Autumn Has So Totally Arrived!

48 degrees Fahrenheit; the sun didn’t come up until 7am; the leaves are changing all over the neighborhood; I did indeed prune the hydrangea yesterday morning…. The flowery  summer wreaths are off the doors — replaced with the ones for fall. I put away the porch furniture.

Now all I have left to do is wait for summer to get here…

All righty! I won’t get far with that attitude, will I? No.

So instead of wishing that life were totally different, I’m going to spend the day ignoring the world beyond Crazeysburg and just doing non-writing work today:

  1. finish formatting 1954 Powder Blue Pickup and send it off to the publisher today.
  2. fix the formatting on the print edition for The Guitar Hero Goes Home. And then upload it to Amazon and hopefully stop tinkering with it and keep it there once and for all.
  3. set up the web site for Marilyn’s Room Books and get that up and running.

Even though I will no longer be self-publishing any of my new erotica (which I am extremely happy about!), I will still put up the Marilyn’s Room Books site because I want all of my available titles to be in one place, regardless of who the publishers are.

Plus, I’m still planning to self-publish In the Shadow of Narcissa, since it’s not erotic. And also bring out a new print edition of Twilight of the Immortal.

If I’m not mistaken, gang, Girl in the Night: Erotic Love Letters to the Muse is going to be brought out in print and eBooks by the new publisher. (So that means I will finish writing it before the end of the year.)

But before that, I’ll be sending them The Muse Revisited, Volume 4 — yay!! But instead of it being strictly a print edition of my selected erotica from 1994 -2012, it’s going to be print and digital, and focus on my previously published hardcore BDSM stories, along with a brand new one that I will write here at any moment!!

So all of it is really exciting to me, gang. It really, really is.

Meanwhile, though, I just now realized (because I’m not dressed yet) that I am still wearing my summer PJs to bed every night. I suppose I have to make an adjustment there. Drag out the fall PJs.

It’s funny, but for most of my adult life, I hated summer — because I lived in NYC and I have a very low tolerance for high humidity. It makes me super cranky and makes my brain feel like it’s going to explode. And NYC summers are usually just the worst.

But ever since I moved into this amazing old house in the middle of nowhere, all of that has changed (mostly because of that man I fell in love with that first summer I lived here who died; he changed summer for me forever) — honestly, honestly, honestly; I cannot emphasize how much in the middle of nowhere this house is, gang. When you get off the highway that leads to the 3-mile, winding back road that leads to my village, there is a really big freeway exit sign and it says “LOCAL ATTRACTIONS” and there is absolutely nothing written on that sign! I’m so serious. It’s just amazing. Nothing is on the sign. It’s just a big blank sign. NOTHING is here, folks!!

However, there used to be a famous homestead out here but it’s been closed down, so they removed the listing but left the huge sign. (In fact, if you were to google my village, you’d discover that it was once home to the world’s largest apple basket — but no more. I have yet to lay eyes on that basket (below) because that homestead was closed down! Yet google seems to think it’s emblematic of where I live!)

Worlds Largest Basket of Apples in Frazeysburg Ohio Stock Photo - Alamy

So I’m guessing that, once I’m dead, the one thing on that freeway exit sign will be my house that will, by then, be a famous museum… (Probably because I was insanely crazy, had a house full of dead spirits talking to me all the time and had too many undomesticated cats, but I would prefer it to be a standing homage to my splendid writing…)

Yeah, well…

Robert Jordan Quote: “If wishes were wings, pigs would fly.” (9 wallpapers) - Quotefancy

Okay, on that happy note… I refuse to talk about politics or the debate.  I refuse to even think about it. I will simply buy a gun, I mean, VOTE, and get on with my life.

And now I will even get dressed and get to work around here. (Just FYI, I never sit down at the desk to blog before getting dressed, so I’m not sure what’s up with me today.)

Anyway.

Have a nice Wednesday, wherever you are in the world, gang. Thanks for visiting. I leave you with probably my most favorite Buddy Holly song from my wee bonny girlhood (even though I pretty much liked all his songs), “Everyday”  (1958) — because I want to feel hopeful about love, like when I was young (yay!!), instead of depressed by its utter absence around here, now that I’m old (yay!!)! So enjoy. I love you guys. See ya!!!

Truly A Bittersweet Autumn Day Here in Crazeysburg

Yes, today’s the day I have to trim back the hydrangea. And while this is a sad day for me, it is a day much celebrated by all my neighbors.

Because this means that: a.) they won’t have to look at an enormously huge brown & drooping hydrangea anymore; and b.) they will finally have free access to the entire sidewalk when walking their dogs, riding their bikes, or pushing their baby strollers, etc., etc.

Plus, since my lawn guy was having such severe back problems (he’s getting surgery soon) that the last time he was here, I told him just to cut the grass and not worry about trimming anything or blowing away the clippings from the sidewalk. So today I have to sweep all those now very- dead clippings up, too, and my sidewalk is only about 17 miles long…

Lest you’ve forgotten about my very long sidewalk, here it is from September of last year:

I know it doesn’t look 17 miles long, but it is.

(And you should see my neighbor’s fence now, gang. Remember that intense wind from early spring that blew the roof off of my barn? Well, it wreaked havoc on that wooden fence there. It is just one great big blown apart mess now, and I guess the neighbors have no immediate plans of doing anything about it.

