Oscars: Aftermath

And so another Oscar season has come and gone, and yet again, much like I have seen few, if any, of the movies nominated, I have not seen the actual Oscar broadcast. Because, really, who needs to. Four-plus hours of Hollywood back-slapping and grip-and-grinning? Puh-leeze. I'll just get the winners' list off the 'Net the next day.

And the winners list seemed to mesh even better than usual with my predicts this year. 16 right out of 24 categories gives me a success percentage of about 66.6666666 (into infinity) %, or -- if my math is correct -- about two-thirds. That ain't too shabby. Let's discuss.

Best Motion Picture of the Year
Prediction: The Departed
Winner: The Departed
Thoughts: Yay Marty!

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role:
Prediction: Forest Whitaker
Winner: Forest Whitaker
Thoughts: I don't know what the movie's about, but I really like the title "The Last King of Scotland." I also like Forest Whitaker. Maybe I should watch this movie, eh?

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role:
Prediction: Helen Mirren
Winner: Helen Mirren
Thoughts: As always, you can't go wrong by voting for someone who either goes through an uglification, or manages to bear an uncanny resemblance to a historical figure.

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role:
Prediction: Alan Arkin
Winner: Alan Arkin
Thoughts: Is Alan Arkin Canadian? I saw his Oscar win on the front page of either The Province or The Sun this morning (can't remember which) which seems like a weird spin for the front. My guess is they either had to ship the front to press before the Oscars were over, or else they went for Canadian content. Assuming Arkin's Canadian. If you hadn't noticed, I'm not sure.

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role
Prediction: Jennifer Hudson
Winner: Jennifer Hudson
Thoughts: Haven't got any. This was just a "well, guess Dreamgirls might win something" prediction. I don't even know who she is.

Best Achievement in Directing
Prediction: Martin Scorsese
Winner: Martin Scorsese
Thoughts: Yay Marty!

Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen
Prediction: Letters from Iwo Jima
Winner: Little Miss Sunshine
Thoughts: No love for Mr. Eastwood this year, I see.

Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published
Prediction: The Departed
Winner: The Departed
Thoughts: Yay Marty! Er, I mean, Yay William Monahan!

Best Achievement in Cinematography
Prediction: El Laberinto del Fauno
Winner: El Laberinto del Fauno
Thoughts: Dark, weird, creepy and moody wins the cinematography category. Big surprise.

Best Achievement in Editing
Prediction: The Departed
Winner: The Departed
Thoughts: It's interesting to note that not only has Thelma Schoonmaker (the winner in this category) been nominated for five Oscars, she has also won three. All while working with Scorsese.

Best Achievement in Art Direction
Prediction: El Laberinto del Fauno
Winner: El Laberinto del Fauno
Thoughts: Again, no big surprise.

Best Achievement in Costume Design
Prediction: El Laberinto del Fauno
Winner: Marie Antoinette
Thoughts: Well, I didn't have a chance in this category, as Fauno wasn't even nominated. For whatever reason, while copying the info from my Oscar ballot, I typed up the nominations for Art Direction under this category. It's easy for me to say, after the fact, that I would have fingered Marie Antoinette for the win had I actually looked at the proper nomination list, but I probably would have. That or The Queen, just because of the way period stuff tends to take the Costume Design category.

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score
Prediction: Babel
Winner: Babel
Thoughts: What did I say about big, sweeping, emotional scores?

Best Achievement In Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Song
Prediction: Dreamgirls
Winner: An Inconvenient Truth
Thoughts: How often does a documentary win in this category? Next to never, I'd reckon. Although, clearly, it isn't impossible.

Best Achievement in Makeup
Prediction: El Laberinto del Fauno
Winner: El Laberinto del Fauno
Thoughts: More shiny statues for dark and creepy.

Best Achievement in Sound
Prediction: Dreamgirls
Winner: Dreamgirls
Thoughts: A movie with people singing wins best sound. Moving right along...

Best Achievement in Sound Editing
Prediction: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
Winner: Letters from Iwo Jima
Thoughts: I'll blame my miss on the fact that I still don't understand the difference between this category and the previous.

Best Achievement in Visual Effects
Prediction: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
Winner: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
Thoughts: Did anyone else find this movie a bit underwhelming? Too much setup for part three, I think.

Best Animated Feature Film of the Year
Prediction: Cars
Winner: Happy Feet
Thoughts: I hate that title. The movie might be fine and all, but that title just rubs me so many different shades of not-right.

Best Foreign Language Film of the Year
Prediction: El Laberinto del Fauno
Winner: Das Leben der Anderen
Thoughts: Huh? How does a foreign movie, that manages to win Oscars in three other non-foreign-specific categories *not* win the foreign language category? Granted, those other wins were for more technical awards, and not for the merit of the movie, but this seemed like such a no-brainer to me.

Best Documentary, Features
Prediction: An Inconvenient Truth
Winner: An Inconvenient Truth
Thoughts: Speaking of no-brainers. Glad this category didn't turn out to be a surprise as well, otherwise I'd have to stop putting my money on the apparent no-brainers.

Best Documentary, Short Subjects
Prediction: The Blood of Yingzhou District
Winner: The Blood of Yingzhou District
Thoughts: While I wouldn't recommend making all your Oscar predictions based on what has the coolest name, this is evidence that, on occasion, it can actually work.

Best Short Film, Animated
Prediction: The Little Matchgirl
Winner: The Danish Poet
Thoughts: In honour of the winner, here is a pastry haiku.

Pastry, you are best / with fruit in your soft centre / yum, fruity pastry.

Thank you.

Best Short Film, Live Action
Prediction: The Saviour
The Winner: West Bank Story
Thoughts: I'm all used up. The haiku took the last of my energy.

Proof that horoscopes are strange. And random. And somewhat schizophrenic.

Checking my horoscope for the week, while I prepare the horoscope strip for the Quesnel Advisor newspaper, I see that the next seven days will be a rollercoaster ride of conflict as I try to appease every aspect of my horoscope's recommendations. Observe:

You are best to stick to yourself this week.

Okay. I can probably handle that. I've been thinking I need some me time lately, anyway.

Get together with those you find mentally stimulating.

Like...myself? I mean, didn't you just tell me to stick to myself? How am I supposed to stick to myself while hanging out with people I find mentally stimulating. Unless I'm supposed to get together with them, then hide in the bathroom, thinking about how much I hate them.

Plan a nice evening for two.

Again, hard to do when I'm supposed to stick to myself. Unless I'm supposed to plan a nice evening for two, then dine alone and think about how pathetic and lonely I am.

Thanks a lot, Mr. Horoscope. Now you've made me sad.

Oscars! Ack!

I don't know exactly how this happened, but apparently the Oscars are tomorrow night, and here I am without my annual know-nothing Oscar predictions. How the heck did that happen?

So here I am, about to rush through them, because I have managed to catch in time, and because this is a tradition now, after three years, maybe four, I can't actually recall. Granted, I won't be able to stick to the predictions for the top awards in my column as I have for the last few years (a point made more annoying by the fact that I was sort of struggling for a column last week as it was) but posting them at all is better than nothing.

So, let the predictions begin, starting from the bottom of the official IMDB Oscar ballot, and working my way to the top.


Best Short Film, Live Action:
Binta y la gran idea
Eramos pocos
Helmer & Son
The Saviour
West Bank Story

Interesting to see a couple of (apparently) foreign films in the list. I like the title of "West Bank Story" as it seems to be a sort-of play on "West Side Story" but I'm gonna go with "The Saviour" as my prediction here. Who's gonna vote against the saviour? Not me, that's for sure.

Winner: The Saviour

Best Short Film, Animated:
The Danish Poet
Lifted
The Little Matchgirl
Maestro
No Time for Nuts

I wonder if "The Danish Poet" is about a guy who writes poetry about pastries? I know that's not the *obvious* meaning of the title, but wouldn't that make for a great play on words? "No Time for Nuts" is clearly a losing bet, as everyone knows there's always time for nuts. Always. I'm gonna go with "The Little Matchgirl" to win this, because hopefully it's a movie about a girl lighting stuff on fire. That'd rock.

Winner: The Little Matchgirl

Best Documentary, Short Subjects:
The Blood of Yingzhou District
Recycled Life
Rehearsing a Dream
Two Hands: The Leon Fleisher Story

As much as I'd like to pick "Recycled Life" as the winner under the assumption that it's about recycling (and, therefore, a hot topic in the same year that "An Inconvenient Truth" made waves), I'm going to choose the movie with the word "Blood" in the title, even though I'm not entirely sure how an entire district can bleed.

