Author David Taylor Black

I ran into a good friend of mine last night, whom I hadn’t seen in too long. She reminded me about her new project, Sonoran Sol, which creates film montages/interviews with local Phoenix creatives. To see some of the completed interviews and learn more about her and the project, visit (and like) her page here: 

Here’s a recent picture of William with my partner’s mothers dog, a chihuahua.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life.
— Steve Jobs

This photo is of William looking young and svelte from a few years ago. He’s a bit grayer around the snout now (the gray is just starting in this photo).

My dog, William, is hard to miss these days—he weighs about 150 lbs. He’s a Great Dane/Neapolitan Mastiff mix. This is a picture of him when he was smaller, at 9 weeks old.

The Elbow Reef Lighthouse is prominently featured in the storyline of Guilt. Here’s a photo of it.

As many already know, Hope Town, where Guilt takes place, is a real location in the Bahamas, on Elbow Cay. A couple of times, Dan, the main character, goes into a pergola with a bench. Here is a photo of the real pergola, just off the Post Office Dock. The photo makes it look a lot bigger than it actually is.

A good friend of mine, and an amazing poet, had two of his poems featured on the blog: The Friday Influence. Germán’s poetry is subtle, nuanced and moving. Check it out here.

So, I’ve been watching the fourth season of Arrested Development on Netflix—the redone/recut version. I’d watched the fourth season back when it was first released and was pretty disappointed. And, I didn’t want to be.

I loved the first three seasons, although I’m not actually sure when I first saw the series. I’d like to think I was one of the smart, hip first adopters. But, I’m not sure that’s true. Regardless, Arrested Development has some of the smartest, most nuanced writing of any program on television, especially for the time.

The new edit/shoot/not-sure-what-all-they-did of the fourth season is so funny and so full of hidden jokes that I find myself laughing harder than in the first three seasons. I keep thinking I should pause the stream and read all the signs if there’s ever an outdoor shot, or a busy indoor shot because some of what I do catch is clearly meant to be a joke. Even in Spanish, some of the signs are clearly meant to be humorous.

Anyway, it’s great. Can’t wait for the fifth season to be released next week.

The are actually a couple of reasons I stopped participating in Goodreads’ Reading Challenge.

First, and I hate to admit this, I couldn’t find how to add a second book after finishing my first. I know that’s kind of pathetic, but there you go. Really, though, a confusing interface shouldn’t be a part of any website in this day and age.

Second, I was too tempted to shy away from books that were longer because there was a number I knew I needed to reach. Reading five 100-page books is going to seem like more of an accomplishment than reading one 500-page book—not what reading is about.