An Open Letter to Jack Kerouac

Actually, I lied. This isn't really a letter to Kerouac. It's more just another endless post wherein I complain. I'm not feeling creative enough (and I find myself not caring enough, either) to talk straight to Kerouac about how weird I found his book to be, and to be honest, while I think it would legitimately be interesting to talk to Fitzgerald or Conan Doyle or Poe or whoever, I do not think I'd have enjoyed speaking with Kerouac very much. Why do I think that, you ask? Well, for starters, I just finished On the Road.

Yes. This one. I kept starting and stopping, starting and stopping, not for the same reason I do it for, say, House of Leaves, which AJKENAIULZBHALQWJ*(^TYAGXHZ, but because I found myself just... not really caring. 

I know, Jack. Mind blowing. 

Here's the thing - I know quite a lot of people. I've met quite a lot of people who I do not know anymore. And with all of these people, very few of them have acted as such great idiots as do the people in this book. In general, I find people interesting. The things that they do, the reasons they do them, all are particularly fascinating in that most people tend to contradict themselves and negate themselves and undermine themselves and all those ridiculous things that make us all entertaining and enlightening and weird. But the characters in Kerouac's book - who, of course, aren't characters at all but are actual people Kerouac knew - just seem stupid. They're the kind of deep thinkers who don't actually think deeply about anything, but because they can make connections between a banana and  selling real estate, all while barreling down the highway in borrowed cars and on borrowed money, they think that this is some form of genius. 

It's not. It's mind numbingly stupid.

Back in college, I wrote something called Kerouac Kids. It's a short story, kind of, wherein I basically bitch about people I considered to be trying too hard to be part of a Beat movement I'd never actually learned about before, had never read anything or seen anything or listened to anything from. But what strikes me is that, despite my complete and utter ignorance, I was right. I looked back at that story when I finished On the Road, and I was a little startled at how accurate - though technically and stylistically crappy - I was in my assessment. It's all emptiness. People think they're enlightened by feigning all sorts of things, when really the greatest achievement is to own your reality, to understand that sometimes things aren't good, and then take steps to make it better. To embrace it. To look at the people you know and value them. 

I admit to not being perfect. That would be ridiculous, and anyone who actually knows me would literally die laughing, and I really don't want that blood on my hands. I am brooding, petulant, and stubborn. I have a vision, and though I am willing to compromise, I'm not going to let it go. But that doesn't mean that I won't be the first to send a message, or a letter, or to make the phone call or visit. I won't do it all the time - there's a point of no return where if I do not see any particular gains in committing myself, I can drop everything and never look back - but if I look at someone and see something I like, see potential for friendship, see that maybe I need to make the first step because they just don't really know how, I'll do it. These people in these books and the people obsessed with these books and the ideas that we need to know everyone and need to know the world, don't really understand. 

You can't be completely self centered, but you can't be reliant on everyone else to tell you what to do, either. Get over yourself, get over your "genius", because you don't have it. I don't have it either, don't worry. There's just something to knowing that I have a friend or two who I can talk to, and who will talk to me, rather than telling the whole world everything all the time, making it into nothing at all.

......says the blog post writer. See what I mean? This shit is bananas. Want to buy some real estate? Just get in the car, but let me borrow five bucks first. I have a magic trick to show you.

A Poetry Entry

Because why not. I've started keeping a notebook of poems, all of which so far are dreadful both in subject and ability.

Photo by Jo Metson Scott and Nicola Yeoman

1.
In the deep of the dark, every sound is a footstep
the tappings and trappings of those come before.
But don't tell the children who play in the yard
for they might not come back anymore.

Projecting my Projects

So since I'm demanding that a certain St. Luke (or is it St. Matthew?) goes and starts updating her blog again, I figured it was only fair if I actually did something with mine so that I could use it to guilt her into doing the same. Not exactly certain if she'll fall for it, because really I'm kind of terrible at convincing her to do things, but there you have it. I think I'll also go demand that Faulkner starts posting as well, but she never listens to me either. My life is incredibly hard.

