I do not.

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The South   That's a Southern accent you've got there. You may love it, you may hate it, you may swear you don't have it, but whatever the case, we can hear it.
The Inland North
The Midland
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Philadelphia
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North Central
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weekend

Vroooooooom, baby.

So, my sweetheart announced that he’s going to acquire and start riding a Harley. I think he may have been expecting a reaction to this announcement wherein I dissuade him with generalizations about Harley Dudes and my lack of desire to date one, or mothered him regarding safety issues. But no. If that’s what he wants, he can go for it. One may not guess this upon meeting me, but I have a history with biker dudes, and I rather like fast, fast motorcycles.

I think it may have started when my parents took me to Deadwood for the Harley convention when I was in middle school. See, my family—two parents, 3 daughters aged 11-15—were piled in our maroon minivan headed for Yellowstone, and somewhere near Kadoka, South Dakota, the other automobiles on the road thinned out. Before long, we were the only four-wheeled trickster on the roads. As we neared Sturgis, we realized that we were the ONLY car surrounded by Harleys. A million of them. A million zillion. We were, coincidentally, headed for the Harley Convention. Most parents would’ve taken a detour to avoid the whole thing. My parents started calling ahead to find a campsite.

Parking lots sparkled as far as the eye could see, a sea of shining chrome. And let’s just say that the biker stereotype didn’t arise from nowhere. Generally, head-to-toe leather, R-rated slogans and inappropriately short skirts, tattoos. Some weren't all that concerned with political correctness, or using one’s ‘inside voice,’ or monitoring one’s cigarette and whiskey consumption or use of foul language.

My father is a Midwestern small-town hardware store owner. He wears plaid flannel shirts and shaves daily and likes to read books about the nesting habits of sea turtles. My mother, a high school teacher. She likes art and sewing and sips tea on the front porch. My family stuck out in the crowd, that’s all I’m saying.

Harley folks are kind. The whole vibe was quite social. When we walked into a place, the people were friendly and talkative. A few times, the gruffer folks noticeably straightened up into best-behavior mode around us children. The ladies called me honey and the men talked to my father about engine repair and joked us daughters in a protective-big-brother kind of way. We got lots of attention.

Years later, I dated a race car driver who had a motorcycle. Not a Harley, but something really fast that looked a bit like a bumble bee. Next, Nate the Fireman had an old retro bike with the headlight that looks like a big eyeball. The guy after that had a bike similar to Nate’s, but he took apart the engine and put it back together, and it broke.

That brings us to my current sweetheart, who is a nurse and a professor and is inheriting his late father’s Harley and is arranging to get a motorcycle license. He sounded braced for a "Hell-no-what-are-you-crazy" out of me. Rather, I suggested that we pack up our camping gear this summer and head to the Harley convention. Then S.A. said yeah, he’d go buy some leather chaps, to walk around in at the convention sans pants. That, however, is where I draw the line. Bikers are friendly, but no one makes friends in assless chaps.

To Poets Who Overuse the Word "Thick": You can keep your worn out words

And Keep your thick crusts of bread, your thick hair
the thick rain pinging your thick tin roof. Keep
Your cliché garden pansies.
Steaming coffee. Cigarette flickin’ attitude.
I don’t want your birds or beaches,
your broken hearts, like violin strings,
like, like, like another tired metaphor, or dusk—
Sunset’s beauty is over, friend, so are your rain clouds
with their heavy hearts, your strangling pinks and peaches.

Give me the jagged edged crusts from the serrated knife,
I want the rain that flattens your hair to your throat I want
a jellied fish too long on shore, sand that grates the thermos lid.
Fingers search through soil, I want your shovel-hits-granite crack—
I want the sound of picked strings vibrating wood
that someone once steamed
into the shape of a woman.
Give me your fingers on that hip.
Give me memory, real memory, not a sunset, but the sound of crickets
as the mighty sun sinks behind your tired back.

