But Call Me Betsy

In my writing cl ass, one of the in-class assignments was to write a take off on Jamaica Kinkaid's "Girl." For those of you who are interested, this is what I came up with: How to Walk in Philadelphia at Night Be careful of stray bullets and muggers. Don’t count your money on the street. If you decide you have to walk home from the subway, don’t dawdle at the corners. Walk with purpose. Stop at red lights. Look both ways before you cross the street and be extra aware of buses. Don’t try to walk in high heels. You could turn your ankle. Wear sneakers. Wear white sneakers because they’re easier to see in the dark and one in five drivers is typically drunk in case you weren’t aware. Keep your house keys laced in your fingers. Be sure not to write your address on the keys in case you drop them. Don’t let your bra strap slip. Don’t even wear tank tops or anything that could tempt a man. The average man has ten times as many hormones as women. Don’t laugh when I tell you that. ...

Am in this kind of odd situation where I teach a fiction workshop on Mondays, and then take a fiction class on Tuesdays. I like teaching, though I have to stop myself sometimes from saying, No, I'm right! if ever someone disagrees or makes a suggestion that seems off to me. I have to remember that they're turning these pieces over really quickly--they're expected to write two full stories in just eight weeks, which is no easy feat. But by far, the comment that makes me the craziest is when someone says, "I liked that I didn't know what was going on or who the characters were or where the story was set..." Any comment praising ambiguity in a piece makes me want to stand on my chair and let out a yowl of disagreement. But it's a good group and the time flies by. Then on Tuesdays, I am auditing a Penn advanced fiction class filled with undergrads. Our first workshop is tonight. I'm curious to see what the other students come up with and I'm also cur...

Before we get to the Springsteen concert, please examine the latest South Philly windows. Here is one jam-packed with Halloween spirit and joy. These decorations stretched almost to the end of the block and around the corner. Just thought this was interesting. The flowers in the vase that woman is clutching are real. Those in the flower box in the foreground are not. Ghosty -ghost. Okay, and here is an example of pretty much every picture I took at the concert on Saturday, held in the soon-to-be-a-parking-lot Giants stadium in Jersey. You'll notice that two out of the three heads in the photo have baseball caps. I would say the majority of the audience were white boys. We saw maybe three black people out of 900,000, even though the E. Street Band is almost half African-American. I guess Bruce's music is for a certain type of listener. You should've seen the flag head bandannas and heard the crowd singing, "Born in the U.S.A." at the top of their masculine lungs. ...

The Halloween decorations have started--in fact, they started in mid-September really. Some of them are really scary--blood-hand prints and amputated limbs and pics of Rush Limbaugh. Others are sweet--like black kittens in witches' hats. And this pumpkin looks so happy, don't you think? I don't particularly like this one because the plastic pumpkin is ugly, but I appreciate the huge effort these people put into it. There are even little ghosts hanging down and they've sort of done a combination of Halloween/autumn tribute. Below, please find a snack pack I bought the other day. They tasted good, but it's weird how it looks like you're eating multi-colored larvae. Excited dog + my shadow. Sad dog wondering where all the cowboys have gone. Manny and I are going to see Bruce Springsteen tomorrow night for free because he is well-connected. Can't wait! I'm hoping to be pulled up onstage by the Boss ala Courtney Cox in the MTV video. How hot is he!!!!!!!! Loo...

The title of this blog reminds me of The Promise Keepers. I think that's a group of Christian teens who promise they won't have sex until they're legally wed, but I might be making that up. I know David Cross refers to it in his stand-up act. Anyway, I really need to get to the blog more. I am busy at work and the day usually flies by, but I should be able to do it after work or at teh beginning of the day. I also have Halloween window pics to upload too. I've been packing boxes and packing boxes, even though I'm not moving until the end of October. I can't seem to help myself. All of my books are packed away and I started taking down the decor yesterday. I guess it's better than waiting until the last minute. I found this one interesting thing I'd forgotten about--a bag of cassette tapes from when I lived in Chicago. I used to have this really old stereo with a tape recorder in it, and every once in awhile, I'd pop in a cassette and then do like an ...

Was walking back from the grocery store and right by the mess of Pat and Geno's steak eateries, saw this guy just throw his big white Styrofoam cup on curb as he climbed into a massive black Hummer. I wondered what he would do if I picked the cup up and knocked on his window with it, saying, I think you dropped this. It would definitely not end well. It pissed me off no end though; and I had him classified in seconds--dumb Republican white kid from the burbs who doesn't care b/c it's not his neighborhood, after all. But then maybe that's totally wrong and he has a heart of gold or the gigantic Hummer belongs to his mean dad who would beat the son up if found any Styrofoam in the car. And then I thought that there are people who would probably think I was the same way kind of because I don't recycle everything. I have been known to throw plastic and newspaper and bottles into the trash. And that's lazy too. I don't flatten out all of the cardboard boxes after...

Last night was the first meeting of this fiction class I'm taking at Penn. I think I'll like it? The story assignments are really short--no more than 5 pages or 1,500 words. I have written a couple of short pieces, but it's hard to write a complete story with that word constraint. I will try. At least I'm not the oldest person in the class; though 90% of the students are in undergrad, two of us are older (plus the teacher). We wrote a couple of free-writes--we wrote about one of our favorite books as a child ( Little House on the Prairie. Someone else in the class choose Eloise at the Plaza, another one my favs), and then later we wrote about our favorite movie as an adult ( Annie Hall ) and how the two are alike somehow. Our 1o minute free-write for each day this week is to describe a physical action in detail such as washing the dishes, mowing the lawn, plucking your eyebrows, eating spaghetti. This morning, I wrote about taking out the garbage, an activity I hate ve...