Another Cold

I have caught another cold. Sux.

But I just ate an awesome chicken and mushroom brioche! (I won't blog about it though.) ;-)

I feel absolutely awful, which is a shame because I've been enjoying a somewhat drawn-out celebration of my birthday, which I've perhaps enjoyed too much.

Anyway, more once I'm on the other side of this cold.

Happy Holidays, everyone!!!

Things I Don't Get: Food Blogging

Why do I care what you ate for breakfast? Or how beautiful your pancakes are? Or what you used to glue together your Holiday Gingerbread House?

People taking pictures of their food before they eat it... Nope, don't get it. I'm a firm believer in finding the aesthetic joy in places unexpected, but I don't think fried eggs make great art.

Not that blogging is art.

But isn't it?

Talk amongst yourselves...

The Galileo Year

Okay, so it's not officially called "Galileo Year", but it should be. In commemoration of Galileo's lodestone that he pointed at the heavens in 1609, 2009 is going to be the International Year of Astronomy.

How do I know this?

Through the wonders of the streaming Internets. I still listen to KQED in San Francisco via their website, which is rad because WHYY in Phila... well, they can throw all the Marty Moss-Cowain they want at me, but give me Rachel Myrow and Michael Krazny over her any day, and twice on Sundays.

But back to the subject at hand: the International Year of Astronomy.

Astronomy is fascinating to me, ever since I learned about the 1919 eclipse experiment by A.S. Eddington that confirmed the theory of relativity. Matter really distorts space! Light bends according to the shape of space! Wacky! Wild! Awesome stuff!!!!

My Old bf in SF gave me a lovely book by Einstein that gives a popular recounting of the basics of relativity. How I miss him! (Einstein and Old bf, both. I haven't read any Einstein in maybe a year now.)

I ask myself, what should the International Year of Astronomy be? Shall we look for little green men? Shall we point the entire VLA in New Mexico at the North Star and see what we find?

I've always wanted to see the Southern Cross. I imagine people from Down Unda want to see the Big Dipper.

So strange that our skies look different above and below the equator.

What does the sky look like at the equator?

Random musings to start out this, the Galileo Year.

R U INSANE????

I just read a post of a former schoolmate in which she actually listed all of her former addresses. The real deal. ON THE INTERNET.

What a doofus.

The SCOTUS Does Something Right, For Once

I'll have to say, the Supreme Court of the United States does know a nutjob when they see one. I found this very brief article illuminating about the lengths people will go to to see that our President-Elect doesn't take office on 20 January 2009.

What a doofus.

A World Populated by Snotty Writers

Disclaimer: I didn't read the entire post, because I got too annoyed to finish it.

****

So, big pet peeve of mine: Open Salon. Oh, how I hate Open Salon, and let me give you a snippet of it just so you can taste the Bitter Bitter Princesses for themselves

I don't want to compete with all the Internet for attention—I can already do that by just posting to any of my several domains. I want the one thing that makes Open Salon different—a personal conversation with intelligent people who are actually committed to being here and chatting about important things. What a special thing.

But once people who are posting elsewhere can dump their stuff here as an extra offload point, I expect you to continue the already annoying trend of featuring people with offsite blogs as editor's picks because I sense that you mistakenly seek to create the cyberspace equivalent of a kind of metropolitan cachet.

What, the rest of the blogosphere isn't good enough for you "real writers"?

Eat a dick.

Snobbery. Elitism. The Ivory Tower and the Benign Dictatorship of the Intelligentsia.

EAT. A. DICK.

By opening up Open Salon to less worthy writers, perhaps you could engage not in a community, but in a true plurality of voices. Yes, it's true, very rarely can you have both quantity and quality, but c'mon, people, Teh Interwebs are for everyone, and lets not forget that. (And let us not forget that they are also for everyone who is lucky enough to have a computer.)

It's this prima donna attitude that I find so offensive in writers like Augusten Burroughs and Elizabeth Wurtzel, but at least I can leave them on the shelf at Borders. You're telling me your prissy asses are going to be following me all the way home?

Screw you.

I'll stay with my pedestrian blogger site and try and remember that the world doesn't revolve around me or any imagined online "community". I suggest, Writer Dear, that you do the same.

My Birthday Draweth Nigh

I love December. Why? Because of the birth of ME! My birthday is sometime around mid-month, and this year I've got some stuff on my mind because it will be what some in the blogosphere have called "The Jesus Year": I'm turning 33.

It's not what you think.

The Jesus Year, as I understand it, is a time to reflect on your accomplishments, see what you've done with your life so far, and think about what you want to do with the rest of it. It's a time to be grateful, NOT a time to contemplate horrible death, NOT a time to get religion.

It could be that I'm interpreting this all wrong, but I like my way of seeing the Jesus Year. And so I'll just keep thinking that's what it is until somebody tells me differently... and then I'll still think of it the way I do!

I won't list my accomplishments until I get to my actual birthday, and then I'll post one accomplishment per post for the rest of the year so that I can really see what I've done so far.

Obviously, NaNoWriMo won't be on that list of accomplishments.

But there's always NEXT YEAR!!!

Holiday Winter Tea: MMMM!

I've discovered something great: some brand of tea that comes in a wooden box with a blend called "Holiday Winter Tea". Oh! I just Googled it!

Culinary Teas' Holiday Winter Tea

Yum, yum, yummilicious! It is perfect for these cold, damp days of early winter.

Speaking of which, my doldrums are still in effect. I try to raise my spirits with writing, but tea actually works better. It gets dark so early! I barely feel the day has begun when I start to see the day end. So strange, every year, stranger still.

Back to my tea now. Seriously. Order some. C'est si bon!

NaNoWriMo: FAIL... and, yet, NOT.

No NaNoWriMo winner badge for me. I got seriously distracted by life and just couldn't put it together enough to write the G.A.N. I couldn't even cobble together an aesthetic manifesto that would vindicate Modernism in this Post-Modern age! I didn't even get to 7K words. Dammit.

DinerGirl = FAIL.

However.

I finally, finally, finally got started on a project that I *like* and that has a voice that I can't believe is actually mine, that doesn't sound like the novel I wrote when I was 13. (It was only 50 pages--typed, single-spaced--, but that's pretty damn good for a tween!) I've "found my writer's voice", as it were, and that means NO FAIL. Means PASS!

I'll write sometime about the dramas that I got caught up in that prevented me from reaching 50K. But not right now, 'cause I have a head cold and am really tired.

In the meantime, shout-out to Tiara for getting past 12K and for starting an awesome project that I hope she's really proud of, too.

Onward, WriMos! Onward!

Thanksgiving Mayhem

My stepfather has a gigantic family. Gi-gan-tic. They're descendants of Welsh immigrants that came to South Jersey in... get this... the 17th century. Yep. And they all stayed, more or less, right where they settled, for over 300 years. Brilliant. Only in America... sort of.

So, at the Thanksgiving Reunion yesterday, there were 140 B___'s present. 140! But there was one person present that really stood out: my step-nephew M.

M. was diagnosed with schizophrenia not too long ago, and had some trepidation about coming down to the circus that is the B___ Thanksgiving. He was doing quite well--he's got some awesome medications now--and I got to talk to him for a while.

Why is this important?

Because I'm bipolar. And because my early 20s --the age he is now-- were equally full of family strife, unemployment, and struggle for normalcy. While we didn't get into the trading of war stories, I could tell it was comforting for him to speak with someone who knew, at least in part, what it's like to live with a brain that makes you suffer.

My mother saw us talking and promptly burst into tears. Those years were traumatic for her as well, but now with things so much better (knock on wood), she felt an immense relief knowing that I could speak with M. without getting sucked down into despair.

And for that she was grateful. And I am grateful. And M., though he struggles, is also grateful that he was able to find a little corner of comfort in the chaos that is Thanksgiving at the Fellowship Hall.

Gratitude. And Hope.

Problem: My Feet are Cold

My feet are cold and I can't knit socks fast enough to keep them warm. I may have to cave and go to Wal-Mart -- I loathe Wal-Mart, but it's the only thing going around here -- and get some machine-made socks. Damn. I love knitting my nice wool warmy warmy socks. I guess that's what I'll be doing more of this winter. That and working on the novel, apparently with cold feet.

I could wear shoes, I suppose, but I'm a barefoot girl, always have been. My mom used to buy me slippers every Christmas in the hope that I would take to wearing them. She tried every kind imaginable: Fluffy Dog slippers, boiled wool clog-slippers, grandma slippers, etc. She finally hit on something when she got me slipper-socks, the kind with the little grabby rubber treads on the bottom. Those I would wear. When I moved out here, though, all my slipper socks were so grubby that I chucked them all.

