Curtis Edmonds's Blog, page 9

ADVICE FOR YOUNG WRITERS

Make sure that your formatting is consistent
throughout your work. If you start with a green crayon, keep using it. Don’t
switch to blue halfway through.

To read this, and a lot of even funnier short stories, buy LIES I HAVE TOLD on Amazon or your favorite e-book seller.

Be sure to vary your
modifiers. Here, you’ve got “poopy” in the first paragraph and “poopyhead”
right after that. I would substitute in “stinkypants.” Think about it.

Set aside time to write.
Having a consistent schedule helps build discipline and good writing habits.
You might start with Saturday between ten o’clock and noon, if only because
that lets your parents sleep in a little bit.

Always respect the integrity
of your work. That’s another way of saying “don’t spill apple juice all over
it.” That’s what the sippy cup is there for.

Every good writer needs a
mentor – someone to pattern themselves after, someone to inspire them, someone
to help shape their style. There’s nothing wrong with that. But please don’t
use Khloe. She’s not even good at fingerpainting yet. And I’m not sure her
parents even went to college. I mean, they’re nice people and all. Don’t get me
wrong.

One trick I always use is
that when I create a character, I do an interview with them in my mind, get
them to answer questions. It’s a great way to explore their personalities. Kind
of like an imaginary friend, I guess. Just a little. Except imaginary friends
aren’t real. And they don’t need to eat any goldfish crackers.

Never use a short word when a
long word will do the trick just fine. Especially if you can’t spell the long
word. “Canine” starts with a C. Just say “doggie.”

Do everything you can to
cultivate your inner voice. I said “inner.” Like your inside voice, but so
quiet only you can hear it.

The best environment for any
writer is one where it’s quiet and as free from distraction as possible. So,
no, I’m not turning on The Wiggles.
Just forget about it.

If the best way to make your
characters likeable is to have them do likeable things, it stands to reason
that the best way to make them unlikeable is to have them do unlikeable things.
Like, you know, rattling the mini-blinds every single time you go near the
window. It’s incredibly annoying. I’ve only said that, like, a thousand times,
so cut it out already. I’m serious.

Write what you know. What you
know is swing sets. So write about swing sets. If I can get a fifty-word review
of the one at the playground before naptime, you can have a Fig Newton. Heck,
make it two. Come on, that’s more than what the HuffPo pays me.

How America Makes Cornbread Dressing: A Scientific Survey

I am not here to tell you what to do.

Let’s get this out of the way first. You are a grownup. You can put whatever you want on your Thanksgiving table. You can serve chili with beans and I will roll my eyes and silently judge you because you do not put beans in chili, but that’s not the point. This is your dinner, and you can serve it however you want and whenever you want. You have control over everything except how Jason Garrett’s inexplicable lack of coaching skill will wreck the Cowboys game.

This is not me telling you how to make cornbread dressing. You can follow whatever recipe you want, whether it’s your grandmother’s sacred text or Stove-Top’s. (My grandmother’s dressing was unmemorable, but she would put chopped hard-boiled eggs in the gravy, and good Lord, don’t do that.)

What this is trying to be is behavioral analysis: what do people actually put in their dressing? Specifically, what are search engines and recipe sites telling people to put in their dressing?

METHODOLOGY: I started by clicking on the first thirty recipes for “cornbread dressing” on Google. This is not exactly scientific, and shut up, but it does tell you what the popular online recipes look like. (I specifically left out the New York Times recipe — these, you know, are the people who insisted that you could make guacamole from mushy peas.) Then, I put the ingredients into a spreadsheet.

I am not getting into the dressing versus stuffing debate here.

The spreadsheet follows a simple pattern, one that I remembered from an old Alton Brown Good Eats episode — basically, how Alton defines a casserole. (Yes, cornbread dressing is a casserole. Shut up.)

Starch. This, of course, in cornbread dressing, is primarily… wait for it… cornbread.
Protein. (This isn’t in Alton’s rubric; he says “main ingredient,” which in cornbread dressing is… wait for it… cornbread, but that’s the primary starch.) Some recipes have a protein, some don’t.
Aromatics. Flavorful vegetables like onions and celery, you know.
Seasonings. Sage is the traditional seasoning, but there are variations.
Binder. This is what holds the casserole together. In traditional Southern post-war cooking, this is cream of mushroom soup (please tell me you’re not putting cream of mushroom soup in your cornbread dressing).
Liquid. This, again, is not in Alton’s rubric, but with all that dry cornbread you need something to keep your dressing from drying out.

The results are as follows:

Cornbread

All of the cornbread dressing recipes include cornbread.

I know, right?

Now, because this is essentially a libertarian article, I am not going to tell you that you have to make your cornbread from scratch, in a cast-iron skillet, the way that God and Martha White intended. I am not going to tell you to put sugar in it, or buttermilk. You do it your way. (I use Jiffy Brand and am not ashamed.) I specifically did not document what the different recipes used for cornbread; no need to stoke that fire. Make cornbread how you want.

White Bread

A little under half of the recipes in this survey include white bread. If there was ever evidence of the total collapse of decent society, it is here.

Three recipes include biscuits instead of white bread. This is also wrong. But it is, somehow, less wrong than just putting a big hunk of Mrs. Baird’s in your dressing. I don’t recommend this but you can do it.

One recipe suggests adding a box of Stove-Top to your cornbread. I do not endorse this or the people that do this. You can try it! You can try lots of things. But there are better options, like admitting you can’t cook and going to Waffle House.

All kidding aside, really, please don’t put white bread in your cornbread dressing. You can! No one is saying you can’t. But all you are doing is adding extra carbs and no flavor.

Protein

One third of the recipes included sausage as a protein. I always include sausage in my dressing; but that’s a minority position and I’m okay with that. Two recipes included chicken breast; I think that would probably be okay if you weren’t making this for Thanksgiving; chicken in dressing plus turkey sounds like poultry overkill.

