Still going strong

Long time readers, take heart. Nelson Marans, long a regular object of my affection in this blog, is back and still writing letters to the NY Times. I haven't seen his name since October 25, 2009, when he got a letter published in the magazine but there he is, live and writing in to the Science Times to complain about cheating. This letter is so obscure, boring and scolding, the NYT didn't even publish it online. So I'm retyping it for you here.

What Cheating Says About Us
To the Editor: Re "Cheating's Surprising Thrill" (Oct. 8): Finding a thrill and even satisfaction after cheating is a sad commentary on our present culture. While those my age (nearly 90) would consider cheating close to a criminal act, the practice, now widely prevalent, is almost accepted as normal. It would have been interesting to see the same experiments conducted on people my age. Cheating and the pleasure derived from it mark a generation that has lost its moral anchor.
Nelson Marans
Silver Springs, MD

I'm a little worried that someone has created a Nelson Marans app that allows you to generate a letter-to-the-editor on any topic, because this is almost too spot-on. Glad to have him back, though.

Nelson Marans: Chemist, Writer

In an earlier post, I included a letter published in the NY Times and written by Nelson Marans. It was a good letter. I noted in dicta that Mr. Marans seemed to write to the NY Times a lot. I have not found a letter, published in Today's Chemist at Work, wherein Mr. Marans brags that he has written "nearly 6,000 letters"in his retirement. Damn. While I admit I am impressed, I hope that when I retire, I find a more interesting hobby. Or at least one that takes me outdoors more often. But when I look within myself, I realize that, in all likelihood, I too will spend my golden years writing sharp letters to national and trade publications. Sigh.

Nelson Marans, Back in the Game

Once a master, always a master. Nelson Marans has a letter in the New York Times Fucking Magazine today. No, I'm not kidding. And possibly for the first time, I agree with him. I tip my hat to you, Mr. Marans. (But I'm too lazy to dig up a link, so if you aren't a subscriber, tough.)

My Vigilance is Rewarded

Nelson Marans is dropping some knowledge on y'all over on the Science Times letters page. Don't think I am not watching, Nelson Marans. I am.

What else is going on with me? Not much. I updated Bay Area Hiking Mamas yesterday. I let someone give my child a buzz cut yesterday. No, wait, I actively encouraged it. It's really freaking cute. Our digital camera is broken, so you'll have to take my word for it.

He's Everywhere

Western Swing was good enough to bring to my attention the fact that I am not the only Nelson Marans "fan" out there. A DailyKos diarist has run afoul of Mr. Marans, who has accordingly blogged about it. Mr. Marans is clearly out of his league in a foreign policy debate about anything that requires more than skin-deep knowledge of the topic. He doesn't support Obama. He either (a) writes physical letters to periodicals, suggesting he is out of touch with technology, or (b) he is facile with basic technology, like Yahoo Mail, permitting him to email indiscriminately. Those are 3 ways that he resembles the McCain-Palin ticket. Just pointing it out.

The Reach of Nelson Marans

Blogging on my Q from the dentist office's waiting room a few weeks ago, People did a story on couples who have sex every day to improve their marriage. Our old pal Nelson weighs in: "When is there time for meaningful conversation and other requirements of a proper relationship?"
Oh, Nelson.
The couple responds: "It's not like we were locked in a bedroom 24 hours a day!"

My, How Time Flies

I just checked my blog, possibly looking to see if anyone has posted anything lately, and was surprised to see that my post acknowledging the great epistolarian Nelson Marans was written on October 15. I literally cannot believe that seven weeks have passed so quickly when it feels, some days, like time just crawls forward. Some days, I am in meetings so boring that I *wish* I could discover a Marans letter. It would truly be the high point of my day.

In the time since I last posted, I have been busy though. I have concocted a legitimate business proposal for which I am courting a serious investor (serious investor = my husband). I have written a rough draft of my first novel. I have maintained a sour dough starter per my New Year's resolution for 337 days, so it seems reasonable that it will last the entire year. I'm feelin' good. I'm at the top of my game.

You want to hear about the novel? Of course you do. Let me first say that I did it under the auspices of National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, an annual event where participants are expected to write 50,000 words in order to "win" the distinction of having written a novel. It's all based on an honor system, and there are no prizes. Some people, let's call them "hipsters", are skeptical of this method of creating a novel. Here are their arguments: (1) it's not "art" to do it racing against a clock; (2) there are a LOT of fan fiction scifi* jugbu** types involved (3) it's corny to participate in any activity that involves other people. At least, I think those are the arguments. Anyway, I have decided I will weigh their arguments more seriously once they provide me with 50,000 words of a rough draft of a novel.

