Happy Friday!

So I told you about my super talented student who is bound to write/act for Saturday Night Live. But I gave you the wrong link for her funny blog that documents her year in a Chicago inner-city school. I’m just glad she came back alive. And not selling crack. You can see the blog (for real this time) HERE. I just had to share some of her writing brilliance.

“All things beautiful must crash and burn and die a horrible screaming death before they can become beautiful again… that’s not a real saying or anything… that’s just how I felt on Monday morning.

I loved this funny story about her crappy boss at her part-time job:
He was (believe it or not) carrying on a civilized conversation with me, when he says “You know, I have a second job. You’ll never guess what it is, though, because it’s so different than this place.” He gestures to the wall of stuffed animals.

I, being stupid (as usual) and not knowing when humor isn’t welcome, say “HAH that would be freaking hilarious if it were, like, teaching Tae kwon Do or something! HA! That would be so funny.”

He teaches Tae Kwon Do. And he doesn’t think it’s that funny.

Or:
Right when you think the worst is over, life is like “Um, NO”, and decides to throw you another curve ball. This wouldn’t be so bad if, perhaps, you were athletically inclined or something. Which I am NOT.

So I’m sitting in class 091, (after a whirlwind of panic) and I’m wondering if maybe I small bad or something, because nobody is sitting within four feet of me on either side. Instead, they’ve all, like, clumped together, discussing the latest drama of the summer. ( And this time, by drama, I DO mean the oh-no-you-didn’t-just-steal-my-boyfriend-you-skank kind.)

Part of me is glad I’m not caught up in that, but the other part of me is kinda wishing I had stolen somebody’s boyfriend, just so I would have somebody to talk too.

So yeah, she’s brilliantly talented. If I had had 1/10th of that writing magic when I was her age. Well, by now I’d be selling my Pulitzer’s at garage sales just to “downsize” the collection. I’m very proud of this girl.

Did you know there are 1000 bacteria in a bowl of salsa after three to six dips of your chip? According to SHAPE magazine, it’s the germ equivalent of kissing everyone at a party. For the sake of salsa? This doesn’t bother me at all.

Thanks to my friend Jocelyn for leading me to this commercial.

It’s like The Odyssey. For cats. It’s also like someone was on crack cocaine when they created that.

And thanks to my good friend Rhonda for finding this fun site of book inscriptions. Isn’t that so interesting? I love reading inscriptions in used books.

My friend Snow Lovin’ Holly is a math teacher and sent me this IM last week: One of my kids has programmed one of my class calculators……every answer is now BOOB…… Gotta love those graphing calculators.

I know most people don’t care about this–especially the type of people who read Christian fiction–but Steven Tyler has reunited with Aerosmith. Thus the band will live to release 10 more Greatest Hits albums. Seriously, that’s all they put out. It drives me nuts. But I am relieved they are back together. Because when Joe Perry hurts, I hurt. May the mike scarves forever wave.

Remember Sleep Talking Man? Thanks to my friend, Salle, for guiding me to his blog. You can keep up with his nightly musings HERE. “Step away from the yam.”  I can’t tell you how many times I’m looking for just the right phrase and “stay away from the yam” is the only thing that will do. And check out his line of products on the blog. I personally like the tshirt that says: Squid Wrestling. It’s all Tentacles and No Substance. It would go nicely on the underwear he sells.

Finally, I want to tell you about a cool new Christian site for teens (and non-teens like me).

It’s called Clash Entertainment. And it’s a great place for teens (and parents) to go for reviews of books, movies, and music. There’s comics, articles, games, and all sorts of great links. The goal is to provide a safe source for teens to go for their entertainment needs, lift up God, and just create community. You can check it out HERE.
Have a great weekend!

JEN

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I just bought the weirdest looking alarm clock ever. In fact, every time I look at it, I “see” something different–none of it appropriate. It looks like when the Stark Trek TV show got canceled and cleared out the set, this is what was left.

