"THE EGO WITH ITS GROSS BODAY AND GREAT, SWOLLEN, PUMPKIN HEAD....

...is like a man who will stand right in front of you at a horse race: you can only catch a glimpse of the race by peeping under his arms or between his legs."


--Christopher Isherwood, quoted in Sunday's NYT book section in a review of the exhaustive new biography Isherwood: A Life Revealed. For those scratching their heads, the Broadway show Cabaret (which the hex and I saw at the old Studio 54 on NYE 2002/3 featuring Molly Ringworm and Tom Bosley) is based on his Berlin Stories. More important, the vendantist and contemporary of EM (Passage to India) Forster and W. Somerset Maugham cowrote, with Swami Prabhavananda, 1953's How to Know God: The Yoga Aphorisms of Patanjali -- which was conveniently left out of the review. Haven't heard of it? Suffice to say that the clear, concise book is de rigeur if you have any interest whatsoever in understanding the philisophical underpinnings of asana (physical) practice.



IN OTHER NEWS

-It seems wrong for a Chicago institution whose namesake is dead dead dead to start branching out. But since Margie's Candies is opening its #2 not far from my house, at 1800 W. Montrose -- which will allow us to avoid the Devil's Milwaukee/Armitage/Western Triangle to get our old-school ice cream fix -- I suppose we'll just have to embrace it. www.margiescandies.com

-It turns out the physician does indeed have a beard. And an ex-wife (friendly terms) whom I know and like very much. Nonetheless he listened intently while I launched into the long, not-so-amusing story of various doctors' and quacks' attempts to cure my 11-month bout of prepatellar bursitis (swollen knee), and patiently sat through my interrogation about bill collection policies at Cook County Hospital (almost nonexistent). Mission accomplished, Madam.