Woo-hoo!

175 pages, 50,708 words (I wrote extra to hit that nice round 175-page mark). More reflections to come later; right now, so looking forward to sleeping until 7:30 tomorrow morning. Yay me!

Homebody/Peculiar

Greetings from the great gray (with snow, at the moment) Midwest, where I'm still ensconced after a happy Thanksgiving weekend with my family. I came down with a stomach bug yesterday that left me with a temperature over 100 and no energy whatsoever, so I decided to stay home an extra day and let my mom take care of me. Thus today I read two manuscripts, overdosed on morning television, finished knitting my first-ever scarf, crossed the 47,500-word mark on the Bad Novel (putting me in good shape to complete 50,000 words by Wednesday), and . . . didn't do much else, having a nice, restful day around the house. I'll fly into New York tomorrow and real life will resume. Until then, other news:

• My funny, smart, and beautiful sister -- still six months away from graduating from Missouri State University -- already has a job with the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City as their newest management trainee. Yay kid!
• Speaking of my sister, I tried on bridesmaid dresses over the weekend, and it looks like I'll be wearing a V-neck halter with a long A-line skirt, all in a pretty rose color. Melissa said, "You can't wear that, you'll look hotter than I am!" when I put it on, so I knew immediately it was the right one. The wedding is next July.
• I caught up with my elementary-school friend Cydney Rabourn, who is now running for state representative in Kansas.
• I saw "Rent" and "Walk the Line." I love the Broadway version of "Rent," but I felt the movie suffered from being a little too faithful to the original material: Relationships and transitions that were perfectly believable onstage felt forced and clumsy in the naturalistic setting of film, and Stephen Chbosky's screenwriting skills and/or Chris Columbus's directorial imagination weren't quite able to open them up and make them real. Still, it's valuable merely for preserving the terrific Broadway performances from Anthony Rapp, Idina Menzel, Taye Diggs, Jesse Martin and Wilson Jermaine Heredia . . .
• . . . and my sister said after we saw it, "So is that really what happens to people with AIDS?" And I said, "Yes, really," and she said, "Oh. I didn't know that." So it accomplishes one of the best things art can do: creating imaginative sympathy.
• And "Walk the Line" was quality as well, though what's remained in my mind three days later were the intense performances from Reese Witherspoon and Joaquin Phoenix (hello, Joaquin Phoenix) and the wonderful, wonderful music.
• Still haven't seen the new "Pride and Prejudice."
• I caught a video on FUSE for the excellent Hasidic reggae singer Matisyahu.
• And I taught my technologically challenged father to use my iPod, which he found really easy and cool. The number-one song he wants for himself? "Hey Ya."

For the Beauty of the Earth

This is my favorite hymn, for its simplicity and its wonder, and because it does list so many of the things I'm grateful for: my family, with whom I ate an enormous Thanksgiving dinner earlier today; my friends, whose humor and faith keep me alive; community; peace; the "heart and mind's delight" provided by nature and the arts and having good work to do. . . . It doesn't mention chocolate, Twinings Earl Grey, the novels of Jane Austen, and wireless DSL, but otherwise, it's got me pretty much covered. The words are by Folliot Pierpont; the music, Conrad Kocher.

Happy Thanksgiving!

For the beauty of the earth
For the glory of the skies,
For the love which from our birth
Over and around us lies.
Lord of all, to Thee we raise,
This our hymn of grateful praise.

For the beauty of each hour,
Of the day and of the night,
Hill and vale, and tree and flower,
Sun and moon, and stars of light.
Lord of all, to Thee we raise,
This our hymn of grateful praise.

For the joy of ear and eye,
For the heart and mind’s delight,
For the mystic harmony
Linking sense to sound and sight.
Lord of all, to Thee we raise,
This our hymn of grateful praise.

For the joy of human love,
Brother, sister, parent, child,
Friends on earth and friends above,
For all gentle thoughts and mild.
Lord of all, to Thee we raise,
This our hymn of grateful praise.

For Thy Church, that evermore
Lifteth holy hands above,
Offering up on every shore
Her pure sacrifice of love.
Lord of all, to Thee we raise,
This our hymn of grateful praise.