Dear Blog,

Why, oh why can't I see you? Have you gone away? On strike? Do we need to talk?
Come back now please.
Thank you,
Cavu

American Mussorgsky

My writer friend Lola seems to always seems to have a big enough bag with her at all times for taking notes on actual full-sized notebooks which she seems to categorize by topic. She’s a serious note-taker, that Lola, and doesn’t appear to mess around with little notebooks. Jessi, however, keeps little notebooks by the toilet in order to capture thoughts that may arise from the collective unconscious upon first waking for a few moments on the Throne. Writers, they have systems for such things.

As much as I’d like to be so systematic, I’m a helpless random-scrap-of-paper person. I’ve tried keeping notebooks, but I forever leave them on the coffee table or lose them—I have about a half-dozen such notebooks lying around at any given time, never where I need them when I need them. When I hear something I want or need to write down for later use, I use whatever is around at the time, then expect to find it later and use it as a prompt to write something no-doubt brilliant. This means I have stuff scribbled on the backs of matchbooks or coasters or receipts or sometimes important things I actually need.

Once in a dark theatre I wrote down a few dirty references David Sedaris made, you know, so I could look them up later to see what they mean. It turns out the piece of paper I'd dug out of my purse to write on was a medical training exam I had to hand in for work that will forever go on my permanent employee record. That’s the thing—these moments often come at the inconvenient times. I fully admit that I do idiotic, careless things while driving, I’m not so bad with cell phone dialing or iPod messing or lip-glossing while careening down the highway. What’s probably going to kill me is writing while driving.

The reason all this comes up is the fact that a while ago I wrote down something I really wanted to find last night and I couldn't find it later to save my life. The four Buddhist truths of consciousness (or whatever—I lost it, after all), or maybe it was the four Tibetan words for the stages of the cosmological cycle? Something like that. Anyway, I wrote it on the back of a bank receipt while driving down Hiawatha Street during rush hour, and the search for it soon became more about the determination to find it than what it actually said.

At home, I dumped out my paper recycling bag and sifted around for it. I didn’t find it, but I did find a random scrap where I wrote down something from the Composer’s Datebook (MPR) that says, “Roy Harris had been described to him as an ‘American Mussorgsky,’ which probably intrigued the Russian-born conductor, and when Koussevitzky learned that Harris had been born in a log cabin in Lincoln County, Oklahoma, on Abraham Lincoln's birthday no less - well, perhaps he hoped the 41-year old Harris might produce music equally all-American in origin.” To which I say, What the hell? American Mussorgsky? Why, I ask you, was this so intriguing that I had to scribble it down to save it for later?

Sometimes it makes sense. In my quest last night, I came across several cool articles I’d saved, some definitions to interesting words, a few notes from Wikipedia and this lovely poem by Kim Garcia:

Eager
Above the snow, a single maple holding forth
its dying flame. Among the feats of Nature:
the wild
greening from dry bulb, sour alchemy of rot, a rusty
handprint of lichen;
the eager
space-seeking species springing up after fire,
as though they took no lesson from destruction
but to begin again, twice as joyful.

That, my friends, is beautiful. That is a writing prompt.

So, this morning as soon as I got in my car, I pretzeled my arms under and around every seat looked through cubbies and cup holders and I found it crumpled up under the driver’s seat. I at least usually stuff them in my purse, but there you go. It says:

The big crunch
World System Evolution
Emptiness
Formation
Abiding
Destruction
Eras of…
Cycle/Formation, Endures,
Destroyed, Void
[subsist, begin again].

In the end, I'm happy with my system. I don't want to force myself to keep things neat and filed away--it's not me. And don't even talk to me about getting an electronic note-taking palm pilot or any of that rediculousness. My system is creative and interesting. I find what I need when I need it. Perhaps I'm whatever an “American Mussorgsky,” is, which may be why I saved that Composer’s Datebook scrap of paper after all.

