Last night, I dreamt that I was searching fervently for copies of Nabokov books. I queued for hours at the front of what looked like a record shop until I got to ask the clerk, in French, not if he knew where I could find any Nabokov, but if he knew where I could find a copy of the Neutral Milk Hotel's first album (perhaps because it looked like a ( Read more... )

Last night, over bottles of wine at a favourite bar, I recounted to some British friends tales of my "glory days" as a pretentious, idealistic wannabe-rebel of an early teenager. While I tend to discuss that period quite a lot in this space (though I don't really need to -- all you'd have to do is hit the 2001 button in my archives and you'd be ( Read more... )

1 September 2006 Postojna, Slovenia 1:20 AM

( THEME OF THE MONTH AUGUST 2006: MONOMYTH OF THE MIDNIGHT JOURNEY )

[Okay, so here, over a week later, is the first part of my road trip to Yorkshire. I've decided to split it up because (1)It's getting quite long, and (2)I'm growing rapidly bored/tired ( Read more... )

I almost enjoy nights like this. Long, slow, intimate nights, entered with apprehension and the anxiety that I'll never finish, that when I do finish, I'll have produced shit. But, here I am right in the middle of the silent darkness, finally settled into my keys, and I know that within hours I'll be finished, before I blink, it'll be printed and ( Read more... )

Yesterday was my last day of classes. I keep remarking to everyone (and to myself) how fast time has gone. Where the fuck did the fall go? I mean, isn't it September still? All of a sudden, BAM! I'm in Belgium and now it's Halloween and Thanksgiving and two weeks from today, I'll be home. And that may or may not change everything. I didn't ( Read more... )

In one of my classes, there’s this greasy drugged-up junior (I know, that description could apply to a lot of people). For some reason, twice in the past week and a half, he has been prompted to make the proclamation “I’m an atheist” in reference to his religious affiliations. No, I’m sorry, it sounded more like, “Om un Ay-ti-ist.” At which ( Read more... )

I wish that I had something to write about because I don't feel much like doing translations, but I have nothing else left to do. So...time for Salomé, I suppose. It's not bad, or even particularly frustrating, as it is all dialog (no crazy literary tenses...apparently, there are five. what does one do with five literary tenses? I don't quite ( Read more... )

Today, I finished Middlesex, which is the most exciting development in my increasingly reclusive life since I crashed the vespa-like entity (oh so many days ago). I would not typically bother to update about such trivial matter as finishing a novel (well, actually, I might...I have...whatever) but, I am currently in the process of putting of ( Read more... )

I think the universe and I just had a holy moment. And it had layers. There was me in the holy moment, then of course, I was thinking of the fact that I was in the holy moment which added to the effect of the holy moment, and then I was thinking about myself thinking about the holy moment while I was transcribing the feeling of the holy moment ( Read more... )