what am i, and when am i going to die

nyu local interviewed me about hipster runoff, go here for more information

feels like i'm going to die in a car crash or hurricane soon



chris killen interviewed me for his publisher's website

muumuu house article in nylon magazine, click to enlarge

ellen's book, brandon's book, and other things can be ordered from the muumuu house store

sometimes my heart pushes my ribs (Muumuu House, 2009) by Ellen Kennedy

Copies have arrived and are $12 in the Muumuu House store. Reviews are here.

Copies are also available at Melville House's bookstore, Powell's, and The Wayward Council.



Ellen Kennedy (b. 1989) is the author of yesterday i was talking to myself and i told myself that i was going to write a book and give it to you so i put paper in my bag and put a pen in my bag and rode my bike to the river bank and then sat on the ground and thought 'i will never write a book' and watched ducks swim away from me (bear parade, 2006), half of hikikomori (bear parade, 2007), and other things. For more information go to her Twitter, Vimeo, Goodreads, or Muumuu House page.

sometimes my heart pushes my ribs (Muumuu House, 2009) statistics:

Paper: 55# Rolland Enviro Natural (100% recycled)
Pages: 64
Word count: ~10,000
Size: 5 3/16" x 7 5/16"
Weight: ~3.4 ounces
1st printing: 1000
1st printing weight: 214 pounds
Style: offset, perfect-bound, paperback
# of stories: 3 or 4
# of poems: 19 or 20
Font: helvetica
Photos: here
Distribution: Small Press Distribution

To interview Ellen Kennedy or request a review copy email muumuuhouse [at] gmail.com or message her on twitter.

To sell copies in your store contact SPD or email muumuuhouse [at] gmail.com for a 58.33% discount.

Muumuu House authors receive 50% of profits. Lifetime subscriptions are available for $100.

For more information go to Muumuu House's Facebook, Goodreads, or Twitter.

3x news item

david nygren interviewed me about money

gustaf (norway) published the gay stepdad and the nearly severely-depressed bird

muumuu house's logo is now 'the helvetica asterisk'

i presented my blog and art at the whitney museum of american art

video by sarah valdez, selected event photos here

referenced items: muumuu house, hikikomori, hihihihihihihihihiiihihihihihihihhi.com

can i write an iconic book of poetry

can i publish an iconic poetry book at age 27, is that too old

can richard yates be an iconic book, it will come out when i'm 26, i think, which seems really old in terms of literary excitement

can i feel excited about a book published by a 26-year-old, it feels like i can't at all

(i just thought 'what am i talking about, fuckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk, hehe')

can i write the most readable non-mainstream book of poetry ever written, a book of poetry intensely liked by people i like, a book that makes me feel 'really clean and modern; constantly meaningless in a high-quality, healthy-feeling way; and suicidal in an exciting and ultimately life-affirming way' for at least 40 years

it would be called i don't want to go to sleep but i don't know what i'm waiting for, i would want it to be iconic in a new way, not in the way 'the catcher in the rye' or 'in the aeroplane over the sea' or like 'michael jordan' are iconic

do i like anything that i consider 'iconic,' i'm not sure, i think i don't, i think i don't use the word 'iconic' except in conjunction with at least 60% sarcasm or 80% 'politeness'

maybe i don't want to write an iconic poetry book

maybe i just want to write a book that 'finally' 'doesn't suck,' 'in my view'

what do i want to do

this is weird, the end of my career

i have been thinking about myself from the point of view of someone in 2100 idly thinking about my career and career arc and things like that while in a space station on mars looking at the earth, and i have images of myself staying in my room reading for a really long time and it seems good and acceptable

i see myself dying and it looks like a frog shriveling in a fast-motion national geographic thing, it looks dramatic and funny

it's okay maybe now for me to be alone a lot, people won't feel bad or think i'm weird, since i've accomplished things and seem productive, people will assume i am staying away from society to focus on 'my things' in a passive non-asshole way, and my value as a human being will increase, perhaps one day culminating in a permanent feeling of being 'beautiful and meaningless'

is this the goal of my life, to trick people biographically and control the tone with which they think about me, feels like i am inside my biography trying to 'get the tone right'

should i write at least 10 remixes of 'shoplifting from american apparel'

the first remix would be in the style of 20-page short stories by lorrie moore (a style previously employed 2-4 years ago in bed); dialogue would be deleted, metaphors and similes would be inserted, there would be em-dashes and semi-colons

