Oct 30, 2007
I recently read an article online called Real Woman, Real Beauty. In it six women embraced their ‘flaws’ of excessive curves (kind of guilty), flat chests (nope), scars (yup), booty (yeah, I guess, but I’m no J-Lo), wrinkles (some), and a gap-toothed grin (no, but I was born without permanent teeth in two spots which makes me look slightly hillbilly). I applaud Barbra Streisand who kept her nose and her unique beauty. I’ll always remember a girl in high school, who had a lovely, long Modigliani face and ruined herself with a pugnose nose job.
Writers are encouraged not to create perfect, unrealistic protagonists, that imperfection itself can be a mark of character. Whether physically or psychologically flawed—or sometimes both—we root for romance to transform our heroes and heroines. Loretta Chase’s Dain springs immediately to mind. Can you think of others whose defects are delicious? If you write, what’s real about your characters? Do you have a flaw that awes? Would you ever consider plastic surgery? Get in touch with Lasik NYC for any other information.
Oct 24, 2007
No, I’m not talking about sex. Or a romance novel title. I’m talking about Trick or Treating. I’m going to make you feel sooo sorry for me.
As a child, my parents didn’t let me go trick or treating, and it wasn’t because of rabid religious reasons or the fact I might swallow a stray straight pin in my Snickers bar. My mother thought T or T was begging. They didn’t do it in Vienna, Austria, ergo, it would not be done in Hempstead, New York. This didn’t stop her from making me costumes for the classroom Halloween parties (when you could still have such things), nor did it stop her from having mounds of Mounds and Almond Joys to pass out to the neighborhood kids. But I was not allowed to venture out in the dark with devils and witches to score free candy.
It wasn’t until I was a freshman in high school that I finally went T or T with my friend Barbara. The night was sadly flat and fizz-less. Even though I was wearing all of my mother’s and grandmother’s costume jewelry and scarves, my lips hideously crimson with lipstick, this gypsy felt gypped. I was past my prime and I knew it.
I have since forgiven my parents for their quirks. When I think of the restrictions placed on Regency heroines, my youth was positively Bacchanalian. My parents let me drink wine at dinner and kaffee mit schlag und schnapps when I was just a kid. That was okay in Vienna, Austria. They gave me a TV and a phone for my room. Looking back, I can say I was pretty much spoiled rotten. And sometimes drunk.
But, ah, how I once chafed to partake in that All-American Halloween ritual. This year, I’ll settle for wearing my glow-in-the-dark ghost pin and muttering the occasional ‘boo.’.
Any plans to trick or treat/party? What’s your favorite costume? I once dressed as a Viagra Victim, with a pillow stuffed under my dress and a baby doll pinned to my shoulder.
What was your forbidden fruit? How did it taste once you took a bite?
Forbidden fruit causes many jams. ~Anon.
Oct 21, 2007
The other day I was dressing the shelves in the library. Doesn’t that sound odd? You’re picturing crinolines and cravats, aren’t you. It means I was straightening all the books, pulling them right toward the edge of the shelf, checking that Melvil Dewey would be satisfied that everything was in numerical and alphabetical order. This is a supremely boring job, but must be done or the library police will come after me for dereliction of duty.
But I was rewarded when I discovered Retro Housewife, A Salute to the Suburban Superwoman by Kristin Tillotson. Loaded with authentic illustrations and photographs from the forties and fifties, it features housewives in a near-orgasmic state as they inspect the contents of their gleaming refrigerators and suds-filled sinks. Every single woman is smiling maniacally as she greets her husband or ruffles the hair of little Johnny or Susie. Wearing high heels and an apron, of course. In one ad, a housewife is on her knees at the side of the bed, having served her husband his breakfast on a tray. Hubby is incongruously wearing a white shirt, a tie and a rather smug smile. Maybe it’s my 21st century sensibility, but I think he’s gotten more than his eggs sunny-side up.
There is a picture of a thrilled woman who has just gotten a new vacuum cleaner from her husband for Christmas. Long ago I told my husband if he ever gave me an electrical appliance as a “gift,” he’d be in for a shock. Once he gave me a laundry-folding table for Valentine’s Day. I was not amused.
The book made me never want to clean or cook ever again, and very grateful I don’t have to aspire to be June Cleaver, although I do have those strands of pearls.
Do you do your housework with a smile? What is your least favorite domestic chore? What’s the worst present you’ve ever gotten from a loved one?
Oct 17, 2007
With apologies to Little People everywhere…
We recently discussed fairy tales. I posit to you that we aspiring writers are Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. And it is ‘dwarfs,’ not ‘dwarves.’ I looked it up. Apparently, Disney can do what it damn well pleases when it comes to spelling and just about everything else.
We are not bipolar; we are octopolar.
We are sweet, naïve, innocent, virtuous as the pure Snow White page. We believe someday our princes and publishers will come. We whistle while we work. So maybe we’re not that careful of what we eat. Woman cannot live by poisoned apples alone. Chocolate and diet soda only kill mice in excessive quantities anyway.
At first we are Happy and carefree. Struck by the Muse and manic obsession to write the greatest story ever told.
Then along comes Grumpy, who is never satisfied with the prose/plot/position chosen. And even if Doc comes along to revise, equipped with a thesaurus and help from his critique group, Grumpy is not satisfied. That’s if Bashful has even allowed the critique group to look things over, because Bashful feels pretty Dopey most of the time. Pitch 400 pages in a paragraph? Like that’s ever going to happen. And he’s allergic to true criticism; nothing makes him Sneezy faster than point of view problems being pointed out. It’s enough to depress him so entirely he becomes Sleepy, naps for twenty years to avoid failure and turns into another tale altogether, Rip van Winkle.
Which dwarf do you want to toss the farthest?
There’s no use in grumbling
When the raindrops come tumbling
Remember, you’re the one
Who can fill the world with sunshine~ With a Smile and a Song
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Oct 14, 2007
Who can resist clicking onto the headline “Is Sex with Robots Possible?” Certainly not I. MSNBC directed me to an article about the future of human interaction with robots, even discussing the possibility of marriage of man to machine. I immediately thought of the movies “Lars and the Real Girl (not a robot, but not real either),” “Blade Runner,” “The Stepford Wives,” “Star Wars”—although C3PO would drive me crazy with his prissiness and R2D2 is just too short.
The upshot of the story was that “Love and sex with robots are inevitable.” So says a guy named David Levy, who successfully defended his PhD thesis at the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands. He says eventually robots will be developed to have more human characteristics (just like they’ve already been portrayed in sci fi books and film), and soon you’ll be doing the rumba with your Roomba.
Let’s get down to the nuts and bolts. How would you program your artificially intelligent significant other? Just think of a flatulence-free bedroom.
