Plans...

And further proof I don't have much of a life outside of my job.

Tonight, the last workshop of the term. I'm actually kind of sad to see this class end.

Since it's our last meeting, we have a few things to make up, which means instead of running from 7:30-12:00, as we usually do, I'm guessing we'll run from 7:30 until about 1:00 or so, which would be fine, but my plane leaves Moline for Atlanta at 7:55 in the morning.

So, I'm guessing I'll be getting to bed (that's right, I'm now blogging about my bedtime) at about two and then waking up at four-thirty. But, hey, I'm going to be on vacation (or, you know, at the AWP conference). If you're headed down to Atlanta, maybe I'll run into you, and I hope to--well, most of you anyway--provided I spend more time out of than in my hotel room.

I'll probably stop by this place on Sunday and let you all know how things went down. In the meantime, mess around in comments, or go read a short story or something.

Or, rather: Go stop by Avery: An Anthology of New Fiction. Their first issue is hot off the presses and includes a little story by yours truly. I have a box of the books on their way to my house, and I can't wait to see them....Maybe they'll be here by the time I get back.

Syllabus

Speaking of work (and since I've been putting up most of my syllabus for the Intro to Lit class I've been teaching)...We're wrapping up our little unit on war literature today.

Here's how the thing has shaken out:

We started with stories: Tim O'Brien's "How to Tell a True War Story," Benjamin Percy's "Refresh, Refresh," and Hemingway's "A Soldier's Home." Then we read Gabe Hudson's Dear Mr. President, for a fictional account of the Gulf War, and Anthony Swofford's Jarhead, for a non-fiction account of the same war.

So, I suppose I should say: When I say I've been working a lot, this is the kind of stuff I've been doing, which, as I've said, is a lot of fun. Even if it does take up quite a bit of time, I can't imagine doing anything cooler.

Difficulties

with blogging, that is. While I was folding laundry yesterday morning, I came to a realization that's not yet wholly formed, but may be worth mentioning nonetheless. It wasn't necessarily about blogging, I don't think, but it wound up there in a way.

I mentioned on here not too long ago that this may be the busiest teaching term I've ever had. I'm chairing an Honors Project, teaching an independent study, and maintaining the usual full load, including a course that is a new prep for me. It's been busy, but not that big of a deal because it's been fun and all that. Plus: the last day of classes is in five days.

The realization I came to while folding laundry, though, was this: I've kind of become one of those people who doesn't have much going on in his life outside of work, and I don't know exactly how this happened.

Last year, a colleague of mine told me that he works sixty to seventy hours a week during the school year. I believed him, but I didn't think it would ever be necessary for me to spend that many hours working. Well, I did, but I was guessing I'd spend forty or so hours on teaching and other "professional" duties each week and twenty or so hours on my own writing. I don't necessarily keep track of how many hours I spend each week working, but if I were to guess, I'd say the time I've spent just keeping up with teaching and all that comes with it would easily match the sixty to seventy hours a week my colleague puts in.

Which, as I've said before, hasn't left me much time to write. And which makes me a little cranky, and jittery, and, um, maybe even a little self-involved.

This weekend, for example, my parents lost their power, and while I was telling my mom I'd be glad to have them come stay with us I was secretly wishing that their power would snap back on, because I had stuff to do. "Sure," I wanted to say. "You can come and get warm, eat some food, but I'm not going to be around."

Last night, I was even going to miss my nephew D.'s birthday party because of a work commitment. When J.C. first brought it up on Sunday, I got all huffy, and was like, "I can't go. I'm busy all night." Alas, I pulled back a little. And I went to Applebee's. (Hey, it's D.'s choice--and he's eleven, what do you expect?)

And as for this blog--like I said, I don't have much going on in my life outside of work. Thus, since I don't really talk much about work on here, no new updates.

Now, though, there is one: I went to D.'s birthday party last night. D. brought his friend D. along. D.'s friend D. has given up celery for Lent. I thought he was maybe making a joke, in the same way my dad jokes about giving up heroin every year for Lent. But, alas, D.'s friend D. was serious. "I really like it with peanut butter," he said.

J.C. and I gave D. an electronic version of Catch Phrase for his birthday, and we played it for a little while we waited for our food to arrive. D. was the first to hold the machine in his hands, and he stared at the first word for a few seconds, squinting. The clatter of Applebee's was all around us: the waitresses, the basketball games on the TVs, table after table of couples and families. D. set the machine down and turned to me, asked, "What's 'middleclass'?"

"If Carl were a fish he'd live forever."

