March 20, 2006
Selling Out: A Rambly Late Post
No, really, it's just my new haircut that makes the page look different to you. No? Ok, look. I'm not crazy about the new look either, and yes, I know, advertising's the devil's trade. It's just that I'm just kind of, well-- comment vous dites? ah, oui!-- poor. I'm not as indigent as I was a couple of months ago when I was out of work, but I'm still just barely scraping by, and things are about to get even tighter.
No, I'm not about to get fired again. Well, at least I hope not. God, I hope not. That would blow. I actually like the work I'm doing-- it's researchy work that I can do from home on my own schedule. Its not in a field I have intention of hoeing-- or whatever it is one does, metaphorically, in one's metaphoric field-- but that's ok. I dig up general-interest interesting info, which is pleasing enough in itself, and besides, I'm not interested in a jobby job job, if you know what I mean. Like, a career-track job. I just want work that will fund my writing time-- something that isn't so draining and time-consuming that I just want to smoke drugs and die when the I clock out. If I can use the time to learn about a world I don't spend a whole lot of time engaged with, all the better. Lately I have been under pressure from my employers to get the project done faster, which means working more hours. It's been cutting into my sleeping time (I'm too stupid/ stubborn to give up my writing time) and stressing me out. I'm going to have to step up and ask to cut back my hours. I hate to do this because I 1) feel like a shmoo and 2) need the money. But on the other hand, this was just the kind of job one takes to support things like writing and if it's stressing me out and cutting into my work time, then the situation probably needs to be reevaluated.
Oh, and writing. This is the best part of my life right now. I mean it always is-- I think this is how I know I'm going to always have to be writing. I just feel so useless when I'm not doing it. I'm so anxious all the time, worrying that I ought to be somewhere else, spending the time differently, living my life in a better way. When I'm writing well it's like I'm just doing what I'm supposed to be doing. It's just what I'm supposed to be doing (even when it's not. . . like, for instance, now. I should be working. Or sleeping. Or washing dishes.). I can't think of another activity I feel that way about.
Anyway, I've sort of gearing up to do more freelance writing over-- well, a long time-- but in the last month or so, I'd say steam has been gathering. That's another reason I want to cut back on my work hours. I know I was all about grad school last month. I still am, kind of. But I'm not going to be ready to apply until 2007 at the earliest. And I took my GREs in 2003 (don't ask)-- ha ha I am so going to have to take those again. It's not that I'm having any, like, material success as a writer. God, no. Nothing like that. Don't get the wrong idea. This is more just about how much time I'm doing to get my work out and how much I am putting out there and just being serious and committed and grown-up in the way I approach my work.
So in the meantime, I have bills to pay. If you happen to be planning on signing up for DSL with Speakeasy as your ISP (I actually do recommend them, esp. if you live in San Francisco and your alternative is crappy SBC), you can do me a kindness by clicking the Speakeasy button at the bottom of the page or telling them the refferal code. I'll get a credit towards my DSL. And if you happen to be signing up, or thinking about signing up for Backpack, it'd be neat if you'd use me as your referral. I spend $9 a month to keep my shit organized on that site, so a credit towards future bills would be cool, if it's no trouble to you and you happen to be signing up anyway. If I suddenly become filthy-- or even scuzzily-- rich I'll take down the ads.
I tried to make the ads as unobnoxious as possible, but if you have any suggestions, feel free to leave them. Also, tell me if you have any issues in browsers other than Safari, since I'm lazy as hell and don't bother to check. Or, if you just feel like calling me a money-grubbing Jew, greedy whore, etc., feel free.
Posted by hissycat at 03:09 AM | Comments (6)
February 22, 2006
Excerpt From Letter Recently Sent To Thesis Advisor In Which I Seek His Advice On A Number Of Topics, Including Grad School
. . . Since 'leaving' my job, I had a streak of astoundingly awful luck: my boyfriend broke up with me and then I crashed my car. It was really a pretty awful time. I expressed my feelings by not showering or washing dishes, which probably did not help me feel any better, either, but then, I suppose that was part of the point. However, I'm doing so much better now, although I still very much miss my car. I'm even seeing this new guy who likes Scrabble and Gravity's Rainbow! Just like I do! Brett, my old boyfriend, is my friend again, which is excellent, and we mean to start up a Finnegan's Wake reading group with our friends like we had been planning before we split, and also I can borrow his car to go driving since the insurance wouldn't pay to fix mine!
