UPDATED

– Things might be a little stop and go around here for the next week and a half or so. Miss L and I are headed down to L.A. on a business trip. We’re renting a car so I can poke around my storage locker in Atwater Village while we’re there and retrieve most of my books and DVDs.

– According to this article in the S.F. Chronicle, the weakening dollar is causing all sorts of new frugality and belt-tightening in households across the land. In an IN/OUT chart accompanying the article, book stores are “out” and libraries are “in” for cash-strapped Americans. Except maybe for some folks in L.A.

From LAist:

The Los Angeles Public Library is under pressure from Mayor Villaraigosa and the City Council to cut spending and raise fees to help decrease LA’s $400 million budget deficit. If the budget goes through unchanged on May 1, drastic cuts would force eight regional branch libraries to close their doors on Sundays, the book buying budget would be slashed by $2 million and library staff may be subject to “mandatory furlough days or reduced work weeks.”

The libraries targeted for close on Sundays are North Hollywood, Mid-Valley Regional, Arroyo Seco, West Los Angeles, Hollywood (Goldwyn Branch), Exposition Park, San Pedro and West Valley. The move would eliminate 36.5 staff positions. Book buying funds have already been reduced by 22% from last year and as a result these monies were tapped out four months early in 2008.

You can read the entire article here.

– “RoboCop” and “Basic Instinct” director Paul Verhoeven has written a book that suggests that Jesus might have been fathered by a Roman soldier who raped Mary. Oh, those wacky Dutch filmmakers .

– Had some fun over at Joseph Mailander’s Mainbrace a couple of days ago. J.M. posted an erudite list of “favorites” (including citing Carver’s Dog as a favorite blog — thank you, Joseph) and I responded in kind in the comments section.

UPDATE

Even though I’ve been shirking my editorial duties due to looming work deadlines, we’re still publishing some good stuff at Hemingway’s Shotgun: an excellent haiku by Christopher Dean; Ghost Writing Distance in Vowels by Mr. Zach; the haunting Grave of William Wordsworth by Eric D. Lehman; and A Writing Life by your humble editor.

And if you’re fan of Nathanel West’s 1933 novella Miss Lonelyhearts, you just might enjoy our Carver’s Dog Book Club dialogue on the book. 33 terrific and insightful ponderings to date. For our next club selection I am recommending one of the many titles I am enjoying right now, Gun, With Occasional Music (1994) by Jonathan Lethem, a delightful blend of hardboiled noir and sci-fi. It has been properly hailed as a marriage between Raymond Chandler’s style and Philip K. Dick’s vision.  

I’m also pleased to report that plans are moving ahead for a 50-page chapbook of the Mr. Bukowski’s Wild Ride adventures. I’ve fortuitously located an investor who is willing to finance the initial run of approximately 64 trade paperback editions that will soon be available online and through City Lights Books in San Francisco. We’ll keep ya posted on that.