For each perfect gift of Thine,
To our race so freely given,
Graces human and divine,
Flowers of earth and buds of Heaven.
Lord of all, to Thee we raise,
This our hymn of grateful praise.

Eliot Deflated

Courtesy of child_lit:

Two limericks off Prufrock:

A man did not dare eat a peach
But he wore trousers rolled at the beach.
Women walked to and fro
Saying, "Mike Angelo"
And he heard mermaids call each to each.

An angst-ridden amorist Fred
Saw sartorial changes ahead.
His ears started ringing
With fishy girls singing.
Soft fruit also filled him with dread.

+++

Waste Land Limericks
by Wendy Cope

I
In April one seldom feels cheerful;
Dry stones, sun and dust make me fearful;
Clairvoyantes distress me,
Commuters depress me–
Met Stetson and gave him an earful.

II
She sat on a mighty fine chair,
Sparks flew as she tidied her hair;
She asks many questions,
I make few suggestions–
Bad as Albert and Lil–what a pair!

III
The Thames runs, bones rattle, rats creep;
Tiresias fancies a peep–
A typist is laid,
A record is played–
Wei la la. After this it gets deep.

IV
A Phoenician named Phlebas forgot
About birds and his business–the lot,
Which is no surprise,
Since he'd met his demise
And been left in the ocean to rot.

V
No water. Dry rocks and dry throats,
Then thunder, a shower of quotes
From the Sanskrit and Dante.
Da. Damyata. Shantih.
I hope you'll make sense of the notes.

+++

He deserves this. But also: The Four Quartets.

Cardeology + Quotation + Signs of the Times

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year(tm) quickly approaches . . . and indeed I'm such a sucker for Christmas that I really do think it's the most wonderful time of the year, excepting September (my birthday month), May (spring), and any time I'm out luxuriating in one of the parks on a sunny day, when I'm convinced that's the most wonderful day of the year.

In any case, I have been thinking about ways to extend the holiday joy to you, my dear readers, and I think it's easiest just to offer this: Send me an e-mail between now and December 1 and I will send you a Christmas card in turn. No hoops to jump through, no odd vocabulary to include in the message, just a simple e-mail with your postal address to chavela_que at yahoo dot com and a little envelope of good wishes and good cheer will come to your mailbox. Many of you friends-and-relations will of course already be on my list, but I hope also to hear from you strangers who post occasionally or who have lurked on the blog up to this point. And it would be lovely if anyone who receives a card from me would send me one in return, but it's certainly not an obligation.

Ten points to the first non-Katy reader who identifies the source of the new headline (author and book).

And the small signs of the season changing:

• I put my comforter on my bed last night, after months of sleeping with only sheets and blankets;
• I linger under it far longer than I should;
• I bought a new hat and gloves (magenta and striped, respectively) and a new pale teal winter coat;
• the snowflakes are up on the lightposts along Seventh Avenue, and light-and-tinsel stars strung across the streets of Williamsburg and Little Italy;
• grocery-store specials on stuffing, yams, pumpkins, and cranberries;
• I'm planning craft projects for Christmas;
• socks curled up in odd corners of the apartment;
• I have an afghan on my lap as I sit here typing;
• the electric teakettle bubbles and clicks all day long.

The Happy List: November 17, 2005

• I went to bed around 11 last night, so when the alarm goes off at 6:20, I feel well-rested and ready to get up
• I get inspired and write over 2,000 words on the Bad Novel
• And crack the 100-page mark!
• The sun is shining
• My Thomas Pink shirt doesn't require ironing
• And I wear it
• (And I own a Thomas Pink shirt)
• There's a lovely autumn nip in the air
• I read The Brothers Karamazov on the train
• On Five Bucks to Friday, Ron and Starbucks Girl (the Little Red-Haired Girl of the strip) have a great date at last
• A good game of Internet Scrabble ends in my victory (but it's close)
• I think long and hard about a manuscript, and eventually write and send revision notes
• The Acquisitions committee approves a picture book I want to acquire
• And I get to make the offer
• I read the blues for The Valley of the Wolves -- the last manuscript stage of a book I've been working on (on and off) for two years
• I have a hot ham-and-cheese sandwich, potato chips, and a chocolate-chip cookie for lunch
• While eating, Rachel and I discuss the usual: her upcoming birthday party; her books, my books, books in general; how much we love food; our families; friends; men; and work (those last four semicolons could also be commas)
• The very sweet Olgy Gary of Children Come First tells me that her e-book of "The Rules of Engagement" is getting a lot of requests and nice comments

