The Mojo Wire

Happy Birthday, Hawkeye.

2012-01-02T06:38:00.004-05:00

I am momentarily at a loss to remember how I usually ring in a New Year here on the blog. There is something about tradition that I always feel bound by, and when I forget it, I have these... solemn moments.

I took down the tree today. All the other decorations too - it makes the room feel a touch sadder, there's too much space now, to much room for things. It's the mandatory concession, is what it is, the acknowledgment that all the pomp and pageantry that I put so much work into, to try and make the holidays special, that's over, and there's no time to squeeze one more gesture of goodwill out, no trappings of the season for me to lean on as I try to make those who matter to me feel... special, unique, loved. Now we are in the long winter, the gray of January and February, where I'm left, not entirely unlike I was before Christmas this year. Hoping for a clean, white snow.

I lament too much.

Finished my last review just after Christmas. I'm fairly certain I have enough banked to break even for the holidays. Saving money has been so important this year, that even though I feel a little more secure, I find it kind of digs its heel in, insist that I keep those numbers up. Anywhere near my once usual poverty-line bank balance and I get nervous now. There are worse habits, and some would say such worries are just a sign of growing up. Shame on them.

Still, it's a load off. The next one's already in the mail.

Got a Christmas e-mail from Ander - apparently he's had some internet-related problems. It was great to get back in touch, and wish him a proper Merry Christmas. It'll be great to start talking to him again, once every thing's sorted..

Had the privilege to be a beta reader for a friend's novel. Talked about it a little here. I am not entirely sure if "beta reader" entails something more specific than "reading, editing, and being critical," but that is how I approached it nonetheless. I'm used to looking at fairly large pieces of finished work by friends of mine, but this was, or is tied with, the largest thing I've ever given notes on. I got through it twice - one time less than I wanted to, but it felt good. I enjoy doing this kind of thing, not the same kind of enjoyment I get from my own writing, because when doing that there's no middle man, there's what I wrote, and what I think needs changed. And the hand-wringing goes here. Plus, I'm never worried about not reading too close, or offending myself.

Still. It's writer's work. I know some writers who wouldn't think so, and I'm not sure I'd call them real writers. I suppose that's as close to a public judgment as I'm comfortable making. Funny learning things about yourself like that.

Enjoyed the experience, and my friend has an impressive of novel on his hands. Exciting enough to make me want to get back to work on... something.

Not sure how this week is going to go yet. I'm hoping to see an old friend, and a new friend of hers, soon. Good chance Justin and I will resume our weekly meetings too. My sleep schedule is just strange, and getting stranger as of late. It's to the point where I don't think I care when I get it, I just wish that when would be at the same time every night... or day.

Today is the birthday of someone very special to me. I remember when I was very young, having the difference between birthdays and holidays described to me, and thinking it was all very unfair, that someone's priorities were fucked. Years and years later, I met someone who put it all into perspective for me, in a way that... well, is very easy to get through to me with - Alan Moore - and just conveyed to me what an amazing thing it is any of us - specifically us, as we are now - are here, so each birthday for someone you know is really special, a true one of a kind thing. And it's easy to forget that, because there are so many us who are special in that way. But it's true.

It's also so funny to me to just think that a year ago, today was just the 2nd of January. And yet, during the passage of that time, I found someone who, by today, by this 2nd of January, has made me want nothing more than to fly across the country with a particularly large cake and celebrate with. Though, I'm sure those TSA bastards probably have some kind of problem with I don't know, frosting or something, but still. It's an amazing thing, the people who come into our lives, so unexpectedly.

Many happy returns.

Amending my Christmas List.

2011-12-22T01:32:00.002-05:00

I'd like some snow.

The near sixty degrees that the five day forecast is currently touting is more than a little disappointing. Hell, it doesn't even really have to snow. I'd just like some nice, crisp, cold weather. You know. The kind of cold that overcoats and thrift store sweaters were made for.

It's Justin's birthday today. We've been good friends for several years now, working on a comic together, playing Magic, taking up tables in IHOP for hours at a time. Hatching crazy schemes, and actually seeing some of them come to fruition. Okay, so that's mostly Justin, but still. Christmas is a pretty crazy time for him - his wedding anniversary is at the end of this month, as his birthday, as mentioned, and his wife's birthday, and then, of course, also mentioned, Christmas. I just wanted to wish him a happy birthday here - he's not much for internet salutations, but what the hell.

It's more and more looking like "Calamity Cash and the Town with No Name" will finally be finished after the New Year. We talked about some other things we might do for the occasion, too. Justin's picked up some neat toys over the past few years while we've been working on this thing, so there might be some neat extras, if for no one else, then for us.

Christmas has really come together. I have one thing left to wrap, and you know, a few people on my list didn't quite get covered, which is unfortunate, but it's late enough now, I figure it's just best to wait, and make it up when just the right gift jumps out of me. I did my best, and I've really enjoyed myself this year. I've stayed busy, and I haven't gotten down, or at least as not down as I have been in the past. Ideas are percolating, and I've been reading a lot of things, and even though it isn't the same as writing something for yourself, it's been nice to help others, or just remember what polishing work is like. I think I got pretty discouraged there, and forgot that there are a lot of different parts of the process, things I love just as much as the writing. It's easy to look at it all as just... the work done after the fun part, but it's not. I'm looking forward to getting back to my own stuff, even put out some feelers to some folks, who might help with some perspective things. And right now, I'm enjoying the reading, the editing, etc.

Anyway, just wanted to chime in. Been neglecting this space. Don't see that changing until after December is over. But we'll see.

Christmas List - 2011

2011-12-12T03:57:00.007-05:00

This is the tree this year. It's pretty similar to the years past, and the picture was sort of... haphazardly take with a computer web cam, which explains the quality. It's just not really a point and shoot job when you're dragging mouse work, and separate monitor into it. Angles, and angles. Apologies.

It's sparser than last year. I didn't use as many lights, or as many beads, and that's weird for me, because I generally think a full tree is the best kind of tree, and last year I thought it was pretty sparse too. But the tree's getting kind of old, and it sags a little under too much weight, and even though I spent the whole night on it, more of that might have went to watching Red Dwarf than digging through the decorations.

Plus, I had to cannibalize some strings of lights for the lights that wound up on there. I don't think I ever realized how simple Christmas lights were until I had to pull out bulbs and take a few sets apart. The upside to this is that fixing them was not as beyond me as I expected it to be. The downside is, as with most really simple things, it's really simple to screw up the perfectly good lights too while trying to fix or replace the bad.

Still, it made me feel handy. That doesn't happen very often.

I was writing last week, this short fantasy story called "The Mouth Devours." The plan was to post it on Friday, but the honest fact is, even though it was only a couple hundred words long, I decided it wasn't really up to my standards - which, if you've seen some of the prose I've put on here is pretty low. So, I nixed it. I meant to pop in on Friday or Saturday and write... something, but I didn't really see any reason to force it if I didn't have to. And I didn't.

Things have been busy. I actually only finished my Christmas shopping today, and that was "finished" with some caveats. There was a new book to review, and I actually polished it off a little faster than usual, just because the extra income to recover from said shopping would be nice, especially with other expenses that might be coming up after the first of the year. I'm also reading a friend's manuscript for them, and I'll admit I didn't really think about doing that with all of the Holiday-related merriment, which was... terribly short-sighted of me. And odd, because I really have procrastinated myself into a crunch in a very long time.

I'm actually pretty good at controlled procrastination, so that's odd.

Justin and I hung out on Thursday night - the long Magic games have been a lot of fun, and something I've come to look forward to each week. Surprise news this week, but Justin thinks on his current schedule, we could see "Calamity Cash and the Town with No Name" finished by February. Once the pages are finished, there will be a lot of work to be done by me again, and I'll detail it all here, as usual.

Something I wanted to add... I do something like this on the blog every year, where I write a letter to Santa, asking for whatever it is I want for Christmas. I have an Amazon Wishlist I sometimes give out which is embarrassingly huge, and my guess is, given the date, anyone who was going to get me anything and knows about it probably has already has. And anyway, the more I think about it, the more I realize that, honestly, I don't really want anything.

I mean, yeah, I know everyone says that. And I'm not going to turn down some book I want, and yeah, my scarves have all seen better days, and I have a Steam Account now, if anyone's interested in getting me a game or something on the cheap or just friending me to play Spiral Knights when I eventually get to that, and a bottle of Scotch wouldn't be so... sorry, no, no, I really am kidding with all that... because this time of year, like that's not what this is about for me. I just enjoy all this, you know? The music, and the shopping, and the decorations, and all the trappings, be they self-indulgent, commercial, and obnoxious, or just quiet, modest, and stirringly heartwarming. A celebration should be both, I think. I think that is what celebrating is.

So really. I don't want anything. If you must spend money on me, make a donation to some charity. RAINN's good, not perfect, but good. Honestly, anything pro-women's issues, or some place that's gay and/or trans friendly. Anything social justice related. Hell, try out some micro-lending. Just... nothing religious, no food banks, make sure you know where and what the money's going to.

It's gloriously cold out. There keep being promises of snow. It's Christmas time. I have this marvelous girlfriend, and a, at times mercurial, yet still incredibly affectionate cat, and yeah, things happen, setbacks like the thing with the story that I was going to post on Friday, but I feel like... it's slow, but I'm getting it back. I'm writing again, and I feel comfortable in that skin, being "the writer." Specifically, being the kind of writer I am.

Mind you, my moods are about like my cat's, so this could all change spectacularly, and soon.

So I'm enjoying my Christmas specials, the decorations, all the prep, so much of it I will never see the payoff of, but just knowing that payoff is there, maybe some of what I do will brighten someone else's season, that's really enough for me.

All right. I am not so sentimental that I can't tell when things are getting kind of saccharine. So here's the thing, Santa. I just want the mail to run a little faster, so everything can get to where it needs to be on time, and I just want a little bit of this confidence to stick around after the New Year. And that's all I'm going to ask for.

Happy Holidays, everyone.

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...

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P.S. I put something like this on Facebook, but I want to put it up here, too. I'm no stranger to depression. It's very much a part of who I am, and maybe it shouldn't be, maybe it's mad that I put up with it sometime. Being tortured is quickly falling out of vogue. But all that aside, I do still find it in myself to enjoy things, enjoy things like this time of year, but I would like to say, I know it isn't always so easy.

Look, it's hard. Life is not what I'd call the most pleasant experience... most of the time, but there are bright spots, and it's easy to let all the times without them get you down - sadly, especially, when there are bright spots. I know what it's like to be celebrating something, but also feel depressed, disgusted, just generally worn down by everything. And I know that for most people, the first thing you get when you mention to someone, especially this time of year, that you're down, you're probably just going to get a nattering "Why can't you just be happy?" Anyone who thinks it's actually that simple is mad, and not nearly as sensitive as they think they are. And anyone who's said as much lately... contemplate sending a very apologetic Christmas card.

Sometimes it's not as easy as just cheering up. And it can be really hard when you can't reconcile the good with the bad. And if you're feeling like you're struggling, well... be damned with the cheer up people, and don't be turned off by suddenly more upbeat disposition. Call me, write me. Or if not me, find someone to talk to, reach out. It's hard. You might have to do it a couple of times, before you find what you need. But keep trying.

To quote myself, it takes some serious mad skills to handle it all on your own, and trust me, not having said skills is probably more healthy than not.

Take care of yourselves.

Merry Gentlemen.

2011-12-06T06:42:00.005-05:00

Christmas time. It is early yet, but I'm starting to get the feel for the season.

Stayed up all night putting up the tree. It may seem a little silly, maybe even ill-advised for someone so insomnia prone, but there's a bit of thrill to be had from the look on my grandmother's face when she wakes up to see a lit and decorated tree. Is this the fourth year I've did this, or only the third? I swear, I only remember two previous, though I have been here for one Christmas more. The blog proves to be woefully inadequate at helping me figure this out, so since I can only recall going to "all this trouble" two other times, I'm going to assume that this is my third.

Was glad to post "With Apologies to Regina Spektor, and Aaron the Moor" last week. Felt good, like I might be getting a handle on writing again, even if just in short spurts, and even if, for the most part, what I was doing was just transcribing and editing things scribbled down in the old moleskin. That process was interesting to me - I noticed again I have this habit of editing over myself, by which I mean changing things actively, as I type them up, only to find much of what I change is actually present in the next sentence - that the work was now following the direction I was wondering moments before why I didn't think to put it in. I guess by the end, it feels a lot like I'm cutting myself off at the pass, but it's not really a bad thing. I just need to be more patient, and probably not try to edit while taking things from paper to the computer. Patience is important.

I was thinking of a friend I don't see as much as I'd like to. He and I share some similarities in our outlook on things, and in reflecting on that, and wishing we hung out more, I wrote up the skeleton for a short comic. Not entirely sure what's going to come of that - but I'd like to put it into proper format in the next couple of days.

Should have posted about this earlier - but one of my awesomely talented collaborators, Ander Sarabia, and my oft-linked comic-loving compatriot Eric Esquivel, have a Kickstarter going for their next book "Thor: Unkillable Thunder Christ," a loose continuation of their "Blackest Terror" outing, which I believe is due to be released soon. They've already made their goal, and doubled it [and then some], but realize that making comics isn't cheap [even without this level of penetration and the support of a label like they have, you're liable to spend a thousand dollars or more just to get a book to print], and any extra they get not only goes to making up the deficit the first comic put them at, but also assures funding to get the third in the series made.

The holidays are a great time for giving, folks, and it's a great project to get involved with. And us creatives need to look out for each other - who knows when we might need similar help?

More soon.

With apologies to Regina Spektor, and Aaron the Moor.

2011-12-02T08:18:00.002-05:00

Matters of succession – you know, sire, these things all started with a sort of logic, a man becomes a king, takes a wife – a queen – and begets a son, and when the king dies, the son becomes king himself. And other sons and daughters, while complicating things, were sensible too, as after all, no king lives an… unaccompanied life, rather none should, and with the world as it is, other sons, other daughters, are, well, a necessary evil. Which, no, my lord, apologies, my lord, not that I’m suggesting you’re – not that I’d suggest anything of the kind, of course. Just illustrating, how something quite logical became not quite so, and thus, we can’t just think of it as such.

Though I suppose, if we could – if I could be very common for a moment, if you might humor that, and speak of these things logically, and we could consider them such again, as they were meant to be. You are, and again, sire, I mean nothing by this but what it is, but you are one in a line, and you were, let’s be generous – and truthful, my lord – set in that line as a contingency, a back-up, an “understudy” as I’ve heard the players it call it, if I may be so profane. And if allowed, while being profane, I might well point out the obvious, not to imply that you are not aware, but just for the sake of frankness that you are not the first, or second, or even third of said contingencies – you are, remarkable by the very nature of it, the thirty-second of the line.

Which is never to be taken lightly, as one thirty-seconds from the king is greater blessed than all but – yes, thirty-one others, well met, my lord. But despite that, your title will always come with its own privileges, its own rewards and responsibilities, the greatest of which, and perhaps, to some, not you sire, but perhaps to your brothers and sisters, the most burdensome, is that you, like them, have been tasked with the protection of your line, the kingdom – no, your kingdom, like your father, your king, and your country. And yes, all its citizens. Your citizens, sire. And so important it is to secure these things that even you, the thirty-second child of your father, our king, both as chosen by God, could be called, by great circumstance or terrible tragedy, to serve.

The weight of it! The consequence of king and country, that it needs not two, nor three, but thirty-two to safeguard itself. Thirty-two for the line to endure! Does anything better illustrate the importance of the throne? How you bear it, how you live with such a burden placed upon you, even with the illusion of being so many times removed – for I know you feel it as though you were first – I cannot fathom it, my lord. Yet I see you, and it, your onus, lying heavy about your brow every day.

And knowing how it weighs upon you, seeing you wear such worry on your brow – hidden so well, I might add, that only I, who humbly your lord must love so well as for you to drop your guard to – I must – no. No, I must not. To disparage your siblings – I couldn’t, though it’s just, no, sire I just wonder, for you have never said. And I, courteously, have never queried. So respectfully, I must ask, do you trust those who come before you, do you believe they grasp that? Do they know the responsibility that you so plainly see?

Apologetically, my lord – my prince, as you are the, and mine, of any of them, I must now speak honestly, tempered but honestly, and if that answer you would say is yes, that they know, that they appreciate it as much as you, why if any man but you would make such a claim I would think them a fool, if not call them such. And if sire, if you are of the mind that would say no, or even say yes with doubts, just doubts, then can you say truthfully that the order of succession should really, truly be managed just by order of conception? That men and women, even if of your own blood, who cannot, or will not – yes, who might outright refuse – understand their responsibilities do one day deserve to be placed on the throne? Superseding even someone who grasps the concept so fully, implicitly?

Which would be impudent of me to suggest, and I wouldn’t dare, of course, as it is not my place to speak of your family in such terms, and raising such questions, well that, that is the privilege of a king… and his children, I might think, but surely not one such as I. And you, you in your wisdom, so young yet, but already a man of intellect and breeding, I know what you would say of the manner, only because I know the measured, benevolent response – that when it comes to your siblings, your brothers and sisters, all of this which we speak is their right, and theirs alone. That they are your blood, and more importantly, the king’s blood, and they need to greater vindication than that.

And I know, my lord, that some, some of them you love. Others, I know of others among them that at least command your respect, your fealty. Their rank, more, their place as a part of the king’s line, of your line, rather, your family’s, demands loyalty. Protection. Submission. And the last, as thirty-two, you know much better than any of the others, and the rest, the privileges they have, which only you, if I may be so bold, have ever properly grasped as to why they are afforded to them, and to you at all.

But yet… their not grasping this, their… forgive me, shortcomings, they vex me, sire. As your servant, and as your friend, and as someone who sees you suffer stoically beneath them. And for you to see their abuses, which neither I nor anyone of my rank would – should indict them for, but rather in just recalling them, as instances – yes, that’s more proper, you’re right, these instances where they wield their power, their privilege, what you so aptly noted as their right, with no regard for the price that others must pay… do you never suppose such behavior, it threatens the line? Is not doing so, despite any other reckless disregard they commit, a danger to the line, nay the very crown and its dominion itself? For is not their very presence owed to it? And in not safe-guarding it is that not a debt that goes unpaid?

I hear the men in the square some days, criers for the church, talking about moral deaths. And how they befall families like waves upon the shore, engulfing many until the strongest among them, the rocks upon the coast, pushes back against the tide, and send the wanton roil back into the ocean. Moral deaths threaten them, your brothers and sisters, and I see from your face, you think perhaps they have befallen a few, maybe more. And you worry, my prince, I see it on your brow again, because you allow me to, I’m sure, wondering who the burden to be the strongest is upon now– who among them can hold the line, and push back to assure it perseveres, no matter the cost?

I am sorry for my forthrightness, but we both know you worry it is you. I tell you my lord, it is no cause for concern, for there are no worries in that which you already know. And you, I promise, even as the thirty-second child, indeed perhaps because of that, have always remembered what too many have forgotten – that the burden is yours, that is has always been yours, just as it has always been theirs. And no matter their actions, their dalliances, their character, you have never wavered. You are prepared if called upon to serve in succession, even when, if any, then you, could be lax.

No sire, again I say none of this lightly, though nor do I dare suggest treason. Some things are just not for me to say. You are my lord, more than even my friend, and though my love for you is great, I know my life rests totally in your hands, and I would take no such risk for a lesser a man. I only wonder – and worry, I worry too, sire, what the responsible, what the logical thing is to do? We seem to agree that the throne is in peril, and there’s no question it demands protecting, but who is its true protector? Even you, with your great knowledge of this burden, and your willingness to bear such responsibility, feel it is not a prince’s place. And I in my impudence, I can barely stifle myself to ask – should not these concerns fall to the King? Does not the shield beneath the swords we have both been raised under, does it not proclaim the King will guard his kingdom, the crown, his line? Is that not why the King keeps the line? And those swords, do they not mean that said protection must come from eliminating threats, be they man, or heretic, or even enemies that come from within?

Even if… they’re of the King’s own blood?

You know well, my lord, you know why no one speaks of you as thirty-three, that if one of those who precede you steps up to claim the throne before the King’s death – may he live long, of course – there would be no exile, no mercy on that day. They would be dealt with, and swiftly, as sure as the hangman would have a new set of boots on that day. For threats against the throne, the King must deal with summarily, be they from a single man, or ten thousand on the battlefield. And you sire, that is why you are here, and by your grace why I am blessed to speak with you, to safeguard something worthy of striking down ten thousand men, and if so called for, to strike down ten thousand more. And I know, you say, ten thousand, nay twenty, is but a small price to protect your line.

And you would be right to ask, if you dared to ask - just what is thirty-one more?

Quick note.

2011-11-28T23:24:00.004-05:00

Still alive, still here. Not writing nearly enough.

Finished a book review today, way behind on something I promised I'd look at for a friend. Plus reading for myself, and I hope another couple books to review because getting paid is rad, plus reading for myself, plus... all kinds of other things. I've got a ton of non-writing stuff to do, and hey, you know what I'd really like to do? Write. That'd be awesome. Trying to dig myself out of this hole, and I imagine I'm failing at it spectacularly. But then again, I'm imagining the hole too, so...

I want to take the opportunity to thank everyone who weighed in on my previous post. I was actually hoping in my absence, some more responses would trickle in, and I got a couple of emails too. I might try and break up the broad strokes, and just have a single post with the best stuff in it, to stick in the sidebar for easy access. I appreciate everyone weighing in - the response was about what I expected, but not who I expected it from, mostly. And it's always nice to know who's out there, watching.

If you're reading this now, and would still like to add something, or respond to something someone else has said, then feel free. I'm... sticking to my story that I said my piece, so I won't be adding much myself, unless, I don't know, the Metatron appears to me with something that needs put out there.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Mine was beyond excellent, great food, the best company, Margaritas, and "The Muppets" and so many other good things. I usually do a fairly maudlin "what I'm thankful for" post, but hey, this year, I just unplugged from the internet and enjoyed myself. Even I can't be tortured all the time. It's exhausting.

And lately, not as productive as normal. But the fruit's still there, just gotta find another way to get the juice.

Begs the question.

2011-11-14T00:42:00.004-05:00

I want to know what you think [I fear this is going to wind up looking pathetic].

I don't have many rules here on the blog, but one of things I've said from the beginning is that it's my space, and I naturally have the time, so I'm always going to have the last word. Just one of those things I can exert some measure of control over, and it helps me feel comfortable here. Plus on the rare occasions crazies show up, I don't feel bad about moderating.

But here's a rare occasion - chance for anyone reading to chime in without me butting in, because I'm going to get my two cents in right off.

My last post I talked about struggling with some of my ideas that didn't really feel like they had any soul to me - just self-indulgent stuff, stuff without a reason, a message, or anything personal behind it. And if that is even self-indulgent, or if that's just fun.

Post prompted this comment from my good friend John [that's John Wiswell of "The Bathroom Monologues"], fresh off writing his novel, which I think deserves highlighted:

"The question of whether something is worthwhile if it's just self-indulgent will probably last another age, until we're all digital and things are decided by sub-protocols for us. But for now perhaps we can jerry-rig a second question onto it: is it okay to do something self-indulgent if you wouldn't do anything else with the time otherwise? Might be better to finish your own Hobo With A Shotgun by the end of the year rather than end the year with nothing finished. It's a conundrum that paralyzed me for a long time."

Now, first, let me just say "Hobo With A Shotgun" was excellent, and I'm sure John meant nothing by that comparison. Second, I personally don't have a ready answer to this question, and even John seems to only be leaning in a certain direction with his statement. About all I do feel comfortable saying on the subject, and I feel like I can say this quite adamantly, is that one of the reasons I write is to write things that I would want to read. And if I'm being perfectly honest with myself, I really just have no interest in reading heartless, soulless stories right now, and the thought of writing more of those, adding to the... pile, which I feel is kind of a fitting word, doesn't exactly spur me forward.

But that's all I've got. So, look, I know I don't have loads of traffic, but what I do have is fairly steady, and I'm just asking that if you read this post, no matter how you come to it, that you tell me what you think about the question. Especially if you're a writer, or an artist, but if you're not, if you're just a consumer of these kinds of things, I'd still like to hear your feelings, hypothetical, or actual, or otherwise. Feel free to comment anonymously. Feel free to write a lot, or a little. Just... chime in. I'd like to know what people think.

And make sure you visit "The Bathroom Monologues" in thanks to John, for asking the tough questions, or if you just want to read something good.

Laura Prepon is a Scientologist. And then it gets worse.

2011-11-07T23:21:00.003-05:00

Haven't done a lot of work in the past couple days. Hence the long lull between posts.

I've actually kind of been sleeping like a normal person lately, a not uncommon occurrence when you think that the usual "up-all-night/sleep-all-day" lifestyle does occasionally lend to catch-up days where you find yourself crashing hard and waking up at seven or eight o'clock in the morning. Once you're awake at that time of day, it's kind of... difficult to not start dozing off around nine. Personally, the whole experience is a bit of a miserable one as far as I'm concerned, the morning not particularly being my friend, what with the nausea and the crabbiness [yes, yes, how can I tell?], and the weird sensitivity to light, sound I have anytime I stick my head out the door before ten o'clock.

Which, I guess is fine. I stick to my dark little cave of a room for the opening hours of the day, and that's not so bad because the cat is still settling in, and I figure as much time as I can take, bonding with him, that's good. I don't have a lot of experience with older pets, most of mine started as puppies or kittens or whatever you call baby hamsters, so this is all kind of new, and I don't really expect to change any of his habits at this point, I just sort of want him... comfortable here, and comfortable with me, and I want to be comfortable with him too. I have always been a coward at heart, and would not put it past myself to become gun shy about interacting with a creature who was physically smaller than me.

I've done a little writing. Had an idea for a comic that I wrote the opener too. I like writing openers, beginnings, even though a lot of mine look the same, there's something fun about carving out the world, or the scene, or trying to figure out how you're going to introduce everything. Halloween must have hit me, because this was kind of a horror-themed thing, and I got a couple pages out of it. And I think I could actually do all of it, but I'm just...

I mean, part of it is just the general hang-up I've talked about a lot here. And the other part is, since college, well since a certain point in college, I've kind of wanted everything I do to have some sort of message, or personal oomph behind it. I feel like it's important to have something to say, something that's a part of myself, even if it's just a little something in a much bigger something that doesn't have anything to do with that. And that doesn't necessarily mean that whatever I'm doing is about me, just that there's some bit of something personal in it. It probably sounds ridiculous, but that's the sort of thing that tends to separate my work from more mindless, Tarantino-esque rip-off pulp.

I don't know. It's that age-old question if something is worthwhile if it's self-indulgent, or just for fun. There will be tons of people who say it is, and there will be tons who say it isn't, and there will be a few - a blessed few - who don't think of it at all, and are probably better for it. And for their sake, I wouldn't bring it up at all, but those people probably also stopped reading a couple paragraphs ago when my hand-wringing started.

Anyway. I'm mid-book review, and I have more waiting-room intensive errands this week than usual, so who knows what kind of work could get done. Then again, I was also supposed to be sorting out some of the clutter in my life. Decisions, decisions. Have to wait and see.

Best.

Obscenely busy week. In its way.

2011-10-30T13:52:00.007-04:00

Actually, that's only half true. I think at least one day was left solely to dicking around.

No progress has been made on the clutter, and I have failed - failed! - to type up that thing I said might show up... day before yesterday. I am remarkably ashamed of myself, almost as much as I am unmotivated. But if you pile on the unmotivated shame, it I think general pity and self-doubt win the day.

Or as the Randall Nichols status quo is concerned: "God's in his heaven, all's right with the world."

This week has been all about the nut orders - I may have mentioned this before, but my grandmother sells bulk nuts seasonally - peanuts, cashews, mixed nuts, and various other dry goods, your gummy bears, Bridge Mix, granola, lots of other stuff covered in chocolate. The sort of things you might have sold for fund-raising in school, but she actually turns a small profit on it, and has a pretty dedicated clientèle. Dedicated enough that despite claiming each year was her last, she still manages to clear about the same number of orders.

