sleeping around

Tuesday, dec. 5, 2006   |   0 comments

My little sleep book is spreading its wings! It’s busting out of its safe independent bookstore world and tearing right into Urban Outfitters everywhere, where it’s rubbing pages with the likes of Orgasms: How to Have Them, Give Them, and Keep Them Coming and Penis Pokey. It’s totally going to come home covered in hickeys and reeking of cigarette smoke, and it doesn’t even care!

The book is also making new friends over at Urban Outfitters’ older, wiser, but-still-able-to-squeal-over-a-perfect-skirt sister store, Anthropologie (thanks to reader Melissa for the heads-up!):

One sort of bad thing: the version that Anthropologie is carrying is a reprint, and it’s not quite as cute as the original run (as seen at Urb Out). The fabric is rougher, the bite of the imprint on the cover illustration isn’t as deep, the color of the end pages is off…it’s all just a slightly less than yar, which makes my stomach hurt. But still…Anthropologie!

are my plugs showing?

Friday, dec. 1, 2006   |   0 comments

Hello pretty friends!

It turns out I’ll be signing my book and maybe doing another little slip-slide-y show this coming WEDNESDAY at the Candystore (in the Mission) along with the funbulous Lisa Brown (author of the Baby Be of Use board books). Reportedly there will even be a sampling of cocktails on hand!

So please come on by after work for some sipping and staring. Bonus: If you’ve never had the pleasure of Candystore, it is the cutest place ever, full of fancy clothes, jewels, and other temptations, so you might just get some holiday shopping in, too.

Note: The event got a mention in today’s Daily Candy (?!), so it could be crowded. Come early to make sure you get plenty of booze!

I sure hope to see you there,
Evany
(Psst, pass it on!)

IN SUMMARY
Boozy book-signing
Candystore
3153 16th Street (at Valencia)
Wednesday, December 6
7-9pm

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I finally got hold of the November issue of Penthouse Forum, and boy are my hands…dirty. But it includes a nice mention of my book, in which they declare that it “has its tongue firmly in cheek.” Which, given the context, sounds unexpectedly titillating.

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The book is also supposed to be out in a smattering of Urban Outfitters and Anthropologie stores. (Yay!) I haven’t managed to visit either store in a few weeks, but I’ve been checking their sites and it’s not for sale at either spot yet, at least not online. Has anyone seen a copy in stores? Please let me know!

sleep and ice tour, leg one

Wednesday, jun. 21, 2006   |   0 comments

So I’ve been back from the exhausting and chilling first leg of the book tour for over a week now, and I’m still not fully recovered. That was a very, very tough week: I am so afraid of public speaking! It makes me blotchy and sweaty, it fills my gut with perpetual feelings of “doom + self-blame” a la the first climb on a terrible roller-coaster (the Vomitron, maybe, or the Regretinator). And then there’s the nausea and light-headedness and insomnia and hot flashes.

Knowing this about myself, I booked myself a wildly expensive hotel room in DC, just so I would be as pampered as humanly possible before embarking on my first reading — and it was so, so worth it.

The Pantone-crazy rooms of the Hotel Helix.

Here’s why the hotel was so spectack: The very day after Jill and I drove home from Yosemite (which was so fun — gushing waterfalls! buffet chocolate pudding! rainbows! the ear of a fine friend! — possibly the only things capable of getting my mind off the looming public speakings), I flew out on the red-eye to DC. My flight landed at 7am, but my hotel check-in wasn’t until 3pm, so me and my hot pink travel neck pillow (which arguably could pass for a very, very fashion-forward space scarf) curled up in the baggage claim area for a few hours, but by 10 I’d had enough of the airport announcements, so I got in a cab a (hi, bye Washington Monument!) and went to the hotel, and? They let me into my room five hours early! I napped the living spit out of the next two hours.

The crazy Helix surf-themed beds, hang ten! (Or, in my case, hang $260 per night.)

