Writing can be a monster. It can lurk behind the thin life we walk. It can become so scary. A parrot you neglect. It can be your friend, but every day you ignore its calls for attention the chances double that it will bite when you reach out to pet it.
Why haven't you been writing? Because by the time I realized I wasn't it became too scary. It's not my pet at all, just some wild thing in my room. But there's this wild thing in my room. There's no ignoring that. So I sit at the opposite wall. Let it smell my smell. Let it get used to me. So we can be friends again.

Yes No Yes

There was another successful reading this Tuesday. Watermelon, prose, orange drink. There were a lot of new faces. Some of which were new to the city.

A young man in the back row told me that he had name dropped the Cyberpunk Apocalypse in his college application. The argument was that Pittsburgh was a good place to be a writer. I still find it amusing when I find that we've worked our way into resumes or applications.

On the writing front both Gunner and I are somewhere in the awkward post-first-novel phase where you hold the thing out like a toddler with some rock he/she/it found not sure what to do with it except maybe to walk up to one adult after another, hands outstretched, hoping someone will take it.
I'm reading through issue III of the Cyberpunk Apocalypse publication right now. It'll be out by the end of the month.

I can feel this blog entry petering out. There's nothing I can do. It feels so limp.

Gorsky Press event tonight!

Gorsky Press authors Mike Faloon and James Jay stop through the Iron City on their book tour. Mike Faloon will be reading from The Hanging Gardens of Split Rock, and James Jay will be reading poetry from his book The Journeymen.

Donations accepted for touring writers. Also, Cyberpunk Apocalypse resident Artnoose will take a break from straight-up zine reading by singing them.

Reading al fresca

Last night's reading was another success. It was the exit reading for Joel, our visiting writer who has been with us all month translating a book from Swedish into English.

It being a lovely summer evening, we began the readings in the yard, with about 15-20 people (and one dog) present. Artnoose (that's me) read two issues of Ker-bloom!, including the brand-new one finished up only hours before.

When the neighbor's pool party next door got so animated that we found it hard to resist crashing it, we moved the reading indoors, and Joel finished up in there. A discussion on the challenges and process of translation followed the reading, and then many of us stuck around for a little while eating snacks.

Every visiting writer we've had so far has been stellar, and although I miss them every time they leave, I appreciate the time that I do spend with them and value the space that we've given them to do important work.

I don't remember if this was ever posted...

CpA yeahhhh!!!!

Comic book skate park

Flies are dancing under our ceiling fan, and my arms ache from scraping sanding and painting the house. The laptop adds another couple degrees to 84 through primer speckled denim. I can't help but feel good about things right now.

I feel at the tip of it all. At the top of the bowl where you give a nervous grin shift your weight to either eat shit or roll and ride your weight and physics--swooping forever. I've gotten two form (or near form) rejection letters from agents. I'm waiting on another three. The two I heard from were the two I was least excited about--that seemed to like only vaguely what I like (what I am). What am I? Whatever.

When I get the rest of my rejections, I'll send queries out to another handful of agents that might be good for my book. When they shake their heads I'll pump out the rest of the polished comic pages, and submit to publishers.

In august I'm leaving to sell posters to college kids. It's grueling, obnoxious, work, and commission based. I got my rough run outline. Texas mostly. There's more money in it for me this time. It means I might pay off the rest of the debt on these houses before the end of the year (I hope).

In the mean time we work. We eat shit over and over in the hopes that one day we'll succeed, so we can move on to the next trick.

Bloomsday hits Pittsburgh!

Joel and I were talking the other day about how Bloomsday was coming up, the celebration of James Joyce's novel Ulysses that happens every year on June 16, the day in which the novel is set. We wondered if we should host a Bloomsday event at the house.

I offered to see if anyone else was already planning an event, and of course I found bloomsdaypittsburgh.org and their list of events all around the city throughout the day. Check their website for more complete descriptions and locations, but here's the gist:

9:00 am - Bloomfield Crazy Mocha
10:30 am - Homewood Cemetery
12:00 pm - Murphy's Tap Room, Regent Square
2:30 pm - Carnegie Main Library
4:00 pm - Washington's Landing
5:30 pm - Harp & Fiddle, Strip District
8:00 pm - City Books, South Side

Bring your copy of the book to any (or all) of these events and read along.