- Article on Writing in Spring 2010 MRJ
Evan was honored to join a slew of great writers in contributing a brief article on writing in the latest issue of Mystery Readers Journal. You can check out the Spring 2010 issue - "African Mysteries" - here.

- The Children of Black Valley Review
The Chicago Tribune has just whipped out a fresh review of Evan Kilgore's summer thriller, The Children of Black Valley. "[R]eaders will literally not be able to put [it] down," according to Mr. Paul Goat Allen. It has "a uniqueness that will keep readers guessing until literally the very last pages."
     Check out the full review in Media.

WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 17, 2008
- The Children of Black Valley Tidbits
The Children of Black Valley picked up another solid review, this time from BookBitch.  You can check it out in Media.
     Also - do you believe that one page of a book can tell you the quality of the entire story?  How about Page 99?  See how The Children of Black Valley fares over at the Campaign for the American Reader's Page 99 Test.
 

MONDAY, JULY 7, 2008
- New Events & Reviews
New reviews of Evan's soon-to-be-released (this weekend!) second novel, The Children of Black Valley have just been posted to this web site.  Check out Media for more information.
   In addition, Evan has booked several new events, and signings.  He will be moderating a discussion panel entitled, "“High-Octane Thrillers: How Authors and Screenwriters Fuel the Genre," at this year's West Hollywood Book Fair. Check out Events for more information.
 

FRIDAY, MARCH 7, 2008
- New Events Added
The spring is heating up.  Check out the Events page to get the latest on Evan's upcoming calendar engagements.
 

MONDAY, MARCH 3, 2008
- COBV Synopsis & Cover Art
Preliminary cover art and a synopsis have now been released for Evan's Summer 2008 release, The Children of Black Valley.  You can check out the new stuff here at the updated Black Valley web page.
 

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 2008
- Sneak Peak at The Children of Black Valley
Get the very first glimpse at Evan's next book, The Children of Black Valley (due out Summer, 2008), with a sneak peak teaser - the first chapter, available now in PDF, exclusively on this web site.  Check it out.
   The Children of Black Valley page has also been updated with a picture of some pre-release author notes - a behind-the-scenes glance at the writing process.

- New Site Unveiled
As regular visitors may notice, this web site has just undergone a major graphical renovation to celebrate and accommodate the new and upcoming projects Evan is now embarking on.  New features include the Blog section (to the right of this article, previously found only on Evan's MySpace profile), as well as the new-and-growing site for Evan's next novel, The Children of Black Valley.
   Further updates will follow in the coming weeks about even more new and exciting projects currently underway.
 

- Get Signed Hardovers of Shayla Hacker
Available only while supplies last, Bleak House Books is offering a limited stock of signed hardcover First Editions of Evan's debut, Who is Shayla Hacker.  You can learn more and order yours today at the Bleak House web site, right here.

Saturday, November 3, 2007
- Lots Brewing
Though updates have been spotty over the last two months, Evan has kept very busy with several exciting new projects.  Look for some official announcements and developments soon...

Saturday, September 1, 2007
- New Tour Date in Los Angeles
Evan will be attending the West Hollywood Book Fair and signing at the Mystery Writers of America (MWA) booth.  Check out Events for more information.

Friday, July 27, 2007
- New Review: Who is Shayla Hacker
The good folks at Booklist have given Shayla Hacker a look and forwarded their thoughts, now available at the Press & Extras section.  An excerpt:  "Balancing always on the edge of surrealism, the novel is a kind of existential thriller, an exploration of what makes a person whole, posing as a story about a bunch of people looking for a mysterious woman. Intriguing stuff."

Tuesday, July 17, 2007
- New Interview
Barb from Front Street Reviews gets down to business in a New Interview with Evan exploring inspiration, the written process, and much more.  It can also be found in the Press & Extras section, right here at EvanKilgore.com.

- New Tour Date at USC
Evan will be stopping by his alma mater at the University of Southern California Bookstore for a signing on Monday, September 10, 2007 at 12pm.  It is at the University Park (central) Campus.  Check Events for address and details.

Sunday, July 15, 2007
- Back from the Midwest
Freshly returned from his adventures in Chicago, Milwaukee, Madison, and St. Louis, Evan brings a couple of pictures from along the way.  Check them out in Press & Extras.

Thursday, July 5, 2007
- New Tour Dates
As he prepares to embark on his Midwest mini-tour, Evan has also set up a signing in Seattle at the end of the month.  Check out Events for more details, and be sure to come see Evan in Chicago, Milwaukee, Madison, and St. Louis this coming week!

