The Little Things that Curl Up on You.

What ever happened to the rollie-pollies? Surely they’re still around. Could it be they’re no longer in my periphery because I am no longer as low to the ground?

Sometimes I feel like a rollie-pollie, if you touch me I will curl up into a tight ball and try to get away.

I saw a kid at the park who reminded me of one of those bugs. He freaked me out because he was so small but wearing adult-looking clothes. He had on one of those puffy coats and dark pants, but was only like a foot off the ground. Plus he kept doing summersaults—which obviously meant he was trying to imitate creatures he and his brother find in the cracks of sidewalks. Or a rollie pollie bit him and he will soon (if not already) turn into a two-year-old super hero. I can’t wait for that movie.

I’m wondering at what point I stopped paying attention to the details, the creatures hidden in the cracks, the little things in life that make it interesting...

I haven’t entirely forgotten but those memories seem trapped or hidden within the deep terrain of my brain—far back in my subconscious or something—they exist only for weird dreams or links to newer images, details, situations.

When I looked up images for the rollie pollie what I found were bigger and grosser looking organisms than I had remembered. Why did I ever touch those things? And why isn’t there a set way to spell the word? And why do we call them "bugs" when they're really isopod crustaceans?

What else have I forgotten that I will one day re-member? Why does my brain feel like a big storage facility instead of a thinking, working machine? What else is in there? I want to remember now! But I guess I don't need to. Or I would. Right?

Writer, You are Not Alone. But You Knew That Already, Didn't You?

I am not having a good day and it continues as I eat the most disgusting apple I have ever had in my life. How can trees (and/or people) mess up organic apples? It tastes like it was dipped in poison and then thrown in the sewer. Organic, ha! It's about as organic as my pink hair.

So I know I've written a few negative-esque blogs recently and I would love to snap out of it, but it's going to take a day or two. I went and heard a literary agent speak at the Boulder Book Store today and besides it being filled with the overwhelming smell of Avon body powder (as there were older women everywhere), it was depressing.

Last year the agent received a total of 36,000 query letters, from that 36,000 she read about 2,000 30-page samples, from there she read 98 entire manuscripts. Nine were selected for representation. Five were sold.

Five.

Five out of 36,000.

Okay, so I don't write sci-fi, or romance, or teen lit; but I'm guessing that the numbers aren't that different in any other genre.

Obviously if one goes to a bookstore it's apparent that more than 5 books get published a year, but still, so many people in the world are trying. I don't want this to be a "hobby," if I wanted it to be a hobby I never would have gotten a degree in it. Yet I feel it would be beneficial for me to go back and get the degree all over again. Or maybe I should just add another one from a different field to the pile since I can't get a job anyway. Ha!

I wish I wouldn't have went to the talk at all. It really didn't help me like I thought it might. Also seeing all those old people there was not inspiring--it made me realize how long it could actually take, ah!

Now I have to read Bird by Bird again just to become re-inspired.

Also must find fruit that doesn't taste like it was used as toilet paper.

Promise to be more positive tomorrow. :) (see I'm already starting with that smiley face)

Dear Companies Who Have Rejected Me:

It's nice not having to get up early to make it to work at the exact time every day. And it's nice not having to stay at work (whether I have actual work to do or not) until a precise daily leave time. It's nice not to have a boss. Or restrictions. Or a dress code. It's nice to be able to work on whatever I want whenever I want to.

But, it's not so nice that my work is never compensated.

And it's not so nice that I have all this talent going to waste that could be used to improve your business or your non-profit. But it's not really my fault is it?

No. I've tried. I've written "you" letters. I've even gone in to meet several of "you." And I've even pestered a few of you, basically begging to let "you" let me help "you."

All I can say is, your loss.

I'll use my energy and creativity for my own good (which directly correlate to the good of all people). And perhaps before my savings runs out one of "you" will notice, one of "you" will actually read my letters, enjoy my company/conversation and want me.

And if not, just remember when I am swinging upside down from a pole (and at her age, who knew!) I will be thanking all of "you" (those of you who wouldn't hire me and those of you who over-populated this earth with people "better" than me).

Yes. I am bitter. Yes. I am cynical. I am highly educated, talented, and way more creative than 93% of the population. Yes, I hate capitalism and I hate the idea of working "for the man," but this doesn't mean I should have to be homeless and hungry. This doesn't mean that my education, talents and creativity should just shrivel up and die! But that's what "you" all seem to be trying to do.

Well FUCK YOU and your quotation marks!!!!!

I don't want YOU either.

And anyone else who is being ignored, rejected, hated-on, please feel free to join me in not only saying F U! But in the creation of our own "thing." We can make our own money. And do what we want (including setting our own hours and wearing yoga pants to work).

