Best Oaf of the Year

The entire yard is like this, pretty much. Living with the missus is like being in a Clarke Ashton Smith story.

So, I've got a couple of hours to kill before we head over to my sister's house -- I'm giving 'em a collection of the Palomar stories from early Love and Rockets. They're going to Bermuda with my sister's pal Cintra, and I figure this will be something the whole lot of them can read in rotation. Now, I could do something productive, but I'm in a pensive mood, and it's freaking Giftmas. So rather than just kill time, I'm gonna take a quick look back at the last year of the blog, and hunt down all the stuff that's actually worth reading.

(Later...)

Well, that wasn't too bad. It is a little distressing to see that the blog has so little material in it that isn't interesting if you're not into the Sean show, but hey -- seventeen casual essays in a year is not at all terrible, right? Right.

So here we go with the cavalcade of fun!

Squitches!

The Watercolor Pad

Brass Knuckles

Sleazy Elephant

The Hayworth Principle

Flossing and Art

The Atheism Posts:
First
Second
Third

Green Chili Ratatouille

In Which I Lose Decisively

Woo

Fauxluccinations

A Child's Garden of Serial Killers

Notes to a Fellow Writer

Helping Anonymous

Going by Appearances

Amazon is Amoral and Complicit

Woohoo! Road Trip!

Ghost Rock Lives

So. I have a few pieces of work to do before I set in on the main task, but the time has come to start working on the hopefully-final version of the novel. I honestly do not know if this is the ninth, tenth, or whateverth draft -- there have been so many fucking fractional drafts it's a meaningless question. The collected manuscript would only have to be dropped about five feet to kill a mule.

The thing to keep in mind is that this novel is how I learned to write. It has been my schooling. And now it's time to finish it off. I am grateful for all the assistance, advice, and criticism I've received. But it's time to stop relying on on other people's opinions.

I write one draft, aiming for three thousand words a day. Write in the morning, revise the previous day's output in the evening. Do one draft, wait three weeks, give it a once-over, send it out to two readers, one last combing, and off. Be a pro.

This shouldn't be that hard. I've written the damned thing nine or ten or eleven-point-eight-three-four times already.

So. To prepare, there are a few things I need to change in the outline.

First off, I need to track all the major incidents in the plot and make sure the lead character responds appropriately to them. Some of the high points so far are his realistic reactions to events that are taken for granted in adventure fiction; I need to make sure that happens throughout.

I need to go through and show his feelings toward himself, and how they change in specific reaction to those around him. I need to show him working and preparing as an artist throughout the book.

Right now the most dramatic, important event in the book happens in the third chapter, and neither the reader nor the protagonist have any idea what's going on. That must change -- the big event goes to the end, and when it comes, everyone knows what it is.

I need to plot the changes in the supernatural world more visibly. I hint at things in the last draft that I need to state clearly -- things which will reinforce deep thematic issues. I'm going to try and and make a serious point about materialism in a seemingly supernatural situation by using the evolution of vertebral pneumasticity in giant cattle. Essentially, each time the protagonist shows up in the supernatural world, it will be as if that world is in a different geological epoch, with the environmental changes relating to plot issues. Fun times.

And I need to make the supernatural elements completely consistent. Right now, there are still some key events that seem to happen without reason. I need to fit them in or eliminate them. Which would be a bitch, because one of them is everyone's favorite scene.

Finally, once that's all done? I'm going to do a plot breakdown of the novel, analyzing each scene for its contribution to the story and making adjustments to smooth things out.

When the time comes to actually write, there will be a few fairly major changes in approach. I'll be going from first person, past tense, to first person, present tense. I'm doing this because the story is a stream-of-consciousness piece.

Given that, there won't be chapters any more. I'll hate to say good-bye to the chapter titles, but losing the artificial breaks and cliffhanger chapter endings will be a real relief.

Rather than the speed-loaded start from the last draft, I'm going back to a plodding, stolid, "Here is the man, this is his world," approach, letting there be a nice long stretch at the start where it isn't clear whether it's really a book about a crazy person.

I get to do some prose skylarking. I get to have a miserable, fucked-up protagonist. I get to be hard to understand.

Most importantly, this gets to be flawed. This is such a strange, twisted, inadvertent piece of work that there's no way to expect it to be perfect. It wasn't planned. It grew. Like a fungus. So it is going to be organic, gnarly, and weird. Most people won't be able to read it. It might not be as bad as, say, Pynchon. It might be worse.

That's fine.

I just want to get this over with!

Alert! Alert!

