Nasty mind gets doughnuts, questions old people. Film at 11.

[mrissa]

This morning I'm going to swing through Byerly's for rolls and then go down to the folks'. My grands and my great-aunt and -uncle are staying there right now -- I don't think I've said that in so many words -- and I'm going to talk to my grands about their time in Southern California when they were first married. My grandmother told a story awhile ago about an incident that happened while they were there, when she was working in a laundry, and her story finished, "And they found him, and everyone was so happy, and it all worked out." But in my head, I had already leapt to, "And they found him dead, and then I had to find the killer, and I got embroiled in a web of deadly politics with the labor movement and its opposition and had to rely on guile to save my life and get the killer jailed. And then everyone was so happy, and it all worked out." Possibly this is because I have an unpleasant mind. Anyway, I'm not intending to write this murder mystery yet, but...well. My grands are extremely sharp still, and they have good memories, and I hope it stays that way indefinitely. But better to ask the fiddly detailed questions while I'm thinking of them; better to have the information when I want it than to want it and wish I'd been more prompt about getting it.

(Also doing this bit of research for this book will probably hold off the day when I start writing the next one in earnest, and that's good, because I still have short stories and revisions I want to do. Need to do. Whatever.)

I got spam from Mislaid Tarzan this morning. Has anyone misplaced their Tarzan? Or possibly laid him incorrectly? Anyway, if you're missing a Tarzan, apparently I can help you find him via my spam filter. For the low, low fee of....

Comments

[laurel]

Good for you for going and asking your grandparents more about details and stuff. A very good thing.

I really really regret not asking various questions of my grandparents. And more than that, I regret that I didn't write stuff down about the stories they did tell me or record them or something, as my memory is very bad and I recall far too little.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It was pretty fabulous. A couple of times I had to stop taking notes so I could put my head on the kitchen table, I was laughing so hard. We have some more stuff to go over yet, but this morning went really well. Some of it is good book fodder. Some of it is just funny stuff.

[writingortyping.livejournal.com]

"And they found him, and everyone was so happy, and it all worked out."

-- and then I found five dollars. The end.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Actually it was orders of magnitude more than that, and in 1951.

[kythiaranos.livejournal.com]

Tarzan is all yours. But if Vin Diesel shows up in your mailbox, feel free to forward him.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

You may have every single serving of Vin Diesel I am ever offered, ever ever ever. I promise. Vin Diesel would have to be female to be any less "my type."

[kythiaranos.livejournal.com]

So, out of curiosity, what person (real or fictional) would you want in your mailbox, were such a thing possible?

(Also, I think making up more dramatic versions of people's life stories is an occupational hazard for writers. At least I do it all the time. And the one about your grands sounds like a good one.)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Err. My mailbox is already a bit full, I should think.

And -- well. I try to be careful with people's life stories. But I'm pretty clear that Jean and Al Swenson, the fictional detective and her husband, are not Bev and Dick Adams, my grandparents. They have several interesting things in common, but they're not the same people. It makes a big difference to me.

Possibly this is because I have an unpleasant mind..

[angeyja.livejournal.com]

.. only in the nicest ways.

I think my filter may be over aggressive. I wonder if you can set it to "amuse me spam?"

[skzbrust.livejournal.com]

This morning I'm going to swing through Byerly's...

Ohhhh...Byerly's.

sniff

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

And I went yesterday. And I'm going again later in the week because our Byerly's doesn't make poppyseed kolachys on Mondays, and I promised my great-uncle a poppyseed kolachy. (He bore up under the burden of the cream cheese one rather well, I felt, considering the grave disappointment.)

Err. Not to rub it in or anything.

[skzbrust.livejournal.com]

You are a bad human being.

I'm all right with that, though.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

That's a good thing, because I can't really think of anything practical you could do to change it.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

And incidentally, I have this conversation all the time, in one form or another, except you're being me and I'm being dd_b. Which is a strange feeling, to say the least. Among other things, I would have thought it would feel taller, being dd_b.