SKIP, OLD BUDDY OLD PAL, YOU’VE OBVIOUSLY GOT TO GET OUT MORE It was with great interest that I read Steven Almond’s article about defaulted message boards (“I Have Defaulted…and I Can’t Get Up,” August 26). As an artist whose medium often involves such items as road signs, government-ese, and…
Something evil in our midst, as the dance to the music of the apocalypse goes on. Ten days that really shook the world, a hurricane of epic Miami proportions: biggest, flashiest, most sinister. The city returning to its natural state, an overinflated banana republic: martial law, looting, and armed troops…
MIAMI BEACH, 1972: THE EVE OF SELF-DESTRUCTION Regarding Steven Almond’s “Where Were You in ’72?” (August 19): I was at Flamingo Park for the Democratic and Republican conventions in 1972. While true that the death of political idealism was born in Miami Beach that year, it was suicide. Even as…
Sometimes I think the only way out is out. No whining here; think about it: I’ve got a cool job, a beautiful wife, a beautiful house, and I feel sometimes like I’m living in a Talking Heads song. I certainly should be the happiest dog in the pound. And then…
Haiti town, and life is loose and fast. Parties start late, time is a real relative concept, and the social graces are still observed, the soothing introductory endearment “c’est on plaisir” being thrown around a lot. Exile politics and nasty assassinations, the zenglendo, Duvalier-era thugs, stalking the politically incorrect. Some…
JOEY TO THE WORLD Jim DeFede did a memorable article on Joe Gersten, greatly revealing the background of the commissioner (“Gersten: The Real Story,” August 12). And the cover illustration by John Kleber should be framed and displayed in a gallery of New Times front pages. Ron Miller Miami THE…
Miami nightlife, doing that crazy tri-ethnic stomp. The Latin division cranking up with the Miss Hispanidad International Pageant, a Hispanic Heritage Festival production at the Fontainebleau Hilton’s Club Tropigala. Glitterama time, the room all tarted up with faux Roman sculptures, brass pillars, various recreations of atmospheric palm fronds in the…
Kids, you might not want to let your parents read today’s column. Things could get a little rough, just like real life. Most people who spend their evenings “smokin’ weed and drinkin'” end up fat and lazy, the television cable hooked intravenously to their flabby arms. Others get their eyeball…
REAGAN AND THE POLITICS OF CYNICISM I would like to amplify Ramon Cernuda’s assertion that the Reagan team in the early Eighties “wanted to counteract the policies of the Carter administration with regards to Cuba” (“The Art of Exile,” July 29). After eliminating or drastically reducing funding for many established…
So I call up the source: Me: “Sir, is it true that you embezzled thousands of dollars from tax coffers?” Him: “I categorically deny those allegations. But listen, while I got ya, do you have any idea how I might be able to get tickets to the Smashing Pumpkins/Chainsaw Kittens…
Club columnists just want to have fun, not provoke the fall of Western civilization, but some readers — and a few friends lately — horrified by our shocking lack of moral/political/intellectual consciousness. Correspondents in particular offended and disgusted, which, ironically, pretty much sums up our usual frame of mind. One…
CERNUDA: A VOICE IN THE DARK I felt a great sense of belonging reading Mike Clary’s interview with Ramon Cernuda (“The Art of Exile,” July 29). I am an American-born Cuban (my parents are from Cuba) and espouse the same views as Mr. Cernuda. Although I am not actively involved…
Summer, the cruelest and definitely nontrendiest season, the fashionable world still plowing along heedlessly, cranking out low-grade fabulousness. A surrealistic beginning to a whirlwind of cut-rate glamour with the United States launch of a new fragrance, SalvadorDali’s “Laguna,” a joint effort by Salvador Dali Parfums of Paris and Fine Fragrances…
No theme this week, just lots of pain, most of which will probably be forgotten by the time you read this, just as this is forgotten as soon as you finish reading it. It’s very sad and unfortunate that an innocent woman was killed in an accident involving a jitney,…
MUSIC TO HER EYES I liked Tom Austin’s article about Russel Frehling (“Music without Melody,” July 22). I have admired the composer’s work for a long time. Austin’s was probably the only credible article about a serious contemporary artist New Times has ever printed. Previous to this, I have been…
I’m tired, real tired. But this theory seems so straight-up simple: If, as the fascist censors insist, listening to the 2 Live Crew will turn you into a rapist and if listening to Body Count’s “Cop Killer” will make you murder an officer of the law, then couldn’t the opposite…
In earlier, more innocent times, parties were simple community celebrations, brave stabs at civilization, sweet as the frontier weddings in John Ford movies. Like everything else, the movieland version of parties degenerating with the onslaught of the modern era. The Nazi homo romps in The Damned. The decay and decadence…
A MOUSE IS NOT A HOME I was a victim of the Morton Towers low-maintenance, high-rent syndrome (“Totally Rent Out of Shape,” July 15). My first rent increase was $30 — no problems, no complaints. Then came the mice, followed by mildew that ran rampant throughout my apartment, clothing, furniture,…
More nightclubs spreading across the terrain. Mambo madness. Rave fever. A serious music spot opens, geared to the “normal people” market. The anti-yuppie movement takes hold, promoters in a death grip with club owners, and general nastiness abounds. A city run amok, but still, comfortable in its amokness. All the…
On language: So the other midday I’m sitting at a bus stop in Westchester, waiting. Some middle-age guy, a 38-year Miami resident originally from Albany, New Yawk, strolls up and begins yammering. The main thing we talk about is distinguishing characteristics of Latin, or Hispanic, dialects and accents worldwide. He…
NOT AN ORGANIC BUREAUCRAT IN SIGHT Not a bad article at all by Mr. Semple regarding the demise of the Grove farmers’ market (“Pave It to Save It,” July 8). The mind-numbing lack of foresight that the city administrators habitually show never ceases to amaze me. They, in fact, bewilder…
People say life’s the thing, but reading is just so much more rewarding. Most of the problems of the world begin with the human inability to sit quietly in a room. But then, life on the hot bottom of the Earth demands a little agitation and distraction. Plenty of both…
