Maybe Eddie Money will write a song about your life and sing it to you from the radio in your car

*This* is somebody's idea of a profitable scam?

blushing, with chairs

The only photo that came out (and not that well) from my and my sister's sets. I forgot to take my real camera and the mobile-device cameras are craptastic at night.

But doesn't it look like as much fun as it was?

Me too

Jury awards $11.3M over defamatory Internet posts

How can you resist a kitten?

BEGINS TONIGHT: Flarf is life

2008 Holistic Expo & Peace Conference

THURSDAY, APR 24, 8:00 P.M., DIXON PLACE, 258 BOWERY, $8
Film, neo-benshi, and theater by:

Brandon Downing: Two new short films
Rob Fitterman: Film: Bisquick / Bismarck
Nada Gordon: Neo-benshi: "Uzumaki"
Mitch Highfill: Play: "The Secret History of the '60s"
Rodney Koeneke: Neo-benshi: "Mary Poppins"
Michael Magee: Play: "William Logan: A Sedentary Life"
K. Silem Mohammad & Gary Sullivan: Play: "Chain: A Dialog"
Kim Rosenfield: Neo-benshi: "Meglio Stasera / The Libido Theory"

++++++++++++++++

FRIDAY, APR 25, NEW TIME ***8:00 P.M.***, 300 Bowery, buzz "Sherry/Thomas," FREE
Publication party for new books and DVDs by:

Brandon Downing: Dark Brandon (DVD)
Mitch Highfill: Moth Light
Sharon Mesmer: Virgin Formica
K. Silem Mohammad: Breathalyzer
Mel Nichols: Bicycle Day
Rod Smith: Deed
Gary Sullivan: PPL in a Depot

++++++++++++++++

SATURDAY, APR 26, 6:00 P.M., BOWERY POETRY CLUB, 308 BOWERY, $8
A Segue reading to benefit Bowery Arts and Sciences, featuring the FLARF ORCHESTRA, conducted by Drew Gardner

Musicians:

Franklyn Bruno - guitar
Ehran Elisha - drums
Francois Grillot - bass
Dave Ross - guitar
The Saw Lady - saw

Poets:

Shanna Compton
Katie Degentesh
Benjamin Friedlander
Drew Gardner
Nada Gordon
Mitch Highfill
Rodney Koeneke
Michael Magee
Sharon Mesmer
K. Silem Mohammad
Mel Nichols
Eiríkur Örn Nor∂dahl
James Sherry
Rod Smith
Christina Strong

Hosted by Gary Sullivan & Brandon Downing

This benefit reading will help keep Segue readings at an affordable $6.

One of "those people"

At the risk of being annoying...I am, as of Monday, (attempting to be) vegan.

Or geez (which rhymes with CHEESE), "mostly vegan."

As opposed to "mostly vegetarian." Which I have been for years, though I've had pretty serious lapses. (Including Texas smoked BBQ & the quest for the perfect grass-fed organic beef hamburger.)

But I just can't do it anymore. I have to pretend to know a whole lot less than I do (i.e. lie to myself) to keep it up.

Luckily cheese is the only dairy product I will miss. I already choose soy versions of most dairy.

Because recently--say the last year--I've become irrevocably fascinated with nutritional science, and the (unfortunate, unbelievable, maddening) politics of food in this country. (My mom was a lifelong employee of the USDA, though a rural division that dealt mostly with environmental issues and farm subsidies.) I began reading the stuff as a way of opening up a second avenue of freelance writing. But there you go. Knowledge is nonreturnable.

So, just because I think kindly of you, I would like to recommend, without further comment on this topic here (possibly ever), the following books, if you are interested in finding out how what you don't know about nutrition is an amazing amount of scary shit but also an amazing amount of very cool shit:

The China Study
Eat to Live
The World's Healthiest Foods (great for everyone, omnivores included--this guy is not a vegetarian)
Eat, Drink & Be Healthy (ditto)

Enjoy. I am.

Random observations

Everything takes longer than originally estimated.

The secret to writing poetry is being in love, with someone or something.

Comedy is sometimes exaggerated accuracy. (Or as it's usually put: it's funny cuz it's true..)

Mulch may be nice looking and effective against weeds, but it often smells like vomit.

And speaking of vomit: Flarf is life.

Good one

Why's it so quiet? OH!

Dumbass me forgot to turn off comment moderation when I got back...in MARCH.

So I've not been ignoring you! Haloscan doesn't notify me--I have to remember to check.

& I didn't.

:P

Been so busy...

...since we got back that I'm behind on my April poems again.

About to head to Binghamton for this:

TONIGHT
Thursday, April 17 at 9:00 PM
in Binghamton, NY

Jennifer L. Knox & Shanna Compton read
at Binghamton University

The Belmar Pub
95 Main Street

Sounds like this will be a ton of fun. A few local poets read for 3-5 mins each, then we go on, then a break, then an open mic. Madness, no?

Then after I'm back tomorrow I'm buckling down.

I think this inability to write while roadtripping makes me the opposite of Gabe Gudding.

Enter views

One with Stacy Szymaszek by Sina Queyras here.

& another with Rachel Blau DuPlessis by CAConrad here.

The refractory period of my excitable membrane

Got back home early Friday A.M. Spent most of yesterday zombielike or napping! That drive from Fargo to Milwaukee in sideways rain was a beeyotch, y'all. Pictures, reports, recordings and other goodies here, with more to come.

But the tour's not actually quite over.

Jen & I go to Binghamton, NY on Thursday.
Danielle comes to Brooklyn on Friday.
And you can catch me reading unpublished, unexpurgated flarf (so, like, the opposite of For Girls) with the Drew Gardner Flarfestra at the Flarf Festival on Saturday 4/26 in Manhattan. (Catch the whole festival if you want your poetry nerve singed and tickled. It's gonna RAWK.)

Details here.

Other than getting ready for that stuff, I'm preparing the review copy mailing for My Zorba and looking forward to starting work on Sandra's book for fall.

I fell behind on NaPoWriMo while on the road, but am hoping to catch up by doing 2 a day for a while. UPDATE:Three today, so I'm getting there. Gonna keep posting them on the Bloof blog, because that's what people have linked in their NaPoWriMoBloRos. But since I'm back at my computer they'll be expiring in 24 hrs like previous years.

NaPoWriMo begins...

Erm, Happy National Poetry Month to everyone except Amazon.

I'll be posting my daily poems, along with Jennifer L. Knox and Danielle Pafunda, over at the Bloof blog.

We're also going to be posting reading reports, pics, video and audio from the road, starting tomorrow.

Didi Menendez suggests another great way to celebrate. I'll try that when I get back. (I can't read in a car, I get motion sickness.)

Anne Boyer's The Romance of Happy Workers is just released today and one of the best books you'll read all year, promise.

See you at Flarffest.