My daughter’s on vacation before her new school starts. We went to the Long Beach aquarium this weekend. Got our brakes fixed yesterday for $500.
I would like to mention how great the New York Mets are. Any Mets fans out there? Last week they got Shawn Green. A nice Jewish boy. His best friend is first baseman Carlos Delgado, who protested singing “God Bless America” at baseball games. I love this team. They have a very good chance to make it to the Series. Unfortunately, turns out that Metsblog, which I’m addicted to, is now part of Pajamas Media. Home of retarded fanatics. Say it isn’t so.
Thanks to Natalia Antonova for the congratulations. The blogger with the best name and a nice new site.
Just saw a Dan Aykroyd movie about UFOs: Dan Aykroyd Unplugged. He knows his stuff. I recently met with some Belgian admirers of the French translation of my novel. So nice to meet with Europeans: they respect writing in a different way. Cool thing, he’s also into UFOs. Told me I should see this movie about Dana Croix. Could you spell that please, I asked. “Dana Croix. You know, he was on Saturday Night Live.” Ah, Dana Croix.
Here’s a good movie about UFOs. It also has a Myspace Page.
August 28, 2006
August 24, 2006
Finally
Contracts are final and I am now part of this agency:
Home to Britney Spears AND Jessica Simpson, so they recognize good writing. Really, though, I’ve never had an agent at this level. The letter he initially wrote to me was like a fantasy I’d made up ten years ago. Basically: I want to make you a best seller and make you money.
Maybe with Tom Cruise being dropped by Paramount for his “recent conduct” and Mel Gibson’s meltdown, the novel will make more sense to people.
Home to Britney Spears AND Jessica Simpson, so they recognize good writing. Really, though, I’ve never had an agent at this level. The letter he initially wrote to me was like a fantasy I’d made up ten years ago. Basically: I want to make you a best seller and make you money.
Maybe with Tom Cruise being dropped by Paramount for his “recent conduct” and Mel Gibson’s meltdown, the novel will make more sense to people.
August 23, 2006
Pleased
Nick Mamatas writes about my recent EW appearance.
“I don't know whether to be pleased that he got some attention for a lulu title, or sad for him.”
I don’t know, pleased for me? I’m bitter because he rejected God’s Wife while he was at Soft Skull.
I’ll update about the agency stuff when the dotted line is finally signed. Don’t want to do it till then. Superstitious maybe, or paranoid. Turns out they didn’t get my signed contracts and I have to send them again. The postal worker seemed really angry, having a bad day. I never saw him put stamps on the envelope and he threw the envelope at his feet. Olivia was clawing me at the time, so maybe I just didn’t see it right. I thought I was being paranoid. Maybe I’m not. It’s a great agency where teen sensations, like me, get to sell their books.
“I don't know whether to be pleased that he got some attention for a lulu title, or sad for him.”
I don’t know, pleased for me? I’m bitter because he rejected God’s Wife while he was at Soft Skull.
I’ll update about the agency stuff when the dotted line is finally signed. Don’t want to do it till then. Superstitious maybe, or paranoid. Turns out they didn’t get my signed contracts and I have to send them again. The postal worker seemed really angry, having a bad day. I never saw him put stamps on the envelope and he threw the envelope at his feet. Olivia was clawing me at the time, so maybe I just didn’t see it right. I thought I was being paranoid. Maybe I’m not. It’s a great agency where teen sensations, like me, get to sell their books.
August 22, 2006
Woman Chaser
I forgot a book that I’d read in my last three. An actual novel. Ruled. Not really about a womanizer. It’s about a used car salesman who becomes a movie director, falls apart. I’d never read Charles Willeford. At one time, I was reading nothing but noir writers. David Goodis, Jim Thompson, Cornell Woolrich, James Cain and so on, read everything I could get. I always liked Jim Thompson more than Chandler. In Chandler, the main characters always win their fights, in Jim Thompson, the main characters always lose.
If this was 100 pages longer, fleshed out, it could be one of the great American novels. Same goes for some Philip K. Dick books, other science fiction. The premise is so great, the plotting, some of the writing, he should have put just a little more time into it. Still, so much more honest than most other writing.
Also, larvae.
Cock Cheney
Interesting pre-2004 election article from Rolling Stone about Dick Cheney.
