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This is the archive page for my blog. I am now putting my writing here, and I have a newsletter, which you can subscribe to here.

Girl Power: Some Adjustments

My favorite magazine, hands down, is Seventeen. I think I subscribed to it for the first time at the age of 22 because I saw an ad that promised free lip gloss with a $10 subscription. I'm a sucker for free gifts -- I have so many New Yorker Dog Books that I could outfit every upscale vet practice waiting room in the city of New Orleans. Anyway, Seventeen is my favorite because (1) It's pretty offensive, and nothing gets me off more than feeling self-righteously better than everyone else by calling out other peoples' (or magazines') insolence; and (2) GREAT MAKE-UP TIPS.

Panic Attack

I want to write about literally anything else. I am racking my brain for a subject. Let's see let's see let's see. This weekend I went to a letterpress opening, and I watched two really girly comedy movies, and the weather wasn't so bad, and I coached improv; I'm trying to find a good angle for those things, but all I can think about is how I had a very public, very ugly panic attack last night. I still feel it in parts of my body. I should probably still be sleeping it off, but my cat is like an Insane Clown Posse concert at four in the morning (very loud, lots of black and white).

Baskerville

Amelia Bird might dislike me. Or, at least, she might not trust me very much, because when I walked into the letterpress print shop she is helping to open in New Orleans on Saturday, I lost my shit completely and acted exactly and precisely like a four-year-old who just found out that toys were a thing. That kind of behavior is charming for about three minutes, but I bounced around the studio space -- aptly called Baskerville -- for more like forty-five, rubbing the gorgeous letterpresses and fingering the heavy-grain paper. When a person is effusive like that for that extent of time, one should probably assume they either want something from you, or are on cocaine. Neither were true for me last night, and you have to believe me: I was just really, really excited to be in that space.

Morning Pages

I have been writing morning pages every morning for three years now. Morning pages were probably not Julia Cameron's idea, but she's the one who named them "morning pages," and so she's the one who gets all the credit.

Strep Throat

On Friday night, I had a single margarita and was basically instantly drunk. That's not unlike me, mind you. That's really pretty typical. I shouldn't say "Friday night," though. I should say, "On Friday at 6 p.m."

Baths

I just got out of the bath. I have to go to work really early today -- I mean, I have to be there by 6:30 a.m., which was my reality Monday through Friday for five years in a row; but just a few months out of the cycle, I feel like I'm being tortured. If you see a teacher on the street sometime, seriously, hug them or something. They really need it.

Mix CDs

There's a terrific mix CD in my car right now, like it's 2005 or something. I actually received it in the mail just a month or two ago, when I was feeling sad. (That's my default emotion. The friend who sent this to me clearly thought that sadness was a novelty -- like, a once-in-a-blue-moon kind of thing. This is a new friend, obviously.)

Snow Days

New Orleans has declared it a "snow day." What this really means is that New Orleans hasn't heard about salt. But no matter. I am inside, listening to it "snow," thinking about actual snow, and actual snow days, like all the other people here who are not from here and are reminiscing about the exact same thing.

The Scary Piece

Today I published this piece in Punchnel's: A Woman Walks Into A Life-Changing Sex Comedy Show.

This piece is a big deal for me, although it's possible that won't be clear in reading it. It's not written in my usual style (long-winded, endlessly verbose, looooonnnnnng-winded). That's because the editors at Punchnel's were like, "Hey, we will consider publishing this piece, but it needs to be edited a LOT." The original version started with a bunch of paragraphs about women in comedy. Here are some of the paragraphs that got cut:

What City Should You Actually Live In?

Just because you weren't born somewhere doesn't mean you shouldn't live there! Although, please do the right thing and adjust for gentrification. "Just because you weren't born somewhere doesn't mean you shouldn't live there" is something that mostly privileged white people get to say. OK? Cool! Now take this quiz and enjoy your privilege!

Going On Dates

Yesterday I went on a date. It was not a date with myself -- I am kind of good at those, though, because I'm a great conversationalist, and so am I. But this time around, I went on a date with my roommate, Derek.

Frisbee Golf

Yesterday my friend Charles invited me to play frisbee golf with him.

That's not actually accurate. He invited me to join him and his (very good-looking) friends to play laser tag, which everyone knows is totally different from frisbee golf. He said, "Meet us in City Park, we are all going to play laser tag." And I thought, "That's a fun and quirky way to celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. I will go and do that, I think."

4/3/10

I searched for "salamander" in my Gmail box on a whim (who knows. I don't know. It just felt like what I ought to do) and this came up. It's an old love letter. It really struck me deeply, and against maybe my better judgment I'm sharing it.

The Woods

It's amazing what makes sense in the woods.

Vastness, for one thing. How big everything is. The scope of a single tree: leaves, branches, bark, needles, seed pods, roots. The scope of many trees: oaks, sycamores, pines, alders, in groves, along hillsides, upwards. The sky, which is deep, like a bowl you will never glimpse the bottom of. The earth, which is old and dark and wise.

Body Stuff

I was a fat kid. Like, really, really fat. I'm not saying this to get your pity (although, pity me if you feel like it; I was pitiably fat). I was fat enough that my family was concerned and spoke to me about it several times. My mother took me to a nutritionist and everything. People talked to me about it like I didn't realize I was fat. This kind of gentle, "You know, honey... what's going on with... your body... is a serious thing." Because I was so aware I was fat, and so aware that everyone was aware I was fat, I stress-ate in private. I couldn't fit under my bed, but BEHIND my bed was a great spot to drink soy sauce and eat maraschino cherries.

Crazy Book People

It's not just me. There are lots of us who are weird about books. We just don't necessarily announce ourselves. Crazy book people are notoriously introverted.

Traveling

I have been traveling since the week of Thanksgiving.

I should re-write that, because I haven't been "traveling" the way that long-haired, beautiful, bohemian people who wear waterproof pants and straw hats mean it. Yesterday I went to my local bike shop, and the owner said, "It's been a long time since I've seen you! Where have you been?" I said, "Oh, traveling." He said, "Where have you been traveling?" I said, "Oh, you know, Belize, Greece. Places like that."

To Be The Most Alive

For a while, I was writing in my blog every day. That was back when I was doing it "secretly." In quotes, because I always sent everything to my sister Alexis, who reliably said, "SOPHIE YOU ARE THE BEST WRITER IN THE WORLD LET'S BE BOYFRIENDS." That was, for a while, enough for me, and I was in a pretty good practice.

Dear Satchmo

Dear Satchmo,

What's up? How are you? Have you been sleeping with the electric blanket on during the day? That's a fire hazard, but I approve because it's very impressive that your little non-human paws can turn that thing on all by themselves.