• The National Agricultural Library asks us for a copy of Food for Thought: The Complete Book of Concepts for Growing Minds for their collection -- which is "What the hell?" but also terrific and hilarious
• Katy and I get to talk
• My family is going to have a huge Thanksgiving dinner with all of my favorite dishes (including, especially, Jiffy corn casserole)
• And we'll play croquet
• My cold is dissipating
• I listen to the Dixie Chicks, Patty Griffin, and Alanis Morrisette while doing dishes
• I drink my first hot chocolate of the winter
• I register for the domain name www.cherylklein.com for the Talking Books site, so there is now a website with my name on it, which is odd but cool
• And having written a blog post with all of these felicities (and hoping I don't sound too smug -- I'm just delighted to have had such a good day),
• I am going to go to bed before midnight and read Saving Francesca.

Yay!

Goblets & Glamour

So Saturday I attended the New York premiere of "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire." It was held at the Ziegfeld Theatre on 54th Street, and when Rachel and I arrived early that afternoon, we were surprised and delighted to see we got to walk down the red carpet -- not with the stars, who were on the press line and separated from us by a movie-poster barrier, but on the red carpet nonetheless. Hundreds of fangirls were lined up across the street from us, shrieking at every black-windowed car that passed by, and we admired their homemade posters and enthusiasm as we waited in line to get in. Once inside, we met up with the other Scholastic people and found our seats in the theatre. After an hour of celebrity-spotting (our genius creative director David Saylor was seated next to Jon Heder from "Napoleon Dynamite," and Rachel saw James Gandolfini and Tim Robbins) and easy HP trivia questions while more important people made their way inside, it was time for the main event.

(Note: major spoilers ahead, and all opinions are of course only my own.) So, "Goblet of Fire." It's quite good, very pacey, and it manages to be both the funniest and the most intense of the HP movies so far. The focus is very much on the big action scenes: the Quidditch World Cup (though we see only the introductions, none of the game), the tasks, the Yule Ball, Voldemort's resurrection, the aftermath. The film does an excellent job setting up the Crouch/Moody plot, and I very much liked Brendan Gleeson as Moody; they managed to drop the house-elves entirely while still keeping the story clicking along, which is an accomplishment. Voldemort in the graveyard is as terrifying as it ought to be, and the Malfoy-as-bouncing-ferret scene is here in its entirety! (We once got a letter at work from a woman who kept pet ferrets and was upset that Buckbeak ate them in OotP -- I hope she isn't too distressed when the ferret goes down Crabbe's pants.)

But what's missing in the focus on the big scenes is the connective material that makes those scenes matter, particularly any sort of emotional transition from scene to scene or emotional context for the events. At the live Pottercast afterward, John Noe said that he felt he was watching an unfinished movie, and while he can't have been right -- thousands of rolls of film must be on their way to theatres this very moment -- I knew what he meant; it seemed a little jumpy in its hurry to pack everything in. (It reminded me of "Elizabethtown," actually, in the sense that both are good movies that feel as if pieces have been forcibly removed from them for reasons other than the filmmakers' vision.) It's hard to know if the movie is aimed at people who have read the book or not; the script takes the trouble to foreshadow Moody's secret identity through his endless slugging from a flask, and yet I don't think it explained "Priori Incantatem" fully (I could be wrong about this), which means the graveyard scene must have been absolutely baffling for some viewers. And while the romantic triangulations leading up to the ball are handled nicely, and Neville especially gets a wonderful not-in-the-book moment to shine, the Ron/Hermione tension doesn't snap the way it could -- particularly when the big "You should have asked me first!" scene ends with Hermione shouting "Go to bed!" at the boys. (Mrs. Weasley? Where did you come from?) But it's always hard for me to judge the HP movies on first viewing, and on the whole I very much admired the filmmakers' work at packing a big, bursting, rumbustious book into two and a half hours of efficient, enjoyable film.