And all told, I don't mind the work. There's something about playing the collection agent and the delivery boy, there's something... I wouldn't call it satisfying, but it's not like other work I've done. It's like the book reviews - it's tolerable, sometimes even enjoyable. Strange, and not how I typically think of work. But I can't hate everything, I guess, right?

I also have a cat, now. A three year old rescue, named Loki. Well, it was just "Ki" but that was because it was the only sound he'd respond to [I'm guessing because of "kitty"], but a one syllable pet name, that just can't stand. He's a long hair, black and gray... a real sweetheart, though a little jittery, as you'd expect for cat who has been uprooted and kept at a vet's around dogs for so long. It's only day four with him, but I think he's settling in well.

It's weird. I have... a part time job [nothing extravagant, or even enough of anything to hold anything in the way of finances up], a cat, a new, amazing woman in my life. Of course, there are other things that can improve, and will. Even though I'd rather not, I'm going to try and pick up driving this fall, and even though I'm not putting a lot of money back, I'm holding at a comfortable place, for the first time in my life. Not "oh god, oh god, I need an operation or I'm gonna die" comfortable, but... ah, I don't worry about it quite like I did. And yeah, I really wish that I could catch up on some of these correspondences that I've fallen so far behind on, and I want to thank everyone who has written, who has been in touch, and who hasn't been able to get a hold of me. I haven't forgotten any of them, and they're all amazing, and writing, talking to them, it makes everything better, but I'm just playing catch up. I wish I had more time, too, to maybe get a little more involved in the Occupy movement - if, for no other reason, than to sit and talk with some of the people, students, ex-students, non-students, workers, citizens, consumers, activists - all thinkers, in their way, in different ways. Missing that bothers me. But all of that stuff, all of that stuff that I feel like I'm missing, or isn't there, I feel like it will be. If it can be. I feel confident in that.

About all that's left is the writing. I just... dammit, I'm just not getting the work out like I want to. And I don't know if it's just because there's been other stuff to do, or if I just haven't had it there. I've worked on stuff, but not every day. The consistency, the regularity, the output... it's just not there right now. I'm just frustrated, and tired. Maybe there's something I'm missing, or maybe I'm still fighting my rut. I don't know.

More's the pressure. That I'm at that age that I'm supposed to be doing everything. Impressing everyone, or at least anyone I can get to look at me. Maybe not success, but inklings, indicators, support systems. I might be inventing all this. Writers hit their strides, become big in their 30s, 40s, 50s mostly. Right? Just seems like all my heroes, were doing... not their best work, but some of their most interesting now, at my age.

I should just, you know, kick into gear, right? Stop bitching, and just do it. There's really no excuse, not even the usual "no inspiration" - I have literally pages of work, handwritten, just needing transcribed, and edited. We're talking outlines, short-stories, complete comic scripts, short scenes... that would be enough to get me working again.

Lighter note. Pictures went up of my kid brother's graduation at Ft. Benning. Occurs to me we never got one with just the two of us. Bummer, about that. But these two, with our mom, they're quite good, and something small gave me a chuckle.

Unseasonably brisk, that day. So, here we are, and then...

We pass dour expressions and slight looks of disgust like most brothers pass footballs. I guess some people would see the switch as a negative, but it made me, strangely enough, happy. It's... remarkably easy to forget our similarities, and there's something about just... having a nice reminder that we may not share fathers, but we still share something.

When it comes to family, it's always complicated. But I hope no one would begrudge me this.

Best.

Clutter.

2011-10-24T08:40:00.004-04:00

As expected, I crashed pretty hard after my "trip." Slept something like... 18 hours, I guess.

The graduation was good... I find myself more and more impressed with my kid brother each day. I don't think I'll go into it here, but there are things, maybe things I only worry about because I'm a deluded, communist hippie, but there are things about the military that worry me, even more than the risk he was undertaking. I'm not really worried about those things now.

The ceremony was nice - hard to really describe, a bit like a football game half-time show high school, except everyone on the field had the same haircut, and there was live artillery. Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if that described someone's high school experience. Still, it was fun. It all felt fairly sophisticated, and epic. Naturally, Aaron was very busy during this time, and since I road along with mom and her boyfriend, I spent a lot of the three days by myself - maybe not physically by myself, but definitely a lot of stuff was going on solely in my own head.

Despite the extra time, I didn't get to read as much as I wanted, nor was there any great wellspring of writing done. Came up with another little prose thing that I might try and have ready by Friday. It is a tough squeeze - I have a book review deadline on Wednesday, and then... I have yet another book already in hand, though I believe I have until around the 15th to get it finished. Maybe not Friday with that prose piece. But soon.

Also saw a couple movies while I was gone. Skipped out on Hugh Jackman and giant fighting robots twice, to see "Moneyball" and "50/50." Moneyball was a no brainer for me - yes, I'm far from any kind of sports fan, but this thing is a sports movie penned [at least in part] by Aaron Sorkin. And yeah, I, who knows next to nothing about sports, was a pretty big fan of Sports Night at the end of the 90s [I think most people who liked that show weren't that into sports, actually], so I was pretty anxious to get Sports Night guy back writing about sports again. And you know, I think also I've sort of been hung up, since my Bennington days, since the Red Sox/Yankees arguments, about just how money plays into what looks to me to be a competitive sport, where skill and such should be the major thing. I don't think I ever really was able to draw a line to what the extra greenbacks some teams got meant for those teams, or even that winning a game could have anything to do with the size of your wallet at all, until I started hearing about rich teams buying all the good players, and even then... Oy. It all seems fairly obvious now, and I suppose it seemed fairly obvious then, but now I just feel like I have a grasp on it.

I dig teaching through drama. It's about all I've got. Ending of the movie has been surprisingly haunting to me as well. Weird way to go out, and one of those cases where one flick had a lot more going on in it that it's advertised as having. Maybe as it can handle having. Would need to see it again. Still, enjoyed it. Rarely do I get to see these things as they come out. And I like Jonah Hill.

"50/50" I liked too. Lot of trepidation going into that, I think getting to scope Rotten Tomatoes before deciding helped a lot [actually, both things I saw were the only chart grossers that were in the 90+ place]. Couple of parts were far from perfect, but I've always dug the adult comedy genre - the "Punch Drunk Love" types, uh... "Bandits" springs to mind. "A Serious Man." We're talking a wide array here. Stuff that's funny, but you might not be laughing out loud the entire time. Maybe not at all, but that doesn't mean it's not funny [It's weird that we have designated only certain actions as appropriate indications as to how we feel]. I don't know, I also have a lot of respect for comedies who dive in and do drama. You see that a lot the other way around, a drama throwing you some comedy, but this is a different way in. Levitt has a bright future, still... weird, thinking how long I've actually been watching him, and Anna Kendrick - I just find something about her to be charming. Also, something about her, surprises me she gets work. I am not sure why on either of those. Rogen, meanwhile, is just still damn good at what he does. I think over-saturation is making people a little sick of the guy, but I think just taken work to work, he's actually pretty impressive.

Plus, some stuff in it just hit kind of close to home. I was a little surprised.

Still, came out with some of the same questions, mostly why there isn't a market of 20-something movies with female leads, more women roles, more women cast. Certainly if there are omega males, there must be omega females. I feel sure of that.

Anyway. Cancer comedy. Can be done. And I'm glad for that.

I read a neat comic book called "That Salty Air." From Top Shelf, by Tim Sievert, would recommend it, especially if you just enjoy marveling at art work. Not that the story isn't there, it very much is, there's just some exceptional layouts, paneling, stunning art, surprising because from the style you expect it to be sort of minimalistic.

My life has felt very cluttered lately. Might need to do some cleaning... even Twitter, Facebook, my blog roll and RSS, it all just seems awful and cramped and too much. Same with the room, same with... most things. I should probably look to that soon.

I feel weird, bad for not talking more about the graduation. My priorities always seem askew. Just proud - probably not in a way I could make anyone understand, probably not like those mothers, or my mother, or anyone else there that day. Well, not anyone else. And the only thing else I can think to add is that it was fucking cold in Georgia, and I didn't bring a proper coat, so I couldn't enjoy it nearly as much as I wanted to. I gotta start trusting myself more, so as to avoid things like three days spent in a suit jacket.

To the grad from Bennington, and his brother, the grad from Ft. Benning.

Out 'till Friday

2011-10-19T07:25:00.004-04:00

Writing this in a bit of a rush.

I'll be gone until late Friday night, and you might well hear from me when I get in then, or I could be so wiped out from the trip that you may not see dazzling words about other words until several days after then. My kid brother [can't say little anymore] Aaron is graduating from boot camp at Ft. Benning, so I'm taking a long, promised-myself-I'd-never-take-a-car-anywhere-under-these-conditions long, 10 hour trip to see him off. It's an ordeal, but like most ordeals, it is well worth it to be there for his big day. Or perhaps just the start of his big days.

So here I am, but only momentarily, and then off I go. For now, trying to work out some final packing things, scratching my head over why a suitcase isn't made to hold suit without wrinkling it. Someone look to that for me, if you would.

I will probably be sans internet for the next three days. If for some reason you need to reach me, text messages and my phone number will serve you the best, and if that's not information you're privy to, and Direct Message on Twitter with some way I can get in contact with you will go straight to my phone. I will miss you all.

Best.

Warren Ellis and good readin'.

2011-10-13T02:23:00.003-04:00

So, Warren Ellis put this up on his blog, and I just think it really deserves a read if you care about comics, print, digital, web or serialized, or otherwise:

"The Broadcast of Comics."

Sometimes you just need to hear things, or maybe some things just sound enough like good news, to inspire just a little bit of hope. And I've been so... frustrated lately, with my own work, mostly, that this just hit me right, hit me at a good time. I feel so much like web comics are treated as a passing fad, and in weird sort of way it was actually the for-free comics on the internet that got me through the doldrums of my last year of high school more than their paper-based alternatives. And while I won't claim to be as... forward thinking as Ellis is about these things, but I do think part of my weird... stand-offishness when it comes to digital comics might have root in some of the things Ellis talks about.

But that can't, of course, be all. I'm just not sure, and I keep reading it, and thinking about it. I don't know.

Justin and I talked recently. As you know, we've been on a long adventure with our 52 page comic book "Calamity Cash and the Town with No Name." To speak for Justin as much as I'm comfortable doing, I feel like working on the book has been a pretty present thing in his really busy life, and yet in our weekly get-together he said he was looking realistically at reaching the end soon. That is a strange thought, that it might actually be finished soon, and what the world will look like without it as a finished project seems kind of mystifying to me, as I imagine it must to Justin. The honest fact is, sometimes comics happen fast, and sometimes they don't, and I don't feel like a lot of excuses are necessary.

A lot has happened over the past couple years, and I find myself wondering what would have happened had we taken the web comic approach. I'm fairly sure Justin wouldn't have cared for the idea, but I wonder if a page going up on the web, for free, even intermittently over that time, might have generated some interest in the thing we'll finally end up printing. Thinking about it, that might not have been the best idea for a project like this one - especially as Justin has looked at so much of the work as practice, and especially since so much of that script was such a mess [and I am still glad I got to take a second run at the last half].

I suppose it would depend on who I'm collaborating with, but I think if I was going to do anything quite so long with someone, I might at least float the idea of putting it up free, a page at a time, on the internet. I wouldn't be disappointed if whoever I'm working with turned this down, I just can't help but wonder, as an experiment, if that might be workable, and interesting for people. I think the general wisdom with web comics is that two years is about how long it takes to get rudimentary exposure [thanks Cheri], barring some amazing act of god or Penny Arcade. So for a longer piece, even if it was something you were just going to take down once you committed to actually selling it - starting as a web comic might be an interesting tactic.

There are also many intangibles. The mind boggles.

I have been writing a little bit, playing with a character from VHS Generation, the short comic Ander Sarabia and I are going to do. But my output is still not consistent, and I already have several book reviews I need to get through. I just... really want to get back to creating, to writing creative things, and telling stories, and do so with some regularity. I am unsure how to whip myself into shape, and I still feel, physically, run down from these allergies. Still, I remember when that wouldn't stop me, not even slightly slow me down. I know it's not age, so it must be laziness. And I kind of find this unacceptable of me.

Speaking of Ander, the Blackest Terror book he's working on with the talented Eric Esquivel for Moonstone continues to get press, excitingly enough on Newsarama this time, where Eric gave an interview about the project and the string of other comics to follow it. It's very exciting - I always looked at being interviewed for anything as a sign that you'd really made it [after all, I grew up in Wizard's heyday], and I just wanted to give it a proper plug, as it's not too late to order a copy at your local comic shop.

While I'm plugging things, oft-linked friend John Wiswell has two of his best - "Sologamous" and "Kill Mommy" on Untied Shoelaces with audio readings added to them. [Also on the Randall Nichols list of signs that you've really made it is having someone else read your work aloud, something that to me screams the same thing that having your work read aloud in class meant in our pre-teen years - that you've done something truly exceptional.] What's great is, if you've been unwilling to try out John's Bathroom Monologues out of fear that driving while reading might cause you to smear your lipstick or spill piping hot Egg McMuffin all over yourself, you can now just download the audio to your mobile device. No excuse now.

Best.

With apologies to Chris Rock. And everyone else.

2011-10-07T18:47:00.007-04:00

"Look, it was the last, best advice most people got in the 1990s, and I'm just saying that's not the kind of thing you tack a last minute addendum onto. It's a shame, but something like that, it can lessen it's impact, make it hard to reach out to the young people, the folks who really needed to hear it.

But yeah, I'll concede, it's not that there's never, ever been any sex in the champagne room. I mean, it's a strip club, there are, well, strippers, and most of the guys there are customers, yeah, but that's not everyone, that neglects a whole cross-section like the DJ, the bartenders, the bouncers... I mean, just the bouncers - two guys, working side-by-side, probably for years, in a keyed up, often violent position. And they've got to be there for each other - they got to have each other's backs. It's Spartan stuff.

So no question, after closing, maybe they're back there, sweeping divorce dust off of the couch. And it's couch, so naturally, they're moving cushions, looking for spare change - job doesn't pay that well - and they brush hands. It's a little surprising, so to break the tension one compliments the other on his AC/DC shirt, he in turn asks how he gets such straight hems when he cuts off the sleeves, and... well, the next thing you know, you have two handle bar mustaches pressed up against each other, and all sorts of new doors opening."

Sustainable consistency. Or something.

2011-10-05T05:30:00.002-04:00

Tuesday was a shockingly productive day for writing. Probably one of my most since getting back into the swing of things.

Spent several hours with a new screenplay [re: "Dodged a Bullet]. Wound up with a five page opener that's pretty solid if you don't look at it too hard, and a six to ten page conversation that I actually worked out when I supposedly on "a break" from writing. The concept is one I've wanted to tackle for a long time, and I actually talked about it once here, but I'm going to avoid mentioning it directly because I don't want what happened last time to happen again, and end up having to police some proxy-using crazy who thinks he's going to use wingnut theories to one-up me on my own blog.

Anyway. I'm pleased with that kind of page count for a day's worth of work. Now all I really need to strive for is a little more consistency. With fall starting, and it cooling off, I am feeling a little more clear headed, but perhaps more important than that particular real or imagined impediment, is that I've been trying to get out more, get some pavement under my feet, just walk, even if that means I have to squeeze in said walk at the inopportune times. In the half of week since I've started again, I've had a couple reminders as to why I stopped in the first place - a discarded diaper was... less than pleasant, in a check-to-see-if-there's-an-indian-crying sort of way, and then there was the woman who just... stood and stared. If we're going through the greatest hits of bad walks, I expect to either be verbally accosted or run over tomorrow.

Courage.

Anyway, the point is, today was awesome, but I'd like to get to a place where I crank out five pages a day, or even less than that, as long as I was regularly producing the same amount. I want something... not structured, but regular, sustainable. I enjoy, and won't lie, prefer spring-writing like I'm more prone to, but the downside is, when I'm not in the sprint, I feel bad that I'm not working on something. That I'm creating something. I forgot how even the exercises I was doing before was giving me that a little bit - and it was helping fight a lot of discouragement I could stir up in myself.

I also worked on the bible for my little fantasy story today, found a neat idea for the third act, I think. Couple pages, hand written. I've been surprised that I haven't been getting hand cramps like I used to.

Catching up on email too, slowly but sure. And I voted. Always sad to me they don't give out stickers or something for that - democracy as we do it now really isn't that different from giving blood, is it? And I have something short I might post Friday, if I don't chicken out. We'll see.

Still fighting this sinus infection. Will be glad to get it behind me.

Find someone to carry you.

2011-10-02T07:29:00.003-04:00

Haven't been feeling well. Fighting a sinus infection, trying to get my rest. "Trying" being the key word.

Bulk of this weekend has actually went to fixing my grandmother computer. The machine's nothing particularly special, a Dell 2400, really an out of the box budget model whichever way you slice it [not unlike my current laptop], that's been floating somewhere between needing a back to factory settings reformat/restart or just a merciful bullet to the brain. Purchased in '04 or '05, it's probably shouldn't be as shocking to me as it that the thing still runs - especially since the only hard workout I can even think of it having was my short MAME-fueled King of Fighters/Samurai Showdown obsession. Still, I'm not used to seeing computers last this long, especially with only the nominal upkeep I've ever bothered to get it.

Which in retrospect was kind of shitty of me. For a short time that 2400 was my go-to computer, in that particularly uncertain period between my Toshiba Satellite dying and selling the house so I could buy this winner I'm writing this on today. As personal milestones go, I had quite a few on that particular machine, from starting this blog, to finishing "Unfilmable," to even doing the bulk of "Trendsetter," not mention a bunch of smaller, probably to most people less noteworthy things, such as the "Before Hulu was Awful" "Death Note" marathons, or getting started on "Breaking Bad" [thanks, Justin]. Sitting at that computer I read a script by my friend Glen, setting up years of future "I knew him when..." stories. It was there that I finally got back in touch with Lex, and it was there that I finally, actually got to talk to her at length - one of those rare instances where a missed opportunity to get to know someone wasn't. Perched on that air-filled office chair in front of that monster of a monitor, I dissected so many things, from "The Dark Knight," to how I spent and organized my days, to how I was treating and taking care of myself, while in the midst of some pretty serious heartbreak.

And though I was partly joking before, it really was quite shameful that I let the computer deteriorate into such unusable shape, especially since it isn't even there for me, really - it's my grandmother's, it's what she plays games on, what she checks her email on. And with a little bit of regular attention and care, there's no reason it can't keep doing that. Selfish of me to let that go to hell like I did.

And as with anything put off far too long, "fixing" it wound up being quite the ordeal. How much of that was actually my fault is up for debate, of course - yes, I probably should have read up on the model and noticed that it was going to give me a bit of a run-around, what with it's notable [though not universal] penchant for not loading all its necessary drivers on the first installation, but that doesn't change the headache of its backup disk being pre-Service Pack 2. Thankfully, my new external hard drive, which was so perfect for backing up what little was on the computer in the first place, was just as perfect for downloading all the necessary BIOS, drivers, and updates that were needed. Especially since accessing the internet on its own was nearly the last thing the it wanted to do.

Actually, it's quite surprising how smoothly it runs now, even with limited memory and hard drive space. I'm really thankful for free virus-scouting programs like avast! and Ad-aware, and less memory-intensive browsers like Google Chrome, and hell, compared to IE, even Firefox, which make running an older machine feel a lot more do-able. The best part, of course, is that while digging through piles and piles of unorganized CD-ROMs for the reboot, I was also able to find the discs for the weird third party games that my grandmother has come to love so well over the years.

I honestly think if I hadn't found those, I would have been better off just shooting it.

Still. It felt odd to be in front of that computer again. Sense memory, the sounds, the texture of the mouse and keyboard and chair, even the smell [all right, I might be off my nut, but I swear when they get going, those old box monitors have a smell] made it feel like it hadn't been that long. Certainly not like it had been 3 years.

...huh. I guess Wednesday was the 26. Weird.

I guess we shared lots of sleepless nights back then. Giving it one more seemed like the least I could do.

And for the Mojo Wire - here's to the end of the first three years.

That one where I need to work more.

2011-09-26T02:59:00.005-04:00

Lost some time this week. Got a couple hours of writing in on Wednesday, Thursday morning, but I had plans Thursday night that went until dawn, and a full day of things scheduled, not my things, until... five or six in the evening on Friday. After that, I pretty much passed out. Saturday was pretty full too, again with not my stuff, and though I thought I might get some work in that night, I opted to catch up with a friend instead.

I got my business cards in the mail during all this. Nothing special, just bare bones, Vistaprint special kind of things, but I've needed some forever, and too often have wound up jotting a bunch of contact information down on whatever was handy, which does not scream professionalism. I was pleased with the way my cards turned out, despite their simplicity, and my only real complaint was that the font was a little smaller than it appeared on the preview. It's readable though, and that's pretty much all that matters - of course, now that I have them, I imagine I won't be any place where I can make use of them anytime soon.

Haven't worked on anything too noteworthy in the past week. Mostly just toying with some memoir stuff, though I'm still not sure to what end. High school, early college have been on my mind a lot, lot of people I haven't seen anywhere other than Facebook cropping up in my dreams. I actually wrote a lot in high school, even though my heavy-handed poetry didn't always make it clear what I was writing about, so it's not hard to dig up a lot of old impressions of people, stories about them. I mean, yeah, some of the stuff about me is pretty mortifying, but it's still more palatable than ten minutes of "Glee."

Had an interesting conversation with a friend about how I use sex in the things I write. The funny thing, or maybe funny isn't the right word, is how often anything sexual I put in my stuff is either transactional, or tied in some way to death. Or some combination of both. I don't think there's much to say about the former - I feel like in those cases, what I'm doing is fairly straightforward. The latter is kind of embarrassing to me, I guess, not just because of any necrophilia jokes it might make way for. I think with sex and death, what I most commonly think of is that whole "after a funeral, the most common thing for people to do is go home and fuck" the idea being, I think, that it's some middle finger to death, by going out and doing that one thing that seems to prove that we're so alive. And I think there's validity to that, but I also think it's a bit of a cop-out to say it's all just some kind of "life affirmation bullshit," as my convo partner so succinctly put it. It also implies an order too, death, then sex, though I guess without sex we could have never gotten to the death part.

It's like moving two pieces of furniture around in the room. Trying to figure where they look just right.

I have a lot of email to catch up on. It feels a little ridiculous that I let that of all things get out of hand.

I also didn't have a book to work on reviewing last week. New one now. I don't like not having one in the queue - it seems like I get them fairly regularly, until I start talking about getting them fairly regularly.

Mm. Superstition.

"We are unfashioned creatures..."

2011-09-20T04:17:00.008-04:00

Spent today trying to catch this one particular moment in time. Nailing down a single memory is... difficult, actually, I'd call it much harder than putting together a whole series of things that happen to you, because that's more straightforward narrative, and it's easier to fill in the gaps when you're not getting something quite right. Creative license is the embalming fluid of memoir and history.

God, if I was fifteen, that would sound so deep.

Funny thing is, this little bit of prose I keep toying with was just an exercise, something I just wanted to see if I could put together. I call it "writing as portrait" when you try to capture a single moment, or an aspect of someone. Usually it only takes a sentence or two - I have a couple of pages of "self-portraits" here and there, tucked away in moleskins, on the backs of restaurant place mats. Of course, looking at yourself is a lot easier, and I try to push, do the same with friends, enemies, my heroes. It... varies in success. Occasionally you might end up with something that would really flatter someone, or really offend them. I don't trot them out much.

Trying to do one of these for a particular moment in time felt a little more ambitious, but I got stuck on it. Not that I couldn't do it, just that I couldn't let it go, and just when I get satisfied, I bounce back to it. I've hit three or four people today with the "Hold on...one second..." and then manic typing or scribbling. It's obnoxious, and I may wake up tomorrow and not care at all. Today, though...

I might post it here. It depends on whether or not I think the person who its about would see it. That can end badly. But I can't imagine what else I'd be able to do with it.

Other stuff. Did some work on "Cherry Stone." I was looking at someone else's project recently, a comic they were working on and asked me to give some impressions, crit on, and they lamented how poorly most monologue and narration was in comics these days. They were absolutely right, of course, and in most cases heavy narration in comics is clunky, exposition-centered garbage, to be avoided at all costs if possible. So, naturally, when I started toying with my own scripts again, I wound up adding to the narration. It's just my way.

I partly blame Kieron Gillen's and Jamie McKelvie's Phonogram - I've been reading both "Rue Britannia" and "The Singles Club" lately, more poring over them actually, and they really are some of the best comics I've ever read. Gillen's narration in them is incredibly infectious, and both books, though "The Singles Club" especially, are exactly the kind of comics that got me excited about writing for comics in first place, and sort of represent the... timbre of what I've always wanted to do, add to, in the medium. They're great. Consider buying them, if you haven't read them. Cannot recommend both works enough. They're my new favorites, for sure.

Anyway. This is all stuff that if I decide I hate, or is unnecessary, I can easily cut [some would argue that's enough reason to do away with it]. Characters talking to themselves in their own heads is dangerous territory, that can quickly become tedious or masturbatory if not careful. But right now I'm just trying things out.

Wrote several of the flashback scenes for "Nerd Love" too. Threw them all out. I kept slipping, and indulging sensationalism. It's not that kind of script, and I really want to keep everything that has happened very much rooted in the real world. In "I don't miss the green" that was easy - I could fall back n pop culture, and brands, and other things to anchor me to the real world. But I never really had to show the real world in that, just suggest it. Things during the flashbacks in "Nerd Love" have to be a bit more mundane, so the stuff balancing it will really drive home what has and hasn't changed.

I think this is the first time since my self-imposed hiatus that I've tossed a significant chunk of work out. Writing everyday and then chucking the bulk of it was a pretty standard habit for me once upon a time, and I have mixed feelings about getting back into that. The practice was great, the repetition and structure were helpful, but it's hard to start deleting stuff again with my last creative dry spell still so fresh in my mind.

Let's start at the end, and work our way back.

2011-09-14T09:15:00.003-04:00

Sunday and Monday I got a bit sidetracked with things. No big.

Yesterday I spent a little more than three hours working on "Nerd Love." I'm having trouble feeling accomplished about that, for a bunch of reasons. The first, most obvious is that working on "Nerd Love" in any real way, and it being a project with so little done on it, feels cheap to me, when I have things almost finished, and possibly could have gotten done in three hours. I can never tell, in those instances, if I'm being cowardly, or just following my muse. I'll also add that I'm still a little shaken by the "Dia de la Vida" incident - I'm used to writing things, and thinking they suck, and then them turning out to actually suck all the time - I'm not used to writing something, thinking it's good, enjoying working on it, and then coming back to it and finding it a fumbling mess. It's just not happened to me very often. Very disconcerting, so I'll probably take a look at what I did on "Nerd Love" today or tomorrow, and hope that its as good as I remember it being.

There are other reasons, but those seem like the two big ones right now. If something more pressing comes up, I'll probably come back and write about it later.

"Nerd Love" is a weird project for me - one of those stories that the ending came first. I'm always worried that anytime I have an ending in mind right off the bat, one that seems so important to the entire story, that the story itself is in real danger of becoming a one-note joke - which I should preface, I don't mean in a funny way. And I think that's a realistic worry, because the good writer who starts at the end and works back is always going to be wondering if his ending has been earned. This isn't a bad thing to worry about, it's an important thing to worry about, because even if you're not starting with an ending and working towards it [though I guess we all, more or less, work towards the endings], making sure you earn everything you get by the last scene, chapter, panel, or whatever you prefer to call it is so damn important.

I also think - and I want to stress this is just me - that the ending of story is not as important as it's sometimes made out to be. Don't get me wrong, if you have the ability, the chance, to write an impressive ending to a story, then you should, and you should make sure it satisfies in every way humanly possible. But the old saying about the journey being the most important part isn't total bullshit, and often times a non-ending ending can say as much as an ending wrapped up in a nice, neat looking package. The Cohen Brothers, for instance, have a real knack for this - so much so that I'm starting to believe non-endings really are, themselves, proper endings when done well.

