Two Books I Spent My Spring Reading

I wouldn't have thought it would be hard to best my meager reading list from last season — I just had to read more than three books this spring. It didn't happen. One big obstacle (nearly removed) was polishing and sending off the final pages of my novel-in-stories. How can a guy read when he's wrapping up a nine-year literary project? Then the ever-generous Veronica S. surprised me with another order of some delicious-looking sci-fi, and I had to read a couple of the books she so kindly sent.

One was As She Climbed Across the Table, which vindicated Jonathan Lethem completely after the disappointment that was Amnesia Moon. I'm almost ashamed that I ever found fault. This short novel has just about everything one wants in a Lethem book. It has a fanciful premise: a woman falls in love with a incorporeal area of null space. It has quirky wit (such as when the narrator muses, "Do you think there are bootleg tapes of Muzak outtakes? Maybe they get excited by the groove and really cut loose sometimes. And the producer says, okay, boys, that was swell but now let's try to get this wrapped up so we can all go home. I'll bet that happens all the time."). It has outlandish character names (Carmo Braxia, Georges De Tooth, Gavin Flapcloth). And it has emotional sincerity that never devolves into gross sentimentality. Yes, I was pleased.

Neal Stephenson wrote Zodiac, a so-called eco-thriller, just a few years before Snow Crash, his prescient novel about VR and the future of the Internet. Snow Crash and William Gibson's Johnny Mnemonic were hugely influential on my growth as a geek, so reading pre-Snow Crash Stephenson risked tainting my opinion. Zodiac has action aplenty, accented by Stephenson's sarcastic wit. But it did pale in comparison to Snow Crash. To be fair, Zodiac, a 316-page novel, took me almost all May to read. I clearly couldn't give it my usual close attention. Even so, a couple of editorial gaffes — extra spaces, a misspelled name, and other such relatively minor typos — leapt off the page at me. This is what happens when you're polishing your own manuscript while trying to read for pleasure. I don't recommend it. It's why I read nothing else this spring. There was other demanding business in my life, which, combined with finishing my novel, demanded maximum focus.

Gavel Club Epic Fail; or, Why Ambition Doesn't Always Pay

It's the morning on which I'm scheduled to speak this month. My speech is well prepared, sure to entertain and inform, and I feel confident that a Best Speaker honor will be mine at the meeting's end. I'm oblivious to the fact that reality's about to prove all these beliefs wrong.

I shake a couple of the other members' hands but don't make it into the meeting room before being pulled aside. The Institutional Activities Coordinator stands in her office doorway, looking terribly stern. Her eyes burning holes through me.

"Are you Case?" she asks. "You're no longer in Gavel Club. You've been removed from the call-out. It's been approved by admin."

My poor, beleaguered heart sinks. I suspect that this has to do with my recent inquiry, via e-mail, into Gavel Clubs' place in Toastmasters' district structure. Our president told me that she'd gotten wind of this and did not approve. But to revoke my membership over it, without any warning? This seems unduly harsh.

In her next breath she confirms my fear. "You had e-mails sent to Toastmasters through an outside party, and that is not allowed. You're out. Go back to your house."

What else can I do but tell the truth? In an even tone, I say, "I understand if I overstepped, and I apologize for that. I didn't know I was doing anything wrong by contacting Toastmasters. Is there any way I can appeal this decision?"

She walks me to the door, in a huff. "Maybe in a year."

A couple of the members watch me, confusion all over their faces, as I exit the hallway. It was challenging fun, gentlemen, I want to tell them, but can't.

This is what happens when you try to do good things around here.

On Missouri Prisoners' Bizarre Cleaning Methods

A six-year veteran of the Department of Corrections recently told me that a cellmate spitting toothpaste in the sink after brushing was his biggest peeve. I asked how he rinsed his toothbrush. This confused him. I explained: "When you rinse your toothbrush under the faucet, the bacteria that were in your mouth swirl and splash all around the basin you're refusing to spit in."

He said, "Yeah, but I guess not as much."

I don't know whence the compulsion springs, but nearly every prisoner whose acquaintance I've made has been downright fanatical about the cleanliness of his sink basin. He won't spit in it after brushing his teeth — heavens, no, that's what the toilet's for! — and wipes every drop of moisture out of it after washing his hands. Why?

No inmates have been able to satisfactorily explain the anti-spit policy. The most insightful acknowledge it's a psychological quirk, but even they can't enlighten me further.

I've been imprisoned now for eighteen years. Many have been the occasions when I've used the water faucet in the utility closet. Many have been the occasions when I found soggy noodles, tiny cauliflower florets, or a sliver of roast beef stuck in the drain grate. Such is their aversion to using their own sink that these people will drain excess liquids from their dinner bowl into a communal sink. Very few seem to clean up their messes afterward. Worse, as sometimes happens, that stuff will end up clogging a shower drain. Any port in a storm, I guess.

On a seemingly related note, I have watched with my own eyes as the same characters with clean-sink fixations sop water from their toilet with a rag they then use to "clean" their cell floors, walls, and doors. To rinse his rag, each has an identical method, dunking the cloth and flushing two or three times.

There are some around here, I've heard it said, who use a similar technique to wash laundry in the toilet. How they also might feel about the subject of sink cleanliness is not a subject I'm knowledgeable enough to address at this time.