(And they have two little girls and so now we can all readily see that those little girls have every available  backyard plaything known to man! Seriously, if it’s made out of hideous plastic and you can buy it for a child and put it in a yard, these little girls have got it.)

All righty.

So, I did the final tweaking and the read-through of 1954 Powder Blue Pickup yesterday and I was really, really happy with it, gang. Just really happy. Today, after I do all my strenuous “yard work,” I’m going to do the manuscript formatting and then send it off to the publisher and I will keep you posted!!

This morning, on Instagram, the official Nick Cave page released an announcement that on Oct. 9th, on Bad Seed TeeVee, there will be this:

And while I have never actually watched the film Lawless all the way through (even though I own it — I also own The Proposition and have never watched it all the way through, either. I just have problems with all the violence. And sometimes, I say to myself “this is the day when I will be able to just sit and watch this and not get squeamish about all the violence”, and then I last about 5 minutes….)

That said, though, the music from the film Lawless is really great. It’s very sort of “Great Depression-era American bluegrass music” type original stuff. Beautiful. And it has performers like Emmylou Harris and Ralph Stanley (who has since passed away).

And as near as I can tell, AEST is an Australian time zone which requires higher math skills to figure out, so I honestly have no clue whatsoever what 8PM AEST really means in, you know, the time zone that everybody else actually lives in…

Plus, I don’t know about you, but I still have trouble watching stuff and looking at chat at the same time! (I’m one of those people who still can’t watch the news and look at the other news scrolling along the bottom of the screen without going insane.) But this is only because I’m ancient, so don’t let the chat room thing deter you.

And also, I think you are required to provide your own snacks. I think I read somewhere, though, that you can pre-order snacks from Cave Things, but the only option is regular pretzels in a 1-ounce snack-size  bag that is autographed by Nick Cave and costs £300 plus shipping, and you must pre-order it today, otherwise they won’t guarantee that it will reach you by Oct 9th…

(I am so very much kidding about all of that!!!! So don’t go looking for it.)

All righty!!!!

I did get an email from Valerie during the night, and it sounds like it is just even more difficult for her right now than I could imagine.  The wake for her mom is tomorrow. Plus, she has selflessly chosen to adopt her mom’s wild little dog, even though Valerie already has a pitbull and about 6 house cats, and about a dozen feral cats that live out back in her yard in Brooklyn. So the menagerie has grown…

Okay, on that note, I’m gonna leave you now. And do yoga and then trim a hydrangea… I’m leaving you with “Sheila” again, by Tommy Roe, since that’s pretty much the only song going through my head these days (Valerie’s “real” name is Sheila, and that was her mom’s name, too, and Valerie and I have been connected now for a very, very, very long time and I have always loved that fucking song.)

All right. Thanks for visiting. Have a good Tuesday, okay? I love you guys. See ya.

[UPDATE: Here’s that photo I went looking for yesterday.  Valerie’s mom is on the left, and Valerie is on the right, and two aunts are in the middle — all are on their their way from NYC to Ireland for a vacation.]

All is Well Here in Crazeysburg!

Sorry I was not able to get back here to post more yesterday, but I was hard at work on 1954 Powder Blue Pickup for another 12 hours.

However, it is DONE, gang! And I just love it. I really do.

It’s 62 pages, about 35,000 words. I will go over the whole thing a final time today and then send it off to the new publisher tomorrow. And then we shall see.

For me, personally, it’s my most favorite thing that I’ve ever written. And I have written a whole heck of a lot of stuff, gang. But I just love this one.

And as is par for my usual course, it’s a love story with an implied “happily ever after” ending — but before we get to that happy ending, it’s indescribably filthy as hell!! And it’s totally hardcore and pushes every boundary of “questionable consent” imaginable. (As all good love stories should, in my happy opinion! Yay.) Okay.

So, golly, I am exhausted here. But I’m just really, really happy.

I’m going to dash into town to get the groceries here in a minute, and then spend the whole day doing the final edit on the book, because tomorrow, I absolutely must  prune back the hydrangea so that the dead blossoms, etc., can be picked up for yard compost when the truck comes by on Wednesday.

All of my neighbors now have their autumn mums on their porches, and their various pumpkins and decorative fall squashes and even Halloween lights!

And yet I still have all my summer petunias out, and all my happy little summer bird ornaments, and yard angels and summer “Welcome” signs and mosquito-repelling candles, etc., so I have to sort of kind of get with the program somehow — although I’m keeping my petunias until the frost comes and kills them.

Still, I’m going to gather all the various flower boxes onto the kitchen porch, so that at least the rest of the house & barn look like they’re appropriate for fall.

And then I guess we’ll get ever onward to the close of another year.

Well, I have not been able to actually speak to Valerie yet about her mom’s death. It will probably be several days before she’ll be taking any phone calls.  It has just been a really, really rough year for her. Big changes now for her, too. She is the last one left in her family now. Her younger brother died a very long time ago (he used to be my computer guy, back in the Dark Ages), then her dad died a few years back, and now her mom.

I tried to find a photo I have of her and her mom and one of her aunt’s heading off on a trip to Ireland many years ago, but I can’t find it. But they are all super-NYC Irish-Catholic blue-eyed blondes, and they all looked exactly alike. It was sort of uncanny.

Anyway, I feel very sad about that.

Okay, well, while hunting for that photo of Val and her mom, I saw that Nick Cave sent out a new Red Hand File just now. It appears to have something to do with magic, but I have not read it yet. Perhaps we can all follow this link and go over there and read it together!! Yay!!

