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2025? Okay.

I’m still processing 2024. One of my goals for today is to finish my reading recap, but I did publish on one of the social media things a shout-out to four books I reread last year:

  • Dragonsinger (1977) by Anne McCaffrey
  • Dragondrums (1979) by Anne McCaffrey
  • Okay for Now (2011) by Gary D. Schmidt
  • Lonesome Dove (1985) by Larry McMurtry (still reading)

Briefly, here are some takeaways from the rereading experience.

Those YA McCaffrey novels (preceded by Dragonsong, which I reread at the very end of 2023) had a strong influence on the way I think about fantasy in general, but especially in how I think about writing YA fantasy. The entire series is really SF, but because it has dragons, it gets lumped in with fantasy. “Science fantasy” is the newish term, I guess. I always did like good SF better than good fantasy, I guess, and maybe it began here.

I reread the series because it came up in conversation with Gin Blossom several times over the years, and a boxed set of the three novels was my Christmas gift to her the night we (a loosely applied definition of “we,” but this is a story for another day) decided to move on. I don’t think she’ll ever read it, which is sliiiiightly too bad because I think she’d like it.

I so enjoyed the reread, and before I got sidetracked on Lonesome Dove, I intended to reread the first two Dragonriders of Pern novels and then perhaps go all-in on the Pern universe. I still hope to do that this year, but:

I’ve been saying for at least twenty years that Larry McMurtry’s influence on my writing is greater than anyone else’s these past fifteen years, at least. I do not write like him (I don’t think), but I have always been knocked over by how clearly he writes. When I teach professional writing classes, our mantra is always, “Good writing is clear first and elegant second.” Clarity. There is no single more important aspect of writing than this, and I read a ton of writing every day whose writers seem to forget this.

Someone I respect asked me once, “How is your writing so readable?” and it’s maybe the nicest thing anyone has ever said about my work, and this includes the tiny handful of comments from women in undergrad suggesting that my writing had turned them on. It’s about clarity, and while I still have a lot of growing to do in this area, when I compare what I write now to my work ten years ago, I can see this focus has really paid off. I don’t know if I’ll ever hit McMurtry-level ability, but you know, if I spend my whole life on just this and if I can look back every ten years and see growth, I will fricking TAKE it.

I read Lonesome Dove in 1992, the year I shared a rented house in Pauoa with Reid and James, then chased it with a couple of his other novels. McMurtry hadn’t yet written the sequel, Streets of Laredo, and he has since written two prequels, Dead Man’s Walk and Comanche Moon. When I recommended Lonesome Dove to R, she pretty much inhaled it and then she inhaled all three of the follow-ups, and until last year she is the only woman I’ve recommended it to who actually read and liked the first novel. The others could not get into it.

Early last year I thought I should read the three follow-ups, but I knew I’d have to reread Lonesome Dove first. Then in October, someone from my book club asked if I’d read it, which I thought was a crazy coincidence because of course I was thinking of the reread. We agreed to do a buddy-read in November and she freaking did the whole novel in six days. It’s a long novel! I started on November 1 and today, January 18, I am still ten short chapters from the end.

I’ve already purchased the Kindle versions of the other three, anthologized with Lonesome Dove in one book called The Lonesome Dove series. I don’t like that it’s packaged in chronological order by the novels’ timelines. It should be packaged in the order of their publication, which is how I am reading it.

I finally read The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt last year. I’d had it in my Kindle library since right after I finished Okay for Now, and it was amazing. It was published earlier, and it has characters in common, so I reread Okay for Now and then a bunch more of Schmidt’s novels in my Summer of Schmidt. Fantastic. I took a break, but I plan to read the rest of his YA novels. After those McMurtry and McCaffrey books, I suppose.

So it was a great year for rereads. If all I’d read in 2024 were these four already-read books, I’d have considered it a good reading year. Outstanding, on the strength of these novels’ qualities.

—

Okay let’s do a Friday 5. From here.

1. If Everyone carried personal cards (instead of business cards), what would you put on the line just beneath your name, where job titles usually go?

I might make it a small order of cards because I can’t decide. However, a line spoken by Calvin O’Keefe in A Wrinkle in Time has been running around in my brain for weeks, mostly in connection to my Silent Book Club (which I will discuss another time): “I just came to get away from my family.” I’m imagining the contexts in which I might hand someone the card, and even though I seldom go anywhere specifically to get away from my family (to get away from people in general is an entirely different thing, and my family comprises people), I think it’d be a good way to loosen up some good conversation, especially with “Madeleine L’Engle” as the quote’s attribution. If I can immediately identify my L’Engle people, we can skip a whole crapload of smalltalk.

2. What’s your favorite card game?

No contest. Cribbage. But so few people play cribbage that I’m likelier to say something else in normal conversation: either Rich Man Poor Man, if the group is the right size, or Speed, if it’s just me and one other person. There are a few games with specialized decks I really like too: Xactica, Quiddler, and Five Crowns.

3. How confidently and competently do you shuffle a deck of cards?

More confidently and more competently than most people, I’ve found. I have two methods for separating the deck so I can shuffle, and for some reason both impress many people I play cards with for the first time, and believe me, neither is very impressive. This morning, I caught some IG video of a young woman who’d practiced some card-shuffling and deck-cutting tricks she learned from YouTube and they were really impressive. Looks like she has pretty small hands too, so maybe I’ll look up those videos and see if I can learn a few things.

4. To whom did you last send a non-holiday, non-birthday greeting card?

I sent a ton of thank-you cards last year, hosting a couple of card-writing get-togethers after the holidays. I think I’ll do that again next month. Lots of people expressed interest and appreciation for the activity, ‘though I think I was joined at them by only one friend each. At least I got my cards written. By itself, that was a very positive thing. So I don’t have an answer to the question, but based on the order in which I attacked the list last year, it was very likely Penny or Grace.

