BOOKS: I got nothing.

I think I'm going to have to rejigger my posting schedule, because I just don't read fast enough anymore to have a new book to write about every week.

This week, I could write about Captains Outrageous, which I'm almost finished with, but since I already wrote about it, that would be a tad redundant. And repetitive. And it would say the same thing over again. And it would be redundant, too.

Or I could write about the Steve Martin book I picked up at the library this week, The Pleasure of My Company, but I haven't read it yet, despite the fact it's only, like, 12 pages long. Seriously, it's short. But I can barely read six comic books in one day anymore, let alone a whole novel (like I used to).

So I can talk a little about Martin's last novel, Shopgirl, which I have read, and then I'll talk about the changes I'm thinking of making to this site.

Mostly what I remember about Shopgirl was how funny it wasn't. There were more than a few humorous lines and scenes, but the overall feeling I got from it was one of melancholy. Love didn't seem to work for any of its characters, and frankly, I felt a little concerned for Steve Martin. After all, Anne Heche dumped him for Ellen Degeneres. That's enough to destroy any man's hopes for true love.

(Tangent: I wonder if he and Ellen have ever talked about Anne. I mean, he drove her to the other team, and she drove her right back. There can't be an awful lot of people in the world who have shared an experience like that. Maybe they have meetings with Lou Diamond Phillips, whom Julie Cypher left to be with Melissa Etheridge.)

Also, I was shocked at the sexual explicitness of Shopgirl. I've grown to think of Steve Martin as an almost asexual character, like Gilligan. As disturbing as it would be to picture Gilligan having a three-way with Ginger and Mary Ann, so was it disturbing to read sex scenes written by Steve Martin. As disturbing as it was to watch him participate in a sex scene with Helena Bonham-Carter in Novocaine.

Even more disturbing: my mother wanted to borrow the book when I was done. She was thinking, "Oh, Steve Martin, he's a silly fella." Meanwhile, he had written an unexpectedly dark and sexually frank book. I don't know about your relationship with your mother, but I was not going to be responsible for giving her that book. She kept asking if I had finished it, and I kept saying, "Nope, not yet!" even though I had finished it in a day and a half. I stalled long enough that I had to return the book to the library. "Sorry, I guess you'll have to check it out yourself!" I don't know if she ever did. I kind of hope not.

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So, what to do with my blog if Wednesdays are no longer book days? It's a little early in my blog's existence to have an identity crisis, yet here we are. I think I may either open the "books" entry to comic book trade paperbacks as well, of which I have far too many for my own good. Or turn it into a grab bag kind of day -- books one week, music or art or whatever the next. Already I post a variety of different items on different days, but I wanted this blog to have an agenda of at least one lengthy post on one particular predetermined aspect of pop culture every weekday. I think I'm going to have to concede defeat on the book posts for the immediate future.

I'll sleep on it tonight. More contemplation tomorrow.