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TAKE TWO: DoubleTake magazine is the photography
magazine we buy in order to read the text. In accordance with
its name, it's incongruous: Whatever you see in it the first time
will unlikely be the thing that you remember about it.
Take the summer issue, for example. We were seduced by the cover
image of a chocolate-brown beach ("Red Sand," actually,
on Maui) disappearing into the softest blue-green ocean, bisected
by craggy rocks of a seemingly impossible scale when you consider
the pale, human figure--a woman holding a naked infant--centered
on the photograph's left margin. It's one of those photographs
that is so beautiful, you understand for an instant what it means
for a photographer to spend days on end without snapping a single
shutter. (For the full story, see "Laura and Virginia,"
written by John McPhee, Laura's father, recounting the renowned
pair's career with their rare view camera.)
That reeled us in. DoubleTake was the first magazine ever
reviewed in this column, and though we felt a pang of redundancy,
the literary bent of the summer issue seemed like it ought to
be required reading: A.J. Verdelle interviews Toni Morrison; a
retrospective on the fiction of James Welch (who might appeal
to regionalists for his varied portrayals of Native American life);
poetry by Federico Garcia Lorca and Seamus Heaney; an essay on
gardening by Jamaica Kincaid (author of Kric Krac, and
My Brother)....
As of press time, however, we haven't read about Morrison or
Lorca or Welch, because the first 90 pages of the magazine yielded
such insightful non-fiction writing on middle America--from the
booming, telemarketing hub of Omaha to the small-town immigrant
enclave of Garden City, Kansas (home of a famous double-murder
and Iowa Beef Processors' signature boxed-beef)--and other quirky
discoveries, like a New York City writer's exposition on the importance
and etiquette of "stoop sitting," and New Yorker
cartoonist Roz Chast's "Planet of Lost Luggage," a true,
pictorial short story on the place where unclaimed suitcases go--the
hamlet of Scottsboro, Alabama. (Among our favorite panels on found-items
in this odd second-hand store: "Someone had lost his Mega-Memory
kit. I hope he didn't leave it on the plane"; and "I
wasn't sure that the bags of 20 or so previously owned tubes of
toothpaste for $2 were such a great deal....")
In the third issue of its fourth year, DoubleTake magazine
proves again to be exceptional reading. It's expensive ($10),
but it's also a keeper; a magazine that reads like a book, and
in fact is printed like one. Quality paper, enduring images. Don't
miss it.
IS THAT WHY THEY CALL IT A HARD DRIVE? For those of you
who've diligently struggled and patiently waited for the bugs
in Windows '95 (and its upgrades) to get worked out, we've
finally uncovered the real problem. To find the answer
yourself, follow these directions:
1. Open a Microsoft Word document.
2. Type "Unable to follow directions" (without the quotes).
3. Highlight the entire sentence
4. Under the Tools menu, choose Thesaurus (or Language, then Thesaurus).
In case you were wondering, Macintosh doesn't offer the same
solution. In fact, Mac was stumped (so to speak) by the query.
*If you don't have Windows '95, you'll find the secret to Word
for Windows printed at the end of this column.
SAN JUAN STORYTELLING: El Día de San Juan
is one of those native-colonial hybrid holidays, a Tohono O'odham
celebration of the harvest that merged with a Spanish-inspired
nod to good ol' Saint John, the Baptist. Learn more about its
history and celebration starting at 6 p.m. Wednesday, June 24,
when nine local storytellers gather in the Tucson Museum of
Art plaza, 140 N. Main Ave., with tales that are sure to surprise
and entertain. The three-hour program is free, and is for all
ages. Call 624-2333 for more information, or see this week's City
Week calendar for details.
*The thesaurus suggests the sentence, "Unable to have
an erection" as a synonym for the sentence, "Unable
to follow directions."
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