The Missus read this and she was very upset that I implied that the novel might be difficult to read -- "It's incredibly readable!" was her indignant statement on the subject. She's a big reader in the Holly Lisle/Robin Hobb/Mercedes Lackey section, so I figure the crossover potential is going to be through the roof.

Swill Is Here! Swill Is Here!

No more desperate evidence of my haplessness exists than this: I conceived and executed this cover with the intention of selling out. This, my friends, is Swill at its most commercial.

Whee!

So this issue of Swill has been particularly grueling. It is late as hell and it is all my fault. Well, when you require art of a crazy person sometimes there will be a delay.

One thing should be made clear. This volume is, to a greater degree than any previous one, the product of cronyism. Nepotism seems to loom in our future. So let me make this clear to anyone who resents the fact that a lot of the people we publish are people we know.

First, the submissions go through Rob before they get to me. So we've probably rejected half my relatives and I haven't heard about it yet. And those who are closest to me can attest to the delicacy of touch with which I approach their creative efforts. Which means I'm kind of a bastard to them. Because this shit is important.

Second, do you think it is easy to find work that's worth publishing? Jesus, all the people writing, writing, writing, you'd think it would be crawling out of the fucking woodwork, but no --

(I don't suppose the fact that we're an obscure magazine that doesn't pay has anything to do with this.)

-- but no, I have to badger, beg, and bat my nasty little squint eyes to get some fucking proper fiction. Out of necessity, I only have friends and relatives who are decent stylists. Damnit.

This is borne out by the other thing that I need to make clear.

Best issue so far.

The last two were fascinating deviations, and it'll be interesting to see if the dice roll that way ever again. The work that came in was all of a piece, literary neo-pulp. I felt like I was doing a punk version of Black Mask or something.

This issue is like the first issue, done right. We have a much wider variety of fiction, a more diverse crop of writers, a finally-perfected layout... (I worked like a bastard on the typesetting this time around. A real designer would have no trouble, but that ain't what I am.) It's more well-rounded, more experimental, less relentlessly negativistic, and still appalling.

On to the contents.

Janine, by Warren Lutz. A perfectly sordid slice of naturalistic noir, this one places a journalist’s eyes and ears at the service of a deceptively lucid, fluid prose style.

Remind Me To Show You Your Face, by Elizabeth Eslami. Nice use of style to convey character, a look at the service side of the entertainment industry, and a good, solid, undependable narrator.

The Feld And The Veldt, by Sean Beaudoin. Now here we have part of the uncanny resemblance to the first issue. Just as someone else submitted a clown story in issue one, this time someone else has a Bush-era relic, and their fucking name is Sean. But at Swill, we do not give a care, because this one is a funny. It made me smirk, persistently.

The Quiet Type, by Chia Evers. Horror seen through the eyes of love, written with an approach that made me think of a hard-boiled Poe.

The Weight Of Fall, by Wendy Sumner Winter. So this is why you should let the editor decide whether or not they like the story. Based purely on light romantic content, you’d think I’d hate this one. Instead, I responded to it as though I was catching up with an old friend. But what really sold me? The footnotes. Which were a massive pain in the ass. But I knew the job was dangerous when I took it.

Jimmy’s Confession, by Sean Craven. This is the second-nastiest thing I’ve ever written. It’s ‘pretty dark,’ even by Rob’s standards. Please don’t actually read it as it will make you like me less. It was written at request for an anthology during the Bush years, but there is a whole other fucking story there.

By Himself, by Allison Landa. Stylistic risks are taken and rewarded in a tricky, crooked story with a painfully human core. Sometimes you need lateral approaches to go deep.

Crystal Vision, by Catherine Schaff-Stump. This one moves as directly as a bullet, with a payload of knotty family dynamics that keeps unraveling long past the ending.

Stomach Punches, by Rob Pierce. Ah, l’amour.

Unmoving, by Z.Z. Boone. One of the great rules of life is that there are some people you do not fuck with. This story reminds us that you can’t always tell who those people are.

Son Of A Goat, by Jasmine Paul. This one is just jam-packed with squealing goofiness, a midnight movie in print form.

blowjob; ferocious patter: fucking incoherent, by delphine lecompte. Rob can explain it to you some time, but delphine is the reason he founded Swill. Rob has tried in vain to get more fiction from her; these are selections taken from the ensuing correspondence. Effortlessly transgressive, sensually driven, and brutally absolute, she writes in a magpie chatter of compulsive verbal brilliance. She’s the saint of Swill.