Actually, it's mainly incredibly busy. I'm moving, starting at a new workplace on Thursday, and it's all just really, really hectic because then we'll be moving AGAIN in a month, and then I think we'll settle. Kind of. Regardless of all this, though, I am determined to really keep up with my projects, especially because I'm actually branching out and moving into collaboration territory. This is all a bit nuts, mainly because we all know that, creatively, I function like a college student, which means that I tend to have to somehow get into a particular mood before I get things done.

Exactly.

However, because Hemingway and I will be living together, and he is actually and legitimately interested in what I spend my days doing creatively and always wants to know, I am kind of anticipating that being a bit of added incentive to actually be productive that I do not possess now. So, I thought that for my own elucidation (and because things look more immediate when they're actually written out and presented visually), I figured I'd set up a list of projects I want to work on and need to, you know, REMEMBER.

1. Dominion Jar

    Dominion Jar is the one absolute project that I am going to make myself complete by the end of the year. I've been working on this project for a really, really long time, both just generally in my head and finally out on paper. There have been about 700 versions of it, and this is the first time that I really do feel like I've... well, not got it right, per se, but that it's the most complete it will be. I did indeed finish those paper revisions, the one I was posting pictures of earlier in the year. I've gotten up through chapter four of the rewrites on my computer file based on the revisions, and so this is what I need to really focus on. I keep getting kind of frustrated with it, probably just because it's taking so damn long and I've been working on this one story for SO LONG, BUT I NEED TO DO THIS. IF IT IS NOT DONE BY THE END OF THE YEAR I WILL SET MYSELF ON FIRE AND DIE. Basically.

2. Strange Children

    So this one is not as formed as Dominion Jar, not by far. This is something that was a complete random shot in the dark. I started writing it for no particular reason, kind of just because I wanted to write something very different from what I had been working on (I've been stopping myself from turning the story's apartment building into the doorway to hell, or making the boiler room in the school into...uh...the doorway to hell, or any other lower levels into doorways to hell). Right now it is a hideous rambling mess, and I sort of keep writing myself into pointless corners and writing myself back out of them, but I'm getting an idea of what I think I'd like to do with this story. It would require a complete rewrite, but I think for now I'd like to just keep going and see where it all ends up, even if it spans into additional notebooks. But I think that could reasonably conclude itself by the end of the year, wherein I could see if there's anything to shape out of it.

3. Pre-existing Conditions

    Not an official title, but it's what I'm going to call this for now. This is the graphic novel that myself, Virginia Woolf, and Leviticus (or is it St. Paul?) are all kind of working on. We're slowly getting through the concept stage, and trying to formulate how we'd like to put it all together. We have the basis for our story, and we have our main characters. I think that, for this particular endeavor, I'd like to see a vague story outline, and maybe some test panels for the intro, which we do have an idea for. But that could be a good place to start drawing practice and all of those good things.

4. T-Shirt Land
    Well, one of the issues coming up this semester is that I'll only be teaching at one school. I have yet to find another area school, which is problematic not only because the job I have now is a temporary one, but also because of money issues. I have enough saved up that I could actually live off of it for over a year, but that's not the point. So, I'm going to look into creative endeavors, and one of the things I want to attempt is making t-shirt designs and submitting them to various websites for possible selection. Some sites pay you good money, others pretty standard, but at least it would be something and it would require me to actually produce something.

5. Artwork Portfolio
    Speaking of producing something, I would also like to get back into the habit of creating different kinds of art. I used to actually *have* a portfolio, believe it or not, but lately I haven't been producing much of anything unless if I saw a specific reason for it. However, that doesn't really allow for much practice. So, I would like to force myself to output a certain amount of artwork per month. I don't particularly want to set a specific number, since there is a lot of difference between big pieces and little, digital and traditional, and all that good stuff. However, I've already completed one painting today, a painting of a dinosaur head (I don't know, don't look at me), so that's more than I had before. I just want some kind of output. Let's leave it there.

