caveat emptor

You don't stop at a milestone. You just take note.

It's a grey, wet day and the tractor trailers on the Interstate throw up white wakes of startled water drops. They rocket upward and forward for several yards and then, as the pull of the road wind dissipates and the energy is spent, they slow and fall back to the slick, black highway, only to be startled again by a pickup truck or an SUV or a hatchback. The Interstate is a hectic and fitful place for a drop of water.

I used to collect ideas and thoughts like a librarian, shelving them in their appropriate places. I used to add new sections to my library every year. This year I spent more time rearranging the shelves, thinning out the collection. I'm beginning to realize that I've shelved a few things in the wrong place. I'm moving things around, leaving some things on the cart, putting some on the curb.

What have I learned this year? How am I different? I've learned a few loose facts, though I can't think of any of them right now. I spent a little time with my father. I've made a difficult job transition. I've admitted to myself and to my wife and to a close friend that I am an agnostic, that I can't remember or relate to the faith I had in such abundance when I was a younger man. I am more at peace than I've ever been, though not without that familiar howl of random, indistinct longing.

Soon this year will be gone, this arbitrary demarcation of days passing by. Next week we will think about what is to come. Today let's think about what has been, about what is now. Right now, if I close my eyes, I don't see gods and heroes. I see people. My imagination is a dance of faces and voices and children and women and men. This feels more right to me.

It's a grey, wet day and my coffee shop window looks out on the Interstate. This grey light, this dance of water and wind, gets into your thoughts. It's a good spot for reflection.

Hello, friends. How are you?

Later. Love.

Hop to the Hip

My teleportation device is almost working. It just has one bug left to overcome. I have to be honest, though, it's a troubling bug and I have no clues what might be causing it.

Here's the deal. You put a person in the "From" booth. You make sure there are no flies in there with them. You hit the "Just Do It" button. They disappear from the "From" booth and reappear in the "To" booth. Sounds good so far, doesn't it? Here's the problem: The person who comes out of the "To" booth is always the Hip-Hop version of the person who went into the "From" booth. Sending them through again only increases the Hip-Hop. Somewhere, during the transfer, they pick up bling.

I tried to convince my investors that this glitch was not an issue. "It's cool to be Hip-Hop," I said. They disagree. They don't feel people will want to use teleportation as a means of transportation if their basic aesthetic sensibility will be affected. I suggested to them that we just sell the device to the Hip-Hop community. "They've got lots of money," I said. Experimentation, however, found that normal, cool Hip-Hop people, after making the jump, turn into hyper-Hip-Hop people. They go all the way to a level of Hip-Hop we've called "Flavor Flav". I've thought about enlisting Flavor Flav to actually go through the device (he seems to take any project offered to him these days), but I'm not sure society could handle whatever came out of the "To" booth.

I'm stumped. If I can't get this thing fixed, my work will come to nothing. My son River, or R-Dog as he likes to be called now, suggested that something was "all fuzizzle with the shizzle". He might be right. As a last ditch experiment, I've created what I hope will function as a bling filter. It's in place now. Wish me luck. I'm going through.

[BZZZZZZZ POW!]

Aw, HELL naw!

Peace out, y'all. 'Sup?

Later. Love.

The Reluctant Pilot, But Then Not

The sky was pink and purple. You probably think I'm kidding, but I'm not. Maybe you think these were the brilliant pinks and purples of the sunset. Nope. Wrong. The sky was pink and purple because a group of stunt jets had just come through with pink and purple smokers making patterns all over the sky. I know there's no way you could have known that before I told you, so I don't blame you for being wrong.

This is a story about Charlie Baster. Helluva surname, isn't it? Baster? Sounds like bastard. But Charlie wasn't a bastard, he was a great guy. Charlie was a stunt pilot. All his life he dreamed of being an accountant, but he could never make it as an accountant. He'd always add things wrong or break his computer or accidentally embezzle millions of dollars. Try though he might, Charlie could never break successfully into the world of accounting. So, he took the only job he could find. He became a stunt pilot for the Air Force. He flew a jet at supersonic speed. He flew the purple smoke jet. He hated his job.

You know what, this story isn't working at all. I've completely forgotten where I was going with it. Instead, here's something else.

We found out today that someone used our checking account debit card number on December 4th to buy $696 worth of tickets from Ticket Master. Man, oh man. I hope they catch the person. I hope they teach the person right from wrong. I hope the person has an epiphany of decency and goes on to become President of the United States of America. That's what I hope. If I actually had to lose the $696, however, I would hope other things, things too dark to express here on a family-friendly blog.

