Stumbling upon interesting tidbits (hopefully something we can use in our current or next work) whilst researching is always fun; like finding a toy in a box of Cracker Jack, or a twenty dollar bill in the pocket of an old pair of jeans (depending upon how interesting/useful the tidbit).

I recently came across an article by a literary agent offering advice to writers and this stood out:  Do you 'keep up' on everything in your genre and the market?

Number one: With new genres being added (New Adult - characters 18-25 and generally gritty, Nordic or Scandinavian Noir - dark, morally complex moods and settings, Cli-fi – fiction about current climate change, Twitter Short Story - *sigh* in 140 characters or less – for those readers who are just too damn busy or have a truncated attention span to read an actual book, New Weird - a mashup of fantasy, science fiction, and supernatural horror genres. These new genres bend traditional rules and conventions and explore new thematic territory.) how can we truly be sure where our beloved tome belongs on the shelf?

Number two: How could we possibly have the time to keep up with the market and read all those books we’re expected to be reading and writing reviews for whilst researching and writing our own books, participating in a writing group or two, reading other writers’ blogs to be supportive, attending seminars and/or writers conventions to get that ‘elevator pitch’ sorted out, entering as many online pitches and contests as possible, building and expanding our “author’s platform” so that when we’re published we’ll already have a band of loyalists eager to plunk down good coin to buy our book, researching and querying literary agents, all the while holding down a full-time job and having some semblance of a life?

I’ve read many blogs and articles offering helpful advice to prepare the as yet unagented author for that call. The call in which a literary agent wants to discuss your manuscript and any future manuscripts you may have ideas for and perhaps suggest an R&R (Revision & Resubmit) or, dare I say it, offer representation.  It's foolish to worry about it now (and I'm not really) but when that certain call is scheduled, will the on-the-brink-of-offering agent ask those dreaded questions?  “What's your book similar to?

Similar to?  Why would I write something similar to something already in print?  Isn’t that sticking a toe in the plagiarism pool?  Aren’t agents always saying, “Don’t write to trend”? 

Some agents want you to give them a mashup (since they apparently lack the imagination to do this themselves), i.e., Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Abraham Lincoln Vampire Slayer, Android Karenina, Mansfield Park and Mummies.  Jane Austen and Leo Tolstoy must surely be spinning.

 Writers in the old days didn't have to concern themselves with this codswallop (there, I said it!), they just knocked the thing out and biffed it off to their agent/editor who did the rest.  I find it off putting to be forced to tread that thin line between being appropriately humble and confident to ‘sell’ our manuscript.  A dash too much humility and we’re dipping into the realm of low self-esteem, and a soupçon too much confidence and we’ve entered the land of boastful pomposity.  How can one respectfully toot one's own horn whilst simultaneously saying, 'Aww…shucks'? 

A writer pal of mine, Will Tinkham, http://willtinkham.blogspot.com/ said, “And you're right: if you say it's the next Huck Finn, you’re pompous; call it a poor man's Huck Finn and you lack the confidence to be successful.”

See, I always thought it was the agents’ job to know the market and find the niche. If they are calling you they've read your manuscript and something about it suggested to them it could sell and bring them some money.  There are far too many literary agents today who are writers themselves – which I find to be a conflict of interest.  And they seem to spend an inordinate amount of time keeping up their own writer’s platform with constant tweets, Facebook postings, and Instagram photos, etc.  I care not a whit about their caffeine consumption, their significant other, their cinema choices, or current crushes.  These agents who write and fritter their time on social media are doing the entire publishing industry a disservice.  I think these absentee literary agents are to blame for so many writers going the self-publishing route, and they are unwittingly shooting themselves and their future earnings in the foot by not focusing on the vast oyster that is out there waiting to be discovered.

And for those semi-literary agents who like to straddle both worlds, I suggest to you that you take on some older slush pile reader interns who could appreciate something other than what’s tickling the fancy of many Millennials.

