June was drought month; July is inundation month. We’ve already had over 6″ of rain in July, and some regions around Houston could get another 3-5″ in the coming two days. We’ve officially caught up with our average annual rainfall as of today. Yesterday we were over 10° cooler than New York City and over the noon hour today we were 21° cooler than the Big Apple.
The second half of my interview at BIFF BAM POP! went up today: Illustrated King: Andy Burns Talks To Bev Vincent, Author Of The Stephen King Illustrated Companion Part 2.
I posted my review of The Passage by Justin Cronin last night. It’s long and it might have what some consider mild-to-medium spoilers.
I’m 2/3 of the way through The Liar’s Lullaby by Meg Gardiner. One of the other subtexts of the book is a pretty damning treatment of televised news services and the lengths reporters will go to get a story and spin it to suit their preconceived notions or the ideology of the channel’s audience. One reporter comes off only slightly less wacky than the white supremacist group.
Two episodes of Law & Order: Criminal Intent made up the season finale last night. The first one was pretty lame and boring, perhaps because I have very little interest in boxing. The second one, however, pulled out all the stops. I had an inkling about what was going on after less than 20 minutes–even before we met the creepy doctor–but that didn’t matter. F. Murray Abraham appeared as Nichols’ father (Jeff Goldblum), and what a treat that was. Nichols and his father have a complicated relationship. The father, a prominent psychologist (or psychiatrist?), wanted his son to follow in his footsteps and has little regard for his chosen profession. They duelled and fenced with each other, hurling past injuries at each other like grenades, but they reached an entente at the end, and “they took a trip to Lourdes,” in his father’s vernacular. They had a good day.
Next Tuesday is the release date for the new Crowded House album, Intriguer. Can’t wait–they’ve long been one of my favorite groups. I also missed Nik Kershaw’s latest, No Frills, which I’ll have to remind myself to download from iTunes this evening. I saw him in concert a few times back in the 1980s when he opened for other performers (including a memorable appearance at the Summer of ’84 concert at Wemblay Stadium in London), and I’ve kept up with his releases ever since. He has a clever way with words, and often twists figures of speech around. I came in second in the Twilight Tales flash fiction contest at World Horror a few years ago for a story called “Your Shoes” that was inspired by one of his most famous songs. No Frills would be a good place for people to start, as it is essentially a greatest hits album except the songs are all solo acoustic.
I’m also very much looking forward to the October release of The Union, which is a collaboration between Elton John and Leon Russell, with T. Bone Burnett producing. Duelling pianos. The album features a variety of musical genres from R&B, soul, gospel, country, pop and rock. Icons Neil Young and Brian Wilson provide guest vocals on the 16-track record along with legendary R&B organist Booker T. Jones, steel guitarist Robert Randolph and a 10-piece gospel choir.
