Joshilyn Jackson's Blog, page 19

We Went Medieval on that Birthday's Butt

I met my husband doing a summer of George Kaufman plays with the Playwright's Repertory Theatre in Florida. It was the first time I got paid actual money to act. This Summer Rep even had a few equity actors passing through; The Rep gave out of towners a place to live and paid enough money to keep us in Top Ramen and beer, provided we were willing to drink domestic.

Actors always are.

This little summer rep did 3 plays by one writer and a debuted a new play every season, and taught Scott how t...

Things I Want to Put Into My Brain Using The Sensory Input Nodes in My Eyes and Ears

FIRST, a response to a comment on last week's blog entry. Let me say, Cakeburnett, I appreciate your deep desire to NOT end a sentence in a preposition, especially one about my tiny dog. That is something up with which she will not put.

Ansley is a grammar Nazi, and if you muck about with THE QUEEN'S ENGLISH she gets upset and nibbles holes in my sheets. (True fact.) Just last week, someone split an infinitive in her presence, and she pooped in the guest room. SO, for you! The proper way to ...

The Hairy Irony

You know those magnets on the back windows of cars, or stickers? Or whatever they are? They show the family, and now that I think of it, they are mostly on vans. Anyway, they show little stick figures to represent the people in the family, and sometimes the kid ones are very specific, like one stick figure is in a tutu and one has a cap and ball, and they have dog ones now, too, and cat ones, little representations of WHO WE ARE IN A UNIT, WE THE TRIBE OF THIS VAN.

You know those?

Well...

Three Good Reasons Not to Walk into the Sun Like a Sun Lemming

Not that I was planning to. Really. But you know, some days you think, "Well if I DID walk in the sun like a sun lemming, at least I wouldn't have to clean up this enthusiastic spray of dog sick I have just discovered in my guest room."

One: My book is sitting by Stephen King's book on the bus. THEY MIGHT SHARE LUNCH. THEY MIGHT MAKE OUT.

Translation: A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty has made the Audible All-Stars List. This is a list of Audible's highest rated listens for the last three months.

A...

Tucson in Pictures

It's so foreign a landscape, so clearly OTHER, that it made me re-realize that wow, this is a BIG country. I felt a little like I had flown through space to get there. Kept looking for green chicks in scanty clothing, with the requisite Captain Kirk to mack on them.

The plants are INSANE looking. It's a very weird, very specific kind of beauty. Best part: A showy little hummingbird, smaller than my thumb, was perched on a cactus needle. I had never seen one BE STILL before.

In Alabama, my mom ...

Things Said or Written by Some People I Love

I hate blogs about why people have not been blogging. SO this won't be that. I will just say, my best cat died. I am blue. Several people I love are having very hard times right now, with bad cancer situations and other family crises, and I can't FIX any of it, or even really help, not with any of it, and I HATE that. SO. We'll say no more about it.

You know, when you go quiet for a bit you feel like you have to come back with the FANGED ELABORATE GRANDADDY LONGLEGS of ALLLLL blog posts to...

The Friday Redirect, Because I Noticed It Was Friday

This is me at Dekalb School of Fine Arts yesterday, where I am apparently teaching some rather gifted young writers how to feel up an invisible mermaid. (Or perhaps how to kindly adjust her seashells, as based on my hand position, her top has gone a bit wonky.)

Charity, I told the kids, begins in the ocean.

They recreated a scene in A GROWN UP KIND OF PRETTY, turning the library into the CALVARY HIGH back to school luau. HOW COOL IS THAT. AND! Look, on the table, they made Mosey's Tree House. ...

No Pictures

The last time I took him to the vet, Schubert's numbers were not good. Not good at all. The vet said, "Well he is 16 years old… his kidneys are failing. When they give out, you will know. How is his behavior?" I reported that he was eating with vim and belligerently ruling over the dogs and sleeping on my feet and violently hating everything on the planet except me with his usual piratical vigor.

There is something wholly charming about an entity who loves ONLY you. Given an opportunity...

The Importance of Being Ansley, Part Three, Finally: Eat, Bay, Love

So if you scroll down there are two previous Ansley blogs that explain who and how and why Ansley is. Now. Here is a true depiction of three dogs.

Bonneville: Bonneville was a foster dog. He was not allowed to stay at my house.

Bonneville had a very terrible life before he met us. When he first came, he peed when Scott spoke. He cringed when I spoke. He knew he was not allowed on the sofa at his old house, but he loved to be on the sofa, so if ANY HUMAN came into the room when he was on the s...

This All Mostly Happened Yesterday…Or An Ansley Re-Deferred

Yes yes yes, spiritual lessons from dogs whose insides seem to be half-bladder yesterday, spiritual lessons from dogs whose insides seem to be half-bladder tomorrow, but NEVER, it seems, spiritual lessons from dogs whose insides seem to be half-bladder TODAY.

SOCK ME NON OF YOUR PINK SOCKERIES, oh best of all possible beloveds, because I want to tell you about yesterday, because it explains in narrative form what a book tour is truly LIKE.

Finishing up the GROWN UP KIND OF PRETTY tour in...