Other than that, folks, well, I honestly have nothing going on over here. I have just been in another world, trying to get that novella written.  And it looks like I am gonna close this now, scoot into town, and then get right back to work on it so that I can officially say it is done!

I leave you with, like, the very first thing I saw on Instagram, the moment my eyes opened today. So I played it at breakfast. Rather intense breakfast-listening music; I’m not sure what the cats thought of it. (They do tend to prefer Broadway show tunes, frankly.) But it was Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds’ version of an old Leadbelly song “Black Betty.” As far as I know, it’s only on their B Sides & Rarities album (2005), but was recorded (as a B-side) in 1986.

So I leave you with that, oh, and I guess, in honor of my cats, I’ll also leave you with my hands-down favorite Broadway show tune of all time — “Letters” from the ill-fated Broadway fucking  amazing show, “Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812.” It was based on a lesser-known Tolstoy novel (just kidding — it was based on War & Peace), and I had tickets to see it in September 2017, when I went to NYC to work with Sandra on our other play. And I was so FUCKING excited to see it but the darn thing CLOSED before I could get there. (It was really, really unfortunate why that show closed, but I won’t go into it here.)

Okay, enjoy and thanks for visiting, gang. Have a terrific Monday, wherever you are in the world! I love you guys. See ya.

Happy International Cat Throw-Up Day!!!

Jesus Christ, you know?? No less than 3 cats threw up before 6am this morning.

Lucy coughed up a hairball at the top of the stairs.

Some mystery cat was a piggy and ate too much dry cat food and then threw it back up, only partially digested, in my bedroom (hence my reluctance to ever go barefoot in this house, especially in the dark).

Then in the middle of my own breakfast, Huckleberry threw up her canned cat food on the kitchen floor because she wolfed it down like a crazy person who was never going to see canned cat food again, so it came right back up. (She does that a lot, even though she’s gotten canned cat food for breakfast, every single morning of her life, for over 8 years now…)

And so the day begins! Yay.

Yesterday was a perfect day, gang.  I spent many hours going over the gangbang segment and, overall, I thought it worked really well, I just wanted to tweak it. The dialogue, mainly. But now that section’s complete and I’m happy with it, and now that means I only have one section left and 1954 Powder Blue Pickup will be done!! I’m so excited.

I only wish that Michael Hemmingson were still alive. This is the kind of novella he would have really appreciated and probably would have published. (Meaning that it’s 99.9% anal sex.)

Michael Hemmingson - Wikipedia
Michael Hemmingson, gone but never forgotten, not even for a minute

However, in regards to publishing it, I won’t go into all the details yet, but yesterday, I accepted a multi-year, exclusive publishing deal for all of my new taboo erotica, so I’m guessing that 1954 Powder Blue Pickup will likely be for sale, in print and digital, by late fall.

I’m super excited, gang. But I’ll go into more detail when I know absolutely for certain.

And I also think that The Muse Revisited Volume 4 is going to be slightly re-envisioned in its overall premise.

Okay. Another head’s up regarding the staged reading for my play, Tell My Bones. (Sunday evening, EST, November 22nd) There will be a link soon for you to make reservations to stream it. It will be free to stream — and it will also be available to stream from several websites (tellmybones.com, our Facebook page, through blueprint productions. com, and I believe through Harlem One Stop, and probably even here on Marilyn’s Room) but primarily it will be an evenbrite thing on YouTube, and streaming everywhere through there. It will run about 45 minutes.

And I’m really hoping you guys will make your reservations and then stream it — because, not only do I hope you will like the play, but also, I need those viewing numbers. I really do. The amount of views it gets matters to potential producers. And this is the first step toward getting it actually produced on stage in NYC (once the virus is over).

So — hugely thanking you in advance!! I will keep you posted.

So, last evening, I started streaming the new documentary on Brian Jones, Rolling Stone: The Life & Death of Brian Jones. I’m more than halfway through it, and will finish watching it tonight. It is really good, but nowhere near as uplifting as that documentary on Bill Wyman is (The Quiet One). I really did love that Bill Wyman documentary.

However, Bill Wyman and Brian Jones were two incredibly different types of people. (Brian Jones, in case you aren’t aware of who he is, was the original founding member of the Rolling Stones back in 1962 and died in 1969, shortly after being ousted from the group due to severe drug use and psychological problems.)

I was already very aware that Brian Jones had a reputation for not having been very nice. He allegedly had a sadistic streak, and could also get physically abusive toward women (at least to Anita Pallenberg), and he also had 5 illegitimate babies by 1965 (when he was only 25 years old), and it didn’t seem like he was doing much about taking care of any of them, accept at least acknowledging that they were his.

So, I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised that the documentary was sort of depressing — it does basically say that all those rumors about him were true. However, it goes much deeper into his personality and his emotional issues, stemming from childhood, and the serious psychological problems that developed from that. (Compounded by unbelievable quantities of alcohol and drug use that he was infamous for.)

It also looks more closely at the personality dynamics within the Stones, and why Mick & Keith came to the forefront, even though it was Brian’s band, etc. Really sad stuff, that you can easily see why it got so emotionally complicated for Brian and why he felt so defeated by it. (He was dead by age 27.)

