ATTENTION

TO ALL HOLDERS OF THE PEANUT BUTTER COOKIE RECIPE:

Do not, under ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, put fork indentations on the tops of the cookies.

I REPEAT: PUT THE FORK DOWN.

Seriously, man, you'll totally cock it up. Don't you EVEN give me that look and that spiel about "tradition", dammit, we had an AGREEMENT when I gave you that recipe, now step away from the fork or you'll find it planted in the back of your hand. Get it? Good.

Why No Comments?

The above is the question I am most frequently asked by blog-readers. If you haven't asked it at some point, you've instead gone the route of reproach. ( Example: "You should allow comments, you whore.") Here's my best answer, to be permanently linked on the side, somewhere prominent-ish, so's I can point that way in future.

Um. So now I have to explain it. Oh, great. Um.

Okay.

Short Answer:
This blog would suck if I had it open to comments.

Long Answer:
1. This blog is not like some others. I don't write with the intention of it being read. Though I occasionally write with the hopes of entertaining (or even merely addressing) certain readers, I pretty much always write for one primary reason: to get the words out of my head. That's it. It's like how you get hungry - a natural and uncontrollable urge - and you eat. And then you don't feel hungry anymore. Or you have an itch - in response, you scratch it. Then you feel better, until it itches again. That's honestly the only thing I am after with my blog: to express myself. It's a beginning and an end, in and of itself. You are a witness to it, if you choose to be. Not a participant. Okay, maybe a participant - but only a silent one.

2. Because of Reason #1, just about all the things I say here are for me to say. Not for you to respond to. Not that you can't respond to it (that's why the good lord created email), but my basic message here is that this is a monologue. It is not a dialogue. I am not asking anyone's opinion or feedback on anything that I am saying. When I want opinions/feedback, I open comments. But mostly, this is like a newspaper column. You know, one of those that don't talk about the news at all? That's me.

3. This is not to say that compliments or hate-mail aren't welcome. If you like or dislike something I wrote, feel free to let me know. My email is all the way at the bottom of the page, orin my profile. Alternatively, you can do like people sometimes do, and blog about me and/or my words in your own space. Dude, it's the internet. Everyone gets his/her/its say. Woo!

4. And the most important one: When it comes down to it, comments fuck with my head. Not necessarily the comments themselves (because I just ignore ones I don't like) (which does NOT mean that if I don't reply to a comment, then that means I didn't like it - that just means I didn't necessarily have anything to say), but the whole idea of people formulating responses to what I have to say? Interferes with what I say. I have realized - much to my amazement - that I am far more articulate and far, far, far happier with myself and what I have to say, when I say it to myself. I do not know why. It's a mystery to me. Most of me is a mystery to me, and I'm just trying to figure myself out. This place helps me to do that. Heuristic is the word, I do believe. You all get to be witnesses to that process.

5. Stick with me long enough, and you'll see that I write many things where it's obvious why I wouldn't want comments. It's really a very important place to me, my blog. And it's not all fun and games here Chez Beth. When I am in A Mood, or wrestling with my incipient alcoholism, or unearthing the not-good things in my past (or those in my present heart/mind/soul, for that matter), or going through the kinda stuff that, months later, I wonder how I lived through at all - well, for those times, I don't want discussion. Or encouragement. Or advice. Or even commiseration. Or maybe I do, who knows, but I certainly don't want it in the comments section of a blog.

People always seem surprised that I don't want feedback because, they say, it would be positive - people tend to complain because they want to say nice things about what I write, or simply to agree with something I've said. It still surprises me to find how much strangers enjoy the things I dash off here, unpolished and unthinking as so much of it is. It's not that I'm oh-so-humble - I gladly accept praise (see #3, above). My friend, an experienced and skilled writer with loads more talent than I could ever dream of having (and more commercial and critical success than 99% of writers will ever enjoy) once told me what she'd learned from her years of writing - about the impulse, the act of writing, the sharing it with others: Praise is more dangerous than the negative crap, because it's more addictive. And the more you crave it, she said, the more your writing will be for other people, and less for yourself. And then it will suck. And it will be No Fun. And you will hate it, and yourself for writing away from the truth. (I'm paraphrasing, but that's the general idea.)

So since I
(a) truly don't need or even want the validation of commentators in order to keep me happy and to keep me writing this, and
(b) truly do need the self-communion thang that I get in writing this here blog,
I therefore
(c) do not enable the commenting function.

Except on Mondays, which is Smart Bitches Day. Because I figure it's only fair, what with how I can comment on all the participants's's blogses.

So there's that. I will open the comments on this post, and they (it?) will stay perpetually open. Feel free to say whatever. Or not. Or ask other questions, since I've got that out of the way!

If I Were a Pirate

If I were a pirate, you would've walked the plank like at least 3 times today, you scurvy cur.