I really miss being a student. I have fantasies about grad school, but I feel like I'm just getting my bearings in SF, and I don't want to leave yet. I wouldn't know where to call for Chinese, and I'd have to make all new friends-- that's very stressful, you know, just the thought of it is making me tense. And where would I go? It's true I'm not really writing piles of fiction so much these days, but I still like to think that I could, if I wanted to, even though I really probably can't, but either way, the idea of attending an MFA program is entirely unappealing, and attending an MFA program seems like the one reasonable thing I can do to be serious about fiction writing. And its probably a bad thing that I'm so put off by MFA-y situations anyway. It probably means I hate myself or want to sabotage myself because I can't stand other people who do what I am or want to be doing, which is writing, but to be fair, I was unfairly encouraged to believe that half the appeal of writing was that it could be done totally away from other people.
I also had the thought: Master's of Library Science! I'd be such an awesome librarian! I love libraries! That was when I was working at my job that I hated and I was trying to think of some kind of job that would give me health insurance that wouldn't make me want to kill myself. I came up with librarian. Useful, interesting and I could totally make it work with my fantasy life as a writer by working part-time at a library, getting benefits, and writing my books on the side. Maybe I'd even have to shelve my own book, who knows? Crazier things have happened!
But now I'm back to my original grad school fantasy, which is a reg'lar old PhD program in lit. That's what I miss. That's what I see myself enjoying the most. It's also the hardest to justify, since I don't feel strongly committed to going into academia once it's over. I feel strongly committed to living in San Francisco or New York, which I don't see changing unless I undergo a radical transformation brought on by trauma to the skull, or something of that nature. So I'd be putting in this enormous investment and then end up, six years later, in pretty much the same position I'm in now: underemployed, sending out (or not, as the case may be) resumes for jobs that, if I think about them, make me want to mash out my eyes with some kind of eye-sized mashing implement.
But then, if I'm just going to end up in the same place, is grad school such a terrible place to spend six or seven years of my life? A lot of people say, Yes! But I wonder-- are those people really as nerdy as me? Really? Maybe. I just don't know. I feel like I shouldn't want to go back to school so soon: I felt really ready for college to be over by the time it ended. Of course, it really wasn't that I was sick of academics as much as I was sick of being on a suburban campus as an undergraduate in a group living situation, no pets allowed, when the only kind of life I've ever wanted involves being left to myself in a studio apartment with books and a cat in a big city with good delivery.
I also feel a little guilty because I am not so successful at the non-school world. Even aside from the first job incident. Maybe this sounds silly seeing as how it's only been eight months since graduation, but I imagine myself, not going back to grad school, trudging through kind of mediocre jobs, just being kind of loserish for the rest of my life and dashing the promise my high school teachers said I was full of. Just kidding. No, but the mediocre jobs bit is true. The work that is available to me is not interesting. Most work, it seems, isn't interesting. Or at least, I don't find it interesting. I have zero interest in getting a job in publishing or advertising or whatever other industry English majors end up working in. I don't see myself having that kind of job ever, frankly. Not for me. I love writing the book reviews. I mean, I love writing fiction, but I'm also reasonable enough to recognize that I'll never be writing fiction for money. But I'm not too shabby at the book reviews. I plan on submitting reviews to more publications. I think I might have a fighting chance of eventually eking out some of the moneys with the writing the nonfiction and the book reviews. And that would be swell.
