The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Tuesday, April 30, 2024

A Little TOO Modern Art by Christopher Weyant, CagleCartoons.com

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Weather: Mostly sunny. Highs in the mid 80s. Southeast winds 5 to 10 mph. Tuesday Night: Partly cloudy with a slight chance of rain in the evening, then mostly clear after midnight. Lows in the mid 60s. See the daily weather briefing from the National Weather Service in Jacksonville here.

Today at a Glance:

In Court: Docket sounding before Circuit Judge Terence Perkins includes the case of Marcus Chamblin. Though Chamblin was sentenced to life in prison for the murder of Deon Jenkins outside a Circle K in 2019, he also faces a charge of battery of another inmate. That’s the case set for docket sounding today. Also on the docket: the case of Kim Zaheer, who faces an aggravated manslaughter charge, a first degree felony, in the death of her mother, Frances Hildegard King, 86. (See: “Manslaughter Charge for Daughter Accused of Leaving Mom to Die Like a ‘Prisoner in a Concentration Camp’“); the case of Derek Jordan, who faces charges of kidnapping and aggravated battery in a case involving the alleged kidnapping of his children (see: “Father Arrested After Taking Children, 3 and 4, Without Custody“); and the case of Qwinntavus Kwame Jordan, on an armed robbery charge in Flagler County, a case that bled into Jordan getting shot eight times at another convenience store he was allegedly robbing, in Georgia (see: “Suspected Gas Station Armed Robber Who Was Shot By a Store Clerk in 2nd Incident Returns to Flagler to Face Charge.’). Perkins begins the day with an 8:30 hearing on motions in the upcoming trial of Joshua Sevin, a 28 year old facing charges of molestation of a teen.

‘First Date,’ at St. Augustine’s Limelight Theatre, 11 Old Mission Avenue, St. Augustine. 7:30 p.m., except on Sundays, at 2 p.m. Tickets are $32.50, including fees. Book tickets here. The 2012 musical takes the audience through the first meeting of Casey and Aaron, two 30-ish New York City singles set up by friends and family. The two have nothing in common: Aaron is a conservative banker, Jewish, and looking for a meaningful relationship, while Casey is an artist and a little too funky for Wall Street. With the influences of their friends and family (played out in their imaginations) as well as the effects of social media (Google, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube personified), this first date seems to be doomed. But with the help of a meddling but well-meaning waiter, Casey and Aaron might make a connection after all. With a contemporary rock score, FIRST DATE gleefully pokes fun at the mishaps and mistakes of blind dates and gives hope that there could be that one perfect moment.

Random Acts of Insanity Standup Comedy, 8 p.m. at Cinematique Theater, 242 South Beach Street, Daytona Beach. General admission is $8.50. Every Tuesday and on the first Saturday of every month the Random Acts of Insanity Comedy Improv Troupe specializes in performing fast-paced improvised comedy.

Byblos: The Library of America’s monthly garland, just delivered, is the fifth and final volume of John Updike’s novels, this one including two of his last novels, In the Beauty of the Lilies (1996) and Gertrude and Claudius (2000), plus the novella, Rabbit Remembered (2001), originally published with the somewhat pruriently titled Licks of Love short story collection, closing his Rabbit tetralogy. I remember those late 1990s when I waited for Updike novels the way Swifties wait for a drop from their godess. In the Beauty of the Lilies paid off, though my Knopf edition contains a note from Marcia Judson, the assistant features editor at the Times, who, after I must’ve lent her the volume, wrote: “I couldn’t get through the long sentences. But my husband read it. Thanks.” The novel is a story of the 20th century through three generations of a family of semi-quirks, the last of Updike’s very good ones. (A sampling: “They hadn’t slept together since the Armistice,” “I try to be dispassionate about it, but I love this crazy, wasteful, self-hating country in spite itself,” and this line more apt for Trumpist American “with the wry triumph of the negatively confirmed”). I had not remembered getting through Gertrude and Claudius, but I did, though it left no impression: the rereading in the new edition will give it another chance. More curious to me is how, and why, the Library of America decided not to issue a good many of Updike’s novels, when it didn’t hesitate to issue every Howells and every Portis and way too much Mailer and even three volumes of Philip Dick. None of the Bech books made it into the LOA collection, though it’s easy to argue that Updike’s latter batch–Seek My Face, Villages, Terrorist–outdid each other in badness. Let’s hope it’s not the end: some of Updike’s best was his literary criticism. If LOA gave Edmund Wilson two volumes for his, surely it can give Updike a few.

—P.T.

Now This: John Updike on In the Beauty of the Lilies, on Charlie Rose, 1996:

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