Well, I wrote another chapter yesterday (this book goes to eleven!), but I have a sneaking suspicion it's crap.
The highlight of my day was riding my bike down to Handlebars, a rather astonishingly authentic and yet genuinely friendly biker bar. Y'all need to see this place. I will take photos tonight. Anyway, I decided to "drink my dinner," and no, I wasn't thinking Ensure. Struck up conversations not only with Sherry, the archetypal bartender, but with Toby and Steve (two late-fifties technical writers/potheads riding their BMWs from Wisconsin to Arizona) and Judy and Bruce (a staunchly pro-gay rights straight couple from Florida; Judy owns a hardware store). A good time was had by all, and when I left, Judy kissed me on the cheek and told me I have a "sweet spirit." Hee. Her don't know me very well, do her? (channeling Bugs Bunny)
I couldn't sleep last night, even though I was reading Real Simple (usually a guaranteed soporific). I was up 'til almost 2 doing "variety puzzles" ("Penny Press means puzzle pleasure!"). Then when I finally fell asleep, I dreamed I found out I was six months pregnant (Jim's response, in my dream: "That's why you've been gaining so much weight!"). Didn't wake up screaming, but I might as well have.
So naturally, today I am Downright Irritable. Would you like to know what's annoying me? Of course you would!
- There are two ladies sitting on MY COUCH (by virtue of my having occupied it for the last four mornings) in the Scarlet House. And they are having an IRRITATING conversation about hurricanes.
- CNN is hyping a hurricane in North Carolina. Why, oh why, must we be subjected to shot after shot of Intrepid Anchors hanging onto telephone poles, buffeted by winds, lashed by rain and shrieking unintelligibly into their handheld mikes? Why, God, why? And where the hell do they get those ugly raincoats?
- There are two small framed prints on the wall directly opposite my seat (which is FAR INFERIOR to the becushioned comfort of MY COUCH). They bear the inscriptions "Cafe de Venice" and "Cafe de Tuscany." This is neither grammatically nor orthographically correct in any language I know. Not French. Certainly not Italian. It is bugging me, bugging me, bugging me.
- The restaurant next door is undergoing construction. Apparently union rules in Silverton require the presence of swarming masses of flies on any job site; and flies being the willful little creatures they are, approximately half of them have abandoned their assigned stations and fluttered in here instead.
But here is a bright spot in my day: to avoid CNN, I have once again cranked the iPod, and am now listening to LCD Soundsystem's "Daft Punk is Playing in My House." Great song, great song; but the bonus is that now I can make the lyrics more topical by changing them to "Fat Chicks are Sitting on My Couch." (Neither of them is actually particularly fat, but it scans better that way.)
Hell's bells (or heck's becks, if you're my brother)... is it 11:10 already? I must needs repair to my cabin and write, write, write. My sweetie is coming to see me tonight (huzzah!) and I need to get a good day's work in before then.
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