But I don't know, maybe grad school isn't incompatible with that kind of writing career. In fact, I was wondering actually if it might not help-- or at least provide me with several years of funding with more spare time than I'd otherwise have. I'm just rattling this stuff off out of my ass now-- I have no idea how the world works-- but I'm thinking maybe there's some kind of para-academic life I could make for myself more easily with a PhD than without. Like, you know what I want to do? Read little essays I wrote on NPR. And, like, write the kind of book reviews they print in the NYRB where you read a bunch of books and then think about them. Thinkedy think think. And then write an essay about some topic that the books deal with but that doesn't even begin to review the books until, like, the penultimate column. And maybe there are teachy things I could do that aren't as limiting lifestyle/ location-wise as being, you know, a serious University professor. I don't know I'm just making this stuff up I could be totally wrong! I know about how insanely difficult it is for English PhDs to get jobs, etc. But what if what I want to get into is magazine writing with maybe a somewhat academicky background? And if I had to work work in addition to writing, would a PhD be helpful? Could I teach, like, community college classes or adult education, part time? I imagine you still need a degree to teach those classes. Are those jobs still so difficult to get?
I suspect that if I could get into grad school, that's that kind of thing that I could, potentially, maybe, if squeeze my brain really really hard, and re-read everything twice, actually be pretty good at. I don't know that that's really the best reason to pursue literary studies, but last week my biggest accomplishment, which made my mother "so proud" that I've "come so far" was that I learned how to clean the bathroom . . .
Posted by hissycat at 06:37 PM | Comments (7947)
February 15, 2006
Grad School
I've been having serious grad school fantasies of late. I don't know whether to be alarmed or not. It hasn't even been a year. I was so ready to be done with school last year, I don't think I should want to go back yet. On the other hand, it's not the academics I was so sick of as much as it was campus life as an undergrad-- I wanted an adult life, meaning a studio apartment in San Francisco and a cat.
I've been reading a book of criticism to review, and reading it has gotten me engaged again in thinking rigorously about literary studies. I feel in my element when I'm making notes and responding to authors. I know grad school is something I could be very good at, and I think a large part of its recent appeal has to do with that. As a non-student, I'm just like every other mediocre, loserish twenty-something. I don't have a real job, nor any real career aspirations, and there's no place I see myself going. I'm just totally unspecial. And I don't like that. I realize that if I were still in therapy, my therapist might encourage me to cite this as a reason not to run back to school but so much of who I understand myself to be is a student. What I do is school. What I do well is school. Other things, not so much, but school I do well. School, academics, literary studies, critical writing-- that's where I can plant a foot.
Posted by hissycat at 10:35 AM | Comments (8126)
January 20, 2006
Stagnation
The winter doldrums or something, except that I feel perfectly fine. Better than fine, in fact, I feel pretty good, nevertheless I'm not getting a damn thing done. The blog entries, you see, are pitifully thin, and it's not cause I have so much else to show for it: I've three books I'm carrying around in my handbag, already read and waiting to be reviewed; the mock-ups for the lit mag website haven't been looked at in ever and that project is stalling; I thought I had a job but then it turned out I didn't and the part time work I'm doing from home is slow slow slooow. I think it's time to start setting an alarm clock. I'm going to try to cut out napping (maybe). Step it up.
Posted by hissycat at 05:56 PM | Comments (192)
December 18, 2005
Deal: New Medea
I am, along with two others, really starting one, yes, and not for a few weeks only, no. I don't know when we'll have the first issue out-- Spring, I guess, would be nice, let's say Spring. It's a prose magazine-- mostly fiction, some non-fiction, a few book reviews-- and will be online; our big bad goal is to be in print in 2-3 years. We have no money at all, but we've been chattering for a while and now we're putting our noses down and working like (very hard-working) little bunnies. My lips are sealed till the three of us make some decisions on some things or something, but when there is more to know, I'll tell you about, and when we can accept your tax-deductable donations, I'll be sure to let you know. Submissions, too. There's even a P.O. Box involved-- exciting!
Posted by hissycat at 12:23 PM | Comments (5)
November 21, 2005
Toilet Plunging
My toilet clogged this weekend, as it is prone to do. Plunge as I might, it would not unclogg, and for two minutes, I really wished I had a boyfriend again.
