FROM THE DECK

Took these a moment ago. Turned the iPhoto temperature up slightly to enhance the glow, but only because my shitty camera washed it out and can't capture how amazing the view is from the naked eye. Click for big.

 

I've been all stressed out for a few days and have neglected a lot of emails; apologies to anyone who emailed me; a response is forthcoming. I bought a cheap car today and I'm calmer.

ON VACATION

Spent the day traveling.  Woke yesterday, Saturday, quite ill.  Threw up a lot (it was fun), then lay in bed clutching stomach, sweating, dozing, and watching Mad Men.  Whoever casts that show is a genius.  Watched the whole second season yesterday, fell asleep at 2:30, woke at 5:30 Sunday morning (today) in 17 degree New York, went outside into the freezing fucking air, got into a cab, went to JFK (full of stomach-calming pills), boarded a plane, flew for six hours, and emerged into 60 degree weather in Los Angeles, where I'll be taking an extended vacation.  (I'm still a New Yorker, don't worry.)  Since I don't have a job, why not spend the winter out here before I have to get another one?  Went straight to the house where I'm renting a room (my roommate is the talented director of Dockweiler, which I wrote about before; strange how things come together), which has a jawdropping view from a deck which, as Nick pointed out, is a little unstable (it has a big hole in it) and hangs over a roughly three-story drop directly onto cacti.

The deck is, however, stable enough for me to go out and read books on it in the afternoons, which I'll be doing a lot.  Productivity TK.

Went from there to the Superbowl party of a college classmate, saw old friends etc, then went to eat Israeli food with Russell, now back and about to read some Tony O'Neill.  It feels fucking supernatural that I was in 17 degree weather this morning and the sky was slate blue here.

Also, I don't have a car and I have to buy one immediately.

STILL SICK, SLEEPING IN

District 9 is nominated for an Academy Award.  I'm glad; I liked it better than anything else I saw this year.  I wish The Escapist and Public Enemies had been nominated too.

I interviewed Paul Tremblay on HTMLGiant.  About sleep!  It's an interesting interview.

I like the cover of Tao Lin's next book.

I was supposed to have a phone call with my screenwriting partner at 11 a.m. today & I slept until 1:30 in the afternoon.  I feel bad.  I did wake up around 9 a.m. and my skull felt like a bowling ball encrusted with dried slime, so I went back to sleep.

Last night I had drinks w/ friends, ate a large cheeseburger, learned two excellent stories (one about Miles Davis, other about a manatee), and came home early to bring ASB benadryl.  I should have gone to sleep right away but stayed up until 3 reading nonsense on the internet.

Sending out my latest novel manuscript now (I mean, my agent is).  This is my favorite novel that I've written, I think, in that I had the most pure fun writing it.  I hope some editors like it.  Read it.  I can't think much about the process of trying to get books published, or I get too depressed.

Time to go watch more Mad Men and internalize the cold pragmatism of Draper.

AWAKE LATE & MILDLY SICK

I can't sleep.  Feel like something's wrong with me.  Oh wait something is wrong with me, namely my nose won't stop running and my head is terribly clogged with wet cotton.  Spent all day packing stuff, moving stuff... (I'm not moving, I'm still a New York resident, I'm just taking a long vacation, except it's not really a vacation because it's work, all work and no play; fortunately I love work).

******

Really awake!  On that physical cruise control, that eyelid thing where they lock at half-mast.
Because I can't sleep I just wrote a bunch of emails and email replies.  I've been corresponding with another writer who I admire very much and who, for reasons of personality and also various external circumstances, makes an excellent correspondent.  I just wrote a bunch to him.  My emails included the below paragraphs (with minor errors now fixed).

