Mary Phillips-Sandy lives here.

This is a concept I’ve been thinking about for several years, and given modern technology it seems like something that should be possible: an ever-changing map of a city marked by smells, not street names, although I suppose you’d need an underlying street map to make annotation easier. This morning, for example, I bicycled along [...]

1. Today I missed New York, specifically the feature that allows you to enter a zen-like trance by walking 30+ blocks to a distant subway stop before heading home. Driving past a series of exits on 295-South is not the same. 1a. I promptly forgot about the city when I got back to Portland and [...]

Man oh man, what a month. Sickness, death and packing tape, and — most recently — a fateful combination of bike + steep hill + pothole + blue Toyota + concrete + my face. Settle down, I typed ‘fateful’ not ‘fatal,’ and the ER doc gave me a handy list of brain damage symptoms to [...]

It’s hard to see at this size, but one of those signs says “grilled chicken.” I can’t muster the energy to get worked up about “illegals,” but I do think that people who order grilled chicken at a place like this should be deported, maybe from the planet.

Or, a lesson in context: Very early this morning I decided to take a walk, so I got dressed and headed up the hill and down the gravel path and past the horse pasture and onto the paved road, in what I might’ve termed good spirits if my mind hadn’t been completely blank. For the [...]

Overheard yesterday evening at Christy’s Country Store1, whilst purchasing certain occasional indulgences2: Gent, to Cashier, in a tone of Confidence: That was my ex-wife, y’know. Just left. With that fella. Cashier, to Gent: Oh re-ally? That planned? Gent: Whaddya mean? Cashier: She here cause you were? Gent: Naw. Cashier: She say hi? Meaningful pause. Gent: [...]

Yesterday in the car headed north I flipped the radio to the news talk channel, where a Texan preacher was reciting Patrick Henry’s speech to the Virginia delegates, like really emoting it in a quintessentially Texan-preacher fashion, and when he was done the hennish host clucked “Wow, gosh, I am just SO inspired by that,” [...]

…or, “My best friend got married in New York City this weekend and the only pictures I took were of street detritus and the subway.” Q: Why isn’t the train coming? What do I do? What’s going on? A: Deal with it.

Discovered yesterday during a visit to the ancestral shire: The Chez has, via black letters on its yellow beer sign/marquee, endorsed Mayor Paul LePage for governor. The shirtless gentlemen conducting business from a rusted LeBaron outside seemed neither to notice nor care, but one should never underestimate the Chez Bump.