I am a Texan living in New Jersey, so I made a special order for Elgin sausage. Sage sausage is excellent if you can find it. Some recipes call for breakfast sausage, others for Italian sausage. I say you can’t go wrong with whatever you like.

Aromatics

Every single recipe had onions. This is as close as you get to unanimity in this world, and it is a good thing. I am not a huge fan of onions, but even I put onions in my dressing (heavily diced, nearly caramelized).

I mean, it can’t be worse than starving to death.

29 of 30 recipes had celery. The other one had cream of celery soup. I honestly do not know what to tell you about this. I suspect that someone, years back, opened their refrigerator on Thanksgiving morning, saw that they were out of celery, looked in their pantry, saw a lonesome can of cream of celery soup, and said to themselves, “Well, what’s the worst that can happen?”

As far as other vegetables, several recipes called for garlic. I think this is fine. I think you probably need to like garlic a lot to make this work. Similarly, one recipe included fennel. Again, if you like fennel, that is fine, too, although I think that you’d do better off with Italian sausage if you wanted that flavor. A couple of recipes called for bell pepper, which I think doesn’t add enough flavor, but you can try it. One recipe suggested jalapeno peppers, which I would personally be OK with but everyone else in my house would rebel.

Seasonings
Not shown: parsley, rosemary and thyme

The easy winner here is sage, with almost every recipe including this particular herb. Those that didn’t list sage included poultry seasoning, which just so happens to include sage. So my sage advice is to make sure you have some sage. (Yes, I know.)

So what else you got? A lot of people use parsley, and thyme, and even rosemary, to go with the Scarborough Fair joke I made in the caption. Any of that is fine, I suppose. There were a couple of people who use nutmeg, why not. I have used ginger before. It’s pretty good, but you can’t use too much of it.

Liquid

So just about everyone uses chicken broth. Which is fine. A couple of recipes use cream of chicken soup as well (and one, dear God, does use cream of mushroom on top of that, why would you). I think cream of chicken soup is a little bit overkill but without ever having tried it I am not going to mock it that much.

Three recipes use milk — two use just regular milk, but one uses Eagle Brand, and I have to admit, I am a tiny bit curious about this. I think it would be too sweet, but I like sweet. I’m a little afraid to try it out. You might try using evaporated milk to make the cornbread — but when you look up that recipe, the first link is from the people who make evaporated milk. Never ask a barber if you need a haircut.

One recipe recommended using wine as a liquid. I am just going to leave that with you.

Butter

Almost every recipe used butter — sometimes as a medium to brown the aromatics (this is what I do) or just for the hell of it. So, yeah, butter.

Other Stuff You Can Try, Why Not

Apples? I mean, sure, why not. Mushrooms? I mean, I guess. Bon Appetit suggests corn nuts, which just sounds weird. Pecans and cranberries could work but you are going to have cranberry sauce and pecan pie, aren’t you? AREN’T YOU?

Conclusions

There is a good bit of variety in these recipes, but you know, really not that much. Getting the basics right is more important than the variations. If you can make cornbread, that’s half the battle. Then all you need to do is add butter and onions and celery, add in some sage, drown it with chicken stock, bake it, and you’re golden. Anything else is just gravy.

And please don’t put hard-boiled eggs in the gravy. I am begging you.

Links to recipes used in this article:

A Little Pinch
AllRecipes (note: this is the most basic of recipes, and the easiest — everything you need, nothing you don’t)
Bon Appetit
Cafe Delites
Country Living
Delish
Dessert for Two
Dinner at the Zoo
Divas Can Cook
Food.com
Food Network
Grandbaby Cakes
Just a Pinch
Martha Stewart
Melissa’s Southern Style Kitchen
Once Upon a Chef
Platter Talk
Sally’s Baking Addiction
Serious Eats
Show Me The Yummy
Southern Bite
Southern Living
Syrup and Biscuits
Taste of Home
Tastes Better from Scratch
Tastes of Lizzy T
Tasty
The Spruce Eats

On Professional Decline

A gerontologist friend recommended the Atlantic article by Arthur C. Brooks on professional decline after 50 on the social media thingy the other day. I skimmed through it and responded, “Wow, I’m ahead of the curve; my professional decline started a long time ago!”

This is flip, but true enough. I am on, basically, my third career. After college and law school, I started off as a “junior politician,” working on the Dallas staff of then-Senator Phil Gramm as an underpaid and overworked “caseworker”. I was on the Senate staff, not the campaign staff, and missed out on his disastrous 1996 Presidential campaign. I jumped ship and worked for Governor George W. Bush, staying on through his successful 2000 presidential campaign. I wasn’t able to latch on with the White House staff, though, and wasn’t able to make any headway getting any other role with that Administration.

So I ended up reinventing myself as an attorney. In the Governor’s office, I was working on disability issues, and I got a job at Georgia Tech with the regional ADA center for the Southeast. That led to a job as an attorney with Disability Rights New Jersey in Trenton, where I represented clients with disabilities in a variety of different cases. I had a secondary role managing the state assistive technology program. I did that for eleven years, until I was heartily sick of it.

I don’t want to go too much into why I left my last job, but what happened was that the Medicaid program in New Jersey got handed over to private insurance. That meant that it was in the interest of the private insurance companies to cut back on individual services — and every time they did that, they would send out a letter telling the patients that my office would represent them in administrative law court for free. Which we did.

The upshot of all this was that I was spending a great deal of time arguing with first-year lawyers over whether little old ladies in New Jersey should get 10 hours of home health care benefits per week, or 8. This is — without meaning any disrespect to the little old ladies involved — not the stuff that great legal careers are built on. Around the same time, I was up for a promotion, and didn’t get it — and the lawyer who did get it was an advocate of taking on a lot more of these cases. This meant that I would be spending the rest of my career wrangling over the details of the bowel movements of little old ladies, and how much Medicaid assistance that required. (You want to talk about career decline, that was pretty much it.)

