RS Aye Aye Aye

I haven't written anything in a week because my old repetitive strain injury just came back with a vengeance. Too many 15 hour workdays I suppose. I couldn't even sit at a computer for nearly a week, so I just ended up making lists of things to blog about when I heal. Yes, I do realize that's pathetic.

The Evidence

I wasn't really in the mood to go out last night. I had been tidying up my apartment and it had been a long week. I'm working on four different booze articles currently and that involves some extreme drinking. I could have used a night off.

Maria calls me at work (because that's how important it was) to tell me that there was a party at Cama, a bar very close to my house, where there would be one-dollar vodka cocktails. How could I say no to that?

So we get there and it turns out that it's a drag queen party raising money for them to attend Trannyshack London, and that it's not one-dollar cocktails but one dollar from each cocktail purchased at regular price goes to their fund. Oh.

Maria opened a tab at the bar and I was on my third gin martini when everybody else showed up. I vaguely remember Suppository Spelling and Kiddie and Princess Kennedy performing, and since it was at Cama they were performing eighties' songs. (At Cama they play so much eighties music you'd swear it was a theme bar.) Maria and Hunter left to go somewhere then they came back and she opened another tab. I don't think I had another drink at that point and I know I sure didn't need one because I was over-loaded.

I remember little after that but the evidence of foul play in my apartment is horrifying: two smashed martini glasses, the remnants of fried ravioli, and (this is a new one) a t-shirt in the toilet. What?

I didn't wake up until 10AM and that means I have only two hours to recover in time for a drinking function I have to attend at noon. You know, that's kind of okay because the hair of the dog is the only thing that's going to get rid of this hangover.

One Less Fish

Many of you remember that I used to have a difficult time keeping my pet fishes alive. This made for a great amount of log material for a while. Lately, though, I've been doing a lovely job at keeping them fresh and healthy. I think I've only lost about one a year for the past few years. (It used to be one a week, so this is like 51 times better.)

Anyway, today one of the three little fish in my big fat tank died. What's amazing is that he lived this long. His fins were all ragged and he looked as if he would die any day- for the past year. I've been meaning to get some new fish for a long time, and as the tank just looks pathetic and empty with the remaining two, it looks like I have my motivation.

F.U. A.C.L.U.

I gave money to join the ACLU after Bush was reelected (by retards), but I didn't renew my membership the next year. I know they do good stuff and it's not easy being the devil's advocate as they are in some cases, but every piece of literature that comes out of that organization sounds like a marketing brochure trying to get you to give them more money. The first mail they send you after you join, even before your membership card, is a plea for more money. Then all through the membership they send you more of it and like magazine subscriptions, try to get you to renew starting 5 months before your membership even ends. I've received about 5 pieces of mail from them since not renewing and the one that came today has "Membership Reactivation Notice" on the front of it- deceptive marketing and I won't fall for it. For a good-cause organization, it sure feels like its being run by a bunch of greasy slimebags.

Reading Is Fundamental (RIF)

I've spent most of the day today reading Kazuo Ishiguro's novel Never Let Me Go. It's fantastic- a sentimental remembrance of figuring out the rules of society and one's place in it, set in a reality where children are being raised for organ harvesting- and I'll likely keep reading it to the end.

This is a bad way to read books. Like with movies, you can spend hours living in the fantasy world that's been created for you and sharing in the thought processes and emotions of the central characters, but then the movie is over or you finish the book and you can't remember a damn thing about what just happened. I'm reading this one for my book club and by the time I get to our discussion in two weeks, I won't even remember the names of the main characters.

In a way giant thick books are better for me to read because I can't do it in one sitting and more of the details stick in my head because there was more reality in between the fantasy.

So anyway, I frequently make myself take breaks to process the information in the book instead of chugging through it to the end. I'll get a glass of water or write a blog entry or just sit for a minute with the book closed and think about it.

This is always when a bit of reality that I dislike reveals itself to me. I truly, terribly, absolutely hate it that the person who designs the book cover get their name printed on the cover of the book. Sure, acknowledge the person if you must on an inside page, but the average book cover is something that takes a couple of hours to throw together whereas a book can and often does take multiple years to complete. To me that's like putting the name of the set caterer below that of the director on a DVD jacket.

So instead of actually reflecting on what's in the book, I get steamed up about what's the outside of it. Then when I get sick of getting mad at something in the real world I have no power to change, I retreat back into the safe fantasy world of the text.

Fluffy Bunnies

D000ds, have you seen Cute Overload yet? It features the cotton candy of the animal kingdom. I like the "cute or sad?" section the best. But you'd figure that out on your own.

