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	<title>the avant guardian &#187; poetry/ lit</title>
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	<link>http://theavantguardian.org</link>
	<description>the rabbit hole, with special sauce</description>
	<lastBuildDate>Wed, 08 Sep 2010 20:41:59 +0000</lastBuildDate>
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		<title>sub-entry 23&gt; episode 172.1 \/\/ on what you are divisible by</title>
		<link>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/09/05/sub-entry-23-episode-172-1-on-what-you-are-divisible-by/</link>
		<comments>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/09/05/sub-entry-23-episode-172-1-on-what-you-are-divisible-by/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 05 Sep 2010 20:19:08 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>andy reynolds</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[poetry/ lit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[new orleans]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://theavantguardian.org/?p=13380</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Drip.

Drip.

In the darkness, it's all I could hear – the sound of liquid slowly dripping into a puddle of itself. Drip. Drip. The smell of plants and herbs wrapped around me like a cloak, making my skin tingle all over. It hugged me tight, then whispered into my ear, “Follow me out of here, and all will be well.”

“We already had this conversation, remember?” I said. “So I know that you're lying. But I'm going to follow you anyway, because I need to come back to life. I have things to do.”]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/09/05/sub-entry-23-episode-172-1-on-what-you-are-divisible-by/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>sub-entry 22&gt; episode 80.4 \/\/ on chasing (and catching) inevitability</title>
		<link>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/29/sub-entry-22-episode-80-4-on-chasing-and-catching-inevitability/</link>
		<comments>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/29/sub-entry-22-episode-80-4-on-chasing-and-catching-inevitability/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 29 Aug 2010 16:00:03 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>andy reynolds</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[poetry/ lit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[n]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[new orleans]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://theavantguardian.org/?p=12979</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[New Orleans, circa 1935.

Canal Street, with its bustling shoppers and rushing business workers, chosen to forever serve as the border between the European charms of the French Quarter and the tall business buildings and statue-guarded city buildings of the Central Business District. Even in the midst of the depression, people walk to and fro with places to go, things to spend their money on.

But to me this street on this particular day meant only one thing: a way back to where I belonged. I rushed past the hoards of people, followed closely by the clown. (I feel like I should call him something else, something more fitting now that I've remembered who he is, but the fact is he doesn't have a name. And in my defense, he is dressed like a clown. I'd have to remember to ask him about the whole dressing-up-like-a-clown thing.)

I felt my wrist start to twitch. “Not yet!” I said. “This sub-entry just started!”

“It's not ending,” said the clown, stopping to look into the sky. “Something's coming.”]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/29/sub-entry-22-episode-80-4-on-chasing-and-catching-inevitability/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>sub-entry 21&gt; episode 72 5/8 \/\/ on souvenirs and the things the things the things</title>
		<link>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/22/sub-entry-21-episode-72-58-on-souvenirs-and-the-things-the-things-the-things/</link>
		<comments>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/22/sub-entry-21-episode-72-58-on-souvenirs-and-the-things-the-things-the-things/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 22 Aug 2010 16:00:13 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>andy reynolds</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[poetry/ lit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[new orleans]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[pontchartrain beach]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://theavantguardian.org/?p=12598</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[There is a fellow up in the clouds who looks down on all of us who live here in Louisiana. He doesn’t have a big white beard and his name isn’t God or Zeus – it’s actually Albert... haven't we done this before?

The rain pelted down on me as I ran through the walkways of Pontchartrain Beach, between the rides and haunted houses and games – all closed up due to the stormy weather. My knees gave out and I fell to the ground like a sack of wet cloth. Just next to me, the balloon-sculpting clown fell in just about the same manner.

