The First Day of Spring

Life is extraordinary.

Last Friday morning, Jeanne shook me awake from a deep sleep. "I think it's time," she said, and we sprang into action and began to execute Project Offspring.

Nineteen minutes later we checked into Memorial Hospital. We verified that, in fact, Jeanne was in labor and we settled in to wait for our little one to join us.

We went through the morning, monitoring contractions, and then things picked up the pace in the afternoon. Shortly after one we had our mid-wife in the room and we were gearing up for the Great Struggle.

Let me say this: My wife is amazing. Her strength and spirit are powers to behold.

At 1:53 in the afternoon, on the first day of spring, Lyla May Powell came into the world. She's a beautiful little girl--even tempered and very sweet. It's been a supreme joy just getting to know her, and we're so excited about where her future might take her.

She weighed seven pounds and six ounces at birth, and she's nineteen inches long. She scored a 9/10 on the APGAR scale, which is great in terms of her overall health.

We feel very blessed to have such a beautiful and healthy little girl with us. I thank all of you have offered advice and wished us well, and we look forward to introducing you to Lyla very soon.

The Barricade Wars: An Ongoing Saga

I am called Blink.


For three years I've commanded a platoon of barricades--hearty, diligent barricades--who stood through rain and wind in our occupation of the northern portion of St. Johns Bluff Road.


Ours has always been a simple mission--to guide others in times of strife and chaos.


The only threat to our mission comes from those who would usurp our position. The armies of ACME Barricades have penetrated deep into the Southside, claiming projects on streets and in neighborhoods where once, only Bob's Barricades directed traffic.


There are those in our ranks who have questioned the direction of Bob's Barricades and our very king, Bob himself, has come under fire. Treason abounds, and jealous thoughts have invaded the core of even the bravest of the traffic cones.


My fealty, however, is resolute, and I will not slander our leader, regardless of our present dire circumstance.


We became suspicious after the first migration. The great machines of progress had worked their magic on the road, transforming a dirty expanse of cracked grey into a ribbon of smooth, black asphalt. I assumed the shift would be temporary, and I sent Slash and his platoon south, to the place where the road intersected with Atlantic Boulevard and the sidewalks were still a network of cracked concrete.


I never knew they would be replaced with cones. Foot soldiers--the smallest and most mobile of our kind--were installed outside of the BP near monument. On that first night, I sent a scout to discern their identities, and we learned for the first time that they were representatives from ACME.


Progress continued. My men were moved, despite our best efforts to maintain our position. We had endured all of the petty indignities: the men who put out their cigarettes on our broad shoulders; the motorists who knocked us askance without so much as a glance in the rear view.


And then we were moved. A re-location transport moved up and down the road, collecting the brave souls of our company and replacing them with ACME cones.


Oh, how they grinned as we were taken away.


It's been nine days. Three quarters of our company have stopped blinking at night. Some have turned on each other.


Our situation is grim.

Tomorrow, I will send an emissary to the north. The machines of progress are on the move, and there is word that the roads near Mt. Pleasant have fallen into disrepair.


We shall endeavor to move our forces into position before the enemy beats us to the punch...

Good News and the Golden Gate

I received a batch of good news today on a story I wrote about that bridge above. Further updates as news breaks...

In the Electric Mist

French director Bertrand Tavernier applies a steady hand to the atmospheric In the Electric Mist. The movie is based on James Lee Burke's novel In the Electric Mist with Confederate Dead.

It's a good movie, and I'll be starting the book this weekend.

Tavernier puts the setting in the storefront window in this one, and that's a solid choice. It's a beautiful film. After moving to the South from the land of snow-capped mountains, I wondered what all the fuss was about. Brackish cypress creeks and mangrove swamps didn't have much appeal to me back then.

But, like the Spanish moss that festoons just about every green thing in Northeast Florida, the low country has certainly grown on me. There is a beauty in the swamps--and a mystery. It's this mystery that drives Tavernier's film toward a satisfying conclusion.

The pacing is just about right, with enough exposition (the film opens up by briefly flashing Tommy Lee Jones's name on the screen, then cutting to a voice-over) to help us get a feeling for Dave Robicheaux, an honorable cop with questionable tactics. Tommy Lee Jones is only getting better. In a stark contrast to the career arcs of such contemporaries as Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro, Jones is delivering the goods in his golden years (not unlike Clint Eastwood). Last year, he gave two of the top ten leading performances in No Country for Old Men and In the Valley of Elah.

Here, he's a delight to watch and even more fun to listen to. His accent is a thing to behold. I'd love to hear him read the audio book version of Burke's novel in just that voice.

Like I said, the film moves well and it covers a lot of territory. We see a little bit of redemption in the story of Elrod Sykes (Peter Sarsgaard--good) and John Goodman is compelling as Baby Feet Balboni.

