Emily Gould wrote a well versed article for the sunday times a few weeks ago about her life in the early days of Gawker and how it became something much more under her grasp. I especially enjoyed the part about how the voice that she and her original editors affected soon became the actual persona of the writers who replaced them.
She made a point of mentioning, of course, how conflicted she felt making fun of people and alternately being made fun of in turn. For example: about a year ago Emily Gould--who is apparently the only person in New York who reads The Observer--had this to say about a poor, starving young author who had just been dumped by his agent and his girlfriend:
Pity the poor souls still laboring under the delusion that book-writing can potentially be a lucrative, fulfilling career. Or, like, don't! Today, we learn of some of the pitfalls and dashed expectations that, yes, even published authors find themselves coming up against. Such as: even a six-figure advance isn't really enough to live on for a year once your agent's 15% comission has been subtracted and you've had to pay for your own permissions. Also, did you know that writing alone in your room all day can be depressing?
Yes, it's hard. Even professional bloggers like Rachel Sklar find themselves unprepared for the challenges. "I wasn't going out, I wasn't shopping.... I berated myself and may have had a few meltdowns," she says of her twice-postponed guidebook about being a contemporary Jew. Oh noes! But at least she's not as hard up as recent Kenyon graduate Brendan Sullivan, who, at 25, has "thrown away several careers and one college degree to spend my time working in bars, D.J.'ing in bars and drinking my rejection letters away." Drinking! Not shopping! Not making a lot of money! People with book deals turn out to be Just Like Us.
My Book Deal Ruined My Life [NYO] Related: Every 'Unsolicited' Column Ever
Which sounds like plenty of fun. This kind of book will of course be read with more interest by people who do not live in New York City, but who are maybe slightly younger, slightly dorkier, and slightly interested in the sex lives of young women in urban environments.
There is much drama surrounding how she quit Gawker publicly in an article about N+1 magazine and how she is now dating its editor. We live in a very strange city.
I saw your post about writer's block. Thanks for sharing. It was really informative. Writer's block (writers' block?) sounds terrible and exhausting. Mostly it sounds depressing. Catchy song, though.
I wouldn't know since I make a pile like this once every year. What's that next to it? Jeez, I'm not sure but it might be the fucking OED. But I wouldn't know since I'm not expert on writing hundreds of pages of brilliant copy.
What am I saying? Nothing. No big deal. But if I were going to make a big deal out of it I would challenge you and Margaret H. to the Glimmer Train Press Fiction Open. Winner buys drinks with their $2000 tab. You guys down?
I don't get novels. What is the big fucking deal about a long book? There's lots of them out there. Many of them are quite good. In fact, there are so many good novels out there that it is really unnecessary for anyone to write any more.
Like most people I imagine a wonderful, vacation-like world where there is all-u-can-eat free-time and only a few great books to be read and enjoyed at a leisurely pace throughout the day. Unfortunately this is my life. I have all the fucking time in the world and I waste an awful lot of it. I waste it to the extent that I miss other leisure activities. Last night I got home from work and sat on my stoop drinking champagne and smoking with an old friend of mine. This cause me to sleep in and miss brunch plans with another dear friend.
(I don't know if this is just a New York thing. I know, in particular, that it is especially a Brooklyn thing. Brunch is kind of a big deal. It's not where you go or what you eat but it's who you go with. At nights I find myself hanging around with people I barely like. The problem is that when you're single you have no way of knowing if you do or do not like someone until later in the game. You might spend several hours in conversation with someone only to realize, halfway through, that you can manufacture a reason to hate them.)
I mean this to be about something else entirely but this just came to mind: for magical-like reasons my Junior High School Girlfriend ended up going to an all-girls' school for high school and then we both ended up at the same college**.
After Freshman year she introduced me to a gorgeous girl from her fancy prep-school. Her father had a large amount of money for some reason or another and he owned this gigantic house up on a mountain some where. I wish I could remember this girl's name because I would no doubt love to google her.
I ended up at her father's house for one reason alone. I was a young journalist who lived with his mom and she was a camp counselor who had digital cable. I went over to her house and we watched so much Saved By The Bell that my voice developed a Screech. I loved it as I loved television.
As if by magic the sky erupted into a beautiful night time rain. We turned off all the lights and watched a stunning New England summer rain storm explode in the mountains. I can still hear the sound.
Soon after that we had our whispered romance on her father's wonderful carpet. (When I think about being 40 I think about whether or not my children will have an area where they can make out.)
Anyway, somehow we ended up talking about the election (this being 2001) and she mentioned, somewhat flippantly, that she was not registered to vote. She added, "Why should I vote? I don't know anything about politics and if I did vote I would just be going off of how my parents wanted me to vote."
