Month: April 2005

Da’Bomb!

Writer guy

A restaurant explosion in Perth, Australia proves that roaches might be pesky, but the traps are a bomb. Literally. Chemicals from thirty-six ( ! ) roach bombs reacted with the pilot light of a stove and turned the establishment into confetti, causing roughly 500,000 dollars in damage. Three men suffered burns and minor injuries. Of course this is not funny, yet something about this story tugs at me anyway.

While my apartment doesn’t have bugs, I resided in one place that did. Overrun by pestilent beasts, I exceeded the recommended “coverage dosage” for the room by a few cans. However, not by a factor of 5 as the owners of the Thai restaurant did.

Guess sometimes it’s just easier to tear something down completely before rebuilding it. No word on the fate of the roaches or the Friday lunch special.

Springtime for Buddhapuss

Writer guy

Rapidly shifting seasons, for the line that separates spring and winter is but a slender reed, make Northeast life challenging. A few days ago the Wife and I huddled under a comforter, wore flannel pajamas and begged for heat. Today I’m cleaning out the filters on the air conditioner.

Now the landlord clangs away on his latest construction project – Buddhapuss Books first warehouse. After the second false start in as many weeks, it appears spring is here for real. Goodbye winter solstice, hello T-shirts.

To old man winter, I curse you. Do not darken my doorstep again for at least six months. You’ve feasted at this all you can eat buffet for too long, sir. Enough with your excuses, your comebacks, your pleadings. Your credit is no good here. You go now!

Sneak Blog

Writer guy

A cold snap ravaged New Jersey on Sunday, but orders on Amazon.com were hot, hot, hot! In more technical terms – Buddhapuss Books experienced strong sales over the weekend. Dear Invisible Hands that Drives Market Forces, please deliver 51 more Sundays like this one. Just pulled all the titles for the day’s packing chores.

Electra and Buddhapuss, in search of warmth and pillows, arose at 5am. Wrote for about six hours, two before the Wife woke up, four after that. More time than usual, so everything was lovely on that front.

Which brings me to the third unrelated tidbit. If one of your favorite authors died recently, and a selection of previously worthless paperbacks by that writer has wasted away on the shelves for years – is it wrong to sell those books on the Internet for quick profits? Or is this “selling out”? I’m curious how beloved some used paperbacks can really be.

Peepshow

Writer guy

Scheduled or not, my meeting Wednesday with the landlord went like most – a cancellation declared by absence. Since he didn’t show, I peeped through the frosted glass windows of the storage room in question. Inside, a garden hose, a mattress, and a fake Xmas tree. And space. Lots of space. The exact dimensions are unknown but the eyes say, or want to say at least, enough for eight to twelve shelves. Thank you, Jesus!

On the writing front, Velocity continues. Following a top down edit of the first one hundred and ten pages last week I tossed one and a half. I say again � after a thorough edit � just over one percent of the content was excised. That was, I must note, a personal record. Honestly, the cut scene had bothered me for six weeks, and I suspected death beckoned, but had hoped that time might alter my perspective. Time lost; scene terminated.

It’s pretty cool after investing months on a manuscript to discover that, for once, it’s not a big fucking mess. The trade off is the rate of output. A really good session nets two pages, and averages out to ten pages a week. Using this method writing a book will take nine months to a year. Perhaps a really big advance check might provide more incentive, but I doubt that. I was born two weeks late. Some things don’t change.