The first step is to give up on the idea of committing the "perfect murder." That's the terrain of Agatha Christie novels, and no Agatha Christie novel ever ends with the murderer eating cheese as they sit in their Tuscan countryside villa, laughing to themselves about the murder they got away with. That’s more like Patricia Highsmith territory. The end of 100% of the mystery novels in world literature—go check them all, I’ll wait—is that the murderer gets caught. The case is complicated, there are many twists and turns, but then the detective solves it, the local constabulary drag the murderer away, the end. Mysteries on TV, too. I want just one to end with like Andy Sipowicz saying to a murderer, “I want you to know that I know that you did it. And I will figure out some way to prove it eventually. So keep looking over your shoulder. Because I’ll be there.” So don’t think about the perfect murder, the one that goes exactly as planned and without a hitch. This is murder—there are always hitches. Think about the perfect outcome: Cheese, villa, laughing.

Have a really good reason. 99% of murders are for money, love, revenge or to cover up another crime. The 1% ones are about using people’s skins to sew together a ladysuit. Let’s focus on the majority.

If your reason is money, make it for a lot of money. If it’s revenge, make it revenge for something great. You probably will only get one chance at getting away with murder. The NYPD clears, like, 60% of murders. Each murder, you keep rolling the dice. You can murder an anonymous stranger, just to see what it’s like to kill someone. But what fun is that? Especially if you only get to kill one? That’s like only eating one delicious slider at White Castle. Do they even sell single sliders at White Castle? I don’t think so. Because you wouldn’t be satisfied. Anyway, killing randomly and for no reason might increase your chances of getting away with it, but it won’t soothe your unbearable bloodlust. People generally kill people they know, it’s just way more satisfying.

Perhaps you want to kill the person who has the job you want. Say Anna Wintour—or Carmelo Anthony. You’re just not getting the ball at the top of the key anymore because Mr. Ball Hog takes, like, 40 shots a night for the Knicks. Or you want to be the one occupying that office atop the Manhattan skyline, deciding who gets to be cool and who has to move to Hartford Forever. Sure, go ahead—if you’re sure the Knicks will say “Now that ‘Melo has vanished from the face of the earth, please be our Small Forward.” Or that Si will turn to you and not some other horrible ambition monster. Otherwise it's not worth it.

It’s a bad idea to try to eliminate all evidence from a crime scene. A tempting strategy, but completely the wrong way to go. Instead of going for zero evidence, what you want to do is make sure there's plenty of evidence all over the crime scene. Like a huge puddle of semen or a big pile of pubes. As long as it’s someone else’s semen and pubes. Or pour some buckets of other people’s blood all over the dead body. Sort that out, coppers!

In trying to eliminate evidence you will probably leave more evidence and then you will be in a lot of trouble. When juries don’t see any evidence, and just have the word of the police over the word of the murderer, well, nobody likes police. Except me. I’ve always liked them for some reason. The uniforms, maybe. I like UPS delivery people, too. And the Starbucks uniform is practically erotic lingerie to me. But anyway, who you gonna believe? The Cops? Or The Evidence that says that some other person came and bled all over the crime scene? People on juries watch nothing but "CSI" shows. They'll always go with The Evidence. So steal a bunch of someone you want to frame’s pubic hair (or regular hair, if you want to be boring) and sprinkle it generously all over the crime scene.

Take the serial killer Dexter, for example. He does that whole plastic-wrapped killing hole thing every time he does a murder. That is so much work. The guy at the plastic store has probably called the cops on him a billion times by now. “This guy uses a lot of plastic and is always buying shovels all the time.” Bad idea. Real assassin type killers leave all the evidence at the crime scene. Just drop the Candlestick in the Conservatory, Professor Plum. Sure, your fingerprints may be on that candlestick. But most likely so are the maid’s. And whoever’s been using it as a dildo. You can try and smudge your prints if you wish in this murder scenario. Which isn’t the best example of the kind of murder you’ll get away with. They’ll have all kinds of “a person this tall and right-handed struck the fatal blow” evidence on you anyway. But it’s better than trying to take it with you, throwing it in the East River. Buried in your backyard that candlestick is you going to jail. You might think throwing it deep into dirty water might help, but someone will probably see you throw it in. And the thing probably isn’t real gold, it’s probably some kind of cheap metal that floats. Floatanium!

You might be wanting to hide the body by cutting off the head, feet and hands and removing any distinguishing marks on the skin. You’re going to carry a body around town with you? You got a duffel bag for the head, feet and hands? Yeah, sure you do. One that drip drip drips blood right back to the tool shed in your back yard. As bad as it is to leave all the evidence in one place so the police can find it all it’s worse taking any of it with you. The police generally approach a crime in a rather narrative way. Looking for clues and then asking people questions and then arresting the murder victim’s husband or loser boyfriend. Which brings me too…

Don’t kill someone you've been sleeping with. A. It's just really bad form. B. You will be the only real suspect: Anytime a married woman is murdered, they immediately jail the husband. And then go get donuts. The best revenge as a spurned lover is not murder, but fucking someone else and throwing it in that person’s face. Like you see them at a party and are like “Hello.” And they are all like “Hello.” And you’re like, “This is Jeff.” And they are like, “Hello, Jeff.” And you are like, “When we make love we make jokes about you.” And they are like “Really?” And you and Jeff are like “Oh, yes. Really.” That is way better than any murder. Anyway, it’s way more fun to kill your parents, who probably screwed you up way worse than any relationship person. Fight the real enemy.

Always do it all yourself. The fewer people you include, the fewer people you will have to kill later. If you want to get away with murder, no one else can know about it. Not your mom, not the cat. You should probably avoid even making eye contact with anyone while you’re thinking about the murder. Maybe that person is clairvoyant. You don’t know. The more people who know about your murder the more people you may have to someday murder to keep them quiet. Because they’ll blackmail you and stuff; people are such creeps. And word to the wise: if you build an awesome killer ninja robot to be your accomplice, then you will have to take the whole thing apart after the murder is done and then hide all the bloody pieces. Don’t accumulate witnesses or conspirators. It will only increase your chances of getting caught.

And whatever you do, do not hire someone to do the murder for you. They will fuck it up and leave you hanging out to dry. In general, other people are unreliable and completely selfish, especially when it comes to criminal enterprises. You should only hire someone to commit murders for you if you’re really excited about having them blackmail you later. Like if you are way into that. Because they will keep hassling you for hush money constantly on your lunch break and at movies during the coming attractions.

Give the cops a boring case. It’s not that the police are dumb. They aren’t. They just have a lot to do. And they're not going to want to spend a ton of time on some bullshit murder unless they think it might be a real moneymaker down the road. Like a murder they can get serious overtime on and write books about and will have Chloë Sevigny playing them in movies. That kind of thing. Which is why you don’t leave letters under their fingernails or paint a riddle in the murder victim’s blood. Don't do anything that might make a great hook for David Grann someday. Leave all the evidence at the crime scene. Take all the folding money in the murder victim’s wallet. It doesn’t matter how much is there. Just take it. The possibility of a failed robbery, however unlikely, is something the cops will have to consider and one they may default to. Cops have seen lots and lots of murders and there’s no reason to think your murder is all that special unless you make it special. Which is why you shouldn’t leave a fortune cookie in your murder victim’s mouth or write the lyrics to Sonic Youth songs with their entrails. That’s the fast way to get HLN and Nancy Grace all up in your shit.

Murder cases are built on progress. When no progress is forthcoming they squish down like a jack-o’-lantern after Halloween. The boss cop goes, “How’s that Jim Behrle murder coming along?” And the cop on the case is like “Half the city wanted that guy dead. We’re nowhere.” And the boss cop goes, “Fuck it. Move on.”

Juries are crazy. “The Twinkie Defense” was formulated before many of you were born. But believe me, juries will buy just about anything. Some murderers are afraid to face a jury of their peers, but they shouldn't be. Half of the people on your jury will probably have committed their own murders and will totally want you to get off. The other half will have watched so many episodes of “CSI” they expect all cases to have exciting montages of fiber analysis, footage of cops taking off their sunglasses and putting them back on, arrows with detached retinas on their tips. Without those elements your jury will probably fall asleep and you’ll get a mistrial. Who knows if they’ll even prosecute you a second time?

Be sure you have it in you to kill. Murder is something you will carry around with you all your days. Some people are great at compartmentalizing. Like me, for example. I wouldn’t steal a pack of gum from a store. But I love owing large corporations money and never paying them. It is a huge part of my life. A lot of getting away with murder will be up to you. If the cops do suspect you, can you avoid saying something stupid and incriminating to them? And don’t be calling the detectives to see if they have any leads. You’ll know if they have any leads on you, because they'll be following you around and bothering you and all your friends. Are you really good at keeping secrets? Because I am not. I would kill someone and then just blab about it all the time, making jokes that got increasingly higher pitched and hysterical before breaking down in tears and confessing it darkly to people.

Then there’s the human conscience. What a weird invention. Sociopaths are the best murderers, because they feel nothing except unlimited rage without consequence. But what about the rest of us, who practically burst into tears when we cut people in line at Duane Reade?

Don’t kill anyone really great. How long do you think the investigation in “Twin Peaks” would have gone on if Pete the Fisherman had been shot? There wouldn’t have even been an investigation. They would have just arrested Piper Laurie and burned down the old mill. Laura Palmer was young, beautiful and promiscuous. Even Agent Cooper had weird sexy dreams of her! Don’t kill anyone who would inspire any sort of life-long search or outcry. They’re still going on and on about Jesus dying on the cross, and that was 2,000 years ago! Conversely, no one mourns lousy people all that long, and their unsolved murder won’t bother anyone all that much.

