My Andrew Tsubaki Story

Many people shared their personal recollections of Andrew Tsubaki at the memorial service in Lawrence, Kansas on 20 December 2009.  For me, the two most moving testimonials came from his sons. Philip, the younger son who lives in Campinas, Brazil, said his father left Japan for North America in 1957, at the age of 26, his character and personality…

16 December 2009: Ben Who?

At a time when newspaper and magazine readers seem to be abandoning print for sexier electronic media, one might expect Time magazine to select someone more bankable for its much-anticipated 2009 Person of the Year cover story—Sarah Palin? Tiger Woods? The Gate Crashers at the White House?  Heck, maybe even the Balloon Boy.  But no.…

13 December 2009: Four Hours to Orgasm!

Just when we’ve all become accustomed to hearing about “erections lasting more than four hours” thanks to Viagra, comes word that there is a new drug in the market which cures premature ejaculation in men.  According to The New York Times, Johnson & Johnson “has developed Priligy, a pill aimed at men who ejaculate before…

11 December 2009: Tiger Burning…

William Blake (1757-1827) said it all in his poem—a song not of innocence, but of experience.  A true visionary, Blake knew about our man, over two hundred years ago, and that this is the way many among us now wish to remember “The Tiger.”  TIGER, tiger, burning bright In the forests of the night, What immortal…

10 December 2009: Just Me, Justice

President Obama, in his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech at Oslo, spoke at length about “a just peace” and, of course, “a just war.”  He uses the word “just” only as an adjective, meaning “honorable and fair in one’s dealings and actions…consistent with moral right; righteous…valid within the law; legitimate…based on fact or sound reason;…

30 November 2009: Tiger Gets a Woody!

Tiger Woods is finally living up to his name.  Okay, so the guy gets a woody with some other lady.  He and his wife alledgedly get into a spat.  He tries to leave in his car.  She chases after him with a golf club and starts swinging.  Did she bash him with an iron or, ironically, with a wood?  In any…

26 November 2009: Head of Gobbler

Thanksgiving is not one of the holidays I grew up with in the Philippines—and so, although I have much to be thankful for, every year on this special day I find myself wishing that I had written a seasonal theatre piece to be performed entirely by actors dressed as turkeys, a spoof of Ibsen’s HEDDA…