So...

I was so happy to be done with school, and going to Costa Rica with my boyfriend, and Christmas, and then I get another rejection letter.

Rejection = sad.

Things about to get interesting?

So my job is amassing enough Civil War arms to man an army of 30.

Is work about to get a lot...more hectic? More military-esque? More...noisy?

Doubtful. Although parts of an upcoming film, CHOOSE, was filmed at my job. They pretended the fort was actually an abandoned hospital. Some kinda famous guy is in it, he also played Satan in END OF DAYS (1999). I forget his name. Something Byrne, right?

I'll spoil the ending right now: THE BROTHER DID IT

School is being sucky...lots. Almost over. And going to Costa Rica over my break!

Woohoo!

AHHHH

I haven't posted in FOREVER.

Because I'm a slacker.

BUT

I got extra financial aid moneys, which is always, always, always good.

Now I just have to get good grades to keep the money that I claimed to have earned.

Today I shot a gun at work. There was nothing to do, and we all wanted to dress up in Confederate and Union uniforms and shoot Civil War muskets. And we did.

Afterward, I had to go to the guys' bathroom to clean the guns. Because that's where all the cleaning stuff is. And I was in there, and my boss came in, and I thought it'd be really awkward. But then he just started helping me take apart the weapon and "wollyrag" it, which means to make it all shiny with a pre-oiled rag.

Wollyragging. I'm not kidding.

And yes, this is the same boss that ignored my skimpy outfit at Halloween.

I will post writing up from the book soon. I'm just nervous enough to die. In the meantime:

I call this "Place Holder." I submitted it to a student publication. Wish me luck!

This was not a normal hotel room.
Instead of the Book of Mormon or a Gideon Bible, I found an advance copy of Miley Cyrus’s autobiography in the top drawer of the nightstand. Advance copy…so the cover was cardboard-like, and I found three spelling errors on the back jacket alone. Menacing black letters told me I could not sell this.
I flipped my purse upside-down and dumped the contents to search for traces of currency. Some yen, but they were carefully placed as bookmarks. I was not using this to buy anything – they were probably novelties I’d collected and started using to hold my page. I also found a Cuban coin, but there was a vague memory of me digging the thing out of a ditch with a long stick as a freshwater crab jumped and snapped at me. I’d been screaming, “I’m not trying to hurt you, crab, I’m trying to get the shiny thing.” And the bluish-purple monster didn’t listen to me.
No other cash. I had a bank card, just one. Viewpoint Bank. No dollars, no euros, no pesos. My wallet was just a folded piece of leather with an etching of a woman with a basket on her head. I had two passports - one with no stamps inside. It was completely blank, completely new. The picture inside looked like a slightly older version of myself. The other had expired five years ago.
Angry, I snapped on the television. There had to be a dialect, a language, something. One station hummed in Punjabi. Another was a language-less weather channel…but it gave the temperature in degrees centigrade, not Fahrenheit. But all that really told me was that I wasn’t in the United States, since that’s the only country that’s stubborn enough to use Fahrenheit. The last available channel sang in Italian. The rest showed static and more static. There was a cable box, and it confused me, so I promptly threw it out the window along with the advance copy of Miley Cyrus’s autobiography.
Radio? Did I have one of those alarm-clock/radio combinations common in hotel rooms? If I could listen to the radio, I could listen for a language, and then successfully discover the nation in which I was a confused visitor.
No. Instead of an alarm clock, there was an outlet and, on the table, a charger for every cell phone ever invented. Ever. I assumed hotel management wanted me to take the hint and use my phone as an alarm clock. And was there a white, inoffensive phone with a springy cord nearby? No. Of course not. And I love springy cords. I like to bite them, like the twisting thing on my keychain. But I couldn’t even leave bite marks in the hotel phones.
What the fuck.
I looked down out my window at the destroyed cable box and the intact piece of shit book. I found it funny that the technologically primitive book survived. It was alright until a pre-teen came by an actually picked the thing up.
“No! No! That is not for public consumption!” My voice screamed at blonde highlights. “It has errors! Terrible, terrible errors in grammar, spelling, and possibly flow! It is meant to be edited! NO!!!”
She didn’t react to me. She either didn’t understand what I was saying because she didn’t know English, or she didn’t understand what I was saying because her ears decided to ignore me.
I popped my ears by moving my jaw. Once, twice, three times. I tried to make music with it, but I couldn't pop my ears as fast as I wanted the beat to be.
Then I went to sleep. The hotel did still have a bed.

