Tag: writing101

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There’s No Such Thing As Ghosts

There’s not much to say about what life was like when I was 12, or where we lived. Our house was next door to a non-denominational church, a half mile away from Wichita State University, just a few blocks away from a new fast food joint called Church’s Fried Chicken, and haunted by the ghost of a murdered wife. Now, that last part is a complete lie, but when I was 12 my life was pretty boring, so I might as well entertain you with something made-up.

Our house was built in 1901, and occupied by one Phineas Densmore and his wife, Felocity. A couple things to note: Phineas is one of those names one only sees nowadays in Steampunk novels, although Mr. Densmore himself (no relation to the Seattle city councilman of 1882) was about as sci-fi as the long-grass growing in the fields next to his new home. And yes, “Felocity” looks like a misspelling of “Felicity.” That’s because it is. On her birth certificate, anyway, and her death note, although most folks just called her “Fel.”

It’s seems that Phineas, a bank clerk, was having an affair, and was racked with guilt. And, like many men staggering under the weight of crushing anxiety, he projected his guilt onto others. He convinced himself that his wife, too, was having an affair. And so when his own lover took a risk and sent a letter to his home, addressed to “Msr. Densmore,” he took one look at the envelope and decided “Msr.” stood for “Mistress.” He dashed his poor wife’s head in with a rock. Then he ran for the local constable, letter in hand as proof of the justice of his dastardly deed.

When they opened the letter, they found that “Msr.” stood for “Monsieur,” as his lover felt that their affair was so “European” as deserved a more sophisticated form of address. Proof, yes, but proof of motive, and Phineas was hung by his neck. Until dead. Which is how the execution order was spelled out, in those days.

Fast forward several years to 1984, and watch the rest of Wichita creep up the hill, building more and more houses until the big yellow house is surrounded by others homes and, as I said, the university, the church, and the chicken shack. And finally, a family of four moves in. One of them me.

In those days I was obsessed with books about poltergeists (this part is true). In the summer I would ride my bike to one of three libraries within ten miles of our house, and head right to the 133.1 section. Grab as many book as I could. Load up my backpack and take them home, and read all day. And all night, until I was exhausted.

Now, my bed frame and my brother’s were old antiques, built by my mom’s grandfather. Our mattresses, however, were more recently acquired, used beds from an old nun-run hospital Perfectly sturdy, but too long for the old frames. My dad’s dad, a cabinet maker, was taking the summer to rebuild them.

So here’s the scene: me on my mattress on the floor. The window open to let in a modicum of breeze. A tall stack of books, sitting on the edge of an old easy chair, the chair itself on four splayed legs and a fat, crusty rusty spring. All is quiet, still, calm, dark. Until:

Creeeeak.

My eyes pop open. The room is bathed in yellowish gray, from a streetlight penetrating gauzy curtains.

Creeeeeeak. Thump.

I sit up. That overstuffed chair looks like it’s shaking just a bit. There’s a book on the floor in front of it.

Creeeeak. The chair leans forward a bit. Sshshsss as a book slides forward and THUMP! Lands on top of a book on the floor. I leap up like a shot and my legs start kicking. I’m wrapped up in bed sheets and cold sweat.

Creeeak sshh thump! Creeakshshsshthump! Shshssthump! Shshssthump! Thump! Thump! The books are flying off the chair. I’m out of breath. I’m thrashing my arms and legs. I’m finally free of the sheets, bouncing off the door frame, falling into the hallway, shooting forward and slamming into the door of my parent’s bedroom. I open it with slick hands, fall down, drag myself to the foot of their bed, and curl up, fist rammed into my mouth stop keep from screaming.

And that’s all I remember. Get this—when I woke up, I was back in my bed! And the books were stacked up on the chair again. Did I dream it all? Did my dad carry me back before he went to work? In later years, I would decide it must have been a breeze, and the weight of the books was just enough that they tipped the chair forward. I mean, after all, there’s no such thing as ghosts.

But eventually I turned thirteen, and stopped reading books about poltergeists. When I was 17, we moved out of the house. I don’t know who lives there now these 26 years later. I just hope they don’t have any affairs, murder anyone, or get that house really haunted for whomever lives there next.

