Wrap Up 2013

Hey-ho folks. I realized that I have not blogged in quite some time, and though I've been busy, it's now the holidays, so I should at least try to put in some effort, right?

Anyway, here's what I've been up to since the last time I was around:

I'm one step closer to obtaining my MFA. This past semester was tough. There's no way around it. Between having a full-time job (more on that later), and balancing school and life, it was an uphill battle. But as always, I made it through, maybe a bit more worn for the wear, but with a better appreciation for my writing and for how things usually work out for the best when I don't procrastinate. TIME MANAGEMENT, AMIRITE?

But that being said, I muddled through my first mentorship, and unfortunately was not able to spend as much time on my manuscript as I wanted. However, I did get some good editing in, and my novel is definitely shaping up. Hopefully I can start querying soon, and maybe by this time next year, I'll be on my way to having my name in print.

The other big thing that happened was I started my new job. I finally feel like an adult, much like this:

I'M AN ADULT.

Just kidding. But having a job that actual pertains to what I went to school for has been a big relief, and made me very grateful that I was at the right place at the right time. Plus my swanky job title gives me some bragging rights among my friends...but I'm pretty sure they're all tired of me by now.

I did some traveling during these past few months. I visited Chicago, which was a blast. 

See? Chicago. Also I'm aware of the hipster-y nature of the filter on this photo. Thank you, Instagram.

Also, just for good measure:

Woolly mammoth, at the Field Museum. If you have a mammoth skeleton in your city, I will find it. 

And now I am off to do some more traveling. I'll be jet-setting back to California for a hot minute, then off to Berlin. I've very excited.

Other thing worthy of note that I've done in the past few months:

Moved into a new apartment and managed to not burn it down whilst my roommate was away:

View from our terrace. That's right, terrace. We're classy like that.

And now 2014 is almost upon us, and with it, a whole new set of adventures. Huzzah! 

Ode to Hummus

A quick poem, taken from a real life conversation. 

Ode to Hummus

he asked do you like hummus 
he was making a big pot of it that night i might have too much of it soon
of course i like hummus i replied

i love hummus and so does my roommate
we eat it with spoons
on nothing
or with everything
like it's pudding or ice cream
so yes i do
what kind of question is that

some people don't like hummus he said
i'm not some people i replied

I'm Finished!

No, I did not just murder someone, a la Daniel Plainview in There Will Be Blood. 

(Quick digression, the novel on which this movie is based on, Oil! by Upton Sinclair, is waayy different than the movie, for those of you who haven't read it. I have read it, and it's a massive behemoth of yes, oil drilling, but also college life and politics of the 1920s in Southern California,  human emotions and the satire thereof, and many other things. It's an interesting read, but not anything you can finish in one afternoon.)

But! (see what I did there?) I do have one thing in common with this final scene of the movie.

I'm finished.

With what? you may ask.

The answer to that, my friends, is the first draft of my novel. Now, for many of you, who are also writers, this may not seem like a big deal. I know people who can whip out manuscripts and toss them around like flapjacks. Maybe these manuscripts are a little crispy, like burned pancakes, but they're tangible, they exist, and their smell sort of waifs through the house until you open all the windows or turn on a fan.

I'm getting off topic.

I am done with the first official draft of my novel. Bits and pieces have found their way onto this blog, but nothing substantial, because really, before now, there wasn't much to call substantial. Gather round, everyone, and I will tell you the tale of my novel, and how it's been a long and arduous journey, but one that will pay off...eventually.

Picture this:

A thirteen year old girl has a dream one night. It's filled with snakes and pink water, and a red balloon. She wakes up the next day and thinks, "Hey, that'd make a good story." Now up until then, the girl had written things, stories and poems, but this dream inspires in her something that is more than just one story; this idea is good enough to be a novel. The big one. The one that will make her famous.

So the girl sets out to write her novel. (Side note, this all took place during the last century - yes, yes, I'm sort of admitting to my age, no matter - and there will be mentions of things that are not commonplace nowadays.) She does not have a computer, so a notebook will have to do. Much like the notebooks from Harriet the Spy, the girl uses a composition notebook with the word "Private" written on the cover:

From the 1996 Nickelodeon feature film. See? Private. This means you keep out. 

And the girl writes, creating characters and places that exist only in her imagination, but are real to her. Because her dream left quite a few plot holes, the girl fills them with new ideas, each idea seemingly better than the next. One notebook is filled and so she moves on to another one. She hides the notebooks when they are at home. She does not want anyone to see her writing until it was completed, and she is devastated to find her notebooks out in plain view when she returns from school one day. Alarmed that someone read what was in them, ignoring the "Private" label on the front, she brings the notebooks with her to school,  scribbling away whenever she can, wanting to devote all of her spare time to the novel. 

