Autumn Souvenir

Where have the days of good service gone? It's pretty unreal that some businesses can survive with such god awful treatment of their customers. We now come to expect adequate service at best at restaurants, stores and so on, and such mediocre service is usually met with, "Wow, they were very nice." Well, no, they weren't. The most common treatment seems to be very rushed service. I guess that's a sign of the times as folks no longer have time to be in the moment, or to allow a moment to extend beyond four seconds. Everyone's on their phone, getting in quick exercise, at a meeting, twittering about the weather or making plans while they're at dinner with friends. There's a local fish restaurant that Noreen and I go to and the girl who usually serves us is incredibly sweet. She doesn't necessarily go out of her way, but she always has a genuine smile, never rushes us and always returns to check on us. We're always so happy with how we're hand...

Thanks and Have Fun Running the Country: Kids' Letters To President Obama Edited by Jory John, Non-Fiction, 2009 : 8.1 The Burma Chronicles by Guy Delisle, Comic Memoir, 2008 : 8.0

I'm not sure if it's always referred to as "Domains", but every once in a while the NYT Magazine goes inside someone's home and pokes around, asks about their favorite things and so on. This week's guest is Lucinda Williams. Since I like this feature so much, I'm going to answer the questions myself: Memorable rejection : At my first job out of college, I was scheduled to go on a date with a co-worker. When the day finally came, she told me she had to cancel because she had to "wash her hair". Seriously. Favorite cover : Probably REM's take on Richard and Linda Thompson's "Wall of Death". Best concert he saw : Slobberbone at Club de Ville in Austin, South by Southwest, 1999. It was pouring rain, the stage was a few feet deep in water yet they never let up for a second. Their cover of Neil's "Powderfinger" was rock n' roll perfection. Always with him : My iPod. Misconception about songwriting : That simple lyric...

Joe Henry : Trampoline Mammoth, 1996

I've been pretty happy with Barack's first month in office. I expected a few minor stumbles and even perhaps inconsistencies early on, yet he's done pretty well. Then came his forceful, realistic and graceful speech before Congress last week. This was a fantastic address, one that outlined in clear words many of the reasons why I was so enthusiastic about Obama during the campaign. He talked directly about health care, education and the wars. He said that, yes, he would be raising taxes on those making over $250,000, something that irrespective of my salary (clearly not a factor right now), is something that I've supported. And then came his words this weekend regarding the lobbyists who will work to derail his massive and nation-changing plans with respect to health care, energy and a slew of others issues. "I know these steps won't sit well with the special interests and lobbyists who are invested in the old way of doing business, and I know they're geari...