Just turned in an essay on Prince. Be out sometime next year. It contains this line: Thanks to my background—raised by truckers, loggers, and small-patch farmers—I still struggle to get past the dumb trope of sneering at art as work. As if any given roadie hustles any less hard than any given logger. As if…View post
A while back I filmed a piece with my friends from Wisconsin Public Television (I say a while back because those pigs are no longer extant and you will also note that my report on the spring weather doesn’t quite match up) and it aired Monday. I had some internet issues that prevented me from posting,…View post
Just overheard a pair of New York City-based financial news commentators marveling over the rise of mobile butchers. They said the concept arose from the local food movement in Seattle and is now spreading. Seattle has been very good to me, so let me say it is not Seattle’s fault that it never occurred to the commentators that…View post
Just about every year I plant some oats. Usually harvest them with a scythe. This year, with book tour a week away, I found myself cornered by the calendar and the weather, so my neighbor “other Tom” (not that Tom) came over with his John Deere 530 and knocked’em down. That green tractor sure…View post
Did the window-to-window centerline breeze-shoot with my neighbor yesterday, he’s given up on getting the corn in, going with soybeans. My oats have been four inches tall for a week-and-a-half. Spring stuck in low gear. Can’t wait to get down to the feed mill and mope…as I buy three bags of chicken crumbles and pretend…View post