Blogger thought this blog was a spam blog, so I couldn't post for a few days.

The reading in LA was great. I've hung out with Dana Ward in a number of cities, but I'd never heard him read--it seems like he's playing around with a variety of tones at the moment, though all very much within a kind of experimental lyric context. And I don't want to write like Susanne Dyckman, but I felt like I learned a lot from her extremely precise images and use of texture--I enjoyed both their readings.

Plus, Michelle Detoire and her partner came down for the reading! Yay!

I'm starting to feel familiar enough with LA audiences that I'm a bit more comfortable and relaxed reading, although a certain amount of nervous energy is essential to the way I perform. I was also glad to be able to see Stan before he heads off to Tampa for the foreseeable future. I read a brief section from See it Everywhere about a swimming, leaping iguana in honor of Stan and Tampa (and canals and Florida rivers).

To blog about later:

1. My little sister Sarah and her love of coconut shells and how she (like I used to and probable many other people) projects her longing onto seemingly bizarre objects.

2. How I never fantasized about my future wedding or house as a child or teenager, but I did spend hours diagramming the perfect horse barn, or cat jungle gym. So the fact that I have been fantasizing about building Lester a cage that is both inside and outside is nothing new. (How this also sounds, rhetorically, like frat-boy fantasies of having a permanent keg or a keg in the truck, etc).

3. I forgot