It turns into an obsession, and it is if the notebooks call to her when she is away. Her edits, in purple pen, become messy, and she realizes that she is she is to continue, she must start typing her novel. 

Enter typewriter #1.

  Just for reference, in case you didn't know what one of these contraptions are. 

The typewriter she uses is big and clunky, but it gets the job done (and looks a little different than the one in the picture above). There's even an option to erase the text, similar to the delete button on a computer. The girl keeps writing, the pages of her novel growing. 

And then, disaster sets in. The typewriter runs out of tape, and she does not know where she can get some more. After inquires to her grandmother (who at some point or another, owned the machine) and looking at local stores, she finds that she can purchase the tape at her local Sears store, a very unlikely venue. A new cartridge purchased, she sets off at a galloping pace to keep on writing. 

The girl has now reached high school, and has moved to a new city. In the midst of the move, the typewriter was thrown out, and she must resort to using her notebooks again, as she still does not have the use of a computer. Solace comes during her sophomore year, when upon a search for supplies in her math teacher's cabinets, she finds a typewriter, similar to her grandmother's but even more aged. The teacher allows her to take it home, and renewed by this, the progress of her novel continues. 

Alas, she runs into the same issue as she had with the previous machine, and the tape runs out. A visit to her local Sears store results in an embarrassing interaction with a sales clerk who informs her that the tape for her typewriter is no longer being produced. Not shut down so easily, she journeys to other stores, and finds a treasure trove of cartridges at Wal-Mart. Several cartridges are purchased as back-up and her novel finds life again. 

This continues on for the next few years, her schedule becoming more and more packed, filled with basketball games and practices, student government activities, homework, and as graduation approaches, she finds less time to write. The pages that she has written are stuffed in a binder under her bed, hidden again from the world to see. Thus far, it is been her eyes only that have seen the words on the page. Others know of her ambition to write, that the role of writer is her chosen profession, and some have even been lucky enough to hear what the novel is about, but they have not seen what it is that she has to offer. 

Graduation comes and goes, and the girl goes off to college. Now, she has a computer all her own, and with piles of pages and pages, she sets upon transferring all of her hand and typewritten pages to a more convenient, electronic source.  The story at this point has changed multiple times, with characters bouncing in and out, and plot lines created, taken out, and created again. She gets everything saved onto the computer, and thinks to herself that maybe it is time that others see her work. She takes a writing workshop and for the first time, shows her novel, her baby, to more or less, a group of strangers. 

Some like the work; others don't understand it. Others rip it apart and if they had physically handed her the pieces of paper back, it would have had the same affect on her. All the same, she takes into consideration some of their suggestions, rejecting others, and edits, edits, edits. 

Disaster strikes again, when her hard drive crashes during her junior year, and she loses everything. Not one word for the saved draft can be resurrected, and she feels not unlike Michael Douglas's character in Wonder Boys, Grady Tripp, when his literary agent, Terry Crabtree, loses Grady's 1000-plus page manuscript. 

Tossed to the wind. Gone. 

Though her manuscript is not nearly as long, the pain of losing literally years of work is not a pain that goes away easily. After the procurement of an external hard drive and the acceptance that she will have to start off not quite at square one, but pretty damn close, the girl sets about writing another draft of her novel. 

She takes another writing workshop during her tenure as an undergraduate, and the piece is met with more positive response. Enthralled by this, she decides that she would like to pursue a MFA degree in creative writing after graduation. She believes that perhaps her manuscript will get more recognition and perhaps even get published. She's dabbled in a few other stories, beginning another novel or two, but this is the story that keeps calling her back, the one whose characters don't allow her to relax, their voices constantly calling at her to come play with them, to write their story. Even when other things have distracted her, when life has gotten in the way, these are the characters that she always returns to.  

Several applications and rejections later, the girl is not accepted into any of the graduate MFA programs, and is distraught. Her back-up plan, to get a MA in English Literature does pan out, and she travels to Boston to fulfill her dreams in another way. 

This time in school, however, life is much more of a distraction, and her novel sits quiet, unfinished, unfulfilled. Her friends have other dreams and don't quite understand hers. The novel is set aside and waits for her to return to it. 

Her graduate degree complete, the girl returns home to a life that she does not desire. It is filled with real-world problems, and she spirals down into despair of what her life has become. Her novel is not even a thought in her mind, as she comes home from a job every day that she despises and instead of writing, it is the television that she turns to. 

After some time, the girl decides that she must change this, that her writing must be continued, that her novel must be finished. Her novel, as well as the city of Boston, have been calling her, and so, she applies once again to a MFA writing program and is accepted. Spurred by this, she begins writing again, really writing, and focusing on her novel; her characters glad to see her come back.

