Why Don't You Write Me
(27 May - 5 June 2001)

5 June 2001
[from Albuquerque]
-Been reading up some more of late on Doug Hopkins.  It's a depressing experience, but then again, following most of my favorite songwriters is.  If anyone's wondering why I don't drink, this man's life has as much to do with it as any of the other little factors.
-Tell me my novel isn't falling into the trap of taking longer than it can afford to.  It's my consistent theme in longer works, to make them too long.  Here I may be going again.  I just don't have time to go over 300 pages, do I?
-What IS a "parking page", anyway?  I know that this is partially my responsibility, finding an alternative to this, but Schteino needs to get back to me.

4 June 2001
[from Albuquerque]
-Happy Birthday Madeline!
-My Dad's right:  Life is fraught.
-Well, yesterday I actually cracked the 4-page barrier (it's like breaking the sound barrier or something!), turning in about 3,000 words in the 24 hours.  Maybe I'm picking up the pace.  Either way, I've certainly heard a lot of kind words egging me on of late, which is always neat.  Good to know that other people believe in me more than I do.
-The Mariners, in case you haven't been paying attention, are off to the 3rd-best start in MAJOR LEAGUE HISTORY!  If nothing else were going well, methinks that would be keeping me afloat.  Who doesn't like icing?
-I'm not big on dividing the world into 2 kinds of people, but I must admit that I'm sorely tempted here.  Those who have never been in love just don't seem to manage to understand the way that those who have will act or think from time to time.  It would hold vice versa, except everyone who has been in love remembers a time before they had been, & thus can reach out to those folks' perspective.  Just an observation.
-16k.
-Wouldn't that silence Russ if the M's won 120 games this year?!
-Well, will you look at that... FFI went & got itself a website!  Too bad that 1998, not '97, is the first year they really have chronicled, so my exploits with funny hats & the 2307 crew are not on display.  But it would seem Pesola & his cronies are still at it.  Besides, good ol' Friar Tuck is still there!

3 June 2001
[from Albuquerque]
-I'm ready for this headache to be gone... how 'bout you?!
-Talking to JP for 5 hours in the Frontier last night was great, even though conclusions were scant & depressing when present.  It really is too bad that one can't meet lots of girls on the hiking trails of Nuevo Mexico, that'd really beat bars or or any other locales we could come up with.  I swear I'm not gonna be able to hear the word "connoisseur" without cracking up for a while, though.

2 June 2001
[from Albuquerque]
-I'm not too pleased at the moment, after spending more or less 16 hours out of commission with a migraine/naseua.  Joy to the world.  Not only did this briefly derail the novel (now over 10k), it just augmented feelings of minor to no productivity.  The last of these things is earnestly silly... I just made (2 days ago) probably the best tape I've ever recorded & that's something.  & for the love of the baby, it's my last "real" summer in some ways.  & I'm still on pace for about 70k words, which is a lot, last time I checked.
-Must... get... coffee...
-Well, I just had perhaps the most grueling movie-watching experience since "The Talented Mr. Ripley".  "Moulin Rouge" isn't quite as good as the prior film, but carries with it enough of the weight (for different reasons entirely) that made the former so tough.  There's a couple of slight plot alterations they could've made to "MR" that would have made it perfectly brilliant & devastating; I'm not sure if I'm thankful or upset that those weren't there.  It sat on the line too much of the time to allow me to sit comfortably.  The movie is recommended, though the preview of "Original Sin" is not, especially followed by the preview of "American Sweethearts".  At this point, I'm being so obscure & cryptic that probably no one is following me, but trust me, if you see those 2 previews in a row right before "Moulin Rouge", you'll be right there with me.

