A nice place for lunch
Sunday, April 16, 2006
Wednesday, April 05, 2006
A Little Calmer...I think
Unfortunately, this blog posts things in reverse, so you may want to read this after you read the post that comes next.
I'm a little calmer today and will apologize a little more about what I wrote last night. I still want to encourage people to attempt to read something that will challenge them if you are one of those people who reads all these mind-numbing pop novels (if you're holding a book with a hot pink cover, I'm talking to you)...you know what, nevermind. Read whatever you want. We're all adults here (probably) and I have no business telling you what to do with your time. My frustrations are my own. I just wish America had a little more class is all--paid a little more attention to quality of life. All this plastic shit floating around in the world and houses that look like they might fall apart at the first strong wind, and fast food taking the place of a meal prepared with attention and care, and strip malls tearing down all our natural places...it's all too much for me sometimes. Take a fuckin' breather America. There's no trophy for being first, just a bunch of pissed off neighbors that can't wait until all our resources run out so they can point and laugh. We're like the cocky little teenager of the world, just snubbing our nose at a bunch of culturally rich, mature nations who could really care less about competing with us. They'd rather spend time with their families and travel than work eighty hours a week. Can you believe the nerve of some people? I think some countries even have food that doesn't come through a window in a parking lot. And they call that success...psh!
I hate ranting. I rant because I care. I don't mean to offend. I don't mean to judge. I just want you to be a healthy, happy, educated individual. Not a softy. Discipline is important. I'm just saying that no matter who you are, you are capable of so much more than you even know and progressive people make for a progressive country. We don't have to be miserable, we don't have to work jobs that treat us like shit, we don't have to breath polluted air and drink polluted water, we don't have to sit back and watch horrible mind-numbing shit on TV while praying that things just kind of work themselves out. What you do matters. Wake up. Play along. There's a whole world out there to explore. It might take some sacrifice. You may have to--gasp!--go without something now and again, but the benefits of a slower, more mindful, and rich lifestyle will change your life and change our country. It's not all about money. It's not not about money. It just isn't ALL about money.
Breathing in, I am relaxed. Breathing out, I am alive.
I'm a little calmer today and will apologize a little more about what I wrote last night. I still want to encourage people to attempt to read something that will challenge them if you are one of those people who reads all these mind-numbing pop novels (if you're holding a book with a hot pink cover, I'm talking to you)...you know what, nevermind. Read whatever you want. We're all adults here (probably) and I have no business telling you what to do with your time. My frustrations are my own. I just wish America had a little more class is all--paid a little more attention to quality of life. All this plastic shit floating around in the world and houses that look like they might fall apart at the first strong wind, and fast food taking the place of a meal prepared with attention and care, and strip malls tearing down all our natural places...it's all too much for me sometimes. Take a fuckin' breather America. There's no trophy for being first, just a bunch of pissed off neighbors that can't wait until all our resources run out so they can point and laugh. We're like the cocky little teenager of the world, just snubbing our nose at a bunch of culturally rich, mature nations who could really care less about competing with us. They'd rather spend time with their families and travel than work eighty hours a week. Can you believe the nerve of some people? I think some countries even have food that doesn't come through a window in a parking lot. And they call that success...psh!
I hate ranting. I rant because I care. I don't mean to offend. I don't mean to judge. I just want you to be a healthy, happy, educated individual. Not a softy. Discipline is important. I'm just saying that no matter who you are, you are capable of so much more than you even know and progressive people make for a progressive country. We don't have to be miserable, we don't have to work jobs that treat us like shit, we don't have to breath polluted air and drink polluted water, we don't have to sit back and watch horrible mind-numbing shit on TV while praying that things just kind of work themselves out. What you do matters. Wake up. Play along. There's a whole world out there to explore. It might take some sacrifice. You may have to--gasp!--go without something now and again, but the benefits of a slower, more mindful, and rich lifestyle will change your life and change our country. It's not all about money. It's not not about money. It just isn't ALL about money.
Breathing in, I am relaxed. Breathing out, I am alive.
Tuesday, April 04, 2006
Ideas In Reality
If my life were a boxing match, as I sometimes believe it to be, between the grandiose, idealistic, dreamer in my head and that side of myself that is firmly rooted in the logical, heart-breaking reality that is day to day life out in the world, I would have to say that reality has been winning the last few rounds.
