You Are Invited to the Cringe Book Release Party
I would like to invite you to the Cringe book release party. I would love it if you came. It’s going to be at Housing Works Used Books Cafe in Soho, on Wednesday, September 3, from 7 – 8:30 pm.
I will be there. My family and friends will be there. And best of all, a whole bunch of the awesome contributors will be there, some of them flying in from all over the country. There will be readings and book signings and discounted drink specials. Publication is nice and all, but inspiring a discounted drink special has been a dream of mine since childhood. Please, come share this with me.
Directions to Housing Works
So come! Bring friends! And email me if you’d like to know about the afterparty. Which sounds much more exotic and exciting than it really is, I promise.
P.S. Thank you, universe, for getting so excited about this with me.
Today is the day
I may not have mentioned this before, but I recently compiled a book called Cringe, and it’s on sale today. I am very proud of this book, and I think you should buy it. It’s funny, it’s hardcover, it’s full color, it’s not too heavy, and it would make a perfect gift. It’s available at all of these booksellers, online and in stores.
This book is made up of material from so many funny people. Many of them have websites, and you should go look at those as well. Here is the list of Cringe contributors:
Heather Armstrong
Jan Arvanetes
Marc Balgavy
Jen Bandini
Jennifer Boyer
Alice Bradley
Erin Bradley
Heather Burford
Holly Burns
Brian Byrne
Jay Carlson
Tracy Carr
Lori Dalton
Millie de Chirico
Bree Ma’Ayteh Dunscombe
Gabrielle Fine
Erinn Foley
Josh Gallaway
Erin Glaser
Johanna Gohmann
Elizabeth Goodman
Dana Gulino
Sandra Heikkinen
Danielle Henderson
Greg Howard
Maggie Jacobstein
Erin Keane
Blaise Kearsley
Liz Kellermeyer
Sarah Kelly
Tracie Masek
Margaret Mason
Marc Mazique
Aaron McQuade
Joshua Neuman
Joshua Newman
Sarah Niersbach
Hollie Pocsai
Davy Rothbart
Aubrey Sabala
Audrey Shupp Sahns
Kitty Joe Sainte-Marie
Rita Schepok
John Sellers
Amy Shapiro
Kristine Smith
Ariel Meadow Stallings
Elizabeth Summers
Brad Walsh
Jessica Wiseman
They are all fantastic, and I am so lucky to have them in this book.
Go, click, buy, read! And thank you.
Wiki wiki
Wikipedia entries I have found myself reading at 2 am recently:
I also like to look up people I’ve dated on Wikipedia. This is so much better for your psyche than actually googling them.
Surely this happens to everyone. You go to Wikipedia to look up one thing, maybe to settle a bet someone made earlier that night at the bar, and then suddenly it’s two hours later and you’re reading the synopses for all the Saw movies. (Do not ever do this. I called my brother in the middle and said, “Oh my god have you ever read the synopses of the Saw movies? They’re horrible!” and he said, “Why are you doing that?” and I said, “Because I know I can never see them but I thought I should know what they were about, but this is even worse! I can’t stop reading them! And now I have to worry about Saw fans! It upsets me that Saw fans walk among us and I can’t spot them on the street!” and my brother said, “Yeah, you should probably stop reading those.”)
I have never once been even slightly tempted to read an Anne Rice novel, but I sure did read the rundown of every single character in every single one of her books when I could have been sleeping. And I love sleeping. I also like reading Wikipedia entries on movies I feel like I should have seen already but I know I’m not ever going to bother to Netflix. This is like the cyber-version of when my friend Emily would go see some mediocre movie that she didn’t like and I didn’t want to see, but we’d still spend a good twenty minutes with a play-by-play and follow-up questions.
Sometimes I read entries on books and movies I’ve already read or seen, just to see if they missed anything, or if I did. I have zero interest in ever participating in Wikipedia myself by logging in and glavening up, but it’s so fascinating to me that Andrew WK has a longer entry than some former presidents.
I also look up things I’m actually interested in, using Wikipedia like I used the library as a nine year old, which means I spend most of the time looking up folklore, mythology and famous ghosts. But I can’t do that late at night or I get freaked out, so instead I find myself reading about Scotland, or Gwyneth Paltrow.
At one point, there were Wikipedia entries for both Cringe and bershon, and I had nothing to do with either. They’ve both been deleted, but the whole thing is so intriguing. Who made them in the first place? Who decided they weren’t wiki-worthy? Were there hurt feelings and rolled eyes? I want to read a Wikipedia entry about that. I bet it’s sort of like the imdb message board for Alien v. Predator, which has been a constant source of amusement to me for five years running.
Hold on I’m going to go wiki Alien v. Predator.
Upkeep
Hello. I have not even been bothering to phone it in here lately, and I feel a little bad about that, not because I imagine anyone has been sitting here, hitting refresh and sighing dramatically at anyone within earshot*, but just because I know I’m about to go all-Cringe up in here starting in a few days with the book release and all its related festivities. So here I am, typing just to keep our fires alive. You’re important to me, baby. Let’s talk. How was your day? Mine was fine.
* I hate it when people do that in public, trying to draw strangers in to their crazy. Oh, are you upset that this line is moving so slowly? That our plane has not yet taken off? Well, I’m not thrilled about it either but I’m not going to make eye contact with you so you can think we’re in some secret pissed off league together and try to wrangle me in to your public a-holeness. You need to learn to carry a book with you and relax.
Right, what else is going on.
I’ve spent a lot of time lately trying to find The Perfect Dress to wear to the book release party. This is a dangerous game, since a few months ago, I came up with The Perfect Dress in my head, but unfortunately my head doesn’t know how to manufacture all of its dreams and wishes, which is sometimes good but mostly harsh. I am also hesitant to even mention this here because now when I post pictures of the release party, you’ll say, What did Sarah wear? and then you’ll say, Oh, another black dress, how shocking. Don’t look at me! I throw my cape over my face and exit stage left!
Oh, I know a thing: I received Bill Bryson’s Dictionary for Writers and Editors as a birthday gift, and I’ve really been enjoying reading a few pages a night, just before bed. I am the one of those people who reads dictionaries, who has a favorite dictionary, and who actually keeps her favorite dictionary on her bedside table and will read it if she is upset or cannot sleep. I am not telling you this because I think it’s cute, I’m telling you this to determine if you are on the level of nerd I’m operating at, which is Thetan IV. If this feels at all familiar, you might also enjoy this Bryson book.
Anyway, so far I’m just to the Cs, but one fun (“fun”) thing I’ve learned so far is that I have been misspelling Barabbas’s name in the title of my site for about three years now.
What else is new? I ate at The Sizzler on Saturday.
Yeah, let’s try something else. I don’t know; we could just hold each other.
Do you want to watch a movie?
5 am, 102.3 °F
I wonder if I’ll ever shake the childhood hope for 100 degrees or more so I can stay home from school when taking my temperature.
No Cringe Tonight
Just a reminder, since I’ve been getting a lot of emails: there is no Cringe tonight. No August Cringe at all, due to the onslaught of Cringes that will be accompanying the book release in early September. There’s some fun stuff planned, so watch this space for more details.
Mr. Bear approves
Did you see Jay’s boozy tea party in the August issue of The Plug? Because these photos made my day.
