This blog has moved to Ghost and become a newsletter

Now that I’ve got it set up and running, I can announce here that I have moved from Blogspot to a newsletter at Ghost, 111 Words. If you find your way here and are interested in my posts from September 2025 on, you can subscribe to the newsletter there. Eventually, I will move all the posts from here to there as an archive of my online writing all the way back to January 2006. Join me there, and feel free to subscribe!

Cumpleaños del gnomo

Cuando me despierto, voy a la cocina y veo al gnomo tomar un café en la mesa. Nos miramos. "¿Tienes algo que decirme?", dice. "¿Tienes algo que decirme?", digo. Nos miramos. El espectro entra desde el salón. "¡Feliz cumpleaños! "Gracias," decimos yo y el gnomo en el mismo momento. Nos miramos. "¿Es tu cumpleaños?" nos preguntamos en el mismo momento. Nos miramos. El espectro ríe. "Estáis ambos locos."

 

El gnomo tiene un trabajo nuevo

El gnomo tiene un trabajo nuevo como guardia de seguridad en un sitio de construcción de tranvía. Cuando le veo en la intersección cerca del hospital, le doy una señal para preguntarle si puedo atravesar la calle, pero él me ignora, como si yo no pudiera ser visto. Espero en la lluvia hasta que el gnomo me da permiso para ir. Varios coches me pasan y también personas mojadas sobre sus bicis y el autobús que quiero usar para ir al centro de la ciudad. Después de unos minutos, desaparezco completamente entre las gotas de la lluvia.

 

The two versions of The Grateful Dead’s “Frankllin’s Tower” available on official albums in 1982

When I first got into The Grateful Dead in 1982, two recordings of Jerry Garcia and Robert Hunter's "Franklin's Tower" had been released: the studio version on 1975's "Blues for Allah" and the live version on 1981's "Dead Set". I once preferred that live version after Bob Weir's "Feel Like A Stranger", but now I appreciate how, after all the complex, swirling lines of "Help on the Way" and "Slipknot!", the studio version completes the three-song suite with the simple A-major-to-D-major groove of "Franklin's Tower" (with a quick passing G major in between), which is a great springboard when Garcia sings, "If you get confused, go listen to the music play." (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 21 August 2025)

El gnomo en Reikiavik

Estaba ponderando que no había visto al gnomo por dos semanas, y el espectro todavía no sabía dónde el gnomo había desparecido. Pero hoy hemos recibido una carta del gnomo. Estaba pasando dos semanas en Reikiavik con su familia islandesa. Sus relativos viven en la ciudad en un parque famoso para las personas mágicas. Con la carta había una foto de su casa, que yo había visitado hace once años con mi hijo y mi hija. No vimos a los gnomos tampoco a hadas o elfos. 

 

“Sweet tarts” and “Maggy’s tea”: Roman Jakobson and James Joyce’s “Finnegans Wake” (1939)

For Roman Jakobson, in "Closing Statement: Linguistics and Poetics" (1960), "the poetic function projects the principle of equivalence from the axis of selection into the axis of combination." The "axis of selection" involves choosing one word instead of another; the "axis of combination" putting words together in a sequence. Reading individual words in James Joyce's "Finnegans Wake" (1939) often involves the former, and sets of alternative senses: "sweet tarts" (116.23) can be cakes, "loose" women, or "sweethearts". But immediately thereafter, such layering is instead "projected into the axis of combination" as two phrases in a row: "Maggy's tea, or your majesty, if heard as a boost from a born gentleman" (116.24-25). (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 20 August 2025) 

“Help on the Way / Slipknot! / Franklin’s Tower” at the Grateful Dead’s concert at Berkeley’s Greek Theater on 14 July 1984

14 July 1984 at Berkeley's Greek Theater was my favorite performance of the Grateful Dead's "Help on the Way / Slipknot! / Franklin's Tower" suite. With the band ready for the second set, Bob Weir wasn't on stage yet, so Phil Lesh got the crowd to shout, "Come on, Weir!" as Jerry Garcia began the "Help on the Way" groove. Then at the end of "Slipknot!", Garcia pushed the register ever higher until the rhythm section suspended the beat and he spiralled back down to the song's primary riff. During "Franklin's Tower", the crowd roared when it began to rain and Garcia seemed to be calling it down from the clouds. (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 19 August 2025)

“The Fate of Ophelia” and “Althea”: Taylor Swift and The Grateful Dead (plus John Mayer)

The first song on Taylor Swift's album "The Life of a Showgirl" (forthcoming on 3 October 2025) is "The Fate of Ophelia". That sounds like a quotation from Jerry Garcia and Robert Hunter's song "Althea" (from the 1980 album "Go To Heaven"): "You may be the fate of Ophelia." Whether Swift's song echoes Garcia and Hunter's remains to be seen, but I was struck by this further connection: guitarist John Mayer, one of Swift's ex-boyfriends, first met the Dead's Bob Weir when they played "Althea" together on "The Late Late Show" in 2015, a performance that inspired Weir to ask Mayer to join the newly formed Dead and Company that fall. (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 18 August 2025) 

Don Q looks down from the roof of Hush Money House

From the roof of Hush Money House, Don Q looked down at the people sitting at the beautiful cafe tables and chairs. "The garden has never been so beautiful." He looked into the distance. "I have to tell Vanza I can see his house from here." When he looked down again, his guards were clearing the tables, and then Malice walked to one of the cafe tables with her assistant, who was carrying a tray with a cup of coffee and a piece of cake. "Malice," he shouted, "order a piece for me. I'll come right down." She glared up at him. "Okay, I guess I'll have to get my own." (Andrew Shields, #111Words, 16 August 2025)