FAQs

It's time to share some blog FAQs.

(Dear Tine.)

What is RSS-feed? How does it work? Is it sexy?

Dear asker,

It's the tiny orange box in the address field above, all to the right, next to the web-address. If you click on it, you get the possibillity to be informed every time a web site is updated. So, when you're here on this blog, and you decide not to check in all the time when there's nothing new posted, but you do wish to check in once there is something new posted, you move your mouse up and press on that orange square and get some RSS going. Sexy? I don't know. What does sexy mean?

(Hi Tine!!)

What Television shows do you watch these days?

Dear asker,

Weeds!! I recommend to use surfthechannel.com to get all tv and movies you wish for for free. Amazing site. Weeds is on third season now or maybe the fourth. You can go and watch every episode, all seasons, from the start, from the pilot. Seriously good show.

(Tine, oh blogger friend.)

I read in the newspaper yesterday that blogging is for writers who can't publish books, and that it's just about the same as shouting down into a bucket. Is that true? Should I start my own blog? Is it fun to write a blog?

Dear asker,

Actually, I'm happy you wrote this. I take it as a piece of advice. It's extremely boring to write a blog. You should start one yourself, of course. I actually published two books, but does it matter? Apparently not, I'm blogging. But from now on, I'll give myself some variation from posting, by sometimes exchange it with going to shout down into a bucket. Thanks, dude.

(Hi Tine.)

Do you know the feeling of painful silence from a telephone that does not ring?

Dear asker,

no.

Yes, It's Me

Yes, I'll be that one! I'll go to all the old people, the everyday cripples, the women bend so much forward, that they can hardly see anything but the floor, the crippled ones from laziness and couches and too soft mattresses and some back and bone diseases, the men with canes, all the ones who grew downwards for the past decades, who just sat in a chair and let their bodies take shape from that chair, who walk but look more like they're crawling, slowly, carefully, aneaimic, crispy, crabs, cripples, I'll be the one, I'll go, I'll put my head under theirs to get eye contact, and with an insistent and enlightened look in my eyes, I'll whisper, Yoga!

Yes, I'll be the lesbian, who satisfies every woman on earth. Too many women for the dick situation anyway. I'll hold my hand on her lower back, not pushing, just supporting, and I'll know that she'll surrender right there, I'll feel the tiny release in her spine and down through the thighs, I'll hold the door for her and smile with one side of my face as if I'm trying not to smile, we both know it's such a cliché to hold that door, but my palm against her lower back and the smile as she passes me closely will disarm the action, and she can't help feeling flattered and very womanlywoman, when another woman, and a beautiful one, holds the door for her, not a man because he's bigger and stronger and supposedly more fit than her to hold a door open, no, another woman, who then by the action acknowledges, that she's a finer woman than her, more petite, more delicate, a little weaker and more fragile, here, let me get that, and I hold the door, and she knows, that she's now überwoman when another woman treats her like her woman, and that's how I get her into bed, when she passes me, she'll smell my perfume and my hand on her lower back will support her so gently that 007 will rewind the tape to see just how delicate yet firm my touch was against her silky white shirt, and when she's through that door, we both know it's a matter of time, I'll lean back, and she'll now hunt me down, if not tonight, then next time, because she'll want me to hold that door for her again. She's a preditor, but once she's smelled my subtle hunting tactique, she's praying to be my prey.

Yes, I'll be the one who loves and understands, who's not so busy being righteous and selfrighteous, I'll live my days from the principle, I'll try to understand you, before I understand myself, because that, I believe, will get me a whole lot closer to other people than the eternal refrain of, Why don't you UNDERSTAND me, which is actually pronounced, Why don't you understand ME-E-E-E-E???? so, I'll understand anyone on my way who wants to be understood, actually, it's not so hard, it's always written in their eyes, and it's usually in the genre, Why am I not loved for who I am? or, Why have I created a life I don't really care for? or, Why can't I feel a true sense of meaning in my life? or, Why do I not treat myself better than this? or, Why is my wife such a fucking uptight bitch who depends her love for me on how well I leave the living room tidy or not, or Why is my hubby so busy escaping me instead of giving me metropol cultural experiences and multiple orgasms or both or just a tiny foot rub and at least once bring me on one of his trips to the local hardware store? I'll answer it all, and I'll understand, and by the end of the day I'll probably understand myself a little better, or it won't matter anyway, because I was so busy understanding everyone else, and it made sense to forget to understand myself. Isn't that why people get children anyway?

Quotes I Dig

"There is no such thing as women literature for me, that does not exist. In literature, I do not separate women and men. One is a writer, or one is not. This is a mental space where sex is not determining. One has to have some space for freedom. Language allows this. This is about building an idea of the neutral which could escape sexuality."

Monique Wittig

A Ticklish Subject

I came here to write a post and my thought was, that I have a weird feeling. Then I see, that I wrote a post five days ago, ironically enough about appreciating my body, and called it a weird feeling.

Ironic, because I learned today that I have Borrelia. In an early stage, so it shouldn't get serious. But it's so strange, if it wasn't for a dog with a tick yesterday, it could've become. Seriously. Serious.

The disease is transmitted to humans through ticks. I had a tick bite about seven weeks ago. Here's a description of the disease:

During early stages of the disease the bacteria is localized in the skin and manifests itself as a characteristic bulls-eye rash, called Erythema Migrans (not in all cases, some people develop no rash). If the disease is caught in this stage and treated, further complications can be avoided. If the disease is not treated, symptoms can include arthritis, cranial neuropathy (specifically facial palsy), and meningitis (abnormal cerebrospinal fluid). Over years, an untreated Borrelia infection can cause chronical skin infection, brain infection or hepatitis to develop.

Yesterday, I was at a reception with The Man and some colleagues. One colleague's dog is there, he has a tick, and they remove it. I say, I had a tick recently, which was really weird because I was in central Copenhagen, and I don't get how a tick lives there. The Man asks if I've developed a ring where it bit me. I didnt even think about where it was, but just said no. I mean, I know that ticks carry these horrible infections, but I was just certain that there was nothing. I probably figured, that I would've felt bad or something. So he seriously asked me to pay attention. I laughed a little and asked if it was like a Devil's burned ring I should look out for. I don't know why I found it a little far out, but Borrelia seemed too serious to be relevant.

Then today, I'm scratching my thigh, on the back side, probably the place where I look the rarest at myself. I realize, I've been scratching there some times lately. I remove my pants, I happen to be very bendy, so I just put my leg up and my head down, and there is a red spot. In the spot, there's a ring. The skin is just edged in a small ring. Of course it dawns upon me, as I look at this itching ring. This is where the tick bit me.

I remember getting out of bed one night, because I reached my hand down to scratch my leg. And felt something strange, attached, or blurted up. Went to turn on light and look on my back thigh with a food on the zink, and a second later stood with a tick in my hand. Kinda strange, it had just been eating of me. I remember not knowing what to feel, as if I was in my right to shout something ugly and hateful at it, like, you little bloodsucker, you're groce, who allowed you to dig your jaws into my body? I didn't, didn't figure he/she'd get the bigger message anyway. And I was also a little fascinated, like a child that finds an animal in its hand rather interesting. I don't run into ticks often. And they do have quite a way to make their living, that makes them pretty wild. Imagine a diet of blood only. Wow.