Derby Death

Ann Calvello, original roller derby bad girl, died on Tuesday. I saw a documentary about her at the Castro Theatre. She's a hoot. This is a very nice eulogy.

Helicopter!

Last night I heard a helicopter flying overhead. That means trouble! (It means news helicopters- people don't take air joy rides over the ghetto.) I figured I should go outside and look around to make sure one of my neighbor's houses wasn't on fire and I should be fleeing.

The coast was clear.

I checked the newspaper today and saw that it was just a gang murder. Pish posh. They sent a helicopter for that?

A bad influence

This weekend I watched Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas as well as The Aviator, so in response I took a lot of drugs and didn't leave the house. Somebody get me a Kleenex!

And I can't get up

I fell down the stairs again tonight. It seems that everytime I order pizza I get so excited that I run out to get it and miss that last step. As that last step is right outside my apartment but a long way before the door, I have to limp down the underground corridor towards the door like a hunchback. Boy that feels ghetto.

Maybe it's because my favorite pizza parlor (Seranos) takes an hour to deliver I get so excited by the time it actually gets here I get tripped up. Or maybe it's because there are three pizza parlors within two blocks of my house that it's only when I am too drunk to walk that far that I order pizza.

Either way, when you're ankle is in a sling, the pizza tastes all the better.

Realization

I was just listening to Kiss' "Lick it Up" and remembered that as a kid we owned a KISS 8-track tape (and also ABBA's Greatest Hits and Olivia Newton-John's Physical) and that made me realize that not only am I pretty damn old because people old enough to drink now don't even remember cassettes tapes, but also that the combination of this music at such a young age is what turned me into the aerobics-loving rock 'n' roll disco homo that I am today.

You know what?

There are several different anarchist bookstores in San Francisco and I just saw a poster for an anarchist book fair. You know, anarchists must be pretty darn well-read.

Open for Comments

I turned on the comments on this blog. I give it about a week until I decide I don't want to hear what anybody else has to say (or spam), but for now, tell me how pretty I am.

Camper Goes to Church

My friend Bev is throwing a Sunday afternoon reggae party called Church starting March 19th. Anyone want to go to church with me?

Hold on a second, it's my agent calling

I've been working my ass off for the past several months on a book proposal. I finished it last weekend after saying I was going to finish it the next weekend for about 5 weekends. I mailed it out to a local agent I know and within 15 hours I had an agent. I have an agent! No wait, a literary agent- that makes it sounds like I write literature.

The agent's job is to get me a good deal on the book with a publisher. For the last book, I didn't use an agent because I knew my advance (and royalties, it now seems) would be so small that I couldn't really give away 15 percent of it nothing. Let's hope this is different...

But anyway, I've been trying to see how many ways I can work "my agent" into conversation. So far, nothing has really worked all that effortlessly. That's important, because it needs to sound natural, like I've always had an agent. Like I'm saying "my mother" or "my therapist."

I was at Day Job today, and I was standing by the fax machine and I said, "I had to fax something to my agent this morning." Then later I said, "I also had to paperclip documents from my agent today!" I don't think I was as subtle as I wanted to come across.


Whatever, I'm sure my agent wouldn't care what those people think.

Got a light?

I am taking the Neighborhood Emergency Response Team (NERT) training course that prepares citizens to help out in the case of earthquake, flood, or fire.

It's kind of funny that half the trainees smoke.

What I did this weekend

I rented a car and drove 100 miles to gather the information necessary to write one sentence for an article. Writers are not overpaid.

Extra! Extra! Puppies Need More Love!

I really shouldn't publicly criticize the San Francisco Chronicle, as I'm trying to write more articles for them and all, but lordy they drive me nuts! I believe the job of a newspaper is not only to report the news in an unbiased manner, but also to set the topics and tone of discussion for the community it represents.

The Chronicle's problem is that it consistently and obviously panders to its readership rather than enlightens them.

This weekend's soft-focus news story was called "The Anguish of Stillbirth." Though the piece is chock full of facts and issues about the medical reporting and research problems associated with stillbirth, the angle of the story is "MY BABY IS DEAD!!!"

At least that story was in the Sunday Magazine. Not so with "Alicia's Story," a.k.a. "INNOCENT GIRL HAS CANCER!!!" This ongoing story is now on the 16th part of the series, and it doesn't have anything to do with science or medicine or any type of news whatsoever. It's a pure, unadulterated tear-jerker. It makes you wonder why they've run many of the parts (with photos) on the front page of the paper.