It’s not a film that seems to have been supported, endorsed, or acknowledged in any official way at all by the Rolling Stones themselves, so I’m guessing they want their distance from it, but so far, it is a really good documentary. Eye-opening, and balanced, but really sad.

All righty. Well. On that note!!

I’ll get the morning underway here and inch ever closer to completing 1954 Powder Blue Pickup!! And when it’s done, I’ll see if Michael Hemmingson (in spirit) wants to come hang out at my kitchen table for a bit and celebrate!! Yay. (I’m guessing he will.)

Wall Art & Home Decor | Famous art paintings, Famous artists paintings, Raphael paintings
Marilyn & Michael in the old days…

Okay. Thanks for visiting. Enjoy your Saturday, wherever you are in the world!! Oh! And before I forget — that pornographic wallpaper over at Cave Things is now available for sale!! (It’s rather on the pink side — I saw a photo of it on a wall on Instagram yesterday — so here’s hoping you have a room that will look pretty in pink!)

All righty.  I leave you with some early Stones, heavily influenced by all the many instruments Brian Jones was so good at playing: “Paint It Black,” their huge hit from Aftermath (1966). Enjoy. And I love you guys. See ya!

“Paint It Black”

I see a red door and I want it painted black
No colors anymore, I want them to turn black
I see the girls walk by, dressed in their summer clothes
I have to turn my head until my darkness goes

I see a line of cars and they’re all painted black
With flowers and my love both never to come back
I see people turn their heads and quickly look away
Like a newborn baby, it just happens everyday

I look inside myself and see my heart is black
I see my red door and must have it painted black
Maybe then I’ll fade away and not have to face the facts
It’s not easy facing up when your whole world is black

No more will my green sea go turn a deeper blue
I could not foresee this thing happening to you
If I look hard enough into the setting sun
My love will laugh with me before the morning comes

I see a red door and I want it painted black
No colors anymore, I want them to turn black
I see the girls walk by, dressed in their summer clothes
I have to turn my head until my darkness goes

Hmm, hmm, hmm…

I wanna see it painted, painted black
Black as night, black as coal
I wanna see the sun blotted out from the sky
I wanna see it painted, painted, painted, painted black

Yeah!

Hmm, hmm, hmm…

© 1966 Mick Jagger, Keith Richards

Another Awesome Day in Crazeysburg!

Technically, it’s not “Indian Summer” yet — I think that usually happens in October, when it happens at all. But it still feels wonderful to have this second chance at such beautiful weather.

Not that I go anywhere. I’m still basically at my desk for hours on end, and only go outside to take care of the waning petunias and to go across the road to check my mailbox. Still, I just love having the house opened up again, even for just three days.

And the boy on his motorcycle is loving this warm weather, too. Like clockwork, he was roaring past my house yesterday — and when the weather had gotten cool the last week or so, he wasn’t on that motorcycle once, even though he was out in his yard, fooling around with cars.

(NO! I’m still not stalking him…) (However, if we could find a way to get him to age about 40 years overnight…)

Okay!!

Well, yesterday, I finally finished writing the gangbang segment for 1954 Powder Blue Pickup!! It only took, literally, 12 hours to write 4 pages. It was really hard work, but I think I got it. I will be reading it over today to see what I think, overall. I really wanted it to be erotic more than violent, but I did want it to have that feeling like it was a little out of control. So we’ll see if I captured it.

Other than that, I’ve had some food, and I’ve slept and that’s about it!! (Oh, and yoga…) I’m just really trying to get this novella finished. We’re at 30,000 words, 52 pages.

Well, so I guess this is gonna be short & sweet today!

On Instagram this morning, I saw a really cool photo of the late Willie DeVille — of the band Mink DeVille, but I always just call him “Mink DeVille” because “Willie DeVille wasn’t his real name, either.

He’s been dead now for 11 years and I find this impossible to believe. If you aren’t familiar with his music, you can find all of it on YouTube now. He was one of those musicians who was really plagued by  heroin addiction and I think it kind of hampered where his career could have gone, in the long run. But while Mink DeVille, as a band, was around, I saw him a few times on stage in NYC and he always just blew me away. He was amazing.

His music was very rhythmic and emotional. I found it really addicting. Back when Walkmans came out, I was always listening to either Mink DeVille or Lou Reed pretty much everywhere I went in the East Village.  I didn’t usually buy cassettes — I was much more into records, and then CDs when those came out, but for some reason, I had to have those Mink DeVille and Lou Reed cassettes… It was just so NYC to me.

I have such precise and intense memories of walking around the East Village one night — over 30 years ago now — having some sort of emotional meltdown, while listening to “Mixed-Up, Shook-Up Girl” over and over and over in the little headphones we had back then. And as fate would have it, I no longer have any clue what was bothering me so much that night, but I remember the music…

I know I’ve posted that song here on the blog before, but I’ll post it again today, along with another one of his atmospheric love songs, “Just to Walk that Little Girl Home.” So, enjoy!! Thanks for visiting, gang. I hope you have a lovely Friday, wherever you are in the world.

I love you guys. See ya!

