We’re headed into Angry Hermit Season which means 80% of my face-to-face, non-computer-related socializing in the next four to five months will happen at the grocery store. To prepare you, darling ones, for the onslaught of “here’s what happened at Cub today” posts, I will tell you about my adventures in grocery shopping by confessing to two things that will reveal much about the inner workings of my being.

But before the confessions I have to tell you how I had to chase down an old man as he walked through the automatic doors towards the parking lot. He was pushing an empty cart. Why was his cart empty? Because he totally forgot to bag his groceries and then transport those bags into his cart. He was not at all appalled by his oversight. He said he was too busy yapping with the cashier to realize he forgot his food.

Best thing to happen at the grocery store since I followed in the old lady who was smoking through the parking lot and forgot to put out her cigarette when she went into the store. There she was smoking next to the carrots. Hilarious.

Onto the confessions.

CONFESSION #1: I often skip the bacon. That’s right. If a recipe calls for bacon, I will nine times out of ten skip it. It feels wrong to tell this to the Internet, the baconyest place in the universe. If you look for me tomorrow and I Will Dare is redirecting to the Pork Council of America, you’ll know why. Bacon is tasty and delicious, I’m not arguing that, but it’s also a giant pain in the ass, a pain so messy and greasy and lingering smell that I just don’t want to deal with it very often. So I don’t.

CONFESSION #2: I bought Velveeta processed cheese food for the first time in my adult life. At least it’s the first time that I can remember buying it. It’s way more expensive than you’d think. Also, it’s not refrigerated, it’s just kept near the refrigerators. This is disturbing. I bought the Velveeta because I am making something called Cheesy Corn Casserole (apparently the recipe creator is not a Minnesotan because really, it’s Cheesy Corn Hotdish) that calls for processed cheese food.

BONUS CONFESSION: For most of my life, and well into my twenties I thought Velveeta was a kind of cheese. Mozzarella, Cheddar, Swiss, Velveeta. I was crushed the day I realized it wasn’t. Also, I believed mayonnaise and Miracle Whip were the same thing for about the same amount of time. I blame my mother for all of this because Velveeta and Miracle Whip were the only cheese and mayonaisse we ever had in our house growing up.

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That’s a lot of fucking reading, people.

Here’s what I discovered this year.

1. The more you ask me to read a book, the less likely I am to read it.
I don’t know what it is. Maybe deep down I’m a rebellious teenager who will not do what you want me to, just because you ask. Maybe I’m a persnickety bitch, but I get really resentful when someone tries to control my reading habits. The more resentment I build toward the book the less likely I am to enjoy it.

2. It’s really easy to write a bad book about Rock & Roll.
For the past two years I’ve tried to dedicate the month of June to reading books about rock and roll. Holy shit has this been an exercise in fortitude. I had no idea it was so easy to write and publish a crappy, boring book about something as awesome, sexy, and powerful as Rock & Roll. I’ve long maintained that writing about music is tough and when you find someone who is good at it, it’s a rare and beautiful thing. All the crappy, boring books about Rock & Roll I’ve attempted to read have proven that point beyond a shadow of a doubt. Also, it seems women don’t write about Rock & Roll and their relationship to the music. Or at least that’s the way it seems because all the books published are by men.

3. Self-publishing is a long way from being like indie music or, don’t mess with crazy cow ladies.
For a few months in 2009 Sister #2 and I had a battle raging on the issue of self-publishing. She thought I was being a lit snob by not reading self-published novels sent to MN Reads for review consideration. I told her she had no idea what she was talking about and self-publishing was nothing at all like indie music.

I explained that self-publishers seem to have no faith in the goodness of their own writing. That instead of putting it up for criticism and review by the editorial process of a publishing house, they publish it themselves. Writers who go this route want to be reviewed, sure, but they don’t want to be critiqued. Also, often times the books from these self-publishing places look and feel shoddy and amateurish, and seems reflective of the writing contained inside. While I know you’re not supposed to judge a book by its cover, I will judge you for a cover that’s not in focus.

She still claimed I was a snob

Then came the crazy cow ladies. After my brother-in-law Ben gave a slightly less than favorable review of a self-published book of cow tales, the crazy came home to roost. Ben and I were inundated with e-mails and snarky comments from the editor and contributors to this anthology. Most of them claimed that we should be nicer since it’s self-published, and assumed we had a personal vendetta against them and/or cows.

See?

4. No matter how much you read, you’ll always feel guilty for not reading one more book.
It’s the truth. I try to cram as many reviews as possible on MN Reads and I still feel guilty for not getting to all the books. I’m sorry.

The post Wrapped up in Books 09: Confessions of a lowly book blogger appeared first on I Will Dare.

2. I had the making out in the kitchen dream, again. Only it wasn’t a kitchen this time it was my driveway. I am beginning to get creeped out. However, the only creepy thing is that the make-outee doesn’t look like how I know him now, but rather how he looked many many years ago.

3. I forgot what the third confession was going to be because I was entirely too busy watching that Madonna and Justin Timberlake video and too lazy to make up another confession.

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