She returns to Boston, with a fresh start, with more ambition, and decides that big changes are in store. Surrounded by like-minded people, she finds new friends with similar ambitions, and feels more at ease. The novel goes through more edits, more changes, and is workshopped again. She makes it her goal to finish this novel, and whether it is good, bad, or ugly, it will be completed. She sets time to write, make it a priority, and enlists the help of one of her good friends to stay on schedule, and to make deadlines for herself.

The summer is almost at a close, and the girl has just finished her novel. It is the first complete draft, and though it is very different from where the story began thirteen years ago, and will probably change several more times, the girl can now show her work to the outside world, and perhaps one day, hopefully soon, someone will find merit in her work and she will have her name on her book on a shelf in a bookstore. 

There you have it, my friends. The story of how it's taken me thirteen years to finish my novel. Now I can start the querying process, which will bring along its own set of issues, but at least I can say that I have a completed manuscript, and not just a work in progress. 

This is definitely how I felt when I finished writing.

How I've Discovered That I May Be a Long Lost Relative of the Cookie Monster From Trying to Eat a Muffin on the T in a Classy Manner

*Disclaimer: If you came to this post thinking that it would be about something else, I would like to state for the record: GET YOUR MIND OUT OF THE GUTTER. I had to say something up front, because I know how people think.*

Unlike every other day when I commute to work, when I'm running a little bit behind (I set my clocks early, 'cause I know I'm always late is basically the story of my life), recently I had ample time to stop at Panera Bread and get breakfast. Now if you know me, I'm addicted to the pumpkin muffins that they have there. (Luckily my roommate is too, so she understands the insatiable cravings for these things.)

 

It's not sugar on top, it's crack. My roommate and I are convinced. 

After grabbing a delicious muffin and a cup of coffee, I made my way to the T. At this time, it was still early enough so that there weren't too many people waiting at the stop. 

(Quick tangent, and please, if you've experienced this, tell me. If I get on the D line at say ten minutes to eight am, there's plenty of space, and I'm golden for the entire ride. If I get on anytime less than ten minutes to eight, or God forbid, any time between eight and eight-ten, then I'm stuck between some person who bathes by using garlic as soap, an old woman carrying a ferret, and a group of prima donna ballerinas who somehow take up way more space than should be physically possible and think that is customary to violently shove people out of the way when they're exiting the train - seriously though, who the hell are these little girls and where do they come from? I swear they multiply when they're on the train, because they start off in a group of two or three, and by the time they leave, there's like seven of them. So it's that weird ten-ish minute gap in which I will arrive at work calm and collected, or sweaty and looking like I just sprinted from the Pru to the office. End tangent.)

Luckily, I had not reached the witching hour, so when I got on the train, I was able to get a seat to myself, there wasn't anyone hogging elbow room or standing directly in front of me with their crotch in my face (as people are wont to do), the car I was in had air conditioning, and all was well. I had my muffin and I was happy. 

Things should have been fine. Except when I started eating, things most definitely were not. After several minutes of trying to juggle my coffee and shove the muffin in my face, I decided that there is no classy way for me to eat a muffin on the T. Hypothetically, eating a muffin shouldn't take more than both hands (or even more than one hand) because muffins are:

• compact
• relatively small in size (unless it's this muffin, but if you're trying to eat this muffin, then you probably have other issues you should worry about) 

But if you're me, then you end up looking like you're on drugs or like you're a relative of this guy.

I believe he may be an uncle on my father's side. 

So if you found a large pile of muffin crumbs on a green line train at some point last week, sorry, that was me. 

The Long and Short of It Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Hair (Sort Of)

My hair has gone through many different evolutions. It's been long, it's been short, it's been somewhere in between, it's been black, it's been brown, it's been purple (no lie). It's been a tough road, trying to figure out what I can stand about my hair, and what I will never, ever do again (probably the purple, but you never know). So, for your amusement, is a brief history of my hair.

This is one of my favorite pictures of my grandparents. Grandpa and Granny circa 1984. 

Clearly, that is not me in the photo above, but is for reference. My Granny has great hair. Dark and curly, it was the kind of hair that I dreamed I had when I was a kid. Now, all you curly-haired folks out there, hear me out before you jump on me for not understanding the pains of having curly hair. I do not have curly hair, nor will I ever have curly hair. My Granny, who is in her seventies, still has these massive curls and looks twenty years younger than what she really is, and is frequently asked for her driver's license because people don't believe that she is old enough to get the senior special when we're eating out. 

She doesn't look a day over 35.