So I have fought the battle of the curtains in my bedroom for a few years. After a lot was cleared and a house went up, suddenly a street light was not just newly visible, but turned its high beams right into my window. I mean it was like sleeping at the end of an airport runway. So my blinds needed some help. Over the next few years, I go through the process of trying out about 50 sets of curtains to block the light. Finally I find something that works. But maybe a little too well. Now when my alarm goes off at 5:00 (and 5:30…and 6:00…and 6:30….), I wake up to a room that’s black as the bottom of a coal mine.

And it’s almost impossible to get up. If it weren’t for the fact that I like the occasional paycheck, I probably wouldn’t even bother. But I had decided, after reading some confirming research, that my brain gets confused without any light in the morning and does everything it can to stay in “sleep” mode. Thus. . .the Sunrise Clock.

The Sunrise Clock doesn’t just wake up you with optional beeping. It wakes you up with gradual light, supposedly simulating the rising sun. (I held my face over it for 30 minutes, but I cannot report a tan. Of course I could hold my face over a blow torch and still not report a tan.) To me this little (or kinda big actually) gadget makes perfect sense. At least until I can afford remote control blackout blinds set on a timer as seen in Cameron Diaz’s house in the movie The Holiday.

So this morning is the Sunrise Clock’s debut. At 5:30 the light slowly comes on. And it gets a little brighter over the course of next 30 minutes. At least I think it did. I wouldn’t know. Because you know how you sleep through your fancy new Sunrise Clock? You pull the covers over your head. No more light!  So yeah, back to the drawing board.

What is your wake-up routine?  Mine is to hit snooze on my radio alarm for a solid hour. And I never get up during a song. That’s just rude and disrespectful to the artist. I wait until I hear the news. Then the weather. Then three more songs. Then some DJ banter. And I don’t roll out of bed until:
1. A commercial for Wild Harry’s Used Cars
2. My cat barfs on something
3. a song comes on that uses the words “I didn’t see that semi coming.”
It’s my system. And it works. Sorta.

Would love to hear your morning routine. Surely someone’s has to be worse than mine.

JEN

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I’m a very independent person. But sometimes not as independent as I think I am. For instance, I don’t think my blinds have ever been cleaned without me paying someone to do it. And I can’t replace a light fixture by myself. Or change a flat tire. Or survive a whole weekend alone at a bed and breakfast. Let me tell you about my weekend…

So two stars aligned this weekend, and this resulted in me hopping in the car, alone, with a suitcase, my Bible, and a laptop. I discovered some time ago that a Christian speaker with a small, but national ministry I’ve been watching was going to be in this middle-of-nowhere town in north Arkansas. AND I needed some time away from my crack called Internet to really knock out some pages on the book I’m writing. Initially a few friends were gonna go with me to see said speaker, but that fizzled out. So I thought, “I’ll go by myself to this rural town in Arkansas I’ve never even seen in my entire life. I’ll get my brother’s GPS and go stay in a B and B and just lock myself in over the weekend and write, write, write!”  And it really did sound like a good idea. In fact, on paper, it was pretty close to brilliant.

So I drive and drive and drive all Friday afternoon.

I passed the town that boasts the locally famous diner Sparky’s.

This became the name of a diner in So Not Happening, though in that book the restaurant got moved to Tulsa. I actually didn’t have a good eating experience here, so I don’t know why I decided to honor them with a mention. They should totally pay me. In cheese burgers.

So anyway, I drove, drove, drove. And as I watched my cell reception bars dwindle, this is pretty much all I saw the last hour of the trip.

Then I arrive in Jasper, Arkansas (population 488), where I’m going to stay.

It reminded me of Northern Exposure.

Especially because if you look down the street, you see huge snow-topped mountains in the distance. I expected a moose to walk down the road any moment. The B and B was over the Ozark Cafe restaurant. I get up there, and the room is great. Truly. But the view?

In their defense, people don’t stay here to hang out. They stay here to have a bed when they hunt or fish. Or write a book without the luxury of wi-fi.

