Oh Hi

important things not to forget, stuff that floors, instructs, or cracks me up

[thisthattheotherstuff]

What other color of flora would this spotted kitty vase fancy?

[some-dude-with-a-cat-blog]

@gnelliswriter @figsandnewtons Re: Death Star cafeteria workers, I give you the Death Star Canteen

[thisthattheotherstuff]

Oldie, goodie. “This one is wet, this one is wet . . . “

[thisthattheotherstuff]

[thisthattheotherstuff]

OMG, John Kennedy O’Toole

“Supercilious blue and yellow eyes”

“The green hunting cap emitting vomit among the ruins”

“Gas that had character and being and resented its confinement”

[thevaultoftheatomicspaceage]

[thisthattheotherstuff]

It's easy to look into your past and find meaning where none previously existed to attribute significance to the trivial. Revision and creation. More than anything, we want to be more than we are. When we delve into our minds, we are the authority. What's to keep us from blurring the lines a bit? In the end, we are the stories we tell.

Derek Hinckley, "List Maker" - Creative Nonfiction Winter 2014

[thisthattheotherstuff]

Hoot hoot

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Going Under is the story of a bright, home-schooled brother-sister pair who struggle with their love and resentment for one another, under the hapless gaze of their clueless parents. Hilly, the sister, got involved in the local high-school’s paper and made her first outside-world friends, one...

[thisthattheotherstuff]

2015 reading

[thisthattheotherstuff]

I sat with my hand on the deer. The sky was ice clear, and the voiceless stars stared at me.

Fritz Swanson, "The Long Hart's Long Life" - Creative Nonfiction Winter 2014

[thisthattheotherstuff]

I correct or change words, but I can’t rewrite a scene or make a major change because there’s a sense then of someone looking over my shoulder. It’s necessary, anyway, to trust that moment when you were sure at last you had done all you could, done your best for that time. When it’s finally in print, you’re delivered—you don’t ever have to look at it again. It’s too late to worry about its failings. I’ll have to apply any lessons this book has taught me toward writing the next one.

Eudora Welty, Paris Review - The Art of Fiction No. 47

[thisthattheotherstuff]

I am not a writer first. I have a family, and without them I would have little reason to want to write -- or to do anything else. My desire to create is held in silence during the day, so that my literary moments can be focused and absolute.

Nick Ripatrazone, The Millions article Gestation of Ideas: On Vertical Writing and Living

[thisthattheotherstuff]

For the husband who says, "Go read a book. I've got this," I give thanks.

[thisthattheotherstuff]

A potato-peeling, lettuce-washing mate is more precious than rubies and pearls.

[thisthattheotherstuff]

Love: Playing Awful Candyland One More Time

"How are you being called to big love today? ...Paul, in Philippians, asks the church to abound more and more in love. What is more to you? More love-that only God can grow in the stagnant crevices of your living and loving? Is it preparing the meal, kissing the man, snuggling the baby, playing the awful Candyland one more time? How is God calling you beyond your felt comfort and into the strength of His big love in little moments?" -from Mundane Faithfulness

Kissing the man. 

[thisthattheotherstuff]

Like a speech disfluency—I stammer—autism isn't a disease but an architectural/electronic feature of your brain.

David Mitchell, interview, Asymptote

[thisthattheotherstuff]

Wrong versions become the scaffolding that you use to build the novel.

David Mitchell, on writing The Bone Clocks, NY Times interview

[intothegreatunknown]

Grinnell Lake | Glacier National Park, Montana, USA (by still.not.making.sense.)

[thisthattheotherstuff]

Just. Wow.