i can't really sing, so

Thanks to all my friends who participated in my birthday club . My birthday was on Monday, and no less than three books arrived in the mail that day. Here is a list of all the books I received, alphabetical by author: Monster Party by Lizzy Acker Metropole by Ferenc Karinthy Ava by Carole Maso Reluctant Capitalists: Bookselling & The Culture of Consumption by Laura J. Miller Zirconia by Chelsey Minnis Inferno by Eileen Myles The Myth of the Simple Machines by Laurel Snyder The Book of Things: poems by Ales Stegner God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater by Kurt Vonnegut Please Don't Be Upset & other stories by Brandi Wells selected poems by the author, Yevgeny Yevtushenko I am mailing most of my "response" books out tomorrow, though not all quite yet. Geoff and I are having friends stay with us down the shore in Avalon, NJ for the weekend to celebrate both of our birthdays (his is tomorrow). I bought him a pair of glasses for his. He says he wil

I drove to Chicago and back for the AWP conference in late February through to earlier this month. Here are some notes on the states that I drove through. Pennsylvania is full of old dilapidated barns. People can actually drive in PA as long as you are not near a major city (Philly/Pittsburgh); if you are near a major city, they don't understand the "keep to the right/pass on the left" thing that makes highway driving amazing. I drove through four mountains, one back to back. I don't think I had ever driven through a mountain before.  On the road again! in PA Ohio has the best rest stops. They are clean and bright and very modern and make you feel welcome. I stayed overnight in Ohio and went through a drive-through for the first time in, like, forever? Since high school maybe? The food was actually good. Then I took a bath. That was nice. Red Roof Inn, mofos! Free wi-fi! Indiana was very windy on the way there, and not as windy on the way back. But it

I am "ahead" of my goal to read 52 books in a year this year. This might be because I read a number of poetry books in a short period of time during February, but this might come in handy when I try to tackle, oh, some lengthy Dickens or maybe Gravity's Rainbow (finally) this summer. Mission: to read 52 books in 2012 Status : 13/52 Books Read, February: 7 Notes on Books Read: 7) 20 Something Essays by 20 Something Writers edited by J. Kellogg & M. Quint I picked this up because it had essays in it by Kyle Minor  and Kathleen Rooney , but I enjoyed the collection beyond solely enjoying their pieces in it, though I looked forward to them. I even used a few of the essays in a class I taught on Business Literature at the University of Phoenix the week we did non-fiction. Some of my favorites were a piece on finding a drummer in NYC, a piece on getting fired from a teaching job for budgeting reasons, and a piece on social networking. 8) Compendium by Kristi

I like my birthday. I am one of those people who reminds everyone for the month before and then the week after that I was born on a certain day of the year and they should care. I also like giving things to people. This is slightly antithetical to the popular idea that most people have about birthdays. My favorite birthday ever was one year where a friend had us over in Brooklyn, and a few of us, including me, cooked dinner for everyone else. I felt relaxed and happy, and I was glad that these people were willing to share this day with me. So this year, I decided I wanted to give people I know things for my birthday. Specifically, books. So, I've decided to start THE BIRTHDAY CLUB. I couldn't think of a better name for it, and I like the simplicity of it. The idea is that, I will have a small group of people who are a part of my Birthday Club and then maybe others will like my idea, and they can have their own Birthday Club and really, in the end, it will be one big Bir