Day 55: Howard Roark Makes Me Write Funny

Nina writes to say she relished my account of the yuppies throwing drinks at me. She says I should tell you all how I gave her bird flu by cheating on her. Okay, I confess: Sneeky and I had a three-way with a stunning, long-necked pigeon. It was a one-night stand only because Sneeky got carried away and decapitated the poor creature.

For his part, Ric says Nina once accused him of fixing me up with women he knew. (He kept it to himself.) Her suspicions are evidently why Ric and I lost touch after she moved in. “I didn’t want to say anything because I’d never seen you so happy,” Ric explains. Now that I’m miserable and helping him reopen his place, anything goes.

DECIMATED, DEVASTATED, EVER DELIRIOUSLY PRETTY

The rest of you aren’t much comfort, either. You think I‘m abnormal because of how I write. Let me explain. I’m not a freak—merely an architect who cares about detail.

So when I find myself reading that a neighborhood in New Orleans was decimated in the flooding that followed Katrina, I know the writer is referring to the Roman military punishment known as decimation (which means to remove a tenth). This drastic penalty made every 10 legionnaires draw lots to choose which individual the other 9 would club or stone to death. I’d expect to see 90% of the buildings standing in a decimated neighborhood, with 10% of them wrecked.

Most people who know anything have come to think that 90% of the buildings were ruined, which is what today’s writers usually mean. That doesn’t make it right.

I was the kind of architect that aims to get everything correct. I will do that in every dimension at my disposal. Ever read The Fountainead? Or see the movie? (No? Well, buy them here!)

Not that I don’t care what others think. Keep telling me what you want me to write about, but please confine future queries to matters of Health or History—just no more Herstory, okay? I’ve posted enough about Nina.

I might skip tomorrow’s post—big party! I’ll do my best to enjoy it on all of your behalves.