Friday, December 21, 2007

A quick note before I dash off again...

Monk and I went to the midnight showing of Sweeney Todd last night. We enjoyed it tremendously. It’s a Tim Burton film, no doubt, it’s got that look to it. Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham-Carter have great screen chemistry together. Neither of them are powerful singers, but who cares? Wow, lots of spurting blood, though. Having only seen the show onstage before, it was different to get the throat-cutting scenes up close and personal.

The theater was full, mostly of what looked like high-school drama enthusiasts, and they were so cute and so excited. I was a theatre geek myself, so I was charmed. I predict a sudden return to the Victorian look for goth guys - waistcoats and full-sleeved shirts. And I also expect to see a lot of boys sporting wavy black hair like a lion’s mane, with one pure white lock.

I continue to get good feedback about the Stranger article, perhaps I’ll do a sampling of emails next week. I got a bit of blog-love from Belle De Jour, and I have lost her email address, so Belle, let this serve as my thank-you.

Bye!

Thursday, December 20, 2007

Before I go further, yes, commenting is off right this second, there’s some issues there, hopefully it’ll be back up soon…

So, my feature piece in The Stranger is out. It’s so different, writing a longer piece. With the column, it’s fairly quick and dirty – what you read is pretty often exactly what I wrote. Occasionally changes are made, but usually not. There was a much longer writing/submitting/editing/rewriting cycle with this piece, and even so, my editor had final say of what ran. That’s probably for the best. Every writer needs an editor, even though we hate it. We think poetry flows from our pen like liquid silver and that it should be unstained by any other human hand. But that’s why we have blogs. For any other type of publication, the dispassion and discipline of another set of eyes is a necessary thing.

Until comments are back up, you are welcome to email me with feedback.

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

I am off today to spend a day and a night with a friend. We have some lovely afternoon plans, and then we have tickets to The Jersey Boys. I love musicals. So we’ll do dinner at Ruth’s Chris and then go watch some singing and dancing.

And then there will be some private performances, but that’s a whole other post.

But meanwhile I have something to entertain you, dear readers: another podcast with me and Monk. It’s a bit longer than the previous ones, about fifteen minutes, because it’s a topic I enjoy talking about. We play a phone call from our pal Hannah who has a question about urethral sounds.

(And we make various tacky jokes about Monk’s lawn gnome fetish. You should expect the lawn gnome jokes to be a constant in these things. We don't seem to be able to stop.)

Enjoy!

Monday, December 17, 2007

Milestones: After my recent email exchange with the legendary Susie Bright, she asked me if she could re-publish one of my recent Stranger columns on her blog. Naturally I replied that I would be honored. So that’s slated to be up today, and I am very excited about it. Hey, baby, I’ve arrived! w00t!
***
Otherwise, it’s been an insanely busy two weeks. I was laughing to myself last Friday night – in an exhausted sort of way – at how overloaded everyone in my universe is. The usual disclaimer: it’s all good stuff. There’s just a lot of it, that’s all. Friday night was supposed to be Date Night with Monk. Normally we would all spend this time doing, shall we say, date-like activities.
However, when Monk showed up at my house Friday, I said, “I’m sorry, darling, I’m not going to be much fun tonight. I do need to go eat, because I pretty much haven’t all day. But then I have to come back and finish this last round of edits on the Stranger article, and then write this sidebar piece, because it all has to be in my editor’s email in the morning.”
He ran a dye-stained hand through his hair and sighed tiredly. “You know what, babe, that’s cool, because I’ve actually got a ton of work I need to do too.”
I looked at him concernedly. “I know you’re fighting that cold. Do you need some chicken pho? I can do that.”
“No, I need some meat. Let's go get protein.”
So we went and grabbed some Jones Barbeque, and then came back and worked on our computers. Sexy, huh?
Monk went to bed before I did, as befit a boy who’d gotten up at the crack of dawn. Later on, when I got under the covers with him, I naturally slid my chilly self right on over and cuddled up to his heat-radiating body. Mmmmmn, warm.
He made a vague noise in his sleep, as he always does when I do this. I suppose it could mean, “Jesus, babe, you’re like a human icicle, get off me until you defrost.” But I choose to interpret it as, “Oh hello darling, please do wrap yourself around me and get warm.”
I ran my hand down his chest and stomach, to the base of his torso, where I found… my goodness. I know Monk likes it when I cuddle him, but I didn’t think he liked it that much. It wasn’t a full-on woody, but it was still quite…noticeable.
Monk made another sleepy noise as I gave it a slight squeeze. “Well, even when you’re sick… I wonder what were you thinking about before you went to sleep.”
I didn’t really expect an answer, but he stirred, and said, in the thick drawl of the sleeper, “Soup.”
I giggled. “Soup? You were thinking about soup before you went to sleep and it gave you a hard-on?”
He stretched and sighed, without opening his eyes. “Yep. Does it every time.”
I laughed again and considered some possible answers to that, but then his breathing changed and I could tell he was falling more deeply asleep, so I took my hand away and wiggled my behind up to his side instead, and went to sleep myself.