And if these straddling agents concentrated on finding and helping to launch the careers of ‘new’ writers, perhaps the publishing world would raise a unified dismissive eyebrow when an alleged prequel or sequel to a best seller magically appears in a dusty vault and is hoisted upon the salivating public desirous of a second helping of something tried once long ago. A long, loud and fervent Bronx Cheer should be blown in the direction of the purveyors of this chicanery.

 



 

 

 

 

You may have noticed when looking words up in a dictionary that the origin of the word is given. The etiology will be attributed to Latin, Greek, French, Old English, Middle English, etc.  But fear not all you denizens of the U.S., Americans have come up with some words of our own in the past 300+ years.

One thing I love about some words is that they sound exactly what they mean.  For instance, nefarious – [from the Latin] What a delicious word for reprehensible, despicable, wicked.  Just looking at the word and you know it’s up to no good.

parsimony – [Late Middle English from Latin] Sparing, unwilling to spend, frugal. It makes me think of parsley and how it’s used sparingly as a decorative finish on a meal.

perspicacious – [from the Latin] Insight into and understanding of things.  Reminds me of perspective and periscope – good for looking into things.

Perhaps it’s just me and how I relate to words. 

Now, onto the wonderful newish American words.

antsy - Ever feel agitated, impatient, or restless? This word dates back to the mid-19th century, and is believed to have come from the popular phrase ‘to have ants in your pants’ – a truly unsettling sensation.

cool - No word is more American than cool. Originating in 1930s America as a black slang word for fashionable, it was adopted by jazz musicians to mean hip and acceptable.

dude -  Originally a put-down for a man overly concerned with his clothes, fashion and appearance, and also for a rich man from the city who vacations on a ranch. Today the meaning has shifted to someone you think is cool, or great. Can be synonymous with bro.

bangs – Not a sound, like a gun going off, but a fringe of hair that’s cut straight across the forehead.

bumptious -  First known use in 1803, meaning offensively self-assertive, proud and loud in an annoying way.

catawampus - Originating in the South or Midwest in the 1840s, catawampus means confused or diagonal. It could stem from kitty (or catty-)-cornered.

discombobulate - First recorded in 1916 as discombobracate, then discomboobulate. They all mean exactly what they sound like: to confuse or upset.

d’oh – First known use by cartoon character Homer Simpson in 1993. Used to express sudden recognition of a foolish blunder or an ironic turn of events – hence Homer’s frequent use of it.

druthers - Derived from “would rather” (as in: “If I had my would-rathers, I’d been living in St. Kitts now.)

foofaraw - From the American West, a mutation of the Spanish fanfaron, meaning "show-off." Connotes a fuss about something insignificant or an excessive amount of decoration, hence foo-foo for frilly homey crafts involving lace and hot glue guns.

hornswoggle - First known appearance in 1829, aptly meaning "to trick or hoax."  Another one of those words that once heard or read you know the meaning.

lollapalooza – First known use 1896  meaning: an extraordinary thing, person, or event.

sockdolager - The product of a 19th-century fad to mix Latin roots with slang to create new, often silly, words. Partly derived from sock, "to punch," and possibly from doxology, "the end of a service".  Sockdolager may have been one of the last words Lincoln heard before he was assassinated. (assuming it was in Our American Cousins, the play he was attending, rather than some sort of snide warning from John Wilkes Booth.)

What is with these people on Facebook who have to put, “Keep a tissue handy, I’m still in TEARS,” thinking they will entice you to read their piece?  Or the other hyperbole-wranglers who cry, “This is hysterical!” when it’s patently not.  Why can’t more people be impeccable with their words and, to quote Lewis Carroll’s Cheshire Cat, “Say what you mean and mean what you say.”  

“No one saw THIS coming!” is another false claim to get you to watch their video    which invariably shows something quite normal and not all that unexpected taking place and could be pretty much predicted by a child. While we’re on the subject, if you have a loved one serving in the military and you’re invited out onto the ice at a hockey game, or onto the field at a baseball/football game, chances are pretty good said loved one will come up behind you dressed as the team mascot to surprise you because they got home a few weeks early.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for reuniting families with loved ones (especially those who had been in potentially dangerous locales) and can get as sappy and teary eyed as the next person, but would appreciate not being patronized with hyperbole and false claims.

