Roz Chast

Update: Adding the caption to that final Wm Hamilton cartoon (oops, didn't realize it wasn't included with the graphic!)by KenSome readers will have noticed that after goodness-only-knows-how-many years of daily (and even twice-daily) posts here, I pretty much disappeared from this space -- and even, sometime after that, from my own Sunday Classics with Ken from DWT blog.

With updates on my New Phone Day Maybe and Calvin Trillin's New Yorker Festival eating tourSurely Roz Chast's "Hamlet hat" will henceforth be derigueur for every actor who takes on this marquis role.by KenI'm still preoccupied by this Roz Chast cartoon, from the September 14 New Yorker, which I presented the other day:

I know you won't have any interest in what follows, which is just for me. I feel bad, though, so I thought you might enjoy this Roz Chast cartoon from the same issue of The New Yorker referenced below. (Click to enlarge.) Oh, and also the Dan Roe one below.by KenI know there are important things happening in the world which demand comment from me, but they'll just have to wait another day (or possibly more).

by KenPossibly this won't be of interest to you country-livers and fitness fanatics, though wise people know that they can always learn something from, you know, everything. And many of the rest of us would like at least to make a gesture toward a fitter lifestyle, and where better to start than with a nature walk?

HERE'S ONE VERSION OF THE CREATION --from the Fourth Day: The lighting of the firmament

THE ANGEL URIEL: In full splendor rises nowthe sun, streaming:a wondrous bridegroom,a giant, proud and happyto run his path.With gentle motion and soft shimmerthe moon steals through the silent night.

Waldemar Kmentt (t), Uriel; Bavarian Radio Chorus and Symphony Orchestra, Eugen Jochum, cond. Philips, recorded July 1966

New Yorker cartoon editor Bob Mankoff adds a note of caution to this vision of paradise conjured by Roz Chast: "Don’t try this at home unless this is in your home." (Note: You should be able to enlarge tonight's cartoon's a little -- like from 420 to 465 pixels wide -- by clicking on them.

Tom Toles, Washington Post [click to enlarge]by KenThe political craziness level has, at least for the time being, flipped me out, and I refuse to let it crowd out some swell times I've been having on to such nifty places as The Players, the theatrical club founded by the great actor Edwin Booth on Gramercy Park South (a Municipal Art Society Tour with Matt Postal), Coney Island (a Municipal Art Soci

Okay, this isn't exactly the "punch line" of a "joke," but it's sort-of. And we're going to work our way backwards, starting with the sort-of punch line and working back to what the hell the whole thing is about. Just trust me here, please.

Roz says she was never able to get her parentsto talk about their wishes for, you know, the end.Her parents, who were born 11 days apart in 1912 and had known each other practically all their lives, "had tough lives," says Roz, "way, way tougher than mine."by KenIt's not exactly a secret that I am in awe of Roz Chast.