Monday, January 31
Showing up
So, the trick (re: being "creative", i.e., working) I've found over the years is to just carve out time in the daily schedule somehow every day, every day, even if it's just a half-hour every day, because in my experience the every day effort snowballs and then you want to give it more time, and you'll find more time, an hour, 90 minutes. But it's always the first thing that gets dropped when schedules get tight, because, well, because there's so much else normal life stuff to do.
My problem (in the past) is not that I can work every day for two or three months in a row (because I can), it's that I can't do it for any sustained periods beyond that initial rush, the first draft. That's when I tend to drop the metaphorical cliche ball and sleep in (til 6, instead of getting up at 5 to work) or watch TV late nights when the house is asleep instead of working. Working! I wish I could stay committed to work a little bit every day for 10 months in a row, year after year, rather than these spurts of two or three months in a row one a year, or every other year. That's what kills me. Sustaining it, tho': then I'd have progress. Yeah. You betcha.
And it's stupid that we don't give the time to our avocations every day, because, shoot, after our families, it's what we want to do, it's what we're good at, no matter what it is (writing fiction, making music, painting, collecting baseball cards, playing Risk, doing yoga or running, traveling, whatever it is) because it's what we're here for, right? At least it's what some of us are here for.
The upside of working every day is of course simply huge… in emotional/spiritual/ psychological rewards mainly, not to mention the dreams and visions of one-day financial/fame rewards. So last night after the kids went to bed, instead of working for an hour, I watched the '65 Dylan documentary "Don't Look Back" with the audio commentary on. Nice, good, interesting, fun to watch, insightful on the filmmakers choices, yeah, sure, all of that, but… Why didn't I edit a chapter instead? Why didn't I sit at my laptop and take an hour to make the changes from the five chapters I did paper edit on Saturday and Sunday mornings? I don't know. And then I sit here wasting time complaining about now working, wishing I'd worked instead…. instead of celebrating and bragging on the five chapters I did edit. There's that inner editor again. It's an ugly, ugly head he's rearing.
What did Woody Allen say? Eighty percent of success is just showing up? He's right about that, I think…. He's right about that.
Sunday, January 30
I hate my inner editor
But man: his personality sucks. He's always negative, seeing my work as pointless and hopeless and useless. He's always telling me to quit dreaming and buckle down. I mean, if had to be stuck with my inner editor on a ski lift, or next to him on an airplane, I'd bury my face in a book as fast as I could (well, not on the ski lift, because it's unlikely I'd have a book with me there….). But you know what I mean. Right? Hate's a strong word, but I think it applies to my inner editor.
So I'm going to try to avoid him as much as possible in coming months, and I'm certainly not going to take him out to dinner or a movie or anything any time soon. No rewards for bad behavior. The one thing I love about American Idol in these early weeks is how all those contestants treat their inner editors, even -- no, especially! -- those who really could or should learn something from theirs: They ignore them. So I'm going to take a cue from all those heroes on American Idol and treat my inner editor as the Dursley's treat Harry Potter when he's home for summer: by locking him up in a dark hole under the stairs. I'm going to pretend he doesn't exist.
Saturday, January 29
Microrandomfiction
So, what some writer needs to do, some experimental fiction writer, some genius, is create a bunch of 2-3-4-5 minute song-length snippets of fiction that can be recorded by a variety of voices (one actor for each character's, another for the narrator?) and downloaded to an iPod and then played on "random" to create a new and different story (or performance piece? literary vocal art, I mean, Art?) -- and a new yet coherent, compelling, enlightening, amazing, touching, plot-driven story -- every time. Every time is different, but every time would need to be a work of unbearable lightness and staggering genius.
That would be taking fiction to the future, eh?
Oh yeah, and when I told this idea to Kristen, she said: "oh, a high-tech version of the monkeys and typewriters."
"Well, not exactly," I said, "but OK, I see your point."
Hence the need for a genius to write it. Someone really smart and so well respected by the critics and the academics that they could get away with it. Someone like David Foster Wallace. Or Pynchon. Yeah.
Wait wait -- another idea. Instead, just have someone -- Colin Farrell, or Bono, or Sean Connery -- read the whole entire text of Joyce's Ulysses, which is famous for being incomprehensible and genius anyway, have someone record it all in little 2-3-4 minute snippets, and then listen to THAT on random play on the iPod. OK, now we're getting somewhere.
