and watch basketball with Emily Pettit while typing words from the six books pictured (Berlin Stories by Robert Walser translated by Susan Bernofsky, TYOYEU by Seths, What Is Amazing by Heather Christle, TYOYEU by Seths, What Is Amazing by Heather Christle, and Conversations with Kafka by Gustav Janouch with a cover by Maira Kalman) in the comments. Whoever is the first to BOTH take a picture of themselves reading both Tyoyeu and What Is Amazing AND correctly match all the words with the correct book (in the comments), that person will receive (either via expedited shipping or delivered on foot by the author of this post) six machines:

1. the only copy of a book written just for that person (either OUR THE ROBERT WALSER or NANCY KÖF’S BÖK MADE OUT OF WORDS™ or RODNEY GRAHAM’S MACHINE FOR READING LENZ)
2. Matvei Yankelevich’s Bending at the Elbow (trade edition, pictured below)
3. Taryn Andrews’ Clouds Can Trees
4. Lesley Yalen‘s The Beginning In (watch Lesley read on a Seth’s Divine Magnet)
5. Just Kids by Lawrence Giffin and Lauren Spohrer
6.  This Is What We Are Up Against by Ben Hersey, who is what what is and will be touring with Heather Christle in March and April.

[matchup #45 in Tournament of Bookshit]

There’s nothing wrong with always being visible on Gmail chat, except that it comes off as pathetic. Talk to me, talk to me, won’t you please talk to me? Yes, I am the asshole who will talk to you, because you’re available, because I’m available too, not available like single but available like I’ve got nothing else happening in my life, or maybe I am available like single and you’re available like single and then it’s triply pathetic because we’re talking on the screen and maybe we’re flirting, maybe you say something clever about writing and I say something clever about writing and we’re both smug with our cleverness, because we both know when we meet face to face at some shitshow like AWP that we’ll both be too awkward to squeeze out a two minute conversation, much less a two minute romp in anyone’s hotel room. 

Calling anything you write a manuscript, on the other hand, is legit, but probably only if you carry around the OED in your back pocket, which knowing you, you probably do. A manuscript, you see, is something written by hand, not printed. So, technically, if you’re writing by hand, you’ve produced a manuscript. Except that’s not what you mean when you say you’re writing or have written a manuscript. What you mean is that you’re writing or have written something that hasn’t yet been published. It’s short-hand for failure. Oh, I’m shopping my manuscript around. If you say that, chances are good that you’ll never publish it, your manuscript I mean. See, here’s the problem: whereas some people may legitimately and correctly use the word “manuscript,” by the time they discuss it as a “manuscript,” it’s probably already been word-processed, which makes their original correctness obsolete. So, it’s lose-lose: either you’re an asshole for misusing a word or you’re an asshole for being pretentious. Or, I guess you’re probably an asshole squared for both misusing the word and being pretentious. Go cry into your Moleskine.

[Bonus: the only thing that would trump calling anything you write a manuscript is if you wrote a book with no words and called that a manuscript.]

- Lily Hoang

* * *

Winner: Calling anything you write a manuscript.

[matchup #44 in Tournament of Bookshit]

I’m pretty sure that Chili’s is really fucking gross. In fairness, I don’t think I’ve been there in over fifteen years or so. I’ve been riding that wave a lot of us are on, where I justify my lack of actual political actions by my worldly, educated decision making and feeling like it is something akin to “personal protest.” I eat organic kale often, and I feel superior packing it in my reusable tote, is what I’m saying. However, Chili’s has one thing that self-congratulation does not– the Awesome Blossom, which, for the sadly uninformed, is a “bloomed” and deep fried sweet onion with a dipping sauce topping out at 2,710 calories that often sparks large waves of passion and controversy. The texture is oddly light and easy to digest, a hint of spice in both the breading and the sauce. It finishes on the palate as a well-balanced dish, surprisingly light on the acidity. Once, when I was about ten, I remember my sister attempting to order an Awesome Blossom as an entrée for herself. It left the family with disturbing questions to answer. Will she also be eating her fair share of the Awesome Blossom ordered as its proper course, an appetizer for the entire family? Could this possibly sustain her for the rest of the night? Etc. etc. etc.

Eventually it was decided that she could order the Awesome Blossom for dinner and she did, on many occasions.

Conversely, women are marginalized and this sucks.

- Kendra Grant Malone

* * *

Winner: dinner at Chili’s

The entries for the Kama Sutra contest were so great, I need help picking a winner. Feel free to vote in the comments by listing the number of your favorite. You have until Monday! Whichever entry gets the most votes, wins!

