1) I've been emailing regularly with Marc "Skippy" Price.

2) Someone reached my blog yesterday by Googling MySpace and "sharing is caring."

3) I was finally referred to by my preferred name "Snowbizzlebaby" in a press release. Sadly, this also reminds me that I actually need to write the story I'm going to perform at the event.

Here's where you come into play, blogpals, in what I'm going to regard as my first ever open-source, random flux, community-directed, Philip K. Dickian participatory writing event, which I'll count as goal number 7 (with goals number 4-6 being seeing "Devil Wears Prada," actually making it through "Devil Wears Prada," and bellylaughing during "Devil Wears Prada" when the grizzled, seen-it-all newspaper editor taps one of the adorable young journalista's perky little clips in his hands and says, "Now this story you wrote on the janitors' union...this is exactly what we're looking for.")

So. If you think I should write about...

a) My brief pre-divorce reign of sluttiness when I went on a Craigslist rampage last summer which finally came to an end by me telling the first nice guy that I made out with at a wedding in Seattle, "I'm sorry but my reign of sluttiness ended yesterday."

...then email me with the subject line, "Fuck you."

b) The guy I dated when I was home from college one summer when I was like 18 or something and he was like 85 or something who looked like a slightly bloated but still pretty hot 30ish Kurt Cobain who kept trying to get me to do acid but I wouldn't, don't worry mom, I didn't do that until my junior year, and then we went camping this one time and fooled around to Bob Marley in a stinky tent and that was all right but mostly he was just kind of boring and then there was this one time that we were making out in the hot tub and that song "Sweet Jane" came on and he looked at me with total romantic gravitas and said, "You can suck my dick now," and I was like, "I don't really like this song."

...then email me with the subject line, "No really, fuck you."

c) The cute police officer on the F train tonight who changed the tone of my journal writing from "You are not alone, you have yourself" to "Ahmed the cop just got on the train, Ahmed the cop is pretty hot" which inspired me to bet that if I was able to withdraw my business card before my stop it must be fate and what do you know, I had one left in my wallet and barely enough time to slip it into Ahmed's hot little hand with nary a word spoken but the knowledge in both of our hearts and minds that perhaps one day our love might just be the thing to bring us together as a nation of people who are blind, that's right blind, to who is black, who is white, who is Christian, who is Muslim, who is civilian, and who is hot cop.

...then email me with the subject line, "You have found a husband in Ahmed."

Here's the line-up for WYSIWYG. It's going to be awesome. I saw Shappy once in Chicago and he blew me away. I also once had a dream about a superhero dog named Shappy that was a poodle and wore a Letterman's jacket.

***

The WYSIWYG Talent Show’s “Summer Lovin’” performs Monday, July 24, at Bowery Poetry Club (308 Bowery between Bleecker and Houston). Doors open at 7:30 p.m., show at 8 p.m. Tickets are $7 at the door. For more information visit www.wysiwygtalentshow.org, www.bowerypoetry.com or call (212) 614-0505.

With performances by:

* Dan Allen (http://www.taoofdan.com)
* Mandy Stadtmiller (http://bloggymcblogalot.blogspot.com/)
* Rives (http://shopliftwindchimes.com/)
* Blaise K. (http://bazima.com)
* Shappy Seasholtz (http://www.uncleshappy.com/diary.htm)
* Sarah Kelly (http://somnambulisme.livejournal.com/)

About the performers:

Dan Allen is a NYC-based comedian, writer, and creator of the very popular website, taoofdan.com. He has appeared on Comedy Central’s “Premium Blend,” has received long form improvisational training from Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre, and performs regularly at The Comic Strip. He is also a regular contributor to Us Weekly’s “Fashion Police.”

Mandy Stadtmiller (bloggymcblogalot.blogspot.com) was recently called Snowbizzlebaby by a seven-foot-tall black man approaching her from half a block away. It is now the only name to which she responds. She has been published in The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Village Voice, The Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel, and The Des Moines Register, and is currently a staff writer at The New York Post. She does stand-up comedy around the city. It is quite awkward for everyone involved.

Rives (shopliftwindchimes.com) has appeared on the last three seasons of HBO’s“Def Poetry Jam,” and was a cast member of the Def Poetry Jam international touring group. He was an Individual Finalist at the 2002 and 2004 National Poetry Slams, and his team, Team Hollywood, won the national title in 2004, as seen in the documentary Slam Planet. Originally trained as a “paper engineer,” Rives has designed and written several pop-up books for children, available from Simon & Schuster.

As of this writing (July 2006) veteran blogger Blaise K (www.bazima.com) has three careers: writing, design and photography. Her written work has been published in four online magazines, one print magazine, and one newspaper, and she has been written up favorably in four newspapers, one British magazine and one newsletter for young orthodox Jews who live in Toronto. She has two websites, one blog, five cameras, four wigs, and two signature karaoke songs. She has been 29 since 2002, and single for approximately 180 days and is thusly available for parties and rebounding. She performs often and eight times out of 10 she’s pretty funny.

Shappy Seasholtz (uncleshappy.com/diary.htm) toured with Lollapalooza 1994, has performed at nearly every South by Southwest for the last eight years, appeared in the Chicago Comedy Festival and at the legendary Second City, competed at a National Poetry Slam, and had two books published, including Little Book of Ass, which won a Firecracker Award for best poetry. He also has a CD called Poet/Comedian/Asshole. Shappy resides in NYC, where he can be found bartending at the Bowery Poetry Club. In his spare time Shappy plays Scrabble with his super-hot girlfriend and dreams of one day owning a crime-solving wiener dog named Wallingford.

Sarah Kelly (somnambulisme.livejournal.com/) is a writer, musician, social worker, and a liar. Her prodigious career began in 1983 when she formed The Executioners, a brother/sister team known for their wild on- and off-stage antics and reenactments of popular music videos. Since then she has moved on to many other creative endeavors, most of which she never completes. In May of 2005 after coming to the realization that she was lazy and that she also had a lot of feelings inside her heart, she began to live her life by the philosophy of “I don't know.” She enjoys popsicles and crosswords.