Again with the Morning Thing!?

An update on my recent efforts to get up at 5 am and write brilliant original fiction:

It's going pretty well - the 5 am part, not necessarily the brilliant fiction part. Some days its more like 5:30 (so don't be too impressed, Jessie), and some days it's more like 8. But out of the past week or so that I've been doing this, I've managed to get up 6 out of 8 days. This ain't bad, considering there isn't a fire or a paycheck involved, both of which qualify as good reasons to get out of bed (well, paycheck depending on the job).

I am writing this cool story that sort of came out of the dark (literally) at me. Before, a couple years ago, when I was doing the early morning write, every morning I would write something new. A couple pages of dreamland, a bizarre scene straight out of the depths of my brain. Then the next day it was something else. But this time around, something different is happening. I'm working on the same story every morning.

I think part of me is afraid, since it was conceived this way, that if I try to bring it out into the daylight before it is done it will vanish. Or, more realistically, that I won't be able to duplicate the style of the earlier pages unless I am in the same state of mind. I worry about trying to write it during the day, or the evening, or late at night. It is a pre-dawn story, and I don't want to break the spell.

I read J what I had written after he woke up the other morning, and he told me he thinks its the best stuff I've ever written. He said that it's like the stuff you read in a book, a published book, a book you buy (I'm paraphrasing here, J, it was early, give me a break). Although I can't remember what it is he said exactly, this is what it meant to me. I hug that compliment and save it - it's a good one.

So this early thing is okay. And a side benefit of rising early is I that every morning I have a choice. After a few hours of writing I can: 1) crawl back into my flannel-licious bed and cozy up to a snuggly sleeping J or 2) keep writing, and revel in the fact that, when you get up early, the days are so very long.

Pre-GRE Freak-out!

I feel sick. The GRE is today, this morning, at 9:30. I've never had test anxiety before, so this is new, and I don't like it. For all you out there who have always felt this way - bummer. it sucks.

I got to school too early, because of reports of impending snow and my own miscalculations (due, I think, to confusion caused by Daylight Savings Time, which always messes me up for about a week). So I've got over an hour to kill before I have to head over the the testing center (a laughable name, as it is a closet filled with boxes and a desk with a computer). So I'm trying to de-blog my anxiety.

I'm not sure what exactly I'm nervous about. This is, in fact, a trial run - an extra test I scheduled so that if I really screwed up I could just take it again in November. So what's the deal?

I guess it's just been so long since I've been put under standardized testing conditions. Last time I took the GRE was so long ago that it was still a paper test. Maybe that's part of the problem. The computer thing. What about the computer sheets with the bubbles? I liked the bubbles - we understood each other. This sliding scale test that adjusts itself to be harder if you get questions right just seems a little scary.

Plus it's a four hour monstrosity that I get to begin with 75 minutes to write two essays. Then the verbal and math, and an extra section that they stick in to try out new questions - they don't tell you which one it is. Somehow that doesn't seem fair.

I have to say, I feel much better about all this after venting on the blog. I am, after all, very good at talking myself in and out of things. So, now, all that remains is to banish this sick feeling in my stomach, and get on with it. I'm listening to Bill Evans right now, which usually does wonders to calm me, so Bill, work your magic!

Tallyho!

This Morning Thing

Off and on throughout my life, I've been forced to be an early riser. High school golf practice (5 am), lifeguarding (5 am), baking (4 am), suitcase factory (5 am), and doughnut frying (1 am - and don't ask, its a sordid period of my working life).

But I am not naturally an early riser. I am a 2 am to bed kind of person, and have been for as long as I can remember. But I've started a new resolution to get up at 5 am every day. Okay, so maybe every 4 out of 5 days would be good. There is a good reason for this. I am getting up to write.

Getting up early, for me, doesn't result in jaw-cracking yawns all day. Once I manage to pry myself out of bed (which is the bulk of the difficulty with getting up early - I love bed), after that, it's really not so bad. I wake up pretty quickly and am fairly alert. But it puts me in a wierd frame of mind, one that will permeate my day. My thoughts are disconnected and dreamy. My imagination basically takes over both halves of my brain and leaves me an absent-minded fool for most of the day.