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The Recipe Isn’t Difficult

Potatoes, eggs, mustard and mayo. People think the secret ingredient is the parsley, but it’s really the dill in the chopped pickles.

Nowadays 19 is fairly young but back in the early seventies, 19 was old enough to join the Navy, meet a nice fella, get married, get knocked up, start raising a few kids. And so on a nice summer day in Wichita, Kansas a bunch of years later, one boy on the front porch reading a book, the other in the back yard swashbuckling with ninjas, the husband catching up on some paperwork, why not break out those old 3X5 cards with your mother’s recipes on them, bright blue ink in a flowing cursive.

Boil potatoes just enough that they’re still firm. Use that creaky chopping machine on them, and on the boiled eggs too. Mustard and mayo, give it a stir, starts to make that sticky sound and the smell is family, nice weather, full bellies, quiet hearts. The pickles have to be chopped by hand. Toss them in, sprinkle in dried parsley, mostly just to give it color. Salt, but no pepper. Now put a few hot dogs in the new “micro-wave.” A lot faster than boiling them, and the cancer’s still five years away.

Call in the kids, tell the youngest to set the table, the oldest to make a pitcher of lemon kool-aid. The youngest fetches out those Looney Tunes collectible glasses, the ones from McDonald’s. He always chooses Daffy Duck for himself. He’ll grow up, join the Navy too, but he won’t meet a nice girl; Nothing bad will happen to him, but life will take a little longer to get started.

The potato salad goes in an enormous green plastic bowl. That bowl has seen some action. That bowl was purchased at a Tupperware party in Springfield, Massachusetts, made its way across the country to Bainbridge, Washington, then down to San Diego, California. Now it’s here, smack dab in the middle of the country, smack dab in the middle of the supper table, heaped to overflowing with potato salad.

The youngest has that permanent grin on him, eyes wide, trying to grab ketchup for his hot dog and a spoon for the potato salad and a glass of lemonade, all at the same time. He says, who’s birthday is it, because he associates potato salad with parties. The oldest smirks, cause he knows better, and because he’s a little smart aleck. He’s going through a phase; no ketchup or mustard for him. But plenty of lemonade, and heaps and heaps of potato salad. Growing boys.

The husband gets the lion’s share, though. He’s a good 210, working on 230, and his desk job doesn’t help any. In a few years the cancer will knock him down to 175. But they’ll catch it early, it’ll back off, and never return, not for thirty years. Potato salad will put the pounds backs on. Potato salad and nice weather and quiet hearts.

He says, oh, it’s probably somebody’s birthday somewhere. The youngest laughs at that. Everything delights him. The oldest smirks again. He’ll come into cynicism, the smart ones always do, its own kind of cancer. But he’ll get over it. How can anyone be a cynic, for very long, with potato salad likes this stored in the memory banks?

He’ll get a copy of the recipe, more than a bunch of years later. His own wife will make it for him. Will it be as good? Of course it will. The recipe isn’t difficult.

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There’s No I in Barbecue

It needs to get warm soon. I need to sit on my back porch, next to the grill. A beer in one hand and a book in the other. Or a baseball game on the radio. Birds twerping, the sound of the distance highway a dull buzz, like the quiet roar of the ocean. But mostly that barbecue, ribs and pork shoulder and burgers stuffed full of onions. Just thinking about it makes me hungry.

I’m sitting here at a kind of barbecue school. Mostly it’s a bunch of folks sitting around folding tables, watching a power point presentation on how to smoke meats. Across from me, turned to watch the slides, are two guys who couldn’t be more different. One of them I know. We’ll call him James—he went to MIT. He works for SpaceX. He’s got a wife who flips houses for a living. No kids. He’s maybe 32 years old.

Next to him, the other fella, I can only guess, but, early sixties? Gray pokes out from beneath his Mariners ball cap. His satin jacket is black, has a patch on the shoulder that reads “National Softball Championships, Las Vegas, 2014.” I got money that says he went there to watch his daughter play.