I hit my point of return.

After finals, I’m always so fried from looking at my work and trying to be creative on a deadline and to revise things that have been through so many drafts that I can’t. Look. At. It. Any. More. I want to read what I want, watch mindless TV, and decompress.

I started by trying to read books on the MLA’s top 100. I read The Great Gatsby and Lolita, both of which have a main female character hit by a car at a very convenient moment for other characters. Then I switched to science audio books stuff, which I love, but it's difficult to concentrate on string theory while I’m trying to figure out Photoshop at work. So I went to my colleague’s desk to borrow a light and brainless audiobook (not that she's brainless--she's smart and lovely), and learned, with no surprise at all, that the guy who penned this got on the NY Times Best Seller List*:

"It was in the darkest hours of the night that he most often found himself remembering his night with Lexy in the cemetery, the night he’d seen the ghostly lights he’d come down from NY to investigate. It was then that he realized for the first time how much Lexy meant to him. As they had waited in the blackness of the cemetery, Lexy told him a story about herself. She’d been orphaned as a young child… she had terrible, recurring nightmares… Lexy instantly recognized the lights in the cemetery as the ghosts of her parents. When she told him this, he wanted to hold her in his arms."

Eventually, the switch flipped. I want to write again. No, I need to write. I have ideas. I need to do my art. I want to look at old projects and shine them up to send out. I’ve been scribbling down ideas, I started reading a book on the synthesis of scientific theory and spirituality by the Dalai Lama, and I found a beautiful photo of Tempel 1 for my project. I got a documentary on string theory to watch before I attempt Bryan Greene’s book again. I have a stack of articles on the marriage of poetry and cosmology, and my little brown book that I write poems in every day is almost full. And I want to write to Deborah and have her send me my weekly prompts. It is good to be home.

*A list I find pathetically useless, and need no part of.

How I Spent My Winter Vacation

Lifts you up, sets you down.

There is something about waves. My firefighter friend said neurologically, ocean waves and fire produce the same chemical reaction in the brain that feels soothing and calming. He’s had experiences where a bunch of firefighters race to the scene of a burning field then stand there for a moment, mesmerized by the waves of fire before they spring back into action, much to the alarm of the poor farmer who is losing his crop. The calming of a camp fire and the calm of water waves are more closely related than one might think. No surprise, considering that even the tiniest atom is full of waves, that sound and light and energy travel in waves, and we’re surrounded by and comprised of waves all around us. It all really is a giant symphony. I can’t say I’m entirely surprised by this news, though I haven’t researched it myself.

Mexico was lovely. It is the first time since Australia I’ve relaxed in crystal clear waves. Being neck-high in warm sea water, and having a big curvy wave coming with all the power and beauty of the Ocean, and consciously choosing to relax every muscle and let it lift me off my feet and set me to rest a little closer to shore—this is heaven to me. The trip, in general, brought back many memories of Australia, and cultivating a friendship with the ocean in this way, and my dear friend Dan teaching me how to approach the ocean. On this trip in Mexico, S.A. and I played on the beach and perched on the sand and swam, rested, swam, rested, repeat, repeat, repeat. And I would ask him to float me up—put one hand on my lower back and one under my head, and I’d lie on my back and be lifted and lowered, lifted and lowered, and every time I tensed up I’d take a breath and try to relax again. This is harder than you think—trusting it and making a deliberate effort to literally go with the flow. But it feels really good.

I’ll have to remember this when shit hits the fan at work today. There are rumors, people leaving, things getting shifted around and re-organized. There’s some crap going down—that likely wont effect me very much, but will have everyone else in a tizzy—and secrets and all that stuff that surrounds corporate nonsense. You can tell the shitstorm’s coming because first they start buttering everyone up. Our department head just came over and handed me (and a bunch of other people) a check for $50 for no other reason than doing a good job. Highly suspicious. And next they’ll offer us something good—like pizza or ice cream or something—to lure us into the conference room. Then, when we’re good and trapped in there: the news. And I'm gonna glide right through it.