Hey, here's something else: We have a giant circle in our backyard where the grass has all died. We used to have a trampoline, but my nephew broke it on Thanksgiving. I'm glad. I hated the trampoline. Now we don't have a trampoline*. Now we just have a circle.

Hello, friends. What was I saying?

Later. Love.

*Actually, we have a broken trampoline behind the shed.

Waxing Earthist Greenly

In the window reflection I can see the illusion of myself sitting out on the cold, dark, rainy front patio of the coffee shop. Like the burning bush that is not consumed, I sit comfortably and type these words, warm and dry in spite of the whipping wind and driving rain. I am impervious to it all. But, of course, it is only an illusion. Imperviousness is always an illusion.

Last night my wife came to bed and told me I need to watch Al Gore's environmental movie. In my world, no person should ever compel another person to listen to Al Gore's voice. Each person should choose for themselves whether or not they feel ready to listen to Al Gore's voice. She felt it would be beneficial, however, because, according to Al, carbon dioxide, which comes out of people's mouths when they exhale and also out of cars and factories, is making the whole planet too warm. Sunlight cannot escape the atmosphere because it is trapped by the carbon dioxide. It's worse in the winter because there aren't as many green leaves taking in carbon dioxide and photosynthesizing it into oxygen. In addition, many of the technologies used by people in daily life, and the current methods of producing energy to power these and other technologies, exacerbate the problem by producing even more carbon dioxide. For this reason, the population explosion is also an issue. More people = More use of technology and more demand for energy = More carbon dioxide. (You can easily remember this using the formula: Mp=Muotamdfe=Mcd.)

So what's the big deal? How does all of this affect my Christmas shopping? Well, it's going to melt all these frozen countries and they're going to flood all the other countries. Plus it's going to stop raining in places where it has always rained. These places have developed shapes and structures and situations of population that take this rain into account and, indeed, depend upon it. Instead the rain will fall in places that are not shaped well nor situated well for rain. Floods and erosion will ravage these places, trying to turn them into the other places. Most of this would be okay, except that we've built all these cities and homes and things with the assumption that the environment, the firmament, was never going to change. It's going to be a terrible readjustment, expensive and dangerous.

Also there is this: Did you know that a lot of people get a slow and steady supply of water from melting snows around the world? The lack or lessening of this snow and the acceleration of its melting will greatly affect these people.

Perhaps the worst effect of this environmental situation, however, is that Al Gore is making movies. I mean, I don't blame him. These are serious issues and he, for some reason, is well-known enough to bring some attention to them. I think we can all agree, however, that Al Gore's voice is annoying. If we could fix these issues and, as a result, Al Gore would never make another movie, I think that alone would be worth the effort.

Plus there's this: When my wife comes to bed in the evening, she won't be stressed and worried about the environment and about Al Gore and she'll be more in the mood to sex me up.

So, you know, plant a tree. Drive a hybrid. Close down your carbon dioxide manufacturing plant. Sprout leaves from your body and start photosynthesizing. Plan now for being underwater later. Build cities and homes that take into account the constant flux of the planet. Use florescent light bulbs. Invent cold fusion. Build a car that's powered by squash.

Hello, friends. How are you?

Later. Love.

P. S. - If I've gotten any of this wrong there are millions of other blogs in the world that would love to talk at length about it with you. This is as right as I'm going to get. I have many less important things to think about. Thanks for stopping by.

P. P. S. - I've posted a couple of new, short pieces on my cogito writing site lately. Feel free to glance at them, if you so choose. I'd love to hear what you think of them. Thanks again.

βαπτίζω

The following is an opinion of mine.

Subjectivity and relativity are not properties of reality. Reality is absolute and objective. Subjectivity and relativity are properties of our accord - our relationship - with reality. Some one thing is the absolute, objective truth for everyone, we just don't know what that something might be. We should behave with this fact in mind. Systems of thought or weltanshauungen (world-views) that suggest that reality or truth itself changes from person to person have a misplaced understanding of subjectivity and relativity.

Every time we learn something new our world changes. The realignment of our thoughts and positions with this new knowledge of the world can be subtle and insignificant. "Oh," we might say, "Pluto is not a planet. I can handle that." Sometimes we round some corner or cross some threshold and the world becomes another place altogether. "Oh," we might say, "she loves me. This changes everything."