And I suffer from what I call a... moralistic leaning. I'm a big fan of cautionary tales, morality tales [you know, things where you find out the morals of the story], tales that sometimes impart a slightly heavy-handed message to make a point. I've been working on that, because I'm not sure it's a very worthwhile endeavor [I go back and forth on this - I don't think it's particularly artful or elegant, but I'm not sure if that invalidates what I have to say - I'd be interested in hearing what others think] but there is something about coming from a place where that is the major school of thought in your head that sort of predisposes you to actually having endings for things. I think anyway.

So, I'm outlining a lot, playing with dialogue, and digging up a lot of old memories which are a little raw, and makes me wish I had money for a good bottle of scotch to have sip from at the end of it all. Christmas is coming, folks. Though really, I need a new gray hoodie, and maybe a scarf, more.

"Nerd Love" is one of those projects I've had on my mind a long time. I think there's something from my high school, college years I really want to address, even though it's not entirely about me, it is tide to a world I was very entrenched in, and in many ways still am. My friend Savannah, she really deserves thanks for this project, because it was actually talks with her, talks she probably just thought were idle conversation, and I did too, which gave me my "in" into this story, and a way to look at some of these more complicated issues. A special thanks will be in order there.

My only reassurances that I'm not using this project to run from things I could actually get done is by how on my mind it has been lately. "I don't miss the green." was sort of a piece of this story, just bursting to get out, even though what I ended up with in that short won't likely resemble much of what "Nerd Love" will hopefully be in the end. There will be one or two important, and striking similarities, but still. I was exploring something - and I'm going to keep exploring.

I'm worried a bit about subconscious plagiarism on this one, if only because there are side aspects to the story which resemble other works I've read/seen, two of which I really love, one I will admit to enjoying, but not being crazy about. My sole reassurance there is that neither of those stories gave me what I wanted, not entirely, and I'm not even approaching the subject matter in the same way. I do worry about the shallow reader/viewer/etc. looking at this and seeing something derivative, but again, as I feel like with "Nerd Love" I'm trying to address something I haven't seen or read before, and in a way that I would like to see, that I kind of want to show to people. It's easy to let this kind of doubt creep in, though. I think I'll leave it for now.

Besides, if you end up with things inspired by enough things, an original idea is probably going to grow in such fertile soil. I hope.

It's a weird project, though. The kind that, at the end of the three hours working yesterday, it was hard not to call folks I hadn't heard from in forever. It makes me wonder how long I've been wanting to just sit down, and work out what's been in this.

Anyway, lots of thoughts. There are other things to look at while I give myself a day or so's distance.

I haven't been feeling well lately. It's nothing I've been advertising, but my sleep schedule is sort of righting itself, which my mind and body are both for in principle, but against in the transition. I've also had some sinus problems that I thought I could shrug off - bad call. I've also been having some soreness, sometimes straight-up pain - in my neck, then my back, and now my leg on the right side. I'm hoping it'll wear off quickly, because otherwise, something like that could seem serious. I've also had a mad upset stomach, and some acid-related problems which have left my mouth raw. I've been drinking a lot of tea. Hoping that will help.

Few things for some friends - this is older, but I just never got a proper chance to link it - lots of good, Ander Sarabia goodness on his blog, where he shows off the CD/album artwork he did for the rock band COBRA - it's amazing art, and definitely tune-age you should consider checking out. Ander hooked me up, and I enjoyed it mightily. The art for the inserts is exactly what you'd expect from Ander, too - top-notch stuff, with lots of great details and a little bit of a throwback to a style not seen as often anymore. Absolutely spectacular.

More recent, John Wiswell did this great 9/11 post called "Do Not Post Until 9/12." I did my best to stay away from 9/11 baiting, because it's always been my contention that grief is something no one handles in quite the same way, but societally, we've sort of only made a handful of reactions "okay." That John felt the need to wait a day, in hopes of not offending others who was mourning was incredibly thoughtful, but I also feel bad that John's method of coping is somehow one that he would have to put off talking about. You don't hear about these reactions enough - and you should, because they are perfectly valid, important, and normal.

Yet more recently [re: yesterday], is Eric Esquivel and crew [that'd be Godlewski, Cody, and Barajas] all popped up on Warren Ellis's website yesterday, with their entry into Ellis' "Three Panel Open" event. Go check out their excellent entry, along with all the other comics that have went up. It's absolutely worth your time, and their entry "Magic Words" is, well... more tip-top work from Eric.

Don't forget to keep checking what both Eric and Dave are up to these days on the ModMyth blog too, and some other websites you should definitely check out are Peter Wonsowski's blog, who has always been a supporter here, and does amazing work as well, but if you want to talk exciting every new entry from PW is more exciting than the last.

Finally, one of my favorite web comics from back in the day, Mitch Clem's punk rock three panel called "Nothing Nice to Say" has returned. If it's not your speed, it's not your speed, but it was one of those comics that hit me in just the right way, at just the right time, and seeing it back means the world to me. Been excited every since he announced he was back in the saddle.

More soon.

Death or Glory

2011-09-10T07:42:00.004-04:00

Heady reading yesterday.

I read a lot. I'm not saying that to be like "Oh ho! No one reads anymore but me, ye god-fearing, X-Box playing, printless heathens!" because I really don't have an opinion on the Middle America culture war that wants to fight about whether reading, television, news, video games, etc., are more or less worth your time than something else in that list. I tend to think down time and entertainment, decompressing, are a lot like vegetables - whatever way you can get them in you, that's just fine. But because of my day-to-day responsibilities, I have what I'd say is probably an inordinate amount of free time in little bursts, and what I tend to do with that is read. My life here, a lot of it revolves around waiting, "hurry-up-and-wait" waiting, a lot of errands that usually involve five minutes here, five minutes there of - you guessed it, waiting. So I read a lot.

I suppose I could use the time for writing. I have tried that before, though I'm always incredibly disappointed with the outcome more often than not. I always feel like I get more, better, focused work done when I sit down, and just pour things out on the page, uninterrupted, and don't have to worry about losing a funny line or a major plotting point because a prescription is ready, or the poodle's treatment is finished. So, yeah, I'm not saying I never jam some writing out in there, but I'm saying, mostly, in those little moments between things, I prefer to read.

Because I read so much, I think I probably don't absorb things as well, or as universally as I should. I'm not crazy or happy about that, but wet, saturated soil floods more easily, and not everything I read is going to get more than a "huh" or a acknowledging nod. Sometimes, there will be anger, sometimes, there will be a little outrage, but I've noticed more and more that's not too much different than the "huh" or the nod - and if I take my time, it'll pass pretty quickly. I've been trying to be better about this, to come away from things I read with as much as was imparted to me as possible. But it's kind of... eh, right now.

Still. Some things just hit you at the right time. In high school, it was "The Great Gatsby," a very visual work that hit me during a time when I feel like the visual part of my imagination was firing almost 24/7. When I think of "Gatsby" I think of Jay, and Nick, and Daisy, and Tom Buchanan and the wasteland between West Egg and New York, and that immutable [shut-the-fuck-up-it's-only-as-heavy-handed-as-it-needs-to-be] green light, and I actually see it, in my head, as this sprawling epic drawn by John Romita Jr. Anyone else ever completely fabricate an American Classic as drawn by J.R. Jr. in their own head? No? These things just hit me, like a re-read of "Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail" hit me at the height of the 2008 presidential primaries. How "Tristam Shandy" and "So Long See You Tomorrow" hit me when I was trying to find my voice, and my place [respectively] in college.

How "Clerks" hit me when I didn't think I could do what I wanted in my life. How "Strangers in Paradise" hit me, when I so desperately needed to know if the stories I wanted to tell were worthwhile. How "Watchmen" hit me when I wondered if they could be art.

I mean, there are a lot more examples than these - many of you saw when I went "Riot Grrl" crazy [hell, I'm still Riot Grrl crazy], partly because I needed an outlet for some of my anger at all the social bullshit, and partly because I'd had enough time for hindsight that I realized, looking back, the kind of man I'd been just wasn't good enough. And "Girls to the Front" was there. And when I wanted someone just as awkward and screaming to get noticed as me, I found Mia Zapata. There are others, some private, some not, but the point is, a lot of things can hit you, and when you read as much as I do, those things tend to be things in print. And all you need is that right timing, and ding, they hit you.

I took a short hiatus not too long ago. I actually considered it a pretty long hiatus, and a lot of it was about clearing my palate, and trying to get back into something that resembled a healthy work structure, not with responsibilities that I'm called on to perform in my day-to-day, but with my writing, which had been jammed into places and was suffering for it, or worse, wasn't getting done at all. Coming back has been difficult, because I'm still trying to eek out that groove, and there are new things - good things - along with the same old challenges I need to try and circumvent.

The hiatus also gave me a lot of time to think, and while most of that has gone into some sort of ordering, trying to form habits that are healthy and productive, it also made me realize there are a lot roadblocks in front of me for what I want to do, and some of them I either have no idea how to overcome, or am just incapable of tackling myself. I'm not... ashamed to say that last part either, there are some things that I just don't excel at, probably will never excel at. And some of that might be more integral to writing, to making my art, and to getting it out there for people to see. Definitely for making money at it.

So I guess I had my knees taken out from under me a little bit when I popped on Twitter and found the article "Two Voices of Experience on Comics as a Career" by Johanna Draper Carlson on her blog "Comics Worth Reading." I'm a big fan of Johanna's blog, sort of swear my limited comic book-funds by CWR's reviews of things, even use it to find comics I wouldn't normally read, but would work as gifts for other people. It's all about spreading the love, as a friend of mine would say. Can't recommend the site enough.

But "Two Voices..." was complicated for me because of the blog posts by creators in the industry that they linked to. Each contain first-hand, real-life comic industry advice, creating as a profession advice, the kind that, as Johanna so succinctly puts it, "you either listen to and take to heart or you suffer through yourself." [I find this statement rigid, but not entirely unfair.]

The first is by Steve Bissette, probably best known for his legendary run with Alan Moore and Jon Totleben on DC's "Swamp-Thing." His posting "Looking for Magic Carpets - An Open Letter to My Fellow Writers (& Artists)" covers a wide variety of topics, not to mention a great deal of common sense-but-not-so-commonly-shared rules when it comes to things like collaboration, ownership, and people who are deluded enough to think that guaranteeing success is some sort of incentive anymore. If you're a person who wants to do something creative for a living - writing, drawing, film making - you should read it. It's a cutting indictment of those out-of-work screenwriters who have a script that they want to take to paneled world of comics, in hopes of exploiting the current popularity of the genre to nab lucrative intellectual property rights and stepping stones to movie deals [I always thought this fair-weather pursuit of comics reminded me too much of the attitudes behind the speculation boom of the 90s - but that's probably a post for another time] .

But more importantly than that, it busts the notion that comics as a medium are somehow easier, that one can be thrown together with little work and come out as a great monument to storytelling, or at least something that will sell high to some Hollywood executive looking for the next big thing. It's hard work, often arduous, often stressful, and always time consuming. And even more importantly than that, it's a reminder that a professional artist or illustrator, that is [to be clear] an artist or illustrator looking to do art for a living, isn't going to be eager to sacrifice that time and stress for next to no compensation. And that's entirely fair.

Now, that being said, I could quibble with some of Bissette's lesser points, but I think in most of the cases that I want to say "wait... but that's not how that works!" it just means I haven't reached his level yet. I did find the way he treats the different mediums - film, novels, comics - as more or less interchangeable a little lackadaisical - as how you go about telling your tale, the way in which you choose to tell it, is just as important as the other aspects of the story. I just don't believe that a screenplay can anymore easily be switched to a comic or a novel, and as someone who works in many mediums himself, I'm a little shocked he implied that would be viable in certain circumstance. Though I guess there are certain circumstances it would.

But this is all parsing. There's more to take from Bissette's single blog post about collaboration than, in most if not all, books on the subject of "Making Comics" that are out there, and I think any creative person is going to take a lot away from it. I think what I most importantly took away from it, what's most applicable to me right now, was bullet #2:

"Cartoonists have their own projects they’d dearly love to afford to do, many of those lengthy works."

I also quite like how Johanna put it - that if "he had the time to work for little or no pay, then he’d be working on his own projects." And that is a smack-across-the-face fair point. And it wasn't something I didn't know, quite the contrary, it's the problem that's frustrated me to no end of late, and finally, I have a name for it. And yes, I've been complaining quite a lot lately about how hard it's been for me to find artists interested in working on comics with me - even gotten to the point if perhaps it came down to just not being very good at selling my projects to them, but in this case, the answers a lot simpler.

So. I think I'm going to stop. Not writing comics mind you, not even asking artists that I can't afford to pay to work on them for me [and I think most encouraging about Bissette's post is his adamance that you should "never be afraid to ask"], but rather complaining. I'm done bitching about how this isn't happening, or how that isn't there, because that's the nature of the beast. And while maybe I haven't been successful, I've been lucky, lucky enough to work with Justin, to work with Ander.

When it comes to my writing, I've really only ever thought of myself struggling with rejection once, but I think in a round about way, the not being able to root out an artist to collaborate on this project or that, well, that's not much different, and I'm getting over it. I'm going to get okay with it. Just, you know... not okay enough to stop looking. Stop hoping.

Which leads me [roughly], into the other posting CWR featured, "If you’re not happy, comics won’t make you happy" by Colleen Doran. Doran is prolific [just look at her Wikipedia page, which is far from comprehensive, and say slowly "Jeeee-zuuus..."], an artist and a writer in both the comics and animation industries whose name may not come immediately to mind, but who has done so much great work that if you're involved in fandom at all, I'm certain you've brushed up against her work more than a few times.

Her article is more of a cautionary tale [seriously, go read it for the same reasons as Bissette's. It's great, and important.], looking at someone who I'm not going to name here who struggled with depression, and a lack of success and fulfillment, and blamed everyone else for those shortcomings and failures. There are parts of it that... they cut me very deep, and it was one of those situations where I almost needed a mantra of "this is not about you, you are not the center of the universe, this is not being accusatory" because let's face it, creativity and a lack of success and fulfillment, in my case just a basic lack of acknowledgment that I'm even on the right path to be creatively recognized for anything - that's me all over, and it's difficult for me to not take a lot of what she was saying to heart, and as, specifically, discouragement. I mean, let's face it, her words here, a little over half way through the article - this, to a point, this is very much me:

"When things go well as a creator, there is nothing like it. It’s a high, an emotional drug. Some people get addicted to it. They don’t look at any payoff except the payoff of seeing their work being seen. Eating, medical care, roof over head: tertiary concerns. Until the day they wake up and realize they are fifty-years-old, they have no savings, nowhere to live, and their teeth are falling out."

Except, of course, my standards of what "going well" is are much lower, and I guess thankfully I still have time to come around to those tertiary concerns. And I don't know if this means me, that I'm one of those people who should, as Doran puts it, "get as far away from the art and entertainment business as possible." I mean, comically, I don't think you can get much farther from the entertainment business than where I am now, but in a self-reflective sort of way, the point stands. And what this is challenging is going far beyond my concerns as to whether or not my work is good, and whether or not I have something important and worthwhile to say.

There are a lot of other things in the article that are hard for me, for anyone I'd imagine, to take - it's hard being told by a pro that it's okay to not be a pro. Advice from someone who has found success, but now pauses to call back to the rest of us to let us know that what we're clamoring for, it's just not all a tea party up top. That said, it's a kind of benevolence that's very common among writers, I imagine less so among artists, but I don't really know, the constant reminder of what's lost, sacrificed, all the bad stuff you should be looking out for, and making plans to tackle [seriously, name the last thing about writing or other kinds of art you read that didn't profess to give you the cold, hard, no-nonsense facts of what you're trying to do. Name the last time you read a something by a professional telling you how wonderful and fun their profession was]. And the posting itself strikes a difficult tone too, because any challenge to it is setup as a fairly indefensible position - disagreement with it is just petulance, a lack of maturity. And rightfully so, if I'm being honest.

But like before, none of this parsing changes the absolute validity of her point. And not just to those who go to the extremes, like the older creator who had fallen so far, but to anyone who is committing to this path. I hope I'm not doing this just for validation. I only include the "just" because I'll admit, the lack of success at 26 is getting to me [yes, this would be a good time to make fun - in writing, 26 is when you should be nowhere near success, yet I still interact fairly regularly with those younger, and more successful in the things I'm pursuing, that I want to do]. Yet I'm not quite there with the "know yourself" part, for the writing, or for the greater part of my life. And that's frightening.

Other things seem in the article I'm not so willing to embrace completely. I've never done this out of some sort of pursuit of happiness. Fundamentally, I've always seen that sort of reasoning as flawed, as though a fulfilling, exciting life can only come out of attaining this thing we call "happy." Don't get me wrong, my writing makes me happy, as much as it makes me angry, or frustrated, or sometimes even sad, but all of those reactions I'm okay with. And while I support the fundamental idea of pursuing wellness, taking care of yourself which the post heralds as some of the most important things a creative person can do [and things I will admit to at times being negligent in], I'm not sure happiness is something necessarily worth actively seeking out. If, for no other reason, than to me it always seemed like those who chased happiness the hardest rarely really find it for themselves.

There's a lot to be gotten from Doran's post [I think the not tearing others down part is so important, and I regret that I won't be touching on it here], and again, I can't encourage people enough to give it a read. And I'd encourage scouring the comments too, as even more than the post-proper I find myself caught on some of Doran's additions, further down the page:

"You don’t get to sit around and create all day. If it is that difficult to handle a day job and create on the side, there is no way you will be able to handle the creative business."

Coming out of college, I kept a pretty standard 9-to-5 retail job, for about a year. It wasn't pretty, and it wasn't an environment that I could work around - this, what Doran describes here, is very much me, unable to create side-by-side while working the day job. I was on my feet all day, and when I got home, I crashed. There was no place, or no time to jot things of worth down. It wasn't like college, where things could be creatively scheduled - I was on someone's else's schedule, they expected me to a do a job, and it could pause because I had an idea, or pulled an all-night working on something.

So I've actually taken a bit of a stance that is "anti-day job," and have been "lucky" enough that my current living situation calls on me to not really take up that kind of work again, because of the necessity of me being as present here as possible. But at the same time, I have a sizable amount of debt hanging over me, and I know that I'm playing fast and loose with some aspects of my life - a certain kind of tragedy or one ill-timed bill, and the day job is an inevitability. Less inevitable, but highly possible going by my short history in retail, that could mean the end of my creative work.

As is, I'm currently struggling to balance being of assistance here at home, doing my freelance work [mostly the book reviews for Kirkus], and also making sure I have time for my writing. It's constant. It's hard. And I'd like to think if there was some success, if I suddenly had to step up and "handle the creative business" I could - because it would be something I loved, and I cared for, and my excitement and my ability would get me through. Maybe, just maybe, something about me has changed from that person before. The thought of finding out is disconcerting, because I know what kind of situations I'd have to be in. But what Doran says seems to make sense to me, and like my inability to sell myself, I fear I've come across another aspect of what I want to do that seems to have so little to do with what I love - creating, story-telling - and seems to be so outside my wheelhouse as to doom success from the beginning.

The one thing I have so long focused on, the one thing I've believed, that getting good, tearing myself down, rebuilding myself, being the best storyteller, being the best writer I could be, that would be enough for people to take notice of, to recognize, that maybe not being the case? That likely not being the case? The very idea that you can be great at something - I'm talking barn-burning, genre-busting, Ulysses-writing great - at something, and you may not be able to do that professionally isn't so much news to me, as it is just more frustrating each time I encounter it. More frustrating that it's repetition is due to it being true.

The thought that talent is not enough, that refining and perfecting your craft is not enough, it's something that I struggle with daily, because the long and short is that a mediocre story with a good salesman behind it is almost always going to beat out a great story from someone who sucks at being a shill [this neglects those who excel at both - I'm not one of them, but I've recognize them, among those I'd be hubristic enough to call peers]. And I'm not really sure how to fix that - I'm not even sure there is a fix for that. And what I am left to struggle with is the very basic concept that no matter how good I get at this thing I love, it's unlikely, maybe impossible, I'll ever actually be able to make a living off of it.

I don't know what to do with that. It overwhelms me sometimes, but I also don't view quitting as an option. Still, time and time again I seem to run into these entirely reasonable indicators that I have no business being on the field. I mean, I am a writer. It's the only thing I've ever felt the least bit of confidence saying about myself, and while I do sometimes have doubts, that still feels true, and real to me.

So I don't know. I don't know what to do with it, or if it even really matters. Again, I know I'm not keen to quit, even if these are all signs that is what I'm supposed to do. But I'm not even sure about that.

Despite the timing [no one can be blamed for my moods but me], I'd like to thank Johanna Draper Carlson for posting the links - my RSS is so backed up, it's unlikely I'd have found them if not for her calling attention to them, and her presence on Twitter. I'd also like to thank Steven R. Bissette and Colleen Doran, not just for these blog posts I've been dissecting, but also for all the stellar work they've produced over the years. I hope sincerely nothing here offends.

Something about Saigon.

2011-09-05T07:37:00.007-04:00

Serious Déjà vu.

Bulk of yesterday went to a comic idea I had - a sort of Two-Fisted Tales sort of thing. Wound up with something so incredibly offensive that I'm not honestly not entirely sure what I should do going forward. On one hand, anything that I get this far done, it's hard not to look at as a project I'd like to polish and finish - on the other, I can't imagine any kind of artist that I could hand this script to, and by the end of it they'd still want to draw it [not that I have a load of artists lined up interested in my stuff anyway]. So. There's that.

I'm not blanket against offending people. There was a time when I prided myself on my ability to do it. But then isn't now, and it's easier to shock people when there's nothing behind it, or worse, when you're just out to piss people off for no reason. But that's not really worth anything, that doesn't do anything but piss people off, and if I'm going to piss people off, I'd like to feel justified in doing it.

What to do, what to do. I'd like to sleep on it - though that hasn't happened yet. I don't like getting into these habits, though looking back in the blog it is fairly common for insomnia to hit me around this time of the summer. It'd be interesting to know why. Maybe not helpful, but interesting. Trying to back off the worrisome habits, too. Thinking lately that there are a few people in my life who don't need the worry.

Change is hard though.

Script as it is now is pretty loose. All in the moleskin. So I'll just sit on it before typing it up. I just want to make sure, you know, if I'm going to write something like this, that I actually have something to say.

Had a better idea for the beginning of "Alone in the Universe." The History Channel and the Discovery Channel might be two of the cooler modern day resources writers have at their disposal - all happenings, no plot. Or characters. Maybe Hitler. Print history is always a hard sell - always some writer spinning some creative license on it, at least the stuff that's best to read. Though I'm sure as soon as I say that, there's someone reading who likes to casually thumb through encyclopedias who will be terrible offended by my statement.

But what am I saying? There's no one reading.

So I guess what that means is that I'm not abandoning "Alone in the Universe" after all. Updating tags in the meantime.

Finally broke down and bought an external hard drive. A whole terabyte of portable goodness. Needed to do it for a long time - saved a little money by shopping around, and buying a color I wasn't wild about. I suppose if it bothers me too much, I can always paint it. That I haven't been backing up files is just wildly irresponsible of me, and the last serious computer problem I had ended with me having to buy something special to rescue everything. Amateur hour, as a computer owner, really. Still, memory is always so damn expensive...

Sometimes I have these paranoid thoughts about the future of information, ownership, and how communal everything is getting, without actually being shared. Paying for access, but not owning anything. As things get more and more digital, sometimes I worry about that becoming the norm, and the only people who have memory storage of the their will ever really have control over the things the can access. Like I said, paranoid. But "clouds," oceanic servers - the wind and the sea, and unlike their natural counterparts, the people who put them there have a much stronger moral leg to stand on when we ask who they are to keep us from these things.

Buy memory. And don't forget about print, either. Or maybe I'm paranoid. Maybe.

Bedtime stories for the Tolkien children.

2011-09-02T09:34:00.005-04:00

On one hand, nothing new has gotten *done* done, nothing old's really been "finished." In fact, I haven't really done much work on old projects.

Still. Broken ground on a lot of new stuff though, which other than showing my inability to stay on task or make goals and complete them, is also writing, and just writing again at regular intervals - well, it feels good. If I had to estimate, I'd guess I've probably done about 30 pages in the past five days, all on different things, but... oh well. Baby steps. This has been sandwiched in with a lot of other work too... I keep telling myself output, focus will improve.

Worked out several pages on a new comic, came up with the ending which was until now ambiguous. I think the outlines done, all that really needs done is it need typed up in script form. It's a Calamity Cash story [re: Calamity Cash and the Nitro Kid]. I've been sitting on it for a while because I don't want Justin to feel pressured, but he knows about it, and we're still working on the first [re: Town with No Name], so this is just me scribbling on the page. I've had this idea for about a year, and have just been letting it work out at its own pace. I guess ultimately, the idea was to write a more manageable Calamity Cash comic, since my first was so complicated, and a lot of what I was trying to do was a bit outside of my skill level. Thankfully, Justin's been talented enough with the pencils to cover that fact, but still. Gotta up my game.

Going back and forth on whether or not to put my Goemon-inspired character in. Whole idea with Calamity Cash was to slowly build up a supporting cast of weirdos and throwbacks to other cultures, genres, generally I think it's better to make a big deal out of introducing characters. But just having them pop up where they weren't before makes and different kind of intrigue. Then again, the character wouldn't add a lot to the story - how important are people as window dressing? X-Men comics spoiled me - there was always at least one blue person in the background, not doing anything, just looking cool. My want to do that with someone in Chuck Taylors and a hakama.

Saw Justin last night. We've been trying to get together once a week - doing a solid hand of it, though some weeks we struggle with what to do. West Virginia is not a post-midnight kind of town. Still, hanging out regularly again, it's cool, much needed, I think. Also really calls back to the earlier days of all this, and the familiarity is good for reminding me I have this space, and I should use it. Plus, getting out, good company... it's all great. I forget the importance of it, sometimes.

Did fifteen pages on a story called "Alone in the Universe." It will not be getting a tag here, because it turned out awful, and I don't plan on pursuing it, at least not in its present form. But I indulged a little, brushed off some old bad habits and a guy in a baseball cap and sunglasses and just enjoyed myself a bit, and think maybe I at least got [emotionally] to a place where picking up "The Tagalong" will be a bit easier.

Few pages [no exact count - someone should find a way to auto-number moleskin and legal pad] done an old project I've only told a few people about - I call it "Nerd Love." Working on it was part of the reason I wrote "I Don't Miss the Green." Anyway, I finally wrote a beginning for it. A neat little screenplay idea that will never, ever, ever get made. But might be sort of high concept enough that if I enter it somewhere, it'll get noticed. It's neat having a beginning for it too. I just don't have my first line - the big entrance. The first thing said. Barring some swear words that I don't think count.

Also playing with something that doesn't have a name or a story yet. Just something I tend to entertain myself with on downtime, little bit of fantasy to lull myself to sleep. No, it's not porn. It's just this world, maybe an idea of a world, which I use kind of like meditation, something to keep the unsettled bits of my mind busy before I fall asleep - bedtime stories for the Tolkien children, I guess. I'm starting to think there might be something to them. For now, just a hunch.

Anyway, creatively, I feel pretty good about things. Practically, less so.

The Short Saga of Metales Pesados

2011-08-28T06:28:00.008-04:00

Feeling a little discouraged right now.

Been on tear as of late, not that I've been doing a lot of good work or anything, but I've been writing fairly regularly, and have been pleased with the results. I think "I don't miss the green" [also, special thanks to Lauren and Emi for commenting, and the encouragement] is a bit of testament to that, and I've been enjoying writing everyday again, even if it's mostly just small stuff.