Anyway, Granny has the hair I aspired to have when I was younger, and instead was stick with some straight-haired madness that my family didn't know what to do with. My Granny, at her wit's end, apparently used to tape bows onto my head because people would assume that I was a little boy, and for some reason, this bothered her. Funny how twenty-six years later, people still sometimes assume that I'm a guy because of the length of my hair. Granny still despairs at this assumption, and the length of my hair. 

Yeah, I didn't have a lot going on up top. I think we still have that watering can. 

Finally, my hair grew and the heavens (and Granny) rejoiced. For several years, I had long hair. Like, I could almost sit on it long hair. I sort of remember having hair that long, but since I've not had it that long ever since I was kid, these are just vague memories.

I guess Granny still was in the "let's slap a bow on her head" phase. Don't I give off a Webby from DuckTales vibe?

Twins, right? 

Proof that I had long hair at some point. It wasn't quite long enough for me to sit on here, but still pretty long. Also, check out my Grandpa rocking the socks and sandals look. 

When I about to start kindergarten, Granny and Grandpa worried that my hair would become too much of a hassle to take care of/become a magnet for glue, gum, all the gross stuff that kids manage to sneak into the classroom when the teacher is not looking, so I got my first official hair cut. Grandpa took me to a salon down the street (which I occasionally go to when I'm at home) and I got my hair cut into a bob. Which I had for seven years. All the bob. All the time. 

This is the sort-of bob. I was six or seven here, as evidenced by my awesome Nala from The Lion King (1994) ensemble.  My crush on JTT was probably in full swing at this point. 

I didn't mind the bob. It was short-ish, but if I needed to do something to it (curl it, crimp it, etc.) for special occasions, I could. Though I was mistaken for a boy several times from about nine to twelve. Hey, it was the 90s, and I knew boys that did have hair about the same length as mine.   

I played basketball from 5th through 12th grade, and my hair was long enough to slap in a ponytail, though the length of my hair changed drastically throughout junior and high school. When I was in 7th grade, I decided that I was going to grow my hair out. I don't know why I made this decision, but I wanted long hair. This was a big deal. I was old enough to take care of my own hair, so I set about growing my hair out. 

Not that I had to wait long. My hair has Chia Pet-like qualities, and I swear it grows at twice the rate as a normal human being (which is about half an inch a month, in case you were wondering). Unfortunately, I don't have photos on hand to showcase that awkward time of my life - ahem - but I had long-ish hair for about three years, until I was a sophomore in high school, and I said enough was enough, and away the hair went. My friends were astonished that I could so easily part with my hair, but really it was more of the fact that I didn't have the time to blow dry my hair every morning, and having to deal with so much hair bothered me. 

I had a medium-length bob for a few years, not really committing to having short hair. One of my friends nicknamed me "Shaggy" (as in Shaggy from Scooby-Doo). 

I think even Shaggy himself is confused by the comparison. 

White Oleander was big when I was in high school, and I loved Alison Lohman's hair in it (after she chops it all off) and I literally went to a hair dresser with this picture and said, "I want this."

 I thought (and still think) that she was the coolest. 

Me, on the other hand...well, maybe not quite as cool. 

After doing the medium bob thing, I cut my hair a lot shorter before I headed off to college. It was fun having hair that short for the first time, and I really took to it, keeping it that way until my sophomore year. Of course, I also did this to it during freshman year:

Manic Panic was the best, right?  Don't lie, you know what I'm talking about. 

My hair made it through freshman and sophomore year without any drastic changes (other than the purple) and at some point during sophomore year, I decided to grow my hair out again, and thus began the crazy lengths melee of 2006 - 2008. 

Right, then, off we go: 

2006. Not drunk, I promise. 

Still 2006. Don't mind the crazy eyes. 

2007 at some point. The hair is getting longer...

Mid to late-ish 2007. This was the longest my hair had been in years. 

Winter 2007. You can't tell where my hair stops and the chair that I'm sitting in starts because there's so much of my hair.

Early 2008. 

Now I will admit, I liked all the things that I could do with my hair. Fortunately I had a friend at the time that was willing to crazy things with my hair like the style pictured above, because I have limited hair styling skills. I had long-ish hair for most of 2008, and then it got to the point where I couldn't handle it anymore again. Granted, sometimes I wish that I had hair this long again to be able to do fun stuff with it, but then I remember how much upkeep it is, and I'd rather do other things, like bake several dozen cookies or solve world peace in the time that it would take for me to manage that hair. 

Off my hair went in mid 2008, after donating it, and I was back to the short 'do. 

Similar to what I had before, but not. 

I kept my hair like this for most of 2008 and 2009, and I was fine with it. 

