Alicia's Blah Blah Blah

In Cars

2010-07-05T12:01:00.001-07:00

Wow. A whole year since I last posted here. Tempis fugit, yo.

So.

I'm driving around the other day and I see this car stalled and a guy pushing it while another guy sits in the driver's seat, and people whirring around it all impatient and stuff, and it occurs to me how I don't see people pushing cars much anymore. Is it because cars are just better now, more reliable? It seems I used to see cars being pushed a lot, back in the day.

So then I start thinking about my first car, a used '62 Renault Caravelle that my mother bought for $525 when I was 17 and starting college. It was just like this one pictured, a red convertible with 2 tops, but I imbued mine with Flower Power by sticking huge, plastic flowers all over it.

The Red Bullet.

For a while the Red Bullet had no reverse but it was small and light and I could easily push it backwards out of parking spots, but no parallel parking. The points in the voltage regulator would stick. I'd see the needle on the ammeter in the red zone and I’d get out of the car, open the trunk where the engine was, and bang the voltage regulator box with my fist to unstick the points so the battery would charge.

I had generator problems, too, resulting in lots of dead battery issues. I learned how to jump start a car. Solo, no small feat. You had to look for a parking spot that was sort of downhill. I got cozy with Speedy, the AAA guy who looked just like Sonny Bono. He came to jump start me and my car for lots of dead batteries, and sometimes I’d ride around with him on calls. Then I found out he was married. Oh, and a heroin addict.

My well-meaning but dumb friend, Harry, kindly offered to put water in the radiator for me (the Bullet overheated a lot and always needed water), but he filled up the oil tank instead. Not much happened. The Red Bullet was resilient in odd ways.

So I had to add water to it all the time and the radiator cap was on an extension hose-thing from the radiator, directly suspended above the distributor. If you got sloppy with the water, it would drip on the distributor and the car wouldn’t start or it would miss like crazy. I’d have to take the distributor cap off and take the air hose to blow all the spark plugs and connections dry. I learned a lot about cars. That car, anyway.

It was a nightmare of a car most of the time but man, it had traction. That thing hugged the road like a motherfucker; whipped down curvy canyons like a race car. "Hold true, Red Bullet." I actually would say that.

I borrowed my mom's Chevy Nova to take my brother and some of his buddies to the beach to surf. We piled the boards on the car and I tried to hurl through Topanga Canyon like I could in the Bullet, and the Nova wallowed wildly all over the road. We nearly crashed. The Nova was no Bullet.

It didn't do too well going uphill. I think I can, I think I can, I think I can ...

There was a time when the only way to stop the Bullet was to yank up the emergency brake as hard and fast as possible while pumping the foot brake to the floor, and downshifting to second gear. Somehow I avoided a catastrophe until the brakes were fixed.

Driving home from frat parties, stopping, opening the door, vomiting (I’m not proud of this). The Bullet never judged me.

Summer nights, in the wee hours of the morning, my GF, Kathy Poole and I would cruise in the Bullet over to the original Tommy's on Rampart, way before it became a chain burger place. Top down and no reverse. If you don't know L.A., Rampart is and was some bad-ass scary high-crime neighborhood, but we were 18 by then, and therefore, immortal. We smoked weed, a felony in those days, even one seed could put your ass in the Big House, and we’d head over to Tommy's for chili burgers with thick slices of beefsteak tomato and those hot little peppers, all served by ex-cons. We’d sit there bloody eyed, wolfing down our burgers amongst the bad asses. They'd offer to help, though, some of them, when they saw us pushing the Bullet.

I took the Bullet to San Francisco once, with my GF Sandy S. It didn't make it back that trip; there was LSD and a dropped clutch in Sausalito, sleeping on Stinson Beach except not sleeping because of being so high on acid. Sandy and I hitchhiked home to Burbank; it took us a couple of days because we went back through Big Sur. We met some good people along the way that gave us a ride all the way to our homes. Then I took my sister's big white Impala back up to Sausalito and jerry-rigged some kind of tow thing. and towed the Bullet home to drive another day. Only one headlight worked on my sister’s car, and I had cracked a contact lens while camping on the beach on the return trip, so the Impala and I had this one-eyed symmetry going on.

I had the Bullet for about 2 years. I got a job at Blue Cross on Sunset and bought a brand new Mazda 626 via the credit union. I traded the Bullet in but I forgot for how much. I want to say $90. It still had the flowers.

So those guys push the car, I think it was a Toyota, into the Chevron across the street. They were probably out of gas.

Everything Matters! by Ron Currie Jr.!

2009-07-04T11:29:00.000-07:00

I finished EVERYTHING MATTERS! in two besotted days, and I'm in that stunned afterglow full-feeling, teary-eyed reverie of having read something so wickedly funny; so crazy ass absurd yet so profoundly moving/heartbreaking and so oddly but overwhelmingly uplifting. Ron Currie Jr. just blows it out of the park (baseball being a major player here) in oh so many ways.

"You wish they understood as you do, that there is no escape and never was, that from the moment two cells combined to become one they were doomed."

What a ride. Everything matters, kids.

'S Been A While . . .

2009-07-04T10:52:00.000-07:00

This is the 'ketchup edition' because a lot has happened and I've missed it all.

So first, because this blog is about ME, my story "Afterlife" was a Story of the Week over at Narrative Magazine, and what a joy ride that was! Lots of great comments and I felt like a proper writer. For a week. And now to carry on with my big bad self.

Farewell to Farah Fawcett. Charlie's Angels notwithstanding, she was brave and ballsy and my heart goes out to her and her family and mostly to Redmond, her kid.

