So, here I am, on Friday the 19th, looking decidedly human again.
What I've been doing lately:
1. Enrolled myself in a driving school;
2. Rounded up the House of 30 poets for Marginalia;
3. Updated Leonard Gontarek's site (he's got a rave review in The Pedestal Magazine!!);
4. Waited in line outside clinics;
5. Did the medical paperwork of my husband -- who's been mending well, diabetes going down, down, down. Yay! for that;
6. Walked to the library and borrowed Middlesex (Jeffrey Eugenides) and American Gods (Neil Gaiman -- it's not exactly Neverwhere but it's the only one they've got and it's in English).
7. Reading Middlesex now and got a bit hung-up on how could anyone name a boy-child Chapter Eleven.
Mental notes on taking driving lessons again:
1. I will be parsimonious with the car horn.
2. I will not keep my foot on the gas pedal even though I know that the instructor is breaking for me every time.
3. I will learn how to do a perfect 90° turn.
4. I will not invade the opposite lane and be the cause of a major traffic jam.
5. I will keep my eyes on the road.
6. I will not run over inanimate objects, mainly shrubs.
7. I will be nice to the driving instructor and not tell him/her it's his/her job to watch where I am going.
8. I will not go slow on the presumption that any crowd can be dispersed by a moving car.
9. I will learn to occupy one (1) parking space.
10. I will not be stultified by my driving incapacities since, if Adrian Mole (my reality) managed to do it, I (the road nightmare) can, too.
Half-acceptance/half-rejection:
Sent a batch of crazy poems to nthposition last Sunday and got a reply immediately from the editor asking me to re-send two poems he particularly liked along with another batch in August because the summer issue is now full. That was nice.
It's a terrific 'zine with tons and tons of inspiring weirdness. I'm still going through the archives: reading and learning. Being, of course, only 60% weird and not from Bayesia I have to study and work hard to obtain an acceptable degree of weirdness.
One week in 30:30:
Well, I've survived so far with, let's see...
1. It had nothing to do with apples
2. And another pill put words into Nigel's beer
3. It's Sunday again on the wet paint sign
4. Michaela
5. Something like death
6. Falling into a Manhole is Considered Lucky
7. May 18, 2003 and My Sister was Still Watching Seinfield
For the record, three of these are Nigel poems. He's become my Linus blanket on bad muse days.
Publications received:
Carousel (issues 15, 17, 18 and 19): opening this package made my multiple selves go tra-la-la!!
Every issue is stunning -- very eclectic tastes in poetry, too. I've never even dreamt of seeing my poems printed on glossy paper. It's 65-85 (a mixture of matte colored and glossy b/w) pages, 6 x 9 (approx.), perfect-bound with matte color card cover. Because of their lengthy response times (more than 6 months, if I remember correctly), I wasn't sure if I'd be submitting again... but now I'm sure I will.
9 comments:
LOTS if news! so many things going on that it took you several paragraphs to bring up a lie about me (bayesia, that's all i say). how disappointing. on the other hand, i can see you are still obsessed with me, because *i* make an appearance in about every other poem of yours. i am not sure whether to be delighted or alarmed. i'll let you know when the jury has decided. they're out on their lunch break at the moment.
wow - for you the hairdresser seems like a once-in-a-year event, for me it's an about-eight-times-a-year experience. if they cut off six inches, i'd be bald. i used to have zig-zag partititions too! aren't they just so cool? love it in your pic!
congrats on the acceptance, and hooray for the kind of glossy magazine that you mentioned!
driving huh ... what do you mean, not use the horn? you are in ITALY, for goodness' sake! we all know that horn = brakes there.
american gods is good, though not as terrific as neverwhere. middlesex is intriguing. and very well written. chapter eleven. yep. better than nigel though. speaking of which, i watched a re-run of "10 things i hate about you" yesterday, and noticed that before the party of *real* jerks is crashed by half the school, the doorbell rings and one of the guys (a nigel-clone himself) says: "ah, that must be nigel with the camembert!" hahhhaaaahhhaaaa!!! perrrrfect.
