MAMBOPUSSYKAT
by Angel & the Mambokats
Genre(s): American Afro Cuban jazz,1 Afro Cuban soul,2 mambo, Latin, dance, ballroom
Mood: vintage/retro, midcentury Read more
culture
Bye bye, Granny. I love you.
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La Bodega
I’ve been thinking about the way I eat (for various reasons) and how/why my eating habits are so bad, why I fall back on banal comfort food, why I’m not adventurous in the least.
As I was writing Paso Doble, I kept finding myself associating my characters’ meals at tapas bars with romance. Small bites in small dishes. Tasting. A meal of hors d’oeuvres, eaten slowly, from a lover’s hand. I wanted to be able to do that.
In defense of ugly jackets
(Or, if I were Hillary Clinton’s speechwriter.)
What do you think it retails for? $5,000? $7,000? That’s what Donald Trump pays for his designer suits. [beat] [audience boos]
$10,000? No. It retails for $12,495.00. [beat] [audience boos]
But I paid $12.50 for it. Why? Because it’s ugly. I went to Goodwill and I had so much to choose from, an abundance of jackets, but I chose this one. Why? Because it was the most attractive one there. [beat] [audience laughs]
Would you wear this jacket outside the house? No. Nobody with good taste would. It’s warm, I’ll give you that. And roomy. Look how roomy it is. It’s well made. It is an Armani, after all. But it’s ugly. Not only wouldn’t you wear this outside the house, you wouldn’t wear it to a job interview.
Yet that’s what most of you, our working women today, have to choose from: ugly, uglier, and ugliest. [beat] [audience laughs]
Say You’ll Go
“Tess … ” She stopped cold at the breath of a whisper, her heart slamming into her ribs so hard she thought it would fall out right there on the table and flop around. She turned slowly—so slowly.
She opened her mouth to scream at him for ambushing her, but she realized just in time that he was as stunned as she was.
And he was beautiful. More beautiful than he had been when he was nineteen. More beautiful than he was the night he’d left her. Yet nothing about him had changed. Read more
Men who hate women
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.
Dude and I went to see this movie for his birthday. I haven’t been interested in reading the books because a) I’m not a thriller/mystery fan and b) haven’t had time to devote to sampling genres I’m not usually interested in. I’m still not interested in reading the books, because I either read the book or see the movie, but not both. (I got burned in the Bonfire of the Vanities.) I am interested in seeing the Swedish version.
mraynes at Exponent II has an excellent post up about the exposition of misogyny in the book/movie.
Ironically, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo phenomenon is a prime example of how our society hides from the culture of violence against women. In the original Swedish version, Stieg Larsson titled the book “Man som hatar kvinnor” or “Men who hate women.” Believing that such a title would turn readers off, American publishers renamed the book The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, changing the emphasis away from violent misogyny to the physical body of the (anti)heroine. This alone speaks volumes about our society. Instead of dealing with the discomfort that in fact, some men do hate women, publishers felt that the only way to sell books was to objectify and sexualize the female protagonist.
Please read the whole post.
This brought to mind a blog post by a Cale McCaskey, ostensibly ripping on romance novels, but really ripping on women, and after I read mraynes’s post, I realized: This is the mindset. Taken by itself, his opinion is irrelevant and he’s a woman-hating man who is single and likely to remain that way.
However, how many WOMEN have I heard over the years say the same thing with regard to romance novels and the women who read them? To hear WOMEN talk about the women who read romance novels, we’re all a bunch of fat Peggy Bundys who, instead of earning advanced degrees, becoming Important People, tending to our hearths with the efficiency of Martha Stewart or a Mormon cupcake baker on Ritalin, or fighting against [patriarchy, white privilege, male privilege, rape culture, insert philosophy of choice].
It is not rapists and abusers alone who silence and hide victims. It is we, society, in our unwillingness to stare evil in the face, name it, and confront it. Until we acknowledge culpability within our culture of violence against women, our daughters, sisters and ourselves will be at risk.
Some men hate women. But so do some very vocal women. Women need to look to themselves concerning their own misogyny.
Sospiro (Franz Liszt)
Week 4 of the group creative experiment was over last Wednesday a month ago, and yeah, we’re all worn out now. I was still super busy, so that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. I posted this back then, but for some reason it wouldn’t show up, so I’m trying again, just to get it off my to-do list.
It was just me and Astrid again this week. Here we go:
Astrid Cruz aka @artistikem “Piano”: You certainly know how to rip a girl’s heart out, don’t you, woman?