And Michael Jackson, holy shit! Nothing I can add here to the media voyeur monster machine, but his music was sure a part of my life and my kid's life and his weirdness was always something to marvel at.

Ununbium (112)

2009-06-11T14:49:00.000-07:00

****BERLIN (Reuters) – A new, superheavy chemical element numbered 112 will soon be officially included in the periodic table, German researchers said.

A team in the southwest German city of Darmstadt first produced 112 in 1996 by firing charged zinc atoms through a 120-meter-long particle accelerator to hit a lead target. (Is it just me, or is that kind of hot?)

"The new element is approximately 277 times heavier than hydrogen, making it the heaviest element in the periodic table," the scientists at the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research said in a statement late on Wednesday.

The zinc and lead nuclei were fused to form the nucleus of the new element, also known as Ununbium, Latin for 112.

(blah blah blah, here's the whole Reuters article)

The atomic number 112 refers to the sum of the atomic numbers of zinc, which has 30, and lead, which has 82. Atomic numbers denote how many protons are found in the atom's nucleus. (I love this.)

In 1925, scientists discovered the last naturally occurring element on the periodic table (FYI: Uranium). Since then researchers have sought to create new, heavier elements.

Proving the existence of atoms with such a high mass, the so-called superheavy elements, is a complex procedure because they exist for only tiny fractions of a second and then decay radioactively into other elements.*****

Creating new elements, that's so God Particle. And something about atomic nuclei forcibly fusing to produce something brand new that only exists for fractions of seconds is so Las Vegas, baby.

Freight Stories, No. 5!

2009-06-09T23:56:00.000-07:00

The new issue of Freight Stories is up, with a story by yours truly, "Wreckers", and lots of great reading by some awesome writers. And it's gorgeous! Andrew Scott and Victoria Barrett, the editors, have done a beautiful presentation and I'm all verklempt and shit to be amongst such illustrious company!

Adam is Gay! Duh!

2009-06-09T11:26:00.000-07:00

He comes out in this week's issue of Rolling Stone. Adam Lambert makes me wish I were a young boy.
Or a green snake . . .

Gatekeeping and Vetting for Self-Published Books

2009-06-08T20:26:00.000-07:00

So, expecting a rise in self-published books as a fallout from the publishing recession, IndieReader.com is a new business that promises to vet self-published books for the discerning reader (for a fee of course, that the author puts up).
From the site:

"Books will be chosen for inclusion on the IndieReader site by a panel of editors, literary agents, and marketing professionals, and all categories of books (except for porn) will be represented. There will be a charge for membership; in exchange, authors will get a sales venue and a web page with its own URL. Authors will set their book's retail price and receive 75% of the sales (the buyer will pay for shipping). Authors will have complete control over the editorial content of their sites with no general restrictions on reviews, interviews, video, and audio."

It's a brave new world for entrepreneurship, yo. Via GalleyCat.

Two Journalists Sentenced to 12 Years Hard Labor in No Ko

2009-06-08T19:51:00.000-07:00

Euna Lee and Laura Ling, journalists investigating North Korean refugees, were arrested by North Korean guards on March 17 near the Chinese/North Korean border. They've been tried, convicted, and now sentenced to 12 years of hard labor No Ko style, in a secret high court. No one thinks they're going to serve the time, rather, they'll be used as pawns for political leverage. It's a steaming hot situation, what with sanctions being considered by the U.S. the U.N. and Japan for No Ko's recent forays into nuclear foreplay, and North Korea threatening severe repercussions if that happens.
But here's what gets me: Euna Lee has a 4 year old daughter. What possessed her to go to North Korea? For what, exactly, fame? Glory? Self-actualization? I don't get it. And I hardly have pity when the baby card is pulled for sympathy, because no one twisted her arm to go. I remember having a 4 year old. Nothing could've convinced me to leave him. The way I see it, the duties of motherhood trump everything. EVERYTHING. I guess they thought they'd be safe (in North Korea???)
Color me self-righteously indignant on this one. I hope they're freed and returned home safely. And I hope Euna thinks twice before she takes on another risky job. Wait until the kid is grown some, it happens fast. 4 year olds need their mommies more than we need the scoop on North Korean refugees. Seriously.

What I One-Clicked Today

2009-05-20T23:41:00.000-07:00

Three books, one-click.

Pasha Malla's The Withdrawal Method, which just won Canada's DANUTA GLEED Literary Award for best first collection of short fiction, and may I mention how adorable and funny Pasha Malla is? He scored $10,000 for this one, drinks on Pasha!

Also one-clicked Dennis Lehane's Gone Baby Gone for particular inspiration, and Jhumpa Lahiri's collection Unaccustomed Earth, whose stories, I hear, are so good they make you slit your wrists and gouge out your eyes.

As always, I encourage supporting independent bookstores (but Amazon is so fucking cheap, whaddareya gonna do?)

Giant Gobsmacking American Idol WTF???

2009-05-20T22:56:00.000-07:00

Adam Lambert, American Idol first runner-up? Wha? There's never been a more talented contestant than Adam Lambert, and gimme a boy with eyeliner, nail polish and glitter any day. I think Kris Allen is adorable, or, as the French say, adorable, and talented, yada yada, but Lambert is in a league of his own.

Eh, he's already a supah star and will be just fine. But knock me ovah with a puff of smoke, yo.

Speaking of Hummingbirds

2009-05-15T01:01:00.000-07:00

Hummingbird Skeleton

I'm super fascinated by the hummingbirds drawn to the feeder at my window. Boss Man is wearing himself out keeping other birds away, but they do get in to sneak a few sucks. Apparently, a dominant territorial man-bird will allow a female at his feeder after he's mated with her.