Slipper socks. In my old apartment in San Liberal, it got so cold in the apartment in the wintertime -- like 59 degrees in the mornings and after dark -- that I would have to wear multiple layers of clothing... or else have to turn on the gas heat and pay an arm and a leg with my utilities bill. I was such a cheapskate, figuring I'd rather suffer than pay. It only gets cold in San Liberal for about 3 months out of the year. Still. That's a $20 increase per month to pay for the gas heat, and I was poor as a churchmouse. So no heat for me.

And now, at the very least, my utilities are covered and I'm not living in an apartment whose walls are essentially all windows. (Windows with no view, I might add.) So maybe I won't be so cold after all.

But my feet, my poor feet, how they require a new pair of slipper socks!

Off to Wal-Mart. ::sigh::

Random Bullets: Hard to Post These Days

• I don't know why it's so hard to motivate to post. I mean, blogging is supposed to be fun, right? I guess I'm just in a blogging funk.
• Things around here are not going well. Disillusionment is happening. And it is damn cold.
• I wore my "Phinally" Phillies hoodie today. Man, how much do I love my Mom for getting me that hoodie? And how happy am I that the Phillies won the Series... still?!?!
• I have amazing new shoes that I got at the Target in Delaware the other day. Talk about Fuck-Me Pumps. They just openly kick ass. So what if they only cost me 25 bucks? Who's counting?
• I heard from the exbf lurking near DC. Man, what a hoot. Why did I let him go? Or better yet, why did he let me go? It's hard to know, even now, who did the leaving...
• Cold cold cold.
• The novel bides its time. It mocks me from afar.
• So g-d tired that I can't think of anything except sleep. Na-night, blogosphere. :-)
  

So How's It Going?

A recent commenter asked how things were going with the novel, if I was still writing it. The truth is, I haven't written a word in about 10 days. Why?

Well, there was the trip down South, for one, where I discovered that ex-lovers are ex-lovers for a reason, especially when they vote Republican and support the Cuban trade embargo, and that apparently, I've got a sexy vibe, if one can believe drunken Carolina Panther fans.

There's also the fact that there was rampant idiocy in the forums of the NaNoWriMo website, which I've bitched about thoroughly, so I'll drop it. But FYI, if you don't know the difference between "a" and "an," you probably shouldn't be writing a fucking novel.

::stepping off soapbox::

And then there's my sense of having read too much. I love literature, I have a Master's Degree in it, actually. I love literary theory. I love dissecting and even occasionally disemboweling literature, especially the Modernists. I'm just a Modernist in a PostModern body. And where is there room for Modernists this day and age?

It is my quandary about Modernism that has me stalled, because for all my technical experimentation that I've done in my 6,600 words, I fear that my style does not fit my subject matter. That my actual story line is too pedestrian for verbal wizardry and the kind of mind-fuck Modernist strategies that I'm ripping off from Virginia Woolf and Faulkner and such.

So, there's an incongruency there that bothers the hell out of me, and I don't know how to transcend it, because I'm wedded to my stylistic adventures, but I suck at theme and plot... as did the Modernists, now that I think about it.

I guess, considering that "plot" was never high on the to-do list of any self-respecting, anti-Aristotelian Modernist, I should simply forge ahead with my explorations of character and hope that one day all of them actually talk to each other and do something.

Then I'll have a book.

It just won't be the one that's due on 30 November.

Sorry for the Silence

I haven't posted in a while, sorry. I decided to give up both on NaBloPoMo and NaNoWriMo at the same time.

Not that I've *really* given up on NaNoWriMo... just the principle of it. I'm here to write a novel, yes, and this got me jump-started, hurrah, but there's something that's just too too too neurotic about NaNoWriMo.

And I don't play well with others. I kept trying to stir things up in the forums and getting nothing back, which led to great frustration and the realization that the maxim "Everyone has a book in them" is really utter bullshit.

Maybe everyone *does* have a book in them. That doesn't mean they should necessarily write it.

But kudos to all WriMos for trying, including myself. Who knows if this book is any good or not. Who really cares.

I'm feeling a bit nihilist tonight. Winter is here and I've got my doldrums on.

There was snow the other day, just enough to make things pretty.

It's very cold in the apartment...

Heading Home

I'm going home. Hurrah.

I got hit on so much down here in the SouthLand. I *never* get hit on at home. I didn't know what to do with it. I told one guy, "Ehh. You just have your beer goggles on. If you didn't you wouldn't be hitting on me." Which prompted an unusual response: a lecture from the drunk letch on how I shouldn't be so down on myself and I should have more self-respect.

That was surprising. It was like a drunk, male Oprah telling me to love myself, honey.

Don't feel like it. Especially when my pep talk was coming from a guy who talked to my breasts rather than my face.

::sigh::

Still, it was nice to be found attractive, even just a little bit.

Now, home, to rampant isolation and the call of NaNoWriMo.

Whereupon I Bitch Some More about NaNoWriMo

Dear God, I have read far too much literary theory.

This is my thinking, all you WriMos out there: BREAK THE RULES.

Of course, to break the rules, you have to know the rules... and therein lies my problem with NaNoWriMo: too many people writing that don't know/respect/dare to challenge the rules.

I know this all sounds really elitist, and that I should be celebrating the fact that so many people are connecting with their inner novelist, but c'mon let's get real about what the future hold for these novels.

1. There will be a wonderful sense of accomplishment that the WriMo will receive upon finishing... hell, even upon starting.
2. There will be a tremendous burst of creativity that will be very satisfying to the writer.
3. There will be a tremendous crash when this project comes suddenly (and arbitrarily) to an end.
4. For some, there will be a drawer somewhere in the house with a manuscript somewhere in the stages of completion that will languish indefinitely.
5. For others, there will be grandiosity that leads to attempts to find an agent, who then crushes the hopes of the WriMo by telling them to go back to the drawing board.
6. For a very select few, there will be revision and rewriting, a similar hunt for an agent, and the shopping around for a publisher who will either accept or reject the book which is now entirely different from what emerged during the course of November.

People, this is not your shot at immortality! This is your shot at self-actualization. Any immortality that results is not because of NaNoWriMo. It is because of what happens after NaNoWriMo.

However, to give NaNoWriMo its due... none of the immortality would come about without the ballsy aspiration to write a novel in a month.

::sigh::

OK, NaNoWriMo, you win. I'll take my frustration and place it squarely where it belongs: with my own failure to produce and my constant procrastination reading the forum topics and mocking them.

I'm a horrible person.

Swank

I am currently on the top floor of a swank hotel in The City that Banking Built in the SouthLand. Here for a little networking.

Swank hotels amuse me; each one has its own little quirks. In this one, for example, in order to use the elevator, you have to insert your room key first. Never seen that before. And they have the coffee maker on the desk instead of in the bathroom, you know, where the water is.

I came in here and there was some tranquil imagery and music on the TV, very funny, but no King-Sized bed as I asked for. Two doubles. Which is really really useless when you're just one little person.

It's gray and overcast here, raining even.

Has anyone ever noticed how when they're getting their picture taken, Southern girls always cock their head slightly to one side and smile in way that you *know* they practiced it in a mirror, or for months before their cotillion? Just a little something I noticed in the society pages of "Uptown" magazine.

Big Ol' Jet Airlinah

Leaving tomorrow... well, today, actually, for a trip to the SouthLand to see a friend or two. Could be interesting. One is a former, shall we say, fling. The other I met in Germany in one of my many travels hither and yon.

The Fling, well, he's all married w/ kids now, and I have the feeling I make him distinctly uncomfortable, mostly due to some of the choices I've made in my life... some of which have landed me back here.

But I'll be on a plane in a few hours (in First Class, I might add) because I used my many, many Frequent Flier Miles to upgrade. Woo. And Hoo. Can't wait to see if they actually still serve *food* in First Class. God knows they don't in Coach.

I'll try to keep up with posting while I'm there, but I may just end up failing NaBloPoMo for November because of this trip.

Wish me luck! I really don't want to fail!

Watch. Listen. Learn.

OK, This Pisses Me Off

So, my uncle got laid off from his job down in Virginia. Sad, but who isn't getting laid off these days? My aunt is... get this... blaming the "new administration" for their own personal economic downturn.

Wha wha whaaaaat?

The new administration isn't even in office yet!

Feh.

Republicans.

Online Life

I'm exhausted. Everything in my life is exhausting right now. It's just too much. NaBloPoMo and NaNoWriMo are eating my soul.

I keep thinking about how now everyone's building a life online in some way or other, even just with email. I have a friend who said that he now finds it unusual when people *don't* have a blog or some sort of website. MySpace, LiveJournal, Facebook... We are building a Second Life. Which isn't even mentioning Second Life.

