Oh the things I miss when I'm asleep.

Eric Slick drinking a milkshake made for him by his sister Julie and served in one of my new expensive champagne glasses...with a straw.

Oh, the things I miss when I'm asleep.

And not only do they leave the evidence in the sink for me to find the next morning...i.e., the dirty glass..grrr...they took a picture with my camera.

So I'm sharing it with you.

I'm so fucking happy today. I hate using terms like this, but I had a breakthrough with my novel yesterday thanks to my pal, Ellen. I won't bore you with the details only to say that I've been miserable for months because I wasn't happy with the first chapter...I didn't feel it was strong enough and yet it was necessary to lay down certain groundwork since this is the type of book which needed to be written in linear fashion. Obviously it's not exactly a good thing to lack confidence in your opener and it was messing with my head bigtime. Ellen suggested something in the nature of a prologue, and while I didn't use her exact idea per se, she pointed me in the right direction and after mulling it over a couple of hours, I had a whole new beginning which has me so excited I pounded out 4,000 words yesterday.

Okay, by the time I edit this morning it will be more like 2,000 but still. Yay!

And now everything else is falling into place because the book is basically written...all I have to do is go in and fine tune. Or something like that. It's only the book I've wanted to write for the past five years but didn't have the guts until now.

In other news...

Every once in a while, I google myself. Oh okay, I'm an obsessive compulsive dork (yes, Lori, you were right) who googles herself. This is because of the Oh Great My Story Is Appearing Simultaneously In Two Magazines Which Do Not Take Previously Published Work incident. A couple of years ago, I simul-subbed a story to two well-respected magazines and much to my shock/joy, they both accepted it -- only one of them had a computer melt down and the acceptance letter never went out. The result was that the story appeared simultaneously in both magazines, which did not make the editors happy and left me with the world's reddest face. Sooo...I google myself from time to time as a precautionary thing.

Right.

Anyway, the reason I mention this is that I just found two new entries when googling my name in quotes like this "Robin Slick" (in case you are technically challenged and do not know this, using quotes prevents you from getting anything other than exactly what you want...i.e., Robin Slick, not Robin's wet slick...ahem....having this last name...you have no idea what happens when I don't use quotes).

Well, apparently the quotes didn't make a difference this time. I once wrote a story for Smokelong Quarterly called "Picnic" which mentioned a "pretty plump wife". Today I see under my name "Robin Slick: Pretty Plump Girls Fucked The Python's Wife".

Okay, explain something to me. Obviously this is a story about lesbians...but the python's wife? Is this the female spouse of a snake? The mate of a member of Monty Python? I wish I could give you the answer to this, but when I clicked on the link, I immediately got this:

"Big and wet and ready to roll these beautiful Faties!"

What the hell is a Fatie?

I can't tell you because the page was so pornographic I had to close the screen at once, only you know what happens with those freaking sites, another one popped up, and this one said "Join Real Big Nudes" and it wasn't pretty. Arghh...I think I've been temporarily blinded.

However, failing to be daunted by this experience at 5:00 a.m. this morning, I continued on and blinked twice when I came upon the entry "Robin Slick and Jessica Biel's pussy".

Who is Jessica Biel and what would I be doing with her cat?

Oh why oh why did I click on that one. First of all, it comes with a video. Now even I'm not crazy enough to download that. But how do you like the review this film gets?

"Robin Slick -- Cozy moon things next station jessica biel pussy. Sisters has our wanted lot nord jessica biel pussy pierre only gone. Wanted younger jessica biel pussy as slightly book about sisters early knows. Small jessica biel pussy since cast or the late. Danzig mustache night run wanted jessica biel pussy gare even. Waited is school reading events jessica biel pussy vision internet lodging directory."

Okay....if you say so. I googled Jessica Biel and at least now I know who she is. Yawn. Anyway, here's the funny part. In the last sentence, the word "internet lodging directory" is a link.

I can't bring myself to click on it. The options are too mind boggling in my current state.

Oh, and in case anyone was wondering, I did watch the Olympic ice skating finals last night on television with the sound turned off so that I could live out my warped fantasy of choosing their music for them and giving them rock instead of Send in the Clowns or Memories. But before each girl skated, I did give them the benefit of the doubt before making my selection. Yikes, it was totally appalling...freaking circus music. Anyway, just so you know, I had the first one skating to vintage Zombies...but the obscure stuff, like "I Love You" and "I Want You Back Again" though I did throw in "She's Not There"...but then much to my shock, the chick from Finland, I could not believe, skated to blues guitar...and I'm pretty sure it was B.B. King. I almost had heart failure I was so excited.

(Be quiet, Lori...I've already admitted I'm a dork)

Anyway, then I cranked out Blondie, Joe Jackson (Look Sharp - awesome), Kinks (the Percy soundtrack - if you don't have it, buy it immediately. Don't even ask questions.)...and I really think I've missed my calling in life. Those skaters never looked better.

Finally, this should be another good writing weekend. Julie and Eric are doing some recording tonight; Julie works the weekend and Eric has Project Object rehearsals and I'm thinking marathon, baby...where I start writing like now and don't stop until Sunday night. I've done it before and it's the world's greatest high.

And for further inspiration, today's twisted Neil Gaiman moment:


Yep, I'm inspired alright.

And I made Gaiman a link because you should really click on his latest post today. I bet the lucky bastard gets himself one of those. A quick glance around my house tells me there are no viable rooms for this, but I could be wrong. I must check into it further because I WANT ONE! (But the question is, how to keep it secret from the rest of the family. Because if they knew about it, it would defeat the whole purpose. Ah...the fantasy of actually being able to disappear at will...)

Oh...one more thing. Eric just got some more confirmed dates for his tour with Project Object:

April 23 St. Louis, MO -- Cicero's
April 24 Detroit, MI -- Magic Bag
April 25 Milwaukee, WI -- Shank Hall
April 28 Asheville, NC -- Stella Blue

And the show on April 13 will be in Sayreville, NJ at the Starland Ballroom featuring the Mahavishnu Project.

Screw it. I'm flying out to every show.

Later,
xo