Girl gotta put out to get fed.

Look at the hummingbird's skeleton. Its forked tongue does a long wrap-around the skull and attaches to its forehead. Look at those wing bones, like filigree, and that way-cool neck, like beads. Wow. That little coccyx. I love this creature.

American Idol Redux

2009-05-14T09:15:00.000-07:00

Definitely, the best season ever. Danny Gokey got eliminated last night, but his version of "You Are So Beautiful" made me cry and still haunts me. Kris Allen sang "Heartless" on Tuesday night, and it's one of my favorite Idol performance ever. Kris killed.

And then there's Adam Lambert, all talent and glam angelic goth. They're all shining super stars.

And hey, didn't Jordin Sparks look hot in all her voluptuousness? You go, girl.

And while I'm on the TV subject, this year's Celebrity Apprentice was pure entertainment, despite the nepotistic, ever more weirdly-coiffed pompous and bloviating Donald Trump. I was glad Joan Rivers won, let's hear it for old people! We'll all be there someday (if we're lucky).

Territories

2009-05-13T16:25:00.000-07:00

We have tons of hummingbirds nesting in the pines and silk trees outside my bedroom, so I hied myself to OSH and bought a hummingbird feeder and boiled up some syrup (1 C. sugar in 1 C. water, my mother's tried and true bird recipe) and waited. What I didn't know about hummingbirds is that they're fiercely territorial, but all I had to do was watch to observe it.

If any other hummers come buzzing by to poke into the sugar, one fierce Ruby Throated tsk-tsking fellow who's roundly claimed this feeder as HIS comes darting out of the pine (also his) to bombard the intruder. He will not allow any other bird to partake of the ample supply I've put out for them.

I get it though. I so get it. When my son decided to start cooking I had a hard time letting him into my territory. I get a bit too enraged hunting down the pots and pans that have their own territories the past 30 years that I've lived here. Emptying the dishwasher is another issue, chez moi. I have the matching Oneida Michelangelo silverware, and the stuff I ripped off from the Blue Cross employees' cafeteria (industrial silverware that will outlast the sun) when I was a student nurse supporting myself as a claims examiner part-time. THEY GO IN SEPARATE DRAWERS. At least, they do when I put the dishes away, and being that emptying the dishwasher is one of my least favorite chores . . .

The BF moved in 4 years ago, and there's this thing called "compromise" that's been a little tough for me. You don't wash towels with sheets, for instance, or underwear. YOU WASH THE FUCKING TOWELS WITH TOWELS. So he washes HIS towels with whatever he wants. Compromise. We all do our own laundry.

Meanwhile, this bird's gonna drive himself nuts, and I'm trying to have that mean something to me. It's constant, the shooing away of the invaders. It's gotta be exhausting. I'm getting exhausted just watching him.

One stealthy little bugger just logged a quick suck at the feeder that the boss-man didn't catch. Methinks it must've tasted even sweeter.

Wigleaf Top 50!

2009-05-06T22:05:00.000-07:00

The Wigleaf Top 50

(very) short fictions 2009.

Night Train 9.1

2009-05-03T12:44:00.000-07:00

Is out NOW! Night Train 9.1
Good shit, yo, pull yourself a beer or a cuppa joe and settle in.

It's 4/20 Kids!

2009-04-20T11:16:00.001-07:00

Yes, it's the Columbine anniversary, yes, it's Hitler's birthday, but 4/20 is also a High Holiday for lots of stoner types. It's National Pot Smoking Day, "an unofficial counterculture holiday that is based on the simple concept of smoking some cannabis and being happy. "

Spark one up for freedom, yo.

Writing News!

2009-04-20T08:44:00.000-07:00

The storySouth Million Writers Award Notable Stories of 2008 have been posted, and Narrative Magazine takes the top spot for best online publication with 8 notable stories.

Yours truly and humbly got a nod for "Lobster Girl" in SmokeLong Quarterly, and dearly beloved Night Train got two nods for "The Tree That Girdles Itself" by Donna D. Vitucci, and "Dating 101" by Angie Chau. Kudos, yo!

More shout outs to my darling pal Myfanwy Collins for her wonderful story "Liar" in Pank, to T.J. Forrester for his story "To the Bone" in Storyglossia, which also gets kudos for 5 notable stories this year. A shout out to FRiGG for 2 starred stories, and have you seen FRiGG's new microfiction issue? Sweet fancy MOSES it's good. Be sure to read the hilarious microfiction debate.

And in other writing news, 3 recent acceptances for yours truly and humbly.

"Wreckers" will be in the next issue of Freight Stories
"Fallen" (from my novel-in-stories-work-in-progress) will be in the annual (3rd) annual issue of Pank, along with Matt Bell, David Erlewine and the irrepressible Aaron Burch.
"Birds, Bees" will be in the next issue of The Los Angeles Review.

If I got all this linking right I owe myself a beer.

Spring Fever

2009-04-17T23:29:00.001-07:00

Tip-toeing through
the tulips
Today in Descanso Gardens
La Cañada, California

Olfactory Orgy

Putanesca, Baby.

2009-04-16T17:09:00.000-07:00

Whipped up a sexy pasta puttanesca tonight.

Here's how:

All ingredients from Trader Joe's.