We are becoming a society devoid of privacy, exhibitionists all of us. But you know, I think that's a pessimistic way to look at it. I really believe that our gravitation towards having an online presence is a way of breaking out of the isolation of our daily lives. I think it is symptomatic of a world that has gotten very lonely in recent years. We're reaching out to each other, complete strangers.

If you think about it, it's really quite beautiful.

.... Now if only we could stop judging each other...

Modernism & the Word War

I've got a ton of books on Modernism. Considering that the Postmodern Genre has been totally played out, I've decided to return to the source of all things individualistic and rebellious, my one great love, Modernism.

I'm not sure I understand all the social and political forces that went into the creation of such works of beauty as "To the Lighthouse" (which I'm presently reading) or "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon", but no matter... it's the result that's important, more than anything else.

I find Virginia Woolf's style to be absolutely inspired, and I'm using "Mrs. Dalloway" and "To the Lighthouse" as tutors in this endeavor.

The problem is... I've gotten so caught up in my research on Modernist style(s) that my word count has only minimally increased over the past 36 hours.

One of the problems is that the book is kind of stalled, action-wise. I'm having too much fun exploring the inner motivations of my character and so I'm just having her walk around the house, making coffee, rearranging furniture, etc, all while thinking about her life. It's fun! But I'm afraid it will be just plain boring to the reader.

But we'll see.

Anyway, that's the update for today. Now back to the Word War.

Word War! and Week One Recap

The goal is: 10,000 words this weekend. 10,000!!!!

So I'm hunkering down to work on getting to 15K total words by 11:59 p.m. Sunday night.

I'm still getting settled in, and am using NaBloPoMo as a warm-up in a way... Good on NaBloPoMo.

Week One was both elation: (Obama!!!) and disappointment (Prop 8). Writing-wise it was both elation: (I'm finally doing this!!!!) and disappointment (I've been so caught up in the election that I've only got 5,000 words!!! D'oh!!!)

I'm very excited because I'm starting to feel like I'm defining my style a bit, and realizing that I don't need to be consistent in this draft, that I just need to try new stuff. (Or at least, new to me. Probably not so new to Virgina Woolf. Not that I'm comparing myself to her. But I *am* imitating her.)

This is just great. But from what I understand, Week 2 is known as "The Sophomore Slump" and considering how much trouble I had with Week 1, I am very nervous about Week 2.

It seems, though, if I can meet the Word War challenge, I might be well on my way...

Will keep you posted.

Getting Frustrated with NaNoWriMo

... not the novel itself, that's not frustrating, that's fun...

No, I'm getting frustrated with the lack of feedback that I'm getting in the forums. I keep posting stuff that's meant to be a little challenging, like this:

It seems to me that the confusion over what is termed "LitFic" in part stems from the question as to whether the novels that have become canonical -- Crime and Punishment, Wuthering Heights, The Grapes of Wrath, etc. -- actually still qualify as LitFic. I tend to agree with a previous commenter that LitFic is more of a recent market designation and that these examples of "classic" literature don't really fit in with the designation. LitFic could perhaps also be designated as Contemporary Literature, that is, literary output that is, in its own way, vying for inclusion in the canon, which is ever-expanding. That may be an elitist view of LitFic as a genre, but so be it.

I also agree that it is an outgrowth of Modernism, and that in itself points to a certain elitism as well.

Let me be clear: I'm not saying that LitFic targets a specific audience, or that it attracts a specific audience. But its stylistic focus and emphasis on characterization, often at the expense of plot, present challenges that Genre Fiction (often, but not always) does not.

LitFic writers are, I think, by nature a little more experimental with technique and tend to draw attention to the medium of language itself, thus the connection with Modernism.

I'm sure I've said something here that's going to make someone angry. Fire away.

You know what I've gotten so far? NUTTIN HONEY. Not a single response to that. I even pulled out the big guns, calling Lit Fic elitist! For the love of PETE, what does a person have to do to start some dialogue??? Am I talking over people's heads here? I don't think I'm offering any sort of insight that is incomprehensible. Just a little quid pro quo, my fellow writers, is that so fucking hard?!?!

Sorry for the language.

Anyway, I'm going to go back to work on the novel. Bless it.

Prop 8 :-(

So, Prop 8 passed in CA. That's very distressing for my friends who live there... and it's very distressing for me, knowing that they're distressed.

I don't understand how it passed. I mean, it's California, for the love of Pete!

More later.

First the Phillies, Now This????

Wow, I don't know how much happiness I can contain!!!

Buena suerte, President-Elect Obama. You've brought me the hope I've been lacking for eight years now. Whether or not we know it yet, we are all behind you.

Woo-hoo!!! Obama!!!

That's All You've Got?

I posted something to one of the forums about my question about Dialogue Markers on the NaNoWriMo website, and the responses I got back were... wait for it... dreary and disappointing.

One said that they were at least a little necessary, but that I could connect the dialogue to the action and therefore avoid all the "s/he saids".

Another suggested I read some Hemingway... Not a bad idea, that one.

The next said the following: "The "said" tag is an invisible marker useful to let the reader keep track of what is going on. It is not a cardinal sin. It is, in fact, a Good Thing. Readers will thank you for it." MORE ON THAT LATER.

The following suggested the simple solution of writing script, and the last said roughly the equivalent, which would be great if I actually were writing a script or screenplay. Otherwise, useless.

The issue that I have with this advice is that it's really not advice. It's about preference. And what's more, it's about the tyranny of the Reader and the Market.

I posted this reply:

Thanks for the suggestions. I guess one can't do away with markers entirely after all, unless...

A couple people have mentioned The Reader as a sort of judge-and-jury. But what if you're writing something that's meant to be highly experimental? Does readability come into play at that point? Because if I'm writing this book more or less for myself, cam I, for lack of a better word, "go for it" with my experiment with no dialogue markers (or even use of quotation marks!) or must I be ever-tuned to the Reader's desires? Catering to the reader seems to me to not be the best option all the time, IMO.

In other words, I'm looking to challenge the reader rather than entertain the reader. Not a popular way to go, but it brings up a good question: when so much of published fiction these days caters to the reader, what happens to the avant-garde? Is it rendered mute for being unpublishable?

I'm just wondering where the proverbial edge of the envelope is these days, in terms of adventures in style.

And I am wondering what room there is for something new and different, or, if in the words of the Barenaked Ladies, "It's all been done before".

The optimist in me that lurks paradoxically in the dark corners of my mind says that there's always something new to find.

So off I go in pursuit of the new. I guess, after all, I am a Neo-Modernist (not a Post-Modernist)--now THERE'S a term the academy needs desperately: Neo-Modernist.

More on that tomorrow.

Day Two Recap: Dialogue Markers

Well, Day Two was not as smooth as Day One, but I got in my 1667 words. I'm not so sure if I like forcing myself to write in these average chunks. I'm kind of wishing that I had kept writing the first day well past the 1667 marker, because I was on a roll.

So now I'm thinking that I need to write in terms of scenes, just complete my scenes one at a time, if they're big, break them up a little, but anything to keep the thread going.

I'm also puzzling right now over dialogue markers. The thing is, I hate dialogue markers, especially the "creative" ones: she exhaled, he shouted, they snorted, etc. Too forced.

So I'm trying to write without dialogue markers, not even quotation marks. It's ridiculously hard, and may, in fact, be slowing me down significantly right now. But at the same time, it is a great challenge to try and figure out how to do this, and I love a good stylistic challenge.

It's time for me to do my evening writing, so I'd best get to it... See you later for the Day Three Recap!

Day One Recap

I wrote the first 1,675 words of my novel yesterday... It was a very interesting experience, because the writing itself went a lot more smoothly than I thought it would. I'm not complaining! I know that it won't be as smooth all the time, certainly not, but wow! How exhilarating!

I feel like I've been waiting for 15 years to write this novel, and the fact that I'm finally doing it, well, I need to give myself a deserved pat on the back for even starting.

Anecdote:

Long, long ago I worked at Big Chain Bookstore, and there I met all sorts of fascinating people that were in various stages of drop-out-of-college goodness, or taking the fast track through the multi-level hell of depression, all of us just trying to figure out who the hell we were. We called it the "Home of the Unmedicated Minority" because we were all popping our anti-depressants like candy, all day, every day... and flush shelving in between doses.

One night, I went to Ruby Tuesday's with one of my co-workers, a girl a few years older than I who would eventually end up in the Foreign Service, but who gave the appearance of being a dumb bunny. We went to this totally mediocre restaurant to talk, and all I remember of the conversation is telling her about how much I wanted to be a writer, but how bogged down I was by my own circumstance.

She said to me, and I'll never forget it: "When you let it all go, that's when you get your gift."

Have I gotten my gift? This NaNoWriMo thing certainly feels like a gift, even if it's not the gift that Tina was talking about.

As for letting go, well... more on that later.

First Day of NaNoWriMo...