I remember the Paraná river as wide as a lake just upstream from Iguazú falls. Wading ankle deep into the swift current, I remember thinking about Heraclitus' saying, "Upon those who step into the same river, different waters flow." In Cratylus, Plato would elaborate, saying, "Heraclitus ... says that everything moves on and nothing is at rest; and, comparing existing things to the flow of a river, he says that you could not step into the same river twice." I can remember that day on that bank when subjectivity first suggested itself to me as an approach and objectivity was washed downstream. That was a tough day. I think sometimes about going back that same river, of stepping in again.

The preceding is an opinion of mine.

Hello, friends. How are you?

Later. Love.

Change and Corn

Traditions are rarely so old as people imagine, and their origins are often anything but glorious. You have to be careful at every moment, in fact, lest you send some new tradition hurtling into the future like some nascent eternal truth.

I wonder if one could learn to be at home in the flux of all things, if one could embrace the fact of change as an experience. I wonder if, doing so, one could avoid the pain of loss. Perhaps it would follow, however, that one would develop a new pain of familiarity, aching deeply because some things never change.

When I was a kid I learned how the world was. I held my paper up to the light and traced out what I saw, true in every detail. I neither learn nor see as well now as I did then, and I can't keep up with all the adjustments to the lines of my tracing. Instead, I've learned to love the blurred lines. I tell myself this.

As you get older, your heart may gravitate toward those things that never change. Strange food, too fast or too fake, may push you to the farmer's market. "Corn," you will say. "We used to eat corn."

As for me, I make up my memories these days. In this world of flux, what is the difference between happening long ago and not happening at all? I remember being taught this by the elders in my tribe. I remember when we used to hunt the wild corn with primitive weapons. I remember when corn ran free, thundering across the plains, giant herds that stretched to the horizon, and beyond.

Hello, friends. What's happening?

Later. Love.

Learn, damn you! LEARN!

In my continual effort to provide value for my readers, I thought I would take this opportunity today to teach all of you something. It is customary, I think, to know something before you teach it, so this drastically limits the topics on which I could present a lesson. There is also, I admit, the concern that I will insult the intelligence of one or more of you brilliant people by presuming to teach you something about which you know more than I could ever hope to know. Rather than becoming paralyzed by these concerns, however, I'm going to proceed with the presentation of an instructional treatise and hope that these caveats will assuage the ire of your offense and sufficiently lower your expectations.

As for the selection of a topic, I am a man of few brains (having, in fact, only one) and the sum of my practical experience in the useful activities of life wouldn't fill the space between a thimble and a finger. This blogging activity, however, I have fumbled at enthusiastically for a number of months and, if you will pardon my hubris, I believe I have collected one or two valuable heuristics that could prove applicable to the activity of blogging in general.

Without further ado, therefore, I present:

How to Blog: A Blogging Manual for Humans

1. Open your eyes (especially when you're driving). Look at all these people. Aren't they weird? Look what they're doing. Are they crazy? Maybe. Aren't some of them nice? Aren't some of them pretty? Look at that guy! Wow! What a character. Remember.
2. Learn to read. Practice reading. Read.
3. Learn to write. Practice writing. Write.
4. You'll need access to the Internets.
5. Make things up.
6. Don't forget about the "open your eyes" part.

I hope this helps. I make no guarantees.

Hello, friends. What can you teach the rest of us today?

Later. Love.

Bookish

I've been reading a book. I know, I know, these are the [whatever the hell you call this decade] not the sixties. Sit down, login and upload. Books are so... I don't know... analog.

Nevertheless, I've been reading a book. It's a frustrating experience for a postpostmodern/preneopostmodern man like me to read an actual paper book. I find myself wanting to stop after every three or four paragraphs and tell the author what I did last weekend. I would try to tie it in with something he said in his post... I mean paragraphs... but I might just cut loose and start riffing on one word he used or something. Plus I keep wanting to say "Hello" to him. But I can't do any of these things, because a book provides no way to communicate with the author (with the possible exception of the Necronomicon).

Every time I enjoy a book it makes me think about writing a book. I wonder why? When I enjoy a car or a movie or a vagina, I don't start wanting to make one of my own. When I enjoy a book, though, it always wakes in me a strong desire to write a book. I guess it's because I could actually imagine myself writing a book (but not really) but I couldn't imagine how one would make a car. (You thought I was going to say "vagina" again, didn't you. You're sick.)

