Syllabus #224

 

My twice-annual reminder of how much I would hate to work in retail or otherwise have to touch and account for physical money has ended.  Book Fair, always a pleasure (to see you go).  My mom came to help, and I may not have survived otherwise.  Can I operate a book fair singlehandedly?  Yes.  Can I do it alone without nearly having an aneurysm and turning into the meanest shrew alive?  Not really.

Parents of young children:  Please teach them how money works.  Pay for things with cash in front of your children sometimes.  Also, don't send your child to the book fair with one lousy dollar.  You're setting them up for failure and disappointment; it's cruel.  You know how many kids cried this week because I had to be the ogre that told them they couldn't buy the [insert hot title here] Pokemon/Dog Man/Manga/Book with the Slime/Book with the Lego man/Book with the Plastic Megalodon Tooth with their $.37?  So many kids cried this week!  

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I would die of instant satisfaction if David Sedaris immortalized one of my foibles in his writing.  This person is ungrateful! 

Amanda Knox coming in hot with the practical sleeping tips you pick up in prison.  She and Martha Stewart should compare notes.  

Say it ain't so!  Everything that Wawa touches turns to gold, except for pizza, apparently.  

Oh wow, so many parallels between a Spirit Halloween and a book fair.  

Analog Reading:

Finished R. Eric Thomas's hilarious book of personal essays, Congratulations, The Best is Over!  I think I said that last week, but I can't be bothered to check.

Then I pedaled right on through Jennifer Weiner's The Breakaway.  I read a review of it in the New York Times in the past couple months that made it sound slightly more...literary?  This was solidly in the rom-com territory and wasn't quite what I was expecting.  I picked it up because the premise of a woman in her 30s leading a 2-week bike tour to get away from some personal drama sounded fun, and tt was an enjoyable, entertaining read, but I was unfamiliar with Weiner's writing before this.  

There was a lot of telling rather than showing, and some didactic stuff about feminism, body positivity, a woman's right/ability to make choices regarding her life path in general and bodily autonomy specifically.  Don't get me wrong, I'm all about those things, but it felt like the author was trying to heavy-handedly persuade someone who might have been on the fence about it all.  And despite all that, it still seemed like the main character, Abby, allowed other people to pressure her into cheating on her boyfriend with this lothario on two wheels.  

AND, despite the occasional typos and proofreading failures of yours truly, bad copyediting in published works drives me bananas.  The author THANKS her copyeditor in the acknowledgements, but I think that copyeditor did her dirty in at least two glaring instances.  The protagonist lives in Philly and works part time as a dog walker for a doggy daycare called Pup Jawn, but it seems like Weiner just straight up forgets one time and calls it Dog Jawn, which is just awful.  Pup Jawn is corny, but calling it Dog Jawn and not Dawg Jawn is just a missed opportunity.  Also, the author once described how Abby got up early and 'road' her bike somewhere.  No!  Fix that before you send it to the printers, woman!  But nobody asked me, did they?

Now I'm reading another memoir about growing up in New Jersey (there is a distinct Northeast theme to the last several books I'm reading) called Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City, by Jane Wong.  It's about growing up as a Chinese-American immigrant in New Jersey, and having a father with a crippling gambling addiction.  Uplifting!

Syllabus #223

We discovered that HBO Max is live streaming playoff baseball, so we have been watching the Phillies games.  I'm getting really into it.  I think baseball is my sport.  It's certainly the only one I can follow and understand, and I've never been groped by the mascot of another professional sport (I'm looking at you, Phanatic).  But anyway, even though it's on HBO, it's just a live stream of whatever TBS is broadcasting, so there are still commercials.  Which is wild, because I haven't watched TV with commercials in years, and all of a sudden I'm confronted with all these dumb products and services that we are supposed to want, that I honestly never even knew existed.  Like a Viagra-ordering website called FridayNightPlans.com?  Ew.  Also, it's apparently a rule that either Jennifer Garner or Pete Davidson must be in every commercial now?  I've missed so much.

