Written at 6:15pm on Wednesday, March 3, 2010

I’m writing this on my Libretto, sitting at the Peculiar Pub on Bleecker Street in Manhattan. I’m waiting for Jason Schoch to meet me here. We’re having dinner here then heading to the Player’s Theatre on MacDougal to see Marylin Nonken play Morton Feldman’s Triadic Memories. This is the second performance we’ve seen of Feldman’s solo piano works. The last was several years ago when we saw “For Bunita Marcus” and “Piano” performed. I am excited about this performance, though, because I have actually studied the score of “Triadic Memories” – not to mention the fact that my current in-progress piano pieces are directly influenced by this piece.

It’s interesting being back here in Greenwich Village, sitting at a bar writing. I spent a lot of time in my 20s doing the same thing, except I was writing in a paper journal then, and I’m writing on this tiny computer now. The funny thing is that this computer (the Toshiba Libretto 100ct) was made at about the same time that I moved to New York and started writing at bars in the Village and Lower East Side.

In order to make it here tonight, I took NJ Transit from my home in Hazlet to work in Edison ( by the Metropark station), and after work took the train into the city. NJ Public Transportation is completely geared to getting people in and out of New York City, so in order to get from Hazlet to Edison I had to go 15 miles out of my way to Newark. Whatever. While I was on the train, though, I realized how much I miss public transportation. I used to read books on the subway to and from work when I lived in Brooklyn, and I would go through a book in a month or two. Now I never read. But on my way to work today, I started reading Charles Stross’ “Accelerando” on the Libretto (I found an electronic copy online), and it is really great. I’ve been meaning to read a Stross book for a while – I am a huge fan of his blog – but I haven’t gotten started on anything yet. I borrowed “Halting State” (another Stross book) from Erik G. a while ago, but I never cracked it open, so I returned it.

Well, Jason’s here, so time to eat!