| Agenda |
[04 Sep 2008|09:09pm] |
I finally managed to buy myself an 08-09 school calendar. I usually have been buying them at El Corte Inglés, and I went last week and again today in hopes that the model I like, a slender week-at-a-glance calendar, would have come in. The current one ran out yesterday, but it seems El Corte Inglés no longer carries the model I like (or, I feared, the company stopped making it, since they had other sized calendars from that same brand).
But, after traipsing hither and yon across Madrid, I finally managed to find the exact same agenda at a shop a block away from home.
It is such a relief to be able to start filling in things, not just for the next few days but longer-range plans as well (various trips, etc.)
Because of conferences/conventions/speaking engagements/etc. I'm sometimes booked as much as a year and a half in advance, although there is also a lot of unscheduled time in my life, as well (or at least, unscheduled so far). Now, at least, I can see which is which again, which (for me at least) is a relief.
:-)
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| Flights |
[03 Sep 2008|08:38pm] |
I just bought my tickets to Frankfurt for the Book Fair in October.
The ticket cost only 14 Euros. The taxes, however, were 75 Euros. (Plus the 12 euro emission fee.)
Still, intraeuropean flights are pretty darn cheap, all things considered.
(Cabs to/from the airport--I'm going to be loaded down with suitcases full of books/catalogs, don't forget--will wind up being more expensive than the flight.)
I forget if this will be my 15th or 16th consecutive Frankfurt Book Fair.
Although I no longer "work" the fair as hard as I used to, lining up appointments aggressively, etc. it's still a useful chance to meet in person with many of the publishers/agents with whom I already work or otherwise have contacts, as well as catching up with friends. Not to mention that every year one always meets a few new interesting presses or people in those unplanned encounters that happen with so many people so passionate about books all crammed into such a small city...
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[02 Sep 2008|01:46am] |
September at last, which means my stint at the bookstore is over. It was fun, filling in for the regular clerks who went on holiday, although unfortunately summer is very slow, which is probably the most painful time to be working in a bookstore; much better when people are coming in and wanting recommendations and so on and in general buying books.
So now I can finally play catch up on my normal life. Today I mostly dealt with a lot of paperwork, emails, signing/drawing up/sending off contracts for various projects, writing bio notes for places that requested them, etc.
Maybe I can actually get back to writing one of these days... :-)
(Although I hope that some translation gigs come through now that people here in Spain are coming back to work. It's still that transitional period where people are JUST back and so they haven't quite settled in and started requesting things yet... they're still catching up with friends and colleagues and regaling everyone with their summer holiday stories.)
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| Freelancing |
[25 Aug 2008|07:17pm] |
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So I finally just got paid for an invoice that has been outstanding since October 2006.
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| Another poem sale |
[19 Aug 2008|09:38pm] |
Just got off my shift at the bookstore and came home to the news that I sold another poem today, an untitled piece from my forthcoming collection in Spanish, DESAYUNO EN LA CAMA (although in my own translation into English). It's a curious little poem, and I think this will be a good home for it.
It was accepted at a forthcoming new zine called FLIT (www.flitmag.com) which looks to be along the lines of BUTT out of Amsterdam or KAISERIN from France or KINK here in Spain.
I think I definitely need to find or make the time to write more poems!
:-)
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| Poem sale |
[19 Aug 2008|04:46pm] |
The new queer genre magazine I mentioned a while back, COLLECTIVE FALLOUT, has accepted my gay fairy tale poem "Skating Beauty" for the Jan 09 issue.
I am in the mood to write more poetry. But I'm not find the time or space to do so.
A few years ago, I used to leave my laptop at home and take my notebook to cafes around 21 or 22h and write for a bit.
These past weeks, though, I've been filling in at the bookstore for someone who's on vacation, so I don't get off work until 21:30h or so, and I'm too tired to do much of anything.
And I haven't quite figured out how to coordinate my time around the regular workshift, especially since the hours I'm working for the bookstore are exactly when I did most of my work...
But hopefully I'll manage to find time and space (because I find the physical space is often helpful for me for writing poetry, a space out of my normal routines, or giving myself dedicated time/space devoted just to it, and to flex those creative muscles again).
A friend has recently started going to yoga, and another friend just started at the same bikram place, so I'm thinking of maybe giving that a try, too, although perhaps not until September...
I'm such a bundle of contradictions, both desperately wanting and taking comfort from and at the same time eschewing and fleeing from routine.
