About Buster Casey

Word is, and L, you'll be excited, I suppose:

Chuck Palahniuk is going to write two more novels about Buster "Rant" Casey. They will release in 2011 and 2013, however, Chuck is still planning on writing in-between. I'm not finished with Rant yet, but I'm more than half-way through with it. I can't wait to finish it, but I'll be sad because I won't have anything else about Rant to read. But I do have other books, so it's not such a tragedy.

p&l

rachel

It's National Incubus Day

4/21 is National Incubus Day. Also, two years ago today, I had alcohol poisoning. Good times. 

Anyway, I just wanted to post to thank those who have clicked on the ads here on my blog. Although it only gives me a few cents each time someone clicks on a link, it's very kind. I greatly appreciate your devotion to my progress. Or just clicking on the ads. :)

I've been watching The O.C. and reading Rant at the same time. Buster is very cute right now. He's asleep; he's snoring. 

Julie Cooper wants to send her daughter Marissa to a mental institution because she overdosed on prescription medicine in Tijuana in the last episode. Ryan, Seth and Summer broke her out of the hospital using a clever scheme including Summer being a candy striper. But she really is a candy striper.

I started a short story last night. I'm calling it "A Scouting Isle." It's about a 12-year-old boy who is sent to an island on a dare because mysterious things happen on the island. He experiences a few things that include a group of camping boy scouts, or are they? I'm thinking about sending it out to try and get it published... if I like what I come up with, that is. If I even finish it. I mean, I have to finish this short story. It's a short story. SHORT. It's not hard to write a short story.

Happy 4/20!!!!!!1

Today is the day. A beautiful day it was. I went to the Crawfish Festival and I went to Books-a-Million and spent my gift card. It was also nice because when I went to buy a book (Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk), the woman said, "You have 25.07 left on your card." and I was taken by surprise because I thought it was only a 20 dollar gift card. So, I bought another book (Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk). My Palahniuk collection is nearly complete. I need to get Diary back from whoever has it. And I don't own Rant yet. 

Ah, but I was hanging out with my friends T and her husband earlier and we were celebrating the holiday, and their smoke alarm starts to go off. T's husband goes into the house and discovers the kitchen is on fire. It was a terrible tragedy. Good thing their daughter wasn't there for the event, she would probably have cried a lot. I felt bad leaving them right after they put out the fire, but I had a ... curfew to attend to. I was late as it was already, but I thought fire was more important. T said she understood though, so it's all good.  

The Crawfish Festival was alright, I guess. I didn't ride any rides because I didn't have anyone to ride them with me. My sister had her own friend with her, and my parents claim they're too old to ride rides anymore, so it's useless to want to do it. But my dad wanted to go and see Eddie Money. I got to leave early though, so it was all good. I have to say, I did have some good food: a funnel cake, a blooming onion, and you can't go to a crawfish festival without having crawfish itself. It came with a potato and a corn on the cob. It was delicious. 

There was a ferris wheel and I was tempted to go on it, but I didn't want to spend any money doing all that. 

Anyway, I think I'm going to do some reading before I pass out or something. 

p&l

rachel

Oral Biographies

As I've said many times before, I'm reading Rant by Chuck Palahniuk and I just can't get over how good it is. 

It's an oral biography of this guy who did absolutely insane things and got away with them. However, he ends his life on television in a fiery blaze. He was also responsible for spreading a silent urban plague of rabies through his saliva. He actually does get pretty frisky with many ladies, as I've read thus far.

Speaking of thus far, I'm not even halfway done with this book yet, and so much shit has happened that I'm slightly afraid but anxiously awaiting to find out what happened to Buster "Rant" Casey towards the end of his existence. These characters are crazy, and I still don't know what the suns and moons next to the people's names are supposed to represent. I think it might have something to do with the "eclipse" period of the rabies virus that Rant spreads through his various hook-ups with women, I'm assuming.

Weird stuff. Oh, and I can't wait for his next book, Snuff, to hit the shelves, which is set to be May 20, 2008. WOO!

Attn: L :He's going to be in Atlanta over the summer, in June I think, and I REALLY REALLY want to go and see if I can get something autographed, hint hint (road trip?). Talk to him. I don't know. Snuff does sound like another mind-fuck-Palahniuk kind of story. Every novel produced by Palahniuk is just something of beauty. Even though some of the stories are quite vulgar and ugly, he makes them interesting with his intense way of telling his audience exactly how to do certain things that normal people would never dare to "try-at-home." To this day, I can't choose a favorite novel written by him. 