Remember, murder is wrong. And “vengeance is mine” sayeth the Lord. Right. So it’s bad for people to murder other people but it’s OK for God to give people cancer for no reason. Sure, sure, whatever. But God has made murder messy and getting away with it difficult, but not impossible. So God must want some people to get away with murder. Maybe you!

Related: The Dos And Don'ts Of Time Travel

Jim Behrle tweets at @behrle for your possible amusement.

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Have you ever noticed that you always know when your dog wants to go “out”? Or when he is hungry? Or when he is angry with you or others?

You know because your dog is already talking to you!

Dogs are natural actors, instinctively adept at using their bodies and facial expressions to communicate with you nonverbally. They are also expert mimes, capable of performing a vast repertoire of deceptively simple routines to subtly get their points across. Some of these “bits” are universal (e.g., nosing the dog dish to indicate hunger, drinking out of the toilet to indicate thirst), but most are specific to the dog. For example, my own dog, Flynn (a seven-year-old Irish setter), raises his paw and points at the television screen when he wants me to change the channel.

Many dog owners are content to communicate with their pets solely on this preverbal level. But imagine how handy it would be if, in addition to being able to alert you when somebody was at the door, your dog could also tell you who it was (dogs, remember, have a keen sense of smell). Or how enriching your relationship with your dog would be if the two of you could just “shoot the breeze” sometimes. Let me show you how.

Exercises: Try this simple nonverbal exchange: place both hands firmly on either side of your dog’s head. Apply firm pressure and pull your dog’s face close to yours (between 1" and 2" is optimum). Now, smile broadly and—again, using both hands—vigorously stroke your dog in an upward motion from the base of his neck to just behind his ears. Your dog will understand this as meaning, “I like you. I value you as my dog.” If your dog then licks your face, that means, “I like you, too!” (Do not be discouraged if your dog does not immediately lick your face. The setting may be too intimate for him, or, more likely, he is just not a licker.)

THE CANINE TONGUE

Dogs are the most vocal of all domesticated animals. Whereas the cat goes meow, the cow goes moo, the sheep goes baa, and the pig goes oink-oink, the dog is not limited by these crude utterances. The average American dog can bark, howl, yap, snap, growl, whimper, woof, yelp, bay, howl, whine, gnarl, mutter, and, of course, bow-wow. In fact, many scientists believe that if dogs had more highly developed brains and sophisticated vocal cords, they could converse much like humans do.

But make no mistake: dogs do “speak,” and not just as a parlor trick. My own close examination of the canine tongue reveals that dogs have a “vocabulary” in excess of 2,000 words. Fortunately, nearly all of these words roughly translate into the English word “food” (dogs have more than 120 words for dry food alone), and so you will only need to learn a working vocabulary of about 400 words in order to talk to your dog.

Pronunciation can be tricky, however. The canine alphabet differs significantly from ours, featuring a fraction of our consonants (b, f, h, p, r, w, and sometimes y) and the rounder vowel sounds, which are more “sung” than “spoken.” Words are therefore primarily distinguished by minor variations in pronunciation (dogs can differentiate twelve types of r sounds and five degrees of hardness in the letter b). From this deceptively sparse phoneme palette, dogs are thus able to create a comparatively rich language.

A basic Canine/English dictionary can be found at the back of this book, but you should be aware of few matters of form and style before attempting to use it.

Eschew Excess Barking. Dogs tend to follow Strunk and White’s dictum about omitting needless words and avoiding weak modifiers. Rather than saying something smells “very tasty,” a dog will simply bark “tasty” (woh-af), placing added emphasis on the initial vowel sound and saying the entire word louder.

Regarding Plurals and Possessives. There is no true plural in the canine tongue. Rather, your dog, seeing another dog, may say, Rarf ! (“Hey, there’s another dog!”), whereas, upon seeing a pack of dogs, your dog will likely exclaim: Rarf rarf rarf rarf rarf rarf! Possessives, on the other hand, are usually indicated with a low growl.

Some Things Just Won’t Translate. Not all human concepts are meaningful to dogs; for instance, there is no dog word for “stay.” Likewise, there are several dog phrases which cannot be translated adequately into English (a few of these do have analogues in German and Chinese, however). Among the more enigmatic dogisms you are likely to encounter:

Bow wow—This frequently uttered canine cant provides an intriguing look at your dog’s overall philosophy. Directly translated into English, bow wow means, simply, “I am.” But to your dog, it means something ineffably more.
Rowp! Rowp!—Usually delivered enthusiastically with your dog’s head thrown back, means something along the order of “Would you listen to that? Is that loud or what?”
Rur rar roo roo roo rawr rawr awr raw rarp rarp rarp!—Means nothing; your dog has gone crazy.

Exercises: Let’s start with a simple “hello.” While dogs prefer to say hello nonverbally, they are capable of a standard declarative greeting when actual contact is not possible. The dog word for “hello” is woof (pronounced wuf, wüf, and sometimes wrüf, depending on breed and regional dialect). Facing your dog, say woof in as energetically and friendly a way as possible (tone of voice is very important; the similar-sounding weuf means “Back off! This is my food!”). For maximum impact, place added emphasis on the w and f sounds (The f is actually more of a ph. Dogs have more space between their lips and teeth than humans do, which causes increased “lip flapping” when they speak and makes them particularly well-suited for consonantal diphthongs.) If you have said “hello” correctly, your dog will woof back, a bit louder and slightly higher in pitch. If your dog just stares at you, you have probably mispronounced the word. Try again. If repeated attempts to say hello fail, it may be because your dog feels you are making fun or trying to talk down to him. Try to sound more sincere. If you have a smaller dog, you also might want to try substituting the phrase yip yip yip.


NOW THAT YOU AND YOUR DOG ARE ON SPEAKING TERMS: WHAT DO YOU TALK ABOUT?

Like humans, dogs prefer to talk about what they know. This varies widely from dog to dog, but my experience with Flynn is probably typical.

Flynn loves to talk about smells, all kinds of smells, even and especially smells humans consider impolite to discuss. You must try to give your dog some latitude in this regard. Remember, smells are your dog’s only colors.

Flynn is also keenly interested in the environment, though his commitment wavers. During our trips to the city, for example, he will complain long and bitterly about the air quality, and yet, he plainly enjoys all the garbage.

Among Flynn’s other favorite topics of conversation are: animals (all kinds), music (particularly opera), the weather, and the moon. Conversation stoppers for Flynn include: politics, religion, sports, clothing, the future, and money matters (about which he often displays an exasperating disinterest).

Your dog will likely share some of Flynn’s interests; undoubtedly he will have several of his own. The important thing for you is to explore a full range of talking points with your dog, to discover what he wants to talk about. Any topic is fair game, although I would strongly warn you against broaching the subject of death. When I tried to explain this concept to Flynn, he began whimpering uncontrollably, then took off through the house, scooting along on his rear end and making a horrible mess.

Exercises: Take your dog for a short, brisk walk around the block. When you arrive home, go into separate rooms and compose a list of all of the things you saw. (Since your dog cannot write, he will have to memorize his.) After about fifteen minutes (a time limit is important; your dog will otherwise spend hours pondering a single five-minute walk), get together and compare and contrast your lists.

You will be amazed at how differently you and your dog look at the world.


GETTING PAST THE SMALL TALK

How much do you really know about your dog? To find out, it is not enough to talk to your dog: you must also listen. Only then will your true dog emerge, as Flynn has for me.

For example, I never realized, until I took the time to listen, that Flynn has such a terrific sense of humor (albeit a bit immature). Before I mastered his language, one of Flynn’s favorite jokes was to spout a canine vulgarity of the lowest order whenever I commanded him to “speak.” He’s really quite a kidder.

In getting Flynn to open up, I also discovered he has the heart of a poet (as I suspect most dogs do). He loves to recite his song poems (which resemble blues dirges) on clear evenings when there is a full moon. Here’s one (translated):

        My master is good
                 and he gives me good food.
        When I am hungry,
                 he brings me food then.
        Except sometimes,
                 I remember one time in particular.
        But mostly,
                 he is a good provider.

Had I known this was what Flynn had been howling all along, I never would have yelled at him to shut up. Getting to know your dog can help you avoid similar misunderstandings.

Be warned, however: it is possible you and your dog will get to know each other, only to realize you are totally incompatible. This happens rarely, but when it does, it is better to accept this fact, and take appropriate measures, than to go on living a lie.

Exercises: If you and your dog have gotten this far, you are beyond structured exercises.


HOW TO TALK TO A BAD DOG

Being able to talk to your dog is wonderful, but should not be confused with true intimacy. Don’t find this out the hard way, as I had to.

A few months ago, I came home from work and discovered Flynn had chewed up all the mail. He could not, or would not, give any explanation for his behavior. Furthermore, he did not seem the least bit contrite. I sternly lectured him on the importance of respecting the property of others (throwing in a few ominous references to U.S. Postal Inspectors) and thought that would be the end of the matter.

But the next day, Flynn had done it again. He had also attempted to hide the results of his crime throughout the house.

It didn’t take too long to figure out what was going on. Behind the bedroom toilet (where Flynn is not even supposed to go), I found the pulpy remains of my broadband bill; it was for nearly fifteen hundred dollars!