1. The Ron Paul Real Talk Presidential Nation Express: Dream of something that will never cum.

2.  The Across the Universe: The ability to give one another an orgasm from a distance.

3. The iForn: Standing, both partners hold mobile device in right hand and lock arms so that they face opposite directions and each looks at his or her respective mobile device. With left hand, reach beneath and between partner’s buttocks. Dial. Accept.

4. The 66/99: When two egotistical people fight over who goes down on whom first.

5. the pretentious:  when you stand naked in front of, and stare into, a full length mirror and jerk off to your own reflection.

6. the heterosexual:  when one or more partners come and then immediately fall asleep before helping you to achieve orgasm7. the anti-capitalist:  enjoying sex without caring whether you or any of your partners come

8. the vicious viscous circle:  positioning oneself in a somewhat awkward position that places your genitals directly over your mouth as you prop yourself up on you shoulders or neck.  at the point of orgasm aim for your mouth & immediately swallow the come.  repeat ad nauseum.

9. The Liz Lemon: order a pizza and eat it missionary style.

10. The Panini – sex in a functioning tanning bed. A hot, melty, crispy-on-the-outside mess.

11. The MFA in Creative Writing: In the midst of having sex, stop. (Optional: tell your partner that this part “just isn’t working for me.”) Fall asleep clinging to your partner and weeping silently. Wake up abandoned, work on your manuscript.

12. unprotected hikikomori tentacle cybersex13. amputee cheerleader threesome love triangle

14. micropenis full penetration nostril banging

15. The shelver: In a bookshop, on top of a big pile of books, while both partners are reading AND blogging about it. And both looking charmingly deshabille.

16. the illumination: when JSF masturbates under his desk while his manuscript in progress cums light all over his face

17. The Pearl Harbor – When you make a movie of yourself having sex and the movie comes out really really badly.

18. Dr. Strangelove - When you make a movie of yourself having sex and the movie comes out really really funny and really really good.

19.  The Facebooker: The couple poke each other until maximum pleasure.

Penguin Classics is releasing a new translation of the Kama Sutra, the ancient spiritual sex manual (yes, it’s much more than that, I know) that  people pretend to know all about when they want to impress a date. Or, maybe I saw that in a movie once. This new version, translated by A.N.D. Haksar,  has been adapted to modern lives. It’s the Kama Sutra, for the people, now featuring wit and charm.

Penguin has offered to give a copy to a lucky reader, so I’m having a contest! To enter, invent a new sexual position that belongs in the Kama Sutra. Leave your entries in the comment field. The best one wins and you have until Wednesday, the 25th. This will be fun, I hope. I’ll also throw in Running the Rift by Naomi Benaron, The Fallback Plan by Leigh Stein, and also some galleys TBD.

And this:

[matchup #43 in Tournament of Bookshit]

“short-short” referring to whiskey consumption

A “short-short” when referring to whiskey consumption is when a short person is drinking from a short glass of whiskey. The short person is almost always less than four feet tall and the glass must only be a shot glass but they sip from it, so it’s like a regular glass for them. Often times the short person is also wearing really short shorts but just like the glass, the shortness of the shorts looks normal against the scale of the short person. When the short person is a woman drinking from a short glass of whiskey, they are called a “short-shorty” (see also: Dr. Ruth (http://drruth.com/)). It’s recommended that you know the “short-shorty” before calling her this, as short women are habitually feisty and like to climb things. “Short-shorties” tend to get drunk rather quickly, so if you are looking to hook up with a “short-shortie”, its best if you holler right at or before her third drink.

The first recorded “short-short” was a man named Carrey O’Carroll in 1542. O’Carroll was 14 when he traveled from Ireland to work in the court of King Henry VIII of England as the official merkin adjuster of the Queen’s ladies-in-waiting. A few historians have disputed that he is the real father of Queen Elizabeth I but others say she may be too tall to be his. He is also credited as the creator of the “body shot” as he frequently spilled his whiskey on the women whose merkins he adjusted. Later descendants of O’Carroll were known to have perfected a method of distilling rye that yielded 273 proof scotch, but after several “short-shorties” drank the beverage and went blind, the method was quickly abandoned. 

Only one “short-short” has been recorded in literary history and that was after James Joyce challenged a catholic priest, known by his parishioners as Wee-Father Malony, to a drink off. Although there has been much written on the accuracy of this story, patrons of the bar claimed that Wee-Father Malony came from a long line of “short-short” drinkers. Skilled in the various methods of drinking as a “short-short,” it was in the seventh round that Wee-Father Malony began to out-drink Joyce. It is said that Joyce became very frustrated during rounds seven though 53 and demanded that the neighborhood cat to be brought to him as a source of comfort. The cat was quickly found and brought to Joyce but not in time as Wee-Father Malony took the last drink before Joyce passed out. Wee-Father Malony took the cat as his prize and soon after the competition Joyce renounced the Catholic Church.

