Baby's first link!

Litblog, eh? I’ll go with it.

Thanks, Paul Constant and “Slog Tipper David.” Even though the link was buried on the second page with two comments within an hour or so, I still got about 30 hits from them. Super. I like, also, that Mr. Constant brought out the rodent-like quality of my face. The man knows his bloggers!

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A seagull divebombed my hat during lunch in 7th grade and I didn't notice the drying streaks of multi-hued shit until someone pointed it out in algebra an hour later. Thanks for making me relive the laughter, David.

Stars align. This was one of the first insults I’d dared ask for, and it was the first insult I’d received outside of a reading/signing. It was as if Hemmingway Himself guided me to The Strand that day in search of a rare book. I normally don’t put much stock in religion, but there’s still enough old Catholic spiritualism (and self-loathing) kicking around in my subsconcious to wonder if I’d been guided to Mr. Mitchell by way of a Flying Spaghetti Monster.

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As a self-effacing, wanna-be writer whose rapidly diminishing chances of ever becoming even a second-rate publishing author is paced only by his readiness to disarm his detractors by throwing his ego under the bus — to laugh at himself, his missed chances and self-inflicted miseries — I don’t particularly like people who take themselves too seriously.

Nicole Krauss apologizes for using the word “asshole” in front of a crowd who’ve already chuckled at its use. She pauses after reading a passage like she expects the audience to murmur in appreciation with sub-sonic “ohhs” and “oohs” that wouldn’t be audible unless it was released in a dead-quiet auditorium. She then waits just a beat too long before beginning again, as if she, too, needed a moment to recover from that Sad Truth despite being the author of said Sad Truth and having read the same passage dozens of times in the last month.

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Though really, he should’ve taken aim at Joe Buck, that pompous fuck.

Below is my Pa’s response to an earlier email containing many complaints about a lack of cable television with which to watch sports, especially NCAA football and MLB playoffs.

I love my old man.

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Rosencrans Baldwin Reading Review – You Lost Me There

Someone isn't a fan of corn

The turnout at McNally Jackson was surprising. I’d not heard or read any of the hype buffeting Mr. Baldwin’s first novel, You Lost Me There, so the kind of flitty buzzing of low voices that comes from an expectant crowd came as a shock. The attendance dwarfed A.L. Kennedy’s (a week or so before) and Tom McCarthy’s (the next day). Neither got this kind of elbow-to-elbow attention from pastel sweaters and thick black plastic glasses. I jittered out a few vicarious shivers and grit my teeth through a brief belly-cut of jealousy. Brief because he looked more surprised about the crowd than I, and spoke like a man appropriately appreciative of the strong attendance. Christ. You can’t help but like the guy.

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