Seven Views Of The Downtown Area, by Sean Craven. For the first four issues of Swill, I more or less hid the fact that I was the one doing the art. You might have been able to guess if you read the indicia, but what kind of freak reads indicias? This time around, I worked my fucking ass off on the illustrations. Every one of them is better than any prior interior illustration in Swill. I’ve posted them on the blog, but they were made for print, and that’s where they work best.

So click here and go buy some fucking Swill!

Ten Thngs I Have Done That You Probably Haven't

In response to John Scalzi's taunting post, here we go.

1. Faced down a Hell's Angel after he rammed the car I was in with a pickup truck. (I didn't know he was an Angel at the time, he thought I was a deaf-mute channel for the Devil...)

2. Nursed a fledgling sparrow to maturity. Best part? When it landed on my shoulder days after I let it go...

3. Written Cockney dialog for Cockney actors and a Cockney audience, as broadcast on the BBC.

4. Debated Mortimer Adler to a standstill at age 14.

5. Befriended a baby elephant, who then tried to keep me.

6. Heard a fellow student shot to death while in my typing class. I'm typing now, if you notice.

7. At a friend's request, operated on his dog's ear to drain a hematoma; the vet who put in a drain later confirmed my diagnosis and praised my work.

8. Laid a brick path around a planter, starting in one spot, laying bricks as I went, and the bricks at the end slotted perfectly with the bricks at the beginning. A pal went behind me and mortared as I went -- we knew I could do it, even though I'd never laid bricks before. Artist's eye, motherfuckers.

9. Pushed a needle all the way through my thumb in fourth grade, for reasons only G. Gordon Liddy would understand.

10. Turned down work as muscle for a mid-level drug dealer.

And you?

What The Hell Is Going On?

I'll tell you about this later. It should be -- oh, shit. Is that a bear?

It's been a while since I've posted. Life has been interesting in the proverbial sense...

But here's the big news.

1. I made my first performance, unless you count speaking at weddings and funerals.

2. I spoke to a psychiatrist, and have tentatively begun treatment.

3. Swill is out.

So I'll talk about the shrink first. Get it out of the way.

It was interesting. The nurse running the place immediately slotted me for a two-week stay in the bin, to be monitored while they determined my medication.

She said, "They'll be delighted with you."

Thus we have my relationship with the mental health profession. It's kind of like Where The Wild Things Are. "Oh please don't go! Oh please don't go! We'll eat you up, we love you so!"

I wound up speaking with the doctor for quite some time. Near the beginning of our interview, she said, "Normally these are much shorter, but you're so interesting!"

In my lowest moments, I can think back on moments such as these, and comfort myself with the thought that women find me of great clinical interest.

So, I've mentioned in previous posts that I've been diagnosed with agitated depression and borderline schizophrenia. Well, the doctor told me that there is no longer such thing as agitated depression, and 'borderline schizophrenia' never existed -- some shrinks use it as a shorthand for, 'well, there's something going on in there, and it's making me nervous.'

What she said? Post-traumatic stress disorder (which, interestingly, Jim MacDonald diagnosed for one of my autobiographical characters) and obsessive-compulsive disorder. "You've got a little bipolar, too, but all artists have a little bipolar." And I'm hypomanic. If you know me personally, look up hypomania and nod in recognition.

There was something I very much appreciated. I mean, she's letting me keep my bipolar! (Well, hypomania is pretty functional.) She specifically stated that the goal of my treatment was maximum creativity, minimum medication. "Maybe just stabilizing your sleep would be enough."

Yes, yes, yes.

She also said something interesting. "I don't think you represent a danger to yourself or the community at all." She said it with the definite air of a woman making a contradiction. I suspect it was directed at the nurse, since the doctor didn't put me in the bin after all.

Instead, I received an initial prescription for two anti-depressants and an anti-psychotic. Which I guess is minimal medication for such as me.

The missus, bless her heart, after all this... after making me go to the emergency room, insisting that I do the follow-up, driving me to the appointment...

"They're putting you on a caaaaahk-tail! That stuff is poison! It's addictive, you know. Have you talked to ______ about how they feel on their medication? (the individual in question has behaved violently when not on meds) You won't be able to work."

And so on. Her great fear is that I'll wind up a broken zombie. I told her that if she doesn't like what it does to me, I stop. The point of this is to make me as easy to live with as possible. So we'll see. She's having me hold off for a few days, which is fine with me. Get one last band session in with beer before the long drought -- no drinking with meds.

I think talk therapy will be more useful to me -- but it's going to be a long time before I can get that going. Turns out Berkeley is hurting for low-cost counseling.

And so.

How'd the performance go? First off, let me thank everyone who showed up. I have got a swell community and I am grateful for it.