6. Stitching it Up
    This one is a bit more immediate, but I'd also like to see about making sewing products that I could actually sell. One idea that I had is making superhero swimsuits, and preferably ones that aren't super slutty or for people who are a size zero. I've already put together a Spiderman one, and have the pieces for an Iron Man suit, but I need to put the pieces together. I also think I could do some interesting things with fall dresses and maybe some pajama pants and things, so we'll see how that all goes. But I'd like to put together a portfolio there, too. See what happens.

7. Shoot the Birdie
    All this talk about portfolios also includes the fact that I've been working on amateur (very amateur) photography projects for some time now. I think that by the end of the year, I would like to have put up a selection of photographs onto my facebook, and maybe - once I look into paintings and sewing and all that other stuff - create a page just for stuff that I've created. I know that tends to be a trend, but I want to actually be goaded into a degree of output, as mentioned before, and I feel like if I keep pushing myself to do that, I'll be more productive in my free time. Also, the photography thing is good because I like making people feel good about themselves, and also if I can get people to wear some of my stuff, that looks pretty damn good too.

8. Shape Up
    I also would like to work on making little figurines out of sculpy clay. Largely just for fun, and also... well, heck. Yet again, something to use as a creative output, to potentially put in a portfolio, and maybe to use as another form of... well. You get the picture here with all of the additional add-ons. Haha! Get it? Hurm.

9. Poetry and Short Stories
    I want to still try and find inspiration in new ways, and lately I've been very randomly having the urge to put together little pieces of poetry. None of them are particularly good (or necessarily coherent), but it's still something I'm going to try doing again. I may try posting some of those here, just for me or for any other poor unfortunates who accidentally stumble across this stupid blog. Same with the short stories, though that's really just to get myself out of the horror genre that I mainly like to hole myself up in and hiss at people from.



I was aiming for ten, but I don't have a tenth option right now. THIS IS AMAZING. AW YEAH. Because, obviously, less than ten is totally more manageable than ten, right? Right? Oh, good grief. I'm going now, because it's taken me far too long to type all of this up. Sheesh!!

Reading and Not-Working: A Hobby.

So I have a lot of work to do tonight. Legitimate work that needs to be done post haste, because a huge, fairly uncontrolled deluge of work is about to rear its ugly head in precisely 11.5 hours, and I need to be as ready as I can be.

Therefore, I read this book all evening:

Ages ago, when I was at Woolf's apartment for a dinner she was making, she gave me Alison Bechdel's Fun Home to read. I was suspicious at first, not really sure why exactly Woolf was recommending I read such a book, but I gave it a try anyway since she and Ecclesiastes (or is it Leviticus?) were chatting about something I didn't particularly have any useful input on. So, I picked it up, started reading...

And read through dinner.

Then I read through the train ride back to my and the venerable saint's apartment.

Then I read through a televised debate involving not-yet-vice-president Joe Biden.

Then I read through all of the ensuing discussion by my roommates and Woolf, until finally I finished the book.

I kept Woolf's copy until my own arrived in the mail a few days later. 

I was absolutely astounded by the book. It's a graphic novel, and it's just honest and raw and gorgeous, and Alison Bechdel is a genius. Because of that one book, I went out and bought the collection of Dykes to Watch Out For, which was a comic strip she did for over 20 years. But I truly love the honesty that Bechdel projects. I find it fascinating.

So, naturally, when this book arrived at my house today (I pre-ordered it months ago), I told myself I would only read a little bit, since I have so much to do tonight. 

Book is read. Papers are not graded. Contain the shock.

To be honest, I don't really know what I think of this book. It's very heavy in psychoanalytical topics, and it doesn't quite have the thoughtful, linguistically and artistically tantalizing essence that Fun Home does. Fun Home just... it really moved me. There are so many pictures and phrases that I can remember word for word and line by line, because for some reason they resonated very deeply with me. But I think that expecting any other work to dig down so deep inside and on the same level is both unfair and unrealistic. Certain works just have that power, I suppose, and anticipating a repeat performance of a unique work is just stupid. But then, I also read Are You My Mother in a sort of furtive rush (my procrastination causes me endless obsessing guilt, yet I do it anyway), so I think it's a book I'll need to revisit. 