To preface, first I have this fascination with lucha libre, and luchadors, Mexican professional wrestlers known for their masks, and almost super hero-like personalities, which probably doesn't surprise anyone since I'm a pretty well outed pro-wrestling fan. But lucha libre in particular is interesting to me, largely in my youth most of the masked wrestlers I came across were American or Japanese, or worse, Mil Mascaras [so awful], but as I got older I begin to be introduced to these dynamic and interesting looking masked athletes on Monday night television, and thankfully a fellow movie and wrestling nerd turned me on to the films of El Santo. El Santo was probably the most popular luchador in Mexico, save perhaps for the current WWE superstar Rey Mysterio [to hear some tell, Rey is one of the most recognizable figures in all of Mexico - ironic, for a masked man], and "The Saint's" popularity didn't end in the ring, and he also starred in a string [at least 50] of what I guess we'd call B-movies today, where he fought not only other rudo [bad guy] luchadores, but also ninjas, mobsters, and monsters like werewolves and vampires.

I have a pair of luchadores I created, sort of in tribute to that, and sort of just so I could play with the conventions on my own time, a tag team called Metales Pesados, or Heavy Metal, who I occasionally write silly little things for, or, more often, make edits and CAWs of on various wrestling video games. They're a little ridiculous, but I think trying to get across the prestige of these two figures in something slightly more serious - but still fun - would be something that I've occasionally aspired to do.

Anyway, Thursday, I was out running errands, and I got a pretty good idea for a story in the same spirit as "I don't miss the green"... but starring one of my two masked warriors. The story hit me pretty fast, and even though it was quite a bit more light-hearted than "I don't miss the green" I still felt like I could make it work, and sort of dropped everything while out to get it down - this flash of inspiration clearly being of the "have to get this out now, or I may never get the chance" kind. I found myself sort mock punching as I wrote, thoroughly enjoying the experience of getting the story on the page, but more importantly, just enjoying writing the story. When I finished, I had what felt like a pretty unique tale, and even if it wasn't, it was so much fun to work on, I was all smiles - and quite anxious to get it back home to type it out, and work through any problems so that I might post it, or use it for something.

Still, stopping everything to write put me pretty well behind on... well, everything, so I didn't really get to sit down with my story, "Dia de la Vida," until yesterday, and I found myself really disheartened that the short which had brought me so much joy the day before seemed awkward, and fumbling. Repetitive too, not to mention a little lighter on the word count than even I expected [stuff in the moleskin is always shorthand, and always shorter - "I don't miss the green" was literally half its length, originally]. It's the first real stumble since I've gotten started again, so I'm sure it's just stinging more now than it would under normal circumstances, but I'm just... ah, bummed about it. I think what I ended up with after a little proofing isn't all that bad, but with the connection it has, even fleetingly, to a much better story like "I don't miss the green" I didn't feel okay posting it. I might still, in the future, I might actually do more work on it. But it would be a disservice to the better story - and that's hitting me as more important than any disappointment I have about not getting to do right by a couple of Santo-inspired characters.

Which, actually, I think is saying something.

I have been wondering if maybe "Dia de la Vida" might be better suited to be a comic book - sometimes when my prose is this descriptive, yet still clumsy, it's a good sign that what I'm working on would be better suited for a more visual medium. Looking at it now, I can't really tell what sort of commitment that would be, how much work that would be. I guess it really doesn't matter... despite my final call, I still want to do right by Metales Pesados. More importantly, I'd like to get back that big smile I had when I finished writing the damn thing the first time.

Otherwise, I'm feeling good about my work output. Again, I'm writing every day, it's not as much of a struggle as it was before the hiatus, and I'm just generally feeling like I'm getting better at managing my time. There are a few things on the horizon that could upset that particular apple cart, but I'm going to do my best to keep that from happening.

I wrote something today, a rant on a topic that I feel like I've been thinking about a lot lately, and have been wanting to address in a lot of different ways. What I ended up with was a fairly artless, straightforward essay that was basically an airing of grievances, which also almost got posted here. But I'm holding it back too because I feel like there might be a more clever way to deal with some of my angst regarding the topic. Also, it's possible being so overt about my feelings might just piss people off. And if you're going to do that, there is something to be said for trying to be clever.

On the side, I've been looking at an early draft of a Cheri Borgstrom project [some might recall I wrote some scripts for her webcomic a year or so back] and trying to help get her notes back on that as quickly possible, and Justin and I have been meeting once a week, with comic talk happening there [re: Calamity Cash and the Town with No Names]. I've also gotten back in touch with Ander, but he's naturally swamped [he and Eric's Moonstone work is really picking up steam], though even when busy I never expect to go too long without hearing from him - he's just that damn good a friend. I've had a lot of ideas for VHS Generation related projects, all revolving around the father figure depicted within.

Thank pity for daddy issues.

Not to jinx myself, but I feel back in the game. Current plans are loose, but finishing "The Tagalong" feels like where I'll be headed next, and I've got an old, old, old, old, almost pre-dates "Sulk: The Morning After" script that I'm going to dig up, and see if it's as funny as I remember [re: probably not]. And there's still "Cherry Stone" and a bunch of little ideas I had over my hiatus. A lot of this is going to depend on some things I can't really talk about here, but I'm hopeful life will be stable enough that I can make headway on some of these projects. Of course, right now, it's all just talk.

If you're one of my northeast friends, be safe. I tried to reach out to as many people as possible, but lack of sleep makes me a pretty absent-minded friend. I generally dismiss weather-related worries, especially these days when everyone thinks everything is a sign of the end times, but I'll admit seeing the coverage of Hurricane Andrew in my youth left me with a touch more trepidation as it concerns this particular kind of natural disaster.

Besides, it's New York. Say what you will about the city [I'm kind of fond of it], but when things happen to New York, it always feels a little bit like its happening to the entire country.

I don't miss the green.

2011-08-22T23:55:00.016-04:00

I don't miss the grass.

I know I should. A better man should. A poet would probably be able to sit here, and write about that, about how much he missed the green grass, just missed the green, the way it waved in the wind, and the softness of it under his feet. Yes, a poet would miss it. He'd lament it. Yes, that's exactly what he'd do. Lament.

But I don't. I never cared much for it back when we had it. Or the trees, for that matter, or even the blue of the ocean. Back before the shit got in it. Sure, now, the water's all still and dead, all black and gray, and I guess that's pretty depressing. They say if you get in it, that'll even kill you now - but I always figured that was pretty likely before. And anyway, the horizon's still there, and that's all I ever really cared for - out there, endless, encompassing. It hasn't changed - everything else has, but it hasn't changed without the green.

I just wasn't made for this. Being a survivor. I mean, sure, I get along okay, and everyone says getting food here, clean water, that's hard, but it's not - it's just tedious. Right click, save as, right click, save as - that was tedious! And that was fine, and it's the same movement, more or less, to start a fire. Just a little further away from yourself - little more oomph behind it, a little harder. But I miss bad food, you know, takeout, and my anti-depressants. And I miss fizzy soda, with ice, and caffeine. Caffeine! And cable, and electric lights. You know, reasons to stay awake after the sun's gone down. Midnight showings. And IHOP. And reruns of Cowboy Bebop.

God I miss Cowboy Bebop. And staying up too late to see it, or rather, to see it again. And I miss having someone to talk about it with, even if just in an IRC chat, and bitch about how nothing's ever been as good as that, and won't ever be again. And talk about what could have happened next, about where Faye might have gone, or if Jet Black would have cried. Someone to argue with about whether Spike's really dead or not.

I met a guy for that, once. After everything went down. Like me, he lucked out, never got any of that shit in him. Unlike the grass, or the ocean, or the trees. He said his name was Diesel, and I knew he was lying, but he'd seen Cowboy Bebop, at least, and seemed up for talking about it, and that was all I wanted. And everyone now wants so much, they want everything, I think this skinny kid appreciated that, me just wanting to talk. Which for a while was cool, plus, you know, there were other things too, he'd seen both versions of Blade Runner, made jokes about things looking like Mordor, and he'd collected comics, and toys, and we'd both left a lot that stuff behind. And liked talking about who had left more.

But, I don't know. Diesel liked talking a lot.

Like, too much. And about everything, and not just Cowboy Bebop. Sure, sometimes it was interesting, but he'd just get started and go on. And on, and on, about this happening, or that happening, and all the what-ifs about what it was that cause all this. What if it was the government, man? What if someone did this one purpose? What if we were all that's left? Diesel was actually okay with that, he was actually pretty okay with everything that had happened. Something about his old girlfriend breaking up with him, just before, and then with everything going on, he thought he'd go see her first, before he left, giver her another chance. Maybe save the day. But it was too late. She'd gotten that shit in her too. Oh, man. And what if that happened?

What if one of us got that shit in them?

Just like that he'd be off again. What if weren't all that's left? He loved that one. What if we found a girl, you know? What if she was hot, what if we just didn't know what hot was anymore, what if we just didn't care? What if you couldn't be hot not that all this had went down? But mostly, what if we found a girl? Because if we did, Diesel said, even if she wasn't into us, we'd pretty much have to do her. Wasn't that rape, I asked. No, he said, because look at the world! Look at the shit, in everything. We'd pretty much have to.

It was about the survival of the species, man.

I crushed Diesel's head with a rock after that. It was pitch black out, and he was asleep, and I'd have never found one if there'd been grass.

My So-Called Attempts at Flattery and Other Embarrassments

2011-08-17T23:06:00.017-04:00

In life we sometimes do things that embarrass us in such a way that our best judgment tells us to bury it. We can, because in the grand scheme these mistakes are not game changers, they do not alter our lives, or greatly affect how people treat us. So we push them down, shove them into some dark space inside ourselves, and do our best not to think of them. They’re a private, but common shame; the stupid thing said to the pretty girl, the malapropism defended too hard on correction, the wives’ tale presented foolishly as fact. The things we think about in front of our mirrors, staring at ourselves as we realize we should have said this, we should have done that – oh yeah, that’d show them. That would save face.

We feel safe doing this. These are not great failings, and on their own they do us little harm. And contrary to popular belief, not dealing with a problem is indeed a way to not deal with the problem.

But so is dragging those embarrassments out into the light.

One thing I try never to be embarrassed about is my influences. Growing up in the 1990s, I felt like nearly all aspects of the decade, both good and bad, became an important part of my identity. In the annals of popular culture, one of the best remembered and oft-cited 90s hallmarks was the ABC teen drama "My So Called Life." Created by screenwriter Winnie Holzman, the show ran for only a single season, a mere 19 episodes, but still managed to become something more than a cult hit. Even compared to other teen dramas of the time "My So-Called Life" was unique, a show reaching out to the very youth it was attempting to portray and forgoing tidy, last-minute solutions for more realistic, less satisfying endings.

I was barely in the double-digit age range when it premiered, but that hardly mattered. Since I was able to sit upright, I was fascinated by teen melodrama, and to this day the still-living members of my family, and probably a babysitter or two could attest to my fondness for the original "Degrassi High School" on PBS, a show that would often follow the usual, age-appropriate fare of my youth - "Sesame Street," "Mr. Roger's Neighborhood," and "Reading Rainbow." I couldn't possibly have understood those Canadian teens and their problems, yet their plight held me at such rapt attention that I'd start bawling if someone changed the channel before the show was over. I was hooked, never to wander far from the strange allure of teenage angst.

So naturally, in 1994, I found myself planted in front of the television set to watch "My So-Called Life." Like most television watched in the first ten years of my life, I don't remember particulars of plot, or stories. But I do remember the imagery, still photos in my head of a sharp curiosity framed by beautiful red hair, shallow blue eyes working in tandem with strategically non-strategic plaid patterns, regular looks of shock, and a shock of blonde cascading down a particular face. Sounds too, but less so, the contrast of the echoes of the hallways of Liberty High with the unnerving silence of Angela's home. And ironically, I wasn't even as into the show at the time as my mother was [it would famously fall to what came to be known in our family as the Robin Nichols/Grindstaff curse - any show truly loved by Mom was canceled swiftly], and yet, the show imprinted on me, and working together with a few other pop culture mainstays of the time period, flannel and misanthropy followed.

In college, I was blessed with a close-knit group of friends, as well as a relaunch of the show from my salad days which started it all - "Degrassi." Thankfully, the former were tolerant of the latter, and some even became, or already were, as obsessed as I was. One of these was a brilliant young lady by the name of Savannah Dooley, not only a fellow writer but a fellow Degrassi fanatic as too, and a legacy wordsmith, her mother being...well...

Winnie Holzman.

I kept my awe to myself.

I have probably been called an ass-kisser once or twice. I have on occasion been able to endear myself to older people, figures in positions of power [at least academically speaking], and anytime someone older takes counsel from someone younger you're going to have whispering, and I think honestly the most common assumption there is "what a brown-noser." I've probably made they same assessments at times. But generally speaking, I have enough trouble with voicing sincere praise, so shameless flattery that isn't obviously tongue-in-cheek [I'm talking four-speed, Hoover-style sucking-up] just isn't something I do. And even expressing admiration is difficult for me, and sometimes the actual feeling is so close to jealousy, I can't imagine the train wreck which would ensue if I tried.

Besides, Savannah had no end of people wanting to talk her ear off about "My So-Called Life" and I naturally just imagined not hearing about it might be a tad more refreshing for her. Still, I was hugely curious, and more than willing to piggyback and eavesdrop other people's conversations with her about the show, which managed to keep my "too-cool-to-bug-someone-about-something-that-might-bug-them" douchebag persona intact.

Still, I had to admit to being hugely envious of Savannah, not just because of her own talent, but because of the atmosphere she must have grown up in. I couldn't imagine what it was like to have another writer in the house, let alone someone as supportive as Ms. Holzman was of Savannah. My own parents always pushed me, but as with any push it was done at arm's distance, and even today there are few members of my family willing to look at anything I've written. Plus, Ms. Holzman was a writer I knew [a rarity - most writers I knew back then wrote comics, or English novels, or were Quentin Tarantino], and I admired her work and the projects she'd been connected to. And parents visited their kids at college. Which meant... I could get to meet her.

Later, the following exchange happened with a "friend":

"You should get her to mentor you."
"I think... she's taken."
"What, like married?"
"No. Well, yeah she is. But I mean, if she's going to mentor someone, I imagine it'd be her daughter."
"But you get to meet her. It's important to make connections."
"I don't like using people like that."
"Just saying. Brown-nose a little. Maybe she'd look at your stuff."
"Why would I do that? Besides, I could probably just ask her."
"Would you?"
"That's not the point."
"I'm telling you. There's nothing wrong with sucking up a little. Besides, you actually like her stuff. It's not like you'd be lying just to get something out of it."

It was a point. A bad point, from a bad friend who I have since excised myself from. But just the suggestion of it seemed to taint things, and it was the last thing I wanted on my mind before Savannah's parents took the lot of us out for dinner in celebration of our senior year. I mean, I certainly had things I wanted to say to Ms. Holzman, had questions I wanted to ask, and compliments I wanted to give. But thanks to the genius advice of my winner of friend above, anything that left my mouth in either of those veins were going to feel like total self-serving bullshit to me. So I spent the bulk of the dinner glued to my plate, letting everyone else talk.

It wasn't really out of character at the time - senior year, I was pretty taciturn anyway, and I liked listening to everyone, probably more than the self-centered art student in me was comfortable with back then. But it was difficult, and it was nice hearing about another writer, a successful writer, her projects, her struggles, things she'd accomplished. One of Holzman's other credits, a fairly large one, was her adaptation of popular retelling of Wicked for Broadway, having written the book for the musical version that had just recently toured Japan. As Holzman talked about the musical going to other countries, and continuing its strong business, and getting to witness that by joining the crowds around the world as the watched it, she seemed legitimately humbled and surprised by how well received it was, even when presented to other cultures.

There was a silence over the table when she expressed. As if everyone was mulling over the achievement of it, and just what that meant. I knew, but I was torn about saying anything. When I did finally speak, I didn't recognize my voice. Honestly, I remember it coming out kind of as a squeak.

"Well. I guess that just speaks... to the ah, quality of the work. That it has such a wide... ahem. Appeal."

The silence returned. My friends let their eyes drop to their plates now, which was kind, I thought. Ms. Holzman looked... embarrassed, but mostly for me. A cliché about flatulence in a holy building ran quickly through my head. And in fairness, I had sounded reticent, even pained when I spoke - like a parroting flatterer in a Shakespeare play, speaking to someone who had never heard an unkind word, so that even a hollow compliment would sound sincere.

And the worst part of it all, I was sincere. I wasn't kissing ass - I really meant what I said, and wanted to say it. Hell, after years of foreign films and anime, I felt kind of like the guy at the table who should say something, about how amazing it was to do something that could survive crossing culture lines, that wasn't slighted by translation and the language barrier. Because it was! But I didn't trust myself. I was still in that mindset that anything nice I said was only to serve me. It made no difference that I wasn't sucking up - it sounded like I was, it felt like I was, and really in the moment, that was all that mattered.

I was mortified. Not only did I come across as some undergrad apple-polisher, I did it in front of my friends, to a writer whose work I actually respected. And all with so little confidence that it left me looking completely scummy and transparent.

Ultimately, no one really cared, and when it came to my friends at Bennington, every personality at that table was so dynamic that it didn't take any time at all for someone else to speak up, say something interesting, so we all could move on. But I felt sort of awful, embarrassed by the execution and failure of my half-effort. I wasn't even without sympathy for my faux pas - Savannah's dad, a bona-fide movie star in his own right and former West Virginian who'd manage to escape the state, took me aside and told me some old jokes about our shared homestead. It was nice, and helped me feel just a little less like a jackass. And I had so much fun otherwise, that I loathe having to tuck that entire dinner away, just to keep from reliving this one embarrassment.

Had it happened between close friends or one of my peers, a fellow writer, perhaps I'd get the chance to talk to them about it later. Apologize, and explain myself. But when it comes to those we respect, those who produce work we admire, that opportunity so rarely presents itself, and I've just sat on this for a long time, hoping for second chance, if not with Ms. Holzman, then with someone else, someone who has had similar impact on me. To not screw it all up again, and get it right this time.

But what is that, other than me in front of another mirror? Rehearsing what I should have done.

Where do you put a mountain made out of a mole hill? This was intended as an exercise, a little memoir to get working again. Is this just me rambling about myself, ala "Busted" or "You're Chasing Amy", or is there something here more reminiscent of "Dante Hicks is Dead"? Or is it crap? Feedback warmly welcomed. With apologies to the Dooley-Holzman clan for the gratuitous name-dropping - it was a lovely dinner, and I am a basket-case. - The Management.

Hiatus.

2011-07-30T06:28:00.008-04:00

I'm taking a hiatus from the blog. My plan is to be back on here and posting regularly around the time of August 10th-12th. The reasoning is pretty straightforward - I'm not writing a lot, and the writing I do have to do is mostly private in nature [reviews, letters, other correspondence, etc]. I'm also having someone come and visit me soon - a rare occurrence in the post-college years, and I'm treating it a like a vacation

I wouldn't normally do this, and I might not stick to it. But for those who do check this space and support me, I want you to know that the two weeks or so that I'm gone aren't indicative of anything, and that I will be back. I can still be reached by all the usual methods, and don't take this as a sign to not bother me with things - I'll still be available, I'm just taking the pressure off myself here while I apply it to other areas.

This is probably all for the best. I'm clearly struggling with some things as far as my creative output goes, and even though I'm not the optimistic sort, this seems like the right move to make to help fix that. I'm big on saying the obvious things - my previous post was all about saying what I didn't want to say, that I was dealing with writer's block. This post is me saying that I need some time to get other things done, regroup, recharge the batteries, and then come back serious about getting into a groove with my work again.

I'll be back soon. Promise.

The Doldrums

2011-07-20T07:04:00.000-04:00

Just polished off a book review. I have taken way too long to do this one, considering the book was finished ages ago, and getting out ahead of these things tends to be how I like to operate. Also, I get paid more. Which is plus.

Let's talk about accomplishments. Back in January, I had kind of a moment. I was watching an episode of "Always Sunny..." where The Gang wanted to buy some cocaine... actually, I think they wanted to by some pills, to sell, so they could afford some cocaine... which they actually sold to the guy they were trying to buy it from in the first place. Anyway, there was this moment where they needed to come up with the money, and Mac, Charlie, and Dennis didn't have any to chip in, prompting Sweet Dee to chime in with "How do three men in their thirties not have eight hundred dollars between them?"

I don't know why that bugged me, because I am neither three men [despite the rumors] nor am in my thirties yet. But at the time, my bank account was not what you'd call... ah, flush, and a couple of other things came up that made me realize building up a little money to have in the bank was not the worst idea for a New Year's resolution. So, the boy who never made New Year's resolutions made a couple, and that was one of them. I didn't announce any of them, not "officially" and if I have mentioned them, I'm sure I haven't mentioned them in this context and I won't.

Anyway, my point. And about a month and a half ago, thanks to a little luck, I achieved that resolution and then some, which is really no small feat if you're like me and you lack full time employment or the hustle which allows good freelancers to make full time employment money. I set a goal, and I accomplished it, and I feel better for it. A little padding. A little protection. Not a lot. But definitely enough.

And I feel okay.

Now, why am I mentioning this now? Hell, why am I mentioning finishing a book review, when that too usually does not make the blog in any significant way.

Honest fact, I kind of need to look on the bright side a little, as far as achieving goes. Which is weird for me. I generally find "achievers" kind of sickening. Oh, look, Facebook status message about what I got done today. Oh, hey, Twitter post of my word count. Oh, here, blog post on how you can be as successful as me. Gag. Fist pumping for accomplishment I get, encourage, and do not begrudge [and trust me, if you are suddenly worried I'm calling you out, I am not, and you are in this camp that I get, encourage, and do not begrudge], but celebrating achieving instead of the achievement, just for the sake of showing how well you achieve is what keeps talented folk up at night worrying that because they don't work like you, they are not really talented folk. But today, exception. I've done a few things. Need to focus on that.

Why? Good question. I'm suffering here, and I've been avoiding using the term "writer's block" so much that I think it's safe to say that is what has afflicted me. I don't feel particular well, talented, or creative. I spend hours staring at the blinking cursor, getting to a paragraph and a half and deleting... well, utter, unsalvageable garbage. I can't get traction, and I haven't really even had much luck when it comes to transcribing notes, or even doing edits on old work. The people I tend to have creative conversations with are not around, and I have not been seeing much movement on the projects I do have going. There are good reasons for all of this.

But I am... discouraged.

My plan to "fix" this is pretty simple. Rachael has sent me a script of hers to check out, which I'm sure will be excellent, and I have a stack of unread books, and a lot of comics to get through. It has always been my philosophy that the work of others is the best inspiration. I've also got a stack of notebooks and moleskins full, or at least half full, that I'm going to pick through, while hoping something can get me excited and working again. I wouldn't mind getting "The Tagalong" into a few more hands, either.

Because let's face it, I have not accomplished much - this blog has a lot of dead or unfinished projects cataloged in it, but that fact is so much easier for me to stomach if I'm producing. And right now, I'm not. I want to write. I'm trying. It's not coming. That's right, the kid who could barely function when his dad died, but could still start penning "Nova" can't write when he wants to. No. I don't care for that.

I've looked back at the last couple blog entries, and seen myself falling into that cliche habit of apologizing for not posting more. It occurs to me now when I do that, I am forgetting what this space is for - as it was not just meant to be a chronicle for my process, but it was meant to stand as a public forum where I could hold myself accountable to the projects I decided to undertake. Blogging less has nothing to do with blogging - it means I'm working less, and therefore I have less to blog about. As defeatist as the whole end of this post may sound, I am kicking myself the most for not remembering that. I blog when I'm writing. Blogging keeps me writing. This is not a chicken or the egg kind of thing that I'm talking about.

If it were possible to just flick myself in the brain for that one, I would.

I needed the week.

2011-07-12T09:27:00.002-04:00

Woke up from a couple hours sleep, realized I should really get back to this.

Yeah. A whole week not blogging is not great coming from the guy who gave the big speech about getting back into it. Baby steps? No real excuse.

There's also no good way to say that some things just came down the pipe on me, and I think I was more than a little exhausted from all the paying work, so the past several days have just been days which I haven't wanted to write, and when I tried [I had a really good angle on one of those essays, I thought], it really didn't come. And that's... just what happens. We have dry periods.

It's really fashionable with nearly all the writers I know to write no matter what's going on with them - whether they have writer's block, or don't, whether they're dealing with emotional shit or not. Some quote about how you find you won't be able to tell what you wrote when you forced it, as opposed to when it comes naturally gets passed around on Twitter more than chlamydia on college campuses, and it's probably valid but it's just not how I work. Maybe, if that's actually true, one day.

But until then.

Right now it's more about just getting back on track. I felt like I was on a tear before my grandmother went into the hospital, and since then I just haven't been as productive. I had a plan then, actually a couple. Getting back to "The Tagalong" should be priority one, but I've been looking a lot at my outline for "Cherry Stone" when I wake up every morning. It's probably just because that moleskin is easier to pull into bed than my laptop, but still. There's no reason I can't work on both. I just need to get motivated again.

Haven't heard from Ander, but again, I haven't really been talking to many people this past week. No link this post, his website is private at the moment, probably an indication he's shaking some things up again, as I'm sure he has a ton of new pieces to post from working with Eric. So no word on "VHS Generation" - though, honestly, he might be waiting to hear from me. I spoke to Justin the other day, he and his wife Staci had some amazing work in a gallery in Huntington, and I went to that [ran into Kyle too - always good to see him, he seems well]. Justin is currently doing some drawing for other projects, but he's also picked up the comic [Re: Calamity Cash and the Town with No Name] again, and things seem to be progressing. He also gave me something of his, a rough outline for a project he's been talking about doing for as long as we've been working together, and I'm going to take a look at it for him.

I have spent entirely too much money on myself the past few days - mostly what you'd expect from me, books and the like, but I also picked up a new tie, as my woven ones seem a little lowbrow for the wedding coming up, and also a new pair of shoes, not for the wedding, but more because my current pair are awful to walk in, and I'm trying to get a little more active. A lot of my best inspiration came while on long walks, and even though it didn't improve my physique, I felt a great deal healthier when I actually got out, moved around a little more.

The "big" purchase [the shoes cost more...ugh] was me biting the bullet and getting a webcam. I passed on it as an option when I bought this laptop originally, because it saved me somewhere in the era of eighty bucks which I could then put towards processing power. In retrospect, even with the few problems I've had with this machine, I've been wishing I wouldn't have went as budget as I did, and want to start buying a few items that will supplement it, make up for the shortcomings I've mostly just been working around, and one of those things was a web camera. I Skype with enough people that it's probably not the worst investment, and there are some projects I'm thinking about trying my hand at Kickstarter to fund - mind you, that last thing is more hypothetical at moment, but not having the camera, not being able to make a video and say "Hey, I'm Randall, and I'm working on this..." has been one of those little stopping points in my head that I just don't need there anymore.

Anything else that comes out of this is cake - I might even try video blogging. I'm not sure about that one, it was just suggested [suggested in a way that implied that video blogs are stupid, and just the fear that mine might be stupid was no reason not to try it, but still, suggested], though I never could stand the sound of my own voice played back to me. I feel a little like this is one of those things that I can sense the potential in, but might not be clever enough to tap into.

So I don't know. You ever have a time in your life where the things that come naturally suddenly seem hard? Where stuff you want to do, really want to do, feels like a chore? I have these moments. Like there's a barrier - a membrane, cutting me off from what I want to do, an obstacle that I need to push past, to break through. Which is possible, but not easy, and takes an effort great enough that I'm not always sure I can keep the momentum up once I can get through. Doubt. Doubt fucks with everything.

That's kind of topical if you know it.

One-Liners.

2011-07-01T00:38:00.007-04:00

No, not the fun ones.

I'm not much for giving "writer's advice." Short of my big thing about outlines [seriously, kids. Write outlines], I don't think I've ever done that here. A couple of times I've even spent all night writing entries about various "rules" or "tips and tricks" that I ended up not pressing publish on, just because I just don't feel comfortable doing that right now.

But I really have to get this off my chest.

First, let me say, I don’t like prescriptivism. Trying to jam everyone into a single box, trying to make everyone play by the same set of rules, it doesn’t work. Now, true, people who are coping with stringent rules will often make great things, and some folks will even go so far as to put certain restrictions on themselves willingly in hopes it will push them to produce something they wouldn't normally. And if that helps, great. That’s completely, 100% your call. And if you don't want to take that on, if you don't need that - awesome.