OK, so it's the first day of NaNoWriMo, and I was intending to go to bed early, get up at midnight, and immediately start writing. But alas, I came down with the flu yesterday and so there was nothing but sleep in the works for me. I woke up at 4:30 a.m. with the thought of *maybe* starting then, but at that point, everything above my shoulders felt like it was on a spring. I was a bobble-head doll.

SPROING!

So I went back to bed. Now I'm about to dig in and start writing. I have to remember that this doesn't have to be the Great American Novel (here on out referred to as the GAN), it just has to be finished. Or at least meeting the word count. So I think today I will do the following:

1. Rest a-plenty. This does involve orange juice, copious amounts of herbal tea with lemon and honey, and at least three episodes of "The O.C." (Don't judge me!!! It's healing with brain candy.)
2. Look over my character sketches and outlines one more time, make sure I've got basic (extremely basic) plot points worked out.
3. Re-read the first few chapters of No Plot? No Problem! by NaNoWriMo God Chris Baty.
   
4. Consider what I want my first scene to be.
5. Start writing.
6. COFFEE!
7. Stay awake long enough to take advantage of that extra hour as we move from EDT into EST at 2 a.m.

Woo-hoo!

And awaaaaaay we go!

And So It Is.

It's here -- the end of the month. One month of blog postings, of ever-increasing anxiety about the election, of ruminations on the past and the future, and the 7-11.

What a month!

I'd like to say that I'm going to do NaBloPoMo again this month, but I'm going to be dedicating my attentions to NaNoWriMo -- woo-hoo!

This month has been great, I've enjoyed every post.

Thanks to those who read, those who didn't read, and good luck to those who plan on doing it next month! Viva NaBloPoMo!

A lo lejos...

I've been reading a lot of the blog Wabi Sabi Moments, an American citizen writing from abroad about the election--*AWESOME* blog.

It's made me reflect, though, on my experience of the 2000 election, when I was in Spain, and having to explain to people every day about the Electoral College and, later, what the HELL was going on in Florida...

... but this was before YouTube, and even Teh Interwebs were in their adolescent stages of development.

The day of the election, I took myself to a little Internet Cafe and tried to get on cnn.com to get any sort of information that wasn't from the International Herald Tribune. There were, apparently, so many hits on the site that it had slowed to a crawl and there was simply no getting on.

So I resorted to Radio Nacional de España and listened to what was happening the night of, which was the morning of the day after for me. I woke up at about 6 a.m., knowing that the polls had closed, and heard the official result... Bush had won with 271 electoral votes.

I don't remember, prior to my existence on that day, ever knowing that 270 votes were needed to win the presidency. But I won't ever forget it now.

Bush won, and we all know the rest of that story.

I sneaked over to my American friends' apartment across the patio and attempted to stick a little note in their reja with the news. At that moment J. came out and I handed him the paper that said "Bush won. 271 votes." He looked at me, his liberal Oregonian face semi-shell-shocked. Slowly put down the paper and said "What does this mean?" I just shook my head and shrugged.

And then the Florida thing happened and there was, for a minute, hope.

But honestly, the 2000 election, being as far away as I was, never fully registered with me. Only now, after 8 years of That Man do I realize how much was at stake.

I've Got Mail!

NaNoWriMo mail, that is.

It's finally dawning on me what it is I'm about to do and I'm so excited.

I've been reading books on intensive novel-writing constantly and I'm thinking this is going to be a pretty incredible month!

Anyway, I'm off to plot my novel some more, using my only-partially-lame writing software. It actually has helped me quite a bit.

Sorry so short today. More later.

Reading My Way to NaNoWriMo: Henry Miller

One of my favorite authors is Henry Miller. I adore his joie de vivre, his explicitness, his vehemence, and at times his aggression-- at least his aggression towards the written word. It seems that he has a frustration with the English language, with the way it has been used traditionally, and every sentence he writes is a slap in the face to the stodgy Victorians and Edwardians that the American realists and surrealists wanted to badly to undermine.

One time I was talking to an acquaintance about our favorite American authors, neither of us having many, preferring instead the Continental and Latin American ilk. I said, "I simply adore Henry Miller!" She said, "Oh, the only American Surrealist."

I'm still thinking about that one. I don't see HM as being particularly Surreal, except in his illusion of automatic writing and intense psychologism. Still I see him as being a slave to the craft, not whimsical the way surrealists tend to be, and certainly not as disdainful of the real as the surrealists.

HM is exponential realism, coupled with impressionism. I guess I disagree with my acquaintance's assessment of HM, which leads me to believe that 1) she read that comment in some book of lit crit that I'll never find, and 2) that she's never, ever, read a single book by Henry Miller.


So I'm curling up in bed with "Quiet Days in Clichy" which begins with a rollicking sex scene, not the stuff that puts you to sleep. But a fabulous read. And inspiring.

Which isn't to say that what I write will be a HM redux. I just find his honesty refreshing, and I can only hope to achieve something mildly similar in my project.

C'mon Phils!

I've always said that you can tell what part of New Jersey someone is from by the teams they root for... As a South Jersey girl, it's the Flyers, the Sixers, the Eagles and THE PHILLIES all the way!!!

Right now, the Phillies are duking it out with Tampa Bay for their first World Series win since 1980... GO PHILLIES!!!

This One Just Blew My Socks Off

For Democrats Who Are Fearful...

Two links for those of us who still think that something might "happen" ahead of the election to screw it up:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/uselection2008/barackobama/3260074/Republican-fears-of-historic-Obama-landslide-unleash-civil-war-for-the-future-of-the-party.html

and

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/10/25/obamas_lead/

HOPE!

Found This Lying Around...

I bought this software *ages* ago, and thought that it wouldn't be compatible with XP, but it is! And last night I spent a good deal of time plotting out a story that seems to have all the right stuff.

My friends can never be allowed to see it though.

I just don't like other people reading my writing, especially since I'm looking at this as my first real go-round with the novel genre, and therefore this one's just for me.

More about the Writer's DreamKit soon.

I'm Such a Sucker

I love kits like this:






We'll see if it actually *works* for NaNoWriMo.

Will keep you posted.

I've Taken the Plunge...

...I've decided to do NaNoWriMo this year. What the hell, right? I may as well, since that's why I moved back here anyway, to write this damn novel about...

...well, a girl must keep her secrets...

So, off we go!

Now, all I need is a freakin' PLOT!!!

Late Night Editing

I'm going back to the Triangle Story tonight that still has no formal title and doing some edits before I submit it to some lit mags to see if they like it. It's an odd little tale... not in the way that sci-fi/fantasy fiction is odd... but rather it is odd structurally, being based on Euclidean geometry and everything. It's a real Math-Section SAT multiple-choice genre of a story. Might be off-putting to the hoomanists, but we'll see.

It's nice to get back to writing, and all this editing (something I usually never do) is making me see where I've been led astray in my own work. It is one word, this villain, and it is the adverb!!! I abuse adverbs like "clearly" and "truly" and "broken-legged-ly"... meaning, I tend to make adverbs where there shouldn't be any.

Sad. I'm in my thirties and I still haven't disciplined my adverbs after so many admonitions by so many professors at the many many institutions I've attended.

I just spilled a cup of 7-11 Obama all over myself, but luckily not on the bedspread. I'm writing in bed tonight... not quite sure why when I have a perfectly good office waiting for me.

NaNoWriMo is still tempting me. I hear its siren song. Should I stuff my ears with wax so that I don't hear it anymore? Or is the song emerging... from inside?

A Tightening Race?

Could it be that the hate-calls are working? New Hampshire has gone from dark blue to light blue on electoral-vote.com (meaning having fallen from "strong Dem" to "weak Dem". Could McCain's accusations of socialism in the Obama camp actually be taking root? It's not beyond the realm of possibility. And I know this guy loves the underdog position, so I am officially now, right worried.

The election nightmares continue.

Can this be over now?

Thoughts at 3:30 a.m.

I'm giving in: I am a chronic insomniac. No sense fighting it. Up all night, getting lots of work done, none of it writing... mostly just plowing around looking through job ads and craigslist.org hoping for a lead in the writing/publishing arena. But this is South Jersey, so that's pretty scarce. Doing some freelance work in the meantime and plowing through that as best I can.

I'm starting to have dreams--hell, sometimes they're nightmares--about the election. Not just about Obama vs. McCain, but also about my friends in CA who are going to have to deal with the outcome on Prop 8, which would amend the constitution so as to ban same-sex marriage. Having a lot of friends to whom this would matter greatly, I am worried. But anyway.

Back to my insomnia: I don't know which I prefer--late night productivity or restless, nightmare-laden sleep.

Too much anxiety these days, way too much, in spite of having tied up a few loose ends that were bugging me.