James is a friend of mine—we met in a coffee shop about 10 years ago. He was fresh out of school, working for Microsoft. It’s the same coffee shop where I met my future wife, and where he met his future wife. I guess that’s a Seattle thing, coffee shops and all.

The other guy, though, if I had to guess, gets into the Seattle city limits maybe twice a year. And even then it’s only the southern tip of Seattle. I’m not trying to stereotype, and I could be very wrong. But me, I’m from Wichita Kansas, originally, and you kind of get a knack for knowing your own. Graduate high school, maybe go to trade school, work in machine shop for twenty years, finally get promoted to management, kind of like retirement but the coffee’s not as good.

James, for what it’s worth, is taking notes. His got a yellow legal pad, and he’s writing down pretty much everything the guy giving the presentation says. Temperatures for different cuts of beef, how to caramelize with a hot skillet, tricks for making a marinade that isn’t too salty.

The other fella, the one in the soft ball jacket, just nods his head every few seconds, like he knows it all already. He probably does. I wonder why he’s here.

Me, I’m here to learn, sure, but also to eat. My wife signed us up for this class, because we’re going to eat what we cook. Of course, some recipes require more time than we’re going to be spending in the class, so there’s already meat on some of the grills. And the aromas in the smoke are making me drool.

I didn’t go to MIT, but I did go to college. I never worked in a machine shop, but I’ve gotten my hands dirty more than a few times. If James wanted to strike up a conversation about, I don’t know, quantum state bubbles drives to shave another three ounces off a booster rocket, I could listen. If this softball fella wanted to tell me about the time his daughter met fast-pitch ace Jenny Finch, I’d be interested.

But I think those conversations would have to happen on my back porch. With a beer in our hands, birds twerping overhead. On that grill, a couple of pounds of prime tip, smoking away, making us hungry, something we all have in common.

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A Different Kind of Work Out

Ten oh five on a Saturday morning, and it looks like Dave isn’t going to show up. I’m standing in a parking lot with three other guys. A Crossfit gym, a “box” somewhere in Seattle. At least it’s trying to be a nice day. The rain is down to just a few drops and the sun occasional peeks from behind bored gray clouds.

We’re all pacing, geared up and ready to get in there and wreck our bodies. Me, I ran here from my house, just a mile or so away. On one of my first days at the gym, Dave said “we don’t do the same workout twice. That’s the problem with runners—always doing the same thing, over and over again, their bodies adapt.” I wish. I’d love to adapt enough to survive the half marathon I signed up for next month.

One of the guys says, “Had to wake him, last week. I showed up at nine, had to bang on the door.”

I furrow my brow. “Wait, does Dave live here?”

The guy nods, and the other two guys look up, paying attention. “Yeah. He moved out of his old place a few months ago.”

I think about why I’m here. I’m getting old, getting fat, need a shock to my system. The good life has made me comfortable, I could say, if I was given to that sort of musing. Maybe I should live in a gym too. Nothing to do all day but pick up heavy weights, cleaning up after every class. Arms like a gorilla. Calves like tree trunks.

One guy checks his watch a few times. I’m tempted to go up to the door, cup my hands against the glare and peer in. What am I going to see? A guy in sleeping bag, laid out next to a pile of dumb bells, his dog curled up at his feet?

Another guy says, “I saw him after the last class, yesterday. He was heading to a bar with my roommate.”

We all chuckle. As if that explains everything. I can’t imagine what a 6 foot, 250 pound guy with 5% body fat has to drink to get too drunk to be up by ten in the morning. He’s not paying for drinks with the money I’ve given him—I used a Groupon.

Ten past ten. Our pacing has slowed a little bit. By now we would have been through our warm-ups. Dave would have given the Crossfit vets their Workout-of-the-Day, and they’d be doing some preliminary exercises. Us newbies would be picking up an empty barbell and putting it back down again. Concentrating on form. Dave would be adjusting his glasses, telling his dog she’s a good girl for staying out of the way. I’d be thinking about that stupid half marathon, and how losing ten pounds would sure help a lot.

