N A Z A R A T I V I T Y

A New Blog Post Finally

2011-08-11T14:41:00.005-04:00

This is a new blog post. I'm considering starting a new blog that's slightly more focused on a theme or two or more themes, but I'm not sure yet how it should look. Possibly it would be OK to just continue to post stuff in this old blog. I am not sure.

Today, I went to the hardware store to buy some light bulbs -- I had bought a couple of lamps that needed special tiny bulbs. It was shocking how long I'd had the lamps in my home with no bulbs in them. Walking around the hardware store was peaceful and exciting at the same time; I love going to the hardware store because it reminds me of all the things I need for my home and all the things I already have. Too, knowing that I have the wherewithal to improve my home myself is empowering. I bought the light bulbs and walked home with them.

On my street, at the top of the steps leading to the front door of a house in the same row of houses as mine, I met a man carrying a small puppy named "Duncan." Duncan had an injured leg and so was a special case: though he was a little puppy, it was hard to give him the exercise he needed because he had to stay off his leg. When I walked up the steps and started to pet Duncan, he wiggled and licked my hand and was very cute. He had shaggy blond hair.

Next, I went into my apartment and installed the light bulbs into the two lamps. Seeing for myself that I could now turn the lamps on gave me a feeling of deep satisfaction. Lately I have tended to feel this way, deeply satisfied by mundane things and activities.

Everything I have said here is true.

Oh, Stella, Stella for star!

2011-02-12T12:50:00.017-05:00

Stella's memorial, continued. Here are a bunch of drawings and stuff from when we were all so young.

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Stella Overman

2011-02-10T11:29:00.012-05:00

Stella, the dog that Gabe and I adopted when we were 22, was put to sleep yesterday at the vet near Jefferson, NY, where she had been living since 2001. Nobody is sure exactly how old she was, but we know she was no younger than 14.

I first met Stella when I was working at Dog and Company, a pet care outfit based in Williamsburg and the East Village (my first job out of college save a brief, terrible stint at the NBC Experience store). Her owner was one of our boarder clients, which meant Stella came to stay at the facility overnight for a week or so at a time. Back then she was a slick, wiry, and very nervous dog; we were always cautioned not to feed her on the last day of her stay because she would vomit in the car.

The owner was a young woman whose last name was Overman. I spoke with her on the phone a couple of times but never met her. She'd adopted Stella from the Humane Society a couple of years before and now was trying to give her the greatest life possible: a Park Avenue address, lunch at sidewalk cafes. But the dog, who had a few behavior problems, proved too much for her when she decided to move away from the city. She surrendered Stella to the care of Dog and Company until we could find her a "forever home."

Gabe Silva, one of my best friends from college who remains a dear friend today, was my roommate at the time and also the one who got me the dog care job. We lived together at 604 Riverside Drive, constantly drinking. I had misgivings about adopting Stella, but he leaned on me every day: "When are we going to get Stella Overman?" (She was often referred to by her first and last name, to distinguish her from the other Stellas we took care of.) Before I knew it, Gabe and I were calling her Stella Our-Dog, pronounced like Stella Artois.

Stella was a sweetheart at home with us: she would sleep with Gabe on the futon and nudge magazines out of my hand with her nose, so I could pet her instead of reading. She had a smirking, mischievous air; her back legs swung back and forth when she walked, because her tail was always wagging. However, when we left her alone in her crate she raised the roof for hours -- neighbors complained about her piercing, incessant bark. We could never take her into the dog run because she would climb the fence and run away, chasing squirrels.

A couple of weekends I rented a car to visit my parents upstate along with Gabe and my then-boyfriend, Jordan. We took Stella with us, though she did puke every time, and noticed that in the country she became a different dog. She could run around and chase/murder animals, and never had to be alone for long. My mom and stepfather recognized this; they told me they would adopt the adopted and take Stella in as their own. A few months later they got Tilly, a farm puppy who became Stella's constant companion. Stella was the boss of the duo -- Tilly, an anxious "Velcro dog" that needed to be cuddled all the time (my stepfather calls her a "faggot") existed in sharp contrast to Stella, who was aloof and queenly. Tilly would also never kill, whereas Stella regularly got into trouble for attacking animals bigger and more dangerous than her. During her tenure she had run-ins with deer, raccoons, beavers, and porcupines.

(Gabe's routine, spoken in the voice he created for Stella: "Well, I tell you Tilly. There's one thing you should neeeever eeeever do, and that's chase a porcupi -- OH LOOK A PORCUPINE!")

Throughout Stella's long life in the country, there were a few things about her that remained a mystery. Weird clues would surface that we never traced: why did she love anyone who smoked cigarettes? Why was she so cautious about the doggie door, hating the idea that a door would close on her? Just how many chipmunks, groundhogs, bunnies, and even cats did she kill unbeknownst to us in her long days of roaming unsupervised? We'll never know. The important part was that she was loved by us all for exactly what she was: weird, funny, disobedient, full of life.

There is so much more I want to say about this dog. I knew her for essentially my entire adulthood. But in the interest of space it's best for me to just open it up to comments from you guys. Leave some! RIP STELLA XOXOXOXOXOX

33

2011-01-18T14:00:00.007-05:00

It's my birthday today. Here is the card from my mom (outside + inside), which features an eerily accurate portrait of me that I assume she commissioned some artist to do. When you open it up it plays "I Will Survive."

And here is the front of my stepdad's card. This is, hands down, my favorite photo of the three of us ever taken.

Yay! I'm going to go out of my house and do some stuff now.

Money Gig

2011-01-15T12:07:00.004-05:00

I don't talk about it too much because I imagine it's boring, and I'm a weirdly precious "artist" and artists sometimes get cagey about things they do for money, but I have a column now on Patch Fort Lee. It's called "Culture and Character" and delves into the hearts/minds of Fort Lee-ians, commenting upon the arts scene and slight oddness of that Northern NJ community. The articles go up every Wednesday; here's one, and at the bottom are more links to some others. You can Facebook-like the pieces and recommend them, if you are inclined to do so.

I am really enjoying the job so far. When I was growing up, my fam and I would pass through Fort Lee every weekend on our way back into NYC from the country (it's the last town in New Jersey before you cross the George Washington Bridge), and it's fun learning more about it. So close to the city, quite small, full of interesting history and strangeness.

Inventory of Light Jackets

2011-01-02T12:01:00.004-05:00

Part 1: Hoodies

Part 2: Other

It's January

2010-12-31T12:43:00.008-05:00

Just like that! Here we are!

Nothing much to add to that besides: I almost lost my phone yesterday on the 158 bus to Fort Lee. My phone! With all my numbers in it! Do you know how many brilliant/entertaining/sexy people are attached to those numbers??? And I know I could have sent that mass email asking everyone for their numbers, but that kind of thing is so awful for me to even think of, my notions of decorum and propriety being grotesquely overdeveloped.

So, understanding that losing my phone would mortify me, refusing to enter 2011 with a social and professional clean slate, I crossed the street and waited for the bus, which terminates in Fort Lee, to loop around and head back to wherever it goes after the route is over. (I am not sure where that is. It probably doesn't go all the way back to the Port Authority, but it might.) It came back bearing a banner that said NO PASSENGERS, so I ran up to the door and waved my arms and yelled. The driver pointed to his ceiling and said, "Read the sign!" the way bus drivers do. I said, "No! No, I LEFT SOMETHING IN THERE!" and so he shrugged and let me run inside. It was on a seat in the back that I found my phone, sitting upright like a commuter, waiting for me to claim it. "You're blessed," the driver told me, laughing, as I ran triumphantly out again.

I was so happy that I got a haircut right away. Here are the results of that:

Happy New Year, all. I love you.

ETA: I've been trying for an entire week to post an mp3 here but the file host is being bullshit, so you get nothing. If you can, find a song called "11:59 It's January" by Scrawl, download it, and then play it while reading this.

Merry Christmas From Brooklyn

2010-12-25T01:17:00.006-05:00

Throughout my childhood my stepfather, Tom Clack, ran a sound effects studio. Every Christmas that I can remember, our family have listened to a holiday mix tape made in 1980 by a guy, Doug DeFranco, who was Thomas's engineer. (Just yesterday, Thomas told me that Doug also scored the first-ever MTV bumper, with the spaceman -- if that's true, a super big deal!) They lost touch and I don't think I ever met him, which is a shame.

I love the 1980 Doug DeFranco Christmas Tape -- "Accept No Substitutes," the label on the original warned -- which was burned onto a CD years ago and which I have saved in my iTunes library. The songs on it are mostly classics, good classics but still, ones you probably don't need to hear again: Run Rudolph Run, Sinatra singing Jingle Bells, couple of Phil Spector Christmas tracks, "Blue Christmas (To Whom It May Concern)" by Miles Davis and Bob Dorough. I love it less for the songs than for the care he took in making it a perfect mix tape, before I knew what a mix tape even was. My sister and I know every note and sing phrases from each song to each other, the Beatles' Christmas record from 1967 featuring "Plenty of Jam Jars, Baby" being a particular favorite.