I call the Man, say, ok, this is not so nice, you told me yesterday to look out for a ring, I found a ring. Anyway, he says doctor and we talk some more. I read about it on the net, I definitely have the Erythema Migrans. I figure he's right, doctor, and I call. My doctor asks a lot about the recent stiffness I've had in my neck and shoulders. I had an appointment for a massage tomorrow, because lately my neck and shoulders have been stiff and hurt like hell. That's a symptom, and can be a sign of meningitis. We agree, that it's not necessarily related, the stiffness has come since the tick, but I say it doesn't feel like anything as acute as meningitis pains. We agree that I'll come see her tomorrow. If anything should feel bad tonight, I'll find a doctor. But most likely, I'm in such an early stage, and it won't develop from this between today and tomorrow.

But the weird feeling is, that the ring that tells that I have Borrelia is so tiny and just a little flaked skin, and it's in a place where I might have never seen it. Besides, had I seen it, and not yesterday because of that tick on that dog and the He-Man telling me about Borrelia symptom ring thing, I would have never paid attention to the ring as dangerous, but just thought my skin had dried out a little right there and expected it to pass. I would've never asked anyone or suspected anything serious from a little redness and a tiny dry ring on the back of my thigh. And the next stages of this infection are so not funny. If not caught and treated, facial paralysis, dementia, all of that. Brain infection, come on?? And sneaky things, developing over years. I don't know. It's just too weird to know, that this very dangerous bacteria is in my body. And that it's such strange luck that I'm getting treatment for it now.

So. I feel a little fragile. Like something dangerous was just close. Maybe it wasn't at all. It could have not spread and developed further. But I have a weird feeling.

A Weird Feeling

Today, I sincerely appreciate that I have a body.

I Was Afraid My Father Would Fall

I was afraid my father would fall asleep again, so I rode with him in the front seat and watched. That morning there were shooting stars over the desert. The mountains changed from pink, to red, then chalky white as the sun appeared. We crested a hill, and saw the wreckage of a car. A man sat weeping into his hands, and another man pulled a body, small, limp, and twisted, through the shattered windshield. Don't look, my father said, but I had to. I was already looking. I'd been looking all along.

From Braver Deeds by Gary Young

Still Dumber Than My Frontdoor - And Sexier Than Ever

As promised yesterday, here’s the republishing of an old blog post. The new addition and justification for this re-posting is yesterday's realization, that this easily can be read and interpreted as genuine porn fiction. With focus on the pornographic level of stupidity unfolding here, I believe that it's actually quite an arousing small piece of literature. The blog post "Dumber Than My Frontdoor" was first published July 25th, 2007:

Dumber Than My Frontdoor

May I first encourage you, if you don't have much time: Read yesterday's posting instead and send it to someone who doesn't know either, that the Catholic Church now has female ordained priests. I'm still very excited about these news.

This day has two ends. Right now, at 11.26am, I'm still too absorbed in the morning one of the two. I went on my morning run, and went by my bank, Washington Mutual. I am a person with much love, and a belief in living with love instead of focusing on the well, not-love things, that life is also full of. But. This bank, Washington Mutual, I by now passionately hate. I have done so for months, since they have been brutally feefucking me over and over again in the most sneaky ways, and with big dumb ass smiles always blames it on somebody higher in the system than themselves, and lets me pay and pay and pay for fucking stupid nothing errors.

I am leaving the country soon, and have therefore not kept many funds in my checking account. I am told daily by email how my balance is, and it's been fine. Untill yesterday, where a check tried to pass, $25,20. It was so long ago I had issued the check, that I had not remembered it, and got an email that there were insufficient funds. There was only $23 in the account. I came to the bank this morning with cash to fill into the account. They had charged me $27 for bouncing the check. Now, there are -$4. The check is still not paid. And they now charge me an overdraft fee for the -$4, another $27. For me missing $2,20 (two dollars and twenty cents), they charge me $54. This is for one day (1 day).

I look at Armycut Idiot behind counter. I say, Do you think this is cool?
He says, Npemifhlkeruhqfgie urfghiwue, hcidfjhj fhawebafglch fhjlag, eflyjyageclfgyalsdlfbn scdlsaueygfryuwegrflc snsfdbza, shdfbalwhfc vfgrbhebyssbjkdsjbgksadjhfguerghdnv jz, in other words, can I call my manager, because I'm too stupid to think for myself?
I don't answer, I just look at him and wait for him to take a stand.

When manager comes, 22-year-old Dumb Stupid Fuck Girl In Blue Shirt With Ugly Logo, Hey, I'm Really Important 'Cause I Read Two And A Half Books And The Entire Index Of My Micro Econ Reader And Passed Two Classes In Three Months In Cabrillo State Junior College To Get To This Position, she comes up and looks at me with a look, that says, "I'm in uniform. You're in running clothes. I have a fresh perm in my hair. You have a ponytail. I'm wearing tons of eye make-up to look older than I am. You're running and look younger, than you are. What seems to be the problem (apart from these horrible inbalances, of course)." I look back, with as much love as I can administer. (Not too much, ok. I am not Ghandi, nor Dalai, I'm pathetically pissed and afraid that if I respond honestly to the situation right now, Mr. Security That's Me overthere by the door will come running because I'll be hanging by my teeth in someone's throat, and if Armycut Idiot and 22-year-old Dumb Stupid Fuck Girl In Blue Shirt With Ugly Logo, Hey, I'm Really Important 'Cause I Read Two And A Half Books And The Entire Index Of My Micro Econ Reader And Passed Two Classes In Three Months In Cabrillo State Junior College To Get To This Position look stupid, let's not go to the level of intelligence, that radiates from Mr. Security That's Me. I like to imagine his brain is just meditating, and is really, really Indian professionally good at it. Like, gone to next level where the rest of us can't follow.

I say, I missed two dollars for one day. My check is not paid, right?
No, the check is returned, she says.
I say, So, I pay $27 for having it rejected?
Yes, she says.
And that takes me into -$2,20 overdraft, for which I pay another $27?
Yes, she says.
Is that fair, do you think? I ask.
I can see we've already returned over $130 in fees to you, I'm afraid we can't return anymore, she says.
I say, these fees were out of a bunch of fees, and they were charged for a delayed transfer, which caused small overdrafts for short periods of time.
There was more than $300 in fees, she says.
I look at her. These fees were charged, and they returned less than half, in spite of the fact, that it was a matter of less than $20 for less than two days, and there were fees of more than $300. This reminds me of going to Kinko's, where my last bill looked like this:

Co-worker breathing fee: $11
Paper jammed in machine fee: $17
Greasy hair fee: $4
We could be playing Dungeons and Dragons at home fee: $26
We're ugly fee: $14
We can see you're a dumb blonde so we're totally going to fuck you over fee: $230
Extra fee for being a foreigner fee: $6
You're smarter than us fee: $18
Turning on the machine fee: $10
First second machine running fee: $8
Self-service fee: $24
5 sheets faxed: $0.50

Total: $368.50

I am not going to ask her, if she thinks there might be a better reason for the $130 returned fees, than for the $300 fees charged in the first place. I look at Idiot Armycut. I realize, my frontdoor is smarter than him. He looks dumber than wood. And my frontdoor, which is also wooden, at least has a window in it, revealing that there's anything behind the wood. It also has a doorknob, which indicates there is an access, to what is behind the wood. Idiot Armycut only signals one thing. Wood. Dumb as wood. I'm scared now, these two together are dumb enough to threaten Kinko's in taking bottom place of Dumb Staff and Happy FeeFucking Customer Service.