Mixed Up, Shook Up Girl

Candle lit, and my eyes are slits
Jumpin’ now, paper clip
Make a move, sail a ship
Tap it in, tap it in, ruby lips

She’s a mixed up, shook up girl
Got me so strung out
I don’t know what to do
She’s a mixed up, mixed up, shook up girl

Take a breath, in the night
Hurry over, she said
But there was no one in sight
Now break away, is in her eyes
You know that little girl, she cut me deep
Inside out

She’s a mixed up, shook up girl
Got me so strung out
I don’t know what to do
She’s a mixed up, mixed up, shook up girl

Hey, you, I remember
All the empty streets
Fill me now
And though you’re gone away
I know not forever
Why don’t you just come over here and tell me, baby
Is it over now?

She’s a mixed up, shook up girl
Got me so strung out
I don’t know what to do
She’s a mixed up, mixed up, shook up girl
She’s a mixed up, shook up girl
She’s a mixed up, shook up girl
And she got me so strung out…
She’s a mixed up, shook up girl…

And she got me so strung out …

She’s a mixed up, shook up girl …

© 1977 Willie DeVille

Just To Walk That Little Girl Home

It’s closing time in this nowhere café
There’s no way in the world I’m gonna let that girl
Let her slip away
No I can’t explain just what’s happening to me
I can tell that guy who’s sticking close by her side
Knows her more than just casually

But there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do
No there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do
No there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do
Just to walk that little girl home
Just to walk that … mmmmm
Just to walk that little girl home

Her flashing smile, her searching eyes
Oh a promise it seems of having all of my dreams
Finally realized
But I can’t ignore hey that guy by her side
Now I know he can see just what’s happening to me
There’s a look on his face he can’t hide

But I’m telling you there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do
No there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do
No there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do
Just to walk that little girl home
Just to walk that … mmmmm
Just to walk that little girl home

© 1979 Willie DeVille, Doc Pomus

Does It Get More Exciting??!!

I’m of course referring to the WEATHER!!

The next 3 days in a row, it’s going back up to 80 degrees Fahrenheit and sunny.  So I can pretend, however briefly, that it’s not really fall.

Then, of course, as soon as it’s really undeniably fall, and all the leaves have changed and the October sky gets that shade of really deep blue — then I’ll act like “Yay! It’s Autumn!! My favorite time of year!!”  And life will go on, ad infinitum.

I was actually conceived in the month of October — it’s the month I consider the moment I chose to come back to Life, so it’s a special month for me. All sad Tom Petty things notwithstanding. And also the death of my best friend Paul happened in October, as well. It’s a month I have a lot of attachment to.

Well, okay. So yesterday was a lot better. I moved forward with 1954 Powder Blue Pickup. I still have a ton of work to do on that gangbang section today.  I really walk a fine line between keeping it believable, keeping it erotic, pushing the boundary of questionable consent, and yet not making it so realistic that I make  myself sick…

But at least I’m getting there. And once that part is completed, there’s really only one more segment and the novella will be done!!

And then  off to the publisher it goes for their consideration…

I forgot to give you a head’s up that the new date for the premiere streaming of the staged reading of my play, Tell My Bones, will be Sunday night November 22nd. Not November 8th.  (Since this will be the anniversary of JFK’s assassination, perhaps it’s a lofty & important omen of some kind.) But I will keep you posted as it gets closer. And remember, it will be FREE!!

All right, well, once again, there is not much going on here besides working on the new novella and finally being in a better frame of mind again, too. It was a couple of difficult days, but they have officially passed.

Last evening was so lovely — I had all the windows open again and I just love that feeling that life is permeating the house. And I once again came to that understanding that death is only a transition, and that if anyone is waiting for me on that side of the veil, they’ll still be there when I get there. I don’t have to rush anything just because I’m lonely.

Also, quick update on The Guitar Hero Goes Home. The cover art has been fixed and is ready to upload. Yay!! And now I have to try to fix that formatting problem I have with the layout of the text. And then I’ll reload all of it to Amazon at one time. But that won’t happen until I finish writing 1954 Powder Blue Pickup. Meanwhile, the book is for sale, there’s nothing actually wrong with it — I just want it to look a little different. And, of course, the eBook is for sale, as well. No problems with that layout at all.

(And a huge thank you to all of you who are already buying it. I really appreciate it.)

And now! I will get yoga happening here, and get down to work.

Have a wonderful Thursday, wherever you are in the world and with whatever you’re getting up to! Thanks for visiting. I leave you with my late-night listening music from yesterday– a huge hit from The Monkees, circa 1967, and it is still a popular favorite among Monkees fans: “What Am I Doing Hangin’ Round?” From their album, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn, & Jones, Ltd. Okay!! Enjoy. I love you guys. See ya!

“What Am I Doing Hanging ‘Round?”

Just a loud mouth Yankee I went down to Mexico.
I didn’t have much time to spend, about a week or so.
There I lightly took advantage of a girl who loved me so.
But I found myself a-thinkin’ when the time had come to go…

[Chorus:]
What am I doin’ hangin’ round?
I should be on that train and gone.
I should be ridin’ on that train to San Antone,
What am I doin’ hangin’ round?

She took me to the garden just for a little walk.
I didn’t know much Spanish and there was no time for talk.
Then she told me that she loved me not with words but with a kiss.
And like a fool I kept on thinkin’ of a train I could not miss…

[Chorus]

Well it’s been a year or so, and I want to go back again.
And if I get the money, well I’ll ride the same old train.
But I guess your chances come but once and boy I sure missed mine.
And still I can’t stop thinkin’ when I hear some whistle cryin’….

© 1967 Michael Murphy, Owen Castleman

Hello Life, Goodbye Yesterday!

