IT'S MONDAY AND I AM MAKING A LIST OF ALL MY BROKEN THINGS

…I have a new story, "Hold On Loosely" at Nefarious Muse and a poem, "Adolf" at Thundadome. Both are also here under "Words In Print."

…I haven't been able to get on the internet for three days. Well, I might have been on for a total of twenty minutes, but that was it. Very frustrating, to say the least. I probably have the greatest office location on the planet, save for someone living in Malibu. However, it's the worst location for garnering an internet signal. (I'm presently at the Snohomish Public Library with four bars. It's very, very quiet in here, but sunny, too.)

Lately I have been listening to these people sing their sad songs:
--Ryan Star ("We Might Fall")
--Death Cab For Cutie ("I Will Follow You Into The Dark")
--Jay Z ("99 Problems," "Hard Knock Life," "Onto the Next One")
--Ryan Adams and the Cardinals
--Muse
--Modest Mouse
--Regina Spektor ("Samson")
--Supertramp ("Breakfast in America)
--Supergrass ("We're All Right")
--Paula Abdul ("Straight Up")
--Buffalo Tom ("Summer")
--Kid Cudi ("Pursuit of Happiness")
--Beach Boys ("God Only Knows")

…I'm spending some lovely time in hospitals this week. Just lovely, lovely times for me. Echocardiogram on Tuesday because evidentially I have an enlarged ventricle in my heart (how's that for irony; I am too big-hearted for my own good) and then a colonocscopy (that's a lot of '"o's") because, evidentially, I am an old fucker. (I just dropped the F bomb. Oops.) And also I have to take my son into the orthoscopic surgeon because, evidentially, he either broke his ankle, or shredded ligaments. (His bruising looks like a lavender sunset.)

…I saw "The Adjustment Bureau" with Matt Damon and Emily Blunt. It was quite good. B+. Really makes you think. Sort of an "Inception" type theme. My son and I rented "Let Me In," the American versions of "Let The Right One In" from Sweden. I loved it. Very moody and the actors were darling. It was more of a love story than a vampire flick. Rent it. You'll jump a few times and you'll say, "Awww" quite a few times as well.

..I got a rejection yesterday from 2 Bridges Review. It was a submission I'd sent in back in APRIL OF 2010. Really? Really, it took you nearly a year getting to the slush? Come now. I assume, if I don't hear back within four or five months, that the lit journal has gone under. As it was, the story they rejected (coincidentally, entitled "Let Me In") got accepted elsewhere a long time ago. I don't mind rejection. I get it. But if you're going to run a literary magazine, especially an online one where it's about speed and ease, then have your crap together.

…On the subject of rejection, I just read this, from Jeff Reich, in the new issue of The Writer:
"Rejection, sad to say, goes hand in hand with writing. We all have to deal with it, and it smarts no matter how many times you've experienced it. No doubt you've heard these stories: Richard Bach's bestselling, "Jonathan Livingston Seagull" was rejected more than 20 times before getting published. "Chicken Soup for the Soul" struck out more than 100 times before winning a contract. And Pearl S. Buck received a ejection slip for a short story the same week she learned about her Nobel Prize for literature."

…"You learn an awful lot by just finishing a complete draft of one thing and looking at it as a whole." Magaret Drabble

…"Love of mine,
someday you will die
but I'll be close behind
to follow you
into the dark.

No blinding light,
or tunnels to gates of white.
Just our hands clasped so tight,
waiting for the hint of a spark.

If heaven and hell decide
that they both are satisfied,
illuminate the notes
on the vacancy sign.

If there's no one beside you
when your soul embarks,
then I will follow you
into the dark." -- Ben Gibbard