Olive oil
Tin of anchovies
jar of capers, drained
jar of pitted kalamata olives, driained
red pepper flakes (some like it hot)
large can of diced tomatoes
jar of Trader Joe's Arrabiata sauce
about 12 large cloves of garlic, chopped
a fistful of Italian parsley, chopped
bread crumbs, toasted, about a cup
a pound of whole wheat linguine cooked al dente
Parmesan cheese

In a large, cold pan, mix the olive oil and anchovies, turn on the heat low and poke and mash at the anchovies until they start disintegrating. Throw in the garlic and continue cooking with very low heat. When the garlic softens and the anchovies are pretty shredded, add the parsley, and some red pepper flakes, keeping the heat low until the parsley is cooked a little. Turn up the heat to medium or so, not letting the garlic brown, and dump in the canned tomatoes with its juice, more pepper flakes to taste (plenty!), the Arrabiata sauce (or another can of tomatoes in puree), some black pepper, the olives and the capers. Bring it to a good simmer at medium heat for 10 to 15 minutes, then dump in the cooked al dente pasta. Lower the heat and toss it together , then add the toasted bread crumbs, and mix it all up some more. Serve with good parmesan cheese or a parmesan/reggiano mix, and a glass or three of red wine. You can also add some red wine to the sauce in the simmering stage.

Weep for the whores of the world.

WordHustler Redux

2009-04-11T21:43:00.000-07:00

So I sent myself a submission of a 4 page story via WordHustler to check it out. WordHustler sends submissions of 4 pages or less in a 6X9 manila clasp envelope, so the submission is folded in half. They charge $.99 to send it, including an SASE. Anything over 4 pages is sent in a 9X12 or 10X13 manila envelope.

It was sent out yesterday and arrived today.

I'm not CRAZY about a folded submission, but, in this economy, if an editor of a journal that still clings to the old ways (snail mail) gets upset about a folded submission, then it's probably not a magazine I want to be in (okay, that's a lie. Or a rationalization).

The envelope came with a thermal printed postage/mailing label, very professional. The return address is to WordHustler's P.O. Box in Los Angeles. At the bottom of the mailing label in very small print: Prepared with care by WordHustler.com - One Click to Destiny.
Very small print. It doesn't bother me.

Zero complaints about the printed submission: very white, 20 lb stock, cover letter is professional and lovely, no signature, of course. They do have an option of adding a photographed signature. The pages are loose, clipped together with a large, high quality butterfly paper clip, again, very professional. The SASE is printed with my name and address, stamped, and has the WH tracking number printed on there as well. My address in the return address, but it would be the literary magazine's return address in a regular submission.

I communicated via email with WH about the possibility of opting for a full sized manila envelope for a 4 page submission, paying a bit extra for the larger envelope. They aren't set up to do that now.

For submissions over 4 pages, they do use a full-sized manila clasp envelope, and I'm now confident that it's more professional than anything I do on my own at home, being that I address my manilas and SASE's in my big loopy longhand, and plaster on stamps all akimbo.

Two thumbs straight up.

Vonnegut!

2009-04-10T21:58:00.000-07:00

Delacorte Press, Kurt Vonnegut's long-time publisher, announced that Look at the Birdie, a collection of 14 never -before published stories will be coming out in November of this year! 14 never-before published Vonnegut stories!

And more! Read about it here.

American Idol: Au Revoir Scott

2009-04-09T22:15:00.000-07:00

It was time.

WordHustler

2009-04-08T14:39:00.000-07:00

So I'm checking out WordHustler, a submissions service for writers. As more and more and more lit journals have gone to online submissions (!), I've snail-mailed less and less, with the result of ceasing to submit to the places I covet that still only take snail-mail subs. I used to keep a mini post-office at home (because I abhor physically going to the PO) but then USPS kept jacking their rates around making my stamps obsolete, which then made for crazy hodge podges of postage additions, and rows and rows of 1 cent stamps, a giant mess on the manila.

So now with WordHustler, you upload your story (they now take Word.docs and convert them to PDF files for you), you choose a market from their market list, compose a cover letter (which they address to chosen market), they print it all up, stuff it into a manila envelope with thermal printed labels (I do my envelopes in longhand) along with a standard #10 SASE also printed with your address and the return address of the market, and they mail it for you. For a manuscript up to 20 pages it's $5.99. Here's their price list:

Under 4 pages (Query Letters, poetry submissions)

$.99

10 pages (Articles, essays)

$3.99

20 pages (short stories, partial mss, articles, essays)

$5.99

30 pages (short stories, partial mss, articles, short screenplays):

$6.99

50 pages (short stories, partial mss, articles, short screenplays):

$8.99

Over 50 pages (Screenplays, Manuscripts, Novels, Non-Fiction Books)

$0.10/page

All of our prices include tracking, postage, and free SASEs!

If you want to include a receipt/reply postcard, it's an additional $1.29 (or so). If you're traveling the world you can use their Virtual Office and have the SASE's returned to them, and they'll update your profile online so you can see you've been rejected by AQR while sipping chai in Mumbai.

You get a free submission when you sign up. I did it. I sent a story to Black Warrior Review. Pretty cool. And since it was free, I included a receipt postcard, postage paid and self-addressed. If it works like it's supposed to a black warrior will drop that postcard into a postal out-box, and I will know BW got my story.

As an aside, snail-mail/SASE submissions give that mailman-anticipation-buzz. Now that I mainly submit online and have no outstanding SASEs, I have lackluster interest in what comes in the snailmail box. It's kind of fun to anticipate mail, even if the presence of one of your SASEs is rarely anything good.

Anyhoo, now all I have to do is hurry up and wait. I'll update the experience.