To do: this week
1. Move the laptop out of the bedroom and into the blue room, thus expanding when I can write to those extra hours straddling dawn and late night (when Kristen sleeps.)
2. Set up the new bookcase -- the one that's been in the big white box on the bedroom floor for the past two weeks -- in the blue room just because it'll make it look more like a writer's office. Image is everything, except when perception = reality. (Or is it because perception = reality?)
3. Finish organizing all my mom's paperwork so I can get it off the floor of the blue room and make space for the bookcase which would lead to the computer being moved in so I can write more. (This should be item No. 1, I suppose, if I'm being logical.)
4. Most important, shut up and write: Start the paper copy edit/proofing to my current untitled novel just as I did for Jared's book. Start this week. (No, this should be item No. 1, I suppose, if I'm being true to the rule of shut up and write.)
Bobby sings on the edge
Friday, January 28
Meeting with Jared
I finished the work late last night, after midnight sometime, but the story was so well done that I just had to crank through the final 70 pages (out of some 230 total) as I dashed green pen in hand to the finish. It was great to do because, in addition to helping out a friend, I now plan to do the exact same thing to my novel starting Saturday (I'd start now, but we're going to see Bobby McFerrin in Greeley tonight).
What makes us happy?
My friend Krell helped refocus my brain when he e-mailed in response to our MELDAR®* reading of "U and I" a list of four things that makes us happy:
1 - Working (writing), which requires consistency;
2 - Completing, which requires discipline;
3 - Publishing, which requires risk-taking and boring through failure; and
4 - Growing, which (happily) requires reading, speaking to readers and writers, exchanges and support of other writers and, ultimately (back to 1:) Working.
And in response to all of Nicholson Baker’s "anxious psychological caterwauling" in U and I, Krell says the whole point of the book comes down to a fear of failure. And he offers this advice to Baker, which I'm stealing and applying to myself: "Shut up and write, man."
*MELDAR, again = Multiple Erics Long Distance Association of Readers
Thursday, January 27
Finding focus and purpose
So far, I've been writing mostly about three or four kinds of things: what it's like to live on the edge of nowhere; some family/personal/diary-type stuff for friends and family reading; some political news (and implied) commentary; and some random stuff about movies, music, things I've read or made up and so on.
Well, I've been in a funk the past few days trying to figure something else out, and you know how one thing always leads to another? Well, here I am again. For me, it always seems to lead me back here and what I want to do. (It's all about me!) And so I'm going to find-tune the focus of The Edge of Nowhere a bit, at least for a while, the next few months at least, to see if it can serve a higher, more selfish, more ambitious, purpose.
So, here's what's been happening the past 10 days or so to bring me here:
1) I'm not always thrilled with my current job (the work I mostly love, the people I work for and the environment I work in is not always what I would dream it could be, etc. etc.), so feeling fed up and getting some positive encouragement, I applied for another State Farm job, in the Learning and Development Department, where I'd essentially become a teacher of classes and a consultant to help certain TBA areas of the company define the learning/development needs of their employees. Not so much writing. Ho hum, I know, but at least it would be a (hopefully) healthy change of scenery, help my attitude. No word yet on an interview; still waiting to hear.
2) Meanwhile, I've been studying and researching and thinking about and talking about a return to graduate school, to pursue a master's in communication science and strategy types of things. In fact, yesterday I spent a bit more than an hour with the main professor at Colorado State Univerisity's grad school for technical journalism and communication. My goal would be to get some credentials and knowledge to launch some sort of business communications consulting career -- get rich sharing my knowledge/experience helping people like me at companies like mine. Or going on to get a PhD and teach at the college level. New career, more money, more flexibility. Or so the thinking goes.
3) Meanwhile, I've been reading and editing a novel for a friend. It's a great experience for me as well, and is teaching me much about the critical process I need to go through on my own novels and fiction. Giving me focus.
4) I recently read two unrelated (and yet oddly related) books: "U and I" by Nicholson Baker, and "Chronicles, Volume 1" by Bob Dylan. The Baker book is by a writer about a writer/idol (Updike is the U) and is a book about writing about writing about writing, as my friend Eric Krell (who's reading it with me) says, a meta-look at a one-sided literary rivalry and the process of writing/comparing yourself to your literary heroes. In fact Eric sent me a very inspiring e-mail the other day about U and I, which is about what we (he and I, and you other writers) need to be doing with our own writing, which, boiled down crassly, is: "Shut up and write."