And so here’s what it did for me: a portion of Chapter 67, The Proviso, “Dulcissime,” which you will have to buy to read, because it could be considered a spoiler for one plot point (even though I didn’t go out of my way to make that a huge reveal to the reader. If the reader figures it out beforehand, great. If not, great).
Thank you!
Asking Us to Dance (Kathy Mattea)
Week 3 of the group creative experiment was over a week and a half ago, and I think we were all running out of steam by then. I was supposed to post this on April 21, but that was my birthday. Dude took me out for a nice dinner and a really cute movie (Death at a Funeral, in case you were wondering) and, frankly, I was too tired to do the wrapup. And then I got busy.
It was just me and Astrid this week. Here we go:
Astrid Cruz aka @artistikem “Ghost”: Oh. My. Goodness. That gave me chills. Y’all must read this.
And so here’s what it did for me: Stay, Chapter 34: A Good Crop of Wheat.
Thank you!
Group creativity experiment: 4
Group creativity experiment: 3
Fairground (Simply Red)
Week 2 of the group creative experiment is over. Didn’t have a lot of participation this week, probably because I wasn’t very handy on the Twitter throttle and, well, choosing this song was an experiment unto itself.
You see, this song (to me) is already about as explicit as a story can get. It spins, it’s glittery, it’s Skittle-colored, it tells the story for you. So what I was going for was to see how you would interpret a story already told in speed-shot liquid neon. (And no, I hadn’t seen the video for it until Astrid linked it.)
So here’s the week’s wrapup for Week 2 of the music-prompt group creativity experiment.
Astrid Cruz aka @artistikem “Fairground”: I could feel the man’s thoughts spinning like a carousel in turbocharge, all the colored lights blurring—and then that last line that brings you down with a sweet thump of “Oh yeah. She said that.”
Babette James, a scene from work-in-progress As Clear As Day: You took the story of the song and appliqued yours over the top of it, leaving little bits of the song peeping out here and there. Very clever! And better! You’re getting your word count in.
So then here’s Lenox Parker aka @LenoxParker formerly known as—shit, she’ll kill me if I say before she’s ready to out herself—with “Like Every Day in Paris, It Was Raining”: OMG you’ve got a theme going with this guy! (This is where I figured it out: “I was totally in love with this man and would have done anything for him at that moment, and in the days, weeks, and months that followed.”)
And so here’s what it did for me: a portion of untitled chapter 11, Magdalene, “Warm*Dark*Sugar*Laugh.”
Excellent! Thank you, all, and the next track will post at 9:00 a.m. Central, and it may really surprise you. Follow on Twitter with #mojogce.
Group creativity experiment: 2
The “end of the week” means Wednesday evening, 7 days hence.
Please see The Rules.
Simply Red “Fairground”
Go!
Litanie des Saints (Dr. John)
Week 1 of the group creative experiment is over and oh, MY! Y’all are awesome, and thank you for playing! So here’s the week’s wrapup for Week 1 of the music-prompt group creativity experiment.
Peach’s haiku: Heartbeat in a tango gave me shivers.
Baby’s Black Balloon “The Collector” [dead link]: OMG the detail! dark-haired gypsy queen who never did understand the difference between herself and real royalty and black-velvet spider lashes and Virginia Slim Menthol Lights and the old Lafitte’s instead of Café Lafitte’s. I am in lurve with this piece.
Danielle Yockman, a scene from work-in-progress Seducing the Assassin: So we’re three pieces in and I’m already seeing a trend: detail, visceral, sensual. Feeling the night and sucking in jasmine air.
Astrid Cruz aka @artistikem “Yerba Buena” [dead link]: The juxtaposition of music that comes from an extraordinarily humid climate and walking into a story that takes place in what seems to be a very arid heat was jolting—in a good way!
Babette James, a scene from work-in-progress As Clear As Day: I’ve been reading snippets of this in Romance Divas chat, so I was unprepared for a long snip and great progress, lady. Looks like you really made some headway. Congratulations.
Galendara, artist, with a variation on Pieta, The Mother and the Wounded Daughter [dead link]: Genius. Genius.
Jenn Topper, “Jean-Baptiste Foulon is a Brilliant Liar”: A beautiful assistant with her Series 7. The ending? Love! I adore the conversational first person (as opposed to the distanced first person), when the storyteller talks directly to the reader. It may be my favorite point of view. The man’s name even feels significant. I think I’m missing a joke.
Guy LeCharles Gonzales, “Thinking About New Orleans”: You gave me melancholy. *sniffle*
And so here’s what it did for me: Chapter 15, The Proviso. NSFW (but you probably knew that).
Excellent! Thank you, all, and the next track will post at 9:00 a.m. Central. Follow on Twitter with #mojogce
Group creativity experiment: 1
NOTE: “End of the week” means Wednesday evening, April 7.