People who find Cheney's extremism as vice president surprising have not looked at his congressional voting record. In 1986, he was one of only twenty-one members of the House to oppose the Safe Drinking Water Act. He fought efforts to clean up hazardous waste and backed tax breaks for energy corporations. He repeatedly voted against funding for the Veterans Administration. He opposed extending the Civil Rights Act. He opposed the release of Nelson Mandela from jail in South Africa. He even voted for cop-killer bullets.
Left
Actually, my sickness wasn’t all good. I got teary-eyed watching some of Lilo and Stitch with my daughter. That alien just needs someone to love! I got worried there for a moment when I wasn’t getting any better. Recently there’s been an illness in my family—trips to the hospital. Everything’s OK now, but it probably contributed to it. The absolute sadness I would feel not being able to be a part of my daughter’s life. Having kidney problems contributes to this—any sickness could be much worse. I was overreacting, lasted a couple of hours.
It was also very hard on my wife who had no help with Olivia, who’s going through a phase. Olivia’s going to be changing schools in September, which is going to be great for her, and us, but it’s got to be hard on her 4-year-old brain. We’ve always been fairly uncomfortable around the other conservative Jewish parents. She’s outgrown the daycare place—in a home—and needs to be in a school setting with more 4-year-olds. It’s also weird for her to be learning about Jewish holidays that we’re not practicing at home. Overall, it’s been great for her, but it’s time to move on.
Her best friend recently moved back to Israel, which spurned on the decision. “They had a cease-fire just in time,” the father said with a nervous, but optimistic, smile at the going away party. Not the sort of conversation you should be having. He’s working at a think tank that studies how notions of Jihad filter through the Arab media and the Internet. A conservative Jewish Islamic scholar. I didn’t want to talk about the book I’m writing—about WW III--so I told him about the documentary I’d seen the night before.
An interesting, troubling movie about the growth of anti-semitism, as exemplified by The Protocols of Zion, which outlines a Zionist takeover of the world. The movie never mentions that conspiracy theorists call the Protocols a front for the Illuminati (freemasons, Rosicrucians, Templars, etc. etc).—i.e. it’s about the Illuminati takeover of the world. Not that it’s true, but it’s part of the story. But it goes against his premise—that there’s rampant anti-semitism. And he’s right.
The reaction of the left to the recent conflict in Lebanon is baffling. The Israel mess was awful and wrong, but people jump suspiciously fast on Jews. Andrew Sullivan linked to some signs at anti-war rallies that are really hateful: “Mel Gibson was right” and “Nazi Kikes out of Lebanon.” Maybe five seconds later, that guy was told to take down his sign. Maybe not. Invading countries doesn’t work. Neither does diplomacy with people who don’t want you to exist. Islamic fanatics suck. That’s not a right-wing talking point, that’s rational.
Today is supposed to be the End of the World. Watch it Live-Blogged at Armageddon Cocktail Hour. While you’re there, check out Know Your Antichrist Candidates.
It was also very hard on my wife who had no help with Olivia, who’s going through a phase. Olivia’s going to be changing schools in September, which is going to be great for her, and us, but it’s got to be hard on her 4-year-old brain. We’ve always been fairly uncomfortable around the other conservative Jewish parents. She’s outgrown the daycare place—in a home—and needs to be in a school setting with more 4-year-olds. It’s also weird for her to be learning about Jewish holidays that we’re not practicing at home. Overall, it’s been great for her, but it’s time to move on.
Her best friend recently moved back to Israel, which spurned on the decision. “They had a cease-fire just in time,” the father said with a nervous, but optimistic, smile at the going away party. Not the sort of conversation you should be having. He’s working at a think tank that studies how notions of Jihad filter through the Arab media and the Internet. A conservative Jewish Islamic scholar. I didn’t want to talk about the book I’m writing—about WW III--so I told him about the documentary I’d seen the night before.
An interesting, troubling movie about the growth of anti-semitism, as exemplified by The Protocols of Zion, which outlines a Zionist takeover of the world. The movie never mentions that conspiracy theorists call the Protocols a front for the Illuminati (freemasons, Rosicrucians, Templars, etc. etc).—i.e. it’s about the Illuminati takeover of the world. Not that it’s true, but it’s part of the story. But it goes against his premise—that there’s rampant anti-semitism. And he’s right.