Winner: The BLood of Yingzhou District

Best Documentary, Features
Deliver Us from Evil
An Inconvenient Truth
Iraq in Fragments
Jesus Camp
My Country My Country

I've actually seen Jesus Camp, and would love to show it some support by predicting a win -- it was a fantastic, if mildly frightening, look at extremes of evangelical Christianity -- unfortunately, I think this is probably locked by "An Inconvenient Truth." Global warming has been a hot, hot topic for a number of years now, this year included, and this movie was EVERYWHERE, and on everyone's mind. I even saw an article within the last few days how an oscar win here might even push Al Gore into a run for the President in the next US election. Which is maybe putting too much power in the hands of a little gold statue, but whatever.

Winner: An Inconvenient Truth


Best Foreign Language Film of the Year
Efter brylluppet
Indigenes
El Laberinto del Fauno
Das Leben der Anderen
Water

Hard to comment on movies whose titles you'd need to put through a translator to understand. Harder still to make jokes about them. So I think I'll just point the finger of prediction at "Water" because it at least appears to be somewhat understandable in English. And because there's a pretty groovy Oingo Boingo song by that title.

[EDIT: After seeing it's name pop up in other categories, I've figured out that "El Laberinto del Fauno" is actually the film better known as "Pan's Labyrinth" which seems a better choice for a winner here, so I've changed my official choice accordingly.]

Winner: El Laberinto del Fauno

Best Animated Feature Film of the Year
Cars
Happy Feet
Monster House

I can't remember if this category exists every year or not. Are there always enough animated films in a year for this category to exist? I don't watch a lot of animated stuff, so I'm not really sure, but it seems plausible, I guess. I'll pick Cars for no other reason than I think it's a Pixar movie, and for the most part, Pixar stuff rocks.

Winner: Cars

Best Achivement in Visual Effects
Priates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
Poseidon
Superman Returns

Wow, looks like a light year for SFX movies, with only three nominations here. As much as there was some nice FX work in Superman, I'm going to give this one to Pirates, just because it seemed to have a whole lot *more* FX going on. Sure it's great to make a man fly. But to make two dozen pirates look like strange, half-fish creatures is an even bigger deal.

Winner: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Best Achievement in Sound Editing
Apocalypto
Blood Diamond
Flags of our Fathers
Letters from Iwo Jima
Pirates of of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

I still don't really understand the difference between this category and the next one, how one differentiates between "Sound" and "Sound Editing." I want to give it to Apocalypto, because I suspect it was pretty noisy, but I think Gibson's getting snubbed this year, after proving to the world that he's pretty much completely batshit insane. So let's go with Pirates again, instead.

Winner: Pirates of the Caribbean

Best Achievement in Sound
Apocalypto
Blood Diamond
Dreamgirls
Flags of our Fathers
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Dreamgirls was a musical, wasn't it? I can't remember. Sure, why not, give it to that one.

Winner: Dreamgirls

Best Achievement in Makeup
Apocalypto
Click
El Laberinto del Fauno

I've only seen a handful of shots from El Laberinto del Fauno, but there's some bizarre, freaky, nightmarish stuff going on in that movie, and it's all thanks to the makeup work. Besides, Apocalypto continues to get snubbed, and Click is a bloody Adam Sandler movie. Let's move on.

Winner: El Laberinto del Fauno

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Song
An Inconvenient Truth - "I Need to Wake Up"
Dreamgirls - "Listen"
Dreamgirls - "Love You I Do"
Cars - "Our Town"
Dreamgirls - "Patience"

Hard to go wrong here -- seems like picking something from the movie that was nominated three times in one category is a safe bet. But which one to choose? Patience, I think. Because it's a virtue.

Winner: Dreamgirls - "Patience"

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score
Babel - Gustavo Santaolalla
The Good German - Thomas Newman
Notes on a Scandal - Philip Glass
El Laberinto del Fauno - Javier Navarrete
The Queen - Alexandre Desplat

What a weird category for me this year. Glass is the only composer who's name I recognize, and yet the movie he scored doesn't ring a bell at all for me. I'll pick Babel, is it was apparently the sort of movie that you feel sort of sad while also sort of poignant, so it probably had a score like that too. Big sweeping moody music is always good for an award.

Winner: Babel - Gustavo Santaolalla

Best Achievement in Costume Design
Dreamgirls
The Good Shepherd
El Laberinto del Fauno
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
The Prestige

It's usually safe to bet on the period stuff in this category, except there's a few period pieces on the list -- Dreamgirls, The Prestige, Pirate, I think Shepherd is. What's a fella to do when faced with that particular problem? Easy. Choose the one that isn't immediately thought of as a period film. And the one with lots of freaky costumes to complement the freaky makeup.

Winner: El Laberinto del Fauno

Best Achievement in Art Direction
Dreamgirls
The Good Shepherd
El Laberinto del Fauno
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
The Prestige

Seriously, with a movie that looks as messed up as El Laberinto del Fauno, how could this not win?

Winner: El Laberinto del Fauno

Best Achievement in Editing
Babel
Blood Diamond
Children of Men
The Departed
United 93

Most people have been predicting Scorsese's The Departed as a big sweeper at the Oscars this year, and tend to agree, so I'll start the sweeps with this award right here.

Winner: The Departed

Best Achievement in Cinematography
The Black Dahlia
Children of Men
The Illusionist
El Laberinto del Fauno
The Prestige

Going for the Fauno yet again, even though I'm tempted to pick The Prestige -- Chris Nolan's films always look fantastic.

Winner: El Laberinto del Fauno

Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published
Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
Children of Men
The Departed
Little Children
Notes on a Scandal

Comedies are rarely honoured at the Oscars, so that puts the kibosh on Borat. Children of Men was apparently quite good, but also quite overlooked. I'll give this one to The Departed.

Winner: The Departed

Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen
Babel
Letters from Iwo Jima
Little Miss Sunshine
El Laberinto del Fauno
The Queen

Both Babel and Little Miss Sunshine are hot picks for the Best Picture Oscar, but I don't think they're getting that one. This category could give voters a chance to hand either of those films an honourary Oscar of some kind. On the other hand, Letters has had a lot of critics raving, and it's got Paul Haggis behind the screenplay, who's been Oscar bait for the last few years, so it seems like a safer bet.

Winner: Letters from Iwo Jima

Best Achievement in Directing
Clint Eastwood
Stephen Frears
Paul Greengrass
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu
Martin Scorsese

Just give Marty the damn award and admit it's at least a couple of decades too late.

Winner: Martin Scorsese

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role
Adriana Barraza
Cate Blanchett
Abigail Breslin
Jennifer Hudson
Rinko Kikuchi

Dreamgirls seems likely to win *something* and this seems as good a category as any.

Winner: Jennifer Hudson

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role
Alan Arkin
Jackie Earle Haley
Djimon Hounsou
Eddie Murphy
Mark Whalberg

Pardon my french, but what the fuck has happened to the world that Eddie Murphy ends up with an Oscar nomination? I mean, okay, I haven't seen the movie, so maybe this is the performance of a lifetime, but I just don't see it going to him. Whalberg didn't have enough to do in The Departed to really snag the Oscar, so I'm giving it to Alan Arkin, because he's a fine actor, and because Little Miss Sunshine will probably snag something.

Winner: Alan Arkin

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role
Penelope Cruz
Judi Dench
Helen Mirren
Meryl Streep
Kate Winslet

Everyone seems to be predicting Mirren, for having so completely embodied her character in The Queen. Seems like a safe bet, even against Meryl Streep, who has sort of lost some of her award-winningness in the last decade or two.

Winner: Helen Mirren

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role
Leonardo DiCaprio
Ryan Goslin
Peter O'Toole
Will Smith
Forrest Whitaker

It could go to O'Toole, as a sort-of honourary, sorry-for-never-giving-you-the-award sort of thing, but Whitaker's been winning just about every pre-Oscar award around, so he's the one to put money on.

Winner: Forrest Whitaker

Best Motion Picture of the Year
Babel
The Departed
Letters from Iwo Jima
Little Miss Sunshine
The Queen

Babel's been hotly debated for a winner here, and also described, somewhat unflatteringly, as CRASH PART 2. I haven't seen the film myself, but if it's anything like Crash -- last year's best picture winner -- I have two things to say. It's probably annoying as hell. And if it wins, I'll be disgusted to the point of vomit. In fact, if Babel wins best picture, I think I'll probably retire this annual Oscar prediction thingy, out of disgust for the awards in general.

