MORPHINE AND CHOCOLATE

My father has been ill for quite some time. As many of you know, I moved in to his house to care for him for several months, until my sister took over those duties in February. He was suffering from chronic obstructive pulminary disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig's Disease).

He finally let go early this morning. He went peacefully, with no pain. Penny was periodically spooning chocolate sorbet onto his tongue so he'd pass away with the taste of chocolate in his mouth.

Hence the title of this post.

Thanks to all of you who gave us your words of support and encouragement these very difficult past few weeks.

JACK BURKE SOWARDS
March 18, 1929 - July 8, 2007

~C~

Here's Something You Never Want to Hear Your Child Say To You Over the Phone.

"Okay, Mom... We went fishing today and... and... long story short... we now have... a goose."

First off, what d'ya mean "we," white man? Second... oh, hell, there is no second... What d'ya mean "we," white man?

They've named it Aflac. They're taking it to the Wildlife Center tomorrow, after it opens. (And that's an order, soldier!)

A goose, indeed... Goodnight, Mabel....

~C~

Stop the Presses!

An arts program in Los Angeles needs our support! Self Help Graphics and Arts, a program that supports Latinos artists in printmaking. The East L.A. arts center has felt the bite of reduced federal and private-sector grant money (since we have this great big war we have to pay for), and is on the verge of having to close its doors. Self Help is seeking alternate sources of grant money, but, as anyone who has applied for artistic or academic grants knows, this is a lengthy process that will require time -- time Self Help doesn't have at the moment.

One look at the samples of their past exhibits will tell you this is would be a huge loss for the arts in this city. Exhibits aside, take a gander at their building! With every passing year, art programs that aren't a part of the entertainment industry (live theatre, live dance, visual arts programs) are vanishing because conservative political forces conspire to syphon funds away from the NEA and local arts sponsors. Programs are being eliminated in our public schools and state-funded universities, and the people feeling this most acutely are people in economically challenged areas. Less grant money means less opportunity for struggling new artists who cannot afford to sponsor their own shows and display and promote their own work, especially in predominantly minority communities. Nothing marginalizes a community more than silencing its artistic voice.

Self Help's website speaks for itself, so I won't ramble on about it. They provide support for artists who might not otherwise find a venue for their work, and gives them the skills and opportunity to get that work shown publicly. That warrants saving. As someone who isn't a visual artist (but plays one on the computer), I ask you to do whatever you can to assist Self Help in reaching its $100K fundraising goal. I know that you guys are being pulled in a lot of directions, moneywise, but a lot of small gifts can go a long way.

Thanks.

~C~

The Television Fates Hate Me!

If I like it, it gets cancelled. That's one of Murphy's most indelible laws.

It's official. Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip is cancelled. I survived the West Wing's cancellation. After John Spencer died, and the show was going into its eighth season, Jed Bartlett was leaving the Oval Office, and Toby was on his way to the hoosegow for contempt of Congress, it seemed that the show had naturally run its course. The fact that I also lost Will and Grace (which I'd only just discovered a season and a half before) the same year was hard, but I don't blame myself for that one, since I was a 'Manda-Come-Lately. I've been spending the past five years in school, trying to finish my bachelor's and get my MFA, and I don't watch much television.

But I coped with losing the two smartest shows on television, secure in the knowledge that witty dialogue and smart characters (who do dumb things, which makes them interesting) would be back in the form of Studio 60. Now, that's gone. Where do I turn for my searing, sardonic dialogue, my witty banter, my deeply disturbed, multi-faceted characters who cover their pain with humor and crazy antics?

To make matters worse, since last year, I've lost my HBO, and wno't be able to watch the only other show I love beyond reason (and I mean, beyond reason, because, hey, it's a show about polygamy), Big Love. The season premieres June 11th. My only hope is to DVR it on my sister's set, and hope that I get a chance to stop by and watch it every week.

Don't tell anyone I watch Big Love. I shudder to think what will happen if the Fates perceive my obsession.

Below, a nowhere-near-complete list of my favorite shows cancelled unceremoniously (be aware that some of them were obsessions back when I was, like, fifteen or so):

Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (Couldn't they at least show us the last episodes?
West Wing (Over? Sure, but I miss it all the same.)
Will & Grace (I have my reruns to keep me warm, tho')
Arrested Development
Kingdom Hospital (Odd? sure. Uneven? You betcha. But how can you not love a show where Christ --or is He? -- shows up strapped to a chainlink fence? That's some mighty fine television, dammit!)
Dead Like Me
Joan of Arcadia (I'll admit to bias here -- Joe Mantegna is a friend.)
My So-Called Life
Tour of Duty (they had it backwards -- the show should have lasted for 11 years -- they should have cancelled the war after three)
St. Elsewhere
Sunshine (God, I had it bad for Bill Mumy -- I was sixteen, gimme a break!)
Star Trek (the original series)

There are probably more, but this is all that came to memory right off the top of my head. I told someone the other day that I'm a television jonah. I'm cursed. I'm taking it personally (because when you stop and think about it, who's it all about?)