I went to look for other work, and found out that I had painted myself into a corner. There just weren’t that many firms that were interested in hiring someone whose specialty was representing indigent clients in administrative law court. And I couldn’t support myself as a solo practitioner handling those kind of claims. I interviewed with several firms where I could have made a lateral move — guardianship cases, special education, medical malpractice — but none of them were a good fit. I had bottomed out at age 48, and I wasn’t sure what to do about it.

I ended up going in a completely different direction. I left my job and enrolled in a master’s program in human resources at Rutgers. I have a very challenging job working for a small human services agency. It is anything but a glamorous role; I do a lot of paperwork and handle a lot of compliance issues. I am never going to get elected to Congress, or work in the White House, or argue before the Supreme Court, and that is fine.

I take a lot of comfort from this Pat Green song, about a hard-luck country singer:

I gave up on Nashville a long time ago.

Damn straight.

So I have, at age 50, become comfortable with the idea of professional decline. I am not exactly thrilled about it. I like to think that I can find a better job, doing something more responsible, perhaps using my law degree. But those opportunities haven’t opened up for me, yet, and maybe they won’t. It doesn’t bother me, or I try not to let it bother me, which is not the same thing.

Professional Decline and Publishing

What does bother me, though, is not professional decline in my career, although that is bad enough. What bothers me is what it means for me as a novelist.

I’ve written and self-published two novels; one in 2013 and one in 2014. Neither were particularly successful, even for self-published works. (I’ve also published an alphabet picture book, which flopped even worse, and had a political short-story collection published by a small press.) I finished my third novel just last year, and I have been querying agents on it over the last month or two.

I’ve had much less success than usual — even though I didn’t get an agent for the last two books, I used to get some kind of response. Maybe it was just asking to look at the rest of the manuscript. Now all I am getting is form rejection letters. And what I am asking myself, from an HR standpoint, is this: if I’ve really hit my creative decline at age 50, does this mean I’m wasting my time?

I’m starting to think so.

There is of course the good old self-publishing stigma, which isn’t (supposedly) what it once was, but only a fool would say it isn’t still there.
I write kind of slow. Three novels in seven years isn’t going to get anyone excited about representing me, and I get that.
I don’t write series, which hurts you a lot in self-pub and doesn’t help with anything else.
I write in different genres. I went from literary fiction to chick-lit to YA fantasy. I have no explanation for this; it’s just what I decided to write about.
I am old. It is tough to write YA when you’re old.
I am an attorney, and attorneys are famously cranky, and twitchy about contract elements.
I don’t have any kind of social media audience to speak of.
I am not only old, but old and non-telegenic, and a white male Republican in the bargain. (Every single agent, in every single profile, coos about how much they want diverse voices. This is partly to keep them from being eaten alive by the Twitter mobs, which is fine. This is partly because they see value in diversity, which is also fine. And none of this, y’know, is keeping me from getting published, but it sure ain’t helping me none.)

There is a name for everything I just did in that last bullet list, and that name is whining. I know that. (I spend half my life telling my 10-year-old twins to stop whining; I know it when I hear it.) And you shouldn’t whine. But it’s one thing to whine about gatekeepers, and another thing to realize that, you know, maybe there are perfectly reasonable decline-related concerns that an agent might have with respect to an aging and slightly doddering potential client.

So This Is What I Am Going To Do

I’m not querying anymore. Not on this project, probably not on any future ones. (I am still waiting on several responses from agents that I have queried; I’m assuming that they will reject me — although I’m open to discussion if they’re somehow, inexplicably interested.)

I’m going to start looking for a cover artist for the book. I’m going to slap a high-quality cover on it and put it on Amazon, and see how well it does. If it sells well, great, if not, great. I’m not going to worry about it one way or another. (This last sentence is a lie, but I’m going to try anyway.)

I am going to start actively managing my decline — my physical decline, if nothing else. I am going to try to eat better, and exercise, and lose weight — if only to set myself up for an enjoyable retirement. I am going to keep working — at least for a while — to save money for said retirement. I am going to cultivate my family relationships, and maybe seek out ways to serve in my community.

But I’m not going to slink into the forest gladly or gracefully. Decline, as Arthur C. Brooks ought to be able to tell you, is a choice. Senescence and death may be inevitable, but that’s not what we were made for. Rage, rage against the dying of the light, Dylan Thomas said.

Damn straight.

What Your Flying Car Says About You

2048 Chevrolet Dymaxion HC

You know how to hack the software in your food replicator to copy the code from the chocolate chip cookie recipe to make chocolate chip waffles.

2045 Ford F-190

You have exceeded maximum altitude tolerance while your truck was loaded with a half-ton of plascrete, just to see if you could.

2049 Tesla Aviator

You have a bumper sticker that says “My Other Car Is A Re-Entry Vehicle.”

2051 BMW 990i

You know how to do an Immelmann turn, but you’ve only done it once, on the aerobahn.

2050 Mini Airman

You have maxed out the space in your on-board musical library, but the song that you’ve played most is the MP9 of “Flight of the Bumblebee.”

2050 Volkswagen Twin-Jetta

You have had to change apartments due to a romantic falling-out with a robot.

2049 Honda Mach V

You have used the hover feature to help dislodge a stuck Frisbee from the roof of your house.

2047 AMC Skyduster

You have made an emergency landing in an alfalfa field, more than once.

2050 GMC Canyonero XL

You have spent at least one Saturday orbiting the field at your daughter’s soccer game while relaying observations down to the coach of her team.

2051 Dodge Grand Aerovan

You have told your wife that you were taking your van in for aileron service while you were actually visiting a chromosomal reuptake clinic to rewrite the parameters on your male pattern baldness gene.

2053 Mazda FC-19 Rotary

You have tried to drag-race a Cessna, and lost.

2049 Audi F7

You have tweaked your on-board voice navigation system so it sounds like a German WWI fighter ace.

2051 DeLorean Gullwing Classic

You have vowed to punch the next smart-ass who asks you where the flux capacitor is.