Winner: The Departed

And that completes this year's list of pointless, know-nothing, bullshit opinion Oscar predictions. Hope you enjoyed them. Check back in the next few days for a post-Oscar analysis of my wins and my losses.

The pinnacle of slightly-inclined upward motion technology.

I watched the original 1978 version of "Dawn of the Dead" for the first time last night. It's strange seeing a movie like that, almost 30 years later, separate from the general climate of the era it was released in. I know it's billed as a horror movie, and I know that it was also intended as a not-so-subtle satire on consumerism, but what I'm *not* sure of is just how funny the movie was intended to be in 1978. I found myself laughing quite a lot, watching the zombies shuffle around the mall while cheesy mall-style Muzak poured from the speakers. But was this scene more horrifying in 1978? Did the zombies send chills along with their satirical message? I really can't be sure.

I noted that 1978 era shopping malls differed little from the shopping malls of today, and after a few minutes of research (thanks wikipedia), I found that the movie had been shot at the Monroeville Mall in Monroeville, Pennsylvania.

The mall was constructed a decade earlier, which made the mall similarities even spookier -- the malls of the late 60s doesn't look much different than the malls of the late 2000s, it would seem.

I was struck by the escalators in in the mall -- certainly a staple of shopping centres, among other locales, but something about seeing the escalators in a 1970s mall made me think of the cheery, optimistic, we'll-all-be-living-on-the-moon-with-our-flying-cars attitude of the 1960s. And it occured to me that escalators were a wonderful 1960s sort of idea.

They're stairs. BUT THEY MOVE. ON THEIR OWN. It's just like science-frickin-fiction.

So I wiki'd escalators. And what do you know, they aren't really a creation of the 1960s. In fact, the modern version of the escalator appeared in 1921.

1921.

The original versions of the escalator (apparently there two competing products that ended up merged into the 1921 version) actually appeared in the 1800s.

The escalator originated in the 19th century.

Tell me that's not stunning. Tell me that doesn't make your jaw drop.

And tell me that doesn't make you wonder why, more than 100 years later, we're still using them?

Put another way, is the escalator *really* the pinnacle of slightly-inclined upward motion technology? I mean, granted, I don't really have any suggestions for improvements or new technologies, but I'm not an engineer. I'm a sort-of-geeky newspaper guy. The actual invention of something like that is sort of out of my area of expertise. Talking about it, though, is well within it.

I know there's plenty of technologies that last for a long, long time (the automobile seems a pretty obvious example) and just become regular parts of our lives. But the escalator has remained almost unchanged since 1921. That just seems...indescribably bizarre.

Another 17 down. 300-something more to go.

I dusted off the editing work last night, pushing my way through another 17 pages on the novel, bringing me to page 67 and nearly the end of chapter two. During a break in the editing, I hit the computer to print chapter three, which runs from page 67 to 97, and approximately one quarter of the novel.

Looking ahead at future editing work on the first half of the book, there's one lengthy section in the first chapter that needs a from-scratch rewrite that I haven't sat down to do yet, and another entire chapter near the end that needs to be created from scratch (when I was originally working on the book, I leapt ahead to the second half, as the first half was beginning to depress the hell out of me).

All of this work followed a dish-washing binge. Because, for reasons I could only begin to guess, I was in a super-productive mode last night.

While doing the editing work, I was listening to what I sort of consider the spiritual soundtrack to the novel, Leonard Cohen's "The Future." It's from that album that I yanked the quotes that open the first part, the second part, and the epilogue of the novel. But while editing, with the songs I had quoted drifting into my head in the background, a further idea occurred to me.

I realized that, instead of *just* using quotations from the songs, it would actually be appropriate to retitle those section based on sections from the quotations.

I rolled the idea around in my head for a bit, and found that I liked these section titles far, far better than what I had originally planned to use, so I made the official change to the manuscript.

And so, the section titles are broken down as such:

Part One: The Awful Truth
Part Two: The Miracle
Epilogue: The Light Gets In

These titles replace the originals, which were:

Part One: Faith
Part Two: Truth
Epilogue: Happily Ever After

And this is why I generally don't title things until I'm finished them. Because it isn't until I'm finished that I really know what it is I'm writing.

It's also nice to know that these sorts of random, sudden, overwhelming moments of inspiration are still able to make an appearance, even after 95% of the creation work is done, and I'm the middle of the more clinical editing stage.

Here's hoping that there's still a little bit of that inspiration left for when it comes time to do those few bits of from-scratch writing. I'm beginning to *feel* the narrator's voice again, just from reading it, so it shouldn't be too hard to sit down and find my way back into his head for those few sections. But it'd be an added bonus if those new sections were particularly inspired. Of course.

Oh, and over the course of last night's editing, I actually came across a section that seemed solid enough to post here. Taken from a scene at a funeral...

And then, I did need to be beside her, and hold her, and let her cry onto my shoulder as I cried into hers, pressing ourselves together, unaware of anything outside of us except the other, closing our eyes to the world around us, and the universe beyond that, making a new universe that would exist only of she and I, where no one died and love was eternal and just wanting something bad enough was all it took to make it happen.

And then dirt was being thrown, and the sobs came a little more loudly while the droning holy man quieted, and people started milling around, moving to comfort those they knew and cared about, because it was all over now except the mourning.

That's all for now. Cheerio.

The wait is over. Sort of.

Last night's technical difficulties have now been dealt with, and the newly face-lifted web gallery for Stick Figure Drama Season Three can be officially unveiled. It is linked in the side bar, under Stickage Season Three, but the sake of convenience, I'll also link it in this post. Right here, in fact.

Season Two will be the next to receive the face-lift treatment, followed by Season One. As the web gallery format allows me to publish commentaries along with each strip, I am currently undecided whether I will simply copy and paste the original Season One commentary as it appeared in the printed collection, or rewrite the commentary froms cratch. That's why it'll be done last.

I *may* do a up-to-now Season Four gallery before either completing the Season Two or Season One galleries, but at the moment I'm a little wary of it, as once I start the Season Four gallery, I should probably make the extra effort to make sure that it remains up to date on a weekly basis. And we all know how I am about that sort of thing, don't we?

Technical Difficulties

Those of you looking to access Season Three of Stick Figure Drama...you can't. For now.

Season Three is currently being migrated to a new (and much, much better) layout, unfortunately technical difficulties have gotten in the way, preventing the new layout from going live at this time. Unfortunately, I dumped all the previous Season Three images before this technical difficulty reared its ugly head. So you'll just have to wait until tomorrow for your Season Three fix.

Yeah, I'm sure that'll be super difficult.

I really should stop watching filmmaking documentaries.

Or, I dunno, maybe I should watch more of them. Because watching them just makes me think, goddamn, I wish I was doing that. I was out making movies. Does that sound stupid? It probably does. But who gives a damn. We're all allowed a few moments of stupid fantasy now and then.

I wish I had come out of high school with a better idea of what I wanted to do. Instead, I came out of high school with almost no idea what I wanted to do. I thought I wanted to be a writer, but I didn't even know what that meant at the time. I was raised on horror and fantasy fiction, thinking that all you needed to tell a good story was some interesting twists and shocking ending. It wasn't until I was in my twenties that I realized what real storytelling was about, how you could actually use a story to say something about the world, about the human condition, about things that really mattered.

So coming out of high school, all I knew is that I wanted to write, and that got me a crappy job as a junior reporter at a crappy little 8-page newspaper. And that crappy little job somehow blossomed into a career that I still have to this day -- not writing, exactly, but newspaper. I didn't come out of high school thinking, "I want to work at a newspaper," but somehow that's what ended up happening. Careers have a way of sneaking up on you like that.

It's probably no surprise that I've been dealing with some discontentment issues lately. Those who know me personally have probably heard me say as much, and those who only know me through this blog have probably sensed it seeping through the writing lately. I'm not really going out of my way to hide it. I'm discontented.

I've been turning to just about anyone I can get my hands on for advice. There was a group discussion at the bar following one of the "Seen Change" performances that was dedicated to trying to find me a new career, something that might be more satisfying. One of the suggestions that came up was, "Write a good book," and that suggestion got me to actually start editing work on a novel that's been waiting for an edit since the summer of 2005. Which is good.