anyway, this has been going on too long. i hope you got my also-going-on-too-long email the other day.
hugs and stuff, m
erm. i actually bought the jury cheese snacks for their lunch. they called me angel. they promised my innocence. bwuaaaahaaahaaaa!!
heh. the hairdresser is a 1-2 hour tweedling-of-thumbs-doing-nothing event for me. i can't even fall asleep with them girlies pulling my hair here and there. but the zigzag thingee is ultra-cool! one of them girls also did me the square/box type once. did you ever get that done to you?
hee. i think you meant southern italy. here in the north, drivers are quite well-behaved. lucio, for one, never even uses the car horn. sometimes i get the urge to honk it for him.
teehee about the film. i've seen it two times now on tv (pre-nigel era) but don't remember that scene. i'll be attentive next time. did you read keith's poem in 30:30? the he and she there sound like nigel and you. i told him so, of course.
a tip on carousel: likes crazy list poems. a copy is going out to you next week so you can judge for yourself. yisnu (you better believe it)!!
a
p.s. your extra-long e-mail (40kb) is tucked in my mailbox. and funny, you got away as a normal, non-spam e-mail this time. what did you do to my spam assassin, wench??
the jury says: be worried, be very worried. better still, run! ;)
1-2 hours for long hair? how do they make it last so long? i never quite understand how cutting long, straight hair takes 3-4 times as long as doing short haircuts. they seem much more complicated. hm.
box-square what? um, explain. make yourself clear. please? *L*
re email: i pleaded with the spam assassin! didn't you read the last couple of subject lines? *L*
no i did not see keith's poem. must check it out. ha - one day they'll say of us: they inspired a whole generation of writers. *LMAO*
oh and - a copy for me? wow! to make up for being so mean to me? *G*
hooray! yskfsaao!
hey arlene, the haircut! love the photo. glad to hear lucio's diabetes is abating.
i need to sign up for driving lessons, too. ugh. the public transport here in Frankfurt is so good, but with kids it's better to drive a car. although i don't like it. it is so easy to get mad.
cin cin
teehee, since you asked: i will attempt to do the square parting and send you a picture of my scalp, michi. you know you want it.
hee, or better yet, maybe they'll say of us: they inspired a whole generation of writers during the post-nigel period (which is defined as noun -- a person who has the ability to be invisible). ronf!!
yay! i'm not alone in my driving lessons, sarah. let's toast to our future... erm, success stories ;)
thanks, nathan... don't make me nervous. jkrlxzzo sounds as scary as fzsnj.
hey, get a load of how you're being defined in this online dictionary:
sarah --
[noun]: A poltergeist sent back in time to change the course of history forever
(teehee, this is a tad worse than michi [noun]: A human transformer (Robot in disguise))
nathan --
[noun]: A person who makes a living suing celebrities
(really now! i'll be damned)
oh yes, angie, i want that. badly. *LOL*
my best friend got the poltergeist definition too, so now i know two of them! :)))
m
Hi. I am in the same issue of Carousel and Pebble Lake Review as you are. I didn't receive my copy of Issue 19, or payment, and they don't answer my emails....
Nanette Rayman Rivera
P.S. love your work
Hi Nanette! I was just admiring your poem today in the Carousel and going "How did she write that? It's brilliant, simply brilliant!"
That's distressing about Carousel. Have you tried contacting the other editors? I saw they've got a whole line of them. They really seem very professional, or... have you tried e-mailing from another account? I've lost tons of e-mails using a local Italian server famous for sending out spam mail. Just a thought.
Arlene
Hi Arlene! I can't even imagine how long your locks must have been since they are still flowing out of the picture in your "after" pic! You do look lovely. And it is good to hear your husband is doing well. Congrats,too, on your pub.
-laur
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