A quick call to the company confirmed my worst suspicions: someone had ordered Beverly Hills Chihuahua more than three hundred times. (This is not quite the fantastic accomplishment it seems; the remote is quite intuitive.) Although a cable company supervisor said she would give me a one-time credit on the bill, I was absolutely furious. It wasn’t the money; it was that Flynn had deliberately lied to me, something I thought dogs were not even capable of.

I lost control and lashed out at Flynn viciously.

Harph! Harhh rrah gruh rau-hurr! I barked without thinking, and then went on to say a number of other things I immediately wished I could take back. But it was too late; Flynn had understood every word.

In retrospect, I guess I should have just taken a rolled-up newspaper and rapped Flynn across the snout. I thought we had gotten beyond that kind of thing, but I’ve since come to realize that words hurt far more when they are spoken in anger than when they appear on the printed page.


WHEN YOUR DOG IS NO LONGER TALKING TO YOU

Flynn didn’t speak to me for a long time after the Chihuahua incident.

I would try to initiate conversations, ask Flynn how his day was, but he would just mutter something unintelligible. When I would try to tell him how my day had gone, he would look straight into my eyes, and then rudely turn away to attend to an itch between his legs.

After about three weeks of this, I couldn’t take it anymore.

I got down on my knees and literally begged Flynn to talk to me again. I have re-created the resulting conversation below. It represented an important breakthrough for Flynn and me, and I think you’ll find it instructive.

Me: C’mon, boy, speak to me! Speak!

Flynn: Arph?

Me: Arph? Because we need to talk about this. I’m going nuts with this.

Flynn: Wuf wif.

Me: I said I was sorry! You don’t know how sorry I am. Rü! But there’s something else going on here, isn’t there? You can tell me, boy. This is your best friend talking. Please. Roof.

(long pause)

Flynn (softly): Har hraugh rhuf whuf hrr.

Me: What do you mean? I pay attention to you all the time!

Flynn: Har hraugh rhuf whuf hrr.

Me: Yeah, rhuf. We talk all the time, don’t we? Or at least we used to.

Flynn: Rhuf… rhuf… hurr.

Me: Oh my God. I am such an idiot.

What I had only then realized was that when Flynn said to me, “You never pay attention to me anymore,” he was employing a euphemism! What he had meant was, “You never pet me anymore.” And I had completely missed it.

I had gotten so wrapped up in the idea of being able to talk to Flynn, and so comfortable discussing matters with him as an equal, I had completely forgotten that, when you get right down to it, Flynn was just a dog—a dog with the same physical and emotional needs as any dog. Words count for very little to a dog; actions speak much louder.

This is the most important lesson I can impart to you: it is not enough to talk to your dog; you must also communicate. I shudder to think that if Flynn had not opened up to me, I might have gone on hurting him indefinitely. Remember: your dog might not be as assertive.

Flynn and I talk less than we did at the beginning, but that’s all right. We know that when we want to, or need to, we can. And it still comes in quite handy sometimes.

But other times, like on hot, firefly nights, when the stars seem so close you can catch them in your mouth, and the old porch swing creaks rhythmically back and forth with the crickets adding chirpy syncopation, and the slow, thick air smells a deep, dark purple, well, words are meaningless. Flynn has taught me that.

You can purchase the audiobook for your dog by sending $19.95 cash or money order plus $3.50 for postage and handling to: Talking Dog, P.O. 8745, Champaign, IL 61820. Flynn cautions that some of the growling on this tape may be too intense for younger dogs or more sensitive, miniature dogs.

* Like He's Your Best Friend

Larry Doyle, a former writer for "The Simpsons," works in showbiz and writes funny things for The New Yorker. He is the author of I Love You, Beth Cooper, which won the 2008 Thurber Prize for American Humor and was made into a major motion picture, and Go Mutants!. He lives outside Baltimore with his wife, Becky, and their three children.

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So if you want to succeed without losing a finger, your sanity, or the weak familial bonds you still have, we need to start right away. For the next three weeks, your hand in mine, we are going to head into Thanksgiving with grace and confidence, getting enough done each week so that at no point are you winging a shopping cart through the grocery store at midnight. And what we’re going to achieve together is not some Sandra Lee/Paula Deen/Rachael Ray half-assed sham of a Thanksgiving. Three weeks is just enough time to prepare.

Step 1 (as always): Clean The House. You will feel competent and prepared with a clean house. Do this tonight, because you have a busy weekend ahead! Do the laundry, fold it, and put it away. If you will have overnight guests for the holiday, launder the guest linens, and make sure you have all the sheets and towels you need. Clean out the fridge thoroughly. Thoroughly. You won’t need ketchup again until next summer, so toss it. Don’t worry about the floors, those are going to have to wait until the last minute. Reward yourself by finishing off the almost-empty liquor bottles, and then recycle them.

Step 2: Menu Planning. A common mistake is planning only the massive, table- and belt-busting Thanksgiving feast. Sometimes it’s hard to believe, but people actually eat other meals on Thanksgiving and the days before and after it. If you’re having out-of-town guests, it’s obvious that you need to plan a meal for the night they arrive, a breakfast on Thanksgiving day, and a brunch for that Friday. But even if you live alone and the guests will only be around for a few hours, you need to feed yourself with more than spare whipped cream.

For the night before Thanksgiving, a stew that you can make in the slow cooker is ideal. Something with lots of veggies in preparation for the avalanche of starches yet to come. Don’t omit dessert, or else you’ll be tempted to sample the pie, and not only is that shameful, but you’ll also lose your appetite for pie. Dessert suggestion: lemon sorbet.

For breakfast on Thanksgiving, offer a big bowl of yogurt along with bananas and chopped almonds. Deputize someone to keep the coffee supply replenished. If you want to show your skills at every meal, you can also offer homemade granola you prepared the week before.

(FYI, here’s how to make a simple granola: Heat the oven to 250F. Get out a ¼ cup measure. Use it to put 3 scoops of brown sugar in a small saucepan. Add 2 scoops of canola (or other flavorless) oil. Add 3 scoops of maple syrup. (There’s a reason for doing it in this order, as the most fastidious of you will already understand.) Stir this and warm it over a low burner while in a big mixing bowl, using the end of a rolling pin, you mash up ½ pound of raw cashews and ½ pound of raw almonds. Mix in 2 pounds of rolled oats and ½ tablespoon of salt. When the syrup is warm and sugar is mostly dissolved, mix everything together very thoroughly. Pour the mixture onto two baking sheets. Stir things up a little every 20 minutes for an hour. When it comes out of the oven, it won’t be particularly crunchy, but that will change as it cools.)

For the day after Thanksgiving, leftovers are truly not going to cut it. The notion of having infinite leftovers to make a whole buffet of creative adaptations is a fantasy. Assuming you eat Thanksgiving dinner in the middle of the day, most of the leftovers will be gone by bedtime. Another widespread bad idea is the totally-made-ahead brunch (e.g., French toast). You know when you don’t have time to prepare this brunch? Right before Thanksgiving. You know when you have plenty of time to make brunch? The day after Thanksgiving.

For Friday brunch, omelets are your very best option. They require virtually no prep other than a little whisking and maybe snipping of tarragon. Use soft cheese so you don’t even have to bother with grating. You can make bacon without stress by baking it in the oven. Keep some sliced bread in the freezer for toast. Also in the freezer: concentrated orange juice.

Now write down all of these menus along with the shopping list for each. On paper. Ideally, in a notebook. You cannot keep track of Thanksgiving in your head. It’s bigger than that. It’s bigger than all of us.

Step 3: Menu Planning, for Realsies. A lot of unnecessary thought goes into the main Thanksgiving meal planning. Scanning the magazine racks at the grocery store, it’s clear that someone thinks they need literally thousands of side dish ideas. With very few exceptions, what everyone wants from Thanksgiving is Thanksgiving. Not a Moroccan fantasia on root vegetable themes.

In addition to resisting your own artistic impulses, you should also resist the urge to accommodate every palate preference and food aversion—barring allergies—that arrives to dinner. Your house is not Per Se! You are serving seven or more dishes, and the guests do not have to love each and every thing on the table!

Your Thanksgiving menu should be as simple as this: roast turkey, stuffing, gravy, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, vegetable/casserole and pie. No white potatoes! No salad! Where do people get these ideas? Variety is the not the spirit of this holiday—comforting food that puts you to sleep when your middle-aged relatives start to get annoying: that’s the spirit!

Within these parameters, some things are fixed and some things are open. Don’t worry about stuffing, gravy or cranberry sauce. We’re going to do those in the simplest, most direct way possible—they need no elevation or innovation. But your sweet potatoes could be mashed, baked or roasted (together with parsnips or celery root). Your pie can be pumpkin or pecan. (If you need more than one kind of pie, ask others to bring some.)

Your vegetable dish is where you most get to express your creativity, but I insist: don’t be too adventurous. People simply crave something green to balance the umami overload. Roasted Brussels sprouts or sautéed Siberian kale spiced with a little cayenne pepper would be perfect. Green beans or broccoli with any delicious white sauce would also be nice, and a little retro.

Step 4: Start Eating Sandwiches. You’re going to make stuffing and you’re going to need a lot of stale bread. So start this week packing sandwiches for your lunch. If you’re worried about holiday poundage, make them with baba ghanoush or kale-almond pesto instead of cheese. Buy unsliced loaves so you can be particularly generous in cutting off and cutting up the heels. Keep them in a big zipper bag in your freezer. When Thanksgiving comes, you’ll inevitably need to supplement this stash with additional toasted bread cubes, but leftover bread is the whole point of stuffing.