See? I could style it...to an extent. 

Then mid 2009 hit, and I hate saying this, but right before I was going to graduate from college, I broke up with my then-boyfriend. And not that it should have mattered, because it's not like it was the romance of the century or anything, but I needed to shake things up, because I was still waiting to hear back from the grad schools I had applied to and I didn't know where I was going to be in a year, and I felt like I needed to take control of my life. So what did I do? I got a new hair cut. (Though I'm in no way saying, "Hey, your life's lousy? A new hair cut will make you feel better." At the time, it just did help me feel better about my situation.)

I have as much hair on my head as I do with my two eyebrows, but whatever. 

I thought my Granny was going to kill me. She couldn't get over how short I cut it. All my Grandpa said was, "It makes you look taller. Whatever makes you happy, baby." (It took a lot to shock my Grandpa.) I kept my hair at this length for the rest of the year and until I went off to grad school. Short it was, and short it was staying. 

Of course, I did manage to make it even shorter than in the last photo, but I was also on the opposite side of the country where Granny couldn't hunt me down: 

Most manageable hair cut ever. No blow dryer necessary. 

My hair was buzzed like this for several cold Boston months - yeah, I probably shouldn't have decided to cut my hair in the middle of winter, but you live and you learn. It was a blast having my hair like this, and it made me feel both really feminine and tough as nails. 

Probably because in my mind I looked like this. My fav, Tank Girl. 

Since then, I've kept my hair short, but not as short as that last photo, save for a brief stint, where I started to grow my hair out again, but then had a friend of mine say that I looked like Martha Washington, and I cut it again. I've also had my hair compared and compared my own hair to Justin Bieber's and Ralph Macchio's (circa The Karate Kid). 

Now don't finish reading this post and think that I'm a bitch because I've been lucky enough to hack and slash my hair off for years, when some people don't have that luxury. I get it - I'm very fortunate to have Chia-Pet-head. I just wish that occasionally it wouldn't turn into the jungle from Jumanji, namely when I get up in the morning and I'm trying to get to work on time. 

I Have Really Vivid Dreams Sometimes

The first time Georgia met Julius was at the request of her friend Melinda. Georgia had been feeling mopey lately, and Melinda thought that meeting someone new would snap Georgia out of it. 

The initial conversation about Julius between Melinda and Georgia went like this, via text message:

M: I think I have someone for you.
G: Unless he’s a six-foot tall man made of chocolate, like literal chocolate, I don’t care.
M: He’s not made of chocolate, but you’ll still find him pretty tasty.

The picture Melinda sent Georgia was a black and white shot of a very attractive man laughing while holding a wine glass. He wasn’t quite looking at the camera, but the angle at which his head was cocked led the viewer to believe that he was still aware that his photo was being taken.

G: Hmm…He is attractive. But what’s with the picture? It looks like you snatched it from Google images “male model laughing”
M: I didn’t. He’s completely real, and I think he’s exactly what you need right now.

Annoyed at that last comment, as if a man would solve all her problems, Georgia waited an hour to respond to Melinda. In that time, Georgia ate a Pop-Tart, watched an episode of her favorite show on Netflix, started to wash the dishes, thought better of it, and was about to watch another TV episode when Melinda messaged her again.

M: Okay, so sorry for that last message. But let’s face it, G. you haven’t been out of the house for a month. I’m worried about you. And not only is this guy good looking, but he’s a great conversationalist, and you’re always telling me that you want someone to talk to. Just meet up with him once. That’s all I’m asking.
G: Fine. Give me his number.
M: He wants you to go to his house for dinner.
G: Dinner at his house for a first date? That’s weird.
M: He’s a little quirky. But you like quirky. Here’s his address.

G: What are you, his secretary? This isn’t your boss that you’re setting me up with??
M: NO. NO. He said Saturday at 7 would work. Do you want me to come over and help you pick out an outfit?

G: What am I, three? I’ll be fine.

M: Okay…and G, for god’s sake and mine, please don’t sleep with him. Wait until at least the third date.

G: Who says that this will get past the first date?

Melinda didn’t respond.

The house Georgia stood in front of was a mild yellow. It was similar to the color of Dijon mustard, but without all the speckles in it. She scratched her right ankle with the toe of her left platform sandal. Why do I let myself get talked into these things? I would have been perfectly happy to spend this evening sitting on the couch eating leftover Chinese food.

Georgia walked up to the door and rang the doorbell. Looks like he has a gardener. What, can he not take care of his own lawn?

No one answered the doorbell, so Georgia rang again. But still there was no answer. Frustrated, she knocked on the mahogany door. Though she knew it was rude, she tried the handle. The door was unlocked, so she walked it.

