Ever

I love CN for posting this. And I love that I aced it. (Please note that I'm stealing her entire post. Because it was that awesome.)

1. The hit 1999 tween romantic comedy, Drive Me Crazy, was based on what fabulous tween book?

A. How I Created My Perfect Prom Date
B. The Boy Next Door
C. Makeover Madness

2. The prom scene from the hit 1999 tween romantic comedy, Drive Me Crazy, was filmed in what state capitol's rotunda?

A. California
B. Utah
C. Florida

3. What famous hobbit was supposed to co-star with Sabrina/Clarissa in the hit 1999 tween romantic comedy, Drive Me Crazy, but was cut because of his baby face?

A. Pip
B. Rudy
C. Frodo



Answers: 1. A 2. B 3. C


Editorgirl's trivia questions (I'm sending out prizes to people who answer)

Easy. Which classic tween sitcom did Melissa Joan Hart star in from 1996-2003?

Medium. Who played Chase Hammond's ex? (Hint: She later showed up in Heroes.)

Kind of Hard. Which band appeared as The Electrocutes?

Hard. In what novel was Dee Vine the main character?

Bonus. Which actor later showed up in (gasp) God's Army?

list

Lately my life has been feeling like the biggest To Do List I've ever faced.

To Do: Find a full-time job (with benefits, etc.). Find a ride to church (failed that this week). Reading for poetry workshop. Writing for poetry workshop. Reading for Prose for Poets. Writing for Prose for Poets. Laundry. Grocery shopping. Emails. Waking up. Cleaning the bathroom. Taking out the trash. Designing a chapbook. Editing poetry for chapbook.

There's no decent organization there, but that's how my life feels. I start on one To Do, and then get distracted by another. And more than once in a while, I give up and watch Leno (actually, it's usually Jimmy Fallon) and dig myself deeper into the List.

The List is stressing me out.

I can start explaining where I'm at for each item on the list, but what's the point. My writing is good, the revisions are hell (and that's what they're supposed to be), and my genius friend just painted the cover of my chapbook for me. I'm excited for the chapbook. I just need the poetry to come together. . . I'm not as confident as I was fall/winter. Now I'm just burned out.

Blame the List.

and she's whining again

Prose for Poets. I'm actually taking a class titled Prose for Poets. It's required, for the poets. We read prose (shocking), our prof tells us why it's good prose (not helping), and now we're supposed to write a 10-ish page prose "montage."

Yeah.

Here's my problem: Out of the four students in the class, two are prose writers taking the class for elective credit and one is doing cross-genre work. Which leaves little old me as the only non-prose-writing writer. I've tried to communicate this to the prof, but I'm not sure he even knows we're in the classroom with him. (Geniuses can get away with that, can't they?)

Tomorrow I'm supposed to turn in a draft. I have maybe 700 words. It's this weird essay-poetry hybrid on (shocker) Barnett Newman's Adam and Eve paintings and the creation myth and my relationship issues. Now I need, oh, a few thousand more words. But I've written out on Newman and creation. At least for this piece. Since it's "montage," I can piece disparate things together, but I want there to be something holding them together.

Here's my idea. And right now, it's not working.

Part of the A/E essay is a poem I wrote that begins "We met in an orange tree. In an oak tree where you held an orange. You held an orange. . . "

Anyway. I'm thinking of using the end of Frank O'Hara's "Why I Am Not a Painter" poem, meaning a collection of essays that aren't about oranges, but use orange at some point in time. Is this too weird?

Maybe I should sleep on it.

Note: I just had the thought that I could use the first line "I am not a painter, I am a poet" as the title for the Newman piece, and then use other lines for the other pieces. I'm overthinking this assignment. . .

thinking about this

dirty little secret

My name is [editorgirl] and I like weddings.

I love weddings.

Not going to weddings, but thinking about weddings. Reading about weddings. Planning (fictional) weddings.

You can read more about this problem here.

imitate

Simone (Muench, workshop prof) has given us the option of writing imitations instead of annotations for the poets we're reading this quarter. Wright, Komunyakaa (told you I could spell in my sleep), Kristy Bowen (I have no idea if that's spelled correctly), Robyn Schiff. . . I'm missing one, I think. Anyway.

An annotation is a two-page paper that focuses on one element of a poem: line breaks, punctuation, repetition/phrases, etc. They're required by the program.

An imitation is a poem that imitates the language and structure of another poem. You keep the form and use the same parts of speech, but the idea is to get away from the original language to create a new poem.

Almost everyone has been writing imitations. I tried my hand at it. I felt awkward and I couldn't seem to get far enough away from the original subject of the poems. Sigh. So I have been writing annotations.

This has brought up a whole new concern for me. There's a few poets I like to read to inspire me, but while I want to write as well as those poets, I don't want to write like those poets--where is the line? Is there a line? Should I go looking for new inspiration? Or should I just go one step further and try using Simone's imitation idea?

What do you think?

mormon fun fact no. 34

(Almost) Every Friday after work, I find myself at Nevin's Bar with a few friends from work. And (almost) every Friday, Jesse asks me how many hours of church I'm going to attend on Sunday. Most of the time the answer's 3. Explaining General Conference was fun, because it was 8 hours of church, but I got to wear jeans/my pajamas. (I also got to eat yummy Charity-popped popcorn, but I didn't tell anyone that).

What follows are random "Do Mormons __________?" questions, scattered throughout the few hours we're there. Occasionally they alternate with "Do you have _______ in Utah?"

Last night Jesse asks, with a completely straight face,

"Do Mormons eat nachos?"