Darling, Maybe You’re Spending Too Much Time Solving Murder Mysteries

Honey, I know you’re about to go down to the marina to look for clues, but do you have a few minutes to sit down for a quick champagne brunch? I’ve ordered us both the quail egg omelet, with the sweet potato hash browns you like. And there’s fresh strawberries, too. Lionel went all the way down to Long Beach to the fruit wholesaler to make sure they were good and ripe.

That’s wonderful, sweetheart. Just sit down. I promise I won’t keep you long.

I know you’re working hard to solve the murder of Ramona Fairchild. I’m proud of you for being willing to help the police find the killer. And believe me, I know how much you enjoy solving murder mysteries. After you retired from being CEO of your own company, I was worried that you wouldn’t find something challenging to do with your time. Solving these mysteries has definitely been challenging, and I know it’s been rewarding, too.

I just think that maybe you’ve been spending maybe a little bit too much time on them lately.

Please understand, I’m not telling you to quit on the Ramona Fairchild case. I know she was your close friend from college, and I think that you’re on the right track in thinking that Baron von Ravenscroft knows more than he’s been telling. I was just thinking, though, that once this case is over, maybe you might consider taking a little break from solving murder mysteries, that’s all.

I know I’ve said this before, and I don’t want to sound like a broken record. But you have to admit that you’ve spent a lot of time lately on murder mysteries. Before this case, you had the Santa Monica smuggling ring, and the Griffith Park Garrotter, and the case with that horrible one-armed man in Silver Lake. It’s just been one murder mystery after another, and I think it’s time we sit down and had a real heart-to-heart about what it is you’re trying to accomplish.

Darling, you know I love you. I support you. And I understand how important solving these mysteries is to you, week in and week out. I just think that a little hiatus is in order, don’t you?

I do think we’re both overdue for a vacation. But this is exactly what I’m talking about. We went to Tahiti, and we weren’t on the beach for five minutes before that mysterious dead body floated up on the tide. We went to Florence, and we’d barely set foot in the Uffizi before you got roped into that case involving those stolen Carravagios. We couldn’t even go to your niece’s college graduation in Boston without you single-handedly apprehending the MFA Murderer. We haven’t had a vacation in the last three years that hasn’t been interrupted by you trying to solve a mystery.

Well, yes, and succeeding. Fine.

No, I am not being ungrateful. I do appreciate that you saved me when Amanda Grayson tried to frame me for murdering Stanton Overholt. I said so at the time, and I’ve said so every time you’ve brought it up since then. And I am very glad you rescued me when the Corazon y Corazon Cartel kidnapped me in Mazatlan that time, but that was really your own fault for interfering with them on their own turf.

Sweetheart, you are not listening to me. I am not saying to never get involved with another murder mystery again. I would never say that. I know how much it means to you. I know that you get a real sense of satisfaction every time Detective Spelling snaps those handcuffs on another murderer and hauls him off to jail. It’s just that murder is almost a constant part of our lives now, and maybe it shouldn’t be.

Yes, I have been talking to Sally McMillan a lot lately. What about it? We have completely different situations, you know that. Sally is trying to get her husband to retire. You’re already retired. And you’re enjoying yourself, which is fine. But there are other ways to do that, darling.

Well, there are! We haven’t been to the chalet in Idaho in months. You were raving about that Peruvian bistro in Century City for days, and we haven’t been back there once. We missed two concerts that you wanted to see at the Hollywood Bowl because you were on a stakeout out in Oxnard. We haven’t even done so much as to take a quick sail over to Catalina lately. The yacht is just sitting there at the marina, gathering dust. In fact, why don’t I ride down there with you? I could take a quick look at it and make sure everything is shipshape.

Oh, wait. When you said that they found poor Ramona’s body at the marina, I just assumed you meant Marina del Rey. You didn’t tell me she was killed at Redondo Beach.

It makes a huge difference, doesn’t it? I mean, the Baron was arrested on Venice Beach at 10:05 that night. You told me the coroner said the time of death was 9:45. There’s no way the Baron could have killed Ramona in Redondo Beach and then gone all the way north to Venice in twenty minutes. So that means he must be innocent, doesn’t it?

If it’s not the Baron, then the logical place to start is the other people who have yachts on that slip. Maybe one of them was aboard when Ramona was killed. Didn’t you say you saw Maurice Desrosiers when you pulled up to the crime scene? I’m not saying it was Maurice, but you might check and see if he has an alibi. I mean, he certainly had motive.

Of course Maurice had a motive, dear. Didn’t you remember? Ramona and Maurice’s sister were both up for the same role in that Leonard Shapiro movie. And when Ramona won the part, Maurice’s sister committed suicide. That was right before you retired, otherwise you probably would have been in on that investigation, too. I know that‘s just circumstantial. You’d have to have physical evidence, his DNA or something.

All right then, darling. I understand. Go to the crime lab and check it out. But we are not finished having this conversation. Go solve your mystery. But when this is over, we’re going somewhere for a vacation where there aren’t any murders to solve. All right? Promise me, sweetheart.

I love you, too.

Brief Recaps of “Low Bandwidth”, an Imaginary Reality Television Show About Media Addiction

Week One

The twelve contestants arrive in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where they will spend the next thirteen weeks in isolation in a remote farmhouse in the heart of Amish country. Each contestant is asked to place any electronic devices in a below-ground root cellar for safekeeping. The producers collect eighteen smartphones, fourteen tablet computers, seven e-book readers, and a Zune music player. Contestants are subsequently searched before entering the house. Producers seize seven Apple watches, four Amazon Dash buttons, and a sixth-generation iPod Nano that Kevin had tried to hide inside a hollowed-out electric razor. All the contestants gather for a traditional Amish family dinner. Santos and Rebecca get into an argument as to whether Omar from The Wire was on Boardwalk Empire or not. The argument escalates as both parties discover that they have no way to settle the dispute without access to the Internet Movie Database, and Rebecca dumps a bowl of egg noodles on Santos’s head.