“I can't believe you did that!” he yelled over the roaring rain.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/22/sub-entry-21-episode-72-58-on-souvenirs-and-the-things-the-things-the-things/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>the expositor\/\/hiccup cures and other snake oil</title>
		<link>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/19/the-expositor-hiccup-cures-and-other-snake-oil/</link>
		<comments>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/19/the-expositor-hiccup-cures-and-other-snake-oil/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 19 Aug 2010 12:00:38 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>kathryn fidler</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[poetry/ lit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[eat pray love]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[priv lit]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://theavantguardian.org/?p=12481</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[In the late 19th and early 20th centuries the Western world went through a period of preoccupation with wellness. People took up vegetarianism, nudism, spiritualism, and the consumption of patent medicines with whopping narcotic content. If Lydia Pinkham’s couldn’t cure your hiccups, there were spas and sanatoriums aplenty, many of them with a comic level of preoccupation with excretion. Turn of the century sanatorium life was satirized in T.C. Boyle’s 1994 novel The Road to Wellville, which was based on the cereal pioneer John Harvey Kellogg’s Battle Creek Sanitarium, as well as my old favorite The Magic Mountain. Unfortunately, it wasn’t all opium and sitz baths. Unscrupulous quacks preyed on rich hypochondriacs, convincing them that they were hysterical or consumptive or just plain constipated. In the worst-case scenario, “taking the cure” could be fatal. In 1911 two British heiresses, both of them convinced that their digestive systems were on the verge of complete collapse, checked into a sanatorium in Washington State to undergo Dr. Linda Hazzard’s extraordinary “fasting cure”, which consisted of not eating anything. Predictably, one of the sisters died after a few months of treatment, and the other was forcibly removed, still convinced that her system was unable [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/19/the-expositor-hiccup-cures-and-other-snake-oil/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>sub-entry 20&gt; episode 72 5/8 \/\/ on souvenirs and the things they bring with them</title>
		<link>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/15/sub-entry-20-episode-72-58-on-souvenirs-and-the-things-they-bring-with-them/</link>
		<comments>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/15/sub-entry-20-episode-72-58-on-souvenirs-and-the-things-they-bring-with-them/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 15 Aug 2010 16:00:16 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>andy reynolds</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[poetry/ lit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[new orleans]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[pontchartrain beach]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://theavantguardian.org/?p=12251</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[There is a fellow up in the clouds who looks down on all of us who live here in Louisiana. He doesn't have a big white beard and his name isn't God or Zeus – it's actually Albert, and he's about as nice a fellow as you're likely to meet. But this sub-entry and this episode don't really have anything to do with Albert, except that he had pulled the lever up there that made the clouds dump their thousands upon thousands of buckets of water down upon the city of New Orleans. Now, I'm not gonna say that if you haven't seen it rain in Louisiana, that you haven't seen it rain. Because what it does here doesn't fall under the definition of rain – it's something else entirely. What happens here is enough to make you question the way you're going about your life. It's enough to alter the way you see things – or alter the way that things see you.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/15/sub-entry-20-episode-72-58-on-souvenirs-and-the-things-they-bring-with-them/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>the expositor\/\/when men wore hats and everyone drank too much</title>
		<link>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/12/the-expositorwhen-men-wore-hats-and-everyone-drank-too-much/</link>
		<comments>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/12/the-expositorwhen-men-wore-hats-and-everyone-drank-too-much/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 12 Aug 2010 12:00:32 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>kathryn fidler</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[poetry/ lit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Dead End Gene Pool]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mad Men]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Real Housewives]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://theavantguardian.org/?p=12131</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[America has been having a bit of a nostalgic love affair with mid-20th century excess. In these austere times, when family vacations abroad are open to criticism and our obese nation is somehow supposed to tighten its collective belt, there is something comforting about hearkening back to an era when one could throw on a bit of couture, get wasted at noon, and drive the gas guzzler home drunk while chain-smoking Luckies. Of course, the most successful media phenomenon in this genre is the AMC series Mad Men, now in its fourth season. The production budget for fedoras alone must be enormous, let alone the expenditures on crystal decanters, red lipstick, and future lung cancer treatment for the cast. If you just can’t get enough of retro overindulgence, and are in the mood for a humorous memoir, Dead End Gene Pool by Vanderbilt heiress Wendy Burden fits the (extravagant) bill. I admit that I read this book solely because it topped NPR’s list of “funny summer books”, and NPR has a good track record of identifying humorists who are genuinely funny – David Sedaris, for example. Comic memoir done well, such as This Boy’s Life and My Life and Hard [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/12/the-expositorwhen-men-wore-hats-and-everyone-drank-too-much/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>5</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>sub-entry 19&gt; episode 0100.11010 \/\/ on the reflections of impermanence</title>
		<link>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/08/sub-entry-19-episode-0100-11010-on-the-reflections-of-impermanence/</link>
		<comments>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/08/sub-entry-19-episode-0100-11010-on-the-reflections-of-impermanence/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 08 Aug 2010 16:00:53 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>andy reynolds</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[poetry/ lit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[impermanence]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[new orleans]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://theavantguardian.org/?p=11863</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The apartment building smelled of must and lavender, as if somebody had walked through the hallways waving fresh lavender in the air just yesterday but now even that scent was growing old and musty. I and my mosquitoed compatriot, Scape, stopped at the door to the apartment. The buzzing hallway light just above us flickered right on cue, and I pushed the door open to apartment 10. The door creaked (like they seem to do in this kind of situation) and the room beyond the door was dim, the air thick.