Man, yesterday really sort of sucked — it started out bad and, try as I did to re-route the whole day, it only got worse. (See yesterday’s post — or simply move on, as I am trying to do.)

I did end up playing some more Tom Petty music off and on throughout the day, and that may or may not have been the best idea. I don’t know.  Is it better to allow yourself to feel something, even if it makes you unbelievably sad, or better to try to ignore feeling something and maybe just go crazy in some other way?

It isn’t so much how sad I was feeling about Tom Petty yesterday, but the man who died 2 Septembers ago — we used to listen almost exclusively to Tom Petty, so it honestly felt like both of those dead men were alive & well in my kitchen yesterday (in spirit), and it very keenly made me just want to cross over. Which, to me, is different from feeling suicidal; it’s just wanting to get over to the other side right now instead of waiting until some other time. The loneliness feels unbearable.

But then I see 7 adorable feral cats staring at me, and crossing over while they’re still alive & well means they will be euthanized by the County Humane Society, since they’re un-adoptable. And then it’s not just me crossing over, it’s me and 7 cats crossing over and it starts to feel so complicated that I say, “Oh for Christ’s sake, I’ll just stay.”

So I got very little work done on 1954 Powder Blue Pickup (the new erotic novella that is almost done). So I am really, really hoping that I can stay in this better frame of mind here today and get some good work done on it, and maybe even finish it by the weekend. I hope!

But by 5 pm yesterday, I finally gave up on the idea that I would get any more work done on the novella, and I closed up shop and went down to the kitchen and streamed the new documentary about Bill Wyman’s life and his amazing archives — The Quiet One.

I am so glad I did that! What a great movie. If you love the Rolling Stones, especially the original band, you have to stream it.

I learned so much about Bill Wyman’s life that I never knew before, plus all of his archival footage and photos of the Stones, oh my god — it connected me viscerally to the girl I was when I was 11- 12 years old, and so in love with the Rolling Stones.

And oddly enough, even though Brian Jones had already been dead for about 2 years by the time I was 11, I always connected emotionally to that version of the group and was not a big Mick Taylor fan. (However, I always loved Ronnie Wood, so when he joined the Stones after Mick Taylor left, I was just in schoolgirl heaven.)

Brian Jones | Brian jones rolling stones, Rolling stones, Keith richards

50 Years Ago: Brian Jones is Fired by the Rolling Stones
Above, Brian Jones in 1965, then only 4 years later, before he died at age 27.

Since Bill was never one of the Stones who got into drugs, he had a whole different take on what was happening with Brian, Mick, and Keith in those days (late 60s, early 70s) — it was just really interesting. It seems like Bill Wyman was/is, for the most part, a very happy person and you would never really have guessed this, since he always had that moniker of the “Stone Face” who never smiled.

And it also seems like he has had a really happy and rewarding life since he decided to leave the Stones, back in 1993 (after 30 years of being the bass player). He is 83 now.

Anyway, that movie really, really helped me forget about myself and move past my sad mood yesterday and put me into a whole different place by the end of the evening. I just enjoyed the film so much.

Okay. Onward with today!

Oh! Except that yesterday, Nick Cave sent out a Red Hand File, replying to his 30,000th letter! (And no — I didn’t write 29,963 of them!!) (I only wrote, like, 110…) He wrote something about fear and life and experience and things like that. And in his usual eloquent way. You can read it here.

(And today marks one year since I saw Nick Cave in Conversation at Town Hall in NYC!) (And here’s something you might not know! If you google “nick cave town hall nyc 2019” this photo comes up and it’s mine!!)

D7AFCE42-1C90-4D1A-81E2-8FDFBD8C5364 | Marilyn's Room
Waiting to see Nick Cave at Town Hall

All right. Yoga awaits. Then, hopefully, some truly splendid hours of working on 1954 Powder Blue Pickup.

I hope you have a happy Wednesday, wherever you are in the world. I’m leaving you with the song I always sing whenever I am once again ready to embrace the idea of living —  The Association’s hit song “Goodbye Columbus” (1969). This was the theme song from the hit movie, Goodbye Columbus, which was adapted from the Philip Roth bestselling-novel of the same name. This was the film that gave us a wonderful look at the beautiful model-turned actress Ali MacGraw. (Whom I got to meet once when I worked at the Museum of Modern Art in NYC, and she was really beautiful, AND she had really, really big feet!!!) (Have you noticed that so many fashion models have really big feet?)

The only thing I really like about the book and the movie is, in fact, that theme song. Because it’s all about leaving Columbus, Ohio, and finally saying hello to life. (Columbus, Ohio, is a place I absolutely despise. Every horrible thing that ever happened to me, happened to me in that town. And I mean everything — starting from my birth there, in a county home for unwed mothers, and then my grandfather putting me up for adoption to a family in Cleveland, behind my mother’s back…) (But honestly, I absolutely hate Columbus. Various rapes, suicide attempts, mental hospital, boy I loved getting killed/buried there…)

Anyway!!! I digress. Play the happy song, get the heck out of Columbus,  and say hello to a brand new life. Have a great day, gang. Thanks for visiting. I love you guys. See ya!