We just have to believe we're worthy and skilled enough to risk it. So, if you're with me, give me a holla'. I'm going to begin brainstorming so I can win my own future. (Take that Obama speech writers!)

A Rabbling on Wasted Time and the Writing Life.

I could scream I am so unfocused. Why do I do this to myself? Why is clicking so addicting? It is a serious waste of time. My friend is right, I should break down and order “Freedom” or “Liberty” or “Stay the F Off Line” or whatever the program is called. I thought I had the will-power. I thought I could stay dedicated to the task of writing, but I’ve been on here since 9:30 and have since wrote an email (a long email nonetheless) and created a FB event. Other than that I’ve just been click-happy, checking out what’s going on in cyber world. WTF? Why am I doing that? I don’t really care do I?

This disturbs me.

The other problem is the writing itself. Every day I write somewhere between 1000 and 4000 words but none of it connects. I can’t seem to continue working on something I had worked on the day before. I lose momentum or excitement or desire to continue on that project. I seriously have like 10 to 15 different stories half-finished.

Perhaps it would be better to just accept it. Until I can learn to focus maybe it’s best to just write like this and then a few months from now I can re-read all my work and find the best story to continue on with. Everyone has their own style of creating, why do I have to feel so guilty that I’m doing it my own particular way? I’m not Annie Dillard. I’m not Stephen King. My "writing life" is in a different time. I never wrote on a type writer. I never wrote without the internet (for the most part). We writers have to learn to adjust to this. It’s not my fault I was born into this transitional period.

It is my fault that I can’t complete anything. Well anything of any length. Anything that must be worked on the following day.

AHHHH!

Sometimes a nice scream is all one needs.

Book after book on writing discusses this idea that the writer’s life is like solitary confinement—that may have been true prior to FB but it is not true now. Unless I turn off my connection I can talk to any one of my 473 friends who happen to be online at the time. Not that I do. But I could.

This is all a major mental battle for me. I know I have discussed similar issues in the past but I somehow find this the biggest challenge of them all. Balance. Clicking the red X and really meaning it.

Or believing that the work I’m doing is meaningful enough to work on a second day. That it’s not just ramblings (like this) but that someone somewhere could really take something from it, that with great care and tremendous work ethic my words could mean sometime more. . . and maybe that’s what I’m most afraid of: not doing it well enough so I trick myself into not doing it at all. Or doing it in fragmented pieces that won’t come together until I’m 53 and finally have confidence.

That would be nice. A mere, “this is my voice, like it or not.”

Maybe if I meditate with that mantra . . .

Coffee, Time, and Inventions that Could Save the World.

The problem with the french press is that it doesn't stay warm very long. Well, it's really hot when I want to drink it. Then I burn my tongue. So I wait. The first cup is a good temperature, but if I want anymore I basically have to chug the coffee so it doesn't go cold. Or, I have to re-heat it.

And can I just say, I'm not a big fan of microwaved coffee. I've really been contemplating an invention that could keep my french press coffee warm--0r an invention that could warm it up without it tasting burnt or giving me microwaved cancer.

The first thing I thought of were "heat rocks" like ice cubes except their hot. Problem is I don't really have a good way to warm them up (if I'm trying to not use the microwave). Nor do I have a way to get them into the coffee without burning my fingers.

The next thing I thought of was a heat pad--where I could just set my french press on top of it and it would stay warm...but the press is made out of plastic and I'm no engineer so I have no idea what materials I could use to prevent burnage.

I then thought that I could plug my coffee pot in and dump the french press coffee into the pot and keep it heated that way...but isn't that just a major pain in the bum? I mean, if I'm going to use the coffee pot, why not just make the coffee in it?

So anyway, I'm sure there is already some sort of invention out there--just like when I invented the self-rising toilet seat or the alarm clock that wakes you up with "sun" light and of course, how could I forget my mini-martini invention.

It saddens me that I am not quick enough to the patent office. . . but maybe if I didn't have to reheat my coffee that extra minute could get me there before anyone else. . .

I'll Sock It To You. (Literally a Blog on Socks.)

Every day I have to put on socks. I go to bed sockless, even though initially, the bed is cold. I deal with it, okay. But then I get up the next morning. I walk around the apartment. I eat breakfast. I drink coffee. I try to sit down and write but I can’t because my feet feel like ice-packs. You know, those big plastic blue things people put in coolers instead of ice. Yes. That’s what my feet feel like. They feel like hard unmovable cold bricks. So I have to wear socks.

Which, is actually pretty cool for the most part, instead of walking I get to slide to the refrigerator or bathroom or couch. Us having a wood floor and all.

