This is my dear friend from Kentucky. We've known eachother for almost ten years now and remained in close contact. On the day I left to visit her last summer her boyfriend broke up with her. She spent the week laughing (she has a great sense of humor) and trying not to cry. The guy who broke up with her was kind of a tool. A banker with a prized collection of Gucci Loafers and a CD changer full of show-tunes that he could belt out on his way to work.
Within six months she met a big shot Englishman in the horse business, went to London, fell in love, and got engaged!
Early for work the other day I stopped into the shoe-shine place and noticed that the April Vogue Magazine finally came out. I called Nikki, knowing that she was to be featured. My first words to her on this historic career occasion--when I found her picture--were:
"They air-brushed out your tattoos!"
So what, of course? I should have said flattering things about this amazing feaure. But instead I added: "Even the one you got with me in San Francisco!"
Immediately after, I wished I had said something more encouraging about this great article. It's fantasic for her lingerie company and very flattering. She and her partner continue to be radically classical.
She then added: "They airbrushed out my tattoos but left my nipples showing through my dress?"
We live in a wonderful time...
(also, for an enlarged version of the full article click here.)
My favorite part about DJ'ing is the connections you can create in people's minds. The other day we had a little dance party in the Chicago apartment we stayed in. It wasn't my iPod, which made it more fun. Two married couples, me and Nikki. Everyone starts dancing with everyone. Great time. I throw on--if memory serves--Ace of Base and the two couples go on about how it reminds them of freshman year in college. I say it reminds me of fifth grade.
Everyone stares at me and then Nikki tells them how old I am. "What's it like dating a 24 year old?"
"Everyone always asks that," Nikki says. "I don't ever notice."
Next day, same married couples, all waiting for a limosine to come take us to see Justin Timberlake. The couple we stayed with entrust me with the tickets and with them ar the receipts. We have front row VIP seats in this roped-off area with its own bar and close enough for your cameraphone. Then I find the receipt. $1350 for the six tickets.
Nikki and I wear what we basically do everyday. The other couple admits that they felt a little foolish walking to the car past their children's playpals in mini-denim skirts and hairspray.
Great show. Really. He is a fantastic pop performer. In the car on the way home the my host and I finish a bottle of Woodford Reserve Bourbon. Delicious shit. And for some reason I throw it from the side of the limo on the highway. Who knows why.
But it sounds so great to shatter glass like that. The limo has a crystal decanter in back filled with some kind of whiskey. The financial guys have me smell it to tell them what it is. It's Dewars. Disgusting, corn-tasting, cheap-ass Dewars. It would have been fine enough to put the decanter back, but I still had my window open.
And I don't know why--other than the love of the sound of shattering glass--but I tossed it out the window.
A few things that may have made this okay: 1. Had this been my own bottle of whiskey. 2. Had this been my limo. 3. Had we been on the highway--as I thought--and not in stopped traffic in a neighborhood... 4. ...in front of a cop car.
They didn't even pull us over. They just hit the lights and the driver got out. Chicago cop says--in that great accent that only Chicago cops seem to have--"Ahhh, sew you think you can leave New York City and come trash our town?"
The next morning we get a call from the limo company. There was another limo behind us that got two flat tires from broken glass in the street. They wrote down the giant phone number on the back of the limo and called the driver at home, screaming at him.
On the way to the airport home, Nikki says: "You know how people are always asking me what it's like dating a twenty-four year old?"
Back in Chicago! I made it! I've already been to Bongo room for brunch and The Hideout for a show! Whenever Ben or I go back to Chicago something vaguely magical or terrible happens. I can't wait to see which one I get!
1) When you have a completed draft you must put it away for six weeks.
2) When you put it away you may do whatever you want during your writing mornings. Ideally this should lead you to improve the draft you have or help you on your next draft. For example, this week I have spent time researching "sleeping it off" in the mornings and "acting like a 24 year old" so that when my characters get drunk they will have convincing mornings-after.
3) To keep youself from getting worried that you're actually just a twenty-four-year-old loser with a dead end job you may research your next novel, plan it out and begin the book shopping trip, which might just be the most fun part. Yesterday I went to the strand and bought all the books about Hawthorn and Melville that I could. My next novel will likely be about the six week writing vacation that Hawthorne had and Melville interrupted when they were neighbors.
4) Order take out I never get to do this and I love take out.
5) Travel without your laptop next week I'm going to Chicago and in my final week I'll be in North Dakota. If I could squeeze in a weekend in Kentucky I would be so happy.
6) Get a new job. Not writing frees up your time for pounding the pavement, training for free, and writing your next manifesto on the job application.
7) Cut your hair. At least once in six weeks.
8) Consider maybe, possibly throwing out your Christmas tree. At least by April.
9) Begin writing again promptly at the end of six weeks. Or you will wake up three weeks later on your 25th birthday and have some kind of life-crisis.
10) Mail out seven copies of the unchecked draft to seven different people who have different interests in literature. If you think you maybe want to read the draft, I insist that you give it back to me within one week (it's only 250 pages or so) with comments and analysis about what works and what needs clarity. I would just email it to everyone I know, but I can't stand when people send me their screenplays and movie treatments because I pretty much just open them and decide on the third page that they're terrible and never wonder about them again. Send me your address and I'll mail you one this week.
Only now I don't live in Williamsburg, I have a full time job. I still work at Beauty Bar but hopefully this time my girlfriend won't throw me out of the house. It's also really convenient that I finish novels right before St. Patricks Day.
And now, the traditional microsoft word Autosummary:
Work? “Liam? “Sherry.” Sherry. “No Dad. “It’s Liam, Dad.” “Liam?” “Right.” “Alan?” “Remember Alan? “This time? This time? “Alan!” “Liam? Liam Boycott!” “Liam?” “Alan! “Name the time.” “Right!” “Liam Boycott? LIAM- CONOR “Liam! Liam Boycott! “Liam? Liam Boycott. Great name. Dad snarls. “Liam!” Conor might never come home. “No, Liam’s brother’s name is Conor. “Conor’s favorite.” “Sherry? “Liam.” “Liam? People drink. “Liam? Conor’s voice. Conor’s rule. “Sherry. “Dad? “Dad?” What if we—” “Dad. “Dad. “Remember Alan Ostaff? Conor Boycott. Dad says. Dad asks. Seriously, Dad. “Thanks, Dad. “Liam?” Liam! “Liam!” “Liam! “Liam!”