American Idol

2009-04-08T13:49:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I have a little TV addiction problem, one of my vices being American Idol. This year I think the competition is hot. 16 year old Allison rocks the kasbah with her Janis Joplin vibes, Matt is a little Michael Bubbly (you know who I mean), and I loved his Part Time Lover rendition from last night. And then there's ***A*D*A*M***. Adam Lambert has the kind of talent, not just chops but a whole sensibility, that has already launched him into the super star stratosphere in Alicia's Universe. From devastating looks to vocals that don't stop to what the new chick judge (Kara?) calls artistry. Because that's what it is, art, interpreting (and choosing) tunes according to his own private Adam Vision and belting them out with his giant talent.

Lil is talented (yawn) but too much same-old-same-old. Kris is adorable and talented, a contender for sure, but he doesn't have the consistency of, say, ADAM (doh). Anyway, it's a great season IMO. Who's going home today? I think it's got to be Scott (enough already).

More Narrative and a Demand for Pith:The American Short Story

2009-04-06T08:56:00.000-07:00

A good article in yesterday's NYT about the short story inspired by near simultaneous new biographies of Flannery O'Connor, Donald Barthelme and John Cheever.

"Reading through their collected stories, you wonder if novels are even necessary. The imperial ambitions of a certain kind of swaggering, self-important American novel — to comprehend the totality of modern life, to limn the social, existential, sexual and political strivings of its citizens — start to seem misguided and buffoonish. More of life is glimpsed, and glimpsed more clearly, through Barthelme’s fragments, Cheever’s finely ground lenses or the pinhole camera of O’Connor’s crystalline prose."

The article by A. O. Scott goes on to say that these three writers "shared the good fortune of writing at mid-century, when the institutions of print supported the flourishing of the short story as never before or since." Well, yeah, maybe, but we've got the world wide web today, and I'll venture to say (without knowing anything really) that the dissemination of pith and narrative is at its height, even if you can't make living off of it like in the days of mass-circulation magazines.

(As an aside, the photo is of Flannery O'Connor's typewriter. How much lower the slush piles must've been back in the days of the manual typewriter and carbon copies! The word processor has generated the writer-wannabe in slush glutting droves, which in turn has spawned the evolution of the low-res MFA program as well as countless other MFA programs, all generating moolah for universities and short fiction like weeds in an empty lot in rainy season.)

Scott suggests that the Kindle might parallel the iPod's effect on music and revive the short story's popularity. I dunno. It's easy to listen to music, something you can do either actively or passively. Much/most contemporary short fiction requires concentration and a high level of reading skills, too demanding maybe, for mass consumption. Literary short fiction tends to be incestuously consumed by literary short fiction writers. Kindle might be conducive in reviving that old conceit: The Plot! Short fiction where shit actually happens!

Anyhoo, anything that touts the short story (and snorts at the novel) gets a solid woo hoo from this incestuous girl writer.

The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers

2009-04-05T18:23:00.000-07:00

Photo of Carson McCullers

I don't know why I never read this before. It's been the kind of wonderful book that could wholly take me away to another place and time for the half hour, hour that I've spent with it at a time. Carson McCullers was 23 when she wrote this, and that freaking blows my mind.

It's an extraordinary book. First published in 1940, and one of the characters, a black doctor, Doctor Copeland, says this:

"I have a program. It is a very simple, concentrated plan to lead more than one thousand Negroes in this country on a march. A march to Washington. All of us together in one solid body."

In 1940, the fictional Doctor Copeland had a dream. 1940. The enormous empathy and humanity and prescience that McCullers, a woman who grew up in the South, had at that tender age for the plight of the black man freaking flumoxes me. I have McCullers fever.

The book is largely about delusion, too, the delusions humans use to make life easier, to cope with slings and arrows, much like religion. Mr. Singer is singular in that he's a deaf-mute, an "other" that the various characters put their Jesus figure spin on, being as his muteness makes him somewhat ethereal and unfathomable. His quiet, attentive patience makes him like a blank Scrabble tile, played to fill each character's need. And then Singer has his own delusion in the passion he has for his friend, Spiros Antonapoulos, who is presented to the reader as a simple (as in mentally challenged), indifferent boor. And the good Mr. Singer inexplicably adores this oaf, to the tune that when Antonapoulos dies, Singer commits suicide. It's astounding, really, how complex and yet wholly true and heartbreaking it all is, and how this book explores human isolation and despair, and the nimble way we humans scramble to find a way to live with it all.

McCullers titillates, too, with Biff Brannon's inappropriate attraction for 12 year-old Mick Kelly, building tension as you wonder if he's going to go all Humbert Humbert. There's a whiff of pedophilia in the air that dissipates (pedophilia-like) when at the end he begins to see Mick losing her childishness after she gets a full-time job at Woolworth's to help out the family. There's also titillation in the inexplicable fondness that Singer has for Spiro Antonapoulos, as in: are they 'mos? The question is subtly posed; never answered. I love this. It keeps my Curious Yellow gland excited.

Craft note: Anyone wanting to nail dialect should-oughtta read this book. It some good dialect.

I officially love this book.

Moroccan Hashish

2009-03-23T20:45:00.000-07:00

Come with me to the kasbah.

Natasha Richardson

2009-03-21T09:53:00.000-07:00

Truly tragic, and we all know about it because she was 1) a celebrity in her own right, 2) married to a celeb, Liam Neeson and, 3) comes from a celebrity family, the Redgraves. And I'm not going to digress about the word "celebrity" here, but it's an interesting word.

