Forgive me, dear readers. It has been five months since my last blogumn. There has been much speculation as to where I have been, and I will simply say NONE OF IT is true (unless you assumed I am right where you left me, in which case, yes it’s all true). I was approached to write a Fierce Anticipation this week, and despite a sinus infection of biblical proportions (did they have matzo ball soup in biblical times?), I bring it to you. I rise from the NyQuil ashes like a mythical phoenix with a stuffy beak. So kick of your shoes, throw on some Foghat, and pour yourself a mojito/margarita/Arnold Palmer/water(?). This Fierce Anticipation is all about summer time, and the living is nerdy. Fiercely Anticipating  Previously, I spoke about how here in South Florida, our changing of the seasons is about as noticeable as a mouse fart (read: not very). The one season we do notice quite well is Summer. You can best notice summer ANY TIME YOU WALK OUTSIDE when you are hit with one of two things: 1) a crushingly severe heat and humidity like being wrapped in a blanket that is both on fire and damp at the same time, or 2) a thunderstorm that rivals The Tempest, which we affectionately call “3 pm.” Despite it being hotter than the devil’s taint, summer in South Florida is something I do, oddly, enjoy. Now, I say “oddly” because, genetically speaking, I am well insulated (hairy and chubby) which does not bode well for the tropical, near equatorial summers of South Florida. I’d be bet suited for a colder, more Northern climate. Like a viking, or a bear. My summers, however, are amazing for me for several reasons (if you’ll indulge me...

If you read my column on the regular, you probably know that it’s a video game industry look at games. So with that being said, it was an interesting challenge to keep it game related during book week. So I decided to talk about a topic that, in this day and age of kindles and nooks and iPads, I think about a lot. And that topic is the idea that [whatever new hot technology] is killing [whatever established art]. When movies came out, everyone said theatre is dead. Now with video games making billions of dollars, people theorize that they will kill film or that they will merge to form a sort of interactive film. My opinion on that stuff is: no. In order to find some decent research on it, I polled a number of friends who work in relevant fields. I’ll use first names only to prevent them from being spammed, but they are: Pedro, guitarist Marta, actress John, Theatre director and educator Deborah, Theatre director and author What Can’t be faked? There’s this weird question I think about sometimes. It’s more of a hypothetical, as I don’t really believe it. But interesting, nonetheless. Why do people still play guitar? Since we have the ability to emulate the sounds, at least for studio work, why not just fake it. Even though we can’t copy the exact nuances of a musician, we will be able to within 5 years, right? I was quickly corrected by Pedro: “the premise of the sound being faked in five years is actually ridiculous. It’s like saying human emotion will be perfectly faked in five years.” I made the connection (since I have a theatre background I needed to find an analogy in my field), that faking a...