The business of America is business. Truer words have not been spoken. In the wake of 9/11 we were reminded of our patriotic duty to consume as usual and overnight a cottage industries for limited edition patriotic hanging plates, flags and flag pins, and fuck em’ up bumper stickers was born. Every great calamity and joyous moment brings an opportunity to sell commemorative trinkets to the masses. Today, in happier, more hopeful times, as Washington DC is shrouded in a suffocating blanket of security in anticipation of four million inaugural revelers, an Inaguration Superstore is setting up shop nearly a full month before the historic moment.

A backtrack to Nevada: Life in a box is no life at all.  But that’s our sad reality - packed like sardines into steel and glass cans with holes cut out for the view. Four corners and walls are the canvas upon which we express our vision of the world - lease terms permitting. So [...]

Vonsky is still blowin’ hard. I was introduced to the playing of Von Freeman two years ago, on my first visit to Chicago. A veritable hidden treasure, a master of bop, it’s safe to say most Chicagoans don’t know about this legend playing right on their back yard. Every Tuesday night at the New Apartment [...]

I like to take my time. To savor the sweet things. Unless they’re very sweet, in which case I eat them with vigor, quickly and greedily. The distinguishing mark of solo travel is freedom to choose when to go, and when to stay; when to smell the roses of adventure, unexpected encounter, and a new [...]

A night was spent camping in Great Sand Dunes National Park. All the geological pieces fell into place to form these massive dunes, nestled below the Sangre de Cristo mountains. Minimal light pollution created an amazing stargazing experience. However, I could not be bothered to commune with the heavens for more than hour - it [...]

Anxious to make eastward progress after a week spent traversing Nevada, I left the truckers, cowboys, and a few lonely hearts at the Border Inn-Diner-RV Park vegetating on a steady stream of talk shows (Ellen Degeneres is the perennial favorite), a back to back parade of TV courtroom judges, and reality TV intrigues. This was [...]

“Nobody’s been up there this winter so we don’t know what the trails are like. Come back and tell us if you make it,” the ranger said.

“It just looks like a light dusting from here,” I told myself, rationalizing my attempt to summit Great Basin National Park’s Mt. Wheeler, the second highest peak in Nevada at 13,063 feet.  [...]