I'm inordinately fascinated by causes of death, and this one is no exception. She had an epidural bleed, a medical/surgical emergency, allegedly from a small fall on a bunny slope (and you do wonder how small that fall really was). Then a fatal comedy of errors, blowing off paramedics, a delay to get to a medical center, in hindsight, so many shoulda this, shoulda thats, with the result that a healthy, vibrant mother, wife, daughter, actress is now dead, no re-dos. That she's a celebrity brings it all into world focus, the uber fragility of life, the nothingness of our individual existences, and yet, the everything factor of them.

She was a perfect candidate to be an organ donor, but nothing was said about that. I would think the family was approached; it's kind of a hospital's mandate to approach a family in these circumstances to donate much needed organs, and maybe the hospital staff did and maybe Natasha's family agreed, understandably electing to not publicize this to avoid the media frenzy that would carry over to the recipient. I hope her organs were harvested because I know some non-celeb person somewhere is dying for her heart, her lungs, her liver, a kidney.

If you're an atheist, in my opinion, this kind of stuff makes life even more precious, cuz baby, this is it, one fast whirl on the planet, liable to go up in a puff of nowhere fast. I'm gonna take this tragedy and do something fun because of it, something rewarding, decadent, something life-affirming. I'm gonna take a moment or ten and think of how lucky I am at this moment in time to not have anything greater than a stinking economic crisis to worry about. I'm going to see the tax man today, get that out of the way, and then go see my best pals at the beach (with the BF at my side, natch), observe the earth (it might rain in L.A. today, woo hoo!), drink champagne and toast to life. Natasha, I promise a sad-but-somehow-merry libation to you.

2009-03-20T17:34:00.000-07:00

SmokeLong Quarterly Issue 24 is LIVE. Light up the smokeable of your choice and go there.

Yates Fever

2009-03-16T16:35:00.000-07:00

Richard Yates

I found this: Richard Yates hisself reading his short story, "The Best of Everything". It's totally cool to hear him read it. So don't say I never gave ya anything.

Some Writing News

2009-03-14T13:12:00.000-07:00

When I'm out and about in my car or grocery shopping* or walking the dog, I think of brilliant and witty blog posts, and resolve to get in here and turn the blog world on end with my shrewd and zany blahgspot observations, my pithy opinions. Then I sit in front of this thing and d'oh.

So, some writing news: I have a tawdry whirl of addiction called "Tango" that just came up at DOGZPLOT, and may I say that Barry Graham is one cool cat.

I'm another bridesmaid, pulling up as a finalist in Narrative Magazine's Fall Fiction Contest, and I'm as happy as lemon meringue pie that they will be publishing "Afterlife" as a Story of the Week in the sometime future.

And a short story "Gravitas" is forthcoming in Hobart 10.

Enough about me, let's talk about you for a minute. What do YOU think of me?**

*In this time of the New Frugality, I'm cooking a lot more and enjoying it too. Tonight I'm-a making a version of pizzoccheri: pasta with cabbage, kale, leeks, potatoes, sage and butter, fontina, Parmesan, gruyere.
Addendum: It was finger lickin' good.

**And apropos of nothing, may Bernie Madoff rot in hell.

2009

2009-01-22T12:41:00.000-08:00

It's a New Year and we have a new president, and HOPE is the buzzword. Here's hoping. So far, 2009 has had its rough patches for yours truly, the worst being the sudden and unexpected death of my beloved Stevie, my female wheaten terrier. She would've been 10 in March. On the morning of January 5th, she howled and died instantly, and all the king's horses and all the king's men . . .

We still have Jimi gracing us, who turned 12 in December, but without Steve it's like one hand clapping. She was a jewel, a truly sweet little girl who loved mountain meadows and wading in an icy creek, riding in cars and a good dinner. She was a real mama's girl, adoration personified (canineified?) I miss her awfully.

Then, I lost a very valuable ruby from a ring my mother had given me years ago, a microwave blew and caught fire, and I had to replace a brand new tire because of a nail puncture, and I caught a cold. I'm just assuming that the Fates had to get this crap out of the way so the rest of the year can soar.

Amen.

SmokeLong Quarterly's 5th Birthday!

2008-06-16T14:07:00.000-07:00

The new issue of SmokeLong Quarterly is up, and it's a big, fat beauty! Hearty congratulations to SmokeLong, Dave Clapper, its superfine editor, and to all the staff for this glorious 5th Anniversary issue.

Click on the cover to see the writers gracing this issue (okay, I'm in it), then pour yourself a cuppa Joe, a tumbler of scotch, put your feet up and dig in!

Five Star Literary Stories

2008-05-02T11:22:00.000-07:00

It's new and it's swell. T. J. Forrester has put together this new and unique literary site and what I'm sayin is you should check it out.

New Short Fiction Series

2008-05-02T10:58:00.000-07:00

I'm up. May 9 at the Beverly Hills Public Library. I'm having nightmares. I dreamt I was dressed in rags and had to borrow the BF's sweater. I dreamt that I looked at my watch and realized I'd missed the whole thing.

The actors are reading 4 of my short stories: "You Go", "Birds, Bees", "Wreckers", and "Toggling the Switch".

Pray for me.

Well Blow Me Down

2008-04-30T20:50:00.000-07:00

I just found out today that my story "Desilu, Three Cameras" published in FRiGG has been chosen as a Notable Story of 2007 in storySouth's Million Writers Award, 2008! And this makes me very happy! And it even got an asterisk, meaning more than one preliminary judge nominated it! Lucy, Ricky, Fred and Ethel!

Is it too narcissistic to mention I won this award back in 2005 for "Toggling the Switch"?

Because I did!