Jeez.

I can't believe Iggy actually went to see if mypussy.com was real.

C'mon now.

Alright, so...it's come to my attention that we all need to get over the rock thing.

I'm trying to install my printer and it's not working. I'm so so so bad with technology that it's not even funny.

Thanks for my job, I now watch the History Channel when they talk about the Revolutionary War. I caught myself screaming, "Retreat, George Washington, RETREAT!" at the television set. And keep in mind I was doing this INSTEAD OF hanging with friends/doing homework/absolutely anything else.

But seriously, those guys were hardcore. Radical for their time. When taxes went up for them, they decided to form their own nation. When taxes go up for us, we just bend over a little more.

Our founding fathers are turning in their graves!

Dear Ones...

I HAVE REJOINED THE MODERN AGE!

Youtube! Google! Facebook! Mypussy.com! Return to me!

I dunno if mypussy.com is a real site...

so, for my job, I had on my archive list...a rock. A rock. I was supposed to take a picture of this rock, give it a number, seal it in a zippy bag, and archive it with like, old civil war diaries. Because somehow, this rock had historical significance.

You know what I did?

I put the rock outside. Where rocks belong. It thanked me. It's having fun with its rock friends in rock-landia. It's having rock-parties under trees and things like that.

Jeez....

Thank you for everyone who liked my poem :) I am beginning the long rejection process. I already got one! :-) Just a million billion-1 to go!!!

:-) I'm a dork.

Slowww...

I love your words of encouragement. I started submitting query letters to authors. The writing of the book is actually the easy part...for me, at least. Publishing can take TWICE as long. Thank you. I feel better with every positive word - the publishing world is full of form letters and impersonal rejections, rejections that make me think, "They didn't even read my letter. They don't care who I am."

This is coming from someone who has written several books and has failed to get them in print :-(

So thank you, my faithful, fellow bloggers!

I decided to put a poem up here before putting any of my story, just to see if anyone lies my style.

Cows

She wants to start buying
cows
and storing them in a freezer because
it's cheaper than buying meat at King Kullen.
"Think how much money we'll save,"
she says,
"if we buy whole cows off the Internet "

She gets her measuring tape and marks lines here and there
"If we get those stackable
washer and drier combos...
And take out this counter
then we'll have room for an industrial-sized
freezer
to store whole cows
and in two to three years,
it'll pay for itself "

But she measured wrong,
so now the freezer is in
her step-son's bedroom and the
dead, skinned cows hang by their feet.
He thinks they watch him sleep.

He thinks they watch him sleep.







Loosely based on a true story...

Publishing

So now for the process of agents and query letters.

I have to get my book into tip-top shape. Then I have to write "pitch" letters to various agents. I will get rejected a million billion times. Then, if one of the agents likes my pitch, he/she will ask for a synopsis, or summary, of the book. Then THAT will be rejected a million billion times.

Then finally, maybe, kinda sorta, an agent will ask for the WHOLE manuscript. And then I will have to sneak into my school library really early in the morning and print out the damn thing using school paper and printers.

Then I will mail it. 

And then it will be rejected.

A million billion times.

Then, even if I get an agent, there is no guarantee that the agent will be able to sell my book to a publisher. It's like, a whole other process.

Thus is the process of trying to get published.

Helpppp...

In other news, at work I had to put "no smoking" signs in buildings no one has access to. That's right. So in case anyone illegally breaks into these buildings, they will know not to smoke. But honestly, I don't think that type of person will care.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!




I was wearing this for over an hour before my boss noticed.

Hey, at least I know he'll never ever try to hit on me or anything weird.

I even talked to him. Gave him his keys. Made him sign something. Didn't even notice.

Jess gave me an award...but I can't figure out what I'm supposed to do. But. THANK YOU. I am honored. Help my sorry ass.

The book needs to be edited...massive quantities of editing. I'm debating whether or not I should put excerpts up. On the one hand, I want feedback, but on the other, I'm very shy...and I don't want to put up a lot of stuff, because people really don't enjoy reading very very long blogs.

