Hey. I'm a little improved. Actually, I can stand fairly upright and walk a reasonable distance without grabbing onto a wall and screaming, which is huge, but everything is still pretty difficult to do, and I'm woozy-ish from painkillers. All that said, I'd never been to an osteopath before, and now I'm definitely onboard with how magic that practice is. So I guess the improvement over the last 24 hours is significant enough. The hardest, most painful thing at the moment is sitting, but I'm going to try to get back on track today and catch up, albeit quickly and rather feebly, I'm positive, with the comments from the weekend and yesterday. As for the reason I'm here in Belfort, I'll just say that, my impairment notwithstanding, the rehearsals for the new theater piece are going very well so far. We've roughed out two of the piece's main and most important sections, and today we're going to try out a third one. Stephen was up all last night working on parts of the score, and we'll start working with them today. The main problem so far has been the holograms, which aren't working well yet and still have the problematic look and quality of video projections, so we're experimenting with different techniques, kinds of screens, etc., and we might have to rethink that aspect of the piece altogether. We're committed to doing a public presentation of the work in progress on Wednesday night, so we're trying to finesse what that will be. Anyway, I'm documenting the rehearsals with my camera as best I can, and I'll post the results on Friday so those who are interested can see what I'm talking about more clearly. All right, I'm going to speed through the comments now because the pain of sitting is already starting to distract and bother me. ** _Black_Acrylic, Hey. Oh, yeah, the reissue of that Serge Gainsbourg album really should have been in my list too. Thanks a lot for the list. ** Bacteriaburger, Wow, long time indeed. You good? What are you working on? Anything new we can see? ** Put The Lotion In The Basket, Hey, Nick. Listen, discovering your work has definitely been a huge highlight of the year, a 'counting one's lucky stars' kind of thing. That stupid comment you got is pretty funny. My stuff used to get the exact same reaction, except with William Burroughs' name instead. Someday your name will be in that sentence too when it's applied to some future young 'edgy' writer. People can be so dumb when they're intimidated. ** Magick Mike, Hey, man. What a pleasure. Great list. I noted the stuff I don't know. On the 'Frisk' film, yeah, that's me making a cameo walking down the hall. The letter to Marcus Hu was a statement I asked him to read at the film's premiere, at which point that ending you mentioned wasn't included yet. My issues with that film are vast and go far beyond the real or not thing. That was just a compromise: if Marcus had read my statement re: the ending, I would have kept my problems with the film to myself, but he didn't read it as he had promised to do, and then Todd Verow gave an interview where he talked about how hard it had been to make a film based on a novel that was such a pretentious, badly written piece of shit, and that was that, which even isn't what you asked me. Blame pain and its killers. ** I have to speed up now and stop interacting so much or I'll never get through this, sorry. ** Pisycaca, Hey, great, I can't wait to see you guys! ** Stephen Elliott, Hey, Stephen! Its an honor to have you here. I need to check out that Eggers. Sorry for the brevity, but thanks a lot for commenting. Respect. ** SYpHA_69, Hope you're feeling a lot better by now. I was slipped an mp3 of the Consumer Electronics album, and I understand it's out there somewhere to be found and grabbed. ** Bill, I don't know most of the things on your list. I will. Thanks. ** Mark Gluth, Hey, M. Thanks a lot. ** Heliotrope, Oh, fuck, RIP indeed. I hadn't heard that. Sad, very sad. ** Darby, Hey, welcome. I like both. BSC should have been in my list too, actually. ** Steevee, Thanks for the list, and, yeah, sounds like a clean break is the way to go on that critic jerk. Fingers crossed and very nice initial news re: the Polish guy. ** Alexander, Hey. Welcome to here. I don't know 'Waste'. I'll check it out. Thank you. ** Reynard, Hey. Wow, an awesome amount of new people today. Thanks. Yeah, I try to keep my oldness purely technical. It's pretty easy to do, so I don't know what all the boring older guys' excuses are. Oh, I liked that Chelsea Martin book too. I forgot about it when doing the list. Yeah, that was really good. Thanks for coming by. ** Colin, Hey, Colin. How are you? What's been happening? How's the writing on all fronts going? Really nice to see you. ** Jesse Hudson, Hey, buddy. Everything's either fuzzy or jolting today. Strange sensation. Talk to you later. ** David Ehrenstein, I have to read that 'Anal Retentive whatever' story, it sounds good, ha ha. Thank you, sir. ** Ken