Then I crammed some french toast in my french toast hole, drank coffee and coffee and coffee, and practiced my routine, which consists of huge, poster-sized printouts of select sleep poses (which Brian and Marco made for me while I was in Yosemite!) plus a crazy folding metal business-easel thing plus a telescoping pointer with built-in laser AND pen (the trifecta). Then I actively panicked for awhile, then I put on a skirt and some blister-shoes and panic-walked six sweaty blocks over to Olsson’s Books and Records, then I got up there and pointed at some things, then I signed some people’s books (harrowing), then I walked home, ordered one beer and a hamburger from room service, wrote up my Tour Dispatch, and watched The Whole Nine Yards until my brains melted.

The next morning, the awesome Michael Jay McClure (who surprise-attended my reading the night before, which made me so happy!) came and fetched me. After pausing a moment to admire my insane orange and green and pop-cultured hotel room (with two thick animal print robes), he whirl-walked me around DC for three seconds, then we gobbled lunch, then we cabbed to the train station. Go, go, go!

Once I arrived in New York, I went directly to Paul’s apartment and practiced for the next reading. So boring! Oh except then we went out for pickles and birthday cake, that part was good.

Then on Wednesday morning Paul and I splashed our way through the pouring rain to the subway (me, riding with my head between my knees as an anti-panic-faint measure), to Coliseum Books, the in-case-of-rain venue for the Bryant Park reading.

Here I am, groping my way through the Coliseum Books/Bryant Park reading in NYC.

The reading was a little damp and rushed, but ultimately okay. I think? Afterward, some more people asked me to sign their books (!), then at like 3pm, my nerves finally mellowed enough for me to eat, and Paul and I went to some Italian-y place and I ate and ate and ate. The next day, I worked on my Power Point for the upcoming LA show, grabbed some beer and pretzels and dinner and cupcakes with Todd, then returned home to Paul’s for another four hours of Power Pointing. At 7am the next morning I took Super Shuttle to the airport, got on a JetBlue jet, and flew to LA. (See? Not much fun, this trip: just an endless stream of churning worry and bile and Power Point.)

When I got to LA, I rented a car, drove to a cafe for a few hours of whispered practicing (luckily LA is full of actors whisper-practicing in cafes, so I totally fit right on in), then I headed over to Hollywood to stutter my way through a run-through for the sold-out (!) McSweeney’s Presents: The World Explained show. The lineup: shivering, panicked me + Davy Rothbart (creator of Found Magazine) + Starlee Kine (of This American Life) + Joshua Davis (author of The Underdog: How I Survived the World’s Most Outlandish Competitions) + Bill Hader (from Saturday Night Live) + host Andy Richter + music by Grant-Lee Phillips and the the Pretty Babies, together we all dogged and ponied up in the name of raising funds for 826LA.

At midnight, I drove home to the Octeau’s, my home away from home, and slept for three hours. At 4:30, the panic prodded me awake, and I spent the next few hours frantically fiddling with my presentation, up until the point the three little Octeaus woke up and sprang into action:

Playing “Luggage” at the chateau Octeau before leaving to go to the horror show.

Then at 3pm, after a very, very dark hour trying to figure out how to operate the Octeau’s devilish printer (big swears and tears), I headed over to the venue for disastrous final run-through, where I basically just read my notes without looking up once. Found Davy was all, I really dig your “scientist persona,” with the notes and the wooden delivery, so awesome! And I was all, but…that wasn’t…oh god.

A small message found backstage, one of two photos I managed to take before I had to leave to go weep quietly in the rental car for the hour just before the show.

Here is my other photo: it’s Eli Horowitz, still glowing from when Zooey Deschanel cupped his right pectoral (I SAW).

Then Andy Richter took to the stage, and the show began! And I drank one very tall glass of everyone-backstage-prescribed wine.

