Kangaroos, Hangovers, and Con Men. New York, I love you.

Hello, readers.

I'm in a dick sort of mood. Which is not the sentence I meant to write exactly, but it is true that I just finished reading Jonathan Lethem's Gun, With Occasional Music and have started his later, more award-winning novel, Motherless Brooklyn. The first featured a sometime-in-the-future setting and evolved animals, like Joey Castle, a tough guy kangaroo with a wicked left kick and a surprising hesitance to shoot our hero. One of my favorite bits of the book was how it was a musical. The radio news broadcast in tubas and trumpets. Later, certain guns pulled from waistcoats triggered ominous violins.

Motherless has less kangaroos so far, but might be more satisfying. We'll see.

In other New York news, BB over at Facebook directed me, and everyone else who reads his wall posts, to Ephemeral New York, a blog of the city's history and, well, ephemera. Ephemera, by the way, is a friend of this blog. I use it in sentences all the time. For example, I might say, "I found the movie's ephemera, quite ephemeral."

On the blog, there are two stories of literary interest. One, is about Jack London's days of hobo-ing in City Hall Park.

The other is a story about the greatest con artist of 19th century New York. His name was Hungry Joe Lewis and one day he ran into Oscar Wilde. Who won? Were there witticisms? Go read. Find out.

Happy Friday. Don't forget Dollhouse.


ttfn.