Step 5: Wine Shopping. This weekend, go wine shopping. I know it’s early, but when the holiday gets nearer, the wine stores get crowded and their shelves get empty. Shopping early also means you can order something that’s running low or not stocked. Plus, all the wine stores will have tastings on Saturday afternoon, so enjoy it now before you get too busy.

What to get? All you need to know is here, but if you don’t have a mind for wine, just remember Loire for both white and red. If you insist on an American wine, reduce the environmental impacts of shipping by picking a wine from your own side of the country. Out west, look for a Zinfandel with low alcohol, around 14%. Back east, consider Cabernet franc, produced in various, delightful ways from the Finger Lakes all the way down to Georgia.

Step 6. Start Grocery Shopping.There are some things you can buy already that will keep (or freeze) and will be in short supply later. For your pie, buy the pecans or canned pumpkin. (Don’t get canned “pumpkin pie filling” nor fresh pumpkin, which is not particularly good in pie.) Buy a bag of cranberries. Buy three pounds of butter, a five-pound bag of flour, a three-pound bag of sugar, and make sure you have plenty of salt and pepper. Review your spice rack and restock as necessary. Replace last year’s cinnamon. Make sure you have plastic wrap, paper towels, zipper bags and aluminum foil. Check the toilet-paper supply.

Oh, and this is important: buy three pounds of turkey wings, because we’re making stock this weekend. Oh, does the store not have any turkey wings in stock? Thank goodness we started so early! Order them from the butcher for pickup later this week.

Step 7. Relaxing Yet Productive Sunday in the Kitchen. You don’t have to get this all done on Sunday, but you have three crucial prep tasks to accomplish before next week: making dough, stock and beurre manié. First, make your pie dough and put it in the freezer. (Obviously don’t roll it out and/or bake it.) Couple of tips here: remember you need to freeze some butter for this task. At the same time, put a stick of butter out on the counter—this will make sense later. While some butter freezes and some butter gets soft, you can be working on chopping vegetables and stuff for the stock.

Okay, so then make the stock we mentioned before. Divide this into one-quart zipper bags and put it in the freezer.

When that stick of butter is soft and your hands are idle, make beurre manié, which will ultimately be used to thicken your gravy. You’re making life easier for your future self! This is an Alton Brown tip you can find all over the interwebs, but here are some simplified instructions:
• Combine the stick of butter with ½ cup of flour. Mix together very, very thoroughly using either a dough blender or a hand mixer.
• Divide this into eight equal parts. Roll them into balls. Put the balls into a zipper bag and freeze them.

I hope you have enough room in your freezer for all this, but remember when I told you to clean out the fridge?!

Homework Assignment: Before our meeting next week, decide on your vegetable dish(es). Also spend some time thinking about decoration. No handprint turkey cutouts or construction paper pilgrim hats, because we’re doing a much classier thing here. Are you happy with the linens and napkins you have? Glassware and flatware? You could totally order these wine tumblers and get them in time for Thanksgiving. These bar mops would make great napkins.

Okay, are you feeling totally calm and confident and ready win—I mean, welcome Thanksgiving?

K. Emerson Beyer, environmentalist and gadabout, lives in Durham, N.C. and tweets as @patebrisee.

Photo by Geoffrey Fairchild, via Flickr.

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Love poetry has, of course, been with us since the beginning of time. Lame pick-up lines were passé even in Mesozoic times; we diminish ourselves with cheap dating gimmickry. And who would want to woo anyone who could be gotten so cheaply anyway? It’s the chase that's the fun—and the poem is the map you use! To get to Someone’s Soul! (Excited trumpets!)

When is the right time in a relationship to present someone with a poem? A good question. The line between creepy and romantic is ever shifting. Some people might like a poem written about them at first, and then later come to find it creepy and taser you. Others might, upon first reading, feel creeped out and then later come to love the poem you wrote. You never know. Love makes us put ourselves out there in crazy ways; it's a roller coaster except there are no safety restraints. You could find yourself floating or smashed on the boardwalk like a heel-crushed hotdog. That’s the fun of it! It starts as a funny feeling in the stomach and then quickly goes on to flood the brain. Soon we're constantly thinking about them, wondering what they look like without pants on, trying to remember their schedule at the yoga place. Poets actually know more about longing than they do about love. Poets fall in love with other people’s wives, people who don’t love them back. They're human, in other words; and humans weren't built for happiness. They were built for dissatisfaction and yearning.

So, what’s your story? For whom do you yearn? Could be your parole officer. Or the guy you hired to kill your ex. We generally are attracted to complication: people who it might be impossible to pursue. As the great John Wieners wrote, “The poem does not lie to us. We lie under its law.” I quote that a lot, because it’s the most important thing a poem can do: communicate energy and Capital T Truth to the reader. In this case to someone you think is pretty special. So make your Truth sound pretty good.

***

The first step is to stare at a blank piece of paper for a while. This is actually a helpful step. Like the way Michelangelo stared at a block of stone for a while and then figured out that there was a man with a strangely small penis inside of it. Or Jackson Pollock would stare at a blank canvas and realize that a bunch of random painting droppings and swirls were underneath, waiting to be dripped out. Or Eve Ensler saw an empty stage and a microphone and then decided that she wanted to talk about her vagina. What does the blank page tell us? A lot. It's a mirror of our own minds. Especially, in my case, when I have spilled coffee on it.

How does one proceed from this blank page? Hopefully, you don’t stare at the page all day and go insane, and then start committing crimes around town under the alias of “The Blank Page.” That would be a terrible outcome. And you’d probably end up a Batwoman villain. There are easy ways to get started writing a poem. And easy is the way to go. No one wants a really tangled and complicated love poem written about himself. Dante wrote about following Beatrice through Heaven, Hell and Purgatory, and he still never actually got to be with her. But they didn’t have OkCupid then, so it’s understandable. Plus, Beatrice was, like, 13, and who knows what 13-year-old girls like? Bieber, I guess. Please don’t send love poems to 13-year-old girls. Unless you are 13.

One way to get started with your love poem is to use the recipient's name. Names are good. Find out what his or her name is and then write it down the page like so:

J
I
M

B
E
H
R
L
E

There is probably a word for this kind of poem. Acrostic. I just looked that up. That is a good way to start a poem! And it shows someone that you know his name. Which is a good thing to know. This is a great starting point. So in the first line you could start with a "J" word.

Just to let you know

Okay! You’re building up to something. So far so good. Don’t use italics to emphasize certain words, though. People use italics too much in poems to mean This is really, really deep. This is so breathlessly important. So skip the italics.

Just to let you know
I think you are pretty cool

That’s good! Building on the "I"! Bringing yourself into it. Being direct! That’s good, because it takes some people a little while to get the gist of something. Just get right to it.

Just to let you now
I think you are pretty cool
Mostly because of your ass

Humor! Excellent. You may not want to mention someone's butt in the first stanza, or maybe at all. It just happens to be my finest feature, and I’m always glad when people have opinions about it. Some people are weird about that, but whatever. Safe things to mention when you don't know somebody that well, or you just know him from work or following him around on the N train or whatever, are hair, eyes and elbows. Mouths, bellybuttons, noses, ears, coccyges—anything that can be used during some kind of sex act—can be approached only metaphorically and with the greatest of caution when you’re writing for people who do not already know that you love them.

So let’s change "ass" for "eyes," which, on me, are also amazing. A kind of hazelnut wonderland of depth and swirling glint. I also have a very deep sexy voice. Those are my only good qualities, I'm a total Round Mound of Rebound otherwise. But this brings me to an important point: use the things you like about someone in your poem. Avoid criticism. I know that guy in the purple hat taught you to play on the insecurities of people to get them to love you. But, c’mon. You don’t have to be an asshole to get laid or love. You just need to be you. Because, as the amazing Elizabeth Bishop once wrote, “Somebody loves us all.” Who knows why they do, but let’s not complicate it.

So you can fill out the rest of that acrostic with all kinds of things you like about me and how I make you feel.

But even though you are a fatass
Everything about you is great.
Hooray for you and the way you make me feel.
Radiant, alive, like a baby bunny in honey.
Listening to your sexy voice while your hazelnut
Eyes swallow me up like a McNugget.

The poem doesn’t need to be something that will be chiseled into the side of the building. It just has to be from you. Heartfelt is a good thing to be. Keep it simple. I think sometimes we imagine that we have to say a lot to get people to like us. But remember that scene with Tom Cruise where he had her at hello? Most people are aching for love, dying to be loved and perhaps only seconds away from leaping into your arms. You just never know. Fancy poems might not get the job done. And don’t spend too much time agonizing over the thing. I wrote that part above in a few minutes, and I don’t even love myself at all. I can barely stand myself. Imagine how inspired you might feel when you’re really crazy about someone? And it’s a bad idea to attempt a poem unless you really do feel something about someone. If you’ve been with someone a long time and you think writing a poem might rekindle things for a while, go for it. Just be careful not to write a Break-up Poem, where you unconsciously bring up all the things you despise about someone.

But even though you never wash the dishes and
Everything stinks because the garbage is piled up
Hooray for you and the way you make me feel!
Raunchy, covered in our waste products.
Leery of your every move.
Expecting to call a divorce attorney.