Tobias Wolff at Word Theater

2008-04-28T12:19:00.000-07:00

Saturday night I hauled the BF kicking and screaming to see and hear Tobias Wolff read from his new collection Our Story Begins: New and Selected Stories at M-Bar in Hollywood where Word Theater hosts many of its events. The book contains "selected stories", including my all time favorite "Bullet in the Brain" ("Short's the best position they is" ... ), and 10 new stories. The readings were of 4 of the new stories.

David Clennon (Miles Drentell in thirtysomething) read "That Room", a short, powerful story where tragedy is avoided via a well-timed puke. It sounds funny, but it opens a door to "that room"—like the Hotel California, once you enter it, you can never leave.

Wendy Makkena (Sister Act) read "The White Bible", a story of an immigrant man who kidnaps his son's teacher because she has caught the son cheating on an exam and has promised he will be expelled. The kidnapper admonishes her not to report his boy because he has dreams of his son becoming a doctor like he was in his native country (somewhere where they name their boys "Hassan"). The shift of power comes soon, and then she's in charge, and yes, she will report the son, who's been cheating all year. She dashes the dreams of the kidnapper:

"Wait—just listen. Honestly, now, can you picture Hassan in medical shcool? Even supposing he could get in? Even supposing he can get through college at all? Think about it—Hassan in medical school. What an idea! You could make a comedy—Hassan Goes to Medical School. No, Hassan will not be a doctor. And you know it. You have always known it."

I mean, girl don't flinch! Then she asks him, "Suppose I'd promised not to report Hassan. Whatever made you think I'd keep my word?"

And he pulls out a little, white, girl's Bible.

Imitation leather. With gilt letters on the cover.

That he got at Goodwill.

"You would swear," he said. "Like in court, to the judge."

Aaaaaaahhhhhh. And by then, you know, Wolff has you. He's reeled you in and you're happy to be flopping on the bottom of his boat. Wendy Makenna did an awesome reading of it.

Robert Forster (Jackie Brown, Mulholland Drive) read "Down to Bone" about a son and his dying mother. It's funny, wry, bawdy, and then, when you least expect it, your heart breaks as the man who no longer knows how to be a son, becomes a father to the dying woman, because that's something he still knows how to do.

And then Wolff read "Her Dog" to completely annihilate and exhilarate. Oh it was a grand night.

I ran into my friend Scott Doyle there, and also one of my early writing teachers from UCLA Extension, Lou Mathews, so that was cool. And I didn't prostrate, fawn and gush even though I wanted to hug Wolff's legs. I wanted to go all Mary Magdalene on his ass, but I didn't. I didn't even get my book signed because of the throng thing. We left and I retold the stories to my darling who hasn't much of an attention span for these kinds of things but whom I cherish for his good sportsmanship and love and who honors me with his company and support.

That's the Tobias Wolff report.

Some Writing News

2008-01-15T03:41:00.000-08:00

A couple of nice things to usher in 2008, the first being that my short story "Wreckers" was a finalist in the StoryQuarterly Fiction Contest, and it won a tidy $100 (thank you); and my story "Back Wash" was given a loverly acceptance by StoryGlossia. And a rejection from Ninth Letter, the swankiest literary rag evah, said they were VERY impressed with my writing. VERY.

Happy New Year, by the way. I say this like I have a readerhood. Blogging is so bizarre.

Lorrie Moore Gets Political

2008-01-15T03:23:00.000-08:00

My heroine short story writer Lorrie Moore has written an Op-Ed for the New York Times where she asserts that electing a woman is last year's role model. It seems she's making a case for Obama because he'd be a better role model for today's Lost Boys, who are sadly lacking vibrant men to look up to. She says girls have a whole slew of erstwhile role models, that womenfolk have arrived. We're done.

Oh, Joseph, I'm So Tired

2007-12-06T10:55:00.000-08:00

Okay, this is the title of one of my favorite stories by Richard Yates, and if you haven't read his short stories, you are missing something.

But this post is to rant, because I'm so tired, tired of waiting, tired of waiting for these damn magazines that take for freaking ever to respond to story submissions. You send out your work and then wait and wait and wait, often to be rewarded months later by a fucking form rejection. Every morning I open my computer breathlessly to check my email (all my submissions at the moment are electronic) and all I get are Facebook things and bill statements and ads from Land's End or Amazon.

But it's going to rain in L.A.! Yay! Yay!

Sometimes You Just Have to Pee in the Sink

2007-12-03T22:43:00.001-08:00

Bukowski a Nazi sympathizer?
Charles Bukowski lived in a bungalow on DeLongpre in Hollywood from 1963 to 1972, and now the city of Los Angeles wants to make it a cultural landmark, much to the chagrin of the current owners, who were trying to sell it as a $1.3 million tear-down.

Co-owner Victoria Gureyeva, who is Jewish, says Bukowski "loved Hitler" and she's not going to let L.A. turn the property into a landmark. She says she will enlist the help of local Jewish activists to prevent it. Read the details here.

Maybe turning it into a dive bar would be a more appropriate homage. I'd raise a glass or six to that.

Kalifornia

2007-12-03T11:33:00.000-08:00

So. A friend of a friend of mine, an insufferable, reckless woman, or so I hear, decided to conduct a social experiment and investigate Medical Marijuana. California has approved the "medical" use of marijuana, a Compassionate Use Act, but the Feds still say pot's illegal, even though the state says it's fine, and we have the Kalifornia Konundrum.

