Tacqueria Mercado

Lo que pasó con todos los elogios 
from a couple of years ago?

Tacqueria Mercado Sangria

      We stopped by their downtown version for dinner a few weeks ago.  Eric and I were looking forward to dining there as we had heard good reports shortly after its opening a few years ago.  Looking at the menu, I was inspired by seeing Goat Soup and Tripe Tacos.  I wasn't interested in ordering

The Theory of Everything

The reflection of the cosmos 

in a loving relationship

     The Theory of Everything will please those who like movies about English geniuses who develop frightening illnesses such as Hilary and Jackie (1998).   I don’t mean that as disparaging because they also end up in some intriguing, outré romantic entanglements.  In H & J, one sister shares her

Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue or Ignorance)

A mash-up (or mix-up?)

or styles in a powerhouse comedy

     We saw Birdman two weeks ago and I’m still not certain how I feel about it.  For one thing, it’s two movies rolled into one.  There’s the tight paced, hyper-energetic backstage comedy that most reviewers have made a big deal about and then the more intriguing mid-life crisis fantasy that keeps cutting in and then finally takes over.  Actually, Michael Keaton is sixty-three, but he could pass for a decade younger.  This is his best work

Rachel Kushner: The Flamethrowers

A young woman comes of age on a motorcyle

1970s Art Scene in New York

     Italian Motorcycles, the downtown New York art scene of the 1970s, American youth revolts of the 1960s, Italian worker/consumer/student/kidnapper-you-name-it revolts of the 1970s, the Land Artists, May-August romances, artists whose persona/story reveals their art, a young woman of talent

Banana Leaf Modern Thai

Destination dining for us that appeared

to be a neighborhood gem for others

Banana Leaf Modern Thai

     I doubt there are many of us that can remember the streetcar and bustling hotel on Main Street in Mason.  They're gone, but the private residence across the street has stood there since 1877.  Currently, it's been elegantly revamped with

Miranda Lambert: Platinum

Yet again, Lambert delivers 

tough vulnerability with exquisite precision

     Miranda Lambert’s latest solo album Platinum was released five months ago, which was when I picked it up and I’ve played it about a dozen or so times since then.  It’s an easy collection to hear a number of times because it sums up the past of country and western music, while also placing Lambert in the forefront of where C & W may go next.  Along with Beck on Morning Phase (Alternative Rock/Rock) and Pharrell Williams on Girl (R&B/Pop), Lambert has taken stock of a musical genre and stated why it is and has been important to American culture.  For me, those are the three most significant albums released this year.

     Lambert wrote/co-wrote about half of the songs on this album and performed works by some other top C & W songwriters.  She comes across as Western because of the