There's but one song on the comp that's excitingly rare -- "Merry Christmas From Brooklyn," by Emerson Bimby and the Cadman Kids. Cursory web searching reveals that Emerson Bimby is/was a name used by musician D.B. Fisher, but the origins of this song are not readily apparent; indeed, I don't have any info at all on it and I'd love to hear from anyone who does. ETA: I realize this might be a known song and I am just ignorant about it -- if so, tell me! It is included on DeFranco's tape along with a warm intro by DJ Vin Scelsa at WNEW, which I present also. My parents tell me that when I was three/four years old and I heard him describe the state the station's Alvin and the Chipmunks record was in, I would wail in anguish every time.

Anyway, this is for you, dear Christmas Day blog reader of mine. The quality isn't great, but I think you'll enjoy it anyway, and I hope love and fun-ness find you wherever you are.

Word Twist Thoughts, Part LVII

2010-12-11T14:42:00.004-05:00

Word Twist is a game you can play on Facebook, my proficiency in which I like to use as intellectual currency in some of my friendships. Should I hesitate to call these people "friends"? Anyway, I play Word Twist so much that there are a bunch of words I score with in Word Twist whose meanings have remained, nevertheless, unknown to me. Today is the day my lazy ass looks up all those words so I can a.) become smarter and b.) feel like I did something today. Most importantly, this will probably indirectly contribute to my getting better at Word Twist. And here they are.

***

BEY: (n.) a provincial governor in the Ottoman Empire.

GAR: (n.) Also called garfish, garpike. any predaceous freshwater fish of the genus Lepisosteus, of North America, covered with hard, diamond-shaped scales and having long jaws with needlelike teeth.

HOD: (n.) I'm actually embarrassed I didn't know this one -- a hod is the same thing as a coal scuttle. I mean, you know what THAT is, of course.

NETT: (adj.) This is an alternate spelling of "net" as in "net profits."

RANI: (n.) (in India) 1. the wife of a rajah. 2. a reigning queen or princess.

SETT: (n.) 1. Also called pitcher. a small, rectangular paving stone. 2. Also called stake. a hand-held tool that is struck by a hammer to shape or deform a metal object. 3. Also, set. the distinctively colored pattern of crisscrossed lines and stripes against a background in which a Scottish tartan is woven. <-- WINNER, MOST INFURIATING WORD

SOH: (n.) music (in tonic sol-fa) the name used for the fifth note or dominant of any scale. <-- ALSO INFURIATING; EVERYONE KNOWS THIS IS SPELLED "SOL"

TOLE: (n.) enameled or lacquered metalware, usually with gilt decoration, often used, esp. in the 18th century, for trays, lampshades, etc.

UMBEL: (n.) Botany. an inflorescence in which a number of flower stalks or pedicels, nearly equal in length, spread from a common center.

Incomplete List Of Songs That Tend To Make Me Cry Slightly

2010-11-29T22:32:00.003-05:00

Sail Away - Randy Newman
Martha - Tom Waits
Just A Closer Walk - Patsy Cline
The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald - Gordon Lightfoot
Let It Be - (as sung by) Aretha Franklin
Never Make Me Cry - Fleetwood Mac (**IRONICALLY)
The Way You Look Tonight - (as sung by) Fred Astaire

Do any of you have any? I have more, but they are even more embarrassing than these, so they have been excluded.

MUST BLOG IT

2010-11-15T17:52:00.005-05:00

Yeah, but who blogs at night? I pretty much never do, that's for sure. (It is 11:40 PM as I write this.)

Tomorrow is the closing on my apartment in NYC. It's taken a long time to get here, with many trials and tribulations, but life feels okay. I guess the best/worst part is that even this event, something I looked forward to so much for so long ("looked forward to so much" = "was at times desperate for") feels not like the culmination of an experience, but like the beginning of one. I can look for new, better jobs; find a new apartment to buy that I can actually afford; spend more time with people I like. Also -- and this is why this whole post exists right now -- I'll do more work on my projects. It sucks that I have no new stories or essays or novels right now and haven't since like February, but taking an extended break from writing has been necessary. I think now it won't be anymore.

All in all, I'm not too mad at myself for the break, only the right amount of mad that will get me to start writing again. If success really is measured by what you have done with the resources available to you, rather than the net amount of your achievements/money/fame (I like to think this is true), then do you know what? Slogging up Route 9 on foot carrying a camera, scan/copying old coursebooks with a Canon printer, endeavoring to define "skronk" in unique words, looking presentable in T-shirts from 1999 until more money comes in, gazing at the Lackawanna clock tower over the top of a pint glass... I am a success.

We had a lecture at JCAS today about autobiography in fiction and essays. Writers have it hard sometimes, because they feel their worth is wrapped up in their thoughts, their ability to translate those thoughts into something others didn't know before. I do believe the better a "translator" someone is, the better they are as a writer. But the worst thing for a writer isn't to be obtuse, it's to be dishonest. So, I will continue to say honest things here and everywhere else my voice ends up, even if it's the very least I can do, like now. And then, eventually, I will be able to do more.

The Past

2010-11-01T17:20:00.003-04:00

Here is a comic I drew 11 years ago for a paper zine -- I just found it in my desk drawer when I was rummaging around. Today is a pensive day.

The Main Thing To Do

2010-10-26T22:54:00.003-04:00

...is to do the crossword online. Why not? I mean you don't have a newspaper in front of you.

If you type Washington Post into Google instant search, "Washington Post crossword" is the first thing that comes up. See? It's so easy!

Life has been bumpin' along. If you're curious about what I ate for dinner tonight, the answer is curried okra.

More Of These Types Of Stuff

2010-09-17T23:50:00.011-04:00

A couple of weekends ago I went to New Brunswick, and here is what happened.

Two Situations That Happen Frequently

2010-09-09T00:18:00.003-04:00

JCAStuff

2010-08-31T11:37:00.003-04:00

So, the Writers' Seminars at JCAS are going wonderfully. The next one, part 1 in a 2-parter about verse and prosody, will occur on Sept. 13th at Jersey City Art School at 7:30 PM. So, youze all have a week to get amped and have Labor Day, BUT THEN YOU MUST BECOME SERIOUS.

***

I don't know what to put here.

Kids

2010-08-09T14:23:00.004-04:00

Weird moment on the subway today when I heard two young people, a boy and girl both around 19, discussing the movie Kids (1995, dir. Larry Clark). The boy had seen it and the girl hadn't. "It's about teenagers in New York in the nineties," he said. "It's just really interesting because there's so much going on: drugs, AIDS, social hierarchy..." She seemed impressed. Earlier, I had been to the registrar at NYU to get them to send one of my transcripts to a place where I'm applying for a job. Naturally, that reminded me of when I was in college, which was 1995 through 1999.

I saw Kids in the theatre the summer before my freshman year began; by the time I started classes at Tisch everyone there was abuzz about screenwriter/filmmaker Harmony Korine, who'd come out of my program and was its most recent success story. I didn't like the movie at all -- to me it felt false and alarmist and exploitative. I used to remark that there'd be a time when Kids would be to the '90s what Saturday Night Fever was to the '70s: perceived as kitschy and shallow. It's weird to me, then, that this boy (who I can assume grew up in New York City, the way I did) likes it. It's weird also because when I was a kid and the film was coming out I wanted to like it. It was supposed to be about me and my friends. But no, the people in it were just bad and soulless and had no love for each other and nobody was likeable, it was just drugs and sex and having a depressing orgy at the public swimming pool. Luckily I didn't have many friends like that, I guess, or perhaps I was just being defensive: "That's not how it really is!"

The prevailing feeling I come away with is not bitterness, though, it's nostalgia. We talked about this film's place in history, back when we were film-school pups, and now it is history. Just like so many things.

Never Not Philosophical

2010-08-02T13:32:00.002-04:00

It's all grist for the mill, you know.

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Journalstuff

2010-07-29T00:14:00.008-04:00

I carry notebooks around with me. They all contain the same mix of material: drawings, drafts of prose pieces, and "morning pages" or m.p.'s consisting of general logorrhea. Lately I've felt that it's time to stop writing in notebooks so often. My opinion right now is that they've become too precious; I've been blind to the fact that they are inferior to the polished thing -- the story or essay or whatever else (panel cartoon, WHFR show). I tend to hoard them once they are done and there are really a lot of them clogging up the shelves by now, all full of frivolousness.

Still, now and then I'll look back on one and get inspired. Here is a bit from the one I've had for the past year, which I'm now almost at the end of.

Updatery

2010-07-26T13:35:00.006-04:00

Beginning in mid-August, I'm going to be leading some talks on literature and craft at Jersey City Art School. If you're a reader of this blog who lives in the NYC/NJ area, and have a couple of hours free on Monday nights, it would mean a LOT to me if you'd come out. This will be great fun! Hit me up for more details, or just watch various places on the internet as the time draws nearer. (Talkin' 'bout like FB, Twitter, here, and I suppose that's it.)