She was the first girl that I never called again.
When I lament my troubles in publishing with my cousins they tell me that I should publish some kind of celebrity-studded autobiography about my various adventures. That's cute. But it's not what I want to be doing.
And if I had any idea what I wanted to be doing I wouldn't be here.
*I still feel class-conscious about the word "brunch." I remember the day I learned it--at my wealthy aunt's house one sunday. I hate the word to some degree and try and use "lunch" when I can. Unfortunately having "lunch" with someone in New York conjures images of a quick meeting that at least one of you wishes you didn't have to have.
**I went to Henry James Junior High School and until I was a Junior in college I still though that Henry James was a pioneer in the construction of Junior High Schools.
A couple of months ago a friend of mine got married back home. For the requisite bachelor party they rented out a local hall and hired a team of semi-professional strippers (actual slogan: "Where our customers really come first.")
For the exceedingly cheap price of $25 you could get a private lap dance in one of the stalls of the otherwise unused Ladies' room. And for $12 you could add on a blow job.
I wasn't at this party, so it's not my position to make assumptions that I can't back up. But $12 seems cheap. Right? I mean, there must have been some kind of several-hundred dollar up-front cost to get these girls to the party. Much of that was probably eaten up by their firm and the security guy who came with them ("The only rule is: no pictures.").
That means that seeking out their own lap dance clients is probably their greatest profit motivation. Reportedly the girls were pulling gentlemen out of their pants, licking their members and moaning, "For $12 I can finish you off."
I cannot figure out for the life of me where that $12 figure comes from. Do they plan on putting away 20% for taxes? Does the driver/security guard automatically take two-bucks off each job?
A lapdance is, of course, just a vaguely uncomfortable moment with a dancer. Shouldn't a blow job, therefore, cost more?
Part of me wonders whether it's my New York mentality kicking in. $12 is almost enough for a movie ticket. But then again back home that would barely cover the gas it would take to get to the bachelor party.
Or maybe these girls are upselling, like waitresses. You're already there. The expensive amounts are taken care of. The lap dance costs $25 and only then do you get the opportunity to purchase the bargain-rate blow job. How is that any different from the waitress who sells another bottle of wine to a person that may be to drunk to say no?
Which leads me to wonder: wouldn't these girls be better off waitressing? I mean, I know that at the end of a long shift most waitresses are sore and tired. But almost none of them have eight kinds of semen in their teeth (eight blow-jobs isn't even a hundred bucks!)
The only theory I can come up with is that these are girls who have full time jobs and only do this on occasion. Maybe they are guidance counselors or personal trainers who do this a few nights a month. In that case maybe they think that their clients are the idiots.
Maybe they sit by the pool at their mortgaged suburban homes laughing away while they start a collage fund and make regular payments on their Mazdas. "Men," they laugh while counting singles. "They're just not that bright. Right, Squanto?"
"Ruff!" says the dogs as he scratches his rhinestone collar.
1) Tonight at 8 on 34th St Ben and I are going to see Julia's feature film debut. It is going to be so great because this film is so gay! Like gayer than the gay awards show I was just in.
2) Kirk's comic is really funny this week. I really love his sense of humor. He also has stickers now which you can get from emailing him.
3) The record got pushed back until August. I'm kind of glad to hear that for now. Hopefully by then I'll have my next step in place. I didn't realize how much of my creative energy this would sap away. On monday I'm going to forget about Los Angeles or any of my other problems and focus on re-energizing Mercutio. I think I've developed a new format that should be both hilarious and gripping.
4) My grandfather died on this day in 1992. I was too young at the time to understand alot of what was going on. But he was still a very important person in my life. He taught me alot about birds and how to build things. It's from him that I get my love of storytelling and jokes. When my brother would wail on me he would sit him down and say, "You can pick on your brother all you want, Jay. But he's the only brother you're ever going to have so you mind as well take care of this one."
His favorite joke was this:
Little Johnny tried out for the school play. The teacher gave him these lines to practice:
"Hark! A pistol shot! There lies a lady with hope in her soul. I think I'll snatch a kiss and run into the forest. By William Shakespeare."
Little Johnny practiced and practiced and did the lines perfectly every time. The night of the play it was his turn to speak. This is what he said:
"Hark! A pigeon sh*t! There lies a lady with soap in her hole. I think I'll kiss her snatch and run into the forest. By William Snakeshit... Horseshit... Oh, shit! I didn't want to be in this damn play anyway!"
Everytime I get a new job I get work-nightmares. Work-mares. After a long day of doing whatever I've done I drift off to sleep and I find myself in the same place doing a repetitive task. It's aweful.