“Hello?” she called. The only light was coming through the front windows. Georgia was standing in the living room. The room was sparsely decorated, in a modern style. The colors of the room were rich, deep, dark reds and browns, with a color palette that reminded Georgia of the southwest. She didn’t know if she should venture further into the house, but since she was already in so far, she figured why not. She called out hello once more and walked deeper into the house. The kitchen was placed behind the living room, with a half wall separating the two. Like the living room, the kitchen was very modern looking with a set of copper pots and pans hanging from the ceiling. A window faced the backyard, which had a small pond and a well-crafted table with a striped blue and white umbrella on the impossibly green grass.

“Fancy,” she said quietly.

Exiting the kitchen, she walked down the hall, which had several black and white photographs hanging on the walls. One was of a church steeple, and another that was a hilly landscape. Stopping to admire them, Georgia heard a sound come from a room down the hall. Passing by a bathroom, and peeking into an office off to the right before she tiptoed to the end of the hall, she saw a tidy study with three walls covered in books, seemingly the only non-modern items in the entire house. Her heart beating hard in her chest, she knocked softly on the door at the end of the hall.

A gruff noise that she deciphered as a “Yeah, come in,” was emitted from the room. Slowly opening the door, not knowing what to expect, Georgia entered a semi-dark room. A man was sitting on the bed, his back to her. He was shirtless, with his hair a jumbled mess. Georgia couldn’t tell if he was in fact the same man from the picture Melinda had sent. The room, by contrast to the rest of the house, looked like a bomb went off. Plastic cups and papers were strewn about, and the bed looked like it hadn’t been made in a week. The room felt slightly humid, and she noticed various medicines and Kleenex scattered around.  

“Don’t step on anything important,” he told her.

“Anything important? How am I supposed to tell if anything is important? Are you sick? What’s with the tissues?” She kept a hand on the door handle, poised to run out of the room at a moment’s notice.

“Just don’t move from where you are. That’s how you won’t step on anything important. And yes, I’m sick.”
“I can leave, if you’re going to be grumpy and contagious.” Or if you want to try and kill me.

He looked over his shoulder at her. “No, don’t leave. It’s been ages since I’ve had company.” He grabbed a tissue and blew his nose.
Cute. He hasn’t asked how I got into the house.

Rather than skirt the issue, Georgia said, “You should be more careful. Your front door was unlocked.”

“Yeah, I know.”
“Well, you shouldn’t do that. It’s not safe.”

He got up from the bed and stood facing her. “I unlocked it because I knew that you were coming over.”

He was taller than she was expecting, and seeing him now made her a bit nervous. Maybe because all he had on was a pair of pajama pants. Even ill with she didn’t know what, Georgia had to admit the man was gorgeous. She forced herself to look above his waistband. “So this isn’t something you do all the time?”
“Do you mean leave my door unlocked, or have my friends set me up?” He crossed his arms over his chest.

Georgia, who had not seen a shirtless man literally in the flesh for longer than she liked to admit, tried not to reveal that she would like to stop the pointless chatter and possibly bang this man.
Even if he does turn out to be a sociopath with a cold. 

“I meant, leave your door unlocked.”
He moved around the bed so that he was closer to her. Georgia took a step backward, and was half standing in the room and out in the hall.

“And how often do you go into strange men’s houses, creeping about without so much as a warning?”
“I said ‘hello!’ twice, and you didn’t respond!”

He took another step closer to her. “Maybe you weren’t speaking loudly enough.”

“I thought we were supposed to have dinner. Pretty strange dinner if you’re going to be in your pajamas.”

“I can change that.” He grabbed her hands and pulled her into the room.
Georgia shrieked, “What the fuck are you doing?”

He immediately let her go. “I thought…you don’t? I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

“You lunatic! I don’t know what I was…what Melinda…fuck! If nothing else, you just blew your nose, and now you’re touching me. God, what do you have anyway?” She rubbed her hands on her pants, backed out of the room and made her way to the front door.

He followed her. “Please don’t go! I’m sorry. I didn’t mean anything by it! I’m sorry. I’ll make you the best pasta primavera you’ve ever had!”

Georgia knew she should leave, that she shouldn’t trust this guy, that it shouldn’t matter if he was a friend of Melinda’s. But her stomach grumbled and she stopped. Walking back, she stuck her finger in Julius’s face. “Don’t touch me again. Unless I ask you to. And JESUS. Wipe your nose.” There was a box of tissues on a table in the living room. She hurled the box at him, hitting him in the chest.

He bent and picked up the box. “Sorry. I’ll go put on a shirt.”

As he walked away, Georgia thought, “He looks like a little boy.”

