Too Many Books

Following celebrities on twitter has proved worthwhile. Rainn Wilson led me to Soul Pancake , a website which encourages readers to particpate in a "spiritual and artistic jouney." Here's a recent prompt, effective at baring your true colors and shedding off writer's block: Let’s type blind to find out what the uncensored you really wants to say. 1. Choose a topic that’s important to you. If you have 'topic-block,' just pick a random word from the dictionary. 2. Open up your favorite text editor. 3. Change the font color to white, so you can’t see what you’re typing. 4. Set a timer for 5 minutes, and start typing blind. 5. Copy the results into the comments section. (P.S. Don't spell check. Don't re-read. Just copy and paste.) Here's mine: I randomly generated the word audacity, which I am certain I just mis typed. I typeveryquickly and I backspace a LOT. I am, therfore, not digging this assignment. I clearly would have backspaced to e

Someday you will find me, caught beneath the landslide, in a champagnge supernova in the sky... I've never been a huge fan of Oasis, though I did once shout "play Wonderwall!" to a patio guitarist taking requests. (The song was featured in an episode of LOST, and it was stuck in my head that day or something.) However, I heard Champagne Supernova on the radio last night, just as I was pulling into my parking space, running ten thirty minutes late to meet my friends for dinner. I didn't care that I was tardy. I just sat there and listened. What a lovely little song. I'm a sucker for a crafty hook -- like Blues Traveler famously observed, the hook brings you back -- and Champagne Supernova certainly obliges. I wanted to hold up my lighter, flick that bic, and have myself one hell of a sing-song. (Okay, who am I kidding. I totally did that. But the lighter got hot and I was afraid one of my friends might see me from their table on the restaurant patio and since

I wonder if it's against the rules to blog on Sunday. It seems that no one really does, or at least not with regularity. Where are you, blog world? You must be attending church or football games or spending time with your family or catching up on housework. Where I am? Right here, at my laptop, surfing the internet, writing, popping my head up over the screen to catch a minute or two of the 1:00 football games. Per usual, I am avoiding the housework like the plague. Really need to start laundry, though, and complete it before my girl's dinner tonight at the Tequila Factory. We're celebrating the birthday of one of my teacher friends, who swears the evening will be tame, as she has to be present at middle school math classes in the morning. It is my last day of my staycation, and the thought of heading into work tomorrow has my proverbial panties in a bunch... especially when there is Tequila in my near future. Nothing says "I'm ready to get back to work"

10.) The premise is cool: A mysterious global event causes everyone to black out simultaneously for two minutes and seventeen seconds, and each person sees a glimpse of their lives six months from now. When they wake up, everyone is left wondering if what they saw will actually happen. 09.) Joseph Fiennes. Sigh. I want to pull out my VHS copy of Shakespeare in Love and listen to him say "You will never age for me, nor fade, nor die. "  08.) The series was adapted for the small screen; it is based on the 1999 novel of the same name by Canadian author Robert J. Sawyer. Sawyer's work is said to "frequently explore the intersection between science and religion, with rationalism always winning out over mysticism." ( wikipedia .) Yeah, I'm going to be reading this book! 07.) Actors from Lost! Sonya Walger (Penelope Widmore) soars as trauma surgeon Olivia Benford,  and I can't wait to see Dominic Monaghan's (Charlie Pace, RIP) character Simon rev

It's four in the afternoon, and I am still in my pajamas. My hair is a mess. I haven't eaten breakfast. Or lunch. I just got up off the couch to let my dog (Carson) back inside. I feel a little lightheaded. So far today I've indulged in guilty pleasures, catching up on missed episodes of America's Next Top Model and 90210. I'm gearing up to watch Oprah. Who can resist a good incest tell-all? I live in Kentucky, after all. Ew. I've spent the whole day writing, feverishly. I am emotionally drained, emptier than my coffee pot, which contained ten cups eight hours ago. My novel is coming along, but the story takes me into dark places. I feel like the victim in a horror movie, stupidly running up the stairs as the man with the machete chases her. Still, I don't feel sad, I don't feel scared. I feel a sense of craving for it all, an urgency to go to there. (30 Rock reference. Anyone?!) If writing is theraputic, it makes sense that I'm on the couc