All that aside, if you are writing a story, and you cannot sum that story up in a single sentence, then it is probably not a very good story. Is it filled with many, many great ideas? Possibly. Is the story you’re telling necessarily bad, if you can’t do that? Of course not. Are there stories that doing this would be very hard, if not impossible, and they still manage to be good? Maybe. I guess. Occasionally.

But probably not. And if there are, it’s definitely not good to assume that you are so great, that you're story is so great, that you are one of the exceptions to this particular rule.

Look. I get it. Your story is tip-top. You’re breaking boundaries. You’re tying things together that have never been tied together before [you’re not, but you feel that way, and that feeling is important]. You don’t want to be pigeonholed, and you do not want the nuance of your narrative stifled by trying to sum it up in only a handful of words. I've been there. But here’s the thing.

That one sentence? That short, to-the-point way of telling everyone else what you’re writing about, what your story is about? That’s the heart of your story. That’s what it’s about. Okay, maybe you don’t think that’s your story’s heart, but keeping with the organ theme, it is at least the skin of your story, it is what’s holding everything in there together, and inside, and keeping your messy narrative guts from falling out all over the place, and ruining the carpet, and distracting from all the great things that are in your story.

One line. One sentence. It can be a compound sentence if you must. God created commas for a reason, after all. But make sure you can do it. It’s important. Because it’s your story, and you should know what it’s about. And if you can’t sum your story up in a single sentence, then guess what? You don’t know what it’s about.

And that's a one-liner. And if you can’t do it, then you don’t know what your story is about.

Parables.

2011-06-28T03:20:00.006-04:00

My computer's casing cracked again. I'm not entirely sure why - yes, I move it around a lot, but it's not like I'm wacking it against things or dropping it on the floor. I think I have just begun to come to terms with the fact that I bought a budget-priced laptop, and the wear and tear is just the side-effect of that. It is the exact same kind of problem I paid Dell somewhere in the area of 200 dollars to fix before. This time I just took super glue, and press the cracks together, sealing the whole thing up on the outside. It looks like crap, like I actual took a butane lighter and melted the casing back together, but otherwise, it has worked perfectly.

It is in these moments I fear I may have forgotten myself.

I find myself wondering why I have strayed so far from these sorts of solutions to my problems, why I had gotten to a place where functional [when all I needed was function] wasn't good enough. It screams of trying to impress someone, and missing the point of what I should really be doing entirely.

I've been pretty busy this past week - most of it has been from paying work. My book reviews have gotten a little intense, longer books arriving at shorter intervals from each other - nothing to complain about, what I get is really just a roll of the dice, and when I get it is almost entirely up to me, when I turned my last review in. But occasionally when two land so close together it's easy to feel overwhelmed, like all I'm doing are reviews, and that's when a pretty sweet deal tends to feel a little more like a job. The company seems really pleased with the work I do though, and I like that, and I don't know this for sure but I've felt lately like I've been getting better assignments from them. I can't think of a single way they'd do that, but still.

It's one of those management tools I picked up from Terry back in the day - letting your people know they're doing good work can really make them feel better about said work they're doing, even if the tasks themselves haven't changed much.

Speaking of Terry, working on the press releases for our PRSA-WV Crystal Award win was what the bulk of last week went to. You can see a bit about our win here on the PRSA website [search "Vandalia," "Angela Beth Armstead," or "Terry Lively" on the page to see the exact info], and I'll link one of the press releases proper if either go up on the web. I got eight billable hours out of doing the releases, which is pretty accurate to the actual time spent working on them - I'm still in that place where there's always an hour or two I forget to account for, and I'm never comfortable guessing and charging the client for that, but I was much better at keeping track this time. I thought it turned out well, but I promised a final edit, which will probably come down the tube sometime this week.

I also got this on Twitter last week from my cousin Travis, concerning the copy I did for his website, TCustomz.com:

DM from TCustomz: "dude, i'm on the first page of Google for "soul beats" and "sampled beats" thanks to your writing"

This? This I really love. This is a DM notification I'd frame if possible. Twitter should look in to maybe selling prints of said tweets. If I got these for everything I worked on, I almost wouldn't need paid.

I also said goodbye to my kid brother this week. Aaron's... shipping out, sans the ship, headed to basic training as part of the US Army. My mom and step-dad threw a small get-together in his honor on Saturday, and even though I'm just as proud of him as anyone, I still have crazy-mixed feeling about my only sibling going off to join the armed forces in this particular climate. Anyone who doesn't give a shit about politics clearly has never had someone they loved in a position to be put in harms way, and I've just been kind 0f... I'll be honest, I'm not even half-way to untangling all my emotions as it concerns his enlisting. I was very lucky to have my friend Beck along with me, it helped take the edge off like you wouldn't believe, and though I've tried, I'll never really be able to thank her enough for that.

The crazy thing is, Aaron is one of the strongest guys I know, and as much as I'm sweating this for him, I imagine to him it's probably next to no big deal. He has this amazing ability to be calm in the face of things that most of us couldn't even dream of dealing with in such a composed and measured manner, and I honestly don't believe there's anything they can throw at him that will ever be able to throw him. But hey. He's my little brother.

I worry.

I'll be out from under these book reviews by the fourth [there's always more, but hopefully not in the same quick succession], and imagine I'll have notes on the press releases and will have made all the important changes by then, too. I'm hoping to have the time to work on some of my more creative projects after, either editing on "The Tagalong," or maybe starting the script for "Cherry Stone." Both have been on my mind a whole lot lately, and I'd like to have the time to put some work in on them. Plus, I have this nice stack of new books from friends for my Birthday that I'd love to start tearing into ["Bone," anyone? Also, Gillen and McKelvie's "Phonogram" - and a bunch of Tina Fey's essays].

I'm also hoping to have an update about "VHS Generation" from Ander. I know he was under the gun on deadlines for a bit, but last we talked he also seemed like he was making some headway on maybe some layouts, or something nifty I could show off here. The same is true for Justin - I heard from him around my birthday, and it looks like he's found a better way to schedule time for the comic [re: "Calamity Cash and the Town with No Name"] around or maybe during his working hours, so I wouldn't be surprised if I have something to show off for that in the next couple weeks too.

State of the Human Address XXVI

2011-06-21T02:23:00.007-04:00

I should really be sleeping.

Hey, that sounds kind of familiar.

Seriously, though, it is ridiculous how much work I'm looking at this week, all of it paying, but not much of it all that creative. I have already complained too much about needing to do things that will ultimately put a little more green in my pocket, so I'm going to try and avoid that, and talk about matters at hand. Well, one matter.

My twenties appear to be circling the drain.

Yesterday was my birthday, the big 2-6. And though I don't feel all that differently, there's a big part of me that desperately wants to sit here and echo a lot of the thoughts that Amy Klein touched on in her post earlier this year entitled "A Woman of a Certain Age." Every few minutes I've had to spare lately, I've been pulling it up and just reading through it. The larger points in it are very gender-oriented, as they should be, as they sort of have to be [given current attitudes and events], and admittedly, your time is probably better spent reading it [as its points are much less selfish, and much more important] instead what I'm about to ramble on about. Because there is snag in it for me. And something in it that doesn't have as much to do with our society's fucked up ideas about age and gender, something that has to do with pursuing a certain kind of goal deep into your twenties, and, barring success, onward, and into your... thirties.

I am worried about being too old. I keep thinking about older people I know, individuals pursuing dreams as lofty or loftier than my own, and how as that age goes up, the more willing I am to scoff at their goals. How ridiculous that seems to me. As if instead of rejecting the idea that growing up is necessary, I decided that, if a certain amount of success was reached by a certain age, it was okay to carry on. It wasn't sad, or pathetic, I wasn't deluding myself. There was still time to dream big. Still room to find out if the way everyone does it was just one choice among many.

I don't know why I think getting older might sacrifice that. I don't know what it is that I expect to impede me as the years progress, other than similar thinking like mine from people who will judge me as uncreative, uninteresting, or unfuckable. I keep trying to stay optimistic, think of "Slouching Towards Bethlehem" and how there are "old hippies too." Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn't. It's hard to see those I know who are better than me struggle, and even fail. Difficult to watch peers find more success, and wonder if my time has past. Discouraging to hear someone as talented as Amy Klein, who in a very short time has become one of my favorite writers, doubt her own shelf life, when the world would be mad to ever let her be forgotten.

But there's hope. I don't know what it is, or what it looks like -- ironically, descriptions that might describe my own feelings on my personal aspirations. There is hope that those who flounder will find their footing, there is hope in any one of us succeeding, and there is hope that the doubts of the best among us are just that -- doubts, not predictions.

In some respects, today has been kind of brilliant. Remarkable, as I've taken to describing things, perhaps a little too often [I always find a favorite word, for at least a little while]. John and Sarah, two of my better friends, and two of the more skilled writers I know, have complimented my abilities, complimented my attention to my craft. They've also both gotten me books, incredibly encouraging gifts to a writer, or at least this writer, as I have used the works of so many others to sharpen and polish my own skills. I doubt, seriously, that were I to give up writing all together, the books would stop, and yet there is a still a part of me that, upon getting a new one, looks at it as a possibility to improve. To see something I haven't recognized, to get better at something I've done badly, or have never done before.

Outside of my storytelling work, there has been other praise. A website I worked on not too long ago recently got an award. Another project, the owner of the site, sent me good news regarding how well my copy had served his site. These accomplishments are to be shared another time, and another place. They just stand to make me feel a little better.

And there's more work on the way. More reviews to write. More freelance work on the horizon. A head full of comic book and creative ideas. Justin and Ander still toiling away at Calamity Cash and VHS Generation, respectively. A new idea I just need time to put together. Some old ideas that are begging to finally be finished. Not to mention a few more responsibilities here at home.

This is hard for me. I am not good at figuring out my own feelings, and it doesn't seem like something I'm getting any better at over time. But I think I have to admit, by how much I'm scrambling, how much I'm neglecting this blog, how behind I am on my daily reading, how many other, personal things I have failed to get done... that my grandmother's recent hospital visit shook me up more than I realized, enough that things aren't going to fall back into place quite like I expected them to. I'm not entirely sure what fixing that is going to entail.

What I do know is that I want to stop neglecting this space. I want to get back to posting two or three time a week, maybe even more. I want to get back to basics with the place, where I actually talk about writing, but when I'm not writing, I'm not afraid to come here and say as much. I think I've gotten self-conscious, the longer this space has been here. I don't think I can afford to do that anymore. And I have to trust that if someone's going to come here, to read "New Hooverville" or to read essays I'm working on for "Casey Jones's Blues" that they'll also be able to tolerate me opining about the minutiae, whether that entails getting or not getting the work done. Or, at the very least, they'll be able to overlook that stuff for what does interest them. I need to stop running this place like it's some half-assed resume. I shouldn't be worried that I don't have enough to write about, or that I've prattled on for too long on any one subject. I shouldn't be worried about the consequences, or looking a certain kind of way. There are places for those kinds of things. I don't think this is one of them. And I don't think that's the kind of professionalism I'm striving for here.

I'm 26 now. I do not know exactly what that means. If I'm honest with myself, I don't want it to mean anything, but I have a fair idea from the lump in my throat that is probably not the case. Because I'm a freaked that I'm closer to thirty than twenty now. And I think I'm choosing to regress a bit because of it - move back, to that time, that process that was working for me before, that made me feel like I had a little better handle on the world.

I don't want to lose any progress I've made. But I'd like to get back to that place where I wasn't constantly doubting myself for the progress I hadn't. And I've already got enough obstacles without making more. I can't find any reassurance in going forward with this, if I already think it's too late.

...then again, sometimes it's easier to play a game that you don't really think you can win...

No. That's a whole different thing. For some other story, or some other day.

I'm going to post a couple of updates on paying work [re: TCustomz.com, Vandalia Productions] before Saturday. Nothing earthshaking. All of it good news. But I need the next couple of days to play catch up, first.Couple of postcards to put up, once I find my scanner, too.

Happy Birthday to me.

Stacking Mad Paper with TCustomz.com

2011-06-13T03:45:00.014-04:00

So, this was sort of buried in my previous post, and I just want to call attention to it again, because I'm really pleased with how it turned out.

TCustomz.com

TCustomz Productionz is committed to bringing premium beats, instrumentals, and drum kits to artists and producers looking for that perfect sound to complete their projects and support their flow. Producing both composed and sampled beats, TCustomz reflects the old school tradition, but with a new school twist, offering a cleaner, industry quality sound that remains true to the gritty, underground style. Whether you’re an aspiring musician, an up-and-coming producer looking for quality drum kits, or an established star trying to find something fresh and real, TCustomz Productionz has what you need.

Above is part of the mission statement - to read more, go check out TCustomz.com.

I cannot say enough about how proud I am with the finished product on this. This was a great job to work on, Travis made himself incredibly available and was just so passionate about what it is that he does, and was so willing to just sit and talk about it that I went into the actual writing process with a wealth of information to craft into the final copy. There were deadlines, but nearly all of them were self-set, and quality was valued above anything else. At this level, this is the sort of freelance gig you dream about. And not to pay myself on the back, but I think it shows in the work.

Again, I want to thank TCustomz for the opportunity to be involved in the next step of the growth of his business, and for being such a great client.

And not to shill, but I also want to say that if anyone reading this is involved in music in any way, in any genre, and is looking for someone to do website copy, or press releases, or anything like that, to take a look at my work on TCustomz.com and, if you like what you see, email me at mojo.wire.productions@gmail.com. Though not a musician or a producer myself, I'm very passionate about music, and love any chance to write about it, and hopefully help those involved with it if I can.

Serve the Servant(s)

2011-06-06T05:50:00.011-04:00

Few things to run through. Just not like, you know, on a sword.

First up, congratulations to my kid brother, Aaron, who graduated from high school this past week. As you can see in the picture, like most high school grads, he can't quite see what all the fuss is about - a feeling I remember well, the sort of "what did you expect was going to happen" vibe that makes it difficult to understand what all the fuss is about. While I certainly felt like high school was going to go on forever, and even hypothesized once to a very stoned friend that maybe it would, that somewhere along the way we had died, and went to hell, and that this was our eternal damnation, two kids forced to live the same day over and over again, backs to the same wall, going through the same routine, over and over again, with no deviation. All as some punishment from some past deviation.

I think what I neglected back then, what the grads are probably suppose to neglect, is that this was not so much a day for the grad. Commencement is for the families, the relatives. A show you act in, but would really not be too keen on watching.

I enjoyed the ceremony, found a lot of hilarity in how high strung my mother was, and gave Aaron a nice gift to commemorate the day. I tracked down an old Raketa watch from the 1970s, the sort issued in the Soviet Military along with the more ostentatious and common [so I'm told] Vostok watches. He's always been a bit of a war buff, and I wanted to get him a watch because my Dad got me one when I graduated, and that seemed to fit. Plus, a proper tank of wind-up that only the USSR can make? Can't beat that.

And it's hard not to find the tiny "CCCP" pretty nifty too.

We got my grandmother home on Thursday, and most of my time since then has been getting her settled in, making sure she doesn't overdo it before getting back to 100%. She's always been intensely independent, and I personally believe that you don't live and go through the things she has, and then have to get ordered around by some 20-something, no matter how good his intentions are. So it's mostly about keeping up with things, getting them done so she just doesn't have to worry about them. We're slipping back into a regular routine here, but it might be another week before I get back to serious work on any sort of writing project.

It's good to have her home. I appreciate all the support, all the nice things said or done by folks while I was dealing with all this. Thank you.

This whole thing is the major reason while my normal, daily linking of things on my Twitter page has stopped. I apologize to anyone who thinks I might be snubbing them by not throwing them some coverage, believe me, I want to, I've just been really busy and really distracted, and that's put a crimp in things. Most everything I link tends to show up in the right sidebar there under "Blog Roll," so I'd recommend checking there daily. Even if I haven't blogged [and that might continue to be sparse too], please come back and see what all my friends have been up to.

Also, something to check out:

TCustomz.com

Some, though not all, of my copy for TCustomz.com has went live. Travis is exceptionally pleased with what we have so far, and we're really only one sit-down and probably a little bit of editing from yours truly away from being completely finished. It was a new experience for me, as I'd put website copy together before, but never for a company like this, and there is very little out there to use as examples or build upon. I'm pleased though, and again, feeling a little better about trusting myself.

Speaking of web copy, the company I was working for on the Angela Beth Armstead, DDS website - Terry Lively's Vandalia Productions - has won an award from the West Virginia branch of The Public Relations Society of America. I don't know much in the way of details yet, but apparently there's going to be a dinner/reception on the 15th that I'll be attending. We're all going as group, company solidarity, I'll probably write more about it when I have more information. It seems like a pretty big deal, though.

As personal work goes, I want to thank John, Ian, Max, and Dave for all the kind words and retweets on "Dante Hicks is Dead." That meant a lot, and along with the "likes" on Facebook, I'm thinking these essays are something I might like to pursue. I jumped the gun a little with this one - I don't feel nearly ready to churn these out on anything resembling a regular basis - but that they elicited any response at all made me think I wasn't crazy to put some time towards this first one, and that it was all positive seems like an even greater endorsement. I am sitting on about ten other rough topics for these essays- originally, I was considering something only 80s and 90s-based, but I've since had a couple of ideas concerning things like Scott Pilgrim and Bryan Danielson, so this might just become something of a catch-all "my life through pop culture" kind of memoir thing.

So there will be more, under the tag of "Casey Jones's Blues." I expect it could be a little bit before a second installment, just because, again, I put "Dante Hicks is Dead" up before I really had an overall theme in mind or anything like that. I've also got to finish "The Tagalong" and some stuff that I have been working on/putting off since before I decided to throw this first essay in a series out into the world. But I feel pretty confidant that I'm going to keep at it, and hopefully soon, if only because I've been reading so much Joan Didion, and Bucky Sinister.

If you know their work, you'll see where I'm coming from.

Brief letter from Ander recently, telling me to expect an email sometime this week. Possibly "VHS Generation"-related artwork? Fingers crossed.

Speaking of comics, my friend Sarah told me today that "Girls with Slingshots," a web comic I enjoy immensely but desperately need to catch up on, is authored by a West Virginia native, someone still actually living here in Sheperdstown. I had not known this about Danielle Corsetto, and am a little bummed that she hasn't gotten more local coverage [or perhaps I had just missed it], but I found myself almost too excited about it, a little gleam of hope that I haven't had since finding out Norm Scott [that'd be of "Hsu and Chan" fame] was also from around here. Of course, I don't draw, which is really a problem since it's so difficult finding people up for any sort of long-term collaboration, but still.

Also local, not comic-related, but still cool, the oft-linked, always quality Glen "Mario's Closet" Brogan has begun working on a mural in the city of Charleston. You can see his announcement of the project here, and some posts about his progress here and here. Big congratulations to Glen on this - we're all proud of him.

Looks, it's no secret that I hate it in this state. You can point a lot of fingers as to whose fault that is or isn't, whether I'm difficult, or if there's just nothing here. I find people will make their own decisions, there. The long and short of it is that Randall Nichols and West Virginia have not worked out for each other in many creative ways - but those who it has, those who I would like to call peers [as the gaps between their successes and my failures grow, I feel worse for doing that], their accomplishments are substantial, and I like celebrating them, want to celebrate them. And stuff like this gives me hope that myself and WV may one day work for each other enough so that the two of us can go our separate ways, hopefully in peace.

Hoping to grab just a little bit of sleep. Feeling a little more tired than usual.

Dante Hicks is Dead.

2011-05-30T00:25:00.004-04:00

In the summer of 2006, exactly one month after my birthday, my father and I sat in a small movie theater at Park Place Stadium Cinemas as the credits for Kevin Smith's newly released sequel to "Clerks" - "Clerks 2" [shocking title] - came to a close, slowly panning back on its two protagonists, the infamous Randal Graves and Dante Hicks, as the color washed from the screen and Soul Asylum's "Misery" began its lonesome entreaty to the audience. The theater was not terribly full, its attendant was most likely busy, so with the lights still off, and the other patrons shuffling out, I sat next to my father and started to cry.

To his merit, he never said a word, never offered a joke to wash the moment away, or asked if there was something wrong, of if there was something he could do. There was something wrong - there were a lot of things wrong in my life at the time, most of them not nearly as important as I thought they were, but one of them important enough that I'm relatively sure that its presence still ails me to this day. I was in a place I didn't want to be, there was a person I loved that I was growing apart from, and the end of college was looming, and I had no idea what the future would hold for me. As far as "what I wanted" went, I hadn't a clue.

"Clerks 2" probably should have solidified that feeling to me. That moment should have been a moment of hopelessness, those tears could have been born from that swelling, growing terror. When I discovered "Clerks" in high school, a world had opened up for me, the early to mid-nineties cinema which I had been too young and out of touch to discover showing me something I wanted to be part of, something that said I could be myself, but I was also allowed to make things better -- not in an altruistic sense, but still, better for me. And while "Clerks" was the first, and while it would introduce me to not just Kevin Smith's movies, but classics of both cult and mainstream variety, it would also hold the distinction of being the favorite, of being the inspiration. Of showing that if I wanted, I could do what Kevin Smith was doing too. Not in a way that made it look easy, but in a way that made it look like something that, with work, I could accomplish myself. Attainability, without dragging that which seemed attainable down. A rare, wonderful thing for a cynic.

And now I was watching the sequel to that, not closer to my own brass ring. Not far from the age Smith was when he made the first, and now, here was the second, twelve years later. The cynic hadn't even caught the gleam off his brass ring.

But it wasn't that. That wasn't why I cried. I was crying because, for the first time in so very, very long, as I sat in that theater with those credits rolling, I realized I felt like I was home. Home. I say it again, and realize it sounds corny. But once upon a time I could recite "Clerks" like a priest with his bible verses. More often than not, when I was alone, when I had a moment of peace, it was on, slightly overexposed black and white film glaring off my TV set, in way that could almost give you a certain kind of headache. A moving poster, an electric, full-screen, analog security blanket. Safe. Comfortable. Funny. Reassuring. Home. And "Clerks 2" took me back home.

It was beautiful. I cried. For a while, I think I cried every time. And even now, occasionally, it can catch me off guard.

You can't be that kind of Kevin Smith fan, however, and not know how close to not having that moment in 2006 I came. The original "Clerks" was not so much released in theaters as it was "released in theater(s)," and in this early, initial cut of the film, a great deal of things were different. The drugged out ramblings of Jason Mewes not so alter-ego "Jay" were longer, and included an amusing anecdote about having sex with his cousin. You could also see Randal interacting with the store security camera, and a few more idiot customers also turned up along the way. And there was a small subplot about another unfortunate customer, not of the Quick Stop, but of the drug dealers and Jay and Silent Bob, who needed just a little more scratch to cover his debt, and outfit the Jersey house party he was headed to with dankest of shit that Jay could provide. Of course, he was broke. But there are ways around these things.

So this nameless drug strolled into the Quick Stop while Dante Hicks was counting out for the day, and shot and killed our hapless protagonist, leaving him lifeless behind the counter, not even supposed to be there that day.

Such a depressing ending was listed, early on, as one of the film's greatest flaws, and Smith's mentor John Pierson suggested he cut it, so naturally Smith did. He was a young man, a young filmmaker, and Pierson's opinion held a great deal of weight. Few would ever call this move a mistake, and even Smith admits he only ended the film that way because it was an indie movie, and "in indie movies, someone always dies." It was unnecessary, some even say it would have made "Clerks" a different kind of movie, and that is a legitimate argument to be made.

But let's also be fair; any movie that's success hinges solely on its ending isn't all that good of a movie anyway, and whether Smith had changed that ending or not probably would have had little baring on the sudden jump start to his career. He still would have gotten studio attention, he still would have joined the Miramax Golden Boys, and its pretty likely Smith would have continued making movies much as he has to this day. Smith himself has cast doubts on the Jersey Trilogy having ever taken shape had he kept that ending, but a touch a stubbornness, a different decision, none of this necessarily would have halted the slow creation of the View Askewniverse.

It would still be a universe. Smith was a comic book fan at heart, and appreciated the shared world the three-color heroes shared in their monthlies. Batman and Superman were friends, Spidey could spin by and have a beer with Daredevil, the Fantastic Four could fight the Hulk -- he liked these things, and the continuity that developed between them, because of them, and put it into his own world he was creating, setting [mostly] in Leonardo, New Jersey. And he was a stickler for his own continuity, at least for a while, and when you consider that, in the same context of the death of Dante Hicks, it is hard not to wonder.

Obviously, "Mallrats" could have went on without him. "Chasing Amy" also could have been made without a hitch, and in fact it's "down ending" would fit better in a world where Dante Hicks was dead. In "Chasing Amy" everything was darker, everything was just a little more real - Jay and Bob, in their few moments of screen time, even seem a bit harder edged... not the kids from "Mallrats" but more like two someones who could have walked into a Tarantino scene. "Dogma" is much the same, though with a brighter gloss, and a feeling like Smith himself is trying to regain a little of his ridiculousness, and little bit of the light-hearted charm, while dealing with something with so serious that the filmmaker would get death threats himself. And why not? If someone would kill over drugs, or a pack of smokes, some Hollywood-hotshot lampooning the Catholic faith probably shouldn't be surprised that a few folks might want him dead.

Other parts of the mythos are more problematic. The Oni-published Clerks comics could have easily been prequels, at least one supposes, barring of course the Christmas Special, but like we've seen with Joss Whedon, even if that had been produced someone could have come along and agreed to its canonicity. "Chasing Dogma" now actually fits better, but its eventual metamorphosis into "Jay and Silent Bob Strikes Back" seems unlikely. Randal and Dante are the impetus for Jay and Bob's ejection from outside the Quick Stop, and it's difficult to swallow that Randal Graves would have ever been able to pick up with his life after "Clerks" and keep working in the video store, steps away from where his friend died. And even if he somehow could, Randal Graves is not so immutable that he would be the same man after such a tragedy, that he'd be able to slip back into old habits, and care enough about arguments concerning Morris Day and "Clash of the Titans" to ever call the cops. Those wheels would not be set in motion.

The cartoon, I suppose, could have still happened. Why not? Though again, what seems more likely is that the "Dogma" cartoon that was originally considered would have taken shape, maybe not made it on ABC, but found a home in syndication. Hell, maybe Kevin Smith could have used that cartoon to walk away from Hollywood completely, become a "TV guy," with a cast and crew diametrically opposed to the cheap animation and one-note jokes of a Seth MacFarlane-dominated prime time cartoon landscape.

All right. So there probably just wouldn't have been a cartoon.

And there probably wouldn't have been a "Clerks 2." And if there had, what would it have been? What would the Askewniverse look like without Dante Hicks? Maybe Randal would have been forever tied to the place that claimed his only friend. Maybe it still burns down, and Randal never looks back, goes to Mooby's, and winds up being the one who knocks up Becky, a relationship which could never persevere, never last, as Elias looks on, probably more of a punching bag for Randal's ever-growing spite for the world. Because he hates everything, and thinks everything is stupid. Who the hell would ever want to be his friend? And what the hell else does he have in life to live for?

Smith has said "Clerks 2" was as much about being in his 30s as "Clerks" was about being in his 20s. That's fair. That picture above would probably not reflect Smith's 30s, even without Dante Hicks, giving it all the more reason to never be made. But then again, what if it wasn't? What if, without Dante, Smith had no outlet for what he felt he needed to say? Where would Jay and Silent Bob be now, what venue would Smith find for his one big musical number? Kevin is an artist, a writer, who is always at his best when he has something he feels he has to say, and Dante really, was his first avatar to express that. Would Holden [Fucking] McNeil have been his second choice, had he left his first back on that Quick Stop floor? Is he still out there, chasing Alyssa Jones?

