BREAKING AND ENTERING: I'll be reading with Franklin Abbott, Lisa Allender, Theresa Davis and Outside the Green Zone editor Cleo Creech this evening at Outwrite Books in Atlanta at 8 p.m. The fab singer/songwriter Melanie Hammett will also join us.I woke up feeling kinda icky this morning, so was running later than usual to the day job. When I went out to the parking deck, I discovered my car had been broken into overnight. They must have used a coathanger or tool to open the lock, because no windows were broken. They trashed the inside...pulling papers and tapes and CDs out of the glove compartment, books from under the seat, etc. The only thing stolen...that I can tell...was an old cell phone I had under the seat. It's deactivated, but maybe they could sell it to make enough for a hit of crack or some booze. My car is an old piece of crap, so why they chose mine is beyond me. The only thing I can think is they thought they could pop the trunk and get at my CD changer (which is probably worth more than the car itself), but there is no trunk release in the car. Ha, ha, motherfuckers. I called the police to make a report, but they didn't send anyone out and I still haven't made a full report to an officer. They don't give a shit. The apartment complex has been plagued with car burglaries and even a few home invasion robberies, but management refuses to hire any security. They tried a Neighborhood Watch Program, but no one gives a damn. It's an apartment complex, transitory and mostly younger people who don't think it will ever happen to them. They just chalk it up to life in the big city.
It was a busy weekend of poetry. I attended a Georgia Writers Association meeting on Saturday afternoon, then performed with Cecilia Woloch, Rupert Fike and Alice Lovelace at a private party held at Eve Hoffman's home. There were about 45 there, which is more than most people get at a reading. Eve has an interesting assortment of friends and it was nice to meet so many people who were appreciative of the poetry (and were also generous enough to buy a book).
On Sunday, it was Voices Carry 3 at the Carter Center. We had about 65 people there, which was less than last year, but still a pretty decent turnout for a Sunday afternoon. All the poets were great, but there were too many of them. We had nine poets performing, as well as Kodac hosting and singing a couple of songs. The reading lasted a little over two hours, but next year I think I'm going to cut back to six poets and mix up the styles a bit. We'll see how it all shakes out.
I joined Cecilia, fellow poet and friend Elizabeth Iannaci (who flew in with Cecilia from LA) and Kodac for dinner, then we went to Java Monkey. It was packed as usual, and Cecilia and Elizabeth were excellent features.
A good, but exhausting, weekend. Too bad the burglary put a damper on it all.
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