I'll let the polls decide! Hey...it worked for OBAMA :-D

41,526 Words

I'm done.

I made deadline.

Holy crap.

37,004

Word count.

It's been crunch time with the book. And also lack of internet time.

OK. I live with this Chinese couple in Queens. I met them on Craigslist and moved in a week later. So anyways, they're not very computer literate. I had been splitting their wireless connection with a router, but something is wrong and I can't fix it.

So I haven't had Internet in a week.

But their Internet is fine. So they offered to let me use theirs. Problem is - their computer is in Chinese. And there's a cartoon lion that keeps jumping up and telling me things in Chinese. And it dances. And terrifies me.

Work has been slow. I've been writing press releases and stuff instead of giving tours. It's been nice...

Fuck. I just wish I had Internet.

It's not that I don't love you, everybody. It's that I can only get wireless signal for two minutes at a time. Pity me.

Funny thing - when I realized I had no Internet, my first reaction was, "Oh. I have no Internet. I'd better go online and figure out how to fix it."

Civil War

A visitor comes up to me with a book and asks, "Is this about the Civil War?"

I look down at the book in his hands. It's called,

CIVIL WAR

I think that moment cut ten years off my life.

Anyways, my blog was marked as spam...but it's ok again!!!

:-D

Converting...

Today, I got a strange request.

I was trying to answer questions, when a visitor on a bicycle asks me,

"Do you read the Bible?"

I said uhm, not really.

She then replied with,

"You know, you should think of the Kingdom of God like a government. Governments have laws. The government of God does, too, and reading the Bible is one of them."

Then she gave me some pamphlet and told me not to kill myself.

On a brighter note, some deaf people came, and I was able to speak to them a little in sign language. They were really, really happy :-D

The perks...

In Response to "Intense Guy"

While I adore...ADORE...the car you selected for me, I think it should be publicly known that, for the safety of children and adults, I do not drive.

At work, before the tourists come, it's typical for us guides to take golf carts around and check for sticks, glass, etc. But it usually results in fun as we off-road it and chase geese around with the carts.

I have a license, but I hardly ever drive. I think the last time I drove a car was during my road test. However, I do drive the cart.

The first time I drove the golf cart, I may have crashed into a giant stone building. Also known as a church. I may have confused the gas with the break and sped UP while heading towards the giant stone building.

That cart has been messed up ever since. Sometimes the bosses complain about that cart, saying, "How come the four-seater doesn't turn right?!

I still haven't 'fessed up.

Oh well...

PS

WORD COUNT: 26,748!!!

Religion Mayhem...

A guide I work with wants to join a religion. She feels lonely and whatnot, and so she's looking to faith. Fine.

Catholicism? No. Judaism? No. Muslim? No.

She wants to join an underground pagan religion where she sacrifices chickens and shaves her head bald. And wears white for a year.

This might not be so bad if she didn't start the conversation with, "Tell me the truth. Does this sound like a cult to you..."

I highly recommended Buddhism. Sitting around, humming and meditating, can do some good. And, if she wants, she can still shave her head.

Hey, trying to save some chickens here.

__________________________________________________________________

Aside - This is my personal blog. I'm not concerned about being politically correct and using language that will make everyone feel happy and cuddly.

Retarded Brain

I had to leave work early because I thought I was going to collapse from tiredness.

My first clue was the ten minutes it took me to figure out a hole-puncher. I picked up the thing, stared, and started hitting it with my paper, thinking, "This creates holes in paper somehow..." Then I just kept pushing the lever, and I wasn't sure how to get the paper in there. Something in my brain just...didn't connect.

And then the visitors.

The building most of the visitors had to go to for some artist workshop was right there as soon as the visitors walk in. It's to their right. I got so confused and disoriented that I told the workshop visitors to take the free tram ride over to the southern end to get to the same building.

And it's like, ten feet from where we were all standing.

Then I told the visitors to hurry because the building would be torn down soon.

An hour later, I realized what huge amounts of misinformation I engaged in. So then I asked my boss if I could take the rest of the day off.

Bahhh...

Nooo...

I don't wanna go give tours tomorrow. I want to have orgasms.

Ahhh, this is the plight. Of life.

Most of the guides are leaving since the season is over. This is bad for a couple of reasons.