5. When did you last jot something down on an index card?

I use index cards all the time for making lists of stuff I have to remember when I have to have the list on my person. A card is just easiest to keep track of, and it slides so nicely into a shirt pocket. Of course I use my phone for this most of the time, but when I’m going to be places where it might not be appropriate to look at my phone, I like an index card. Also, I use them at work for similar things when I’m having trouble keeping myself on task and organized. So the answer is: probably a couple of months ago at work.

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Friday 5: This week in the news

From here.

1. Has the death of a famous person (not connected to you personally) ever made you cry?

Some of these things are major blows, emotionally. When Kurt Cobain died, I was in my last year of undergrad, and I didn’t get out of bed for two weeks. But I didn’t cry .

I was at my desk in the office when I read that Neil Peart, the drummer for Rush and the greatest rock and roll drummer ever, died. I actually yelled, “Oh no!” and everyone looked at me, and I said, “My favorite drummer died!” and I realized nobody was going to care, although one coworker did say, “Oh you mean the guy from Rush?” I could feel the tears coming, but I pushed them down and focused on work. I cried several months later listening to “Limelight” on repeat in my car.

I’m not even really into hip hop, but I did cry when Phife Dawg from A Tribe Called Quest died. I really liked him and respected what his group did. And I cried a little a few years after Adam Yauch of the Beastie Boys died. He had always been my favorite Beastie, and it was a tough loss.

Last month, my favorite baseball player died. Rickey Henderson. I didn’t cry right away, but I cried that night as I thought about what he meant for the game of baseball and what he meant for me as a young fan. I can still make myself cry when I think about him even a month later.

2. Have you ever sent money as relief aid after a disaster?

I haven’t. Although I volunteered a couple of weekends to help with hurricane cleanup on Kauai, I don’t think I’ve ever sent relief aid money anywhere. I’m more likely to respond to stories of single people who’ve had trouble or illness.

3. How will the recent declaration affirming alcoholic beverages as cancer-causing affect your consumption?

It hasn’t yet affected my modest and moderate consumption except to give me something to think about. So there is a very good chance it will cause me to give it up or at least to stop drinking casually, as I have done these past few years. Ever since the breakup with Gin Blossom, I’ve gone out almost every Sunday night for a couple of drinks, some alone time, and a good book. It’s been my favorite night of the week. During NaNoWriMo, because I was working on my novel, I went instead to an open-all-night cafe (we have one left, and it took me until last year to discover it — it’s actually in a hospital) and drank coffee instead, and I have to say I enjoyed those evenings as much as my bar evenings. I could easily trade one for the other.

4. What is the most bizarre (or difficult to understand) movie you’ve seen?

I haven’t seen Pink Flamingos or Eraserhead, which are often the answers to this question, but I did see Jim Jarmusch’s The Dead with Johnny Depp, Crispin Glover, Iggy Pop, Billy Bob Thornton, John Hurt, Alfred Molina, and Robert Mitchum, and I found it impossible to wrap my brain around AND impossible to care about.

My feelings are the same about Bubba Ho-Tep, with Bruce Campbell. Just couldn’t get interested and just couldn’t care.

So I think my favorite answer is David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive with Naomi Watts. Challenging as heck but not utterly inaccessible. I still don’t really know what it is, but I know I like it, and each time I see it (that is, all two times), I’ve found more to think about.

5. How willing and able are you to separate art from artist when a musician, actor, writer, or other creator is discovered to have behaved very badly?

Fandom is a strange thing, and it is very personal. And I have found that it’s close to impossible to draw a hard line and to be consistent about it. This is why I don’t judge others whose responses to people like Michael Jackson or J. K. Rowling or Neil Gaiman do not match my own. I was never a huge fan of Gaiman, ‘though I did very much like the handful of books I’ve read by him and planned to read the others. My feelings about Rowling are easier for me to sort through and deal with (The first seven books are canon; I’ve read them and adored them; I will likely continue to read and adore these first seven; I will not likely give her any more of my money). I never really liked Michael Jackson or his music to begin with, and certainly never looked up to him as artist or person, so it’s easy to just not think of him.

However, one thing this Gaiman thing makes obvious is that we could find out tomorrow that it could be someone very dear, someone I look up to as a person, where my fandom is an enormous part of the identity I’ve built myself. Bruce Cockburn. T Bone Burnett. It could be one of them tomorrow and if it is, why should I be surprised? I shouldn’t. I think I’m too old to be devastated by it, but my heart will be broken.

Less personal: it could be Stephen Colbert or Tom Hanks. No identity things for me, but BOY will I be sad and disappointed. But yeah: I will refuse to be surprised.

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Friday 5: Scattergories Part 14

It’s time for the annual Friday 5 Scattergories questions. The random-letter generator gave me a P.

1.
If you can schedule it, what would you like for your last meal?

P makes it too easy: pizza, of course. My problem with pizza is that it’s so filling, and you kind of want your last meal to take a while. Or at least I do. I’ll save a little bit of room for pie at dessert, too. Apple. Ala mode with cinnamon ice cream.

2.
Where would you like to be buried?

I want to be buried in centerfield at a major league baseball stadium, which of course you can’t do. You can’t scatter your ashes out there either, ‘though many people have tried. However, since I’m dictating things, we’ll go with it. Three teams play in stadiums whose names begin with P: the Cleveland Guardians at Progressive Field, the Pittsburgh Pirates at PNC Park, and the San Diego Padres at Petco Park. I saw my first major league games at the old San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium when I was 15, and my uncle (four years older than me) still lives in San Diego, so this is clearly the choice. Although I would much rather be buried in an American League park (that would make it Cleveland), my connections to the Padres — whose triple A team used to be the Hawaii Islanders — make it really the only option.