The reaction of the left to the recent conflict in Lebanon is baffling. The Israel mess was awful and wrong, but people jump suspiciously fast on Jews. Andrew Sullivan linked to some signs at anti-war rallies that are really hateful: “Mel Gibson was right” and “Nazi Kikes out of Lebanon.” Maybe five seconds later, that guy was told to take down his sign. Maybe not. Invading countries doesn’t work. Neither does diplomacy with people who don’t want you to exist. Islamic fanatics suck. That’s not a right-wing talking point, that’s rational.
Today is supposed to be the End of the World. Watch it Live-Blogged at Armageddon Cocktail Hour. While you’re there, check out Know Your Antichrist Candidates.
August 21, 2006
(sic)
I am sick. Spent the weekend with a 102 fever. My wife wondered when the ball was going to drop on all the good stuff that’s been happening. Maybe this was it. Except I sorta enjoy being sick, if it’s every once in a while. An excuse to sloth. Watched movies—Aeon Flux, bleh, saw The Island a couple of weeks ago and I actually liked it, a better clone movie, even though I think Michael Bey is satan. It has one of the funniest moments in movie history. They’re clinging to a huge R on the side of a skyscraper, part of a logo. The R becomes dislodged and they fall to the ground, clinging to the big R, screaming something that sounds like “RRRRRRRRRR!” Man, that’s good. It’s got some good sci-fi stuff in it. Also saw Marathon Man, All the President’s Men, and Outland. Seen them all before, but never with a 102 fever.
Recently, from the library, I got:
The Last War, H.G. Wells,
A History of Secret Societies, Arkon Daraul
New World Order, H.G. Wells
Prophecies of the New Millennium, James Manning
An Autobiography, Rudolph Steiner
The Complete Guide to Mysterious Beings, John Keel
The last three books I read are:
Hidden Truth, Forbidden Knowledge, by Steven Greer
Extraordinary Times, Extraordinary Beings, by Wayne Peterson
Saucers of the Illuminati, by Jim Keith
Should show where my head’s at. One of these days I’ll write down all of the fringe books I’ve read in the past several years. I’m in the thick of it again. I dropped my interest in this stuff for a long while. Always interested, but never obsessed again. Glad to be back.
Recently, from the library, I got:
The Last War, H.G. Wells,
A History of Secret Societies, Arkon Daraul
New World Order, H.G. Wells
Prophecies of the New Millennium, James Manning
An Autobiography, Rudolph Steiner
The Complete Guide to Mysterious Beings, John Keel
The last three books I read are:
Hidden Truth, Forbidden Knowledge, by Steven Greer
Extraordinary Times, Extraordinary Beings, by Wayne Peterson
Saucers of the Illuminati, by Jim Keith
Should show where my head’s at. One of these days I’ll write down all of the fringe books I’ve read in the past several years. I’m in the thick of it again. I dropped my interest in this stuff for a long while. Always interested, but never obsessed again. Glad to be back.
August 8, 2006
Agent
Holy-mazing, I was propositioned by a high-powered lit agent today, wanting to take me on. And how’s this for a review, from Sound of Meat.
It incorporates both my fear of the apocalypse with the love of being liked.
In other news, Prisoner of X (my review here) has some readings coming up in Portland and Seattle:
Powells in Portland, Oregon, on Thursday, August 10 at 7:30 p.m. The address is 1005 West Burnside.
And then on Saturday, August 12 at 4:30 p.m. the whole thing happens again in Seattle, Washington, at Elliott Bay Books. Address? 101 South Main Street.
Okay, now get this: I'm reading Henry Baum's book, North of Sunset, about one third into it. And so far, I am mightily impressed. Impressed in the Biblical, apocalyptic sense of the word 'impressed.' Comparisons with Raymond Chandler keep arriving in my synapses, on their own, like they're just in from the 24 Elders, the Zoe, the Living Beasts, of Revelation. This is one glistening read, the kind that just oozes and drips noir.
It incorporates both my fear of the apocalypse with the love of being liked.
In other news, Prisoner of X (my review here) has some readings coming up in Portland and Seattle:
Powells in Portland, Oregon, on Thursday, August 10 at 7:30 p.m. The address is 1005 West Burnside.
And then on Saturday, August 12 at 4:30 p.m. the whole thing happens again in Seattle, Washington, at Elliott Bay Books. Address? 101 South Main Street.
August 7, 2006
Reasons for my absence.
1. I didn’t want to write a blog post explaining the reasons for my absence.
2. I was starting to hate the blogosphere. Surfing around and seeing the sites that are popular/get a lot of comments is depressing, no different than the books/movies that are popular.
