5x5 With The Hook: Nicki Daniels.

Reading her work is like mainlining non-addictive heroin and Red Bull while juggling grenades on a treadmill – that is suspended over a shark tank.

She is Nicki Daniels and she has conquered a sizable portion of the universe we know as  WordPress after a mere three months of blogging. Seriously, this chick has become a force to be reckoned with almost overnight.

How does she do it, you ask?

Well….

• She’s willing to be naked in front of the crowd, as they say.
• There are no secrets between her and her loyal followers.
• She lays down the law when necessary.
• The past is not a place she fears to tread; this sets her apart from the pack.

You know what? All this sweetness is giving me a toothache. Let’s fire this puppy up, kids! After all, Nicki’s blog is called The Nicki Daniels Interview, so let’s get down to brass tacks, shall we?

“GAME OF WALDOS!”

1)  We just met, but you seem pretty cool. That having been said, if you could be any literary character for a day, who would you choose?

   I am obsessed with the dark side of human nature. I love reading about serial killers and famous crimes.

   When it comes to fiction, I am a sucker for a great villain. I  just finished Stephen King’s Doctor Sleep , the sequel to The Shining. The antagonist of this very entertaining book is an immortal creature named Rose the Hat. She’s kind of like a vampire, except instead of living off of blood she lives off “steam”, the life essence of children. It’s a rollicking read, and Rose is a delicious amalgamation of Hannibal Lecter, Sophia Loren, and Caligula. Rose is beautiful, cunning, brilliant, and of course very dangerous. Her whole life is lived in the pursuit of pleasure. Yet she is complicated. Even though she is a killer without morals, she is capable of love.

   I would totally be this bad bitch for a day.

2)  Your favorite Bee Gee is…

   You’re showing your age, Hookey!

   I have a secret passion for disco, how did you know? Back in my wild young days, there was this dilapidated nightclub down by the river that did a disco night on Sundays. I would storm the dance floor as soon as I heard the amazing glass shattering falsetto of Barry Gibb, I was in booty shakin’ heaven. I also have a bit of a beard fetish and I challenge you to look at  a photo of 1973 Barry and tell me he was not a dish!

   Any guy who can wear a gold jumpsuit without a trace of irony and still look masculine…meow.

BARRY IS THE ONE IN THE MIDDLE, KIDS. ENJOY.

3)  As a bellman, I’m fascinated by the concept of travel and how it relates to the human condition.  Please tell me a little about your favorite trip – anywhere, at any time in your life – and how it impacted your life.

   I haven’t done a ton of travelling. I’m no Aussa Lorens, or anything. But like many college age people, in my early twenties I did the whole tour of Europe thing. It is always a big deal the first time you go overseas. I expected to be caught up in the exoticism of everything, but in reality I was a little let down by the how similar everything was to home. I had gotten used to the monotony here in the states, but I expected Europe to amaze me.

   Take Paris, for example. I was foaming at the mouth to get to the City of Lights. But there is still McDonald’s. Still homeless people and litter in the streets. This sounds like a bummer but it was a valuable lesson. I learned that my imagination is more fertile than is probably  good for me. And I learned that globalization is real. If we can’t manage to scale back the growth of corporations overseas, pretty soon the whole world is going to be one big Walmart stuck atop a garbage dump.

4)  Your favorite stand-up comic is…

   Man, that’s a tough one. I love to laugh more than anything else on the planet, so comedians are very exalted to me.

   I think the late, great George Carlin really had it nailed. That guy could go off on a spoken word tangent that would just blow your mind. He was funny as fuck, but take away the jokes and you actually had some really shrewd commentary on the state of the world today. His last special, It’s Bad For Ya is available on Netlix On Demand, and it shows Carlin as a social satirist and badass SOB at the top of his game.

   If you wanna hear a little secret though, Hookey, stand-up is something I’ve always aspired to do myself. Shhhh.

5)  How do you feel?  (Sorry, I just watched Star Trek IV, but if you haven’t you’re going to be feeling very confused right now… If you could just answer the question, that’d be cool. I’m going to take my meds now.)

   Right now? Kind of like I need to take a poop.

   OK, seriously. I feel….grateful. I started my blog in mid-November of last year and I didn’t have a lot of expectations. I am not a college graduate and haven’t written anything I’ve shared with others since high school. It has been incredibly gratifying to see my blog grow so quickly. Starting a blog is scary, especially for those of us who don’t blog anonymously.

   I’m feeling like a badass. I’m feeling like I can conquer the world with nothing but my laptop and my ladyballs. I’m realizing that there is power in words, all of our words, and we can use them to do anything we want. That, my friend, is an awesome feeling.

   It is awesome to be a part of this community.

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And we’re happy to have you hear, Nicki.

Well, kids, I’m going to let you take some time to absorb Nicki’s particular mix of cool. This has been fun. Let’s do this again soon, okay?

I WROTE A BOOK.  HERE’S WHAT THE BACK LOOKS LIKE.