3.
What will they place in your coffin to be buried with you?

A year ago, as I was brushing my teeth before bed, the old children’s prayer popped into my head. Now I lay me down to sleep / I pray the Lord my soul to keep / If I die before I wake / I pray the Lord my soul to take. And it occurred to me for the first time that it’s a child’s prayer about dying while asleep. How heavy metal is that? And of course I remembered that Metallica actually incorporates the prayer in “Enter Sandman,” one of the band’s best songs, so I’m not the first to think of this.

It led to my composing this: Now I lay me down to rest / I pray for peace and placidness / If I die, dig up the dirt / And bury me in my Sabbath shirt.

And then it led to several more. For fun, I’m writing a few a week just to see if there are any projects it might lead to.

Alas neither Sabbath nor shirt begins with P, so please bury me with some progressive metal CDs (Images and Words by Dream Theater, Fates Warning’s Long Day Good Night, Opeth’s Blackwater Park, and Rush’s 2112) and some poetry. Make it the hugest anthology you can find.

4.
Who will sing at your funeral?

Get the Police back together for one more gig, and ask them to play “Can’t Stand Losing” and “Murder by Numbers.” I would have asked for Peter, Paul and Mary, but alas.

5.
Who will deliver your eulogy?

The One Who Got Away had a nickname I gave her in high school beginning with P, but I’m not saying it here, and although she’s the person who’d probably best deliver the eulogy, I’d hate to put her in this position because I don’t think she wants it. My uncle’s name (yeah, the same uncle) begins with P, but there’s a P in my main friend group: Penny. So let her do it, and tell her to keep it short, and if all she wants to do is read a section from one of my favorite books, it will be completely fine with me.

—

I used to have a long list of stuff I want for my funeral, but now that it draweth nigh, I honestly don’t care. I’d prefer to be cremated with no service, and have my ashes sprinkled in the Pacific by someone who doesn’t know me.

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Friday 5: No intersection

Set theory was one of my best events in Math League when I was in high school. You probably didn’t know this.

  1. When did you last read a physical issue of a magazine?

I subscribe to the reincarnation of CREEM magazine, but I admit I’ve allowed issues to pile up. Part of my job is writing for the physical magazine my employer publishes quarterly, and of course I also edit that before we go to print, and then read the hard copy, but I feel like this shouldn’t count. As a member of the National Puzzlers League, I receive the monthly newsletter, which contains news and a crazy number of word puzzles, but is that a newsletter or a magazine?

I also help edit the state university’s alumni magazine, and I write a crossword puzzle for it. I read it many times before it’s in print, and then usually when we get the hard copies. We put this to bed a few weeks ago and it’s not yet in print, so I can’t count it even if I can count it.

Does a literary journal count? I read a few pages from one the other night. It happens to be the issue in which I published a poem last year, but I was not reading my own work. I think this counts. So yeah. Bamboo Ridge issue #124, late last week.

2. If someone were going through your wardrobe, which item or items would give the person a good idea of your age?

I still have every one of my class shirts from intermediate and high school, and they all say some version of Class of ’87 on them. Dead giveaway. Also a counterfeit Members Only jacket and a tee that says, “Shall we play a game?”

3. What is your favorite song released in 2024?

This week marked the year’s halfway point, so I’ve been thinking about this in preparation to make a couple of lists. My choice three months ago (the quarter-year mark) was “Life’s a Fucking Miracle” by James. Yes, the James who had something of a hit album in 1993 with Laid. They put out a new album this year called Yummy, and it’s pretty dang terrific. This is probably still my number one, but some good runners up are “Houdini” and “Illusion” by Dua Lipa (pop), “Hot City” by Bonnie McKee (also pop but a different kind), “He Came Down” by T Bone Burnett (Americana), “Picked First” by Sasha Alex Sloan (psycho-folk singer-songwriter), something from the Taylor Swift album and something from the Billie Eilish album and maybe something from the Sheryl Crow album.

I just tried to embed the James video here, and it turns out because the video is age-restricted (there isn’t even anything in the video; it’s just the sung lyrics I suppose), I can’t embed it here. So I’m embedding the radio edit, which I just discovered exists. Please, as you listen, replace in your ears the word “shocking” with the word “fucking,” which makes it a much better song, or look up the song yourself on YouTube or in whatever streaming audio service you use. It’s just a fantastic song.

4. What non-food item did you last put in a zippered plastic bag?

When I’m reading a physical book, I usually carry it around in a zippered plastic bag. So this photo from yesterday morning answers the question. You can see the corner of the bag on the left.

5. You may know that in Japan there are cafes where you can play with bunnies, cats, hedgehogs, reptiles, owls, and many other kinds of animals. Assuming one hundred percent good faith, which would mean the animals’ safety and mental health are completely assured and the animals are rescues, making it unsafe for them to be released back into the wild, which animal cafe (whether it exists now or not) would you most like to spend time in?

We don’t have fireflies in Hawaii, and while I’ve spent a few evenings in places where they exist, I rather miss them. I’d like to sit in an open-air type space where fireflies just buzz all around, while I sip coffee and enjoy them, perhaps in the company of a bookish middle-aged woman with a thing for writers.

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The Arctic Light

Before I attack a couple of Friday 5s, a little update in bullet form because my brain’s a little fluffy this afternoon and I’ll excuse myself much more easily when my prose is terrible if I’m just making a list.