A car drives by the parking lot entrance, and we all turn to look. And then I realize I’m sort of hoping he doesn’t show. I want to work out, I want to feel the burn, I want to be a little bit proud of myself. I also want to, well, not.

“God damn it,” the guy, the one who said he’d woken Dave up last week, mutters to humself. Then he smiles “Well, I guess I can always come back at noon.” He turns and wanders towards his car.

The other guy, the one with the roommate says, “Alright fellas.” He looks at his watch, smiles, shakes his head, and walks off too.

Me and the only other one remaining stand there for a few seconds. A moral victory. When Dave’s timing us on burpees and Russian kettle-bells, he never shouts. His voice is loud above the heavy metal blasting from the speakers, but he’s not screaming. You got this, he says. 15 more seconds, he says. You can do this, reach in. Last Thursday, when he did that, even though I was whipped, I managed a few more reps. Felt it all day Friday, but it felt good too.

I want to wait this out, but I don’t. I want to be here when he shows up, forgive him for being, despite a 400 pound bench press, only human. But I want to go home, have a Saturday, do nothing. My wife’s working, won’t be home until 5, so I mean: really do nothing.

I take a deep breath, look the other fella in the eye. “Monday, I guess.” He just smiles, nods, turns and walks to his car.

I decide to compromise. I ran here, so I’ll run back home too. I’m hoping Dave doesn’t have a hang over. But just in case, I’ll commiserate. I stop at the 7-11 on my  way, grab a bag of onion potato chips and two Cokes. I plop in front of the TV, and before too long I’m sugar-and-grease queasy. A different kind of work out

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5th of May, and Me No Burrito

fiction by Jason Edwards

Just a walk in the park. Not a metaphor. High cholesterol. I’m 53. Too young to die; too old to start something new. Still. Wife likes the time to herself. At least it’s a nice day. Stupid sodium.

Trash on the path. Piece of cardboard. And this is supposed to be the nice part of town. My doctor says “When I walk, I pick up trash. Stretches the back. Sitting is the new smoking.” Fine. My good deed. Earn an extra helping of couscous. What the hell is couscous.

“Anything helps.” That’s what the cardboard says. One of those homeless signs. They stand by the highway. A good reason to turn up the radio. But the nearest off ramp’s two miles from here. Like I said, the nice part of town.

And what’s that smell. That’s marker smell. This sign is fresh. But why is it here. Somebody wrote this only an hour ago. I’m like CSI right now with my deductions skills.

Maybe he sleeps in the park. And he makes a sign. And he walks to the highway. And then what. Does he buy a frozen burrito from the 7-11? One of those sodium bombs? Does he have high cholesterol?

Is he 53 like me? Is he too old to die, too young for hospice? My kid, he’s 23, he says, when you’re old enough to know you’re going to be dead someday, the rest of life is chasing distraction. Existential discomfort. Everything else is hospice.

I could go to 7-11. I could buy a burrito. I could find this guy. I could give it to him. Cinco de Mayo, I could say. That’s a good walk, four miles. Earn me more than couscous. Seriously, what the hell is it.

But he doesn’t have his sign. So how can he be at the highway. I’ll never find him.

There’s a trash can. Next to a park bench. I could leave the sign for him. But what if some other old geezer who doesn’t watch CSI finds it.

I guess the park is a little cleaner now. Still the nice part of town. I’ll sit on the new bench. If sitting is the new smoking, it’s time for a smoke break. More hospice. My kid’s kind of an asshole.

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The Mariners Lost Last Night

mariners capI can very much appreciate it if someone is not into sports. In and of themselves, most sports are pointless. They’re just entertainment, one choice in a slew of others—why watch a baseball game when one can watch one of a million TV shows on demand? Or read a book, or go for a walk, or sit in front of the computer and write a novel? And don’t get me started on how much those guys who throw a ball around for a few hours a day get paid. My point is: you’re not into sports? I get it, I accept it.

I used to be the same way, frankly, but for the past 10+ years I’ve lived in a city big enough to support a few major sports organization. And there’s an identity one has, living in a city, and rooting for the home team Not everyone in Seattle roots for the Mariners—we’re a fairly hipster town. But some of us do, and some of us do because we love where we live. Call it civic pride.