As for the situation with the exbf, I found out through the grapevine that he is married now. Married! That puts him strictly off limits. Yes, strictly off limits. Sad. I really miss him. G. always made me laugh, and I could use some laughter these days, and not at the expense of Sarah Palin, although that kind of laughter is very very satisfying.

I know someone who is straight as an arrow but has a girl-crush on Tina Fey. God bless Tina Fey for lightening up this election season... although her imitation of S.P. has a way of drawing attention to the fact that she is totally unqualified for the post. She makes Dan Quayle look like a Rhodes Scholar.

How I miss Bill Clinton.

Why I Haven't Been Blogging About Diners

The title of my blog alludes to a voyage I made many years ago to hit as many diners in South Jersey in one day as possible. I think I got through... three?... before I got tired of crap coffee, tuna melts and (occasionally, still pretty rare) grits. It wasn't about the food, really, why I did the diner tour. It was to get to know my homeland.

I'm not blogging about diners right now because I'm attempting, in a different way, to get to know my homeland--America--via the Internet. See who's out there, poking around in corners.

What I've found has disturbed me so much that I've been unable to blog about anything other than the election, really, with the exception of the occasional post about Stouffer's Mac n Cheese (in the freezer aisle, go buy some when you have a chance!)

We're so divided right now. We have been for so many years. Why can't we elect someone who would be a unifier? Plurality is the basis of this country, but apparently so is animosity. It's so hard to accept the plausibility of opposing views when you know you are right.

In the words of Rodney King, whose plea gathers more poignancy and pathos by the day: Can't we all just get along?

Apparently not. I hope and pray for a day when we stop judging each other and start learning to be kind to each other, and forgiving of each others' foibles and differing views.

What's to fear? A better society? A tolerant one?

I guess, in the end, it's just politics as usual.

How very, very sad.

And she wept.

Thoughts at 2 a.m.

It's really fucking cold here tonight, yes, really fucking cold, below freezing even. Not cigarette weather at all. ::sigh:: I really have to quit.

I've got my insomnia on again, although I admittedly induced it by going to the 7-11 tonight for my 20 ounces of Obama. (Someday SpellCheck will recognize the word "Obama" and not underline it in red dots... Huh. It recognizes McCain. Odd.)

So other than screwing around with spell-check on Mozilla, what else am I doing? Well, principally I'm thinking about how lonely it is here now that I've alienated most of my old (former?) friends. Interesting to see my home town with eyes unencumbered by old alliances. But still very, very lonely.

So, I'm thinking about loneliness.

And then I start thinking about G., my ex, who lurks somewhere along the DC Beltway. Should I email him? I wonder. Or would that just be inviting Hell into my kitchen? I haven't heard from G. in close to four years, he may not even have the same email...

What's the policy on gratuitously starting shit up with ex-boyfriends? Do I get bad karma points for that?

Redemption for Colin Powell?

He just endorsed Barack Obama, and chided McCain.

Bravo.

Protect CIVIL RIGHTS: NO ON PROP 8

Even though I'm not in San Liberal, CA anymore, I was very disturbed to see in the ads on my sidebar here with a "Say No to Liberal Judges" etc etc and the slogan "Protect Marriage" with a little stylized cartoon happy family beneath.

Why is this in my sidebar???!!! I suppose they paid for it. From what I understand, out-of-state, right-wing conservative Christian interests are flooding California with money to overturn the state's ruling that the ban on same-sex marriage is discriminatory. (Rock on, Liberal Judges!!! Not that I have an opinion on this.)

As I've said in a previous post, this is a civil rights issue, not a MORAL issue (unless you construe morality as treating your fellow human beings with respect ) and the whole "judges-legislating-from-the-bench argument doesn't hold water either.

Well, this out-of-stater says to my former fellow Californians: Vote for Equality, Vote for Justice, VOTE NO ON PROP 8.

Compromise

I've decided not to do NaNoWriMo this year, in spite of the votes for it. However, as a sort of compromise, I *will* be doing NaBloPoMo again, but decidedly not blogging (as I have been out of necessity, as a way of purging my nerves) about the state of the Political Machine here in Amurca. That's not to say I won't have an Election Day post... or a few following that.

I think the best thing that I could do with NaBloPoMo November is blog about writing, about why I don't write, and what I would write if I had the gumption to actually do it.

I'm disappointed in my lack of courage with NaNoWriMo, especially since I got two very enthusiastic comments. Am I being a total wimp??? Speak out if you think so. Public opinion may still sway my vote.

Regardless, November NaBloPoMo will RAWK!!!

VOTE: David Letterman or All of the American Media Pundits Combined?

David Letterman did something brilliant tonight: he actually asked hard-hitting questions of John McCain, even invoking McCain's relationship with G. Gordon Liddy. Now, don't you wish *any* of the major interviewers had done that? How did that slip by Gwen Ifill? She's no slouch.

McCain looked flustered, whiny, defensive about Sarah Palin. I'm sorry Mac, but having a VP whose credentials include having "served on the PTA" as one of her major qualifications does not inspire confidence.

And Letterman's crack about ObL--"Sure, 8 years later, let's go get him!" really made McCain trip up, because he almost missed it, and then didn't know how to respond.

The irony of all this is that the McPalin ticket talks about change even more than Senator Obama does. And that's an excellent strategy: rob the opponent of their most powerful weapon by co-opting it yourself. Excellent.

But it's the kind of thing that accrues some really bad Karma.

I vote that David Letterman conduct all presidential debates from now on. What do you think?

Here's the YouTube clip:

VOTE: NaNoWriMo for DinerGirl?

OK, since I can't make a decision about whether or not to do NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) I hereby allow *you all* to make the decision for me. Because I'm a push-over. So, vote here for DinerGirl's NaNoWriMo, and I'll let you know what the verdict is on October 31. Vote early and often by leaving a comment below!

Even-Keel Girl

Been a little off-balance lately, not good. Taking on too many projects... my participation in this NaBloPoMo thing is probably due to things being a bit off-kilter. Too much energy, probably just a cyclothymic thing. I'm feeling better, although now I'm finding it hard to motivate for NaNoWriMo. When I'm off-balance I am (somewhat paradoxically) super-productive. I'm also super-irritable, as the email to my HS friends displays...

...but with regard to that, my goodness! Some people have responded to me telling me to just chill, and some people have responded with "It-wasn't-about-YOU" logic, which is in essence... telling me to just chill. Which actually has succeeded in pissing me off even more.

Can't win with Off-Kilter Girl, it seems.

Even-Keel Girl, however, now she is not rattled by stuff like this.

I still think I did the right thing by sending the email, even if it was generally dismissed by my friends. My evil exbf from North Jersey who hates my HS friends with the fire of a thousand suns even told me to back off. "Take it easy on your friends," he said. "They're just kidding around!" And then he added as a p.s. "Besides, nobody's ever moved to Canada based on an election!"

Well, I just might! I think Canada would be good for me.

As it's shaping up, this place might not be...

On Falling Asleep in the Bathtub

I needed to relax tonight. The whole kerfuffle over my email to my friends is gnawing at me-- I really ruffled a few feathers, and for that reason, couldn't get to sleep. So I decided to tune out the world, the election, the voices in my head and take a nice long bath with lavender bath salts. I eased into the tub, the water almost too hot to stand, taking very slow, long, deep breaths, and rested my head on the cool porcelain. I turned down the volume of chatter inside and tried to relax my muscles... ahhhhh....

... why is the water cold?

I startle awake. I have fallen asleep in the bathtub, something my mother always warned me against. I get out of the tub, go into the kitchen and look at the clock on the microwave... I'd been asleep for 35 minutes. No dreams. My mind just turned itself off completely.

Lavender Bath Salts, how I love you!

Now going to bed.

Sick.

Tonight, I would love to write, but I am sick as a dog. So I'll postpone all wisdom until tomorrow. Need to go to bed.

Hello, Economy, WTF???!!!

I am dreading tomorrow morning. Not dreading the sunrise, not dreading the alarm clock, not dreading the Today Show (although there is much to dread in that now that Kathie Lee is knocking around the set).

Instead of dreading any or all of these things, I have chosen to dread only one, and that is the opening bell of the New York Stock Exchange.

I'll probably have some insomnia tonight-- I mean, it's already after 10 and I'm still drinking my 7-11 coffee, my fault really, and I will have no right to bitch about not sleeping tonight-- and I will spend that time watching the European markets to see what they do. Sarkozy of France, who I generally dislike-- gave an impressive speech about how the time of unregulated speculation, "c'est fini". Now if only our own country would man-up and put the Wall Street crooks in their place.

The credit markets are frozen, bad times are a'comin', and I can't look away from this train wreck.

Can you?

Well, That Oughta Do It.

I just got an offensive forward from one of my "friends" around here.