Another was the fabulous STOP THE SUICIDES!!! series about the Golden Gate Bridge, which they actually named "Lethal Beauty."

The SF Weekly busted the Chronicle on a similar note a couple years back. They counted 30 animal stories printed within two months- some of them page one features.

But the people love this stuff. Love it!! How do I know this? Because the Chron prints hundreds of letters to the editor about the stories they hype in the first place. And if there are too many to print, they'll tell you exactly how many there were and point you to the website, where you can look for the letter you wrote saying you knew someone with cancer too!

**

This paper should have better reporting on gender politics. It should have better reporting on the realities of outsourcing to India. It should have better reporting on immigrants being deported thanks to the Patriot Act. It should have better reporting on the environment. It should have better reporting on urban development. It should have better reporting on biotech.

There are plenty of places in a newspaper to print articles on culture and other fluff (you know, the kind of articles I write), but I find it embarrassing that my newspaper prints news disguised as sappy fluff and sappy fluff portrayed as news. People read the New York Times because it is important, not because it makes them cry. People will read the Chronicle more if it reports and presents news in a more mature fashion.

And speaking of fashion, I've got to go write an article...

The Dog Murderer

Police still baffled over dog killing:

More than a week after two men snatched a Yorkshire terrier named Princess at gunpoint and strangled the tiny dog as her owner pursued them, Oakland police still don't know who committed the crime or why.

They suspect this was a dognapping gone awry, as the breed apparently is worth money. But then why would they strangle it?

Nowhere in the article do they mention the possibility that this was the work of doggie hit men. Of course it was a dog hit! (When not blogging, I also solve crimes.)

This was the first thing that came into my mind because there is a dog living near me that I want to strangle. It's some little yappy dog and the thing barks for hours in a row with its high-pitched yelp. I can shut the windows and turn up the stereo and I can still hear it. It drives me fucking nuts and I would have no problem murdering it. Heck, if I could afford a hit person maybe I'd do it that way too.

Yes, I'm a vegetarian, but it's not because I don't believe in killing animals, especially obnoxious ones. I just don't like how they taste.

So I've considered various ways of killing the dog. So far a pellet gun seems the best option. Poison seems a little cruel. Burning down the building where it lives would probably work, but I'm not exactly sure where that is from the street, so I'd need to burn down a few buildings to be sure.

But anyway. I'm betting that the dog was yappy and annoying and it got what it had coming to it. That'll shut you up, Princess!

Great use of government time

"S.F. supervisors ask lawmakers to impeach Bush"

Sometimes living in San Francisco is just plain embarrassing.

Great Nate

My old pal Nate is in town, not for a particularly good reason but I'll get to that later. Nate and I have a long history of heavy drinking and barhopping, so we decided to do a little of that last night. Nate is in school now so he's not been keeping up his liver damage, and it's been a while since I have done rounds of shots at the bar either. (Sidenote: If you go to the Pilsner Inn, ask Warren for his new shot named something like "bloody red" or "red death." It's fantastic.) So several drinks and shots later, but about 1/3 of the amount we used to drink on a nightly basis, we were totally tanked. We went to get a slice of pizza then to the Transfer then back to the Pilsner then home I think.

Today I had to go into Day Job for a "diversity training." I showed up looking noticeably haggard, so I told them I was out late celebrating my proud Irish heritage.

I got out of jury duty

On Monday I was assigned jury duty. I cleverly brought my laptop to do some work while waiting in the juror assembly room. Our jury room has both phone lines for dial-up and wireless internet access. San Francisco is good in that way.

Two hours later I was called up to a courtroom. They told us that the trial was expected to last six weeks. They began the session by asking if that was an unreasonable burden on anyone. People used two excuses mainly; either they had a medical condition or they were self-employed. I was amazed at the number of diabetics in the room. It's a very popular disease these days.

After much internal debate, I decided to ask to be let go. If I were full-time at my part-time university job, I would have signed up in a second. They pay for (I think) unlimited jury duty time, so it would be six weeks of not being at the office. Sounds great.

But the other 60 or so hours a week that I work are freelancing, and to have 20 less of those hours for six weeks would be pretty rough. I told the judge that though I have a part-time job, I'm primarily self-employed. I didn't think they would release me, but they did.

I was out of there by 11:30. This means that I worked for two hours in the juror assembly room that I would have normally had to spend at my day job, and only had to do one hour of service. So I ended up getting paid from my day job to work for two hours at writing.

Jury duty rocks!