Except for the fact that the bed didn’t have a level spot on it, the bedroom was really nice.

I thought the bath/dining area was a smart combination.

The only thing better than a dining room table within reach of your tub would be a mini-fridge.

The town was quite rural. But with metropolis little touches like this.

I totally related to Emma’s Museum of Junk. I think I’m gonna start calling my “linen closet” the same thing.

I’m guessing this is an old movie theater.

Anyway, I check in Friday night and hit the road again to make it to the even SMALLER town, where the speaker is at. On that 25 minute drive, I didn’t pass more than 5 cars. And I had zero cell phone reception. None. And my GPS, who I decided to call KITT, was USELESS. It’s very, very curvy (like barf bag curvy) over there, and more than once KITT would say, “Take a left. TAKE  A LEFT!” And I’m like, “KITT, if I take a left, I’m going off the side of a mountain.”  And yes, I did say this out loud. Because when you go by yourself to Jasper, AR, you kind of get desperate for someone to talk to. Even GPS systems who want you dead.

Did I mention it’s VERY rural in this part of the country? Like check out these people’s back yard.

So I get to the church. And it’s tiny. But super friendly. (Like the pastor remembered my name the next day. My own pastor doesn’t even know my name.)  Do the church thing. Go back to Jasper. To the “B and B.” And I’m exhausted. So no writing happens. I go to bed. And at 4 am…I’m still awake.  I could NOT sleep. First of all, the bed was some weird blob of memory foamness. And then I was the ONLY one staying at this place. And did I mention I didn’t have cell service? And I was still thinking about the tub/table combination. And they had cable channels I didn’t (no phone, but they have HGTV!), and it was kinda creepy. And I wondered if somebody came in to get me, would they toss my lifeless body over the balcony and into the collection of boxes below? And it’s an ancient building, so it made lots of creaky noises. And there weren’t blinds on the bedroom window that faced the box dumpster. And no matter what I did, I couldn’t get to sleep. And at 2 am, I had the entire plot for a novel that was going to simultaneously change the world and make me rich and famous.  By 2:45 I had completely forgotten it. At 2:59 I sat straight up in bed and said, “Omigosh! It’s Adam Lambert! Adam Lambert sings that one song!”

And did you know at 3 am you can watch reruns of Modern Family? At at 3:30 there are at least three channels simultaneously running infomercials for Girls Gone Wild. (I’m not sure, but I think I saw one of our principal’s on there.)  And I knew by 4 am that I would NOT be staying the whole weekend and getting lots of writing done. Because it’s hard to achieve lots of writing when you can’t even accomplish a little sleep.

So I got up that morning and went to the cafe below for breakfast. Which honestly was the most awesome part of my trip. As part of my B and B stay, I could order anything I want. (For someone obsessed with food, do you have any idea what kind of sick thrill this gives me?) I got an omelet the size of my table.

It was supposed to have onions and sausage in it. And it did. Like WHOLE sausage patties. With the egg just flopped over it. It was like an egg blanket for a whole roll of Jimmy Dean.  And at least half a red onion. I kinda ate around that. And the cafe was a place where “everybody knows your name.” I wanted to stay there longer. It was some great people watching. There was one table of about 10 folks, age 20 something to 70 something, clearly not related, and they were regulars, as they sang happy birthday to the waitress, who they knew by name. I really wanted to know what their connection was. I was gonna ask the waitress, but I didn’t get a chance to. So I decided they had all probably seen Big Foot in the surrounding hills, but nobody believed them, so they had made a club who met over breakfast every Saturday morning. Except I didn’t hear them talking about Big Foot. But I did hear one guy talking about his prostate.

