tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55453232007-06-16T12:33:27.532-06:00bugs galoredighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comBlogger158125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1166544655112542122006-12-19T09:58:00.000-06:002006-12-19T10:17:27.870-06:00page 79
Well, I never did finish the novel - I stopped for gas and coffee at the halfway mark and never got back behind the wheel. But if a slackass like me can write half a novel in three weeks, imagine what someone with any kind of work ethic could do. 25,000 words is no joke. And my protagonist and I are still on good terms, more or less. It was an amicable ending. What follows is one of her dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1165863884089644492006-12-11T12:59:00.000-06:002006-12-11T13:04:44.103-06:00
This is my Grandpa, Frank Martin Toews. He played the harmonica, rode a motorcycle, rescued a maiden from abuse and slavery (and then married her), and liked to drink a glass of beer of an afternoon. He is fondly remembered.dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1163696410098843382006-11-16T10:49:00.000-06:002006-11-16T11:13:11.243-06:00like my dad always says -
I'm so far behind I think I'm first. The forwarder I go, the behinder I get. Etcetera.
Yay! I'm one quarter done my novel. Booooo, I'm one half done the month. For those of you who read my excerpt at nanowrimo (author name lisalouise), I'll swap it for another bit that falls later in the story.
For those of you who may have wished to comment but were unable to, I've dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1163452722731448402006-11-13T15:11:00.000-06:002006-11-13T15:30:19.586-06:00word count: 11, 453
I know that sounds like a lot, but consider that I need to have 50,000 words by the end of the month (which only has 30 days) and some might argue that they should even make sense. No picnic, dear reader. No, trudging off the to the word mines every day to be engulfed by the soot and sweat of creation is a sacrifice not for the faint of heart.
Also, my novel sucks. I should dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1162488247485300892006-11-02T11:05:00.000-06:002006-11-02T11:57:30.556-06:00
NaNoOhNo, or "It was a dark and wordy night."
Busiest month of my life. But, as Simon said, we're all frickin' busy. Simon also says 'play longer and faster - only then will you be the master.'
It's in that spirit that I begin writing my first novel - my NaNo m.o., of course, is to start a day late and at least a dollar short. I don't even have an idea. Or a genre. But I have the first 600 dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1156810435085015132006-08-28T18:05:00.000-06:002006-08-28T18:13:55.100-06:00
Being a thinking person is kind of a burden, you know? Always with the thinking. Runs in my family.dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1156808874045759022006-08-28T17:34:00.000-06:002006-08-29T13:42:52.206-06:00real job
No shit. No, I am not kidding. I have my own office, and everything. It's kind of the colour of the underside of your tongue. Except for where the ceiling tiles are discoloured from water damage. And my own desk, which has its own computer. And you know what that means. It's time for Lady MacBugs to fire up that magnificent time-wasting machine. And as an homage to this treadmill that'sdighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1144014771014629272006-04-02T15:40:00.000-06:002006-04-02T15:52:51.036-06:00you're so interesting i want to talk at you for 89 minutes
So I'm trying out my somewhat rusty social skills chatting with some anonymous dude at ye olde caffeine trough. He seems to know something about me - 'you still in journalism?' - and I have to confess I know fuck all about him. That hurdle past, he asks what sort of stories I do. Mostly arts and fluff, I say - but I do have this one dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1140917463135228672006-02-25T19:27:00.000-06:002006-02-25T19:31:03.136-06:00fear me.
dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1140895863252444552006-02-25T12:18:00.000-06:002006-02-25T13:31:03.310-06:00cosmonaut
Why would I even bother? I mean, it's been half a year since I had anything to say. This blog is as dead (and probably as irrelevant and cliche) as a doornail. What? You didn't miss me?
Perhaps my absence has been like that of Jodie Foster's in Contact, when she blasts off and disappears into a wormhole and sees galaxies glowing and undulating in the velvet black of space and meets dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1127928621390435942005-09-28T11:13:00.000-06:002005-09-28T11:30:21.443-06:00Am I nuts?
Early results are looking pretty positive in the lunacy poll. People I respect most say 'definitely dotty'.
But it's a done deal. The Date is now the Roommate. My house is roughly the size of a winnebago and now it houses a weight room. And more CDs with the word 'death' in the title than you can shake a fist at.
Over granola, we chew over the lingering debates:
Can things that aredighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1127191892331067612005-09-19T22:36:00.000-06:002005-09-19T22:51:32.336-06:00ma'af
That means sorry. Sorry I've had nothing to say. I could blame the lack of internet access, but it would be more accurate to say this:
Mass graves have a way of robbing one of glib remarks, the kind I've made a habit of posting here.
Don't get me wrong, I haven't been wandering the fields of the dead day and night since I left or anything. It's just that my usual throw-away tone just dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1126402560966572592005-09-10T19:30:00.000-06:002005-09-10T19:36:00.970-06:00Papayity in Mennonesia
The jet lag has worn off, but the culture shock persists -
I'm with Mennonites every day - hymns, devotions, you name it.
The official version of this response can be seen at www.bitlink.ca/mccs.