It is clear to me, that they have been hired here in Washington Mutual because they were to stupid to check out movies in Blockbuster, let alone the challenging task of laying sliced pickles in hamburgers at McDonalds (I know that, because McDonalds are very particualar about only hiring people, who can stay with one pickled cucumber slice per hamburger, and none of these two have that kind of math/precision/consistence skills tracable anywhere in their four eyes).

I ask her, Does it matter to you, that I have a ton of money on my other account with you guys, you know, the normal bank deal where you would've just taken the $2 missing in the checking account from that savings account, sort of let me spot myself from one account to the other - you know, the normal bank way?
She says, No, then we couldn't really charge you $54 if we'd let you cover yourself, now could we?
I ask, Do you think it's a reasonable way to treat and punish a customer, who has thousands of dollars in and out of accounts, to charge $54 for lending me $2 for one day?
She says, That's how we do.
I swallow, find some big smile and say with a shaky voice, How fast can I get out of here if I just pay the $54?
Perm looks at Wood and says, I think you can take it from here. Wood closes his mouth. He's drooling. I think, Oh my God, he has a condition. Something is wrong. These people are in charge of my money.

I RUN for the exit.

I could hardly even run home for anger and fear filling my body. Now, it's time to change focus. That was this morning. Tonight is tonight. We have a Wednesday night event at this house. We're going to elect an official mascot for the upstairs of our house. The election is between Friend, my fish, who is now in foster care by the friends of mine living here, and a dear friend of the house, she goes by the name Strap-on Spice. I will be spokes person for my fish Friend, and represent him in the disciplines, where he might get in trouble himself, like the ball gown contest. The swimsuit contest, I believe he'll win over Strap-on any day, even though she's hot.

It's going to be a ton of fun. I'll tell you tomorrow who won and will in the future be the mascot of our house. I hereby let go of bad feelings from this morning. And start being excited about tonight.

Have a great day.

Readers, Masturbators, Workers!

I sometimes wonder who reads this blog. Not much, because to me, it's like pondering the end of the universe, or, what's going to happen after death, or, why did I choose these fucked up parents and not someone loaded, loving, and a little more Larry Davidish? (Sorry, Memsahib President aka My Holy Mother, I didn't really mean that. And you actually are pretty much like Larry David. When you get to know you.) Anyway, who reads this blog is most of the time a huge mystery to me, and I don't try to drive myself insane by figuring out the impossible. I imagine a very good deal of the hits are some fucked up idiots with a hard on in their hand, who get so disappointed when they type "fuck" or "asshole" or "bukkake", or "Mother Mary goes down on the Lord", and then they end up in here - fucking eh; Am I going to masturbate to this wordshit, where are the pictures, lady, and what's it about sexy cows being bullies and all this WORDSHIT??? - this is not what I was looking for, fucking fucking fucking Google fucking HateGoogleFuck!!!! I imagine all these poor souls getting directed in here because of my dirty language, and all the disappointment and all the shrinking dicks it has caused. I'm sorry. I mean, I could be sorry.

Actually, I don't think I ever wrote bukkake before. Now I did, even twice, and expect it to get the hit counter to go beserk. WELCOME BUKKAKE SEEKERS!! But guess what? This is not a bukkake blog! Hahahahahaha, you wasted your precious horny time reading this, oooh, aahahahaha....oh, ahaaa, yep, I'm a small person, who enjoys not satisfying horny people. Coined.

Then once in a while, it happens, that I meet someone, who tells me that they occasionally read my blog. It's usually combined with the phrase, When I'm really bored at work. Or, When I should be studying. Or, When I'm breastfeeding (love that one, that's like supersubtle petting on some sophisticated level, much better than masturbation as an activity in front of a blog, I mean. Like, I would be really ANGRY if I found out, that you were naked right now, reading this. It would just piss me off. Do NOT read this blog naked. Just DON'T! For fuck's sake. Is that too much to ask? But, ok, you can breastfeed. I like that.)

This week I ran into an old friend who said that she reads my blog. She did the other usual follow ups to the phrase; told me it's a huge blog, almost excusing that she's not reading all of it, secretely checked my paleness-level to see if I ever do anything else in life than sit indoors and write this huge blog (at least she did not, as I've tried before, at all get accusing and hostile about this volume fact - som people react as if I'm trying to force them to read a phone book or something extremely massive and horrible. That is the point where I usually very humbly try to point out, that they typed the address in the little funny window and stayed there, and I really appreciate it, and I try to stop myself before I hear myself make excuses for all this blogging I force onto them), then she not so secretely looked at my teeth to see if I actually do floss as I say I so wish to do, said she really enjoyed the blasphemy and the posting about the bank - actually, that was a really funny one, the one about the tremendously stupid blonde and the doorman, I think I'll repost that one tomorrow as a celebration of a time I was really funny, I think I've been blogging long enough to do that, I mean, how many repeated editions are there not of Bob Dylan songs, not to mention Leonard Cohen, and how many times in how many collections have the same old tedious Hemingway short story about a man and a man, and a man, and maybe another - oh, here it comes - man, not been published over, and over, and fucking over again, can I not republish a single blog posting to manifest its greatness, I think I can and will tomorrow, and by the way, it'll probably be the closest I can get to satisfy those horny bastards confusing their way in here anyway, I mean, stupidity does after all seem to be the most solid turn-on factor and basic ingredient in all porn, the one thing they never let down or leave out of the movies is the amazingly mindblowing stupidity they display in every facial expression, every dramatic curve, every set-up, and every grunt in every fucking porn movie ever made. In the right mood, at the right level, with the right attitude and intention, I believe tomorrow could be a good posting for a good jerk-off. Just focus on the sexy aspects of being completely emptyheaded - and working in a bank, administering other people's money!! I'm almost turned on myself now, better stop and save my energy for tomorrow. Mmmm.

So, I know now, that she sometimes stops by here. I'm happy and proud to know that. Whether or not it's because she's bored at work, I'm just happy to know she enjoys to read. And whether or not she masturbates while doing so, that doesn't really make the difference either. And then again. What would actually thrill me would be to know, that the core reader of this blog generally was the bored, masturbating person reading at work. What an interesting segment of the population to have a hold of. Anyway. Thanks for reading, whoever you are, whatever you're up to.