Did you catch that? Two minutes. That was it. And then I went out and bought some Liquid Plumber and unclogged it myself and felt competant and proud.
The weeks after Brett dumped me were so gloomy and dangerous; I felt I couldn't get out of bed without cutting myself on some memory. I'd drift into the kitchen for a Diet Coke and suddenly see Brett there scrubbing the new apartment, dusty and furniture-free, on the weekend after I'd signed the lease. The cat would meow and I'd hear the howls she made the whole ride home on the evening Brett and I brought her home. The entire oevre of Stephen Merrit was off-limits for listening because there wasn't a song I hadn't, at one time, heard Brett hum or sing.
In the last two weeks, though, I have been feeling worlds better-- positively cheerful, at times. I am progressing in both Leaps and Bounds. I'm not calling him anymore. I have nothing to say to him. I can bop along to Neutral Milk Hotel again and not let myself get pulled back to the summer we exchanged love letters and favorite songs from New York and Berlin.
What has changed? I have discovered the key to good cheer, and it is Hate. You see, I have moved past the stage of Grief and Pining and onto the stage of Anger and Hate. This Hate has grown from the tiniest pinprick of light to a glorious flame. Like a miracle, a fire that devours up the wet leaves and rotted wood. It burns so cleanly and makes the world sharper and clearer. It makes me feel better.
So I guard it against any kindness that could dampen it; I keep it to myself and I nurture it. It, in turn, rips through vestigial longing, repels tender memories, and gets me through the day. Whistling, even.
Posted by hissycat at 03:14 PM | Comments (5)
I'm Cooking A Turkey This Year
It's the first time I'll be having Thanksgiving away from home. Well, there was that one Thanksgiving I spent in the fetal position on the rank carpeted floor of my dorm room trying to figure out if it was possible to kill myself with actually having to, like, get up.
But this is the first time I'm playing hostess-- not at my apartment, of course; it'll be at a friend's much larger one. I'm pretty excited. I've never cooked a bird before, but how hard can it possibly be?
Posted by hissycat at 01:56 PM | Comments (35)
November 16, 2005
Must Be The Pills
At two in the morning I weathered a small but surprizzing blizzard of domesticity. I made creme anglaise. Out of nowhere! I was compelled by this totally uncalled for urge to make pudding. . . or custard. . . or charlotte russe. Of course, I did not have the necessary ingredients. I made the "creme" using the rice milk I dug out of the back of the cupboard. The egg and sugar mixture, when added to the hot rice milk, did not behave. The stuff smelled ok, but looked like a pot full of curdled vomit. It may even have tasted ok, but I couldn't tell you, as I don't eat things that look like curdled vomit.
The domestic urge was predictably brief. I did not clean up. The stuff is still on the stove, looking, now, like curdled vomit that was left out and congealed.
I wrote a story about a chef who cooks pudding in lieu of leaving her husband. I don't know if this happens to anyone else, other writers maybe, or if it's just my special brand of insanity, but sometimes I'll be doing some random thing-- cooking creme anglaise in the middle of the night, for example-- and it will occur to me that I am acting like one of my characters. Not that I'm leaving (or not leaving) my husband. Not that I have a husband. But the fictitous personage in question compulsively cooks yolky foods for the numb and comfort of stirring something and the milky smell. She even makes creme anglaise specifically, in the very first paragraph of the story. I creep myself out. I must be out of my skull to think of things like this.
But, aside from the back pain, which I think is getting worse, I felt some amount of better today. Like my heart pain was finally abating some. I picked up that package I've been meaning to pick up forever, then walked over to the Embarcadero and sat around looking at water and bridges and listening to Martha Wainwright (hitting repeat on "Bloody Motherfucking Asshole" more than once) and smoking. It was the golden hour, with sunlight that could break your heart. Smog obscured everything on the other side of the Bay Bridge, like someone had spilled water on a page and blurred out all the lines.
