First, be lazy.
That’s not hard for me. Never has been.
Unfortunately, I haven’t been allowed to be lazy lately. In fact, I’ve been very, very, very, very busy. (And I don’t think there were enough “verys” there.)
And by busy, I mean I’ve been busy writing. I’m working on a terrific project and am really putting the nose to the grindstone because a) my deadline is not that far off; and b) I want this to be the best thing I’ve ever written. So far I think it is.
So you’ll have to forgive me. I’ve kicked around the idea of quitting the blog business altogether, but since the day job will be gone soon, I’ll have more time to devote to blogging. Not that this will necessarily make a difference in the quality of my posts — there are only a few blog ideas and it seems that every blog in the universe has recycled most of them again and again — but at least I’ll have time to actually POST.
Which, again unfortunately, I don’t have time to do today.
So what does this mean to you, the Murderati diehard reader?
How the hell would I know? I’m not you. (Did I mention I’m tired and cranky, too?)
But instead of completely abandoning you, I thought I’d leave you with a couple of videos I did for Murderati back when I was still semi-sane. Or, at least, pretended to be.
I’ll have a question or two after the jump.
RERUN #1
So, question: What song do you sing badly and where do you sing it?
RERUN #2
Old chestnut question: What’s your favorite book opening?
Okay. Sorry. That’s it for me. But the author of the answer I like best will win a book of mine of your choice: Hardcover Kiss Her Goodbye (upcoming news on that front) or paperback Whisper in the Dark or Kill Her Again, or… a pre-publication copy of my newest thriller (coming in June), Down Among the Dead Men.
Thanks for playing.
I sing pretty much anything by U2 lately since the concert a couple weeks ago (awesome, awesome show). I sing it so badly, in fact, that if large groups of people were to hear me sing it, Bono would lose all his money.
My favorite opening is from The Godwulf Manuscript in which Spenser compares the university president’s office to a Victorian whorehouse.
I’ve always really liked the intro paragraph to Lehane’s A Drink Before the War, where Kenzie discusses his suit amongst the glam of the Ritz, and figures maybe the Ritz knows something he doesn’t. I also love the simplicity of the first line in the first book in King’s Dark Tower series: "The man in black fled across the desert, and the Gunslinger followed." Perfect way to first show Roland.
As far as songs I sing badly, I actually have a pretty good singing voice. Just not the range I would like. So my wife (and neighbors) got a good laugh out of me belting out the high end of Shinedown’s "Second Chance" when I was mowing the lawn this summer.
What song do you sing badly and where do you sing it?
Led Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song. And I sing it while walking. Scares the hell out of the neighbors.
What’s your favorite book opening?
I assume this is more expansive than the old ‘favorite first line" query.
I first heard Personville called Poisonville by a red-haired mucker named Hickey Dewey in the Big Ship in Butte. He also called his shirt a shoit. I didn’t think anything of what he had done to the city’s name. Later I heard men who could manage their r’s give it the same pronunciation. I still didn’t see anything in it but the meaningless sort of humor that used to make richardsnary the thieves’ word for dictionary. A few years later I went to Personville and learned better.
***
The city wasn’t pretty. Most of its builders had gone in for gaudiness. Maybe they had been successful at first. Since then the smelters whose brick stacks stuck up tall against a gloomy mountain to the south had yellow-smoked everything into uniform dinginess. The result was an ugly city of forty thousand people, set in an ugly notch between two ugly mountains that had been all dirtied up by mining. Spread over this was a grimy sky that looked as if it had come out of the smelters’ stacks.
The first policeman I saw needed a shave. The second had a couple of buttons off his shabby uniform. The third stood in the center of the city’s main intersection—Broadway and Union Street—directing traffic, with a cigar in one corner of his mouth. After that I stopped checking them up.
Dashiell Hammett, Red Harvest
Fave thing to sing aloud:
Uh, it might be a sign of mental imbalance, but when I’m driving I like to sing along to whatever classical music is playing on the radio and making up words like, "Get out of my waaaaay" (to Beethoven’s 5th) and "Why… can you… not speed your slow ass up?" (to Eine Kleine Nachtmusik). Okay, I’m sure it’s a sign of mental imbalance, but it’s fun for me…
Fave book opening:
Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s 100 Years of Solitude. Just a fascinating beginning!
I’ve always been an Elmore Leonard fan. I like the way he gets right to the point. The opening of MR. PARADISE is a good example:
Late afternoon Chole and Kelly were having cocktails at the Rattlesnake Club, the two seated on the far side of the dining room by themselves: Chole talking, Kelly listening, Chloe trying to get Kelly to help her entertain Anthony Paradiso, an eight-four-year-old guy who was paying her five thousand a week to be his girlfriend.
Damn, you’re a good videographer. Expect me to cite this blog liberally in my next post on Tuesday.
I’m right there with you, man. Banging my head against the blog wall.
What song do you sing badly and where do you sing it? War Machine by KISS. A 5’2" female (who can’t sing) trying to sing a song about vengeance and destruction that is originally sung by a 6’6" man wearing demon makeup just does not work… anywhere, anytime. 😛
Current favorite book opening: "When you have to kill the same terrorist twice in one week, then there’s either something wrong with your skills or something wrong with your world… and there’s nothing wrong with my skills." — Patient Zero by Jonathan Maberry
You are too sweet, Louise…
Too… lazy… to… comment……………… ; )
Sick with fever and aches. Trying not to whine. Failing. Miserably.
Books too heavy and songs too noisy just now.
Curious about "terrific project."
Oooo – I can sing just about anything badly! But Bohemian Rhapsody has to be the best … or the worst in this case 🙂
I think my fave book opening is Farenheit 451. Just love the images and the ideas behind that whole book.
Name me a song and if I know it, I’ll sing it, and I guarantee it’ll be bad. But enthusiastic!
Seriously, I used to get the dog to howl along with me, I’m just that good.
And I still maintain the opening line to Dick Francis’ IN THE FRAME is the best, because it conjures up every possible crime and horror and sadness in one single sentence — "I stood on the outside of disaster, looking in."
Paul, you have my sympathy on blogger-itis. I’ve been blogging since 2006, and topics and time can be pretty darned thin on the ground sometimes. I gotta say, bless the YouTube! It’s saved me more than once!
And the winner is….
(next time)
Favorite book opening (that springs to mind): The opening of Michael Robotham’s THE SUSPECT, which includes the line "Chemotherapy is a cruel hairdresser."