Scrivner

I have been through some terrible things in my life, some of which actually happened.

Since the Calgary Reads booksale was such a great deal last year, went again this year.  Well I went tonight, I should say because I might go again tomorrow.  This was the first time they’ve done a Friday night opening and it was lined up down the block!!  And we parked three blocks away!

I’m still a bit choked about the $2 ‘donation’/entry fee but my daughter pointed out that it might stop some of the browsers from attending.  What browsers?  the books are a dolla’ …holla’.  Word.  Lots of them.

So, here’s what I bought tonight (alas, they were unable to take credit cards just as I got to the teller so I had to put some back):

1.  Roses Are Difficult Here by W.O. Mitchell.  This dude is a prairie standard and I’ve never, ever read one of his books.  I took a writing course with his nephew, though, if that counts.

2.  The Spire and The Paper Men by William Golding.  I’m just going off of Lord of the Flies here.  I hope they’re good.

3.  The Notorious Jumping Frog of Calaveras County and Other Stories by Mark Twain.  This is a wee, tiny, odd shaped, little square book with a giant title.  Plus, I really like Mark Twain.  Plus, I might send this one to my friend B. because it would fit into a regular envelope.  The recesion is effecting my book choices now.

4.  Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray.  I have a sneaking suspicion I might already own this book but the cover price was 75 (the original list price) and the cover is so cute and it is in super condition for having been printed in 1958.  Wow! I should really stop judging a book by its cover….(but I’m good).

5.  A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley.  I think this is on one of my lists of books toreads before I croak or break a hip or something.  I recently bought her non-fiction title 13 Ways of Looking at the Novel.  Yeah, haven’t started that one yet.

6.  The Time in Between by David Bergen.  This was my find of the sale.  It was on the Canadian Authors table for $1.  It was also in hardcover on the Bestsellers table for $5.  I got the $1 one, whoot!  Recession strikes again!

And that’s it!  The books I had to put back since that other $20 bill I thought I had in my wallet mysteriously disappeared (I think I spent it, no mystery there) were:  Kim by Rudyard Kipling, Labryinth by Kate Moss, and The Tiger’s Claw by Shauna Singh Baldwin.  Oh well.  Next time I’ll tell my kiddies that a book about High School Musical movie is not as important as classic literature but since they actually let me look for nearly 10 whole minutes, I’ve forgive them this time.

There’s nothing like travelling to raise the one thing that can arouse road rage in even the meekest mouse.  Waiting in line.  Is there anything worse?  And travelling onlt exaserbates the problem with our North American urge/desire/response to be first and first only.  Here are the lines I’ve been in this week so far:

• waiting for the Park’N'Fly shuttle to come back around and pick us up
• waiting in line for an airplane ticket
• waiting in line at the Subway for something to eat on the plane (including wait time and flight time you’re looking at about 7 hours…they won’t give you more than a cookie for that?  Ouch!)
• waiting for them to open the flight lounge where our gate was
• waiting to see if they could put our seats together.  Somehow the word ‘anniversary’ and ‘honeymoon’ got mixed up.  I feel ever so much younger being labelled a honeymooner!
• waiting in line at Tim Horton’s…being a Canadian, this is calculated the moment you are born that at least 456 minutes of your adult life you will spend in line at Timmy’s.  It’s a National quota.
• waiting in line to present our boarding passes
• waiting in line in the airplane tunnel as the pre-boarding families weren’t yet boarded
• waiting to take-off (not so long, thank you West-Jet)
• travelling…ever notice how traffic, while moving in air or on land, is essentially one giant line?
• waiting to get off the plane
• waiting for the luggage (forever)
• waiting in line to get the pre-paid rental car (eternity!)
• waiting in line AGAIN at another part of the same rental car place to get the keys for said rental car
• traffic in Orlando…not so bad at 9 p.m. on a Sunday night
• waiting in line to pay the tolls – twice
• waiting to check into the hotel
• waiting for the table at the restaurant
• waiting to eat
• waiting for the bill (why can’t we just go?)
• waiting for a DIFFERENT car from the rental company because ours is almost broken, essentailly waiting for them to get there so we could go to bed (add on another 2 hours)

Wow!  In one day I don’t know if you could wait ay more than that.

I admit it.   I’m a published writer who’s not really published.  At least not according to many people.  Never mind that I was nominated into the shortlist for the top 50 short fiction writers worldwide, or that I’m in not one, not two, but three journals of the tangible paper variety, that I’ve been a semi-finalist for a contest to appear on a television show that features writers, not once but twice (see also ‘always a bridesmaid’), nevermind that I had to apply and be interviewed for my short story university class taught by one of Canad’as top playrights, or that this experience springboarded into a writer’s class with the Saskatchewan Writer’s Guild(this was my teacher).  Oh no.  I know not what I do.  I am not really published.

