There’s a slow-moving, never-ending river of red-hot rage that burns through me on a daily basis for oh. . . however long it’s been since the tsunami of sexual harassment & rape allegations have become…
Date Archives 2017
Three Scenes From My Life with a Tom Petty Soundtrack
Scene 1: 1996 A bright, sunny day in August, most of my family is huddled under the trees in a small, family cemetery on McColl Road in Savage. They’ve close the road because there are…
13 Ways of Looking Like a Fat-Shaming Misogynist
I’m not sure why so many people who read Mona Awad’s collection of linked short stories, 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl, found it so funny. What was hilarious? The way the main…
How I Almost Totally Could Have Maybe Died in a Cabin in South Dakota
This weekend I ventured to the wilds of South Dakota with my BFK to her family’s cabin in Redfield, SD or near it. I made a big deal about the weekend-trip and the lack of…
Things I Intend to Do This Month
So, let’s be real, I’m failing miserably when it comes to my writing goals. I blame my own inherent laziness and the feeling that the entire world is on fire all the time and nothing…
A Typewriter of One’s Own: On 17 Years of Blogging
On Monday, the actual date of IWillDare.com’s 17th anniversary, I only remembered the event for about 10 minutes over lunch. Then I got swept away in the Scaramucci news and freezing some green beans. You…
The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley
There’s something of an old west feeling about Hannah Tinti’s novel, The Twelve Live of Samuel Hawley even though it a lot of the book takes place in the here and now. There’s no time…
Three Recent Reads
Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi One of my weaknesses as a reader, and as a human, is that I’m not too keen on history. I don’t like to read about olden times. If a book takes…
Petty Bitchery: Out of Control Pop Culture Lists & the Death of Curation
Here’s the thing I want to bitch about today: ridiculous lists. First I know that classifying, judging, ranking art and pop culture is stupid nonsense. So shut up. But it’s fun stupid nonsense and the…
Wisconsinality
Recently, a friend pointed out on Twitter that a book he was reading would drive me bonkers because it touched upon very many of my literary pet peeves. “Dick Lit to the extreme. Selfish, sad-sack,…