Last week I had a semisurprise visit from two of my great friends, KG and SS. Impressed by the sort of old-fashioned look of the living room, which has the desk as its central focal point, Sarah said, "If this was my desk, I'd feel like I was Thomas Jefferson writing the Constitution." We all snickered. But so be it.

BPGOIT IS IN ACTION RIGHT FREAKING NOW

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Q.E.D.

2010-07-21T09:57:00.004-04:00

Sorry for the lateness.

BPGOIT To Follow In Like 12 Hours Or So

2010-07-20T18:31:00.003-04:00

I'm sitting at my desk at work right now and am suddenly like, FUCK, I forgot to draw a Bipolar Glass of Iced Tea cartoon yesterday. SHIT. This is the WORST.

So, there will be one tomorrow. Get pumped.

Love,
Amanda

Adorable

2010-07-14T10:31:00.005-04:00

Just got off the phone with Jenny, a lady who lives in my parents' old building on the Upper West Side. When I was a teenager I babysat for her now-grown daughter, and these days I walk her dog once a week.

The last time I came to her place, the note she'd left me read, "Don't be alarmed by the bird in the box!" Yes -- when I looked around I found a shoebox with a little bird inside it, a young blue jay that wasn't blue yet. Jenny is, like, an amazingly tenderhearted person and I guess she "rescued" the bird because she thought it was hurt. This was on one of those days last week that was dangerously hot, too.

So I asked her about it today: "How's the bird doing?" "Oh!" she cried. "It went back to its mom!" Apparently the bird experts she contacted (these people do exist in the city; they're the ones who hunt for lost parrots and all that) told her to just set it free again in the same place where she found it. She was all scared that it would be abandoned, because she had already touched it.

Know this! The notion that birds won't take back their young after humans touch them is a myth!

So, yeah, Jenny put the little blue jay back under the tree where she found it; it flopped around; after five minutes or so the mother blue jay came along and checked on it. And it looked like they made plans to just go back to the nest in a minute after the baby had finished flying practice for the day. Its two-night stay at Jenny's animal hotel had left it none the worse for wear.

Urban wildlife buffs, I hope you have found this story adorable. I did.

Ideas That Are Happening

2010-07-12T11:04:00.007-04:00

35-ISH DUDE IN BAR LAST EVENING (to Yorkshire Terrier running around on the floor): Hey, come here, Jameson! Jameson! Come on, get over here!
60-ISH DUDE, THE OTHER ONE'S FATHER: Ahh leave him alone, he's drunk.

***

Oh hey, I have been blogging some for WFMU's Beware of the Blog. It's fun times and if you'd like to look at the posts they are easy to find on the site. Go to http://blog.wfmu.org and click under "Categories" on the left where it says Amanda Nazario's Posts.

I'm also working on some essays and things which are hard to talk about here because they're not finished. They're good, don't worry.

It's high summer now, and cool, emotionally volatile refreshments are on everyone's mind. What perfecter time, then, for the Bipolar Glass of Iced Tea's triumphal return to these blog pages? I ASK YOU!

Jameson, get over here.

I Should Also Mention That I'm Now Moved Into My New Apartment

2010-07-05T09:28:00.016-04:00

Exactly one year ago, I wrote/drew this EXTREMELY SAPPY cartoon essay. Today seems like the perfect day to share it with all of you. Hope you enjoy. (You can click on each image to enlarge it.)

Oh yes! Please know too that the BPGOIT will be returning next week for his regular Monday engagement. I have the use of my scanner again is why.

***

Dad

2010-06-20T17:19:00.001-04:00

Happy Father's Day, everyone!

Pidge

2010-06-18T14:48:00.003-04:00

Hey, look who I met this morning whilst walking across Montgomery Street! He seemed to have fallen or wandered out of one of the nests that's up against the abandoned building. You know the building I mean. The one with the pigeons' nests all over it.

The Truth

2010-04-25T16:44:00.003-04:00

I've been looking at new JC homes for myself while living in a shared sublet that's a couple of steps underground and very cold. The notion I keep coming away with, after considering each new property, is: it's possible to be happy, or unhappy, pretty much anywhere. But I feel I have a better chance of staying happy in Jersey City than in most other places I've been. So I'm in good shape.

Many cute dogs live in downtown Jersey City, particularly many Huskies.

Too, there is good ice cream to be found.

Upper right kitchen cabinet contents, 1999 - 2010

2010-03-25T00:02:00.004-04:00

5 phone chargers
Dale Earnhardt Jr. car-shaped air freshener
3 pairs of headphones
"Coby" brand portable CD player
Charger for a PalmPilot
Canister of zip-ties for fastening a bike onto a car rack
Talking Mr. T keychain
A box of Whip-its
Charger for a beard trimmer
Bitter apple spray to discourage puppies from chewing furniture
A toaster
Birthday candles shaped like PBR cans
Mini-screwdriver set
"Silvo" brand silver polish
2 packets of toothpicks
A keg pump
A small stockpile of canned food, from when I assumed the end of the world was coming

I discarded all but three of these items. Can you guess which ones?

Developments

2010-03-21T00:00:00.004-04:00

There are some. I'm moving into a sublet in Jersey City in April -- that's the main one.

Another of them is, I'm doing a reading tomorrow night (Sunday, 3/21) at the Ding Dong Lounge! It begins at 7:30 PM and I hope very much to see you there.

"Professionalism": I don't have a lot of it. And yet, due to my "elbow grease," I manage to succeed?

This afternoon on the subway I caught a woman picking her nose and marveled at her devil-may-care attitude.

A lot of Cadbury Creme Eggs have been bought, few of which ever make it home. Before I eat them, I mean.

WFMUthon

2010-03-04T01:43:00.004-05:00

This week, in addition to packing, painting, and negotiating with contractors, I am working at WFMU during its annual fundraising "marathon." I love WFMU. Do you love it also? Do you love things that are good?

Go here to donate a bit of your dough to WFMU so it can stay on the air. Via that link you can also listen to it, and believe me, you won't be sorry.

I have been entering data into the system stating who donated and how much. Here I am singing along to an A.C. Newman song while waiting to take pledges over the phone.

Packstravaganza

2010-03-02T00:06:00.003-05:00

There's probably a lot to say as I pack up most of the books, drawings, tapes, handwritten notes, etc. I've accumulated in the past ten years, throwing about 20% of them away. I just don't have time to say it all right now. I will ask: when and why did I make this?

If Then

2010-02-15T16:37:00.002-05:00

BPGOIT For Your Enjoyment

2010-02-08T13:12:00.001-05:00

About My Job

2010-02-07T20:35:00.004-05:00

My job is weird.

A girl at my job said she thought I was twenty-seven so I was like yaaaaaaaaaaaaay!

Sometimes, when I'm in a recalcitrant frame of mind, my job frustrates me very much.

At other times, I am happy to be at my job, because it's so easy to be quiet and unassuming there.

I enjoy the company of most of the other wretched drudges at my job.

At my job we use a timeclock to clock in and out. (Yes, spell check, I agree that "timeclock" is a dumb, redundant term.) The other day as I left work, I told myself I was going to "clock out with my cock out." Then I laughed to myself. Nobody heard it.

Sunday Sunday Sunday

2010-01-31T13:18:00.003-05:00

Hey, you should read this column in the Johnsonville Press, a rag out of Rutgers. The piece was written by Ben Kharakh, who is one of my most glib and charming friends. (In writing, anyway. Ho-ho.)

All I want to do right now is be asleep. Winter, am I right? Yeah, this guy knows what I'm talking about.

Wilco = I skip the song so my last.fm profile might someday get less embarrassing. Uncle Tupelo = I turn the song way up and mess up my Word Twist game by singing along lustily.

This Has Been BS (News)

2010-01-27T21:57:00.010-05:00

Various types of BS in life have meant that I haven't been writing or posting for a little while. Please still like me.

My apartment will soon be listed as for rent on a real estate site. I'm extremely anxious about this -- not because I don't want to move, but because it's been a buttlong time that I have lived here and change is naturally scary. Isn't it? I love my apartment. But I'm a grown-ass woman who deserves to live and write in her own non-shared place, which she can afford, an't I? A: Yes. The move will be exciting, when it does finally occur.

I'm reading some books. A book I began reading is entitled Born To Be Good by Dacher Keltner. My godfather gave it to me for my birthday. It's not a literature book; it's a social science book. A literature book I began reading is two books in one, called Miss Lonelyhearts and The Day of the Locust by Nathanael West. It is/they are lovely and frightening. That one I borrowed from the "lending library" on Greene Street (just a bookshelf sitting out on the sidewalk with instructions taped to it) and will have to return when I'm done with it.

Earlier today I found a cartoon I drew a couple of years ago of two bunnies looking at each other. The first bunny is saying, "Happiness is a choice, Jason!" Above the second bunny's head is a thought balloon that says, "Trust-fund bitch."

I just watched a Netflix Instant View of a Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode. I found it soothing and got nostalgic for when I used to stay up late in high school and watch that show while eating a pint of Ben and Jerry's. I now feel I should make the end credits music of MST3K my bed music for when I talk during Nazario Scenario once, just to try it.