My reading of Dylan's book is this: It's about ambition, single-mindedness and pursuit of a personal dream and ambition, and it tracks his progress from wanting to get out of Minnesota, to wanting be a great folk singer, to wanting to be a great Woody Guthrie, to wanting to be himself. See where this is going yet?
5) At work, I'm taking part in a test to introduce the web log technology to our internal employee audiences. I'm learning what works and doesn't work in blogging, much like I'm learning it here on the edge of nowhere (which was started in response to a work need to see what web technology is like and explains is lack of directoin and focus thusfar.)
6) The CSU professor yesterday asked me what I wanted to do when I grew up. Truely. It's the first thing he asked, and the answer I gave him wasn't the truth. I laughed, admitted I didn't really know, and then launched into some practiced and rehearsed messages (yes, this is how I think now) about why I wanted to get into his program, about learning, consulting, teaching, like I noted above, etc. But the real, honest answer is: I want to write fiction. I want to write good fiction. I want to publish fiction. This has been the honest answer since my sophomore year in college, although until the past 12 or 15 months, I've never been able to say it outloud, much less publish this info to all my friends and family. It's been a secret desire of mine every since I took a short story class my sophmore year at a junior college, and it's been the thing I've been trying and failing to do nearly every year ever since (with a few gaps around the time when I first met Kristen and after my children were born). My parents weren't particularly encouraging (that's nice, but you need a real job) and so I ended up working at newspapers for a few five or six years, and then working as a writer/editor etc in corporate America for the past 16 years. I've been a professional writer for 20 years. And yet, what I want to do is write.
7) I've been writing a four-sentence sports mini column for the past eight weeks for the local newspaper. You know what? I'm a curmudgeon, and I've been there, done that. That experiment is over.
8) I've been inspired my brother's blog (see link to Paul) and his column and essay writing and by Nick's enthusiasm and opportunity to see the world, by my two-person reading group with Krell, and by Jared's completed novel, and by my daughter's musical abilities and by my son's movie making and by Kristen's overall arty go-for-it-ness in all things (pottery, cello, quilting, knitting, etc. -- she just keeps finishing projects and I spin my wheels).
9) I just want to be me. (Whew: New-agey touchy-feely mid-life crisis averted)
So all these these things have been mixing around my head the past few months, weeks, days, and it was getting more and more confused and I was getting quieter and more flummoxed. Introverted. Self reflecting. Stumped. But then it all made sense:
Shut up and write.
So, while I still ponder going to grad school and while I wait to see if I change jobs at State Farm, I'm going to just shut up and write.
And this blog is going to migrate from a random place of who knows what it is now into a personal tool that one day, when I'm a published writer earning an Academy award for adapting my best-selling critically praised novel into a screenplay, those who are interested in me the writer will be able to tune in and see behind the scenes as I draft my acceptance speech via this web log. And I can outsource to India and get someone to write my blog for me as I jetset around between our homes in La Jolla and Aspen (mention this post and you can stay with us for a week either place!)
And for those of you who are already out there, thanks for reading so far and I set you free. I appreciate the feedback you've given, and if you want to be with me from this new start (or umpteenth restart), I encourage you to stick around, check back and keep reading. Tell your friends, particularly in a few months, and particularly if your friends include literary agents, small press editors or big shots at the New Yorker. But if this new direction doesn't interest you, no hard feelings.
So, I may go back through the archives and prune a few things that don't make sense any more. And I may still include some stuff that seems random, but I'm going to try and learn now, and share my learnings with myself here in the blog. I'm going to make this a working tool to help me in my goal: to publish fiction (I realized today with the help of my friends Krell and Champ that my goal all these 20 years has been to write fiction instead of to publish fiction). I'm going to write about what I always wonder about when I go see writers at book signings: How do they do what they do? What's their schedule? How often do they write? Who's their influences? All that behind the scenes stuff. Plus: I'm going to use as an accountability tool, as they'd say at work, a way to measure my progress and report back on my goals and achievements, my collection of failures and the thrill of those first success: the first story accepted, the first story published, the first poem, the first novel, the first best-seller list.
I know, I know, it sounds freaking crazy. But one thing I'm going to differently this time is have confidence. And take myself seriously. I'm getting too old to screw around. It's time to shut up and write. So, with this post, I'm announcing with a certain false bravado that as of now, today, I will now work to publish.