“Goodbye, Columbus”

Got to say hello
It’s a lucky day
Kiss the moon goodbye
And be on our way

It’s a lucky day
Cause I found you
Gonna build a
New world around you
Touch the sun and run
It’s a lucky day

Hello life
Goodbye Columbus
I’ve got a feeling that
You’re gonna hear from us
You’re gonna know
That we’ve taken
The world by surprise
Got that look in our eyes
It’s a lucky day

Just for changing
Leaving the old world behind
Lucky day for walking a new road
Just to clear your mind

It’s a day for starting a new way
Telling the old one goodbye
Lucky day for getting above it
Spread your wings and fly

Hello life
Goodbye Columbus
I’ve got a feeling that
You’re gonna hear from us
You’re gonna know
That we’ve taken
The world by surprise
Got that look in our eyes
It’s a lucky day

Hello life
Goodbye Columbus
I’ve got a feeling that
You’re gonna hear from us
You’re gonna know
That we’ve taken
The world by surprise
Got that look in our eyes
It’s a lucky day

Yeah, yeah…
Goodbye, goodbye Columbus
Goodbye, goodbye Columbus…

© 1969 James Yester

Sun, Fog, Cold, Warm: You Name It, We Got It Here In Crazeysburg!

Just weird weather, I guess. But we’re getting it, like, all at once here this morning.

I woke up extremely sad today.  Just extremely.  And that’s also weird because I had such a great day yesterday and went to sleep in the happiest little mood.

Part of it was getting on Instagram first thing, and being reminded by many of the little Tom Petty-related accounts I follow, that in ten days, it will be the 3rd anniversary of Tom Petty’s death.

First of all — that isn’t possible. And in some ways, it feels like thirty years, not three.

Second of all — it’s like this sort of nation-wide Tom Petty thing now, to do all kinds of commemorative stuff on the anniversary of his death. Including, bringing out “new” albums around that time, too, so that we can’t possibly miss the facts that: a.) he’s dead; and b.) yay — more new songs. So — is he actually dead?

It’s fucking weird. Plus, he had the foresight to die only a handful of days before his birthday, so October just becomes this sort of washout, if you’re a Tom Petty fan.

Anyway. I no longer sit around, morbidly thinking about Tom Petty being dead, I’m okay with it now. But the Instagram stuff just sort of hit me first thing — my eyes barely open, still dark in my world, and suddenly I’m thinking about all this sadness and loss and my girlhood gone, and time flying away from me.

However. Here’s one of my favorite photos of him. He’s around 52 here, I think. It’s from the tour supporting the release of the album, The Last DJ. An album that is absolutely brilliant, but the industry mercilessly panned it because they didn’t like the picture he painted of them — and yet, alas, I think we all know, especially in hindsight since the Internet killed the music industry, that he was right. (And Bob Dylan allegedly told Tom Petty, regarding The Last DJ, that just because the industry was panning it, it didn’t mean the album wasn’t good.)

He’s off of heroin here, and officially with Dana, finally, but I don’t know if they were actually married yet. They were together a long time before they actually got married.

 

On a happier note, though, today is Nick Cave’s birthday!! And he’s actually still alive. So that’s good. (I’m actually hoping I don’t outlive him. Here is a list of people I don’t want to outlive: Nick Cave, Keith Richards, Bob Dylan, and my friend Valerie.)

Because of his birthday, I had posted a handful of photos of Nick Cave on my Instagram page, but then I took them all down this morning. It just suddenly seemed odd and too personal.

I’m funny about photos (even the one of Tom Petty there above).  I save them because I love them. And so pieces of my actual love are attached to the images. And I don’t think that things that matter to me, like, for real matter to me, belong on social media.

So even the fact that I’m posting that photo up above there — it feels a little weird.

But on another topic entirely…

This is something that left me sort of thunderstruck yesterday. I saw this photo on Instagram, and it struck me as one of the most erotic photos I have ever seen.

And I thought it would be interesting to share it on the blog — as an example of how my mind works. Since, for the most part, I write such intensely graphic, explicit stuff.  But where the images come from, is this whole other realm of my mind, and doesn’t actually stem from the libido, per se.

I’m not even a Brezhnev “fan,” or anything like that. It has nothing to do with Brezhnev, really.   It’s the energy in the photo. It shot me to the moon and back.

And the photo stuck with me for the entire day, and long into the evening, and was one of the first things on my mind (that didn’t make me sad) when I woke up this morning.

Yes, I am in just a really, really sad mood here today. But I think of emotions as weather — you know? Only they move across the inner landscape, not outside your window. So I’m just going to ride it out. And focus on the new novella and hope for the best.

I got some great (albeit, a little disturbing) work done on 1954 Powder Blue Pickup yesterday. But I have decided to just allow the book to write itself, and to say what it needs to say. (And I’m still not talking about that darn gangbang segment, which I think I will finally be tackling today. And it’s an organized gangbang, not a rape — so I’m not planning to get all “Last Exit to Brooklyn” here or anything. But I probably will be inching into that territory. However, it’s the segment that comes before that, where the girl did that unexpected thing, that I still find sort of disturbing. She painted me into a sort of corner that I wasn’t sure how to get the story out of. But anyway. I did it.)

And so today should be a good day, all sad things considered along the way.

So, I’ll close this and probably do yoga. And then get back to work on the novella. Have a terrific Tuesday, wherever you are in the world. Thanks for visiting, gang.  It feels like a sort of toss-up here — to leave you either with the “live” version of “Dreamville”, a song off of The Last DJ album, but that might be too sad for me right now. So I think I’ll leave you with something else, from those years when he was still full of all that angry, wonderful, pent-up, fighting energy — a “live” version of “Louisiana Rain,” that I just love. (Recorded at Wembley Arena, in London England, in December of 1982.) Enjoy. I love you guys. See ya.

