Archive for the 'Mary Hamilton' Category

PHEW

Published on December 28, 2011 in Mary Hamilton and Todd Zuniga. 2 Comments

We made it through the major color-driven holidays. Good work, everyone. I used to get very depressed during Christmas — twelve screaming fights, eleven morning cocktails, ten pounds of weight gain — before I decided to embrace the day, to go all out even: buying a tree, hanging a wreath on my sad apartment door, playing the hell out of Pandora’s “Christmas Jazz” station, having lots of people over the day-of for breakfast, lunch and dinner. It’s maybe one of the more annoying things I do, but it helps me get through the end of the year.

HOSTESSING OUT OF CONTROL

(Mary Hamilton made the dress above. She made it!) My parents were in town for the week and we got to explore Silver Lake and Griffith Observatory. They also helped me out (with Mary and Todd) with a cold-read of a pilot I’m working on, and now I have the forever-memory of my mom saying “Hotties aplenty, dude,” which is maybe the best line of dialogue I’ve ever written or will ever write, past or future. Just give me the award now. The Dialogue Award.

All that holiday cheer is tiresome, even when it’s self-sustaining. I haven’t ventured into my office yet, choosing instead to stay in bed like I’m still on vacation and I just like answering work email for funsies.

I hope you had a lovely holiday, or if you didn’t have a lovely holiday, that at least it’s over now and hey it’s almost New Years, the holiday that sneaks up on us all and is a fun party, with kissing.

THE SCENE

Published on November 14, 2011 in J Ryan Stradal and Mary Hamilton. 2 Comments

People have been asking how the literary scene looks here in L.A. If this past week was any indication, it’s pretty sweet. Here are some mini-reviews of the shows I got to see over the past five days:

THE ENCYCLOPEDIA SHOW

In only their second episode, this reading series has the makings of a local institution. Caitlin Parrish delivered an excellent monologue at the opening, and every reader (including my dear friend Mary Hamilton) delivered unique, touching, funny pieces. Michael Roberts’s piece on Astronaut Michael Collins was a standout. I’m looking forward to seeing how this show will evolve, with local connections in film, acting, stage writing, etc etc. For now, it was nice to see a show that has its roots in Chicago and Austin — made me feel less homesick.

THE NERVOUS BREAKDOWN @ BOOK SOUP

This was my first chance to check out Book Soup, a great bookstore in West Hollywood. My friend J. Ryan and I made the rounds of the store before the reading started and found new offerings from presses small and large. I picked up the crazy/wonderful If ‘n’ Oof, which is shaping up to be my favorite graphic novel of 2011. The reading itself was good, strong writing all around. My favorite was a Ben Loory story about dads. Greg Olear was a new discovery that I immediately loved. More writing about dads, read very well. Afterwards, my pals and I went to Chik-fil-A and ate nuggets and that was cool.

TONGUE & GROOVE @ THE HOTEL CAFE

This was last night’s offering, at a dim quiet bar that made for the perfect venue. Everyone was good and my favorite was John Jodzio, who I had no idea writes these screamingly funny/absurd short stories. Both my companions snapped up his book Get In If You Want To Live. After the reading, we went out for tacos and I finally had lengua and it was great, as promised. I tongue-kissed the taco. That’s enough.

This week I’m going to try and make it to the Dagoberto Gilb reading downtown (I only just heard about this one, need to find a listing for it). It’s fun to live in a big city! I’m missing friends back home in Austin a lot, though. Need to figure out that tesseract trick so I can squish both cities together in four-dimensional space or whatever.

WEST COAST: BEST COAST?

Published on August 22, 2011 in Angeline Gragasin, carson daly's beautiful blue eyes, J Ryan Stradal, Mary Hamilton, my girl lesley and Nick Antosca. 2 Comments

Los Angeles. Last year I was refusing to drive its highways, and now I’m here in Texas missing the feeling of smog on my teeth.

I was happy to catch up with J Ryan Stradal (lunch meeting turned into three hours of conversation), Nick Antosca (gainful employment has not spoiled his charm), Mary Hamilton (blooming like a bloom in that ocean air), Angeline Gragasin (energy soulmate and queen of collaboration) and Johnny Anthony (working with a focus I’ve never seen). Different people and different goals with the common bond of tenacity, ambition and talent. I felt so glad to spend time.

Home again. We’re looking at another 10 days of 100+ temps, not a cloud in sight. School’s starting and the college kids are getting their youth stink all over my haunts. My girl Lesley got a gym membership and I’m teaching her good squat form. My body bleeds iced tea.

