Miner Mishap, originally uploaded by Brian Wilkins.

Drank this beer while we were in Hot Springs, and it was deeeelish. There were not yet microbrewerys when I was living in Oklahoma so I’d never had it before.

The Oklahoma Historical Society has an excellent write-up of so-called Choc beer which has nothing to do with chocolate and does nothing to dispel the stereotype that Native Americans like to hit the sauce.

Even in its hedonic infrastructure, Galveston displayed grand aspirations. The city had five hundred saloons, more than New Orleans, a city not exactly known for banking its fires. Galveston’s poshest whorehouse was situated right behind its richest men’s club, the Artillery Club, which barred women except for an annual ball and the occasional coming-out party of a member’s daughter. The city’s most disreputable block was Fat Alley, between 28th and 29th. In Galveston alcohol was blood, but one could also gamble, acquire love, and lose oneself in an opium mist.

The city exhibited a rare harmony of spirit. Blacks, whites, Jews, and immigrants lived and worked side by side with an astonishing degree of mutual tolerance.

From Issac’s Storm. Oh how I wish the city was still like this.

Not really news unless you live under a rock, but the words fundamental right to marry make me fill with gooey warmth.

• May 27-31 — AmeriVespa 2010 in San Antonio
• day ride to New Bruanfels to go toobin’
• including a police-escorted ride to the Alamo for a group picture. The mayor is giving the VCOA president the keys to the city! It’s like an episode of Batman or something.
• raffle and party at the 125-year-old Pearl Brewery
• June 2-14 — Florida!
• I’m going diving with manatees!
• Hukilau 2010!
• Somewhere else! But we’re not sure yet! Maybe Key West? Or Tampa!
• June 20-July 13 — Gothenburg, Sweden
• Now it really sounds like a Batman episode!
• Maybe I’ll check out the Epidemic of Art
• 18 hours of sunlight a day!
• The Malm Whale!!!
• July 15-19 — Cloudcroft, NM
• We’re riding the motorcycle from Houston for my family reunion
• Maybe we’ll make a side trip to White Sands
• or hike to the famous rotting railroad trestle one of my relatives helped build
• August 15-22 — maybe back to Sweden?

We’ll only be home about five weeks total during the entire summer. Looking forward to may adventures.

My current editors are pretty awesome — so awesome that I have sent a letter to their bosses and their bosses’ bosses highlighting the ways in which they’ve made my life, and my work, more enjoyable and easier. Which is why this memo, from Village Voice editor Tony Ortega to writer Foster Kamer, makes me giddy.

We put into words the things people actually think and say when they are being honest with each other and not talking in that pretend-voice that the dailies and the television people put on. Right? I mean, that is at the core of this foul-mouthed, truth-telling, non-pandering institution. I mean, that’s the only reason I want to work here, anyway.

It is so heartening to have an editor stand up for the bottom line (the realbottom line, journalistic integrity, not the financial one).

I referenced the Bechdel Test in a longform essay test today about the plight of the female protagonist in Leslie Fiedler’s pattern of the male narrative. I am awesome.

I had just met Crystal, the Rocker girl, about five minutes before the shoot, and then we had to sit there and stare at each other menacingly. I couldn’t stop giggling. The awesome part was that she rode her own bike, and I rode mine. We’re legit!

Teabaggers were protesting downtown yesterday because it was tax day. Wonder if they drove in their cars on roads (paid for by tax money) to get to Discovery Green (also paid for by tax money).

Last weekend at the BMW motorcycle rally in Llano a couple of guys showed up with the Gadsden flag and this one hanging from their tents. “Don’t Tread On Me. Unless you’re a maker of fine German motorworks.” I wanted to take a picture but there was no way to do it covertly, and besides, they were drunk and I didn’t want them to throw me in the river.

More on the moto trip later. We camped, and carried everything with us on the Beemer.

* Insert air quotes here