I am actually not going to say a lot about my novel. It's "realistic fiction". (I don't know what is up with me and quotation marks today). It is not fan fiction or science fiction.  I titled it "Upstate" until I found out that there is another novel with that name, which is a so-called "urban romance" (OHMyGOD stop me from putting quotes around another thing!). My novel is nowhere near as interesting as the story about Antonio and the letters he writes his girl from prison. But whatever, mine is an okay story. You cannot read it yet, though. I am going to actually sit down and do a serious revision and probably write another 20,000 words before this baby sees the light of day. At that point, I will start tweeting it line by line. Kidding.

With 27 days left until New Year's Eve, I will go ahead and make this resolution: I will revise this novel and show it to at least some of you. Okay, how's that? Aiming high for 2014.


* science fiction
* juggling/bisexual union: a reference to the fact that in our college, there was a 100% overlapping Venn diagram of the members of the juggling club and the University of Chicago Bisexual Union, and all of them were very hirsute and very sketchy.

What Brings You to These Parts?

As I told you yesterday, I have the technology at my fingertips to determine where my readers are, and how they found me. I don't actually check all that often but I was prompted to do so by a more careful reader (okay, it was Mr. St. Scobie). Here's a list of google searchs that have brought you to me, my sweets.

1. works that opposed thomas payne's "common sense"
2. joe maguire and ann coulter
3. "pregnant milking FAN" on Polish google. Don't do this search, it delves into realms you don't want to explore. I am NOT kidding about this.
4. "blog's theme" on the Vietnamese google. Huh? Boring City.
5. pix of fireman Here again, I think the searcher was probably hoping for something a little naughtier than I dish up.
6. breakfast in a can and Htoo brothers
7. Nelson Marans is googling himself again. Although this search suggest Marans has a nemesis.
8. union auto plants
9. Amanda Cotten You remember her, don't you?
10. And, saving the best for last, mustache phobias

I am pretty proud of my failure of cohesiveness.

The Occasional Grab Bag

Its been hard to blog lately, for a couple of reasons. First of all, I am obsessed with politics, both national and my own local race, and since I can't gauge the enthusiasm of my readership for this topic (I think that pork roll got more love), I don't want to bore you to death. For next, I have been spending a lot of time in the car, and in anticipation of the coming illegalization of driving with a cell phone, or whatever, I am trying not to type and drive at the same time. Trying is the operative word but by July 1, I hope to be weaned from this nasty habit. Other reasons: the kids are less adorable now that they talk back; work is boring (there, I said it): no one has tried to unload clarinet instructions in months and the Afghan for Afghans plan is so far advanced, I can't make fun of it for fear of offending every last person I work with. The Wire has been off the air for months. Nelson Marans has been having some trouble getting published.

So what does that leave me?

1. Well, there's a new baby giraffe at the Oakland Zoo which, at least in the photos, is freaking adorable.

2. My older child now says things like, "If the astronauts want to travel to a new place, Mars is their best bet", " If we kill all the fish, it will hurt the planet", and "What's Buffalo Soldier?" This is a lot of stuff to answer to, and that was all basically in the 20 minutes before dinner tonight. Junior Jr. also has a lot of say, but it's in Spanglish, so we are still in the new exchange-student phase of communication: lots of smiling, nodding, waving of hands, and proclamations of joy when we understand one another. Then we repeat the understood phrase back to one another for a few minutes and all share a good laugh over it.

3. Michelle Obama lists Sudoku as an interest on her Facebook profile.

4. Our slate mailer went out on Friday and it looks great. I have gotten over 96,000 Google adword impressions and its only cost like $16. (In other words, if you live in my area and do a search for certain keywords, an ad promoting my candidacy will pop up).

4. We had 25 people distributing flyers on doorsteps on Saturday and "dropped" over 2000 flyers. Remember, only about 50% of people who will vote in June will even vote in this race. I really just need people to see my overlong name a couple times and then they will vote for me out of pure "that is a long-ass name" psychology. (That's an actual term of political science art, just ask Gov. Schwartzenegger)

5. I went to Redwood City today and gas was $4.49 a gallon. Holy crap.

Should I Keep This Up?

National Blogging Month really makes a gal focus on the important things. Like, should I keep blogging? I haven't really felt inclined most days. Plus, I went back to the beginning of this blog, and it was way better then. It used to have silly themes and random stories, and attempted at originality. Barely any of that exists now. Most of my snarky one-off comments have moved over to Facebook and Twitter, or I just keep it to myself because I am too worried that someone I work with will find this blog and it will be a disaster for my career. As I "mature" (and I mean that in a bad way), I worry more and more that this blog might be a platform for some terrible self-destructive revelation that triggers my downfall. Not like I am a big celebrity or anything, but that happened to a guy I tangentially knew, so I am paranoid. Add in the fact that I barely ever read new books, watch new movies* or buy new music - much less stalk the Montgomery Advertiser or Nelson Marans - and there is practically nothing to say.