When a headline on Facebook or Twitter contains the words obliterates, devastates, destroys, etc., I’m guessing none of those things happened and will make a mental note to avoid that poster.

Another beef with some social media posters – and they’re generally of the female persuasion – why must they feel the compunction to share with us their glee each time their ‘hubs’ or ‘DH’ (dear husband) brings them a cup of coffee, tea, wine, chocolate, etc.?   We get it.  You’ve got a husband (allegedly) who dotes on you (allegedly) and you’re delighted with that fact (alleged fact).  Notice that men manage to refrain from that form of bragging.  I can’t recall seeing, “The wife just brought me a [fill in the blank] beer, coffee, beef jerky.”   [God knows they can and do brag about plenty of other things that are just as boring, but rarely the aforementioned doting spouse trope.]

The penultimate social media oversharer is the tweeter or FBer who feels the need to keep their friends/followers up to date on their every move.  The ones on vacation truly mystify and irk me. 

“Here we are on the [fill in the blank: plane, train, boat, cruise ship, catamaran, International Space Station – now, the latter would admittedly be impressive, but still].” 

“Here we are arriving in [fill in the blank: Vegas, Maine, London, Paris, the Mekong Delta, Tahiti.” 

“Here we are [fill in the blank: water skiing, hang gliding, zip lining, bungee jumping, wrestling rabid wildebeests, playing volley ball on a nude beach.”

Wherever you’ve gone, whatever you’re doing there, and with whomever you’ve gone there with – we don’t care.  Honestly.  Go.  Have fun.  Enjoy.  Tell us about it when you get back.  We really don’t need a blow-by-blow description of your travels.  Seriously.  How about you live in the moment and experience your own vacation while it’s happening?   While we’re relieved not to have to sit and watch a hundred slides of your trip as in days of yore, likewise, we do not want to see multi images of you on social media wrestling rabid wildebeests on the International Space Station.

One final complaint.  [It’s my birthday, I’m allowed.]

I think a brief revisit is in order re: the excessive overuse of the word hero. [You know my feelings on this.] According to social media, as well as the regular media, nearly everyone and their granny is a hero.  A cop who helps little baby ducklings from a rain grate and reunites them with their anxious mother does not a hero make.  If said officer climbed down into a putrid alligator-infested sewer pit to rescue the fluffy little critters, that’d be a different story.

And while it’s more than commendable for children to fork over their lemonade stand profits to a charity or worthy cause, this act alone does not constitute the stature of hero.  They are good deed doers who will hopefully carry that generosity of heart with them throughout the remainder of their lives. There is a vast difference between making of monetary donation to a cause you endorse and diving on a live grenade to save your colleagues, or entering a burning building to rescue a person or animal, especially if they are strangers.

It’s exhibiting courage and bravery, risking life and limb, to save someone else – be they human or animal – that makes a hero, not just someone who has done ‘the right thing’.  It’s a sad state of affairs that too few people are ‘doing the right thing’, so that when someone does, they are elevated to hero status.

Watch this space – where next time we’ll chat about the 1960 Pulitzer Prize winning novel ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ which I feel was highly overrated, and why its sequel ‘Go Set a Watchman’(which was actually written first but lay hidden for 55 years beneath some other papers in a safe deposit box, allegedly), and portends to depict Atticus Finch* not as an open-minded caring person, but as a racist who has attended a KKK meeting and rails against desegregation. At a time when so many racial atrocities are happening it could appear to some that author Harper Lee and her ‘people’ have decided to release this second volume now feeling it could be quite profitable. 

One can only have concern for the 89-year old Ms. Lee who, by all appearances, seemed content to live a quiet life off the royalties of her first (and until now, her only) book. Word has it she lived rather simply, even frugally by the looks of her self-inflicted haircut.  It gives one pause to hear Ms. Lee’s attorney and trustee of her estate, Tonja Carter, hint there may even be a third recently uncovered novel bridging the two.  Can I get an Amen and a Halleluiah?