Top Ten Signs You're At A Lame New Year's Eve Party

10. To give it a Times Square feel, everyone is groped, fondled and pick-pocketed

9. "Party hats" look suspiciously like stolen traffic cones

8. "Ball drop" at midnight consists of a trick your Uncle Earl does when he's loaded

7. "Champagne" really apple juice mixed with Alka Seltzer

6. You notice a "Happy 1999" tag on the package of shrimp you've been eating all night

5. The host kicks everyone out at 11:58 so he can go to bed

4. The only guests are you and Richard Simmons, and guess who wants a New Year's Eve kiss?

3. The Amish can do many things well, but throwing parties ain't one of them

2. It's just you and a dozen Mullahs in a cave

1. It's held in March

Today is my little sister's birthday.

I was only 16 months old when she was born, so I don’t remember it. When she was 3 months old, she contracted meningitis and nearly died. She was in the hospital for a long time, and I’m told I cried and cried while she was gone, and my parents cried and cried and so did our older sister, Emily, who was old enough to know that everyone was crying but didn’t understand why. And about a year ago at a family dinner, her illness came up in conversation, and how hard it was on all of us, and how much we love her and how totally different life would be without her, and all of us, 28 years after the fact, cried there at the dinner table together. I am so thankful she was born, and so thankful that she survived.

She grew into a hilarious, energetic, totally hyper-active little kid who snort-laughed at the dinner table, set our pet bird free, made up nonsense words and shouted them an inappropriate times and giggled, and squirmed through every minute of church. She’s random and unpredictable. She loves Juice Newton and Beethoven. She’s got some weird thing for celebrity-sponsored cheap perfume and new tennis shoes—she absolutely loves them. She’s afraid of the dark. She’s an intuitive, amazing cook (I asked her to write down her recipe for chocolate chip oatmeal cookies and she couldn’t), and she plays the piano by ear. She loves and cares for the elderly for her job. I can't remember the last time she said something hurtful to anyone.

She struggles, though. Sometimes she struggles a lot. I worry about her. I am blessed to have her as a sister. She’s a unique bird, and brings warmth and joy to the world. I tell her that often.

Lists.

Things I like. I just do.:

Cool pens and ink
Spiral notebooks
Fuzzy socks
Rugby
Cosmology and Quantum Physics
Bacon
St. Mary’s Basilica
Making lists
Shells on the beach in Perth

Things I wish I liked but I just don’t:

Oatmeal
Knitting
Gardening in the yard
Sudoku
Surfing
Mornings

Things I intend to do:

Read a science article daily
Keep an audio book in my car all the time
Make more regular trips to the library
Write 2 new poems a day, good or bad
Send something out each month, at a minimum
Keep my exercise dates with Scott
Call my Gram once a week
Take a road trip south, Louisiana, the Smokies, the Florida Everglades, while they still exist
Visit Hanover
Paint more
Save for a new couch
Move into an apartment with a whole kitchen
Hand in my first draft of thesis this fall
Write more letters, including a love letter
Really learn to play the piano

Well, Brett Favre does have a nice booty.

Have I mentioned that I'm enjoying my liberation from homework, and have taken on intellectual endeavors like watching TV in my spare time? I jotted down a couple direct quotes from the announcers of the Packers/Vikings game for you. If you add "in bed" after them, you know, like you do with fortune cookies, they're even funnier.

"...Slipped and threw it right into the offensive lineman..."
"...He came right into the arms of Williamson..."
"...Williamson had six balls. He’s correcting himself now."
"took a hard hit to get the thing out to Chester Taylor--and it goes long and deep..."
"...Asked him about his relationship with Greg and he said, 'We’re cool.'"
"Oh, I like what my quarter back did right there, and he gives it to the 272 pound tight end."
"...The ball's wet and slippery.... We’re going to see a pair at first down."

