Here are some tips on becoming a better writer, which begins with your posture. Feng Shui means ‘wind water’ in Chinese, which is better than ‘passing gas diarrhea.’ My point is, us Chinese are profound peoples. Fortunately, htmlgiant has an in-house Chinese representative, yours truly. My goal is to help you survive the literary world. Please pay attention:

1. Chip on Shoulder

You will need a chip on your shoulder. When somebody asks you ‘what you do’ at a party, you will need to think ‘fucking moron,’ and reply, [sigh] “I’m a writer highly published online. I’ve been nominated for a the Million Writers Awards and was interviewed twice. My chapbook sold out in two weeks.” As you sulk by the spinach dip, you will reaffirm the stereotype of self-involved writers.

2. Monitor Angle

Your monitor should tilt towards the heavens as you blind angels with your genius.

3. Area for Chick Tattoo

Writing will make you more and more gay, even if you write like Bukowski or Hemingway. You will need to get a ‘chick tattoo’ on your lower back, optimally a motif from a culture you do not understand, like Aztec n’ shit. If you are a women writer, and you do not have a sexy tattoo already, you will be called ‘Gertrude Stein.’

4. Monitor Size

The bigger your monitor is, the more confident you will feel. The same applies to salaries, penises, and publishing credits. The fetishism of girth and length began with the Greeks, and will not end here.

5. Large Check

In  the absence of a large check from your publishers for book sale royalties, you will need to have a literal ‘large check’ around. This will serve as a reminder that one day you may be famous and will receive an actual large check.

6. Wanking Hand

You will need to ‘wank it’ at least once a day, preferably three times, to relieve stresses brought on by severe submission guidelines. By now in your writing career, your girlfriend (if you [still] have one) is not attracted to you anymore because you don’t have a real job and can’t get published in print. You are on your own now.

7. Unluckiness

Lucky No. 7 is a myth. Use your unluckiness as an excuse for why Ninth Letter rejects you. Tell yourself, “fuck, most likely my unluckiness changed the font to wingdings and the editors at Ninth Letter thought I was trying to be clever, fuck.”

8. Wanking Wrist

The actual ‘wanking’ motions will be applied by your wrist. Your wrist is very important.

9. Wanking Elbow

Wanking is not possible without torque. This is why god gave you an elbow – or, if you don’t subscribe to creationism – this is why your elbow evolved into a torque machine.

10. Backstabbing target

You will be stabbed in the back in the comment section of someone’s blog that you discover while googling yourself. People will say your tropes are tired and that you have bad grammer and spelling. Instead of feeling down, start working out and drinking Red Bull so that next year at AWP you will be ripped and can fuck those faces up.

11. Walk stumps

Walden pond didn’t go to Thoreau, he walked there motherfucker. Your feet, or ‘walk stumps,’ will be used to walk to your own personal inspiration point. Be sure your inspiration point is not under a large tree or in a meadow, because that will make you write foliage-ridden poetry. It’s about posture not pasture dumbshit.

This concludes Htmlgiant’s guide to becoming a better writer. All thoughts of suicide should be sent to htmlgiant@gmail.com. Someone will g-chat you off the ledge. Good luck on your writing career.

•