But the Mariners lost their second game of the season. No big deal though, right? It’s only game two out of a 162. And they won their first game! Still, if you’re not a sports fan, or if you’re not a baseball fan in particular, or if you don’t follow the Mariners, then you don’t know: already there’s rumblings.

When non baseball-fans think baseball, they think Yankees, maybe Red Sox, they think about the most recent world series winner (the San Francisco Giants). And, for the most part, these are winning teams. I’ll be blunt: they’re winners because they pay for the top talent.

The Mariners, finally, have started paying for top talent. Thanks to a loophole in the MLB profit-sharing rules, they had an extra 190 million to spend on guys like Nelson Cruz and Robinson Cunoe. The talk through all of spring training has been: the Mariners are the team to watch this year.

And that’s saying something, as the Mariners have not been to the playoffs since 2001. Last year, they were literally one-game away from making the playoffs. The very idea that the Mariners could be playing in October is a bit apocalyptic. People who live in Seattle, who have civic pride, who identify with the Mariners—all of us are tired of, but used to, our team losing.

Which is why, despite the season being only 1.2345679 percent complete (that’s the real number- baseball’s all about esoteric stats) we’re all a little anxious at this point. Yes, the Mariners won their first game (thanks in no small part to our Cy Young award-winning pitcher) but we got no production in that game from that new 190 million dollar talent we brought in. And none again last night. Are we doomed?

Another team people think about when they think baseball is the Cubs. The perennial losers. The last time the Cubs were in the world series, the Mariners weren’t even a team yet. Heck, the first MLB team Seattle ever had, the Pilots, wasn’t even a team yet. The Cubs have been to the World Series six times in the last 100 years and lost every time.

Is that to be Seattle’s fate? We lost last night—it’s really hard to think about anything else.

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Three Songs That Are Important To Me

Writing about music is very difficult. That’s a plain, vague, throw-away kind of sentence, hardly very evocative, and truly representative of most writing about music. Liking, which is to say, judging music is just too subjective. Asking people what kind of music they like is a fairly intimate question: asking them to name their favorite band or song is downright invasive. At least it can seem to be. Responses usually give no real insight into the person being asked. At best, they’ll tell you, “I like all kinds of music.”

Sitting here and writing about three songs that are important to me is going to be tough. Especially since my tastes run to songs without words, so there’s no interpreting what a song “says,” to me. Nor do I attach any kind of significance to life events and the music that accompanied them. (Why not? See above: subjectivity.) Seriously, you’re getting more about me from the fact that I’m writing this at all than you are from what it is I’m actually saying.

Three songs that are important to me, then: Mozart’s ‘Piano Concerto no. 20,’ Tool’s ‘Right in Two,’ and ‘Zombie Harem’ by Daikaiju. I really don’t think I can tell you why they’re important. I just now that I need them to be available to me and they’ve become like old friends, songs I can count on if I need to count on anything at all.

carlsbad sunsetThe Mozart Piano Concerto no. 20 is in D minor, a key for brooding, but an active brooding, a stomping through darkened streets kind of brooding, heavy coat and fog and a frown turned sneer turned snarl. It starts off with the orchestra setting the main tone and theme, and then the piano comes in gentle and quiet, building to a fury and then backing off again. The second movement is like the coming of a storm, building and building and finally crashing down around you, only to calm down at the end and leaving you in sunlight. Sunlight, you see, the third movement, playing in D major, all of the D minor demons exorcised and the world bright once again.

Tool is a band from Los Angeles, and have been around for 20+ years. This is a band that defies description: call them “prog rock,” and the hard-rock fans shake their head, call them “hard rock”; and the math boys curl their upper lips. ‘Right in Two’ starts with just guitars and bass playing stunted arpeggios, in 3/4 time. 3/4 develop into 11/4, and as the song progresses, as the drums come in, the time signature continues to evolve. The song gets more complex, layers instrumentation on top of more time changes, until a final rush of tightly controlled fury. This is one of my favorite songs to listen to when I’m running.