It is a morbidly fun game to play. Would Dante Hicks would have had some small part as one of the many kinds of living dead in "Dogma" [he has, of course, the experience, from being one of the living dead in "Clerks"]? Maybe not in physical form, but as some twisted Alan Rickman-uttered metaphor for the meaninglessness of existence, about the man who put himself out one day, who lived a day so important in its unimportance, and who, on the precipice of change, was denied that change by an act of random violence, by a bullet from some hoodlum of a gun? And then a sobbing Last Scion, so angry at the Lord who she feels has forsaken her on her question, screams back at him, asking why, why the Creator couldn't himself have saved this man, reach out to him, protected him, just ended the picture a minute or so early, that he may go on living, and make the changes he had planned on. Or not. Couldn't his God have given him the time?

The best things in Kevin Smith movies occur in conversations, the nuanced parts that take a little more attention, that ask someone to look at the threads between the characters. You have to take the time. Maybe Dante Hicks would have been remembered like that, the reason his cousin Gil goes for the big prizes in "Mallrats," a parable for living life to its fullest in "Chasing Amy," a memorial in the background, if you just pause the laserdisc, or put the DVD on slow motion, and run through it, one frame at a time. Here lies Dante Hicks. "The Lord Has Taken Him Home."

Home.

Every comic book fan loves a good "What If...?" Everyone wants to see the Elseworlds or Earth-2476, everyone wants to know about The Nail. It's hard not to be interested, it's hard not to want to leave the comfort of the fictions we know, and visit places where Superman still has the mullet, where Wolverine has killed the X-Men, where Donna Noble turned right. We want to see how they'd be different, how they would cope if we perversely reallocated their losses and theirs gains. And right on the edge of that, we wonder what we might have sacrificed, and how we too might have been changed.

In July of 2006, if Dante Hicks had died, I would not have sat in a movie theater and cried openly in front of my father, hunched over the back of a faux-velvet seat, the only thing keeping me from falling to my knees in genuflection. I would not have this small moment, which most would think was of little consequence, as a part of my life. And though I can speculate endlessly what this would have changed for Kevin Smith, or my father, or even the fictitious Randal Graves, I cannot imagine what it would have meant for me.

I always feel weird writing an invoice...

2011-05-24T01:54:00.004-04:00

A lot of positive stuff to talk about, despite it not being the best couple of days.

Nearly finished with the copy for TCustomz.com. Sent off the invoice, and the rough draft of the biography page last night/this morning. Feeling pretty good about it - I spent a lot of my week working on the page that profiles who Travis is, where he's been, and what he's done, and while I know this is always the page of copy that needs the most adjusting, I still found myself digging what I did with it. The "problem" with an artists profile is that there are just so many ways to do them, and if you're any good at interviewing your client [I like to think I am], then you're going to have a wealth of information to pull from, and a lot of ways to utilize it. I've seen websites that just jam the information about the artist in there like it's the back of a hardcover, and that's fine in some circumstances, but I've always thought the way you present said information should reflect the person its about.

So the rough copy of that is in Travis's hands, and the rest of the work is done. Everything but the bio will be up on his website soon, and I'll do a post pointing everyone to that when the time comes. I've really enjoyed working with Travis on this, and am hopeful that my copy will help him. We really ended up doing something that not a lot of other websites in his industry does. In fact, I'm just going to go ahead and say, if you're a producer, if you do sampling and sell beats, honestly, if you're just a musician, someone in a band, and your website is looking sparse, I would recommend upping the copy on it. Your Flash Player is not showing up in any search engine.

And if you need someone to do it for you, well... hi. How can I help?

Justin has put up some sketches for the comic on his blog [re: Calamity Cash and the Town with No Name]. The first is of Tana Cash herself, just an amazing and dynamic shot, though I think Justin's having a little problem with his scanner, so you won't get to see any of the background in the sketch. Still, it's absolutely amazing, exactly how I picture our heroine at her most bad ass. He also just finished said page, and put up this thumbnail, which is absolutely worth a look too. It's hilarious to me that even with a plot point being how little ammo they have, I worked so many firearms into that script.

Unrelated to all of that, I also wanted to thank my friend John Wiswell for his blog post today. He recently received another Versatile Blogger award, a real honor in his community, and one he absolutely deserves, if you're familiar at all with his stuff. But in the post, he also made reference to our Tuesday night ritual where we watch Dragon Gate Infinity together, and just generally talk wrestling while he listens to me gush about how great K-Ness is. It's one of the highlights of my week, and one of those things that just wouldn't be possible without the internet to bring us together for it. The great downside to my years of college in Vermont means that the bulk of my friends are not folks who live right next door, and chilling together can get a lot more involved than just grabbing some beer and a DVD and popping by.

But more flattering than all of that is that John named me on a list of his versatile writers. Again, if you follow John's work at all [and if you don't you really should] you'll know there's really no one who busts genres like he does, no one who personifies versatile more than John, and to be recognized by him at all for even achieving a modicum of that is just... beyond flattering. I don't have words, or even a proper way to say thank you for him saying this. It just means a lot.

I may actually join in the game later in the week, throw out some little known facts about myself, but right now my heart's just not in it. My grandmother's in the hospital, and she's doing okay, but it's still thrown everything here into disarray. She's doing okay, which is really as much as I'm comfortable going into here, just because I know she finds it mortifying that us kids throw up so much personal stuff on the internet for anyone to read, and even with this glowing shrine to myself I kind of agree with her there. But yeah, that's why despite all the good news, the past few days have not been great.

My kid brother is graduating from high school this weekend. But it's barely Tuesday now, and that feels a long way off.

If the Rapture is coming, I'll be starring in all 16 of those shitty novels.

2011-05-19T23:43:00.005-04:00

Already got the client feedback for the bulk of Travis's website copy, we had a short sit down about it, and I plugged in the pretty minimal changes he wanted made. Unless you've ever worked on a project like this for someone, it's hard to illustrate how incredibly satisfying it can be to just see how pleased the client is with what you've done for them - in my experience, it rarely ever happens, even when the client is pleased. That's been the awesome thing about working with Travis on his website - this business he's started is his baby, he is in charge of every single aspect of it, and he's passionate about making it great. Which means he has made himself available and has wanted to be involved in the project, and as strange as it sounds, that actually tends to lead to less drafts, less changes, better work. Communication is key, folks. Could not ask for a better person to work for on this, either.

Still have to finish off his biography/profile page. It is one of the more involved sections, with a lot more text and about a hundred different ways it could be put together. I have a rough deadline for myself on Monday. My guess is that some, if not all, of my copy will be going live on TCustomz website sometime next week. Expect links. I'm pretty pleased with how this has worked out, and I'm hoping other music-type people will see what has been done, and think, "hey, we should get something like that too."

Preferably from me. Hah.

Justin has an in-progress preview of the most recent "Calamity Cash and the Town with No Name" page up on his blog. He's really bogged down, and having to alter the way he prefers to work [not style, time, etc - but read his entry, he'll tell you about it better than I can], but he continues to plug along on this. It looks good, and I'm always happy to see the new stuff. Hopefully I'll get to see the how page in person in the next couple weeks... we've also been trying to make a better effort of hanging out.

It's a balancing act.

Always a good excuse to remind you to get one of Justin's sketchbooks. It's awesome, and supporting fellow creatives is what this space is all about.

I've not been feeling my best the past couple of days. I think it's just been bad times, though I dislike saying so because there has been good stuff happening too.

Sunday to Sunday

2011-05-16T00:54:00.005-04:00

"The electric white of the computer screen causes me great pain - when switched to black, the glowing reds feel like needles, slipping just under my eyes, throbbing with each heartbeat. The access it affords me is unprecedented, but I fear, more often than not, I'm stretching my perceptions in ways they were not meant to be... I think that we are absorbing information in a manner our bodies never expected. That we are committed now, pragmatically, to going in through the out door, the arrows on the floor all pointing us in the opposite direction in which we move. It's crowded; we will bump and crash into each other. It will damage us - if we're lucky."

--William Kurdt (May, 2007)

---

A whole week after promising to post more. Ridiculous.

I blame the Blogger outage at least partially, though I will admit to finding some perverse glee in what a state it seemed to put so many people in. We are remarkably sensible about the internet when it's working, but when something goes wrong I think our dependence shows a little. And I kind of think that's great.

The work on the TCustomz project is going really well. I've already gotten first drafts of about 2/3rds of the copy done, and that was sent to Travis today, a full 24 hours ahead of the deadline we set. I wanted to get one of the larger chunks of copy that wasn't scheduled for tomorrow done as well, that other third of the work, but it's just occurred to me that I'm going to need several more days to polish it off, and since I'd originally said that's how long it would take, I just had to admit to myself that I was on schedule. And that was okay.

It's funny that I sweat being on time more than being ahead or behind.

I also got feedback from Kyle this week on "The Tagalong," a pleasant surprise which will come in real handy once I have some time to get back to working on it. Right now I'm a little swamped, and paying work almost always takes precedence with me, less out of a great commitment to the almighty dollar, and more because I have a tendency of letting my projects take over my life. It's counterintuitive to deadlines to work on something unrelated for days until you pass out in a stupor, only to sleep said stupor off until you've made an acceptable dent in the sleep debt you've accumulated. It can get out of hand.

Discipline.

Since I haven't written anything I can really share, I'm going to link Amy Klein's recent blog post on the passing of Poly Styrene. Or maybe just prompted by her passing. It's called "Poly Styrene Takes Her Place in History" and like most things Amy writes, it has a lot more going on than just it's obvious topic. Which means even if you're not a Poly Styrene fan [and what's wrong with you if you're not?], you should probably read it anyway. I said this already on Twitter, but when Amy Klein blogs, I realize just how much I need to up my game as a writer.

I also got to read to someone this week. Joan Didion - not who I read to, but what I read to someone. I hadn't really read to anyone, hadn't really read out loud, in such a long time. And that was really nice too.

Catching up - new copy project for TCustomz.com.

2011-05-08T01:26:00.007-04:00

There's really no reason for me to have not posted more lately. I've certainly been working.

Sleep is the problem. When isn't it? I've been staying up all night, running errands during the day, and sleeping just enough in the evening to stay up all night again. Sometimes it butchers my productivity, other times I hardly even notice a difference. Five to nine instead of nine to five. The short five to nine though. I should probably fix this, try to adjust to something more sensible. It's hard, because I do feel really comfortable on this schedule, even though it's not very sensible. Everything can get done on this schedule. Even if I do feel unpleasant for most of the day because of it.

Big project right now is preparing copy for my cousin Travis Cole's website - or TCustomz as it's called [that's the business, website, and artist's moniker]. I've mentioned before, but Travis is a music producer; he samples and creates beats, puts together hip hop instrumentals, and makes drum kits, and has it all online and up for sale. Along with being extremely talented at it, Travis is also a much smarter artist than I am, as he's been plying his craft as a producer on the side while keeping lucrative, steady employment, and along the way he's really found some success with his beats and feels, rightfully so, like he's ready to take his business to the next level.

As anyone who has a website-based business knows, it's all about search terms, getting those important words and all that self-promoting content onto the site proper so you pop high on Google when searched for. Accessibility and visibility translate into big business, and Travis has hired me to put together the copy which is going to facilitate that. We've had a slew of emails passed back and forth between us over the past month or so, and two good Skype conferences about what it is he wants, and now I'm just in that busy place where I'm looking over notes and trying to get a rough draft going for him.

Current deadline is loose [upside to working with someone not in a hurry, and who wants the best work possible], but I'm trying to get first copy to him by the 16th-17th. That's the tentative date. We've talked about several things we can do with this, both now, and down the line, and I may also interview Travis and post it up here after this project is done, just to get him so press to link to, as a placeholder for when all his rather spectacular work starts to get a lot of real press. Which I'm sure it will.

Check out just what Travis does on his website here : http://tcustomz.com/.

But that's getting a little ahead of myself. Right now I'm not looking much farther ahead than next week. I just polished off a book review, and I'm hoping another book won't come until I have a lot of this stuff worked out. Splitting my time has never been my strong suit.

And yet, I do it a lot. I've decided mostly what my plan is with "Walks with Angels" - I'm going to do two versions, one as the short screenplay I've written it as, and a second as a comic. It'll be a good study in the differences of the style, while still giving me something else I can send out to festivals and contests. I think though the thrust of the story will still be the same in both versions, I think the end product will be different enough so as not to be a problem. We'll see. It occurs to me that as often as I talk about trying to figure out the best mediums for telling certain stories, I've never really tried to take one story and tell it both ways before.

It feels a little like blasphemy. Self-hating blasphemy. But I'll run with it.

The comic version of "Walks with Angels" is going to feature a character from "VHS Generation." Idea came about when Ander and I were talking about how one of the characters was probably something of a hustler... it fits, really well, actually, and it also plays to the 90s aesthetic. Most of the new dialogue is already written. It's just all in the moleskin right now.

Another comic, I only recently got outlined. Sort of a... tribute, I think, to my friends here, a group of people I haven't seen a lot lately, but I wanted to write something about. In kind of a... circuitous way. Plus, there's a little spirit of The Housemartins in it, a band another friend of mine, Caitlin, turned me onto. They're not my style at all, but their message is really what's kept me listening, and given me a lot of inspiration for this too. I'm calling it "Cherry Stone" for right now. My hope is it'll only be about 18 pages long, but the outline is almost half of that which means it'll probably be over. Maybe I'll be able to make cuts. There's also a lot of really cool stuff in it to draw, which means there might be some hope of getting an artist interested in working on it once the script is finished.

I haven't gotten any more feedback for "The Tagalong." I'm holding out hope that a couple of people will still get back to me about it. But I told folks not to hurry, and they're not. I can totally dig that. I'm getting to that place where I'm busy enough with other things that I'd like to put it to bed soon.

All three of those projects are at bat after I finish the copy for Travis's website, or at least get enough of it done that I can, in good conscience, work on other things.

---

I know it doesn't look like it, but I'm really trying to get more pragmatic about my stuff these days. If I'm honest with myself, I don't think I have the hustle to do traditional freelance work, chasing down paychecks and elbowing other people out for gigs. I don't want it bad enough to trample on other talented people, and that's... you know, that's a problem. That's going to impede me. In the past week I've been called a "nice guy" on numerous occasions, said in a way which is both a compliment but also like the person saying it was trying to get something sour out of their mouth.

I don't know what I'm going to do about that right now. I've been lucky enough to have friends, or people familiar with what I do to offer me work. I don't expect that to last. On the bright side of things, there have been enough of that kind of thing that I would actually have a pretty robust portfolio if I bothered to put it together, and that's a good thing [probably will put one together after I get this website done for Travis - it would be the nice little crown jewel of work]. But I'm not a journalist. I'm really not. I just like to write. I like to tell stories. And I can do prose, but I really don't know if I do enough prose to ever be able to submit work, and make money that way. And it's not even medium that I like to work in.The mediums I like to work in involve connections, and funding. And the former is a lot easier to get if you have the latter too, which... well, I don't.

It's hard not to get discouraged. There is this very real part of me that thinks... if I actually had something, if there was something worthwhile about me, it would have been noticed by now. The lack of any sort of recognition brings a lot of problems, the lack recognition itself only being a small part of that. There's very little feedback. No clue as to what I'm doing wrong. No pat on the back when I do something right. There's no one here to help sharpen dull ideas into concrete plans. These things, in and of themselves, are important. But to be worth these things, that's important too. Not catching anyone's attention enough to have that... it works on you.

So ultimately, I'm left with stuff like this, Gail Simone's "Brutal Tips On Breaking Into Comics" a really great article that only partly applies to me, and to my goals. Most articles, many books I read are like that - things about writing novels, movies, comics, that are encouraging but not helpful enough, not for my particular set of circumstances, and there are never any articles about adapting these useful hints to help yourself specifically. You're left to try and mince it out on your own. In my quest to become as unique as possible, I have inadvertently stumbled on a set of circumstances that there's no guide for overcoming.

Hopefully not because no ever has.

It's a really good argument to go back to school. To hope I'll be able to, when that's actually an option again. To hope that will actually be an option again. And if not that, there will be some people, somewhere, willing to accept me, and engage me in some satisfying way. Hopes.

I do at least have the blessing of some support and time, which does allow me to consider these things on my own, even though, for as smart as I claim to be, answers don't come quickly. It is also reassuring to know that, while I might not be doing the right thing by myself, I am at least doing what I believe is right for others. It's not as "pat-yourself-on-the-back" awesome as it sounds, but it makes certain things easier. And easier does not always equal wrong.

And there's work. Work still comes in, though I am constantly worried more people are doing more than I am, both because it means they're doing better, and also because it means that there's something very deficient in me for only being able to handle this much at a time. And there are the stories I think of, that I want to tell. Not having a set idea how I'm going to turn that into a living, or what I could do instead so that I could keep telling those... that's a hard hurdle to overcome, but it doesn't take away from when I'm actually elbows deep into a script.

There's not much time to worry about it all with copy still to do.

None of that probably makes much sense. But if you read it, you deserve an explanation. It's all why I've only been writing here sporadically.

Much Love - Ander Sarabia relaunches his portfolio, Justin Cornell's sketchbooks are up for sale and more!

2011-05-02T07:53:00.007-04:00

On this rather auspicious day, I thought I'd focus on spreading the love, and show off some of the amazing things my friends have been working on.

Ander Sarabia, the amazingly talented artist from across the ocean, the Bilbao-based illustrator of any writer's dreams who I collaborated with on "A Change is Gonna Come," and am currently logging time with for our next short subject comic, "VHS Generation," recently did a soft relaunch/makeover of his blog/art website/portfolio over at andersarabia.blogspot.com. Along with giving the site a completely new look, he's also added loads of content that wasn't up before, making it impossible to not be impressed by his sheer talent and versatility once you've seen how many different kinds of things he's actually done.

Plus, Ander's uncovered a neat trick, what I assume is one of the many new and as of yet not much heralded features of blogspot's new additions to the service. So if you hit this link you can see his whole body of work in Google's flipcard layout, a design feature that effectively turns his blog into an actual online art portfolio, in a style that, at least to me, seems to make way more sense and have way less clutter than the various DeviantArt-style sites I've come to know. If you're an artist, and don't know about it, check it out, and hell, if you just want to see all of Ander's stuff laid right out there at your beck and call, definitely give it a click.

Now, Ander and I haven't known each other for crazy-long yet, and when we've talked, it's mostly been shop-talk, or pleasant and hilarious reminiscing about the 80s and 90s, so even I was surprised at some of the work he's done before. Some select panels from "Change" are also featured over there, along with a shout-out to yours truly and some gracious linkage, which I am greatly flattered by. I know from working with a lot of artists that the portfolio is an artist's best foot forward kind of thing, and consider part of the work we did together getting included a great honor.

Ander has been crazy-busy lately with various projects [including working with the oft-linked mad scientist Eric Esquivel], but like the good friend he is, he's always made time for a little email chat with me, despite the time difference and his hectic schedule. I've been so happy with the work we've done together so far, and I'm really looking forward to doing more in the future, and I wanted everyone to see his new internet digs as it were. I think it's turned out great, and really reflects him, and his work, well.

---

Now, I linked this once before about a month back, but Justin Cornell, my good friend and partner-in-crime on "Calamity Cash and the Town with No Name," is selling his first sketchbook, and the first copies have just come hot off the press. Mine arrived the other day, and it really looks great, the printing is tip-top, and I've never seen a sketchbook with such a wide and varied amount of subject matter within from all over the annals of pop culture. Ever wanted to witness Buffy staking Edward Cullen? Ever think you'd turn a page and see portraits of Charles Bronson and Nikola Tesla next to each other? Well, in Justin's "Sketchbook Ho!" you can see all that, a whole lot more.

You can order the book here from Justin's website, and it's a hefty 40+ page monster of an art book for only $12.00, American [though no worries, his shop is through Paypal, so if you're not currently using American currency you can still get one]. For another ten smackers you can get Justin to do a custom sketch in yours, literally anything you want [after all, when it comes to pop culture, Justin is the king of the obscure], and even if you don't order the sketch, all books are signed and numbered by the artist himself.

And don't forget, this is the same model Justin and I will probably be released "Calamity Cash," so all orders made won't just get you a great sketchbook, but will also help with our next project too, along with future Mojo Wire and Vanderhuge Studios productions. But, and I'm not playing pitch man at all here [okay, a little, but these are awesome], supply is limited, and I'm fairly certain when Justin runs out, there's no plan for a second print run. So cliche though it may sound, if you want one, your safest bet is to order now.

---

There are a few other things of note, including Zoe Chevat's recent post to her own blog - a color and movement test entitled "Mr. Pidge" for her thesis project "Beastly Things." Zoe's an amazingly talented animator currently studying at the super-prestigious CalArts, and as she's always working, it's rare we get the pleasure of seeing some of her moving picture antics, and this 20 second clip is just amazing. I know just for me personally, it's hard not to get that same tingle I felt as a child, having Tex Avery explain the animation process to me on television, only to see today that my friend, someone I used to discuss short fiction with, doing exactly the same thing herself [well, okay, not exactly the same thing. I imagine there's probably a bit nuance to different animation styles, and some considerable technological changes since the Avery days, but... Moving! Pictures! Cartoons! Is there anything better?]

It's absolutely lovely and worth a look, and I only wish I could call CalArts and yell at her instructors to stop working her so damn hard, so she could post more wonderful things like this for the rest of us to see.

Of course, there's always after graduation...

Zoe's also been doing some writing for The Mary Sue, a Geek Girl Culture-specific blog, which I can't recommend enough.

Finally, last but not least, as they say, a little something from my buddy John Wiswell dropped over the weekend, which I feel like I'd be remiss if I didn't link. Now, usually, John's daily awesomeness over on his Bathroom Monologues site gets coverage from me on Twitter, but to give myself a bit of break, and also because I don't always get to my RSS reader then, I haven't been doing links over the weekends. But recently, he posted a short piece called "The Wrestler in Black," which not only did I find to be exceptional, but that I was just really glad he got to do as, it seems sometimes, as writers, so rarely do we get to feature what some might consider our "fringe interests." I found this to be highly entertaining, and one of my favorite stories of his in a long time, which, with the sheer amount of quality material John puts out, is really saying something.

I hope everyone enjoys. I realize my postings have been kind of sporadic lately, and as much as I'd like to say otherwise, I don't know if that's going to change. I've been really swamped with work lately, and sort of just cramming creative stuff into whatever free moments I've had. Not all of that cramming has been exactly productive, but just getting it in is an accomplishment, and I haven't really had time to come back and touch base here as it concerns some of my current or new ideas. It's a problem because, as ridiculous as it may sound, having the time to take a minute, collect my thoughts, and put down what I've been up to here helps my process and my output greatly, but there just hasn't been time. Nevertheless look for an update later in the week, specifically about a couple of things I've been working on lately, along with a little news about a really cool freelance gig I've taken on for a friend and family member.

More soon.

To Remember: May 1st, 2011

2011-05-02T07:09:00.014-04:00

I'm not crazy about doing short blogs. Most of the short stuff you'll find here are either quick hit updates as to what I'm working on, usually right that very minute, with some kind of note to remind me of something for later, or one of the handful of posts that got redacted to shit at my ex-writing partner Casey's request. I wasn't going to say anything about this at all, but when I went out to get the paper this morning, the bolded headline above the fold reading "BIN LADEN DEAD" suddenly drove home to me how important this might actually be, in that "where were you when...?" kind of way.

I can't really bring myself to celebrate someone's death. I'm not here to judge anyone who did, who does, or who will, over the next several days, continue to. If you want me to join you for a beer on this occasion, I will gladly, just realize I'll be drinking because I was given a beer, and probably not for any other reason. I get it, though, I do. We pulled a bogeyman of an entire generation out of the closet, and screaming into the light. We caught the man who hurt and scared us when we were young. Someone who took something from us... in some cases, just our innocence. In others... in some folks' cases a whole hell of a lot more, from lost family members, to just those who saw a city scarred, a city they identify with so closely as to consider it a part of themselves. They all deserve whatever it takes to get them closure [in some cases, this won't be it]. So I am not going to sit here and tell anyone what I think they should be feeling.

As for what I'm feeling it's... mostly reflection, on how I don't really have the spirit of a revolutionary, or the soul of a warrior. How I don't have it in me to feel particularly good about this, about the death of someone who was an enemy. Who would have been glad to have seen me dead - so honestly, my enemy. When I heard they had got him, I was surprised. I turned on the television, I opened Twitter. Talked to a few friends, but mostly, I just let it happen around me. I kicked myself for not having enough foresight to realize what this means yet, or to even be able to conjecture. And I went back to work on something unrelated. I was plugged in and interested, it's important to be plugged in when stuff like this happens, but I wouldn't say I was happy. There are a lot of complicated things at work here, and some very real truths that a lot of people who feel the same way that I do are going to bring up over the next couple weeks... maybe a lot longer. So I think, like with those who are celebrating, I'm going to leave that up to someone else too.

What I will say is good riddance. This is a good thing. A bad guy, in every sense of the term, is gone from this world, and I am not so cynical as to believe that doesn't make it at least one iota better than it was with him in it. I'm also not optimistic enough to believe there was any other way. I'm proud of the stern and measured way the man I voted for, probably the first politician I really believed in, handled this situation. And I have an endless amount of respect for those members of the military, who took up not just this particular mission, but all of them who fought this war [and will continue to fight it], willingly. And that's the long and short of it. I mean every word of that. But no, I wouldn't say I'm happy. It needed to be done, but I'm not going to celebrate it.

On May 1st, 2011 Osama Bin Laden was killed. I was at my grandmother's in Elkview, WV, where I have been living the past few years, when a special report interrupted the television show she was watching. Desperate Housewives, I think. I scrawled part of this down in the back of book, like I did with my thoughts ten years before, on September 11, 2001, in English class at Herbert Hoover High School in Clendenin, WV. That one will always remind us of the other is something we should all be mindful of going forward.

...for reasons other than just the obvious.

I Live Off You - R.I.P. Poly Styrene

2011-04-26T05:19:00.006-04:00

Probably going to see that video posted a lot of places in the next couple days. It's one of the first hits for Poly Styrene and the X-Ray Spex on YouTube. The clip is from a documentary called "Punk In London," dated around the late 70s. Punk's renaissance. Unless you think it happened some other day.

This has been the worst evening I've had in a bit. Lot on a mind, had a lot to do this evening, had some really big morale killers earlier in the evening. Kind of just buried myself into my work, wanted to get it done, wanted to not think about stuff. Got online, and on Twitter Jenny Woolworth, of the oft-linked and much-loved "Women in Punk Blog" had posted this on there:

jennywoolworth: R.I.P. Poly Styrene, you punk heroine.

I believed it, of course, as far as punk news goes, I'd believe anything Woolworth posted, just because so much of the music I'm into now is thanks to her blog, her writing, her pointing me in the direction of so much good stuff. It's the reason I ran out and bought "Girls to the Front." It's the reason I looked up the X-Ray Spex a couple years ago [has it been that long?]. But I still needed to see it somewhere else, you know? Like, one person wasn't enough. So I hit NME. And I saw this.

Which I knew already. But I had to see it.

You know, she was sick. Cancer. Breast cancer. I guess I always figured she'd beat it. I've read so much about Poly's health issues, it just seemed like, nothing like cancer could kick her ass. She was the pure punk rock, like the spirit of it, with a pink poof on her hat. I haven't been a fan for long, but in my mind, she's in that same place I put Joey and Johnny and Joe Strummer. And I couldn't believe that any of those guys could go either.

On Twitter, Woolworth told me she was "working hard and fighting strong" until the end. She had a new album out. I figured it'd be one of many.

This was a shitty evening. I had every intention of coming on here, venting, you know, just blowing off a little steam, and talking a bit about this comic that I've started writing, even though I'm working on a million things right now, things for other people or things with deadlines, or just things like "The Tagalong." But I can talk about those things later. And my bad evening really doesn't seem all that consequential when I think about the day Celeste Bell-Dos Santos, the surviving Styrene, is having. So...

I'm going to talk about this. My life is not exactly glamorous. I mostly go out of the house to go shopping for my grandmother. Or to go to my head doctor, get my, or someone else's, prescription filled. Other errands, long walks, lot of solo time, is the point. And I really don't like... the background noises here. Mowers, and country music over loud speakers, and exhausted, often toothless parents yelling at children who... in my view haven't done anything to deserve the constant shrieking and swears their parents communicate with them in, but hell, what do I know, maybe those poor kids go home and start fires.