Here's what I thought I would do. I thought I would do a poll of my various options at this point and let you, the readers, be the judge of this blog's fate. But then I decided that I was too lazy to figure out how to add a poll, so instead, I will just list the options, and you can comment on them. Be aware, if I don't get comments from certain people, I will assume that this blog has lost its core readership, and I may not continue it.

1. Stop blogging; I follow you on Facebook.

2. Stop blogging; I follow you on Twitter.

3. Stop blogging at this website; I will follow you onto a software platform that is easier to post to.

4. Keep blogging here. **

5. If you get fired from this or any future job because of any content or revelations on this blog, I promise to employ you at your last rate of pay ad finitem to continue this blog.

6. Yo no leer en Engles.

* We watched Scott Pilgrim vs. the World last night, and I really liked it. Best line from a tertiary character, "Their first album is so much better than their first album."

** You will need to add some vaguely flattering remarks if you vote for this one, as I am feeling very down on the quality of the blog at this time.

Sorry

Once I got in the zone of blogging like every day, I had hoped to keep up the pace. But even I ain't that witty and original. Plus, we were away all weekend. Here are some highlights from my favorite topics:

The Wire: Stressing me out. Why does Omar need to come back if Butchie's dead? I've seen ep 4 so I don't want to write much more because I want to respect my one reader who gives a crap about this and not spoil it for him. Suffice to say, I am having a really hard time buying this season so far. And there's a good S2 cameo in Ep4. Okay, that's enough. No more.

The kids: Hilarious little people. They loved the snow so much in Tahoe that, driving home, Li broke down crying, "I don't want (sob sob) the snow to EVER melt!"

Barack Obama: All my Edwards peeps, please please please breathe deeply of the reality of this campaign and vote for my guy on Feb 5. I love Edwards, too. But he will not get the nomination, and probably won't be a "kingmaker" at the convention either. I was listening to Hillary on the radio today and all I could think of was Betty Loren-Maltese. And let's be frank. No one ever wants to think about BLM. Plus, can you imagine four, much less eight, years of Bill Clinton lounging on the couch of the Oval Office, eating Funions and proffering his opinion on every damn thing? I assume even Hillary would kick him out by March 3, 2009, but who knows? "Two for the price of one" means two equivocating triangulators* for the bloody 2008 election of one. SO, if you were already planning on not voting for Hillary, them I invite you, nay implore you, to not vote for Hillary by voting for Barack. Thank you.

* whatever that means.

Nelson Marans: Don't worry, he's had letters published recently in the Washington Post and The New York Times (and here), opining about such meaningless topics as Amtrak and Barbara Cook: Songbird.

I don't have much else on my mind. Take it easy.

I Direct Your Attention

The first letter in the Science Times is written by the indefatiguable Nelson Marans, God bless him.

Ummm....

Due to the wonders of modern technology, I am able to view a list of searches that bring folks to my website. As a result of this, I believe that Nelson Marans googles himself pretty frequently.

But anyway, today a visitor to my blog came via a search for "child birth, whiskey". I just wanted to tell that reader, if he or she should visit again, that while it sounds like a good idea to combine the two, it probably isn't medically advised. Please seek professional help for either your alcoholism or your pregnancy or both. Thanks.

Best Comeback of the Day

The other day, my little family visited a private preschool in Berkeley during an open house. It was a lovely school but the focus of the other parents' questions* was how would the school handle their child's brilliance. "What will you do if a child is more advanced than his age? Can he accelerate through the curriculum?" This drove me nuts.

I have not come up with a way of dealing with it, but I like this NYT letter writer's approach to handling people bragging about their children:

To the Editor:
I would suggest as an appropriate response to over-the-top bragging of parents about their child that one should repeat back to them word for word what was said, with the statement prefaced by a comment about how fortunate one is to know the parents of such a gifted child. A similar, but adult, situation occurred when one of my friends touted the fact that he was a friend of a multimillionaire. My response again was simply that I was proud to be the friend of a man who was the friend of a multimillionaire. The bragging stopped immediately.
If you really want to brag about your children, wait 30 years and point out that your child gave you a car or a house, indicating that your offspring was worthy of praise, in the unlikely event that this occurs.
Nelson Marans** Silver Spring, Md., Jan. 5, 2006

*My hubs asked about how they impart values of social justice. When the teacher got into an explanation involving puppets, he then stood up and rushed out as though our child were in crisis. He was not.

** A search for this name on the NYT website shows that he writes into the paper chronically, getting a letter published on average every two months. This makes me question whether he has actually employed this approach. Whatever. I hope I have the nerve to use it someday.