Here it is, done in the spirit of satire and parody, but laced with hatred, as per usual:

*********


Subject: Fwd: Illegal immigration into Canada :)

From the MANITOBA HERALD, Canada (a very underground paper):

A flood of American liberals sneaking across the border into Canada has intensified in the past week, sparking calls for increased patrols to stop the illegal immigration.

The possibility of a McCain/Palin election is prompting the exodus among left-leaning citizens who fear they'll soon be required to hunt, pray, and agree with Bill O'Reilly.

Canadian border farmers say it's not uncommon to see dozens of sociology professors, animal rights activists and Unitarians crossing their fields at night.

"I went out to milk the cows the other day, and there was a Hollywood producer huddled in the barn," said Manitoba farmer Red Greenfield, whose acreage borders North Dakota. The producer was cold, exhausted and hungry. "He asked me if I could spare a latte and some free-range chicken."

Officials are particularly concerned about smugglers who meet liberals near the Canadian border, pack them into Volvo station wagons, drive them across the border and leave them to fend for themselves.

"A lot of these people are not prepared for rugged conditions," an Ontario border patrolman said. "I found one carload without a drop of drinking water."They did have a nice little Napa Valley cabernet, though."

When liberals are caught, they're sent back across the border, often wailing loudly that they fear retribution from conservatives. Rumors have been circulating about the McCain administration establishing re-education camps in which liberals will be forced to shoot wolves from airplanes, deny evolution, and act out drills preparing them for the Rapture.

In recent days, liberals have turned to sometimes-ingenious ways of crossing the border. Some have taken to posing as senior citizens on bus trips to buy cheap Canadian prescription drugs. After catching a half-dozen young vegans disguised in powdered wigs, Canadian immigration authorities began stopping buses and quizzing the supposed senior-citizen passengers. "If they can't identify the accordion player on The Lawrence Welk Show, we get suspicious about their age," an official said.

Canadian citizens have complained that the illegal immigrants are creating an organic-broccoli shortage and renting all the good Susan Sarandon movies.

"I feel sorry for American liberals, but the Canadian economy just can't support them," an Ottawa resident said. "How many art-history and English majors does one country need?"

**********************

My response follows below:


NOTE: If you haven't already, please read the attached forward below about "Illegal Immigration into Canada" before reading my message, so as to put my outrage in context.

****
Dear all:


As one of the few card-carrying liberals of this bunch, I can honestly say that a McCain-Palin presidency scares the hell out of me. And I can also say that the knee-jerk mocking of liberals in this email is downright offensive, although, I must admit, I've seen much worse out there in the blogosphere and sent to me by other friends and family. Liberals are not latte-sipping elitists; we're people who care about the direction of this country, believe in progress towards social and economic equality, and believe that no child should ever be abandoned to a government that has abandoned them. Justice. Equality. Freedom of thought. The principles of true democracy.

The social conservatism and foreign policy choices of McCain-Palin are frightening because both of them provoke the worst kind of xenophobic hatred among their supporters. Shouts of "Kill him!" and "Traitor!" and "Terrorist!" at GOP rallies only proves that there is much bad blood out there. Obama is not a terrorist. Not an Arab. Not a Muslim. I do applaud McCain for professing his respect for Obama, but the crowds' boos when he attempted to defend his opponent only show that you reap what you sow, and that it's far too late now to undo the divisive damage that they've (honestly, mostly Palin) gone about seeding. When we all have to live together, riling up anti-anyone sentiment in the out-for-blood way that they do is positively reckless, and, should Obama win, will come back to haunt everyone when this country disintegrates into a state of disunity. That will be the GOP legacy: a country more filled with vitriol and fear than during any other era in history, and yes, I'm including the '60s and '70s with their emblematic civil rights movements.

I'm on the job market this year, and am applying for two jobs in Canada, one in Vancouver and one in Calgary. Maybe I, too, will be part of the exodus that the below email parodies. Should I move to Canada, I'll be able to do the following things that the Neo-conservatives have continuously prevented me from doing: 1) I would have free health care so that I could actually afford the medications that I must take in order to remain firmly on this planet. Currently, I owe major thousands of $$ simply because my health care coverage as a graduate student has been so poor that for the last 6.5 years I've had to put my meds on my credit cards. $2000/year of prescription coverage. $6,000+ in expenses/year. You do the math. Universal health care? If you're healthy, I congratulate you. If you have a chronic illness like me, then well, to put it bluntly, then you're absolutel screwed. Scared universal health care is socialist? Look around you at the uninsured and impoverished and tell me then that capitalism is fair to those with less. Ideology is unimportant, and the Cold War is over. Everyone deserves the right to be healthy. 2) If I moved to Canada, I would have equal rights as a non-heterosexual and have the freedom to marry whomever I wish. Now I know some of you may oppose this on religious and/or moral"grounds, but let's put that aside for a minute and think secularly. (This is not a theocracy, after all. We *are*, contrary to all appearances, a secular nation that prizes the rights of each individual.) Are you really, *really* willing to deny any sort of right to a person based on what is essentially an issue that is none of the government's business? Would you do the same for a social class? For a racial group? No. Why is it so easy to do this to the queer community? Because we're different? Because we're "immoral"? Because we scare people with our fashion sense? It is precisely beyond unfair to legislate against a minority group *because* they're a minority group. I'm not saying you have to support or even agree with same-sex marriage. But the next time you voice your opposition, think of me and ask yourself if you'd really like to see me marginalized by the government in this, the 21st century. It's a civil rights issue, not a religious one, not a moral one. Oh, wait, yes it is moral... And the moral is to love your fellow human beings and be fair unto them. And finally, 3) I'd be able to travel to a foreign country without once having to explain the injustices of the electoral college, say ever again the words "I didn't vote for him", or feel guilty about how we squandered the world's goodwill poured out to us in the wake of 9/11. So many, many tragedies came out of that day.

I love my country very much, and it's because of that that I'm sending this to all of you. I'm not trying to get you to vote for Obama, that's not my point. I just wanted you to think about what "jokes" like this really mean to those of us who feel threatened by the government that's supposed to protect us all, not just some.

Thanks for listening.

*************

If that doesn't drive a stake in the coffin of our friendship, I don't know what else will... Oh well, their loss.

Cackelacky Logic

I talked tonight with a former friend/lover, all now tucked away in North Cackelacky with two kids, a wife and a house--a total amnesiac about our affair, too, (which, BTW, happened long before he was married) and which is probably better for him in the long run, but hangs like a white elephant doing the merengue on the telephone line between us.

We talked about the election. He's voting for McCain, because he thinks he's straightforward and won't "Rob Peter to Pay Paul", as he thinks Obama will do. So even if he agrees with Obama on social policy, apparently owning a house will make you vote for, essentially, the perception of better financial security.

As I don't own a house, I couldn't jump to the defense of Obama's economic policies. That and I know squat about economics in general.

Shamefully, especially since my friend lives in one of the most hotly contested battleground states in the union, I did not try to turn his head with my Most Heated Liberal Arguments. Instead I just kind of lay down and let him turn traitor. Why? Because I didn't want to push him any further to the right. It seems these days that that's all arguing over politics does--entrench people even further in their beliefs.

I went to hippie-dippie Montessori school until I was seven. In my hippie-dippie heaven, there was no gender, no race, no religion. It was *so* late-'70s nirvana. I have carried all those teachings with me ever since, and the school remains my imagined "happy place" when I see what's wrong with the world. I fit in well in San Liberal, where it seemed everyone lived in a hippie-dippie bubble.

Now that I'm back here, in the Red Part of a Blue State, I cling vehemently to my past, to my liberal views, but I've stopped trying to convert the McCainiacs. They'll just call me Pinko Commie Liberal. And I'll just call them Redneck Xenophobes.

God, I miss my friends in San Liberal. Not that they were open minded. They were not. It's just that their closed-mindedness I understood and agreed with. San Liberal is a bubble, though, and I'm learning more about what it *really* means to be an "Amercun" here in SJ.

I don't like what I see.

It's very lonely here these days. Just the writing and the working and the 'rents. Very little in the way of friends. And even less by way of dating.

Maybe I should call an ex-boyfriend or two. One is lurking outside of D.C. and another outside of N.Y.C.

Consider yourselves warned. ;-)

It's Accurate.

You are 49% Southern Jerseyan

Who are you kidding you'll never fit in here. Just because you moved to the Shore house doesn't make you a local local. It takes a special kind of person to live here. You probably don't even drink the water.

South Jersey Quiz
Take More Quizzes

True, I don't fit in here. And considering that half of me is Californian, I have to say, this test is dead-on.

But here I am anyway.

The Madd(en)ing Crowd.

I read this article on Yahoo today: "McCain booed after trying to calm anti-Obama crowd". When your own supporters won't listen to you defend the integrity of your opponent, that's a sign that your own rhetoric has gone too far.

