February 2012
2 posts
5 tags
Last Chance Saloon
Lordsburg, NM Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Two Stars. Came a time sooner than you might expect when the yelpers measured every thing in that town. Every place of business bore the mark of the yelpers. Fivepointed stars, their number correspondin with the verdict of those strange folk. And for a time there was a kind of peace in those parts. The townsfolk and the yelpers...
Feb 23rd
31 notes
Maria's Cantina
Lordsburg, NM Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Three Stars. I caint tell you what it must of been like. I don’t think anybody could. But I can tell you what come to pass. I can tell you that. They first caught sight of the yelpers round about 1879. They come from the south but they wasn’t Mexicans. Wore cowls like monks. Spoke with a outlander accent. They made a sound that is...
Feb 16th
43 notes
January 2012
6 posts
6 tags
Design Within Reach
Pacific Heights - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Three stars. They emerged from the crucible of adolescence rosyfaced and long of bone, inheritors of the hurtling world of their progenitors. Cocksure but for the onerous legacy of war and rapacious greed and around them the soaring monuments and dolmens of their race fissured irreversibly. And like spawning...
Jan 24th
61 notes
6 tags
Chevy's Fresh Mex
Palo Alto, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Two stars. The Sheriff stood over a table cleaved cleanly in two. Around him wellheeled young people lay newly dead. What do you have there deputy, he said. Deputy Stevens leaned over the ruined bar and looked behind it. I got two androids and a iPhone. The Sheriff crouched down next to the table and looked at a pretty Asian girl...
Jan 18th
63 notes
5 tags
Tijuana Marriott Hotel
Tijuana, Mexico Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Five stars. I want to go back to the hotel, said Clyde. The hacendado leaned against a wine cask in the dim cellar and regarded Clyde. You will be returned soon, he said. First there is the matter of the girl. I didn’t do anything. In your mind perhaps this is true. But you have broken a sacred law of this land. A very old law....
Jan 11th
49 notes
5 tags
Dottie's Cafe
Twin Falls, Idaho Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Three Stars. *First Review. He walked into the empty cafe and looked at the vinyl booths and the linoleum counters and picked up a menu to glance at it and then put it down again in one smooth motion. His leadgray eyes settled on an old woman wearing an apron and standing behind the counter. Three stars, he said. First review. ...
Jan 9th
107 notes
5 tags
Red Lobster
Wichita, KS Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Two stars. The manager sat tied to the chair in the corral, firelit on all sides by the torches of the townfolk. Dean stood next to him with a Colt army revolver pointed to the hardpacked earth. Who else will speak, he said. A chorus of voices rose at once. From the din a miner hollered: The shrimp was rubberlike. I believe Pastor...
Jan 5th
88 notes
6 tags
Chipotle Mexican Grill
SOMA - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Three stars. See that false burrito. See it swaddled in tinfoil on the desk in the bowels of that great tower, a bundle of meat and sauce in a place long ago ceded to silicone and copper. The stooped man eating that peasant food as if in consuming it he can escape to a farmfield in a verdant valley and look down and see...
Jan 3rd
299 notes
December 2011
3 posts
6 tags
P. F. Chang's China Bistro
Emeryville, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Two stars. You think that I am petty. You think that I am self important. I am nothing. I am a vessel. I am a crucible in which truth resides for a brief instant. I hear the stillsmall voice of God and I bow before it in ecstasy and He speaks not in the obscenity of man’s tongue but in stars torn from heaven. One star. Four stars....
Dec 23rd
118 notes
5 tags
Chili's Grill & Bar
Natomas - Sacramento, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Four stars. I am going to remove a star, he said. Please don’t mister. Don’t move. It’s better if you don’t move. Please. It’s important you know why. Do you understand why this is happening? Oh God. It is because I clearly shared with you my condition. I cannot countenance gluten. And yet I see croutons here. Do you...
Dec 15th
161 notes
4 tags
Urban Outfitters
Union Square - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Three stars. And they come there in great numbers shuffling into that mausoleum that was built for them like some monument to the slow death of their world and among those tokens and talismans of that faded empire they forage like scavengers their faces frozen in a rictus of worldweary their clothes preworn in some...
Dec 7th
450 notes
November 2011
7 posts
5 tags
Olive Garden
Walnut Creek, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Four stars. And so. The day came. The alguacil asked the boy what did he wish for a last meal. The boy asked for a bowl of pasta from Olive Garden. The alguacil considered this and finally agreed saying there was indeed an Olive Garden in the next town. That evening a mozo came back into town leading a procession of men and...
Nov 29th
115 notes
7 tags
Trader Joe's
Santa Rosa, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Three stars. A sweltering breeze hissed among the grape vines soldiering in rows up the hillside. The earth and the grass baked and golden and high above the white orb of the sun left the farmer spotlit and shadowless as the riders approached. They came from several directions winding among the vines insouciant and lordly with their...
