Boca Town This is a great place. Bocas del Toro is a small group of islands off the Caribbean side of Panama. The main town is a town—flat and slow; perfect for shambling around. It is very hot and nobody moves very quickly. It has many services for the tourists and the large number of […]
Jane Kansas
Posted inNews + Opinion
Puerto Viejo
Norval, Mike and I have come to the Caribbean coast of Costa Rica, and thank christ the net is full of photos to swipe: my Canon SX110 camera up and quit working; a look on the interconnector shows many people complaining about the problem my camera suddenly has. The same thing happened with my Dell […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Saprissa vs LDA
I was walking around the Central Market area in Alajuela, and in the window of a junky accessory store (sort of a Central America version of Ardene—much smaller) I saw a mauve and white striped plastic ring which appealed much to my stunted 14-year-old fashion sense, so I went in and asked to see it. […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Gates & Dogs
Norval Collins Mike Sangster Norval Collins has a condo in Alajuela. He and Mike Sangster are here. The Condominiums Mana have an electric gate by the road and 24 hour security (as many places do) in the form of Eduardo and David, who have brown para-military uniforms, aviator sunglasses, guns and beltsfull of bullets. They […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Juan, el negro VS Jane, ella blanca!
We took a bus into San Jose (30 minutes, 400 colones [.76CDN]) and after errands and a museum visit took another out the other side of the capital, to Coronado. Norval had shoes to deliver. A friend of a friend has a son with size 16 feet and a pair of shoes had been sent […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
World Turns Weirdly
The Republic of Costa Rica (pronounced coast-a, not cost-a, as I have been doing my whole life) is in Central America, bounded on the north by Nicaragua, on the south by Panama, on the east by the Caribbean Sea and on the west by the Pacific Ocean. The ISO 3166-1 designations for Costa Rica are […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
The MOCA
Mark Rothko’s “No. 301, 1959″Oh, The Museum of Contemporary Art. It’s on Grand Street in downtown LA, where lots of people don’t seem to go, but should. It’s 30 years old and to celebrate, has a huge, exhausting show.
Posted inNews + Opinion
The Armand Hammer Museum
Detail of van Gogh’s “The Sower” A lovely place, is The Hammer Museum, on Wilshire Boulevard at the corner of Westwood, which runs up into UCLA. The galleries are on an upper floor surrounding a courtyard with tables and chairs for the cafe, and as you walk around between the galleries there are benches and […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Animal & bird life I have seen and/or heard
From the patio in Los Angeles I have heard: 1) gentle owls hoo-hooing every night2) horse (probably from Lea Thompson’s spread)3) various birds including one with a big voice like a pterodactyl4) rooster5) coyotes almost every night—group howls6) dogs responding to the coyotes I have seen: 1) squirrels2) robin3) hummingbird (also heard thrumming of its […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Kansas ascends to the Getty Center
The Getty Centre is like Valhalla over Century City To go to The Getty Centre is to feel somehow ascended. It is huge—five main buildings. It is high—in the foothills of the Santa Monica Mountains. It looks down on Los Angeles. And yet, for all its grandness, it is made for people; built on a […]
Posted inArts + Music
Late Late Afternoon with Craig Ferguson
The old intro to The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson had a montage of disturbingly ugly characters – men with nightmarish dental work and comb-overs. When I was up late and David Letterman was over I switched stations right away to avoid the British/Scottish comedy thing of really mean caricature and whoever Craig Whatshisname […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Muriel Duckworth at peace
Muriel Helena Ball Duckworth died on August 22. The legendary peace activist was visiting her beloved cottage in Magog, Quebec, built when she was four years old. She had a gentle fall and was taken to hospital. She said she was ready to go, and did, surrounded by friends and family. “She lived a wonderful, […]