Please see The Rules.
“Litanie des Saints” by Dr. John
Go!
Group creativity experiment: Intro
UPDATE: “End of the week” means Wednesday evening, April 7.
On the Ides of March, Mind on Fire blogger John Remy (@johnremy) orchestrated a project wherein artistic types were given a prompt to create something based on the prompt (in this case a randomly drawn Tarot card). It could be anything.
I couldn’t participate, as it was short notice and I didn’t have time, but I’ve been building the playlists for my books and it got me thinking about how much I depend on music to inspire my writing, keep me enthusiastic, pump me with adrenaline, and pretty much feed my subconscious what it needs to do my job for me.
So now I’m totally ripping him off and putting a different spin on it: music. I’ll post one track every week for the next three or four weeks (as long as people are interested), and see what you come up with. With John’s permission, I’m going to copy and paste his rules:
- Each week, starting Thursday, April 1 (April Fool’s Day!), I will post a track that played a significant role in my books.
- Use the track as a spark for some kind of creative activity. It can be a sketch, a paragraph from your novel, a tweet, a photo, an interpretive dance, a poem, a political blog post, a video. The activity can even change from week to week. The only requirements are that:
- you leave some element of the project undetermined until you hear the track, and
- the final creation has to be done by the end of the week, and
- it has to be linkable.
- I will then post links to everything everyone created by the time I post the next track the next week.
- The Twitter hashtag will be #mojogce if you care to keep track that way.
I have a cross-section of readers from the Mormon lit crowd, genre romance, and independent authors of all variables. I’m curious what that intersection can produce and anyone can play, even if you don’t think you’re creative (and you would be wrong anyway).
I’ll be drawing from these playlists: The Proviso, Stay, and Magdalene.
Have fun!
Theme of the week
Dude DVRs all the series dramas (and a few sitcoms) he can pack into the box, and he watches them in chronological order (natch).
About two years ago, we started noticing something very odd: Across all the dramas, across all the networks, there would be a theme of the week. It’s as if The Great Producer in the Sky (aka James Cameron) said to all the writers in television, “Okay. This week’s writing prompt is underground BDSM sex parties, a murder, and collector’s wine. GO!”
Amongst a good dozen dramas, this writing prompt will show up at least three times, sometimes four, all in different permutations. Now it’s just a running joke. Dude says, “The theme of the week is … ”
While it’s interesting and curious to see how each writing team interpreted the prompt to fit their characters and canon, it’s super annoying and gets very old very fast.
And it’s one reason I’ve pretty much stopped watching TV dramas. Homogeneity pretty much sucks the fun out of … well, everything.
Foci and projects for 2010
1. Finish Magdalene.
2011: Widowed Mormon bishop and steel magnate Mitch meets corporate restructuring specialist Cassie St. James, a former prostitute. As they navigate a relationship, they work together to stop a man who’s destroying everything Mitch holds dear.
2. Make some pretty things.
a) An afghan (Tunisian crochet, the only kind I like) for XX TD.
b) A Hobbes doll for XY TD.
3. Get better at the ebook formatting thing.
a) Continue self-tutoring in SVG so I can get The Fob Bible completely digitized (text, no problem, but it’s graphics heavy).
b) Give more priority to embedding fonts.
4. Shamelessly rip off RJ Keller’s 2010-in-photos idea.
5. Get my foyer, living room, and dining room decorated and my art up on the walls, including my kitschy matadors ~1950 and my cheap bought-out-of-a-car-trunk-in-a-parking-lot-but-expensively-framed Pissarro.
6. Expose my real identity to you all (in case you haven’t figured it out already and no, my real name is not famous in the least bit) and my artsy-fartsy business because I think you might like it. But to do that, I need to work on the super-outdated website.
7. Get The Fob Bible into college curricula, where I think it belongs best.
8. Implement some fun ideas I have for The Proviso et al.
9. Get back on the low-carb wagon, exercise, and load up on the probiotics/coconut oil.
10. Sit down and relax, watch a movie with Dude once a week or so.
There. I fixed it.
Kansas City: Little help?
I’m choking on childhood nostalgia, KCitians.
Does ANYBODY remember the mechanized dolls in the display windows at Harzfeld’s at Christmastime? And if you do, do you have a decent picture or, better yet, a line on where I can get one of those dolls or six?
There is a Harzfeld’s page and a Harzfeld’s blog, both created by historians with a book in the works, but neither has a search feature, and as far as I can tell, this [dead link] is the only mention of the dolls:
A couple years ago a Dresden Doll (right), said to be from Harzfeld’s, was sold at a Kansas City area auction. This was a mechanical doll that may have been part of a Christmas window display.
