Her Neighbours Call Her An Evil Machine

Quote above because I've been listening to L7's "Fast and Frightening" quite a bit--more than I should, probably, because it does put me primarily in a Cornish sisters-writin' mood, and Chapter Eleven is thus far resolutely refusing to catch fire. Of course, it doesn't help that I'm in the PMS/change of seasons phase where my feet swell up like horrible pig's trotters, either...but come on! Barely 500 consecutive words over the last three days is pathetic. "Working writer", my fat and spotty ass.

(OTOH, I did finally finish Cool & Dark #9, my John Connolly retrospective piece, for FearZone; that came in at 1,124, and is off to glamberson as we speak. So now I get to think about Thing Next in that regard, too, since I'm at least a month behind.)

So: Now I've got maybe half an hour before I have to go pick Cal up/run him over to Surrey Place, which means I damn well better do more than just squish, clip and move things around. I have some notes I can input--maybe that'll make me feel better.

Amended to add: Okay! 723 words of notes, taking us almost to 72,000 overall. And I...am...out of here.;)

My Musical Life

Some time back, we figured out that one (reasonably) effective way to get Cal to do something was to present the command in question in the form of a song. This led to the creation of such musical opera—still in use today—as this one (sung to the tune of the “Toreador song”, from Bizet’s opera Carmen):

Pull up your pants! Use both hands!
Tuck in your penis, then do a little dance!
We’re happy now, because—you changed your pants—
those droopy, poopy pants!

Or this one (sung to the tune of “Turn That Beat Around”, by Miami Sound Machine):

Turn your bum around! Stick it in the stroller!
Lay your buttocks down, before we get much older!...

(Repeat, since this is all I know of said song, ad infinitum/ad inferno.)

In both cases, people who regularly overhear me serenading Cal with these things start out laughing and saying "how cute!", but quickly end up getting as immured to them as I am. Sort of sad, I guess. I just hope I won't still be singing them when I'm fifty, since then he'll be...fourteen?

Math skills: Minus eleventy-hundred. Jingle-writing on command skills: Okay, I guess. I mean, I'm no Don Draper.