Book Review Week: "When You Are Engulfed in Flames" by David Sedaris

Unlike Dave Sedaris' other books, this one is inscribed to my father. As a struggling writer, it is is nice to hear what already established authors, especially ones I personally value,have to say.


Because with all of the insecurities, all the doubts, all of the difficulties that are unique to being an author, one does often wake up in the middle of the night wondering, "But is my father enchanting?"




For Further Reading on How Great Authors have Reacted to Justin Please See:

Garrison Keilor.

Dave Barry.

So then, save me, save me.

Photo is courtesy of the very pious Radioactive Cotton.

The Practice of Medicine Used to Be About So Much More Than Just Getting Stuff That You Could Steal on Your Own.

I called and made an appointment!

I waited in the lobby and in the exam room!

The doctor gave me a prescription I could have "Picked Up On My Own."








And call me old fashioned, but if you steal OTC prescriptions at least you aren't responsible for killing the hundreds of trees necessary to wrap up single sample pills.

Family Circus

The parents are in town. That puts a lot of presure on me, because they always said when I was growing up that they wanted me to be more then just a really brilliant blogger.


You would think that being a really brilliant visual artist would count for something, but who can blame them if they just want me to get a book deal.


KEY FOR PEOPLE WHO DON'T UNDERSTAND AVANT GARDE ART.
J=Justin
M=Mom
D=Dad
L=Lexi
L=Leo
P=I forget because I drew this cartoon a few days ago, and can't remember what I was thinking.

Murder-Suicide?

No, just two lazy golden doodles engaging in marathon napping!

Roy G. Biv at Seventy.

I’d like to think I made a difference, but everyone does. And now I’m useless. The years of being around kids finally took their toll. Not the kids, themselves, of course. It was all the sugar that caused adult diabetes, which led to my cloudy, almost non-existent vision.

What is the world like? Colors could have changed a lot since I was in my prime. Or they could be nonexistent. I don’t know, and it seems I’m going to spend my last days never knowing.

I have my sense of smell though. That is something to pass on to the kids: Rancid. Odor Yucky? I could change my name—but why should I? I can’t think of any more words for odors. Not any that kids would have to know throughout their whole life. And even if they did have to know them through their whole life, it isn’t like they would ever visit me and tell me about how I helped them find the right word for talking about their experience.

They never visit, they probably don’t even remember me, after first grade.

Nothing Spells Truble Like Watching My Niece.

Lexi has only been here for an evening, and look at all the craziness she is already getting into with Leo.

It is going to be quite the week.

J. Kahn Apologizes in Advance to the Author for the Following Book Review.

A REVIEW OF “MOLECULAR REGULATION OF 23A2 SKELETAL MYOBLAST DIFFERENTIATION AND APOPTOSIS” BY DR. MARGOT FREER.

Ignore the Helpless Pleas of The Carrots and Radishi.

For sometime I have been eating as a vegetarian. This came about as a result of a number of important facts, i.e.

Fact The amount of grain that cattle consume could feed all of the currently starving poor.

Sometimes people challenge my statistics. So I throw red paint on them and yell, "Murderer!" This is because if I am not morally superior because of my food choices I really have nothing going for me, superiority-wise.

One of the great challenges of being a vegetarian is finding cheap, nutritious food that doesn't require a wife to prepare.

Recently I have stumbled upon pop rocks. It meets all of the basic requirements, while also serving to boost your brain power. Nourished by weeks of pop rocks I created a culinary masterpiece.

BONUS FUN VEGETARIAN SALAD RECIPE

1/3 cup of Lettuci
1 Gaggle of Radishi
1/5 cup of coleslaw
1 tablespoon of diced mint
1 lb of turnii
1/2 cup of croutons
3 lbs of pop rocks
A Cow (skinned)
1 cup of tablespooni
1 tomato
1 cup of other vegetables.


Mix Together!
Serve!
Eat!

People I Meet At the Coffee Shop from 9:00-5:00, Monday-Friday.

Q: True or False? all Regular Mid-Day Coffee Shop Patrons are unemployed, crazy or have leprosy?

A: True.

Which is why I figured that I should talk to them so as to get some blogging ideas.

Today, I met an elderly man, who is apparently retired. He was, he said, a retired doctor who devoted himself to Jewish Mysticism.

I asked him what sorts of works he was reading, and he said it wasn't entirely a question of reading.

"But I want you to read this." He gave me a photocopied packet. "Keep it."

"Well," I said.

He excused himself.

I read the article and here is a line from it "The danger is not that the golem…will develop overwhelming powers ;it lies in the tension which the creative process arouses in the creator himself.”

Oh, The Secrets I Could Tell You, But Won't Because I'm Just So Very Conscientious.

While on one of my daily visits to the grocery store I become concerned with what
happened to some of my favorite veggie-substitute products.

I don't know exactly why I need to buy veggie burgers and veggie monkey brains, but it makes me happy.




So, I asked the cashier what happened to the Morning Star Products.

She leaned in, actually they are making the {Our Store} Brand.

But I shouldn't even be telling you that.

