Skinny jeans

There are a number of things I do that aren't strictly hetero. Loving Lady GaGa and La Roux is one of them. Getting as excited I do about Haircut Day is another one. But there's one that I've recently realized and embraced, and that's my jeans.

Like most women, I have a pair of jeans that I like quite a bit, but they require some dedication to my appearance to wear it. Kind of like making sure you look good in that totally cute bikini you bought, I have to work at looking good in these jeans. Let me be clear, though, these jeans are not the kind that look spraypainted on that are so trendy among the high school crowd. Not like Howard Wolowitz. My skinny jeans are just a good pair of jeans that I need to work at to wear.

The last couple of years, I've been fairly sedentary, so I've gotten a little thicker around the middle than I usually am. (I know you're probably hating me right now because I've never really been big. A guy with a 31 inch waist can't complain much.) But since I have time during the day right now, I've gotten to walk my kids to and from school every day. A few days ago, I measured how far a walk it is and I walk about 2.5 miles every day.

Aside from getting to go outside and walk around a little bit, get some fresh air and sunshine, I've noticed that I can wear my jeans and not be in pain because they're way too tight around the waist. In fact, I've got room to spare.

It's amazing what a difference small changes can make in your life. Rhetorical question here, but you can share in the comments if you want to: What are your skinny jeans? What goal would you like to reach that you can make a small change in your life to reach?

A Mercy

Cover of A Mercy

I just finished reading Toni Morrison's novel A Mercy and thought I'd write a quick little review here. Why not?

When I sat down, book in hand, I had expected it to start with something horrible like her other novels do. I had prepared myself emotionally, but the beginning of the novel wasn't the same kind of jarring event. It was nothing like "They shoot the white girl first. With the rest they can take their time." On top of which, it takes off in the dialect of a character. That's not an unusual tack for her to take, but it made me concerned that the whole novel would be written in that dialect. Thankfully it wasn't, because I would have dearly missed Morrison's typically beautiful prose. (Pynchon's Mason & Dixon makes you work for every page and it took me about 2/3 of the book before I realized that the word phiz is face.)

The story was interesting, but I got lost as the point of view shifted from one character to another. I don't feel like I had enough time with each character to really understand what was going on with them before I had to move on to something else.

A Mercy was a good book, just not her best. If you've never read Toni Morrison before, this may be a good start, like easing into a slightly too-hot bath. If you're already a fan, you may miss some of the recurring character types and underlying themes, but it's still an engaging book. My favorite Toni Morrison novel is still Song of Solomon, but I recommend that one about as often as Gravity's Rainbow. Unless I'm sure you'll like it, I'll just keep it to myself.

NaNoWriMo is coming

This weekend, I registered for another month of insanity this November, since it's National Novel Writing Month. If you haven't heard of it before, you can learn more about it at www.nanowrimo.org.

In short, the goal is to write 50,000 words in the 30 days in November. Easy, right?

I've reached the goal two of the last three years, but that doesn't mean the books are readable. The year I didn't reach the goal, I didn't write anything useful. And the last novel I wrote was not a good one. It's on my shelf, but unless you come over to read it, no one will ever read it. I might be able to salvage it someday, I just don't want to make that effort at this point. It's that broken.

NaNoWriMo is good for me because I do a lot of editing while I'm writing, which means that I'm generally slower than most people and this is a good exercise to just get things on the page. A lot of things on the page. Sometimes, in an effort to just keep going, I'll throw a phrase out that I end up liking better than what I had been struggling to get just right in my head.

I'm more excited for this year's novel idea than I was for last year's, and I was excited last year. I thought it was going to be a winner of a story. The problem I had last year was that I got so enamored of the details I'd come up with that I forgot to think about the whole story. As a result, I got to what should have been the climax and realized that I hadn't built up to it at all. So the story just kind of dies. I'd like to avoid that this year, so I'll be spending time planning out how the story all works together.

If any of you are participating this year and want a writing buddy, my user name is cossackboy and you can find my profile here. I'd love to help motivate you and get through this crazy fun together.