I feel a kinship with people who share my early March arrival. I have the same birthday as Dr. Seuss and Jon Bon Jovi. I celebrate the latter via karaoke, but realized today that I haven't fed my Seussaddiction in years. Visiting my four year old niece makes my heart happy. She is the most imaginative, creative, special, intelligent... yes, I am completely biased, so I'll stop. But, seriously, she is awesome. It's a real treat when Carley lets me read to her. Usually, she wants to sit in front on me, indian style (or criss-cross, applesauce, as she calls it) and read aloud to me, holding up the book and licking her finger before turning each page, like her preschool teacher , my sister explained. (Note, she doesn't actually read yet. She makes up a story based on the pictures in the book. I'm one hundred percent in love with this. I think she's going to grow up to be a writer!) We sat down to read And to Think That I Saw it All on Mulberry Street. I actua

I love not going to work. I'm sure the novelty of staying home would wear off, but today... nah. I slept late. I caught up on corespondence (okay, I facebooked.) I watched a minute of The View (sooo annoyingly wonderful!) I read a little. I wrote a lot. It was three in the afternoon before I knew it. I had smoked the better part of a pack of cigarettes. Where did the day go? I had to hurry to get to the bank to make my car payment. My husband called from work to ask if I would take our comforter or bedspread or whatever you call it, to the laundromat because it is too big to go in our washing machine, and did I remember that our dog puked on it the other day? Yes, I remembered, but I was trying to ignore it, to pretend it wasn't balled up in a corner in our bedroom, starting to smell a little funny. (In my defense, I had taken a couple of swipes at the pukey area with some wet paper towels, and it wasn't a ton of puppy puke or anything... don't get overly grossed o

I did it. I faithfully blogged every day this week, because I am the most awesome person you know. Most people love Fridays; it's the last day of the work week, sometimes it's payday, it's the start of the weekend if you work a nine-to-five, it might be date night, blah. Etc. TGI- eff-ing F. Bankers do not love Fridays, because it's always somebody's payday. On Fridays many of these somebodies want to cash their paychecks although they do not have a checking account and they are no more interested in opening a checking account than they were when you asked them last Friday, when they got their last paycheck and, really? There's a $10.00 check cashing fee? That's bullshit. You mean to tell me that you are going to charge me ten entire dollars to cash a check drawn on your own god damn bank? Yes, sir. We can cash it for you as a courtesy, since the check is drawn on our bank and we can verify that the funds are available, but we charge you ten entire

Ahh, I'm off work early today to make up for early morning conference calls which would put me into overtime, and there is no working more than 40 hours a week for me! I've been reading about novel structure and debating the way I want to put together my book. I found an interesting site  site that reccomends writing a one sentence summary of your novel. Here's mine: A narcissistic woman copes with her ex-boyfriend's apparent suicide. Next, the author of the website suggests that you take an hour and expand that sentence into "a full paragraph describing the story setup, major disasters, and ending of the novel." (The sentence itself was supposed to take an hour as well. I wonder if you think I spent an hour on mine.) The paragraph is supposed to have five sentences and should read like back-cover copy. This is fun. Louivillian Laurel Lancaster's charmed southern world is quickly coming apart at the seams. After an alledged bout of mania, she

I had a goal to blog every day this week. My quest was almost thwarted by my husband's addiction to online gaming. Grr, I'm irritated again, as much as I was on Monday. I did, however, get to watch whatever I wanted on t.v. This leads me to the following list of items that all beg the question: WTF? I DVR-ed The Vampire Diaries last week, and just got around to watching it tonight. I'm a little bit disturbed by it and a little bit in love with it. WTF? I was hesitant to begin the Twilight saga, to be one of thoooose, but after picking up the first book I was, of course, hooked. Yes, I've admitted it now, and it's a weight of my chest. Whew. I caught a minute of Jay Leno's new 10:00 slot, and he did this little bit about "back to school" tools. After stating that books on tape are out -- oh, and that books on paper are, too -- he pulled out a twitter book idea. Classics are condensed to fit the 140 character limit. Hardy-har. However, his example