Point is, in those places, in those situations, I can't take it. It threatens to overwhelm me, become this unbearable headache, this revulsion that brings on this nauseated feeling that I just can't get rid of without extricating myself from those places. I know I sound like an elitist prick here. You know, if not being able to stand listening to Toby Keith scoring arguments about whether Marshall or the Mountaineers are the best football team this year is elitist, I might have to concede my guilt there. So, I started tuning it out with my iPod. When I'm on my own, when I'm running errands, it's actually turned into something fun for me, because I get to spend that time listening to music, really listening to music, in a way that I hadn't since high school.

But again, it's also a coping mechanism, something to drown out the parts of life here that I can't handle. Can't stand. And it's gotten to that point where, I've actually started thinking of those ear buds like life support. I remember one time I took them out to pay the cashier, I always take them out to pay the cashier, I'm not rude, I try to be pleasant, but when I did it that time I realized I was holding my breath. Like someone had taken off my oxygen mask underwater. I laughed about it then.

Couple days later, I was still thinking about it. And I heard this:

"I Live Off You" by the X-Ray Spex. Sorry about the quality. I guess I could have linked the YouTube video that was just the song, with the Germ Free Adolescents cover in the background. I wanted you to see them move. See Poly do what she did. But this song, what it's about, it's title, just that it plays sometimes when I'm hooked up to my life support... it's one of my absolute favorites. It means something a little bit different to me than what it was intended to, probably, but it still... I don't think what I take away from it is that dissimilar.

And I do. I live off of this. For now, maybe for a lot longer.

I didn't know Poly Styrene. I can't really talk about her other than to say what I've read, what I've listened to, what she's done, and what that, what she means to me. I sort of think of that as a crime, hate that in a moment like this, all I can talk about is her in context to myself.

So I'm not going to write anymore, and I'm going to save my stuff about what I'm working on for tomorrow. Or the next day. I've got things to do. And some music I'm going to be listening to a lot. And if you like those videos [and thank you to whoever I've ganked them from], if you haven't seen any of this before, you should find more Poly Styrene, more X-Ray Spex, and listen. It's well worth your time.

R.I.P. Poly Styrene. 1957 - 2011.

No time to write, have to write.

2011-04-21T01:01:00.003-04:00

...yeah. That's pretty much where I am currently.

It's actually not as bad as it sounds, it was just one of the first times since I started getting paid for writing that I actually found myself having to put off things I wanted to write for things I had deadlines for. I feel kind of bad that it hasn't happened sooner, though looking back to college, I think it probably has, and I just made the wrong decisions about how to prioritize back then.

There are worse times it could have happened. "The Tagalong" feedback I've been getting has surprised me - people are either wildly enthusiastic, or really displeased with how it ends. I didn't really expect a story about a lost love and a neglected child to be more polarizing than the thing about strippers and depression [re: The Peep Show], but hey, strong feelings are better than no feelings. Plus, having this other work to do means I'm getting a little time away from it, and will hopefully be able to pop in with a lot of good things to think about, and fresh eyes.

And I haven't even heard back from everyone yet.

"Walks with Angels" work remains on hold, though probably not for very long. Weekend, maybe. Looks like I'll have a small website copy job for my cousin coming up, too. Would like to do some comic work too. Old projects and new. I guess I am still figuring out how to balance things.

Before all this hit, I had a couple of days there where I was just reading for myself. Finally finished off "Strangers in Paradise," which I guess saying out loud would probably surprise a lot of people. Terry Moore's first big indie title was probably one of the most influential things I'd ever read, as far as my own work goes, and when I tell people that, there's usually this immediate belief that I followed the work closely, and just knew it all backwards and forwards, could recite from it the way I used to be able to do with Kevin Smith's "Clerks." And I guess that's valid... I mean, in geek culture, how much you know, what obscure thing you know, what your recall is, like any subculture that pretty much measures the size of your geek penis, but I never really bought that sort of obsession necessarily indicated your level of passion for the work, or what kind of effect it had on you.

I could write for pages about SiP, talk about it even longer, but again, my time right now is limited, and something like that I feel would demand a lot of care, like my Amy post. I think a post like that will happen for "Strangers" someday, just not today. Instead, what I will say is that when I first came upon SiP, I was fairly sheltered in the kind of comics I read, they were all super heroes and Ninja Turtles, and while all that was great, something about what Moore was doing in the few issues of that book I was able to get a hold of - they just moved me. They turned a hobby involving a niche medium into something that could suddenly be so vast. I even think, honestly, that if it weren't for "Strangers in Paradise," I wouldn't even love super hero comics as much as I do, because I'd never have gotten to that place where I could appreciate moments that weren't all big fights and cool powers.

It wasn't the only thing that made me love comics. Far from it. But it really made me want to write them, I think. I don't know. Maybe I just needed to see that nothing was off-limits. That there was a lot more ground to cover.

Anyway. A few issues, or the whole thing - there was something intrinsic there, something that wasn't going to let me down, something that I could get from a few pages or from the entire narrative. I think that's how good the series is, but I also think on some level my experience with the work made it a pretty big deal to me. And I also think that, deep down, there was something frightening about finally having no more excuses [I haven't had any for awhile], so it was just time, to buy that last trade, to finish the series.

I dated this girl once who was a huge Charles Dickens fan. Just, the biggest I've ever known. And rightfully so, his work is great, and lovely, and some of the most important in literature, love it or hate it. But she called me once, upset, not overly so, but just very... upset, because she'd just finished reading the last thing by Dickens which she hadn't read yet. For the rest of her life, there would be no new Charles Dickens, no story of his which she hadn't delved into. She could read the old stuff, and still be surprised by what was in it. She would forget things, or see things in a new light. She would discovers gems she'd never noticed before. But there'd never be anymore. There'd never be anything new.

Terry Moore has other comics. His upcoming "Rachel Rising" seems to be an idea which could easily surpass anything else he's done. But this story, this story of Francine and Katchoo and David and Casey and Tambi... I've finished it. I'll never read more "Strangers in Paradise." There will never be a time again where there's an SiP story I haven't read.

I mean, maybe. Moore's never said there wouldn't be sequel. Occasionally, he seems to flirt with the idea. And even though I'm kind of down about being finished, part of me almost hopes he doesn't. But either way, for now, having that hit me, being done with it, especially when working on "The Tagalong" which, as I mentioned before, felt like it had some of that "Strangers" vibe in it... well, it's good I'm busying myself with things.

More soon.

They're all doomed.

2011-04-16T07:11:00.020-04:00

Haven't slept. I'd be less bothered by it, but I felt like crap the majority of the day, and just when I thought I might catch some zzz's I started feeling a touch better and got momentarily productive.

Speaking of productivity, Justin finished another comic page recently [re: Calamity Cash and the Town with No Name], and you can see the rest of the sketch I've posted part of here over on his blog. He's really in the thick of the book's action now, and has been making my sub-par action writing look really dynamic on the page. I haven't gotten to see the whole page yet - Justin's been swamped, as usual, and I haven't exactly been lucid during regular business hours as of late. I'm sure we'll fix that soon.

I haven't been getting out much, and I think it's starting to worry me a little. There hasn't been much in the way of "fun" on my calendar in a while, something that's easier to forget when the work's there. And the work has been there, between finally working out my book review scheduling, and spending a couple hours each night on the current short [re: The Tagalong]. I've gotten some really encouraging feedback already, and have been tweaking this and that, occasionally dropping back to 19 pages, and then finding myself back at 20. It's the usual song and dance for me, delete, undo, then rewrite, copy, undo, paste. I don't know if I could have ever been a typewriter guy.

Sorry, Hunter.

Still, making headway, and might be finished with this one way ahead of schedule. Probably going to make "Walks with Angels" my next project, in hopes to get one more short script in the bag as quickly as possible. "Angels" is a weird script, my take on adaptation and biopic, without actually making either one, and if I wanted finishing it could be a really easy job as - full disclosure - it's already technically written. Right now, I have five pages, a sort of shortest-of-the-shorts, something that I think could be really useful to have in my portfolio. But...

In a weird sort of way, I'm not sure anymore if "Walks with Angels" should be a movie script, especially since, reading it recently, I noticed the tone was a bit more in line with the two comics I did with Ander [re: "A Change is Gonna Come" and the current project "VHS Generation"]. It has a lot of the same feel, a real 90s touch to it, and plus I've always seen it in my head as more of long comic than a short movie. Still, I've already written it as one, and would like to have it polished, and would like to have it to send places as a five-minute-movie, so...

Maybe I'll do it as both. It's against my principles, all told, as I've always thought comics are already treated too derivatively when their ideas are used interchangeable with movies. It misses the point, I think, and neglects the fact that with every story, there's a perfect medium to tell it in. Plus, I find people who talk about comics in movie terms to be pretty self-hating, and I can't stand that.

I tend to stress pretty hard over whether or not I'm telling a story in the wrong way, in the wrong medium, so I guess at worst I could just call this experimentation. If the subject matter of "Walks with Angels" wasn't so short and well-known, I might even be able to figure out a way to make the two different versions unique to one another, but... not sure if that's possible, not sure if, story-wise, there'd be much chance to focus on one thing more than another in the different versions. I'll have to think about that. And remember what Moore said - that comics, essentially, are about the reader taking his or her own time with things.

We'll have to wait and see on that. If I do both, it'll be interesting to see how they differ. Not sure how I'll make the judgment which is better. One of those times when I'll just have to trust myself... assume that, if I'm really good at what I do, I'll make the right decision. And if I'm not good, well, it won't much matter what medium a crappy story works better in.

Unrelated to any of this, I went on a little rant the other day on Twitter, thought I'd put it here too. Felt like something I wanted to say to everyone at the time, now it just feels like something I don't want to lose forever in the impermanence of micro-blogging. So here it is. "Enjoy."

I have always been a big proponent of bitching about burdens. People who silently shoulder shit just because they think its noble bug me. This is, ultimately, immaturity on my part. Because when I would preach that, I had never realized there are burdens that if people know you have, it can hurt them. Worry them unnecessarily. Think about that person you know who cares so much that if, say, you mention sideways your stomach's upset, dinner plans change. The whole day changes. Suddenly, you've slyly been tricked into taking it easy. And taking it easy is rad. But sometimes you need to get things done. Even if you have a headache, or a stomach ache. You just deal with it, because it's not as major as you made it sound. And I always saw bitching as a nice way to taper that. Oy, I don't want to do this in this condition but I will. It made me feel better. It, apparently, scares the shit out of people. Hang-ups take precedent over the tasks at hand. Why? Because people are generally pretty kind. To the folks that folks give a shit about. Everyone gets solution oriented. Forget some things just need to be weathered. But you don't explain to someone their kindness is wrong. Eventually, you shut your damn trap about the complicated things. It is actually kind of ridiculous, if you think about it. Like in space movies, when one person knows something is broken, but to not worry the other person about it, they keep their mouth shut, try to fix it. In those instances, things go horribly wrong, guy who was doing the nice thing gets sucked out into space through a crack in the hull. Real life's not so different. More cracks maybe. Takes a little longer to wind up in the abyss. I guess my point is, sometimes you can't bitch about your burdens. But if you can, I encourage it. Wholeheartedly.

---

Finally, I wanted to share something I should have put up a link up here to right away - it was one of those things where what it's saying is really important and worthwhile, and how it's saying it is really skillful and lovely, and because of that it has to be looked at. But on a more personal level, it's just one of those articles that said some things I really needed to hear when I read it, perhaps more than I even realized. So without further ado, here's Kimberly Kaye over on her blog "The Trouble with Poet" with "On Creative Vampires (A Letter About The People Who'll Suck You Dry Through Two Holes if You Let Them)."

Can't recommend that enough to all my fellow writers, and any other creative-types who may be reading this. And thank you, Miss Kaye.

Going for Bolingbroke

2011-04-13T06:33:00.003-04:00

If you think that pun is bad, you'll love the joke that got bandied about a lot my first time through the play:

"The great thing about Richard II is that even if you don't know Shakespeare, by the end at least one person is sure to get the point."

Yeah, you know what? I'm not here to impress you.

Tonight's been a mixed bag. I've spent a few hours going over the script [re: The Tagalong], tweaking this, and fixing that. No surprise to anyone, my fondness for commas left the thing a wasteland of punctuation. If you've read my stuff before, or if you just take in a few old blog entries, you know I have a tendency to play it fast and loose with commas, ellipses, and what I think is sort of like my signature - the dash/double dash. It's my feeble attempt to try and mimic the way things sound in my head, the rhythm, the way I talk, or tell a story out loud, trying to keep all the beats and pauses, and bits of suspense intact even on the page. When it works, I think it works well - I've have some high-standard writers and readers tell me that even when chucking Strunk and White out the window, it's forgivable since the final product delivers.

But like with all things, moderation's the key, and if you're like me, and you have a particular style, or trick, you know it can easily become tiresome, trite, or lose a lot of its oomph from too much repetition, and on the path to first draft to final, I'm always left weighing whether phrasing x, or ambitious punctuation y, is best used here, or later, or not at all [save it until next time, kind of thing]. And a lot of scriptwriters will tell you any of those kinds of flourishes should just be left out - even when it comes to dialogue - and pity knows I'd save boatloads of time if I'd just blanket eliminate them from my work. But the charm!

Anyway, I've gotten some notes back on the script already, and Ian especially was good pointing out that I was over-doing it. So I guess the bulk of the writing night was just messing with that, hunting those spots down, and making the hard choices in places where the choices should probably be easy.

Rest of it I spent reading Richard II over again. I'm not sure why. I think it was my intention to read Cymbeline, or at least find out if I had already had[despite studying Shakespeare in college, I'm convinced that there's one play out there I haven't polished off yet. Even though I can't for the life of me figure out which one that is]. But I like Richard II, and reading it again I realized I liked it more than I remembered, an having been through it a couple times before I could just sort of have fun with it, pick it up, put it down in between Adult Swim bumps. With the book reviews, and new books I get, and comics [which I almost always give preference], and the loads of news and blogs and internet-related reading I do, I don't tend to get to read things over as much as I'd like [one of many, many reasons I'm garbage at memorization]. Especially something that demands Shakespeare-level engagement.

It was a good night, but not one with any sleep in it, and I'm watching the sun come up again. What a drag.

Here's some good, cool news though. My "Change is Gonna Come"/"VHS Generation" collaborator/partner-in-crime from across the ocean, Ander [that's Ander Sarabia, kiddies] and friend of the Mojo Wire Eric M. Esquivel [of the Modern Mythology Esquivels] have a story coming out in the Moonstone published comic "Zombies vs. Cheerleaders #4." The big excitement about this is that "Zombies vs. Cheerleaders" is a Diamond Distributed book, so you can get your very own copy just by asking your local comic proprietor to put it on your pull list. You've seen the amazing work Ander can do in some of his sketches for our stuff I've posted, and hopefully you've checked out Eric's stuff that I've linked in the past, so really, you've got zero reasons not to check it out.

Well, that was easy.

2011-04-09T00:52:00.008-04:00

So, I hit my 20 page mark [re: The Tagalong]. It wasn't very hard, as you might imagine - it's never hard to add things, after all. That it happened surprised me, though, as I never really felt like I was adding things... sitting down to work on the script each night this week, I felt more like I clipping, and was actually worried that this early in the process I might be clipping a little too much. So I did something rare for me, and saved a copy of my original marathon run-through on the script [the thing that usually doesn't survive past the first read].

Depending on what kind of thing I'm working on depends on how much I save from previous drafts. I'm just not that taken with most bits I cut, and usually the "killing all my darlings" thing only comes in very late in the proofreading/editing stage for me. I can't think of any compelling reason for that - immaturity, probably, because when I write something that I actually like or think is clever, I do tend to want to keep it. There's a line in this that's like that, that I imagine will not make it to the final draft. We'll see.

Tried to take a break working on this last night. Failed miserably at that. Tonight, it's been a bit better. Talked to some people, read a little, did some work on the book review I have due next week. Doesn't hurt to get outside of "Tagalong" headspace.

It feels almost... shoddy to me, how quickly this came together. Admittedly, I've put in several nights, but this is a pretty rapid pace I've kept up, not odd for me in grand scheme, but odd for me lately. "Nova" took a couple of weeks to finish to a working script point, and that's not counting the months of polishing and the mad editing I did to get it to 25 pages. Which, I guess could still happen here. Hopefully not for as long. But I am still in the honeymoon period.

The process hasn't felt as solitary either. I mean, it's writing, it's always solitary. That's typically unavoidable. Hell, even collaborations have solo aspects. But Twitter, as much as people like to bad mouth it, has actually been kind of good this past week. There are times, when working, when you kind of just want to bang your head against the wall and scream like a mental patient, or just have someone to say one of the repetitive things that have been running through your head all night - so being able to post it there, whether people acknowledge it or not, takes a little bit of the edge off [Twitter's new slogan - not a stiff drink, but a healthy alternative]. Less pacing. Less moving around. Hell, even I'm surprised to say it, but the internet has, at least for this project, been the opposite of a distraction.

One of my college literature professors, the immensely talented writer Christopher Miller [good reads here], he joined Twitter this past week, and it was just so... nice that he was there, because I've been having this hang-up lately where in dialogue, I just sort of choke whenever a character says "I love you." And it's not a new problem, back when I was in a class with Chris it had come up before, and what he said back then was sort of a game changer that got me comfortable thinking about how and what people say in situations like that. With the phobia returning, Chris offered up this bit from Mamet, which was just spot-on what I needed, and I'm sharing it here because... it's a damn good point, made by one author and passed on from another.

Chris: Advice from Mamet: "People may or may not say what they mean, but they always say something designed to get what they want."

Chris: I.e., it doesn't matter whether or not your characters MEAN it, as long as it's plausible that they would SAY it.

And maybe there was just something in the air, but one of my favorite comic book writers right now, Kieron Gillen, one of the many talented persons behind the CBGBs comic I liked so much, and the guy writing my new favorite teen X-Men book, Generation Hope, was also talking about writing, and his process, and also about how he always tries to avoid using songs as titles for stories. His reasoning was just not wanting the medium to feel any more derivative, but his point was, more than anyone else following his rules, was how important it was for writers to have rules of their own, boundaries that may seem restrictive, but push you, even in a small way, to do things others aren't doing. I mentioned in response that I was trying to eliminate instances of characters talking to themselves when no one was around, a common trope that annoys the piss out of me, because only in a handful of situations do people really talk to themselves like that. I didn't expect him to see my response, because honestly, the dude writes for Marvel, and has a lot on his plate, so imagine my surprise when, upon mentioning a day or so later I'd already broken my own rule, he replied back "It was a good one, but a fucking hard one."

Always nice to get encouragement from writers you respect, look up to. I know it gave me a bit of charge, got me back to work. In both cases neither Chris or Gillen had to go out of their way, but even their little bit of help meant a lot, the acknowledgment got me going again, and I appreciate that. It's easy as a writer to put people on these levels, where your heroes and your teachers and the successful are kind of unreachable, and your peers, not all of your peers mind you, but some of them come across like they want to impede your work, as if there's some sort of adversarial relationship there [which is, by the way, a poisonous way to look at writing, or any creative endeavor]. But small courtesies can go a long way.

So thank you, Chris. For a lot more than just this one thing, I should probably say. And to Kieron Gillen. I appreciate it.

I've sent the short off to a few people. Not many. If anyone else is interested in seeing it who I didn't think of, or get it to, feel free to e-mail me, comment here, etc. Always interested in readers, feedback... though I might put you off until I get one more draft under my belt.

More soon. Cheers.

P.S. I removed the Google Search Bar from the blog. It's not been working properly since 2010 ended, so I'm not screwing with it anymore. Hopefully, I'll find an alternative, or something that'll make going through my archives easier.

Leaders and Followers

2011-04-05T04:25:00.007-04:00

I've mentioned before that I tend to go through down periods after finishing things. Never really understood why, just always feel a little hollow whenever I get done with with a project... I realize it's weird, and that there's supposed to be some "Don't I Rock?"-style elation, but that's just not me. Post-"The Peep Show" I was having the same kind of feeling, but I felt like even being a little depressed, I still had some momentum going, momentum I should try and follow through with on other things.

I spent a night or two transcribing some old notes, mostly for that new romance comic I've been thinking of about. It's nowhere near close to being finished [there are huge gaps in the action, scenes where I know things are supposed to happen, know what's supposed to happen, I just can't seem to get those things... right], and I didn't really want push it in the mood I was in, so I figured it would be better to follow up with something that was close to being done, and that I'd put off. I figured it was pretty unlikely finishing a second thing would make me feel worse at this point.

A couple of choices popped up. This first is this old, near-completed short screenplay [really short actually... only five or six pages] called "He Walks with Angels." I've been sitting on it for a long time, and this would have made the fourth time I picked it up again, but on one read-through I realized it really wasn't something I wanted to work on now. It's ending is similar to "The Peep Show," and I wasn't feeling up to writing more about the subject, even if, barring the ending, the two stories couldn't be more different.

There was one other script I remembered wanting to work on, an idea I had last Spring during a pretty intense period of insomnia. I started going on walks during this time, because it was still cool out, and because I had a couple hours to go over to the nearby school yard's playground before anyone arrived there. I get this weird nostalgia pang when I see dew on playground equipment, something I don't know how I'd remember because I don't ever recall being allowed to play outside early enough that there would be dew on anything.

The idea wasn't wholly my own, as it was partially inspired by a story an ex-girlfriend told me on a couple of occasions, that on my remarking on she said I was welcome to take a stab at, which was awfully good of her because she's a writer too, and a way better one than me, in my not-entirely-humble opinion. Somewhere, between what we had talked about and me leaning on a soaking wet jungle gym, I got down what I remembered being a pretty thorough outline for a short piece, and was even excited enough about it at the time to tell Kyle. I got distracted with other things, other ideas I had on this early morning walks, and while I didn't forget about the project, set it aside. I figured with a full outline, I could always come back to it.

Usually my outlines are pretty detailed, to the point they often will break down a whole story scene by scene, even conversation topic by conversation topic. I kind of expected the same thing here, so imagine my surprise when I dug up the file that had said outline, titled "Misdemeanors" and just found this:

- House - Wake up.
- School - Talk, kid, breakfast, arrested.
- Police station - motivations.
- Back to House - Sex. Fight.
- Morning - Next afternoon, alone.
- School - School's out, kid.

...goddammit.

Of course, that wasn't all, I had a few little snippets of dialogue to work from [it is me, we're talking about here], and some character names [the principles anyway], but compared to my usual level of detail, it wasn't much. So I was more than a little surprised when I opened up Final Draft and got to typing, and realized that the story I wanted to tell was still really vivid and fresh in my mind from the year previous. In fact, it all flowed out naturally, and as prompts go, that... I don't even want to call it a skeleton... up there was pretty helpful. And it's weird the things you can recall in a pinch. I found myself in the pantry yesterday, completely dumbfounded as to why I went out there in the first place, but working on this, a whole year after the first heavy thoughts had been put into it, I could still remember that I needed to decide if my protagonist's sidekick/boyfriend was from the town it was set in, or had moved there with my main character after college.

Anyway, a few sleepless nights later, what I've ended up with is a rough, 19-page short titled "The Tagalong." I'm actually feeling pretty good about it, really excited, actually. There's a lot in this that's new, sort of unexpected for me. I have a female protagonist, and I think she's a pretty good one, there's this personality there that I like, and I enjoy writing her interactions with the other characters. I get to write a kid, which I've never done before, not really, and I've sort of been obsessing over whether or not I got the voice right or not [seems like one thing I can't remember is how I talked when I was six]. And it's not all new ground either, there are still some Randall Nichols hallmarks, which yes, I know are masturbatory, but I feel good knowing they're in there. So "Tagalong" rocks that small-town dynamic, has a guy with a girl's name in it, and rocks a few references so obscure I can already hear the "I don't get it." And swears. There are lots of swears.

It still needs a lot of work, of course. Trying to write a kid is just going to be a headache, I already feel pretty far outside my wheelhouse with it. And there's another entirely, another transition near the end, that I'm already sweating every spare moment I get. But... there's just something about this one I just like.

I'm hoping when it's finished it'll be 20 pages even, which is another weird, new challenge since I've been mostly trying to cut down on page length lately, not add more. Still, having that whole extra minute to work with is going to make changes and edits a lot more comfortable, and while I'm not ruling out ending up with a 15 minute movie, I'm still going to aim for that 20.

I have some bigger things I want to work on. Comics, features-length scripts [re: Mary Hobb, Untitled Bigfoot Horror Film, etc], but this is going to be a good primer I think, and nice transition piece while I figure out a good schedule/system for the extra books I'm getting to review, and few other things I need to do too. Watch the tags. There will be more soon.

And if anyone's interested, I'll probably be looking for readers, and notes.

"The Peep Show"

2011-04-02T03:23:00.004-04:00

Finally put my untitled peep show script to bed. Finished product stands at a well-polished 10 pages, exactly what I wanted it to be all along. I will probably eyeball it again for typos and the like, but the broad strokes are done, things that were bothering me are more or less taken care of. The honest fact is that you can torture yourself over these things until the end of time, but for the sake of your sanity you occasionally just have to say "done."

I think I am. I tried to give my female lead a little more personality, a nudge here, a curious glance there, a whole bunch of self-consciousness than some might expect from someone working in a nudie booth. It's much more subtle than anyone suggested, so she's probably not as good as she could be, but I feel pretty pleased with her.

There's always a fear with characters. As a writer, you tend to know a lot more about them than actually makes it into the final piece. When you're reading it, you always have to check yourself, ask questions like "am I feeling this because I know it, or because that information is in there?" I'm always thinking of other conversations, other stories for the same characters, so I'm especially bad about it. Or at least, I think I am. It's one of the many reasons I like getting fresh eyes on things, other people's eyes on them.

So there's that. I didn't change much at the end, but the transition into the big reveal is smoother now, I think, mostly thanks to some dialogue tweaks that happened more because I wanted to get it down to 10 pages, than all the different and new stuff I tried to tack on when actively attempting to fix it. I think that's funny, kind of unexpected, but it's also probably more common than I realize. Sweating a script isn't just about eliminating unnecessary beats, and killing one word lines - it's also about looking at what you have, and whether the repetition you employ [if you employ repetition... I can't imagine anyone wouldn't - good, realistic dialogue sort of demands it].

If anyone would like to see the finished product, I'll be happy to show it to you, and I'd love to hear what you think. Just message me, either here, via email, or on Facebook. It's not drastically different from earlier drafts though, so if you have read those, you might want skip this one. Still, I like getting people's reactions... this is a very reaction based project, probably the kind of thing I should have written in college. I picture it as the kind of movie, even though it's a short, that people walk away from arguing, sort of heated-like. I've definitely gotten some very impassioned responses to it. I love that. My script, the conversation piece.

The name I've settled on for it is just "The Peep Show." Simple, I know, but it's kind of transgressive, which catches people's attention, and one or two folks have said that would be enough to get them to see it. And besides, none of my other names really seemed to fit. "The Filth" or "The Filth and the Fury" or anything else, those were never going to make it, time to accept that.

So for now, it's "The Peep Show," short-subject, 10 pages.

Watch for the new label in posts.

I don't know what I'm working on next. Several possible projects. Good to have options.

To Ben, to Sarah, and now, to Jack.

2011-03-31T06:15:00.006-04:00

So I keep looking at this picture that I got off of Facebook...

I don't want to post it. Mostly because I'm not really sure if that would be okay. I'm fairly certain if celebrities have a problem with random websites putting up pictures of their newborn babies, it's probably not in the best taste to do it on my little tribute to myself out here in the middle of the internet.

But the picture is of my friend, Ben Garner, and his newborn son, Jack.

I've had a unique privilege when it comes to Ben and his wife Sarah. I remember sitting in my room, my senior year, cordoned off in my darkened room, and one of the only visitors I tended to get, who would stick around, talk, was Ben. You see, Ben was the first person I met at Bennington College, a roller coaster ride that involved two men with pony tails looking for a copy of Thriller and disposing of/storing cutler under dorm room beds [okay, it only happened once - and no, it's not a euphemism for anything]. But anyway, senior year. I was less pleasant to be around my senior year, that I'm sure of, but it never stopped Ben from popping by, because he had a girl, which was not odd for him, but what was odd was that Ben wanted to talk about her. This one particular girl. This girl he was more than taken with. Sarah. His Sarah.

