Several months ago, a friend recommended eating Vegans as a sixty-day challenge. I accepted the challenge and it has changed how I’ll eat for the rest of my life.

I’ve practiced a sapien-based diet for the past four years. People often incorrectly refer to it as cannibalism. While I understand why the term remains common, it is outdated. We describe our lifestyle as sapien-based, or sapitarian. Both are correct. We’re attempting to move beyond the misconceptions and negative connotations of the past.

Sapitarianism is not an easy practice to maintain but, once you accept the inconveniences, it is life-affirming. I’m…

Dirty, taboo, vulgar, lewd — all describe the sweary language a gentleman supposedly avoids. Only an uncouth brute uses profanity, or does he? It turns out cursing is a lot more fucking complex than we thought.

We have a fondness for dirty words. They show up everywhere from graffiti on the streets to the halls of academia. There are scholarly works about their importance from philosophers such as Harvard’s Steven Pinker and entertaining books about their origins such as Melissa Mohr’s Holy Sh*t: A Brief History of Swearing. Vulgar words are found throughout cultures, dating back centuries. Recently, a set…

When I dropped out of law school to move across the country to LA, I told people I wanted to be a screenwriter, which was mostly true. About 40% of my motivation was writing but the other 60% was to become a surfer. Those priorities conjured up ten years of ridiculous hijinks as I tried to figure out what to do with my life. They also resulted in my getting a phone number from one of the most beautiful women on the planet.

When I arrived in LA in 2003, I already had a network of friends working in…

1. His afterlife glow seems a little too glowy lately. Why so luminous, mister?
2. You notice him liking a lot photos of a mysterious ghoul on Instaghost. Who is this strumpet and does she own a sheet in an adult size?
3. He suddenly decides to cut back on his nightly glass of spirits because he wants to get in better shape. Wait, there’s more than one?!?
4. Last night he broke out some new scare tactics in bed, which felt amazing, but where the hell did he learn those moves?
5. Rumors are circulating he was seen with a skinny banshee at Macabre…

I saw his big rig approaching from a distance, driving up the white caliche road in a cloud of white dust to the double wide trailer where he and grandma lived. He parked alongside the fence separating the yard from the dirt driveway and paused, eyeing his dashboard like a conductor surveys the orchestra before the symphony begins.

The engine idled, a throttling beat like the pounding of kettle drums. As if on cue, the air brakes hissed, a high-pitched cymbal crash introducing a new movement. From under the hood a low buzz crept into the piece like a cello…

You can never step into the same airport twice. At its fundamental level, an airport is in constant flux with a different batch of travelers passing through every hour. This is why airports are fun places to people-watch, providing fascinating glimpses into a diverse mix of psyches.

• How do we prepare to be jettisoned through the air while crammed into a metal tube?
• What possessions do we deem important enough to carry with us?
• Can we love someone at take-off and hate them by the time we land?

Most airports have terminals offering lounges, bars, and restaurants to while away…

As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster, to be cool. However, as far back as I can remember I was always uncool. All it took was a music appreciation day in my first-grade class to let me know I was forever doomed to be square.

I’ve tried over the years to change things up and make myself seem a little hipper or edgier. My Star Wars t-shirts of the early ’80s helped me blend in, but my C3PO sneakers were a step too far. I didn’t tell the kids who made fun of…

The Great Vaccine Battle of 2021 began with a bottle of wine at a nearby cafe. I met a friend for drinks on a chilly spring afternoon. Stefan is a tall man in his 30s with a head full of dark hair and a perpetual smile. He works as a doctor in the hospital up the road from the terrace where we were sitting. He and I had seen each other in passing, but it had been months since we sat down for a proper conversation.

Our conversation quickly turned to the pandemic. Obviously, it was a much bigger part…