Sherman Alexie, last night, referred to Seattle as "a town of readers." He was also telling self-deprecating stories about how wherever he goes he runs into people who have read his books � and this is a comment on his skill as a public speaker, that he can make being that kind of a public figure into an occasion for self-deprecation � and I can�t figure out whether he did in fact mean to identify two separate phenomena. In case he did, this was interesting to me because my experience is so different; years ago, sometimes I�d only realize that my conversations with Crusty Steve had shifted into book-chat mode because we�d unconsciously have become furtive and insular, in the same manner as a cluster of nurses headed out the back door of the doctor�s office for a cigarette break. But Sherman Alexie, he should know what he�s talking about, right? And it occurred to me that maybe he�s correct about Seattle being a town of readers, it�s just that nobody is reading the same things I am and that Crusty Steve was. Do you suppose there might be anything to that? Hmm. During the question-and-answer session someone asked he what he liked to read, and he said mostly mysteries and poetry. It is true I do not read many of the former. In the car on the way home, Mary H. noted that he�d clearly meant it about the mysteries, he had rattled off maybe a dozen of his favorite authors without even pausing to think (notable omission: Tony Hillerman), and then I realized that he didn�t seem to have brought the same level of zeal to the poetry side of things, all his favorites were the heavy hitters of intro-level anthologies, Frost and Whitman and Dickinson. I mean, he�d tried harder to discover new mystery writers than he had new poets. As inconsequential as the fact was, it felt cool to have sussed out something like that, to have put Sherman Alexie under a microscope and to believe that we had seen something. Then we got on the subject � it�s a long haul back from Green River Community College � of the extent to which what Alexie said was true, Best of all I like to read mystery novels and poetry versus the extent to which that is what he wanted us to think of us, i.e., to which he wanted us to see him as someone who preferred the m. and the p., whatever that "someone" meant to each of us. It�s fun to think about: what do you say when someone asks you what you like to read? If you are like most people, you don�t stick to one genre exclusively or even to two or three, yet when you�re put on the spot, you�ll come up with the politely reductive thing to say, and why is it that you say that particular thing? It is probably a combination, partly unconscious, of wanting-to-seem-like and not-wanting-to-seem-like. As we were talking, for example, I realized that I read a lot of reference books, on subjects like film and anatomy and etymology. I love them and own shelves full, but it would never cross my mind to answer "So what do you like to read?" with "Reference books" � no way! I have enough trouble and not enough success keeping the librarian image at bay; can you imagine the damage I�d do if I copped to reading encyclopedias? As we used to say in high school, dat would be a good one. We all have an image to protect, whatever our individual ideas are of image and protection, and every so often I think it�s good to be aware that the process is constant. We may be hard-wired not to turn it off. It wasn�t until this morning that I wondered what someone who pretends not to read at all is protecting, what is to be desired about that kind of seeming. I don�t know.

3 pm and, mercifully, Kathleen�s foulness only lingers in the air. She hovered over me for a full half an hour, wringing her hands over the tragedy of leaving such an ineptus as I sitting on her throne of adminstrivia, giving me last minute cram sessions on Outlook and voice mail. She shoved folders of correspondence at me and expressed poignant despair that these months-drawn-out bureaucratic snafus are now out of her hands. What do you bet I can have everything fully under control by Monday afternoon? Today I decided that it would be my agenda to kill her with kindness, and every time she snapped at me I thanked her for her patience. I didn�t get roped into her complaining, just sat there smiling, and whenever she said something snotty about someone I found an excuse to have friendly chatty conversation with that person as soon as possible. It�s weird, I don�t think anyone else in the office knows she�s insane, over lemon tart they seemed sorry to see her go, and other people dropped by the office because they knew it was her last day. And she truly is insane, I�ve decided. This morning she was showing me the correspondence files and without thinking I said something to the effect of, This is hilarious, I can�t believe there are still offices where you�re supposed to print all the e-mail you receive. Kathleen drew back a little and spat, "WELL, Mister Cracker�" "*What*?" I interrupted, laughing, again without thinking, at her silly non sequitur, and then I saw that the laughing had been a mistake, because she started stammering something about a nickname, then gave me a death-ray look and stomped out of the office. Also she seemed angry today on account of how complimented my outfit has been. (Black and brown and gold patterned pajama-top-looking silk shirt, brown velvet Sonja Henie skirt, tights with subtle vertical stripes in shades of brown and black, and the black boots. I was tired this morning, and it was one of those days when looking better equals feeling better and looking this good made me feel great.) Twice I caught her looking at my legs and tsk-tsking in such an obvious way that I was obviously supposed to notice and obviously supposed to be hurt, but I didn�t take the bait, and it was her own bad luck first of all that whenever one of the nurses or admin staff or an office visitor was making a fuss over my fashion sense she happened to be lurking right around the corner in what second of all was a rather less fly ensemble of stained and wrinkled dirty cardigan over a t-shirt that featured a sequined American flag. What a nasty, nasty person. Ugh. It�s the doctor I�m mainly assisting to whom her devotion was particularly slavish, and in his absent-minded, too-busy-for-expense-reports way it�s possible he may not ever have noticed that she�s a harridan. I mean, the work she did for him got done; if my hypothesis is true, then he didn�t notice her sighing martyrdom either. He is concerned that without her his office will spiral into entropy, but I bet that�s because she told him it would. Little does he know. Starting Monday, it is my mission to overwhelm him with unostentatious competence and assistantship without bitterness! Which of course will also make him want to keep me around. Good riddance, Kathleen, you fuckwit.