It's going slow. I'm 50 pages into a manuscript that's just shy of 400. I'm not working at it as hard as I should be, I'll confess, but I'm picking at it. Bit by bit.

Someone else told me, you're young, go have an adventure.

It's lovely advice. I want to. I wish I could.

Someone else suggested going back to school, retraining. They were doing it, why couldn't I?

Which, you know, is a damn good question.

So while browsing through the courses available at BCIT, what do I find but this.

Yeah, BCIT has a film program. And it's a film program designed with a flexible schedule to accomodate older adults who need to hold down a somewhat steady job while they go back to school. How perfect is that?

I can't afford it, of course. I could save, and maybe afford it in a year or two. Or maybe three or four depending on how many things break down (heaven knows my car doesn't have much life left in it).

And I can't help but think how much easier this would have been ten years ago. Before a stupid marriage that was doomed to failure, and the acquisition of debt that comes hand in hand with that. I can't help but think how much easier this would have been without a mortgage, without a credit line, without a visa, without an overdraft, all of which I'm struggling to make disappear so I'll be free of the remnants of that former life.

There's a part of me that wants so badly to just throw everything around me in the trash, and go somewhere else, and start over again. Maybe with the same career at a new location, and maybe with something brand new. Maybe start everything fresh, back at school again, for something I might have a passion for. Something I might actually love to do.

But there are just too many pieces of my former life that still have their claws dug into my current life. Too many to just shake off and be free of.

I'm still young. Have an adventure.

Sure. As soon as the bills from the last one are paid for.

God, I hate the word "Grok".

Hate it. Hate it hate it hate it. I fucking loathe it. Seriously.

My only regret is that I can't say that I've *always* hated it. Because I haven't. Originally, it was just a sort of passing annoyance. It has since evolved into hate.

What brings this up? The fact that GROK appeared in my inbox recently as the Oxford Dictionary word of the day.

For those who don't know the word, here's what Oxford had to say:

grok \GROCK\ verb

: to understand profoundly and intuitively

Example sentence:
No matter how many times I try to explain it, my grandmother just can't grok what a blog is and why anyone would want to read one.

Did you know?
"Grok" may be the only English word that derives from Martian. Yes, we do mean the language of the planet Mars. No, we're not getting spacey; we've just ventured into the realm of science fiction. "Grok" was introduced in Robert A. Heinlein's 1961 science fiction novel Stranger in a Strange Land. The book's main character, Valentine Michael Smith, is a Martian-raised human who comes to earth as an adult, bringing with him words from his native tongue and a unique perspective on the strange, strange ways of earthlings. "Grok" was quickly adopted by the youth culture of America and has since peppered the vernacular of those who grok it, from the hippies of the '60s to the computerniks of the '90s.

I should also admit, I suppose, that I never finished reading "Stranger in a Strange Land." It had been highly recommended by a friend who had lent me the book, but I just couldn't get through it. It was just so...dreadful. But my dislike for the book didn't have much bearing on my dislike for the word. Although, admittedly, I thought the whole "Look! Martian words!" thing was pretty lame.

So why the hatred for the word? Because it's a stupid fucking made-up word in martianese AND PEOPLE STILL USE IT.

IT'S IN THE FUCKING DICTIONARY.

Ugh.

Worse yet, it's generally used by annoying hipster-geek types who want to show their hipster-geek cred by using made up martian words. These are the some sort of hipster-geeks who probably have iPods, so I'm already hating them for that as well. If you use the word "GROK" you've probably got two strikes against you, so don't even talk to me.

On the bright side?

Well, I guess, at least they're not speaking Klingon. There's that.

Who am I?

Who am I? Who are you? That guy who lives next door, who is he? That other guy, a few houses down the street, with the dark blue car? What about him? Who's he?

Who are we?

What makes us who we are?

Contrary to Tyler Durden's manifesto -- that we are not beautiful and unique snowflakes, that we are the same decaying organic matter as everything else -- I can't help but realize that, at least on certain levels, we are unique. Perhaps not beautiful, but unique, at the very least.

I am not you, and you are not me, and the guy next door is not the guy from a few houses down with the dark blue car.

Why not?

What makes us different?

More importantly, what makes us who we are?

I've had this weird idea for awhile that there really isn't any such thing as free will, just the illusion we have of free will, based on the way we perceive time. Every choice I make is actually the only choice I could possibly make, based on the combination of my particular biology at that moment in time, as well as all of the internal and external influences I've had on my life for my entire life.

Of course, I don't realize that I have no choice but to make that choice. So I just make it. And it seems like I'm choosing. And everything continues on as planned.

So, in a way, who I am could be defined by the entirety of my internal and external experiences, as well as my particular biology.

That's me.

There's only two problems.

First, it's really boring.

Second, it doesn't leave much room for self improvement.

See, one of the problems with this particular philosophy is that, as much as you may believe it, you can never, under any circumstances, spend any time thinking about it. If you do, you end up stuck in a sort of defeatist spin. I mean, why make any choices? You have no control anyway. And there, even that choice to make choice at all was a choice that you had no choice but to make. So why bother? Just give up. Lie in bed all day watching crappy daytime television and reading comic books. Because, hey, you didn't have any choice but to choose that.

See what I mean?

But it did get me thinking, even without that particular philosophy, who much room do we really have for self improvement? I mean, there's the age old adage that a leopard can't change its spots. That who we are is who we are is who we are, regardless of how much we may want it to be otherwise.

For example, if I were to say that I wanted to be more athletic, people would say, "Well, go and play some sports then. Go to the gym. Play squash or something. Stop talking about it and do it." And I probably would. For awhile. But most people who try to change their lifestyle, they follow the new thing for awhile, then eventually drop it, revert back to their old habits. Because they're lazy? Or because that's who they are?

What if I said I wanted to be blonde? Or have green eyes?

People might tell me to dye my hair or get coloured contact lenses, but then, are those things really changing me, or are they just cosmetic differences? I don't actually become a green-haired blonde. I become a blue-eyed brunette with hair colouring and contact lenses.

What does this all have to do with? I don't know. Partly the fact that I've already sort of been bombing out on the "write every single day" part of my new year's resolution, and it's not even the end of february, so sure, I'm wondering if maybe *not* writing is some inescapable part of my biology.

And yeah, it's got something to do with last night's rant, partly my desire to be a better person, and partly that less spoken-of desire to be a worse one, the desire to be selfish and self-serving, to myself first above all else, and continue down that path until I'm happy, everyone else be damned.

But can I ever actually do either? Can I be better? Can I be worse? Or am I fated to simply remain stuck in the middle, stuck with exactly who I am, whoever that might be?

And, yeah, this is coming out as a response to the general sense of discontentment that's been rattling around in my head for far, far too long. Because when you look at your life, and you feel that sick sense of discontment, the only solution you can think of is, "Change something."

And maybe you can't.

Maybe you're just who you are.

And maybe who you are is someone who's always going to be discontented. Maybe there's no escaping it. Maybe there's no cure. And maybe there's nothing you can do different.

For those that are wondering:

Yes. Yes, I do feel better now.

Thanks.

I am so fucking tired.

I want to be a better person than I am.

I don't want this to impress Jesus. I don't want this because I'm afraid that God will fling me down into some firey lake of sulfur and suffering if I don't. I don't want this because I'm afraid of what might happen if I don't.

I want this because, as a human being, I should want it. I want this because, like it or not, we're different from dogs or cats or wildebeest or antelope. Maybe the only measureable difference is that we've managed to develop nuclear weapons that could wipe out the planet a few-dozen times over, but it's still measureable.

Like it or not, we're different.

And we should hold ourselves to higher standards.

So why don't we?

I feel sometimes like I can't get away from people who don't give a shit about trying to be better. People who are happy to be just as cruel and selfish as everyone else -- and better yet, people who are on a race to see who can be the most cruel, the most selfish.

That's most people, actually.

And when you look at them, stabbing each other in the back, fucking each other over, being cruel and stupid to one another for no real reason other than to be cruel and stupid, I can't help but feel, why the fuck do I bother?

Why do I give a shit about holding myself to a standard above what any and everyone else seems to hold themselves to?

I mean, the fact is, you can't win by trying to be better.

The only reward for integrity is integrity itself. There's no cash in it. No one's gonna give you a Christmas bonus or a new car or a promotion because you did the right thing. In fact, most people won't even notice, because they wouldn't know what the right thing was if it bit them on the ass.

