted a wrap-up of all of the posts about the Spring 2012 Blog Fest over on NEPA Blogs. And before you get worried about when the next Blog Fest will be...well, that was announced even before this Blog Fest was over!

OK, technically it's the last full day of Summer. We'll see what the weather is like then!

Three Blogtastic Days, Day 1: Best Blogs of the Lehigh Valley

THURSDAY, MARCH 28, 2012:

A while ago Michelle Davies, co-administrator at NEPA Blogs, told me about a "Best Blogs of the Lehigh Valley" contest being run by the Allentown Morning Call. Now, I've soured on these popularity contests that are run by local papers after seeing how a few of them operate. The paper throws open the floor for nominations, and a handful of the most-frequently-nominated entries get put up for a vote. Maybe three, maybe five. In one "best blogger" contest, there weren't even links to the nominated blogs - you had to go searching for the blogs yourself. Or not. Because ultimately, these aren't contests based on merit, or even on popularity; they're contests to see who can have their friends stuff the ballot box as quickly as possible.

The Morning Call's contest was different. It listed and linked to every nominee right from the beginning - and didn't take down the list once winners were announced.

http://www.mcallcommunity.com/mychoicevoice/end.php
(We've duplicated the list on NEPA Blogs for safe keeping.)

After we added Shane Burcaw's Laughing At My Nightmare to NEPA Blogs, we talked about how it would be good if someone were to take the initiative to create a Lehigh Valley Blogs linking network - same idea, different location. After all, Shane wasn't technically in Northeastern Pennsylvania...

...just like NEPA Blogs isn't technically in Lehigh Valley. Which didn't prevent us from getting nominated as one of the "best blogs" - and invited to the awards ceremony.

I didn't want to go, at first. I felt like we would be party crashers, horning in on an event where we didn't belong. Then I saw that Shane was also on the distribution list, and realized that this might be our best chance to meet him in person! So this past Thursday afternoon I met with Michelle after she got out of work and we headed down to Allentown together.

We noticed two things about Allentown pretty quickly:

1. Almost every car in Allentown has tinted windows. Blacked-out windows, really.
2. Allentown has a White Castle.

A scene from the movie "Harold and Michelle go to White Castle." Because sometimes filling up on Brie just isn't enough.

The awards ceremony was in the Rodale Room of the Allentown Symphony Hall. It's a beautiful room in a  beautiful building. The room had seating for probably close to a hundred, and had a buffet table full of fruit, various cheeses, crackers, cookies, bottled water, sodas - all for an awards ceremony for bloggers being hosted by a newspaper.

The view of downtown Allentown from the Rodale Room

Close-up of one of the creeptastic birds that decorated the next building over

The room never really filled up, but several dozen people attended, bloggers and their entourages. After a while I saw a motorized wheelchair coming through the door, and I knew Shane was in the house.  He was barely through the door before I was introducing myself to him, and his father, and his cousin Sarah. After a few minutes of chatting, I had the presence of mind to ask his father to get a photo of us.

Me, Shane, Michelle, Cousin Sarah

Shane writes one of the funniest and occasionally most gut-wrenching blogs out there. This post is an excellent index of his stories. I only became aware of him when Monica Madeja from WBRE's PA Live! told me about him, after she read an article about him in the Morning Call. Again we see a special relationship that exists between the Morning Call and the bloggers of the Lehigh Valley.

The awards ceremony itself was a fun event, starting off with opening remarks by the Editor-in-Chief of the Morning Call. Cheers went up as each nominee was announced, and winners were feted with music as they approached the podium to receive their awards. A complete list of winners can be found here, and an article on the ceremony here. NEPA Blogs didn't win anything, though we were torn between what we might do if we won: either turn down the award on the grounds we weren't really eligible, or attach a chain to the plaque and wear it around our necks at the next evening's Blog Fest like an oversized rapper's clock.

Too many people on both sides of the issue believe there should be an antagonistic relationship between the "old media" of newspapers, radio, and television, and the "new media" of blogs, with various individuals being openly hostile towards or contemptuous of the other side. The Morning Call has gotten this relationship right: by providing no-strings-attached publicity to the dozens of bloggers nominated in this contest, they have generated vast amounts of goodwill towards the Morning Call within the Lehigh Valley blogging community. Northeastern Pennsylvania isn't entirely in the dark with this. WBRE's PA Live! has included the "Blog of the Week" segment from the beginning. Various newspapers and TV stations have given some coverage to blogging events like Blog Fest, including the front cover and a multiple page article in this past weekend's edition of The Weekender. But it would be wonderful if more people on both sides of the old media/new media divide realized the mutual benefits that come from doing the sort of thing that the Allentown Morning Call has done.

Blog Fest Spring 2012 report, part 1

The Spring 2012 edition of Blog Fest was held at Rooney's in Pittston last night, and it was a great time. We did some things differently this time around, and they worked out well. Although we've had "Hello My Name Is" tags in the past, this time we made special "BLOGGER" tags to help identify the bloggers in the crowd more quickly. We also had a blogger sign-in sheet at the door. The idea was that this would help us to say who was there when we started doing the post-fest reports and tagging the photos, but it also worked to let us know who had just walked in through the door. I met several bloggers I might not have otherwise recognized, just by seeing that they had signed in as they arrived.

A photographer from the Times-Leader and a writer from the Citizens' Voice were there. Neither was wearing anything identifying them as press, so we had to judge by the fact that one was carrying a large camera and the other was carrying a pad. (I didn't realize reporters still took notes on pads!) Maybe next time we'll make up special "PRESS" badges.

Citizens' Voice: NEPA Blog Fest draws candidates' attention

Most of the politicians didn't need badges because they were wearing their own campaign buttons. (We tried to get a picture of Matt Cartwright in front of a TV that was showing one of his ads, but we weren't fast enough.) Gene Stilp's people took the regular name badges and marked their own names, followed by "for Gene Stilp" - a very effective way of identifying their association. As far as I could tell, Gene Stilp had the largest and most enthusiastic crowd with him. Plus he had a giant inflatable pig.

In addition to  the bloggers and the politicians and the candidates, there were several people who stopped by to see if Blog Fest lived up to the hype. Several people from the Wilkes-Barre CareerLink's Job Club came to visit, and I was able to help connect them with both politicians who might speak to the group in the future and people who could benefit from taking part in the Job Club. A member of my writing group (who is herself a blogger) also stopped by with her husband, as did several other friends.

Unfortunately my persuasive speaking skills were not adequate to convince the coffee shop owner next door to stay open a few extra hours - during which time he might have doubled his revenue for the week. As the night wore on people became more and more tired of standing and straining to hear and be heard, and many would have appreciated having a quiet place to sit down and talk over coffee. This became especially obvious once the band took the stage around 9:00 and began blasting the hits of the 60's and 70's, making it almost impossible to have a conversation without shouting, even with a person sitting across from you at a table. I'm thinking for next time maybe we could arrange for a quiet acoustic act to play, something that would be more in keeping with what is essentially a mixer and networking event. (Or we could go in another direction entirely and introduce...BLOG FEST KARAOKE! Thrill to NEPA's bloggers belting out their favorite tunes! Judge political candidates based on their singing skills! See competing candidates square off in rap battles! ...hey, it could work!)

All in all it was a very successful event. I was very pleased with the number of non-political bloggers who came out, as well as with the turnout of candidates. The dynamic, as always, was very relaxed and upbeat, and I think as a mixer and networking event Blog Fest was extremely successful. As a bonus, Gort has announced the date of the Fall 2012 Blog Fest: September 21! (Though it's technically the last day of Summer...) So now everybody has nearly six months to plan around this event!