There is a Netflix DVD that just came of some Futuramas, but it's dirty and won't play. I'm going to try washing it gently like they say you're supposed to.

FINALLY: There has been some dining out with Helen and Diana, both lovely ladies of whom treated me to meals for my birthday.

I love those ladies.

"Tell me many kind words dear."

2010-01-16T09:32:00.001-05:00

(The subject line of a piece of spam I just received.)

Contextual Obligations

2010-01-09T10:11:00.004-05:00

Cultural products that reference older institutions mean something totally different to people who are unfamiliar with those older things. Does that mean postmodernism is dying, or does it mean it will continue forever?

OK: when I was a child, I witnessed the rise to superstardom of a pop singer named "Madonna." The adults around me understood that her name referenced a religious figure, but I didn't -- even though I went to a parochial school with a statue of the Virgin Mary out front, I heard the term "Madonna" used in reference to the religious icon only afterward, years after I knew who Madonna the singer was. (Yes, I know that's her real name, but that is not germane to this argument.) And even though I've since seen Madonnas in museums and now fully understand what they are, what they always were, my perception of them will always be colored a tiny bit by the existence of the other Madonna. Another example: when the Michael Bay film Armageddon came out, there were many young people who had never heard the term "Armageddon" used to describe the end of the world -- I'm sure those people, who are now adults, snicker inwardly when they hear it used in a serious context. (I was not among them, but I conjecture this is true.) These are kind of extreme versions of seeing something parodied in MAD magazine or, later, on the Simpsons, and having to go back and research the original work -- or just enjoying the parody in ignorance until finally stumbling upon the Hitchcock film or whatever in college.

It's interesting how this all bespeaks a collapsing of things into themselves and each other, another variation on humanity's fabled cultural melting pot. In some ways this is depressing; in other ways it's exciting. It used to bother me, but looking at it as a symptom of "everything becoming the same thing" makes me optimistic and happy, sort of. So how long before everything in the world is recontextualized and nothing exists solely in its original form? And what happens then?

OK, I Am Home

2010-01-06T22:47:00.004-05:00

You know? Sometimes I make word choice and usage mistakes that feel so incredibly stupid that I'm convinced I have a brain tumor. But then I realize it's only stuff like saying "interject" when I should say "interrupt" or "interface" when I should say "interact," and I may be the only one who sees the mistake who even notices it. And then I realize that I will have a good night's sleep tonight in my own bed, and then I feel amazing.

My orthography remains decent.

Nope,

2010-01-04T15:12:00.002-05:00

Still not home yet. On Wednesday I will be, and won't it be grand?

Some Things That Have Me In It

2009-12-31T10:54:00.006-05:00

1. Impromptu conversation between 'Shlay and myself on her show You Can Take It With You. (Begins roughly 1/4 of the way through.)

2. Video I made this past summer to promote my van project, for which I learned how to use iMovie.

3. SmokeLong Quarterly, Issue 25. I was so proud of this this year!

4. The Ding Dong Lounge later tonight. To ring in 2010, you silly.

5. 2010 itself.

2009 was a year of hard work that I look forward to seeing the fruits of in 2010. I had roommates, walked bunches of dogs, stayed in other people's homes. Eventually I found a new job and sank my teeth all into it. I DJed -- oh boy, did I DJ. Perhaps I DJed too much. Still and all, I'm satisfied with having worked my tail off. (I almost just wrote something there about having had a vestigial tail and now that it's completely off, being 100% human. Should I leave that in?)

I celebrated Mikey Solomon's marriage. WFMU, my favorite cultural institution, became a bigger part of my life as I started to volunteer there regularly and visit with staff. My li'l sister, upon graduating college, finally made me realize how alike we are, how much fun we are going to have together now that we are both adults. I went to Princeton to pester Amanda B. a couple of times. I went to Chicago to help Vern sell books about Nelson Algren, meet inspiring minds, and reconnect with lovely writerfriends. I joined Twitter, which was ridiculous. God, I used a lot of public transit. I went to rock shows that I didn't drink so much at that I forgot any detail of them. Many people made me glad. How many is "many"? I'm going to say about twenty-five.

That is a pretty high number if you understand how difficult it is to make anyone glad; how much we all struggle to attain gladness and see ourselves in the faces of others. Thank you so much, those people, and best wishes for a wonderful healthy New Year filled with love.

My Four-Day Workweek

2009-12-29T09:56:00.005-05:00

Tuesday is like Friday for me, because I have off on Wednesday. But then, since I go back to work on Thursday and then work through Saturday, Friday is a little like Tuesday. Now Saturday -- Saturday is the one that's really like Friday.

Whenever I write musings like the above, the sentiment I want most to close with is, essentially, "Soon I will be dead and none of this will matter."

But that would be wrong, yes? I have a tentative New Year's resolution to stop being saturnine.

On The Housesit

2009-12-28T10:06:00.005-05:00

Living "in the middle of it all" during holiday-time has its advantages, even though these dogs shake me down every five minutes for rubber toys stuffed with food. Last night I was able to run to the bookstore and be back in ten. On my way to the bookstore I chanced to meet Jonhayro, who was dressed in a suit and looked less like a bedraggled punk than anyone I have ever known, prompting me to puzzle over why he is still friends with me at all. Though I did not question it aloud. It was great to see him.

This morning aka just now, I swung by the coffee cart on 87th and Broadway which is staffed by my favorite coffee cart guy in the whole neighborhood/city. "I got a new job!" I told him. "That's why you haven't seen me around!" He smirked and replied, "Ah, you brightened my day, so this one is on me." And he gave me a free coffee. Last week, apparently, he gave each customer a free plastic car with a lotto ticket in it.

The dogs are so cute, too, a lot of work tho they be. They are good company.

There is no scanner here. I was going to post a rerun BPGOIT of him standing empty and telling his associates he "just doesn't feel up to it," but didn't, seeing as the drawing did not reflect my mood.

I AM SAYING THAT I DO FEEL UP TO IT.

All my love,
Amanda

Nonvisual BPGOIT Toon

2009-12-21T12:38:00.004-05:00

The Bipolar Glass of Iced Tea has a mistletoe harness around him. In panel 1, he remarks that the mistletoe harness looks damn good. In panel 2, he goes on to state his belief that it's important to look damn good 'round the Holidays. In panel 3, he says, "Because then you can get luuuu-hu-hu-huuuve." In panel 4, he says "A whole lot. Of it." In panel 5 he does not speak. Panel 6 has him apologizing for being drunk on fruitcake onto which too much rum was poured. FIN

Below, an hilarious portrait of the BPGOIT wearing a mistletoe harness.

Bread

2009-12-20T22:35:00.003-05:00

Today at work I wrote about a countdown show that spotlighted the twenty greatest ads of the decade as chosen by, I assume, a panel of Brits. (I write market research questions about prime-time programming that airs in the UK.) It was fun, and made me think a lot about my friend Bob O'Brien, one of the only people I know who really knows advertising. Back when we worked together as copywriters he taught me a lot about why certain ads work: color schemes, celeb appearances; not just concept. (Of the T-Mobile ads that were airing at the time, I remember him saying, "I don't like Catherine Zeta-Jones doing those -- she 's too famous." And I kind of feel the same way now that Luke Wilson is doing AT&T ads. You know you saw a phone company ad that used Luke Wilson, but you're not sure which company it was, because you were distracted by the spectacle of Luke Wilson.) Anyway, I didn't know many of the ads that were in this countdown and I was happy to learn about them. The one wherein bakers made a car out of cake, for example. And the one where parts of a car (a different one) are a Rube Goldberg device that eventually starts the actual, put-together car. The two ads for a Sony flatscreen that do things with color: one sends thousands of Superballs down an empty San Francisco street; the other makes paint explode all over a drab tenement building.

The ad that won the title, ultimately, of "Ad of the Decade" was for Hovis bread and was an homage to a classic British Hovis ad from the seventies featuring an old-timey delivery boy. For this version they reenacted things that might have happened on streets throughout over a century of history (uniquely English things: celebrating after the 1966 World Cup, carrying belongings after the Blitz, etc.) and ended with the kid coming home to eat bread in his house. This is the ad and this is the classic ad it was based on, directed by Ridley Scott.

True True

2009-12-14T13:19:00.005-05:00

I am a fan of the advice column Fxck Feelings. I just read the header before the advice-givin' in their most recent installment, and it put my previous blog entry into perspective in a big way. Luv u, everyone around me who is wonderful and significant. Really.

http://www.fxckfeelings.com/2009/12/14/the-gift-that-keeps-on-giving/

And To All A Bad Time

2009-12-13T22:49:00.005-05:00

Okay, I like the Holidays sort of. I like getting together with my friends and family, to see them, to be comfortable in a festive setting. I do like that. But I do that a lot casually anyway, during the rest of the year. So... yeah.

Around the holidays, I am usually working. This year, as has been the case for the past like five Christmases, I'm going to be looking after a couple of dogs in a fancy apartment. Please note: I enjoy doing this. But it's hard; it demands a lot of my time and attention. I won't also have a lot of time to go out and meet all the friends and family members who are clamoring to unwind Holiday-style with me. And of course, this is pathetic and makes me feel sad. It makes me feel like I have a weird life that other people don't understand.

