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Life Without Toilet Paper (Vice)
New story at Vice: Photo via Engrish.com, from a convenience store in Japan. Among the many alarming things that have emerged in the few past weeks is Americans’ apocalyptic obsession with toilet...
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Hope in Small Things: An Interview with the late Binyavanga Wainaina
Author’s note: In 2005, I interviewed a young Kenyan writer named Binyavanga Wainaina. In the following years, he would go on to become an international celebrity, author and provocateur. Wainaina was...
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The Marfa Mystery Lights (Texas Journey Magazine)
This story came out last year in Texas Journey Magazine. It was one of my favorites to do. Since it’s not online, I’m posting the story here: Magical Mystery Lights: A Journey to West Texas in Search...
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The Tyranny of the Young
From Rotary Magazine: Advanced in Years: Americans have long valued youth over age and experience. Shouldn’t seniors have their moment? Not long ago, a letter appeared in our local newspaper. In it,...
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Thinking Yourself To Death
A new piece out at Salon: Until recently the idea that our beliefs, or our fears, could kill us was not taken seriously in Western medicinal circles, due to the lack of a mechanical explanation for...
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Free Your Mind: On Creativity and Doing Nothing
From Rotary Magazine: Spencer Silver just across town from where I sit typing this in Minneapolis. The 80-year-old chemist died recently. Silver’s name may not be familiar to you, but his work has...
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The Shape of the World: Essays (New Book)
In 2009, I was traveling across West Africa when I stopped in a hostel in Bamako, the capital of Mali. Inside the compound a trunk was parked. On its hood there was painted a giant wheel and the words...
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Bologna, Italy Audio Walking Tour
When I was 18 years old, I got on a plane and went to live overseas as a foreign exchange student. The city I landed in was Bologna, Italy. That year changed my life and set the course for many...
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Museum of Torture, others (Star Tribune)
New piece, sort of, in the Star Tribune: In January 2020, I found myself in Mexico City with a few days alone. And every afternoon, I discovered that you can barely walk a block in the mega-city...
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Una Visita Guidata a Bologna
Now there’s an Italian version of my Bologna audio tour, translated with much patience and help by my old deskmate Filippo Nonni, and read by me. Grazie Filippo! Intro here: Bologna è una città con...
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