She put her purse on the couch, and went into the kitchen. She hopped onto the counter and waited for Julius. Melinda owes me big. I don’t think he’s going to kill me, but she cannot set me up with any more sociopaths.

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This is all I have so far. Maybe tonight I'll finish it. 

Childhood Crushes

Now gang, don't despair because of the flippant post title, I'm not running out of topics to discuss. This topic came about due to a recent viewing of the epic film Newsies, and a discussion about who my friends and I had crushes on when we were kids and teenagers.

It's something about the period clothing, I'm telling ya. 

Now, for all the world to read, I've complied a list of my crushes that I had when I was younger. (And yes, I'm aware that this might open the floodgates for mocking, but hopefully it brings back happy memories for some of you).

Literary Crushes

To start it off, here's Theodore Laurence (or Laurie or Teddy) from Little Women. I've chosen a photo of Christian Bale portraying Laurie in the 1994 film version, as he is also in Newsies, as seen above.

Laurie, probably creepily looking at the March house at Jo.

For fans of the book or the film or both, we all know that Laurie doesn't end up with the Jo but ends up with Amy (ugh). Though Laurie has his faults - his temper (to match Jo's); his ability to blow through a shit-ton of his family's money and not give a damn, etc. - he still was the first crush that I had on anyone - real or literary, and will always hold a special place in my heart.

I'm telling you, it's the period-piece clothing.

Another of my first literary crushes was Gilbert Blythe from the Anne of Green Gables series, seen here portrayed by Jonathan Crombie in the TV series.
In a similar vein as Laurie with Jo, Gilbert was always trying to outwit and out-clever Anne. Unlike Laurie, Gilbert ended up with Anne, and had a ton of children. I always enjoyed that Gilbert doggedly pursued Anne, even as she refused him time and time again, and when they finally ended up together - as cheesy as it sounds - I felt like they deserved that appropriately happy ending.

They could have at least dyed his hair, but no.

As I already admitted in my post on my friend's blog, I had a thing for A Wrinkle in Time's Calvin O'Keefe. Like many other perturbed fans, when the film adaptation of the novel came out, and Calvin was not a redhead as he damn well should have been, I wanted to write a strongly worded letter to Miramax and possibly throw rocks at their studio windows. However, the film portrayal by Gregory Smith (as seen here, and who I had a crush on at some point in the mid-00s) could not deter my love for Calvin. Like Gilbert, Calvin ends up with Meg, awkwardness and all, and though he becomes less of a major character in the other Time Quintet series, I was still enamored from Meg's first description of him, "Calvin O'Keefe. He's in Regional, but he's older than I am. He's a big bug."

TV and Film Actors

RIP 90s JTT. 4EVER IN OUR <3s

Now, let's all admit it - Jonathan Taylor Thomas or JTT was one of the quintessential crushes that everyone had in the 90s. Whether you liked him in Home Improvement, Tom and Huck, as the voice of young Simba in The Lion King, or in one of the many other roles he had, JTT was on the radar for most of the 90s. I think what I liked about him was that he was entirely non-threatening, and that he was relatively close to me in age, but still had the appeal of an actor. As JTT grew older, and I realized that every other girl I knew liked him, JTT became a thing of the past, and I moved on.

If only I could say in real life as you do in (500) Days of Summer, "I love us." 

Like JTT, Joseph Gordon-Levitt had a cool three name that could be abbreviated into a shortened nickname, JGL. JGL caught my eye in the 1994 film, Angels in the Outfield. I remember I saw the trailer for Angels before seeing The Lion King, and it absolutely broke my heard when I first heard JGL utter the line, "God...if there is a God...if you're a man or a woman...if you're listening, I'd really, really like a family." And a crush, which has sustained itself until the present day, was born.

I'm assuming that he was going for a tough-guy look with the leather jacket. 

This next fellow is little less well-known, but I had a mad crush on Corey Sevier from his role as Dan on the TV series Little Men, which was based on the novel by Louisa May Alcott (big surprise that I liked another one of Alcott's fictional characters, right?). Sevier, as Dan, played somewhat of a bad-boy, which was a bit different from the character he played in Summer of the Monkeys (from the Wilson Rawls novel of the same name and co-starred Wilfred Brimley of "DIABEETUS" fame), which I saw a bit after Little Men. Sevier has had a bunch of hit and misses over the years, and maybe his acting isn't the best, but he has still managed to be consistent in one thing - being attractive.

Yeah, looking back now, I'm not sure why I liked this guy so much.