  • I’m going through a wee bit of ickiness these days, which I will explain in the coming weeks. I’m not depressed — I hear the call of the abyss many times each day but I only allow myself the briefest glances in its direction. I’ve learned to redirect in moments like this, as tempting as it is to dive in and plummet. It has worked so far. My therapist (yes, I have one now) and my psychiatrist (I have one of them too) both say this is a good strategy. I’m rather pleased I came up with it on my own, before I met either of them. I’m somewhat annoyed it took me so long to figure it out. I’m baffled that such a thing works.
  • However, I’m pretty sad about one major thing and perhaps a few smaller things. Sadness doesn’t worry me, but it’s been intense this weekend.
  • The major thing is I’m going through a breakup. I was seeing someone most of last year. We shall know her in this space as Gin Blossom. Or at least for now — I should really look that phrase up to see if it meant something before it was the name of a great alt-pop band in the mid-90s. It ended right after the new year and I’ve been mostly okay, but this weekend it got worse for reasons I’ll probably get into, if only to help me sort it out. I mean, that’s what this space is for. You thought it was for the audience?
  • I’m writing this in a physical space very, very familiar to me, yet not really visited in the past five years. Hamilton Library, on the campus at UH Manoa. The nonprofit I work for, who used to be based here on this campus, moved to offices near Ala Moana in February 2019. I’ve still come by, because I love libraries and because I’ve continued to borrow things here (one of the perks of my employemnet), but I haven’t worked here. I have several favored spots. Right now I’m in one of my most productive locations, completely alone while much of the rest of the study spaces are rather busy. It’s finals time, you know.
  • Listening to Marika Takeuchi’s soothing neoclassical and new wave piano excellence while I write. I needed something mellow and intelligent. Not an album in order, as I usually listen, but “Top songs” or whatever Apple Music calls it, just a very long list of songs played a lot by other fans, I guess.
  • I’ll be writing and working in this space a lot more, beginning pretty soon. The foundation moves back on campus. We were supposed to move in the day after tomorrow, but this is not happening, so now most of us are in work-from-home mode until things get straightened out, which I suspect will be in a week. I was on the fence about leaving the old space, which was in a great area. I am no longer on the fence. We’ve been talking about this move for so long and we’ve been actively getting ready for it for so long that I just want the whole thing to be over. I did not forget how great it is to work on a university campus; however, I feel myself clicking into place with a comfort I find affirming and encouraging.
  • I’m stopping at the fish market to pick up stuff for dinner. I make dinner for the parents on Saturdays, and I realize now I probably won’t have time to finish my Friday 5s before I have to go. I’ll do what I can, though, and finish this evening from home.

From April 19: Gemini from here.

  1. What movie do you think everyone should see?
    I think I have several answers to this question. I surprised myself by not having a ready answer, the way I do for the books version of this question. The film I think everyone should see because it’s (a) about as close to perfect as a movie has ever come and (b) perhaps the most canonical film in the canon, is Casablanca, which is also my favorite film.

    Somebody somewhere asked what book every president of the United States should read, and my answer was Farewell to Manzanar by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston if an autobiography is preferred or Weedflower by Cynthia Kadohata if a novel is preferred. They are both about the Japanese internment in WWII in America, and I am not saying this one issue is more important than any of the other super super important issues every American should be aware of, but Americans are less likely to have a meaningful understanding of what happened, and we just can’t allow this kind of treatment of our fellow citizens ever to happen again.

    So I feel I need to come up with a film with that kind of approach: something everyone should see because it makes them more (fill in the blank). Something beautiful or important or meaningful we would all benefit from experiencing if everyone else were also to experience it. This leads me to something with cosmic or spiritual meaning, but maybe I haven’t seen the film that does this for me, at least directly. I can think of many, many films that do it a bit more artistically. Many people thinking about this suggest Babette’s Feast, a wonderful example. However, reserving the right to change my mind when I think of something much better on my drive home in a moment, I’m going with Groundhog Day.
  2. What song describes your overall mood or outlook on life right now?
    The song in my headphones right now is called “The Arctic Light” by Marika Takeuchi, and in this moment it really sums it up well. Melancholy but hopeful, while being aware of all the non-melancholy, beautiful things around me.
  3. What’s the most memorable food you’ve eaten while traveling?
    I don’t even remember what we had, but when I stopped at Stanford to visit R in her senior year there, we took the BART into the city and wandered around until we found an Italian restaurant. Our college years were so crazy for us, individually and as two friends who would later be in love (one of us was already in love, but we shall not revisit this today), and as she was about to close this four-year chapter of her life and come (maybe?) home and I was still trying to figure out how to make college work, we had a meal that made me think it was all going to be okay, that we were still the friends we’d been in high school. We went back the next night to eat there again, only this time I ordered what she’d had, and she ordered what I’d had. It felt for years after like the most important meal I’d ever had.

    The other is Molokai hot bread. That’s what they call it there. I didn’t know what it was either when I asked all the teens I was working with for a week one summer what their favorite food was and almost all of them said hot bread. There’s a bakery there, Kanemitsu Bakery. After 10:00 in the evening, you could walk down a back alley, knock on this old wooden door, and wait for one of the bakers to stick his head out and say, “Yeah?” as if he had no idea what you were there for. There was one thing to order: a round loaf of bread, right out of the oven. You could order it with some combination of butter, sugar and cinnamon, jelly, and cream cheese. Years later they added other varieties, but I have always had the strawberry jelly and cream cheese and let me tell you: there has never been a more perfect food on this planet. It’s the Casablanca of food.
  4. When were you most recently disappointed by the closing of a store or restaurant?
    My lovely non-Hawaii friends are not going to understand this, but a crack seed shop opened near the office right at the start of the lockdown, and it’s closing at the end of the month to go strictly online. It was a block from the office, which is no longer my office, and a terrific combination of new, inventive candies appealing to today’s sweet tooths and throwback nostalgic snacks only people in Hawaii of a certain age would appreciate. I was pleased to discover it for all my coworkers who also became regulars, and we went for one last visit last week, and a few of us had stamp cards to redeem for free Icees. I will still order from them when they are only online, but dang will I miss going into that store.
  5. How have you been sleeping lately?
    Mostly terribly. I wake up an hour before my alarm no matter when I set it and I can’t get back to sleep. My weekends, where I usually catch up on sleep when I need to, have been busy with Camp NaNoWriMo stuff. I have been. undisciplined in putting myself to bed. It’s been just ridiculous for a few weeks.