Week Two

The twelve contestants are divided into two teams–Team Wi-Fi and Team Broadband–and both are given an initial challenge. Both teams are given a long-handled axe and a cord of wood and are asked to make firewood. Cameron of Team Wi-Fi had previously binge-watched seven straight seasons of Axe Men, and was able to instruct his fellow team members in the proper way of splitting hardwood. Although Team Broadband was able to overcome internal dissention and split three logs, Team Wi-Fi was the clear winner. Team Wi-Fi won the award, which allowed them to watch a YouTube recording of Ryan Seacrest reading a T. Coraghessan Boyle short story. Janice of Team Broadband was unanimously voted out of the farmhouse after fighting with a fellow team member over whether the last Adele album was overrated.

Week Three

Although Rebecca has adopted the “evil and calculating” persona, standard for all TV reality shows, she effectively leads Team Broadband to a decisive win in the butter-churning contest. As a reward, Team Broadband gets to go out for a celebratory dinner at the Lancaster T.G.I. Fridays – but team members are crushed to find out that all the televisions above the bar have been turned off. Back at the farmhouse, Team Wi-Fi struggles with using a wood-burning oven to make bread, but Marvin is able to save the day with baking skills honed from watching two seasons of Cake Boss. Sky and Delilah of Team Broadband are up for elimination at the end, with Delilah leaving the farmhouse after the producers offer to replace her iPhone 4C with a new Samsung Galaxy.

Week Four

Andre the sound guy inadvertently lets it slip to the contestants that there’s a new red-band trailer out for the new Will Ferrell movie. Santos is distraught once he learns that Andre isn’t able to bring any electronic devices with him to the farmhouse. Team Wi-Fi wins the cornhole challenge thanks to a last-second toss from LaTricia, and gets to spend fifteen minutes looking at Wil Wheaton’s Twitter feed. Both teams have to work together to hitch up the oxen and plow the west pasture for spring planting. Carol of Team Wi-Fi is voted out of the farmhouse after she admits that she’s never listened to the Making a Murderer podcast.

Week Five

Rebecca switches allegiances from Team Broadband to Team Wi-Fi after she is accused at cheating in the quilting challenge. LaTricia and Hannah of Team Wi-Fi are less than happy about the switch, and Hannah has to be restrained from throwing a shoo-fly pie at Rebecca. The remaining contestants all pitch in to dig a new irrigation ditch, and are rewarded by having James Earl Jones visit the farm to read them selected headers from their e-mail accounts. Cameron learns that his Aunt Christy is finally marrying her longtime boyfriend, and is crushed when he can’t access their wedding registry. Alex of Team Wi-Fi is voted out after he starts a rumor that One Direction is getting back together.

Week Six

Team Broadband is rocked by a divisive argument between Kevin and Sky over which of the cartoon characters on the old Beavis and Butthead show was Butthead. The hard words between them wreck the team’s performance at the threshing challenge, and Team Wi-Fi is rewarded with a trip to watch the filming of a live television program. Unfortunately, the program in question is Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. While Cameron and Marvin are excited about meeting Guy Fieri, Hannah harbors some lingering resentment related to some bad service she had at Fieri’s New York restaurant. Hannah is asked to leave the restaurant after she berates Fieri regarding her opinion of his “Donkey Sauce,” and is subsequently voted off the show as well.

Week Seven

LaTricia moves to Team Broadband after an acrimonious spat with Rebecca over who should get credit for Team Wi-Fi’s victory in the sheep-shearing challenge. Team Wi-Fi is presented with one hour of free Netflix access, but the only screen they can use is on a vintage Dell Inspiron laptop running Windows 95, and the buffering makes it impossible for the team to enjoy Orange Is the New Black. Kevin and Sky work together to repair the tractor, and begin a subtle flirtation. Santos is voted out of the farmhouse after making a sexist comment about the lady in the Progressive insurance commercials.

Week Eight

All hell breaks loose on Team Wi-Fi after Rebecca convinces Cameron and Marvin that the other has the password for the neighboring farm’s wi-fi hotspot. But before the two can come to blows, they are reminded of their shared love of Beyonce’s Formation video. The two teammates work together in the corn-husking challenge, but are defeated by the efforts of Kevin and Sky. For its reward, Team Broadband gets to have lunch at the Cracker Barrel Country Store in Lancaster, followed by country-western karaoke night at the Texas Roadhouse. Rebecca and LaTricia are both put up for elimination, but in a surprising twist, LaTricia reveals that Sky had found a discarded Android phone in the restroom of the Texas Roadhouse, and that it was not handed in. Sky was asked to leave the show, leaving a distraught Kevin behind.

Week Nine

Kevin vows vengeance on LaTricia, to the point of sabotaging her in the whoopie pie challenge. A victorious Team Wi-Fi celebrates its win, only to find out that their reward is to sell the whoopie pies they made out of a food truck in York. As Cameron and Marvin relax after a hard day’s work. Rebecca and LaTricia form an unstable alliance to protect themselves. But after Kevin and LaTricia are both put up for elimination, Rebecca changes her vote, sending LaTricia home with a Game of Thrones DVD box set and a Amazon Fire mini-tablet.

Week Ten

With only four players left, the teams are merged and put to work clearing tables at an Amish smorgasbord restaurant. The contestants are surprised to find that, after ten weeks of isolation from electronic media, they are more cheerful and hardworking than before, and actually find pleasure in cleaning up after diners, even when they leave half-eaten pieces of pie on their tables. Cameron and Kevin bond over complaining about having to hose down the parking lot, but their short-lived alliance is shattered when Cameron turns the hose on Kevin. Kevin gets the last laugh when Cameron is sent home following a serious injury resulting from an accidental tumble into the wood-burning stove.

Week Eleven

Kevin and Marvin decide to put aside their differences regarding their respective positions on who should have won the sixth season of Survivor and agree to vote Rebecca off the show no matter what. Rebecca attempts to seduce both Kevin and Marvin but is rebuffed. Hurt by the rejection, Rebecca accepts the producers’ offer to return to civilization, and her angry walk-off speech at the end garners five hundred thousand views on YouTube. Rebecca is immediately offered the lead role in Bachelorette: Alaska, which she accepts.

