This week I’m running this post about the game of Canasta once more (originally posted in May 2019). It’s a bit wonky to read but if you take it slow, you should be able to set up a rousing game for yourself and at least three others. Christmas break is the perfect time to unplug from our phones, tvs, and whatnots, and, you know, face … Continue reading Canasta’s Trip to the Bayou
I mentioned last time that I have dedicated my upcoming book to Moby, our sweet, rust-coated vizsla, who left us two summers ago. His passing ranks as one of the very hardest things I’ve had to endure. At the time of his death, I wrote a note that we shared with our friends, essentially saying that our wonderful pooch had “taught us how to be … Continue reading The Comfort Only a Good Pooch Can Provide
As you may have read or heard by now (if you haven’t – where the hell have you been?!), I’ve done a memoir – which will be released by the University Press of Mississippi in April 2020. As I was wrapping up the manuscript for the book, I put together an acknowledgements page, where I listed people who either helped me by being a beta … Continue reading Thank You, Moby, Siblings, & Early Readers!
Since it became available for pre-order, several people have purchased my upcoming book, “Stone Motel – Memoirs of a Cajun Boy” (expected delivery April 2020 from the University Press of Mississippi). To be quite uncharacteristically sincere about it, I am humbled and grateful, and more than a bit fixed in a state of suspended belief. Part of the writing experience necessarily includes the selling experience. … Continue reading Where to pre-order “Stone Motel”???
Today the temperature dropped quickly here in Manhattan, and I hear that the Coonasses down home in Louisiana are also experiencing a cold snap. Which can only mean one thing for them and me: Gumbo. So today I’m channeling all those fine Coonasses down there to write this blog post on Eliza Mae’s (my long-departed momma’s) Seafood Gumbo. I think seafood gumbo was Momma’s best dish … Continue reading Rouxvana: Eliza Mae’s Seafood Gumbo
It’s getting realer and realer by the day! Check out the catalog page from the University Press of Mississippi for my new book, Stone Motel – Memoirs of a Cajun Boy. You can preorder now! Continue reading Check out the Catalog Page for my Upcoming Book!
This isn’t really a “Cakeover” story per se (where I take a vintage recipe from the 1950s, 1960s, or 1970s and update it). No, this recipe is the original, as submitted to me by my old home-state friend (and peer reviewer* for my upcoming book) Valerie Andrews. Valerie was reminded of this recipe from her grandmother Josephine, when she read my post on Watergate Cake … Continue reading Cakeover: Josephine Gonzales Andrews’ Church Lady Cajun Cake
My book “Stone Motel: Memoirs of a Cajun Boy” (University Press of Mississippi, Spring 2020) takes place in the early-to-mid-1970s. From the first pages, I give the reader a sense of place (a little roadside motel in Cajun Louisiana), and for context, a sense of time: This was all before widespread access to cable television, microwave ovens, fast food, and of course way before the … Continue reading We’ve landed in 1974, Baby!
When I moved to New York City from New Orleans in 1992 one of the first things I realized was that there are quite a few fellow Louisianans walking these streets, riding these subways, and having a blast, as I was. Turns out there were many first things I would need to realize – such as that the stereotype that New Yorkers are rude is … Continue reading I’m a Coonass in Gotham, me.
Eunice native Jere Longman, writing for today’s edition of The New York Times, on the tumultuous late 1960s to early 1970s and beyond. He beautifully captures the electricity of a period when our home city was in the throes of transition. Continue reading Sunday Times: Dispatch from Eunice, La. on a Piece of its Desegregation History
The experience of eating an otherwise forgettable dinner in a fancy restaurant in the SoHo neighborhood of Manhattan was marred by the very memorable dessert they served: a chocolate cake that wasn’t trying to be anything else. SOOO many restaurants – especially fancy ones – try to pimp up what should already be standard fare: simple chocolate cake that tastes like chocolate and that doesn’t … Continue reading Cakeover: Chocolate on Chocolate with a Smidge of Chocolate
Ten years ago, the first time I walked into the house on Cornwallville Road in Cornwallville, New York, where I now sit and write this, I felt a powerful, mostly positive, energy about the place. What was odd about that is that, for the most part, I don’t typically feel or sense such things at all. I just bumble through life clueless about that kind … Continue reading An 1851 Farmhouse With Stories to Tell – to Anyone Who’ll Listen
In my senior year at LSU, I wrote this poem while sitting in my bullet-proof cashier’s booth at the ECOL filling station on College Drive in Baton Rouge. We sold only fuel, engine oil, cigarettes, and lighters. I had the brutal 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. shift. When my roommate Colleen discovered the poem in my stuff (it was scribbled on the inside of a … Continue reading Poetry at the Filling Station
In April, when I converted my old newsletter (Parenthetically Speaking) into this blog, I announced that the University Press of Mississippi (UPM) will be publishing my memoir next year. At the time, the title of my book was “The Canasta Summers – Memoirs of a Cajun Boy.” This was the only title I’ve ever considered for this book because the story covers a period of … Continue reading How’s this for a book jacket blurb?
C.A.K.E. It’s my favorite four-letter word. No matter the time of day, or the setting, or the circumstances, I never turn down cake. Even the lowliest, skankiest-looking 24-hour-convenience-store shelf cake (think Entenmann’s but without the ‘finesse’) has me squirming with glee. That said, I definitely gravitate towards the more substantive, authentic homemade cakes – those that our mommas and mémères and tantes made. I also … Continue reading Cakeover: Beautiful Black & White Cake
(Parenthetically) Speaking 