I have discovered something about this state of mind, though. I produce bizarre stuff while in it. Good writing stuff that I read later and say, "Did I write that? I can't believe that came out of my brain. Who knew?" I get, by far, my best stories by writing at 5 am. The only rule I have is that I can't think about what I'm going to write, oh, and another rule (that's two, I guess) - I can't stop writing. I think it was Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down the Bones where I first got that suggestion. It was one of those writing tips that normally I'd say "yeah, okay" to, and promptly brush off. But I tried it one day sitting on my deck, and actually came up with an entire story.

Pretty wierd stuff.

So anyway, that's why this post is coming in at 6:30 am. Because it's Daylight Savings Night, and so I actually got up at 4, which is pushing it a little, in my mind. Out of the past seven days, I've managed to get up at 5 for 5 of them. So far so good, but every morning is a fresh struggle.

A Big Dilemma

I have a problem. Should I spend my weekend studying for my upcoming GRE,

or

watch the entire Twin Peaks television series, on loan from a friend? Hmm, tough decision.

Jackpot at the GoodWill

I had an exciting find at the thrift store, which is, to me, one of the best thrills to be offered - thrift shopping is like panning for gold.

On Wednesday I took a trip to the Bemidji Good Will with Kasandra. It really is one of the nicest GoodWills I've been to, not the largest, but clean and well-organized and cheap, and most of all, lacking in that thrift shop smell. That thrift shop smell, while part of the experience, somehow always has the effect of making me, and everything I touch, feel slightly unclean. Anyway, so thumbs up for the Bemidji Goodwill, which I've been to before, but never in such detail. We were shopping, and K had some dorm room needs.

So we're testing out chairs, sitting, rocking, trying different reading positions, comparing. The last chair I sit in is sort of a stodgy wingchair that I had dismissed earlier because it didn't look slouchy enough, and it didn't rock. But, I figure, what the hell, sometimes the most unassuming chairs turn out to be heavenly. So I sit and bounce and look across the store to the opposite wall. There are shelves cluttered with toys and kid's books. I look up and up, and on the top shelf I see something that I had forgotten all about, but used to be one of my favorite toys:


Spirograph.

Spirograph was right up there with Lite Brite in my favorites list. Spirograph!! So I jump up from the chair, actually gasping with happiness (I am sort of a gasper anyway when surprised, so this is not that unusual) and run over to the shelf, dodging clothing racks and little old ladies. K, mystified by my delight, follows behind. I grab it off the shelf and open immediately, unable to belief that a Spirograph in the thrift store actually has all its pieces. But once I get it open I realize that it does indeed have all the pieces, and, as K pointed out, this is duly noted on the front of the box, right under where it says "Don't Open."

So for the bargain price of $1.99 I brought it home. This weekend has been thrilling, needless to say, sheets of paper cluttered with swirls all over our house. As a result, be expecting some changes to the blog soon. Oh, and I found this online spirograph too, so those of you that had one can relive the dream.

A Well-Balanced Meal

Hmmm... a dinner consisting of one box of Le Petit Ecolier cookies (damn I love those things), and a 20 ounce Coke. I think I can hear my stomach rotting.

Moonlight Mile, Buffalo 66, and Clean

Or perhaps the subtitle: Two of My Favorite Movies and One That Didn't Quite Get There.

This weekend I watched, yet again, two of my favorite movies, Moonlight Mile and Buffalo 66. And, as mentioned above, I also watched Clean, a 2004 release directed by Olivier Assayas. But more about that one later. First, my favs.

Moonlight Mile is a 2002 release directed by Brad Silberling, whose more recent fame came from his Lemony Snicket movie. I'm not a big fan of Silberling's other work, but I find this movie amazing. I know a large part of it is the acting: Susan Sarandon, Dustin Hoffman, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Ellen Pompeo. It's basically a story of grief: getting through it, overcoming it, and taking responsibility for it. But it's not a sad movie. In fact, the best part of this movie, in my opinion, are those moments that have you giggling, and feeling badly for doing so (in the middle of a wake, when Jake's character goes into the pantry to get away from everyone, for example). The characters are all flawed and problematic and lovable and frustrating, and each come to terms with their own grief in their own individual way. Anyway, yeah, if you run across this one in the video store, take it home.

