Jay Black, Dena Blizzard and Nick DiUlio Read Their Work at PA Bookstore

Someday I’ve got to learn how to delegate.

My writers’ organization, the Brandywine Valley Writers Group, has regular public readings at bookstores. I’m the current president of the BVWG. For our May reading, I delegated the responsibility for organizing the reading. The result: in May, we had three readers and one audience member. ONE!

For our June reading, I was determined to have good readers and a sizable audience. So I did everything myself. I sent our press releases. I posted it as an event on Yahoo and Facebook. I emailed so many reminders that people got sick of them. And I stacked the lineup with good, funny writers: comedian-screenwriter Jay Black, comedian and former Miss New Jersey Dena Blizzard, and editor-reporter Nick DiUlio.

I know that their presence drew at least three audience members, all of them fellow stand-up comics: Norm Klar, LaTice Mitchell-Klapa, and Jason Pollock. So I already had a larger audience than last time. (Jason has already put his version of this event on his blog.)

I had dinner with my readers before the show (except for Jay Black, who was coming from another gig in North Jersey.) We ate at the Magnolia Grill inside the bookstore, so we didn’t have far to travel. But the Chester County Book and Music Company is a BIG bookstore, reputed to have the largest selection of books east of the Rockies. The speaker’s area isn’t visible from the Grill.

Now I LIKE the people I was dining with, and I lost track of the time. So it was almost time for the event to begin when one of the BVWG officers showed up and said that I was needed. I left my guests—who hadn’t finished eating—and hurried over to the speaker’s area. Where I found another officer of the BVWG already at the lectern, organizing the speakers. (And putting herself on the lineup, which I had already arranged to fill our allotted time.) I realized that I should have delegated someone to be in the speaker’s area while I was dining with our guest speakers.

But it turned out all right. Even with her unanticipated addition, we kept to our time, since a few speakers went short. I took the opening spot – the least desirable, since people are still arriving. (In fact, Jay Black arrived during my reading. My dinner guests missed it entirely.)

Nick DiUlio read a fine personal essay titled “Yes (I Think) We Can: Surviving Family Brunch in a Post-Election America.” It can be found here, on his website, About Twenty Pounds of Headlines.

Dena Blizzard read a short piece from her blog, and a very funny article she wrote for HybridMom.com.

And, to my amazement, Jay Black wrote a hilarious piece just for this event. I hope he posts it on his blog (or gets it published somewhere).

Was this event a success? Well, we had about 25 listeners (some came and went over the course of 90 minutes). That’s as many as most professional authors on book tours get.

My guest speakers all said that they’d like to do it again. Perhaps I’ll schedule another such event before my term as BVWG president ends in August, provided I learn how to be in two places at once. Or learn how to delegate.

Thanks for the Headache, McG

I just came back from watching the new "Terminator: Salvation" film. And I want those two hours back.

For the first time in my life, a movie actually gave me a headache. The high-decibel explosions and music, combined with the film's unremitting grimness just made my head throb. Plus, for the giant Terminator sequence, the sound editor stole that annoying foghorn noise from the recent version of "War of the Worlds."

Of course, the idiot plot didn't help. (Skynet has both John Connor AND Kyle Reese inside its base, and all it does is send one Terminator after each man? Skynet is cranking out Terminator after Terminator, yet it only sends ONE?! And hasn't Skynet thought of flooding its corridors with poison gas?)

It looks like they've stopped giving an acknowledgment to Harlan Ellison in the credits. Just as well - Ellison shouldn't have to be associated with this mess.

Now I have to go take some Tylenol.

Sometimes Things Actually Get Better

It's too nice out to spend all day in my home office...so I took my laptop to the library. (I like to live dangerously.) I was still inside, but at least I had a nice window, and thousands of books near at hand.

Unfortunately, what the library doesn't have is food. So, when I got hungry, I decamped to a nearby Panera Bread, which offers free wi-fi. And I still have a window, although this one opens out onto a parking lot.

This Panera Bread is in an old shopping center that was upgraded a few years ago. When I was a kid, this parking lot was a barren, potholed, trash-strewn wasteland. My High School Ecology Club inherited a recycling center in this parking lot, so I spent some time here, separating recyclables. Eventually, with people dumping non-recyclable trash here, the site grew beyond what High School kids could handle, and the owner just carted everything away.