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| Summer |
[04 Aug 2008|04:20pm] |
Summer's in full swing, which usually means I get nothing done. Today it's only 37º C (99º for those of you living in Fahrenheit). Wheee.
I'm working at the bookstore this month, filling in for one of the regular clerks, who's on holiday.
I enjoy it, especially when people come in and ask for book recommendations. Much more common is that the customers who do come in (so many people are on holiday, and this is especially noticeable on weekends) just want to buy DVDs or porn videos. Which is fine and all, but not why I love working in a bookstore. But that's just me.
Am reading Charles Ardai's FIFTY-TO-ONE, his meta-novel celebration of Hard Case Crime publishing 50 titles, and it's lots of fun.
Although with the weather and etc. I hardly have energy to do much of anything, and I'm late on so many fronts (my apologies if you're expecting something from me, even just an answer to an email!).
I experimented yesterday with something forbidden on my anti-candida diet (a few sips of lemonade with sugar) and sure enough, I bloated and have had an upset stomach this morning. So even though things've been going better, they're not yet back in balance, sigh. So may need to go back to the doctor for another round of fluconazole.
If I don't eat anything I'm not supposed to, everything's fine, but it's such a limited diet, it makes life difficult (especially eating out).
Sigh.
But while this post sounds so... negative (or at least blah/slough of despond/etc.) things're actually fine, just unexciting.
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| Carlos de Cires/Leopoldo Alas |
[01 Aug 2008|05:08pm] |
Last Wednesday my friend Carlos de Cires (with whom I worked occasionally at the Spanish gay magazine ZERO, especially for their travel supplement DESTINO, of which he was the director) passed away quite suddenly, just when it looked like he'd bounced back from a pneumonia. This is a photo the Spanish writer Leopoldo Alas (some of whose work I've translated into English for various magazines) took of us back in 2006.
This morning, Leopoldo passed away, after six weeks of hospitalization, which again began with a pneumonia.
:-(
:-(
:-(
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| rice cakes and road trip |
[30 Jul 2008|06:06pm] |
Here's a snap of me from the drive to Barcelona last week.
Given how difficult it is for me to eat lately, I brought my own provisions: rice cakes and a thermos of tea.
Now I'm a bit tanner (not to mention scruffier), since I managed to get to the beach a few afternoons, in between other things (like the presentation of an anthology of short stories I translated into English and the Eurogames, which I didn't take part in but a lot of friends from other countries were visiting for it so I stuck around a few days extra to see them and was around the margins of the Eurogames as well).
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| clown call |
[25 Jul 2008|02:15pm] |
Last Saturday morning, we were driving down Gran Via in Madrid after Achy had picked up the car rental when I espied this peculiar scene from the window, and managed to catch a quick snap of it before the light changed.
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| cameo |
[17 Jul 2008|04:27pm] |
There's a photo of me from last week on the CRITICAS blog entry about the Semana Negra (since the night before Achy left for the festival we had dinner with the lovely Adriana Lopez and the editor at Vintage Español for the Junot Diaz book Achy just translated into Spanish):
http://www.criticasmagazine.com/blog/810000481/post/860029886.html
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| FPQ Lammy |
[14 Jul 2008|08:18pm] |
I finally got around to downloading the photos from my camera. Here's my new Lammy for FIRST PERSON QUEER, on my parents' living room table. They were so proud to show it off, I've let them hold onto it still.
:-)
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| FYI: New journal |
[11 Jul 2008|07:35pm] |
I've been corresponding with the editors of a new print journal devoted to queer genre (sci-fi, fantasy, horror, mystery) fiction and poetry, COLLECTIVE FALLOUT.
Since I imagine a number of you who read my blog are interested in the overlap of these subjects, let me point out their new blog, where you can also find out more info about the project (I'm not involved, except possibly as a contributor, so ask them directly for more info or details):
http://collectivefalloutmag.blogspot.com/
You can find their call for submissions all the way at the bottom of the page.
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| 3 Good Things |
[11 Jul 2008|04:10pm] |
1) My luggage arrived.
2) My friend Achy Obejas arrived this morning, en route to the Semana Negra in Gijón to promote HAVANA NOIR.
3) I saw my dentist this morning and he replaced my filling.
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| Home |
[09 Jul 2008|04:32pm] |
I am home in Madrid again.
My luggage, alas, is in Heathrow.
With luck, it will be delivered to me tomorrow.
Keep your fingers crossed!