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"Let it never be said that you haven't had an interesting life.  While I was in the ocean in the DR I was thinking about this; given the exceedingly limited time in which I will be able to experience consciousness on this earth, and given the incredible good fortune I've had to be born in a wealthy nation where I don't have to work in a mine or sweatshop, shouldn't my primary goal be to live an interesting life?  To experience as many diverse and interesting experiences as I possibly can during the time I'm here?  Since then I've been doing thought experiments in my head, would I rather have X's life or Y's?  You know who I realized has an interesting life?  Jesse Ventura.  He was a Navy SEAL, a bodyguard for the Rolling Stones, a professional actor (in Predator, remember?), a professional wrestler, Governor of the state of Minnesota, and now he chills and surfs and whatever.  I'd much rather have his life than Brad Pitt's, I decided."

******

"That's a good story about your friend. I could never have sex with a prostitute. Unless I was so obscenely rich I didn't know what to do with myself or something. I've been to four strip clubs in my life--the Penthouse club in Manhattan, a club in Youngstown, Ohio (while visiting Noah Cicero) where lapdances cost $5, one in Nicaragua, and one in post-Katrina New Orleans.  Manhattan sucked; the others were fun but not in a turn-on way."

Actually on second thought I don't know why I wrote that; the one in Nicaragua was terrible, too.  I don't know why we went; we were just walking past and it seemed like tempting fate, somehow, to go in.  It was creepy inside, but kind of sleek and fake-classy, much more like the Penthouse club in Manhattan than the Youngstown or New Orleans ones.  They gave us some drinks that they charged a lot for, and as soon as I took a sip I knew something was wrong.  I whispered to my friend, the guy on the trip with me (who is gay), that I was pretty sure the drinks were drugged.  We left.
 
******

"[ASB] had to go to her friend's house to get photos taken.  The friend needed to do portraits for a photography class and [ASB] had agreed to be the subject.  Later she emailed and said they went on the friend's roof and took pictures, which turned out lovely (the friend put them on flickr here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/laurenfarmer/sets/72157623323197410/), but in between posing for those very lovely/untroubled pictures, [ASB] started violently projectile vomiting.  She had gotten a stomach virus or something.  I like that story."

It really adds something to the pictures, I think.

******

That happened this afternoon.  I'm sleeping (or not sleeping, rather) on a futon in the living room, desperate to avoid catching whatever bug it is.  I do not need this to fuck with my travel plans. 

******

Watched a lot of Mad Men episodes last night.  John Slattery is amazing.  I like the scene in the first season where he rides the girl around the office.  And later when Don slaps him.  What a brilliant show.  Better than The Wire, certainly.  Better than The Sopranos.  Better than The Shield?  Only if it can top The Shield's ending.

******

My eyes just won't close.  [UPDATE: I just slept for like ten hours.]

OUTER SPACE

Somebody posted this in a comment thread at HTMLGiant.  I like what I see.



Preparing for vacation. I have to pack. A fuck-up has happened regarding luggage (someone has taken or stolen it!!) and I have to buy new luggage for ~$150 right now. Filled with irritation.

Just went swimming. Feel okay. Reading On Writing.  The memoir part, which I just finished, is excellent.

Today at the pool a woman lost a blue key and I had seen it through the wobbly water while I was swimming, so then I was looking around for it, swimming under/around lap-swimmers across lanes, searching the bottom of the pool.  It was like some sort of dream.

Experiencing some restlessness/anxiety.  So annoyed about the luggage.  The errands I have to run in the next few days are nearly uncountable.  Fortunately, it's nice out.

BLIZZARD SITUATION

Woke up at 9 am this morning from a nightmare about being at my old job, saw HUGE snowflakes filling the window; wtf, blizzard?  Went back to sleep, woke up ninety minutes later, the sky and streets were clear.  Feel like I'm losing my mind.

This essay is the best response I've read to the Katie Roiphe sex-writing essay that appeared in the New York Times a few weeks ago.  Of course I like it; it's full of James Salter appreciation.

Odd how at least three people have brought up Stephen King's On Writing to me in unrelated recent conversations.  I own it but haven't read it.  I guess I will, starting now.