On to Buffalo 66. Oh my God, does this movie make me howl with laughter. Director, writer, and star Vincent Gallo is hilarious (Gallo's name may sound familiar if you remember the more recent "Brown Bunny" fiasco, with Chloe Sevigny performing oral sex on him at the end of the film). He plays Bobby Brown, a man who is so incredibly insecure and hurting that he is a complete asshole to just about everyone, most notably Christina Ricci. She is blond, plump, and falling out of her dress for most of the movie, and she is just what Bobby needs. He kidnaps her from her tap dancing class and takes her to his parents house to pretend to be his wife for the day. Enough said. I don't know, the character may bug some people, but I just find the whole story so touching and sweet. Also, the cinematography and the editing are just really incredible (a side note: the trailer is even cooler). There are some really great scenes: Ricci doing a sad, dreamy tap routine at the bowling alley, the two of them in a photo booth, the list goes on. Add to that the fact that Gallo seems to have a preternatural ear for matching music to scene. For me, this movie has it all.

Now for Clean. This is one of those movies where I checked the time about 45 minutes into it, and kept checking about every five minutes from then on. Maggie Cheung (Hero) plays Emily Wang, a heroine addict trying to get over her addiction and pull her life together so that she can see her son again. The thing is, nothing really happens. You know the whole concept of plot reversal? Well, this film doesn't seem to subscribe to that theory. The story is what the story is, all the way through. If it weren't for Cheung's pretty amazing performance and great cinematography, I probably wouldn't have even finished watching it. Saying that, Cheung is awesome, and the cinematography is great, so maybe that would make it worthwhile for some folks. Or maybe they would find something in it that I just didn't see. I hope there's something there I didn't see, because if not, there ain't much there. Truthfully, I wouldn't bother.

That's the latest Film Watch from Toad Lake. If you have any recommendations, I'd love 'em. Saturday nights are a little dull out in the boonies, and this is the season to cuddle up with good movies!

Pssst! Wanna buy an almond - cheap?

So, as a break from worrying about the impending threat of North Korea, I've been reading about these almond heists that have been plaguing California. Yes, apparently robbers have been making off with almonds from farms in California, to the total tune of 1.5 million so far. They are calling them "nutnabbers" (which I won't even touch, as it's too obvious for even me to mock). These guys are not amateurs - they are not clipping the cyclone fence in black clothing and shoveling nuts into garbage bags, then sneaking away. They steal whole trucks filled with them - the last robbery was 44,000 pounds of nuts.

So the first thought that occurred to me - where does one find a fence for almonds? I mean, it's not like you can go downtown and sell them out of the trunk of your car under an overpass or something. We're talking a specific market here. The police say that they must have a buyer already lined up, someone overseas, because there's less paperwork. Sort of like lining up a buyer for the Mona Lisa before you steal it.

Anyway, that's it for the national news. Now, back to the latest impending threat to the world's greatest bully: the U.S. of A.

In Limbo About Limbo

Today, in a stunning move by the Catholic Church, Limbo was abolished. The Pope informed the public that there would no longer be a Limbo, that popular eternal resting place between heaven and h-e-double hockey sticks. While Heaven and Hell are reserved for the good and evil, respectively, Limbo traditionally is home to those who do not seem to deserve hell, but can’t get into heaven either: those born before Jesus’ resurrection, unbaptized babies, and the like.

Martha Jones, a Catholic resident of Baltimore, was shocked and appalled. “What’s going to happen to all those unbaptized babies now?” she sobbed. “Where will the refugees from Limbo go?” The Church has responded to these concerns, voiced by many, by stating that all current residents of Limbo will receive an upgrade to Heaven. “After all,” said a Catholic Church spokesperson, “they’ve been in Limbo long enough. It’s not really fair for them to keep paying for something that was not their fault.”

Critics have questioned this move, stating that the Pope has no authority to actually change the fabric of the universe. “This is not a question of politics. It’s not like reversing the Church’s stance on birth control,” stated Petula Smithers, president of PAPAL, Parents Allied to Prevent the Abolishment of Limbo. “Next they’ll be saying that they’re going to abolish Hell because no one is inherently evil, it’s all a matter of upbringing. For hundreds of years, they’ve said Limbo exists. Now, because they want a kinder, friendlier God to attract constituents, suddenly Limbo doesn’t exist? Would that I could shape my world and my God to fit my marketing concepts.”

**Author’s note: The Pope has not abolished Limbo, although the Church has apparently considering doing so for a while now. Said Author was overcome with mirth and a deep sense of irony when she discovered this. Here’s a link to NPR’s recent article about the issue. It was just too good to pass up.

Anti-social? Me? Pish-Posh!