Shane West was another pseudo-bad boy that I came across, solely from his role in a film that I'm pretty sure a total of five people have seen (including myself), Whatever It Takes. He played sort-of geek named Ryan, who with another crush on my list, James Franco, pulls a Cyrano DeBergerac to get the girl of his dreams, played by another late 90s, early 00s hit and miss Jodi Lyn O'Keefe. Franco's character likes Ryan's friend Maggie (Marla Sokoloff) and through a series of wacky teen rom-com twists and turns, Ryan ends up with Maggie, who, as the audience knows from the very first scene, were meant to be. (Sorry for the digression. I just felt the need to tell the entire plot.) West became more well known for his role in the uber-sappy A Walk to Remember, and thusly had posters of himself plastered onto the walls of millions of teenagers' walls. Looking back, I should have paid more attention to Franco, who is still around today.

Just your typical, average, every day sort of guy. 

Ah, James Franco, what can be said about you that hasn't already been said? Just look at the photo. He's bringing all the sexy...again? I haven't already mentioned this, but in case you haven't figured it out, I grew up during a time that the Internet wasn't always easily accessible (try using the computers at school to look for photos of your celebrity crushes when you should be researching Amazon tree frogs - yeah, not that easy) so I had to rely on cheesy teen magazines, which usually would have a lot of the same photos that every other magazine had. Anyway, Franco, like JGL, has still been one of my favorite actors (even if his acting choices haven't always been the greatest - Tristan + Isolde, anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?) but more than anything, his antics and his goal to be an actor/writer/director/professor/astronaut, etc. have always proved to be amusing.

My friend's mom was right. He does have a light bulb-esque nose.

Another actor who has shared the screen with Franco, is Tobey Maguire, who I have to admit, I only started to like because of Spider-Man. I'd seen him in Pleasantville and Wonder Boys, but it wasn't until he played Peter Parker that I felt like I had any justification for liking Maguire. Now, all I remember from the time that I liked him was that my friend's mother said that he has a light bulb nose. And more recently, that he was Nick Carraway in The Great Gatsby with his pal Leonardo DiCaprio (a 90s crush that I did not have).

I gotta love a guy with a sleeve. 

Musicians

 Oh, A.J. Popoff of Lit, you made me realize how hot guys with tattoos are. A staple of late 90s, early 00s alt rock, I wore out my copy of A Place in the Sun and Atomic. What made Popoff even more appealing was that Lit is based out of the OC, so there was always that chance that I could run into him on the street, if I was ever allowed out there, as a thirteen year old (which never happened). But, as Lit is touring with Alien Ant Farm, Fuel, and Hoobastank this summer, all my teenage dreams may actually come true.

Another guy with tattoos, Adam Levine of Maroon 5, made my fifteen year old self swoon (and my twenty-six year old self, for that matter). I know that I don't own the market on Levine-love, but at least I know that there are support groups out there for that sort of thing. Songs About Jane was the first album that I purchased with my first paycheck (hey, hey for working a ballpark snack stand) and for that, I have to thank Levine.


So there you go, gang. Thanks for reading.

Hey Look, It's Me on Another Blog

One of my friends asked me to be a guest blogger on her blog (which is amazing and wonderful, and you should check it out), so here's the link to my post. It's a good one, if I do say so myself.

Here's a photo of me and said friend, in case you wanted to see what we looked like all dolled up. 

Cannibalistic Cereal and Why I Should Never Google Myself

In my last post, I talked about how I was watching a lot of TV lately and not doing a lot of writing, but I finally broke out of my writer's block and calmed down with the TV. However, what I realized from watching many hours of TV was that apparently there is a trend for cannibalistic cereal in commercials. Both Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Krave have these weird commercials where the cereal characters are eating each other, and it's no big deal. I don't know why the advertising team for both General Mills and Kellogg's thought that the cannibalistic cereal angle was the best way to go for their products. I think it's mildly terrifying and doesn't persuade me to go get either cereal.

Even Don Draper doesn't have an answer for this.

Now another thing that has stumped me lately are the hits that come up when I Google myself. Everyone has Googled themselves at some point or another, and if you haven't, you're lying. Recently, during a late night when I had a major case of jet lag, I decided it would be a good idea to see what would pop up when I did this. Surprisingly, the first thing that came up was my LinkedIn profile. Which I forgot that I had created. So it was something that was really about me, and not something goofy like one of the other options that appeared further down on the list, like this. For the most part, the top hits were things that are connected to me, like my old high school basketball stats, some articles that I wrote and that are about me, and then the list apparently had a meltdown and thought that my last name has an O in it and not an A, and it takes a turn into la-la land. If you're looking for something to do, scroll through several pages of a Google search for yourself and see what you can find. But remember, like most things found on the Internet, once you see them, it's really hard to unsee them. 

Also, for some reason, when I Google image search myself, this picture shows up.