You, too, can do cruel things to Albert if you go here.

But February is the surprise, the bitter pill stopping short and dissolving in the wrong place, year after year after year.

Of all the programming on TV, I watch a handful of shows. I go to a handful of movies a year. I like less than half of the books I read. And as for poetry, I read so much really bad unvetted stuff online that my average is probably way less than one percent.

And, as you can see from a couple of posts down, I seem to think that’s a terrible thing. I complained about Jimmy Stewart’s poetry, but I’ve never complained about bad Jimmy Stewart movies (okay, I have complained about “Shop Around the Corner,” but it’s Margaret Sullavan who makes me want to suffocate myself). I don’t complain when some celebrity writes an autobiography, or a cookbook, or a children’s book, or a Star Trek novel. I don’t generally read them, but I don’t complain about them.

Why poetry then? I asked as if I couldn’t understand why they were thinking they could write it, instead of asking why I was thinking they shouldn’t bother.

When I read “unpublished” poetry posted on the internet, I’m reading the equivalent of an agent’s slushpile. There are gems, but there are lumps of coal, too. Many more lumps than gems. Thousands more lumps than gems.

What I see on TV has already been winnowed. Yes, I’m mixing my metaphors. Shoot me. What I see in a bookstore or a theater has been winnowed. And then I take it further. I winnow winnow winnow until I get down to my handful of movies that I’ll even try. And then I still don’t end up liking all of them.

Why, then, did I seem to expect poetry to be different? I read a journal and am disappointed when I like a handful of poems, even though that’s huge. I won’t even see 1 in 50 movies, but I can like 25% or somewhere like it of published poems. To then be disappointed is a foolish and hurtful double standard.

It seemed to be a slam to say, “Oh, I liked one or two,” when really it’s something of a miracle to be able to say, “You really nailed this. This suits me very well.”

He’s watching something with… squishy… sound effects. You know the kind. The sound of a blade being stirred around in someone’s viscera. That sort of sound.

And I, fool that I am, turned and looked. For the love of all things holy, why can’t he stick to porn and American Idol like a normal person?

I like four poems in the New Hampshire Review. No, five. One poet with more than one.

Of the four editors on the masthead, I know and greatly respect three. I do not know one.

I like them. But I like only four poems. No, five. Five poems. Is that a good success rate, or a poor one? Do they like all of the poems they have chosen? Would any one person like them all?

I have read them all, and now I’m writing like this. I am the burning tire. I am the purpling toe. I like four poems in the New Hampshire Review. No, five.

So, go read it! Tell me I’m crazy. No one has told me yet today that I’m crazy and I think I need some affirmation, people!

Jimmy Stewart published a book of poetry. So did Art Garfunkel. So did Mattie Stepanek.

Has anyone who became famous for something else ever written a poem I should read? I know Jimmy and Mattie didn’t. Did Art?

What is it about poetry?

Of course, everyone thinks they can sing, too. Except me. I know I can’t. I hurt myself when I sing, except if it’s “Cotton Fields” and I’m in the car. That’s just beautiful.

But whose work I find admirable and awe inspiring.

Octavia Butler was one of those people. RIP you fine woman, you.

I’ve ventured into a new realm of study, mainly because I dislike my job and am becoming less enthused by the minute.

But I live in a wasteland of singlewides and unemployment. If I were a yaller dog I could get a job lying in a driveway, but a college grad? It is to laugh.

So I’m studying medical transcription. It’s going pretty well, until today. Today was a chapter on analgesic drugs and I don’t know if it’s because it’s Sunday but dayum, all these drugs sound alike. I sink, sobbing, onto the sofa. If I were higher class I’d suffer a decline. As it is, I’m just annoyed.

I apologize for the insult. I do!

You’re too stupid to use myspace.

I tried to set up a profile, mainly because Kevin did and I’m a follower. *baa*

I’m too incompetent. I need hipster lessons.

Speaking of hips, the arthritis in mine is killing me today. Why? Because it’s Saturday and pain waits for the weekend to throw its parties.