Readings, Reading, and Furries

No elliptical poetry lately, not because I've been slacking on the exercise front, but because I was in New York City all last weekend for performances with the TypewriterGirls, so no elliptical machine there (though Crystal, Sneaky, and I did do yoga in Central Park and danced like maniacs two nights in a row!), and this week I used the elliptical machine but read something that I wasn't a huge fan of (a couple of times, upon finishing a poem I exclaimed "Really?! Really??!!") and, while I understand the "necessity" of writing a not-glowing review every so often, this was not a particular piece that has yet received much in the way of reviews, and I would hate to be the jackass who reviews the piece first and it's, well, not particularly nice. Also, I don't see myself as knowledgeable as I could be about this particular kind of poetry, so there's that, too. I might just be missing something.

Part of the reason I've been loving everything I've read up until now is that it's been selected entirely by me. They're chapbooks by poets or presses that I know I appreciate, small parts of it is work I've read before when it was previously published in literary journals. No one has asked me to do these reviews or sent me books for free. I bought all of them with my own money (with one or two exceptions) because I knew I would think they were awesome. So there's that.

I'm doing a reading tonight! At 7:30pm I'll be joining the super-talented Karen Lillis and Margarita Shalina (who's in all the way from New York City) at ModernFormations in Garfield. I'm very pleased that they asked me to read - Karen and Savannah (the other woman who runs the series - Seasonal Shorts) are both amazing ladies who add a lot to the poetry/reading scene here in Pittsburgh with their writing and with the multiple projects they both work on.

Also coming up next weekend is TypewriterGirls Gone Furry!! Crystal and I have busted our butts over this show and we have some spectacular performers. Anthrocon is coming to Pittsburgh, and what better way to find an excuse to hang out with the furriest than to do a show less than a block from the convention center?