LITERATURE

Please see a review by Laura Owen of a review of Museum of the Weird from Gulf Coast. Sorry about not trying too hard on the sentence structure there. Thank you Laura, and further thanks to Gulf Coast reviewer Dane A. Wisher.

I’m finishing a good long story and working through edits on a shorter one that is set to appear at some point in McSweeney’s.

Advising Lesley’s niece Rhi on dance class: “You never know when you’re gonna need to know how to waltz.”

NO PERCH

Published on August 18, 2011 in Angeline Gragasin, Cool, Mary Hamilton, moovees and THREATS. 1 Comment

Check out some stills from some short videos Mary Hamilton and I shot for No Perch, a reading series putting writers in strange places (“outdoors”):

That’s Angeline Gragasin making her personal perch on the back of a moped and Aaron Plasek in the superstar helmet.

VISITORS

Published on June 28, 2011 in Mary Hamilton, road trip soundtrack and Zach Dodson. 3 Comments

Friends Mary and Zach came to town for a few days of fun. Mary is moving to LA and needed a place to put her cats up. We ate breakfast tacos and scones and Mary held my hand and repaired my glasses. I made them each a smoothie with bananas and guava and crushed nilla wafers for their trip out of town.

patron saint of burritos

I’ve been feeling a bit down lately. Today I ran on a treadmill while watching a television show featuring a bear in a cage. I watched the bear walking back and forth in its cage and thought to myself, Does that bear shit in the woods? (By “lately” I mean “for the past seventeen years.”) Oh, but then I found a nice blog and it cheered me. I’m gonna turn slacks into shorts in her honor.

Soon, I’ll take a trip to Albuquerque with my girl Lesley. She just texted to say that the DQ has mini-size now so we can do cool treats on the hour. Things are looking up.

AWPED

Published on February 7, 2011 in Adam Robinson, dream, Jac Motherfucking Jemc, Lindsay Hunter, Mary Hamilton, Readings, real talk, Sasha Fletcher, ugh up with people, Zach Dodson and zombies. 12 Comments

SUCH BEAUTY.

My favorite parts of AWP included but were not limited to reading at the zoo (stories by Mike and Tim were highlights), reading at the literature party (holy crowd), then putting on my flats and dancing (always dance when the DJ brings groupies), sitting next to Jamie at the JMWW reading and hearing his good news, feeling like I was in many warm rooms with people I love both personally and professionally, saying hello to folks from FC2 and hearing their work, having a great meeting with Emily about the book, hangouts with old friends Tom and Charlie and new friend Amina, getting to know a few very kind and solicitous District residents (though what’s up with your waitresses, really), and seeing old friends from acronyms ASU and TSU and experiencing major hugs with my girls Mary and Lindsay and Jac and Sarah and Wolfe and seeing but not spending enough time seeing Zach and Aaron and Elizabeth and Matt and Gene and Jenny and Sasha and Molly and I missed doing some stuff and did some other stuff and found a cheese plate and there was simultaneously not enough time and far too much time with the cheese plate. Now I’m back home where it’s a temperature that properly sustains human life. As soon as I got back, my body put roots into the ground. I have eaten three tacos in two days and slept 12 hours. Good to see y’all. Back to work, y’all.

Let the sunshine in

Published on November 27, 2010 in baking, Burlesque, Mary Hamilton and ugh up with people. Closed

Dear friend Michael is in town. And so, a baking spree: cranberry bread, strawberry-rhubarb pie, pecan pie, sage-apple-pecan stuffing for yesterday. Butternut squash in the oven currently. We went to Bikram yoga and I sweated out a second Amelia onto my mat. I want more Bikram but it’s expensive. My thoughts are simple and food-related. A few weeks ago, dear friend Mary was in town. I made a lasagna. We wore wigs and went downtown. I miss her. Up with people.

[Pause to watch six minutes of Up With People's 1982 Super Bowl Halftime Show, while shaking asleep foot and wondering if maybe my mother watched this while 2 months pregnant with me and that's why I feel strange watching it, like I'm watching some central part of my nervous system perform a ten-minute medley to the 1960s and Motown. Probably Mom said "Ugh, Up With People is on," and changed the channel to watch something else, anything else, a car commercial, a cowboy smoking a cigarette, the static fuzz]

I’m making the time watch a lot more Burlesque. Do you think it would be an effective piece of art to watch Burlesque continuously for one week, slowly removing your clothing, then your hair, and then small slices of skin? The theater would be empty, so you could practice dance routines in private. You’d be filming it. By the end of the week, colors and lights from the movie screen would glisten on your sweat-soaked bleeding nude body. This is an idea I had while watching Burlesque.

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