“curating” a reading series

The word curate originates from the Latin cura meaning “care” and a curator is a person who manages and cares for things. I know this because I “curate” stuff on a daily basis. In fact, I’ve been “curating” things since I was five years old and I feel like on most days I can sit back and say, “good curating” and it feels completely true. There are so many objects in my life and I “curate” them so well. I hand pick all of them specifically for their robust colors, textures, flavors, and smells. Sometimes I even call my best friend and tell her about all of the special things I took care of and put together for other people to see that day and she always tells me, “Good job. You select the best things!” and this is how I know I am a great “curator.”

In case you doubt my “curating” skills, here is a list of things I “curated” today:

My teeth (I brush them all the time)

The instant pack of oatmeal I made for breakfast

The coffee pot at work

My cats

The shoes I’m wearing

The underwear I’m wearing (Not my clothes, my cats curate those but I curate them, so it’s cool).

The music in my iPhone

The number of exclamation points I use in work emails

The guy I paid to mow the lawn

My Etsy favorites list

Dinner

People may say that you can’t curate everything, but what do they know? You can curate all sorts of things, you can even curate people. People are just like animals or a collection of spoons! I curated the line outside of Wal-Mart last Friday morning and it was one of the best things I’ve ever curated. People are like colorful globs of things that need to be arranged and ordered. They need to be shared in the best possible combinations so that other people can enjoy them and those people whose palettes are better than other people’s need to be celebrated, they need to be called curators. People curators! And it’s not that us people curaters are insecure or narcissistic, it’s that we know how important our job of putting people together is and we want you to know it too. It’s important that you know it, even more important than you knowing who the people we are curating are!

—

Since this is not-quite Mean Week, I will give my points to the least obnoxious of these two (or to the shortest man at the bar).

- Kirby Johnson

- – -

WINNER: the “short-short” referring to whiskey

[matchup #42 in Tournament of Bookshit]

Since 2004, Katie Price, the British glamour model, singer and actress, has written four autobiographies and seven novels. Her novels are called Angel, Crystal, Angel Uncovered, Sapphire, Paradise, The comeback girl and Santa Baby. Lots of people love to read these wonderful books because they give realistic insights into the ultimate human lifestyle that everyone aspires to live in 2011: CELEB/CELEB-SPOUSE. The novels contain a lot of very detailed descriptions of outfits and accessories and perfumes and luxury products that everyone wants to buy. The main characters of the novels are usually the wives of footballers or glamour models. Everyone wants to be a wife or model so it makes sense that the books are so popular. Also they are beautifully written. Here are examples of the writing in Santa Baby:

“seriously under-dressed in a black tutu-style skirt”
“brightly coloured, revealing body-con dresses and fake tan”
“fingerless lace gloves, and a black tuxedo jacket.”
“Tiffany’s style was more quirky and individual.”
“silver sandals, bare legs”
“sprayed on masses of Coco Mademoiselle”
“long chestnut-brown hair”
“plastering [her hair] against her glossed lips.”

These extracts all come from the same page of the book. The first page.

Other celebs also write books but none of them are good at it, only Katie Price. Someone like James Franco for example. Palo Alto has almost no descriptions of clothes or hair or perfume on any of its pages. For every Katie Price (good) there is a James Franco (bad). Fiction by celebrities is always better than fiction by non-celebrities because they are doing better at life than us.

Talking shit about the New Yorker while submitting frequently to the New Yorker is great. It is like being at school and being bullied. The bully is funny and big and cruel and makes fun of everyone. You talk to your friends about the bully and say what a fucking dick he is and what a piece of shit he is and how awful he is to everyone and how unfair and judgemental he is and how miserable he makes everyone feel.

Then whenever you have the chance, when you are with him alone for some reason, or he is picking on someone who isn’t you, you try to make him laugh. You try your best, cracking your best jokes. You try so hard even though he makes you look like an idiot in front of everyone. And then eventually you are with your friends and the bully is there and bullys your friends and you join in with the bully and make cruel jokes about your friends and then you are better than them and you hated them anyway and you go and live with the bully in a tower and pour shit on everyone below the tower and you love your new life.

I don’t have much of a sense of humour, but any joke I have made in my life comes directly from trying to impress people who I thought were idiots. So that proves for definite that Talking shit about the New Yorker while submitting frequently to the New Yorker is good for your sense of humour and will improve your personality.

But I love Santa Baby so much I award this to celeb-fiction.

- Socrates Adams-Florou

- – -

WINNER: Celeb fiction

- Steve Roggenbuck

- – -

WINNER: horny middle aged balding professor on campus

- Ryan Call

- – -

WINNER: hating on Jonathan Safran Foer