More news from the family business:

1. San Franciscovians can see my pa, Conrad Bishop, doing short pieces from his solo storytelling show Survival Tips for the Plague Years (which is funnier than it sounds) on December 10 and January 7, as part of The Marsh's Monday Night Marsh series.

2. This plug is 27 years late: I've been putting up scripts on the Independent Eye website and finally got around to what was one of my favorites as a kid, Marvels, a poetic puppet fairy-tale based on Carlo Gozzi's 18th-century play The King Stag. If you ever wondered how magical body-switching got to be the plot for a zillion movies, it's probably Gozzi's fault. Anyway it's a good story, and remarkably prescient about the dangers of going hunting with the Vice President (plus it includes the line, "Oh you tiger. You beast in pants"). You can read the script and see some of the puppets here.