brianrayfiction.com Blog

Here we go

Greensboro Review’s lit festival kicked off with a reading by George Singleton and Claudia Emerson on Thursday. I expected a show. But I didn’t expect the story George read to be based on an old friend from my undergraduate and MFA days. At the cheese and wine thingamajig afterward, George explained that he gave a heads up to the stoner of honor–we’ll call him Joss Whatsan to protect his identity–and this might explain why he didn’t show up. “Now I really am going to kill him,” George said.

The story involves a poetic though scatter-brained dog sitter, sopping wet carpet, a runaway dog, and lots of grass.

Day one: good. Now let’s see about waking up at 6:30 a.m., which means I’m actually hoping that my upstairs neighbors’ dog-rooster mix wakes up at sunrise and starts howling.