Also, during the Holidays (I don't know if you were aware of this or not, but just FYI) a lot of money is spent. So during this time when everyone else is running around with giant bags from American Girl Place and Macy's and shit, I'm all like, "I love you! Here's a mix CD I made that doesn't have very good sound quality!"

And relatives always want to know things. (Again: you, reader, may have already been aware that this goes on.) They want to know what my plans are and whether I am ever going to move up in the world. This is information I can't give them right now.

So, yeah. I'm inclined to hide and not see anyone this Holiday Season. What I'd rather do is take advantage of the relative quietness in the work sphere and be by myself, maybe write a little, draw a little. But of course I won't, since that would be improper.

In summary: Ughhh. Even though I DO love you, and I WILL make you that shitty mix CD. Do you see what I'm saying here?

Post Office Days

2009-11-23T17:51:00.006-05:00

1. Went to the post office carrying a lot of different parts of an application, as well as a huge ginormo envelope I had just bought at Duane Reade.

2. Exited the post office to find a stapler. The woman behind the counter at Bookculture, the bookstore directly next door, had one. I stapled my documents.

3. Stuffed application form and manuscripts into the envelope haphazardly. Everything got kind of bunched up (not literally wrinkled, but would have arrived at the place creased and unprofessional-looking). Took everything out, sat on floor of post office, replaced everything. Sealed the envelope.

4. Realized that the address I needed to write on the envelope was on a piece of paper that was now now inside it. Used 411 lookup and called the organization while standing in line. Found that nobody was in the office.

5. Called my friend Alison Klein, who can be counted on to be near a computer and with whom I don't have a complicated relationship. She looked up the address and gave it to me.

I feel totally awesome now.

***

You Don't Know How It Feels...

2009-11-16T16:31:00.003-05:00

I wanted to say something today about how I just discovered that all the episode titles of "Cougar Town" are Tom Petty songs. (Look at the Hulu page for the show, and you will see that I'm right.)

But then I realized that people probably already knew that, so if I said anything about it I would be exposing myself to not just one or two, but several different kinds of embarrassment.

So I decided not to mention it.

***

What else?

2009-11-14T10:16:00.002-05:00

I want to write some more deeply engrossing and important stories and essays now. So that I'm, you know, not a failure.

So leave me alone, please, so that I can go do that.

Okay, no, I didn't mean RIGHT NOW.

Hey dudes, I know it's been a while since I wrote anything here, or posted a cartoon or anything else riveting or delightful like that. I'm sorry. Blogging will return to normal soon. It will!!!

Love,
Amanda

Grocery Listery

2009-11-04T14:51:00.006-05:00

I have blogged about this before, but it's drawn sufficient interest to warrant another mention. Last summer I compiled a bunch of my friends' grocery lists and published them in a zine that I called THE GROCERY LIST LIST. Two pages from said zine appear below.

I thought making it would be an interesting way to bring together my friends from different regions, whose tastes were different -- I mean, no matter what you choose to eat, you have to shop for it (unless you grow/raise it yourself, and the people I consulted did not). Based on each list, I tried to create a little scene telling the story of the food-buying excursion in comic-strip form.

OK, so, do you want a copy? They're free; I'll just send you one if you email me your address. Please indicate, also, if you'd like to submit a grocery list of your own for inclusion in a possible future incarnation of this.

Lists from a whole bunch of people, like over 20, would make for a highly entertaining read, I believe.

My email is: amnazz@gmail.com

***

(Untitled)

2009-11-02T14:28:00.001-05:00

Naming Names

2009-11-01T12:53:00.002-05:00

I'm working on a personal essay right now which I like. It's almost finished. I'm feeling like the next thing I need to do, before I can make any home-stretch-type edits, is change the names of all the people in it, who are of course real people. Doing this is standard practice in nonfiction writing for a lot of reasons, legal and literary and not-feelings-hurting. I imagine nonfiction writers (I think of myself as primarily a fiction writer) re-name their people at the beginning of the essay-creation process so they don't have to go through this painful step later. I'm a little wet behind the ears on this and gotta say, I'm finding it hard to change these names of these people I like so much both in the narrative and in real life. But I look forward to the freedom the resulting narrative distance will very likely afford me.

That was a very nerdy thing to talk about.

***

Since I was delinquent in Bipolar Glass of Iced Tea last Monday, I am posting a BPGOIT today. And will do another tomorrow, if all goes as planned.

The 3 Things I Learned Today From The Appliance Repairman Who Was Here

2009-10-23T16:21:00.004-04:00

1. A "circuit breaker" is not the same thing as a "fuse."

2. The broken part in my dishwasher is called a "drain impeller."

3. There is a Christian dance party named "The Gate" happening tonight at Times Square Church.

Mondayze

2009-10-19T15:37:00.004-04:00

I still have a shit-ton to do. Johnny had a birthday. Andrew had a birthday a couple of days before that. A nice person whose email I didn't know has commented on my blog and left an email. Possibly soon I will hang out with her. I will delete the comment so not everyone sees her email. I ate a basket of corndogs at Union Hall last night and lived to regret it. Since then I have had fruit.

It's Monday, so you get the BPGOIT, you lucky duck.

Dog Life

2009-10-16T08:44:00.007-04:00

Quittin' Time

2009-10-12T22:42:00.005-04:00

Why quit dog walking, you ask? The easy answer is "because I got another job." And I did. But I will admit now that while I'm sure I'll like this new job, I harbor no hopes to parlay it into any kind of stepping stone for my writing career. No: it, like dog walking before it, is going to be a means to support myself while I write in my spare time.

What follows is the long-form reason why I am going to be not a dog walker anymore, effective at the close of the business day this Friday.

I love dog walking, all right? I funded my entire grad school career with the job, and for the two years after grad school managed to carve out an interesting life based around it. I took my notebook with me to work and wrote drafts sitting in doorways and at diner counters between walks. I was always very busy, and this suited me; not least, the dogs were all wonderful. Not least either, I got to be outside and exercising all the time.

Five years is a long time to be walking around in New York City for six hours a day, often six or seven days a week. I'm still young(ish) and healthy, but last winter I already felt the dread that old people feel when faced with the cold months: I knew in mid-October that I'd be cold more than warm, all the time, until Spring. I slogged through it until now, but with winter approaching again, I know that I just don't want to anymore. And then there's knee pain and back pain, which I don't really have, but am beginning to feel at the end of long workdays.

And also. Last year I didn't make as much progress with my writing as I wanted to: had a couple of great publications, but didn't get to go to any residencies; didn't get (or try to get) an agent; won nothing. I mention this not because I feel I deserve something mindblowingly prestigious every year -- writers often go a few years without any huge success milestones, and this past year I don't think I did good enough work to merit any. But the lack of "glory" this time took an emotional toll that I don't want to go through again. The feeling of being unsuccessful as a writer, of being only a dog walker, was awful. I just kept reminding myself that I was 31 with no money, no boyfriend, and now possibly no future. These days I'm going to try to get my financial shit together and not always be a.) frazzled, beholden to other people's schedules b.) grubby, with messy hair and dirt under my nails. It's fair to assume that greater emotional stability, later financial stability and boyfriends, will follow logically.

My stories will get better, I think, when I'm writing them on a more rigorous schedule -- before work each day, rather than whenever I can find a spare moment. (God, I hope this is true.) I will no longer be able to tell people I support myself as a dog walker and hear them say "No way! That's so cool!" and then immediately ask me how many dogs I walk at the same time. But I will be able to tell them I used to be a dog walker, and in the interest of my sanity this is a fair compromise. Also, I can sometimes tell them I am a DJ.

***

I was inspired to write this whole post earlier today as I was crying over an article about Norman Rockwell in Vanity Fair. It's very weird, the kinds of things that can make you cry when you're not expecting to.

Few Things

2009-10-08T09:45:00.002-04:00

Meh, I kind of hate when my blog becomes a to-do list or, like, a database of "Okay, today I'm going to focus on this and that, so that tomorrow I might do/feel/think the other thing." And that is why I haven't posted anything here in a while. I'm busy to the extreme until the end of next week. But, the things anyway:

1. Stay tuned for some information about the mobile radio project, if you're a contributor to it.

2. I have a really big problem with Bejeweled Blitz 2 now. I'd rather not say any more about that.

3. Over last weekend I got a surprise piece of mail: a copy of Marshall McLuhan's Understnding Media, on loan from a friend. I haven't even started it, because I'm still reading John Barth, but I'm excited to start it soon.

4. More to come. Soon enuff.

For Fall,

2009-09-28T10:36:00.004-04:00

Yep, I'm definitely going to need to go shopping for nice outfits and start getting my nails done. And all that kind of thing. I guess it will be a fun activity. But what I'm pretty much saying is that I need to look nicer, fancier, and more "put-together" so that I might finally be taken seriously.