It has been one week and four days since I've last written a word. Well, I have written plenty of words -- on this blog, on facebook, at work, in my checkbook register, and with the electronic pens at Speedway and Kroger and Walgreens and such, after entering my pin number. But I have not written a word of my yet-to-be-titled-and-properly-worked-out novel in eleven days, or two hundred and sixty four hours. I do, however, have the perfect opening line of what will some day become my query letter when I look to get an agent; you know, the moment in time just before I'm published and bankrupted by libel. So... here it is, the opening line: Laurel Lancaster's closet is over-full of skeletons. Damn. It sounds so much cooler in my head than it looks on the page. Laurel Lancaster's closet is overly full of skeletons? Laurel Lancaster's closet is overflowing of skeletons? Laurel Lancaster's cloest is overflowing with skeletons? Laurel Lancaster's

For the record, I spent the better part of the weekend curled up on the couch watching football. It's my first year participating in fantasy football, and I am getting my ass thoroughly whooped by my week one opponent. Well played, hate it or love it(whose real name is Lui Muniz), well played. So, my weekend was anything but manic, and my monday hasn't really been much more exciting, except for top secret work-news that I'm probably not allowed to share, and it's news that I shouldn't refer to as exciting, so stratch that. Today, I have a case of the Mondays. Here's a laundry list of the things that are bugging the shit out of agravating me: I wanted to live-blog something or other last week and my husband was playing some fantasy-shoot-em-up game (okay, fine, I know the name of it. It's World of Warcraft, and I am embarrased and ashamed. But, I typically don't mind him playing this game, because it means I can watch whatever I want on tv) and I

Not that being published in my high school literary magazine, Serendipity, wasn't a pleaure, but that was back in the nineties when these things weren't done on the internet. Check it out: I'm an alumnus of the University of Louisville, and though I wasn't even officially enrolled their honors program, I was permitted to sumbit to their literary publication, The White Squirrel. Three of my very own poems were chosen for publication. I plan on submitting again this year, and hope that this time perhaps a print edition will be available should I be so lucky to be included again. Read my poems! http://uoflhsc.com/whitesquirrel/poetry/ Check out my work and feel free to give me your feedback.

Wake up at 7:45. Grab diet pepsi and cigarette as hubby is on his way out the door, half kissing him, because is it too early to be lovey-dovey with anyone. Switch t.v. from Malcolm in the Middle to Good Morning America. Spend the better part of an hour updating facebook and twitter and reading what others have posted since I last logged out. At some point let dog out. At some point realize dog has left back yard. Curse her audibly, and try to locate her out the living room window. If I'm lucky, she's on the front sidewalk and close to the front door. (Like today!) Let her back in and feed her. Read a couple of followed blog's entries. Feel bad I've wasted the hour not blogging. Know that if I do not get in the shower NOW I will have to forget either make-up or blow drying my hair. Light another cigarette (my last one, and I'll get in the shower, swear!) and contemplate: do I have time to write for five minutes before I start getting ready? What will I even

When I was an eighth grade student, my English class read Daniel Keyes' Flowers for Algernon. As a tie-in and a probably a reward for our engagement in the lesson plan activities surrounding the reading, we were scheduled to watch the movie Forrest Gump: rated PG-13 for drug content, some sensuality and war violence. Permission slips were sent home, perhaps on a Monday, and we were given until Friday to have them signed. I observed for the next few days my classmates, returning signed slips smudged with coffee stains and their own grubby fingers, and I inwardly felt a tense mortification: my conservative parents were not going to like this. Not just in the classroom, but in life, I was not at this time permitted to view PG-13 movies without parental consent. I think it was Wednesday after school when I finally got the balls to ask my mom to sign the simple form. Not to my surprise, she wanted to "talk it over" with my dad. She would let me know in the morning. She calle

Yes, I just broke radio silence with a picture of Bob Saget and John Stamos in bed together, because what better way is there to announce my return from an eight month blogging sabbatical? It has been eight months since my last blog entry... do I need to say ten hail mary-kate olsens?