The only reward for integrity is integrity itself, and you can't fucking buy a cup of coffee with it, so what damn good is it?

What damn good is it when you can't sleep at night knowing how many people around you have none, have no shame, have no guilt, and have no remorse. How can you sleep at night knowing there are people who are living far worse lives than you have, and are happier for it?

What I want to do is this.

I want to say, "Fuck it."

I want to say, "Fuck integrity. Fuck being a better person. And fuck any and everyone who gets in my way. I'm going to be cold and cruel and mean and selfish, and I'm going to take what I want, and I don't give a flying fuck who gets hurt along the way, because it's all about me. I have no desire to be a better person. All I want is what I want, and I won't stop until I get it, and I don't care how sick and twisted and fucked up a human being I have to become along the way to get it."

That's what I want to say.

Instead, all I can say is this: "Fuck all of you."

Fuck all of you who puts yourself first. Fuck all of you who doesn't think about who you're stepping on while you're pursuing your dreams. Fuck all of you who lie and cheat and steal. And an extra special fuck all of you who take the time to feel a little bit guilty before going out and doing it all over again.

Because I'm right.

Because we should hold ourselves to a higher standard.

Because we can hold ourselves to a higher standard, but too many of us refuse to, because we're too goddamn lazy.

Fuck all of you.

Because I don't want to be a part of you anymore.

Wilhelm!

Wilhelm, Take One.

Wilhelm, Take Three.

Wilhelm, Take Four.

Movie buffs among you might be familiar with the Wilhelm scream. If you're not, then a lengthy history (which actually filled in a lot of gaps in my own knowledge of the scream) can be found here.

Of course the history is only a tiny, tiny part of the victory I had today, in actually finding three copies of the infamous Wilhelm scream. I've wanted a copy of the audio file for awhile, and now I can't wait to find a play to sneak this thing into.

EDIT: An oversight on my part while posting this little blurb kept me from linking to the source of the three sound files linked at the top of the page, Hollywood Lost and Found, as well as their own page on the Wilhelm Scream, located here.

This makes me sad.

I came across some statistics, while engaged in my usual, daily web-browsing habits, that sort of made me a little bit sad. Here are the particulars that caught my eye:

1/3 of high school graduates never read another book for the rest of their lives.
42 percent of college graduates never read another book after college.
80 percent of U.S. families did not buy or read a book last year.
70 percent of U.S. adults have not been in a bookstore in the last five years.
57 percent of new books are not read to completion.
70 percent of books published do not earn back their advance.
70 percent of the books published do not make a profit.
(Source: Jerold Jenkins, www.JenkinsGroupInc.com)

To think that 80% of U.S. family didn't buy or read a book in the last year is just indescribably sad. Even more absurd, the article indicates that other research (which doesn't actually seem to be cited in the article, strangely enough) shows that 80% of the people in the U.S. would like to write a book one day.

Those numbers are just psychotic.

80% of people want to write a book.

80% of families haven't read a book in the last year.

Obviously those aren't the same 80%, but come on, there's gotta be some overlap between them. There's gotta be some *huge* overlap between them. So, why are there so many people who'd like to write a book that don't even bother reading them?

This makes my head hurt. It also makes me sad.

And, of course, I'm a little sad about the notion that 70% of published books do not make a profit and do not make back their advance, particularly at this point in my life, as I begin official editing work on my own novel, the first step towards what I hope will be eventual publication. Publication and, it would seem, eventual failure, if these statistics are to be believed.

Be sure!

Are you too critical about your body? With Penis Enlarge Patch you can be sure at least about one thing.

Yes! You can be sure that, somewhere, you have a Penis Enlarge Patch! And doesn't that make you feel better?

Editing is hard.

Which is, I suspect, why I traditionally do so little of it.

But I formally decided a couple of nights ago that, not only would I allow myself to consider editing work as part of the "write every day" resolution, I would start off my editing work on the big one -- the novel that I finished in the summer of 2005, "Waiting for a Miracle."

I made this decision for a few reasons.

First, I really do want to keep up with the resolution, but it's not even the end of January and I've already done a horrible job of it. Lately, with two plays on the go, the last thing I want to do when I get home is crawl up to the computer and spend an hour at my desk. I want to just drop into the sofa, turn on some music, and relax. Editing is writing work that I can do on the sofa, if I've got some pages waiting for me.

The second reason is that, for the most part, I hate editing. When I'm finished writing something, the last thing I want to do is look at it again. I want to move onto something fresh and new and exciting. By allowing myself to include editing work as part of the resolution, it gives me a reason to do something I don't much enjoy, when I'm too lazy to do the actual writing work.

And the third reason evolved out of a conversation I had after the play on Friday night.

I asked a few people to help me choose a new career. The question came out, partly as a joke on the current trend that most people have four or five different careers in their lifetime, unlike people in the past who would generally stick with one career through their entire working life. And it came out partly as a result of a certain degree of employment dissatisfaction I've been feeling lately.

Among the many suggestions that were tossed at me (some good, some odd, and some downright dreadful), someone said, "Write a good book."

Which got me thinking. Maybe I should.

Which got me thinking, hey, wait a minute, I almost have. I've got a book that's pretty darn good, and probably just needs some cleaning up before it's of publishable quality. And all I really need to get it there is to, you know, actually work on it.

So I printed out the first two chapters of the novel tonight, double-spaced for easier editing. That amounted to about seventy-five printed pages (which is actually quite a lot, leading me to consider splitting some of these earlier chapters into smaller chunks), and promptly started work on editing a novel for the first time in just about ever.

And holy fuck, editing is hard.

I spent two hours, and made it through about twelve pages. Twelve double-spaced pages. There's black marks everywhere, sentences added, sentences modified, whole paragraphs yanked out. I'm ripping this book to absolute shreds, and it's actually a book I'm more than a little bit fond of. I can only imagine the sort of editing work that would go into something I didn't like at all. Although, more reastically, if I didn't like it at all, I doubt I'd bother with the editing work. You can't polish a turd, as they say.

And I'm only one night, and two hours, and 12 pages into this editing job, and I'm already wondering, when I'm done all this, when I've transferred all the changes back into the document, so it's a true reflection of this version of the story, when I'm done all that, will I be able to look at it and not make any further changes? Or, if I let the book sit for another six months, would I find myself making just as many edits as I did this time? Would I end up going through this whole process all over again?

This is what I'm afraid of. This, more than anything else, is why I don't edit. Because once you start, you can edit forever.

I have a book called "Paper Dreams." I first wrote it, as a novella, in 1990. Since then it has been rewritten, from scratch, another three or four times. Each time it's become considerably better. Each time I've found new things under the surface that can be mined for meaning, for significance. And each time I find myself thinking, "Wow, this is really, really good."

And, inevitably, time goes by and I look at the book again, and find myself think, "Oh, that's shit. I should just start that over again."

This is why I don't edit.

But I have to, and so I will. I have to make "Waiting for a Miracle" is good as humanly possible. Because I really want to be able to proudly send it to publishers. I really want an editor somewhere to read it, and then phone me, desperate to be able to put it into print. I want this book to have a life outside of a folder in my computer. I want people to read it, to experience it, to be moved by it. I want an audience.

And yeah, I'm thinking maybe "Write a good book," isn't a bad idea for a next career.

More fun with spam

The subject line of a spam that arrived in my inbox today.

When your penis lets you down in the most inappropriate moments, ask Cialis Soft Tabs for help.

Maybe it's just me, but is there really an appropriate moment for your penis to let you down? Are there times when you're really counting on your penis to come through for you, and it doesn't, but you think, "Okay, under the circumstances, I can let that one slide..."? Am I over-analysing this stuff, or does it really read as ridiculously as I think it does.

All this reminds me of the good times over at Spamusement. The site hasn't been updated in forever, but the archives are worth a look if you haven't been over there before.

Ha ha!

Well, it's not even the end of January yet, and I'm already struggling with this stupid "write something every single day" resolution. I suppose under the circumstances it would be easy to blame my current involvement in two different theatrical productions, which leaves me very little in the free-time department. But really, that's just making excuses.

Because, honestly, I'm really not so busy that I can't find at least fifteen minutes to post a little something here. I could, if I was so inclined. I'm just not. When I do have a few minutes to myself, the only thing I want to do is lay on the sofa and relax with a little bit of gaming.

In a little less than two weeks, "Seen Change" will be at an end, and I'll have a little bit more free time on my hands. At that point, there won't be any excuses left, no reason that I won't be able to write at least a little bit more. Any one want to make any bets on whether or not I'll actually do it?

