katie is(n't) and that's cool.

i need every day to be a writing night.

like the song says, i’m not sick, but i’m not well.

mistakes made stay mistakes forever. other people ARE in control of your life. comparing the price of gas to the price of gatorade is flippant. all the free keychains in your bag will just make your elbows tired.

here’s my essay.

i caught a girl balancing an unopened LP on her head. it was a coincidence. she blushed. neither of us smiled. we were preoccupied. 

a tall, beautifully musculatured girl walked to the counter just after that. her face was nothing to write home about in profile. “and my heart’s still beating like a hammer” was in my ears. 

the LP girl looked sadly at the tall, less-cute girl’s body.

we all eat or will eat cupcakes. we don’t need to look sad at each other.

you never give your bad days.

step on the gas and wipe that tear away.

(huh.)

step on the gas and wipe that tear away.

(i’m thinking.)

step on the gas and wipe that tear away.

one sweet dream.

(i’m thinking.)

step on the one gas and wipe sweet that tear away, dream.

hey, i did something.

crap, hang on. i did something.

i want to be flaming lips. is that too much to ask?

you’re sorta stuck where you are

and all your bad days will end

you’re, and all your sorta-stuck-bad-days where you are, will end.

that’s…almost something.

i should be wearing an animal suit.

this is a good assignment. take some lyrics. uncle mushy ‘em up.

talking to myself in the head.

“when i said, ‘that’s a tall dog,’ you know that’s not what i meant.”

“what did you mean, then?”

“it was a metaphor. for our relationship.”

“oh, like when people say ‘strong as an ox.’”

“no, that’s a simile.”

“but it’s still a metaphor, right?”

“god, you never understand the point of things.”

“but, there was a dog across the street when you said that. and it was tall. like, not metaphorically or anything.”

“really?”

“yeah. you didn’t see it? it was black and skinny.”

“i don’t remember.”

“maybe you weren’t really speaking in metaphors. maybe you were just observing.”

“i was doing both. i was observing our relationship in metaphors.”

“well, all i know is, i only observed a tall dog.”

it gets better as you go.

someone asked the other day, “are you ever going to write again?”

my initial response was to tell this person to go f him- or herself. instead i said, “why don’t you?” which is a thinly veiled go f yourself, right?

i’d love to say i’ll write today. i’d love to say i’ve got all kinds of ideas and words nick swishering around my brain. 

i follow some awesome writers on twitter. they do things all the time. everything. poetry, shorts, flash, essays, reading, books… everything. some have kids, some don’t. i don’t know any ladies like that, though, that have kids. i should search some out, probably. make them my heroes. but they better be edgy. they better be practically crazy, or i won’t respect them.

i need to read more. 

i need to write—100 times—sentences that i love. 

i need 

i need

i need

it’s a dumb vicious cycle. if i don’t write, i get depressed. when i’m depressed, i can’t write. like with exercise. (only, fat AND depressed then.) and it’s awful, painful stuff trying to get back in shape (mentally or physically or triangularly, too, i suppose). you all know. we all share that. we’re all terrible at “sticking to it.” (except patty. kind of amazing that one.) so, even though i feel like all i do is whine, i also feel like you know what i’m talking about, so it makes me feel better. to be in the gang.

i pretty much liked the season ender of snl. pretty much thought that was good.

why is pandora playing songs to try to make me cry? dumbass pandora.

i’ve had this argument with people before, but i don’t think anyone takes me seriously: karma isn’t karma, it’s just energy, and you need to repolarize yourself if you’ve got the bad energy. which is why i always had bad luck when i wore a ring made of hematite in 6th grade, and have tremendously average luck touching a magnetized hematite nugget every day before work. what i’m thinking of doing, actually, is sleeping with the magnetized nugget in my mouth. i’m thinking, hey, if this changes my luck, i can write a book with a stupid mix of regular and italicized words on the cover, and get an hour-long PBS special. it doesn’t really have to be THAT scientific. just persuasive to middle aged and older people. or young executives. or people like this one person who i may or may not have taken a writing class with. he or she would eat that up!

and the more fillings you have, the better the hematite will stay put at night. because, magnets, right? or. wait. are fillings the kind of metal that magnets stick to? 

listen. you don’t understand (but you do). i’m just happy to be writing words in a consecutive order.

{chad} ha{s} a new story up in the Coachella Review

chadasaurusrex:

http://thecoachellareview.com/fiction/bluehippo_chadredden.html

this is a story i like, that i would like to share with you, my friends. and enemies.

ok, fine. don’t give me edits. BUT…

can someone PLEASE tell me what the typo is in this paragraph?

“I could smell the anticipation in my sweat. I tracked house numbers as I drove, trying to come back to cool. But the reflection of myself in the driver’s side window caused my palms to dampen.”

is it supposed to be “me” instead of “myself”? is it supposed to be “driver-side” or “driver’s-side” window? or is it just that i need a comma after “But”? should i have used “tried” instead of “trying”? it’s killing me!

nature poems.

i want to write some poems about nature.

it’s for a… thing. 

what’s a good topic? flowers? air? dust?

how do i write a poem?