And as for the performance. It turns out that my completely unreasonable confidence was not unreasonable at all. I have a talent for performing that isn't obvious until I have an audience to fuck with.

I'm good at it. Real good. The video will go up at some point, but I will tell you in honest pride that I kicked ass. I was told a number of times by a number of people that I was 'the hit of the evening.' What's sick? I didn't need to be told. I knew it; I was there.

This was something for me. A while ago I began attending readings, and soon found that I wanted to be on the other side of the podium. I can even put a date on the birth of this ambition -- my birthday in 2009, when I attended the Litpunk reading. To concieve an ambition, and see it through to completion at a high level of skill in a prestigious venue? On purpose? Dang. Didn't know I could do that shit. Bodes well for the future.

Okay, I'll confess. When I was told that I was going to be opening, I smiled and nodded and agreed internally that it was only smart to put the new guy in first. First time out, you can't expect too much.

But something in me said very distinctly, "You're gonna eat that."

Not a nice statement, is it? But there it was. Something in me felt challenged, and responded. I don't think I would have done as well if I didn't have a wee touch of malice in my motivation.

It was interesting. I was in a distinctly altered frame of mind. Normally that kind of busy-busy atmosphere -- people bustling around, eating, talking -- shuts me right down. Instead, I was able to smile and converse, but I felt a real distance from everyone. That was my only bad feeling of the evening -- I felt guilty about not being able to spend real personal time with all the friends who had come out to support me.

And here's the other thing that was weird. When I looked at the audience? They were all just a horrible undifferentiated blur, a genially horrid many-handed monster -- except for women I found attractive, who gave the impression of being arranged like chocolates in a box. Very disturbing. Between that and the disassociation, I think I have a better understanding of how celebrities get into trouble.

But I'll tell you what. After an initial stumble, I had them. I got laughs I wasn't expecting, but when I turned the screw they shut the fuck up and listened. The missus later explained that stumble to me. At the start, I mentioned that I'd brought the wrong copy of the manuscript.

At first I argued with her about that -- I was just being candid, which is part of my thang, etc. But on further thought, I decided she was right. (Sweetie, here it is in front of everyone -- you were right, and I was wrong.) I think an audience likes being told what to do -- if you have convinced it that you are in charge. By admitting an error, I cast doubt on my authority, which made the audience suspicious until I proved my mettle.

And once I thought of it that way, I realized the pleasure I'd experienced in performing. It was that of dominance. Control. I work hard on being polite, deferential, cooperative, a person of service. I do this because the alpha male I have locked in the basement is a motherfucker and I do not trust him.

Performance gave me a time and place to let him out for a while. I liked that. I want to do more. And it felt safe. It was appropriate for me to be extreme, demanding, and unquestioningly in charge. It was the time and place where I was serving by ruling, to put a ridiculously overweening caste on things.

And like I said, it's safe, it's harmless. I mean, some crazy artist getting sick power thrills from the control of crowds? What could possibly go wrong with that?

I'll tell you about Swill tomorrow.

Let Me Harden Myself With Ten Thousand Hours Of Labor

And finally, done! Every issue of Swill must pay obeisance to the Insect God.

And once again, a comment on someone else's blog ran wild, and turned into a post. Catherine Schaff-Stump wrote about that book on expertise that's got everyone all het up, and I figured that if I was going to accuse a pal of serf mentality I shouldn't do it on her turf. I'll do it here, where I'm familiar with the escape routes and can keep a table between us until I get a chance to explain myself.

I should read this book. All I know about it is what I've heard or read in other's discussions. So really, I'm not talking about the book. I'm talking about the reactions to it that I've seen in a number of creators of my acquaintance.

But there are a few things I wonder about. The premise under discussion is that it takes ten thousand hours of practice to become an expert in any given skill. I get the impression that what's meant by 'expert' is a world-class, top-grade, unquestionably significant and accomplished talent.

I've seen a common reaction to the ten-thousand hour paradigm. People see it as a sentence. They are crushed, then they nobly lift the burden up and accept it as part of their load.

Because the idea that this is something that must be done also implies that it's something that can be done. It takes a question that seems unfathomable -- how can I achieve greatness? -- and gives a straightforward numerical answer that is just barely on the acceptable side of impossible. Practice for ten thousand hours, and if you still suck, get back to me. We'll work something out.

Don't get me wrong. I am the poster child for compulsive woodshedding, and I think it's paid off. If you want to be good, you need to put the time in. And I think that a cold, sober look at the amount of time that dedicated professionals put in on their work is a damned fine thing.