Think about that William Carlos Williams’ poem about the plums he left on the fridge for Elsie. Elsie might have said, oh, what a nice poem. But she also thought, hey, those were my plums! You dick! What am I gonna eat? But Williams does teach us to keep it short: Brevity is key in poems! If you go on and on, like I am doing here, chances are the poem's recipient will fall asleep. Or not read your poem. A few short lines letting them know you want to say nice things to them and do nice things for them. And not, like, eat all their plums. What an asshole.

***

If the acrostic is not the thing for you, if the person's name is like Xigglebewl or something, there are other delightful poetic forms you can use. NOT THE SESTINA. Those always come out forced and ridiculous and there are all these repeating words and it just never fucking works. All sestinas are terrible—name one that isn’t. Haikus, while they are excellent for football picks, are maybe too short. You always want to give love poem recipients a little meat to chew on, even when they are beautiful vegans lit from the inside by paramecium and gluten.

The sonnet is a delightful form. You can think of it like it’s a puzzle. A crossword or a sudoku. You can read all the rules. Although rhyming is frowned upon in many snobby circles of elitist poets, you can rhyme if you want to. That’s what the Modernists fought all their battles for: the right for poets of this age and every one going forward to do whatever the hell they want. Rhyme, don’t rhyme! You don't need to be trendy. Anyway, the trendy thing in poetry these days is to have a twin that also writes poems, so, unless you have a twin, that’s out. And don’t worry about it. Love makes us all act like awkward nerds. Which in turn makes us adorable and loveable.

My favorite way to cheat and write sonnets is by stealing the rhyming end words of some famous Shakespeare poem. They’re all online; you can just copy and paste them into a Google doc. You don’t need to adhere to the exact words and rhyme scheme, it just gives you a starting point.

view
mend
due
commend
crown’d
own
confound
shown
mind
deeds
kind
weeds
show
grow

These are the end words from Shakespeare’s Sonnet 69. They're actually not so hot, but they give us something to work with. "Commend" and "mend" are practically the same word, so I’ll probably sub in the words "tumblr" and "humbler." Or "Facebook" and "gobbledygook." There are lots of rhyming dictionaries online. So, for this poem, maybe I will write about the cute lady from Marlowe & Daughters, the place I get sausages. I mean, they’re all cute in there. And their sausages are great. But you get the picture.

At the sausage place I come to view

OK. That’s something, At least it’s a start. Then I start counting on my fingers. I guess some people can count syllables in their heads, but I can’t. I am always counting on my fingers. And I came up one syllable short. Don’t panic!

At the sausage place I am thrilled to view

Not bad! And ten syllables! Pretty good. You can get all iambic and whatever, if you want your poem to sound old-fashioned or buh dum buh dum buh dum buh dum buh dum. But I really just want the pretty lady from the Meat Store to like the poem and like me. OK:

At the sausage place I am thrilled to view
A woman I hope has a cool tumblr.
With all the world’s wild beauty she’s imbued
In her glowing presence I feel humbler.

I think "imbued" might actually mean "bleeding." So I have to look that up. Nope. It just means she’s dipped in beauty, that it permeates her being. Not too bad. Better than “due.” I try to keep the poem sounding like me, i.e., I make dumb jokes and generally evince low self-esteem. I know women are supposed to love fake confidence, but no one really feels confident all the time. Especially not when writing poems addressed to strangers in butcher shops. So the poem is me, even though I have punked Shakespeare a little. Stealing a little from other poets is a part of all poetry, but now that things can be Googled, you have to be careful. Stealing a little is an homage or an allusion. Stealing a lot is, you’re a thief and a fraud. Not very sexxy.

I would love to see her page on Facebook
I’d click 'like' over everything that’s there.
I speak only in odd gobbledygook
When I’m ordering sausage up in here.

"There" and "here" aren't great together. But the rest is charming enough. And the keys to a great sonnet are having a great beginning and a great ending. No one remembers the middle—they're too busy tearing off their clothes (and, hopefully, yours as well).

I bloom like a dandelion in my mind
Every Sunday morning agog and sweet.
I know I’ll stop by and you’ll be so kind
While I order delicious breakfast meats.

I changed "sweetly indeed" to "agog and sweet" after I wrote the "delicious breakfast meats" line. Slant rhyme is good, too. But nice, full rhymes are also great. And it took but a little poeting to move it around. But now for the big finale. How will I complete this masterpiece to meats and pretty ladies?

Sometime we should cuddle and watch “Mr. Show”
Hope this doesn’t make me seem too psycho

When you're writing a poem to introduce yourself to someone you like, you probably should avoid the word “psycho." On the other hand, you must take bold measures to get the life you want in this world. Or else be rich or sexy. I'm not rich or sexy; I have to go by grit and wit and hope for the best. Which isn't to say that you have to make your poem drip with self-deprecating humor. Just let it be you; put yourself out there a little. Even if you end up getting stabbed through the heart with a plastic salad spork, at least you tried.

Now, for those people who have been together a while, love poems are nice because you gotta keep things fresh. Or else they’ll sleep with their shrink or something. Poems are good because they show effort; instead of just sexting or something, you actually spent a little time trying to make something that might make the other person feel special and appreciated. But be very careful about what you put in your love poem! It will be parsed for any and all possible meanings. If you use the poem to promise to take out the trash more often, They Will Remind You of The Poem to take out the trash when you forget. So easy on the promises and commitments. You’re not writing your marriage vows here, just something sweet that makes someone else feel appreciated and desired. Those are nice things to feel (I have heard).

Another resource for you might be The Awl's own poetry section. Mark Bibbins collects a lot of different voices there; if you come across some poems you like, try to copy them until you make them your own. Prose poems, weird poems, traditional poems. Poetry is pretty much whatever you want to call a poem. And poetry is more than just not-a-cartoon on a page of The New Yorker. There’s some excellent stuff out there. And you don't have to only admire what other people do; you can write poems, too, even if you’re too shy to ever show anyone. It’s not about being judged or getting a genius grant or being remembered for all eternity. Writing a poem could just be about making other people think about art for a second instead of, I don’t know, Work and Money and Troubles. The world is a little better when you believe in poetry, too. Even if you never get a genius grant, you still might get laid or loved or even liked. And you might make someone’s day. And get an invitation out for drinks. It's nice to be liked and to have poems written about you. Especially is the poems are interesting and alluring. How many poems dedicated to you about how great you are ended up in your inbox today? Don’t you wish there was at least one? Yeah. So do I.

Jim Behrle tweets at @behrle for your possible amusement.

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My mom's house, miles and miles from the ocean, wasn't supposed to be particularly at risk, but with a storm of that magnitude, wherever you live, you board up the windows and hunker down and pour a drink, get high or pray your ass off. If you're far away, you keep calling home. That’s what I did, at least. In the background the storm barreled and screamed; my sister's voice got lower and lower with dread; at some point the plywood covering a sliding-glass door ripped away and my stepfather pushed back against the bucking glass, with his hands, to keep it from breaking (never, ever do this) until they could get the kitchen table braced against the door. Unlike a good third of our neighborhood (I'm estimating), my family was lucky: the house stayed standing. But I have friends who watched their windows break and their roofs fly off and their possessions became projectiles. Some cowered in bathtubs; others fled to strangers’ apartments. One of my favorite people in the world tried to weather the storm in a houseboat and later washed up in a canal.

Hurricane Irene, now churning toward us, is only projected to be a Category 1 (to Andrew's 5) at landfall, and could easily change course or die down like so many before. But you can't count on that, and even if it looks like the storm is going to hit someplace else, or is continuing to weaken, be wary. Camille and Katrina and Charley are proof that no one, the National Weather Service included, really knows what a hurricane is going to do until it's done it.

As New York City's Office of Emergency Management establishes, hurricanes with sustained winds of 74 mph or greater are nothing to make light of. As of now, we are officially under a hurricane watch, which means we need to complete preparations as quickly as possible. Here's what you can do to get ready, and to protect yourself if the storm gets bad.

Low-lying areas: Take a look at the city’s flood map. If you're in an evacuation zone and you can go stay with friends or family, do so now. If this isn't possible, if the city issues an evacuation order, go stay at a storm shelter. Do not try to ride out the storm of this scale and strength in, for example, Dumbo or west Williamsburg—or your houseboat. And don’t wait too long to get out; Governor Cuomo just announced an emergency plan that requires the MTA (including the subway) to shut down at noon Saturday. Take your "go bag" (see below) and get the hell out of the East Village.

At the store: Buy bottled water, one gallon per person per day. Stock up on ready-to-eat, non-perishable foods, like canned soups, peanut butter, crackers, dried fruit, nuts, chocolate and pretzels. You’ll probably want liquor, and, if you smoke, cigarettes, and make sure to have plenty of kibble on hand for your pets. Get a bag or two of ice (or make as much as you can) for your freezer. It could prevent food from going bad if your electricity goes out for only a short while.

If you don't have flashlights (LED strongly preferred) and a battery-or-crank-operated radio, get them. As of yesterday, J&R was still selling a two-in-one with a USB port and solar charge capability. You're also going to need a lot of batteries, because the power could be out for awhile. (My mother, an Andrew veteran and avid Weather Channel-watcher, reports that "the ground is already saturated from all the recent rain, which invites telephone poles and trees to come crashing down.")

You'll also want a first-aid kit and to fill your prescriptions. Take out cash and try to break it down to small bills.