Though I finished grad school almost two years ago, I'm still on the English Department's listserv. This is my own fault--I never sent the email asking them to take me off. The truth: I kind of like the virtual eavesdropping. Last year at about this time, in fact, they were whispering about me (in a good way), and I got to watch it all go down.

This morning, though, news of a different sort: An announcement about a new online magazine, Cadillac Cicatrix.

I can't say much about it yet because my first move once I hyperlinked over there from the listserv email was to click fiction, and once I did, I saw Peter Orner's name. I do like that Peter Orner.*

*I do. But his novel? I still haven't read it. It's one of the thirty or so books stacked in small piles around my office that I've purchased over the past year and haven't yet read. Our little break between terms will arrive in two weeks; maybe I'll get to it then.

Three

My nephew Sam turned three last week, so Saturday we traveled to Ophiem for brunch: blueberry waffles with whipped cream and sprinkles, spinach frittata, bacon, sausage, a bevy of sliced fruits. I think every Saturday morning should begin just like that.

D., after letting me in on a little secret he's figured out--"Um, Chad, girls don't dig guns"--called me into the computer room to look at parodies of "Gold Digger" on YouTube. Yes, Uncle Chad introduced D. to the uncensored Kanye West way back in the day. So we watched some videos, including one about the Freshman Fifteen ("I ain't sayin' she a lot thicker, but have you seen the girl eat a Snickers") and then D. started saying he wanted to look up "White and Nerdy." I was like, um, I think it's called "Ridin' Dirty," hoping we wouldn't have to, you know, go there. But D. persisted: "No. It's 'White and Nerdy.' Look that up." And, of course, that's the name of the Weird Al Yankovic parody of "Ridin' Dirty." When I was D.'s age, I knew every word on a couple Weird Al cassettes, but no longer. I've fallen out of the loop.

The quote of the day, though, didn't come from D. but from the birthday boy himself. As J.C. and I were about to leave, we walked into the living room where our four niblings were all hanging out--the two three-year-old boys, the two two-year-old girls--and J.C. said, "Who wants to give Auntie J.C. a hug." Sam, right away, raised his hand over his head and said, "I don't want to."

And here I didn't think "Girls don't dig guns" could be topped.

On a side note, Blogger finally made me switch to its new version. I, however, haven't really noticed any changes. Are things funky around here for y'all or is it pretty much the same as it always was?

Haircut

J.C. once went three years or so without a haircut just to avoid having to talk to the women who would cut her hair. I, on the other hand, have always enjoyed conversations with these women--until about two years ago. Once I turned twenty-eight the women stopped talking to me. Sometimes, toward the end of the process, one would say, "So, are you from Galesburg?" and I would answer her, but that would be about it. I still tip well, but I've started to wonder if they think I appreciate their silence and consider the tip hush money.

My hair had been getting shaggy during this busy term o' mine until Sunday, when I went to the mall for a haircut. I listened to the clippers, the scissors. I stared out of fuzzy eyes at the black cape draped over me. I noticed, though, while staring at my cape, a number of gray hairs. I'd seen them before, random flashes of silver near my temples, but there were usually just two or three of them. While not talking to the woman cutting my hair, however, it seemed there were more gray hairs falling onto my cape than dark ones.

At the end of the haircut, while the woman was swiping at my neck with that stubby little brush, I broke our silence, asked her, "Is my hair turning gray?" I figured that this was her area of expertise--hair. Back when I used to talk to the women cutting my hair, I would ask as many questions as I could that involved their expertise: I would ask about cosmetology school, or carpal tunnel, or those little hairs that once snipped end up re-rooting along my trapezoids.

When I asked this woman if my hair was turning gray, she said, "How old are you?"

I told her I was thirty, guessing that she had some numbers stored away in her head about aging and graying.

"Well, I'm twenty-five," she said. "And I think your hair's just ashy. People of our generation, we just have this naturally ashy hair."

When she finished speaking, she bent over and spread her hair for me at the part. "See my roots?" she said. I did. Her roots were the color of Hershey bars; the rest of her hair was platinum striated with that same chocolate color. "My roots have that same natural ashiness." And then she reiterated: "It's just something people from our generation have."

There was a male stylist standing behind us, and I think I actually heard his head turn when she said this for the second time.

And then I was kind of stuck. Should I just let the comment go, and have this guy think I actually believe her about generational hair ashiness? Or should I say, "Really? You think so?"

The guy, I could tell, was waiting.

"Well," I said, "I guess it's good to know I'm not going prematurely gray or anything." And then I walked over to the register, paid, tipped the stylist twenty-five percent and left a little sad that she hadn't been sharing any other theories with me during the rest of the haircut.

