Stacy Horn

Last night, while in the living room resting, I heard something fall in the bedroom. I wasn’t concerned, because the cats knock things over ALL THE TIME. It’s their favorite thing, knocking things off other things. But for some reason I thought I should check. Thank god I did. One of the panes in my windows was broken and they’d managed to pull in the piece of glass, which I found on the floor. They definitely could have squeezed through the hole that was left, and gotten outside the window. It’s one of their most cherished dreams. Outside that very window is a favorite pigeon hangout spot. The cats sit in this window all the time watching them.

Here is Bodhi sitting in the window with the piece of glass duct-taped back in (and nailed). Please scroll down to see the danger they faced.

There’s only the tiniest of ledges and it’s five flights down. Jesus. I’m losing it just thinking about it. What if I had walked in when they were halfway through?? It would have startled whoever it was and he would have freaked and jumped.

Buy Damnation Island from your favorite bookseller or from: Barnes & Noble, IndieBound, Kobo, or Amazon.

“Horn creates a vivid and at times horrifying portrait of Blackwell’s Island (today’s Roosevelt Island) in New York City’s East River during the late 19th century . . . Horn has created a bleak but worthwhile depiction of institutional failure, with relevance for persistent debates over the treatment of the mentally ill and incarcerated.” —Publishers Weekly.

“Stacy Horn’s history of Blackwell’s Island is a shocking tale, and an invaluable account that will reward anyone with an interest in the history of New York.” —Simon Baatz, New York Times bestselling author of For the Thrill of It and The Girl on the Velvet Swing.

“Blackwell’s Island’s descent into darkness is chronicled with clarity and conscience by master-story-teller Stacy Horn. No one who has taken that journey with her will return the same.” —Teresa Carpenter, Pulitzer Prize-winner and editor of New York Diaries: 1609 to 2009.

I was on a panel for Claire L. Evan’s new book Broad Band: The Untold History of the Women Who Made the Internet (I’m in the book!) sponsored by the New Museum and Rhizome (thank you!). Jaime Levy was also on the panel. From the website:

“Jaime Levy was an early Echo user—she posted as “Kurt’s Brains”—and a host, in her East Village loft, of the part-rave, part-hackathon “Cyber-Slacker” salon. She went on to become the creative director of Word.com, an influential early web publication that showcased the web’s creative capacities through interactive design: chatbots, games, and graphic hyper-text were fixtures of the site, which would influence a generation of online publishers.”

The panel from my point of view. It was a very nice turnout and I loved their feedback after the panel was over. It was mostly young women which was so great.

Here is the panel from the audience’s point of view. From left to right that’s Claire, me and Jaime.

Bodhi is fascinated by the bubbles that sometime appear in the humidifier. It’s cute, except every morning at 5:30am he starts batting at it, trying to tip it over (to get inside, I guess) and I am woken up by the bat, bat, bat sounds and also the noise of the tank rocking back and forth.

My phone was stolen from a dressing room at the Old Navy at 18th Street and 6th. I’d forgotten I had it with me or I would have taken it when I left the dressing room to get different sizes. But it was zipped up inside my jacket, so someone really had to go looking for it.

Without accusing anyone, since it was as possible that an employee took it as a shopper I called the corporate offices to see if they could do anything to help me (like ask the manager to at least look into it, talk to his employees). No, basically. They opened a case and gave me a case number, so there was a record that it happened, but they didn’t even take my name or number. I wonder how many thefts have been reported at this store?

I’d already called the police, but I imagine they have more important things to do and better uses of their time. I have renters insurance so I called State Farm to see if its covered, and amazingly it is, but there’s a $500 deductible on my policy so no help there. Also, American Express has purchase protection, but it’s only good for 90 days, and I bought the iphone 98 days ago. I was so close!!

So I’m feeling a little sorry for myself. I have to get out of this glum mood because I’m supposed to speak on a panel tonight.

The glorious magnolia tree in front of Grace Church.