3. Sick of seeing the nitpicking online. This blog has seen some of it. What causes people to go to someone else’s site and criticize them? The internet is full of it. Metafilter is terrible. Look at the comments on Youtube. One example. I looked up a Sebadoh video, titled “Sebadoh playing with a boombox.” The first comment was “It’s called a drum machine, not a boombox.” First, he/she was wrong. It was a boombox, not a drum machine, they were playing along with drums played to tape. Second, Why Bother. Not the best example, but it’s one of many. People nitpick each other to death, like we’re all part of a bad marriage. I’m doing the same thing by saying, Negativity sucks. But there’s a difference between having opinions on your own blog and attacking someone on their site.
4. Around the time of my birthday (June 29), my wife and I were fighting horribly. It did us some good and we’re much better for it. The fever broke.
5. I got sick of having opinions. It’s not so healthy to be so critical of everything. Not blogging isn’t quite curbing my appetite.
6. I’ve been seeing the Apocalypse everywhere. The Middle East isn’t helping. Went to Ojai the weekend before last. At the pool they were playing contemporary country music non-stop. I’ve never heard that many new country songs in a row. My thought—this is why George Bush can get elected—people can listen to music this brain damaged and think it’s meaningful.
7. My novel is about the Apocalypse—trying to put into words something I think could actually be occurring. Scaring the shit out me, blocking me. I waver in and out of enthusiasm for my novel.
8. I used to feel compelled to blog things the way I felt compelled to get things down in fiction. Like I had to. I thought blogging might detract from the other. In the past coupla weeks, I haven't been writing that much more fiction. I think this blog can be a warm up for the book, not suck my energy.
9. I’ve censored myself on this web site. Many of my more radical thoughts have been met with criticism or silence. I haven’t written half of what I believe in--demented things that I feel the need to qualify as demented. I’ll probably be posting more of it in the future.
10. Fatigue. Been doing this for 2 years.
11. Listening to John Coltrane’s Interstellar Space. I want to go there. How the hell do I go there?
12. One reason I’m back: I’m listed in this week’s Entertainment Weekly (Aug. 11) as the number one self-published novel. I wanted to write that down.
2. I was starting to hate the blogosphere. Surfing around and seeing the sites that are popular/get a lot of comments is depressing, no different than the books/movies that are popular.
3. Sick of seeing the nitpicking online. This blog has seen some of it. What causes people to go to someone else’s site and criticize them? The internet is full of it. Metafilter is terrible. Look at the comments on Youtube. One example. I looked up a Sebadoh video, titled “Sebadoh playing with a boombox.” The first comment was “It’s called a drum machine, not a boombox.” First, he/she was wrong. It was a boombox, not a drum machine, they were playing along with drums played to tape. Second, Why Bother. Not the best example, but it’s one of many. People nitpick each other to death, like we’re all part of a bad marriage. I’m doing the same thing by saying, Negativity sucks. But there’s a difference between having opinions on your own blog and attacking someone on their site.
4. Around the time of my birthday (June 29), my wife and I were fighting horribly. It did us some good and we’re much better for it. The fever broke.
5. I got sick of having opinions. It’s not so healthy to be so critical of everything. Not blogging isn’t quite curbing my appetite.
6. I’ve been seeing the Apocalypse everywhere. The Middle East isn’t helping. Went to Ojai the weekend before last. At the pool they were playing contemporary country music non-stop. I’ve never heard that many new country songs in a row. My thought—this is why George Bush can get elected—people can listen to music this brain damaged and think it’s meaningful.
7. My novel is about the Apocalypse—trying to put into words something I think could actually be occurring. Scaring the shit out me, blocking me. I waver in and out of enthusiasm for my novel.
8. I used to feel compelled to blog things the way I felt compelled to get things down in fiction. Like I had to. I thought blogging might detract from the other. In the past coupla weeks, I haven't been writing that much more fiction. I think this blog can be a warm up for the book, not suck my energy.
9. I’ve censored myself on this web site. Many of my more radical thoughts have been met with criticism or silence. I haven’t written half of what I believe in--demented things that I feel the need to qualify as demented. I’ll probably be posting more of it in the future.
10. Fatigue. Been doing this for 2 years.
11. Listening to John Coltrane’s Interstellar Space. I want to go there. How the hell do I go there?
12. One reason I’m back: I’m listed in this week’s Entertainment Weekly (Aug. 11) as the number one self-published novel. I wanted to write that down.
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