Ah, friday, the end of the week. Oh, wait, that's right, I didn't really have a week. I was home, skipping out on classes and other responsibilities with the flimsy excuse that my car has been in the shop since Tuesday. Okay, the excuse isn't that flimsy when you live 20 miles from any town. I'm as stranded as I would be on an island, except that instead of water surrounding me, it's a lethal combination of marshes, thick woods, and highways where people (who are asked, legally, to go 55) are actually going about 70, passing on the shoulder, and doing all sorts of crazy things. This means: no bike riding or, god forbid, walking, on the shoulders of the roads, even though they are broad and paved, with those scored rubbity-bumpity things along the edges. Still, to be on the roads here without the protection a car is to take your life in your hands. This means: yep, I'm still stranded.

It's been nice. The week has passed in a fog of writing, blogging, studying, walking (with pooch, down my nice long safe gravel road), and a lot of staring out the windows at the leaves changing and rattling down from the trees. I've never been one to mind solitude. In fact, it is a preference for me. I can go days without seeing a soul, without talking to anyone on the phone, and that is just fine.

My record for going without any companionship except that of my dog is 11 days, accomplished two summers ago with J was on a month-long backpacking trip in Montana. I did not go anywhere by car (which means I didn't go anywhere), I did not talk to anyone on the phone, I saw no neighbors, no one stopped by the house, I had no television, no internet. The only person I talked to was my pooch, Zoe, but after a while even that stopped. It was serene. That's the only way I can describe it. I went through the days without saying a word. It made me realize that speech is a sort of burden. Vows of silence must feel like a respite, to permanently relinquish the responsibility of speech.

Eleven days seemed like months. I read for hours, sitting on my back steps, walked down the road and back again, painted old furniture, watched movies, baked, rowed our little boat to the island to go swimming. It was like, for those eleven days, life was enchanted. I was under a spell, a bubble that protected me from the world and put me back to when I was eight and rowing my grandfather's boat into the channel to look at the flourescent molds and algaes, and catch turtles.

This week is a little different. I am still working (studying for GRE, etc.). But I find myself slipping into that bubble of timelessness. When I stand under a birch tree, the trunk glowing white against the crisp blue sky, round yellow leaves like chips of sunlight. The wind runs through them and they rattle like paper, like rustling windchimes. The rusty colors of reeds, lying over in tossed bundles, bumping and rolling across the marsh. Intermittent spikes of an unknown plant, dark red at the bottom, lightening towards the top into pink-orange-yellow, like thin columns of flame shooting up through the reeds, like otherworldly fires spurting up from below .

These are the thoughts that get lost in the everyday.

Unbirthday

So, today I'm just another 32 year old. Milestone passed. Back to studying for the GRE and doing laundry. Which isn't so bad really.

But first... must take a minute to wax rhapsodic on my birthday dinner. Because, well, I love food, and I especially love to talk about it. I'm one of those folks that reads cookbooks, and for me imagining the recipe is almost as good as eating it. I said almost. Anyway, we didn't go out for my birthday dinner, because we never do, because there are no good restaurants less than an hour away, and the ones an hour away aren't that good. Oh, yeah, and I'm really lazy, and would rather eat cozily at home than get in the car and ride endlessly through the Minnesota countryside to get to a restaurant that has like one vegetarian dish (alfredo pasta, usually). So anyway, I made the dinner and J made the dessert, which is a switch from our usual and one that I think we should seriously consider making permanent, as you will see.

For dinner, I made: Vegetarian chili (with a little bittersweet chocolate... mmm), and cheddar chive scones. Nothing fancy, but I was in the mood for chili, birthday be damned. It was delish, although the chili was so rich. There was just a little chocolate in it, an ounce and a half, like you could smell it more than taste it, but still very rich. J pointed out that some ancho chile would be the perfect complement to it, so next time that gets added to the recipe.

For dessert he made: Poached pears with port wine syrup and ginger marscapone cream. This is why I think he should become the permanent dessert maker. Because my apple crisp is damn good, but poached pears?! You should know about me: I usually don't care for cooked fruit, the skins of cherries or apples floating around in there, and for some reason warm seems to make it worse. I'm very selective of my pies. But poached pears, which I'd never had before, seem more like candy than fruit. And they get a thumbs up for texture, which I'm very fussy about. My eating likes and dislikes have more to do with texture than taste. For example, bananas. Just the sound of someone near me eating a banana will literally send a shiver down my spine. Ick.