If I were a pirate, I would not have a poofy shirt with ruffles. I would instead follow the Pirate Fabio tradition and have a white shirt tucked into my skin-tight black leather breeches, and it would be totally unbuttoned and blowing in the sea-wind and artfully showing my cleavage to the world and I would rule the World Of Men through the power of my boobage. Because in the end, the twins always triumph. You know it, I know it, and so does the World Of Men. I'd take my advantages wherever they come from, if I were a pirate. So you'd bow before me breasts, me hearties.

If I were a pirate, when you showed up late for the weekly meeting for the like 4th time in a row, showing no remorse, not even pretending anything's amiss, no apology, nothing - as though it is your god-given right to stroll in while I'm talking, 20 minutes into the proceedings, a clear act of defiance - I would brandish my razor-sharp cutlass in your face and you'd splutter: "But but but but!" and I would bellow: "INSUBORDINATION!" and the unwashed, rickets-riddled ship-hands would send up an almighty chorus of "To Davy Jones's locker with the bilge rat!" They would do that because they are, in fact, me hearties. Unlike you, you film of scum on the chumbucket, you.

If I were a pirate, I would wear these boots, and just TRY to defy a woman wearing those boots, motherfucker.

If I were a pirate, I would snag your arm with my hook-for-a-hand every time you did that shrug-pffsh-eyeroll thing that I HATE. You'd look lively, swab, and think twice about discoursing at length on the usefulness of my directives, lest you meet rope's end. Because if I were a pirate, I could TOTALLY scupper your ass.

If I were a pirate, you wouldn't blow me off, grab the ship's wheel, and announce we're headed for Antigua, and then ACTUALLY GET SHITTY WITH ME when I tell you thanks for the idea and I'll discuss it with the rest of the crew because it's their loot too and I'm their captain and you're SO close to being fish food.

If I were a pirate, I would only have to tell you to do a thing once and then you'd do it or else walk the goddamn plank. Because it's ME who's wearing an eyepatch, and ME with the gold-capped teeth and ME with the mangey parrot on MY shoulder, and ME with the luscious little kidnapped virgin noblewoman down in the cap'n's quarters who will bang me six ways to Sunday and this is MY SHIP. Get it, bucko?

Because you know what? I am so totally NOT a pirate. But whether on sea or dry land, don't get into a pissing contest with the likes of me. I swear to Christ, you will lose. And anyway, our little jollyboat is so much jollier when we all hang out with our yo-ho-ho and our bottle(s) of rum, singing chanties and counting dubloons. So don't go messing with it, or it's Man Overboard with you.

Arrrr.

Celebrate Smart Bitch Day!! With Kate! And I'm gonna count Chas' comment too, so there.

Why I'll Never Confuse A Romance Novel With Real Romance
inspired by this dumbass

Just off the top of my head:

• Stunningly enough, there are not really ballrooms full of gorgeous, rich, titled, manly men who are great in the sack, and none of whom are gay and/or married. Reality sure can be funny like that, and desperately hard to confuse with fiction.

• It's really, really, really difficult to find a sheltered virgin who is both a skilled and enthusiastic fellatrice.

• If a man stares intently into a woman's eyes and says, "I know you want me" (or some variant thereof), he generally gets a gale of snort-laughter. Not a passionate make-out session.

• Pretty blond pre-1900 women who get sold into sexual slavery and are forced to please an arrogant sheik and, if not showing enough enthusiasm, are given a wicked good aphrodisiac that immediately has them humping said sheik's leg and later crying from the humiliation, degradation, and well slavery of it all? Um, generally it's only in fiction that she'll fall in love with the sheik.

• There will never be a Romance heroine who has a problem with unwanted hair on her upper lip, especially in historical fiction. Ever.

• EVER.

• There is a STUNNING LACK of good-looking pirates who are (a) noblemen in disguise and (b) really tender and sensitive and intelligent and noble, once you get to know them.

• If I tell a real-live, filled-with-deep-affection-for-me guy to get out, go away, I don't want you, we're through, get it, it'll never work between us, goodbye, go away -- he, um, goes away. For good. And doesn't fall into my arms months later when I realize what a fool I've been. (Note that this example can be flipped round, gender-wise. And that I don't really mean me, personally, since I've pretty much never changed my mind about anyone whom I've told in no uncertain terms to get out of my life. But I digress.)

• When really pretty and curvy girls dress up like boys, they look like really pretty, curvy girls. Not like boys.

• If some guy slips ben-wa balls - or anything else - up my coochie without asking first, I can guarantee the scene won't end with me purring my undying gratitude to him.

• It's SO weird, but I've never ever had a monarch force me to become his concubine, thereby making my real boyfriend totally jealous and causing a great big misunderstanding that only makes our relationship stronger in the end. I'm sure it's just a matter of time, though.

Okay sorry - that's all I gots at the moment. I have a headache and am not up to the topic tonight. It's a shame, since it's a great topic. Feel free to add to it in comments.