The city has a more succinct list that includes, in addition to the things mentioned above: a whistle; iodine tablets or one quart of unscented bleach (for disinfecting water only if directed to do so by health officials) and eyedropper (for adding bleach to water); hygiene items like soap, tampons, toothbrush and toothpaste; a phone that doesn’t rely on electricity; and "child care supplies or other special care items."

Outdoors: If you have an outdoor space, tie down your gas grills and your propane tanks and whatever else you can't move. Bring everything else indoors.

If you have storm shutters, as the city for some reason appears to think we all do, by all means use them. Some people say not to bother taping your windows, that it doesn't help, but FEMA recommends taping to reduce the danger of flying glass, and my mother and stepdad believe tape helped save their hides in Hurricane Andrew. Close your blinds and curtains.

Indoors: Assemble your "go bag." The city recommends that you put into a backpack or something similar:
• Copies of your important documents in a waterproof and portable container (insurance cards, photo IDs, proof of address, etc.);
• A set of keys
• Credit and ATM cards and cash, especially in small denominations (ideally $50-$100 total)
• Bottled water and non-perishable food such as energy or granola bars
• Flashlight
• Battery-operated AM/FM radio and extra batteries
• Your medications
• Very basic toiletries
• First-aid kit

Fill pitchers, large bowls, bathtubs and sinks with water, not just for drinking, but so you'll be able to wash up and flush the toilet if the water supply is disrupted.

Turn your refrigerator to the highest setting. If you bought ice, put it in the freezer.

Brace doors to the outside. (I’m sure there’s a better way to do this, but, in a pinch: my mother said that she and my stepfather nailed criss-crossing 2x4s into the molding of the exterior doors and then filled in the holes and repainted later.)

If you have time, you might want to put a few of your most beloved or fragile possessions or electronics into plastic bags, in case water gets in somehow.

Pets: If you have to evacuate, try to leave them with friends or family in safe areas. Only "legal pets with proper identification” are allowed into NYC shelters. I'm not sure what happens if you show up with your cat or dog but without your vet records, and it's too depressing to think on that for long, so I'll just refer you to OEM and FEMA information about pet preparedness.

The storm itself: Some people say not to bother taping your windows, that it doesn't help, and the Times says, "Residents riding out the storm should not tape windows; it does more harm than good, federal officials say," but a disaster-preparedness expert on "The Brian Lehrer Show" this very morning recommended taping to reduce the danger of flying glass, and my mother and stepdad believe tape helped save their hides in Hurricane Andrew. So make a decision about that. Close your blinds and curtains.

An interior bathroom, particularly one with a bathtub, is the safest place in the house. If a window breaks, go in there. And it probably won't come to this, but interior stairwells are generally the best place to be in an apartment building, if it's compromised. Lower down is better—assuming flooding isn't a danger. (FEMA has more advice.)

If you're in a high rise, be prepared to move to a lower floor. Mayor Bloomberg keeps saying that city high-rises were built to withstand high winds, and that’s probably true, but I wouldn't want to hang out in the penthouse if things get shaky. The wind will be more severe on upper floors.

Do not, under any circumstances, use candles or kerosene lamps while the storm is in progress.

And as FEMA says, "Do not be fooled if there is a lull; it could be the eye of the storm—winds will pick up again." More feel-good news from Mom: “the storm is HUGE (450 mi. across) and moving slowly and the larger and slower the storm, the longer it takes to die down.” Even afterward, venture outside with care. Debris could be obscuring downed or uprooted live power lines.

Or, if this is all too much for you, Fucked in Park Slope and Choire have more low-key advice. Stay safe, everyone.

Maud Newton is a writer and critic best known for her blog, where she has written about books since 2002.

Photo by A. Strakey.

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Now, because you can’t get something for nothing, there's a problem. Which is, Yoga Can Be Extremely Annoying. So if you’ve been meaning to get yourself there but have been thinking, “I’m afraid it will annoy me,” here’s some good news: You might be crazy but as far as this particular fear goes, rest assured, it's the product of whatever shred of sanity you may have retained.

There's no getting around it. Yoga has moments of such profound annoyingness that after I finished Eat, Pray, Love (needless to say, I read the ashram section 100 times) all I could think was, “You wrote an entire book about yoga and meditation and you never mentioned, 'oh, by the way, sometimes you will want to punch these people in the face'?" And this is where I perform my public service; in yoga we call that a "seva" (how annoying is that?). All the stuff Elizabeth Gilbert was too high on homemade pizza and Javier Bardem penis to mention, you need to know. Everyone’s always telling you how great yoga is, and that’s true, but then you go there and maybe the studio smells like onions steamed in cat pee, and it might have been helpful to know about that beforehand! You need to know exactly what will disturb you before you get there, so you can prepare; and you should also know that, even though everyone around you will seem perfectly unperturbed, someone—someone who stayed—feels your pain. Oh, and by the way, I want to underscore that what follows below is what bugs me about yoga; everything else is a glittering gift from Lord Shiva. Namaste!

People who just saw each other yesterday will hug like one of them was just rescued from a burning airplane. I’ve always thought of a hug as a slightly protracted, lightly physical way of saying hello to people I know fairly well or have not seen for a long time. Regular practitioners of yoga see hugs as a great way to spend an afternoon. You will want to stare at them and wonder, "Are they really pressing their whole bodies together?” (yes); "are their eyes closed?" (they are); "do they really have dreamy looks on their faces?" (yes, yes, yes). But remember, while you're staring you're wasting valuable time in which you could be cultivating your “I am not the sort of person who likes to be hugged for long periods of time” vibe. This is easier said than done because you will sometimes see people at yoga—like, people who you actually know, who are your friends—with whom you may wish to make brief, friendly physical contact. Engage in such exchanges as you wish, but realize that you are setting yourself as a person who willingly receives hugs, and these people will not take the extra mental step to say, "oh, but above-the-waist hugs,” or “hugs that only last a second.” Make no mistake: these people are looking to soul-blend. To avoid: Arrive early. Lie down with closed eyes. Bring flip-flops—they're essential for a hasty exit.

During hard poses, women and gay men will remain silent and straight men will laugh self-deprecatingly. Imagine being at a gym. Men are lifting heavy weights. They strain, grit their teeth, sweat. But they don’t laugh. So why, here, as they sink into their thighs in Warrior Two or lift their chest skyward during Upward Facing Bow, do they feel the need to let out a little chuckle? More importantly, why does this irk you so? Because, my friend, you are witnessing An Unconscious Assertion of Masculinity. That little laugh is their way of letting you know that hey, they're not really embarrassed about being so bad at this, because they're not even supposed to be here, they're not really doing this, they're good at other things, like, for example, sitting in an airport bar working their way through a 1-dollar-for-the-upgrade double scotch, a bowl of nuts and a "Two and A Half Men" re-run on the corner TV. Of course, there is also the other type of straight guy in yoga, the guy who can wrap his arms around his ankles and turn himself into a perfect circle, the guy who can stand on his hands in the middle of the room, and he is his own version of Hell. Why, you ask, does this man wear his hair in a bun, on top of his head? There are some secrets that no amount of enlightenment will reveal. I will tell you this: These guys tend to get a lot of ass, so laugh as you will, but know that they're getting the last one—upside-down.

There will be Yoga Overachievers. You will be doing Cat-Cow at a normal pace, and they will be bucking and heaving like mechanical bulls. You will be expending an amount of effort somewhere in between “challenging yourself” and “able to retain sufficient muscle strength to remove shampoo bottle from shower caddy." They will be straining, grunting, grimacing. When the pose is over, they will often emit some hideous but presumably cathartic howl. I always want to say to those people, “The auditions for the high-school production of The Trojan Women are in the Lotus Room today,” but I don’t think I need to tell you that your basic yoga overachiever does not have the greatest sense of humor. Then, when class is over, and everyone does that weird little bow, the Yoga Overachiever will bow down for, roughly, an hour. Seriously. You will have already taken your own little I’m-so-spiritual-and-humble-before-the Creator bow, put on your flip-flops (good job!), hightailed it away from the would-be hugger/soul blenders, made and consumed a meal, masturbated to some violent pornography and be just about to crawl into bed with the fall Anthropologie catalog, and they remain on the floor in the yoga studio, thanking God for making them, well, them. As these people have a tendency toward spraying you with saliva and noxious BO (see next item) you should give them a wide berth, and don’t attend any functions at their homes, because, for reasons with which the universe has not yet supplied me, they’re almost always horrible cooks.

People will have chive crotch. I developed the term "chive crotch" when, as a mere girl, I was visiting a friend in Oregon and attended a county fair with her. This was my first time on the West Coast. I had smelled body odor before, of course, but never body odor strong enough to make me almost pass out. This was not mere sweat, this was, I said to my friend, the scent of a person who, after carrying around the same bunch of chives in their underwear for an entire summer, had found themselves mid-August with no shower, no clean underwear and, needless to say, no fresh bunch of chives. This is what about 15 percent of people smell like in yoga class. Look, I will confess to having mild body odor myself at times. But I believe smelling like a person who showered recently, applied a non-Alzheimer’s causing deodorant or crystal to her pits and sweated a little in the car is a far cry from chive crotch. The thing that’s really annoying about people stinking is they always have this look on their faces like smelling bad makes them somehow closer to the earth, more spiritual, than evil clean people who have used up precious natural resources and unleashed sodium lauryl sulfates into the environment for the mere purpose of not befouling the rooms they share with others.

