Le maudit Mo D.

friday

Here's what happened this week, and why noveling has been sheer hell since about Tuesday:

1) Beginning of writing week started well. Asaf and I sat across from each other at a couple coffee shops and used our presence to keep butts in seats long enough to create.
2) S. Bird's new novel came out. Whee! I love S. and S. loves GGG and therefore me, too. I attended the local celebration and purchased the book, which she duly signed.
3) Read the entirety of the new S. Bird book in a 24-hour fit of obsession because, OMG, it is AMaZINg. A tour-de-force gem of comedic novel perfection. The characters, the pacing, the ridiculousness, and of course the now-national recognition of Wom Kim's Peach Pudding (Austin's hands-down BEST dessert, available only at Hyde Park B&G), every bit of this novel is so impeccable, so magical, so laugh-out-loud awesome, that it fucking killed my writer's libido. Comparing my writing to that of an experienced, accomplished novelist is asking for a lot of undue heartache. But still, I compared. And I compared some more. And I concluded, based on this amazing work of fiction, that the 78,000 words of Armenian-American diaper-squirt that I'll be peddling next week at the Agents and Wanna-Be's convention are inferior and will be passed over like a cold, gristly bit of beef fat on a churrascaria gaucho's meat sword (we had dinner at Estancia tonight, ergo the reference).

So yesterday and today were most fallow in the noveling department. Carol and Philip are verveless caricatures. Orson and Olivia are poo-stained ragamuffins wandering fetid landscapes of bullshit.

I must remind myself that every agent who has rejected me has said I'm talented. Vermont Studio Center thinks I'm talented. And yes, S. Bird herself thinks I'm talented, so I must quit riding my own dick on this.

Yeesh.

Feeling craptacular about myself, I decided that exercise was the key to an improved mood. Friday is not a tai chi day and I let my Yogax2 membership run out on purpose, so I decided a trip to one of Austin's convenient and sanitary municipal pools was in order. I threw on my Mormon bathing suit (no, really--I bought it from a Utah mail order concern specializing in "modest swimwear." It goes from my neck to my knees. It's awesome.) and headed to the nearest pool. I worried that the pool would be overrun by disrespectful youths doing cannonballs and furtively urinating, but fortunately they had a few laps-only lanes cordoned off so that the grown-ups could get some exercise. I felt like the young version of the portly older ladies doing their languid dog-paddle across the pool. Hell, I even kept my sunglasses on while I was doing the laps. I can't hold my breath long enough to do a proper stroke, so I keep my head up the whole time. By lap six, I was panting like the dog I was immortalizing with my paddle. But I felt good afterwards. Not good enough to sit my ass down for some writing. But good enough to go to Alamo Village and see...

THE SEX + CITY MOVIE!

I won't bore you with a textual analysis of the film. I am a great fan of the TV show and if you are too, I will politely leave you to draw your own opinions of it. The one thing I must comment on is (SPOILER SPOILER HOLY SHIT IT'S A SPOILER!) that Samantha's shaming of Miranda for having an unwaxed bikini area frightened and worried me. I felt that the message that the presence of pubic hair on one's pubis (the biologically-designated area for pubes) helped push Steve into the bed of another woman and thus disrupting his marriage to overworked, unpleasant, unable-to-enjoy-sex Miranda was complete bullshit. Rocking the full bush is not a flaw that indicates an unwillingness or unworthiness to fuck. (I suppose this paragraph might indicate the current state of the Maudit National Forest) Rocking the full bush means you are either awesome, of Middle Eastern extraction (I suspect that a Brazilian on me would have to include Paraguay, Bolivia, and Peru as well), or not fucking a dude with porno expectations about real twats.

Also, I think the audience deserved a longer shot of that guy's dong. The millisecond of frontal was not enough in this reviewer's book.

Tonight's grand feast at the Churrascaria was a maddening array of double-entendres waiting to happen. Why are all the gauchos male? Is there something about a man offering you a taste from his meat sword that doesn't play as well coming from a lady? At any rate, this chica ate no fewer than five cheesy rolls and tasted all the meats except the lamb and the ribs. I waddled away from the table satisfied and happy, but also worried that Bob's enormous appetite for red meat might cause him to someday keel over in the style of Tim Russert. RIP, Tim.

Posted by Zerd at June 13, 2008 10:48 PM