Dream: September 22, 2009

2009-09-22T08:20:00.002-04:00

I was at a Q & A panel about a movie, featuring the lead actor and one other person who I think was a producer. All of the attendees at this heavily-attended event (besides me) were actors, pretty men and women wearing clothes that were brightly-colored or sequined or otherwise attention-getting. Eugene Mirman was there, I think he was curating it. While answering the questions, the actor and producer seemed uncomfortable and like there were aspects of the film they didn't want to discuss. Finally someone asked both of them about their relationship with the film's director (who wasn't there), and they hemmed and hawed and looked extremely mad and uneasy. I interrupted and said something like, "You know, maybe you were both just nervous about being around so many people, especially so many writers -- a screenplay always has a lot of writers -- and that contributed to whatever went wrong." Immediately, everyone in the audience looked at each other like they were suspicious of something, and then people started leaving the room. Everyone left very quickly and it was clear that the event had abruptly ended. On my way up a staircase to a different room, I remarked to Eugene Mirman that the talk had ended rather suddenly, and he replied, "Well, yeah, because of that thing YOU said. Why did you have to say that?" Until then I'd had no idea it was because of me. Glittery sparkly-dressed people were climbing the stairs all around me and I stayed where I was. Finally I saw a friend of mine standing at the bottom of the stairs and complained to him. He told me I shouldn't worry and that everything I had said was inoffensive. I was so grateful that I kissed him on the mouth. Then he said he was being sarcastic and he actually did believe that my interjection was kind of stupid.

Sittin' and Thinkin'

2009-09-21T08:06:00.003-04:00

I just realized that I was sitting in the exact same pose as Rodin's Thinker. It made me remember the animation of the Thinker at the beginning of Mr. Wizard's World where the statue has a thought balloon above his head with a light bulb in it and is saying, "Hmm... hmm... a-ha!" and when he says "a-ha!" the light bulb turns on.

If I post BPGOIT today it will have to wait until the evening, as today is jam-packed with activities. Just an FYI.

I'm working on one new essay and one new story. I like them both but I'm also staring down the barrel of an extremely busy two weeks (that is two barrels, I guess), and I doubt I'll be able to finish either one before those weeks end. It pisses me off. However, I'm grateful for all the work and the social-butterflyness, which feel appropriate for the beginning of fall. Right?

Yay?

Rare Have Been The Times

2009-09-14T11:02:00.000-04:00

9/11/09

2009-09-11T11:38:00.000-04:00

September

2009-09-07T21:02:00.000-04:00

Lil Puppet

2009-09-01T09:23:00.003-04:00

My stepfather called me yesterday to tell me that he recently met a woman who was preparing to compete in a rapping puppet show. She was at a party that he and my mom went to. Apparently the woman has been a puppeteer for a long time and her puppet is a 9-foot-long snake made of fabric and papier-mache.

Now, I assume this is how the event unfolds: ventriloquists and other puppeteering hobbyists get together with their puppets, and make all the puppets rap, using the format of an MC battle. The thing is ("This is maddening!" he said), my stepfather didn't know where or when the battle was going to be held, only that it was in New York. He claimed the snake-puppet lady "got away from him" before he could quiz her on the details.

I'm sorry I don't have more information about this.

Late Summer

2009-08-31T09:54:00.007-04:00

Yes, I had a nice Sunday (yesterday). Vern and I biked across the Manhattan Bridge and almost fell off our bikes when we went over the two giant bumps towards the end of the bridge span, right where it starts to go downhill and you start to pick up crazy momentum. It was scary and exhilarating. Will's band, the Octagon, were playing in Gowanus in a weird venue that looked like an art gallery and I think was. They were great. Then I went home and made some fried corn-off-the-cob and ate it and took a shower, and then I went to see Howlies AGAIN (at the Mercury Lounge) after already having seen them on Friday but this time Jonhayro came with me. I then gossiped with Jonhayro about work, family, and dating -- he is always good for that. Howlies drummer Aaron W. told me all about their trip to Graceland and showed me his TCB-in-a-lightning-flash necklace. It impressed me. Later, the guy at Bereket stuffed my sandwich so full of grilled lamb that the pita split open in the cab and grease and meat spilled all over my lap.

***

Twugs!

2009-08-27T09:54:00.006-04:00

I believe in tarot cards, all right? The reading I did for myself the other day ended with the Ten of Swords, the card that depicts a dead guy lying on the beach with ten swords in his back. Does this mean that I, who have spent much of the past year feeling like the heroine of a Lars von Trier film, am to experience ANOTHER shitty episode that will make me temporarily wish I were dead? I really hope that doesn't happen, especially because I thought things with me were finally starting to go okay.

Pfft, I know the superstitiousness is dumb. Feel free to berate me for it, especially since we're on the eve of destruction and all.

(I love songs about nukes and the world ending. Some favorites: "Eve of Destruction," "Atomic Power," "Political Science," "Five Years.")

It should be obvious to everyone that all that remains to be mentioned now is Donnie Wahlberg's Twitter feed. He's always enticing people to "twug" him and to "twug it out" when there's drama or stress or something; also, he calls his fans "soldiers" and himself "D-Dub." Let's all be more like him. A LOT more.

Awwww, "Then He Kissed Me" just came up on the iTunes shuffle. Awwwww.

UTOOBZ

2009-08-25T11:02:00.003-04:00

I have two YouTubes to share, since A. Bock has abdicated her responsibilities in this department. Both of them came from her via another source. Both have started to loom large in my legend.

First, this. Notable for being sent to me by Matt Burnette-Lemon mere hours after Bock sent it, so I suspect it's "viral," unlike most of the diamonds in the rough I get from her.

Next, this, by the pop group Green Leaves aka GREENL. The catchiest song you have heard in a long time, and also I defy you not to be completely delighted by the video. My sister and I can't stop singing "Yatta!" to each other (often while doing the dance), and neither can Amanda Bock and I, or Diana and JP, or Heaven only knows how many other duos and groups of people. Look, even that old lady loves it!

Food Has Inspired Us

2009-08-24T11:18:00.005-04:00

Melissa Range, my very excellent poet friend, is now a professor at the University of Missouri in Columbia and has decided to arrange her creative writing class around the theme of food/eating. That is wonderful, though its wonderfulness is hardly surprising, considering how cool and inventive Ranger is, at her core.

But guess what else! She has decided to teach, as one of her texts, THE GROCERY LIST ZINE. Can I tell you how happy that makes me, that a little photocopied Elmer's-glued shitass DIY job like that -- MINE! -- will actually be distributed to Melissa's students to help them learn!?!?!?

Oh wow, it makes me happy indeed. Thank you, Melissa. And thank you, other writers who contributed your grocery lists and let me use them as a (this is a cliche by now, but still) "jumping-off point" for my boundless if slightly frazzled creativity.

Yay?

***

You Should Know It

2009-08-20T23:54:00.003-04:00

I just put a bunch of new MP3s of shows up on the WHFR site from this week and last week. More are coming, I assume. See, once uploaded from the WHFR computer they appear on a list we site admins have, as if by magic, and I get to make them public for you people.

Do you want to listen to them?

***DO IT***

LG Stands For Life's Good, They Tell Me

2009-08-17T09:48:00.007-04:00

I was eligible for a phone upgrade, so I got a new phone! This happened last week. I am telling you about it now. It is still the cheapest phone available, but for me it's wonderful, being so much better than the cheapest phone that was available four years ago. IT EVEN HAS A CAMERA IN IT.

The most noteworthy development in the my-phone realm is that I've changed my personal banner to "Amnazz" where, on every phone I had since my very first phone in 2000, it used to read "Eat a Dick." A little part of me has died, but at least now I won't sweat bullets if I ever leave my phone at my boss's house.

***

Dave Madden's book is getting published!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Dave is one of the sweetest people I know, and has been steadfastly dedicated to his project ever since I met him. The last time we saw each other, he had just spent all day in the Museum of Natural History looking through archives for research (we then sat outside at the Hi-Life with fancy cocktails and felt very New Yorky, which I know he appreciated though for me it's all just so dull anymore). I'm really proud of him. Read more about this fantasticness here.

Blog Readin'

2009-08-15T21:46:00.004-04:00

For the first time in months, I just clicked on all the blogs on my sidebar. What a joyous and also humbling experience! Chad and Jamie both said complimentary things about my SLQ story, like, a while ago. Kim wrote an inspiring entry inspired by the Sewanee conference, which is where she and I met last year. Kevin Wilson boosted my van project. In addition to promoting emerging writers Scott Garson continued to talk a lot about rock music, which I always enjoy. Ryan Call's blog is not even really a blog in the traditional sense anymore, and must be seen to be believed. Amanda Bock's blog ceases to exist. I can't ever say enough good things about Helen's photos, so I will say again that they're great, and I got to look at a few more that I hadn't seen. And Joe M. posted the best video EVER of a bunch of suburban Dutch kids dancing around their mopeds at twilight. (He also made his font enormous, so elderly people can read his blog now if they would like to.)

I apologize to you all for not having visited your blogs in so long a time. I'm really glad I did it tonight, because it made me appreciative and grateful that we have a friendship/association/admiration. Yes, I am sober writing this, though the can of Pepsi I'm drinking may have made me a little over-ebullient.