I'm reading The Last Gentleman by Walker Percy. I'm enjoying it a lot, although the guy's extremely specific notions of The North and The South don't resonate with me. His descriptions of human nature, on the other hand, remind me of thoughts I'm going to have one day. I'd hate to meet him in person, because he's dead and that would scare the hell out of me. Were he still alive, though, I'd love to have coffee with the guy or leave a comment on his blog.

Hello, friends. What are you reading (you know, besides this)?

Later. Love.

Legends of Old

Come, children, gather 'round the fire. Closer, come into the light. Show me your faces and I'll tell you the old stories. I'll tell you about heroes long gone, great spirits of days past, thunder in the skies of forever ago.

Today most things have been made, and things are largely as they are, so children believe they were always this way. The old, however, remember when some things still were not, when there was much work to do. Many great ones lent a hand in making world, children, but this day's story is about only two. I could tell you about Coyote and Wolf or about Eagle and Crow. Those stories always fill your hearts with wonder and fear. Everyone knows about Coyote and Wolf and Eagle and Crow, though, so his day, children, I want to tell you a new tale.

Duck and Cat were great friends. Have you heard of them, children? Duck lived at the setting sun and Cat lived at the dawn. Duck was quick and sly, a teller of stories to make you laugh or cry. Everyone loved Duck's stories because they always had truth in them, whether they were true or they were not. Cat told stories too, beautiful stories warm or sad. Maybe you wonder if that is all they did? Well, it would be enough, but it is not. They did many other things as well. Cat would fight to protect the sky and the water and the soil and the trees. Duck liked to drink. Cat would bake the most wonderful treats. Duck liked to talk. Cat would make, with her own hands, wondrous new animals. Duck... uh... talked and drank.

I see you looking at me like that, children. I know you are thinking, "So what is so heroic about them?" I'll tell you, children. They were fun. Many days, when we were all working so hard to make the world, Duck and Cat would make us laugh or smile. Duck and Cat made the days easier. Do you think this is a small thing? Listen to me children, it is not. It is a thing rare and wonderful, and everyone loved Duck and Cat.

What's that, children? Where are Duck and Cat today? Well, some say they are gone. Some say they ran away. Me? I think Duck still lives at the setting sun and Cat still lives at the dawn. I think you can still find them, if you know where to look. I think there is fun yet to be had. What do you think?

---

Hello, friends. What do you think?

Later. Love.

Mad Tom

McClurls was a friendly enough sort. He had windy eyes, two of them, that peered outward like the beaks of warblers at play. Just below the surface, however, like a lawnmower, there was the sadness of a man who may have accomplished more with fewer resources if only he'd had at least one more vowel in his surname.

Tom noticed these things immediately in McClurls. Tom was the sort that notices things like this, things that aren't there. Tom was crazy as a loon. He and McClurls sat with the others, seven men and a woman, travelers all, around a fire on the edge of a small Ohio wood just off the Interstate. It was a crisp, cool Autumn evening.

"Are you a Michigander, Mr. McClurls?" Tom asked, smiling wildly.

"No. I'm from Florida, and my name is Wilson. I don't know any McClurls," McClurls replied, scooting away from Tom a little, leaning into the woman beside him.

"Yes, I can always tell a Michigander," Tom continued. "Michiganders always have secrets. They keep them tucked inside their cheeks. And they do this wild flurry with their wings to scare off predators." He stood and demonstrated with his own wings, laughing wildly at his own antics. Taking his seat, Tom considered his new friend. Tom liked McClurls, and the woman with him was a handsome sort. Tom wondered, not for the last time, if the woman might be McClurls' father. "You're a Michigander and true, McClurls," said Tom, raising his empty canteen in a toast and taking a long, deep, imaginary drink from the spout.

"Look, you," said McClurls, "just you hush up and don't cause any trouble." He opened his coat slightly and showed Tom the wooden grip of an old Enfield revolver tucked into his belt.

Tom knew just what McClurls was getting at, and he thought it was a lovely idea. Just then the wind changed and blew the smoke of the fire into his eyes. Tears welled up and one ran down his cheek in the cold night. Tom shivered and hugged his arms around his knees. 'What an adventure,' he thought, and felt a thrill to be here with McClurls and his father. He wondered, not for the last time, where this ship was headed. Perhaps, when they made port, he and McClurls could go ashore and have a drink.

---

Hello, friends. Where is this ship headed?

Later. Love.