It me

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Last Sunday, I made this Irish Seafood Chowder, but of course I didn't follow the recipe exactly.  I followed it in spirit.  I'm not about to buy fresh clams from either the Murder Kroger or the Always Smells Like Farts Kroger (doubt they even sell them), and I'm not schlepping across the river to Whole Foods to spend an inordinate amount of time and money on a meal that Andy will only begrudgingly admit is 'okay.'  So I used canned smoked oysters and canned smoked trout plus cod and mahi mahi out of the freezer.  I had but one sad piece of each fish languishing in packages that had contained an odd number of filets, which is annoying in a 2-person household.  And then I couldn't find leeks at Kroger (shocking) so I used a couple shallots and some yellow onion.  And then I didn't want to buy a whole container of half and half to use only 3/4 of a cup and have no earthly use for the rest, so I just used 2% milk.  Oh and I didn't have fish stock so I used vegetable stock and threw in a couple dashes of fish sauce.  How am I even allowed in the kitchen?  I thought it was great; Andy, naturally, deemed it 'okay.'  It paired well with this soda bread recipe, sliced hot and slathered with salted butter.

We are having our first book fair of the year this week, and my mom is just a glutton for punishment very helpful and likes books and children (and, I suppose, me) enough to come and help me run the fair.  We are in for a real treat this week.  After setting up the fair on Friday after school, I can confirm there does not appear to be anything questionable on the Celebrate Every Voice cart, and honestly I find it offensive that anyone would argue otherwise.  I'm not worried about anyone objecting to the content.  I'm just bracing myself for the onslaught of the kids who bring in a sock full of uncounted loose change, and the ones who hand over a sweaty fistful of crumpled dollar bills, and the ones who think 7 pennies is "seven monies" and that they can use their riches to buy the hardcover book with the shark tooth that costs $18.99 plus tax.  Oh and don't get me started on sales tax.  Or the specific family who thinks it is acceptable to purchase books on day one and try to return them on day five after they have very obviously been read from cover to cover.  But if any student asks, I'M SO EXCITED.

Analog Reading:

Finished Zadie Smith's The Fraud.  Wow.  The amount of research and planning and craft that must go into such a book makes me feel inarticulate.  

Breezed through R. Eric Thomas's collection of humorous personal essays, Congratulations, the Best is Over!  It was great!  Hilarious, insightful, irreverent, poignant, all the words that show in blurbs on a book jacket, but for real.  He is now in my pantheon of humor writers who could write the copy on a package of hemorrhoid cream and I'd be thrilled to use it:  David Sedaris, Samantha Irby, Chelsea Handler, I feel like I'm forgetting someone but that might be it.  

About to begin Jennifer Weiner's The Breakaway.  It sounds fun!

Syllabus #222

Fall Break has come and gone.  Now we're on a slow, cold, march to Winter Break.  I got a new phone (well, the oldest model of new phone that (very little) money can buy), got a haircut, visited the parentals.  All while the world burns and lives are falling apart over in Israel and Gaza.  I don't have anything worthwhile to add to the discourse, but it feels wrong not to acknowledge it at all.  I remember when it was a catch phrase in the early 90s to go around saying 'peace in the Middle East,' and I'm sure kids were just repeating it because it vaguely rhymed, not because we really had any ideas about the ongoing conflict, but it's sad to think a whole lifetime has passed and people are still killing each other about the same things.

 

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I am very anti-gun.  I am SO anti-gun that I would love to round up every firearm on the planet and throw them all into the mouth of an active volcano.  But if I thought a grizzly bear was gonna take me out on the way to the mailbox?  I am walking out my front door strapped to the nines like m.f.'ing Rambo, y'all.

Not me over here googling DOD school librarian jobs.  Fully stocked supply closets?  Higher pay?  Students who all have their basic needs met?  What is this fantasy land?

This article about the origins of 13 as an unlucky number failed to mention one of the most salient manifestations of the number - The Jersey Devil.

See also, Stephen King's (shockingly brief) 1984 essay on reasons to wrap yourself in bubble wrap and hide out in a bomb shelter whenever a Friday the 13th hits the calendar.  Nothing truly bad happened to me on this Friday the 13th, of October, no less, but I DID endure 7.5 hours of driving that should have been only 5.75.  I could have walked from one side of Chattanooga to the other in less time than it took me to process through the city limits on I-24.  

Analog Reading:

Sped through Laura Dave's The Last Thing He Told Me.  It really took some twists and turns, as a good thriller should.  

Savoring Zadie Smith's The Fraud.  I expect to finish it today.  There's so many layers of meaning.  It's so good, but I feel like I'm missing some of the historical references.