Nov 22nd
38 notes
4 tags
Westfield Shopping Mall
Union Square - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Four stars. Tucked in the far corner of the food court next to a sushi bar he saw a blue hieroglyph beckoning. The bathroom. He walked quickly and stiffly toward the door. A boy and his father walked out just as Bragg entered the bathroom. He paused and held his breath listening. No one. He found the handicapped...
Nov 17th
44 notes
9 tags
The Taco Trilogy
Set in the gray villages of a desertbound country, The Taco Trilogy is a taut, brooding Yelp review epic about a fateful taco and a mysterious wanderer who is consumed by a quixotic quest for truth. Taco Bell, Review I Taco Bell, Review II Taco Bell, Review III Advanced praise for The Taco Trilogy: “The world must see this, and revere it.” —Bit Bucket, Tumblr “…the writing tends...
Nov 11th
39 notes
7 tags
Taco Bell, 3rd Review
Financial District - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM One star. They left him there in the cell. Delirious. Speaking of crazy things. Wild things. The guards would not touch him. As if his blaspheme would taint all in his presence. We do not know how many days passed. The villagers assumed that the man had been shot. Many claimed to have seen his corpse. But...
Nov 10th
78 notes
7 tags
Jamba Juice
Financial District - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Three stars. I’ll have another, he said. The clerk wiped down the counter and would not look at him. We’re not supposed to give customers more than three guarana boosts, he said. I aint askin. The clerk poured another shot of what looked to be hog lagoon effluent and pushed the glass across the counter. ...
Nov 8th
79 notes
7 tags
Taco Bell, 2nd Review
Financial District - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Three stars. We do not hear from the man who ate the taco until November of that year, when he returned to the town on the back of a mule. The villagers gathered in the square reverently as if before them rode some great emissary. Staring with coalblack eyes at the man in his rags and on a crude cedarwood pike...
Nov 3rd
52 notes
October 2011
8 posts
7 tags
Taco Bell
Financial District - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Two stars. And so the man defied the villagers and ate the taco. In defiance of the will of those people but also in defiance of some order older than he. Older than tortillas. Than the ancient and twisted cedars. How could we know his mind? We are all of us unknowable. Blind strangers passing on a mountain...
Oct 26th
136 notes
7 tags
Forever 21
Union Square - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Two stars. The first woman I been with was a gal named Mabel Rae down in Plano. She was the second prettiest woman I ever did see. I was eighteen years of age at the time and she was twenty one. She was a whore down on Gas Street. I suppose that may shock some folks. Layin down with a whore like I did. But I see...
Oct 24th
25 notes
7 tags
Whole Foods Market
Noe Valley - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Four stars. The sheriff and the posse were now a block away and riding seven abreast rifles in hand and horses snorting and wildeyed. The outlaw dropped his pistol and stiffwalked into the parking lot of a grocery store. Around him young women in skintight sporting clothes stopped and stared. The ground shook as the...
Oct 20th
38 notes
7 tags
McDonald's
Reno, NV Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Three stars. He pulled another cold french fry from the greasestained Happy Meal box. He ate it slowly. The sun rising behind him over the limestone bluffs. The barren valley and the road winding through it still in morning’s blue shadow. He wiped his hand on his jacket and checked the breech of the big Weatherby. Bullet as long as man’s...
Oct 17th
29 notes
7 tags
Starbucks
Bismarck, ND Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM One Star. Wallace and old man Tucker sat the horses and watched the cattle cropping the tallgrass on the rincon blazed amber by the shallow and palegold morning sun. The horses pricked their ears in unison and soon Madison pulled up in the battered Ford. He stepped out in new boots and carrying a small paper cup. He said good morning...
Oct 13th
50 notes
7 tags
Victoria's Secret
Union Square - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Three stars. Victoria bore a secret unutterable and incomprehensible as if she carried with her the dessicated corpse of some creature from beyond the borders of the earth which no language could describe. A secret hidden for a thousand years and of such proportions that it existed not among the mountains and the...
Oct 11th
35 notes
7 tags
T. G. I. Friday's
Fresno, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Two stars. Watts strode into the restaurant smelling of horse and woodsmoke and all the patrons turned to watch him as if he had called out to them but he had made no sound save the whispering of his leathers and the jangle of his spurs. He sat at the bar. A bartender in a vaudevillian striped shirt approached smiling like a grifter. ...
Oct 7th
169 notes
8 tags
The Apple Store
Union Square - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Two stars. Given the way my uncle died havin a drink directly after his funeral just didnt seem right so I went for a walk instead. One of them downtowns where all there is is stores. Came across a store was a big cube. Two stories tall and all silver. There was folks outside just standin there. Line stretchin...
Oct 5th
335 notes
September 2011
11 posts
9 tags
Duboce Dog Park
Castro - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Five stars. The Chickenhawk tucked in her wings, folded her tail and dropped from the sky silent as falling snow. Hooked beak sighted on the park below as if the bird could pierce the crust of the earth and add to her dominion the world beneath. A heartbeat from striking the ground she spread her broad wings, talons...