Damn.... damn, damn, damn....

~C~

Why an MFA? Sr. Catharine of Perpetual Cellphone Bills Explains It All For You.

As I get closer and closer to finishing my MFA, I have had a couple of people ask me why I bothered, since its not like you can't write without one. This is ever so true. People all over the world write beautifully without MFAs in Creative Writing. So why, indeed? Why should a writer spend over $30K to get a degree that won't necessarily make them a better writer*?

I wrote an essay over at Helium that explains my stance on this issue. Hope you enjoy it, and I hope it answers all your questions about this topic... so that I don't have to.

~C~

*For the record, I have absolutely no doubt that the MFA experience has made me a better, braver writer.

What YOU Write!

But enough about me and what I write. Let's talk about you, and what YOU write. Or what you might write, if you be courageous enough to pick up the soon-to-be-thrown-down gauntlet.

Every year on November 1st, tens of thousands of intrepid writers and writer-wannabes gather over at National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo.org) to undertake the Herculean task of writing a 50,000-word novel in a mere 30 days. Impossible, you say? Nay, say I, and so says NaNoWriMo's founder and yearly participant, Chris Baty. Baty founded the site in 1999 with only 21 writers, convinced that the biggest stumbling block novelists face when sitting down to write a first draft is the absence of a deadline. Baty refers to the deadline as the single most important tool in writing, next to the implement with which the writer applies the words to paper. In his FAQ section, Baty writes:

"NaNoWriMo is all about the magical power of deadlines. Give someone a goal and a goal-minded community and miracles are bound to happen. Pies will be eaten at amazing rates. Alfalfa will be harvested like never before. And novels will be written in a month."

And they are. In fact, Baty lists eleven novelists who've published novels that were birthed as NaNoWriMo projects. There are no awards given (except an icon, a certificate and the satisfaction of a deadline met). It's art strictly for art's sake, says Baty. At the end of it all, a writer is guaranteed nothing but a good headstart (or, more optimistically, a completed first draft) of a novel.

But wait, I hear you say! We can't wait until November to begin our writing adventures. And besides, we laugh in the face of expositional narrative prose! This is Hollywood, baby, and in this town it's all about the screenplay. Well, fret not, my starsmooching little friends. For now, there is a sister site to NaNoWriMo called ScriptFrenzy.org. And if you hussle on over there right this minute, you'll be in time to sign up to write a 20,000-word screenplay in 30 days in the month of June. The same rules apply to the screenplays as to the novels (with the exception that screenplays may be written by a partnership of two writers, whereas novels must be singularly authored).

Writing is a solitary business, and one of its downfalls is that a writer can fall victim to the oppressors that live inside her own head. The benefit of spending 30 days, twice a year, locked in mortal combat with a literary endeavor, and being in that boat with thousands of other fellow combatants similarly engaged, is that you have back-up, support and many voices of sanity that will bring you out of your head and back on the path to getting the words out. As my mentor, Rob Roberge, has said, "A first draft's job is to get written." That's all. Just get written. Because every writer knows that writing is rewriting, and you can't rewrite what has yet to be written.

So, my little spectators, it's time to get those feet wet in a safe, supportive atmosphere where you don't have to show anyone your work if you don't want, but will find a receptive audience if you do.

Let's see what you guys can write. C'mon, baby. You know you want it.

~C~

What I Wrote

I've been writing and posting some essays and a couple of fiction pieces on Helium.com. The above link takes you to my bio page, where all my pieces are listed. I'd love it if you guys would read them -- the greater the number of hits, the higher in the ratings I rise (and the greater the opportunity for me to get paid).

If you want to join Helium, I'd be beholden if you could e-mail and let me know, so I can send you an official invite. You don't need it to join, but, again, it helps if people I've invited to read end up joining.

Some of the non-fiction topics so far have been on the following:

When Dogs Raise Kittens
Don Imus
Virginia Tech shootings
How I rate Helium pieces
Why Did the Chicken Cross The Road

A couple of my fiction pieces have been posted as well:

Death of the American Western
The Gibson Girl

Anyway, as I post, I'll post a notice here, too. I'd be much obliged if you guys would pop over from time to time to take a look at my writings.

Thanks.

~C~

By Any Other Name

My friend, Shannon, sent me this "name game" e-mail, and, since she suggested I share it with a "few friends," I figured I'd just post it on the Naked Chicken and be done with it. Here are the names of all my personalities for your amusement (my comments in blue):

1.YOUR PORN STAR NAME: (first pet and current street name):

Duffy Lasaine (no... seriously)

2. YOUR MOVIE STAR NAME: (grandfather/grandmother on mother's side first name, favorite candy):

Helen Roca (I'm eating some right now!)