One guide who is leaving has been there forever, and I always go to him when I fuck up. So he's like my buffer. He has saved my ass on many occasions, and he very rarely gets angry with your stupidity, because he's very patient and god-like.

One guide is very clueless and confused. She's always freaking out and panicking for some reason. So...basically...she makes me look BETTER.

With both of these people gone...I'm just average.

Eeek. Help.

22,399 Word Count

Sometimes it's hard to juggle school and work and my own personal writing.

But then I'm walking past Bryant Park and see this poster. And then I know that all is well in the world.

Ohhhh holy hotness.

Although I wish his crotch wasn't so obviously stuffed. I mean, come on. It's really OK to have an average-sized penis. Let's put it this way: If that thing is real, I'm making sure it stays the hell away from me at all costs. That would be like the thickest schlong in the world.

Olympic God

I actually had an OK day today. Thinking about attractive men makes everything go by better. This girl I work with develops a new crush every week just to make things interesting. Safety guys, firemen, the emergency medical people, other tour guides, repeat visitors, artists who are throwing their exhibitions...

This gorgeous, OLYMPIC GOD walked by. I was talking to some woman about where the bathroom was or some shit. But we both stopped. Completely. And stared.

This man had his shirt WIDE open, revealing a perfect set of golden abs. It was like from the movie 300. He had 300-style abs. It's an adjective now.

We both stared until he had gone. And then I continued like nothing happened, and she started paying attention again. It was like we developed this understanding, this bond of appreciation...

and then I realized:

OH MY GOD. We're acting like MEN.

This guy was just hot enough to drag us down to that level.


So even as the economy crashes around me and houses are getting foreclosed and tuition goes up, I still have hope for the future. Because there are 300-style abs out there, and they're not purely digital.

Is it 1985?

I'm not going to lie - some atypical school and camp groups do come. Most of them are normal, but the normal ones are never the ones that stick with you. It's always that group that says, "fo' real???" at everything you say that you remember.

Or a group like this one.

There was a group of about twenty-thirty students in a camp group a while ago. From the Bronx. And the biggest kid had something on his shoulder that I hadn't seen in a while.

A boom box.

A boom box.

I just have to say it one more time...

A boom box.

Is it 1985? Who carries a boom box over the shoulder in this day and age? And who the hell would bring one ON A TOUR??? On a spoken guided tour?

My fellow guide tried to ask the leaders of a the group for some cooperation. Nope. They thought it was perfectly fine. The boom box was acceptable to them.

Ugh. I need food.

Mobs of Children

School and camp groups love dressing their children in really bright colors...like bright pink or bright green. The most common one is bright yellow...probably because yellow doesn't indicate either gender like pink does.

It'll be a calm, calm day. All will be still. Birds chirp, squirrels copulate, women wearing huge high heels fall on their asses to provide a good laugh. A buff jogger will come by and make me stare. A fat jogger will come by and make me feel good about myself.

And then a massive yellow wall will descend upon me like a wave. With their questions. With their incessant demands for water fountains, bathrooms, and educational experiences. DESCEND

What's worse - the camp guides and teachers feel like tour guides are babysitters, and then they can just leave. This is legally not the case. You don't know how many teachers I've had to chase down yelling, "EXCUSE ME! EXCUSE ME! WE CANNOT ACT AS CARETAKERS!!!"

So about my book, ALEX.

Or, rather, Alexander(A), which is what it will be called.

I'm looking for a 40,000 - 50,000 word count. So far, I have a little over 18,000. I'm almost halfway there. As for the content - it's (roughly) a coming of age story. Of a transvestite.

It's more complicated than that, but I don't wanna give too much away.

:-D

What the hell?

I had a weird-ass visitor that I have to write about.

So this guy...just continuously kept rubbing his belly...while I was trying to give my tour. It was extremely distracting.

Not only was he obscenely rubbing his big, big belly...with that shirt dark from sweat stains...but he was also licking his lips and asking strange questions.

"What's the weather like in San Francisco?"






I wish I could kick people out.




I wish I was a really big, powerful man. Who could throw whole human beings.

Good news - broke 17,000 words today.

Stupid Questions

Commonly, I will be answering one question when someone comes up to me and asks the same exact question that I just answered. Which is fine if you really didn't hear it all.