I actually can't believe it's been four days since the last post here. It feels like maybe two at the most. Time is flashing by me at a ridiculous rate right now, and there doesn't seem to be any way to slow it down. Some days I find myself staring blankly into the distance, wondering what the heck day it is -- I honestly couldn't remember if it was Wednesday or Sunday for a couple of minutes yesterday, which doesn't make any sense, because there were plenty of little cues around me to indicate what day of the week it was, such as it being the opening night of the play. But still, for those few minutes, I just about had a panic attack because, if it was Sunday, there were a whole lot of things I didn't get accomplished that needed to be.

Fuck it, I've got nothing interesting to report in this space. I'm just filling it up so I'll feel like I've actually written something today. So now I have.

Goodbye.

(Picture above is courtesy of the Ha Ha Funny Pictures site. Check it out and make your own!)

Booze

Maybe you know this. Probably you don't.

Since the new year, I've been pretty much on a wine-only liquor diet. There's a couple of reasons for this, and the primary one is a desire to modify my lifestyle so I'm drinking just a little bit less than I have in the past. This has grown out of a realization that there may be some connection between "depression" and the intake of "depressants."

The wine only -- and, in this case, specifically red wine -- grew out of a couple of other things. First, I realized some time ago that red wine gave me a sort-of creative buzz, one that left with a desire to sit down and write something, so it seemed as if it would go nicely hand-in-hand with my resolution to write more in 2007. Also, recent readings on the health benefits of red wine indicated that up to three glasses a day helped to lower blood pressure, and three glasses a day seemed like a nice, round, not-terribly drunk sort of number.

This is not to say that I've removed beer or other liquors from my life. That is not the case at all. They're just not part of a regular lifestyle. Some of them were -- particularly beer -- but that's the very habit I'm trying to overcome.

So far, the change in lifestyle has actually brought about a noticeable improvement. My mood is better. I'm sleeping better. I'm waking up feeling better in the morning. And, barring the occasional day where I've dropped the ball, I'm being more productive with my writing.

Of course, none of this has anything to do with why I'm writing tonight.

After a "Seen Change" rehearsal tonight, I went out with a handful of the cast and crew for dinner and a few drinks. Thinking this was one of those "not part of the regular lifestyle" nights that I had allowed myself to have, I figured I'd have a few beer, just for a change of pace. And I did. And they were tasty, and I enjoyed them very much, and there was much chit-chat and laughing and merry-making at the table, and was fine with the world. Until it was time to go.

When it was time to go, I paid my bill, headed out of the bar into the parking lot, and as I walked towards my car I felt something...odd.

I felt this massive, soul-sucking sort of void in my heart.

I felt this terrible sense of despair and loneliness crashing down on me. And I thought, "What the fuck is this all about?"

Because I recognized it. It was something I had felt for a good portion of 2006. It was, in fact, one of the things from 2006 that I was eager to be free of. And here it was again, from out of the blue.

And I wondered for the first time if maybe it was the beer. Because I hadn't felt that way while drinking red wine for the last few weeks. Quite the opposite, as I've already mentioned.

I find this possibility somewhat troubling. I mean, I wasn't looking eradicate beer from my diet because it made me depressed. I was looking to reduce its presence in my diet because I was drinking too much of it. I'm still quite fond of beer, and the thought of having to remove it completely from my life is...well, a thought I'm not willing to entertain at the moment.

So here's hoping it was a one time thing, and the next time I feel like treating myself to an icy cold, refreshing brewski, it's a pleasant experience from the moment it begins until long after its over.

Well what do you know, you *can* stop procrastinating.

So, I did it.

Sat down with the novel tonight, and pushed my way through the trouble spot. And it was...well, I won't say it was a nightmare, but it sure wasn't easy.

I found myself tangenting an awful lot, going into some insomniac, stream-of-consciousness style stuff that, essentially, allowed me to pad the last chunk of this chapter just a little bit. What's weird about it is that, at the time, while I'm writing it, it doesn't feel like padding. It feels like this character struggling for coherence, struggling for meaning, struggling to make sense of his own head, and the world around him. But when it's done, the whole bit just feels sort of...meaningless.

Meaningless because it's not really driving the story forward. And in a way, it feels like anything that isn't driving the story forward is just padding. Just taking up space. Just killing time.

But I'm wondering if, in a book like this, part of the story really is what's going on in the character's head. Not just his internal reactions to the things going on around him, but the random flailing of his thoughts as well. Just letting his headspace go wherever it wants to go. Because, even outside of the raw, point-to-point narrative, this is a book about a guy flailing about in his own broken perspective on faith, and coming out the other end with something new. Seems to me I'd have to have a lot flailing around to capture that.

I stumbled upon a nice bit of metaphor, entirely by accident, but completely botched my attempts to actually bring it to life on the page. I'd include a segment here, but, like I said, it was pretty badly botched, and not something I feel up to sharing publicly at the moment. Hopefully I got enough of the gist down on the page that, when it comes time to edit, I'll remember what it was I was going for, and be able to actually do it properly.

Here's one line, though, that captures the basic idea: "I’ve gone without sleep for so goddamn long that, until this moment, I had forgotten that being awake meant a whole lot more than just not sleeping."

And on that note, it's time to hang up the writing hat for tonight.

Sometimes 'good enough' is good enough.

This message, courtesy of some spam that was waiting for me in my inbox this morning:

In popular mythology a small penis is still thought to signal a totally inadequate lover. Penis Enlarge Patch can make you an adequate lover.

It seems to me that if the best your product can do for me is make me adequate, it might be time to head back to the ol' marketing department. You might want to try selling me on a side effect or something.

Where did that come from?

There's a bottle of Tequila on the kitchen counter. I don't know where it came from, or who it belongs to, but I hope to find out so that I might have a tiny taste.

Not right now, of course.

Maybe Tuesday.

I'll stop procrastinating. Tomorrow.

I'm still avoiding the next portion of the Insomnia novel, for particularly good reason except that I'm not sure how to get from point A -- where I am right now -- to point B -- which is the start of the next chapter, which I wrote months ago in anticipation of the fact that I was eventually going to get there.

I should just stop procrastinating. Just throw caution to the wind. I actually had a flickering of an idea just before I sat down to write this post, an idea that could get me through this next potentially rocky area without a hitch, while keeping my narrator's head spinning, not entirely from a lack of sleep.

So I really should just sit down and do it. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe tomorrow I'll stop procastinating.

I guess on some level, I'm afraid that I'll hit another road block as soon as I get past the intro to the next chapter. Because I have a pretty solid idea of how it starts, but after that, only a general idea of where the rest of the book is going. My hope is that by working my way through easy part of the next chapter, it'll get the creative lubricants working again, and everything after while move as smoothly as really, really smooth moving things. That's the hope. Of course, the opposite is just as possible -- as soon as I get through the easy stuff, I'll just hit yet another road block.

This is part of the problem of writing a novel with a "follow the story and see where it goes" mentality. Sometimes it just doesn't go anywhere. And the fear of it going nowhere can be quite overwhelming at times.

I didn't actually do any writing yesterday, not proper writing, but I did sit down at the computer for an hour or so to work. A few nights earlier I had done some editing work on "Dinner and Drinks" -- a vulgar one act play about love and romance that I finished last summer -- and needed to transfer the pen-and-paper edits into the computer, to make an official second draft of the play. Which felt sort of good. It's not often I actually do any editing. Usually I'll write something, and then move on to the next project, leaving the previous to collect dust, never to be touched again.

My initial thought with this "Write every single day" resolution was to include *only* writing of new material. A friend wondered if I would include editing of a previous book as part of the "write every single day" resolution, and I immediately told him no. But I'm beginning to have second thoughts.

Editing isn't as obviously creative, and you certainly don't have anywhere near the word output as you do when you just sit down and start writing, but it's still a very, very vital part of the creative process. And on days when I'm just dry, and I have nothing to say here, or anywhere else, at least if I sat down to edit I'd be behaving in a constructive way, instead of playing video games or watching movies. And really, that's the point of the resolution. To be constructive, and creative, in some way, every day.

So I may have to rethink this knee-jerk response to editing as part of the "write every single day" regime. Between now and the end of the year, I could get a lot of editing work done, even just on days when I found I had little actually say that was new.

