death or glory
02.22.04 @ 9:30 p.m.
I talked to Martha for three hours last night on MSN messenger. I don't normally use it but I'm making an effort now that Jo's in Australia and it's her messenger of choice.
I've nearly got Sometimes a Great Notion licked. I'm on page 545 of 628 at 3:20. Last night I told myself I could go buy a bag of Cadbury Mini-Eggs as a reward for getting to 500 but by the time I did it was dark and I wasn't inclined to go out. So this morning I told myself I was allowed to go anytime I pleased since I made the goal last night, but instead reassigned the goal as 530. So obviously I've just come back from the grocery store.
There's a part I hit last night that struck me as really interesting.
The kitchen was hot and silent except for those tiny rain sounds: the monotonous drumming on the porch roof, the sluggish gushing as the downspout flushed into the worn ditch that rand down to the bank, the endless reiteration of rain spattering against the window . . . all sounds that served to sink one into that state of drowsy fascination that Oregonians label "tranquilitis" or that Joe Ben titled more graphically "standin' and starin'."
Is this a regional thing? Because I am insanely prone to that. All my life I've had trouble, especially in the mornings when I'm supposed to get going somewhere. I'll suddenly realize that I've been sitting half dressed staring into space because I just kind of froze up into a state of staring at nothing. It's one of the reasons this book is going so slow: I've been sitting in the rocking chair in the corner windows and keep catching myself staring off at the butte to the south.
Or maybe I'm just spacey. I don't know for sure. This book is more and more fascinating to me. I mean, first there's the need to find out what the hell is the thing with the arm in the first few pages, yeah, but there's also sharp regional nostalgia and a vague sense that my dad is rather like Hank without all the outside hassles and dramatic Oedipal revenge plot. Tonight I'm going to either write a short paper on Leland Stamper and blame or Leland and the Moon.
But read it, definately, even with the frustration of the first hundred pages or so and definately if you live in the Pacific Northwest.
Last night a character died in one of those mildly cliche scenes where a man dies with his best friend or brother at his side, saying it's going to be all right and all that. It was sad, but what really got to me, to the point where I pretty much had to stop for the night, was that I was listening to "Stay Free" by the Clash when that scene came up and it was just too much. (Contributing to this was frustrated alienation because the living room was filled with a collection of magpie-like women chattering loudly in Mandarin to the point where I had to keep turning my music up to be able to concentrate on the book in my room and a kind of annoyed lonliness that all culminated in a brief 7 pm cry. Which coincided with my laptop, which was playing DJ for me, playing "Drowned" off Quadrophenia which is just SO cheery. Pfft.)
But then I went out to talk to my parents and putter around until 9, when I started talking to Martha. And that lasted until mid-SNL. Today is not really much less boring, but I do intend to finish this book off soon. Since I don't have the internet right now as it's in use, I'll write more later, I'm sure.
6:30
You're The Catcher in the Rye!
by J.D. Salinger
You are surrounded by phonies, and boy are you sick of them! In an
ongoing struggle to search for a land without phonies, you end up running away from
everything, from school to consequences. In this process, you reveal that many people
in your life have suffered torments and all you really want to do is catch them as
they fall. Perhaps using a baseball mitt. Your biggest fans are infamous
psychotics.
Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.
Interesting, as I could never bring myself to finish the damn thing. It still sits on my shelf with a scrap of paper marking my place about halfway through. I do not see why it is the grand favorite book of so many people, really.
9:30
I have nothing else to add, just that I'm just now getting around to uploading this. I've got 10 pages of SaGN left, but they'll wait until I'm done with TV. In the meantime, I'm making covers for a couple of CDs so I can get them in the mail this week.
Previously
fuck it @ 08.01.05
fanciful imaginary sea voyages to come @ 07.20.05
*dies* @ 07.19.05
more ootp @ 07.17.05
harry potter: driving our children into devil worship @ 07.17.05