In bed. In bed. In bed. In bed.
[Insert snort laugh.]

Why didn't someone tell me this is what I'm missing while I'm in grad school. Jeeze.

I am the star.

Of all the years I’ve had so far, this is the year I've learned the most and am happiest to move forward from. I’m thankful for it. Both the dark and light times of the past year make me I’m happier to move toward the future than I’ve ever been. Thanks, Chloe.

You are The Star Hope, expectation, Bright promises. The Star is one of the great cards of faith, dreams realised The Star is a card that looks to the future. It does not predict any immediate or powerful change, but it does predict hope and healing. This card suggests clarity of vision, spiritual insight. And, most importantly, that unexpected help will be coming, with water to quench your thirst, with a guiding light to the future.

Faith, yes. Dreams realised, yes. Powerful change, yes. Healing, yes. Clarity, spiritual insight, unexpected help. Yes, yes, yes.

Who are you?

Bring it.

So, I’ve been working my ass off and the semester’s almost over. The first two years of grad school I worked part-time and I had my mornings to linger over a croissant and coffee and to write when I wanted to and to read a ton. I was also really, really poor and struggling. Now I work all day, come home and do homework until 11 PM. I get down about it sometimes, wishing I had more artist-time, and more free time or at least didn’t work for a corporation. The whole working-all-day-and-all-evening thing, I’m really really tired of it. But there’s a reason I do it: I am well taken care of. My job is pleasant enough and fairly flexible as far as jobs go. I have awesome insurance. I can pay my bills and save some. I have paid time off. I enjoy the people here, and feel good about what my company contributes to the world. So maybe I can’t sleep in and linger over coffee. But I can take advantage of the other stuff.

To those of you who know me, this will come as no surprise: I spent my bonus on an airline ticket. I haven’t been out of the country in over a year and my feet are starting to itch. There is something about being out of my culture and comfort zone that just cracks open the world for me. I lived for a while near the ocean—in Oregon and in the tropics for a little while. I love Minnesota, many things about it, but being landlocked and wearing layers of heavy clothes is really weird for me. I need sand and water. I need to wear a sarong and tank top all day and be barefoot and not covered in something wooly. And for a little while, before I start my thesis, I need my biggest decision in the morning to be “Should I lie in the hammock first? Or should I go for a swim first?”

So I’m going to the Yucatan Peninsula with my sweetheart. We’re likely staying in a small fishing village for a few days, then a hotel in the jungle by Mayan ruins, then we’re going to a small island where you can walk or bike anywhere. We’re staying in a huge condo that one of my graphic designers at work is renting to us for, like, nothing.

I’m going to dig my feet in the sand. I’m going to float on my back in the ocean. I’m going to sleep. I’m going to read whatever I want. I’m going to wander markets for beautiful jewelry. I’m going to see the ruins of an ancient village and old observatories made by one of the most advanced civilizations of the known world. I’m going to get to see what my gorgeous boyfriend is like when he isn’t half crazed by PhD work. I’m going to see what I’m like when I’m not half crazed by MFA work. Oh, it is going to be so very good.

NASA Plans Permanent Moon Base

“[NASA’s] deputy administrator, Shana Dale, said the United States would develop rockets and spacecraft to get people to the Moon and establish a rudimentary base. There, other countries and commercial enterprises could expand the outpost to develop scientific and other interests, Ms. Dale said. ‘The door is open for international and commercial interests.’”

--New York Times, NASA Plans Permanent Moon Base, December 5, 2006

As some of you know, I’m a science nerd. In my free time, I read books about astronomy and physics and quantum mechanics for fun, and I’m in love with planets and stars and the waves of light that come from dust clouds billions of light years away.

I value studying astronomy very much.

NASA’s plan to build a base on the moon is so, so saddening.

