First, in narcissistic news, I’ve updated The Scriptorium with excerpts from some of my MFA Year 1 productions. The full versions are all freely available; simply remember that I always try to follow the word of the Lord. In this case: ask, and it shall be given unto you. That’s a promise and a warning.

Second, I will be posting real content weekly for the duration of the summer. That, too, is a promise and a warning, but mostly a way to ensure that I feel obligated to more than myself, which has too stony a heart to be bothered by broken vows. Being anti-politics, I’ll give you exactly what you expect.Not change, just more of the same.

Third, what was that?My way to do footnotes/asides. Fast, intuitive, and unobtrusive except for the link color (I’m still debating how to strike the right balance between subtlety and noticeability.) So yeah, I guess you can expect some change, but only in style and appearance, not substance. Here I am behaving politically.

Now, get ready for some thoughts on money as a root of all kinds of good before the weekend, whereupon you can choose to spread your cash (if you have it) for either dark or light.

I shall miss some things about Cincinnati:

• The excitement for under-.500 sports teams. Here, people want to be happy and excited. We seize the smallest glimmer of hope, but don’t whine (though we do weep) when it gets crushed by low payroll, a strike, or Kimo von Oelhoffen.
• Private kindness. No one will accost you or hug you on the street, but if you ask for pretty much anything except cash, you’ll get at least an earnest effort toward help and a sincere apology if no assistance can be lent. And if you don’t ask, you won’t get condescending offers of help just because you might look a little lost.
• The skyline.
• The greatest single-city triumvirate of independent ice cream makers: Graeter’s, Aglemesis’s, and Madison’s.
• Being able to count on people to “come home” for holidays, for your landmark occasion, or for good.
• Unflinching loyalty, but not without a willingness to give criticism when you (read: a person, a school, a sports team) behave in a way undeserving of loyalty (read: 2008 Bengals.)
• Markets. They have them here, but they are overpriced and underqualified. I’ve already started my list for Herbs and Spice and Everything Nice, I have a craving for some of Madison’s mushrooms, and why can’t I find a Mediterranean Imported Foods anywhere? DC is as behind the times for culinary indulgence as Cincinnati is for, well, everything according to Mark Twain.
• Humility. Everyone (real people, not students) seems/tries to be consciously important here. I miss persons whose first concern was raising a family. I miss family, too, for that matter.

Next post will either have images or address what I won’t miss about Cincinnati. Or I’ll just say it here: racism, provinciality, and Elder (which is well-characterized by the first two.)

In my itchy roots fashion, I am again transplanted. But rather than a modest shift between Ohio gardens, I am now trying to grow on the concrete grid of our capital, the heart of darkness in politics and crime (but I repeat myself!) Minimally acquainted with the city, I already see how little I understand the word urban, but I think it fits this site’s titular aims even more than I had conceived.

© Josh Jones

Contrarily but kindred, I spent the past week at the Trappist monastery Gethsemani, silent in Kentucky hills and bluegrass. The only similarities to the city were the heat and my struggle to sleep (highly related); all else was new. Submitting to the rigors of the liturgy of the hours, I learned a new pace of life ruled by the Word.

The intended fusion now confronts a new challenge: transposing that reflective, patient rhythm onto the pell mell staccatos of city commutes, work shifts, and gunshots. (Oh, another similarity: Kentucky hunters and DC thugs - but different targets.) Maintaining the traditional tranquility and sanctuary within the Daily Office will confound, elude, and challenge me, but that is the nature of the quest of the Urban Trappist.

That and not flunking out of grad school or going broke. Writing here more regularly, too (sorry for the unintended/unannounced hiatus; life happened.)

- Finished the work at Yelp, whence you can find bushels of reviews and teaspoons of value.

- Submitted a new film review for Pulse. Don’t wait to read it next Wednesday; skip the middle men and go see Starting Out in the Evening now.

- Got to do some of my writing, which you may hear/drink in the City.

- Met salmonella and we took immediate dislike to each other. I would say that I won, considering he is now gone, but I can’t deny that he got his thing done. Either way, I learned why restaurants don’t let you order chicken medium-rare.

