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Supposedly Fun Thing
1. Grab the book nearest you. Right now ( Read more... ) -
I'm a Moron
I'm taking Corporate Compliance Training Courses in Information Protection, Harassment-Free Workplace and Labor-Charging. I will commit none of these wrongs because I wish to continue working here. I have seen someone get fired for harassment by a person who could have been the Judge in a Cormac McCarthy novel. I guess that's it's all for the ( Read more... ) -
Day Tripper
I've got day shifts for tomorrow and Tuesday so what's to prevent me from asking to take my holiday the day after Columbus Day? You know they spread ten of them out over the year, not clustered in November (Christmas in November! the idea makes me sick) and supervisors don't get paid for indulging the better angels of their nature but the ( Read more... ) -
13 Steps Lead Down
EC's Brutal Youth is becoming an earwig again so everything on the record sounds tolerable (SHE LIVES ON PONY STREET!) I don't know whether that is a good thing. I've now finished five books in the last three weeks: Wallace Stegner's Angle of Repose, Zadie Smith's On Beauty, Terry Pratchett's Making Money, Terry Pratchett's Johnny and the ( Read more... ) -
Wrapped Around Your Finger
I plug along, reading--or rather listening--to those books that have been cluttering my bookcase, my car trunk, hell, my garage (could that be where my copy of "Infinite Jest" is--or has my daughter taken it like she takes my best CD's?), So now it's Zadie Smith's "On Beauty" At first it was a little to close to Allan Hollinghurst's "The Line of ( Read more... ) -
No Use For Vampires
I will not be reading any books about vampires soon. Sure, they're a hell of a metaphor with all of that blood-sucking, seductive behavior, danger but not that dangerous, but I have no real interest in that kind of fantasy. -
Last of the Islip Old Timers
I helped A.J. pack his truck before he left Virginia for Fort Worth today, leaving me as the last of the old time Islipers here in Ashburn. Is my Long Island experience worth anything on this northern fringe of Dixie? Why did Robert E. Lee feel such loyalty to this state? Tonight I get to see my name on the Jumbotron, as EMU of the night--E- ( Read more... ) -
Writer's Block: Your First Record
Three Dog Night "One" (the loneliest number that you ever do). I remember picking up St. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band in a newspaper-subscription selling contest, and then my sister yelling at me because "the family" already had two copies of that album, away at college, as it was. I don't think John, Paul, George and Ringo minded our family ( Read more... ) -
Writer's Block: Awesome Openers
Let's go with two:
"Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show."
and
"If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all that before ( Read more... )