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• Welcome to NaNoWriMo 2010! (nanowrimo.org)

Book Academy

Today I went to The Book Academy, a writing conference at UVU, and enjoyed myself. It was fun meeting with people like me who love words and nice to be around people who don't talk about their characters like that one guy in one of my college writing classes who said that his characters weren't doing what he wanted them to do. (My teacher looked at him like he had celery growing off his face and said, "You're the author. You get to pick what they do because you're God to them." And that reminded me of when Kilgore Trout gets to meet Kurt Vonnegut in Breakfast of Champions.)

It was fun to learn more about the industry and though I would have liked to get more into the business end of things, the conference wasn't about that. It was still fun and I met some interesting people. Writers are a fascinating bunch. I don't just say this because I consider myself one, they really are interesting to talk to because they generally have more things going on in their heads than most people.

I'm also kinda bummed that I don't have enough of a handle on my place in the industry because it would change how I would relate to people. I didn't network as well as I wanted to, and I have no one to blame on that but myself. I'm not the kind of person who goes around the room like the typical business major. I've got to find my stride on that kind of networking and I'm not there yet.

Can you tell that I've discovered a number of weaknesses today? The trick now is to work on fixing them.

If you didn't hear about it, they're going to have it again next year. Come with me, will you?

What comes first?

Booking Eddie Van Halen or having a triumphant video?

That's one of the things I'm trying to figure out with what I want to do with this SixUnpossible site I've got. It seems like a classic Van Halen-and-the-video conundrum.



Kind of like why Facebook is so popular or why Paris Hilton's famous. Facebook is so popular because it's popular and Paris Hilton's famous because she's famous. It's tautological and kind of maddening. I'm thinking of doing something related to books, but I still don't know enough about the industry or have a clear enough vision of where I fit into the future of books to have a chance. I'm still learning, but soon, very soon, I think I'll have a plan and a vision and be looking for a place to make it happen.

Master of my domain

I know that all three of you are cringing about that title, but yesterday I took the plunge and registered a web domain that I thought suited me. Okay, so it's not the exact one I was looking for, but it's close and possibly better than the one I originally wanted. There are two next steps, I think. The first is to get a design for a logo. The next is to design a placeholder webpage and contact cards. Okay, so that's probably more like three steps.

Image via Wikipedia

Sir John Tenniel's Red Queen

But the new domain is sixunpossible.com. Because the Red Queen thinks of six impossible things before breakfast and it's kind of my natural state of doing things as well. What I'm going to do with it yet, I have no idea. But I've got email and stuff set up for when I actually decide what I want to do with my nifty domain. Don't go there now, there's nothing there yet. I don't know whether I want it to be a consulting business, publishing house, or even an online opium den where you can digitally drop in, tune out, have some pancakes and disappear from reality for weeks at a time and not care. Okay, maybe not so much that last one, but I'm hoping to have some reason for people to visit and say hey. Again, one of those things I'll have to work out.

In the meantime, I'm still looking for a job and still optimistic that there's a company out there looking for me. If you hear of something, let me know, will you?

I'm still here

I'm still here, just haven't been keeping up as well as I could have. I've been really busy with looking for a job, helping other people out with things (since I figure I've got time now) and doing school work.

I've been thinking a lot about Althusser's concept of hailing, about the power of naming things. I also think it's interesting that he seems to be the only person who's done significant work in this area and I'm thinking of writing something up about it as well.

In a brain flash I had frighteningly early this morning, I've come up with a name for my business, when I finally get around to starting one. It's vague enough that it can fit whatever I want to do and descriptive enough that it totally suits me. I'm not telling what it is until I've got the resources to control the identity. I may tackle it in the next few hours.

The other thing I'm doing right now, because I have time, is I've got a friend who's doing a presentation to the youth at church about dating. I figured I would also have some good insights, so I'm working on that. If you were giving a presentation to the teenagers at church about dating, what would you want them to know?