Saturday, June 30, 2007
- Site Updates: Press & Extras
Now you can find all reviews of Evan's work, plus some exclusive bonus extras in one, convenient location.  Press & Extras will henceforth be the home for any new publicity, reviews, and bonus materials available nowhere else. 
    Evan's tour schedule has also been updated in the Events Section.

Thursday, June 28, 2007
- Kirkus Reviews Shayla Hacker
To be published in the July Edition of Kirkus Reviews, Who is Shayla Hacker has received another great review from the fine folks at Kirkus.  "Twin Peaks meets The Da Vinci Code in this surpassingly weird debut."  Check out Press & Extras for more.

Monday, June 11, 2007
- Who is Shayla Hacker: The Lost Chapter
To be available exclusively from this web site, a never-before-seen chapter from Who is Shayla Hacker will be coming soon.  Keep checking back here for more information.

- Los Angeles Launch Party
Thank you to all who stopped by and helped make Shayla Hacker's first official signing event a great success.  Evan had a great time seeing old friends and meeting new readers.  For more information on upcoming opportunities to meet even, check out the Events page.

Evan signing a copy of Who is Shayla Hacker, at The Mystery Bookstore in Los Angeles, on June 9, 2007.

- Front Street Reviews Shayla Hacker
The gang at Front Street Reviews has posted a review of Who is Shayla Hacker.  Here are a few excerpts...

"After the first couple pages the hook has been set...other books get set aside. The fascinating plot premise evolves as 5 different people, in different parts of the country, for different reasons, become obsessed with a girl they have never met.

"[I was] up late into the night, not able to put the book down....This book is well worth the energy to follow the characters on their quest to find the elusive Shayla Hacker. As a mix of mystery, thriller, sci-fi and adventure, Evan Kilgore seems to be creating a new genre.

"This is an author whose writing progress will be interesting and, probably, noteworthy."

Monday, May 7, 2007
- Crime Spree Magazine Reviews Shayla Hacker
The fine folks at Crime Spree Magazine have weighed in on Who is Shayla Hacker.  Here's an excerpt from their review (available in Issue #19).

"Evan Kilgore’s debut novel is an amazing piece of work. From the fist few lines it feels like something a little different, something special...

"Kilgore has a wonderful ability to draw in the reader...The characters are people that you are instantly interested in and care about, and the way they keep circling each other is pure genius, like a avant-garde ballet choreographed by a genius madman. The descriptions in the book took me to the place the characters went and are still in my head. This book is going to stay with me for some time to come."

Thursday, May 3, 2007
- New Events Section
If you're looking for where Evan will be putting in his next appearance, an EVENTS section has just been added to this web site, detailing his forthcoming tour schedule.  From now on, signing and other information of that nature will appear there, instead of here.

Sunday, April 22, 2007
- LA Times Festival of Books 4/28-4/29
Evan will be attending the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books at UCLA's main campus in Westwood next weekend, April 28th-29th.  He'll be stopping by the Mystery Bookstore booth, as well as making the rounds at a number of other exhibitors.  Be sure to stop by and say hello if you're in the area.
 

Monday, April 16, 2007
- Evan Interviewed on Podcast
Evan has an interview on Bleak House Books' shiny new Podcast, The Future is Bleak.  You can check it out right here and catch the answers to some of those burning questions you might have.  Thanks to Ben, an excellent host and interviewer.
 

Sunday, March 18, 2007
- Who Is Shayla Hacker Page Updated
The official web page for Who is Shayla Hacker has been updated with new cover art and a stylish, themed look.  Check it out here.
 

Thursday, March 8, 2007
- Book Expo of America in New York
Evan will be launching Who is Shayla Hacker at the Book Expo of America in New York city on May 31st-June 3rd, 2007.  If you're in the vicinity, drop by, say hello, and pick yourself up an autographed first edition of the novel.
 

Thursday, February 1, 2007
- This Weekend in Seattle
As a reminder, Evan will be in Seattle, Washington, this coming weekend to promote Who is Shayla Hacker at the Left Coast Mystery Convention.  If you're in the area, be sure to stop by and say hello.

- In the News...
Who is Shayla Hacker is set to appear in the soon-to-be-published features in latest issue of the Library Journal.  You can check them out online right here.