But, since the renovation, there are flowers here. There are shrubs and plantings in the medial strips. There aren't any potholes, and the trash is picked up. There's no need for a recycling center, because the local townships all have recycling programs. Sometimes things actually do get better....

And the Winner Is...

Last night I entered a "Battle of the Bards" -- a competition for writers delivering their work orally. I won first place.

An event like this is as much about how you present your work as your work itself. Fortunately, I read a comedic piece, and I made the audience of 25-odd people laugh. Nine of the twelve contestants were poets, and no one else read anything humorous, so I stood out well.

By the way, while I am currently the president of the Brandywine Valley Writers Group, this event was staged by a different writing organization, the Chester County Writer's Workshop.

It's been awhile since I came in first in a competition. I still find it hard to believe that people voted for me instead of one of the hot girl poets!

I don't know how long this link will be up, but here are some photos of the event. The MC is Tom Lillard, the guitarist is Jake Michaels. Poet Andrea Daniels took most of the photos, and Julie Latham was the main organizer.

http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLanding.action?c=18glzfwk.6rukxez8&x=0&y=-eh5fir&localeid=en_US

Advice from the Old Cock

Grammar maven Richard Nordquist just posted an article on About.com, in which he relates the Five Rules of Thumb for Editing by the late Gardner Botsford.

Botsford worked as an editor at The New Yorker for almost 40 years. His ruthless editing skills earned him the nickname "The Ripper;" he once edited a three page article by legendary reporter A.J. Liebling down to a half-page. But Botsford was also a good editor, making articles clearer and better. The argumentative Liebling himself complimented Botsford on his edits.

Botsford...who addressed male friends as "Old Cock"...believed in first impressions, as you can see from his fourth rule:

Rule of thumb No. 4. In editing, the first reading of a manuscript is the all-important one. On the second reading, the swampy passages that you noticed in the first reading will seem firmer and less draggy, and on the fourth or fifth reading, they will seem exactly right. That's because you are now attuned to the writer, not to the reader. But the reader, who will read the thing only once, will find it just as swampy and boring as you did the first time around. In short, if something strikes you as wrong on first reading, it is wrong, and a fix is needed, not a second reading.

Of course, the superiority of first impressions has been expounded upon by many theorists. It's the main theme of Malcolm Gladwell's book Blink.

And yet, when I think of how many times I've been distracted while trying edit something, it's a wonder that I catch anything except glaring typographical errors. These days, when my critique group meets, I close my eyes to better concentrate when an author reads his or her work. It seems to help.

PS
It's a cliche among stand-up comics, but I have to say it: when you name your kid something like "Gardner Botsford," you'd better be prepared for him to get beaten up in school. On the other hand, if your kid survives childhood, he'll probably end up in a job at The New Yorker. The drunk felon on "Cops" wearing a wifebeater and a three-day growth of beard never has a name like "Gardner Botsford."

A Model World

I recently came across a photographic technique called tilt-shift photography. You can find a full definition here, but it involves keeping just part of an image in focus. A common side effect to tilt-shift photography is making the photograph of a real-life image look like a photograph of a model, especially if the photograph is taken from above and the colors are heavily saturated.

The tilt-shift image pictured is of Joe's Crab Shack in Nashville, TN, by Shawn S. Ide.

Apparently you can reproduce the effect via Photoshop, avoiding the expense of special photographic lenses.

This link will take you to 5o excellent examples of tilt-shift photography.

(By the way, I stole the title for this blog entry from author Michael Chabon, who used it for both the title of a short story and a collection.)

A Freakin' Brilliant Idea

....No human being has more energy than a normal, well-fed, well-rested child. Especially boys. Which makes it difficult to get them to sit still in class.

The New York Times ran an article last week about schools that are experimenting with adjustable-height desks. Kids can sit or stand, as they please. Standing burns more energy, allowing them to focus better on their schoolwork. Adjustable-height stools are made available. The desk model pictured in The Times (above left and center) also has a swinging footrest, allowing kids to burn off even more energy.

The idea has been around for a long time. Many adults use standing desks. Personally, I always had difficulty typing in any position other than seated, but not everyone does. Yeshivas also use adjustable-height desks, where it is called a shtender in Yiddish. (far right) The shtender seems to lack the swinging footrest.

I wish my classroom had had these desks when I was teaching Middle School. I might still be teaching.