Week Twelve

Kevin and Marvin are told for the first time that either Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton will be the next President. They elect to split the contest winnings and stay in Amish country permanently.

Oh, Yeah, I Am Still Totally Moving To Canada

No, I haven’t forgotten. I said, right before the election, that if Trump won, I was moving to Canada. And I still am. In fact, I’m more determined than ever to move than I was on Election Day. I mean, did you see that last thing he did? I mean, come on.

So, yeah, I’m still moving to Canada. You know me. I wouldn’t make a promise like that and not follow through on it. It’s not like it was some kind of empty threat. But, you know, it’s not as easy as all that.

Well, for one thing, I can’t find my passport. I mean, of course I have a passport. I’m not one of those Americans who never takes the time to find anything out about other countries. It’s just that I don’t use it every day, and I don’t know where it is. I thought I put it in the lockbox after I got back from Cozumel, but I looked there just the other day and I couldn’t find it. My birth certificate is there, so that’s good. Maybe it’s in my suitcase. I’ll have to check. Anyway, you need your passport to go to Canada.

And I want to go to Canada to visit first, because I need to figure out where I want to live there. You have a whole country to choose from, so I think that you’d want to scope it out first, figure out where you want to go.

I was thinking Vancouver first. It’s supposed to be really nice. The only thing is that it’s on the West Coast, and that means that I’d have to get up early to watch the Giants on Sundays. I mean, I guess I could DVR it, but then you’d lose something from following the game on Twitter. You’d just have to balance out getting up early to watch football with having better access to good salmon.

I’m definitely not thinking Montreal, because they speak French there. I mean, nothing against multiculturalism, right? But you think about it, it’s not really multiculturalism. The French were just as big as colonialists as the English were, when you think about it. I suppose I could pick some of it up, and there’s supposed to be an app that helps you learn new languages. But it’s going to be difficult enough to move without having to worry about dealing with learning French.

There’s always Toronto, but I don’t know about Toronto. You know that they shoot a lot of American TV series episodes in Toronto? That’s because they know Toronto looks like America. I don’t want to go to the kind of Canada that looks like America. I want to go to the kind of Canada that looks like Canada.

So, yeah, I’m thinking about going to Halifax. Or Lethbridge. Or St. John’s. Except that St. John’s has its own time zone that’s a half-hour off from everything else. You believe that? So weird. It just reminds you that Canada is a foreign country.

I’m not worried about the cold, though. I mean, it gets cold in New Jersey, right? It’s cold now. I figure you get more snow in someplace like Calgary, but it can’t be that much snow, right? I figure I can trade free health insurance for having to shovel a little more snow.

Yeah, okay, it’s not free because you have to pay more taxes for it. Big deal. Like I don’t pay enough in taxes already here in Jersey.

Anyway, look. There are lots of reasons to go to Canada. And that Cheeto-brain in the White House is just one of them. Cleaner air. Government-run television and radio. Hockey. And I’m sure that there are plenty of other reasons that I don’t know about that will become clear once I move up there, which I am totally going to do as soon as I find my passport, or else get around to filling out the application for a replacement passport. Which I guess I’ll have to do if I can’t find my passport. Damn, the government makes everything so difficult down here.

And of course, the other real reason is that I get to spend more time with my girlfriend. Yeah, she’s real, and she lives in Canada. I can’t wait to see her again. In a way, I’m glad that short-fingered idiot won the election, just so I can see her more often.

So, yeah, I’m totally going to Canada. I can’t wait.

Rules For Fidget Spinners In This House

Fidget spinners do not go in your mouth.Fidget spinners do not go up your nose, or in your ear, or HEY PUT THAT DOWN.Fidget spinners are not conversation starters, especially for conversations about how awesome fidget spinners are.Fidget spinners are not throwing stars.Fidget spinners are not shurikens, which are the same exact same thing as throwing stars.Fidget spinners do not have names.Fidget spinners do not have charming personalities.Fidget spinners do not have rich inner lives.Your imaginary friend does not need a fidget spinner.Fidget spinners are not a substitute for doing your homework, or your chores, or talking to Nana when she calls on the landline, and yes, that’s why we still have one.Fidget spinners do not get lonely when no one plays with them.Fidget spinners do not get dizzy.Only fidget spinners are fidget spinners, so put that down before you hurt yourself.Fidget spinners do not need to be woken up at three in the morning so you can show them how much you care about them.Fidget spinners do not come to life when your back is turned.Fidget spinners do not need a ten-page instructional handbook.Fidget spinners do not have complicated back-stories.Fidget spinners were not invented by cavemen.Fidget spinners do not float.Just–okay, just hand it here. Go play a video game or something. I am begging you.

Curriculum Vitae

Curtis
Edmonds

curtisedmondsnj@gmail.com
https://www.linkedin.com/in/curtisedmondsnj
Hillsborough, New Jersey / (908) 938-7747

Profile

Attorney with an extensive background in disability
law, with an emphasis on technologies used by people with disabilities. Graduate
degree in human resource management. Authored five law review articles. Strong
legal research and writing skills. Expert in analyzing disability-related legal
issues. Nationally known presenter and researcher on disability issues.
Experienced in managing multiple projects. Outstanding knowledge of MS Office
and database systems.

Education



Masters in Human Resource Management, Rutgers
School of Management and Labor Relations, New Brunswick, New Jersey, 2017. GPA:
4.0.J.D., University of Texas, Austin, Texas, 1994.B.A., Baylor University, Waco, Texas, 1990. 

Major: Political Science.  Minor:  History.



Professional Licenses 



Member, State Bar of Texas (issued 1994)Member, State Bar of Georgia (issued 2004)Member, State Bar of New Jersey (issued 2005)



Professional Experience



Disability Rights New Jersey

Managing Attorney / Program Director, Assistive
Technology Advocacy Center. Trenton, New Jersey, 2005-2016.

