MFA: Master's of Fiiiiine Arts

It occurred to me as I was writing a friend about my recent decision to pursue an MFA in Creative Writing (that's right, folks!), that I haven't announced it here, on this reader-less forum! Well, there it is, actually - I just did.

The facts are simple.

1. I've been writing fiction for as long as I can remember. Ten-year-old me's sequel to Jurassic Park (written before that hack Michael Crichton wrote his version) received stellar reviews from Mrs. Douglas. And she hated the author, so you know it meant something.
2. Still, to this date, despite my magazine internship, my forays into internet citizen journalism and blogging, and my two month gin-soaked retreat to San Luis Obispo, I feel I have not given the pursuit of my art an honest attempt. Two to four years of free tuition and just barely enough money to live on while focusing almost exclusively on my writing (and not being able to afford gin) would change that. If, after that, I fail, then I can say I tried.
3. Maybe I suck at the whole white-collar office gig. Maybe I'm okay with that. Lord knows I don't enjoy it, so why should I pursue it? Just because that's what my middle-class upbringing had in mind for me? Yes, it sounds a little bit like middle-school-punk-rock me is returning to the surface, but maybe that's a good thing. I got lost in this whole 'grown-up' scene for a while. The difference is that now my parents can be counted amongst the good guys.
4. What better time than now? No kids, no car I couldn't part with for food money, and no limitations on where I could live to fulfill this dream. Except Arizona. And Nevada. I'm so done with these desert environs. Give me rain, lord, give me rain!

So that's that. There are tons of details, sure, but that's the gist. For the really curious, the list of programs to which I'll likely apply currently includes (in no particular order):

• University of Iowa in Iowa City
• University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
• University of Virginia, Charlottesville
• University of Texas, Austin
• Brown University in Providence
• New York University in New York City
• Cornell University in Ithaca, New York
• Syracuse University
• University of Minnesota, Minneapolis
• University of Houston in Texas
• University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa
• Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge
• Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond
• American University, DC
• Washington University, St. Louis

Sing Song Silence, Tell Tale Tapping

There are times when I need to sing. Like thirst, I can postpone its sating for a time, but not forever. Often this is because I am sitting at my desk in my cemetery-silent office.

So, instead of singing, I do everything I can but sing. I motion the words or the rhythm with my lips and tongue. I type the words at the same pace at which I'd be giving them voice. I bob my head, rock my body and, if I'm careful not to shake the plywood floor or the plastic cubicle walls, I even settle into a salacious tapping of my heel.

To actually break out into song would be to stab at the heart of this unsuspecting, sleepy beast of an environment. So I tip-toe around it, slaking my thirst but leaving the beast on its throne.

Until the revolution comes!

"There will come a time when everybody who is lonely will be free to sing and dance and love...There will come a time when you can even take your clothes off when you dance."
- Frank "who cares if it's satire" Zappa

Weather Update: Still Weird (Addendum)

May 2nd, ice falls from the sky.

It's new to me too.

Weather Update: Still Weird

This morning I had to take a circuitous route to work that involved heading way up north, then looping through the NE Heights, and into my office Uptown. On the way, I saw three bank marquees displaying the temperature. At 8:20 at Menaul and Carlisle it was 71 degrees; 8:40 at Wyoming and Comanche it was 52; and by 8:43 at Wyoming and Indian School it was 62. I have little doubt that these readouts were accurate.

On my 10-mile journey, I passed through three (likely more) climate zones. I want to remind all the folks back home that all of Albuquerque could fit inside the San Fernando Valley one and a half times.

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No Earl Grey at these Tea Parties

I stumbled upon David Weigel's blog for the Washington Post and have been reading up on his notes from the inside of the Conservative movement. This one and the stories it links to caught my eye in a special way. What is the deal with the Tea Party Movement (how I hate to even validate it by calling it so!), anyway? Is it racially driven? Who are these people? Are they as stupid as their signs suggest they are?

This Gallup poll gives us the figures. About 79% of Tea Party members are white, 6% black, and 15% other. Given that the total US population is 11% black, it seems to me that blacks are only half as likely to be tea partiers as people in other races. In addition to being whiter than average, they are more likely to be wealthier than average, less likely to hold an advanced degree, more likely to be a man, and more likely to be a homemaker. Though, your average tea partier is probably not those last two things at the same time. But hey - wealthy, undereducated white men directing their anger at a black politician and his followers...you don't say.

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