There are teachers and students who think flexibility is some kind of indication of how good a person you are. A teacher once said to me, "Your hamstrings are tight is because your mind is not flexible." I said, "Have you ever taken differential calculus?" She said, "What?" I said, "Have you ever taken differential calculus?" She had not. She said she was terrible at math. I said, "Well, I am very good at math." (This was not strictly true, but I was quite confident I was better at math than she was.) “Is there something wrong with your mind that you aren’t?” (No, this was not just a strategy to stop this person from soul-hugging me, but it did have that fortunate side effect.)

While we certainly hold tension, trauma and rigidity in our limbs and joints and muscles (otherwise The Universe wouldn’t have given us Bengay), there is no reason to imagine there’s some absolutely direct correlation between how well we can move and how functional or healthy our mind is. I seriously doubt that Einstein or Susan Sontag had less flexible minds than, I don’t know, Rodney Yee. My point is, some physical limitations can be aided through the practice of yoga and some can’t and no one needs the increased pressure of someone telling them, every time they strain to get their heels on the floor in Downward Facing Dog that this is because their mind is all fucked up. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t, but you just wait until the day when there's a public forum where people can pay $10-$18 dollars to get in a room with other people to demonstrate how good they are at math. Actually, there is such a place and I guess that would be called "school" and it goes on much longer than a yoga class and often costs much more and it scars people horribly and makes them grow up angry and thinking of ways to humiliate people who can’t touch their toes.

So if, one day, your teacher says, we hold a lot of stuff in our hips and hamstrings and as we begin to let this stuff go and become our authentic selves we will be able to wrap our arms around ourselves eight times, look around the room. You will probably see a guy who can do that, while smiling, and I’ll bet you a $100 prAna gift certificate that you will eventually hear from someone in class about the time he flew into a rage and broke a car window with a shop vac. When your hamstrings become authentic, maybe they can help him.

Teachers talk like Yoda’s MSW-having Mom. If you were to ask your yoga teacher, “Can my newly authentic hamstrings help the angry guy?” she might say something like, “That depends on whether they were coming from a space of pure intention.” The word "honor" is used a lot, as in “honoring yourself,” or “honoring your practice.” Other popular words: "Joy." "Integrity." "Space," but not as in outer space, as in “Go into a space of,” and "place," but not as in “that place next to Shoe Pavilion,” as in, “Let yourself come into a place of…" When class is over, the teacher will say something like, “Bow to your inner wisdom,” or “take a moment to thank yourself for committing to your practice,” which always makes me intone the prayer, “Please, God, make me less fat than I was an hour and a half ago.”

The worst part about yoga world vocabulary, of course, is how quickly you may find yourself learning and using it. The hope is that because yoga has made you—I’m sorry, I mean, allowed you to open up a space to become—so much more self aware and less narcissistic, you will only talk this way in front of other people who talk like that too. And now that you are friends with so many of them, because you have, after so thoroughly mocking this world basically joined it, that means practically everyone you speak to. My final warning, when you are talking to one of your new yoga buddies, do not accidentally buttdial an old friend, especially if he is a sniping, gym-going homosexual, and allow him to hear you speaking the lingua franca of Yogaland, because, after seeing the record of the call and hoping he heard nothing, you will receive a text message reading: "YOU ARE SO FUCKING BUSTED BITCH – YOU’RE A LOSER!" and no amount of yoga will ever mitigate the shame.

"How are you?" is not a simple question at yoga. No one at yoga is ever just fine. They’re “working through a lot of heavy stuff,” or “dealing with a lot of craziness.” That said, when people ask you how you are, don’t say anything bad. If you are broke, the universe is just trying to teach you a lesson about how much you already have. If someone dumped you, the universe removed that person from your life for a reason. (And that reason is that person is no longer interested in having sex with you!) The universe is very busy in the yoga world, always trying to show you things. I have simply let the universe know, hey, I have seen enough. I have learned enough. Until you can give me a billion dollars and a soundproof room filled with 2002 Zinfandel and organic goat cheese cheddar where all I have to do is watch "Foyle’s War" until I drop dead, please leave me alone. But it's determined to keep pestering me. At any rate, when people ask you how you are at yoga, don’t tell them anything bad has happened to you unless you’re prepared for the suggestion that you look at your misfortune with an attitude of grace and gratitude. And while I think grace and gratitude are both wonderful things, I also think they are attitudes best preceded by bitterness, rage and self-pity.

So yes, in the beginning it’s all about slipping the car keys inside the flip flops so that all the tools of your escape are in a neat little package. But just keep showing up. In no time you will become sufficiently like all these people that they won’t bother you at all. And then some crazy asshole will make fun of you. Is the circle of eternity beautiful or what?

Sarah Miller is the author of Inside the Mind of Gideon Rayburn and The Other Girl, which are for teens but adults can read on the beach. She lives in Nevada City, CA.

Photo courtesy of lululemonathletica.

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WHERE
Grilling in New York City requires access to serviceable outdoor space. I don’t care if it’s a roof deck on the UWS, a fire escape on the LES, a patch of grass in Prospect Park or a sidewalk in Canarsie. If it’s not combustible or patrolled by cops, use it. If you don’t have access to outdoor space, start sleeping with someone who does. If you have a fire escape, get comfortable with carrying loads of food through your bedroom. Brooklyn may be considered twee by some, but at least we can grill outdoors in our Olmsted-designed park. And what’s more New York than an extended family celebrating a Quinceañera, playing dominoes and grilling al fresco near the bandshell?

HOW
OK, you've secured a venue. With a few modest tools, you too can be a Patio Daddy-O and still catch Massive Attack at Terminal 5 in the same day.

You're going to need:

1. A charcoal grill. This isn’t one of those boring philosophical arguments that guys get into about the “purity” of grilling or whether gas provides a more even heat or anything like that: it’s a given that gas grilling is lame. This is about convenience. Gas grills are huge and unwieldy, and propane is hard to get in NYC. Also, it's illegal: "Standard 'backyard-type' propane barbecues (using 20 pound LPG containers) are not allowed on balconies, roof decks, rear yards and courtyards of apartment buildings and other multiple dwellings."

Charcoal grills are better suited to roof decks, gardens and fire escapes anyway. Some nice options include the classic Weber Kettle, the smaller, more portable Smokey Joe and the timeless Hibachi.

2. Hardwood charcoal. Sure, if you hate yourself, go ahead and use self-starting charcoal, soaked in so many chemicals that it burns faster than a spliff at Lollapalooza. Lighter fluid? Just give up and order Domino’s or something. Natural lump hardwood charcoal like Wicked Good Charcoal’s emasculatingly named Weekend Warrior blend burns hotter, cleaner and longer. As a bonus, you can reuse it: just snuff your fire out when you're done grilling by closing all of the vents on your grill. Deprived of abundant oxygen, hardwood charcoal will just go out and you can reuse it later. Who knew that belching smoke into the sky could be so green?

3. A chimney, the New York Times and a grill brush. With no fancy accelerants to get the charcoal going (and make your food taste like Raid), you’ll need a chimney and some newspaper. Just add a Bic lighter. When the coals start to glow, you’re in business. Super easy.

Oh, and do everyone a favor and have ready access to a spigot or hose or fire extinguisher. Be an adult.

WHAT
A common misconception is that grilling is the sole province of carnivores/Paleo Dieters. Not true! Granted, for me, meat is as essential to grilling as fire (Meat-Loving Exhibit A). But if you're a vegetarian (which, why?), there are plenty of awesome things to grill.

There’s nothing like grilling sweet corn in its husk, or sugar peas and shallots with some olive oil, salt and pepper in a grill tray. Make some polenta and finish it on the grill with robiola; throw Japanese eggplant on with red onions; char some scallions that you then toss with olive oil, lemon juice and garlic. Asparagus! Haricots verts! Red and yellow peppers! New potatoes! Portobello mushrooms! Meat is incomplete without these simple grilled accompaniments.

Grilling is like adding butter: it makes just about anything taste better. However, you need to start with good ingredients. Don’t bother inviting people over to hang out on your rooftop if you’re going to slap frozen Costco beef pucks on the grill and call them burgers. You live in New York! You’ve got Staubitz Market and Fairway and Union Market and Whole Foods and the Food Co-op and greenmarkets as well as the occasional bodega with D’Artagnan products. Use them!

Once you decide what you're throwing on the grill, let’s talk about how long they should stay on there. What are you preparing, and how long do you have? A few bone-in ribeye steaks? A couple of minutes over direct heat. Two racks of baby backs? Maybe an hour and a half on indirect heat. Plan accordingly so that you don’t have to struggle to adjust the fire or reallocate finite space on the grill. Asparagus is only gonna take 5 minutes over direct heat, so save it for the end when the tagliata of bone-in ribeye is resting. You do know how to rest meat, don’t you? The greatest sin—Garden of Eden expulsion-worthy—is overcooking meat on the grill. So remember to cook just shy of your desired temperature, remove it from heat and let it rest, tented under tin foil, for at least ten minutes. The internal heat will finish the cooking, and you’ll retain more of the flavorful juices. You can always throw something that’s a little too red in the center for your tastes back on the fire. But like the old joke about light bulbs and pregnant ladies, you can’t unscrew an overdone flank steak.

Direct v. indirect heat also has implications beyond how you prefer to prepare the food. Direct grilling throws off a lot of smoke, unlike indirect grilling. So, if you have a neighbor who has an itchy trigger finger for dialing FDNY, you might opt for indirect (and more discreet) grilling. Because there's nothing more depressing than dousing a Weber Kettle with the champagne bucket on a W 70th St. rooftop with the FDNY looking on. Trust me.

