The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress

Alexandra Wolfe

Did You Know?

Posted by Alex | March 8, 2010

In her spare time, Alexandra is a dinoflagellate otherwise known as, Alexandrium Fundyense.

Her hobbies include swimming near the surface of various oceans, drifting with the tides, and joining with her fellow flagellates to create the occasional toxic blooms called: Red Tides. She is a phytoplankton, which means she is often seen sunbathing in the nude.

As a flagellate, Alexandra prefers to reproduce asexually, through binary fission.

For more information about Alex and her fellow flagellates, check out the Encyclopedia of Life.

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Lists

Posted by Alex | March 2, 2010

Today’s checklist

• Laundry started: check!
• Plants watered: check!
• Cremation planned: check!

What? You want to know who I’m cremating? Well, it isn’t so much who as no one in the family has died. It’s more a case of what. Three and a half dead rats, to be exact. The rat lady (lady?) was here not an hour earlier rooting out the decaying and well festering remains of three and half rats…and yes, you read right, there was a half eating body also recovered from the crawl space beneath our bath tub.

Did Buddy really gnaw down on his pal, Charlie? We’ll never know.

And heaven alone knows where the other bodies are located (as I don’t) but I sure as hell can just about pinpoint them by smell alone! Dang! How long does it take for a rat to decompose? Because, I tell you, that heinous sour smell is driving me crazy.

Looks like I’ll be spending the afternoon at the coffee shop.

{ Filed Under idyll vices | 2 Comments }

Quote, Unquote

Posted by Alex | February 24, 2010

“Stories are built with words the way a house is built of bricks, but an accumulation of words is no more of a story, than a pile of bricks is a house.” — de Wolfe

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Rules For Writing Fiction

Posted by Alex | February 23, 2010

If you haven’t already discovered this one for yourself, or stumbled on it while surfing over at the UK’s Guardian online, check out: TEN RULE FOR WRITING FICTION.

Not only is it a must-read, but there are some hilarious observations from some literary greats in there, like— Elmore Leonard: Using adverbs is a mortal sin.

Another good one from Roddy Doyle is— Do not search amazon.co.uk for the book you haven’t written yet.

And my favourite from Helen Simpson— The nearest I have to a rule is a Post-it on the wall in front of my desk saying “Faire et se taire” (Flaubert), which I translate for myself as “Shut up and get on with it.”

Oh, and watch out for Margaret Atwood and her pencils, she’ll sharpen them on anything.

{ Filed Under On Writing, Words & Language | 2 Comments }

Where Do You Do It?

Posted by Alex | February 18, 2010

Come on, people, I want to know. Where do you do it?

Do you do it at breakfast, or over the dinner table when alone, how about in bed or even in the bath? And would you consider doing it in the shower? Have you done it while stirring the pasta sauce, or maybe leaning up against the kitchen cabinets? Or how about with your back up against the radiator while sat on the floor? Is your thing to do it while riding the bus, the tube, or sitting in the back seat of a taxi? Maybe you’re the kind who sneaks off to the bathroom, to do it in secret, while at work?

Or maybe, you’re the kind of person who prefers to do it on the sofa, in the privacy of your own home?

What the hell, I hear you asking, am I talking about?

Why, reading, of course, what did you think I was talking about?

So tell me, where do you do it?

{ Filed Under idyll vices | 8 Comments }
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