Represented clients with disabilities in federal
court, the Appellate Division, Superior Court, and administrative law courts.Managed the work of a variety of assistive
technology contractors.Initiated small grants program to build network of
AT service providers.Oversaw complex data collection process and
prepared annual compliance reports for federal funding agencies.Conducted national and local training sessions on
disability issues.



Georgia Institute of Technology, College of
Architecture

Education and Technology
Specialist, Atlanta, Georgia, 2002-2005.

Co-Project Director,
Georgia Tech Research on Accessible Distance Education (GRADE)Drafted successful grant application for federal
funding.Developed fully-accessible “Federal Courts Concepts”
module for distance education: http://www.catea.org/grade/legal/intro.htmlSoutheast Disability and
Business Technical Assistance Center (DBTAC):Conducted training on disability issues on a
national, regional, and statewide basis.Managed small grants program to enhance
accessibility of information technology in education in the Southeast region.Developed fully-accessible website for national ADA
training effort.



Office of the Governor, State of Texas

Austin, Texas, 1997-2002.

ADA Specialist, Texas
Governor’s Committee on People with Disabilities (1998-2002)Provided technical assistance on ADA requirements to
state and local officials, employers, professionals, and people with

disabilities.Managed monthly training series for ADA coordinators
in state agencies.Conducted ADA training on a statewide basis.Monitored state and federal legislation related to
disability issues.Writer, Correspondence
Division (1997-1998)Responsible for the Governor’s correspondence on
environmental, federal, parks, disability, military, and law

enforcement issues. Drafted proclamations for special events for a
variety of requestors.



United States Senate, Office of Senator Phil Gramm

Staff Assistant, Dallas, Texas, 1994-1997.

Caseworker for disability and military affairs.Responsible for assisting constituents with
disabilities on Social Security and health care issues.



Academic Publications

“Four Emerging Issues in Americans with
Disabilities Act Litigation Involving Hospitals and Other Health Care Providers,”
The Review of Litigation, vol. 20, p. 623 (2001).

“Snakes and Ladders:  Expanding the Definition of ‘Major Life
Activity’ Under the Americans with Disabilities Act,” Texas Tech Law Review,
vol. 33, p. 321 (2002).

“Two Revolutions, One Goal:  Increasing
Accessibility to Information Technology for People with Disabilities,” SCI
Life, Fall 2002/Winter 2003, p.28.

“When Pigs Fly: Litigation Under the Air
Carrier Access Act,” North Dakota Law Review, vol. 87, p. 687 (2003).

“Providing Access to Students with Disabilities in
Online Distance Education: Legal and Technical Concerns for Higher Education,” American
Journal of Distance Education, vol. 18, p. 51 (2004).

“Won’t You Let Me Take You on a Sea Cruise:
The Americans with Disabilities Act and Cruise Ships,” Tulane Maritime
Law Journal, vol. 28, p. 271 (2004).

“A Meaningful Opportunity To Participate: A Handbook for Georgia Court
Officials on Courtroom Accessibility for Individuals with Disabilities,” Georgia
Administrative Office of the Courts (2004).

“Closing the Circuit: Accessibility from the Ground
Up,” Information Technology and
Disabilities Journal, vol. 11, no. 1 (2005) (principal author).

Book Review, “Seeing Beyond Blindness,” by Shelley
Kinash, American Journal of Distance
Education, vol. 21, p. 51 (2007).

“Can Costco Reign in Spain?” (2017). Available at
SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2934940

“The Impact of Proposed Immigration Policy Changes
on American Health Care Providers,” (2017). Available at SSRN:

https://ssrn.com/abstract
=2954743

“Lowering the Threshold: How Far Has the Americans
with Disabilities Act Expanded Access to the Courts in Employment Litigation?” Journal of Law and Policy (Brooklyn Law
School), vol 26, p.1 (2018).

Invited Presentations

“Make Web Pages Accessible to Everyone,” EDUCAUSE
Southeast Regional Conference, Charleston, South Carolina, June 19, 2002.

“IT Access for Students with Disabilities,” High
Schools That Work Staff Development Conference, Louisville, Kentucky, July 12,
2002.

“Evaluating
Online Educational Resources for Access to People with Disabilities,”  “, MERLOT International Conference, Atlanta, Georgia,
September 28, 2002.

“Understanding and Removing Barriers to
Information Technology,” MERLOT International Conference, Atlanta,
Georgia, September 29, 2002 (co-presenter).

“Creating Distance Learning Courses That Are Accessible to Everyone,” EDUCAUSE 2002, Atlanta, Georgia, October 2, 2002 (co-presenter).

“What
it Means To Be in Compliance,” Kentucky Virtual University Conference,
Richmond, Kentucky, October 9, 2002.

“Legal Issues in Information Technology Access,” North Carolina Assistive Technology Expo, Raleigh, North Carolina, November 7, 2002.

“Making Web Pages Accessible for Everyone,”
International Technology Education Association, Nashville, Tennessee, March 13,
2003.

“Making Web Pages Accessible for Everyone,” North
Carolina Disability Services Conference, Sanford, North Carolina, March 28, 2003.

“Making Web Pages Accessible for Everyone,”
Mid-South Instructional Technology Conference, Murfreesboro, Tennessee, March
31, 2003.

“Assistive Technology – What’s New and Hot in
Accommodations,” American Association for Affirmative Action Annual Conference,
Atlanta, Georgia, April 9, 2003.

“Accessibility and Wireless Technologies: Policy
and Regulatory Considerations,” RESNA 26th Annual Conference, Atlanta, Georgia,
June 22, 2003 (co-presenter).

“Strategies and Techniques for Distance Learning
Accessibility,” AHEAD National Conference, Dallas, Texas, July 11, 2003.

“Information Technology Access:  State, Federal, and International Law,”
MERLOT International Conference, Vancouver, British Columbia, August 8, 2003.

“Your Rights and Responsibilities on the
Information Highway,” Georgia Vision Superconference, Macon, Georgia, September
12, 2003.

“Evaluating and Retrofitting Distance Education
Elements for Accessibility,” Louisiana Board of Regents, Anytime, Anyplace,
Anyone Conference, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, September 27, 2003.

