Hustle and bustle of the Christmas season...

Made it down to Somerville last night to see debg while she's in town. Good to see her, and had a most excellent time. Lot of people I was extremely happy to see -- haven't hung out with the Somerville crowd too much lately. Tend to get very hunkered down sometimes. Barely leave the bloody house.

No chance of that right now, though. Maybe it's the holidays, but man, we're on the move this weekend. Down to Lea's brother's house in a bit, and our friend Beth M. is somewhere on this coast, visiting from California. We're set to run across her sooner or later.

All and all, a bit hectic. But it's a good sort of hectic.

More Def By The Day

Almost through with Season Three of Def Poetry Jam, and overall, I have to say the quality is slipping. Still some good pieces -- Shappy, particularly, cracked me up, Poetri's Krispy Kreme poem always makes me smile, and Suheir Hammad gets better every time, but really, it's suffering from using fewer and fewer "established" poets. And watching the StaceyAnn Chin/Black Ice dual voice poem was kind of surreal -- Chin's SUCH an excellent writer, with so much presence, I just didn't feel like he was keeping up. But it was the most I liked him in the three seasons, so there was obviously something there.

On the other hand, I'm still taking unabashed pleasure in watching Mos Def recite classic poems. He seems to take so much joy in it. Seriously too cute for words. And the words, "Hafiz: Def Poet" had me in stitches. Seriously -- a lot of you out there have been on or at least recorded for the show. Is he that cute in real life?

Three more episodes to go. Still don't regret watching it all, and still don't hate it.