And you can follow my journey, if you're at all interested, here on the edge of nowhere.
Wednesday, January 26
Good question
"We are enmeshed in a global system of conquest and destruction in which Corporate America and the United States government manipulate and control the lives of millions of ostensibly free individuals. How many Americans are prepared to die to make the world safe for McDonald's, Wal-Mart, 747s, gas-guzzling SUVs, the Internet, Bill Gates, and the rest of the Forbes 400 richest Americans?" This is Thomas Naylor talking, author of the "Vermont Manifesto" and the Second Vermont Republic movement. And here' a Salon link on secession movements.
This topic is of interest to me because a long time ago, back in 1986 or so, I started working on a long piece of fiction about a group of Californians who work to split northern California from southern California. I got probably 50 pages into it before I moved from Northern California to Southern California and put it away.
Taking electricty for granted
Did anyone happen to catch on PBS last night the docu about the American power company in the Republic of Georgia? Fascinating TV, an amazing look at post-Soviet life and a peek at exporting American business values in central Asia. Who knew the power grid could be so interesting? Maybe they'll run it again, so check local listings or the Independent Lens web site.
This is a good reminder to remember the rest of the world. Things aren't like they are here in America, and the struggle these Georgians face will be repeated and repeated in coming decades, particularly if the Bush Administration continues on its path of forcing our democratic model and our culture down third-world throats. Reminds me of mom: because it's good for you. Altho, officially, I can't remember my mom ever ever ever using that advice on me. Plus: my parents were against medicine.
Tuesday, January 25
Idea is on the way
Then ponder this thought from an essay on 'egocasting,' art, culture, iPods, TiVo and, by extension, blogs: "Another mother whose child has grown up watching DVDs said of her four-year old, “She just takes for granted that you can always cue up the song or scene that you want, or watch things in whatever order you want.”"
The idea is coming... hang on.
Thursday, January 20
Ole's farm
In a register from 1668 the area around the farm was already called Jelsnes-Ødegården which is still in use today. The farm remained in its original size until the early 18th century, when Lensebråten was the first to be separated in 1815 but still belonged to the Fredrikstad parish. Subsequently also 10 other smaller farms were established between 1839 to 1865, including Lensebråten, my ancestral family farm in southern Norway.
Lensebråten lies south of Jelsnes school and borders the river Glomma - Norway's longest river. During the second half of the 17th century a croft was established here under the ownership of Jelsnes-Ødegården. The name Lensebråten obviously comes from the expression "lense," which means a place where driftwood is collected from the river Glomma and which stretched acrosss to the other side of the river.
Lensebråten had some forrest "up to Hoveden and Suteren." The border stretched to the river where "an oak tree used to stand." It continued to the northwest behind the creek between Hovden and Suteren to the northern bank of the Glomma.
The farm Lensebråten was leased by Sjøllert Larsen, son of Lars Sjøllersen. Sjøllert was born in 1798 and died in 1880. In 1861 Sjøllert agreed with his sons Jens and Anders that they should operate the farm - at first for one year - because of his age he could no longer run it himself and that the sons should provide him and his wife with reasonable room and care.
In 1863 Jens left the farm, now about 38,000 square meters, or just under 10 acres, and his brother Anders bought it in 1867 for an amount of 570 specidalers thus becoming the first owner of Lensebråten. Anders had a son Ole, born around 1890. Sjøllert was Ole's grandfather. Ole was my grandfather, my dad's dad. He came to America just about 100 years ago. He moved to an edge of nowhere too, settling eventually in Fergus Falls, Minnesota. Technically, it was never Ole's farm despite the title of this post; it was just the place he grew up before heading off to America. The farm is still in the family today.
Wrath
Right: I'm also currently reading a novel you've never heard of -- yet. It's called "Wrath" and it's a murder mystery/detective story set in Denver (so far). It features a Denver cop, a farting dog and God, Coors Field and, I'm told, later the St. Louis Arch makes an appearance. It's got great dialogue, a quickly moving plot, well crafted chapters (for the most part), a few rough spots and it's pretty good overall. Not only am I reading it, I'm editing it for Jared Fiel, a friend of mine (you can see his blog over in links), former co-worker and fellow Chico State grad (although I went through a half-dozen years before him). Jared wrote Wrath during the past two National Novel Writing Months. He wrote it in '03, as I recall, and then rewrote it totally during '04, then spent another month adding/fixing during our local post-NaNo GreNoFiMo efforts. And I've had it for a week or so now, and have edited the first 70 (or 220?) double-spaced pages or so.