Okay I did have time to finish one 5 but not two. I’ll take it. Will come back and edit typos and dumb phrasing later. Here’s some stock video someone put behind the Marika Takeuchi song, which I was pleased to discover has been covered on YouTube by maybe 20 musicians. I had no idea this song was so popular. I’m pleased to see it is.

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Last of 2022

My silence in this space was only intentional the first several months. I’ve meant to get back to it for nearly half a year now but certain logistics have made it less convenient than it used to be, believe it or not. I didn’t think anything could be less convenient than my old setup, but while the technical aspects of getting this space updated are much much better, some practical aspects need figuring out.

A brief rundown on the rest of the year before I hit the Friday 5.

  • I moved. Got the word from the landlord he needed the space to take care of a sister in hospice care. So after 24 years in that space, I knew this was a sign it was time to come back to the parents’ home in Waimalu, which I finally did at the very end of March. I didn’t write about it then because I was a bit stressed-out and I didn’t want to share details with people before it was done. It’s how I am with the big things in life.
  • I still write for the non-profit and had a good year — good enough to get probably the best evaluation I’ve had in my five years. Yay, five years. It’s the magic number in the foundation because it’s when the free parking kicks in. Free parking in this town is like getting a raise. I still love my work and I think I’m getting better at it.
  • I lost nearly 20 pounds between Thanksgiving last year and July this year, and then I put almost. all of it back. Very annoying, but when I finally stepped on a scale again last week for the first time since July, I was semi-relieved to see I was exactly where I was a year ago. I mean exactly. And if I dropped all that weight last year, I can do it again this year, and hopefully keep going. Stick around for my resolutions, which I’ll write in this space probably tomorrow.
  • I was Municipal co-Liaison again for NaNoWriMo, for the second year. This year we returned to in-person events, which is a big deal. I met some new people and got to see some long-timers for the first time in ages. It wasn’t nearly the fantastic blowout I would like to see, but it was a very good transition, I think. I have big plans for next year. Oh yeah, and I hit 50,000 words for the month on a new project I’m pretty excited about.
  • The writing partner and I haven’t met as often as we planned, but we’re still meeting and still writing. This is an important relationship for me for many reasons, not the last of which. is it keeps me thinking about my writing and my dreams of writing, which I am not quite ready to give up on.
  • I saw two movies in theaters. Dio: Dreamers Never Die, a documentary about Ronnie James Dio, and Clerks III, the Kevin Smith movie. I think I’m ready to make movies in the cinema a regular thing again, as long as I go on like weeknights for the late show or matinees when everyone else is at work.
  • I didn’t do as much reading this year as last because of the move, which took forever! Moving sucks, I tell you. It’s one of the worst things. But I did read parts of several books I’ll get back to in 2023 I swear, and did read a few things in their entirety. The second, third, and fourth book in Madeleine L’Engle’s Time Quartet, the sequels to A Wrinkle in Time, which were of course rereads. I really enjoyed Tae Keller’s Jennifer Chan is Not Alone . Keller is that Punahou grad who won the Newbery a couple of years ago. Ginger Park’s The Hundred Choices Department Store was a nice discovery. And I finally — finally! — finished John Updike’s Rabbit, Run, one of those English major books I’ve tried to read many times since my undergrad days. I’m quite sure there’s more but that’s what I remember right now.
  • Jessica died three weeks ago as I was getting off the freeway at Kinau Street. I don’t have to tell you if you’re from Honolulu that’s a terrible place for a car to break down, but things worked out about as well as they could have, and I laid her to rest after four years of super super super fun driving. The night before last I drove my new car home, a red Kia Soul named Bellatrix. My first new car. You need a ride anywhere or want to borrow some wheels for something? I’m your guy. So far I love this little thing, which is actually not that little. I can’t believe how roomy it is inside.
  • I am strongly considering doing FAWM in February. It will be my first time since 2007 or so.
  • Beginning in early August and lasting through the beginning of November, I went through some really, really rough depression. Somehow I stayed out of the abyss through the worst of the pandemic, but wow. These three months or so were rough as heck. Worse even than what I went through when Crush Girl first friendzoned me three years ago, and that was pretty bad. I will definitely write more about this later, but a couple of things I did on my own made me think I can, with some professional help, confront this thing finally and do something about it. One of my new year’s resolutions, already shared with some close friends and my supervisor at work, is to speak to my doctor about what I believe are undiagnosed depression and ADHD. I’m ready to figure a few things out.
  • I have a secret I’m practically exploding with that’s actually helped me out of most of the depression. I’m not in the clear yet, but I can see the sun again most days and when the chasm has opened up I haven’t let myself dive in. The secret is helping. I promise I’ll share it when the time is right, but if you’re reading this I know you care enough about me that you’ll be pretty happy for me when I do share it!
  • I caught COVID in July and again the week of Thanksgiving. After these years of being super careful I came down with the things twice. And somehow my parents, my new cohabitants, managed to escape it. Whew.
  • I think my favorite thing I watched this year, besides the Harry Potter films which I am rewatching this week (I’m on Order of the Phoenix, which I will watch part of tonight)), was this series called Sprung on Amazon’s free, commercial-supported platform Freevee. Or Freevie. I’m too lazy to look it up. Anyway go see it. Each 30-minute episode is 26 minutes of stupid and 4 minutes of incredible sweetness. I’m fervently wishing for a second season. Other rewatches this year were Silicon Valley in its entirety and The Queen’s Gambit for like the sixth time. I am still slowly working my way through Downton Abbey and a few other things.