3. YOUR "FLY GIRL/GUY" NAME: (first initial of first name, first three letters of your last name)

C-Sow (oh, hell no!)

4. YOUR DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite animal, name of high school)

Cat Providence (I so want to do a series of novels now!)

5. YOUR OPPOSITE SEX NAME: (name of dad/mom, cell phone Company you use):

Jack Verizon (Can you hear me now?)

7. YOUR STAR WARS NAME: (daily prescription medicine, make of car)

Buproprion Hyundai (Clearly on the side of the Empire)

8. SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, street you grew up on):

Amanda Vanowen (note to self: Future nomme de plume)

9. YOUR FASHION DESIGNER NAME: (first word you see on your left, favorite restaurant)

Harper Marmalade (That's The House of Marmalade to you peons!)

10. YOUR KUNG FU NAME: (favorite mineral, favorite animal)

Obsidian Cat ("I must kill you now, Wong Lee, to avenge my family's death!")

So these are my names. I think this just about covers all the little people living inside me. Except for Edna, of course, but we rarely talk to or about her. That girl is NUTS!

~C~

Down With Daylight Saving Time

Admittedly, this early transition to DST has left me completely in a muddle. I usually have a hard time "springing forward" anyway, but this year, I've been late to work every day this week, and daylight saving time is to blame. I'm not sleepy when the clock says I should be, I'm not hungry when I'm supposed to be, my entire inner clock has been thrown out of whack.

In short, I have had it.

Why on earth do we insist on enduring such a ridiculous custom, first proposed in the late eighteenth century, prior to the invention of the artificial light source? What can we possibly hope to gain? Are you aware that the Clorox corporation petitioned to have DST extended because they are the parent company of Kingsford charcoal, the single biggest selling charcoal manufacturer in the country? Think they might have had an ulterior motive for extending daylight evening hours?

And before you go and blame the poor farmers (as my mother used to when we had to turn our clocks), you should know that this was NOT an appeasement of those hardworking, underappreciated folks who grow our food. Unlike the rest of us, farmers' lives are not dictated by a clock, but by a calendar, and by the natural sunlight. When the sun goes up, so does a farmer, who has a finite number of hours of daylight to get the work of the day done. Regardless of what the clock says, those hours are fewer in winter than in summer, and, barring a major shift in the Earth's orbital trajectory around the Sun, will likely remain so for a good long while. Farmers are equally as inconvenienced by DST as the rest of us, so don't lay the blame for this idiocy on their doorsteps.

No, no... we can thank the United States Department of Defense for this one. Not to delve too deeply into the history of it all, because I'm just so bored with it I could scream, the War Department instituted the time change during both World Wars to conserve energy by reducing the need for artificial light in summer. It was abandoned after WWI, but somehow managed to stick around in some places after WWII, until, in 1966, Congress passed the Uniform Time Act of 1966, making DST a matter of national policy. Nice to see that whole mess in Vietnam didn't keep them from deciding truly vital matters of national policy.

Last year, in an effort to do anythingbutANYTHING rather than deal with the genuine fustercluck going on in the White House and Iraq, Congress took time out of its busy day to increase DST by four weeks (three weeks earlier and one week later). Yet again, Congress turned its back on a killing, illegal, immoral war and allowed itself to be distracted by... what?... time? Morons!

Enough already. The website End Daylight Saving Time has a proposal which would make DST all year round, and illiminate all but two time zones, Eastern and Western. We'd all change our clocks once... just once... then leave them alone forever and ever. No more trying to figure out how many hours to add to the Central... or is it Mountain... time zone. East and West.

Get the government out of our bedrooms -- specifically, off of the nightstand. They need to pick a time -- any time -- and run with it. And they need to do it now, because the redhead is getting mighty cranky from loss of sleep!

~C~

It's Just Not Right!

It's too much. I can't stand idly by while such a travesty is allowed to continue. If I do, I'll be an accessory after the fact. It is only be speaking up, by voicing our dissent, by loudly railing against wickedness and wrong where we see it that we can truly combat the forces of evil. It is for this reason that I say, emphatically and with no reservation....

Raisins have absolutely no business being in bread stuffing.

I'm sorry to have to be so blunt and unaccommodating, but I feel strongly about this, and I have no intention of backing down.

There. I've taken a stand. I've said what I came here to say. I've spoken my piece. Do your worst.

~C~

My New Place

The Digs.

What it lacks in space, it makes up for in being reeeeally tiny.

But it is forcing me to be meticulous and judicious about culling and keeping.

And it's 100% cigarette smoke free!

Wah-hooooo....

~C~

Who Says There's Nothing Good On TV?

The Python Channel.

(broadcast in high definition and 3D)

Contact your local cable provider for details.