I suspect there also just may be the fact that I am more connected to the idea of fathers than mothers, for a variety of reasons, but that's taking things in a more personal direction that I'm not currently prepared to go. I don't know. I'll get back to you.

And it will probably be before I get back to my poor, unfortunate students. Oops.

Sherlock Holmes and the Case of I Have An Obsession

So I submitted an abstract to a proposed collection of essays today. Guess what the collection will be about?

OH YEAH!!!

I've never actually written an abstract before in my life, and I'm not entirely certain if I even did it correctly or attached it correctly or provided the correct information in my email and blah blah blah, not to mention that the deadline for the abstract is, indeed, April 2 (one hour to spare - look at me go!), so I have very little hope that anything will come of this, but I feel quite proud of the attempt anyway! The majority of my intended article comes from an already partially written discussion on the concepts of identity and the rampant cultural appropriation of the Holmes character throughout the large number of adaptations featuring our great detective. I still have to add some information on, like my very recent analysis of the BBC Sherlock adaptation, but maybe I'll write it anyway just for fun and to feel like I possibly still have a brain left dormant in my head somewhere.

In case anyone was curious, here's the abstract that Virginia Woolf helped me form. Thanks, Woolf!

Humanizing Holmes: Appropriation of an Icon

by Mary O'Reilly

"Humanizing Holmes: Appropriation of an Icon" is an essay that describes the evolution of the Holmes that once was into the Holmes that he has become via the quest of a collective readership to maintain a cultural identification with the great detective. From his beginnings as a disconnected, mechanical, ingenious Victorian gentleman existing firmly above the level of his peers (and his readers), Sherlock Holmes has been appropriated by a public desperate to find cultural resonance and personal identification within the superhuman abilities he possesses. Though we were intended to first find our foothold through the eyes of Doctor Watson, Holmes is the character that we revere and aspire to become. Through the numerous adaptations of both Holmes and Watson, and the changes and alterations that have been undertaken upon their characters, these two cultural icons have become not only everything that we hope to be, but ultimately have developed through adaptation into figures in which we can legitimately find ourselves. This essay examines particularly the adaptations presented through William Gillette, Basil Rathbone, Jeremy Brett, Robert Downey Jr., and Benedict Cumberbatch.  

*bites nails even though she knows there's no chance*

An Open Letter to F. Scott Fitzgerald

Dear Mr. Fitzgerald,

I have a bone to pick with you. Stop smiling.

Alright, first and foremost, I finished your book yesterday, The Beautiful and the Damned. I really wanted to like it, because there's something about you that I like. You're such a goddamn tragic figure who had a ridiculously large number of insecurities and self destructive tendencies and romantic visions of the world.... I mean, I wouldn't want to have been friends with you or anything; you would have driven me completely up the wall. But there was something engaging about you regardless which came through your letters in Dangerous Friendship: Fitzgerald and Hemingway. You were immensely flawed, but that may have been what made you so likable. You were fascinating.

Unfortunately, I'm having problems with the extension of that same tolerance for juxtaposition to your work.

When Virginia Woolf and I undertook the rereading Great Gatsby last week, we were mildly alarmed to discover just how empty that novel was. I mean, it's not like stuff doesn't happen, given that one person gets run over by a car, one is bewildered by real books, and another gets shot in a pool because he's completely spineless and disillusioned and lies and cheats and rowed a boat and really didn't understand the intricate workings of that crazy thing we call reality and gee golly I'm pretty sure that was meant to be you, but despite the volume of things happening in a relatively short book, it's just... empty. Woolf and I came to the conclusion that the emptiness was, of course, purposeful in that it was meant to reflect both the temporal 20's as well as the age strictures, and we were able to draw out distinct tangles and pinpoints that, once our conversation concluded, allowed us to pull together an overall interpretation of your work that left us feeling better than we had at the outset.

Beautiful and the Damned? Not so much. 

