The World Isn't Your Oyster

But these additional cat pictures may make you think that it is. This first photo of Henri covered in yarn is entitled "Humiliation." The second photo of Emma Carol is called "Queen" as she is the head of everything in the house.

And here we have a very disturbing trailer park trash representation of every day life with the three cats all sprawled together on the bed. Notice that Emma Carol has no shame about bearing her shaven belly (from getting fixed), that Ernesto is a delicate flower, and that Henri faces away from the camera as if to say, I am frightened. He has a long red scratch on his nose these days from a run-in with one of the other two. It is quite sad and pathetic.

I confess that I'm reading Stephen King's newest novel, Lisley's Story. It's about a widow of a famous author who is haunted by all these memories of the past that she's put aside. I don't care what anyone says about SK. I know he's not the best writer in the world, but he's good enough; one of the few popular writers that has consistently kept me reading. There's usually one arresting moment or idea in each book that stays with me. In Pet Cemetery, it was a particular scene with the ill sister; the one who choked while everyone was out in the garden. She had some kind of spinal cord injury and I remember a scene where the healthy sister is terrified by the vision of the sick sister crawling across the floor toward her with a not-nice glint in her eye. My favorite book of his is The Talisman--one of the few novels that's not been made into a movie probably because it's more of a fantasy genre--a journey story about a kid who can flip between two dimensions. At the center of Lisley's Story is an idea that comes up only in nightmares--the thing you're most afraid of. Here, it's that the one person that this little boy can count on to keep him safe (his older brother) suddenly turns evil--crazy insane, I'm-going-to-kill-you-and-eat-you-up-little-brother-evil.

When I first started writing fiction (when I was around 11 or 12), I only ever wrote scary stories or these sort of sci fi rip-offs of the Star Wars saga. My friend Dee and I had an entire book that we started in sixth grade about these two women (Sayora and Enserena) who were on a space ship (The Star Searcher) with a bunch of hunky co-pilots with unoriginal names like Rhettreeve (a combination of Rhett Butler and Christopher Reeves--I believe he had jet black hair and a debonair mustache. I bet you anything that I even used the word "debonair" when describing him in the book). We would each write a chapter and then switch and we included pencil illustrations. My character was Sayora and she had long, long, long, long brown hair (to her feet). Dee's character was Enserena and her hair was blond and ended in ringlets (because I could draw excellent ringlets). We had a few dogs (golden retrievers with antennas) but I forget who our actual enemies were. I started another co-authored book in 10th grade with a redhaired girl named Kirsten who I thought was exotic because she had lived in Saudia Arabia. Don't remember much about that one either except I believe it took place in medieval times (so that I was able to draw unicorns). I should start something like that again--it was just fun to write, like watching bad TV, eating Cheetohs, and drinking Coke all at the same time.