It's fascinating editing someone else's novel, I'll tell you that. It's certainly a labor of love, and I'm learning so much about what makes a book good as I go through each chapter, each sentence carefully, pen in hand, sometimes reading whole sections twice. I'm being pretty harsh with it, too, as Jared knows (or so I've told him a couple of times now, giving him the chance to back out but he's bravely letting me go forward), asking questions about things I don't quite understand, questioning the motivation of characters, wondering aloud if a character would do this if before he did that, asking if Denver has a police academy, or nothing that ten pages ago this person had a partner and now she doesn't, and so on. It's very helpful to my own writing, too, which (selfishly, of course) is a main reason I'm doing it (plus it's a nice favor for a friend). By being free to be harsh/helpful on Jared's work, perhaps when I do this process to my own current novel next, I'll be just as helpful/harsh to my own work. And it will be better for the effort. Jared plans to take it to some editors and agents and a book conference in April (or is it February?). So, friendly readers, look for Wrath at better booksellers everywhere sometime in the fall of 2006. Plus you can buy Jared's current book (and see my glowing review) at Amazon.
Wednesday, January 19
Too many books....
So, the clock is ticking on four library books now, one that boasts a $1 per day -- day! -- fine if it's overdue (it came from the Denver Public Library), plus the chocolate bunnies book. And I've read the first dozen pages of three of them and want to keep reading each. But I can only read one at time.
*Multiple Erics Long Distance Association of Readers
Praise for the prairie
Dawn in the real world
Tuesday, January 18
Other lists
Next Five Movies: Dr. Strangelove, Citizen Kane, Man from Snowy River, House of Flying Daggers, Stepford Wives.
Last Five TV shows: Desperate Housewives, The Simpsons, Who's Line Is It Anyway?, Nuggets basketball, The Weather Channel
Last Five Meals: Bagel with cheddar cheese; cereal with milk, spaghetti with veggie sausages and salad; buritto with cheese crackers and veggie jerky; bagel toasted with butter.
Last Five Activities: Playing racquetball, taking Westley to intermediate obedience class, playing trivia game with Bellman-Kaufmans, taking Westley to practice dog match at Adams County fairgrounds; playing Risk with Kristen's cousin Jon and Connor ( bonus sixth item: watching Connor's movies/eating pizza at Tabers.
Last five books
+ Nicholson Baker's Checkpoint: In May 2004, Jay has summoned his old friend Ben to a hotel room not far from the nation's capitol. During the course of an afternoon, Jay will explain in 115 pages of dialogue to Ben exactly why and how he is planning to commit a murder (of the current president). It's not a good novel, but the writing is crisp and Baker captures the passion of 49 percent of the country.
+ Bryher's Visa for Avalon: In this chilling futuristic 150 page novel, four men and women attempt an escape to legendary Avalon after "the Movement" threatens the liberty and comforts they have taken for granted in their unnamed homeland. First published in 1965, it resonates profoundly in the U.S. in 2004.
So then I went to our shelf and ran with the theme, pulling off Orwell's 'Animal Farm' (or Animal House, as I called it earlier today)(which I finished tonight), his '1984' and William Golding's 'Lord of the Flies,' which I set bedside to read soon (after two more Baker novels I pulled from the library yesterday after reading Checkpoint). It's like a minicourse in political theory and sociology, and while depressing, the parallels (in Animal Farm especially -- the sheep drowning out any/all political conversation/discourse with their repeated "four legs good, two legs bad" chants and the ever-evolving stories the pigs use to explain their actions and cover their mistakes) to what's happening in America today are fascinating and somewhat chilling.
And, for the record, the final two of the last five I've read are: David Sedaris' 'Me Talk Pretty One Day' (I didn't find it as funny as everyone said it was, or, rather, it didn't live up to my expectations) and Life of Pi author Yann Martell's short story collection 'The Facts Behind the Helsinki Roccamatios," which was interesting but unsatisfying. Read Life of Pi instead.
This is more like it
Dawn of a new day
"(Snowball) fought bravely at the Battle of the Cowshed," said somebody.
