You're Doing It Wrong

Well, here’s the news on Salinger. There isn’t as much as I thought there would be and that’s because Mr. Salinger hasn’t given the world much to work with – and not that I didn’t know that beforehand — I just didn’t understand how meager it was. Salinger.org is pretty good as is this one except for the popup ads.

I also found a Salinger piece on neumu.net [art + music + words] which I’d never seen before and has some other good stuff on it.

Having a slow day here — catching up on odds and ends. I think we’re going to dinner and a movie tonight. Oh — yesterday I saw My Big Fat Greek Wedding which was hilarious and had a happy ending which was what I needed yesterday. While I was at the theater, I bought my ticket for Thursday morning: 10am. Be thinking of me then.

I’ve just returned from a couple of days in Ocean Shores at the Quinault Beach Resort & Casino (and I hesitate to even type that URL due to a long story which I don’t want to go into right now) which turned out to be very fabulous but with some David Lynch movie moments. The sun shone the whole time I was there — Kimberlee told me that the sun only shines there about 3 days a year (she grew up around there) but luckily, I was there those three days. I was there to do some training related to work which I don’t really need to go into here but it was all perfectly tolerable and it turns out it was nice to get out of the office and out of the house for a few days and break my routine and learn new things and talk to new people.

J.D.SALINGER
You’re not going to believe this but, I just read for the first time, Salinger’s Nine Stories. I stole my Mom’s copy about 100 years ago and have carried it around with me to Sherman Oaks, up to Sacramento, to West Linn, to Lake Oswego and two moves in Vancouver — all these many years and I never read it. I think it was because I thought it would be so fabulous that I would gobble it up and then never have it to read for the first time again OR I was worried that it would be drudgery to get through. It turns out #1 — I gobbled it up. I am completely infatuated with Salinger at the moment. As soon as I finish the blog I’m going to troll all over the Internet and see what I can find and I bet it’s voluminous. I thought my favorite story was The Laughing Man until I got to De Daumier-Smith’s Blue Period and that until I got to Teddy. And for some reason I remember the title: Teddy attracting my attention when it was still my Mom’s book and I was very young. If I had to pick, I’d pick De Daumier. This is a truly fabulous book and if you’ve never read it I’d recommend: run, don’t walk.

THE LATEST REVELATION
I spent most of the first 35 years of my life thinking everyone else was smarter than me. I’ve gotten a clue since then. I’m understanding that just because a person is standing in front of a room talking to me doesn’t mean he has the slightest clue what he’s talking about.

NEXT TO LATEST REVELATION
When a woman is in her 20’s sometimes she notices, to her great horror, that she’s acting like her mother, something she’s always sworn would never happen to her. But now I’m getting fairly close to 40 and I’m realizing that I do things like my Mother and I’m pretty proud of that.

FOOD HORROR
Something I don’t understand, even though I am determined to be understanding of all people to be who they are: butter on pastries. ew!

I can’t fall asleep after watching television. Don’t most people fall asleep while watching TV? I have two shows that go from 9-10pm (Alias and Angel) and I can never fall asleep afterward. TV season is almost over so I won’t have to worry about it again until September.

How about this item? You can’t see the National Zoo’s Pandas’ medical records. The Smithsonian Institution’s National Zoo has taken the position that viewing animal medical records would violate the animal’s right to privacy and be an intrusion into the zookeeper-animal relationship.

I am crabby this week and wishing that buying a one way plane ticket to some tropical paradise was a valid way of dealing with problems, real or imagined. I just took the How Long To Live quiz — 95 years old for me, isn’t that good news? (sarcasm) I can make it to 103 with dietary modifications. What do they base this on? I’m sure they’re optimistic so people will visit their site and not get bummed out. I only want to live to be 80 (well, I say that now) and have planned my retirement saving accordingly. I think 80 is long enough.

Yesterday I “finished” a story I’ve been working on for I think a couple of years at least. I felt good about finishing it — except it’s not really finished finished. The ending is tacked on and cheezy and I am waiting for the brilliant moment of insight that will help me write that last critical sentence that pulls the whole story together. Not sure how long I will be waiting. This brings up a whole issue of how do you know when something is finished? Or is this the part of the whole point?

This online stuff sucks up so much time. I going on a 48 hour no computer kick this weekend. I’m going to put a blanket over it and not even look at it.

Meanwhile, Bob Mould was fabulous last night. It’s just Bob and guitar and gadgets and a screen behind him with different arty clips. And he hammered through a ton of music in 90 minutes. I loved it. And we got two new discs so I have new music all over the place that I get to dig into.

Last item: hilarious story about what happens when people collect too much music.

I’ve got to get over this Paul thing at least for now because I’m seeing Bob tonight. But here’s a good article/interview by Bill Holdship (!) with Paul that talks about new business and old business. And this is a pretty decent interview from the SF Chronicle.

Right now it feels like I’ve got about 600 pieces of paper with notes of things I don’t want to forget: “plane tickets to Wisconsin,” “return library books,” “buy yellow highlighter,” “use cranberries.” Isn’t there some law of physics or other scientific principle that measures the limit of how many things can be listed and remembered before there are too many things thus nullifying all efforts?

Bob wasn’t wildly impressed with Paul. He said it’s the third time he’s seem him and it’s the same schtick every time: half-assed. I defended Paul by saying that I’ve seen Cheese three times and they only played one song. Bob said, “At least they finished it.”

I forgot to mention that Paul played a song written by Bob Mould who is going to be in town next week. Unfortunately I don’t know what the song was or if I’ve heard it before or whether it’s on Paul’s record and I wish someone would tell me. Someone has posted a comprehensive report on the Seattle show but I haven’t seen a fanatical report on Portland. Maybe I should have taken notes. Also I realized yesterday that I don’t own Pleased to Meet Me on disc which is a crime. I need to take care of that.

Not really but I just got back from seeing him tonight at Millenium. (To recap: we’re talking about Paul Westerberg.) IT WAS SO COOL. The thing started at 7pm and I got there a little after 5pm and brought a book and was pretty close to the beginning of the line. I have no idea how many people they fit in that record store — it’s not a huge place but they crammed everyone in and I don’t think anyone got turned away.

I got a great place to stand, I could see him completely from the guitar up — a very rare privilege for a height impaired person like myself. I can barely remember anything that he played — I’m not good at that. He played “I Will Dare”! Other songs I remember: “It’s a Wonderful Lie” and a song from the Singles soundtrack, “Waiting for Somebody,” “Achin’ to Be,” and part of “Skyway” and part of the Portland song. Skyway is one of my favorite songs and he couldn’t remember the words to save his life and it kinda bummed me. He holds up the guitar pick and complains “This is like an angel hair” so they find him a stronger pick and he goes, “Oh, now I’ll remember the words.”

But he looked fabulous: sort of fresh out of the shower rosy and rumpled and he was wearing this goofy suit like leather that looked liked someone spray painted it with gold, and then a pink pin-striped button down shirt with a sweater vest. Not a lot of men can get away with that look. I love him.