Daikaiju is a surf-guitar band out of Huntsville Alabama. This is the new generation of surf-guitar, the hard-rock kind that takes the old reverb, cranks it way up, and runs around the stage, getting fans tangled up in the guitar cords. (That’s both an aural metaphor and literal description: their stage antics are as wild and crazy as their guitar licks). For all its craziness, ‘Zombie Harem’ more or less follows a kind of minuet format. Riff A, development, Riff B, repeat; middle section; repeat Riff A and B. As simple as it is, it nevertheless fills you up. It’s all energy. It’s sweat and thirst; you can’t help but play air guitar along with it. Which I do, pretty much everytime, even if I’m out running and it comes on my iPod, even if I’m three miles overdo for a stop—I have to run even faster when it comes on.

~~~

As writing exercises go, let me say this: I wrote way more than I thought I would, here. And I feel like I wrote hardly anything at all. Ah well. At least I’m writing. Maybe that’s a take-away here: if music is just good because it simply is, then writing can just be as well.

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Nothing Much to Do in Hawaii

You stop the car and the Hawaii heat comes back because there’s no more driving breeze. You can feel it in your bones. Even if you’re only in your (early!) forties, you can see why old people move to places like Miami and Arizona. Why not Hawaii? The long flight? The disappointingly drab view from the airplane window when the plane is landing? Waiting in line for what seems like hours at the car rental place? The really bad radio stations, driving around the edge of Kuia, from airport to vacation rental?

outdoor-showerEverything is bright, so bright you don’t notice the out-door shower. Later in the week you’ll take Instagram photos from inside that shower, of the nearby flowers and distant mountains. But for now you just want to haul your bags inside and have a beer. The house is green. Not a real-estate, easy-to-sell green, but an almost garish green. Three years later, writing down a description of the place for a writing-course blog entry, you’ll think: monopoly house green.

It’s not a big house, but it’s big enough. A back door leading into the kitchen. A rickety table, something from the seventies. Well trod linoleum. A squat fridge; your fridge at home is an enormous, brushed-stainless-steel behemoth, but this one’s short enough to see the top, where you can set your bag of groceries. Some sweet onion potato chips, a few cans of spam, more than one six-pack. 11 of 12 bottles go into the fridge; the other goes in your hand.

The kitchen window with the view of the beach a few blocks away. The next room, a sitting area, large, overstuffed couches that would be miserable in this heat. Because it’s stifling in here. You glance at one bedroom with its tiny bed. Pass the cramped bathroom. Step outside onto the porch, two rocking chairs, a card table, more view of beach.

And then the breeze arrives, gentle, like it wants to ask you a question. You sit down in one of the rocking chairs, open the beer, and drain half of it. You ask yourself, where else would you want to be right now? You’re not even sure if any other place on earth exists right now.

The breeze moves around, makes the grass in front of the green house wave, plays in the distant palm trees. The sun’s getting ready to think about setting, but content for the moment to loll in the sky. Deep blue, probably goes on forever.

You notice your beer is empty, so you stand up. Notice how the screen door creeks when you open it. The floorboards, too, as you walk into the kitchen. Grab another beer. This house is starting to feel like your threadbare Hawaiian shirt (had it for 10 years) and your easy-fit cargo shorts. Where did your shoes go? Nevermind. Grab a book from the shelf of vacation-left-behinds next to the door. Something with guns and intrigue and romance. Stuff you don’t really have in your life.

But you’ve got that beer, that breeze, that rocking chair. That’s really all you need. All you want, too. So turn to page one. You’re going to be here for a while.

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Freewriting Exercise

1:08 PM. Here it is day one of this writing course thing and I’ve already failed. Instead of free writing for twenty minutes, I wrote a thousand words about my first Crossfit experience. Oh well. Maybe I’ll clean it up and publish it later. For now, I guess I get to start over.