Updating my blog links now.

Well, I Never

2009-08-15T11:46:00.007-04:00

Can you believe the filth they're selling at Home Depot these days?

Seeing-Eye Candy(...?)

2009-08-12T09:59:00.003-04:00

First off: the reading was wonderful. A few of our writers had never read in front of an audience before, and they did SO WELL! (Maybe even better than those of us jaded performer types who read all the time? Hmm.) We got compliments galore from the curators of the series and spectators. Our heads are swelled to death. We need to do it again sometime soon, because -- as I always knew, but appreciated seeing in evidence in a new way last night -- we are good.

Second off: I just drew this. Did I inadvertently steal the idea from somewhere? I feel like it's been done before.

Perchin' It

2009-08-11T09:23:00.003-04:00

Here is the homepage of the Perch, where I and the rest of the Hi-Fi Group will be reading this evening at 7:30 whaaaaaaaat!

Yes, it's true. Our group, consisting of six talented and very, very good-looking writers, has been convening at the Hi-Fi Bar on Avenue A for two years to swap manuscripts and chat about the writing life. It's been a gas. Now we are getting on a stage and showing the rest of our friends all the stuff we've been doing all this time. And we are diverse! One of us is writing a thriller about Shakespeare scholars, another a novel-in-stories about a punk construction worker, and another a multi-voiced novel set in the Netherlands in WWII. AND THERE ARE MORE. I hope you, reader, come out and have funtimes listening to us.

***

This BPGOIT cartoon is late and I apologize for its being late. I had been in Princeton eating pancakes and buying Squeeze LPs that cost a dollar, and the thrill of that happy experience caught up with me and I didn't get time to post yestermorn.

Word Twist Is The Joy Of My Life

2009-08-08T09:12:00.004-04:00

Seriously, what would I do without Word Twist? How long would it otherwise have taken me to learn that NIFF and PARA are real words? And how else, living as far away from them as I do, would I be able to consistently antagonize Amanda B. and Steve without fisticuffs?

To properly express the elation I feel the moment I realize the 7-letter bingo in the WT game I'm playing is something naughty, like RAMRODS or TITBITS, would be impossible.

And it's the perfect -- THE PERFECT -- activity to perform while drinking iced coffee and listening to music, on a Saturday morning OR AT ANY OTHER TIME OF THE DAY OR WEEK. You, people who drive, speak often of the peace you feel when driving around and listening to music. For now, Word Twist provides me with that feeling. For now.

Scramble is also pretty fun.

I don't do crossword puzzles anymore, but I really should start that up again too.

***

Here, again, is the link to the grants site where you can put in your pledge for the DJ van. I'm sometimes whimsical in my tone and diction when discussing the project, but I am actually serious about this -- I need help to raise these funds, and I hope I get it. Thank you, so much, in advance.

Stolen!

2009-08-07T11:12:00.002-04:00

Stolen from my friend Guy Gonzalez's Facebook page, that is. He uses it as his personal quote, whereas I use an arcane reference to the Beatles' Christmas record from 1967. Again I say: Sighhhhhh.

***

"The only thing I was fit for was to be a writer, and this notion rested solely on my suspicion that I would never be fit for real work, and that writing didn’t require any."

–Russell Baker

(Russell Baker is a satirist and memoirist, the author of Growing Up -- which at the time of this posting I haven't read, but now would like to.)

OK, Yeah

2009-08-04T23:20:00.004-04:00

...I feel better now. Here is a photo of a sculpture of "Gloppy" (the Molasses Monster) from Candy Land, which I just made into Amanda Bock's Gchat avatar.

And here is the icon she chose, reciprocally, for me to use.

Send Confidence

2009-08-04T10:03:00.002-04:00

Today is weird. I'm thinking about good things, like teaching myself how to play guitar with the nice guitar Mike Solomon loaned me last week and little baby bunnies. But I'm also kind of anxious and nervous. What if everything I've ever tried fails? How do I set aside the time to do the work necessary to prevent said failure? Have I shot myself in the foot by wanting (and trying) to do a million different things, rather than abiding by the old "do one thing and do it well" saw? Life is really tough sometimes. Isn't it.

In my work, I'd like to think I am motivated by the light of truth that lives in us all, but manifests slightly differently in each individual and that's why everyone's voice is unique. Not by panic or the fear that if I don't do something people won't like me.

This happens to me every few months. To you too, maybe. If it does happen to you, I want to know -- but if it feels like too emo a subject for the comments section I of course understand.

I'm now going to post a YouTube of something ridiculous, to leave you with a residue of glee.

The Atlantic City Business

2009-08-03T18:27:00.005-04:00

I was in Atlantic City yesterday (Sunday)!

Barry Graham is a very nice guy, and I'm really grateful to him for inviting me down and letting me read. It's too bad that my work schedule didn't allow for a longer visit, because the writers who were already there seemed to have had a rollicking weekend full of guerilla-style word-sharing and weird-smelling beach that I'm sorry to have missed. Everyone I met there seemed cool.

OK, so, I made it down to the boardwalk in the nick of time for the reading to begin, having taken the new "ACES" train that expresses between AC and NYC on the weekends. Thumbs up to the ACES train, by the way. While writers gathered in the bandshell behind Bally's, beside the Korean War memorial, the sky darkened scarily. We decided to walk a little ways down and stand under a small rain shelter instead. This proved wise, and also dramatic, as thunder, heavy rain, and high winds punctuated everyone's performance. We all stayed moderately dry. The piece I ended up reading was a draft of this strange story about a girl who thinks she has herpes; I hadn't read it anywhere before and I'm not sure how great a choice it was for a venue like that (or was it perfect?). Anyway, everyone else did awesomer and was nice to me, though I'm sure they all wondered if I had herpes. Afterward I hit the slot machines for hours and hours -- ended up down about forty dollars, but I'd gambled so much that it felt like I had won. I'll get the whole "slots" thing figured out soon enough.

Today, my Facebook account got hacked and posted spam on everyone's walls that I know. I was monumentally pissed about it; it almost, almost ruined my day. I'm over it now, thinking about ordering Mexican for dinner. I think that brings us up to speed.

OH EXCEPT! Dave Madden, a talented and handsome friend of mine who has a book about the history of taxidermy, and who is probably forty IQ points smarter than me, has written about the Nazario Scenario mobile project for a brand-new "Third-Person Blogging" feature on his site. Check the interview, etc. out here!

The Bipolar Glass of Iced Tea strip below is a rerun.

That Is All.

2009-07-30T11:35:00.002-04:00

I am so tired of dogs today. Also, I'm noticing a spike in usage of the phrase "That is all" for comic effect/emphasis at the end of an otherwise banal announcement.

Ay-See

2009-07-29T09:56:00.004-04:00

Hey! Atlantic City, NJ is a crazy place where seagulls dive out of the sky to eat your funnel cake. I am going there this weekend, to participate in a reading sponsored by my friend Barry G. and DOGZPLOT. Unclear yet as to where the venue will be for Sunday (which is when I'm up), but below is a link to the flyer with the info for Friday and Saturday. If you're coming, just get in touch with me and I'll tell you where to go.

It promises to be bizarre and frightening.

http://tinyurl.com/nxwl54

BPGOITtime

2009-07-27T10:53:00.002-04:00

Dream: July 23, 2009

2009-07-24T09:05:00.002-04:00

A nice man was driving me over dirt roads through an overgrown area in summertime. There was sunlight streaming through the windows. Next to the man, occupying the driver's seat with him but not driving, was another, weirder man who had written a novel that he made me look through, and which he kept wanting to discuss with me. The two men were brothers, and I liked the first one and kept leaning forward to hug his shoulders through the driver's seat. The second one was just annoying.

We pulled into the driveway of a farmhouse. There was a litter of adorable puppies playing on the porch with their parents, which were a pit bull and a standard-sized Dachshund. Each puppy was a different color and they were very friendly. I jumped out of the car and began playing with them, saying, "O the puppies that captured my heart! Each one prettier than the last!" and similar rapt exclamations. Suddenly my mom and stepfather were there; they led me to a boardwalk-type structure with a giant gaping hole in it. I jumped over the hole and we came to a spacious, scrubby field that reeked of pigs. I was holding a white puppy. We didn't stay in the field long because my mom said she was allergic to the smell. On the way back the hole in the boardwalk was bigger. I threw the puppy across it (it landed safely) and gained a foothold against a water pipe/water pump-like structure on the other side, so that I could cross. Once back across I played with all the pit-Dachshund puppies and talked to them. The nice man and his weird brother sat in rocking chairs looking down at me indulgently.

Not Overwhelmed With Anything

2009-07-22T11:03:00.003-04:00

My family's gone (snif!) and it is once again "my time." I've come to realize that a few of my record albums are missing, presumably because I forgot them at the Ding Dong sometime lately when I was there. So I have to go there when they open today, to see if they are still there. And I hope they are. This is the only thing I'm currently overwhelmed with, if you can even call it being overwhelmed. "Whelmed," more like.