Yesterday I went upstate to a country club where I taught a bunch of lawyers how to make wacky cocktails. It would have been easy if I hadn't been responsible for setting up 50 tables with 5 bottles of liquor, 3 different sized jiggers, two mixing glasses, and the appropriate fruit and garnishes for 4 drinks.
I fell asleep last night early (for me) at midnight and as I was drifting off I started to dream of sorting the tiny metal jiggers. When I woke up this morning I was prepping my notes for the class. I felt like I hadn't had any sleep at all. I decided to go back to sleep and I drifted off thinking about all the boxes of liquor I had to lift yesterday.
I know alot of teachers have nightmares of about teaching, or worse: they're naked in front of a classroom of children. I wonder if this is a normal thing or just something that happens when I don't drink.
At the coffee shop today I asked for my cookie on a plate. "Do you want your coffee in a ceramic cup too?"
Yes please.
An hour later I went up for a refill and a glass of water. They had no glasses but, assuming that I must be a die-hard environmentalist, she poured me a coffee mug full of tap water.
Now I'm sitting here with a mug full of water, feeling like a guest on The Daily Show.
I'm worried about you. Constantly. Are you okay? Are you eating well? I heard you quit your job so you could focus on writing and getting published.
The reason I'm worried is because in 2003 I quit a somewhat promising career to write short stories and eventually a novel. That was five fucking years ago. They were difficult years, most of them. Foodstamps, couch surfing, fake careers, etc. But the big thing is that now I finally have all that time we always pretend we need in order to write: and I don't know what to do with it. Every single day of the week I could be writing from 8-12, like Wallace Stegner. I finally don't have a job that starts until the afternoon.
But let's say I don't want to do that. What if I want to write from 12-4? No problem. Except on Thurdays. Then I have to be done by 2. Like everyone else I do work but let's say that my job is tiring and awful (it is) and I don't feel like writing on work days. That still leaves me the morning before my first day and the day after my last. Sundays-thursdays. That's a five-hour work week and it still doesn't change the fact that sometimes I don't feel like I have anything worth saying.
Sometimes I wish I knew how to write teen romance novels or middle-aged women who have sex in an urban environment stories. But I don't.
Someday I'll matter because it will be my job to explain intergenerational changes that took place in the suburbs between the creation of the internet and the rise of gas prices. There was a time where suburban life was an isolating place. It was also relatively feasible.
Saturday night was a blast. I had a friend in town and we got caught in the rain--Jimmy Buffet-like--on my day off at a place that had $4 mimosas. We drank all afternoon and reminisced about our old days.
That night we went to a dance party where I was hosting. We danced until four--at which point I had been drinking since noon. 16 hour benders are for college freshman.
Admittedly I was feeling it on Sunday. I didn't drink all day.
Since I was quite young I was always sure to take a glass of water to bed with me and it has spared me much. No headaches (dehydration) and I've rarely over-slept (gotta pee!). But now that I'm older I really can't be bothered to go downstairs to the one sink in my house and if there's a chance that I might have to get up and pee in the middle of the night I'd rather just wake up feeling aweful and dehydrated. My kidneys are no doubt beginning to look like canned figs.
I vaguely stayed in on Sunday night.Tomorrow I begin Mercutio again. I've forbidden myself from writing on the weekends because it makes me miss all the activities that I should be enjoying at my age.
I went to bed watching an obscenely dorky documentary about the history of a typeface. Then Kyle came home from his date at 2. We dicked around and then I decided to indulge myself in 30 Rock on Hulu.
That lasted for six hours. I was conscious and laughing about something Tracey Morgan said while my goddam alarm was going off. At this point I had seen so many episodes of this goddam show that I had begun replacing memories of my brother with those of Alec Baldwin.
When I finally did wake up I pretended that I had been too focused on my work to notice all of my missed calls. I edited up until the very first line where Romeo & Juliet begins and it was something of a magical experience. I'm the only one who can make this story any good. And I'm going to do it and then forget about it and write something else.
In other news, I'm one chapter into Salman Rushdie's new novel Enchantress of Florence and it's helping me to take things a little less serious and remember that the magic of novels is in the intrigue and story telling. And the pussy. No one can top Salman when it comes to writing about pussy.
This song is a simpler version of the kind of novel I should be writing. I should write novel about kids. Young kids growing up in the eighties who play outside and run around in the woods.
I don't really know why I've chosen to write a historical novel. To be honest I thought it would be an instant hit that would write itself. It turns out that all work is hard work. Lately I've been thinking about doing something else. Maybe I should just to get some things worked out. I'd really like to write something more fun like the Screwtape Letters and maybe I just should.