Woolf has not read that one - it was my own undertaking because I was determined to discover that the mess you called This Side of Paradise was only a one time, completely irritating piece of melodramatic nonsense. I'd really hoped that B&D would show a greater sense of purpose in the writing, less time wasted rolling around through inner ramblings and justifications that didn't particularly ingratiate me to your characters, let alone you. But B&D was just really freaking aggravating. I didn't like any of the characters, mainly because they were all morons. However, where I'm getting the impression in the even more melodramatic work The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford that I'm actually supposed to dislike his characters because they are all morons, I'm not entirely certain that you intended for me to find your characters moronic. But they are. They are completely moronic. I felt that, even though Anthony proves himself to be the laziest, most self absorbed and egotistical child on the planet by the end, you still wanted me to pity him. Pity him! I wanted to throw him under a bus!

Really, Fitzgerald. What were you doing? 

And don't get me started on Gloria. I find it very hard to engage with characters where the only one who displays any amount of intelligence keeps getting described as looking like "a large cat" and "a tiger" and who sits on top of a railway station watching the sun come up after describing at length why he doesn't actually think the world means anything. FITZGERALD. WE'VE BEEN THROUGH THIS. Why did I read TSOP if you were going to tell me the same thing in a book with a much nicer cover some years later? And why the hell is it over 300 pages?! Nothing actually happens! They date, they get married, he goes off to war and she's told she's too old to play an ingenue, and then they stop loving each other and life is meaningless. WHY DID THAT TAKE 322 PAGES, FITZGERALD?

WHY

WHY

WHY

Oh, stop looking at me like that. You're a goddamn literary icon - what do you care about the fact that some of your writing makes me want to bang the book against my head repeatedly until my vision spaces out and suddenly everything seems interesting again? And I'm not saying ALL your writing is like this, anyway. I just told you that Woolf and I redeemed Gatsby together (though Flannery O claims that Daisy isn't a selfish moronic ditz, but I think Flannery probably needs to stop drinking), and I actually do like your stories in Tales of the Jazz Age. Plus, I haven't even told you yet that Leviticus (or was it St. John?) and I are going to a library book sale on Saturday and I plan on finding some more of your work if I can. I'm going to try Tender is the Night, Fitzgerald. Last attempt. Don't make me regret it, because I absolutely refuse to read The Love of the Last Tycoon. Nobody cares about tycoons unless we're talking about the guy who gets you out of jail free in Monopoly. Just saying.

So you have one final chance, Fitzgerald. You'd better not have screwed up it.... when you wrote it about a century ago..........

You were warned.

Regards, 

The Bird.

Some Photos What I Have Taken

As I sit here waiting for Virginia Woolf to sort out the problem of the faulty Skype microphone, I figured I'd make a slightly different post (and one meant skillfully to hide the fact that I haven't worked on my wretched revisions today and do not really intend to). Instead, I thought I'd talk about photography!

I've found in recent years (like, the past single recent year) that I greatly enjoy messing around with my crappy, blurry, rotten, stupid, ugly camera. I'm sure I'd like messing around with a not-crappy, blurry, rotten stupid, ugly camera even more, but I'm not one to spend lots of money without endlessly fretting over it first, and I've got other things to worry about, like Colorado and San Diego. Thankfully though, there's such a thing as photo enhancing, and I have had the good fortune to find a couple people who don't mind standing, sitting, or smelling a bunch of flowers for a long period of time while I hiss and mutter over my malfunctioning camera. I've never really shared these photos before except with the people who modeled for me, so I figured that for the fun of it I'd post some photos here. First time ever, never seen before, whoop de - freaking - doo.

Anyway!

My lovely friend Samantha. She is lame and told me I couldn't take more photos of her until she loses weight. I may kill her. 

 This is what it looks like when people touch magical boxes they aren't supposed to. Put it down, Miranda!

This is why I can't take my beautiful friend Amy to the Art Institute. She causes a scene.

The Dawn Ashke of mention and I decided to do a Lisbeth Salander - inspired photoshoot in the city one day. She looked so tough and awesome that I thought she was going to beat *me* up.