The three missing record albums:

J. Geils Band, Hotline
The Cowsills, The Cowsills
A.C. Newman, Get Guilty

I'm sure there are more which I will discover sometime soon are missing and then I'll get angrier. For now I have to cope with the possible loss of these three and not FTFO about it.

Overwhelmed With Stuff

2009-07-20T08:33:00.005-04:00

I'm overwhelmed with stuff. My mom and sister are on their way into the city to help me rearrange my bedroom before my new roommate comes in, and that is good. I like my mom and my sister. But I hate getting all my stuff all messed with. It makes me crazy.

Later today I have writing group, for which I will need to travel downtown a ways. This will happen after I get off work.

The grocery list zine is finished, except for the part where I glue everything down. Instead of cleaning my apartment, I would like to be gluing everything down.

I started a new short story and a new essay. Now I don't know when I'll have time to write more of them.

For about a week I have had that weird feeling you get like there is a lump in your throat. That is to say, I have had a lump in my throat. I've heard this is a symptom of not being able to express yourself or having feelings that you're suppressing.

***

Fundtimes!

2009-07-18T11:13:00.004-04:00

I am weirdly trepidatious about this, because it involves asking for money. But I wouldn't be trying it out if I didn't think it were a really good idea. Please take some time to read my grant "pitch" on Kickstarter, and please give some money soon. If I show them I can raise ten grand by October 15th, I'll get it and it will ALL be sunk into this project.

Here it be!

In a nutshell, I'm looking to buy a van and DJ out of it. The more I think about the idea the more I like it, but without the money there's just no way.

Thoughts? Happy/sad? I'm pretty excited, and pretty confident that I can raise the funds if I get EVERYONE's support. (An aside: Kickstarter is a wonderful organization to help entrepeneurs do this type of thing; you might want to try them out if you have something in mind that needs financial backing.) Please let friends and family know, too!

Thanks in advance. Really.

Long Form

2009-07-16T21:56:00.002-04:00

Yeah, I've been doing a lot of stuff lately. This blog has gotten slightly neglected, because I'm so busy and because Twitter has sufficed for the info quick-fix. I hereby resolve to give it the attention it deserves again, though. Let it be known that the long form is still a friend of mine; to serve as proof, here's a vignette that is just barely too long to be encapsulated in a tweet in any satisfactory way.

This afternoon I met Justin at Cafe Provincia for his lunch break. I didn't want to eat anything, but I bought a China Cola and went to the counter to pay for it before sitting down. Now, Cafe Provincia is known by me for playing pretty good music, making it a better lunch spot, atmospherically speaking, than most others in the neighb. Last couple times I was there, if I remember right, I heard Stevie Wonder and the Bee Gees. Today they were playing CBS-FM.

Um, so, okay, [legendary New York oldies station] CBS-FM plays songs from the eighties now? And, like, that means ALL of the eighties. As I attained the counter and put my money on it, the song playing was wait for it wait for it "We Didn't Start the Fire." And so of course, since I do sing along with the radio, the lady who rang me up for my China Cola had to add this to the list, no doubt substantial, of indignities she suffered during work today: me looking her in the eye and going, "Wheel of Fortune, Sally Ride, heavy metal suicide. Foreign jets, homeless vets! AIDS, crack, Bernie Goetz!" I couldn't help it, because that is what was on at that exact moment. And because that is how I am.

Everyone: I'm sorry.

Very Hilarious

2009-07-14T09:34:00.003-04:00

Dramatis Personae: Me, a little seven-year-old girl, and two little boys who I think were brothers (not related to the girl), one her age and one slightly younger.

Setting: West End Avenue, yesterday.

GIRL: I fell off the bunkbeds, but I didn't break my arm! And I didn't break anything!

BOY 1: You didn't break your knee?

GIRL: No.

BOY 1: You didn't break your elbow?

GIRL: No.

BOY 1: You didn't break your --

BOY 2 (interrupts): YOU DIDN'T BREAK YOUR PENIS?

ALL 3 KIDS: (uproarious laughter)

(At this point I start laughing; the younger little boy notices me, smiles slyly, and continues to look back at me to make sure I am still laughing.)

BOY 1: You didn't break your... hair?

GIRL: No!!!

BOY 1: You didn't break your butt crack?

GIRL: No.

BOY 1: You didn't break your butt... cheeks?

GIRL: No.

(I was walking the other way, so unfortunately I was unable to hear the rest of this exchange.)

Existential

2009-07-13T10:03:00.002-04:00

Coffee Quit Fail

2009-07-12T13:21:00.002-04:00

Today was the first day in many, many days that did not begin for me with a cup of coffee. Instead, I got up and walked Tug, then returned here to his home and fed him.

Then, unwilling to do anything else for the couple of hours before my brunch appointment, I went back to sleep.

I slept through my brunch appointment and called and cancelled it. I felt bad that I had to cancel on the nice person who I'd made the appointment with.

Then I went back to sleep.

I had a dream in which I took a scary cooking class with chef Alton Brown where everyone had to shell and fry up a different type of seafood, but many of the seafoods were grotesque facsimiles of mammals. One kind looked just like little blood-red babies and were called "demons." "Ooh, Bruce just made a nice broth with bear shrimp and demons," someone said. My assigned seafood was clams, but I never got to cook or eat any of my clams because they were so hard to open. Chef Alton Brown knelt in front of me and asked me, "Do you have heartbreak?" Then he asked the date I had brought to the class, "Why is she weird?" My date said, "We're both weird," and I noticed that he looked all grey and sickly. My mom was there too.

I woke up and felt sad. I walked Tug again. Then I turned on the radio, returned to bed, and listened to the radio for an hour while snoozing.

Then I arose and made myself a cup of coffee, which I am drinking now.

When It's Time To Change, Then It's Time To Change

2009-07-09T12:20:00.005-04:00

This is not an interesting thing to talk about, but I will say right now that, now, after a couple of very fun writing years post-MFA, I need a change. Stay tuned for updates for the next few months on how grand and sweeping the change is.

Part of the change will involve my getting a driver's license. Just, you know, FYI. I also may try to give up coffee. (I can't believe I just said that last sentence. I think there need to be quotes around some of those words.)

***

I am this week listening to the Romantics, owing to the fact that Sunday I was walking back to the PATH train from Helen's place and heard "What I Like About You" coming out of the shoe store on Newark Ave. Why did that song pique my curiosity right then, though I have heard it ten thousand times before over the course of my entire life and am completely desensitized to it? This phenomenon cannot be explained nor understood.

Post-4th

2009-07-06T09:26:00.000-04:00

Amen Break

2009-07-01T10:39:00.002-04:00

Ryan Lynch put this up yesterday and I listened to it. I have been thinking about it.

Monday Monday Monday

2009-06-29T18:34:00.002-04:00

Thanks, those who reminded me that I have to post a new BPGOIT cartoon today. Here you go.

SOMETHING ELSE ABOUT JAMIE

2009-06-29T10:17:00.002-04:00

Travis set me up on a blind date with the woman I would call The Cackler. Her power was that, when drunk and she laughed, her voice was the sound of comets colliding, if they did so in an atmosphere of oxygen, nitrogen, and the lovely ill-fated trace elements, where organisms lived that could hear the cataclysm.

That's a passage of Jamie Iredell's that I like a lot. Seriously, you should read this guy.

You can now pre-order the delightful chapbook WHEN I MOVED TO NEVADA, written by that same very talented Jamie, through this link right here, and you should. You might remember my mentions of his previous books BEFORE I MOVED TO NEVADA and ATLANTA, both of which I endorse heartily. Yes?

Matt: How It Will Happen

2009-06-26T08:00:00.003-04:00

Great news to wake up to this early morn! My story "Matt: How It Will Happen," which is very short so you should read it, is up now at SmokeLong Quarterly along with great work by Darlin' Neal, Dorianne Laux, Dan Chaon, and many more. I'm proud of this one, yessir. The hunky drawing that accompanies the piece was done by Summer.

Drawing Is The Panacea.*

2009-06-25T10:18:00.005-04:00

So, we know that lately I've been down in the dumps. Yes? We all know this? OK, good. Today I decided, nudged by some unseen hand or other, to look through a file in my file cabinet that I have kept for 10 years or so, full of cartoons and notes. In it is a 2-page comic strip called "Un-Thought-Out Funnies" that's just a bunch of vignettes from the summer right after college, when I was roommates with Gabe. It is so, so touching and good (maybe just to me; hopefully not). I thought about posting it here, but I'd like to save it for another time, when I'm brave enough to compile all those real-life cartoons into one volume. And also, I think now is the time for me to draw another Un-Thought-Out Funnies similar to the one I did back then -- updated, still good, maybe better. And now I feel happier.

Anyway, yeah, it's odd that I should just say that: "Uh, I looked at something I did once! You can't see it!" but it bears mentioning, I think, for some reason.

___
*I had to look up the word "panacea" to make sure I was spelling it right.

The Bipolar Glass of Iced Tea

2009-06-22T10:51:00.002-04:00

By popular demand I've decided to re-introduce the BPGOIT and draw more comics about him. Watch this space on Mondays for updates.