“Emerging Civil Rights Issues:  ADA, 255 & 508,” Southeast Regional
Institute on Deafness, Mobile, Alabama, October 9, 2003.

 “Electronic
Curb Cuts:  Legal Requirements for
Accessible Distance Education,” The 9th Sloan-C International Conference on
Asynchronous Learning Networks, Orlando, Florida, November 15, 2003.

“Strategies for Accommodating Students with
Disabilities in Online Education,” Assistive Technology Industry Association
Conference, Orlando, Florida, January 21, 2004.

“Evaluating Internet Pages for Access to Students
with Disabilities,” Georgia Educational Technology Conference, Macon, Georgia,
February 11, 2004.

“Evaluating Internet Pages for Students with
Disabilities,” Creating Futures Through Technology Conference, Biloxi,
Mississippi, March 1, 2004.

“Making Accessibility Accessible: A Collaborative
Project in 508 Compliance for Online Higher Education,” Society for Information
Technology and Teacher Education Conference, Atlanta, Georgia, March 2, 2004  (co-presenter).

“Accessibility in Distance Education,” North
Carolina Community College Distance Learning Network, Fayetteville, North
Carolina, March 12, 2004  (co-presenter).

“Making the GRADE: 
Improving Access to E-Learning,” Georgia AHEAD Conference, Athens,
Georgia, March 2004.

“Bridging the Gap: 
Policy Development for Increased Electronic Access in Higher Education,”
Georgia AHEAD Conference, Athens, Georgia, March 2004.

“Air Carrier Access Act,” National ADA Symposium,
Kansas City, Missouri, May 2004.

“Making the GRADE: 
Improving Access to E-Learning,” Southwest ADA Center webcast, June 9, 2004
(co-presenter).

“Closing
the Circuit:  Accessibility from the
Ground Up,” MERLOT International Conference, Costa Mesa California, August 2004
(co-presenter).

“Planning for Accessibility and Usability in E-Learning,”
Assistive Technology Industry Association Conference, Orlando, Florida, January
20, 2005.

“Introduction to Assistive Technology” and “Hands-on Introduction to Web Accessibility,”
University of Texas, Pan-American, Edinburg, Texas, April 8, 2005

“Accessibility of
Web-based Distance Learning Content,” Ocean County College, Toms River, New
Jersey, January 13, 2006.

“Assistive Technology for the Transition-Age
Students with Disabilities,” New Jersey Educational Computing Cooperative,
Montclair, New Jersey, March 13, 2007.

“Tips and Tricks for Web Accessibility Training,” Annual
Conference of Assistive Technology Act Programs, Denver, Colorado, May 24, 2007
(co-presenter).

“Creating Pathways to Access Through Universal
Design,” Governor’s Conference on Workforce & Economic Development, New
Brunswick, New Jersey, December 3, 2008 
(co-presenter).

“Trends and Innovations in Assistive Technology,”
AccessAbilities 2010, William Paterson University College of Education, Wayne,
New Jersey, May 17, 2010.

”Infusing
Assistive Technology Concepts in the Technology Curriculum,” New Jersey
Education Association Conference, Atlantic City, New Jersey, November 5, 2010
(co-presenter).

“Educational and
Assistive Technology Resources for School-aged Children with Disabilities and
Their Families,” Arab American Communities and Disabilities Conference,
The Boggs Center on Developmental Disabilities, Somerset, New Jersey, December
10, 2011.

“Caption YouTube Videos for Increased Accessibility
and Traffic,” Closing the Gap, Bloomington, Minnesota, October 18, 2012.

“Air Carrier Access Act Update,” National ADA
Symposium, San Antonio, Texas, May 15, 2013.

 “Assistive
Technology and Transition,” Edcamp Access New Jersey, The College of St.
Elizabeth, Morristown, New Jersey, March 8, 2014.

“Assistive Technology and Employment,” Philadelphia
Muscular Dystrophy Association Muscle Summit, Princeton, New Jersey, September
20, 2014.

“Employment Accommodations for People with
Disabilities,” RWJ Stroke Support Group, New Brunswick, New Jersey, July 1,
2015.

“Competing Revolutions: How Technology Advancement
and Disability Advocacy Can Coexist,” Access GA, May 18, 2015 (webinar).

“Funding Assistive Technology,” Rutgers University
Behavioral Health Center, DD/MI Superusers Conference, Piscataway, New Jersey, November
6, 2015.

“Funding Assistive Technology,” Supportive Housing Conference,
Woodbridge, New Jersey, December 4, 2015.

“How the New ABLE Act Can Help You Finance AT,
Education, and Health Care,” Abilities Expo, Edison, New Jersey, April 29,
2016.

“Understanding the Proposed Department of Justice
Rule on Website Accessibility,” Assistive Technology Industry Association, June
28, 2016 (webinar).

Rain on Your Wedding Day

Will Morse lives alone in a remote cabin in the mountains north of Atlanta, grieving over the loss of two of his daughters and the collapse of his marriage and career.

Over Christmas, Will receives a visit from his only remaining child, his daughter Alicia, who broke off contact with him five years ago. Alicia informs Will that she’s getting married in the spring, and asks him to attend the wedding.

Alicia’s wedding is an opportunity for an aging Will to reconnect with his family and regain part of what he has lost. But Will struggles with his still-raw emotions over his role in his daughter Trixie’s suicide, and the resulting loss and grief. 

Will tries to reach out to the few women in his life to find a date, and makes an unexpected connection with Dorothy Crawford, a writer who shows up at his door, seeking directions. Will develops feelings for Dorothy, but finds that she has secrets of her own.

As the wedding nears, Will must find a way to put the pain and guilt he feels Trixie’s death behind him, weigh the pain he feels at Dorothy’s betrayal with his own need for forgiveness, and pull himself together for his daughter’s sake.

RAIN ON YOUR WEDDING DAY is a poignant, wrenching story about a father’s love, a daughter’s compassion, and the universal need for forgiveness and redemption.