Writers are cautioned not to begin their story with the protagonist waking up, especially from a dream.  I try to adhere to that caution.  However, real life is something different.  Sometimes, in those moments on the precipice of waking or dozing, thoughts, ideas, snippets, or simply a name come to me.  Short of whipping off the covers and leaping out of bed to scribble the thought, idea, snippet, or name, I’ll let it play in a loop, round and round in my head as I begin to tinker with it, see where it leads.  Is it something to include in my work in progress or something to be filed away for the next project?  Only time will tell.

The other morning it was just the one word, Ozymandias.  Lovely word, that.  I knew I knew it, just had to place it.  Turns out – as you probably may recall from your school days – it’s the title of one of Percy Bysshe Shelley’s sonnets.  A spiffy poem he wrote about a statue in ruins of Rameses II.  It rhymes in accordance with the strict guidelines of a sonnet and I like that.  While it doesn’t have to rhyme in a sing-song-y way like Edward Lear’s The Owl and the Pussycat, I do like poetry to rhyme here and there.  Otherwise it’s just prose, no?   

The title of my recently released paperback Death at the Drive-In (available on Amazon.com) (shameful product placement) came to me in one of those drowsy moments of pre-awakeness.  It was definitely a catchy title – and I say that in a non-braggy way because it was just there, fully formed and begging for a novel to be written around it.  And so I complied.  One likes to comply with the Universe, especially when it so nicely lays something spiffy in ones lap.  I’ve even woken to some of my characters exchanging dialogue that later found a place in one of my novels.  It’s like pennies from heaven, these gifts bestowed in the semi-slumber moments, generally the lucky ones with heads on both sides.

I don’t like Jazz.  There, I said it.  I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with Jazz, and I’m certainly not saying those who enjoy it are pretentious, maladjusted, drug-addled ne’er do wells.  I just don’t like the way the musicians begin at relatively the same time, then sort of wander off doing their own thing and not in a drum or guitar solo sort of way we’re accustomed to and that can be tedious at best when over indulged, but in a free-for-all, hodge-podge, discordant mélange of noise that can sometimes build to a frenetic peak that almost makes you want to jump out of your skin, and then they seem to realize they’ve run too far afield and manage to get back on track to end at approximately the same time.  The only thing worse than Jazz is scat singing; that singing with nonsense syllables usually to an instrumental accompaniment sung by the likes of Ella Fitzgerald and Mel Torme.  You know you’ve entered one of the Circles of Hell (somewhere between Limbo and Lust, I believe) when the Jazz begins and the scat singing commences.  At the first few bars of “A Tisket, A Tasket, A Green and Yellow Basket”, hike your skirts and leg it for the comfort of a cozy spot where you can listen to a soothing Beatles, Blur or Billy Joel song that has real words.  

For the most part, gone are the days when you’d be classified a social pariah for wearing white shoes after Labor Day. Perhaps if you’re from old money, reside in Connecticut, and speak as if you’ve got lock jaw, the white shoes/Labor Day thing persists in giving you the pip.  I’m not saying the Binky and Muffy’s of the world need to ‘get with the times’ or ‘choose their battles’ (you know how I detest clichés).  But there are more important things (in my opinion) than the choice of foot wear in early September.

And one of those important things is to make a concerted effort to not sound ignorant.  A lofty goal some might say.  Perception is everything, some say, and one way in which we can try to sound intelligent if by making the effort to speak properly.  I realize for some it’s a massive endeavor, a Herculean feat even, but let’s give it a try, shall we?

In our defense, we are the result of the metaphorical melting pot of accents and dialects.  Perhaps the pot needs the lid removed, the heat reduced to a simmer and  some sturdier stirring to get those stuck bits off the bottom.  Perhaps too much seasoning’s been added – alluding to texting and tweeting and permitting a little device to ‘auto-correct’ us when some of us wouldn’t know if we’d been incorrect to begin with.