So it was a rather good, terrible, remarkable, year, which I have just done. I didn’t take you with me for most of it, but let’s see what 2023 brings. I have a feeling I’m about to have a lot of adventures these next 365 days.

Let’s do the last Friday 5 of the year.

1. Among people with whom you are not personally acquainted, who most made you laugh in 2022?
I ask this almost every year (in some place or another) and the answer is usually Tony Kornheiser, via his Tony Kornheiser Show podcast. The fricking pandemic, combined with his being a senior citizen and therefore very careful, has meant major changes to the program, mostly hosting from a home studio and cohosting with his son, rather than the rotating team of cohost friends, who are D.C. A-listers like a former Pentagon spokeswoman, two award-winning sportswriters, and an on-air CNN personality. The show is still pleasant and amusing but no longer can’t-miss listening for me. I still listen religiously, only not religiously like when I went to church in college. More like religiously like when I go to church now. So the answer is (as it has been these last couple of years) the producers and hosts of the Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz. It’s not just Le Batard and Stu; it’s the whole team, but especially Mike Schur, who you might know from The Office and Parks and Recreation. Man, the guy just cracks me up almost every time I hear him. He’s the best on Le Batard, but he’s alllllmost as good on the Pozcast with Joe Posnanski.

2. Among people with whom you are not personally acquainted, who most inspired you in 2022?
The people of Ukraine and the people of neighboring countries who opened their doors and said come in, my brothers and sisters. Man, I can’t sleep at night sometimes thinking about what’s going on in that part of the world. I actually had to stop consuming broadcast news and commentary for a while; it was all just too much. I still read the news in my usual places, but I didn’t watch any of it on TV or listen to any of it via podcast. I’m slowly bringing some of that back — mostly just the PBS NewsHour — but I’ll seldom listen to a whole broadcast and I do not go back and catch up on days I’ve missed as I used to. I have to say it’s made a big difference for my mental health.

3. What were your food discoveries in 2022?
Most recently, as in just this month, the Malaysian dish called laksa, a curry-brothed noodle dish I just adore. It’s also found in Singapore and Indonesia, and I think the place where I get it, in the Ala Moana food court, is Singaporean. I also had my first Cubano sandwich, which was freaking delicious and now that I have new wheels I am going to be scarfing a lot more during my lunch break on work days. I also documented on IG my discovery and experimentation with gai lan, a staple in Chinese restaurants apparently everywhere but in Hawaii. It’s Chinese broccoli: dark green and leafy with stems slightly woodier than asparagus. I thought it was delicious but I have only seen it on two menus in local restaurants. I had to find a shop in Chinatown for fresh gai lan so I could prepare it at home. I’m a big fan. I tried a few new hot sauces, too. Penny gave me a bottle of Truff red sauce for Christmas last year and I opened it in the early spring, and it is my new favorite. I didn’t think anything would unseat Tabasco from its throne, but this has. It’s unbelievable and delicious in everything I’ve tried it in or on. Melinda’s Original Habanero Xxxtra Hot was a clear runner-up, and you can just ignore all those Xes because it’s not that hot, but it has excellent flavor. So my new top 4 are Truff Red, Tabasco, Huy Fong Foods Sriracha, and Melinda’s Habanero Xxxtra Hot. A good year for hot sauce!

4. What were your music discoveries in 2022?
As usual, I listened to a lot of new (to me) bands. Last.fm says I have listened to 810 unique artists in 2022 so far (there are still 3 hours left in 2022, and you never know). I’ve been aware of Sepultura since the days when they ruled the metal world in the early 90s, but never actively listened until this year when I finally gave their Roots album an attentive listen. Good stuff. You can see, now that we have 30 years of history to look back upon, how influential they were in the genre that became Nü Metal. Wet Leg, who is a darling of the critics (and all your friends who like cooler music than you), was also a nice discovery. Oh, and Pattern-Seeking Animals! It’s basically some of the guys in Spock’s Beard with some guys who used to contribute to Spock’s Beard or something, and it’s just lovely, wonderful, nerdy, proggy goodness. Most of my prog listening has been metal these days, but it’s very, very nice to get a good dose of creative prog rock to remind you of where your nerdy passions came from. Just excellent. Speaking of prog, I was using the radio function on Spotify one day for a progressive metal band I love, Soen, and this band Jadis came up and it was fantastic. I ordered the band’s live DVD album on Amazon and plan to watch it sometime this week.

5. Where will you be when the clock strikes midnight on January 1?
As I write this, it’s a quarter past 9 in the evening, December 31, and I’m on our lanai with my wireless headphones set to maximum noise cancellation (listening to Amanda Shires for now) as the illegal fireworks explode all around me. I don’t know if I’ll be here all the way through to midnight, but I’ll almost certainly be out here at midnight, which is where we usually situate ourselves when the new year’s fireworks — official and illegal — hit their peak. I hate fireworks but someone has to keep an eye on things in case something terrible happens. This is the first New Year’s Eve in ages and ages where I have not been intentionally alone. I usually, wherever I am, call my parents shortly after midnight to say happy new year, but in 2022 when I did it, they were both in bed asleep. Huh. So I’m expecting them to be asleep this year and I’ll be out here alone. Which as you know is just fine.