it would be the same time-frame and main events, 'reading it in conjunction with the unremixed version (or other remixes) would be an insightful, interesting, unique, and ultimately life-affirming literary experience,' i honestly feel

i could write one remix a year for the next fifteen years then kill myself, having done perhaps 'one of the worst things imaginable career-wise (non-financially)' in my view (writing fourteen sequels to a book)

a commemorative '15x shoplifting from american apparel' box set would be released to celebrate my last year of existence

people would argue about which remix they prefer, factions would develop, like 'the 4th remix gang,’ there would be drive-by shootings, on cnn (if i don't kill myself) larry king would say 'are you the new gangster rap’ with a serious facial expression

my face would look really scared

would i rather die or publish a sequel to a book, not sure

maybe the remixes could have titles things like 'shoplifting from american apparel: the 20-page lorrie moore short story style edition' to lessen sequel connotations

'shoplifting from american apparel 2' seems like maybe the worst thing that could happen to me

but i just thought 'no, that seems maybe really funny and honestly good, i could still get a girlfriend that i like a lot and eat food that i like if i published a book like that, and i honestly think it's good, maybe, like really funny and artistically pleasing even'

everything is so uncertain

how can i keep living, with things being so uncertain, seems weird, like i’m in a science fiction movie

after typing ‘in a science fiction movie’ i felt strongly that i am currently in a science fiction movie

cyril connolly said 'the more books we read, the clearer it becomes that the true fuction of a writer is to produce a masterpiece and no other task is of consequence, especially not remixes, though each remix may be another attempt at a masterpiece'

and 'the worst vice of the solitary is the worship of his food,' hehe

feels like i'm not going to be okay

am i going to be okay, i'm not sure, not sure what i'm referring to

feels like it would be funny if there was a situation where i cried at how bad my next book is

when i think about what i want to cry about i can only think about my next book

specifically like moving sentences around or something

i want to cry at the mouse cursor moving around, deleting a word, things like that

my brain when it is comparing two sentence structures and is unable to discern which is better, seems funny

like a small boy training to be in the olympics and his father hitting him or something when he 'sucks'

i think it would be really funny if someone pushed me out of a window of a tall building

when it is happening i would keep thinking 'this is really funny' and 'haha, you just have to accept it' or something

i just want to make noises to respond to people, to things people say to me

unless it's 1-2 hours after i drank coffee, then i can say something witty maybe

i emailed the stranger and vice magazine 'selections from my twitter account,' i received no response

i emailed the stranger an article proposal, 'different kinds of shit-talking something something,' it is here:

I think I have a good idea. The article would be called "Different Kinds of Shit-Talking in Contemporary Literature" or something. It would list 4-6 different kinds with little descriptions like in my "Levels of Greatness" thing. Some would be "Anti-irony/sarcasm," "It seems like it was written in 5 minutes," and "Realism doesn't depict reality."

i keep editing shoplifting from american apparel but it keeps being bad

like i am trying to train it but it doesn't have the IQ that is necessary to not be bad

just thought 'i used to blog or something, what happened, fuckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk'

i have an image of a robot trying to do something it has been programmed not to do

i just remembered a specific time when i ate smoked salmon, seems funny

i keep thinking 'i don't know what i am referring to'

instead of thinking specific things i keep thinking the word 'something'

> 10x news item

*hehe* a richard yates article cites my second novel as a 'measure of fame' for richard yates i think *hehe*

*haha* chris killen was interviewed on second life about his new novel (info) which i reviewed here *haha*

*3x interview* i interviewed stacey levine, chris killen, zachary german, and nick antosca for mobylives *3x interview*

*ellen kennedy's book* i will have copies in ~2 weeks, pre-order now to avoid not pre-ordering *ellen kennedy's book*

*4x notable tao lin shit-talking* tumblr, twitter, blogger, goodreads *4x notable tao lin shit-talking*

*2x spanish news item* andy riverbed translated my poetry into spanish and eeeee eee eeee is going to be published in spain by el tercer nombre *2x spanish news item*

*hehe* i have more readings and things *hehe*

*poetry* i am in pear noir issue 1 *poetry*

*myspace* melville house has a myspace page *myspace*

*'damn'* look at hipster runoff's 12-month chart (interview) *'damn'*

*new blog* joseph from the mystery books started a blog *new blog*