My newest obsession and current inspiration comes from Google maps (maps.google.com). Not the kind that give you directions, but the satellite map that lets you zoom in on any part of our planet. I am torn between flying over beautiful earthscapes, like those from New Mexico (pictured), or capturing the grid patterns of urban centers. Use the search engine to choose any place in the world, then enlarge that area, drag to different spots, take a screen shot or print it out. Visit any place you can imagine (except for a few sensitive government locations).

I recently found myself standing in the kitchen of my friend's house and all I could think was, "Me hungry. Me want poached eggs." No poacher necessary. Boil water, a splash of white vinegar if you've got it. Now, get all your supplies ready 'cause you need to put the bread in the toaster and crack the eggs into the water consecutively. The toast should pop just in time to butter it, salt and pepper it, and pull a two-minute egg out of the water. Plop on top. More salt and pepper. Yum yum.

I press play and step out into the sunlight as the film begins: "Light Of Love" by T. Rex. As I pass the long-heralded "grocery store" at Second and Girard, The Capitol Years explain, "It's a mirage, people." On the train Al Green leans over to his girlfriend to hit the sweetest falsetto in "Belle." American Music Club tells me "day to day life shouldn't be what it's all about," Joanna Newsom asks "where is your inflammatory writ?" and Guided By Voices serenades the "glad girls." At the end of the day, the train emerges from the ground between Second and Spring Garden, I look west to see The Kinks' "Waterloo Sunset."

I am an audiophile. A books-on-tape reader. (Or is it listener? I'm sure you have heard the debate.) I love being read to and the readers are magnificent. Truth is, I waited a long time for this. When I was a kid, I was a "poor" reader. Reading was a difficult task. I eventually learned to read for work, but not for pleasure—a life lived without the worlds created in the words of the great writers. And then one day they found me. Novels. Poems. Plays. Biographies. Reading without my eyes and seeing more than can be imagined. Try it. You'll like it. Worth noting: The Philadelphia public library is a wonderful place to get audiobooks of all kinds.