Look, we are all judged and judge and if we say we don’t, we’re liars or up for canonization.  (As a side note: hearing much talk recently about a certain female who held a pretty impressive position in a political organization in which she was passing as black until being outed by her own parents for being white.  Rather than calling her a liar or saying she was lying, I heard many people – both pundits on race relations as well as some of her family members – say she spoke in ‘untruths’ and was ‘less than honest’.  Now, I like a nuance as much as the next person, but come on. Is it now unPC to say someone’s a liar or is or has been lying?  We are judged for all the obvious reasons: bad hair day, no hair day, wearing high-water pants when not in Brooklyn’s hipster areas, excessive facial piercings or not enough facial piercings – depends upon which side of that coin you’re on, too tall, too short, too fat, too thin., wrong religion, wrong ethnicity, wrong political party, and on it goes.

So, let’s face it.  The playing field will never be leveled in our lifetime.  But rather than throw our hands in the air and surrender, we can try to lessen the judging by making the effort to speak better.  Most of us have verbal quirks.  Some are cute and kind of endearing.  Others not so much.

I knew a man who said he ‘was raped over the coals’ in some business deal gone awry.  My natural instinct was to correct him and say, ‘raked’ but he was a misogynist and I figured he said it to provoke outrage.  I felt ignoring him was better. 

With that in mind, here are just a few of the myriad words that are misused or mispronounced that tend to make the speaker sound less than scholarly:

Aks – instead of ask.  This is what we in the word biz like to refer to as a dyslexic mispronunciation (caused by switching the order of the letters).  Having spent most of my life in New York, I thought aks was a New York thing but since I haven’t had the opportunity to spend most of my life in the other 49 states, I’ll have to take my word for it.

Drug vs. dragged – as in “I drug that dead body into the woods.’   This tends to be a Southern thing but we all know how easy it is for slang to become pervasive and creep north, east and westward.  A drug is something one gets at the pharmacy or from that shifty co-worker who always has the munchies or is always wiping their nose and blaming it on allergies.  Whereas dragged is the verb you’re looking for to convey the fact that you lugged that dead body into the woods.

Duck tape – it is neither made from ducks, nor intended to be used on them. It is duct tape – to be used on air ducts and the like.

Expresso vs.  Espresso - We all know it’s espresso so just stop saying expresso.

Heighth – this one’s been around for decades (if not longer).  The correct pronunciation/spelling is height.  It is probably being confused with width.  It seems to be a favorite among TV color commentators (a sports commentator who assists the play-by-play announcer, often by filling in any time when play is not in progress.  [Weren’t they simply called TV commentators before the advent of color television?  Can’t the ‘color’ bit be dropped now after half a century of use?]  You can hear heighth being used with not a little frequency at the Olympics and other sporting events referencing the impressive heighth the athlete has achieved in the high jump, etc.  Even anchorpersons and TV hosts use the word.  Don’t they all have those ear pieces where the producers tell them things?  Why aren’t these producers telling them to STOP saying heighth?!

For all intensive purposes is another one that seems to trip some people up.  Now, your purposes may be quite intense, but you mean to say: for all intents and purposes.

Irregardless  - The less at the end says without, so no need to repeat the same sentiment with ir at the beginning.  It’s just plain old regardless.

Snuck – no such word as snuck. Don’t say, ‘We snuck into the movie.”  You ‘sneaked into the movie’ (and should be ashamed of yourself).

Yoke vs. Yolk – Yoke is the wooden frame connecting two animals – generally oxen – to work together.  Yolk is the yellow gelatinous bit of over-easy egg built for dipping toast.

Some of these mispronunciations are due to regional dialects.  Some to laziness.  If you can’t differentiate between the correct pronunciation, chances are you’ll misspell the word as well giving you a bonus point in the dopey column.  Memorization may be your last and best resort.

Now, it would be harsh to simply label those who mispronounce as stupid.  They’re just less concerned with words and how they are perceived by others and probably feel no compunction to cease wearing white shoes even in December.

Watch this space where perhaps next time we’ll discuss redundant words such as: Luxury Yacht .

It’s good to be back.  Not in an over-the-top Jack Nicholson crazy-assed-axing-a-bathroom-door- in-The-Shining sort of way.   Just in a sort of Ah-yes-about-time-to-get-back-to-the-blog kind of way.  Not that I really was anywhere else.  As previously mentioned, I was not mug-shotted and handed a figure-flattering orange jumpsuit and answerable to The Man.  No.  But now I da Man.  Well, in a way. 