Quotes I Dig

Alcoholics build defenses like the Dutch build dikes. I spent the first twelve years or so of my married life assuring myself that I "just liked to drink." I also employed the world-famous Hemingway Defense. Although never clearly articulated (it would not be manly to do so), the Hemingway Defense goes something like this: as a writer, I am a very sensitive fellow, but I am also a man, and real men don't give in to their sensitivities. Only sissy-men do that. Therefore I drink. How else can I face the existential horror of it all and continue to work? Besides, come on, I can handle it. A real man always can.
Then, in the early eighties, Maine's legislature enacted a returnable-bottle and -can law. Instead of going into the trash, my sixteen-ounce cans of Miller Lite started going into a plastic container in the garage. One Thursday night I went out there to toss in a few dead soldiers and saw that this container, which had been empty on Monday night, was now almost full. And since I was the only one in the house who drank Miller Lite--
Holy shit, I'm an alcoholic, I thought, and there was no dissenting opinion from inside my head - I was, after all, the guy who had written The Shining without even realizing (at least until that night) that I was writing about myself. My reaction to this idea wasn't denial or disagreement; it was what I'd call frightened determination. You have to be careful, then, I clearly remember thinking. Because if you fuck up--
If I fucked up, rolled my car over on a back road some night or blew an interview on live TV, someone would tell me I ought to get control of my drinking, and telling an alcoholic to control his drinking is like telling a guy suffering the world's most cataclysmic case of diarrhea to control his shitting. A friend of mine who has been through this tells an amusing story about his first tentative effort to get a grip on his increasingly slippery life. He went to a counsellor and said his wife was worried that he was drinking too much.
"How much do you drink?" the counsellor asked.
My friend looked at the counsellor with disbelief. "All of it," he said, as if that whould have been self-evident.
I know how he felt. It's been almost twelve years since I took a drink, and I'm still struck by disbelief when I see someone in a restaurant with a half-finished glass of wine near at hand. I want to get up, go over, and yell "Finish that! Why don't you finish that?" into his or her face. I found the idea of social drinking ludicrous- if you didn't want to get drunk, why not just have a Coke?

Stephen King, "On Writing"

Gendered Language

Can a cow be a bully, and a bull be a coward?

Back and Forth

Almost done with the translation of No Other Life, a poetry collection by Gary Young. 162 poems, now existing in Danish as well. So far I've had two people read and edit my translation. I have one final guy about to edit them, he's a linguistics guy, a Danish friend from University of Copenhagen and UC Berkeley. With a great interest in poetry. I'll be completely confident when he's done. My mother reminded me yesterday: Translations are like women. Either they are ugly and faithful or they're beautiful and unfaithful.

I could write long and tediously about the challenges of translation. Like, punctuation. I love commas, but often they won't work in Danish. The English comma often has to be replaced with a : or a ; or a " or a . - not to confuse. It can hurt, like really hurt. Visually, breath-wise, timing, flux, oh, it's so different. Commas are like dear little pets, like, you know, fleas or ticks I suppose, but then really sweet and well-educated ones, the kind you want to keep and can't help adoring and feel gratitude towards. But the replacement can be necessaary, you don't want to activate the many layers of thought in the reader, going, Oh, ok, this was in English where it made sense, now in Danish you mean, yeah, ok, I get it, I'll just read these lines again, now that I know what to get from them. I neither want to perform violence upon the Danish grammar to insist on some originality, some word, some wonderful, magnificent comma, which otherwise would be lost. I will loose it. Something will always be lost in translation. I definitely avoid being overly creative in Danish in order to keep everything as close to the original as possible, because I sense the constant risk of some weird and constructed Danish taking focus. I abstain from really using my own originality in replacing irreplacable meanings and experessions, simply because it feels too unfaithful and immediately would - for me - involve a thought about the translator, aha, smart translation, mhm, something like that. I don't want anyone to think of me while reading Gary Young. No, I want you to read smoothly and pleased. Not think it's a good translation, not be confused, but just enjoy the language and get the content, the athmospere, and the poetry, without ever thinking about it coming from another language in the first place. Actually it was Gary who once said to me, your readers don't read the story. They read the writing.

I've done this translation for fun and passion, I still don't know if anyone wants to publish it. They should, I think it's great. I'd want the Danish people to read this. But poetry is hard, people don't really read it. Maybe there's not enough crime and thriller in poetry. Maybe it can be too good, too sensitive, too into your heart to bear. If a Danish poetry collection sells more than twohundred copies, it's a huge success. Anyway, I did it for my own pleasure of working with the wonderful poetry of Gary's, and the challenge of re-creating it in Danish.

A poem from the book- in English and Danish:

I discovered a Journal

I discovered a journal in the children's ward, and read, I'm a mother, my little boy has cancer. Further on, a girl has written, this is my nineteenth operation. She says, sometimes it's easier to write than to talk, and I'm so afraid. She's left me a page in the book. My son is sleeping in the room next door. This afternoon, I held my whole weight to his body while a doctor drove needles deep into his leg. My son screamed, Daddy, they're hurting me, don't let them hurt me, make them stop. I want to write, how brave you are, but I need a little courage of my own, so I write, forgive me, I know I let them hurt you, please don't worry. If I have to, I can do it again.

Jeg opdagede en dagbog

Jeg opdagede en dagbog fra børneafdelingen og læste: Jeg er en mor, min lille dreng har kræft. Længere fremme havde en pige skrevet: Dette er min nittende operation. Hun siger: Sommetider er det lettere at skrive end at tale, og jeg er så bange. Hun har efterladt en side i bogen til mig. Min søn sover i værelset ved siden af. I eftermiddag pressede jeg hele min vægt ned over hans krop, mens en læge førte nåle dybt ind i hans ben. Min søn skreg: Far, de gør mig ondt, lad dem ikke gøre mig ondt, få dem til at holde op. Jeg ønsker at skrive, hvor modig du er, men jeg behøver lidt mod selv, så jeg skriver: Tilgiv mig, jeg ved, jeg lod dem gøre dig ondt, du skal ikke være urolig. Hvis jeg bliver nødt til det, kan jeg gøre det igen.

Gary Young, No Other Life/Intet andet liv

Guidance

She said to me: In spiritual practice, you have a choice. Your choice will lead you down one of two paths. There are no other ways for you than one of these two. Either, you write the books you want to write. You use your gift. Or, you choose not to write the books. And to live with the pain of not writing the books you want to write. It's your choice.

Behind and a Little Ahead

Sometimes I don't know (truth correction: I never know) if I'm escaping something behind me or chasing something ahead of me. I know I'm on the move. I know it's possible to keep something from my consciousness by moving, but it's not possible to keep from my consciousness that there's something, I'm trying to keep away by the constant moving. I have a sense of lack of peace. Restlessness. Disturbance in the stomach and the back of the head, right where the skull meets the neck.

It's the luggage of having had a hard life, of carrying that along somewhere in the heart, of it weighing just that enough to maybe not dominate, but neither to ever be forgotten. It wipes life melancholic and, even with its wonders and daily joys, sings a note of blue that can't be taken out of those days. I see, hear, smile, enjoy, read, eat, love, but I hear it all the time. The shame, the guilt, the burden of never having done well enough. Of probably having forgotten something important. That's the basic backwards.

