17 degrees.
Small town life is beginning to get to me, just as it does every year at around this time. I found a pretty nice coffee shop with some wireless access to the internets, but other than that, it's basically the same town it was 17 years ago when we first moved in. Small. Desolate. Nowhere.
The streets have no sidewalks. Some are paved with bricks, which some people think is charming, but I generally regard as hazardous and prone to potholes, not that San Diego has this town beat in that regard, but I'm just saying. If San Diego's streets were paved with brick, we'd have collapsed into the ocean by now.
For a few days I've been trying to get some work done on my siddertation. I've come to the conclusion that 75% of the first chapter is unsalvagable - which eliminates about thirty pages from the thing, of which I can only see myself replacing about five. I suppose this isn't an unmitigatedly bad thing; it was running a little long in any event (in 12 point font it was about three hundred pages. Luckily I use 11 point, which has it coming in at a tidy 225). Other than that, I'm not making much progress, but I am enjoying the occasional spin of "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" on the coffeeshop stereo. (Well, I have one complaint about the stereo here - they keep playing that song "Baby it's Cold Outside," which itself is, I think, a pretty nice song, but the recording of it has some guy singing who sounds like he just swallowed an entire plate of bacon fat - like he needs to clear his throat about fifteen times before speaking to anyone, or singing, for that matter.)
On the plus side, the people here aren't as fat as they were in Oklahoma City. I don't really know what the explanation is. But nevertheless, it seems to be fact. Lawrence remains one of the great towns in the midwest; it's practically a little version of San Diego, only with a sweet music scene and without the endless miles of freeway. And with cold. And snow. And the occaionsal boot shop. And the occasional ad on TV for bootshops. And the occasional ad on TV for Farm Implement Supply stores. (Actually, this one is a little more than occasional. These freakin' stores must purchase 16 hours of advertising on TV every day. It gets a little tiresome. I tell you, I don't want an orange tractor vest!) Off topic, anybody have any idea how many miles of freeway there are in SD county? It's gotta be in the thousands. Anyway, Lawrence has even put in a new World Market, which allowed me to buy the spices I need to make a tasty plate of Aloo Gobhi for me and mom. If you try to make this, add a touch of honey at the end - quite nice.
The thing I notice most about east-central Kansas during the winter are the trees. Leaveless, of course. (KS doesn't have a lot of palms, eucalyptus, or pines.) But they're these huge, majestic trees, all grey in the winter overcast light.
Really quite striking, I think. It'd be a great place to film the beginning of a nifty film noir, if only the Coen brothers hadn't stolen the idea already in Fargo. Er, I guess "stolen" is the wrong word. Fuck it. They stole it. Jerks. You know, you'd start with a wide-angle shot, snow covered, in a clearing where two men in overcoats are walking toward each other, one holding a briefcase, as you discover as the camera slowly zooms in.
MAN #1
Is that the briefcase?
MAN #2
It depends. You have the money?
MAN #1
It's in the car.
MAN #2
Is that the car?
MAN #1
Yup.
And scene.
The streets have no sidewalks. Some are paved with bricks, which some people think is charming, but I generally regard as hazardous and prone to potholes, not that San Diego has this town beat in that regard, but I'm just saying. If San Diego's streets were paved with brick, we'd have collapsed into the ocean by now.
For a few days I've been trying to get some work done on my siddertation. I've come to the conclusion that 75% of the first chapter is unsalvagable - which eliminates about thirty pages from the thing, of which I can only see myself replacing about five. I suppose this isn't an unmitigatedly bad thing; it was running a little long in any event (in 12 point font it was about three hundred pages. Luckily I use 11 point, which has it coming in at a tidy 225). Other than that, I'm not making much progress, but I am enjoying the occasional spin of "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" on the coffeeshop stereo. (Well, I have one complaint about the stereo here - they keep playing that song "Baby it's Cold Outside," which itself is, I think, a pretty nice song, but the recording of it has some guy singing who sounds like he just swallowed an entire plate of bacon fat - like he needs to clear his throat about fifteen times before speaking to anyone, or singing, for that matter.)
On the plus side, the people here aren't as fat as they were in Oklahoma City. I don't really know what the explanation is. But nevertheless, it seems to be fact. Lawrence remains one of the great towns in the midwest; it's practically a little version of San Diego, only with a sweet music scene and without the endless miles of freeway. And with cold. And snow. And the occaionsal boot shop. And the occasional ad on TV for bootshops. And the occasional ad on TV for Farm Implement Supply stores. (Actually, this one is a little more than occasional. These freakin' stores must purchase 16 hours of advertising on TV every day. It gets a little tiresome. I tell you, I don't want an orange tractor vest!) Off topic, anybody have any idea how many miles of freeway there are in SD county? It's gotta be in the thousands. Anyway, Lawrence has even put in a new World Market, which allowed me to buy the spices I need to make a tasty plate of Aloo Gobhi for me and mom. If you try to make this, add a touch of honey at the end - quite nice.
The thing I notice most about east-central Kansas during the winter are the trees. Leaveless, of course. (KS doesn't have a lot of palms, eucalyptus, or pines.) But they're these huge, majestic trees, all grey in the winter overcast light.
Really quite striking, I think. It'd be a great place to film the beginning of a nifty film noir, if only the Coen brothers hadn't stolen the idea already in Fargo. Er, I guess "stolen" is the wrong word. Fuck it. They stole it. Jerks. You know, you'd start with a wide-angle shot, snow covered, in a clearing where two men in overcoats are walking toward each other, one holding a briefcase, as you discover as the camera slowly zooms in.
MAN #1
Is that the briefcase?
MAN #2
It depends. You have the money?
MAN #1
It's in the car.
MAN #2
Is that the car?
MAN #1
Yup.
And scene.
posted by dd0031 at 12:50 PM
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