It was brought to my attention that I haven't posted anything in awhile now, and to be perfectly honest it's because I haven't felt anything but intense disappointment since I finished writing back in February. Writing...real writing...good writing that inspires thought and conversation is a lost art. No one even knows what good writing is anymore because the only books anyone ever hears about are the ones that make it on the Oprah Book Club list. And to get angry about Oprah is ridiculous because at least she's getting people to read at all.
My beef is this: A good book should not only be an interesting story, well crafted and well written, but should also inspire a person to think and consider alternate realities to the one they live in. Today's best-selling stories are neither thought-provoking or well written (which means the majority of us aren't reading the good stuff. Which means the majority of us writers can't write the good stuff that won't sell). Today's books are crap. And no one even knows they're crap because after reading big pieces of crap for the last fifteen years or so to read a slightly smaller piece of crap seems revolutionary. Yes, I'm talking about the Da Vinci Code and other books of this nature. For Christ sake! If this is what passes for an intellectual conversation in America I'm leaving. My grandmother told me about the Knights of Templar when I was maybe ten--not a new idea. Fifteen years later some asshole writes a fictional story--a FICTIONAL STORY--about it and this whole Bible-thumpin' country loses their minds. Here's the first hint to reading a good book, if your Christian book group endorses it, it probably isn't going to get your synapses all a firin'. You might have to journey out past your cookie-cutter version of an all powerful being who helps your favorite basketball team win to learn something new. I promise He won't get HIS feelings hurt (even if HE is a SHE--huh? Back up! My mind's gonna explode. Someone pray for this lost soul.).
Anyway, I apologize--but only slightly--for this fanatical outlashing. I'm mostly frustrated with myself, because instead of sticking to my ideals of what good art is and isn't I went and wrote a serial-killer suspense novel in the hopes that this conservative (but mass killer loving) nation might read it. It won't happen again. From here on in my stories will have more depth and quality, even if I am the only one who ever reads them.
It was brought to my attention that I haven't posted anything in awhile now, and to be perfectly honest it's because I haven't felt anything but intense disappointment since I finished writing back in February. Writing...real writing...good writing that inspires thought and conversation is a lost art. No one even knows what good writing is anymore because the only books anyone ever hears about are the ones that make it on the Oprah Book Club list. And to get angry about Oprah is ridiculous because at least she's getting people to read at all.
My beef is this: A good book should not only be an interesting story, well crafted and well written, but should also inspire a person to think and consider alternate realities to the one they live in. Today's best-selling stories are neither thought-provoking or well written (which means the majority of us aren't reading the good stuff. Which means the majority of us writers can't write the good stuff that won't sell). Today's books are crap. And no one even knows they're crap because after reading big pieces of crap for the last fifteen years or so to read a slightly smaller piece of crap seems revolutionary. Yes, I'm talking about the Da Vinci Code and other books of this nature. For Christ sake! If this is what passes for an intellectual conversation in America I'm leaving. My grandmother told me about the Knights of Templar when I was maybe ten--not a new idea. Fifteen years later some asshole writes a fictional story--a FICTIONAL STORY--about it and this whole Bible-thumpin' country loses their minds. Here's the first hint to reading a good book, if your Christian book group endorses it, it probably isn't going to get your synapses all a firin'. You might have to journey out past your cookie-cutter version of an all powerful being who helps your favorite basketball team win to learn something new. I promise He won't get HIS feelings hurt (even if HE is a SHE--huh? Back up! My mind's gonna explode. Someone pray for this lost soul.).
Anyway, I apologize--but only slightly--for this fanatical outlashing. I'm mostly frustrated with myself, because instead of sticking to my ideals of what good art is and isn't I went and wrote a serial-killer suspense novel in the hopes that this conservative (but mass killer loving) nation might read it. It won't happen again. From here on in my stories will have more depth and quality, even if I am the only one who ever reads them.
Tuesday, March 21, 2006
Friday, February 10, 2006
Excerpts from Fates Worse Than Death
"Scientists, for all their creativity, will never discover a method for making people deader than dead. So if some of you are worried about being hydrogen-bombed, you are merely fearing death. There is nothing new in that. If there weren't any hydrogen bombs, death would still be after you. And what is death but an absence of life? That's all it is. That is all it ever can be.
Death is nothing. What is all the fuss about?