(I want want want one of these dolls, even if I have to build one. I’m good at DIY! Promise!)
As an aside, I remember these chairs:
[2025-07-31: Image of a Harzfeld’s “corset chair” unavailable and I don’t remember what it looked like. That’ll teach me to hot link.]
But a trip to the Harzfeld’s blog yielded something fabulous: Elle Decor featured an article on Kansas City (worth the read, even for non-Kansas Citians), and the picture gallery [dead link] features the usual suspects, but gorgeous as always.
However, the ugly-ass addition to the Nelson-Atkins was extolled briefly:
“The marriage of the original neoclassical building and the stunning addition by architect Steven Holl … ”
I will not be happy until somebody takes a wrecking ball to that abomination. I would PAY MONEY to attend its destruction.
The 1960s ranch
I have really fond memories of the house I grew up in, which does not exist anymore. I mean, well, there’s a HOUSE there, where I grew up, but it’s morphed and changed so much (not in a good way) that it might as well not exist. I think it burned somewhat at one time and was um, “remodeled,” or else it was, er, “rebuilt,” but MY house is gone.
Still, when I was a kid, I’d go to my grandma’s house and it was in what I thought was a chichi neighborhood (I don’t know, maybe it was, but now it’s a tad rundown). I would go sell my school wares around HER neighborhood cuz none of my neighbors had any money.
Now, I love architecture anyway. If I’d been more focused in school (ha!) and a little more in touch with my creative/analytical abilities, I’d have known to go to school for that, but, well, hindsight is 20/20.
Anyway, I’d go around my g’ma’s neighborhood and see all these NEAT houses of mostly the same style: 1960s ranch, with a mid-century modern (which I did NOT like as a kid, but have come to appreciate more as an adult) mixed in here and there. I wanted to live in that neighborhood so badly. To me, living in a 1960s ranch represented having “made it,” but I was 12 and didn’t dare dream any higher (even though I knew there were far more grand neighborhoods in existence and had drooled).
So fast forward a couple of years and here I am with husband and tax deductions and 2 cats, in want of a house and we moved into … a 1960s housing development with … 1960s ranch types (albeit no mid-century moderns). Some are more georgian (which here means, ranch with a second story) and a couple are split ranch (of both types) and ours is a raised ranch (finished, walk-out basement).
Friday I did some yard work, which involved going outdoors. (Shocker, I know.) Once I collapsed on my front porch to rest, I looked out over my neighborhood with the old, well-kept houses, the pristine lawns, and somewhat 1960s-ish landscaping (well, hell, I planted arborvitae, so who am I to talk, right?).
This morning, my door is wide open and I can see one old 1960s ranch with the brick veneer facade and the diamond-mullioned windows and the immaculate emerald lawn. The only sound in the neighborhood are the birds and the 3-year-old Tax Deduction.
My inner 12-year-old is very happy right now.
My angel is the centerfold
I sorted my music by Mojo-defined genre for a change and noticed a very strange juxtaposition in the category of “’80s Pop”:
“Centerfold” by the J. Geils Band directly followed by
“Black Velvet” by Alannah Myles (don’t hate me ’cause I’m cheesy).
and I’m like, why? Why do I have these together in the same sort because they represent two vastly different phases of my life.
The remembery I associate with “Centerfold” is a roller rink. I was 13.
The remembery I associate with “Black Velvet” is my room in the apartment I shared with 3 other girls in Provo, Utah. I was 21.
That’s not to mention all the flashes of rememberies in between the Centerfold part of my life and the Black Velvet part of my life, all rich in music, rich in experience, all helping to define my personality and philosophy, riding with me through alternating giddy and painful adolescence to adulthood. (Although to be fair, I don’t remember much between giddy and painful ’cause I tend toward the melodramatic. Betcha hadn’t noticed that yet.)
I have self-defined genres that fit a certain aspect of my life. I remember nearly every song on the radio the day I sat in my aunt’s house in Salt Lake, waiting for my parents to say it was time to take me to Provo and leave me there for the next 4 years of my life, 1200 miles from home. Shit, I couldn’t wait. (Never mind I didn’t make it 4 years and ended up with a home-grown degree from UMKC.)
I also have one that chronicles the summer I was 20, feeling my oats, not a care in the world and delivering pizza on a lunch rush for fun money. I went to Europe that summer for a month with my family and I couldn’t turn around in Holland and Germany without hearing Belinda Carlisle’s “Circle in the Sand.”
I did a lot that summer. I wish I’d done more.