Louisville Magazine is Louisville's city magazine, covering Louisville people, lifestyles, politics, sports, restaurants, entertainment and homes. Includes a monthly calendar of events.
Issue link: https://loumag.epubxp.com/i/532701
8 LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 7.15 Inter-office MEMO In the spirit of our 30th annual Best of Louisville awards: What's the best advice you've gotten this year? At the cover shoot for this issue, I was saying to My Morning Jacket frontman Jim James and Forecastle founder JK McKnight that the Highlands needs a win. Seems like so much weird has died lately. (By the way, Wild and Woolly Video, I think I still have that copy of Christmas Vacation I rented six years ago. Should I go ahead and keep that? Wait a sec: Did I help kill the weird?) The newest battlefeld: the recently closed KFC Eleven (whatever the hell that was) where Bard- stown Road and Baxter Avenue form a point. That nexus is the Highlands' heart. Too much fast food is bad for the heart. At the photo shoot, I started ranting about how KFC's neighbor, the Holy Grale, needs to expand its compound by transforming the parking lot into a grassy beer garden, by building a rooftop bar where Baxter and Bardstown meet, by erecting an outdoor movie screen. It has more potential than any other prop- erty in the city! Can you imagine the views from the roof? I hate to keep brining this up, but the Highlands needs this! I might have been hyperventilating. "You should write about it," James said. Josh Moss Editor "You can't drive forward by looking in the rearview mirror." Also: "Order the pork chop at Jack Fry's." Jenni Laidman Writer at large "I learned working with the negatives can make for better pictures." — Drake Mickie Winters Photographer My doctor told me to watch the carbs and get back into Pilates. Since swallowing that horse pill, I haven't gotten hangry. Mary Chellis Austin Deputy editor My creative writing professor said, "If you're read- ing an article that starts with 'According to TMZ,' stop reading, turn off your computer, go outside and plant a tree." Ashley Hoff Editorial intern A few months back, I had a terrible time working on a short story. The characters fickered in front of me, incomplete, and the words dropped onto the page in bloody clusters. I emailed Brain Leung, a fction writer who used to teach at U of L. I wanted him to send me a to-do list for good writing. I knew it was crazy, and so did he, but he still gave me some of the best advice I've received. "My response is going to surprise you, I think," Leung wrote. "I tell every writer, 'Don't torture yourself.'" His not-so-utilitarian rules, paraphrased: Take as much time as you want; plan writing time a week ahead; don't worry about writing every single day; don't force it. "Think about fction like coral, growing over time, not overnight," he wrote. I might add some advice I got from Jenni Laidman, a former teacher of mine who writes for this magazine: "Sit your ass in the chair and write." Dylon Jones Associate editor Best advice was not to listen to this past advice: "The hardest things are the most worth doing." Now, I know this is meant to be a call to meet life's diffcult challenges, but most of the time there are good reasons things are hard and shouldn't be done. Been getting me into trouble for years now. I am now listening to why things are hard rather than jumping in and dealing with the consequences later. Suki Anderson Art director Spring 2015: If you want to get from Second and Muhammad Ali to Crescent Hill during evening rush hour, take Chestnut Street instead of Market or Liberty, because bridge-approach construc- tion and various other aggravating pubic-works projects have the latter two pinched to a standstill. Except don't take Chestnut between 5 and 6 p.m. because the Medical Center garages are emptying their contents onto Chestnut then, so stay at work until 6 or dive out early. Jack Welch Copy editor (I could counter with a better route, but if I put it in print it would make my commute worse. — MCA) I love the advice that actor J.K. Simmons gave in his Academy Award acceptance speech for his perfor- mance in Whiplash. "Call your mom; call your dad. If you're lucky enough to have a parent or two alive on this planet, call 'em. Don't text. Don't email. Call them on the phone. Tell 'em you love 'em and thank derbydinner.com