I walked in and the room was in shambles – the desk, dresser and table were covered in heaps of torn and crumpled paper. Blanketing the walls and the dirty window were maybe a hundred moths, all twitching their wings and waving their antennae about. The old man who lived in the apartment was standing on the cluttered desk, writing a seemingly endless stream of ones and zeros on the wall with his finger, which was dripping with black ink. Across the room was the boy, maybe 14 years old, shoving notebooks and a compass into a shoulder bag. The boy barely looked up at us when we entered.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/08/sub-entry-19-episode-0100-11010-on-the-reflections-of-impermanence/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>the expositor \/\/ cryptonomicon</title>
		<link>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/04/the-expositor-cryptonomicon/</link>
		<comments>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/04/the-expositor-cryptonomicon/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 04 Aug 2010 22:00:25 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>kathryn fidler</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[poetry/ lit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cryptonomicon]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[secret soldiers]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[turing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://theavantguardian.org/?p=11618</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[You don’t have to be a mathematician to appreciate Alan Turing. He was a hero of World War II, remembered for his role in breaking the German Enigma code at the British decryption lab in the gloriously named Bletchley Park. After the war, he made significant contributions to mathematics, chemistry, and the newly-emerging field of computer science. In addition to all of that he was the sort of eccentric genius who continues to make science classes more interesting with anecdotes about his life. He kept his coffee mug chained to the radiator in the lab, wore a gas mask to ward off hay fever, and ultimately committed suicide by eating an apple dipped in cyanide. Unfortunately for everyone including the would-be biography reader, the reason for the spectacular demise was depressing and not unique: he was essentially hounded to death for being gay. Adding insult to the injury of such a pointless waste of a brilliant man are a laundry list of biographies and fictionalized accounts of the torment he went through. If you are like me and want to read about Turing without undue misery, you could do worse than to turn to fiction, specifically Neal Stephenson’s Cryptonomicon. In [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/04/the-expositor-cryptonomicon/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>5</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>sub-entry 18&gt; episode 2 1/4\/\/on things that were and things that have yet to be</title>
		<link>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/01/sub-entry-18-episode-2-14-on-things-that-were-and-things-that-have-yet-to-be/</link>
		<comments>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/01/sub-entry-18-episode-2-14-on-things-that-were-and-things-that-have-yet-to-be/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 01 Aug 2010 16:00:36 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>andy reynolds</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[poetry/ lit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[new orleans]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://theavantguardian.org/?p=11469</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[New Orleans is often considered the most haunted city in the states. Sure, there are the ghosts out there who go “Woooo” when people walk past dilapidated houses – but it’s ghosts like that who give the rest of the ghosts here a bad rap.]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/08/01/sub-entry-18-episode-2-14-on-things-that-were-and-things-that-have-yet-to-be/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>the expositor\/\/building bridges</title>
		<link>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/07/29/the-expositorbuilding-bridges/</link>
		<comments>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/07/29/the-expositorbuilding-bridges/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 29 Jul 2010 12:00:25 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>kathryn fidler</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[poetry/ lit]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bookcrossing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mrs. piggle-wiggle]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[peace corps]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[philippines]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[rachel simhon]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[the dharma bums]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[the magic mountain]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://theavantguardian.org/?p=10566</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Bookworms are usually thought of as somewhat solitary, socially inept people. Websites such as BookCrossing like to portray books as a bridge between people, a means of connection for those with like minds, all over the world. Read a lot, they imply, and you will find literary company wherever you go. But, is it really true? Is a well-stocked bookshelf a way to win friends and influence people? Here are five interactions from the life of The Expositor. You be the judge: 1987: I was a messy kid. Rather than suggesting I brush my hair and make some friends, my father encouraged me to obtain a copy of a story about a magical woman named Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle who cured a girl of slobbery by planting radish seeds in the dirt in her ears. Unfortunately, the book was only available at the public library branch in Pawtucket, RI – maybe a twenty-minute drive from our home in Providence, but an Odyssey in the estimation of my Pennsylvania-bred father. Still, he loved his disheveled little bookworm, so he bundled me into his Volkswagen on a snowy winter evening and promptly got lost. A more reasonable person – such as my mother – [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://theavantguardian.org/2010/07/29/the-expositorbuilding-bridges/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>8</slash:comments>
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