I walked home, and when I got in the gate there was mail-- the good kind; not bills!-- waiting for me. The new New Yorker had arrived, and it contains a wonderful poem I love ("Impersonater of Blank Walls" by Charles Simic). And even better, I recieved a packet containing two new books for me to review. And if there's anything I like more than books, it's free books.
And my new friend (!) invited me to a cool art cool thing on Saturday, so there's that to look forward to. That and the Peckinpah film fest in Berkeley.
New reasons to live. Which I deperately needed, as I've watched all the Desperate Housewives I've been able to download.
P.S. I haven't been able to download many. If anyone has any Desperate Housewives and would be so kind as to share, I'd be eternally grateful. I'd bake you cookies and mail them to you and everything. (Pudding doesn't ship well.) Seriously. I'm getting fiendish and I need another hit.
Posted by hissycat at 07:39 PM | Comments (7)
So Much Fun
I meant to go to the post office this morning to pick up a package but was waylaid by a Whole Foods. My groceries were sufficiently heavy to be immedeately brought home, meaning I failed at my original mission. However, I had the brilliant idea to apply for a job at Whole Foods. I love produce! And stuff. I'm kind of serious. What can I say, I have a weakness for yuppy grocery stores.
It doesn't seem that there are any appropriate positions open at the time (boy, would I love to handle meat and do butchery things), but I filled out the online application anyway. The application is the funnest thing ever. With seventy pages of personality test-like questions to respond to on the fly (don't think too hard, says the instructions, answer quickly), it's a lot like an online personality test or one of those survey thingies that Psych. students bribe housemates with donuts to fill out. Those things were such fantastic procrastination activities. The Whole Foods application is a lot like that. Only without the donuts.
Posted by hissycat at 02:13 PM | Comments (6)
November 02, 2005
No More Excuses
It's officially National Novel Writing Month
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October 18, 2005
My Bookjacket Photo
After leaving La Onda last evening, I went home and pondered the wisdom of Agent 007's advice.
I have come to the conclusion that, as a young, unknown with neither book deal nor agent, the only reasonable thing for me to do was to take a sample head-shot. That way, anyone who is interested can know, right off the bat, whether my face is pretty enough to be published.
I took this photo first. As you can see, I have my glasses on in this photo. My glasses not only enable me to see but also, I like to think, lend me a certain air of intellectual gravitas, bestow upon my visage a certain boyish, bookish charm a la Ira Glass, Jonathon Lethem or any of the number of other admired, bookish and bespectacled men.
Then I remembered the Agent's warning that "the standard is higher if you're a woman," and that no one likes a "bespectacled" and "tweedy" girl scribe. I decided to take another photograph, this time removing my glasses first. Here, you can see how I Iook without my glasses on.
As the great Ms. Parker once noted, literary agents don't make passes at girls who wear glasses. Or something like that.
Posted by hissycat at 01:30 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
October 10, 2005
The Sober Writer: A Sign Of The Times; and, An Appeal To Dave Eggers
Upon arriving at work this morning I was delighted to find in my inbox an email from my dear friend Ameeth directing me to this NYTimes article about the growing trend of members-only writing centers in New York. These exclusive cozies, apparently, are popping up faster than pustules on the member of Paris Hilton's latest conquest. Accompanying the link was a message:
Pathetic. I hate new york. stab stab stab stab
Though I love that city of mine with all my filthy heart, I admit to on more than one occaision been known to sputter with far less eloquence than he sentiments of a similair nature. I appreciate as much as the next New Yorker the chance to rag on the "cool people" and "writers" and other boroughlings whose lives and successes I wish I had. (For the record, I am allowed to say offensive things about New York, for I am of New York, much like Woody Allen may say offensive things about the Jews, for he is of the Jews. If Ameeth had not lived in Brooklyn the past two years, earning his right to resent and detest every white boy with bed-raggled hair in Williamsburg, I would have not taken his comments in such good stride. Lest you think his Brooklyn years were not enough, rest assured he also attended Brown, which, in certain crucial ways, bears a more than passing resemblance to Brooklyn.)
