I've manage to catch some sort of plague-like infection and it's totally put a damper on my weekend. What I had intended to be a weekend filled with working on short story has turned into nothing but whining and coughing and sleeping and sobbing.
In general, I'm kind of a crybaby. Even on my very best days. When I get sick, I'm leveled. I sobbed through a "Roseanne" marathon this morning, and because that wasn't quite enough I decided to watch the original "V" I TIVO'd last weekend, and cried through a lot of that too. "The Amazing Race" too.
I didn't cry during "The Maltese Falcon" though, perhaps that's progress.
Read a fucking book, you're probably thinking. I thought that too, but the pressure and burning in my eyes made reading nearly impossible. In fact, I tried and gave up because it just wasn't working for me. Some people are really good at working through the sickness. I'm not one of those people. My brain doesn't function well when I have a cold. It just feels slower and filled with mud. I try to think, but fail miserable. I don't get jokes and barely understand what people are saying to me. It's not good. Really, all I'm capable of is laying around being generally unhappy and whining about how much being sick sucks.
It does suck. I'm going to bed.
Boy, for a couple of teetotaling vegetarians, CarrieNation and Dabysan throw one hell of a party. I mean, I knew it was going to be a good time, but yesterday went above and beyond my highest expectations. I'm so unbelievably happy for the both of them, and even though it's been said plenty, I'd like to offer them my public congratulations one last time. I am deeply honored that two people I care about so much asked me to be a part of their special day. I'm just thankful that I only flubbed my toast in small ways that nobody seemed to notice. I was so sure I was going to screw it up.
Wow! It had been a while since I/d seen such a big audience(in truth you can't really see them with the lights down)
and we were only eight women; I had not tried to memorize anything seriously since the seventies in high school so my question was, "Would I freeze and not even recall which song I was supposed to be singing?" Or something like that. But it was OK!
In the video my husband took, I looked a little on the serious side while our conductor spoke briefly, but Sven assured me it's nice for me to be serious once in a while because usually I'm just so silly!
Our songs were:
1) "Prayer of the Children" about kids in the Bosnian War-- but shadowing ourselves to highlight a slide-show of
Haitian children served by Mustard Seed, a group of volunteer doctors who visit Haiti twice a year to treat people in remote villages, pro bono.
Next was 2) "Stand By Me", a reference to the Playing For Change world-wide additive mix you can find on YouTube:
This was all part of a concert called Vocal Chord Bowl which featured a number of a capella groups from the area.
All ages, except Young of Heart were not present at this one. Great time had by all!
I have to leave soon to bring my ailing Ruby to Ben's to see if he can't figure out what is wrong with her. But before I go, I had to wish a heartfelt congratulations to Dabysan and CarrieNation, who are getting married today.
I have other stuff I should be doing right now. But I made the mistake of turning on my computer when I got home. Then I re-read Dabysan's excellent post about getting married this weekend. Then I started thinking about my toast, which I thought I had completed last night. Then I started going back through some - okay, most - of our posts about Karaoke to the Death. Then I started listening to the audio from past years. Then I started thinking about how great all my friends are, and how much I'm looking forward to this fantastic celebration on Saturday - despite the fact that I have to give a toast, which I definitely don't want to do.
I have other stuff I should be doing right now, but you're going to have a hard time convincing me I wasted my evening.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Suck it, Phillies.
PS. Jerry Hairston, Jr. got into the game last night. Is that why the Yanks won? I'm saying yes. Thanks, M-----l. Jerry is good luck.
A few months ago, I showed how Pearl Jam had stolen a song from Devo.
Apparently, Pearl Jam just really really want to be Devo.
Exhibit B: Their Halloween show a few days ago:
PS - I'm seeing the real thing Friday! Woo!
Jeez, I'm only one day into this "no pictures, no video" thing and I'm already being tested. The discovery on Youtube of the infomercial for the Weezer Snuggie is not helping. Must.... not.... link....
A couple of days ago, we glanced over to the left there and noticed that we're on pace for 2009 to be our most prolific year as a blogger. That surprised the hell out of us. It had seemed to us that the month that just ended was a microcosm of our output this year as a whole. But about the same time we decided we were being a little too self-critical, we remembered that late January and early February saw a flurry of "posts" from Tampa which inflate the overall number. All told, we have literally phoned in nearly forty posts so far this year, and all but a handful of them are just a photo with no explanation. There's no denying it - 2009 has been the laziest year in the short history of hotrod.vox.com.
So in an effort to rectify this, for the entire month of November we're going to focus on quality over quantity. We won't be posting any photos or videos. We're going to rely solely on our words. (Frankly, this strikes us as a more appropriate way of commemorating National Blog Posting Month than posting daily, for what it's worth.) And no, we don't have any idea of how this is going to play out. We hope that we might find something to say in the next four weeks (besides this introductory post) that doesn't require a visual crutch. Lord knows, we've still got stories to tell. Maybe we'll even get to the tale of how we got our nickname....
I think I only read three books in all of October. That's damn near shameful. I will, however, blame my writing class on this. Where usually we read a majority of 12-18ish page short stories, this time around we're being bombarded by 6,000 word 28-page novel beginnings. It's been hell. Not just the sheer amount of words to read, but only a few of the novel chapters have been worth my time. In fact, one novel start was so offensive that the class was actually angry. Of course the complete lack of punctuation didn't help matters. It just goes to show you, domestic violence is not an issue you can make funny, right up there with rape, child molestation, and genocide. None of these things are funny. Let it be known.
On with the show.
BOOK ACQUIRED
Swimming Inside the Sun by David Zweig
Chronic City by Jonathan Lethem
Totally Killer by Greg Olear
Last Night in Twisted River by John Irving
BOOKS READ
Await Your Reply by Dan Chaon: This novel about identity, identity theft, the Internet, brotherhood, and more is probably going to make my top 10 best books of 2009 -- will blow your mind.
American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang: Even with an ending that comes off as a little convenient and coincidental, this graphic novel about growing up Chinese in America weaves together three different stories in a way that is sweet and funny.
Andromeda Klein by Frank Portman: A slightly disappointing novel by the author of the the fan-fucking-tastic King Dork is about a skinny weird girl obsessed with the occult and has a tendency to be a bit boring under the weight of all the magic research.
CURRENTLY READING
Every Boat Turns South by J.P. White
The Complete Essex County by Jeff Lemiere (which I actually finished today, but now it's November)
Last Night in Twisted River by John Irving