On my way home, I saw the remains of what used to be Dog Patch USA. If you were a child of the 70s or early 80s you might’ve heard of this place. It was an amusement park in the middle of nowhere (though a beautiful part of the middle of nowhere), and most kids who lived in Arkansas went at least once. It was supposed to give Disney a run for it’s money. I don’t think Disney had to even speed walk to keep up. Here it is before:

And after:

That picture really doesn’t do the decay justice. I didn’t even know what I was taking a picture of until I got home and Snow Loving Holly told me. It’s so depressing to see things from your childhood decay. Like theme parks. And the elasticity around your eyeballs.

So I fearlessly went on a road trip by myself. Then I not so fearlessly returned. No writing done. But I did get a firm picture in my head for the setting for my next YA series. And I spent some quality time with Blackie the Honda and KITT the deadly GPS.

Northern Arkansas–a great place to hunt. Or hide a dead body.

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Happy mid-week!  Are you watching the Olympics? American Idol? The Bachelor? Lost? SOOO much going on TV right now.  And the cool thing is, with Twitter, I don’t have to watch any of it, and I’m still in the know. Except for Lost. But I don’t even think Lost watchers know what’s going on there.

As a speech teacher, it’s vitally important that I communicate in an exemplary fashion to model the appropriate behavior for my students.  I must strive to enunciate correctly, to speak with quality content. To verbalize with precision as I lead young lives.
Yesterday I was reading the announcements aloud to my 9thgrade class. I got to one about a CHEER meeting. But here’s what came out of my mouth:
“There will be a beer meeting Monday, March 15th. . .”      So if that meeting has better-than-usual turnout, they have me to thank.

I haven’t watched much of the Olympics, but I caught a news piece on something called Skeleton Racing. Have you seen this event? I mean, seriously? It’s basically like climbing on a sled in order to zip to your death. These people go like 80 mph. On a sled. Head first.  For some reason, if I’m racing toward an imminent, crashy death, I want to go feet first.

So our big contender in the skeleton race is Noelle Pikus-Pace.  She got knocked out of the Olympics four years ago (literally) by a bobsled. As in it took her out. She now has a steel bar in her calf. I know MYfirst thought would be gimme some more of that. How does one even get started in that career? Because my friend Snow Loving Holly is the best sledder I know, so I want to nominate her. And unlike Noelle Pikus Pace, she doesn’t have any bionic parts. That I know of.

There is a great interview with Francine Rivers over at PASTimes blog. Hop over and give it a read AND get in the running for a copy of the fabulous Redeeming Love.

I’ve mentioned before that I taught a girl a few years ago who is pretty much brilliant. She wants to be a SNL actor-writer, and I really believe she’s on her way. She’s trained with Second City in Chicago, and she’s such a gifted writer. You can check out her blog HERE.  And definitely check it out HERE. After receiving a grade she thought was unfairly low on a writing assignment, this student created a top ten list for writers. Check out her wisdom.

The Top Ten Things A Writer Must Know In Order To Write Good

1. A good writer must be very detailed and specific.
(That’s pretty much it for number one.)

2. A good writer needs a strong vocabulary.
In other words, a writer should kinda talk good. People who write stuff should, like, use big words or whatever. There, like, shouldn’t be anything that sounds totally lame.

3. A good writer should paint pictures with words.
Like…instead of with paint and stuff…

4. A good writer knows how to take criticism.
Unless you don’t like what’s being said. Then you can just do whatever.

5. A good writer can find humor in everything.
Because sometimes humor is 100% necessary. . . unless you’re talking to your mom. . .because then you’ll just get grounded.

6. A good writer knows when to be serious…
NAH! Forget THAT!

7. A good writer reads frequently.
Magazines and DVD subtitles totally count.

8. A good writer practices.
Practices clogging, practices Yiddish, practices whatever. . .you get what I mean.

9. A good writer finds inspiration in everything
Like pasta. Or Canada.

And finally. . .

10. A good writer can make up a list of ten things just to make themselves feel like a better writer.

I can’t wait to say, “I knew her when.”  Especially when she gets me front row tickets to SNL.

For those of you who write, got anything to add to that brilliance? I would add: A good writer must know that the amount of chocolate she consumes is directly proportional to her creative output. As is the quality of her sweats.  What about you?