“Louisiana Rain”

Well it was out in California by the San Diego sea
That was when I was taken in and it left its mark on me
Yeah she nearly drove me crazy with all those china toys
And I know she really didn’t mean a thing to those sailor boys

Louisiana rain is falling at my feet
Baby I’m noticing the change as I move down the street
Louisiana rain is soaking through my shoes
I may never be the same when I reach Baton Rouge

South Carolina put out its arms for me
Right up until everything went black somewhere on Lonely Street
And it was just some mean old poison that I took up my nose
Thank God for love that followed the angel’s antidote

Louisiana rain is falling just like tears
Running down my face, washing out the years
Louisiana rain is soaking through my shoes
I may never be the same when I reach Baton Rouge

Well I never will get over this English refugee
Singing to the jukebox in some all-night beanery
Yeah he was eating pills like candy and chasing them with tea
You should have seen him lick his lips, that old black muddied beak

Louisiana rain is falling at my feet
Baby I’m noticing the change as I move down the street
Louisiana rain is soaking through my shoes
I may never be the same when I reach Baton Rouge

Louisiana rain is falling just like tears
Running down my face, washing out the years
Louisiana rain is soaking through my shoes
I may never be the same when I reach Baton Rouge

© 1979 Tom Petty

All Righty!! Already Been to Town & Back!!

For some reason, after I did yoga first thing this morning, I was full of energy and decided to just head into town and get the groceries ASAP.

I think I got there the moment the market opened — or close to it.  They were still trying to stock the shelves.

But it feels nice to already have it behind me for the week and I still have the whole day ahead of me to write!!

Plus, it is just a beautiful morning, even though it was chilly out there.  But what a nice drive. So sunny and it was kind of amazing to note that all the corn is long gone, and the fields are turning brown and some of the trees are even changing colors already.

When the heck did all that happen?

What an incredibly weird summer 2020 was. Although, in most ways, I really, really enjoyed it. Everything was just so low key out here in the Hinterlands, and we hardly had any signs of the virus, and god knows we had zero riots & no looting & no shootings, and we still got to have fireworks on the 4th of July.  And I hardly ever left Crazeysburg the entire summer. So it was actually kind of nice — like living in Yesteryear…

But as always, I am sad to see summer officially go. And on this day last year, I was seeing Nick Cave in Conversation at Lincoln Center in NYC and there was a god-awful heat wave going on the whole week I was there. Nothing at all like this year — where it was down to 38 degrees Fahrenheit during the night.

Anyway. Here was September 21st, last year:

Waiting for Nick Cave at Lincoln Center

I had the time of my life…

Okay. My progress yesterday on the new erotic novella, 1954 Powder Blue Pick Up, was sort of very strange.  I am still getting really stuck on the timing of the various events that bring the novella to a close. I mean, I still have a good 10 pages to go, but it is heading to a close. Which is very weird, since the first 30 pages came out in a sort of nonstop flood. And now, for two days running, I have not been able to get a clear reading on how it all unfolds toward the end, even though I know exactly what’s supposed to happen.

So I’m hoping today will be more productive. It’s one of the reasons I headed out to the store early — to just be able to sit here and focus for as long as it takes today.

Well, yesterday, I broke down and changed the bedding in the guest room over to the fall stuff.  Put the flannel sheets on and the extra blankets. And since I didn’t have a single guest the whole spring/summer, it was kind of sad to take off all the summer bedding and wash it and put it away for next year… (I keep the entire bed under mounds of fleece and cotton throws all year, in order to keep  the sheets and blankets safe from all the cat hair, but I still like to wash everything before I put it away each season.  I don’t know, there’s something about switching things out for the seasons — makes me really happy when everything is already clean and ready to go, even though almost no one sleeps in that bed now except for my birth mom, maybe once or twice a year.)

Anyway, I’m reluctantly admitting that fall is indeed coming.

Okay, well I guess I will get started here! Thanks for visiting, gang. I hope you have a great Monday planned, wherever you are in the world. I leave you with my “traveling to town & back” music from this morning — from Bob Dylan’s Planet Waves (1974), “On A Night Like This.” (You have to actually watch it on Vimeo. They won’t let me embed it.) However! Enjoy!!!! (And come visit!! The sheets are clean!!) All righty. I love you guys. See ya.

https://vimeo.com/381447648

“On A Night Like This”

On a night like this
I am so glad you came around
Hold on to me so tight
And heat up some coffee grounds
We got much to talk about
And much to reminisce
It sure is right
On a night like this.

On a night like this
So glad you’ve come to stay
Hold on to me, pretty miss
Say you’ll never go away to stray
Run your fingers down my spine
Bring me a touch of bliss
It sure feels right
On a night like this.

On a night like this
I can’t get any sleep
The air is so cold outside
And the snow’s so deep
Build a fire, throw on logs
And listen to it hiss
And let it burn, burn, burn, burn
On a night like this.

Put your body next to mine
And keep me company
There is plenty a room for all
So please don’t elbow me.

Let the four winds blow
Around this old cabin door
If I’m not too far off
I think we did this once before
There’s more frost on the window glass
With each new tender kiss
But it sure feels right
On a night like this.

© 1973 Bob Dylan