Last Words

When, in 1923, Doroteo Arango Arámbula, better known as Pancho Villa, was assassinated in Chihuahua by, it is believed, agents of Jesus Salas Barraza of Durango, he breathed some of the best last words ever uttered. "Don't let it end like this," he said. "Tell them I said something." It could be argued that the recipient of those words failed miserably in his or her assigned task, but what artifice could have been more spectacular than the truth? These are, in my estimation, the perfect last words.

Impending death typically leads to a sort of clarity. Even the enigmatic John Lennon, when shot, was uncharacteristically precise. "I'm shot," he said to the doorman of the Dakota. No further words are recorded.

Pancho Villa understood the value of pretense for a public figure but, in the end, his last words were pretentious in motive but direct in execution, punctuating his life with irony.

As for me, I have already planned my last words. They will most certainly be, "Friends, members of the Galactic Council, citizens of the universe, I do not understand what mystery of fate has allowed me to stay alive for these 3,785 years, but I am grateful for every moment of my amazing life. It has been my honor to be your advisor and counselor, to share with the leaders of your many worlds whatever meager wisdom my millennia of life and experience have brought. And now, on this beautiful day here on the Planet Earth Wildlife Preserve, I am honored to accept, based on the unanimous votes of the people of the universe, the office of Supreme Figurehead Without Difficult Duties. I am humbled by... what the hell... ouch... THWUMP." I'm not actually going to say, "THWUMP." That's going to be the sound of my firm, muscular, dead body hitting the stage of the amphitheatre.

Hello, friends. What will your last words be?

Later. Love.

My Hubris

I will wring from my heart and mind the words to a song, a song that sings the spirit and love of women and men who change dreams and convictions into a world in which we all can live. One verse tells of a man of palettes and paints who brushed and colored a world where we can laugh when we are happy and a world where we can also cry when we are sad. One verse tells of a woman of wood and stone who carved and shaped a world where we love you if you are and a world where we also love you if you are not. Still another verse tells of a man and a woman of girls and boys who tended and taught a world where arms hold you when you are weak and a world where arms also reach out for you when you are strong. If ever a wall kept me from the wind, I will sing for the hands that built it. If ever a fire kept me from the cold, I will sing for the hands that sparked it. I will sing like a man who has been pulled gently back from the edge, like a man who has seen beauty so fierce he had to close his eyes, like a man who has laughed until it hurt and like a man who has cried until I didn't. I want to write the human song. I want to sing you all.

But no one can write this song. No one can sing it. Some things only everyone can do.

Hello, friends. Won't you tell me how you are?

Later. Love.

---

P. S. - As requested, here is a (poorly scanned) picture of me "at that age" for comparison. I'm either 20 or 21 in this picture, probably close to the age my dad was in the picture of him below. River is only 14 in the picture of him below. Thanks for stopping by.

Outrage and Onomatopoeia

I'm not going to lie to you, none of this is true. Nevertheless, have you heard about this new law they're trying to pass that says everyone has to poke themselves in the eye three times a day with a pencil? This lame duck Republican congress is just trying to make everyone miserable before they leave office. Well, guess what? I'M NOT GOING TO POKE MYSELF IN THE EYE! It's an unjust law and I'm standing up for sanity. Go ahead and arrest me! The Democrats will just let me out when they take office.

See, I started out all serious this morning, but I just couldn't maintain it. I was writing this beautiful sad poem with imagery and metaphor and foreshadowing and spelling and alliteration and onomatopoeia, but then, just as I was getting to the punch line, I was overcome with this notion of posting a silly post full of lies. So I cast down and broke the stone tablets into which I was chiseling the poem and typed this instead. I would tell you how it sounded when the tablets shattered, but I'm only allowed to use onomatopoeia once each day.

Seriously, though. Do you know what's sad? The unemployment rate for children around the world has reached an all-time high. Kids are being put out of work by this group called Amnesty International at an alarming rate. Someone should stop them because... Hold on... What? Really? Seriously? Are you sure? Oh. Okay.

Never mind. Apparently that's a happy thing, not a sad thing. So, you know, that's good. Way to go, Amnesty International. Sorry about spray painting "DICKHEADS" on your van.

I'm just going to stop. This is getting too long. I'm slamming on the brakes and coming to a screeching halt. EEEEERRRRRRRRRTTTTTTT!

Oops.

Hello, friends. How would you spell the sound of screeching brakes?

Later. Love.