- What Editing Looks Like
The editing cycle has arrived for Who is Shayla Hacker, as galleys prepare to go out in the coming month, and the presses are warming up for the book's June release.  Though it arrives in the summer, the fairer weather is already here in Los Angeles, and Shayla is getting a spit and polish in the poolside sun. 
   Just for fun, here's a glimpse of Evan at work on whipping the final draft of the book into shape...
 
Who is Shayla Hacker, in-progress by the pool (left), and on the balcony (right).

Monday, January 15, 2007
- Who is Shayla Hacker Podcast Online
Now you can hear Evan read from the first chapter of his forthcoming novel, Who is Shayla Hacker.  You do not need an iPod or any special software to listen to the recording.  Check it out here, and thanks to Paul Toth and his Tothworld web site for hosting the program.
 

Wednesday, December 20, 2006
- Left Coast Crime Mystery Convention
Evan will be attending the Left Coast Crime Mystery Convention 2007 in Seattle, WA, from February 1st through 4th, 2007.   Be sure to stop by and say hello if you are in town.  For more information on the event, please visit the Convention's official web site at www.lcc2007.com.
 

- MySpace Profile Launched
Evan has added a MySpace profile with updated information on upcoming author events, as well as exclusive excerpts from works in progress, and more.  Check out the page at www.myspace.com/evan_kilgore.
 

- Los Angeles Times Festival of Books
Evan will be attending the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books in Westwood this May, 2007.  Be sure to stop by and say hello if you are in town.
 

Wednesday, August 23, 2006
- Bouchercon 2006
Evan Kilgore will be promoting his forthcoming book at this year's Bouchercon book festival in Madison, Wisconsin. Come meet the author and get a taste of the book from September 28 - October 1, 2006. Visit here for the official festival web site.
 

Monday, February 20, 2006
- Site Officially Launched
Though more updates and information are to follow, this marks the official launch of this web site. In the future, you can expect enhanced commentary on some of Evan Kilgore's upcoming projects, exclusive material you won't find on bookstore shelves, and a variety of premium content still under development.
    Please check back here often for news and updates on Evan Kilgore's work.

I look forward to seeing you there:  (twitter.com/evan_kilgore) or hit me up at @evan_kilgore .

It was—to begin with—the process of awakening to the shouts of neighbors and the urgent whispers of the roommate.  It’s not that I mind a little emotion from the parties in question.  In fact, placid apathy would have worried me more.

It was not even that I minded being awakened at four-forty-seven in the morning, though in truth, it would not have been my first choice time slot for a block party bonanza.

It was that it had to come from innocent bystanders instead of, say, a fire alarm.

But nay – from the great shrieking devils of the allegedly-ever vigilant, there was silence. 

Silence, after multiple occasions on which blaring sirens have brought the entire complex to its sleepy, bed-socked feet at ungodly hours of the morning for no reason whatsoever.  Silence, now, in the midst of actual inferno – save for the crickets, the neighbors with heroically dusty fire extinguishers, and the hapless roommates scrambling for precious possessions that fit in arms, fast.

Luckily, the Los Angeles Fire Department was not so blasé. 

I only hope they’ll come back in the event of another emergency. 

While the one-bedroom apartment four doors down was promptly flooded, attention shifted to its occupant—who, taking a page from the noble cellists aboard the Titanic, flatly refused to abandon ship. 

Feet planted firmly on her deck, surrounded by lawn furniture, plants, vodka bottles, and a torrent of ashen slop, she declared: “No.  I won’t be touched by any man.”

The firemen assured her their intentions were sincere.  She told them to go to hell, and claimed, by the way, that there was a strange man in her bedroom.

The firemen searched the premises.

And came back.  Empty-handed.  

“Oh, he’s there all right,” she said. 

As though, dodging mag-lights, eight burly gentlemen in flame-retardant suits, and ninety-five gallons-per-minute of extinguishing foam, he had found a convenient pillow, magazine, or false moustache behind which to conceal himself. 

Dutifully, the firemen searched again.  And again.  Dazed and confused, they came back to Our Lady of the Patio in a flurry of questions and raised eyebrows.

She told them to go to hell, and once more refused to be touched.  Then she asked if one of them could rescue her stash of booze, and by the way, were any cigarettes readily available? 

A pump that reached the approximate decibel level of a Boeing 767 jet engine came on to clear out the smoke and water and conceal the lengthy remainder of the argument. 

