Repurposing

I'm genuinely surprised at the blankness that reigns inside my head, now that I've set myself a task as deceptively simple as blogging even once a day. It's a little mortifying...and, yes, has kept me on tenterhooks regarding NaNo, to the point where now I know I've fallen too far behind and can't bring myself to try. I'm seduced by the notion of it, the experience of everybody in their coffeehouses and dens and Denny's...es, being creative...but my fiction-mind is pointedly staring out the window, away, sourly adolescent, god just shut up you are embarrassing me GOD.

So, instead, I'll shill other people's work today. Point one: the Sis has a collection of paintings showing at Herkimer Coffee in Greenwood--where I'm actually sitting now, typing this. Bright blocky wee pictures of miniscule vintage cars (at this moment, a deep-blue VW Microbus hangs directly over my head). Check it out.

Two: this obituary for the store cat, Fup, at Powell's Books in Portland, Oregon (via mimi smartypants). I'm not being at all facetious when I say that it's one of the better examples of a good memorial essay I've read: it really gets to the core of who Fup was as a...cat. Diligent in her work, with a demonstrated fondness of tandoori chicken and a streak of temper--she was not above biting her colleagues if she found them irksome, it seems. I love that they've included that aspect of her character, somehow; it makes the entire portrait well-rounded and moving, at least to me. I only hope to be as fairly and fondly remembered when I slough off this particular incarnation, whenever that comes.