I’m All Lost In, #103: Farewell, My Lovely; Penguin Classics Cover Generator; I’m pro-graffiti, and I vote.

I’m All Lost In…

the 3 things I’m obsessing about THIS week.

#102

1) Farewell, My Lovely by Raymond Chandler

Dad’s 1976 copy of Farewell, My Lovely, and my copy since the mid-1980s.

Only a guess, but this is the fifth time I’ve read Farewell, My Lovely, the hard boiled detective masterpiece, written in 1940 by literary pulp poet laureate Raymond Chandler; my own record keeping only tallies two previous readings, but I didn’t start officially tracking every book I read until I was in my late twenties. And I’ve been on a Chandler kick since 9th grade when Dad and I used to savor the Philip Marlowe novels together. We’d kibbitz about Chandler’s knack for dealing nonstop corny and amazing similes. “He looked about as inconspicuous as a tarantula on a slice of angel food.” "He is a big man, but not more than six feet five inches tall and not wider than a beer truck.” And that’s just on page one of Farewell, My Lovely.

My fifth reading has already morphed into my sixth; after finishing the denouement chapter—where on-the-lam millionaire’s wife Mrs. Lewin Lockridge Grayle, aka former lounge singer Velma Valento, slips a revolver from her purse and murders a police detective in the dressing room of a Baltimore nightclub—I immediately turned right back to page one. I’m already 65 pages in on this week’s second reading.

I get obsessed with Chandler’s writing every couple of years, including back in 2019 when I went to L.A. and spent a Friday and Saturday visiting some of the real life spots that figure in Chandler’s other Marlowe masterpiece, The Big Sleep (1939), including the Art Deco Bullocks Wilshire building at 3050 Wilshire Boulevard; the Sternwood Mansion in Beverly Hills, actually the Greystone House at 905 Loma Vista Drive; and Geiger’s “rare” bookstore, really Edmunds Bookshop at 6644 Hollywood Boulevard.

Even though I’ve surrendered to the prevailing opinion that the Marlowe novels are about the crooked mood and the acerbic comedy as opposed to the byzantine plots of conspiracy and deception themselves, I once again can’t help trying to pin down what the heck’s going on in Farewell, My Lovely’s evasive storyline. Why exactly does wealthy playgirl Mrs. Grayle want Marlowe dead? Why not just knock off the “weak link” in her assumed-identity cover story, haughty, well-dressed playboy Lindsay Marriott? And what makes her think Marriott is capable off pulling off a murder? Or more to the point: Why does Marriott agree to committing such a dastardly crime? And why didn’t she kill Marlowe herself? She had the perfect chance to do so in the secluded embankment in Purisima Canyon where Marlowe was already lying unconscious in the sage bush, face down on red clay earth having been sapped during a supposed jewel heist payoff rendezvous.

And what’s with the trick photo of Velma Valento? What’s the significance of charlatan psychic Jule’s Amthor’s business cards hidden in Marriott’s cache of marijuana cigarettes? And why does ex-Bay City cop Red Norgaard help Marlowe sneak onto racketeer Laird Brunette’s off-shore gambling yacht?

Maybe all will become clear on my 6th reading.

Or maybe, as always happens when I read Chander, I’ll simply remain at peace with the universe as I—like someone peaking during Savasana—tag along with the beatific Marlowe in the murky foothills of L.A.

2) Making Classics

As part of promoting my new EP (shameless plug) The Collapse of a House Party (out October 26 with a release party at Mosswood Loft), I have discovered an excellent app: the Penguin Classics Cover Generator. I’ve been using it to make album covers.

Plug in the author, title, and subtitle, select a picture of your own, and shazam.

This crafty miracle site comes with a disclaimer: “This site is not affiliated with Penguin Books Limited. All trademarks and copyrights are the property of their respective owners. Please don't make me take it down.”

Playing around with this app—courtesy of an SF-based Javascript techie supposedly named Josh—I have arrived at the precipice of an actual novel I want to write: An urbanist parable, loosely prompted by Fagin’s pickpocket gang in Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist, about a crew of U.S. Open ball kids during their bildungsroman summer spent training for the tournament, during the day, anyway.

Arriving from spots all scattered all over the country, these mostly out-of-town kids are suddenly living in Queens. The Artful Dodger analogy starts to take shape in the evening hours when they engage with the city scenes beyond the stadium grounds.

3) Pro Graffiti

It was too noisy to have high quality hang out with my pal Glenn at our go-to spot Revolver on the Drag Beyond the Drag. So, to toast his imminent ride-trains-all-day wish-list Tokyo vacation, we moved two doors down to a place called Montana. I’d never been before; I’d never even noticed it lolling there on the west corner of the block like Donna Summer on the cover of Bad Girls. Having now been introduced to this easygoing watering hole, I went back a few days later, inviting my other drinking co-conspirator, Dan.

In addition to the relaxed atmosphere, comfy booths, casual bartender, and sparse crowd, there was the life-affirming graffiti and stickers feng shui.

Graffiti lights up Montana.

Graffiti is a striking and beautiful accoutrement of city life, urban cuneiform that energizes the streets and walls.

It’s election season in Seattle right now and our chest-forward bro mayor, facing a surprisingly serious challenge from a socially awkward policy dork, has turned to a hallmark of lowbrow politics: broken-windows theory anti-graffiti posturing and lecturing.

Erica has the budget item details at PubliCola—a 36 percent increase from 2025 to $6.1 million anti-graffiti effort. And she notes: “Harrell’s official accounting of the graffiti budget doesn’t include the ‘in-house’ cost of diverting lawyers in the Law Department from working on other types of misdemeanor cases to focus on pursuing taggers.”

Pearl clutching about graffiti to improve city life is like rounding up immigrants* to lower grocery prices.

*Trump’s ICE agents raided an apartment building in Chicago this week, indiscriminately zip-tying residents.

Graffiti at Seattle’s Capitol Hill light rail station.