Ahead is the dread of letting down time, possibilities, opportunities, life. Trying to make promises, trying to believe to be able to keep them. Trying to catch the dust in the air, not just forgetting and not paying attention to what is, what is right here, right now, around me, with me. Ahead, trying to be present. Ahead, seing fulfillment of ambitions. Dreams come true. I fear deep down in the pit of my stomach, more than anything, even more than death, to not use my own potential. I fear to let myself down. I fear to want and not do, to go but not get, to be able and then be too arrogant to use that ability. I fear death mostly in the perspective of dying without having done shit.

This week I turned thirty-two years old. My siblings gave me books about Karen Blixen, whom Americans will know as Isak Dinesen, and about Herman Bang, Danish author. My Man gave me a trip to Iceland, we'll be going in July. And then he gave me a present, which I'll probably soon have to write something about here. It made me discover, that I have not sofar been a complete woman. Because I haven't had my own one until I got one yesterday. I finally got my own fishing pole.

Can I be having a crisis of some kind? Here, I must say, that these thoughts are in no way particularly new or more present now than they normally are. But I imagine calling it a crisis, a late thirties-crisis, maybe an early forties-crisis, or, maybe I won't get older than sixty-four, and then I can actually be having a mid-life crisis, well I just imagine that a crisis would be convenient, and maybe even end up explaining something. Maybe what I'm running from. Or chasing ahead.

Braveheart

I often talk to the Man about smoking, he smokes. I hear this me talk, fussy, worried. Danger, lung cancer. Now spring has come. The Man has worked in the garden and been out sailing. He's got a great tan now, dark and outdoorsy, a great tan. I talk about skin protection, sun screen, UV rays. Yesterday he asked me, Are you afraid I'm going to die from you? I said, Yes. And surprised, because I was just talking about sun screen when he asked, I started to cry.

Sir Mixalot - Baby got Back

Dear Tony D

Today was one of the He-Man's best friend's birthday, and the three of us went fishing. I caught three trouts, but they were all too small, and I had to let them back out in the sea. It was great though, we stood out in the fjord and threw our lines. We had planned to eat what we caught for dinner, but and so none of us really, and so we bought steaks on the way home and had a great birthday dinner. Lovely day.

I got a new novel in my head. It's the story about a man called Corbin. To make a long story into a short sketch, he escapes his hard boarding school and lives in the street from the age of fourteen. He's an orphant. He meets Katharina soon after his escape, whom he loves instantly. I think she's two years older than him. He works his way up to be a merchant of some kind, achieves great success financially and socially. During his years of rising from orphant and street kid to successful businessman, the lovestory between Corbin and Katharina develops and continues. When Corbin is at the top of his career, Katharina leaves him. Corbin seeks and finds his mother. She's dying from cancer in a hospital by the time he finds her. Katharina told Corbin that she didn't recognize him anymore, he had become so different from the boy she met. The boy full of hopes of freedom, the lost kid looking to find and be found, the one longing to built something to replace the solitude and poverty of his school years. Corbin somehow adopts two little boys. I think someone working in charity contacts him because he by then is a wealthy businessman. He adopts a pair of twins, probably from Iraque or Palestine, probably from a refugee camp, at least from a place in which their destiny otherwise was uncertain. He looks up Katharina, shouts to her windows from the street, and eventually gets to see her. He tells her about the adoption. Katharina asks Corbin, But why did you do it? And Corbin understands. Fourteen months later, he once again looks up Katharina. She is now in a relationship, and Corbin says, that it must be like that, but he still wishes to thank her. He understands, that he only took the boys into his life to win her back, but now it is different. He wishes to thank her for pushing him the way she did, and tells her, that he is now the two boys' father. That he has grown into the role of being their father. That it changed his life, and changed him. Four days later, Katharina sits outside his house, when Corbin returns from work. She has ended her relationship. She says, that she wants him now, if he still wants her. He says, I have wanted you from the day I first saw you. They enter the house, the housekeeper is there with the two boys. Katharina immediately takes a liking in the boys, their beautiful eyes and loving arms around her neck. They like her. The future seems bright and happy. FIN.

Tony, it's been a long day. I caught three fish and got a new idea. Goodnight,

t

Girl Talk

"Whether or not she is more or less prepared, she senses a destiny in these changes, that removes her from herself. With them, she is thrown into a cycle, which reaches beyond her momentary existence, and she senses a dependency, which ties her to the man, the child, and the grave. In themselves, the breasts seem to be useless and obtrusive growths of flesh. Hitherto, her arms, legs, skin, muscles, and even the rounded buttocks, used for sitting, have had a very specific purpose. Only the sex, which she regarded as a urinal organ, has all the while been a little suspicious, but it was though something secret, which couldn't be seen by others. Now, the breasts make the sweater and the blouse tighten, and this body, which she thought was herself, she experiences as flesh, as an object, which others can see and look at. "For two years, I wore a cape to hide my breast, so embarrassed over it was I," a woman has told me. Another tells, "I still remember the strange confusion I felt, when one of my peers, an earlier 'developed' girl, one day bent down to pick up a ball, and I thereby saw two already heavy breasts behind her front cut. This body, which was so close to my own, and an image of how my own body was to become, made me blush over myself." A third: "A man laughingly made a remark about my heavy calves, when I as a thirteen-year-old walked bare-legged in short skirts. The next day my mother let down my skirt and gave me stockings to wear. But I will never forget the shock, from suddenly experiencing that I was looked at." The girl gets the feeling that her body is slipping away from her, that it is no longer an expression of her individuality, but something alien. And simultaneously it occurs, that others start to perceive her as an object. She is noticed in the street and remarks are made about her body. She only wishes she could become invisible, is scared of becoming flesh, and scared to reveal her flesh.
In many young girls this disgust shows as a wish to slim down. They refuse to eat, and are they forced to do so, they throw up. They constantly monitor their weight. Others are struck by pathological shyness and feel it as torture to have to enter a room, or even walk the streets."

from "Le deuxieme sexe II", Simone de Beauvoir, 1949 (my translation)

A Poem

A human being has four needs.
Fire, bread, embrace, and quiet conversation.

Katzanzakis (freely from my memory since I can't find the original poem)

Tiny Gu

The Letter I Never Wrote

Today is a day of sorrow. My friend is dead. Today is also a day of guilt, for me, bad, stupid, empty guilt. I need to write. I just sit alone and cry, I cried last night, I cry all day today. My friend wrote me eight emails in the past couple of weeks. I only replied to one of them. The first one, in which he asked why we hadn't seen each other for so long. I smiled, when I read it. It was somehow funny and typical, we'd usually see each other several times a week, and now a surprised email, why hadn't he seen me for six months? Could we meet the next day, catch up? I replied that I was back in Denmark. I sent him love, wrote and asked him to write me again and tell about life in Santa Cruz.

I've lost my deaf friend. I've written an earlier blogposting about him and our friendship. He wrote back after my email, in fact he wrote me seven more emails back. Some short, just saying he missed me, some longer, and more and more questioning why I didn't answer, asking me to please get in touch with him asap. I was lame. I didn't answer. I received but didn't reply. I didn't write the letter, he asked me for, I didn't include the picture, he asked me for, not to forget how my face looks, I didn't write about my life here in Denmark, I read the one mail after the other, and figured I'd answer eventually. I neglected my friend's reaching out, his words about missing me and wanting to catch up and stay in touch. And then late last night, a common friend sent me an email with links to the news reports. My friend was crushed under a truck two days ago. Today is a day of sorrow and guilt. Here is the letter, you asked me for, that I never wrote.