Right.  In a past blog I vocalized the irksomeness of languid talkers – those whose voice boxes sound as though they’re suffering from Epstein-Barr Syndrome and can’t drum up the energy for even a cheery ‘hi’.  I would blame the Kardashians for bringing to bear this prevailing blight on the ear drums but I eschew giving them credit for anything.  Are quaaludes making a comeback? Is that what’s causing this vocal lethargy?  Stop the ‘ludes and knock back a couple of Red Bulls, for God’s sake.

Moving along.  I am here today to talk about up talkers.  Uptalking is the annoying habit – and it is a habit – and a habit which needs to be broken - as the French would say, ‘tout de suite’[pronounced: toot sweet].  Which translates to: immediately.  Uptalking is related to Valleygirl speak but in a third cousin twice removed sort of way. And whereas few males used Valleygirl speak – generally the festive ones - statistics show more males are embracing uptalking .  And it’s not relegated to Southern California.  I am distressed to say some of the males who have taken uptalking to their ersatz bosom are well educated journalists who regularly speak on NPR.

Radio, as we all know, is an auditory medium.  We, the listeners, cannot be distracted by the attractiveness or lack thereof of the speaker or spiffy graphics that swirl about in the background.  All we’ve got are the words.  And the words are rising in timbre. And not just at the end of sentences that harbor a question mark.  It sometimes seems as if every 3rd or 4th word is emphasized in a quizzical tone which undermines the intelligence of the speaker and affixes that (perhaps unfair) label of airhead.

When exactly this uptalking began to infiltrate the lexicon, I don’t know.  I wonder is it an American anomaly or is it prevalent in France, Germany, Italy, Ukraine, etc., and what the non-uptalkers there make of it.  Should the funding be made available, I would venture to investigate further.  On the up side (no pun intended), we do know that it’s a phase and will and should peter out of the vernacular before 2020 – or so the experts tell us (and by experts I mean me).  After all, Valleygirl speak was popular (and by popular I mean it was spoken but also mocked) in the early 80’s.  [Frank Zappa’s Valley Girl song came out in 1982.] By my calculations, if a Valleygirl speaker was 15 in 1980, then she was born in 1965.  She’d be 50 years old now and would look pretty strange if she hadn’t dropped the Valleygirl speak before menopause struck . [“So, like, I’ve been getting these gnarly hot flashes…”]

I’m not certain if uptalking is a syndrome or disorder of sorts but it is definitely something that needs squelching, and fast.  Fear not, there’s no need for hokey telethons with D-list performers singing and tap dancing while 800 numbers flash across the bottom of your screen.  The cure doesn’t cost a dime.  It’s totally free.

Some of you may know I was a reluctant reader until around sixth grade. Then, as P.G. Wodehouse would say, ‘the scales fell from my eyes’ and I was off and running.  However, until that time, while I enjoyed school for the most part, standing and reading aloud in class gave me the willies. 

This unease was most likely based on my fear of coming across an unfamiliar word that would cause me to stumble over its pronunciation which would set some of my classmates off in sniggers.  Two words in particular stick with me today – the name Penelope – which I had neither read nor heard until then and so I pronounced it: Pen-a-lope.  Apparently some of my classmates had heard the name and the sniggering commenced.  Woe is me when soon after that I came upon hyperbole and again, having never read or heard it before, I pronounced it: hyper-bole.  This was not met with another helping of sniggers as no one else in the class had heard it before.  Lucky reprieve there.

But I digress.  Uptalking.  Yes.  Spoiler alert: I was an early uptalker.  Afflicted with uptalking if you like (and this was pre-Valleygirl speak – always ahead of my time).  Just thinking about it and I am transported back to that classroom.  The smell of chalk, baloney sandwiches, and Dennis Jeffries (he was a bed wetter).  I can once again feel the brown paper bag cover on my reader, hear the crinkle of it as I pressed the splayed spine open and tried to scan ahead for that most dreaded of punctuation symbols  – the question mark.  Due to my lack of interest in reading up to that point, I had not acquired the knack of natural reading.  When I saw a question mark looming at the end of a sentence, I hitched my voice up a notch and read the entire sentence in a questioning manner rather than just at the end bit. 

