Rebel Prince

Yup, I am now 26 years old. Welcome to my early mid-to-late 20s. To celebrate, my co-workers and I had lunch at Tako Grill, a great little Japanese restaurant on Wisconsin Avenue. Mmm, teriyaki. And as if having a birthday wasn’t enough of an event, today I started my new position at work, that of assistant managing editor. No more slacking for me, I guess. Well, one of the perks is my own office, with a rather nice view. So for now, even as the reports start to pile up on my desk, you know me, I’ll be lazily turning in my swivel chair, mentally re-decorating the room. “Framed prints on this wall, potted palm over there…” If only I had Nate Berkus on speed dial.

Ha, cool.

Small company seeks combo pianist, receptionist for front office

SAN FRANCISCO (AP)—If you can handle some light filing, answer phones and hammer out a little Chopin on the ivories in between e-mails, you’re qualified for a job at Retina, a startup looking for more than Muzak for the front office.

Full story here.

As much as I find annoying the process of registering for online access to news articles, I think the free New York Times access is well worth the few minutes it takes to sign up. I’ve been reading the Times online for years, and have found it to be a great resource. (However, most articles except reviews go into the pay archive about a week after the publication date.) That said, here are some recent, interesting arts and style articles:

• Warner Brothers commissioned Elton John to write a Broadway musical based on Anne Rice’s Lestat novels, scheduled to open fall 2005.
• New York City Ballet revives a sleek production of Swan Lake (plays through May 13).
• That Matrix look. I admit, after seeing the first movie, I went into a Keanu-as-Neo phase, and wore all black for a few days.
• Is there a link between language and creativity? The case of the Chinese syllabary (via Arts & Letters Daily).

In other media news, Eric McCormack will be on Live with Regis and Kelly tomorrow. Finally. He was supposed to be on months ago, but it was a false alarm.

Hugh Jackman and Paul Rudd were guests this morning. (Oh, on the show, I mean. Not at my house. Don’t I wish.) What was up with Hugh’s flowing hair? It’s supposedly for a new movie role, but it does not become him. Pulled back, maybe. But as it is, a little too Fabio. By the way, this fall Hugh will star in a new Broadway musical about songwriter Peter Allen, called The Boy from Oz. I’m all over it.

Even web pages need a little validation now and then. I don’t mean to be all conformist on principle, and not that this has any discernible impact on your web browsing experience, but after wrangling with a few ampersands and closing markup tags, I’ve worked the front page to validate as XHTML 1.0. As for the dozens of other pages on this website, you’re on your own.

Used books often give clues to stories of their own. Settling into bed just now, I reached over to my bookshelf for an anthology I bought last month for a mere three dollars at the used-book store Second Story: The Faber Book of Gay Short Fiction. So far I’ve read a couple of the stories. Not bad. But only tonight as I quickly thumbed through the entire book did I find evidence of its former life. Tucked between pages 472-473, in the middle of David Leavitt’s “When You Grow to Adultery,” is the original receipt for the book at twenty-four dollars and ninety-five cents, dated December 7, 1991, from A Different Light Bookstore in New York. Part of a small, but important chain of gay bookstores for nearly twenty years, the New York location of A Different Light closed in early 2001.

And so as a piece of history, this receipt, this small, yellow piece of paper, stirs in my mind a brief flurry of whimsical speculation. Who first bought the book? Has it sat on a shelf for the past ten-plus years, or has it accompanied its owner on distant travels? Who or what brought it from Chelsea to Dupont Circle, and when?

Oh, the stories books could tell. So to speak.

Thom’s post about a couple of interesting recent gay-themed segments on All Things Considered reminded me of a public radio project that I had come across a long while back: Outright Radio, a kind of gay This American Life. I just revisited their website and am glad to see the show is still going strong. All the stories are available online in Real Audio format. Check it out.

And by the way, if any of you subscribe to Sirius satellite radio, I’d be interested to hear thoughts on OutQ, their new queer channel.

Pottery Barn Kids (furnishings for children’s rooms) has been around for a while now, but I was surprised to find out about PB Teen, which was launched a few months ago. Based on the scant pictures on their new website, it looks like Urban Outfitters meets Target. Having a separate teen furniture catalog seems a bit ridiculous–or at least calling it “teen” is ridiculous; I’m sure its demand could extend up to, say, twenty-something apartment dwellers–but it’s a shrewd move in any case. Marketing directly to younger people encourages assertion of their own room-decor choices, an area in which they might not have had much say; and the Pottery Barn name, already familiar among older consumers (namely, parents who will ultimately make most of these purchases), projects the whole Williams-Sonoma sheen of attainable luxury.

We’ll see. I ordered a print catalog, and when it arrives, will report back with a review of the goods.

My friend Richard is in town for the last performances of the current tour of Rent. I’m more of a casual fan, but he (who knows all the Rent people personally) and the others I met are totally into it. My new friends and I have been partying the past couple of nights, and Richard scored me a second-row rush ticket for last night’s show. I’ve seen Rent five times now (twice each in San Francisco and Washington, and once while on vacation in Milan, Italy), but I’ve never seen it from so close to the stage. It was fantastic. The energy from the actors was palpable. I was moved at lyrics I’ve heard countless times. Sometimes I get asked how anyone can see the same show over and over again, but the thing is, it’s never really “the same show.” Each individual performance of any work (be it drama, dance, music, etc.) brings out a different set of nuances, even with the same performers, and makes for a wholly new experience.

Info: this tour of Rent runs through Sunday, May 4 at the Warner Theatre, Washington, D.C.