My reaction to the article was twofold. As I'm always keen on a chance to vituperate any writer more successful than I (in this regard, my utter lack of success is truly a blessing, as I have a virtually infinite number of targets onto whom whom to direct my groundless ire), you can imagine how I must have snorted with gleeful scorn to read statements such as this:
"The concept of writers as drunken Hemingwayesque malcontents traveling the globe is over," Ms. Cecil said. "They see it as a job now, and they see themselves not as inspired alcoholics, or depressive psychopaths alone in a tenement. It's more mainstream. It's good kids going to M.F.A. programs, then looking for a place to find the kind of writerly community they had in grad school."
Fucking rat shit good kids! Fucking bitchy bitch fuck fart M.F.A. programs! Jesus fucking mainstream! Ugly fucking whore cock grad school! Somewhere, I know, Fran Lebowitz is rolling around atop her unmade pull-out couch, horrified to read that the belles lettres have sunk so low as to fall to the hands of the sober. If these sober, ambitious, M.F.A.-weilding goody goodies are the writers of the future, than I am frightened for what the future holds. If writers can't be lovable alcholoic malcontents, I ask you, who can? Or, to put it another way-- and this is where it really hurts-- if depressive, alcoholic, deranged psychopaths who live alone in filthy tenement apartments, who have only a cat and a bottle of gin for love, can't be writers, what can I be? People, I am running out of options. An unreliable malcontent just can't catch a break these days.
Oh, and I almost threw up when the doyenne of Paragraph compared her quill club to a gym:
Ms. Parisi compares writers' rooms to gyms. In both, a large group of people share the same equipment. And, paying for membership helps writers take their commitment to writing seriously, she said, and gets them "off of the couch" and onto the literary StairMaster. . . And like exercise buffs, the writers who use these spaces need to be self-motivated and disciplined.
Egads-- "literary" and "StairMaster" are two words that do not belong together! Oh, somebody say a prayer to Jean Rhys, beg pardon from Oscar Wilde! Dorothy Parker weeps angel's tears at the thought that "writers" have become like "excercise buffs." With things such as they are one can hardly summon up the appropriate degree of horror at the lack of sexual goings-ons amongst members. It is a grim truth that when alcoholism leaves, it takes sexual debauchery with it.
And yet-- and yet-- And yet there is the other fold of my twofold reaction, which is this: I want to be let in the club. One writer quoted describes the communality of working in one these spaces as "parallel play, like toddlers in a sandbox." How delightful, I say, how appealing! That is perfect for me! I loathe human interaction and frighten myself! I need a place to go that is full of people who don't expect me to speak or smile back! "When you write at home, there's a lot of distraction. . . You want to go clean out the fridge, or tweeze your eyebrows," or, if you are me, pick your toes, "but when you go to a space to write, that's what you do." All that unholy Swedish furniture and track lighting would not only increase my productivity but impart a clean, modern birghtness and simplicity to every aspect of my life, I am sure of it.
So please, Dave Eggers, if you are listening, when you or yours decide open up one of these writers' clubs in SF-- and I know you will, because that's just the sort of thing you would do-- please, please let me in. I am sure you could find room for one alcoholic malcontent. I can be the club's kitschy, fashionably-obslete mascot. I'll sit at the door in my fashoinably-obsolete get-up of sweat-stained t-shirts, jeans I picked up off the floor, and underwear that should have been changed two days ago, I'll sit there with my fashionably-obsolete accessoriess: a copy of Ulysses and a bottle gin and let my forehead crash noisily onto a typewriter. Everyone will look up with an expression of ironic bemusement. I will be the source of much amusement! You clever young upstarts can laugh and laugh as I barf through the tears and I will oblige and drink all the more. I will blink back at you with my reddened psychotic eyes and I will not know whether your hearty laughs are ironic or sincere. And you will love me.