...I will not waste your time with trivial fates, which are only marginally worse than death. Suppose we were conquered by an enemy, for example, who didn't understand our wonderful economic system, and so Braniff Airlines and International Harvester and so on all went bust, and millions of Americans who wanted to work couldn't find any jobs anywhere. Or suppose we were conquered by an enemy who was too cheap to take good care of children and old people. Or suppose we were conquered by an enemy who wouldn't spend money on anything but weapons for World War Three. These are all tribulations we could live with, if we had to--although God forbid.
...But suppose enemies came ashore in great numbers, because we lacked the means to stop them, and they pushed us out of our homes and off our ancestral lands, and into swamps and deserts. Suppose that they even tried to destroy our religion, telling us that our Great God Jehovah, or whatever we wanted to call Him, was as ridiculous as a piece of junk jewelry.
Again: this is a wringer millions of Americans have already been through--or are still going through. It is another catastrophe which Americans can endure, if they have to--and still, miraculously, maintain some measure of dignity, or self-respect.
As bad as life is for our Indians, they still like it better than death.
...So I haven't had much luck, have I, in identifying fates worse than death. Crucifixion is the only clear winner so far, and we aren't about to be crucified. We aren't abuot to be enslaved, either--to be treated as white Americans used to treat black Americans. And no potential enemy that I have heard of wants to come over here to treat all of us the way we still treat American Indians.
What other fates worse than death could I name? Life without petroleum?
...In melodramas of a century ago, a female's loss of virginity outside of holy wedlock was sometimes spoken as a fate worse than death. I hope that isn't what the Pentagon or the Kremlin has in mind--but you never know.
I would rather die for virginity than for petroleum, I think. It's more literary, somehow.
...Now look what has happened. Thanks to modern communications, we have seen sights and heard sounds from virtually every square mile of the land mass on this planet. Millions of us have actually visited more exotic places than had many explorers during my childhood. Many of you have been to Timbuktu. Many of you have been to Katmandu. My dentist just got home from Fiji. He told me all about Fiji. If he had taken his fingers out of my mouth, I would have told him about the Galapagos Islands.
So we now know for certain that there are no potential human enemies anywhere who are anything but human beings almost exactly like ourselves. They need food. How amazing. They love their children. How amazing. They obey their leaders. How amazing. They think like their neighbors. How amazing.
Thanks to modern communications, we now have something we never had before: reason to mourn deeply the death or wounding of any human being on any side in any war."
-Kurt Vonnegut (1991)
Death is nothing. What is all the fuss about?
...I will not waste your time with trivial fates, which are only marginally worse than death. Suppose we were conquered by an enemy, for example, who didn't understand our wonderful economic system, and so Braniff Airlines and International Harvester and so on all went bust, and millions of Americans who wanted to work couldn't find any jobs anywhere. Or suppose we were conquered by an enemy who was too cheap to take good care of children and old people. Or suppose we were conquered by an enemy who wouldn't spend money on anything but weapons for World War Three. These are all tribulations we could live with, if we had to--although God forbid.
...But suppose enemies came ashore in great numbers, because we lacked the means to stop them, and they pushed us out of our homes and off our ancestral lands, and into swamps and deserts. Suppose that they even tried to destroy our religion, telling us that our Great God Jehovah, or whatever we wanted to call Him, was as ridiculous as a piece of junk jewelry.
Again: this is a wringer millions of Americans have already been through--or are still going through. It is another catastrophe which Americans can endure, if they have to--and still, miraculously, maintain some measure of dignity, or self-respect.
As bad as life is for our Indians, they still like it better than death.
...So I haven't had much luck, have I, in identifying fates worse than death. Crucifixion is the only clear winner so far, and we aren't about to be crucified. We aren't abuot to be enslaved, either--to be treated as white Americans used to treat black Americans. And no potential enemy that I have heard of wants to come over here to treat all of us the way we still treat American Indians.
What other fates worse than death could I name? Life without petroleum?
...In melodramas of a century ago, a female's loss of virginity outside of holy wedlock was sometimes spoken as a fate worse than death. I hope that isn't what the Pentagon or the Kremlin has in mind--but you never know.
I would rather die for virginity than for petroleum, I think. It's more literary, somehow.
...Now look what has happened. Thanks to modern communications, we have seen sights and heard sounds from virtually every square mile of the land mass on this planet. Millions of us have actually visited more exotic places than had many explorers during my childhood. Many of you have been to Timbuktu. Many of you have been to Katmandu. My dentist just got home from Fiji. He told me all about Fiji. If he had taken his fingers out of my mouth, I would have told him about the Galapagos Islands.
