Shooting War co-creator and illustrator without borders Dan Goldman unfurls an excellent San Francisco SMITH mag party report here. Check out the Flickr stream here. Thanks to co-host Mo Clancy as well as Max and his excellent crew at Mr. Smith’s bar & lounge.

Our rockets red glare got a little brighter when we saw that USA Today’s Angela Gunn called Shooting War a “special Great Big Read” for the holiday weekend and said:

If you’ve ever gotten in on something important at the very beginning, you understand what’s in store for you — and even seven chapters in, I think this is just the beginning for this project and this creative team. Expect greatness.

If you’re new to SMITH and/or Shooting War, and, like us, not at the beach, crank up the AC and check out Shooting War from the beginning. Have a terrific 4th and remember: it’s thoughtful readers like you and bad-ass go-getters like Jimmy Burns who make this country great.

A few weeks ago, The New Yorker ran a lovely profile of the late composer Morton Feldman, who discovered his “voice” and talent late in life, largely as a result of his friendship with fellow musician John Cage. Cage’s “chance operations,” a radical obedience to happenstance and the now, had an electifying effect on Feldman, who found the permission that Cage’s approach offered him creatively liberating.

Though ostensibly about Feldman, the piece is more about the creative process, and what happens when one submits to it.

You can listen to some of Feldman’s haunting music here.

“Isobella Jade, a model who has been living out of a suitcase in New York, is pitching a memoir, Almost 5′4″, about her struggle as an aspiring, height-challenged starlet. And she’s apparently been using the communal office that is the Apple Store on Prince Street in SoHo to write it.”

So begins a fascinating story on the blog FishBowlNY, which also posted a follow-up interview with Jade the next day. (Note: As you ponder the details of Jade’s writing process, your credulity mileage may vary.)

From the model/designer’s pitch to Mediabistro, which runs FishBowlNY:

“Where Isobella wrote her book is a story in it’se self [sic]. She wrote her whole memoir which is over 250 words [sic], while standing in heels infront of an Imac 17inch computer at the Apple Store in soho.”

I’m guessing she meant “250 pages,” though saving and/or printing her chapters was likely to have posed some problems.