More indignant shouting did its best to compete.  Griping about imaginary men in bedroom closets and dirty firemen and dirty men and men as a species.  At last, the symphony was succeeded, now approaching the hour of seven, by merciful departure. 

The following morning, the courtyard is filled with charred detritus.  Stacks of newspapers that date back a decade.  Cabinet doors.  A skeletonized desk chair.  Like forlorn survivors of faceless tragedy, the fire extinguisher remains alongside a bottle of Ocean Spray Cranberry Juice, a stuffed monkey, and the tattered patio umbrella—for the next three weeks.

Silence inhabits the apartment with the sole company of imaginary men in bedroom closets.  Dust gathers.

Time passes.

It happens one Friday afternoon when the sun is out and the air is filled with the relaxing play of tennis balls on concrete courts and water dancing in a fountain. 

She comes back from the hospital.

Carpet gathers in cindery piles on the deck, along with prodigious quantities of moldy newspaper and foul-smelling muck. 

Through the now-reopened sliding glass door, a television appears the following day.  It remains lighted from dawn to dusk, broadcasting nothing but a field of electronic blue that is penetrated by a single, screen-filling word in relaxingly new-age Arial: “COBY.”

Surname of the spritely spirit who started the fire?  Mantra of the newly-rehabilitated, there to coax our arsonist from ten A.M. to twilight?

Nay.  Research reveals it is the name of an electronics company.  Further research reveals its fifth-highest search string listing leads to an article about equipment recalls—

Due to known fire hazards.

I exist in unsettled flux. 

What does one do with this information?  Make large, bluntly un-anonymous donations to the Fire Department?  Unearth a telephone number and make prank calls with repeated FBI “red flag” words to force round-the-clock surveillance? 

Or do I simply contrive a life that can be gathered and carried from the room in a thirty-second trip from sleep to sleepy exodus? 

Perhaps the oversight in planning is the assumption that there will be any sleep at all.  Ever again.

After a brief and inexplicable September-October hiatus, the 99-cent 42oz. soda is back in full force. McDonald's has officially undercut 7-Eleven, a feat heretofore accomplished only by sketchy freeway onramp vendors with pit stains and names like, "Bloodeye." Someone is suffering for this.

I miss the era of foodertainment, but it got me thinking:
We're going to skip a couple of logical steps here, but what must it be like to be the AT&T recorded-message woman? I'm talking about the one who first sat down with an eight-track and busted out with the hit single, "I'm sorry, your number cannot be completed as dialed."

Finally: while searching for something else (internet grocery delivery services, bathroom French fry machines, YouTube videos of turtle sex…something important), I happened across perhaps the most scandalous, covert government institution in the world. I'm talking, of course, about the Professional Association of Santa's Elves, Inc. (www.paseelves.org).

Sunday, June 17, 2007
"The Last Thing to Enter My Kitchen Through the Ceiling"
Nature hikers and professional photographers will attest that there are few things more beautiful or unique than a waterfall at sunrise.  This is one of those universal rules that has a bylaw, and the bylaw states that the rule holds true for everywhere but one location, and that location is a fluorescent kitchen light fixture.

Imagine, for a moment, the brilliant, pink-orange colors of the early morning.  There's even a somewhat-profoundly-creepy fog around the fountain that makes everything seem that much more enchanting.

It starts as a pleasant trickle around 4:30am.  Who wouldn't want one?  It's like a blossoming natural spring, except that it's the color of leprechaun sex, it's coming from above, and all that's above are a pair of surfer dudes who spend their lives clomping around with such fervor that they're either in the business of beating furniture into firewood art, or they're champions of some kind of Dance-Dance Revolution extravaganza. 

"Evan," the roommate's whisper says at a quarter to five. "Evan, wake up.  There's water out here."

It looks like the Angel Gabriel taking a whizz from some swampy perversion of Cloud Nine.  The office opens at eight-thirty, and that's more than a hop, skip, and a holler from the crack of dawn. 

The emergency security number yields a grumpy man who doesn't seem to understand English.  He helpfully suggests a number with another area code with the kind of blasé nonchalance that says how sure he is that I could never track him down in a thousand years.  Still, it's worth a shot, long-distance charges and all.

"Whose dog?"

"No.  It's Evan. I live here. We have water.  In the kitchen, only not the wet part of the kitchen."

"My dog is right here.  In my yard!"

"Dogs aren't related to any part of the problem, but thank you."

"Who is this?"