Gotta go. To church.dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1125679106030469312005-09-02T10:17:00.000-06:002005-09-02T18:00:55.763-06:00barometer
I've created a system to help people at work understand how to approach me. A quick glance at my desktop will give significant clues to my state of mind.
dehydrated or hormonally unstable - keep reasonable distance
biological clock ticking -
keep reasonable distance or risk impregnating medighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1125635552919073762005-09-01T22:16:00.000-06:002005-09-01T22:32:32.926-06:00
why do I look pensive?Because, holy shit, I just realized I'm leaving for Indonesia in, like, 4 days. Like, tuesday. Like, hello; PizzalikePete's. I have as much shit to do as there are... islands in the Indonesian archipelago. I have to learn how to use a canon XL-1. I have to make my home ready for the house sitter (oh, good christ, the Date - I suppose I'll have to throw away the severed dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1125514257900797532005-08-31T12:38:00.000-06:002005-08-31T12:53:05.053-06:00camping with carlo rossi:
in which our heroine finds a leech on her ankle and gets falling-down drunk with Tracey at Namekus Lake.
in the consuming dark
I lose both
balance and shoe
tentscape plurality
bodies insulated
possessions encapsulated
carlo
we bested you
you laughed last
when gods awake
they must have
coffee, bacon
oh, duplicitous day
sun-obscuring grey
no match for she-wolves
nowdighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1125329657288891892005-08-29T09:30:00.000-06:002005-08-29T09:34:17.293-06:00It's exhausting,
this business of feeling and not feeling. Feeling enough to be alive and to know it; not feeling so much that you bleed all over the fucking office and your unwitting colleagues are slipping and sliding in the mess, banging their shins on desk edges as they try to get out of the way.dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1125273599102511012005-08-28T17:35:00.000-06:002005-08-28T17:59:59.200-06:00Day, I love you
This is the kind of day that wants to be acknowledged. Hell, it was practically fishing for compliments from the get-go. Awright, awright.
Ahem.
Hey, Day! Right arm, buddy. You rocked out there. But seriously, thanks for the details -
the handfuls of silty sludge perfect for sand-lair building at cranberry flats (I said it was the beachfront mansion of the brokenhearted dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1125074219594649872005-08-26T10:02:00.000-06:002005-08-26T10:40:42.906-06:00caution!
You may have had two punk bands sleeping at your house if you find:
a can of chili
mennen speed stick (musk)
a black sock behind the couch
a spiked leather bracelet
toothpaste that is not yours
the smell of tobacco, testosterone and anarchy in the porch
Thanks for folding your blankets and leaving the nice note, fellas. Everyone said, "Oh my God, you're letting a bunch of hooligans dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1124988918396428952005-08-25T10:50:00.000-06:002005-08-25T10:55:18.403-06:00haikus du jour
blue hearse -
yellow-slickered driver
fondles moustache
this morning
catshit on the floor
smells of melancholydighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1124908505038129642005-08-24T12:28:00.000-06:002005-08-24T12:35:05.043-06:00weep for me
Once upon a time, I cracked open a fresh new line of credit to buy a laptop. I knew that in the years to come, it would deliver my first GCN*, bear witness to genius home recordings, and tuck into its bosom tokens of a life I love - photos and words.
Today, someone** stole it.
So, watch the web for my real diary. Yikes.
*great Canadian novel
**an assholedighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1124740979905305052005-08-22T13:44:00.000-06:002005-08-22T14:02:59.913-06:00a moving tale
I confess to my friend (we'll call him Mr. Smarty Pants) that my new roommate is, in fact, my ex. (See dating chronicles 1 through 5)
friend: Well, that's a disaster.
me: I suppose so. But he's got a table.
f: So I could have my table back?
m: Yeah, and he bakes really good muffins.
f: I see. You are completely deluded.
m:dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1124492769300825232005-08-19T16:39:00.000-06:002005-08-22T14:38:31.630-06:00Also, this:
I'll be leaving for Indonesia in 2 weeks.
What, didn't I tell you? It's going to be difficult, and weird, and good.
I'm going to Banda Aceh and a few other areas that were smashed to bits by the tsunami last year. A volunteer organization is sending a bunch of us to find out how the rebuilding effort is going.
I'll be posting my culture-shocked observations to http://dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1124490747750144152005-08-19T16:19:00.000-06:002005-08-19T16:32:27.756-06:00It was the loveliest shitty time ever.
It rained and rained - and cold? Jesus, there weren't enough fleece pants in the world to keep us warm.
But we laughed and yelled and made like crazy amazons on the Churchill river for 5 days, and there was no way to repress our delight. That's the honest-to-god truth.
I was sent on this all-women canoe trip with my guitar as a campfire song catalyst. It dighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5545323.post-1118953976777887642005-06-16T14:22:00.000-06:002005-06-16T14:32:56.790-06:00bloody caesar
vegetarian: "I just don't like the idea of a tomato in juice form."
friend: "I know, and when you add clam juice in there, well that's just disgusting."
v: "How do they get the clam juice in clamato? Do they, like, squeeze them?"
f: "You don't squeeze the juice out of the clams."
v: "Huh? You mean they just give it to youdighttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02268244089720931646noreply@blogger.com