Seriously, Sam? Come be my model again. WTF.

The Prettiest Miranda of Them All and the Dollar Store Bubbles! (obviously an official title)

Amy, Elephant, and some great works of literature. Sort of. Moby Dick can go suck a... well...

Ms. Ashke doing professional model-level vogueing in front of the coolest wall we've ever accidentally stumbled across.

The actual pictures are all larger, of course, but I figured I'd stick them up. I really enjoy playing around with photos, and would always love some new models to add to my fold (I'M LOOKING AT YOU, LEVITICUS!! YOU CAN ONLY SAY NO FOR SO LONG UNTIL YOU GIVE UP BECAUSE I'M REALLY EFFING ANNOYING). But yes. So if anyone sees this and would like to be a model (or if my current models see these and go "hey! I want to take more pictures!", just let me know!! As long as you're somewhat near me. I do this for free, after all.

End of slightly sales-pitchy blog post.

Revision Day.... uh.....8?

Hello! I know I haven't posted in six days, but I was busy. Unfortunately, I wasn't really busy doing anything creative, or for work, or anything else, but whatever. What do you want from me?

Actually, I did a lot of reading this past weekend and completed rereading A Room of One's Own and first time reading A Moveable Feast. I've recently started The Beautiful and the Damned, and I'm already kind of questioning where the hell it's going. I WOULD be reading The Good Soldier, but it was stolen from me by someone whose name begins with D, ends with D, and has an "a" in the middle. No surprise there.

I have also, believe it or not, been legitimately working on my revisions. I've gotten through the first ten chapters, and have been finding pieces that I don't like and need to fix, or just phrasing problems. Whenever I find such things, I leave myself helpful notes.

Example of helpful notes:

That is apparently what I do when my descriptions start putting *me* to sleep. When in doubt, have people talk about how ugly the house is! Yeah!

Also, thank you for answers to my previous entry's question about backstory. Though Ecclesiastes (I'm expanding your Biblical scope, St. Mark) was the only one to respond via blog, I actually got some texts about the matter, so thanks for those!! Like I said, I'm just worried about pushing the backstory too much when it isn't going to be mentioned in this first book fully, but I know it's something people will have to read to judge. Thanks again!

In other news, Hemingway grabbed up my manuscript yesterday and started randomly critiquing a page in the middle, which didn't really do much for my self esteem because how stupid does everything sound halfway through with no sense of what the heck is going on? However, he later told me that he thought I was "almost there", which I think was meant to insinuate that I was "almost there" in terms of having good writing, instead of "almost there" to the point of sucking. I think. I hope.

Woolf, Ecclesiastes, I will leave the ultimate decision of book burning to you. Whenever I finish my damn revisions and rewrites. Again. Bwaaaaaaaa.

Also, everyone say hello to William Faulkner!! She's got her own blog up and running, so go take a look at it and leave meaningful commentary! Though you might not want to call her William Faulkner over there. People will get confused.

Revision Day 2

It is hot still. I am sitting here eating corn chips and drinking lukewarm coffee that I am unwilling to reheat, mainly because I had to spray down the whole stupid kitchen thanks to all the goddamn ants that decided this heatwave would be a great time to repopulate and come hang out on the floors and countertops. I had to block off the kitchen because of this, which means that the dog is panting worriedly at my feet because she is a border collie and panting worriedly is pretty much her hobby.

Ugh. Too many corn chips. Whose idea was that?

Anyway, this is officially day two of revisions, and I've...well, I've not really done anything yet. Day one was a fairly good success. I got through the first five chapters, and that five week wait really did help. I tend to be obsessively critical of my work, and when Stephen King's book told me (more accurate than the phrase I used last time) that I should wait and will then find myself being less critical, I thought the book was probably lying to me and spreading rumors. So I decided to start revision immediately.

This happened. I started obsessively rewriting every single sentence, twisting the words around and adding new words and attempting to be creatively alliterative and blahblahblahblah.

So I put it away.