Come get me, 2023.

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Friday 5: Obligatory

From here.

  1. In 2021, who made you laugh?
    Real laughter of the interpersonal communication sort was extremely difficult to come by in 2021, especially in the first ten months, before we were called back to the office and I had some kind of in-person human interaction on the reg. I have a couple of coworkers who frequently crack me up, including the woman whose cube is right behind mine. She’s from another country and also a lover of old films — she’s the only friend I can think of who also subscribes to the Criterion Channel — and we have similar fatalistic senses of humor. Most of my laughter this year came from podcasts, though, and the best for that was the Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz. Irreverent takes on sports and culture. Stupid and clever at the same time.
  2. What was a pleasant surprise?
    I don’t know how pleasant it was, but shortly after my second shot, I found myself in a lot of neighborhood bars. I kind of hate bars, but one thing I missed most during the lockdown (as I have written in this space multiple times) was hanging out in cafes and boba joints. Just somewhere to be, surrounded by people who didn’t know me and wouldn’t talk to me. The cafes here still aren’t open at night, so bars it was, and I rather enjoyed it, although I think I dropped too much money per visit. Once I can find a way to have a few drinks and maybe a bite without spending the equivalent of five lattes each time I go, I think I can make it a more regular thing. Of course, this is all off the list now until numbers begin to go back down.
  3. How have you grown?
    I’m pleased to find myself getting better at my work. I was rather unhappy with myself at work for most of the lockdown, but I’m finding better ways to handle the flow, and I’m finding myself more pleased with my time management.
  4. What do you forgive yourself for?
    I’m forgiving myself for not stressing about my body during the lockdown. I made good efforts to walk and to get in the ocean, but those were mostly for mental health; physical health benefits were secondary. Or sometimes physical health benefits were an excuse to make unwise decisions about what I put into my body. I’ve been seeing a doctor lately about correcting some of these actions.
  5. If you were to get a tattoo to represent the year, what would it be and where would you put it?
    The most depressing theme of these past two years has been a sense of lost time, like there is this hole in the timeline of my life where there should have been stuff. I started a local silent book club whose inaugural meetup in February 2020 turned out to be our last. The podcast I planned to launch depended on meeting people in public spaces, so that never got off the ground and I haven’t even taken the gear for a test run. I wanted to spend some time with new acquaintances. I hoped to travel a little. I miss concerts, movies in theaters, dining with friends. Meanwhile, my body and mind don’t I’m in stasis as the days rip slowly off the calendar. My life may be on hold, but the aging process certainly isn’t, and since I don’t have too many birthdays left, I’m feeling resentful more than anything else. I would get the tattoo on my shoulder, and it would be a hole to represent everything I’ve missed, to remind me of this gap in the continuum of my life that probably doesn’t have to be as significant as I’ve allowed.
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Friday 5: Brainstorming

From here.

  1. If you owned a new professional sports team (pick any sport!), what would you name it, and what would be its team colors?
    I’d name my new NFL team the Honolulu Vampires. The colors would be black, black, and black with highlights of blood red.
  2. If you owned a new restaurant, what would you name it, and what kind of cuisine would it serve?
    I’d name it Flapjacks and it would be a breakfast spot similar to Cold Stone. You pick your batter, you pick your fillings, and the cutie behind the counter-length griddle makes your pancakes right in front of you. Build-your-own crepes and omelets also available and prepared in front of you.
  3. If you owned a little independent retail shop, what would you name it, and what would it sell?
    It would be fun to run a little book shop specializing in mysteries. I’d call it something like Clues or a Cozy Bookstore.
  4. If you launched a charity, what would be its cause?
    A nonprofit dedicated entirely to helping people pass their U.S. citizenship tests and gain citizenship. A lot of teaching, some counseling and advocacy, and some legal help.
  5. What kind of recreation is sorely lacking in your town?
    I wouldn’t mind seeing the return of the drive-in theater, perhaps somehow amped up a level, maybe with food trucks or neighboring restaurants delivering to your vehicle. Also, racquetball is super difficult to play in this town unless you have access to a military base or membership in a club. It kind of sucks because racquetball is so much fun.
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Friday 5: Are you prepositioning me?

Work has been a bit frenzied lately. It usually calms down for me in December — when I was first hired in December five years ago, they told me not to come in until the second week of January because there just wasn’t much for me to do yet.

If the last few Decembers have been less than frantic, I’ll just say I kind of earned them because in order to get year-end stuff out, my busy time is September into November. Those stories take time to write, and getting them approved by all stakeholders often takes even more time.

But I’ve picked up a new responsibility: sending out bulk emails on behalf of some of UH’s units. We are tenacious protectors of our data, as we must be. We collect money from a lot of people, and our records are freaking sensitive as heck. We also keep alumni data. So when the department of ______ wants to send out a bulk email to its donors or alumni, it does it through our foundation.

I’m not in charge of any of it, but we lost one of our people who used to do it, summer 2020 on the day I still think of as Black Tuesday. So responsibilities have shifted, and they continue to shift as people move into and out of positions.

I’d been bugging my boss for years to let me learn Mailchimp so I could help out with that stuff once in a while. Also because learning new stuff is critical to keeping me interested in my work. I finally got the okay when someone needed to pick up the mailouts for a few units.

The end of the calendar year is pretty busy for a task like this. I’m handling the smallest number of these and they still take up an enormous chunk of my time and energy. They’re not supposed to, but I’m still new to this task, so I’m still in the steeper part of the learning curve.

I’ve complained to my boss that I haven’t lately had any time for goofing off during my workday. I have to do my NYT crosswords at home before bed, rather than during breaks at my desk. I was being playful when I said it, but I was also being serious.