I missed any publicity for this one in the theaters, and that's a shame. I would have liked to have seen the Louisiana low country on the big screen. If you're looking for a nice film this weekend at your local Blockbuster, you could do a heck of a lot worse than In the Electric Mist (B grade, overall).

Pay to Read Online

Here we are, writing and reading through an historically poor economy.

I spent over an hour today at the Duval County Fairgrounds, picking through books at the Friends of the Library Book Sale. It was $10.00 for a grocery sack filled with books, and I nabbed nineteen for that amount.

And let me say, the tables were picked. I couldn't find any good King titles. Not one Lansdale. No Richard Ford or Jeffrey Ford. No Neil Gaiman, no John D. MacDonald, no Chuck Palahniuk, no John Connolly.

The sum total? Four Michael Connollys, four John Grishams, one John Farris, one Robert McCammon, one Michael Crichton, three Elmore Leonards, one Peter Straub, one James Lee Burke, one Lawrence Block...so on and so forth.

Now, I've already written about the importance of supporting a magazine in these rough times. But, in case you need another look at what is amounting to the paramount discussion on where the world of writing is headed, take a gander at this article, and the discussion that ensues, at the Internet Review of Science Fiction.


I applaud all of the quality markets and editors who are making a very serious job of publishing work in this down time. I'm simply thankful for the hard work that editors devote to putting together a quality magazine (online or print), and I think they deserve a ton of credit for having the stones to do that.

As an aside, I just asked my wife if she'd be willing to subscribe to the Oregonian online, and we both agree that we would. The question then boils down to what that would mean. Could online subscriptions ever eclipse the economic thrust of advertising, or would content providers find some common ground between the two?


To be honest, I can't imagine paying much more than six or seven dollars a month to read the Oregonian online. That said, I can certainly live with that, while maintaining my subscription to the physical copy of the Florida Times-Union.

So here it is: would you pay for online content? If yes, how much?

The Week That Was

You know that sensation that prickles your skin just before a real gully washer splits the skies and fills the streets with rainwater? You know that pungent, coppery smell just before the earth and the heavens are bridged by electricity?

We're just about there. Not quite, but just about there. The storm clouds have massed. The temperatures are dropping.

Jeanne's having a couple of contractions each day. Officially, we're still looking at three weeks, but our little girl could come any time. Like I said before, it's danged exciting. Jeanne, by the way, is amazing. She and I took a two-mile walk a little bit ago. Her spirit, attitude and strength are inspirational. I'm looking forward to watching her parent the little gal, to be honest.

In terms of the last week, I went back to work. I've got three delightful groups of students at the college, and I'm looking forward to reading some good student writing in the coming months. It feels good to be back at a place so filled with positive energy.

I had a great week at the word processor. The prose flowed well, and I had a lot of fun. I received a pair of very kind personal rejections (with an offer to re-submit upon revision) and two form rejections on short stories.

Jeanne and I hosted seventeen at the house last night to celebrate the birth of Delaney Finch, the daughter of one of my colleagues at the college. It was a lot of fun, and now I know a little more about roasting thirteen pounds of skin-on pork. I made two types of pulled pork (apple cider mop and mesquite smoked) and two types of homemade barbecue sauce, as well as a mess of baked beans and some homemade coleslaw. Friends brought cake and ice cream. They brought homemade beer and oranges plucked from their back yard.

It was a nice way to spend a Saturday, and Jeanne and I feel very fortunate to have forged the relationships we have here in Florida.

I hit the Jacksonville Public Library's mondo used book sale today and nabbed a grocery sack of books for the mere pittance of ten clams. I fit nineteen books in that sucker, all but three of them hardbacks. I was able to grab a couple of Dave Robicheaux novels by James Lee Burke. I wouldn't have known to look for them if I hadn't seen the fine film Into the Electric Mist last night. Review forthcoming later this week.

We hit 82 today in Jacksonville. I ran the bridges downtown, heading down the waterfront, where Hooters was packed and folks were drinking margaritas at Cinco de Mayo. The sky was clear and the water was glittering and I was running back over the Acosta bridge when I looked down and saw a large woman sunbathing with her top off on a yacht that was puttering down the river.

Huh. Florida.

All in all, it was a good week, and I'm pretty excited to see where this week takes me. We're covering some great stories in lit. class and watching On the Waterfront in the film class. My buddy Kris Schaub is flying in from Oregon to get waxed in three rounds of golf.

And maybe, just maybe, the clouds will split and we'll have a new addition to the Powell family.

Lack of Posts...

A trio of wise men (I think it was the Beastie Boys) once said:

My posse's gettin' big...and my posse's gettin' bigger

That's the situation for the Powell family as well. The dearth of content around these parts is due to the fact that my wife and I are in the dog days (figuratively, we're not having a litter, Octo-mom) of pregnancy.

Our first child will be joining us at any time. It's danged exciting.

I'll have some things to write about soon, I promise...