My friend.
You were so funny. Of course you'd also be funny like this. How do you think I feel now? I feel horrible. Couldn't you have stayed out from underneath that truck just untill I had got my ass up and had written you back? I've been sobbing all day today. Because of you. Because you're gone. Because you were such a piece of life. Because I miss you.

You were my only deaf friend. Now I have no deaf friends. I imagine you and I will meet in Nangijala again. And then, you will hear. Skorpan's legs were straight when he looked down, and I'm sure you will stand in a meadow and wait for me, when I come. And you will open your arms, and shout to me, The birds, Tine, hear the birds. And you will smile your big lovely smile, and I will laugh and run towards you. There, I will hug you and say I've missed you, and you will say, I always wondered what your laughter sounded like. Your voice is much deeper, than I thought. And I will hum very deep, and you will laugh. And I will laugh with you, and say, How amazing, you and I are talking. And you will say, It's like that, here in Nangijala. Look at you, you've lost ten pounds. And I will look down, and say, Oh dear, do we all just perfect out when we get here? And you will bend down and pick a small white flower, and give it to me, and we will walk over the meadow together. My friend, I will say. My friend, you will say. Good to see you again, yes, you too, good to see you again, we will say.

Today, I listen to the soundtrack from The Big Blue. To Morton Feldman's Rothko Chapel. To Gavin Bryar's The Sinking of the Titanic. I try to feel your deafness. It's impossible. I imagine your silence. I try, but I can't. But, my friend, I do love silence. When I think of you today, I think of the silence you lived in. When I think of you today, I think of silence.

The biggest sensory experience I've had lately, was in the Sinai Desert. I was in Egypt over New Year, it was a great trip. It was with my He-Man, you should meet him, I know you would like him. I haven't met anyone yet who didn't like him, and I know how you would give me a thumb up and a nod and a knuckle. Behind his back of course, just a recognizing compliment from you to me, that I've found such a handsome and good man. Anyway, he and I and a couple of his friends went to Egypt. We went on a tour out in the desert to hang out with some Beduins. We walked, rode on camels, ate food with them, they danced, and we smoked shish, water-pipes. And then, half an hour before we were leaving the camp site in the desert, we left the camp, walked out into the desert. We walked into silence. It was the most amazing feeling. It was wonderful. It was more silent than any silence I've ever experienced. It was peaceful. It was a silence stretching far. It was complete. The Earth did not make a sound miles, and miles, and miles, and miles away from where we stood. There were no people, or animals, or winds, or vehicles making sounds. There was sand. Rocks. Sky. Moonlight. Silence.

It rushed through my body. It was freeing. Intoxicating. Massive. It was a gorgeous impression of the world, an unquestionable and enormous and unison sound of no sound. I'm disabled as a hearing person, I can only hear that grandiose silence as a sound of no sound. And I felt a thrill in my entire body, I had a magic and happy response to the moment. I felt consumed by the world in the seconds and minutes it lasted.

As a musician, I appreciate the pauses undescribably. The silence in the music is hard to explain, but it's for me where the magic can happen. The best I know is the beauty in between two lines I'm singing, two lines that both work, which are performed exactly the way I wish to perform them, the phrasing, the volume, the pronounciation, the tonality, the improvisation, it all works. But in between those two lines, in the breath, in the awaiting, in the opening lies the world of possibilities. Lies the listener's own attending contribution. Lies the uncomposed, the unexpected, the universes we don't know, but try to approach in the sung lines. Lies the respect, the understanding between performer and listener, lies the love for what was, and what's to come, and the unspeakable understanding of the fragile room in between those two moments in time and space.

Sometimes, when I fight with my He-Man, I wonder who of us is the deafest. And sometimes when we sit close, and look at each other, stroke each others' hair and look into each others' eyes, in silence, I feel we say the truest things ever to each other. I feel he tells me about all the sorrow he has felt before. I feel I say, that I have felt and know the same sorrow. I tell about the dreams and wishes I have. I feel he says, that he shares those dreams and wishes with me. He tells about the sudden lack of confidence that can hit him. I feel I say, that I also loose confidence and fear a life without him. I feel we tell each other that we will try to carry each other through. That we have trust and patience. That there is a beauty between us, that only we can see. I feel we say, that we see the beauty. We promise each other, that we will take care of it. That we will treat our beauty as carefully, as was it a newborn on the arm. I feel, that we somehow say and hear these things. Our best talks are in these silences. We listen in these silences.

I remember biking with you. I couldn't even imagine the muted world you biked in. You and I biked together through heavy traffic. You were a good biker, you were always on that bike of yours. He got you, this truck man. With a load of cement sand. He didn't even know he had drawn you in under his truck, the police stopped him out in the intersection of Highways 1 and 9, and told him he had just clipped you and killed you at Mission and Bay. Poor guy, especially if people have told him what kind of a person you were. Man, he must feel bad.

I sometimes feared that you had a shine of happy cripple, that I didn't see through. But I always ended up thinking that that wasn't it. You were just a good energy person. Who happened to be deaf. You survived a brain bleed fourteen years ago. But you were alive. And healthy. And glad. Such a cheer me up person. You taught me sign language. We spent hours of our time together with that. Now I don't care, I learned those many signs to be able to communicate with you. Thank you for the many lessons. And thanks for the many funny signs. And the sweet ones. And the obvious ones that were easy and easy to impress you with the next time we met. You and I shared an imtimacy. I could hand spell, so usually when you entered a room and went around and said hi to people, it was with me you sat down and had a conversation and hung out. I loved being your friend, that you could talk to. It made me feel able to normalize you. Meet you. Hear you.

Do you know the feeling when you meet someone, and they have a bad conscience for some reason, forgot to call you or whatever they've felt they should have? And the first thing they do is to make you understand, how many bad feelings you have caused them lately. Well, I don't want our friendship to turn into me feeling bad over not writing you back in time. That's not fair. You've always only made me feel good, and I'm sure you don't want me to remember you and feel bad. I want to be fair and not ruin all the memories of us by letting them end up in a final guilt. So, please forgive me. I will try to forgive myself.

Maybe, when we meet again, it will not be, that we both hear. Maybe we meet in silence. Maybe I am to enter your world of peace. Maybe in Nangijala, perfect is not hearing, but rather that I'm finally fluent in sign language. I don't know. Dude, we'll meet again. Don't know where, don't know when. But I know we'll meet again, some sunny day. I can't begin to tell you, how sorry I am. I'm devestated. You're really dead. It's true, I have to learn that it's true, you, my friend, your life ended under the wheels of a truck, coming from Pilarcitos Quarry with a load of 7,800 pounds of sand, to Los Animas Concrete in Santa Cruz. That was you. Finish. Over. Done. Stop.

You asked me to please stay in touch. The silence, my friend. In the silence of this world, I will be in touch with you. In the beautiful, peaceful, amazing silence, I will feel you, touch you, remember you. I will think of you, and stay in touch. You are forever with me. I treasure what we had together. I'm sorry I didn't write you, when you were still alive. Please, say you guys in the Heavens read blogs. Say hi to my other friends, who have already passed. I cry a lot today. Wait for me. I will see you there, and hug you and laugh with you again. Untill then, I will miss you.