Andy, it turns out, is hilarious and Michigan-cute and bogglingly nice and also he wears sandals. So that happened, then he introduced me, and I walked out there! And started talking in a surprise all-new Evany voice (according to post-show reports, it was very “husky librarian karoake”). The next eleven minutes were tota
lly crazy, and I really don’t remember much of what I did or said. But according to the LA Times: “Following Richter, Evany Thomas, a contributor to McSweeney’s and author of a new, mostly tongue-in-cheek book called The Secret Language of Sleep, dissected couples’ sleeping positions — Classic Spoons, the Seatbelt — to lots of amusement.” Lots of amusement! Also: Carrie Fisher was there? The woman who wrote the book I once sat in a London bookstore for eight solid hours and read cover to cover? And then went ahead and bought it anyway? Holy crapping god. Just reading that little tidbit got me all retroactively nervous and star struck and sick in my mouth, and pants.

Here I am, in full blackout, talking to three hundred people about my acne and cuddle parties and puppies. The photo is a little out of focus (the slideshow aspect made things too dark for photos), but it’s actually a super-accurate embodiment of the experience, from my point of view.

Then it was over, and I wandered off stage and collapsed (after Andy Richter hugged me) in total exhaustion, and then just lay there on the floor in a corner behind the stage, watching the rest of the show backwards through the back of the projection screen.

Between each presentation, Grant-Lee Phillips’s gang, plus Zooey Deschanel and Samantha Shelton, all sang thematic songs. Like after my thing, they sang “Lay, Lady, Lay,” and after Starlee’s, they sang “Crazy” (her presentation was about how to find the right therapist), etc. It was sweet and lively and really made the show extra awesome.

Marco took lots and lots of pics of Zooey, for some reason?

After the show, I staggered over to the post-event VIP party (!?) to squeeze my many great friends who all turned out for the show. (Kristin and Pat and Jill and Marco all drove down, down, all the way down from the bay area!)

Wow, somebody loves blazers! (Evany + Stee + Pam love blazers.)

Pam is BLOWN AWAY by my Fran Drescher mouth.

The famous Tom Mott (a brand-new father! CONGRATULATIONS TOM AND MOUKI, and LITTLE EVE and LITTLE JOHN!) and I ponder life, love. (Turns out: wildly near-sighted people with glasses perched atop their heads = deep, mole-faced thinkers.)

Me, China, Jenny, and my wine.

Sophia, Becky, and Evany squint out some smiles and secretly long for bed (that’s what I was doing, at least).

And that was it! I pretty much slept the whole next day, in between marveling over how old and frail I now am, then on Monday Jill, Marco, and I drove home by way of Anderson’s split pea soup, the end!

And they all lived Happea-ly ever after.

move!

Tuesday, may. 2, 2006   |   0 comments

I’m all moved! And oh my holy big wow did it suck. Somehow I thought that since I already did a big Goodwill sort after I got laid off (both times!), and since I was getting rid of so much cat-scratch furniture before I left, and since I hired three big, nice, burly movers, and since I bought a whole roll of bubble wrap, that maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. But surprise, it was heinous: seven solid days and nights of old-person back pain, foot soreness, and that packing tape sound. I think I remember this happening the last time I moved: I thought it was going to be relatively painless that time too, but it turned out to be the same kind of exhausting, last-minute scramble, combined with insane maneuvering to remove a stain in the rug so I could get back the whopping $2100 deposit (I rented a steam cleaner and that didn’t work, so I actually cut the stain out of the rug and patched it with a section I snipped from some surplus rug laying in the back of one of the closets, then I spent days trying to glue the patch into the hole using a wide variety of glues…superglue finally did the trick, superglue plus some artful vacuuming around the hole to make it blend in). Though I guess I’m not really surprised by my surprise: PMS blindsides me each and every month. Why am I swollen, sore, sweaty, and so very mad at this retarded slippery satiny shirt that keeps falling off the hanger, grr, grr, grr??? Oh right it’s LADY TIME, god.