This is what my revision scheme looks like after waiting:

Much less critical! There are still quite a few notes and words scribbled out and things underlined and what have you, all done in the lovely green of the Sonic Screwdriver Pen gifted to me by the illustrious Ms. Ashke, but it doesn't seem as awful as it did when I tried revision directly following the printing. However, I think that the parts I'm heading into now may contain some serious problems in terms of silly little things like logic and continuity, so I'm balking a bit. 

Plus it doesn't help that I've been continuously distracted by my phone. Last night it was lying to me and St. John (Or is it St. Matthew?) about whether or not Jupiter was where we thought it was, this morning it was apparently receiving text messages from Nora Hawthorne (the love child between Nora Roberts and Nathaniel)'s sink. The inimitable Ms. Ashke's pocket dialed me next, and now one confused person is sending me pictures of a menu where everything is named after a work of literature. I told her to get the Edgar Allan Potatoes. 

I'll try and do something, though, because Hemingway will be here soon, and we're off to see my famous actress friend's play tonight. However, I have a question:

How much backstory is too much backstory? My main character, Andy, has a past that is not fully discussed in the book I'm revising now. However, her past is completely the focus of the second story (if St. Luke and Woolf don't tell me to go hang it all and never write on this again), so how much do you think would be apt for the first in terms of teasers or whatever the hell. I don't really know what I'm asking. Just... backstory! What do you think! Thanks!

T - 1 day till Revision

Sheesh, it's hot around here.

Usually a Chicago March does not find me sitting in a t-shirt and slowly sweating away the afternoon, but apparently this year is the exception. Today the dog and I went on a walk, and even for her it was too hot to pee on everything within leg-lifting range like she normally does. Instead, she trotted along until we got to the duck pond a few blocks down, where she promptly submerged herself, enraging the nearby geese and nearly dragging me in with her. Thankfully she lost her momentum when the water got up over her legs, so I was able to balance myself on the edge of the water while she slogged around as deep as the leash would let her go.

I wish geese weren't so evil. They're really rather pretty birds, big and soft looking, but the fact that they would just as soon carve a hole in my head with their beaks is not a particularly endearing quality. They spent most of our visit squawking from the other end of the pond with some much quieter and very pretty mallards sporting beautiful emerald green heads. By the time Sadie deigned to get out, the geese had rounded up their rage-courage and started to advance.

Stupid geese. Also, stupid 80 degree weather. Ernest Hemingway texted me yesterday and said that last year, the temperature was around 32. Blaaaaarg.

Virginia Woolf and I are tearing through the twenties in our reading lately, and we're eagerly waiting for St. Matthew (or is that St. John?) to join us, but she's being obstinate and reading Game of Thrones instead. Of course, I bought that for her, so I really shouldn't complain. Her entire blog is about complaining, though, so maybe if she posts a post about books (THISISASUBTLEHINT) I will protest over there. But I've never read much fiction from the legends like Fitzgerald and Hemingway, and reading Stein's Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas and a book called A Dangerous Friendship - Hemingway and Fitzgerald both have rather ridiculously spurred me on to read more from that generalized era of people. Woolf and I re-read Gatsby and discussed it at length, and that with Broccoli's book has made me love Fitzgerald just a bit. I'm still suspicious of Hemingway, though, but we're going to do Moveable Feast as it's more reminiscing than bullfights or war.

Of course, then Woolf decided she wants to get through the real Woolf, so I'm in the middle of re-reading Room of One's Own. I've fallen back in love. This is ridiculous - I feel all polyamorous.

Ms. Ashke has recently announced that she is plugging along with her own writing, so if she's reading this, she'd better STOP READING THIS AND GET BACK TO WRITING. GOD.

Wrote a short story today about dinosaurs. It's stupid. Maybe I'll send it to St. Luke (or is it St. Mark?). She had a good meeting, so I should probably make her day a little stupider.

Tomorrow begins the revisions. Blaaaarg. BLAAAAARG. Etc.

So I've written a book.