~C~

Back From My MFA Residency

I just spent ten glorious days as a writer. Not a legal secretary who manages to squeeze in writing when she has the time and energy, but a writer. Considered so by other writers. I did a reading of one of my short stories, workshopped some essays, and got some really amazing feedback.

I got the mentor I wanted (Rob Roberge), and my co-mentees are some of my very favorite people in the program. I have to spend some time on my long (25 pages) critical paper, but I have a topic about which I'm very enthusiastic, and I hope to use it as the basis for my final grad lecture that I'll be giving in December '07, as a condition of my graduation from the program.

I can't believe I only have a year left of this. I was once so anxious to get it over with, but now that people that I've gone through the program with are starting to graduate and leave, its becoming clear how much I'm going to miss this when its over. Ah, well... still two more project periods to go, so I'd best not be counting chickens before they hatch and then get eaten by coyotes (sorry... went to the dark side for a minute).

Good to be back. I've got a ticker up top that's counting the days until my next Residency, specifically so I don't have to.

~C~

Christopher S. Lister, Where Are You?

Listen, bucko. I've got three words for you.... CHANGE OF ADDRESS!!! Okay? Got it? I realize that being a lousy letter-writer comes with the mitochondrial DNA, but enough is enough, kiddo. We may not have been raised together, but I'm still your big sister, and I can kick your ass! (And I believe that there's a section in the Bill of Rights that gives me express permission to just that. I'll have to look it up.) Now, in my profile at the right, there's an e-mail address. I've checked. It's good.

Now, write me. Or I swear to God, I'll hunt you down and give you an Indian burn like you won't believe!!!!

Love,

Me

~C~

Goodbye, Old Friend

"I have studied many philosophers and many cats.

The wisdom of cats is infinitely superior."
- Hippolyte Taine -

Jerry
1997 - 2006

New Island Discovered in the South Pacific

I call "Dibs"!

~C~

We Interrupt This Blog to Bring You...

... a very important message.

Mary-Mia and Rod from Do They Have Salsa in China* are finally, definitely, really parents. They are pictured in the post by Mary-Mia's dad (happy grandpa) holding their 1-year-old twins, Rose and Marie (they're identical, so please don't ask who's who), and have already spent a near-sleepless night. I think they're already earning their chops.

Congratulations to M3 and Rod and their new (enormous) family. May their "trial-by-fire" be swift, fair and relatively painless.

~C~
__________
*Ending months of speculation, Mary-Mia was able to obtain these shocking photographs that prove, once and for all, that they actually do have salsa (and tacos, if you can believe) in China.

Beauty is Pain -- But It Doesn't Have to Be

Ever since Dove put photos of real, untouched, unairbrushed women's bodies on their posters a few years ago, I've watched with cautious optimism to see just exactly where their so-called "Campaign for Real Beauty" was going. I have watched other media try and tackle the monsters of our twisted American perception of beauty, and have sighed with disappointment as the attempts fizzled in the face of "Extreme Makeover" and "America's Next Top Model" (two of my favorite shows, I confess). The message usually ends up being diluted back into, "All you chicks really could stand to lose ten pounds, cuz you'd just be so much happier, and so would we."

But Dove has surprised me at every turn. The first was their decision to shift focus from grown women to the self-esteem of the American girl, aged 8 and upward. This moving ad actually appeared during this year's Super Bowl, and has run sporadically since, as the opening volley to help little girls learn to love themselves (as Bridget Jones would say) "just as they are." Later this year, the slightly more alarming, darker interview style ad where high school girls discuss the pressures and uncertainties they feel at the hands of their peers, was a more graphic, grittier display.

Now, YouTube is all abuzz with Dove's latest effort -- targeting females of all ages, called "Evolution" which graphically demonstrates a young woman's transmogrification from very pretty and freshly scrubbed to cover girl material, by virtue of hair, make-up and Photoshopping techniques.



Bravo to Dove for taking on our deeply ingrained, perverted ideas of what beauty means, and let's hope that their fund, which sends counsellors into schools to help coach young girls about more positive body images, keeps rolling along.

~C~

Who'd Have Ever Thought...

... that we'd see the day when it was actually better for us to eat a Big Mac, fries and a Coke than a salad?

Two words, man...

SUPERSIZE ME!!!

~C~

Friendly Landscapes

My friends, Valerie and Matthew, spent 18 months landscaping their backyard into a gorgeous little oasis in the midst of a San Fernando Valley suburb. You can watch it all for yourself (compressed into an amazingly deceptive 26 minutes) on this Wednesday's episode of Landscaper's Challenge on HGTV.com.

Watch it.

No, no.

You don't understand.

I'm not asking.

I'm telling.

Watch it.

Or else.

I know your secrets, and I will reveal them. All of them.

Don't make me prove it.

Have a nice day.

~C~