The moon does not belong to us. It is separate and gorgeous and mysterious and pure and lovely with all its pits and shadows. We don’t have the right to exploit it. We just don’t. And to claim it and try to live on it and pursue “commercial interests”—the power we assume there, to stake a claim on it—it’s egotistical. It’s gross enough that we left a golf ball there—a golf ball! Guys got to the moon and someone thought, Hey, lets hit a golf ball! Think for a moment about the sport of golf and the target market golf often caters to, and the values thereof. Men went to the moon and we littered a golf ball.

The article said, “Commercial concerns might want to process rocket fuel and other products from water and other materials that might be found in the ground nearby.” The implied intention is to mine the moon’s resources. An article on Hubble’s Web site said, “Hubble observations suggests new patterns in the abundance of titanium and iron oxides, both of which are sources of oxygen, a key ingredient for life, and an essential ingredient for human exploration.”

If you study the images NASA and Hubble has taken of astrological phenomena, and if you read books by astronomers and physicists and cosmologists, the awe and reverence for our vast and amazing home is astounding. It’s breathtaking. It’s a privilege to be a tiny, microscopic part of it, and deserves such reverence and respect.

But this? This is a major violation. NASA has reservations about whether it will even serve to advance astronomical research goals at all. For the 17 billion dollars a year it will cost to make the moon base, we should first think about taking care of the planet we actually live on, or, say, feeding all the people on it. I am disappointed. I think I’m going to write NASA a letter.

Image: "This image shows the Moon's soil and mineral compostion. Mare Tranquillitatis - the 'Sea of Tranquility' - is the dark blue region on the right."

Actually, I'm writing about YOU. Any other questions?

I bet you other writers out there get this too: People who ask “What are you writing about?” I especially get it from family, who I most often see around holidays. I hate this question. I love that they’re interested, and I appreciate the kind intention behind the question, but it’s impossible to answer. And any answer I try to give is followed by a confused look and “But… what is it about?”

What is it about? Well, I’m working on 2 short stories, an essay and about 19 poems right now. One of my poems includes a character based on my self-destructive sister and the narrator’s relationship with her and her ongoing struggle between the care of herself versus the care of her sister, and finding balance between self and giving love, and the guilt for not being able to do more, and suffering and fear. It’s abstract, so the reader needs to read both for the layer of narrative and the multiple layers of suggested emotional turmoil—pain and healing in the universal sense. I’m trying to a villanelle, using the narrative of a woman with a black eye driving down a gravel road in a pickup truck. In the poem, I intertwine metaphors of what is infinitely small (atoms) and infinitely large (the cosmos) to cause the reader to question mortality and what existence really is about—is it about what matters to us? Should we make an effort to put our impulses and serious problems into perspective? What is a big problem anyway? So it’s also about theoretical cosmology. The history of the universe and physics and theories about how and why we exist. Would you like to hear about my other 21 projects?

I can try to give this answer, or a less painfully personal version of it, but they never know how to respond. I don’t think this is what they want. It’s like when people ask “How are you?” and you know they want to hear “Fine” because they’re asking to show light affection, not to get a real answer.

Giving a general answer doesn’t work. Saying one of my current 22 writing projects is about a girl driving a truck is like saying Animal Farm is about a pig. If Animal Farm is about a pig, then here is what I am writing about:

Nursing homes
Sex
Outer Space
Sledding
Eagles (the band)
Somalia
Grass
Breakups
Cats
Domestic Abuse
Rubber Chickens
Birds
Planets
The Spine
Boats
Ribbons

An incomplete list, but you get the idea: Giving a short answer trivializes the work. I have so many multi-dimensional projects going at once, and even I don’t know what some of them are about. “What are you writing about?” would be more accurate if stated as “Tell me about what you’re doing that’s meaningful to you right now. I know writing is important to you—tell me about that.” That is a warm, good request, especially if followed by attentive listening, an effort to understand and subsequent inquiries.