The fact that the GOP has whipped up the troops into a frenzied hatred of Obama strikes me as being more than reckless in the face of what could potentially be an Obama win. Disrespecting the opponent in such an irresponsible way just seeds further divisiveness on the whole, and can only lead to disaster in the long run, especially if the Dems win.

I'm thinking now of how much I've come to resent Bush and his cronies, not to mention his social conservatism and general ideological platform... But I can't imagine ever shouting things to the tune of "kill him!" or "off with his head!" or even "traitor!", mostly because that kind of thinking represents only the basest and most violent tendencies of our (animal) behavior.

The xenophobia that appears to be the lifeblood of the Republicans these days scares the hell out of me. This is barely concealed racism. In the case of calling Obama a terrorist, it is out-and-out racism, just not in the form that we were expecting, tying Obama to a religion (one that he doesn't profess, by the way) rather than to his skin color. But at the end of the day it's the same thing: they just don't want the guy who's "different" to be their president.

I used to respect McCain for being a different kind of Republican. I used to buy the "maverick" tag line. But his choice of Palin and the way he's been running his campaign has destroyed my trust in him, just as surely as for the other side his camp has made it impossible for nearly half the country to ever trust Obama.

Unwise policy when we all have to live together.

I am frightened.

Sorry for the cop-out post last night

I know that was a cheap post that I "wrote" last night about Stouffer's Mac n Cheese, but I had to post *something*, and I was not digging the blog vibe yesterday... I had a bad taste in my mouth after thinking more about memoir, which made me feel like more of a narcissist than I really am. But I am a Writer Chick, and that lends me to being a little more self-involved on the whole... And thus the reticence with the blogging.

That and the utter appreciation of Stouffer's Mac n Cheese.

So, I looked at the map at www.electoral-vote.com and was dismayed to notice that overnight, NC had swayed into Barely Republican territory, and Missouri went from Barely Dem to Exactly Tied. I don't know what caused the shift, but it's scaring me a little. Something must've happened in the news that I'm not aware of, since I'm boycotting TV.

"McCain needs a game-changer." "McCain has to stop the hemmorrhaging of his campaign." Why do I have a sneaking suspicion that he's doing it? That somehow he's finding a way to play dirty pool and shift things in his direction? Is it the Ayers thing? Is it the low-down-dirty pool he's playing? I've never seen a nastier campaign. Please don't let McCain swift-boat Obama!

I had a dream Obama won, and there was such joy in me that I was virtually bursting at the seams.

I hope it's a premonition.

Stouffer's Mac n Cheese....

...ROCKS.

Can't Sleep, Can't Write

Chronic insomnia is a problem for me. So when I can't sleep I write, or organize, or just listen to music and wish fervently for sleep... which probably succeeds in keeping me awake.

I don't know what it is that's keeping me awake tonight. I tried to write something somewhat meaningful, but fell back on blogging instead. Blogging and going outside to smoke in the street that's always deserted. (Smoking = Bad For Me, I know. It's on it's way out. Of course, I've been saying that for three years now.)

Anyway, I can't sleep. Apparently I can't blog either, because nothing's coming to me at all now. I had some great idea about blogging about where I went to college, and then I thought, no, I need to save that for some sort of memoir, and then I thought about all the troubles with memoir in the U.S. right now, and thought more about whether I really want to participate in the perpetuation of a genre that's based on self indulgence, when I do enough of that here, with the blog.

Things that make you go "Hmm..."

Christ, the lady upstairs is vacuuming right now, and it's barely even dawn. I've been up all night. How glorious.

Going out to catch the sunrise.

It Only Took Eight Years, But...

I got this .jpg attachment in an email sent to me by my Dad on 2 December 2000, right after the "election" of George Dubya Bush. I gave an uneasy guffaw (if that's possible) when I got it. And looking at it now, well, all it's all I can do not to, simply and sadly, turn the page for Bush as he fiddles over the smoldering embers of this nation.





I am so angry at Bush, who is essentially acting like a Deadbeat Dad to this country. I've never been angrier. There is no leadership in Washington right now. NONE.

This election cannot come soon enough.

Ode to 7-11

“Hello, Lady, Long Time No See You!”

I’m in here every day
just not when you’re working
but I must admit
I enjoy our 3 a.m.
discussions in broken English,
mine shattered through exhaustion,
yours still incomplete
after your long journey.

I came for my Obama cup
for the 7-Election
Your brilliant marketing ploy
to get out the vote.

I came for Spaghetti-O’s
I came for Fruit Cocktail,
Muscle Milk,
Stouffer’s frozen Mac ‘n Cheese
and Oatmeal Raisin Cookies.

But most of all I came
for your coffee,
your Dark Mountain Roast,
your high-test,
keep me awake
elixir that tastes like
percolated
mediocrity.

Where’s my Obama cup?

I want it to be
worth something
someday.

Really? Biker Poetry?

I was combing through the listings on the New Jersey Poets and Poetry blog to see if there was anything doing in SJ anytime soon. Anything. Even if it means getting lost on my way to Hippie Fruit Farm out in the wilds.

What did I find?

A reading for Biker Poetry.

As interesting as this looks-- and believe it or not, I do have a poem I could read there, if only it were open mic-- I am going to have to say my usual "WHA WHA WHAAAAAT?" to that, because I had no idea that Bridgeton was a place where Bikers like to hang and rev their engines and wax eloquent about the road.

Man, I bet that reading would be fabulous!

Too bad I can't go.

And I would include my "Sturgis" poem here, but I have a rule about publishing poetry on Teh Interwebs, as in, I don't do it. Too paranoid.

But, hey, cheers to the Bikers of Bridgeton, NJ. May Rte. 47 always be well-paved and humble.

7-Election?

Went to the 7-11 today... I was over in Delaware to go to Borders to look for some new books of poetry and some other piece-of-garbage book on writing to semi-inspire me for NaNoWriMo. (I have a serious addiction to these books on writing, which have succeeded in getting me precisely nowhere. DinerGirl has published *nothing* to speak of, in spite of Julia Cameron's wit and wisdom.)

Anyway, at the 7-11 there was a sign out front for the "7-Election": "Every Cup Counts" it said.




Wow. If you click on the above picture it will take you to the 7-Election site, where you can see how the candidates are doing in your state. To my absolute horror, the John McCain coffee cup is winning in New Jersey. Whaaaaaat? That's not supposed to happen in a Blue State! I fear cup tampering! At least in Delaware, it's 63% in favor of Obama.

The 7-Election. Would that it were so easy.

(P.S. For the opposing viewpoint of a cup-carrying McCain supporter, click HERE. I love a good debate.)

Poetry on the Foam

I ended up hauling that foam mattress from my parents' house to my new place and putting it in my office... or maybe I should call it a studio, since it feels more creative than anything else, not quite so work-oriented right now.

It was a beautiful day here so I opened my windows and read for some long hours, all sorts of poetry, the kind that makes me weep.

Ever since I was a child, poetry has had the capacity to make me feel both wounded and exalted by beauty at the same time. It's an excruciating, piercing sensation, when some metric taps out the rhythm of your own heart, when words on the page seem to seep into your skin.

The foam mattress was positively tinny, pounded thin by over 20 years of wear. I think my friends and I used to sleep on these same mattresses back in high school. So, lying there, reading Baudelaire, I thought of my own little "fleurs du mal" -- the peccadilloes of youth that seem so grand and tragic at the time, that really end up being nothing.

The beauty of that, though, is that when they happen, those tiny traumas between friends, they feel so immense, and it's only 15 years later, lying on the same foam upon which you fell from grace, that they shrink to become gems, the anecdotes you will tell for the rest of your life.

Raining in San Liberal

I checked the weather tonight in San Liberal via Yahoo and noticed that it's raining there. Finally, rain in San Liberal! I can imagine the brown velvet tinder-box hills starting to tinge green, the sigh of relief from the glacial hill near my old apartment that was long tagged with the red flags of fire season.

Winter-Spring-FIRE!-Fall: the four seasons of San Liberal.

I'm homesick for it tonight, sitting here smoking in my apartment, trying to come up with some sort of idea for NaNoWriMo. The electrochemistry novel won't work--too much research. I have to find something else to write about, besides the old axiom of "writing what I know".

Although, it could be said I know San Liberal.

But I think that would be too painful.

I left someone behind there.

More on that some other time.

I also know Hometown, NJ. I could write about this place, this disappearing place, getting eaten up by suburbia in spite of the housing crisis. At the county fair grounds, there's a bench with an engraving that says "Save Our Land". I have a picture in black and white of a young agrarian with strong arms, back to the camera, leaning against that bench. It moves me to tears when I look at it. Not even the strongest arms can keep out the developers.