Next year, he'll be coming out with yet another gripping novel. This one, called Pygmy, has apparently already been written, or at least a first draft. Posted from the forums on chuckpalahniuk.net

Palahniuk says:

"I've just finished the first draft of a novel called "Pygmy," a dark comedy about terrorism and racism. The lead character is a 13-year-old foreign exchange student sent to live with a suburban, white, middle-class family. Oh, and they're Christians. The visit is for six months, and he's one of a dozen similar kids, all shipped to America to live with typical families.

The secret truth is that Pygmy is a terrorist, trained since infancy in martial arts, chemistry and radical hatred of the United States. He has six months to build a prize-winning project for the National Science Fair. If he succeeds, he and his project will go to Washington, D.C. for the finals competition -- where the project will explode, killing millions.

So far, Gerry Howard says it's the best book I've done. Fingers crossed for luck."

So I'm pretty much very excited about this one. It's going to be pretty amazing. But it's not like he doesn't do anything that sucks. 

To get onto the topic of oral biographies, I think it takes a lot of talent to actually make it work. I think if I tried to write an oral biography of someone right now, I think it would turn out really shitty. I need to start writing again. Writing things other than my wannabe GossipGirl/It Girl novel-project-thing. I didn't like how it was coming, so now I have to think of something new. Something more original. 

I just need to broaden my horizons, considering I've only been reading the Gossip Girl books and It Girl books recently. You write what you know, right? So I guess that it's also about what you've been reading too. I mean, writers read, don't they? Reading was what got me into writing in the first place, so shouldn't that also have an affect on a writer's style? Which is why I picked up Rant and some Hemingway books from the library. I think I need to do some more shopping on the library's internet database, or card catalog. 

I need suggestions for new reads. It makes me sad that I may be losing my intelligence every time I read a Gossip Girl or It Girl book. It kind of drives me crazy. Thinking I might fall into that mindset. 

There are other influences that could affect my mindset as well. For example, watching Veronica Mars makes me want to be kind of like her. Watching Grey's Anatomy makes me want to work at a hospital, even though I'm slightly afraid of them. Watching Lost makes me wish I were on the mystifying island too. And Heroes makes me wish I had a special ability like flying or cellular regeneration. Would I be evil- like Kristen Bell's character? Or would I be good like little Claire, the cheerleader. Ugh, television makes me crazy, maybe. 

p&l (for now, who knows how many more posts I'll post just this evening)

rachel

I love Palahniuk.

I've been reading Rant for at least the past two hours, and although I've only read a few chapters, the stories have been increasingly amazing. 

Not only has Chuck already awed me with his shocking literature, the characters are realistic and creative. Original and funny. Oblivious but aware. I can't get over it. I want to just keep reading, but I know that soon I will have to go to sleep. I have so much to do tomorrow, I feel like I don't want to do it just so I can read the book. I'm just crazy. 

p&l

rachel

I'm a little perturbed today.... and I wish I could get paid to blog

Sons of bitches. I went in for an "appointment" for the call center for AT&T today, which I considered to be a job interview, and they said that I didn't even complete the "minimum requirements" in order to proceed with the application process. Bastards. 

I just had to vent about my anger towards the company because I would have made an awesome call center employee. 

Now.... I'm sitting at home with my awful sunburn. I went to the library and picked up Rant, an Oral Biography of Buster "Rant" Casey, written by the truly amazing Chuck Palahniuk. The classifieds are open on my bed next to me, and I'm tempted to glance over it, but I have a plan on how I'm going to get the job of my dreams: I'm just going to continue to apply at the Hard Rock Casino until they call me. The mass applying starts tonight. T said that they're going to be hiring groups of people each week, so... they have to hire me for something. Right?

Anyway, I also wanted to put out there that everyone should go out and see Forgetting Sarah Marshall when it comes out this weekend. It's probably going to be pretty awesome, only because Kristen Bell is one of the stars. I put up a new link to the Forgetting Sarah Marshall promotional blog. Kind of like the Gossip Girl blogs they have online. There is also another blog for the "fans" of Sarah Marshall. 

While I was on the road to Kentwood, I purchased the new Cosmopolitan magazine with Kristen Bell on the cover. The Sexy Issue: Not for girls who blush easily. That read on the cover in the corner. However, I left the magazine in C's car and I can't get it back until I go see him in Mobile this weekend.

Hopefully by then I will have either: heard back about a job, or my sunburn will have reduced in pain. 

p&l

rachel