Sep 30th
19 notes
7 tags
Chez Panisse
Gourmet Ghetto - Berkeley, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Two stars. He forked another helping of seared Muscovy duck breast with foraged chanterelle succotash into his mouth and chewed it mechanically and without joy. On his tongue the rusty tang of revenge sought and achieved. His eyes fixed beyond the warm glow of the restaurant to a middle distance known only to him, to a...
Sep 29th
10 notes
7 tags
Cafe Gratitude
Gourmet Ghetto - Berkeley, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Four stars. The old man sat there reading the menu with sagely focus. It was the strangest menu he’d ever seen. A waitress festooned in face jewelry and wearing clownish rags appeared at his tableside. When he looked up she was staring at him intently. What are you grateful for today? she said. Well mam, I am...
Sep 27th
92 notes
7 tags
Juicy Couture
Union Square - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Two stars. The traveler found himself in a gilded and luminescent valley of commerce beset on all sides by baying signage, the air redolent in fine leather and human urine. He turned and saw behind plate glass two mannequins, their alabaster buttocks thrust toward the street, their womanly frames ballooned like some...
Sep 22nd
68 notes
8 tags
Ritual Coffee Roasters
The Mission - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | Lost in the chaparral, NM Four stars. Kent awoke to the dawn skylighting the foothills. The sun’s promise not yet fulfilled.  He got up and walked to the campfire where Davis was brewing a pot of coffee on the coals. What are you doing, Kent said. Brewin coffee. What’s it look like. It looks like you’re overextractin. Give me that. Kent...
Sep 20th
112 notes
6 tags
IKEA
Cormac M. | Author | A dusty home at the end of a road, NM Red Hook - Brooklyn, NY Three stars I went to the damndest store I ever saw with my son and my daughter in law shortly after my granddaughter was born. Had to be the biggest furniture store in the world. Showroom floor with these little rooms all done up you could walk through. I felt like I was trespassing. My son and his wife were...
Sep 15th
95 notes
7 tags
Self Edge Denim Boutique
Mission - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | A dusty home at the end of a road, NM Three stars He dodged smoldering barricades as he ran down the boulevard with the ancient Winchester in one hand. Choking ash everywhere and the sky bloodred and roiling and somewhere the sun presiding over the day’s death. His tattered pants soaked through with blood. Three gun shots in steady succession....
Sep 13th
9 notes
7 tags
Cheesecake Factory
Galleria/Uptown - Houston, TX Cormac M. | Author | A dusty home at the end of a road, NM Three stars There were a variety of cakes and sweet things there.  The desserts paraded by in their desperate decadence, at once a fading and colorless memory. A Bavarian chocolate cake stood apart, on a simple plate. Like a rancher’s wife it was seasoned by hardships and nature’s brutal...
Sep 9th
136 notes
7 tags
Dolores Park
Mission - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | A dusty home at the end of a road, NM   Three stars He sat down next to the others. Studiously ragtag bohemians carefully squandering the waking hours. Pieces of a conversation that when added weighed nothing and meant nothing. He stopped listening and looked east to the valley and saw among the Victorians the wavering image of Ohlone people in a...
Sep 8th
82 notes
8 tags
Bombtruck Popsicle Truck
Mission - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | A dusty home at the end of a road, NM   Four stars The girl and the boy wait in line sharing no words between them. She wears the patchwork uniform of a young Bohemian. Tights quaintly shredded.  Faded garments a manufactured history of a life she hasn’t led. Eyes dulled by ceaseless days of studied indolence. The boy distractedly...
Sep 5th
7 notes
6 tags
Kittery Trading Post
Kittery, ME Cormac M. | Author | A dusty home at the end of a road, NM Four stars It was boots he needed. He surveyed the store looking for a someone who would understand, but knew he would find no kin here. He settled upon a teenaged girl wearing the polo shirt livery of the store. Blemished skin not yet that of a woman. Her hair in a severe pony tale. A twinge in his memory, echoes of loss or...
Sep 2nd
11 notes
August 2011
2 posts
7 tags
Heart Wine Bar
Mission - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | A dusty home at the end of a road, NM Two stars Karl nodded toward the untouched mason jar of wine. You best drink up son, he said. The young drifter looked away.  I cant. Yeah you can. Go on. The boy went silent once more, turning to the window, to the city street wet with night fog.  Somewhere, a train whistling. Karl joylessly toyed with...
Aug 22nd
6 notes
7 tags
Papalote Mexican Grill
Mission - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | A dusty home at the end of a road, NM Two stars The young cowboy lies in the afternoon sun, gut shot.  The bitter tang of cordite and blood mingles in his mouth. In his hand, a pearl handled revolver, still warm. He lies propped against the lone cottonwood. A mile distant, dust trails mark a coming reckoning. Three riders, maybe more. His eyes...
Aug 21st
31 notes