"It's Evan.  I'll be the one looking like a muddy protozoa by the time you get here with your helpful army of submerged light specialists."

Click.

Several hours pass.  Water of an unnatural color enters the plumbing system through a plastic bucket and the bathtub.  It's the only way I know to react to things like this before drinking my morning coffee.

The Complex determines that a "water heater upstairs" has "ceased functioning within normal parameters," but while mops, panicked exclamations, and grudging admissions of guilt are warranted, only two of the three are involved.

The breathy and disarmingly metallic smell take about four hours to evaporate from the kitchen and the shower drain, de facto repository for Things Too Disgusting to Think About. 

The psychological damage of being violated by a Sasquatch in a room where food is prepared – that will take a little longer.

Sunday, June 17, 2007
"On Fleeting Romance & Estonian Mothers in Pink Bathrobes"
Last night, something tragic happened.  My neighbors – an amorous couple consisting of an Estonian actress who practices shouty family reunion scenes at three in the morning, and a passionate young painter/guitar-player/model-plane-builder/Bud-Light-at- noon- taste- tester-who-wishes-his-father-happy-Saint-Paddy's-Day…daily – broke up.  They split ways.  It was the end of their happy union for all time.

 

There were tears, but they weren't mine, and it's not because I'm heartless.  I may be heartless, but that has nothing to do with this.  The thing is, this happens virtually every night.

Each day of their lives is a divine comedy.  In the morning, there is silence.  It is holy.  At around one or two in the afternoon, the actress emerges in a terrycloth bathrobe.  She has breakfast on the patio, looking like she's just been blasted out of a Hoover.  Eggs, toast, coffee, and beer are involved.

The boyfriend makes occasional guest appearances, sharing the stage with cigarettes, reefers, and six-packs.  At around three or four, they head to the pool.  Six o'clock occasionally marks an acting class, while the mid-afternoon can find a head-bobbing, aspiring Bruce Springstein and a graphite-black MacBook making magic in the courtyard that sounds almost entirely unlike music.

It is evening, though, when the fireworks begin.  Once enough substances have been consumed, the cracks in the relationship are exposed.  It turns out that our friend, Mr. Van Halen, is a monumental asshole who yells and takes people for granted. Our victimized young actress?  She doesn't love the guitar savant the way he loves her.  He may not give a shit that her mother has traveled thousands of miles to stay on the floor of their studio apartment, but he sure as hell has a better sense of romantic commitment than she does. 

Why else would she smoke her cigarette with the screen door closed, leaving him to cry into his elbows on the patio?

Today took everything to the next level.  Today, the mother was there.  Mediation in mid-inebriated-rage transformed soap opera to full-blown-Shakespearean-heads-rolling-on-the-stage tragedy.  After Hippie Boyfriend was ordered out of the house, mother and daughter closed shop and commiserated in private, but the next morning, it was spreading.

Mother emerged in pink terrycloth goodness to brood with the rabbit cages on the patio.  It takes a hardcore mother to party with bunnies at nine in the morning, but a mother who doesn't even shower before she takes the stage with her stein and her cell?  That's a MOTHER.

She sits there, creepily muttering into her cell phone like it's some kind of direct line to Heaven – not aware that from a distance, she looks out of her goddamn mind.

I'd feel sorry for this group if they didn't seem to enjoy it so much.  Maybe that's ignorant, but why else would you end your relationship 365 times a year, only to lock lips and hit the guitars thirty seconds after the Apocalypse of Love?

Me, I think they're in Nirvana.  Or maybe it's Hell.  Or maybe, in some sick, twisted way, there's really not that much difference.

Saturday, February 24, 2007
"A Night at the Hot Tub"
Tonight, I was flashed by a girl in the hot tub who – should not – have bared her bosom at me.  I'm not saying this as a kind of mean, superficial judgment on her appearance.  It's not.  I don't really think there's a politically correct way to say what I'm trying to say, so I'm not going to say it, but what I will say is that – it – should not – have happened.

The wink-and-the-"oopsie" that followed it were nails in the evening coffin.

I shouldn't have been particularly surprised.  Come to think of it, nothing at the hot tub should ever surprise me.

Let's review our cast of steam-baked characters, all available at various times throughout the day (and by the way, I swear to whatever power is currently trendiest that I am not – not – making these up):

- The twenty-something guy who sits too close to people and talks incessantly about Disney characters' genitalia and stale Cuban cigars.

- The middle-aged grandmother who dispenses random and not entirely appropriate facts, while acting a little too motherly for her own good.