But wearing socks every day makes me have to do more laundry. And my toes can’t breathe as easily. And I get those little fuzzy things in-between my little piggies—though they never go to the market or go wee wee wee (if they did, well, I’d probably enroll myself in a mental institution).

But aren’t socks just really weird when one stops to think about it? They’re actually quite funny. Two identical pieces of cloth we pull over our feet so our feet can keep their distance from our shoes or the floor or from feeling like ice. And did you know they have stores dedicated just for socks!?! How odd. I mean does one think about socks so much that they feel the need to want to shop just for them?

“Hmm, I feel like buying something today, what haven’t I treated myself to in a long time. Oh, I know, my feet have really been yearning for a new pair of socks!”

Even the word itself is weird. Where did that come from?

“In the 20th century nylon became popular for stockings because of its strength and elasticity. As men's pants grew longer, socks became shorter, with the word "sock" replacing "stocking" for these smaller foot coverings.”

Okay. That makes sense, but it doesn’t explain where the word “stocking” came from. That word is just as strange.

“The word stock used to refer to the bottom "stump" part of the body, and by analogy the word was used to refer to the one-piece covering of the lower trunk and limbs of the 15th century—essentially tights consisting of the upper-stocks (later to be worn separately as knee breeches) and nether-stocks (later to be worn separately as stockings)."

Thank you Wikipedia. Without that I may not have been able to continue through my day. I now feel relieved to know the origin of the stocking.

But to be perfectly honest the sock isn’t my problem as much as my blood, okay, not really my blood but my circulation of blood. It seems to not like to reach my fingers or my toes.

As my aunt used to say, “cold hands, warm heart.”

Which makes sense biologically and personality-wise (not that I’m necessarily a warm person, but that’s probably because I wear socks and gloves to prevent the whole “warm heart” thing from taking over).

I don't really know where I was going with all of this. Really I was just complaining to myself about my cold feet. And not "cold feet" like I'm scared to do something or anything or everything. Cold feet as in literally freaking cold, like the depths of the antarctic sea.

Why! oh Why! Can't I have a heated floor? Or better circulation? Or socks that don't leave fuzzies and that let my piggies breathe?

(It's also strange to call toes little piggies, but I'm not going to go there today).

10 Important Questions On: The end of the world, technology, veganism, writing, zits and more!

1) Is there always an "end of the world" scare looming over people? I mean didn't people think the world was going to collapse in 2000 based on bad computer coding and it becoming a new century? Obviously it didn't happen. Nothing happened. Yet, 2012 looms nearer--should we really be worried?

2) Are we better or worse due to advancements in technology? What does that even mean? How can that even be determined? Obviously we can't know what we would be like now if we didn't have those things because we do have those things; thus the question is should we embrace them wholeheartedly, ease into them, always be slightly suspicious, or go off the grid entirely (do it Amish style)?

3) Writing fiction seems really complicated. I mean creating whole human beings out of thin air, making them dimensional, making them have depth and motivations, allowing the story to move forward in a thrilling page-turning way. Creating made-up events in an attempt to connect with other people. I just don't if I'm capable. I'm wondering if I should just stick to non-fiction?

4) Why does coffee taste so much better pressed than from a pot?

5) Why do I still get zits?

6) Should I really be meditating? Everyone keeps shouting at me, "Yes!, Yes!" and I try it off and on, it's okay. But mainly it has just become another thing I feel guilty about not doing. How does one stop feeling guilty--I bet people will suggest meditating. Ha!

7) If the government cuts funding to all non-profits etc. and truly turns into a completely neoliberal free market society, will we all become like third-world citizens? I don't know about the rest of you all but cutting birth control to poor people is one of the worst government mistake I can think of...and then not letting those kids who pop out watch Sesame Street, wtf? Maybe our world really is going to end soon.

8) I find it a little annoying and very distracting that so many people attempt to "remake" traditional meals into vegan meals instead of creating new better tasting ones. I understand that transitions are important, but sometimes I wonder if the good original vegan creations get lost in the chick'n parmesans and mac and cheez's of vegan kitchens. But whatever makes people happy. I'm just wondering where I can find some recipes that are tasty and not rip-offs from my great-grandma's lard-infested beef stocked cookbooks?

9) Am I the only person who, on a daily basis, gets pissed off at the atrocities that are constantly occurring? Both BIG mega events like genocide and every day craptastic things like people not sharing the sidewalk and living in a rape/violence/misogynist friendly environment? These things and many more make me angry. And I hope I'm not the only one.

10) If 2012 is the end of the world or even a major shift in the world should I be doing something better with my life right now? How could I ever really know that? Unless there is a parallel universe out there... I wonder...