the pancakes were an excellent choice
i think i might have figured out what my bigbang is about - like, what the story actually is - which would be great except if so, it means i'm only at the middle or possibly the end of the beginning, not the beginning of the end, and i have two weeks to write a lot more than i was expecting. altho now my title fits better.... i've done bigbang enough times that you'd think i'd know what i was doing by now, but no. i don't.
in other news, i spent a lot of time today hanging out with people and buying stuff i probably don't need (chiefly a salt and pepper shaker set shaped like cacti, because cacti). first, brunch with tamalinn and friends and yummy pancakes. then four of us went to home goods, which was like half an hour away. we met a very cute, very chill shih tzu and her little old lady mom and her mom's little old lady friend. apparently she was a rescue and came with a box of clothes. a stylish puppy! the little old ladies were really sweet and had absolutely no problem with these total strangers giving their dog some love. and seriously, she was the most chill dog. after that was target and no dogs, but i did get the aforementioned cactus salt and pepper shakers and a new teakettle, because the whistle in my old one is busted. so something useful and something cactus. :D after that the grocery store (by now just me and one other person) and then it was 5:30 and i was finally going home. and then i worked on my bang for a while and realized at like 9:00 that i might have hit on the actual story. even tho i still don't know how it ends.
and yes, i will eventually stop talking about the bang but probably not for two weeks, because the draft is due may 1 and i'll probably be panicking right up until then.
last night at seriously ass o'clock i signed on to my work laptop and e-filed a bunch of tax returns and extensions. but not as many as i was hoping! tomorrow will be fun. :|
South of Plaza Mayor by Plaza de Cascorro-
past streets named Lettuce, Raisin, Barley-
is Madrid’s outdoor market called El Rastro,
hundreds of stalls, lean-tos, tents squeezed tight
as niches where anything from a clawfoot tub,
to a surgeon’s saw to a tattered La Celestina
bound in sheepskin could be haggled down
with raunchy bravado or the promise of beer.
Mostly it was junk passed off to the tourists
as pricey souvenirs, like plastic castanets, hand fans
of silk (rayon really), or tin-plate doubloons.
So what drew the youth of Madrid to this place
every Sunday afternoon by the hundreds?
None of us were bargain hunters or hoarders,
just hippieish kids in patched dungarees,
espadrilles, & wool coats frayed to cheesecloth,
our pockets with enough pesetas to buy
a handful of stale cigarettes. It was to revel
in life, squeeze out joy from the lees of fate,
make fellowship like pilgrims to a shrine.
We’d sprawl against a wall or a lamppost
long into the afternoon to talk, joke, carouse,
eat cheese rinds with secondhand bread,
drink wine more like iodine than merlot,
oblivious to time & space, the crowds tripping
on our legs, tossing butts into our heads,
how they smelled like horses & we told them so,
who then shot out crude medieval curses,
but we didn’t care, for we felt alive as never before,
singular in every breath, word, & thought,
stubborn as wayward seeds that trick a drought
& grow into hardscrabble woodland trees.
--"El Rastro", Orlando Ricardo Menes
in other news, i spent a lot of time today hanging out with people and buying stuff i probably don't need (chiefly a salt and pepper shaker set shaped like cacti, because cacti). first, brunch with tamalinn and friends and yummy pancakes. then four of us went to home goods, which was like half an hour away. we met a very cute, very chill shih tzu and her little old lady mom and her mom's little old lady friend. apparently she was a rescue and came with a box of clothes. a stylish puppy! the little old ladies were really sweet and had absolutely no problem with these total strangers giving their dog some love. and seriously, she was the most chill dog. after that was target and no dogs, but i did get the aforementioned cactus salt and pepper shakers and a new teakettle, because the whistle in my old one is busted. so something useful and something cactus. :D after that the grocery store (by now just me and one other person) and then it was 5:30 and i was finally going home. and then i worked on my bang for a while and realized at like 9:00 that i might have hit on the actual story. even tho i still don't know how it ends.
and yes, i will eventually stop talking about the bang but probably not for two weeks, because the draft is due may 1 and i'll probably be panicking right up until then.
last night at seriously ass o'clock i signed on to my work laptop and e-filed a bunch of tax returns and extensions. but not as many as i was hoping! tomorrow will be fun. :|
South of Plaza Mayor by Plaza de Cascorro-
past streets named Lettuce, Raisin, Barley-
is Madrid’s outdoor market called El Rastro,
hundreds of stalls, lean-tos, tents squeezed tight
as niches where anything from a clawfoot tub,
to a surgeon’s saw to a tattered La Celestina
bound in sheepskin could be haggled down
with raunchy bravado or the promise of beer.
Mostly it was junk passed off to the tourists
as pricey souvenirs, like plastic castanets, hand fans
of silk (rayon really), or tin-plate doubloons.
So what drew the youth of Madrid to this place
every Sunday afternoon by the hundreds?
None of us were bargain hunters or hoarders,
just hippieish kids in patched dungarees,
espadrilles, & wool coats frayed to cheesecloth,
our pockets with enough pesetas to buy
a handful of stale cigarettes. It was to revel
in life, squeeze out joy from the lees of fate,
make fellowship like pilgrims to a shrine.
We’d sprawl against a wall or a lamppost
long into the afternoon to talk, joke, carouse,
eat cheese rinds with secondhand bread,
drink wine more like iodine than merlot,
oblivious to time & space, the crowds tripping
on our legs, tossing butts into our heads,
how they smelled like horses & we told them so,
who then shot out crude medieval curses,
but we didn’t care, for we felt alive as never before,
singular in every breath, word, & thought,
stubborn as wayward seeds that trick a drought
& grow into hardscrabble woodland trees.
--"El Rastro", Orlando Ricardo Menes