So we now know for certain that there are no potential human enemies anywhere who are anything but human beings almost exactly like ourselves. They need food. How amazing. They love their children. How amazing. They obey their leaders. How amazing. They think like their neighbors. How amazing.
Thanks to modern communications, we now have something we never had before: reason to mourn deeply the death or wounding of any human being on any side in any war."
-Kurt Vonnegut (1991)
Sunday, February 05, 2006
If winter was more exciting, I'd do something besides blog
I have to recommend John Irving's "The Fourth Hand". It is hilarious. Irving is probably my favorite contemporary writer; someone who actually develops characters and plots without having to kill, rape, or go outside the lines of reality to entertain. Alas, my novel is not this smart, but I am currently developing an idea for a second story and I'm inspired by Irving's creative style and wit.
Speaking of my novel...
The editing process is coming along and I have written to ten literary agencies in an attempt to find representation. I should hear back from some of them within two weeks and others within two months. In the meantime I'm trying to make the story as perfect as possible before an editor hacks it apart for me. Thank you to Phil Lucero, my brother Brian, and Danielle Dolan for reading and offering feedback! To keep my anxiety at bay, all I can think to do is start writing something else.
Allison is incredible at her job. She is complimented often on her ability to work well will the mentally ill and is trying to keep notes on how she deals with different illnesses to help her in graduate school.
I am also awaiting an acceptance (or rejection) letter from MU's creative writing program. If I'm accepted I'll start classes this summer. If I'm not? There's a great job at a local veterinarian's office disposing of euthanized puppies. That sounds promising.
Speaking of my novel...
The editing process is coming along and I have written to ten literary agencies in an attempt to find representation. I should hear back from some of them within two weeks and others within two months. In the meantime I'm trying to make the story as perfect as possible before an editor hacks it apart for me. Thank you to Phil Lucero, my brother Brian, and Danielle Dolan for reading and offering feedback! To keep my anxiety at bay, all I can think to do is start writing something else.
Allison is incredible at her job. She is complimented often on her ability to work well will the mentally ill and is trying to keep notes on how she deals with different illnesses to help her in graduate school.
I am also awaiting an acceptance (or rejection) letter from MU's creative writing program. If I'm accepted I'll start classes this summer. If I'm not? There's a great job at a local veterinarian's office disposing of euthanized puppies. That sounds promising.
Friday, January 27, 2006
The Book is Finished!
It is 3:24 PM on January 27, 2006 and I have just written the last line to my first novel.
Next week will begin the editing process and long road to finding a publisher. I'll keep updates posted. For now, we drink.
Next week will begin the editing process and long road to finding a publisher. I'll keep updates posted. For now, we drink.
Sunday, January 22, 2006
"Be wary of any endeavor that involves buying new clothes."
Samuel Clemens's (Mark Twain) childhood home.
"Education: that which reveals to the wise, and conceals from the stupid, the vast limits of their knowledge."
The white fence from the story "Adventures of Tom Sawyer" (read sign).
"Grief can take care of itself, but to get the full value of joy you must have somebody to divide it with."
Becky Thatcher's childhood home across the street from Tom Sawyer.
"Honesty is the best policy - when there is money in it."
Hannibal Missouri-Mark Twain's birthplace.
Wednesday, January 18, 2006
Conscious Investing
Hey Friends! Allison and I were recently looking over options for retirement investing given to us by the company she works for. We have always prided ourselves on trying to live in such a way that does not support social or environmental desecration, however when it comes to making choices about investing this is a slippery slope. There is a webpage http://www.care2.com/financial/ that rates companies and mutual funds based on standards related to the environment, animal rights, human rights, etc. ALL of the mutual funds offered by her company fail in one or several of these areas; it was more a matter of how the fund is split up and how much money is going to companies we don't care to support. My question is, has anyone out there found a way to invest in companies that aren't sweatshop-using, animal- torturing, land-paving assholes? I know these companies are out there. I've seen Sierra Club investing and a few other Green investment brokerages, but I don't know if these are viable options or just wishful thinking. If anyone uses one of these investment brokerages or knows someone who does, will you let us know how they like it? We would greatly appreciate it. I'm trying not to lose all faith in America, but it's truly getting harder the more I learn. We're supporting some souless bastards and my question is, do people not realize it, or do people not care?
Naively Yours,
Pissed at My Country's Ethics
Naively Yours,
Pissed at My Country's Ethics
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