Emailing Rebecca

Remember Rebecca? My friend from high school who performed a fabulous lip sync to the Spice Girls “Wannabe” freshman year? Well after my post about the Spice Girls and how cool I was in high school, I scarily stalked her out through Google. Could I be creepier? I really don’t think so. Now we have some email banter going on, which reminds me of our old days in the freshman drama room. Oh, freshman drama room, how I miss your musty smell and your set decorations fashioned out of construction paper.

As it’s a Monday morning and I’m extremely groggy and, honestly, a bit bitchy, I thought I’d share some email banter with you all. Because Rebecca lives in New York and works in publishing and reads romance novels for a living and has cocktails in the evening, and I’ll do anything to feel a connection between that life and the one residing in Kansas City with diapers and Boobah and corporate marketing and dog poop and annoying, rich, competitve mommies.

Rebecca on Posh Spice:
“Sup’ Sporty Spice – At the risk of totally shaming myself, did you see the “Posh Spice Comes To America” reality show last week? Because I did. I always thought she was supposed to be a psycho bitch but I have to admit, I kind of love her now. Especially her haircut. If we ever have a reunion of the MHS Spice Girls, I so call Posh. She wasn’t always blond, right?” – R

“I thought you were Posh the whole time. I’m remembering a little black dress…” – M

“I’m BABY SPICE, effer! I just <3 Posh." - R "I'm sorry. Ahem, Baby Spice. Girl Power." - M "Was Lacey Posh? Lily was Scary. And didn't Sporty turn out to be a lesbian? It was all those sports bras, I tell you. I bet Baby is fat now. Figures." - R On part time jobs:
“Know what I do for extra dolla? I read manuscripts. For HARLEQUIN. As in, romance novels. It is the best job ever, and if it paid anywhere near my current job, I would do it full-time tomorrow. This whole grad school thing is a nice idea, but my ultimate career goal is to write romance novels. Seriously. It’s a total racket; some authors get six figures! You should start working on your “throbbing member” and sexy poolboy scenarios, and in a couple of years you’ll be ready to put that kid through college.”

“Also, I meant to mention this in my last e-mail. I’m reading a romance novel at the moment, appropriately titled “The Mother Of His Child,” and it was just revealed that the woman the hero reconnected with and proposed to is not the ex-girlfriend who secretly bore his child, it’s her twin, who’s been raising her kid since she died in a car accident. So if Lucy is really your dead twin sister’s secret love child, I want you to know it’s okay to tell me. I understand.”

On former teachers and exchange students:
Good ol’ Fang-loving, parrot-toting [Mrs.] Wika. I don’t know Fang, obviously, but her Facebook picture looks like the Korean hooker from that ’80s Don Johnson music video.

On work:
One of my books, Global Capitalism (context: this is a stuffy, non-fiction economic analysis written by a nice but very boring professor from Harvard that got coverage in the NY Times), was recently translated into Spanish. The Spanish title is CAPITALISMO GLOBAL (imagine that being said in a Telemundo announcer voice) and the Spanish illustration for the jacket – which, fyi, is a nice, regal K-State purple – contains a frowning cartoon octopus wrapping its tentacles around the earth!

Maybe you have to see it to get the full impact.

Then, after learning that the Spanish word for octopus is “pulpo,”(our guesses included “octo” and “octupo” – both incorrect) my workbuddy and I tried to imagine the illustrator’s thought process: “ah, si, el pulpo quiere TODO EL MUNDO!” (also in Telemundo voice).

Ah, here we go: www.ecobook.com