Posted by hissycat at 07:56 PM | Comments (94) | TrackBack
September 24, 2005
Untitled #53
Having just purchased nearabouts $50 worth of used paperbacks at Adobe, I have to ask myself: why oh why did I just spend more money than my net worth? Is it because I just won the lottery or received a fat advance from a publisher? Did some cultured magnate decide to bless me with his patronage? Did I get a new job, a raise? Did a heretofore unbeknownst to me trust fund come into maturity? No, no, no, no, no, and--to my deepest dismay-- no. Is it because there is copious free space in my grand, penthouse pied-a-terre and empty bookshelves crying for some book loving? No. Is it because have leisure time enough to read these books? No, it is not.
On second thought, I don't have to ask myself anything at all.
Caroline and Zuzka were boozily enthusiastic about starting a reading group. I seem to recall there was talk of make-out contests and squeeze-a-boob fundraisers. I don't know. I'd been drinkning.
My homepage is still an embaressing blank, but I decided on at least one more project I will be using the hissycat domain for. Since my big, fat lesbian pulp thesis is just burning a hole in my desk drawer, I decided I'll be putting it up as a web document so that that information, whatever it's worth, is accessable to anyone who wants/ needs it. I'm going to be doing a whole lesbian pulp resource, actually, with extensive bibbliiographies and directories to further resources. There are a few pages out there already like this, but there is definately room to make one more up-to-date and comprehensive. Plus it gives me a chance to rescue some of the dead darlings I had to cut from the thesis-- writings about the historical backgrounds not directly pertinant to my critical argument, but still possible of use to someone looking for that type of information.
I told Brett and Ameeth I'd meet them an hour and a half from now, which means that in Joannatime, I need to start getting ready to leave the house now. I cannot leave my house without spending at least forty minutes making sure I have everything I could possibly need with me for the next 72 hours, and I can't leave without a bag of supplies to see me through any contingency that might arise, including but not limited to prison, earthquake, famine, psychic discomfit of the type alleviated by pills, pyschic discomfit of the type alleviated by fiction, extreme heat, chapped lips, excessively oily skin, a spontaneous shower in which to condition and comb my hair, frigid cold, draught, a gang of drag queens in need of concealer, mascara and a few other necessities, an on-the-spot assignment, a meeting with an agent or editor. I leave the apartment and return about half a dozen times before I'm satisfied that I have enough of what I need and I have double-checkd that the lights are off and the cat is not on fire.
Posted by hissycat at 03:56 PM | Comments (27) | TrackBack
August 03, 2005
It's Just Another Hypomanic Monday (Oh-Oh-Woah)
I'm doing some serious fantasizing about making radio stories for ThisAmerican Life. I have a couple of ideas for stories I'd like to do. I've been looking at recording equipment on Transom.org and trying to figure out what I need, but I'm having a hard time making sense of everything. All I need is something basic thatworks. Of course, I will probably need to buy a computer first, as the space bar on my laptop has been broken since spilling vodka on it last week; I mean, that's not the only reason I need a new one-- my laptop is also just old and slow and generally busted; I tried to buy a new computer this weekend. Brett and I went to the Apple store downtown and to CompUSA; I even filled out the application at Apple to purchase a laptop on a lay-a-way plan, but of course, I was rejected, because I have no credit history. It really sucks. It's amazingly hard to get a credit card without a history, but of course you don't have a history until you open a line of credit. You also can't do online BillPay, can't get a cellphone contract without leaving a deposit and so on. For the lastmonth I've been applying for credit cards and getting rejected. I know perfectly well that it's totally stupid-- I have a job; I pay my rent-- and that the only reason is that I have no credit score. Still, I feel like such a loser every time I get rejected. Like,it's this judgement on me, that I'm not resposible enough and not a good grown-up.
