Tired

Corey Pein recommended me to write Land of the Blind when he left for the gloomier, but arguably greener pastures of Portland, Oregon. And when he did, man was I flattered. I mean, Corey's the man...before he's done he'll have a Pulitzer or two in his backpack (cause I'm pretty sure they don't have mantels at whatever youth hostels he's staying at). Now, I'm starting to think he either doesn't like me very much or is just kind of a sick bastard that finds some pleasure in inflicting misery on his friends.

Because this column is becoming a burden of Atlasian proportions.

OK, it's not that bad, but I'm in a hyperbolic mood today, so humor me. I should have seen the signs, though. Before he left, when he was still writing the column, he told me more than once that he hated it. I thought he was kidding, because, c'mon...a forum where you get to screw with the media establishment, and weekly at that?

Well, it sounded pretty awesome.

Corey never elaborated on why he hated writing it, and I never asked him. Mainly because I was afraid he was serious. I told myself that he was just overburdened, and needed to have some of the weight lifted. Nine months later, I know he hated it. Here's the thing. It was pretty cool, at least at first. Especially for an ordinary person with bare minimum qualifications (i knew that journalism minor would pay off some day). It was fun, taking the best of the worst Augusta Chronicle columns and shredding them to pieces. What no one told me was there was this reputation that went along with it. And while Joan Jett may not care about her bad reputation, turns out I kind of care about mine.

Lately, I've taken a whipping at the hands of the folks all over town. I've been called "sanctimonious" and "negative" by people who've never met me. And, normally, that wouldn't bother me a lick. Get to know me, and I might change your mind. But what does get me is when people who *do* know me tell me that what I write doesn't reflect the person I am. That may be a subtle distinction, but man. It hurts a little; it tells me I'm not being true to who I really am.

I mean, I know I've got this sarcastic streak, but I swear I try to use it in a good-natured way. In print, though, it's hard to pull off sarcasm in a good-natured way. You can't see the upturn of my mouth into a half-smile. You can't see my eyebrows raise as I try to get a rise out of you. You can't hear me laugh a little. If we're having a beer together, you get to take my words in context with my tone, inflection and gestures. You don't get those luxuries when reading my words.

I've heard that tone is set by the writer, but I believe that's only a half-truth. Yes, you can try, and probably better writers than me can pull it off successfully. But, ultimately, unless you're having discourse, tone is set by the reader. You make of the writer's words what you will. You bias them with your experiences or expectations. If you didn't, there wouldn't be classes in school where you try to get at the writer's true meaning. There wouldn't be debates about what Melville's whale really symbolized. Not that I'm putting myself in that category, but if the true meanings put forth by good writers are constantly in question, why would it be expected that I would do any better?

So, Like Atlas and Ahab, I have this burden.

You want cheese with those quackers?

Se went and had Mexican last night at Teresa’s on Boy Scot road—Nola loves it because there’s this pond out front full of ducks and geese, and the girl loves the birds. So we were eating, and all of a sudden the geese, probably 8 of them, parade up the driveway going who-knows-where. So, as we’re leaving, we see all the geese and by now a bunch of ducks, all waddling around in this big field. And, of course, it looks like a party, so I start singing “ain’t no party like a goose par-taaaaayyyy…” And I’m trying to figure out why it sounds so familiar…but then I figure out it’s because there ain’t no party like my Nana’s tea party.

Hey.

Ho.

A man of several words

So I'm in a hurry a couple of days ago to pick Nola up from school. I've left work a bit late, and so I'm scrambling trying to make red lights and avoid trains on the way. I *hate* being late. So, cruising down Laney Walker and I'm happy because there are no trains in the distance. Thanks the iron gods!

But that happieness is shattered soon enough when the giant Escalade in front of me lumbers to a crawl in advance of the first set of tracks. I try to cut right, into the other lane to get around the guy, but there's a school bus stopped there, the driver apparently looking both ways. So my attention is focused on the big shiny truck. Finally, he inches across and speeds up. But for literally 2 seconds, because there are more train tracks to come. Brake lights. Blood pressure rising. C'mon! You're driving a huge truck!, I think. But my telepathy doesn't register with him so he continues inching his way across the second set of tracks.

And by now, even though I'm being delayed mere seconds, I'm seriously getting angry. And if you know me, you know that's something I just don't do. Unless, maybe, I have to pick up dog poop at 5:30 in the AM (but that's another story).

But angry I am, and especially so because I know there's still one more treacherous set of parallel iron bars set into the asphalt for this guy to navigate. So when his brake lights come on yet again, I've had it. Down goes my window, and out comes this:

"Goddammit...you're driving a huge truck! Not...eh. Not...uh..... Not...um, not something that can't withstand the stress of driving over railroad tracks at a decent rate of speed!"

Needless to say, my window went back up.

Nola say what?

"Daddy...don't come in here. It might make you sick. I'm doing the monkey one."

Taken out of context, those are words that don't deserve to come out of a seven-year-old. Unless, possibly, it's the progeny of Britney and K-Fed you're talking about. But, when said in reference to Super Monkey Ball Banana Blitz, it makes perfect sense.

Note to journalists: this is why it's evil to take quotes out of context.

Shut your trap

Over on my triathlon forum, there was a thread started by a guy who had a disagreement with his swim coach. Coach told him to do thing "A", guy wanted to do thing "B." Coach told him to shut his trap and do thing "A." Oh, and by the way, the coach is my wife the guy said. Not surprisingly, the consensus from the group was "shut your trap and do what your coach/wife tells you."

So that brings me to today's hilarity. I'm in the unique position of having an editor who's also my wife. OK, maybe it's not unique, because I'm sure somewhere in the universe there exists someone in a similar position. But at least it's an interesting situation. So anyway, I submit my column this morning with the following request:

"Not to question your editorial prowess, but can we keep the bolded headers? So much easier on the readers…"

To me, it makes sense. I write a column that often features short, unrelated snippets. Without bolding the first few words of each paragraph, the unassuming reader thinks (naturally) that it's all related. But then they see this rapid shift of topic and they think they're either missing something or I'm an idiot. Regardless, it trips them up, and tripping up you're readers is never a good thing. Like elementary school students and Michael Bay film fans, once you've lost their attention, there's no getting it back.

This is the e-mail I got in response:

"Writers do not get to make demands of the editors. Have I not made this clear?"

Damn! I sure got the smack-down. Of course, she meant it as a joke (what better than a snarky wife?), but she's right. We've had this discussion many times before. And I get it: Writers write, editors edit. Now, were I to have a different relationship with her (namely, if she were not the woman I often have sex with), that would totally be the end of it. Oh sure, we might have some respectful, possibly even scholarly conversation about the merits of my point of view, versus the pointlessness of hers. Like "if we did that for you, we'd have to do it for everybody" or "it's a style thing for which we have no flexibility" (cause style is so much more important than substance).

But, being that my relationship is so much more, well, familiar, I can be more to the point. As I was with this follow-up email:

"Did you not see the punctuation? That was a question. For reference, this is a demand: Shut it!

Clear?"

If I weren't her husband, that kind of backsass would get me canned in about three seconds. But since I have a different relationship, I can send her crap like that with no fear of retribution.

Until I get home, of course.

O'mazing Gray

Crack in the communion wafers? Why yes I will have some!

Rhetorical question

So I've fallen asleep on the couch, watching the third episode of the night of Veronica Mars, from the 1st season DVD Amy got me for Christmas (awesome). I'm just waking up, and Amy comes over and picks up the remote to turn it off so we can go to bed:

A: How does this work?

J: Press the "stop" button.

A: (irritated) I know how it works!