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| I could have predicted this would happen |
[04 Jul 2008|01:30am] |
I don't know why my filling only seem to fall out when I'm on the road, but sure enough, it's 19:25 on Thursday, July 3rd, so not only am I far from my regular dentist in Madrid it's a holiday weekend and even if I wanted to go to someone else I wouldn't be able to find one until Monday at the earliest...
Oh well.
Doesn't hurt much. And I do have a sort of temporary filling kit I can maybe use to stick it back on for the interim... (I've never used it so not sure how it works or if it's better to just leave it until I get home and hope the dentist can see me.)
It just seemed so typical of how these things happen to me, or at least when: on the eve of a holiday weekend being high on the list of when it's likely for something to go wrong...
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| Publishing is strange |
[27 Jun 2008|10:34pm] |
I have just had perhaps the weirdest publishing encounter of my life. I recently had a short story accepted for an anthology, at a publishing house where I have actually published more than one book. They need the contract back next week, but only sent the acceptance on Thursday; they emailed a pdf of the contract, saying to print it and fax it back to them.
I do not have a printer or fax here, but I am staying half a block from their offices, where I have been many times, but the person who was handling all this made me meet with him downstairs on the street, where I signed the contract, and handed it back to him, like some illicit transaction.
All completely bizarre, but whatever.
It left, alas, a very sour taste in my mouth, though, which only serves to make me less interested in working with them in future. It should not be this difficult to do a simple business transaction (with a company I have worked with many time sin the past, although admittedly, the editors I worked with are no longer there and the company has recently been bought... but still).
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| NY, NY |
[27 Jun 2008|04:49am] |
Am in muggy NYC, but have very spotty wifi access since my once-reliable neighbors seem to have moved. A lot of empty storefronts all around town, it seems, which is not surprising given how EXPENSIVE everything is. Was still shocked to see the empty spot where the Barnes & Noble Chelsea used to be, since that had been a fixture in the neighborhood for almost the entire time I've been here. (I later recalled a friend saying they'd had the rent raised from 1 million to nearly 5 million, or numbers to those effects, so I had been told it would be closing but that's quite different from wandering by and seeing it not there.)
(NYers, take note, I've also heard that the Strand Annex is closing because THEIR rent has been raised astronomically, so they're likely to have a mega sale between now and September to unload stock without having to move it, since they also don't really have the space to move it TO...)
The local bagel shop has also closed, and something else is in the process of being put in although not yet sure what. Even the pizza place that had been on the corner for YEARS is gone, now a Verzon wireless store.
Of course, both bagels and pizza are part of my dietary past, which may be a large part of the nostalgia twangs.
(It was hard at the supermarket to pass by the Entemann's, the Pepperidge Farm oatmeal raisin cookies, etc.)
I did manage to buy a handful of books, some dupes of things I already had (J. R. Ackerly's MY FATHER AND MYSELF, for instance, or Paul Monette's novelization of the film NOSFERATU), and some for other people (a parody dog book titled THE COMPLETE petROSEXUAL), but quite a handful for myself as well.
Will type up my book haul and post when I have more reliable connection (although I do wonder where that might be...)
NYC is especially muggy after today's rain... And already my knees hurt from pounding the pavement more than I'm used to.
Anyway, let me post this before the connection goes away again (has done so at least twice as I've been typing).
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| Slumped |
[24 Jun 2008|06:23pm] |
I can't believe it's time for me to travel again tomorrow. I am so not prepared. The past week I've been in a sort of slump of no energy. The heat has been oppressive, yesterday we had these dark leaden skies although it did in fact rain last night, with tremendous thunder and lightning, which broke the heat somewhat.
But I'm still lagging. Instead of packing, I just had a siesta.
So I'm in a sort of triage mode or something, able to do only a few things each day and hopefully what I get to are the most urgent things, though this is not always the case.
I fear how things will be in NYC, which seems to be having the same sort of heat, and where I am never able to get as much done as I feel I SHOULD. Maybe I should not try to do anything, and this way anything I do manage to do (social, professional, whatever) is a plus.
I don't even think I read anything all week. I need to figure out what to bring for the trip, since I'm flying via London, so layovers and plenty of flight time to while away. Hmmm...
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| Happy Visit to Tax Office |
[20 Jun 2008|01:33pm] |
I had to go to Hacienda this morning to do some routine paperwork, and it turns out that the woman who attended me had bought one of my children's books (MISTERIO EN EL JARDÍN) for her son, years ago.
:-)
The whole process was rather painless, but this extra detail made the trip to the tax office actually pleasant.
:-)
:-)
:-)
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