P. S. - Doesn't my son look like my dad? That hotness must lie dormant in my genes. Thanks for stopping by.

Primitive

If you took a primitive man from a really, really difficult life and put him up in a nice hotel and paid for him to hang out at the coffee shop all day and surf the Internet, I wonder how long it would be before he started complaining about petty things? "I wish they'd change the CD." "This cappuccino isn't very hot." "My hotel room needs some new movies." "I got back to the room at three and they hadn't serviced it yet." I wonder how long it would be? This is what I hate about primitive people. They're so damned petty.

I also wonder how long it would take me, if you put me out where the primitive man lived, to cry. I would most certainly cry before I died, so it would have to happen pretty quickly. Probably on the way there.

Maybe everyone should just stay where they are. The primitive man is better off out there. He is smarter and stronger than me in the "living primitive" department. He gets too bitchy if you try to help him out.

I wonder if I could trick him into mowing my lawn for some beads or something. Maybe for an espresso machine.

Hello, friends. Are you primitive?

Later. Love.

On This Day

It was on this day almost a hundred years ago that a man in Idaho invented the first mechanical Mars polisher. "What does it do?" "It polishes Mars." "The planet?" "Yessir." "Does it work?" "Not from Idaho. You got to put it on Mars." Demand for the device was low, as it turns out, and the man died penniless. What he lacked in money, though, he made up for in crazy.

It was also on this day a few weeks ago that, for the first time in history, a woman was brought to tears of nostalgia by the song YMCA by The Village People. "Those were simpler times," she sighed, staring across her steaming coffee cup at the sun coming up over the prairie.

Meanwhile, in a dimly-lit room in the basement of an abandoned clown shoe factory in Arizona, an older Italian gentleman in an Armani suit stares through his cigar smoke at the greybeard wizard tied to the chair across the room. "We can make this hard or we can make this easy, capisce?" says the old man in his best Joe Pesci voice. "gishbar ia zi ia ia zi dingir girra kanpa," mutters the wizard, struggling to free his wand hand.

My point is this: Has anyone noticed that Mars looks a little dull lately? It's lost some lustre. I wonder what we can do about that?

Hello, friends. Tell me something interesting.

Later. Love.

Zither Busker Passes

I was busking with my autoharp, singing Christmas songs in February, trying to stay warm by pretending. If I'd had a friend or a blanket, maybe a shoe without a hole, maybe a sock or a job, I might have made it through that night. Instead the shop clerk found me in the morning and called the police. Not having heard my performance, they determined that there had been no foul play. I had no identification, so they took me away and made me disappear. The detective kept the autoharp, but he never played it.

I'd never really believed in transmigration of the soul, or the soul for that matter. When, only an instant after shivering to stillness on that sidewalk, I opened my infant eyes and looked up at that smiling woman, this thought occurred to me only briefly, and then forgetfulness wrapped me warmly and everything was better. Much better this time.

If you pretend to know how it works, that's okay. In the end, it either works or it doesn't. In the end, it either is or it isn't. The end.

---

Hello, friends. Tell me how you are.

Later. Love.

Romance. My Foot.

Most of you can probably tell by the way I've been writing this week that my right foot hurts. I'm trying to compensate by leaning to the left. It seems like the democratic thing to do. My doctor says it's an inflammation of the tendon. "This can often be caused by excessive physical activity," he said. "I think we should explore others causes," I told him.

To switch things up, therefore, and in light of my limp, I've decided to type this post with my hands and leave my feet firmly on the ground.

Hey, guess what? It snowed here yesterday. Seriously. I know, right? This is Texas. I think this snow got lost on the way to Canada or something. I blame global warming, which you may consider ridiculous, but that's because I haven't told you about the drowned polar bear I found in my bathtub. Who's ridiculous now? That's what I thought.

I know that many of you wish I'd get this blog back to it's original format: all romance all the time. I don't know. I just haven't been in the mood to write romance novels lately. There are only so many words to describe abs and lingerie, you know? I've been there. I've done that. I don't think I ever want to write another description of a pair of underwear hitting the floor as long as I live. These days I can't write about a man and woman staring into each other's eyes without one of them suddenly poking the other one in the eye with a baby carrot or something. I'm just so over the whole romance genre, you know? I'm sorry. I know that some of you thought I'd be the next [INSERT NAME OF ROMANCE NOVEL "AUTHOR" HERE]. I can't be who you want me to be, though. I gotta be me.

I think I'm going to turn my Scion into a monster truck and get into that whole scene. What do you think?

Hello, friends. What genre is your life? Mine's a manifesto.

Later. Love.