Fortune smiled upon me as did my teacher, Miss Taccia.  She was one of those people born to teach and she reveled in it.  I recall her dark hued tulip-shaped skirts having splotches of white chalk down the right side where she’d wipe her hand after writing on the board.  It was with her patience and gentle guidance that I was able to grasp how the whole question mark/voice rising thing worked and I only raised the querying pitch of my voice at the proper spot.  Miss Taccia was an uptalker squelcher.

So, you may well ask, how can I (meaning you) [someone lacking the patience and caring of Miss Taccia] help to stamp out, eradicate, and put an end to this uptalking nonsense?

Fighting fire with fire is a technique worth utilizing.  If someone, male or female, begins to speak to you in uptalking, don’t just roll your eyes or clench your fists in submission, will yourself to be an auditory mirror for them to hear their irksome and misguided speech patterns.  But not a regular mirror, be a funhouse mirror.  Whip out your best Valleygirl speak for your response.  If they ask why you’re suddenly talking like that, if you like to avoid confrontations – and apparently you do if you haven’t mustered the courage to tell them to stop uptalking - you can be passive-aggressive and say you thought they were going for the Valleygirl speak but hadn’t quite gotten the hang of it.  But, if you’re strong and don’t care what people think of you, you can simply state that you are an uptalking squelcher and are performing this impromptu mini-intervention to hasten the end of their awkward phase. And though they may appear put off at first, they’ll thank you in the end. 

Two years is definitely a long time.  Why, it's in the neighborhood of 730 days, 104 weeks, or 24 months.  In any event, it's a crying shame to let two years slip by without addressing The Bloggerage and its myriad followers.  Mea culpa, mea culpa to you all, my lovelies.

So, what have I been doing in all that time, you may well ask.  And don't believe for one moment that I don't hear the catch in your collective voice, and perhaps the hint of haughty sarcasm.  It's the sting. The hurt. I know.  The pain of having been ignored, shunned as it were.  But fear not my lovelies, I never intended to abandon you - not for this long anyway.  It's not as if I said I was going out for a pack of cigarettes and never returned. 

But sometimes Life (yes, with a capital L) gets in the way and though our intentions are good and meritorious, like an old TV, technicalities beyond our control come along and adjust our rabbit ears.  No, I'm not subtly referring to a stint in the slammer, just ... things.  Let's move on, shall we?

The WIP I mentioned in a previous blog [Nooks & Grannies - that's the name of the book, not the name of a previous blog] has been completed and is currently being queried to agents looking for quirky, contemporary YA.   Am very happy with how it turned out and already kicking around ideas for the sequel.

A number of amusing short stories were also created in the 'away time'.  Oh, don't start fussing. I'm sorry I brought it up again.

I must pootle along now, things to do, don't you know.  But next time I will address those bloody up talkers.  And you know who you are.

Until then, be well, my lovelies.

Origin of ENNUI French, from Old French enui annoyance, from enuier to vex, from Late Latin inodiare to make loathsome — more at annoy.  First Known Use: 1732.

Give me the perky Valley Girl-speak any day.  That hyper excited way of conversing that let one's listeners know there was life going on.  Even if they were talking about shoes or handbags, they were animated; they were alive. Admittedly, hearing too much Valley Girl-speak could lead to a facial tic, but I miss it and would gladly embrace it should it care to make a comeback.

Unfortunately, this cheerful inflection seems to have fallen by the wayside and been replaced by this joyless, languid-seeming uber ennui voice.  You’ve heard it.  You know what I’m talking about.  It’s not unlike a rusty spade being dragged down a lonely tarmac road, syllables drawn out to emphasize the speaker's lethargy.  Or annoyance and vexation as the French felt was rife in 1732, warranting a new word to describe this ultra malaise of the mouth. What are these lazy talkers so tired about that they can't muster up the oomph it takes to converse in an upbeat, engaging manner?  

