Scene: Grrl Freitag

I was writing on the bus, on the way to the HP, and a hipster chick sat next to me, dug out her copy of the New Yorker and briefly read it, before popping on some headphones and chilling out. She was average height, black hair, slightly sallow complexion, assiduously plucked eyebrows, black knitted beret, black leather jacket, black skinny jeans, melon-colored socks and black Keds-style canvas sneakers. She had a big turquoise ring on her left middle finger that was two triangular pieces of turquoise pointing toward each other, off-center, like two ships passing by. The overall ring was fairly big. She had a worn, dusky silver-toned messenger bag with "FREITAG" as the label, which amused me, made me want to snap a picture of her -- especially with the whole black ensemble going, except for the nerdy socks. I would have liked if her name was "Tuesday" -- that would've been perfect, seeing Tuesday with her Freitag bag on a Thursday morning.

She sipped at her coffee, kept stealing glances at my notebook while I was writing. Normally it bugs me if people are trying to read over my shoulder (HATE that), but my handwriting is nearly incomprehensible, so I doubt she could read much. Reminds me of when I used to take the South Shore train line, and a couple of teenaged girls marveled at my handwriting, watching me write in a notebook, and one said "What LANGUAGE is that?" in that nasally teenaged way of talking, and I told her it was English, and she asked to see it, and I showed her, and she said "Dude, that writing should be a font!"

Details about Grrl Freitag, let's see... her hair was a brown-black shag, from what I could see, since she had on that beret. The eyebrows stood out to me, just because she'd definitely worked them over a bit -- just short of the point of being too much, in my view, with my whole eyebrow thing. Her upper lip was utterly hairless (a good thing in my view, and if her eyebrows got that kind of attention, no doubt the mustache had no chance!) -- I bring up the upper lip only because she kept nursing her coffee, kept venturing tentative little sips, because obviously it was hot, so it was this kind of dance with her lips perched atop the white Starbucks coffee lid, a beverage tango. With the sun streaming in, her face had turned to gold, which showed a lot of detail, the steam rising from the cup.

That's about it. She loped off the bus, and I kept writing.

Yessssss

I worked on "Wash, Spin, Rinse..." all morning. It's hot. It's humming along very nicely. It is very much in the spirit of Richard Matheson, one of my influences -- it's my own thing, in my own style, but somebody who likes Matheson would find a lot to like in this story.

It tickles me, writing longhand again. While I don't write as quickly as I type, I like being able to write at will. Of course, with a laptop, I get the best of both worlds, so that just puts a laptop at the top of my to-get list.

But anyway, the story's humming along beautifully. I should be able to bang this one out and then delve back into the PC at home and wrap up the ones I'd mentioned the other day.

Writerly

I started working on "Wash, Spin, Rinse..." yesterday, on the bus ride home. Writing longhand, as is my lot for the moment, until I can afford another laptop. It's going to be an interesting story, I think. The voice of the character flew out of me, male protagonist, snarky, sarcastic, cynical -- sound like anybody you know?

I know I was going to wait on it, but the character's voice started going and I just had to take dictation, get it down. I have these fab Papermate pens I bought at the store the other week -- they're click-pens with black and white patterns on them. Love the patterns and the black and white. Just kinda Mod, I think. I may have to buy a few more packs of them, just to have, before they disappear.

I know I was going to read "The Road," but I paused in favor of an "American Gothic" anthology compiled by Joyce Carol Oates. That's keeping me entertained at the moment, keeps a shade of Halloween alive well past the holiday itself.