After the movie, I said goodbye to Rachel, and it was on to the live Potter/Mugglecast at the Barnes & Noble at Union Square. Melissa had reserved a seat for me, so I walked past the fangirls (who seemed to have migrated down en masse, switching their undying devotion from Daniel Radcliffe to Emerson along the way) to a place near the side. The MuggleNet boys all look about twelve, but they'd be the smartest and smart-aleckest twelve-year-olds I know, and Andrew especially had many intelligent things to say about the film. Afterward I met Emerson, John Noe (for the second time), and the super-sweet Sue Upton from TLC.

And then began the surreal portion of the evening: Melissa had secured tickets to the premiere afterparty, so we shot uptown to an old church near St. John the Divine that had been converted into a party space. The Goblet of Fire stood on a pedestal outside, and the Triwizard Cup just inside the doors; the main space was decorated to look like the Yule Ball, with waterfalls of shiny silver material flowing from the balconies to the floor, where tables stood covered with white tablecloths and spindly ice sculptures. By the time we arrived, about 10 p.m., the party had moved downstairs to the dance floor and bar/lounge space. We saw Melissa's lovely mother, the all-powerful Mrs. Anelli; she and Melissa introduced us to Jamie Waylett (Crabbe), then Rupert Grint (Ron) and Jason Isaacs (Lucius Malfoy). Melissa, John, and Sue met Daniel Radcliffe and the beautiful, beautiful Robert Pattinson, but I was feeling shy because of my lingering voice-warping cold, book-and-not-movie background, and not-very-swanky clothes (I feel I can safely say I was the only person at the party wearing something from Old Navy), so I circulated around the room by myself, thinking "Oh! That's Hermione. Oh! That's Fred or George, and there's also Fred or George. And that's Neville Longbottom, he did a great job . . ."

Eventually I came back to where Sue was talking to Jason Isaacs (and trying not to faint), and we three chatted for a few minutes about the books, "The West Wing," and American electoral politics. I excused myself to use the bathroom, where I found myself standing in line in front of a pretty Asian girl in a black dress -- Katie Leung, who plays Cho Chang.

"You were very good in the film," I said.

"Thanks," she said. "I'm excited."

"Is this your first movie?"

She nodded, then put her hand over her mouth and said, "Excuse me, I have the hiccups."

"I always try to hold my breath and take a drink," I told her. "That gets rid of them."

"Oh," she nodded again, and at that point a stall opened and I went inside. Then I thought, "Oh, my lord. I just advised a movie star how to get rid of the hiccups" -- and the incongruity, the unlikelihood, the sheer goofiness of that made me smile: for these stars were all people like anyone else, and they certainly acted like anyone else, getting hiccups and hating George W. Bush. And yet there is something about stardom that makes them seem more real: They are more seen than I am, and therefore more important in the world, even if they get hiccups too. But to the credit of all the stars of the party, none of them acted like this fact existed; I smiled at Katie as I came out of the stall, and she smiled back.

Then it was back to the main room, to observe, to listen, to chat with Mrs. A. and fan Sue (who was still recovering from her time with Jason Isaacs), till the three TLC'ers and I left for the PotterCast afterparty. I didn't stay for this -- the clock had struck midnight, literally, and my head felt like Cinderella's pumpkin. But I relished the memory of the whole night on the ride home, as I probably shall for a long time to come: my brush with glamour for 2005.

Enjoy the movie, all!

Because Tax Cuts for the Wealthy Are *So* Not Hot

Another excellent forward from my uncle.

Sniff Sniff

I woke up yesterday morning with a knife-sharp sore throat and a stuffy nose (no doubt the result of wearing summertime running clothes to a November marathon), so I decided to spend the day working at home. It was actually a nice day, as I finished reading/made notes on two novel manuscripts and edited the text for a rhyming picture book from a French publisher: "Clever orange fox--tell me, who are your friends? / Not the tall farmer but her tasty hens." I wrote my assigned hour for NaNoWriMo (over 58 pages/16,625 words of crap now!); I listened to the rain chatter on the roof; I drank endless mugs of green tea with honey.