Surveys show the condition was once confined to the wealthy reality show ‘celebs’ but as insidious as these things can be, it has crossed over and is now plaguing the middle to upper classes.  (Though there are some members of the lower classes who have tried to adapt to this ennui-speak, but they’re generally too busy with work and school to maintain the stamina for the faux linguistics.) 

Why would anyone willingly choose to sound bored - which to me means they lack imagination and are unhappy with their situation.  Then why not get up and out and do something useful.  Get involved.  Find a diversion.  Get captivated.  If not for yourself, but for others.  Thinking outside the box that is you can be a real eye-opener.  Perhaps a fundraiser to find a cure for their anemic speak would be the ticket.

Watch this space where I will focus on the 'up' talkers.

'Some books are written to be swallowed like an oyster, barely chewed.' - French critic Roland Barthes.

I wish I'd said that.  Well, by quoting Mr. Barthes I am showing my solidarity to his words. 

NPR recently spoke about some schools paying students $2 for each book they read.  Scandalous!  And some students are opting for the thinnest books they can lay hands on in order to go through more of them and get their $2 bribery...er...reward that much quicker.  How heinous.

Recently on that wonderful site for writers - QueryTracker.net - a thread appeared with someone asking if those members who were students or were teachers knew if the skill of memorization was still employed in high school or college - of the Preamble to the US Constitution, or the Amendments to same, or Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, passages from Shakespeare or poems was still being 'taught'.  The answer was a resounding NO.  [They would, however, know of Lincoln  because of his vampire slaying.]

A QT member posted that her daughter was not required to memorize any bits of The Canterbury Tales but was assigned to create a Facebook page based on one of the characters in said book. 

We are veering into Paddy Chayefsy's Network territory here.  To quote Peter Finch's Howard Beale character, 'And woe is us! We're in a lot of trouble!'

What's going to happen to future generations who have gone from sounding like air-headed Valley Girls to the now humanoid entities whose batteries are running low - that nasal Kardashian whine with a slight rise at the end that hints at a question where none exists.  It makes the Valley Girls seem frenetic and semi-intelligent. 

Some schools are doing away with teaching cursive writing since the students do most of their work on laptops or tablets of one brand or another.  Gone to history will be the handwritten Thank You note, or the handwritten Condolence letter.  These future adults will be unable to spell since their vocabulary's are shrinking into acronyms and abbreviations in their texting - we're all familiar with LOL and BRB and it's understandable to incorporate brevity in emails and texting.  However, that need for micro-condensing has crept into their speech.  And in that winding down humanoid voice they now employ cannot muster up the strength to compete words: Details is now simply deets.  Totally has become totes.  Amazing has morphed into amaze.  And Vomiting is now vom.  That second syllable just too exhausting to spit out.

Three cheers for cerebration. Feed your reader's head. This dumbing-down nonsense is hurting everyone and creating a generation of imbeciles who couldn't diagram a sentence with a slide-rule and a crutch. Cry for those without shoes but weep for those who do not yearn to read and learn.

Kevin Spacey's production company, Trigger Street, has partnered with Jameson (Irish Whiskey distiller) to host a contest for 5-minute short film scripts - Jameson First Shot - Short Film Competition.  The extra spiffy thing is Willam Dafoe will be one of the judges and will star in the short film, and the writer of the winning script gets to direct it.  How cool would that be?  Saying 'Action!' and witnessing Willam Dafoe bring my character to life.  Oh joy, oh rapture!

They have three categories: Legendary, Humorous, and Tall Tale.   I opted for the middle option - Humorous.  Then I realized my script for GREETINGS FROM HELL! previously adapted from my novella was too long and I doubted I could condense it to 5-7 pages.  My brilliant daughter Kate suggested PINKIE a humorous 4-page short story I'd written a number of years back and was published in the now defunct Improper Hamptonian. 

I always find it a challenge to adapt a work of fiction of mine to script format.  All those lovely thoughts, musings, ponderings have to take a hike if they can't be reformatted to an action or dialogue.  It turned out well and after a few more tweakings, edits, and beta readings, I'll submit it.  *fingers crossed*