"Bravery is not enough," said Squealer. "Loyalty and obedience are more important. And as to the Battle of the Cowshed, I believe the time will come when we shall find that Snowball's part in it was much exaggerated. Discipline, comrades, iron discipline! That is the watchword for today. One false step, and enemies would be upon us. Surely, comrades you do not want the (terrorists) back?
Of course, Squealer said they do not want Jones the Farmer back, but the point is the same. So I read this book and I think of the Jerry Garcia quote hanging on our refrigerator downstairs: "Somebody has to so something. It's just pathetic it has to be us." And the next you know, I'm back to posting political stuff. Must be a personality flaw. So if I must be loyal, I will be loyal to the America of free speech, political dissent, Thoreau's civil disobedience, Martin Luther King's I have a dream and life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. (And I must be loyal to breakfast, because apparently my hunger is making me go all patriotic on y'all. Bye for now).
Updated: An earlier version of this post called 'Animal Farm' Animal House, which I blame on the early hour of the post and prompting Nick's comment below.... so whoops, and thanks for the heads-up, Nick. And then I commented, made a mistake, and reposted my comment with typo fixed and now I can't seem to find the way to delete the redundant comment. Oh well....
Cold War 2.0
I guess the 9/11 terrorists gave them that, even though Iraq had nothing to do with it. They were, in the eyes of Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld, just bad, or worse. evil. The trio of evil. And now, as Hersh writes, it appears the Bush Administration has been conducting secret reconnaissance missions in Iran so that in his second term, sources say Bush intends to expand the war on terror and give Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and the Pentagon control of it. It's not just about 9/11 anymore, if in ever was once we go beyond the Taliban. It's about creating a whole new cold war, a mindset for America to always be at war, to have enemies, to fund the wasteful military rather than continue to grow the economy add jobs and save the planetary enironment. Sadly, the way the Bushies are running this new war, it's clearly much hotter than most of the cold war. How many American solider deaths in the "search for weapons of mass destgruction" in Iran? Oh yeah - pushing 1,400 now.
Asleep at the Wheel
Saturday, January 15
The world is a pretty place
This morning's snow is drying up, and there are patches of blue sky above. It's a winter wonderland right off Vermont postcard right now, the bare tree branches covered in a hoary frost, the geese wobbling over the snow-covered ice on the corporate pond, and the remains of Wednesday's snow is now covered with bright white fluffy cotton candy textured snow that fell most of the morning. The sunshine breaking through the fading clouds is casting perfectly rigid shadows on the ivory landscape. The houses in the nearby subdivision look small against the big clouds and patches of blue sky. Fresh. New. It's optimistic out here on the edge today.
Thursday, January 13
Tumbleweeds 8.0
Fake Uncle Joe
+ Fake Uncle Joe
+ Yelling at Sneeezers
+ Messiah's Sneaker
I'll post the rest when I tackle my closet/archives one of these days.
Upper Valley Connection
Tuesday, January 11
Lessons of today
One saw the corporate pond just across the street from the parking lot, and soon a big contingent reversed course and came floating honking down. Then another committee swung into action, cutting through the first group. Then a task force reversed course and spun a different direction. Soon the whole organization of geese, what we at work would call the entire enterprise, each following the orders of the leader of its own little silo, was yelling and screaming and going all different directions, each group somehow listening to a different set of orders, all of them spiraling down ('auguring in from the forty thousand foot view,' as our corporate consultants would say) towards the lake. No low hanging fruit here, folks. I watched for a good five minutes, captivated by the action, as these geese kept making false moves toward their goal, then be cut off by a new leader shouting louder and spiraling off to a new direction. It was fascinating to watch, and, after a day listening to a corporate communication consultant sharing his best in class strategic communication practices and processes, the irony was not lost on me.
Gown by Oscar
The silver-blue tulle knee-length shorts, embroidered with bugle beads and outlined in crystals spelling out Laura's name, is the stately if unconventional centerpiece in a wardrobe Mrs. Bush will wear during four days of festivities in Washington, including 10 balls, candlelight dinners, a parade and fireworks.
In addition to Mr. de la Hoya, a longtime welterweight and middleweight and a surprising newcomer to the fashion world, designers for Mrs. Bush's wardrobe include Carolina Herrera, who's not a boxer, and Peggy Jennings, a little-known designer who has been quietly wardrobing Mrs. Bush from her apartment at the Waldorf Towers in Manhattan for two years.
Got milk?