I just looked at her.

Yet, deep down I knew that she was right. That's why I can't tell you what store, or what brand. But if I could tell anyone, it would be You.

Honestly, that just scratches the surfaces. I have secrets about how to improve your golf swing and how to know if S/He likes you and friends and family and the economy and work and the future and the lives of bees and my Own Personal Emotional Highs and Lows.

But like the proverbial grocer I really shouldn't tell you of such things.

Yet More of the Worst Spring Break Ever.

My whole life consists of grading papers, because honestly finding a non-leaking pen isn't that hard.

To cheer myself up, I decided to commission a portrait of me grading papers.

It is a good likeness, I think.

The Worst Spring Break Ever.

This morning two pens, leaked in my shirt pocket.

Call me a polytheist, but I believe that I have angered the fashion gods, due to maybe not paying homage to them.


On the upside, I will have a legitimate excuse, when I return to school. I.E.,Tried,to grade papers, but ran out of ink.

In Which Justin Uses the B Word to Describe the Subject of a Previous Post.

No doubt, you will recall with fondest memories, my post in which I joked around with Mother Nature about dumping batteries in a lake just to mess with her.

She clearly didn't like it, and like the great big baby that she is, decided to respond.

My roses, which I placed outside just three days ago, can be seen here:



If that doesn't earn Mother Nature the name of belligerent, I don't know what does.

Anyway enough chatting, I have to dig Leo out:

“Fairy tales do not tell children the dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed."

For years I have said the two greatest threats to humanity are 1)Electronic Publishing classes 2) Rebecca Spagnuolo and 3) an inability to grasp basic mathematical principles.

Imagine my surprise when the first four of the above resulted in, what is maybe the greatest blog to come out of the Kent region. Ever.

And I don't think I'm biased here, just because this blog has a link to my blog through a picture of me.


After all that link comes at no small cost: Why must Shannon past a goofy face on my handsome body?

In Which Justin Is Once Again Punished by the Universe For Being Virtuous.

I have some amazing posts for you guys. Unfortunately they all require the use of my camera.

But my camera requires batteries.

And here is the kicker: Because I love mother earth more than my own life, I buy rechargeable batteries. But here is what those tree huggers in the battery industry don't tell you: The battery recharger is very hard to keep track of.

I could have sworn it was in my home office, near the dart board. But it isn't: Neither is it behind the toilet tank, or in the dishwasher. I have no idea where else it could be.

So I am going to go out and buy me some batteries. And then I am going to dump them in the river, just to make the point to mother nature.

And then I am going to buy more batteries, load up my camera, and post some of the most amazing, mother earth-shattering posts ever.

The Unapologetic Reception of Sly Kahn.

News of my 38th Triumphant Return is Everywhere. This is as it should be. But it has also made think hard, about how much better than my triumphant returns--at least when compared with the body building mentally deficient set.

Virtually everyone I know has seen the most recent Stallone films. And most everyone I know, begins by admitting that they saw Rocky XVI or Rambo VXIII with a profuse apology,

"No, I know, but I grew up on those movies..."

Or

"I have always displayed a propensity for making poor life choices, but it looked so good..."

But COI enthusiasts need no such apologies.

In fact, based on this week's reception they feel no need to comment in any sort of way.

"Short Posts Are Good" Week: The 38th Unexpected Return of Justin.

I put a dart board in my home office, where I write, thinking that if I needed a distraction from my writing, I could always play a game of darts.

I spend 8 or 9 hours a day in my office.


I haven't written a thing since my previous post, but I am getting really good at darts.

This is Our Last Goodbye.

I wanted to give you, dear readers, a chance to beg me for a part of my library before I begin donating it to the library.

Has my library ever done anything wrong? No, not once. And yet I am cruelly tearing it apart, limb by limb. Such is life in the modern world, where an honest man can't live peacefully in his bungalow with his collection of forty thousand books.

It wasn't easy but I have decided that I am giving away Rod McKuen's New Ballads. Since January 01, when I began the great library clean up project, I have wrestled with the idea of getting rid of this gem.

I finally decided to part with it, because
1) In the last 35 years since the book was published McKuen must have published more ballads, rendering this title false, and I will not allow my home to become a den of books with lying titles.

2) I don't know who Rod McKuen is.

3) He has the same hair cut as Leo, which is awkward when the three of us go out.

One down, 39,999 to go. Begin begging:

Now.

Rated U for Unbelievable:

With the return of Kelmaree, making it clear that women all over the world are waiting for my next post, why has there been such a delay?

Before I answer, parents shield your children's eyes; faint of heart, call the ambulances, now.

My dearest children, I who live in a state of monkish simplicity have undergone one of the few catastrophes that can prevent the most determined of men from writing.

Heart break?

Illness?

No, no. These things are child's play for the real writer. The just become so much more fodder for the writer.

My chair broke. After eight years of faithful service, Larry's plastic spine broke in twain. Or in terry. Whichever one, is the fancy word for two.

But the point, is I had no where to rest my weary butt.

And so now you know. I will tell more, when my feet aren't just absolutely murdering me.