Goodbye, t

Golden Orange Valleys

All right, all right. I know. I'm on a bad path. I'm blogging about the most ridiculous banalities of my life with the highest self-importance I can muster. I spent several words yesterday telling you about my breakfast. I honestly believe that you have to be Anthony Hopkins to have the right to entertain other people with the exciting subject of what you had for breakfast. But I'm weak. When it comes to judging, I can be very weak in my self-estimation. And actually believe, that someone will find it thrilling to know, whether or not I eat fruit for breakfast these days. I guess in my head, I make a, well, me and Anthony kind of judgement, saying, we are interesting people, Hell, I'll let them know what at least one of us had for breakfast today.

What did I do last night? I forced myself, along with one of my books, on the literary critic that I probably respect the most these days. Why, but how, what are you saying?

He's a sharp man, very aggressive pen, high standards, and I recognize a character trait or two in him; he's completely megalomanic and believes the world would be better off did he only critique every written word ever written in it, he's very humoristic and has a problem with everything having to be so very deep to have literary value. Stuff like that, I like him, and I like to know that there's so much he doesn't like. Makes me feel safe. A critical person has to be able to get seriously pissed off, especially over bad quality and idiots and bad writing.

He's writing for the best newspaper in Denmark when it comes to cultural stuff. He has a performance he gives, in which he tells what not to read. He brings a plastic bag of the last years' worst popular books (now two bags, because bestsellers have become generally huge) and lets someone in the audience draw a book. He then kills it with critique, and so it goes, next book, next. Very entertaining, because there's so much shit out there, and why not laugh at it and know, that we know better and are smarter than that.

He started last summer to publish some of these critiques from his show in the paper. I read some of them, I like the guy, I'll usually go straight to his writings in the paper. On his list of writers behind the hated books, he calls them his favorite aversions, is one day in the fall 2007 the writer: Mette Tine Bruun.

I have tried to google myself, and there I have encountered this helplessly horrible pathetic looser poet woman - WITH MY NAME. Alas. Thank God I'm not vane, then this might bother me. Thank God Denmark is among the biggest countries in the world, no one in the milieu will ever think, writer, Tine Bruun, Tine Bruun Writer - that Tine Bruun? (Notice how Tine Bruun Writer metrically feels very similar to Paperback Writer. Am I a blurred Beatles song? Is this a future prediction and will everything I write come in paperbacks? How did McCartney know this? In 1966?) Why would anyone ever say to me, oh yes, Hi Tine Bruun, I read your poem about that flower in the middle of the dark field, man, you must have had a bad day that day, what an image, I'm sorry, man. And I'd have to say, that's not me, hey, you've got the wrong Tine Bruun here, MAN! No fucking flower in no fucking field, OK?

Anyway, I'm a good person. I read, that this critic suffers from the same feeling as me when it comes to her - she sucks. So, when I read that, in the paper, in the fall, my instant thought was to soothe him. Comfort. Show him compassion. And who would be better to do so than the other Tine Bruun Writer in this world? Who else could balance out her evilness with some other writing, of another quality, of another world than hers? Like, of mine, yes.

Of course I imagine that I would be Pollock and he would be my Greenberg. And we'd live happily ever after, I'd produce, he'd promote. Sort of.. team working, I guess. I throw and drip and pour some words around, he claps and shouts, Brilliant!! Da Capo!! No coincidences here!! Worth millions!! He could do the holding hands before his eyes tricks, open them in front of my newest book, open it, flap through, and as a message directly from God spontaneously shout out his judgement and excitement. Well, and even if he would hate what I write, I wouldn't mind hearing why. I've had a lot of useless critique, but his, I'd actually like to hear. Example of useless critique in my past, coming from one of the most talented writers I know, let's call him Doobie:

Doobie: You can't write this, it's too good.
Me: ?
Doobie: You can't, it's just.. too good.
Me: Shut up, what are you saying?
Doobie: It's like you stole it from Hemmingway.
Me: Stop comparing me to Hemmingway!
Doobie: It's not you, it's him, like it's not original. It's great, but it's too much.
Me: Don't you farcking compare me to Hitler!
Doobie: Just cut it out, ok Rita?
Me: (through teeth) Hrmnm.

I didn't cut it out. Why not? I actually have to say, Doobie is an amazing critic. I've sat in three creative writing classes with him, and apart from this one critique of me (where he's probably right too) I've only heard him give out critique as very few can do. He's one of those who can really read as well as he can write. Must become editor somewhere. But why am I not that into critiques and why did I not listen to Doobie that day?

The line he wanted out was an ending line in a short story I'd written. The story is a couple in their fourties. They go to a cabin. She turns out to be dying. She shrinks to a skeleton. She dies. The man goes to sit by the lake behind the house. Here are the last lines of the story:

"Robert sat on the bench all morning that day. Birds would fly up and circle the sky. There was ice on the lake and snow on the trees, and snow on the ice of the lake."

And it was the very last sentence, that Doobie wanted out. "There was ice on the lake and snow on the trees, and snow on the ice of the lake." It's a mirrored metric rhyme. Metrically, the rhythm is like this:

xx- xx- -- xx- -- xx- xx-
(anapest, anapest, spondee, anapest, spondee, anapest, anapest)

So the middle anapest (on the trees) is the mirror which the sentence folds around in equilibrium. Why keep it? Because I like it!!!!!!!! Termina! That's it. That's enough, that's why. I like it. I like to write like that. It's pretty, but it's not stupid pretty. It's symmetrical, which is peaceful and neat, and not at all mean and cutting edge and avantgardistically annoying and in your face. It rests. It strokes your cheek. And that's the kind of writer I like to be. I just slapped you by killing the heroine of the story, Robert's wife Chloe. Now, let me please stroke your tear-stained cheek. I put the story, along with Chloe, to rest. The symmetry is not there to over-pretty-do a pretty ending. It's not there to compensate for a lack of aesthetic quality. It's there because I like it to be there. I also say with it, that I rest my case. I let the story return to nature. To the lake and the weather and the changes, that are above me, and above the characters of the story. To the order. And the metric order is, for me, allowed to give a physical feeling of a reading (it inescapably will anyway). I don't end by throwing a rock or opening a storm. I end up with a dead beloved. And a covered lake. There is a moment there, a beat. The sentence folds itself out, opens up from inside and out, unfolds its two wings to land like a light and delicate butterfly, which can only and always be balanced in perfect equilibrium. Don't ask me to downpretty that.

I don't like that people compare me to anyone. Especially not old mysogynistic men with big ass guns in their drunken mouths. I like to feel my own writing. And feel that I write it. I don't imagine that I own shit anyway. It's not mine in that way, like I invented it, or I claim right to use it in particular. But it's mine if I like it. With that sentence, I honestly felt that it was mine. So I couldn't cut in an attempt to try not to be me, because being me might remind a reader too much of me trying to be someone else. I know when I copy and when I don't. I copy all the fucking time. But I know when I like it and when I don't. I like my lake and snow etc. Hemmingway didn't fucking patent nature. Did he?

