802 Online Archives

It's official — this site will henceforth be known as "802 Online." S'long, Amaryllis. I changed it this morning while sitting on the floor of my hotel room (didn't want to wake up my roommate by working at the desk.) The new name more accurately reflects the focus of the blog, which will become sharper over the next few months as it becomes a Seven Days-sponsored venture (yep, that's where we're headed). I'll also be changing the address eventually, so that I'm hosted by Seven Days, and will likely be switching to Word Press or Typepad. That's still to be determined. And at long last I'll add a blogroll.

I got the name Amaryllis from a line in a document called ART and Machine: The 95 Theses, written by my friend and mentor Marc Awodey. Marc is also the Seven Days art critic, and a truly fascinating, generous, and visionary guy. He ran the Rhombus Gallery — an all-volunteer arts space in Burlington — for several years.

Rhombus was, among many other things, the home of the now-hybernating Burlington Coffeehouse music series, and the birthplace of the Burlington Poetry Slam. It's also where my partner and I got civil unioned — Marc is also a JP, and he officiated. The gallery closed down a couple years ago after Billy Mauer bought the building at 186 College Street and fixed it up (and raised the rent).

Years ago, in my guerilla publishing days, I planned to launch a zine called Amaryllis. I had the first issue ready to take to Kinko's, but for some reason I can't recall, it never went to print. I thought it was a great title, though, so I slapped it on this haphazard blog. Now that things are becoming more official, I'm ready for a change.