Saturday, January 8
Rabbit hutch hobbyists
Kristen: 'Custom-made Rabbit Hutches.' Who knew there was such demand for rabbit hutches?
Me: Maybe it's a rabbit hutch hobbyist.
Kristen: Wouldn't that be a rabbit hutch hoppyist?
Me: Huh? Wha? Oh. Ha.
Friday, January 7
Popcorn tops my nominees
CNN has a list of the top 25 innovations of the last 25 years, things like cell phones and computers and microelectromechanical systems and what not. They have only 24 innovations listed because they want us to tune in and watch commercials on Sunday, Jan. 16, when they reveal No. 1 (the internet -- duh). So/but/instead, until then, here are my five finalists for what should be the No. 1 innovation since 1980.
+ Microwave popcorn
+ Google
+ Pokemon
+ Colorado Rockies
+ The emergence of postmodernism as a theoretical discipline
Overheard in the car
It was four below zero this morning when I scraped a heavy layer of frost off the windshield, and when we got the car started and moving I noticed my son was not wearing a coat.
Me: Where's your coat?
Son (reaching into the backseat): Right here.
Me: It's colder than heck. Or Pluto, I guess is colder. Heck, or hell wouldn't be this cold.
Son (without missing a beat): It would be now that the Red Sox have won the World Series.
Wednesday, January 5
GreNoFiMoYearGos
So I will have a finished first draft to brag about and drink mocha lattes to in five weeks, getting to the point where Jared's at now, while Amy promises to get to the point where I'm at right now, which is a printed copy of a rough and tumble first draft, while we assume the absent Chris adds another 5,000 words and Niki finishes her second rewrite. My own word count sits at just a few score words under 60,000, which is no longer important aside from a measure of progress. What I still need to do (and this post can now officially be ignored by all readers and filed under a note to self heading) is change one character nearly completely, beef up (tofu up? soy up? protein up?) (i before e except after c and in protein?) the wife character, create the town of Utopia, Colorado, add a lot of color and develop the main male character's quirks and complete those four or five missing chapters between when I left off working before the solstice to the three or four ending chapters I wrote earlier this week to claim I was done with a rought first draft when we met tonight. My intentions are good and the year is young: if you see me in meatspace feel free to ask me how it's going. Keep me honest. OK. G'night.
Snowstorm 1.8
Seals and Siennas
Heidi Klum and seal engaged to wed
NEW YORK (EoNN) -- German supermodel Heidi Klum and a seal are engaged to be married, Klum announced on her Web site.
"We affianced on a glacier in Whistler (Canada). We reached this beautiful place by helicopter one day before Christmas Eve. It was a unique experience," said a posting on Klum's Web site.
Whistler is a ski resort town in British Columbia.
Klum, 31, and the seal, 4, started dating last year, shortly after her breakup with Renault Formula One team boss Flavio Briatore, who is the father of her daughter, Leni, born in May.
Klum, who is a Victoria's Secret model and has appeared in Sports Illustrated magazine's swimsuit issue, separated from her husband of five years, celebrity hairstylist Ric Pipino, in November 2002.
The seal lived mostly on an ice floe in Canada's Northwest territories until earlier this year.
Jude Law to marry Toyota Sienna
LONDON, England (EoNN) -- Jude Law has become engaged to a Toyota Sienna minivan, proposing to it on Christmas Day.
Law, whose films include "The Talented Mr. Ripley" and "I (Heart) Huckabees," proposed to the Sienna on Christmas morning in England, presenting it with a gold steering wheel featuring nine diamonds set in platinum, the couple's spokeswoman, Ciara Parkes, said Wednesday.
"Both their families and friends are thrilled and of course Jude's children are, too," Parkes said. A date for the wedding has not been set.
Law, 32, divorced fashion designer Sadie Frost in October 2003 after a six-year marriage and three children.
The 2002 Sienna, 3, was last seen as in Law's car in the remake of "Alfie."
Law earned Oscar nominations for his roles in "The Talented Mr. Ripley" and "Cold Mountain." His screen credits also include "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow," "Closer" and "The Aviator," all released this year.
Snowstorm 1.7
Snow started falling heavier again this morning, at times quite thick at times. It still hasn't climbed above 5 degrees yet here on the Edge of Nowhere. It seems to be stopping now in early afternoon, the flakes are smaller and I spy a flock of geese flying over in a straggly vee. The radar shows a thick band of snow still upon us, but the end is near. Total snowfall at our place: maybe five inches?
