Dave Shulman

WHILE ADMIRING SOME OLD album covers, I decide that I like Tom Hannan’s artwork on Thelonious Monk/Sonny Rollins (Prestige, 1953) enough that I should search online poster shops for a print, something suitable for hanging in my new one-room palace. It doesn’t take long to find an affordable 16-inch version......

HAZEL PETTIGREW, SENIOR GRAPHOPHOBIA editor at the Elliot Tanpool Mangrave Institute of Modern Hieroglyphic Studies, calls at 6 a.m., as is her custom, with an offer of unreasonable work: For one week, I’m to sleep on the couch in the living room of one Daisycorn Blue, self-proclaimed mayor of Spud......

AS A FICTIONAL CHARACTER, Erik Cheeseburger was offered a considerable sum of money to appear in a feature film. But then the production company could only raise enough money to produce a documentary — a form which, by definition, requires its subjects to be nonfictional. The situation was remedied by......

Jennifer and Richard live in a cave over the river. Colleen and Bill live two caves down. I live in the cave between them, with my cat, Jackson. Everyone but Jackson has a job. We’re good neighbors. We share stories and meals. We’re conveniently located within walking distance to shops......

John Hawkes’ father, Pete, was an extremely bright and rugged fellow who grew up outside of Alexandria, Minnesota, now a town of about 14,000, two car-hours northwest of Minneapolis. At the age of 15, Pete left the small apartment where he’d lived on his own since he was 12 for......

I HAVE SEVERAL FRIENDS named Tom. One Tom is concerned that I might be spending too much time alone, reading and writing instead of keeping up with current events. So at least once a day, he leaves short updates at the tone. “Hey, it’s me again. It turns out that......

Humane and Reasonable?I was 11 or 12, drinking sugar, coming down from an Edgar Allan Poe binge, rummaging through the living-room bookshelves for something new. We had a fireplace with built-in floor-to-ceiling bookshelves on either side, with the lower shelves hidden by cupboard doors. To the right of the fireplace,......

{mosimage}THE TOTALLY FUCKIN’ L.A. human-resources unit contacts me by e-mail: “Our hieroglyphics editor is very interested in meeting with you.” It doesn’t say why, but I can use some more income. So after the judge turns me loose from jury duty at 1 p.m., I call the number on the......