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Chapter Nine: In Which I Think Only Of My Harper’s Application

I am linking to this blog only because of the picture in the margin. I would include this picture in my application to intern at Harper’s if I thought they would understand just how eerie the juxtaposition of Anime-style art and a Confederate flag is. It’s their kind of weird, I think, but still I don’t think they’d get it. It’s still my kind of weird, of course.

(time passes)

This is to inform you that from now on anyone mentioned in my writing, for here or any other publication, will get a “-chan” suffix.

… and in the end, of course, it was discovered that Kissinger-chan had more to do with the orders to bomb Vietnam than Nixon-chan!!! X-D Here is a passage on the subject from Daniel Elsberg-chan which is s00per-niftee!

(more time passes)

Trixie Belden has a posse. I can’t believe it. People are even writing fan fiction… Trixie Belden, for those of you who don’t know, was like one-off Nancy Drew. Probably better for the teenage soul than the Babysitter’s Club or Sweet Valley High, because any girl who faces down bandits makes for a better friend than the girl who spends all her time worrying about the neighbor’s two-year-old, but still: garpy, badly-written, she always has to end up swooning over a redhead named Jim in the end, and there’s just too damn many of them. and of course I read all of the episodes I could get my hands on. I wonder what that’s done to my prose style in the long run. That and the Marguerite Henry.

Oh dear… Marguerite Henry passed away in 1997. Why wasn’t I informed?! Goddamn it.

(I chew my nails and stare out the window)

I am exceedingly tired of people who blog about their daily purchases or what they watch on TV or even what they’re listening to. If you’re telling me you shopped at Dress Barn today or saw the last X-Files or are listening to Live, you could be one of about fifteen million people living absolutely anywhere in the U.S. and having 100% identical experiences. You are completely replaceable. Who the fsck cares what you think. This is not what your brain and creative capacities were minted for.

sorry, mom. there’s another outburst of the sort you seemed to be trying to get me to temper in high school. I’m just frustrated. I sat for a quarter-hour today with a super-bright and exceedingly aggressive student of mine, having him run down his encyclopedic knowledge of whales, the solar system, and U.S. geography. At least part of his aggression is due to boredom. I wish I could send his classmates off to the mall where they belong and steal him away to the Natural History Museum for the rest of the week. (ok, not all of his classmates.)

Today I sent him off to computer class (it’s how we keep him occupied and away from the reaches of his classmates’ fists) with the admonition that he was not to open the control panels (which he did last week) or hack the Pentagon. “What’s that?” he said. “Don’t Hack The Pentagon,” I said. “I’ll explain later.” He looked interested.

(agitated shifting)

What I am doing: Blog

What I am avoiding: Tinkering with my resumé, applying for grants, putting the final touches on my Harper’s application, seriously considering what I want my future to look like

some days I want to let the dice fall where they will, and some days I want to aim for the New Yorker.

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