But here I am off-topic. What was the topic again? Oh yes, the return, or the resumption (is that a word?) of normalcy. Which doesn't actually differ that much from my birthday day. I'm still at home, the car is still at the shop, I'm still alone for the day. But something is different. I don't have that me-day feeling. Although I am still feeling me-day enough that I used a bit of leftover whipping cream in my coffee this morning instead of skim. So decadent.

But Kaplan's is calling my name, and I doubt I'll be feeling very me-day with a hefty dose of algebra under my belt. The trade off, I've already decided, is an afternoon to work on my latest story. And maybe a nice hike, since time is limited before people start stalking around in the woods with guns. After that point, I tend to stick to my own road. I could wear orange, I guess, but last I heard, that color still wasn't bulletproof.

Another Year, Another Trip to the Mechanic

So, this birthday, my 32nd, has so far been unexpectedly lovely. Yesterday when I got in my car to head up to Bemidji until Thursday, my car broke down (well, more like it never started up). It is currently in the shop, and I am awaiting the bad news. This has had repercussions that affect my whole week. One is that I missed the workshop of one of my pieces. This is not a big deal, as the professor is not a stickler, and we will just do it next time I am there. But still, I always look forward to workshop day. Another thing is that I missed having drinks with a friend for the second time in two weeks. This sucks, because we've been trying to get together. And the third is that I will miss my birthday celebration in Bemidji, which likely would've consisted of pints and a veggie melt at Brigid's with friends. This, too, sucks. Plus, for my birthday, I was going to buy myself some sandalwood lotion, which is (of course) on sale in Bemidji. So all of those things are unfortunate. But here is the nice.

I am stranded at my house today, just me and the pooch. I have no method of transportation, and so am forced to stay here and do whatever I want all day long. For no good reason at all J and I both woke up before sunrise this morning (this is not a regular occurence in our house - not even annual), and so just snuggled and talked and watched the sun rise through the windows. Then he made me coffee just the way I like it - very strong with lots of milk. Then he gave me two chocolates for my birthday - a truffle and a mint meltaway - which I promptly ate because, well, chocolate for breakfast. That and it's my birthday. When I was a kid we always got to have cake and ice cream for breakfast on our birthdays, and I guess I've never grown out of that.

So then, J left for work, and I took a wonderfully long shower, scaldingly hot, just the way I like it, and put on the brand-new lounging outfit my moms sent me for my b-day. I may be the princess of loungewear, but I learned from the queen. Softer-than-soft cotton pj pants and shirt, a fleece hoody to go over it, and fuzzy chenille socks for the feets. If I had my druthers (I've always wanted to have my druthers), I would wear this gear every day. Who am I kidding? I do wear this gear every day, except those three days per week that I am student and graduate assistant extraordinaire. That's right. I wear pjs more days a week than I wear clothes. Perhaps the coolest thing about being a student/struggling writer.

Anyway, and now I have all day, in my cozy clothes, to myself. I know that a mud mask and painting the toenails are in order - it's not often I'm so deliciously girly, but my b-day does that to me. Also, nice long sunny walk with the pooch. Also, pick something delicious to make for dinner and call j with my grocery list (he has promised to take care of the cake). Those are my only plans. The rest, I think, will unfold.

It is shaping up to be another breezy, cornflower blue fall day, my favorite kind. I love that my birthday is in the nicest part of fall (of course, that's just my opinion). I think perhaps jumping in leaf piles might be in order. But wait, then I'd have to rake the leaves first. Although, that might be fun. Plus, then I could light them on fire (after I'm done jumping in them). The smell of burning leaves would be an excellent birthday present to myself. And so would fire. Leaf fires are another favorite fall tradition of mine. I think some of it stems from a childhood in Chicago followed by a move to the remote suburbs when I discovered, to my delight, that you can just burn stuff in your yard in the country. How cool is that? It still feels slightly illicit to me, which is probably part of the appeal.

That's right. I'm a rebel.

Upcoming GRE Spooktacular

So I signed up for the GRE today. I’m taking it on Halloween, which seemed appropriate for some reason. But it is also the last day of October (which you may or may not be aware of). I actually strategically chose that day due to some fine print that I only discovered yesterday, stating that you can only take the test once per calendar month. That only gives me two tries: one in October, one in November. It was a bit of a panic when I discovered this, because it means that I have to really kick ass this month. But also something of a relief, because, after all the planning and the waiting for deadlines, at last something is zooming up. The process is beginning, and now I don’t have to drive myself crazy sitting around thinking and waiting anymore (since we all know about my thriving need for deadlines and resultant procrastination).