Also familiarly awful: the big Deposit Clean. I spent all day Friday, eight long hours, cleaning my old apartment, scrubbing down the stove, fridge, sinks, tub, walls, and floors. There was so much dirty! I kept finding new, heretofore unseen splatters of coffee and…soup? Frosting? It was amazing and gross. I kept thinking how sad it is that my apartment is really, finally sparkling, but I won’t get to enjoy it. I actually caught myself vowing that in my new place, I’m going to schedule regular insane clean-a-thons, so I can actually reap the benefits of my bleach-pan hands. But mid-vow I dimly remembered promising myself something eerily similar after the last move. But this time I mean it! Yes I say it with the rueful, self-experienced doubt of a drastically hungover person’s promise to never drink again, but still I vow to clean this new house with white-flower-sale regularity. I do, I do, I do!

So yes, boxes, boxes, boxes, and lots of puffing and growling from Marbles the cat, who is less than thrilled to be rooming with PIGGY the dog. After spending all afternoon hiding behind the toilet, Marbles finally let me coax her out to the area near the tub, where she and I napped together for a few hours Wednesday afternoon, and then again Thursday morning. Finally on Saturday we put Piggy in the laundry room (there is a laundry room! AND a dishwasher!) and let Marbles sniff around the rest of the house for a few hours. Then we put her way up high on a shelf and let Piggy out. Piggy, who is half whippet and half boxer (half crazy, half crazy), can jump about five feet straight up in the air. It really is a sight; when she gets going — which she does whenever she wants her bone, or wants to go out, or wants come in, or hears your keys jangle — it really looks as though she’s on a trampoline. Her shadow, viewed from the sliver underneath the door, looks wide and dark, then gone, wide and dark, then gone. So Piggy managed to propel herself up to Marbles’ eye level, over and over and over, while Marbles just sat there watching, looking almost bored with nothing moving but her head yo-yo-ing up and down in concert with Piggy’s leaping. We tried to get Piggy to calm down, but it was pretty clear that this was the very best thing that had ever happened to her, this black and white squirrel-thing inside her own house! So then we tried to make a movie of it, but of course the camera got them all distracted (animals never do anything right). Today we had one or two bouts of howling and puffing, but in between they did manage to fall asleep on the very same couch, with me sandwiched in the middle. Things are looking up!

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Elsewhere: the latest issue of lit-magazine Swivel is now out and about, and it is so good and funny and perfectly sized for in-bath enjoyment! (Also it features a smattering of excerpts from the sleep book, which turned out really nice.) I’m doing a guest stint over at Mighty Goods, which has been all kinds of fun (stuff, stuff, for you to buy (me)). And yes Desperate Housewives is still happening, it is relentless that way!

sleep book a go!

Tuesday, apr. 11, 2006   |   0 comments

Today is the best day: My book, The Secret Language of Sleep, a Couple’s Guide to the Thirty-Nine Positions is now officially available for purchase! It’s at the McSweeney’s (online) Store for a specially discounted, one-week-only price of $12 (it’ll be $15 starting next week), and sure it’s at Amazon, plus I heard it through the gossip-vine that Jim found it at Booksmith in San Francisco, and Inger found it at Green Apple, which means that it might just be in your local independent bookery, too. (!!!)

Meanwhile and elsewhere: my Sleep Advice Column has made its debut over at McSweeneys.net, and one of the hot topics I cover is the whole debate over the official number of positions, which really does seem to throw people: the New York Post claims there are thirty-eight poses, while V Magazine says there’s just twenty-nine (the short piece they did on the book’s not online, but I put some choice pulls on the press page). But, just to be clear: as it says in and on my Couple’s Guide to the Thirty-Nine Positions, the true number of acknowledged poses is 39.

All in all, these are good and exciting times here at Camp Evany. If my heart were an emoticon (and it probably is), it would be one hundred smilies, font size 24!