Hope you have a great rest of the week.

JEN

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Happy Monday!  Congrats to Gretchen, the winner of Lisa Wingate’s Never Say Never. (Gretchen, email me your home addy: jen at jennybjones dot com)

Did everyone have a good Valentine’s Day? I did! I always do. Any day that involves celebrating with candy or a dinner out is my kind of holiday.

This weekend my girls and I celebrated my friend Kim’s birthday. She’s one year younger than me, so I think she’s 25. (Right Kim?)  Anyway, when it’s your b-day, you get to pick the outing. So Kim wanted to see Dear John. She has been looking forward to this movie forever. And its’ not because she’s a sold out Sparks fan. I think it has more to do with being a sold out Channing Tatum fan. He’s an interesting actor to watch on screen. And by that I mean I haven’t decided to what extent he can’t act. But he had some decent acting moments in this flick, but does anyone really care if he can act? I didn’t think so.

The movie was okay. I haven’t read the book because I intentionally don’t read Nicholas Sparks because someone ALWAYS dies. I have two good friends who LOVE his books pretty much because of this, and they were always trying to get me to read him. I resisted. So they said, “You HAVE to read this one book. It’s so good. And we promise–not a single person dies in it!”  So to appease them, I take the book home. About half way through it hits me what’s going to happen. The freakin’ DOG is gonna die. Sure enough in the end, the dog bites it. I was SOOO ticked. An animal dying? Even worse.

Anyway, so I’m not a fan, but it was Kim’s birthday, and if she had said, “Let’s go to Nascar, get tattoos, and eat brats,” I would’ve agreed to it. It was her day. One fun thing to know about Kim is that in high school she had a date to go to the drive-in.  He rolls up to her house in his van. With a couch in the back. Kim was not allowed out of the house with this boy.

So the movie was okay. It was actually a good one for a little Mystery Science Theater running commentary. (Reason No. 29458 to never sit beside me in a movie.)   I think some things must not have transferred from the book to the screen because I had a few “huh?” moments. But honestly I think any book-inspired movie is a success as long as it doesn’t star Robert Pattinson, Kristen Stewart, or any member of the original 90210 gang.

Last week I also saw When in Rome. Avoid! Avoid! It’s a total renter. Did anyone see Lightning Thief this weekend?

Favorite blogger Green Bean Teen Queen has such a good question of the week up.  She wants to know who your literary crush is. You definitely need to hop over and share who your favorite man-of-the-pages is.

There’s a campaign on Facebook to get Betty White on Saturday Night Live as the host. This is brilliant on someone’s part. And about the only thing on Facebook that makes sense these days.

Eighties kids, remember Sweet Valley High? Well guess who’s coming back? Author Francine Pascal is releasing Sweet Valley Confidential in 2011, a book that picks up the lives of Elizabeth and Jessica Wakefield in their late 20s and early 30s. You know– old.  Reading this news didn’t make me happy like the article said it would. It totally depressed me. The kids of SWH are not in their 30s. They’re still teens. Young. Like the rest of us. I need to believe they are living in some time/space continuum where they still tuck-roll their jeans, Madonna doesn’t have Hulk arms, and the eye shadow is still blue with an extra dose of frosty.

Okay, there is a new Kay Jeweler’s commercial and…it’s actually good. Have you seen it? I can’t find it anywhere and it’s driving me nuts. It’s the one where the guy accidentally drops to one knee, has a catch in his leg, and thinks, “Well, as long as I’m down here, I might as well propose.”  If you find it, please send it my way!  I also can’t find a link to We Are the World Part Deux.  My friend Salle has been obsessed with We Are the World pretty much her whole life. In fact, she has had the redo planned forever, including assigning all the parts. She even wrote the Super Bowl folks and pitched her idea. I’m really sad that she didn’t get the credit for her genius. She should totally get a cut of that donation money. ; )

I would love to know what you gave or received for Valentine’s Day.  Lemme know!

JEN

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