Baumann, Hey, Ken. Yeah, I think Shane Jones is sending me his novel. I can't wait. And you mentioned 'Waste' too. Okay, I'm going to get that as soon as I'm enclosed in Paris again. I'll hope to give a more lucid update on the theater stuff tomorrow. I'm still vagued out by painkillers and interrupted by stabs of heavy discomfort this morning. Take care, K. ** JW Veldhoen, I'll hold you to that, naturally. ** Adam, Hey, Adam, welcome. I wish I were able to be a better host today, but that 'hey' was a linguistic glass of champagne, if you didn't notice. I want to see Ponytail live. And Religious Girls too. Thanks. ** Rigby, Those were, like, the perfect comments for my exactly inexact state at the moment. Top Ten, easily. ** Kiddiepunk, Cool, man. ** Joshua Caleb Weibley, Hey. Very cool of you grace my place. Yeah, I'm all torn in half about the Blur reunion. If Coxon hadn't been in such good shape music-wise of late, I think I'd roll my eyes. Agree on the MSP and on Wavves too, come to think of it. Nice. Yeah, thanks a lot. ** Tfcinnyc, Wow, all you new guys ... this is cool. I'm not normally such a mealy mouthed space case. Such bad timing. Blah blah blah ... oh, I haven't read the Lisa Jarnot book entirely, but I have read either a piece of it or something else by her, and, yeah, it was really terrific! Good call. I'm gonna get that. Thanks a lot. ** Oscar B, Hey. Thanks, pal. Any year is good for Rites of Spring. Cool, cool. ** Wolf, Howdy, Wolf. I'm fucked in the head and lower back today and getting more fucked by the minute. Still, you ever get osteopathy done on you? Man, it's pretty special. ** Alan, Ha ha ha, what? That was complicated when you're on painkillers. In a confusingly good way. ** I'm starting to feel too much pain. I have to move even faster. I'm sorry. ** David, Gracias. ** Bernard Welt, ... saves the day. ** Mark, Wow, nice. ** Alexandre, Dude, hey, what's the haps? I'm in Belfort. You ever been here? I'm in pain. You ever been in pain? It sucks in a very uninteresting way. When am I going to see you? ** Chilly Jay Chill, Hey, man. I'm going to have to go back and read your list later on or tomorrow or something because I'm losing my grace period. ** Tonio k, Hey, pal. I owe you an email, which I'l write to you soon, but thank you so much for what you sent, and I'm going to use it proudly and very gratefully. ** Thomas Moronic, My extreme pleasure, man. ** NB, Excellent add on the FB add by that tattoo guy. Are your fellow NYT employees giving a going away cupcake? ** The Dreadful Flying Glove, Like with Chilly Jay Chill, I've lost the ability to process a comment as rich with suggestions as yours for the moment, so a raincheck. Thank you. ** Distimium, Hey, my friend. Do I understand you correctly that you're doing a Buenos Aires Day for my blog? If so, wow, thank you, and if I misunderstood, I apologize. Pain's effect on thinking is really weird. ** Fanny burney, Oh, thank you so much about the Chris Lemmerhirt post and the posts like that. That means a lot. Oh, on your poems, well, I'm too fucked up by pain and its killers to give you any good suggestions this morning, which sucks. You could show me your poems first, and I could read them and ... what's it called ... vet (vett?) them? Anything I can do to help, I will. ** Steven Vineis, Hey, man. I'll try to check out 'Black Sabbatical'. Thanks. Sorry to be quick ... I'm seriously getting eaten by pain now. ** Inthemostpeculiarway, Hi, man. I'm out of it. I'm crawling to the finish line now. That said, I don't like you not having someone to talk to. Is that Valentine guy worth this? I don't know. Best, best, best to you, and I'll hope to be lucid tomorrow. ** Blake Butler, Hey! I'm totally like you on the Gaspar Noe. I'm losing my shit waiting to see it. Last I heard, I think it'll open in France in ... early August? ** Misanthrope, Too much pain now. Can't get the stuff in your stuff. Sorry, sorry. Must finish this. Love you, dude. ** Winter Rates, Thanks, hey, sorry. ** Nick Hudson, Don't know about the phone thing. If I get a signal, I guess so. We'll figure it out. I'm all about Messian's (sp?) organ music at the moment. ** David, Hey. ** Okay, I had planned to respond to the comments from yesterday too, but I just can't. When I looked at them yesterday in the early evening, which was the last time I looked, they were full of good wishes and kindness, and so I'll thank you all collectively, okay? If someone said or asked me something in particular, can you post it again today so I'll see it and respond tomorrow? Thank you. Very sorry for this crappy p.s., but I wanted to get things restarted here, and I'll surely be more with it and a more attentive friend tomorrow. What's the post today ... oh, yeah, Michel Butor. Very interesting writer. Hope the Day interests some of you. Thanks for your patience, everyone. Things will be more normalized by tomorrow, I'm pretty certain. Mark my words. Bye.