Another New York Trip

We just got back from a few days in New York. The main reason we went there was for a book party for my friend Marilyn's book which she edited last year.

We spent the rest of the time just goofing around. Ask Cris and she'll tell you about a photo exhibit we saw at a place we always go to -- because it's close to the midtown hotel we always stay at -- the International Center of Photography. They had an exhibition of photos taken by North Vietnamese combat photographers -- very interesting.

We also saw an exhibit of those wild Henry Darger paintings -- he's that nut from Chicago who made all those long scroll-like fantasy paintings of the little girls fighting a war against the Glandolinians or whomever. Darger links:

- http://www.uiowa.edu/uima/darger.html
- http://henrydarger.tripod.com/

The weather was quite tolerable, except for the first evening. I have to say, it's so much nicer going there in the winter than in the dead of summer, like we did in July 2001. What a sweat broke out.

Now back to work... VERY busy for me. I mean my job. Cris is still lollygagging around the house, refusing to go to Dublin, Calif. -- a ghastly, centerless suburb 30 miles east of the City -- where Sybase moved in January. I mean, she is actually working out of the house. But she really is refusing, more or less, to go to Dublin.

I'm not getting much writing done, but a little, on weekends... I'm going on two business trips in the next few weeks and plan on holing up in my hotel as much as possible and writing there when I don't have to do something for work. I'm in the middle of Part 2 of my novel now, trying to get over the hump in the beginning of the third chapter of the part. I feel a real urgency to get this damn book finished and on to other projects. But it will still probably take another year at least even with steady work and discipline.

I'm doing zen meditation now. Every morning I drive to Hartford Street Zen Center in the Castro for 6 a.m. meditation! I like it.