Hmm, which one of these is not like the others? Probably the illness. It did beget an awful lot of reading (mandated: A Room of One’s Own; recommended: Raymond Carver’s short stories; strongly suggested: Wislawa Szymborska’s poetry), but other than that and my education on poultry preparation, it was nonproductive.

The other three, however, have taught me that I surely love judgment. Even the work for Yelp, which was trivial at best, spawned something creative and diligent in me. As such, you are likely to be subject to more critique here (i.e. the Counting Crows assessment a couple of posts down), but hopefully in ways as clever as the aforementioned Brewsicians page.

Until then, who knows?

So if you’re a glutton for it, here’s where you can find it:

Yelp Reviews
Pulse Film Review

I’ll be honest. There will be a lot more going into those than on here in coming days. (Please stifle your jubilant hymns.) But that’s only because they’ve become duties (and profits). My heart is here, and I’m glad you’re with it. Before May, I’ll unfurl some thoughts and words on various media of the city and how there is gold within the soot and structures.

(Sorry urban prospectors, that was just a metaphor.)

First, a multitudinous paean comparing my 23-course gluttony at Alinea to sundry scenes.

Second, the latest additions to the brewery:

Maplethorpe, a dark ale brewed with maple syrup and artistic temerity.

Paradoxicale, a balanced brown ale gone nuts with almonds and filberts.

Figment of Your Inebriation, a dark ale brewed deceptively with figs and spices.

Go look.

That’s all for now; be back in February. Get excited.

Turns out, analog writing is productive, too. I had to spend a few days typing up my tangible scribbles. I considered writing this entry au naturel, but recent complaints about my penmanship (blame genetics: medically inclined father) made that seem foolish. So, back to the digital grind.

Actually, that’s probably enough. Better for us both to ease back into this.

Anyway, in this season of expectations and arrivals, expect plenty more arrivals, though I can’t promise glad tidings, great joys, or Messiahs. But keep watch over these flocking posts anyway, by night or by day.

Anyway, this site isn’t doing overly well in that development, so I figured I’d better write about that, since that’s generally how I try to solve my own crises of identity. Note that I said “try to solve” not “typically address”, which starts with ignorance, moves to depression, tries a self-rescue by some decadent prodigality, then finally reaches for the pen. All in one day, sometimes.

The blog entries are all over the map, and I find myself creating more and more broad categories. I had hoped to see so many in one realm that specific topics would earn icons, but instead I’m wading through Google images with nearly every post. This was is no exception.

Labora has been all but ignored, which is depressingly accurate. The only real development of note is my two-headed spelunking trip into the caverns of bookmaking. (Hmm, that has no alternate, non-literal/literary meaning, does it Pete Rose?) One is a novel, one is a devotional, both are well underway and far from complete. That distance from the finish is good in that it indicates an amply large vision, but it’s not dissimilar from starting to get winded in the first mile of a marathon, a feeling I never intend to experience.

The city was never intended to be rapidly evolving, and I do have two projects in store for it. One could be ready next week, but I don’t know how to implement the already-finished content. And, as my aesthetic studies have taught me, form is content, so it’s not ready until the medium fits the message. The other has its form but needs an awful lot of clever content, and, as we can see right here, that takes decades for me to create.

That’s the state of the blogastery. Thank you for reading. May we both enjoy this site for the length of its life.

This is not a livejournal. You won’t hear about my life except as a portal into more general issues that you might actually appreciate, at least if you tend to appreciate the sorts of things I appreciate.

I probably won’t post frequently. As you’ll eventually see in another portion of the site, I like to write slowly. “Fools rush ink” is my (irrepressibly witty) credo. The intent of this is that when I do post something, it will be well thought out and worth reading.

Expect no fiction or creative writing. That’ll go elsewhere. Also, no links to works of mine, nor announcements about impending publications. (Hint: check the labora page; it’s aptly named.)

One explanation about this being in the ora category. No, it’s not precisely prayer (so don’t expect meditations), and yet it is. Part of the Urban Trappist intent is for all use of God-given skills to be a form of prayer. I hope that writing is one of my gifts (or else I’m up the freelance river without a paddle), so these compositions are prayer.

Also, ora is obviously the etymological root for orate, so its meaning is also speech. Consider this blog to be my mouthpiece.