Free writing. I dunno. It’s not my thing? I don’t like this much self-reflection? So write something else then? Once upon a time there was a prince who lived in a great big castle, named Steve. The castle was named Steve, not the prince. Princes are rarely called Steve. Castles are also rarely called Steve too, but this one was.

Ugh, barf. Here’s the thing I know about why I’m no free writer—I have made more typos than usual. I make a lot of typos, I know, but I feel like I’ve hit backspace as much as I’ve hit space bar in the last few minutes.

I guess this is supposed to be a habit-making thing. If I can spend twenty minutes physically sitting in front of a physical keyboard and physically tap my physical fingers on the physical keys, then surely I can do that when the doing of that has another purpose. Feels like sitting on a bed and spinning my legs in the air so that I can run to the grocery store the next day.

1:13 PM Five minutes done, a quarter of the way there. Yippee Skippy. Speaking of grocery stores, and Skippy: we’re a Jif household. This is important. Long nights sitting on front the computer screen, browsing Reddit and eating peanut butter right out of the jar. Can’t do that with Skippy. Long nights fighting whatever the opposite of insomnia is. But not fatigue. Wanting to be an insomniac. Because then I could get things done.

As it is I get things done in the morning, before the wife wakes up. She’s a nine-hour-a-night-er, and I’m a 7.5-er, but I’m also an always-up-at-5-am-er. No good reason for it. Ugh, me me me. Let’s talk about something else. In two minutes we’ll talk about something else. I mean, I will. I mean write, not talk. About something else. Castle Steve. It’s the only castle in all of France made of wood! Yep, The Prince of Castle Steve is French. I’ve been to France. Twice. Paris twice, as well as parts of not-Paris. But mostly Paris.

It’s not as bad as people say. Parisians are no more rude than anybody anywhere are if you don’t come at them with entitlement and attitude.

1:18 PM Halfway done. This is a chore. I guess that’s the point. The Prince of Castle Steve doesn’t do chores. He doesn’t have to, of course, and even if he did have to do chores, he wouldn’t. Cause what’s the point? It’s not like the Princess of, um, what’s another word for Castle? Palace. Yes. It’s not like the Princess of Palace Cynthia is going to like him more or less than she already does or doesn’t just because he does or doesn’t do chores. Like, what’s he going to do, anyway? Fold clothes? He’s the freakin’ Prince of Castle Steve! He doesn’t know even know where the Laundry Room is!

I mean Royal Laundry room! Just now I went back and added “Royal” in front of “Laundry Room” and then I decided that since I’m free writing I shouldn’t edit, so I went back and un-edited my edit. And I’m pretty sure un-editing is still editing. Two wrongs, making a right. No one has to know. Except for me, who wrote this, who is writing this, and you, the unfortunate idiot who decided to read this screed. Back to TPoCS? Sure. In a minute. Cause that will be the 75% mark. Speaking of editing, am I allowed to go back and correct the typos I’m not catching on the fly? Well of course I am. Who’s going to stop me or punish me or tell me I am doing things wrong? I’m a 43 years-old-man, I’m not going to listen to anyone!

1:23. TPoCS doesn’t do chores, and truth be told, hasn’t ever met TPoPC, or even know if she exists. Nor does she know about him. Also, she does chores. No because she has to, but because we live in a sexist world and women always ended up suffering one way or another, especially in made-up worlds created by men. Which reminds me of something.

I have this memory of a few scenes from a movie where this nerdy type guy (Jeff Bridges) is at a formal party (tuxedos) and tells his friends that if his ex (Elle McPherson) arrives, not to let him go home with her, because she will just use him for sex. And of course she shows up, he leaves with her, and the next morning she is getting dressed and he asks if he can call her and she says, what would be the point of that?

You see? That’s like a male fantasy wrapped up tight in a swaddle of misogyny. I bring it up because I want to look up that movie and see if it was directed by Woody Allen. Because all of his movies are misogynistic. Woody Allen would totally want to produce that story of TPoCS and TPoPC, star-crossed lovers who have never met and never will.

Those chores TPoPC does? I don’t know. It’s 1:28. I get to be done now.

P.S. The Mirror Has Two Faces, directed by Barbara Streisand! Boy, was I wrong! Written by some French dudes though, so there’s that.