But there are a few reactions that I've been developing as I've seen the ten-thousand hours join the hundredth fucking monkey and Catch-22 as part of the law of the jungle.

First off, it implies that there is a distinct point at which one says, "Yep. There it is." Ones skill is undeveloped, then ten thousand hours later it's in full bloom.

My favorite band is the Ramones.

By this I do not mean, "Craft counts for nothing." What I mean is, is that lack of expertise is not always a barrier to achievement. I don't think the world would be a better place if Blitzkrieg Bop had an interesting chord progression and some kinda life to the beat. Which is what would have happened if the Ramones had put in their ten thousand hours before they started working.

So that's the first point. Don't think of what you do as practice unless you are doing a deliberate exercise in order to develop some facet of your skill. If you are working on something that means something to you, you are not practicing.

Next is the ten-thousand hour figure itself. Let me tell you something. Practice is not as clear-cut as it seems. Are you doing the same routine every day, or are you challenging yourself? And what counts as practice? Maybe you spend two hours a day writing, but how many hours a day are you spending thinking about your work, or even just consciously using language? When my observational drawing skills are strong, I can draw without drawing -- I look at a branch and count the leaves, that kind of thing.

That gray area in practice, where unavoidable moments in life are turned to the advantage of art, is crucial. Those are the moments when art is not something you make yourself do, or allow yourself to do. Those are the moments when the artistic process is part of your process. When you've fully assimilated your creativity.

When your art is fully part of your life, everything contributes toward it. It becomes impossible to estimate practice time, because it is all practice. It isn't a chore or an effort, because if it is? You won't do it.

When I first heard about the ten thousand hours, it totally rocked my John Henry. I did a little math and felt better about myself.

In other words, I reacted the way Catherine did. Lots of people have reacted this way. One at a time, each is the result of an individual struggling with questions of dedication and achievement. Seen en mass, I find myself reminded of that Maoist-era toe-tapper, Let Me Go To The Mountain, Mother, And Harden Myself With Physical Labor.

I am not criticizing the concept of practice here. But I have noticed not just in myself, but in most of the serious beginning writers I know, a sense of stern duty, of feeling that we must steel ourselves for the rigors to come. Writing these days feels like a polar expedition, where we expect to lose a finger or nose to frostbite in the process of starving to death while surrounded by bears.

This sense of eternally plowing under gray skies (while wearing thick damp pants that chafe) is not an essential element of art. The grim satisfaction of dedication is a useful tool, but I worry that it has grown too important to too many of us.

Here is the secret of the ten thousand hours. You do not get through ten thousand hours of practice through grim dedication. Okay, you can -- but your work will reflect that grim dedication.

If you are one of the people who is actually going to get ten thousand hours of practice in, most of those ten thousand hours will be spent enjoying yourself. Yes, there are tedious practices and chores and so on, but give me a break.

For those of us who like to spend our evenings carving crude pitchforks with which to maintain our dungheaps, this is a bitter pill indeed. When you embrace the labor of art, you embrace the pleasure of that labor -- which is actually play. The moments when you are engaged, when you are loving what you are doing -- those are the moments when you are learning.

Ten thousand hours isn't a sentence or a guarantee. It seems to be an estimate of how much time people have spent doing something they love by the time they get noticed. And a lot of people do good, interesting work long before they clock in those hours. And a lot of people put in more effort than that without advancing. Practice is necessary, but it can only take you as far as you can go.

Bummer, huh? Once again, quantification proves of more apparent than actual use.

Come See Me On December Tenth

That would be my area of specialty -- the menacing faked pastoral. One more of these prints and I'm done.

So, the time has come for me to plead, to beg. Do you live in the SF Bay Area? Are you interested in edgy literature?

Then come see me perform in Lip Service West. This is a literary event dealing with performances of transgressive works drawn from real life. It is very prestigious for those of us who could be described as, 'belletristic dirtbags.' NPR has been known to broadcast from these readings from time to time.

It's taking place on December 10, at 8:00 in the evening, at 5512 at San Pablo in Oakland. There will be wine and hot dogs and such.

Listen, I'm begging here. The more people who show up, the better I look, and the more likely it is that I can participate in the future. This is, oh, brother, a significant career moment for me, and I need y'all to be there if I'm going to pull this off. I'd like to get 'performance' onto my resume, and here's an excellent opportunity.

I'll tell you what, though. It's a good reading. Consistently engaging and interesting. Confessional memoirists are the only folks in the 'literary scene' who still want to entertain the audience. It is a guaranteed good time for those who don't mind peering over the edge!

Bring a friend. Bring two. Did I tell you I heard there would be hot dogs and wine and stuff?