Memos from the Moon

An early and often embarrassing attempt at a daily blog

24 posts

Filling in the Blanks

Most writers, if asked what questions they field most frequently, will answer with something along the lines of "Where do you get your ideas?" or "What are your work habits?" Not so for me. The questions I get most often, at least from visitors to my

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5 Min
By: William Shunn

Observing Brooklynites Observing John Turturro

I guess this is celebrity week here at Memos from the Moon. I can't seem to stop droning on about the subject, and I really can't seem to get away from droning on about the subject as it relates to my observations of John Turturro. So

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2 Min
By: William Shunn

Observing John Turturro

I ran into John Turturro again today. (Not today as you read this, but today as I write this, which is more than a month before this memo is scheduled to appear.) Well, okay, I didn't really run into him. I actually just passed him on the sidewalk

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3 Min
By: William Shunn

Timothy and Kevin and Dennis and Me

Not long ago, a new colleague at the office told me that I reminded her of Dennis Miller. You know, old news anchor from Saturday Night Live who's now in movies and has his own show on HBO? The comic who's so witty and sarcastic and

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3 Min
By: William Shunn

I Send a Message

In one of these recent memos, I mentioned something about how teenagers can always be counted on to do the wrong thing. In the great tradition of using myself as proof of whatever thesis I'm propounding, here's another example to help nail the lid of that

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4 Min
By: William Shunn

The Unspoken Contract

I rarely walk out of movies. Somewhere deep inside, I suppose I consider the contract between artist and audience so sacred that I can't help but uphold most of my own end even when the artist or artists are failing miserably to live up to their own. That

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2 Min
By: William Shunn

Bassoon Beats Clarinet

I wonder what ever happened to Butch Harper to make him such a mean bastard. He must have had some pretty serious unhappiness to contend with. Of course, when I was in 7th grade, I didn't care two figs about Butch's unhappiness. I was only concerned

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4 Min
By: William Shunn

Miles Per Guilt Trip

The following piece was written in January 1997, under the pseudonym "Daedalus," for Alexis Massie's now-defunct Web site Pandora's Box of Tricks. I feel free now to reveal that the Thayne of this essay is in reality author Sean Stewart, and the book in

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4 Min
By: William Shunn

Oh, Those Pesky Ethical Dilemmas!

So there I was, sitting in the BYU lecture room that served as a chapel for my Young Adult ward in Provo, waiting for sacrament meeting to begin, talking to a girl who sparked a certain interest in me. I have to confess that I don't remember her

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2 Min
By: William Shunn

Eat Glass!

I didn't develop my bullshit detector until rather late in life. (If I'd had it earlier, I might have avoided a few psychotic girlfriends . . .) I guess I was about six—this would have been the summer when my family lived with my uncle in Liberty, Utah,

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1 Min
By: William Shunn

A Long, Skinny Drink of Water

Okay, we all have dirty little secrets in our pasts that we've never ever told anyone. I'm about to share one with you. If you're a regular reader of "Memos from the Moon," then you've surely realized by now how

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1 Min
By: William Shunn

Gilding the Pine Sprig

Teenagers can usually be counted on to do exactly the wrong thing in any given situation, and I was certainly no exception. Take the time I won a gilded sprig of pine needles, for instance. Now, I used to be obsessed with winning things from radio stations. I had my

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2 Min
By: William Shunn

Showing 12 of 24 total posts

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