Sometimes truthiness is better

One of the most improtant things in all of my creative work is honesty. And for the life of me, I can't think of anything that could possible be any more important. A creative work -- whether it's a film or a play or a novel or a painting or even a stupid newspaper column -- should endeavor to communicate something real, something significant, something true.

I made a vow in my column a couple of years ago, when I decided that I wasn't going to retire it on the tenth anniversary, to be honest with my readers. In my own words:

As writers – and more importantly, writers lucky enough to find themselves published – we have a responsibility to you, the reader, to speak truthfully. Because this is a column and not a news story, I’m thankfully free of having to ensure that I quote people properly or spell their names right (at least most of the time). But even when writing a rambling, general-interest, opinion-based piece, it is my responsibility to ensure that it is an honest, rambling, general-interest, opinion-based piece. I owe you that much.

Having said all that, I am currently questioning the wisdom of, essentially, confessing to copyright violations in this most recent column. While I fully stand by my new year's resolution to try to right those wrongs by purchasing one CD every two weeks of music I have already acquired illegally, it did occur to me to today that maybe proclaiming that resolution -- and thus proclaiming the illegal acquisition -- might not have been the best choice.

It's the sort of thing that can come back and bite you in the ass.

I'm hoping, of course, that if it should come back and bite me on the ass, that by the time it does, I'll have purchased enough CDs to make the majority of my MP3 collection completely legal. This is, of course, assuming I follow through with the New Year's resolution for longer than one week. Which, given my history with New Year's resolutions, isn't such a safe bet.

So what I'm really hoping for is to not have this thing come back and bite me on the ass. And for me to learn a very, very important lesson from this. Try not to discuss your own criminal activities in a printed newspaper column.

Let that be a lesson to all of you as well.

Maybe this wasn't such a great idea...

Part of why I wanted to establish multiple writing outlets for my New Year's resolution to write every single day is because -- particularly at the moment -- I don't always have the time to focus all my attention on just one thing, like finishing the Insomnia novel. Which is where I'd like to be focusing all my attention. Two bursts of writing on it in the last few days has me almost feeling like the ball is rolling again (though I'm about to push that ball through a sort-of sticky patch, where I might get hung up a little bit...).

Unfortunately, acting in two different plays which are both in rehearsal is leaving me with A) Very few free evenings to actually sit down and focus on that novel; and B) Very little energy left by the time I actually do get home.

Simply put, I don't feel like writing. I don't feel conscious enough to string together a sentence, let alone a series of them, one after the other.

On the bright side, coming here and writing about how I don't feel like writing actually manages to fulfill my promise to myself, of writing. On the down side, writing about how I don't feel like writing is going to get pretty old pretty darn quick.

I think getting back to work after the Christmas holidays is sort of sapping my energy a bit too. After two weeks off, it's a little tough to get the motor running in the morning, a little tough to drag yourself out of bed. Even after the all-important first coffee of the day, I'm still half asleep until the afternoon.

I suppose I'll take Wednesdays off in my "writing every day" thing because I'll be writing my column that day, which will be the fifth possible outlet for my daily writing. I considered taking off on whichever day I happen to do Stick Figure Drama, but decided that might be just a little bit cheap, as really, there isn't a lot of writing that goes into that. There isn't much drawing going into it either.

Speaking of Stick Figure drama, when (NOT if -- I promise, it's a when) the updates get done, and regular updating becomes more consisten (okay, that one might be an IF), there's some exciting stuff for you guys to see. The next few weeks will see the introduction of a whole new, well, gimmick I guess. But the idea makes me laugh. And, really, that's the most important thing.

Nothing personal.

On titles

I've actually been meaning to post this for rather awhile now, but just haven't gotten around to it for a number of reasons, but following the post of a few minutes ago -- also about the novel -- this seemed like a perfectly appropriate time.

I'm still working on a novel that reads, "UNTITLED," at the top of the title page. This is, of course, the norm for me. Generally speaking, it's not until I'm at least halfway through, and quite often not until I'm at the end of something, before I know what the right title is. That's because, quite often, I don't have the foggiest idea what it is I'm writing about until I'm at least half-way through, or, quite often, at the end.

I already had a title that was bouncing around in my head: "Absence of Faith." It was a title I'd tacked onto a never-completed short story some years ago, taken from a chunk of lyric in a Nine Inch Nails song. I'd always liked the way those three words fell together. They seem to say so much with so very little.

But a few months back, another title idea came to me.

I was having a drunken conversation with a roommate who, just before going to bed, said something to me about "significant epiphanies." The rest of his sentence was muddied by out mutual drunkeness.

But the phrase "significant epiphanies" stood out to me.

I'd always liked the word "epiphany", specifically the third definition provided by dicionary.com:

a sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by some simple, homely, or commonplace occurrence or experience.

And so the two-word phrase hung around in my head for awhile, mostly because I liked the word epiphany, and because the character in the novel would have a few, and because they would, occasionally, be significant.

But something about it bugged me too. Too many syllables. Too clunky. Too awkward. It needed something to help clean it up.

After a few days, my brain came up with something new -- one word the same, one word completely new: "Everyday Epiphanies"

Still a lot of syllables, sure, but it's made a little easier to swallow by the fine use of alliteration. Which I usually detest. Well, which I always detest. But for some reason, this one I could swallow. Because it worked. Because it wasn't the significant epiphanies that I cared about. The significant ones always stand out. That's what makes them significant. It's the everyday epiphanies, the ones we almost don't notice, the ones that you almost throw away, those are the extraordinary ones. And those are the ones that are the most important to my character.

So there it is -- a second title option, making two titles with two very opposite meanings. Both very appropriate for one novel.

Votes?

Random book excerpt

My legs feel like jello. I wobble.

For just a moment.

Just a moment.

My hand shoots out, and it grips the edge of the closet doorway. It fumbles around. Fingers twitch like spider legs, looking for something solid, something to cling to. There’s a black hole swirling behind me, and it wants to devour me, and more than me, more than my flesh, it wants to devour my mind, my consciousness, my soul, my very reason to go on living.

The spider legs scrambling up the wall, my left leg disappears. Gone. The world turns sideways, and I’m reminded of call centre suddenly, of spinning, of losing direction, of losing focus, of losing track of who I am. And then the floor hits me on the side of the head and everything goes white.

Then grey.

Ashen.

Then black.

No, I think.

Fuck no.

Not black, I think.

I try to call for Jamie. My own mushmouth makes a bubbling noise. My throat is a sewage line, backed up with rotting, stinking death. I’m choking on a week of consciousness, I’m choking on desperation.

“Help me…” The words slip out on my breath, as light as a breeze. Intangible. I can feel them blowing away the moment they’re out, like smoke.

There’s a noise down the hall.

“What the fuck are you doing man?”

Jamie’s watching The Sopranos, I guess. Or pay-per-view. Or, I don’t know, uncensored episodes of Jerry Springer.

“I heard a crash. Is everything all right?”

I answer the television. I say “No, everything is not alright,” or I try to at any rate. But the only noise coming out of my mouth is some sort of grunting, wheezing hybrid. And besides, I was talking to the television.

And still, everything is black.

I try to open my eyes, but they’re sealed shut. There is not a force on this earth that could open these eyes.

Even in the darkness, the world spins. I feel it spinning around me, and then it’s more than the world. Suddenly I can feel every planet – Mercury and Mars and Venus and Neptune and…fuck, I don’t know, how many planets are there, anyway? Nine? Ten? Twelve? They keep finding new ones. Everytime you turn on the TV there’s a new planet. And I don’t know all their names, but they’re spinning around me, the sun is spinning around me, and all those planets we know of, all twelve or twenty, and all the ones we don’t, or twelve or twenty thousand or million or trillion, at this moment, every one of them is spinning around me as well. For just a fraction of an instant, I am in the center of the universe, and the universe is spinning a circle around me, staring at me, watching me. Every living thing on every planet with a living thing has its eyes on me, holding my breath, because this is my moment.

This is the most important moment of my life.

And I’m about to fall asleep and miss it.

And as soon as I do, as soon as I drift off into unconsciousness, then the laugh track will start. They’ll all have a good laugh at my expense, and I’ll be too deep into the darkness to notice or hear or really give a damn.

And there’s no escape.

I don’t even feel the floor anymore.

I’m floating.

I’m floating in this blackness, and this blackness wraps its arms around me, and it is so peaceful, it’s so amazingly warm and quiet and restful, and I’m so fucking happy to be here right now. I’ve wanted this moment for so long that it no longer matters what I’m giving up to be here. It’s worth it. Oh God, it’s worth it.

