See that picture up there?
It's a fitting image to begin today's post, because the great people at Simon & Schuster just sent these books--right off the third printing of Winger--to congratulate me for having had such a good year.
Big thanks are due to Simon & Schuster, and especially all the readers who love this book so much.
Thank you.
Okay, so since it's the end of the year and all, I've been feeling like it's time to come clean about something that's been bugging me for a long time.
It's about Facebook--my Facebook, in particular.
I am a failure at it.
I'm a failure at it because I never post about being sick or having all this pent-up internal anguish. I never talk about what I'm eating, cooking, favorite recipes, or what my unidentified and unphotographed children and wives are succeeding or failing at.
I don't even take photos of my dashboard's outside-temperature display.
As a matter of fact, you don't even know what kinds of fucking cars I drive.
See what a failure I am?
I do not want to post updates about insomnia, which I don't ever get.
And, I'd like to take this opportunity to offer some advice: ATTENTION, INSOMNIA STATUS UPDATER--YOU HAVE INSOMNIA BECAUSE YOUR FINGERS ARE TYPING ON A FUCKING KEYBOARD. YOU CANNOT POSSIBLY GO TO SLEEP WHEN YOU ARE TYPING A STATUS UPDATE ON A FUCKING KEYBOARD.
In fact, pretty much all I ever post about on Facebook is stuff about my books, or the writing business, which are undoubtedly the only two topics I actually want to post about in a wide-open, unregulated forum.
I'm just a really private person. My real-world friends know this about me, so they don't hook into Facebook to find out things about my wife or kids, or what I'm eating, because they know if I'm posting something along those lines, I'm probably making it up.
But in a sit-down, face-to-face conversation, I'm pretty open about pretty much any topic, although I will admit that there have been a significant number of times I've told people that I didn't want to answer certain questions or address particular topics that were uncomfortably personal.
People want to know so much sometimes. It kind of creeps me out.
So, please don't think I'm stuck-up, or that I'm trying to sell my books. I am NOT trying to sell books via Facebook or Twitter, because I just don't do that.
It's just that my books are the only thing I want to talk about online. Sometimes my dogs or horses; rarely my incredibly ugly cats. But that's about it. Never my cars, meals, or sleeping routines.
Oh, I also don't want to talk about drug testing welfare recipients. What a stupid thing to suggest on Facebook! But, if you really want to know, I think we ought to drug test anyone in the US making more than $200,000 per year (for prescription meds, too), and if their pee comes back dirty, we should charge them double taxes--with no write-offs--because they're obviously taking advantage of our economic security to support organized crime. That would get us out of debt by next April.
And I don't want to talk about how "your generation" grew up saying the Pledge of Allegiance in class every day, but now nobody says it because they're too afraid to offend anyone.
Well, WHAT RIGHT-WING GULAG HAVE YOU BEEN RAISED IN??? I'VE BEEN TEACHING HIGH SCHOOL IN CALIFORNIA FOR OVER 20 YEARS AND WE HAVE SAID THE PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE EVERY DAY OF MY PUBLIC SCHOOL CAREER.
But I don't want to say things like that on Facebook, because... you know how easily people will change their opinions when someone like me expresses MINE, and then America would transform overnight into a rainbow-flag-waving-same-sex-marriage-supporting-anti-war-liberal-freaking-hippie-free-love-commune.
And nobody wants that, right?
Last night, I cooked Lasagna for my wife and kids.
It was good.