Tonight from here I head straight for the Sunset, where I am going to booze a little and bowl a lot with the Pennsylvania Mafia and Cheryl and Mary H. Tomorrow I have to get some mail out, pick up my tax forms at H & R Block, go shopping with Art for his new glasses frames and perhaps think about a new look in eyewear for me too, go to the tattoo joint and show them Popeye�s sketch and make sure they can make my Sunday, decide on a menu for vegan dinner with Jeanne and shop and cook, and then host her for "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg" � oh, and tidy up a bit before she comes over, because I want Jeanne to like my house and to see that I am living in it well � and, like I said, if the evening winds down early I might hit the I-Spy solo. So you see what I mean about being busy. Sunday it�s the tattoo with Vanessa and then, schedule permitting, bloody Marys at Septieme. I have to say, I love the idea of getting tattooed on the Lord�s day (sorry, Catharine). Knee�s feeling better, so maybe Sunday early I can go for a run and build up some endorphins before I go under the needle. Or does it not work like that?

Oh oh, it is getting late so I will have to run through this part quickly, but I am sure we will return to it. Late last week I decided that since I had so much time on my hands and was starving for a project anyway, I was absolutely going to apply to the MFA program at the UW for next fall and that, goddammit, I was going to get in. When I checked the web site and saw that I only had until January to get portfolio and letters and whatever together � why did I think it was March? � I wavered but only for a moment, because, let�s be reasonable, I�m enough of a writer to churn out a solid 20-page short story in two months� time while also studying like a champ for the GRE, am I not? (I am.) But then I called the MFA program�s advising center, and in two conversations with the staff there, I found out that no matter how good my portfolio was and no matter how rapturous my letters of recommendation, I would basically be s.o.l. as a viable candidate because I am so old. The adviser said, "Well, since you�ve been out of school for so long, of course you will have been going to workshops and working closely with a writing mentor for a few years, really making that your priority." Um � of course I have? But isn�t the quality of the portfolio what�s decisive? I asked. It is important, she said, but we do need to make sure that the people we let in are serious about writing and have made a lifetime commitment to it, and that kind of work is a pretty good indicator of who will be successful here. Actually, when I first called, last Friday, this was so absurd to me that I didn�t think it could be the case. I assumed that this was an advising-center trainee or perhaps a drunk person, and I resolved to call back Monday and try to talk to someone different. Who, it turned out, was if anything even more bottom-liney about the mentor thing and as supportively as possible told me not to bother applying for this year since my rejection would be automatic. (Note: I didn�t take this personally! Progress!) So, fine. I�ll pay dues, I am not above that. I�ll play the game, because, really, the February deadline would have stressed me out, and if, ha ha, more than sporadic temp work did fall into my lap in the meantime, I�d be hosed. But it was wonderful to find out how much I wanted to apply, and maybe also to have the sense of wanting something. It had been a while. So now the plan is to spend the next year or so building up the application package they want me to have, stellar GRE scores and masterful short story and all the rest, and does anyone know how you go about finding a writing mentor who would be willing to work with me for free or cheap on a regular basis and then ratify me to the UW in January of 2004 and have that mean something? Do you suppose Sherman Alexie has a writer buddy who�s looking to help the less fortunate? I have to think about this over the next few weeks and formulate a plan. That�s a lie, I have to spend a few weeks steeling myself before I can face the sloppy careless spitty kiss of a workshop again, where presumably I will meet some people who have mentors already and can give me tips or maybe even potential mentors, not that I know what I�m looking for but sometimes you just have to jump in. Oh god, a workshop. I�m cringing already. But no! I have another mission, and that is the UW MFA program in a year and two months or bust. I mean it. Unless, between now and then, I decide that I�m good enough to apply to better programs and follow through with that and then manage to get into one. But maybe we should take things one day at a time here. Anyway, that�s the plan.

Do you remember those cds my sister sent me that I got about a week ago? When I talked to her on Wednesday, I told her that I hadn�t listened to them yet but that was because they would probably make me cry, and I wanted to wait until I could do my blubbering in private. The past few days I�ve been feeling tuff, so this morning I grabbed them for the commute to gastro, and I don�t know how she kept from snickering when we had that conversation, because one of the first songs on the first one is "It�ll Probably Make Me Cry" by Mary�s Danish. Mary�s psychic. Other highlights include Matthew Sweet�s "Over It" and Tori Amos covering "Real Men." I didn�t cry.

It�s good. I�m doing well. I�m OK.