- The older gentleman who flirts indiscriminately with anyone a third of his age, regardless of gender, appearance, or evident interest.

- The foreign gangster with his tales of Mafioso thuggery (which are actually true, and which, as an added bonus, include satellite-signal-stealing-guerilla-warriors, top-secret government/casino cover-ups, and the KGB) – and his scandalous and foxy young wife who deals in the upscale human hair trade.

The hot tub has seriously become a minefield.  It is more dangerous than the distinctly-unsanitary-24-hour-tattoo-parlor that operates under the radar across the hallway, with the assistance of various unnamed substances.

I'm kind of feeling like my next book is just going to be a thinly-veiled biography of the warm-water-and-bubbles crowd.  A glass of cheap wine and a hundred-foot walk is all it takes to reach Nirvana.

Who would have known you could live so close to perfection?

Wednesday, January 24, 2007
"I Live Next Door to a Brothel"
I don't really know how else to say it.  They don't wear many clothes.  They have male solicitors in various forms of disrobe knocking loudly on their door at all hours of the day.  It is always different men.  They frequently do laundry, though sometimes they also play tennis.

Perhaps they are a dry-cleaning service, incognito.  I could see uses for this—The Laundromat You Never Saw Coming.  Leave Your Worries and Your Clothes Behind…Together.  In An Abyss of Worries and Clothes.

But who is free for rampant, pay-per-go sex at four in the afternoon?  Do these people not have jobs?

They speak in many languages.

It's funny, because between the scum in the bathtub and the kitty sex in the garden (did I mention that) and the—well—the brothel next door, you might think I live in an alley, but for the most part this is a pretty clean and decent place.  Maybe that's the trick of it all.  It's the white elephant in the middle of the palm-tree-terraced room.

Anyway, I suppose I enjoy hunching at the peephole and watching the romantic bonanza in the hallway now and again.  I just wish the knocker on their door was a little quieter.  I'm not sure I want to know every time a notch goes on the bedpost.

Oh, who am I kidding. It's pretty great.

Wednesday, January 10, 2007
"If Only This Was Fiction"
There were noises from the bathroom walls last night. 

Now, it approaches the hour of two and my slimy black friend is still curled in the bathtub.  This is not a racist statement.  I would be delighted to have a human being—and a friend—of any skin color in my shower instead of what's there right now.

I have never seen water so sickly, opaquely, impenetrably black.  Six inches of pure tar, littered with chunks and fragments of unidentifiable horrors. It moves.  Oozes, actually, with small swirls and bubbles.  There could be something alive in there.  How would anyone know?

I don't know how it came to be in my bathtub.  It just popped into existence.  Maybe I have enemies in the Department of Water & Power.

The plumber came this morning.  He spent an hour with a machine that made noises like women in labor.  It sounded as though he was dismantling the bathroom.  He came out somewhere around eleven and asked if I had any spray-cleaner.  There are some things you do not question. 

 By eleven-thirty, we had involved the maintenance personnel as well, coordinating our War Against The Scourge of the Pipes across several apartments.  We drained the kitchen sink and turned off someone else's toilet. 

It was nearly noon when he admitted defeat.  "I dragged some hair out of there," he told me proudly, pointing to my trash can, where it had found a snug new home. "Long, black stuff.  Doesn't look like yours."

I concurred.

"But that wasn't it.  There's something solid in there.  I'm going to call my supervisor.  Sign you up for a 'Second Try.'" 

The word, try.  Try and plumbing disasters that involve declining personal hygiene.  Sadness fills my heart.  What will we do if the plumber and the bathtub and I keep failing so miserably?  Move?  Consult an exorcist?  Rip out all the walls until we find the offending pipe?  Or maybe burn the building down and thank the stars no one was showering when It slithered into our lives.

It.  So cold an impersonal.  It needs a name if we're going to be spending so much time together.  Something charming and non-threatening.  Nobody likes to be threatened in the bathroom.  I'll call it Rupert.

Rupert is in the bathtub.

Maybe we'll bond.  I suppose I could get used to cleaning myself in the sink or the swimming pool.  Or licking, like a cat.  It might be worth it.  Guests could marvel at Rupert.  I could dip my feet and not have to wear shoes, if nobody looked too closely.

Maybe, without knowing it, my bathtub has  quietly, subtly changed my life forever.

It smells bad, though.  I'm sorry, Rupert, it's true.