So: What to do…. Here’s a possible answer: “What I’m writing about is really complex and personal. Trying to explain it quickly wouldn’t really do the work justice, but thanks for asking. I’m working on several pieces right now about relationships and philosophy. When I get published, I’ll bring you a copy.” There—I just killed both “What are you writing about?” And “When can I read something?” with one stone. Now, for a response (be sure to look at the cartoons) to “I’m thinking about writing a book when I’m done with my next knitting project. It sounds fun.”

Rothko

I’m in a coffee shop down the street from me that feels oddly empty and quiet. It isn’t empty. Every table here has one occupant each, and I just noticed that I’m the only woman. The walls are large and bare and mostly white except for a scene painted on them in one color with no variation—a sort of tomato orange. The scene is solid and has distinct corners. Part of the mural is of an abandoned warehouse with broken windows, which takes up 1/3rd of one of the walls, and the rest of the walls are painted with a silhouette of telephone poles and connecting wires that cross and sag along the rest of the walls.

I can sort of see it—an urbanite wants to open a coffee shop, so she gets a retail space sort of in the hip neighborhood but on side streets so she can afford it. She brings in an artistic consultant. He comes into the room, puts his hand to his chin and after a moment says, “I’ve got it. I see white. I see a red—no, orange—no, red-orange. I see [dramatic pause] telephone poles. Rows and rows of telephone poles.”

I’m sitting by the wall by the cracked-up orange warehouse and my shirt, oddly, is the same red as the paint. It looks planned. Everyone is quiet here. Most of the men look like they came home from whatever work wherever, ate something and fell asleep in front of the television for 15 hard minutes, then woke up with a start and thought “I have so much shit to do. I have to get out of this apartment.” Two of them are holding up their heads by resting their chin in a hand and an elbow on the table. I kind of wish my cell phone would ring.

All the men have white coffee cups except the guy with the hair straight up and the cowgirl boots. There are large, bulbous lamps on each table that look like trees from The Lorax. I’m drinking a lemon soda called Bubble Up! And sitting in a chair covered in gold-flecked plastic. There’s definitely some sort of 50’s theme going on here.

All of us are here for company and we know it. There are five tables against each wall and behind us and behind the light from the Lorax Trees, orange telephone wires connect us at the shoulder or head, and I think about wires. Telephones with hearty coiled cords and grounded computers and the speaker in my car with a loose and unreliable wire "I'm wired," how obsolete telephone poles already are. I think of how 50’s homemakers cried the day a husband wheeled the first television into the living room because otherwise, there had very little access to the outside world, except in books and radio and imagination.

The tables are full here because our own walls are not covered in orange telephone poles and we need something that isn’t what we’re surrounded by all the time, even though we’ll stare at our screens and books like I have for over eight hours already just today. And we need people—silent is fine, just to be around more people. In the same room with them. Six Dells. Three Macs. Four Razors. Us. We probably won’t talk.

Epitaph: Foolish humans, never escaped Earth.- Vernor Vinge

Hemmingway once wrote a really short story. It goes like this:

"For Sale: Baby Shoes. Never worn."

Wired Magazine asked authors to write a 6-word short story. Here are some of my favs:

Longed for him. Got him. Shit. - Margaret Atwood
Failed SAT. Lost scholarship. Invented rocket.- William Shatner
Computer, did we bring batteries? Computer?- Eileen Gunn
Gown removed carelessly. Head, less so.- Joss Whedon

Then I tried some of my own:

Submerged crocodile licks lips.
“Romantic swim?”

**

Broken vows generate escape velocity.
Freedom.

**

Tequila in Minneapolis?
Breakfast in Tijuana.

**

Here he comes! Run for your—

OKAY, your turn.

Thesis? Piece of cake.

Miz Voix de Michele is handing in the first draft of her thesis today. Do go congratulate her.