I also had a particularly frustrating encounter with my credit union; I applied (in person, explaining to the teller that I just wanted the simplist, most basic, beginner credit card) and was told I would hear back by the end of the day. Of course, it took a week and I had to call the credit man at the bank and leave messages on his machine. Finally, I got a phone call telling me that I had been rejected for the $10,000 platinum card. What? I thought, well, duh, you'd have to be a moron to give me a credit card with a $10,000 line of credit. You know, I'd have to be a moron to apply for a platinum card and think I could get one. But of course, I didn't. I suppose the teller punched in my request wrong. Whatever. Anyway, I was told that Visa made a counter-offfer for a Classic card with a $500 limit. Perfect. All I had to do, the guy told me, was fax him a copy of my paystub. I asked if I could email it instead and he said fine. I emailed him a copy ofmy paystub. Then I get an email back from him saying that I can't send an electronic version, it needs to be the receipt kind that gets mailed to me. I write back to inform him that I don't get a paper copy, I'm on the University Payroll and do direct deposit at theuniversity credit union. I get an email back that is five words long:
"everyone gets a paper stub."
Not only is this not true in my case, it is not true in the case of what I imagine to be a very large percentage of members of the credit union, since anyone who is on payroll and direct deposit at the University associated with the credit union is in the same situation as me: no paper stub. In fact, I looked this up and there's a big notice as soon as you get to the payroll website explaining that they no longer mail paper stubs. So I write back and calmly explain why I don't get a paper stub (by the way, if I'm on direct deposits houldn't they already have some kind of record of my earnings? is it really necessary for me to make a record of what they obviously must already have on file?) I don't hear back for maybe two weeks. Then I get a letter in the mail-- a letter informing me that I'd been denied that $10,000 platinum card I'd applied for.
So yesterday I finally got it together to go talk to someone at thecredit union. This time, I went to a different branch and had no problems. I got a call the same afternoon saying I'd been accepted and just needed to send proof of income. I told thewoman about the paper paystub issue and she said not to worry, theelectronic copy is totally fine. So now I'll have a credit card in about a week.
I've been feeling kind of funny lately. I'm going to say this is partly my own fault for letting my meds run out last week and not getting a refill of my prescriptions till Monday. But I also just feel funny. You know, I've been out of school a few months,working at my job, I feel like I should be falling into apattern. But all I think about is other things I could/ should/wish I would be doing. Like going to librarian school. Like applying to This American Life's internship program and going to Chicago for four months. Like writing in a serious way--especially, finishing the two short stories I have laying around and sending them off and transforming my thesis into a kicky article on lesbian pulps that I can pitch to some kicky magazine.
I know in theory this is a good job and I should be grateful I found it, but I want to be doing something else. I want to be putting more of my time into creative and intellectual work again. I'd like to look for something else, but it's so hard and takes so much time and energy that I can't imagine working and job-hunting at the same time. I'd probably have to quit my job to do a serious hunt, and I can't afford to do that. On the other hand, if I don't start getting benefits soon, I can't afford not to do that. My salary isn't something I'd sneeze at, but with no health insurance, it isn't worth it. I require three expensive prescription psychopharmeceuticals as well birth control and at least semi-regular therapy and med-checks with my psychaitrist. My goodness, I require extensive upkeep. In any case, at the very least I need my Rx drugs covered. I mean, I could easily be spending half my salary just to pay for my drugs. That's just not liveable. In that case, I think it would make more sense to quit and be a full-time job hunter and find a position with benefits as soon as possible.
Man, I hate that healthcare is so expensive. There are a ton of jobs I'd rather be doing but can't because I need health insurance. Like, I'd rather just have some dinky little job inthe city to make bucks and then have more energy to put into writing, but since there are no bartending/ table-waiting/ shirt-folding jobsthat have health insurance, it's just totally out of the picture. Same reason why I can't just tutor, even though I'd probably be making more dollars. It's just impossible for me to buy my own insurance, and even if I could, no insurance company in CA is going to cover my pre-existing conditions (depression, anxiety, ADD), which are of course the reasons I need coverage in the first place. I hope I get insurance soon at this job, although no one has really told me what is going on. I've been to scared to ask my boss and I don'tget the impression that anyone else has any idea. I wish this place were organized more like a normal kind of company.
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Posted by hissycat at 03:42 PM | Comments (26) | TrackBack