1 June 2001
[from Albuquerque]
-Hey June, don't make it bad...

31 May 2001
[from Albuquerque]
-I feel a little behind, after spending the better part of today discussing stuff with my Dad.  Mostly just stuff about his potential web project.  I still have written within the past 24 hours, but I really wanna catch up on e-mail sometime too.  Shucks.  I haven't even gotten to Part One yet; I'm still in the Prologue.
-I must concur wholeheartedly with Lisha's reaction to our unfortunate city's vote on the baseball bond issue.  Just when you thought it was safe to call Albuquerque a city, with the Big-I renovation making us look serious, we decide to "renovate" the sandlot & call it a stadium.  At least we're bringing baseball back.  But why would we want a revitalized downtown?
-I wonder if there's gonna be a bond issue on what to NAME the new team that's arriving here.  I have this bad bad feeling that 'Querque voters, by a 2-1 margin, would opt to rename it the Dukes.  At least that would be better than the Scorpions.

30 May 2001
[from Albuquerque]
-Current pace:  70,000 words by August.  I think I should start to give myself an August deadline, given how hectic (in a good way) that month is shaping up to be.  Hm.
-I am SO BEHIND on e-mail!  Ay, no me gusta.
-I read it, but I don't understand it.  Maybe that's the point.
-Why is no one responding to a bid for a Civ 2 game?  I understand Kunx & Freez waiting till they head for more permanent residences, but where are Jake & Fish?  C'mon, play me!

29 May 2001
[from Albuquerque]
-Kate & Stina are in quite different mental states right about now.  But good talking to both of them, of course.
-Do I need to make a new tape soon?  Parts of "A Midsummer Night's Theme" ring true, but parts are just sounding flat.  I still haven't even made the tapebox for "Renaissance=Rebirth" anyway.
-I need to stop dreaming about being a bestseller.  I think it'll be plenty to just have all my friends read it.
-At this rate, August is gonna rock.  Not only are JP & the Griser coming back with me from here to Waltham (where the House of Mep is looking likely), but Ariela's actually coming out to pay a week-long visit.  This puts a little more pressure on me to finish the novel early (another 1k words in the hopper so far today), but gives me a lot to look forward to.
-Yes, I'm currently obsessed with the writing project.  It should be obvious, but I don't want to leave any doubts...

28 May 2001
[from Albuquerque]
-What's a good guideline for pages?  I'm writing in 9-point font, Times New Roman, single-spaced, but that's so I don't get too caught up in how much I'm writing & because I like looking at as much of the tale at a time as possible.  My Dad tells me that 400 pages (full paragraph text - obviously one-liner dialogue is gonna be less) per page is a good guideline. If that's true, I've got 14 pages so far.  Fourteen pages!  In about half a week.  Did I mention that I'm pumped?
-My friends, as per usual, are all over the emotional map.  I wish life were easier for most everyone.  Trying to make it that way seems my challenge.
-I'm not gonna see Jaque for 6+ months!  He was asking if the novel would be for sale in Australia while he was still down there.  Best-case scenario, he'll only be 3 years early, I figure.

27 May 2001
[from Albuquerque]
-Despite the worst bowling I've probably done since freshman year in high school (maybe not THAT bad, but darn close), this day turned out pretty well.  & by this day I of course mean yesterday, since I do these updates consistently around 3 or 4 in the morning about now.  Basically, we wound up spending 2-3 hours (after another disastrous go at Monopoly) having a roundtable discussion about relationship futures & children & even a bit of death.  Mostly relationships.  The "we" here being Jaque, Schneider, Freez, Eliaii, & myself.  Even though JP & the Bumpkin don't give each other enough credit, we managed to have quite a series of good talks... very denteresting, if nothing else.
-The moths are a bit too much like a Hitchcock scene, especially at night near lights.  I guess, unlike the caterpillars, there's nothing to prevent them from doing well.  Moths can fly to food, which the 'pillars really couldn't, & this makes their odds of success much better than the prior plague to hit 'Burque.  But what happens when ALL the MOTHS reproduce....?
-An interesting tidbit from a recent inquiry into the latest US News University rankings revealed that while I've always known that Brandeis & UCSD are running neck & neck (current tie at #31), the next 3 colleges after those are NYU, Rochester, & Georgia Tech.  It's almost creepy.

 

Introspection, My Worst Friend* (Current)
Ye Olde Archive (Past)

Tell me this is not the end...*


*-lyrics from an as-yet unreleased song, "The Same Old Frontiers", by SWClayton.