Week

It's been a week since my last post. I haven't been avoiding this place because of my failed Super Bowl prediction; I've just been busy. To those of you who stop by here on occasion looking for updates, I apologize; I'll try to do better. For now, I offer a mega post in which I attempt to catch y'all up to speed.
* * *
As for the Super Bowl, I said that I was going to cheer for the Colts, because I wanted Peyton and Dungy to get their championship. Once the two teams took the field, however, I was all for the Bears. The heart, I suppose, wants what the heart wants.
* * *
And speaking of my heart...I haven't been neglecting just my blog. I'm teaching a new prep this term--Intro to Lit--and the class is consuming me. I literally wake up thinking about it. In the end, I think the challenges I've faced this term have made and will make me a better teacher, but right now, I'm really missing writing. I'm not saying that teaching has prevented me from writing, just that teaching well has definitely taken the front seat or whatever the expression is, and teaching well this term is much harder than in terms past.
* * *
On Intro to Lit: We just finished book number four: ZZ Packer's Drinking Coffee Elsewhere.

Man, can she write. I tend, as a reader, to favor story writers to story tellers, because, I suppose, I consider myself more of a story writer than a story teller. I think of Packer primarily as a story teller--as opposed to, say, Junot Diaz, whose book we finished last week--but she just does so many things so well. She truly awes me.

This week in Intro to Lit, we're starting a little unit on war literature.
* * *
One of the things I do when I'm not writing much is buy books. And this past week I put in a massive order at Powell's. Well, not massive, but certainly decent-sized, especially considering how many new books I have sitting around the house that I have yet to touch.

Here're the books on their way to my house:

The Mysterious Secret of the Valuable Treasure by Jack Pendarvis

Dying Light: And Other Stories by Donald Hays

The Open Curtain by Brian Evenson

Unconventions: Attempting the Art of Craft and the Craft of Art by Michael Martone

Before You She Was a Pit Bull by Elizabeth Ellen

The Brief History of the Dead by Kevin Brockmeier
* * *
I'll be teaching on Valentine's Day, so J.C. and I made date plans for this weekend. Things were pretty much up in the air until J.C. saw that Alejandro Escovedo was going to be playing at the Redstone Room in Davenport. I bought the tickets online on Friday, and J.C. reserved us a room at a nearby hotel later that night.

The last time J.C. reserved us a room online at a place we'd never seen...well, let's just say that while riding the elevator I was twice asked if I was looking for any drugs. This time, we arrived at the hotel, and it looked deserted. Inside, there were burned-out neon signs for a restaurant and lounge that appeared to have closed fifteen years ago. We decided the place would be fine; besides, the place where we wanted to stay was booked. Then, when the clerk went to swipe J.C.'s debit card, the machine wouldn't work. He asked us to stop by later to try and swipe the card again, and he gave us our room keys. When we got upstairs, the room keys wouldn't work. The little green light would come on, but the door wasn't budging. It was like it was deadbolted from the inside. I looked around at the scuffed doors and dingy walls and imagined someone cooking meth on the other side of the door. We returned to the lobby, and the clerk sent a woman upstairs to check the door. She returned a few minutes later and said it worked fine. So, we went upstairs, and she had propped open the door via the deadbolt, which seemed a little odd, though not ominous or anything. J.C. stepped inside and snapped back the bolt and I stayed outside and tried the key again. No dice. J.C. exited the room and said we were leaving. The desk clerk seemed a little disappointed, like it was his fault, but really it wasn't. Our main reason for wanting to leave was that in the time we were there we saw only two people in the hotel besides the two workers. At least the hotel where I could have bought drugs in the elevator had lots of people around.

We ended up trying the place that was allegedly booked for the night, and they had a vacancy. So, the "new" hotel was only two blocks from the concert venue, and two blocks from one of the river boats. Plus, it had a king-sized bed that was just fantastic. And the place was clean.
* * *
The Escovedo show was probably the best concert I've ever seen. The venue only holds 250 people. Onstage, there was Escovedo, another acoustic guitar player, and a fiddle player. Gorgeous, gorgeous music.

The martinis at the place are named for blues musicians, and I drank Junior Browns: Maker's Mark, sweet vermouth, and grenadine. They looked very Valentine's Day-appropriate. Gorgeous, gorgeous drinks.
* * *
After the show we ventured over to the river boat. I lost some money playing the slots, and then J.C. and I found a diner that served burgers. Afterwards, I decided I wanted to play twenty dollars worth of blackjack, so we walked upstairs, and I sat down at what I thought was a five-dollar minimum table. I handed the dealer my twenty bucks, and she said, "This isn't blackjack. It's hold 'em, and it costs fifteen just to play a hand." I told her that was fine; if I lost, I'd only play one hand.