And then I’m gone.

And then I’m not.

Then there are hands.

Hands on my shoulder.

They’re picking me up.

And the world stops spinning and the black turns to ash, then grey, then white, and something dissolves whatever was gluing my eyes closed, and they open, and I’m blind it’s so bright in this room, and there hands sliding me backwards, and they’re setting me back against the bed, and then there’s a voice that sounds like what ever was on television, and it says: “What the fuck happened in here?”

And I realize it’s Jamie.

And I say, “I fell down.”

I say, “I think I almost fell asleep.”

And he laughs and he says, “Well, shit, if I’d known that I would have left you alone. But you made suck a fucking racket that I thought you’d hurt yourself.”

And I wonder if I have hurt myself.

I still can’t quite feel my legs.

I know my arms are there, because I can see them. But they seem disconnected. They seem to belong to someone else. I try to move my arm, to lift my arm straight up, and dose a crazy wobbling jig sideways and my smacks Jamie in the shin.

He looks at me.

“What?” he asks me.

He thinks I was trying to get his attention.

Maybe I was.

“Make me some coffee,” I say. “I’ve got to get dressed.”

Can't say if there's anything terribly good in this batch of text quoted from the novel-in-progress, but here it is anyway, just to verify that I am at least trying to maintain my new year's resolution to write on *something* each and every day this year. Although, sure, yeah, I could have written this in December and just posted it here until now, it's not like anyone would know.

But I would. And I'd feel bad about lying to you. And that just wouldn't cut it.

I'm about to try to push my way through an awkward portion of the book. I know sort of what has to happen in this next chunk of text, until the end of the current chapter, because I know exactly how the next chapter begins -- I know it so well, in fact, that I wrote it months ago, right after I started the novel. I knew that this next chapter was going to happen eventually. I just wasn't sure when.

I'm not sure, at last, that it's the next chapter. And I know, sort of, more or less, what I have to go through to get to that chapter. But the details...the details are hazy.

So I'm nervous. I'm not sure I want to just dive in and wing it because, as much as that has worked for me in the past, it also has sort of a tendency to steer off my original course. And while that can be fun sometimes too, getting steered off my original course might not be so good when I have a fantastic plan for exactly how the next chapter should start.

So I'll probably do what I usually do when I bump into trouble like this. Avoid the novel for a couple of days. After all, even though I've resolved to write every day, I still have at least three other things I can dump words on.

So, here's the deal...

As hinted at in an earlier post, I have made one and only one new year's resolution this year (though I had considered making a resolution to be even angrier and bitterer than ever before, but I ultimately decided that went against the general notion of resolutions). And that resolution is somewhat related to this blog.

That resolution is this: Barring days when it is simply physically impossible, I'm going to write every day this year.

It doesn't matter what it is. As long as it's writing. Words. In english. One after the other, in a series that we often call "sentences" which then make up things we call "paragraphs".

At the moment, I have four projects to choose from in my daily writing. I have, of course, the blog you're currently reading. There is a new blog, started just a few days into January located here, which will be the new home for most if not all of my gaming-related blogging (stop by if you're so inclined). There is the novel about the insomniac. And there is the play about the guy with the knife in his stomach.

If I can't think of something write in at least *one* of this things on a given day, there's a problem.

There'll be breathing room, of course. I didn't actually write much of anything yesterday, as I'd been struck with a nasty case of insomnia the previous evening, leaving my brain a bit like porridge. Days like that will happen. Other days will have other things come up, making it impossible to write. I'm not going to beat myself up for missing a day here or there. Because shit happens. And if I do beat myself, I'll just end up even less inclined to actually get the writing done the next day, and the day after that.

As for SFDs (which, heh, uh, I should have known about all along, obviously) I'm delaying updates just a little bit, as I think I may be redesigning the whole Stick Figure Drama interface, now that I've found a spiffy little album-generating application with which I can make a proper sort of interface for the strips, instead of just having each jpg individually linked. No guarantees on when that'll happen, but it's unlikely to see completion until February.

Of course this post itself, this little entry bringing all you fans up to speed on my plans, in fact counts as my writing for the day. And so now I can go to bed tonight feeling good about myself, because I accomplished something, however little, however insignificant.

Swing by the Project

I'm sort of a loser sometimes, and I frequently neglect to update the linkage section in the right column, which is sort of a perfect place to drop not only blogs I enjoy, but blogs of friends as well.

Yes have them. Well, some. A few. Look, I don't want to talk about it, okay?

Anyway, linkage is now place for Project Tarantella -- a blog maintained by a buddy and former co-worker who somehow managed to escape the daily horror that is the newspaper industry before it devoured his soul. Drop by and say hi.

Hello, 2007.

Right.

So, it's the start of a new year, and I'm still reeling over yesterdays Farking. I can't think of a stranger, more surreal way to start a whole new year, and I can't help but think it's a sign of something, though I don't have the foggiest idea what.

I'll confess, I haven't been the biggest fan of New Year's celebrations for the last few years, for a number of different reasons. One of the big ones is that New Year's tends to demand a reflection on the previous 365 days, and given my nature, I tend to focus on the negative while reflecting.

This is not to say that 2006 wasn't without its share of high points. It certainly was. Among them: starting (and getting a good way through) a surprisingly good novel during a month that wasn't November, taking Monkey House to the Zone Drama Festival and walking away with five awards, and potentially shredding my already shaky reputation by proposing a funny but startlingly vulgar play I wrote to be performed during stampede (a propsal which was ultimately, if unsurprisingly, rejected).

However, I've got to be honest and say that, when it comes to the lows, 2006 had some of the lowest I can remember in recent years. So instead of celebrating the end of one year, and the start of another -- as many were, I'm sure -- I spent a quiet New Year's Eve at home, bidding farewell to a year that I was glad to be done with. And trying to make promises to myself that the next wouldn't be anywhere near so bad.

Which, yeah, I know, stupid. Making promises like that is like begging for disappointment. Too many of the things that happen around us are ultimately out of our hands. But I suppose it doesn't hurt to try to improve the things that we *can* control.

Resolutions were made, though after past years failures, I'm keeping these ones fairly close to my chest at the moment. I will confess that the majority of them have something to do with writing, and this blog is included (as is a second blog I fired up yesterday, for no particularly good reason, which will I'll likely get around to linking here at some point in the near future, if I don't completely abandon it in the next few days).

So to those of you who are frequent visitors of this site, and for the few of you who still might be trickling in from Fark -- the brave, the bold, the lovers of Hot Mustard -- I wish you all the finest in this new year.

Cheers.

Good heavens, now I've been Farked.

Who'd have thought that one silly little post about the absence of Hot Mustard sauce from McDonald's would have resulted in so much, well, five-minutes-of-fameage...

After finding my silly little post at Digg about a month ago, I checked my Gmail account this evening to discover that there were almost a dozen comments on my Hot Mustard article. Figuring I'd picked up a bit more traffic from the month-old Digg posting, I popped by this site to see what sort of traffic had been going on in the last few days.

Well, it was more than a few more hits.

It was more like 2,500.

2,500 freaking pageviews. Today.

At this goofy little blog, where I write my goofy little ramblings, and occasionally post not-so-goofy little chunks of bits of writing I'm working on. 2,500 page views in one day.

Digging in my referral log, I see that they've all come from the wonder that is Fark.com, after -- I assume -- someone posted a link on their main page to the afforementioned ramble about McDonald's Hot Mustard.

This is just too weird for words.

Hot-freaking-mustard = 2500 pageviews.

So, um, hi to all you Farksters! Sorry the updates have been sparse lately. Blogging a bit more is on my short list of new years resolutions to take under consideration, but never publicly admit to, because once you publicly admit to a resolution, you look like a wanker when you don't actually keep it. Which, heaven knows, is the case with most of us.

Anyway, I digress.

Thanks for the 2500 page loads. Who knows, with the power of Fark, I could break 10K by the end of the week. Huzzah.

Now it's time to start planning an expose on the Bull's Eye Barbecue Sauce conspiracy. Clearly the path to internet fame is paved in condiments.

Anyone wanting to check out the lengthy discussion of the loss of Hot Mustard over at Fark can find it here.

EDIT: It seems that my counter jumped by approximately 100, just in the time that I was writing this post. I don't think I've ever gotten 100 pageviews in a single day, let alone in the handful of minutes between starting a post and ending it. I'm feeling dizzy.