::sigh::

Smoked my last cigarette. Maybe I should try quitting.

Going to stop rambling now.

I'm imagining the sound of rain on the pavement, the damp California air, the fog, all floating through my open window as I lie tangled in the arms of my (now former) lover.

I'll never get to sleep tonight.

Winning By Not Losing = Garbage!

I'll leave behind my little travelogue for a minute just to say that Not Losing is Not Winning either. The fact that the media is giving Sarah Palin an enormous pat on the back for jumping over a bar set 3" above the ground is appalling to me. She didn't win. She lost. Plain and simple.

"Well, she didn't really answer the questions posed by the moderator, but she was snappy!"

"She brought that down-home feel to the debates."

What?? Again, WHAT?

Isn't the point of a debate to answer the questions? And do we really, do we really, want someone "just like us" in the White House? Methinks, we've already had that. It didn't work out so well.

So, all this b.s. about how Palin won simply by exceeding the expectations set for her is just pure garbage.

Joe Biden won, plain and simple...

****

In other news, I decided to "watch" the debate last night via Twitter commentary, now that I finally have wireless in my sad little apartmen on Bad Rep Street. I later watched commentary and saw snippets here and there, watching some downloads on my computer. Did she really say Senator O'Biden? Did she also really say, "John McCain is the person we need to leave, uh... I mean lead."

Some guy on PBS said that Sarah Palin stanched the flow of the hemmorrhaging McCain campaign, but I doubt it.

Back to Twitter. Second-hand commentary is so much more illuminating, especially when it comes from the technocracy rather than the theocracy.

You don't think we have a theocracy in America?

Think again.

Breeders!

Weird about being home again: all my old HS friends are still around, and that's cool, but now they've got their brood in tow... not cool.

I know that it's very common for women in their 20s and 30s to be breeding out the wazoo, but, wow, I really did not realize that it was expected of me to have some little larval creature cooing in my arms before I got my first gray hair. (In that case, I would have had to have had a baby before my 26th birthday, when my stepmother noticed a streak in my locks, pointed it out to me over my birthday cake and cackled.)

Here's how I feel about children, after 7 years in San Liberal, where also, breeders abound, but so do greeners: Not having a baby is the Greenest thing you can do. Think of all the diapers, the bottles, the nappies, the binkies, all the things that can't be recycled that come along for the ride, and anyone has to admit that there's a lot of stuff going into the ground that won't ever, ever lose its form and return to the earth.

So I stay righteous about my decision not to have children. But...

Then I see the happiness (and loving exhaustion) in their eyes and I wonder if I'm not missing out on something. Of course, not being married, or having a partner, having a child would be a little, shall we say, exotic at this point, if not plain stupid considering my salary at the moment. And the fact that I'm an unstable writer chick who can't even care for a pet fish! (Gotta go to Fish 'n Stuff and get a new one. I like having another consciousness around me, even if it is a simple Betta consciousness.)

But anyway, babies. I was raised to feel that I would be incomplete as a woman if I didn't have babies, and no matter how strongly I feel about not bearing any children from my own womb, I still feel its emptiness from time to time. Don't know what that's about.

So I'll enjoy everyone else's children, even though kids make me nervous as hell--what if they don't like me? What if I break the baby???" Dunno what that's about.

Maybe I should write a story about this choice I've made, and about being around people I love who have made the opposite choice.

Or maybe I should write about how, even though I'm here, back where they are, none of them choose to call me... at least not a lot.

I've Got Hope!

Not that polls really mean anything, but I was really, really glad to see this headline on Yahoo! : Obama Takes a 7-point lead over McCain.

I've been refraining from the whole "Got Hope?" thing, because I'm a natural pessimist, and the proliferation of McCain-Palin signs in Hometown were giving me the willies. But after seeing this, wow! Do I ever have hope!

Tonight is the Vice-Presidential debate, and being a South Jersey girl, I often feel like Joe Biden represents me more than... uh... whoever the current NJ Senators are. (Sad that I don't remember their names, but what can a girl do?)

I'm concerned that Joe Biden will be crucified for "sexism" in whatever he chooses to say to Sarah Palin, who seems to be able to get away with abusive, condescending, belittling mockery of Obama simply because she, too, represents an "exceptional" ticket--i.e., she's a woman.

Just leave identity politics out of it, everyone, rise above the fray.

Hope!

NaBloPoMo October

So, I just discovered NaBloPoMo online. It's like NaNoWriMo, only you don't have to write anything necessarily coherent and/or publishable, just write 31 posts in 31 days. A challenge! It's not easy! A friend of mine tried to do it back in May, and she failed miserably, making it through maybe a week before she gave up. Albeit, she was writing a chapter of her dissertation at the time, and really didn't have time to actually post about anything except the deadlines that were making her crazy.

So, this month's topic is "VOTE". Alright. Here's my sitchy:

I live deep in the belly of NJ, a red county in a blue state. My father's cousin is a great big bigot that somehow got my email address and sends me horrible emails about how Obama is a Muslim, how he is unpatriotic, and other random b.s. about putting up a fence between the U.S. and Mexico to keep the undesirable immigrants out. To which I say, I hope you're enjoying that South Jersey tomato, Cousin Charlie. Wanna know who picked it?

Today, interestingly enough I saw a Prius in Hometown, NJ. A Prius--rare in these parts--with a McCain sticker on the back. Wha-wha-whaaat? One of these things is not like the other.

So, I'm thinking about heading down to Obama HQ and seeing if I can help out in winning the election so that it can put people like Cousin Charlie in their right place. Not because of his politics--I respect conservatives even though I don't agree with them. But I cannot abide his xenophobic and reactionary, nonsensical vitriol that holds less water than a slotted spoon.

The debate is tomorrow. I'm going to go to Local Bar and watch, if there's no Eagles game on. If the Eagles are playing, then there's no hope to see Biden tap dance around Sarah Palin's gender; train wreck of a moron that she is, everything that Biden does will be scrutinized for condescention and sexism.

Go, Joe! South Jersey believes in you! (Or at least this SJ Diner Girl does!)

My Parents' Basement

I brought up a piece of old furniture tonight from my parents' basement-- a particle board desk that used to hold my old Macintosh IIc back in the mid-90s. It has slots on the side of it for CD-ROMs, dating it significantly. Now I need slots for all the various external hard drives I have! (One for photos, one for music, one for failed NaNoWriMo projects, etc.)

I set up the desk in the front bedroom of the apartment, which I've decided will be my office. I'm going to get a chaise longue.. or maybe just swipe one of the old twin foam mattresses (also from my parents' basement), throw a fitted sheet over it and use it as a place to flop when I need a break from writing.

NaNoWriMo is coming up, and I need to start thinking about my upcoming novel. I've always had this idea in my head (well, ever since high school) about writing a novel based on the principles of electrochemistry. Since I graduated from HS about 8 billion years ago, all of my knowledge of electrochemistry has since been cast to the four winds.

But there's my parents basement, treasure trove that it is, that has my chemistry book from college-- I wish it were my chemistry textbook from HS, but those we weren't allowed to keep. (And if I remember correctly, my HS bf ensured that I had his former copy of the book, where he had left clandestine notes to me in pencil that I was to erase when I returned the book at the end of the school year. Kind of romantic.)

Either way, I figure I'll spend the next few days working on a scheme for NaNoWriMo and refreshing my principles of ionization.

Ooop! I'm late for work! Gotta run.

Why Go Home?

Sure, North Jersey has 'em. The Diners, that is. But really, they've got nothing on the Greeks and the Turks that run a Diner Mafia down here below the Burlington county line, where 295 and the Turnpike run parallel, where you can't get there from here.

I've been living in San Liberal, CA for seven years now and have just returned to my native land, South Jersey, Salem County, to be exact.

In San Liberal, "SJ" did not mean South Jersey, it meant "San Jose", and what a relief it is to be back where there isn't a Spanish name to be heard for miles... well, not until you hit Malaga on Rte. 47, and have a piss-poor root beer float there. They're probably not even aware of Malaga, Spain. Of course, in Spain they write it Málaga. How right they are.

I've also just returned from Spain where I was dicking off for about seven months. I went there in between San Liberal and South Jersey, and then the dollar tanked and, pues, here I be, starting this blog about coming home, to see if you actually can go home again.

I'm not living at home. I have an apartment in my hometown on a street that has a bad reputation. But I pay $300 a month for two bedrooms, f-in awesome. I've got a full-on study in which to write.

I'm a writer. Working on a novel. Working at a hospital in the meantime, putting that Spanish to use in the ER, translating for patients that have been through the wringer: rapes, heart attacks, demons chasing them, puppies with lasers trying to kill them... I've seen, if not it all, then I've seen a lot.

So why go home?

That's the question I'll be exploring here.

Why, indeed.