I'd never played hold 'em at a casino, and it must have shown. The dealer, Nancy, immediately took me under her wing. She told me how and when to bet, and five or so hands later I was up about sixty bucks. Then Nancy had to switch tables. Before she left, she leaned into me and said, "Know when to walk away," as if she was Kenny Rogers. I wanted to give her a kiss.

I stayed in a few more hands and still walked away with twenty-five extra dollars after tipping the two dealers a total of fifteen bucks.

I know it's only twenty-five bucks, but my god it was fun playing hold 'em against the dealer. Way more fun than blackjack. I almost wish I hadn't done it, because I'm ready right now to go back and play for a few hours.
* * *
Another thing I do when I'm not writing much is come up with ideas for things to write about.

Today alone, I've been toying with the following ideas:

A monologue by a guy who sells knives on infomercials. He wears a fake mustache and has a love/hate relationship with Ron Popeil.

A book of semi-biographical poems written from the persona of Gram Parsons. A sort of life-story, but, you know, made up.
* * *
And though I haven't been writing much of anything, the stuff I've written has been well received lately. In addition to that little essay that I said got picked up, I found out another little flash fiction of mine is going to be published in the Spring issue of Blue Earth Review. I'd entered the piece in their flash fiction contest. While I didn't win, they did think enough of the story to want to publish it, and for that, I am grateful. I'll let y'all know when it becomes available.
* * *
Did I mention that king-sized bed at the hotel? J.C. and I are in the process of looking for a house to buy, and we've decided on a new priority: We want a bedroom that is large enough for a king-sized bed. Seriously, people. Have you ever slept on one of these things? It was like sleeping on Rhode Island.
* * *
I suppose I need something halfway decent to wrap up this post. About that hotel we ended up staying at: We loved that it was two blocks from the Redstone Room, and we loved that it was only two blocks from the casino. We loved that there were lots of other people around, and that it was clean. We loved, of course, that king-sized bed. This morning, though, when I went to get in the shower, I noticed there was no shower curtain. I wasn't going to let that keep me from showering. You may not know this about me, but I love showers. Showering, sleeping, and eating. I can't get enough of any of them. So I got into the shower-curtain-less shower, and the water wasn't getting very hot. If the water had been hot, then that enormous mirror across from me would have fogged right away. As it was, it took almost fifteen minutes for the water to get hot enough for the mirror to fog.

In the end, I really, really don't recommend showering when you are able to look at yourself in the mirror.

Nostradamus

I feel like I should make a prediction about tonight's Super Bowl--since I have this little quasi-permanent record called a blog and all that.

First, a little background: I spent the first ten years of my life in Monmouth, Illinois. Then we moved to Logansport, Indiana, where I lived until I was eighteen. So, I grew up cheering for the Bears--and oh how fondly I remember Super Bowl XX--and, eventually, the Colts. I always figured: one of them's in the NFC, one of them's in the AFC; maybe someday they'll meet in the Super Bowl.

And now, of course, they finally are. I want to root for the Bears because they're the underdog, apparently, thanks to the AFC's utter domination of late. But I want to root for the Colts, too, because Peyton Manning is great, and I don't want him joining that list that of great quarterbacks that includes Dan Marino and Dan Fouts (what's up with the guys named Dan?) who never won a Super Bowl.

So, I'm going to cheer for the Colts, but I won't be disappointed at all if the Bears win. And, in fact, I think the Bears will win, despite the line in Vegas. The score: 23-17.

Forthcoming

I received word yesterday that a little essay of mine will be published in the warm weather issue of The Duck and Herring Co. Pocket Field Guide.

The essay is a tad old--in it, J.C. is referred to as my "girlfriend"--but it's still something I like. It's called "The Perseids," and here's my one-sentence teaser:

"[J.C.] and I are fabulous drinkers, fantastic dreamers, and when we combine the two--when we drink and dream--the world becomes right and just and conquerable."

If you're looking for something to do with the weather the way it is, the Duck and Herring Co. cold weather guide is available now.

Elizabeth Ellen, 1972

A couple days ago I was killing fifteen minutes in my office waiting for J.C. to come pick me up (she still couldn't drive her own car thanks to das boot) and I found this little story by Elizabeth Ellen over at Monkeybicycle. Like pretty much all of Ellen's stories, it's worth a look.

Finding the story reminded me that I still haven't purchased this book, which I've been looking forward to since I heard Future Tense Books was going to publish it.

I should probably get out my debit card right now, while I'm thinking about it.

And since I mentioned das boot: J.C. is now done with it. She's wearing shoes and walking around almost like a normal person.