Matthew Dicks's Blog, page 736
October 18, 2009
Zombies!
Check it out. A zombie wedding cake! Do you like it?
In terms of unconventional and nonconforming things like this, I believe that people fall into one of three camps:
1. I love it! It's amazing! I wish I had done something like it at my wedding.
2. It's definitely not for me, but isn't it great how people are willing to go out on a limb to do something unique and different and buck conventional wisdom?
3. This is stupid and tasteless. What could this couple been thinking?
I...
Water Street Books
I spent last night at Water Street Books in Exeter, NH, discussing SOMETHING MISSING with a group of enthusiastic readers. It's a wonderful independent bookstore located along a quaint little street lined with shops and restaurants, and its owner, Dan, is as enthusiastic about books as they come.
Among the audience members was Brooks Sigler, author of FIVE FINGERED FICTION, and the person most responsible for arranging my appearance. Even though we had not met until last night, she has...
October 17, 2009
Not all books should be recorded
WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE, a book I have never read, consists of only ten sentences, yet it is the second most popular audio book in the iTunes Music Store.
Who purchases a ten sentence audio book, even if it's only 95 cents?
According to the product description, the recording is six minutes long. Six minutes to read ten sentences? I may just have to purchase the audio book to figure out what the hell is going on during this recording.
As if to highlight the lunacy of a...
Giving hotdogs a bad name
Hotdogs are my second favorite food, but some things should not exist.
Raven
A while ago, I wrote about group descriptors in the animal world. Words like a murder of crows and a pride of lions.
I also proposed a few of my own, which I did not like very much at the time but have grown rather fond of in the warm glow of hindsight. They include:
A gamble of poker players
A concern of mothers
A fumble of left-handers
Not bad, I must say.
Recently, I became aware of a group descriptor that I adore:
An unkindness of ravens, also sometimes referred to as a...
October 16, 2009
Ten-year-old genius
In the spirit of Connie Wanek's Radiator and William Carlos Williams The Red Wheelbarrow, I challenged my students to identify a topic that no poet has ever written about before.
One of my kids came up with this:
The line sometimes used to distinguish between a 6 and a 9.
I was jealous and wanted to steal the idea immediately.
Old fashioned book burning
A Baptist Church in Canton, NC is hosting a good old fashioned "Halloween book burning" in order to purge the area of Satan's works, which include all non-King James versions of the Bible, popular books by many religious authors and even country music.
In all fairness, I am not religious (and could do without most country music) and therefore am less concerned about the burning of religious texts than I am books like Huckleberry Finn, but it would seem to me that the burning of any book is...
October 15, 2009
Death is not a deterrent
Whenever I speak about my book at a bookstore or library, I always encourage the members of my audience to begin writing. I tell them that anyone is capable of writing if they apply themselves, and I mean it. I think everyone should be working on a book. Regardless of a person's level of skill or experience, everyone has a story, whether it be fiction or otherwise.
Too few people take the time to commit these stories to paper.
Following my appearance at the retirement community on...
October 14, 2009
Out of print but still in demand
BookFinder.com tracks the most sought-after out-of-print titles in America and updates their list annually. It's an interesting list, usually populated by previously unheard-of books, but occasionally you find something of interest. This year's list includes:
Cameron Crowe's FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH, the 1981 book where Crowe, as a free-lancer for Rolling Stone magazine, went undercover at a California high school and wrote about his experiences. Crowe later wrote a screenplay based...
October 13, 2009
Bad day
Not a bad day. I had a rotten day today.
It began as one of those days when all I wanted to do was stay home and play with my eight-year-old daughter. My wife and I used to work together, our classrooms just two doors apart, but she is taking the year off to be with Clara, which leaves me on some mornings lamenting the loss of my wife at work and my daughter from my entire day. As much as I enjoy teaching, I think that I could probably stay home with my daughter, playing with her...