Snowstorm 1.6
Tuesday, January 4
Snowstorm 1.5
Hall of Fame
Snowstorm 1.4
The noon update: visibility has dropped here on the edge of nowhere to less than a half-mile, the pavement is mostly covered with a thin layer of white, although the grass and lawns remain golden winter tan. Temp has fallen to 16 degrees F (-9 C), the wind-chill is down to 1 degree F (-17 C) as the wind has kicked up to 15 mph from the northeast. Radar shows a band of snowing headed our way from the southwest, although it looks now like it'll pass us and head into Wyoming. I remain skeptical of large snowfall amounts. C'mon, sky! Prove me wrong!
Snowstorm 1.3
Anatomy of a snowstorm:
Mid morning, and it's still not snowing. The temp has dropped down to 18 (wind-chill to 3 degrees), and I keep seeing snowplows making the rounds on the highway and the corporate streets spreading the chemical snow melt stuff. The winter storm warnings keep coming in, too, so someone thinks its still coming.
Snowstorm 1.2
Current forecast for Edge of Nowhere:
Areas of dense fog and flurries will give way to snow by this afternoon... with the snow becoming heavy at times by tonight. Storm total accumulations by noon Wednesday will be from 5 to 12 inches. Temperatures will drop to around zero Tuesday night. North to northwest winds will cause dangerous wind chills and some drifting of the snow. A Winter Weather Advisory means that a combination of snow, wind and cold temperatures will create difficult travel conditions. Roads will become snow packed and icy. Plan for difficult travel later today and tonight and carry a winter survival kit if you must travel. Current temperature is 21° F (-6°C); wind-chill is 7°F (-14°C); Wind from the north northeast at 16 mph (26 km/h). Anderson out.
Snowstorm 1.1
Anatomy of a snowstorm:
So far it's a whiff. Strike one. This winter storm was supposed to start overnight, but this morning there's very little sign of it except for the radio report saying the 25 degree current temp is likely the high of the day as it's only going down from here. Outside at 6 a.m., the ground is mostly dry. Later, at 7:30 when I go out to drive Connor to school (it's Tuesday, so Reade went to the high school earlier for orchestra practice), it's just starting to snow, little hard granules plinking my neck. Freezing fog, more or less. On the drive to school, the wind is up and there's walls and ripples of wind-driven snowy granules swooshing and swirling across the bare streets. Fun to watch. The wipers go now and then, but it's still barely coming down. After dropping off Connor, who walks slowly into school in his gym shorts and t-shirt with his teen-age invincibility, there's a tiny red car wrecked in a one-car head-on. Flashing lights. A thick-waisted cop. A guy in one of those brown one-piece insulated farmer guy suits. At work, I park in a pull through spot so later, if it does snow, I can scrape and pull out forward, a snow negotiating trick I've learned in my 14 years on the high plains. I've also learned that despite the predictions of four-to-eight inches, right now I have my doubts we'll get even an inch.
Monday, January 3
Random thought of the day
Where we are now
See: I'm not sure what it is. But I'm not going to let that stop me, at least not yet. I'm going to keep experimenting for a while still, I guess. I know there are at least five readers out there, plus the occasional drop-in commenteer (commentator? person of comment?) and I'll take comments or e-mails about what you think this is. Or should be. Or should not be. Which types of posts to you like best? Which annoy you? Which annoy me? Anyone? Bueller?
Tumbleweeds 7.0
Tumbleweeds 6.0
Snowstorm 1.0
The National Weather Service in Denver has issued a Winter Weather Advisory for the Edge of Nowhere. Snow will spread across the area starting around sunrise Tuesday morning. By the time the snow decreases Wednesday morning... accumulations of 4 to 8 inches can be expected. A combination of snow and cold temperatures will create difficult travel conditions. Roads will become snow packed and icy. We'll see if they're right this time.
Web controlled Xmas lights
So of course it's hoax. Why wouldn't it be? I was suckered (I included a link to it back on the solstice). But get this: Kristen and I were walking Westley around her parent's neighborhood Sunday afternoon, and we exchanged pleasantries with this guy taking down his lights, and he said to us as we walked by that it "got a little out of control as you probably read." It's him. The guy with the "web cam" and the lights lives in Kristen's parents' neighborhood. What a world. So much effort. A great joke.