RECIPE: BEER CAN CHICKEN
A simple recipe for those of you looking to take the training wheels off. Now, normally, I feel like grilling chicken is like kissing your sister, or scoring an empty net goal. But Beer Can Chicken combines simplicity and beer, and the result is pretty hard to beat. Off we go!

Procure yourself a nice-sized Murray’s Chicken. Rinse the bird, get rid of the gnarly stuff in the cavity and rub it down with olive oil. Select your favorite dry rub (this stuff is my favorite, because I’m juvenile and immature), and liberally season your fowl inside and out.

Got a can of beer? Of course you do, hipster. Open a 12 oz. can of beer, and drink about ¼ of it. STOP! Jeez, OK, go get another beer, and this time stop after you drink a few sips. Pour a couple tablespoons of your rub into the beer can, reminding yourself that this is the only acceptable reason to ruin a perfectly good beer. Ask the chicken to lie back and think of England, and gently shove the seasoned beer can up the cavity, balancing the bird on the upright can. Feel free to have the chicken do a little jig with its legs at this point.

Get a hot fire going in your grill, reserving a space in the center of your coals for a foil pan with some water in it. You can also throw some aromatics in that pan, from sliced apples to sprigs of rosemary. Balance the chicken on your grill, using the base of the protruding beer can and the chicken’s legs to create a macabre tripod. Cover and cook for at least 45 minutes, or until the juices run clear when the meat is pierced. If the skin starts charring too much, adjust your vents and tent the chicken with some tin foil. The steaming beer in the can will help cook the chicken from the inside as well as keep it moist and juicy.

Serve that beast with some grilled veggies or roasted potatoes. Tear apart and devour with your hands. Be sure to remove the can first.

John Ore knows that fire is good, yes. Fire is our friend, yes.

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From time to time, you may see enormous critters of the roach-like variety, particularly on the floor, on their backs, with their legs in the air. (Bug porno!) If they're scuttling around or, worse, flying, just leave the apartment for a while. This on-their-back thing generally means that your building has had an exterminator visit and/or it's rained really hard! Your new bug friend is dying. :(

1. The discovery is the grossest part. You may be moved to panic! Don't. You can wait this out. One of two things will happen: it'll either die, or it'll crawl off into some little hole. Either way, you win! (Or: your cat will eat it. Thanks, cat!)

2. Some hours later, this terrible bug will appear to be dead. This is often not true. It is likely still hanging on. Watch for tell-tale twitches. So this is when you either smack it to death with something (not a nice book you like!) or continue to wait it out. Those of you who can imagine yourselves picking up this still-living critter and flushing it, knock yourselves out. (Also, come on over.)

3. By the next day, Mr. Bug'll actually be dead. (Note: it's likely that your bug is really a lady!) Then you can pick it up with something and get rid of it. But you know, no rush! It's not going anywhere, and neither are you. Better to wait it out, experts say, than having an ill two-inch insect climbing up your arm and into your shirt.

NB: If you have some friend (or some dude you met on Craigslist) coming over, you actually should rush this process. It's really a private experience. NB #2: Bug is bigger than it appears in picture.

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At least that’s what I think it was about, the article, I mighta not completely absorbed it, on account of I have Reader’s Block, seriously, I mean, I don’t move my lips or anything like that when I read (except in connection with enjoying snacks so I guess I totally and constantly move my lips when I read, urp!), and I’m pretty good at sounding out any novel Big Words inside my head, but I have to read stuff a few times usually, especially if I am Thinking while I read it, because then I just start Thinking about Thoughts and my eyeballs continue to look at the shapes of the letters and the way they are grouped into bigger shapes and then the way those are separated by little marks and so my eyeballs are perfectly happy to just cruise right along like this time where I got all caught up trying to remember the Significance of some Ancient artwork where They (the Ancients) would depict, like, the Deity/Rulers or whatever they were supposed to be as much larger than the ones who were getting Ruled, and that’s because in the artwork for this thing, about the guy who has all this psychology for how to Unblock, the guy was drawn as being like a giant compared to the person who was In Need of Guidance, so I sailed through major chunks of the article thinking about those Egyptian deals, friezes? Bas-reliefs?

Whatever, that’s another key to not having Writers Block, I think, is you don’t ever have to stop and figure anything out, you know? And you are all hung up on having to have an Outline? Fine, start making the Outline, out of words, and just keep going, you know? What are you, trying to be Economical with all those letters you are touching out on your iPodpad or whatever? That shit’s free, man, just concentrate on spewing out another coupla thousand of ‘em and there’ll be something in there to work with, trust me, you don’t have to stop anytime soon to look at it or read it (blergh) or fix your punctuationals, jeez, just stack up some words and then later you can go back and see if any of it makes sense, see?

I could totally set myself up as one of these quacks who tells people their whole problem with why they are not Awesome (yet), like they are Supposed To Be¹, is buried deep Within their psyches or whatever, because of course it’s true, where the hell else are all your goddamn Writer-Block problems, hah? Of course you are The Enemy! Write me an Essay on Why You Can’t Write and I bet you would be able to go nuts with that shit, right? Unless you are lazy or on drugs (or have a similar legitimate Medical Excuse such as ti many martoonies), you have only your own brain to blame for these Problems, and only your own cute li’l brain can fix them. I think that is also Dianetics, but I am afraid to read that book and I am also afraid of the Scientologists, so please do not attack me, Scientologists, I am not making fun of your Beliefs or anything like that, I am just Afraid of you. I mean, that religion has gotta work if John Travolta has his own Boeing 747 that he knows how to fly? No offense, but that is some Science Fiction, man, and I’m not too proud to say I have a primitive Fear-Response to all that next-level Achievement, you know? Anyway, back to you and your so-called Writing Blockade. Do you ever have Writing Blocks when you are making a list of groceries, or when you are writing to Santa? Of course not! One Ingredient leads to another, one Selfish Demand inspires thousands and that’s exactly how you write.

So look, I was gonna write my column about something and I couldn’t remember what, so I have these Notes where I write down Ideas. Now I am looking at my notes, Jesus H. Christ, what a bunch of garbage, but like, kabillions of words, man. It’s just like panning for gold, seriously, I am not sweet on myself like it sounds right now, but with all the Notes I got stashed away, I don’t ever have to think up another idea ever again, and neither should you, if you have a Brain.

Ants. I was gonna write about how I have ants in my house every Springtime, and the way I usually deal with it is I go to the hardware store and but this shit called TERRO, which is straight-up Liquid Death.

Warning: Explicit Ant Death footage.

Every Spring/Summer, The Ants find their way in, and pretty soon they are making a goddamn beeline, if you will, for just outside the dish where the little pellet of dry catfood that the stupid cat batted out of the bowl is (and seriously, sidebar here for the stupid cat: you cry for the goddamn food pellets and then you fucking swat ‘em around like it’s Olympic ping-pong or whatever, what the hell is your problem?), or (back to the Ants) for like, a tiny fragment of food particle on the counter or floor in the kitchen, and look man, I am not a slob, I clean up, because I lived in an apartment that had roaches once and you get pretty fucking Paranoid about leaving anything out when those nasty fuckers are creeping around eating stuff that doesn’t even qualify as food, you know, like glue outta books and stuff? Fucking roaches. Anyway, when I see some ants doing their trail-thing, I do not hesitate, I go Nuclear with this TERRO shit, and I understand that an Ant Colony is like a giant Organism and stuff, so yeah, there’s a little bit of Murder to regret, since I am not having like, Roast Ant for dinner after killing ‘em, and then I read a thing someplace by this guy who studied Ants and got a Nobel Prize or something, I dunno, maybe it was this guy, har! Nah, it was this guy, he wrote a book maybe, or did enough to get people to ask him questions about Ants, and he said something like, “If you have Ants in your house, please don’t kill ‘em,” unquote, approximately, and then there’s that thing in The Bible:

"Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise: Which having no guide, overseer, or ruler, Provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest. How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep?"

That's the Proverbs 6:6-9, King James Remix.

See, the Ant, she is an industrious mofo, which should be an example to All Americans, on the back of a 25-cent piece somewhere. I mean, you ever hear any Ants bitch about getting disappeared like all the Bees? Hell no, they handle their business. They ain’t out there like those hippie-ass Bees all blaming The Man for all their problems. Respect the Ant, man.

So now I really officially feel bad about the skyrillions of Ants I have wiped out, and so this year it’s all about the non-lethal response, to wit; Peppermint Oil. I saw a few scouts out the other day in my kitchen, and they weren’t ant-trailing to anything, so as long as I don’t have a solid column of ants parading over my kitchen counter, I am gonna stay cool, and then if the shit jumps off and there’s a hardcore Ant incursion, I’m going with this Peppermint Oil stuff, which you are supposed to put down and it repels ‘em, I guess, and then they will stay outside or just eat stuff where you can’t see it? Anyway, I have had my problems with the Formicidae family in the past, and I want to move forward, especially since the Ant is for me, a sign that Summer is on the way, Good Times, and I can start enjoying my above-ground Geto-Pool™ providing I take care of all the goddamn wasps that have built nests out under my deck. Those guys I will not do Peppermint oil on.

¹ And I totally reserve the pukey book title: WHY YOU ARE NOT AWESOME YET LIKE YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO BE²

² ("Because you already are, you just don’t know it!")³

³ Puke

Mr. Wrong can instruct you via many medias.

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