Royal Oak smells like garbage today. And I don’t know if that’s just because it’s so hot here (and everywhere else today) and the world is just decomposing, or because the air pump I used to fill up my tires was near a trash bin.

We bought a new tire for the shit box this week. I went to get the tire resealed because it was leaking and they showed me a giant scuff mark, which apparently means the whole thing was about to explode.

So I watched them put the new one on. It was just a little gas station garage, no lobby, nothing to do but hang around and watch. You’d think they’d get self-conscious or something, working with people hanging around watching. Anyway, did you know that tires are GLUED on??? The tires we drive around on are held onto the rim with nothing but some stinking glue!

I don’t know why I thought this, but I always imagined that auto tires were kind of the same as bicycle tires, with the innertube inside, and the tread part outside. But no, there is nothing inside an auto tire. It’s just glued onto the rim.

Freaking glue! And then you drive off on it right away, a big heavy something-ton car, and you don’t even need to let it dry very long.

How can that work? How are all of our tires not popping off the rims every day?

So, anyway, that is my earth-shattering discovery for today.

The story of my morning is avoidance. I’m writing this blog entry because I can’t figure out what comes next in my current short story. I wrote the beginning, I know the end, and now I’m stuck in this ugly and hazy web of a middle with my fingers all tangled in the strings.

I’m only home because I didn’t want to stop and get my tire sealed. It’s been slow-leaking since forever, and I figured I would just fill it up again rather than get it resealed today. Tomorrow - I will tomorrow.

I don’t really have much on my mind today other than the ever-pressing question of why the hell do we have to send every weather man in the country down to Mexico to stand in the hurricane??? As if we wouldn’t believe there was a hurricane if we didn’t see some sad intern standing in it, probably scared shitless. I know I would be.

No, I’m not reading Harry Potter!!! I haven’t read any of them.

But I am hopelessly addicted to Breakaway by Kelly Clarkson, which may sound like an equally shameful pleasure, but no, it’s really good. Really. I know, that’s what Potter fans say too.

And Hot Fuss by The Killers, which is not shamefully good, but just good.

Peace to you all on this bright and shiny morning

Some days I have absolutely no interest in accomplishing anything. I did nothing today and I don’t feel bad about it. I didn’t write anything, edit anything. I didn’t read anything that mattered. Didn’t go to the post office. Didn’t buy milk. Oh well.

Days like today I wish I had something mindless to do. A video game or something. We lost the cord to our PS2 when we moved and I haven’t played it since.

Yesterday I was productive. I conceptualized a new story and got down the first scene. Sent out a submission. I reorganized my office closet, sorted all the books that I haven’t looked at since we moved in, made myself a “writer shelf” in the closet with my reference books and supplies.

But how many really, really productive days can you have in a week? With no boss, no concrete deadlines, no immediate rewards, I find it very hard to stay motivated five out of five days. And is this realistic even? If I were working a “job” kind of job, would I really have five out of five days of good solid productive work?

I suppose this would change if I had a book deal. If I had an editor breathing down my neck, wanting a manuscript on his desk in so many months or whatever.

I hear people say these are the easy times, the lazy times, before publication. I write because I want to, and if I don’t, there’s no one but myself to answer to. No pressure. No expectations.

And no money either!

This baffles me.

A Minnesota organization issued a nationwide parental alert Friday about the video game, “Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas,” claiming that it contains hidden pornography. A modification can be downloaded from the Internet that allows players to see female characters naked, and show a male and female character engaged in various graphic sexual positions.

If you’re going to let your kid play Grand Theft Auto, steal cars, shoot cops, murder for money, pick up a prostitute, have sex with her, steal all her money, and then beat her to death - then do you really care that he sees some naked animated tits?

I don’t understand the concerns of people in this country. Of all the things to worry about. Murder is wrong, violence is wrong, stealing is wrong. However, sex and nudity are not wrong, or certainly not the biggest of concerns when it comes to this game.

This game is rated MA, which means that your kid has to be 17 to buy it. Trust me, your 17 year-old has already had sex, or at least seen a woman naked before. Your 17 year-old is looking at pornography on his computer already anyway. If your kid is younger than 17, he shouldn’t even be playing this game. If your kid is younger than 17, you, as a parent, need to make sure he doesn’t play this game.

Maybe it’s because I’m still young. Or maybe it’s because I don’t have any children of my own. But I have always enjoyed the Grand Theft Auto series. I know right from wrong, and I know reality from gameplay. Seventeen is a good age to understand the difference between reality and gameplay, and MA is a suitable rating for this game. If your child doesn’t know right from wrong by the time he is 17, you have bigger problems to worry about.

If anything were going to raise the rating to AO (Adults Only) - which they worry about because then stores like Target, Best Buy, and Walmart wont stock the game anymore - why shouldn’t it be the violence that matters and not the sex? Again, let me note - violence is wrong, murder is wrong, stealing is wrong - sex, between two consenting adults after a date, is hardly that wrong.

So, why all the panties in a bunch now?

People in Europe have the right idea, when they generally give higher ratings for violence than sex. People in this country need to get their priorities straight.

When young light breaks sky
     like seven shades of spilled paint,

I want to be that energy.

So went a little poem I wrote ages ago, or so it seems, in January of this year. We woke up at sunrise, the first night in our new apartment here in Royal Oak. A hundred miles from home. We had a little money, finally, but nothing else. Only a suitcase of clothes and some groceries. No furniture - no couch, no tables, no bed, no matress. We slept on the floor, on blankets.

And when we went out that morning I couldn’t help but feel the energy of the way light falls on everything like fire - on trees, on the ground, on our faces. Before the world wakes up and starts living, the sunrise breaks its way through horizon and clouds. A fresh new day starts in brilliance, full with the energy of promise.

I have decided not to import my old entries from my life as a bug. But I don’t want to get rid of them either. They came from a different world entirely, a time when I was naive, hopeful, ignorantly blissful and desperately poor. From the girl who wrote Isn’t it fun to have dreams? Isn’t it fun to be 23 years old and believe that you can be absolutely anything in the world? I can’t help being cheesy sometimes, really, I can’t.

And no, by the way, I am not a whole lot older now. But my hope is that this blog (and the inevitable self-titled domain of a writer) will come from something maybe a bit wiser. I’ve finished the degree; I am a certified brooding writer chick with no job prospects (not that I wanted one anyway). A new city, new life, and 1.5 years older. A lot can happen in a year and a half.

So then, the old entries (August 2003 - July 2005) will stay there in blogspot heaven, indefinitely.

Kudos, of course, to my husband (who is too busy to design his own website) for the beautiful design. You can send any comments, questions or praise to jim (at) graphikjunkie (dot) com.

So, here we’ll start.