Not complaining about the work or the workload, actually. Just trying to keep it going without letting myself get fully immersed beyond a reasonable week’s hours. ‘Though I could certainly let myself without worrying too much. It would never be as self-destructive as when I was teaching.

It’s 2:33 in the morning and I’m still up because this last two weeks I crash as soon as I get home, for two to three hours, and then I’m up too late getting non-work things done. It’s a very unhealthy thing I do every so often and I find the cycle super difficult to break. I was going to reset last weekend, but I got a request to put together a proposal on Saturday afternoon and spent Sunday evening — late Sunday evening — doing it. Because end-of-year stuff. We’re a charity, and people want to get their donations in by the end of December.

Soooooooooooooooo I might as well do a Friday 5.

From here.

  1. When did you recently do something on the sly?
    I stayed late in the office to get a few things done Tuesday night. Was about to lock up (everyone else had gone home) when I remembered Wednesday is when I hoped to put my office Christmas gift out: eight tins of assorted teas from Harney and Sons. I wasn’t exactly sneaking around to do it, but I like to leave that stuff when nobody’s seeing me. Santa-like. I printed an obnoxiously punny message on some Christmas-printed cardstock and set it up nicely in the break room where we keep the tea stuff.
  2. Which of your plans for the coming week is still up in the air?
    I have to mail Christmas gifts to people I won’t see in person, and I still have two unchecked items on my list. Gotta pick something up then pack stuff to mail. I’m hoping to get the shopping done Saturday evening and mail it all out early Monday morning.
  3. What’s happening across the street?
    I live across the street from the faculty housing of a certain Hawaii private K-12 school, and since they’re about to begin Christmas break, it’s been super quiet over there. I think some of my neighbors are from off-island, so during breaks they go away. Just a suspicion; I don’t actually know any of them. Between semesters, there’s often some turnover there too, although less in December than in July.
  4. What have you heard recently through the grapevine?
    As I have said many times, I try to run away from gossip. If I consume any gossip at all, it’s usually about football or baseball, but that’s not gossip. In baseball’s winter months, it’s hot stove. A different creature entirely. Which player is thinking of signing with which team, that kind of stuff. And the hot stove league is quiet these days because the stupid Major Leagues are in lockout pending some kind of new collective bargaining agreement.
  5. What kinds of videos on YouTube are likeliest to send you down the rabbit hole?
    I don’t like looking at video on my phone, and I’ve never really liked it on my computer. I’m kind of old that way. I like computers and phones for reading and interacting. I don’t like them for sucking in video content. However, when I do get drawn in (or when I let myself willingly be pulled under), there are three common culprits. I like compilations of Jimmy Kimmel’s Celebrities Read Mean Tweets segments. I find them hilarious and have watched some of them several times. I also like concert videos of bands I like. Most of the musicians I really want to see in concert never make it out here, so if there’s good live video of them, I’ll occasionally lose a few hours. Related: the third culprit is a series by Loudwire, a metal blog, called Wikipedia: Fact or Fiction? in which the host interviews metal musicians, reading them stuff Wikipedia says about them. The musicians then confirm or correct the info. It’s just this chill vibe with musicians I admire the heck out of, and there are few things I find more interesting than artists talking about their art.
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Friday 5: The work of the child

From here.

  1. What musical instruments have you played?
    I took several years of piano lessons in elementary school, and taught myself harmonica in high school. Then mostly taught myself guitar in college. Those are the main ones. I’ve goofed around with ukulele and planned to buy one during the lockdown but I got distracted by other things. I have a doumbek Ross gave me when he didn’t want it anymore, but it’s doesn’t have great tone so I never play it. Planning to use it, though, if I ever record any of these silly songs I’ve written.
  2. When do you play with your food?
    Man, I can’t remember when I’ve done this. I play around in the kitchen all the time, messing with or creating recipes, but that’s not really what the phrase means. Oh, sometimes when I’m eating goldfish crackers, I like to make little stories with them moving around on the table, taking photos to illustrate little sequences. I kind of consider this writing, though, but in the context of snacking it certainly is playing. Sometimes I close my eyes when I’m eating M&Ms or Skittles and try to guess what color candy I’ve popped into my mouth.
  3. What’s your favorite stage play?
    I’m very fond of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, but I also really like Arthur Miller’s All My Sons and Death of a Salesman. The Music Man may be my favorite, though, which is weird because I don’t love musicals. I’ve also directed three high-school plays, so they are closest to my heart. A little comic murder mystery called If It’s Monday, This Must Be Murder! Also Once Upon a Mattress and this wonderful musical called The Emperor’s New Clothes with music by Allan Jay Freedman (who, I just now discovered, died this week) and lyrics by Oscar-winner Paul Francis Webster.
  4. What games do you play on your phone?
    I’ve been playing Words with Friends since the moment I got my first iPhone. I’m also into this word game called Ruzzle, and as I’ve mentioned in this space, I got back into Tsum Tsum during the lockdown, after a few years away. These are the current games, but I do try not to get stagnant, trying new games every few months to see if anything else is sticky.
  5. When did you recently play it by ear?
    It’s pretty much the way I live my life, when I’m not in the classroom, and even sometimes when I am. These days I eat lunch out every day at work, and most of the time, I just walk around until something strikes me. Now that I’m trying to avoid empty carbs, it takes longer, or I just end up in the same few spots for a good salad. Yesterday I walked in a different direction and found myself at Ja Gal Chi, a Korean spot in the neighborhood I haven’t been to since right before the lockdown, when Ali moved away. It made me a little sad since she’s not talking to me anymore and I miss her. The tofu soup was great, though.