But what really cooks my noodle is when two people (who didn't come together) are staring at me. One asks a question and the other waits:

Visitor 1: "Where is the tour?"
Me: "At the top of the hill."
Visitor 1: "OK. Thanks." (This part is optional. Half the time people simply walk away when I've answered their question.)

Now Visitor 2 steps forward.

Visitor 2: "Where's the tour?"

This happens more than it possibly should.

There is also this situation, which happens at least five times a day:

Visitor 1: "Where's the tour?"
Me: "At the top of the hill."
Visitor 1: "OK, so the tour is at the top of the hill, right?

NO. It's NOT. I just told you that to CONFUSE you.

Back to writing, Mila, just get back to writing...

Creepy Men

Tour guides have to deal with creepy men. And since you're a tour guide and you're basically being paid to talk to and be nice to people, they get more leeway than in real life. In real life, if you're taking pictures of me with your phone, your phone will soon be under a bus.

But when I'm at work, I kind of have to deal with it since photographing me is obviously allowed.

So when a guy comes up to me and says,

"Wow, you girl guides sure are hot. Prettier than Betty Boop."

I kind of have to deal with it.

But there is a line that cannot be crossed.

"Where do you live? It's OK to tell me - I'm a cop in Jamaica."

Yeah...see...that doesn't make sense.

Holdin' Stuff.

Security makes sure no alcohol gets through. Knives and shotguns are OK. But no booze.

This angers a lot of people. Enter the couple who brought a bottle of wine for dinner later on. Enter the recent graduate with a keg.

So if I'm in the bookstore, I get asked to hold wine a lot. Expensive wine. This is pretty typical, but I don't like to hold expensive shit because then I might be accountable for it later on. I usually say "no" when someone wants to put something behind the counter.

But right now I'm watching a watermelon for some lady.

She didn't want to bring her watermelon. And I figure hey, it's a watermelon. It's not some rare wine. Fine, I'll take it. And it's sitting there like a deformed baby leaning against a Civil War book.

And it's mocking me.

Word Count: 12,619

Tomorrow I have bookstore all day. Which means I'll get plenty of...

WRITING TIME!!!

However, my writing will be interrupted constantly by this one harrowing question:

WHERE IS THE STATUE OF LIBERTY FERRY?!

Foreigners just walk in and say, "Stat-ooo leee-bear-teee???"

It is apparently the question that drives every single burning heart.

I don't mind answering the question. A lot of people come a long way to see the bitch. But I DO mind when people try to steal my maps.

Since the question is asked about once every minute (sometimes more), I have a small map of lower Manhattan with my building circled with your typical "YOU ARE HERE" over the bookstore I'm in and a dotted arrow going towards Castle Clinton, which is where you get tickets to see her. (In all honesty, the STATEN ISLAND FERRY is better. It's a free boat ride and you go right by the statue. I tell tourists this as much as possible because I don't like when people spend money.)

Now, I only have one of these little maps, and I never let anyone hold it, and I kind of keep it really close to me when I tell people where to go. But so many people try to MOLEST my piece of paper. They want it. They gotta have it. Problem is, I only have one copy, and there are about a billion other people with the same exact question.

Then people complain that we don't print maps.

We are a tourist site! Why would I create a bunch of maps on how to LEAVE my tourist spot to get to ANOTHER? I still want, you know, a job! That would be like Coca-Cola giving out coupons for Pepsi and then giving you a map to the Pepsi-Cola plant.

12,619 words. Keep reaching for that rainbow, Mila.

Be Nice...

Here is what tour guides do to mean, mean visitors:

1. Direct you to the bathrooms that we know are dirty
2. Tell you about the worst or most expensive programs
3. Say, "We're out of those" when we really have a stash of product X beneath the counter
4. Recommend the food cart that we know is infested with roaches and will give you indigestion

If you come up to me and demand a map, and then complain about the one I give you, or maybe complain that tours should be given more often, or maybe you don't like the fact that you can't bring your dog, well then, guess what - I'm going to guide you to the facility with the toilets that spray your asshole with a strange orange juice when you flush...yeah, the one where the sinks don't work until you hit it for a while, and then it sprays hot water everywhere.

You will then be so petrified that you will be tested for HIV.


Like on your face.