Here's the deal:
To obtain medical marijuana you have to go to a health professional, usually an MD, who "recommends" your use of marijuana for Whatever Ails You. Whatever Ails You can be just about anything, and in my FOAF's case, what ailed her was arthritis. The doctor, a thirty-something, very serious, stocky man who explained he would never, ever recommend cannabis for recreational use, only for What Ails You, spent a long time with my FOAF, so I hear, explaining the many ways to manage pain, and just when she thought he was going to turn her down for not taking enough Aleve, he wrote the recommendation, an officially sealed document on good ecru colored stock, and valid for 1 year. For this, the reckless arthritic woman paid $150 cash. She told my friend that the clinic waiting room was teeming. She said it was a diverse group, from the elderly and the rickety to another MD (attired in a suit and tie) patiently awaiting his "recommendation", as well as the usual friendly-if-skanky types you might expect in such a "joint" (so to speak). She also said that the cult classic Reefer Madness was playing on a television set in the waiting room, providing ironic ambience.

So then, recommendation in arthritic hand, the plucky, reckless and enterprising woman sought out a "pharmacy", and this is where the story gets good. This FOAF went to one of the many "pharmacies" advertised in the clinic (the clinic is only to get recommendations). Outside at the given address, the signage indicated a nail shop, the windows covered and a security gate in place. She rang the buzzer, she told my friend, and was buzzed in to a clean, well-lighted place that reeked of slaughtered skunk. She signed in and sat to wait. When her turn came, she was ushered into another, private room filled with jars and jars of fine, perfumed sinsemilla, as well as cookies, brownies, and other products. "We just moved here," the cheerful clerk reportedly told her. "We'll be getting more stock soon: edibles, hashish and lollypops by next week.

LOLLYPOPS!

She bought a half ounce of OG Kush for $175, and my friend hasn't seen her since.

The BF

2007-12-02T12:18:00.001-08:00

He's a baaaadass mo fo, and this here's the proof.

Saturday Night Fever

2007-12-02T09:35:00.001-08:00

Last night the BF and I went out on a date. We hit Zono Sushi for dinner, and I had the Seafood Soba Salad, an artful presentation of freshly cooked-to-order buckwheat noodles and mixed greens in a pungent wasabi/soy/lemon dressing and studded with tide pool shit, dee-licious always. The BF ordered the weekend special with teriyaki salmon and sashimi, and we kept to green tea in interest of staying awake (our beloved Sapporo is super but soporific).

Then we hied on down through Hollywood, but first, we hit the drive-thru Baskin Robbins for sugar cones of Jamoca Almond Fudge. Happily slurping these in the BF's shiny new Prius, we got to the Farmer's Market and walked around, incorporating the adjacent The Grove in our evening promenade. If you're not familiar with The Grove, it's a mega mall, Disneyland's Main Street, USA meets Shopping America. It's all done up for Christmas, complete with hordes and hordes of holiday shoppers of the white, affluent persuasion, and we got some coffee and people watched, feeling festive and even a little gay. We bought tangerines and pears and bananas (pomegranates were $3.98 each, why, you could buy a gallon of gasoline for that. Unlike Persephone, we passed on the 'granates), and then:

We hied our asses to the Regency Theater on Beverly and Fairfax to see He Was a Quiet Man starring Christian Slater, who plays a sick nerd, the kind that goes beserk and goes on shooting rampages, and that's pretty much what happens. I'm a jerk for quirk, but this one, this one, no.

Then we went home. The BF was horny, I wasn't, that was the end of that.

New Books!

2007-12-01T23:49:00.000-08:00

Two new additions arrived today to grace the piles on my bed, the stacks on my dressers :

The New Granta Book of the American Short Story edited and intro'd by Richard "Ol' Blue Eyes Hisself" Ford, a 750 page monster, and
Who I Was Supposed to Be, a slim collection of short stories by Susan Perabo.

Happy happy joy joy.

Ode to the Pomegranate Martini

2007-12-01T23:18:00.000-08:00

It's a thing of beauty, this drink, made with the beautifully perfumed Pama Pomegranate liqueur. Friday night the BF and I went out and I consumed not one, not two, but three of these beauties at Woktano, along with some miso soup and a sashimi salad. After, we wandered over to the dollar book store for drunken book-browsing. We capped off the night at Granville with beautiful glass of Five Rivers Pinot Noir, and a fresh berry shortcake.

Alas, I slept in my clothes that night, and woke up to a disturbing, whirling headache, but it was gone by noon.

Right to Choose

2007-11-29T10:12:00.000-08:00

If old, white, male Republicans could get pregnant, abortion would not be an issue.

Baby Daddy

2007-11-28T17:49:00.001-08:00

It's a Jerry Springer Nation

So today, listening to the news, they announce a new over-the-counter DNA Paternity Test. It comes with two swabs for $10. You swab the inside cheeks of the suspect baby-daddy and the baby, and then you send the swabs to a lab and it costs something like $120 (it might've been $200 something?) for the results, which are said to be 99.9% accurate in answering the poignant question, Who my baby-daddy?

Over the counter kids, next to the EPTs.

Welcome to my Blahg

2007-11-28T17:44:00.000-08:00

I'll be fumbling along here, trying to make sense of this. Hopefully no one will stumble across it.

Under 4 pages (Query Letters, poetry submissions)	$.99
10 pages (Articles, essays)	$3.99
20 pages (short stories, partial mss, articles, essays)	$5.99
30 pages (short stories, partial mss, articles, short screenplays):	$6.99
50 pages (short stories, partial mss, articles, short screenplays):	$8.99
Over 50 pages (Screenplays, Manuscripts, Novels, Non-Fiction Books)	$0.10/page