Here are the qualifications of being published (as far as I can tell):  To be really published you must:

• get paid for your work.  This is always the number one priority regardless of what people ask about.  Also, the more money you make for your work, the more published you are.
• have something that people can hold or buy, i.e. must be on paper.  This, for me, is most common question.  My answer usually makes point number one (above) irrevelant, but you know people still want to ask.  The majority of my work is published (yes, published) online journals, or E-zines (see Vanity bar to the right) without payment.  This is not easy!  I believe that the perception is that online material is junk, not one reads it, or that it’s just some computer geek’s version of a garage band – anyone can join.  Uh, no.  I’d explain more but if you don’t get it, you won’t get it.
• someone has heard of your name or knows of your work, i.e. if you might happen to be either John Grisham or Stephen King in disguise.  Yeah, Nora Roberts is my pen name and I go to work as a receptionist riding downtown on the stinky train everyday for kicks.  You know, staying in touch with the common people.  Whatever.  No really, you don’t believe my name is Danielle Steel?  It is!  Gaa.

There is one definition for being a writer.  You write. 

There is one definition for being published.  Your written work is available to the public.  See also graffiti artists.

Huh.  Who knew?  I’m really published after all.  Now, where’d I put my purple spraypaint?

Like G.G. Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude, this book is definitely not for people with ADD, i.e. North Americans, in general.  The language is languid to the point of feeling like one has gotten a lobotomy without having felt the scalpel.

It took me four months to read this book piecemeal on the morning and afternoon train to and from my job.  Having gone on an iPod diet for Lent I got much farther with the book than expected in the last few weeks and finally finished it last night. 

I have to admit that Marquez is better when you can really concetrate on what is happening because I could get lost within a half page.  What do you mean he’s having an affair with someone else now?  And really, was it 622 affairs as the description says above? (See Visual Bookshelf..probably the only good thing about Facebook).  He’s lucky he didn’t catch something.

As for Fermina, well, I still don’t believe she loved him, even in the end.

I won’t reread this one, but I’m glad to have said I’ve read it.

red tranquilizers

mixed with poetry writing.

You know the ending.

So after the anger-inducing, depression-mongering Anne Sexton biography, I’m taking a stab at a new author, Tom Perrotta.  The cover of this book intrigued me, albeit is a movie cover (I’m assuming since it has real people on the cover and a seal-looking thingy in the top left corner yelling “NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE”.  I often feel that is like hiring an abnoxious little boy to lift up women’s skirts and announce they need new pantyhose outside the department store.

Perhaps I’m being old-fashioned.  Who wears pantyhose nowadays?

Anyway.  The book is simple.  Yes, I’m still going to read it for exactly that reason.  It’s practically mind-numbing.  I have no desire to see the MAJOR MOTION PICTURE either.

Here’s the plot: two thirty-somethings decide to have an affair.  They are both married, have one child apiece, and meet randomly.   I’m about halfway through the book and the cladestine couple are moving toward escaping both of their marriages and being with one another full-time.  Ho, but here’s the kicker:  the wife of the wayward husand has just asked him who Sarah is (the other woman).  Insert diaster music here.

Here’s my prediction on the rest of the book:  Sarah will leave her husband and strike out on her own as her own husband is quite addicted to…er, not her.  Todd (the other husband) will stay with his lovely, modelesque wife because she’ll realize she’s been treating him badly and she’ll give up on the dream of him passing his bar exam to become a lawyer and support her in her dream of becoming a documentary film maker.

I know, you can’t make this stuff up and keep a straight face, can you?

Oh, one last prediction, the neighbour child molester will turn out to be actually not a child molester at all, mistaken identity or something, and come to the aid of the man who has been plaguing his home for most of the novel.  Right, I almost forgot about this character who seems to have nothing to do with anyone.  Who puts a child molester in a novel for kicks?

Will be done soon.

Hey -o, submissions are not being picked up as readily as I would like using my sure-fire (ha) method of submitting at least three poems every weekend since the top of January this year.  Until now I’ve had one thing published.  Yes, until now.

Gloom Cupboard, issue 86, was kind enough to pick up my former sonnet called “Miles to Go” which is kind of a poke at the frustration I’m feeling at having no time to write poetry, sonnets or otherwise.  I say former sonnet because they opted to drop the 12th line…which, I must admit, didn’t really go anywhere in that poem anyway.  Maybe another.  Some other time.  When I find the time.  Grrr.

And yes, I’m at the end again…but hey, at least I’m on the page.

Wow!  That’s surprising!  See below to get Blog Things link and find out yours.

Thank you BlogThings!  You always make random quizzes seem integral to my well-being.