I also took the Diagnostic Test that came with the GRE book that I picked up at B&N on Sunday. I did poorly, but somehow it made me feel better. I missed a lot of math questions, which did not surprise me, and mostly showed me that my skills are rusty as hell. Usually the math problems can be solved using logic if you go about it right. Except the ones that involve 2 &pi r and &pi r2 and the eternal question: which one of these is circumference and which is area?

It’s strange, re-entering the world of standardized testing after a 10 year hiatus. It amazes me that my brain used to function so well in this environment. I had the system down, I was skilled at the bureaucracy surrounding the education system. I knew just what they wanted me to say, even when it was multiple choice, even when I didn’t know the answer.

Things are different now. My brain does not operate that way anymore. Or maybe I’m rusty. Or maybe I killed too many brain cells during college and the following four years in Aspen. But mostly now standardized tests just strike me as lame. What a lame way to decide if someone can get into your school. I realize they need a method, but standardized testing really says so little, especially when you’re talking about people entering graduate school, law school, etc. All it really shows is how well someone operates within the system. Maybe that’s their point. The cynical side of me says, yes, yes, all they really want is someone who they know will perpetuate their system and work smoothly and easily within it. Clearly, I will have to set these feelings aside and jump through the requisite hoops to get to where I want to be. Ah, well, compromise again.

Another thing today’s Diagnostic Test showed me: no matter how many times it pops up on standardized tests, I will never remember what abstemious means.

Getting Sidetracked

So yesterday we took the Grand Tour of Fargo, which we do about every three or four months. This consists of going to the cooking store, Barnes and Noble, and usually Bennigan's because I can get a veggie burger (joy! to order burger and fries in a restaurant), and because we can also get very large mugs of Guinness.

Anyway, in Barnes & Noble, the plan was to get a GRE study book, which I did, before I promptly got sidetracked. This does not upset me because it always happens in bookstores, and really isn't that the point of a bookstore? It's not like a hardware store where you go in and get your doorknob and your caulk or whatever (whatever you might be doing with a doorknob and caulk, that's certainly your own business). Bookstores are for browsing, and unfortunately for me I rarely walk out of B&N without suffering the consequences. I tell myself that there are worse things to spend money on than books (in fact, most things are worse, don't you think?), and that helps soothe my fevered checkbook and rationalize the way for another spending spree.

Yesterday I got lucky. I managed to limit myself to two books (other than the GRE book): Rule of the Bone, by Russell Banks, and A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, by Dave Eggers (see sidebar for links). Both for very specific reasons.

I bought Rule of the Bone because it is a first-person narrative of a 14 year old boy. I'm writing something right now from the same age, and it is first-person as of yet, so I wanted to see how it worked. Call it research. I spent the better part of today sucked into it, and am about halfway through. Very compelling. IIt's difficult to sustain a novel with a voice like this one - first person, young - without the reader tiring of the eccentricities of the narrator's speech like slang, etc. And as far as writing convention goes, you hear (or rather, I hear) stuff about first vs. third person, and how third-person is the most often used, and sometimes the implication is that it is what one should use. So I was swaying towards shifting my story to the third-person. But this book has sort of renewed my faith in the first person. Yes, it can be done, and done well!

The other book, AHWOSG, well, it has the kind of reviews on it that make you think that this book may indeed solve world hunger. Or rather, sort of make you think it'd better, for all the fuss that is being made about it. But they're all reviewers that I respect, and I'm sure it's incredible, so I'm looking forward to that. I have to admit, that the reason I went looking for it was because I read an interview with Dave Eggers in Stop Smiling magazine, and found out that he is from Lake Forest, which is the rich kid suburb that is right next to Libertyville, the not-so-rich-but-upper-middle-class suburb that I lived in from age twelve on. No, that wasn't the only interesting thing he talked about, of course, not even the most interesting. But I'd been planning to get his book for a while, and then this article made him stick in my head. Because, in a way, he's from the old neighborhood. Okay, so he was from the part of the neighborhood where everyone looks like those Abercrombie and Fitch catalog people (only not quite so gorgeous), but Lake Forest actually had some cool folk there. Enough already about Lake Forest. Anyway that's the next book on my list.

And the GRE book? Oh yeah, I suppose I should be hitting that. Right after I finish with these two...