It's a very weird thing to say. It seems so pretentious and overly ambitious and like I'm completely full of myself and delusional, but it's bizarrely true; I actually wrote a book. There it is, up in that picture. It's not completely finished, of course - it seems like everything I write needs about 957 revisions before I even begin to debate letting other people read - but look at all those pages, bound together in a plastic sheath of finality. I'm not sure if it's a good book, or even largely readable (blah blah self doubt blah blah creeping despair etc), but it's a little too late now. Now I have to polish it up, do my last set of revisions, and pass it along to my two long suffering primary readers, Zanzabara (Leader of the Not-So-Free World - KNEEL) and Tina (the Super Awesome Cool Person) (This is ridiculous - I did not come up with either of these, for the record). If they like it and give me the green light, I'm going to start sharing it with a third set of already enlisted readers (for whom I do not yet have pseudonym requests, praise it all). It's remarkable how many encouraging (and strange) people I know. Quite a few friends and acquaintances alike, upon hearing I finished the stupid thing, went "So when can I read it?" Very sweet, very supportive, and apparently possessing little regard for personal sanity. Two of them didn't even ask what it was about.

I didn't tell them. I'm sure it will go well.

Currently, however, the manuscript is collecting dust on my drafting table. Though I proceeded to rip the plastic binding off and wave it around in a fit of excitement about two seconds after I got it (ask Tina the Super Awesome Cool Person - I practically hit her in the face with it), I gingerly set it aside almost immediately afterwards for two reasons:

1) I carefully set it aside because, surprisingly, Stephen King told me to. Well, not personally. I would have made much more of a fuss had Stephen King shown up at my house to talk books. No, I read his advice in On Writing, which was a very fun book to read. King's advice is that, when a first draft is completely finished, to set it aside for a minimum of 6 weeks. King promotes the idea of starting something new to take your mind off the finished work in an effort to distance yourself. (I found that to be very good advice, since when I initially began revising two days after getting the manuscript, I was correcting EVERYTHING). So, that was one of my reasons to set the manuscript aside. The other reason was

2) Because I  forgot to put page numbers on any of it. I have since numbered them all by hand while skyping with Zanzabara, Leader of the Not-So-Free World (Kneel). It's only about 169 pages, but damned if I'd be able to put it back together again with no page numbers. I'd probably just set it all on fire and pay 20 bucks to print it off again.

So those are my two wonderful, completely mature reasons for why I've put off my second to last (I hope) revision. We're slowly reaching the 5 week mark, though, and I feel that will be about the limit of my rumination time. I'll admit that I haven't really started anything new, but I have written eight short stories (don't ask - about two are good, and by good I mean I don't wince when re-reading them) and there is the small fact that the fifth week coincides with Spring Break. I plan on spending that whole week doing the revisions. At this point, I've written the story, revised the story, rewritten some of the revisions, scrapped the rewrites and wrote the whole thing over AGAIN, and then revised THAT before printing. If it sucks, that's pretty much how it's going to stay. I just... have the compulsive need to look at it again.

Well, that's what I'll be doing for awhile. Unfortunately, afterwards I'm pretty certain that I'll be going completely crazy while waiting for feedback from Tina the Super Awesome Cool Person and Zanzabara, Leader of the Not-So-Free World (KNEEL). I've decided that I should probably have more than one project going just in case, you know, the book completely sucks. That's where this blog comes in. I've got ideas and plans and projects in my head, but the thing is that I never really talk about them with anyone, and because of my lack of willingness to communicate (I'm weird about this stuff, again - ask Tina the Super Awesome Cool Person about the time I dragged her on a walk to talk about the plot for a story she was already reading because I felt weird talking about it in a normal setting) these projects and ideas just sort of... never happen. Maybe if I share a couple of ideas, and get some low level feedback along the lines of "DIDN'T YOU SAY YOU WERE GOING TO WRITE A STORY ABOUT A FAMILY OF ANTELOPES? WHERE IS IT?" then maybe I'll get inspired.

Maybe. I don't know. We'll see. Until then, don't actually mention antelopes to me. That's totally not my story.