You've heard of being nice to the waiters, yes? Well be nice to the tour guides.

Confederate Confusion

Sometimes all the tour guides dress up like Civil War soldiers. We even have rifle muskets from the time period that we carry around. One of the guides...let's call him Corey, dresses as a Confederate.

About a week ago, Corey was dressing in his Confederate uniform. He had his rifle musket leaning against his locker while he tied his shoe.

As Corey was down there, Jacob (name also changed) went into the bathroom to do his business. He startled Corey, who jumped up and bumped into his rifle musket. The damn thing then fell on Corey's head.

Corey suffered a concussion and had to be taken to the hospital. An ambulance was called for him. WHILE HE WAS DRESSED AS A CONFEDERATE.

My boss feared that the gun might go off or explode or something, so the fire department was also called.

While Corey was in the hospital, he called his roommate just to tell him what had happened. But Corey didn't explain it very well. He simply said, "I'm in the hospital...I got hit in the head with a gun." The roommate didn't know what was going on, and so he assumed that Corey got pistol-whipped by some gangster.

The Moral: The next time you dress as a Confederate soldier, lean your rifle musket against a wall.

I really, really wanted to see the look on the doctor's face as Corey was rolled in to the ER while wearing that sad sack.

Fliers and Signs

A lot of my time is pointlessly wasted in:
1. Making fliers and signs
2. Laminating fliers and signs
3. Taping up fliers and signs

And all these fliers and signs contain the following:
1. When the tours begin
2. Where the tours begin
3. How long the tours are
4. Arrows pointing to the direction of the tour

And, of course, most of the questions I personally receive aren't about history at all:
1. Where is the bathroom?
2. Where can I get water?
3. Do you have a map?
4. Can I have a map?
5. Why can't I have a map?
6. What about the map that YOU have?


I would like to make one last and final flier and post it everywhere. It will not contain any pictures, cute boxes, or exclamation points. There will be no promises and no arrows. My new and improved flier will say:

ALL QUESTIONS CAN BE ANSWERED BY SIMPLY WALKING AROUND AND USING COMMON SENSE

Of course, sometimes I get some strange questions. Those are always entertaining.

"What is your nationality?"
"What is your phone number?"
"Where do you live?"
"Can you tell my son that you met Yogi Bear?"
"How old were you when you realized you wanted to do this with your life?"

With my LIFE? Are you serious???

First day of school tomorrow. Have to finish a scholarship essay, but I'm putting it off.

Lying on Tours

Sometimes tour guides get bored of their own material. Because let's face it, history isn't always interesting. And after the fifth kid asks you, "Why is this place so boring?"...you kind of want to step up your material.

Some personal examples I have heard from co-workers:

Reality - There is a parking lot.
Tour Version - There is a parking lot, but beneath it is a grave site - Native Americans, Civil War soldiers, and Nazis are secretly buried here.

Reality - This used to be a helicopter pad.
Tour Version - A Coast Guard helicopter crashed into this apartment building in the middle of the night.

Reality - Nothing happened.
Tour Version - We saved the muthafuckin' world.

Hey, we have to make ourselves seem SOMEWHAT important. Otherwise GameBoy will win every time.

So I was in a sex shop in SoHo and came across this lovely vibrator. You can hook it up to your iPod and it actually vibrates in tune with the song. The heavier the beat, the more intense the vibration. I played with the display one. "Enter Sandman" is an extremely hardcore song.

Maybe next paycheck...?

9,730 Words

I hope to have 40,000 words by OCTOBER 31.

and i only have 9,730

About the day job -

I am a tour guide in New York City. Sometimes, honestly, I get some fucked up people. One old man was walking around aimlessly. I figured he needed help.

Me, "Do you have a question?"
Him, "Would you believe me if I told you I was mentally unstable?"

So he obviously DID have a question - it just wasn't, you know, "Where's the bathroom?" This is a typical tourist question.

It turns out this man's father is from Sicily, and he had too many kids. As a result, this old man and his siblings didn't have a good education. Oh, and he's Catholic. Oh, and he has a learning disability. OH! And he's 77 years old.

Man, I really need to take off with this writing thing. After college, I'm going to teach English courses overseas. I'll get paid shit and treated like shit and I won't know the language. So basically, it'll be just like living in New York.