Last fall, I was commissioned to write an essay about Stephen King’s poetry and his relationship to poetry by the Poetry Foundation. I wrote about that experience here. The essay itself came out today, the day before The Outsider is released, and also the day before King receives the PEN America Literary Service Award (the timing of the release of the essay, which can be found here, is not coincidental). My review of The Outsider also debuted today at CD Online.
My wife has been away for a couple of weeks, so I’ve been finding things to occupy all the free time I’ve had that we would normally spend together. Last weekend I went to a baseball game, my first in over 25 years. Texas Rangers vs Houston Astros…the home team won decisively. However, I’m not entirely sure I enjoyed myself. It was like going to a movie where people go to the concessions stands all the time, and the space in front of the seats is so narrow that you have to get up to let them by. With the concessions as expensive as they are, I don’t get the draw. Sit down and watch the game, people. It was quite distracting.
Last Wednesday, I went into Houston to meet up with Michael Koryta, who was in town to promote his new book, How It Happened (my review at the link). I first met Michael at a NECON several years ago, and always meet up with him for drinks before his event and for dinner afterward. This time, we were with the owner of Murder by the Book and another store employee. Always an enjoyable time.
On Saturday, I went into Houston for the MWA Southwest monthly meeting where the guest speaker was…the owner of Murder by the Book! Unfortunately, the meeting room in the restaurant had been previously booked, so we were in the main dining area and had to compete with the din of fellow diners. It was the first of these meetings I’ve been to in at least half a dozen years.
Speaking of Murder by the Book, I will be signing at their booth at Comicpalooza next Saturday from 1:30 to 2:30. Then I’ll be on a panel with Joe Lansdale from 3:00 to 4:00 and another panel from 6:00 to 7:00.
Yesterday, I cashed in a Fandango coupon I won in the grocery store Monopoly game that ended recently and went to see Deadpool 2 at the late-morning matinee for less than five bucks. Most of the trailers/previews didn’t interest me much (loud…hyper-kinetic…frenzied), not even the Sicario sequel. I really liked the first movie, but the second looks far less interesting, perhaps because Emily Blunt isn’t in it. I definitely want to see the new Oceans 8, though. DP2 was pretty funny, with a decent plot that gave it some depth. I probably missed a lot of inside jokes because I’m not fluent in Marvel, but I still laughed a lot. And if you stick around to the very, very end, you’ll hear something that should become popular as a ringtone. Afterward, I went to a nearby pizza place and enjoyed a carafe of wine while watching an intense thunderstorm. A mellow afternoon!
Last night, I finally watched Get Out. I had studiously ignored anything and everything about the film, so I knew virtually nothing about it other than the basic setup: white woman takes her black boyfriend to meet her parents. It absolutely went in directions I didn’t expect, but i thought it was a decent horror flick. The alternate ending was probably more in line with reality, and I imagined an even darker, more realistic way it would have ended, given recent events in this country.