• But it's a good thing my uncle didn't send me the link to this website until today, because then I would have accomplished nothing -- it's more addictive than Minesweeper. I've gotten up to 17 seconds three or four times now, but I can't break that 18 barrier. . . .
• And I managed to keep myself from goofing around on the Talking Books page till tonight, when I added a few new links and created an annotated list of books I've edited.
• Because of my cold, I will not be working the baked-goods table at Park Slope United Methodist Church's Hollyberry Fair this Saturday as I was supposed to; but if you're in the Park Slope area, you should definitely stop by to see/buy beautiful crafts by Brooklyn artisans and get started on your Christmas shopping. Saturday from 10-4, just behind PSUMC on 8th St. between 5th and 6th Avenues in Park Slope.
• Oh! And at the Hollyberry Fair, you can bid in the silent auction on a "manuscript consultation with a professional editor," that is, yours truly. I edit, I copyedit, I'll strategize with you about getting published. . . . Opening bid is $40, I think.
• I keep forgetting to say: On my HP&SS analysis, thanks to all the people who advised me that the "Privet" in Privet Drive is a hedge and not a toilet. That line has been cut.
• Anthony Lane reviews the Keira Knightley "Pride and Prejudice," which I have no choice but to see sometime in the next week. Really, I will try to resist, and I will fail utterly. It sounds like it truly is Austen's story with Brontesque throbbing and precipitation, and even then maybe it's not so big on the story part; but at least it should be pretty to look at. If any of you see it, let me know what you think.
• The life of Charles Dickens, "South Park" style. (In animation, not content, thankfully.) (Link from Katy)

All right, I must take myself and my poor beleaguered nose to bed. Have a good weekend!

Tell Me, Who Are the People in Your Neighborhood?

My uncle recently sent me a link to a website called Family Watchdog US. It's endorsed by John Walsh, who established "America's Most Wanted," and designed to "let you see where registered sexual offenders live and work around you." You enter your zip code and get a map showing all of the sexual offenders in your area:

The Brooklyn Sexual Offenders Map

The red dots are people who commit "offenses against children"; yellow dots are rapists; blue is sexual battery, and green is people who committed the ominously huge category of "other offenses." The whole thing is topped by the alarming and ungrammatical notice, "There may be additional offenders who cannot be properly displayed on this map."

Scrolling around to see all of New York City, I'm fascinated to see where these people live -- primarily poorer, denser neighborhoods, as might be expected of people who have spent serious time in jail. There are a lot of rapists, child molesters, and "other offenders" in Fort Greene, Bed-Stuy, and Williamsburg. Quite a few rapists and other offenders in Chinatown and the Lower East Side. The sexual batterers appear to have settled down en masse in New Jersey -- three times as many as the rest of the entire metropolitan area. Queens as a whole seems to be the most sexual offender-free borough, but most of the rich neighborhoods are clean: Cobble Hill, Brooklyn Heights, TriBeCa, Soho, midtown, the whole Upper East Side.

And I was indeed relieved to see that there weren't any rapists or child molesters in Park Slope. But an "other offender" lives right on 12th Street, between 4th and 5th Avenues, about three-fourths of the way down the block. And when I clicked on his dot, his name, address, mug shot, and offense popped up: Michael Hands, 243 12th Street, "Sodomy-3rd degree Male, 14 years."

Oh God. The poor, poor boy -- such an awful thing to have happen to him, if it was forced, and I hope, wherever he is, he's gotten the help he needed to recover. And yet I can't help feeling a twinge of pity for Michael Hands too, who will be stalked by this offense (and Family Watchdog US) the entire rest of his life. . . . There is no allowance for the individual story here, that the boy consented, that Michael repented, that it was one time fifteen years ago and he has a partner now and two safe, happy kids of his own. (Yes, I know how unlikely these scenarios are, and about sexual-offender recidivism rates. But I hope.) There is no mercy, after he has, after all, paid his time.

But I admit that, knowing this, if I lived in the apartments at 243 12th Street, I'd have a harder time saying hello to him in the lobby. And if I had a child, by God, I wouldn't want mercy, I'd want safety.

So I am fascinated by this map as a sociological tool. I am troubled by it as a supporter of the right to privacy and a believer that people can change. I am grateful for it if it helps prevent even one sexual offense.

I am conflicted. And now I'm going to eat dinner.