Syllabus #221

My weekend morning porch coffee habit might be coming to a natural hiatus for a few months.  It's been in the 40s at sunrise the last 2 days.  It's tolerable with a thick bathrobe and a hot coffee, but if it gets any colder, my fragile Reynaud's*-having fingies and I will be staying inside.

It's like meteorological fall held off until the exact beginning of Fall Break.  I'll enjoy wearing layers and not sweating for approximately 3 days before I will be ready for 80 degree weather to return.  

*A very real and not made up affliction that, ahem, some people insist is imaginary.

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A couple of interesting books about race and labor history 

When a writer is so amusing you'd read even their grocery list, and the universe gives you, basically, their shopping list.  Samantha Irby's roundup for The Strategist is funny, but her Substack newsletter reflecting on the concept is even more hilarious.  She makes a good point about not seeing normal brown teeth on TV anymore.  We don't really watch TV (what a pretentious thing to say, but I am who I am) so this isn't a phenomenon I encounter regularly, but last night we were at a bar having dinner and watching the Phillies/Braves playoff game, and one of the cameras zoomed in on a coach in the dugout, aggressively chewing something with his mouth open, and the sight of his jagged, nicotine-stained teeth in full HD relief was SO JARRING.  I think sports might be the last bastion of average human dentistry on television.

Analog Reading:

Finished Mr. Mercedes.  I did appreciate the ending, but man, was it tense for a while there (because of course).  Also, our pal Steve could use a more ruthless editor, but who am I to say that?  I mean, guy did write actually very good tome of advice on writing, the aptly named, On Writing, but maybe he should apply himself to the natural sequel, On Editing. It might be the shortest work he ever produces. 

 

Now reading Zadie Smith's new novel, The Fraud.  She strikes me as the opposite kind of writer from Stephen King (beyond genre and literary merit) in that I get the impression she labors, if not agonizes, over every word, whereas it's easy to picture King just sitting down at his keyboard and unleashing a firehose torrent of words, tweaking a comma or an adjective here and there, and keeping it moving.  At any rate, The Fraud is excellent.  It takes a while to settle into its rhythms, but then it's a layer cake of exploration into the human condition.  Aside from the most obvious case of fraud that lends the book its' title, is anyone really who they purport to be on the surface?  

Also picked up The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave, on the recommendation of a coworker friend.  It promises to be a fast read, so I promoted it towards the top of my always metastasizing physical and electronic TBR pile.  It's not a book I would have been likely to stumble upon on my own, but it's highly entertaining so far.  I always think I'm not really into thrillers or anything romance-adjacent, but then I pick one up and have to admit the appeal.  Also, I did devour V.C. Andrews' Flowers in the Attic series at an age when I was old enough to be fully aware and in thrall of how salacious it was, but too young to fully grasp all the references, so I can't be throwing rocks from inside my glass house, or whatever.

Syllabus #220

The high point of my week was a literal high point.  If you're not popping 1/4 of a perfectly legal 10mg Delta 9 gummy at 7:30 and in your jammies brushing your teeth with your electric toothbrush at 8:30, is it even Friday night?  

The low point of my week?  How could I ever begin to choose?  The inventory reads like a list of candidates in the Republican primary race - interminable and repugnant all the way down.

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Speaking of politics (let's not and say we did?).

Analog Reading:

I've been reading Stephen King's Mr. Mercedes and I have some notes.  Steve, hi, it's me.  Just a little constructive criticism, but the 1950s called and they want all their n-words back.  Every last one.  We don't need 'em anymore.  I feel like there's a way to show that Brady is a big ol' racist without having him think the n-word in his internal monologue every other paragraph.  

I feel like I shouldn't even be reading it at this point, but like, it's a library book, so it's not like I endorsed this language with my dollars.  Like, ok, Steve, we get that you're a white Boomer who lives in Maine and probably don't know more than a handful of Black people.  Maybe that was a valid excuse at the beginning of your career, when one could argue that it was the times and you possibly didn't know any better.  But now you are one of wealthiest, most famous authors in the world and your books have been made into dozens of films and tv productions.  Surely, someone, at some point, has suggested that maybe you, in your infinite creativity, can find some other way to convey to your reader that someone is racist without making them constantly say racial slurs.  Your audience is smart!  We will recognize racist dog whistles that aren't explicit racial epithets!  Show, don't tell!  Or maybe you can just come up with characters that are bad for reasons besides being racist!  There are other ways to be an awful human, racism is but one of them!  I don't know, just a thought.