Why else don't I care about critique? Because I haven't found the right way to work with it. So far, listening to critique has only made me make my writing worse. I've ruined stories because I've listened to people. But I'm aware of that being my weakness, not the phenomenon of critique. I'm sure there'll come a day when I have the right people and treasure them. There is an exception, Gary Young. Everything I've ever had him look at was improved. But till now, except from Gary, the best changes I've made have usually been to change things back from what critical voices made me change in the first place.

So, last night. I've written about Regensen before, the old dormatory where I live. Because of the history of this place, we can attract some really fine people here, ministers, writers, musicians, royalties, philosophers, scientists. Four hundred years count, I guess. And of course the snobby self-feeling we have in here, along with the fact that we're very clever and the bloom of the Danish youth. So, the critic came in here in our tiny library last night and gave his speech and performance for an exclusive crowd, I suppose we were forty people or so. It was fine. Afterwards, I went to him and told him that I had wanted to comfort him since the fall. That I had thought about sending him one of my books. And now that he was in my home, I asked if he wanted one? He did, and I gave him one. I tried to tell him that it was a handbound book from an edition of only fifty books, and that if he actually didn't care for it, then I'd appreciate to get it back somehow. That little piece of information disappeared, I guess also because I wasn't crazy about making the returning possible by forcing my phone number or address at him, that would be more like making a pass at him than actually making sure that he would be so rude as to call me one day only to tell me, that he did NOT want my book in his house for another second, if I would please come now and retrieve it. I tried to make him sit down next to me, to tell him this long emotional story about the other writer, and my name, and my giving him my book, not for him to review it, but for me to make him hopefull about this lovely name getting another opening in the future with my wonderful writings, but he then sat down on the armrest of the sofa, instead of in the sofa, so I became very small and stupid next to him, then someone brought him wine and thanked for the evening, then I stood up, not to sit there as if I waited for him to ask me to dance, and then we stood in the library, and I tried again, and asked if I should go and get him a book, and we had a friendly and almost relaxed moment, and then an extremely drunk strange man came and started talking to him/us, and we sort of pretended that the man wasn't completely shitfaced, which he absolutely was, and we listened politely to his weird shouting-mumbling about literature, and the critic looked at me, asking if this was my friend and I looked at him saying, can we please pretend this is normal, which we then almost did. I got the book. I gave him the book. It was ackward. It had to be. I generally love ackward, it's so human. This was over the edge, though, mainly because it involved me giving one of my books to someone, who hadn't asked for it. I met a critic in San Diego last year. Actually, we spent Christmas Eve together in a book store. She's reviewing for the San Francisco Chronicle and Chigago something, Tribune or what it's called. She asked me to please send her whatever I wrote. I haven't, because, I just haven't. It's not published big anyway, so I don't need reviews. But I like it to be that way around, giving critics something if they are so kind to ask for it. I don't like to force me on them. Last night I felt like I was a kid, asking his opinion of my drawing. But hey, the man came to my house. His choice. And there's a good chance I'll never hear his opinion anyway.

Today, for breakfast. I had an orange. I believe Tony had two pieces of toast done on one side, and a cup of tea. Please have a great day.

Rules update

A couple of weeks back, I wrote the posting, My Good Life Rules. It included some rules for my good life, and was also meant as a statement, that my life is good, it rules. So, does it? How am I doing? Well, I'm not blogging enough. I miss being around English speaking people in order to keep up the feeling of the language. And I've had so many problems with my He-Man, that it has been difficult to either a) write about them here, b) write on something else than the big issues going on in my head and heart. Instead, I'm lame. I look at my blog, and feel a miss, and an apathy, and a sense of neglect. We've had a couple of issues, where he's read something on the blog, and asked about it, and it's been most unfortunate. Not so much because of him, he's pretty tolerant and open to the fact, that I'm blogging. He's encouraging me to write, not trying to silent me. But there's something very strange in the fact, that we partly get to know each other through this blog. He doesn't have an open diary/entertainment site, that I can tap into and get a similar weird presentation of his person and reflections. I'm exposed here, and sometimes in a twisted way, which has never bothered me before, but sometimes does with him. Like, I'd like to be able to sort more in the info I give to a relatively new boyfriend, but I'm not. Then I should've done so for the past couple of blogging years. Not an option.

The life, the rules. I eat fruit for many of my breakfasts. I don't drink milk anymore. I get my oils. I finish with a cold shower every morning, that was an easy one because I have been doing so for more than sixteen years. I do yoga, but not as planned, more not for a long while and then for a couple of days in a row. I don't write my thesis yet, but have read six books by now for preparation. Queer theory, which I look forward to apply to Pippi Longstocking.

My boyfriend said the other day, that I'm a Pippi myself. Talk about a compliment. I'm really flattered. He said he'd thought about it often since I chose her as the subject of my thesis. Then earlier today I was thinking, That's such a great compliment, but ok, I don't carry a horse around. And then I remembered last year's Halloween party in Santa Cruz. A friend of my friend, an over 200 pound guy had gone out of my friend's house and in his drunken state laid down for a nap in the street. I went to talk to him and try to wake him up, but there was no contact. And then, well, I picked up the unconscious guy and carried him to the house. I heard that story many times since, and also heard it told many times since. Everyone who had been outside the house saw it, and found it much crazier than I did. But when I remember their version of the story and think about it today, I get it. He was a huge guy, and the story was simple; You picked him up!! My boyfriend doesn't even know that story. But he thinks I'm a Pippi. I smile, and remember that guy, and not to brag, but it makes me think, You know what? If I had a horse, I might damn well carry it around. Just because I could.

Gentlemen and Ladies

Men are like this: Big, strong, tough, raw, men have no feelings, they're made of stone or wood, men don't cry, men are funny and wild and brave, men make it big, men earn lots of money, men are good at technique and mechanics and machines and gadgets and things, men decide, men throw the ladies around when they're too much, men drink like pigs, men are pigs, men just want to use women and get as much as possible, men can't be trusted, particularly not those under forty.

Women are like this: Women have no humor, there are no funny women. Women have breasts, and that's probably the best thing about them. Women are not too smart, why they do best with simple tasks. Women are weak, they're afraid of everything, they're hysteric, they menstruate all the time and are impossible to be around, women back talk, women giggle, women are mean to each other and cruel in their hearts, women love children and animals and everything that's fluffy with little feathers and laces, women must be punished and kept down, women are vain and close to dying if they have a pimple on their ass or their favorite pants are in the laundry, women always think they're too fat, women never think what they do is quite good enough. Women think everything tiny is cute, even a miniature toilet is cute, and such a small horse and see that little flower, women always want more, you let them drive a car and the next thing they want to vote and have their own income.

Eddie Izzard - Sexy Tunes

My Good Life Rules

Finish with cold shower every morning.

Fresh fruit for breakfast.

No milk.

Alcohol max. every third day or only in the weekend.

Get vitamins and essential oils every day.

Write thesis Monday-Friday from 9 AM to 4 PM.

In bed before midnight.

Do yoga to CD twice a week, Tuesday and Friday.

Be kind.