He was never bold enough to just out and say that to me. Besides, we were guys. Guys don't say that stuff to each other. But I could tell. There was some lovey-dovey, possessive pronoun talk just under the surface. Dude was in love.

Sarah was one of those women that a lot of guys what. She complimented Ben. She was a little more straightforward, she was less whimsical... but she shared this talent that I always saw in my friend too, which was this ability to see and pull beauty from things that, like many of things Ben appreciated himself, and I personally hardly noticed anymore. Flowers, especially, I remember these brilliant flower arrangements she'd do, gorgeous colors that she'd bring out even when I thought the seasons had faded them, they'd look alive in the vase. Brand new.

I always relate bright colors to Ben. Something about a big bus. That part you'd have to ask him about.

I could say more. I wish, honestly, that I had my wedding toast that I gave written down somewhere, so I might share that. But I chose to wing it, actually I didn't really have any plans to speak, but I had something to say, and I was told several times that evening that it was quite wonderful [so much so, that Sarah's mother offered to put my wedding together in repayment, which was very sweet considering I'd met her just hours before]. It's lost now though, gone in the in the haze of the intense alcohol consumption of that night, washed away by the rain that soaked my suit as I waited for Ben's father to give me a ride back to my hotel. Shame. I winged it then, like I'm winging it now, but I feel like that night was special.

Their wedding, and maybe more so the next, seeing them off on their honeymoon, looking at them arm and arm, dressed more like I remembered them from school [suits and wedding dresses color things]... I count that day among some of my fondest memories. So naturally, when I pulled up Facebook, I saw this, and that same feeling came flooding back to me:

"Jack was born at 8:39 am Monday. He is 7 and a half pounds and 21 inches long. Labor began Friday afternoon." - Sarah Garner

Kind of simple. Straightforward. Certainly expected, as Sarah had well-documented her swelling [in that way where it's not insulting to say someone is swelling], the whole pregnancy for those of us far away to see. World we live in now, the beautiful moments posted up like adverts on a bulletin board. I think it's why the feelings we attach to them matter so much more. I mean, it's highly unlikely Sarah even posted that herself, probably someone else, with access to her account, just to let everyone know.

Still, it's a hell of an announcement. Jack Garner, son of Ben and Sarah Garner, welcomed into the world. And I have this picture now, of my friend Ben, looking pretty different, looking pretty grown up, holding his son Jack. Looking a touch overwhelmed, a little surprised, but more than capable. Beyond capable. And Jack... well, if you ask me, I already see a resemblance between the boy and his mother and father.

Congratulations, Sarah, Ben. Welcome to the world, Jack. It's been my pleasure, even though I wasn't always present, to get to watch you guys become a family.

---

On the home front, things here have been strange. Had some worries there for awhile about some financial stuff, but it all worked itself out. Also some good news, seems the outfit I do my book reviews through, they legitimately seem to like the work I've been doing, so I'll probably be getting a few more books each month to go through. It was kind of a surprise, I guess when I finish a review I always sort of expect it to be my last, to get an e-mail that says I have totally missed the point and there's no way they can accept this. But the quite the opposite is true, it seems. It's very good news, not just for my ego, but for my bank account.

I wrote previously it was in my plans to work on the peep show screenplay over this past weekend. I did okay, wasn't really getting anywhere, but I was trying some new things, and felt like maybe I'd stumbled on a pretty good fix, if I could just execute it properly. But Mom dropped off a stray box of stuff, something left behind in the move [some days I wonder if I'll ever stop getting boxes of things left behind in my sudden relocation], and going through I found a stack of postcards from my Dad, so very much like him, but also a little like me, in the wording, the tired, almost mopey, but still endearing glibness. One even had a stack of post-its stuck to it, a favorite trick of dad's, a short letter on what was probably about half a pad of those little sticky-backed pieces of paper. I can't imagine the post-office would have let him send those stuck to a postcard like that. They must have been mailed, stuffed in an envelope, or a care package, or some comics, or something else.

I don't remember. Reading them... broke me up a little bit. Kind of put a kibosh on the writing. I remain, sometimes, too sensitive for this kind of work. Sometimes, when people call Sterne sentimental, I laugh, and wonder how that could have been true, when he actually got things done? Oh, puns.

Never stops feeling like a weakness. I don't see my peers pulling off to the side every time some memory gets a little too hard to handle. It is probably not a trait of the successful... which, seems bolstered by the fact that it remains a trait inherent to me.

I've been conflicted about other things too lately. The week+ without a post was not intentional, and is not, for once, a sign of inactivity by yours truly. In fact, I've been writing for a couple of hours most days, but in a dramatic change of pace, mostly on paper, which is killer on my hand, and not great when I'm looking to feel accomplished. As I've complained to some of my friends, for some reason, writing not done at the keyboard doesn't seem much like writing done at all to me, so it's been hard to come on here and say I wrote what could be a romance comic book, everything but the layouts and interludes [yep, it needs interludes], when there's no polished copy in Final Draft to show. It's ridiculous that I don't register writing on paper as "counting" as writing - that seems to be the consensus among people I've asked, though many have sympathized with where I'm coming from. And it's really the best kind of problem to have - a non-problem, and I'm just glad to be filling up a moleskin, and relishing those moments when I can't quite write as fast as what I'm working on is coming to mind.

Plan is to break the habit. Get a little more work done. Post here again much, much sooner.

Justin Cornell Relaunches his Website, Pre-Premieres New Sketchbook

2011-03-23T20:36:00.011-04:00

My friend and Calamity Cash comic collaborator [now there's some Stan Lee-worthy bullpen alliteration] Justin Cornell has recently relaunched his website, the aptly named justincornell.com, and has also given his oft-linked blog a fresh coat of paint to match. Justin's wanted to do a big redesign since his website was hijacked a few months [a year?] back, and the end result came out especially impressive, I think, reflective of Justin's straight-forward, no-bullshit style and off-beat sense of humor. You can check out some of his samples there, and if you're so inclined [why wouldn't you be?], you can order prints of some his older work too.

Most importantly, Justin has set it up so you can pre-order his official sketchbook, "Sketchbook-HO!" the first release from Vanderhuge Studios. The characters featured are various personalities from history, pop culture, or anything else that piqued the artist's interest, or that he just felt inclined to draw, and his unique takes on similar subject matter has already impressed at the locally-held Buswater on the Boulevard Show in Charleston this past winter. The really cool thing is, for an extra ten dollars, you can get a personalized drawing by Justin in your sketchbook too, pretty much insuring that your book won't be like anyone else's.

Right now, Justin's looking at the store being a limited-time only part of the site, so if you're interested, it's good to take advantage soon, or the opportunity might slip away.

Justin's also interested to hear if there's any bugs, or viewing problems in obscure browsers that he may have missed. If you find anything [or have any questions for Justin], just e-mail him at justincornell@justincornell.com. And as always, keep checking back, as Justin often has "Calamity Cash and the Town with No Name" artwork, sketches, and previews that I don't always showcase here, along with various projects of his own.

Updates. Also, who wants to talk about Roller Derby?

2011-03-22T07:18:00.010-04:00

First up, and IMPORTANT. I'm tooling on a big project [re: Mary Hobb] which I want to feature Roller Derby in pretty prominently. I know some about the sport, but not a lot, and have been looking not only for a crash course [no pun intended], but also some people who are involved in it to talk to, to get some basic ideas of what the culture is like, specifically, the mindset of those who play, their camaraderie with their teammates and other teams, all of that. Inner workings, small things most people wouldn't think about, or realize. Pathos and atmosphere, too.

I've gotten in touch with one person so far, and am pretty optimistic about talking to them, but that's one person, and I know the wider my sampling, the better handle I'll have on all things derby. So, if you are on a roller derby team, and would be willing to talk to me, just let me know in the comments section of this post, friend me on Facebook, or e-mail me at mojo.wire.productions@gmail.com. Same goes for anyone who thinks they might know someone who'd be up for talking about it, naturally, along with any recommendations of books, websites, movies and anything else I won't necessarily get through Google searches on the subject. For the things I'm dealing with in this script, I really feel like derby is the best fit for the story, and because of that I want to be fair and respectful to the sport, and I know actually talking to some players is a way better way of representing it than just presenting it as the romanticized amalgam of punk rock, wrestling, and hockey that I've always pictured it as.

And don't worry, I've no plans to hit you with a boring questionnaire or anything like that. I just really want to talk, and take some impressions, maybe get a little insider info, and most importantly, do justice to this very interesting subculture.

Thanks to everyone in advance. I really appreciate it, and am looking forward to digging in.

---

Kind of a crazy Monday, only now really winding down. Which is probably good, because it's Tuesday.

Received some feedback recently on the peep show script. Sent it to a lot of people, but adequate time has passed now that I think I've gotten all the notes I'm going to get. Know what I need to do to finish it, just not entirely sure how yet. I need one of those Mr. Fantastic/Wrinkle in Time miracles that's going to allow me to get more in about one character, while also eliminating about half a page [roughly 30 seconds to a minute] from the script. Screenplay tesseracting. Why not? If you haven't seen it, and would like to, or if you're just interested in what I've been working on, let me know in the comments, and I'll send you a copy. Be glad for the extra eyes, or just the chance to share the story with you.

The peep show script is incredibly filmable, I feel. Could probably be done on a pretty modest budget [if not downright guerrilla-style], with just a little bit of construction and a good makeup artist. Honestly, the only problematic thing about it is the issue of extras... maybe finding a good actress willing to take her clothes off in an indie film. Depending on who you talk to, that can either be very hard, or very easy. Still, seems like a doable project, assuming all the talent/interest is there. Maybe something to poke around about.

A friend hooked me up with a pretty good resource for festivals. Much better than the outdated internet phonebook I'd stumbled upon. Now, it's just a matter of making good use of it. I have one finished feature [re: "Unfilmable"], which I think if I submit anywhere I'll probably be renaming "First Cut," and soon, two shorts that I feel pretty strongly about [re: "Nova" and the peep show script], so that's a good place to start from. Some of these places even take comic book scripts, which strikes me as backwards, but is encouraging. And I have more than a few other shorts that would just need some polish [re: "Christmas on the Titanic," "Walks with Angels," etc], and then I feel those could be responsibly tossed off as well. Need to start looking into registering these. For what I do right now, I'm pretty much covered legally, but if I'm serious about having folks look at these, I need something a little more solid to protect my work with.

I have a couple new comic ideas, not weird because I usually get a lot of ideas, but notable because they're mostly finished with how they came out in my notes. Outline, dialogue... rough layouts would be good, but since one is mostly talking heads, an artist might be hard to come up with. Neither have names yet.

One's a new Calamity Cash comic, though. Shorter than the other, simpler. It's not a new idea, but it's more a rough finished version of an older comic I had in mind. I've been way too on edge to sit down a do a lot of typing lately, but once this month is over, I'll have a better idea if I'm on solid ground for the foreseeable future. I'm not saying this stuff won't get worked on if I'm not, I just want a better idea of my schedule before I try to work out what's what.

Bugs me that I have to do that. I'd prefer to just be the kind of person to just sit down and motor through. I know a lot of writers who would, and do. I guess the short answer is that they're just better at this than me... I wish I wasn't at the mercy of other people's schedules, and my moods, but I am. Working on it.

A few quickie links before I head to bed. CheriAnn's deadline came up, and she finally shaved her head for St. Baldricks. You can read about the whole experience on her blog, and really get a look at the good she, and the other participants in the program, have done. The whole thing just makes me very proud to have gotten to know CheriAnn in the short time that I have.

A couple of Kickstarter things as well. With the tragedy in Japan, I know a lot of people have probably locked up any donations they might have made already, but if you can spare some small amount of money to support the arts, I'd like to draw your attention to these two projects.

The first is "Gigantic Sequins," a literary arts journal that was brought to my attention by poet Sophie Klahr. I don't know Sophie personally, but her blog is a favorite of mine, and anything she and her work is involved in is a worthwhile endeavor, and I'm certain those also featured in the "Sequins" are just as quality. The money goes to Issue 2.2, and they have a $500 goal they need to reach in less than a month.

The other is "Forever Young Fashion" by Rachel DeCavage, a fashion show being produced under Evergreen Design Co.'s banner. Rachel and I both went to Bennington College around the same time, but I will admit to not knowing her very well, if at all, honestly. However, I was turned on to Evergreen Design via Dee Goldsmith, and bought an organic or eco-friendly or some such t-shirt from them that I have kind of fallen in love with [if you know me, you know about me and t-shirts], made all the cooler knowing I was supporting [meager though said support was] a fellow alum's artistic pursuits. What can I say, I don't know a lot about sustainable design or fashion, but I can be won over with an awesome t-shirt, and I'm sure the more ambitious designs are going to be even more impressive than that. The project's looking to get donations in the area of $1,950 in little over a month, so spread the word if you can't at least spare some cash.

In both cases, don't just take my word for it, go check out the pages and the proposals.

I'll should be back with updates sooner rather than later. If I do fall behind, the blame can lay squarely on the shoulders of the Agatha Christie novel I stumbled upon in one of my grandmother's many boxes of used paperbacks the other day.

"Testicles, testicles, give me your keys." - A Calamity Cash Update

2011-03-16T20:11:00.004-04:00

Had breakfast with Justin yesterday, talked pretty extensively about Calamity Cash [re: The Town with No Name].

Justin recently finished his first [technically second] sketchbook, which you can see some samples of in the past several posts on his blog, and is looking at July as his tentative date to be *finished* finished with the artwork for Calamity Cash. This has been a pretty long-term project for the both of us, just a huge learning experience with a lot of unexpected bumps in the road [and very little of it having to do with the project proper - maybe my next comic should be about all the things that can get in your way when you're trying to be creative and clever in your 20s], but with even a loose date set, you'll probably be hearing more about the comic again.

Some decisions are going to have to be made, of course, as that time comes closer. We're definitely going to print some, and I personally am not... certain how I'll be budgeting my part of that, but we'll definitely figure something out. And the book's about as long as two of your standard, direct market monthly comics, and in a weird sort of twist you can sort of tell. Justin worked in grays a lot in the early parts of the book, but switched to a starker black eventually, and as I've mentioned on here, I took the whole second part of the comic back to my drawing board and re-wrote it. Talk right now is learning towards cutting the whole project in half, which wouldn't be the worst thing for it, especially since, right now, it's slated to be a hulking 52 pages.

Slicing it into two parts might give us more room to move, and make the markedly different halves a little less jarring to the reader. Still, we're not sure if that's the move we're going to make, and have a few other ideas we might employ [one inspired by those big discount packs of 20 or more comics you used to be able to buy in Walmart and K-Mart]. But we have a lot of time until July, and are planning to discuss it more between now and the time he's finished up the art.

I also have to stress that the summer deadline is not a hard and fast rule for either of us. It's just a good cap to set by Justin, and I'm more than supportive of. But Justin's also got some other commitments and plans in the works [dude owns his own home, after all - roofs gotta have shingles], and I've got some... uncertainty in the next couple months myself, stuff that I'm really not ready to talk about here, but might call for some drastic altering of the way I... well, live my life.

We'll have to see. It's all up in the air for now.

Still, big news, and it's exciting to think about having Momma Cash and her daughter Calamity finally ready for everyone to see.

---

Something kind of unrelated, but still very important and topical. I've talked a lot about Amy Klein as of late [who was recently interviewed on the Village Voice website -- definitely check that out], but this post on her blog, about the recent string of disasters in Japan, was just really touching and I felt I should link it here. She spent a little over year in Japan after college, and her post talks about the music and the culture, while sharing a personal story of something that happened during her time there. There are also a lot of beautiful pictures of the country, a vision of Japan that is easy to forget with the images we're being bombarded with daily now. And the whole thing is, as always, wonderfully written.

Amy's also decided she's going to donate all the proceeds from her music to the relief effort, so if you've been waffling about checking out her solo album, or her side-project "Solanin," then there's no better sign to go and get them now at http://amyklein.bandcamp.com/ and http://solanin.bandcamp.com/ respectively.

One more thing, concerning Japan... quite a few people have asked me about my friend Ian Rogers, who was teaching English there until just recently, and whose blog I often link. Most likely, if you're following him on Facebook, you now know he's fine, and had left the country a bit before the disaster[s], but just in case, he is alive and well, and would probably love to hear from you.

"Nightmares" - A Half-Memoir

2011-03-12T00:54:00.011-05:00

It's funny. When I sat down to write about this, I pictured it all happening much earlier. But it actually started later in high school, around my senior year.

I was going through kind of a rough patch. The first inklings of the problems between Dad and I were starting to rear their ugly heads [which would, eventually lead to our short falling out while I was off at school], while at home, my step-father and I really weren't clicking like we used to. "Wearing out my welcome" might be the best way to put it. Which makes sense, of course -- I was a moody teenager, who wanted to spend the bulk of my time avoiding any sort of responsibility to save time for more moodiness. Other things were going on too -- I'd recently had one of my first real relationships fall apart, quite unexpectedly, and as in most cases with me and women, it hadn't quite lasted long enough for me to be properly prepared for the separation [funny, as I'm not sure I'm ever ready in those cases, even when it's quite clear the party is over]. I had probably just abandoned my journalistic dreams, as I was quickly realizing the only thing I really liked was having a soapbox, and being able to editorialize. News wasn't for me. And the choir, my sole extracurricular activity [think more "Glee" than church... and no, I don't believe for a minute that the distinction is any less embarrassing], was pretty much the most unpleasant part of my day, every day, and I'd soon be quitting.

God I was lame.

Anyway. It was around this time I started having these... nightmares. I guess it could have been a little earlier -- I do have a penchant for tweaking dates a little, to make things better lineup in my own head, and yes, sadly, even I can't always parse through my own bullshit anymore. But nightmares. Maybe it was because all of this stress, maybe it was just the constant grind of high school, that feeling that I imagine they recreate pretty well in hell -- not suffering, per se, but the doldrums, that sinking realization that today is just like yesterday, is just like the day before, and that the weekend, the supposed "freedom" of the week, is just like the weekend before that. Routine, nothing ever necessarily unpleasant, but nothing all that good either. Schedule, contentedness, absolutely no thought of any sort of future. Because how could there be? You had lived this same day for three years.

As a teenager, three years was a lifetime.

I didn't... cope well. I guess that's the big theme of my life, huh? But I didn't really feel like I had anyone to talk to about it, and in most cases, people don't really care what your dreams are about anyway. And solving the problem seemed... entirely simple to me. If I was going to have bad dreams, I just wasn't going to sleep. And though it took some doing [Mom could be something of a hammer], it wasn't like there hadn't been other times in my life when I'd waited for people to head to bed, and then got up to mouse around in the dark in secret. Pillow under the door muffled most sound. Soda under the bed got me the caffeine I needed.

Really all that was left was something to fill the time.

Reading was out. One of the few things that relaxes me, so it couldn't be that. And even if I was in that insomniatic state where sleep wasn't coming no matter what I did, comprehension would dip, and make reading pretty much useless to me. And I don't care for useless reading. There was television, and sometimes that was enough [in my early stages, I found a lot of late-night comedy programs that were usually truly awful -- though occasionally there'd be a diamond shine through, like a certain about to arrive star in the late Mitch Hedberg], but I didn't quite have the amount of engagement I needed, and I could still nod off. And that was no good. Typing tended to get the job done [plus it was hard to sleep at keyboard - boy do I miss those days], but the computer wasn't in my room, and that meant possibly getting caught, and having to sleep.

What can I say? I have always preferred to be quietly rebellious. I'm sort of... ashamed of it.

Video games ended up being my saving grace. For eight or ten months before graduation, the bulk of my nights were spent sitting at the foot of my bed, playing my PlayStation, specifically, Final Fantasy 7, or the re-released Final Fantasy 6. Over and over again, in perpetuity, alternating as I beat one or the other. Now, mind you, I wasn't doing anything so outstanding here... never took the time to put down Emerald Weapon, never found that Seventh Dragon [respectively], though occasionally I'd make the games harder by denying myself certain things, or going wildly off-path, just to see if the game had some way for me to get back. Of course, they always did. Neither RPG ever gave me the dead-end I was looking for.

Not even sure why I was looking for it.

It was remarkably easy to do all this, of course. I was young, my body didn't really care if the energy it was getting was coming from food or sleep, and I had the appetite of a teenage boy to pick up the slack. There was also all the caffeine, in just about any form I wanted it, from soda, to pills, to coffee, and it was easy to give myself a boost if there was something during the day I needed to be awake for. But honestly... I didn't need to stay awake most days anyway. My rural high school was not so demanding in its curriculum as to command my full attention. I remember a lot of times in class having time to read, play Game Boy, listen to music, and... if I felt desperate for a couple of hours, throw my head down on the desk and catch a quick nap. Oh, and the poetry. All those little notebooks full of my bad word play with meticulous spacing. I even remember a couple of them were from the Smithsonian, and had these... rubber covers. And glossy pages.

Practically water-proof. So perfect for all that angst.

I don't remember it ever getting to me, the lack of sleep. It probably did, but it's odd I can't recall it. I remember being weary. I think I was weary most of the time back then, everything always feeling so... heavy. But that was just school. No exhaustion though. No desperate need for a nap here, or there. Maybe a couple of days sleeping until noon, sure -- but again, teenager. Wasn't odd. It integrated pretty quickly into my everyday life, and if it ever caught up to me [which occasionally, it did], I was single, very little was expected of me, and I did such a good job staying out of the way that no one really noticed or cared if I needed to pass out for a day.

And this continued more or less into college.

Classes in college made it harder to keep up. The sleeplessness, I mean. Of course, at this point, a lot of it was happening naturally, I'd just... not think about sleep, and not really need as much of it. The haze wasn't as common either -- that thing that kept me from reading, kept me from understanding what I reading, it was something I'd figured out how to work around. And the time, mostly, went to good use, papers and studying and all that collegiate stuff. Now, naturally, m recall wasn't great. I really needed to look more closely at what I was studying, to get a better handle on it. It definitely wasn't always me at 100%. But I think I took a lot of pride in how close to 100% it was, when it wasn't.

I also started taking a lot of naps.

One or two terms in college, they became almost a daily thing. And there was a lot more sleeping in, not usually a problem, but occasionally, with an early class, a real killer. I overslept a few times. Not as embarrassing as not oversleeping, but waking up after just a couple hours in bed, thinking I had, and stumbling to where ever I thought I was expected to be, only to have said destination have a different class in it, or less embarrassing, but still head-slap-worthy, nobody there at all. And I'd forget things. Get headaches. One professor actually noticed, the only one who ever did, which isn't odd exactly, because Bennington profs tended to be pretty on the ball. But like with a lot of things in my life, I had gotten really good at hiding the little terrors I put myself through. And I certainly wasn't used to being asked about them, so when confronted, I just said exactly what it was. Probably one of the first times I'd ever just leveled with someone about it.

I didn't like sleeping. I had nightmares.

Sure. Give me the statistics. Tell me no one can have nightmares every night. Tell me no one can remember their dreams every night. Tell me I'm crazy. That last one I might concede to. But these were always awful -- maybe I wasn't Homer Simpson, maybe I wasn't kicking and screaming about cobras during them, but these were bad. These made me not want to sleep at night. They more or less made me wish I never had to sleep again, and took on a sort of... presence, you know? Like they were an enemy, just waiting for me to slip up, just waiting for me to nod off. So as I kept denying them the long-sleep [which I really didn't do... I was always caving to the long-sleep, to the regular sleep, and in those cases, I did my best just to deal], they'd find ways to sneak up on me. A nap in the stairwell of the art building would end 15 minutes later when I'd think there were hands around my throat. Couple hours sleep in the room would be interrupted when a perfectly average dream would end with a friend or family member shooting me in the back. A night where I'd just decide the hell with it, I needed my rest, would be a night where I was chased around my dorm, by whatever that was sitting at the foot of my bed.

I preferred those. The ones with the tangible scary, even the gore.

Yeah, they were awful. But my mind -- the enemy -- it got smart. Figured out how to really make a nightmare hang around, how to really hurt me not just while I slept, but in the waking hours too. Those were the ones I hated, the nightmares that would choose to exhaust me, that would show me the dead, alive again. That would give me back a girl I'd lost, or would never have, and give me everything else I wanted too, just as long as I knew I'd be waking up soon -- that it wasn't real. Make me happier than I could ever be in real life, and take it all away. Offer me answers to those big questions but, oh, no, you have to go. Next time. Somewhere downright cliché about it, and if, say, I had a rough week ahead? I'd dream my way through that entire week, Monday through Friday, only to wake up, exhausted, and realize just hours before Sunday night had just ended. The whole week was still ahead. Cruel. And as much as I blamed an outside force, I wasn't a moron, I knew it was self-inflicted. It was always just me.

No one knows how to hurt you quite like "me."

I didn't tell anyone this, but a little over a year ago, just before I decided I was going to do something about all these anxiety problems, my nightmares had more or less stopped. I don't know why. Things weren't any better when they did. The argument could be made they were much worse. Certainly had plenty of other things that kept me up at night. And sure, occasionally, they would come back, and they could be quite severe, but hey, not having them every time my head hit the pillow? I'd take that. And when they would rear their ugly heads, they would always be sure to make up for lost time [or maybe my skin just wasn't as thick... or maybe seeing Dad was just... a little too much], but again, it wasn't every night, and I could handle that.

I have no problem beating myself up like a normal person does.

Of course, a lot of the damage had already been done. My sleep schedule's a mess, and bouts of insomnia still hit me hard. But without the nightmares, there was this feeling of... normalcy, and occasionally it all would self-adjust.
And I even got sort of complacent about it, you know? Like you realize you get about being well when you're sick for a long time. You just take it for granted, not feeling like garbage, so when the day does come that you do, when you feel awful and can hardly stand or keep down food, you say to yourself "No! No, when I get better, I will remember this, and I will appreciate not feeling like this, for as long as I can."

But of course, you don't. Why would you?

It is shame the nightmares are back. I'd have done well to not be reminded of all this. And though they're not as bad now [at least I don't think], and while it's only been for a couple weeks, thus making it entirely possible I'm just going through a rough spell, I could have done without them popping up again. And sure, there's that urge, still, to just sit up with them like people used to do with the dead, but it's not really healthy, and as I said, already I miss so much sleep from these little bouts of insomnia, or worse, from my own doing, when I have something I'm working on, when I'm pushing myself towards some finish. "Doing the writer thing" as a friend put it -- typing, or scribbling, and forgetting that I might need a little sleep, a little something to eat, while I wonder why the hell I feel like crap.

So yeah, this can stop. I've got other reasons to stay up. I don't need this any more.

Esquivel/Sarabia [Black] Terror Campaign, Postcards from Afar [Key West & Vienna]

2011-03-05T22:53:00.008-05:00

First up, a bit of a favor.

This will actually seem kind of silly on my part, since Eric already has far more online/comic book community exposure than I do, but I wanted to take a minute and encourage everyone reading to chip in. I mentioned earlier that Eric M. Esquivel [of Modern Mythology fame] was working with Ander Sarabia [my Bilbao-based collaborator on the short comics "A Change is Gonna Come" and the currently in-production "VHS Generation"] on a comic themselves, a sort of Earth-2 take on the public domain super hero property "The Black Terror." The Terror's been around since the early 1940s, and has numerous fans all over the globe, one of whom turns out to be the Image Comics guru and creator of the Savage Dragon, Erik Larsen.

Larsen came across Eric's post about working on a Black Terror book [actually, a couple of them, which you can read about here] and was naturally interested in the idea, so much so that Eric was able to send him a copy. Now let's face it, Eric and Ander are both so wildly talented there's no doubt Larsen's going to love the book, so all they really need from us is a little grassroots movement for the project. Go and check out the Facebook page/event here, along with with Eric's Larsen-tagged plea for all our support, and most importantly don't forget to let Erik Larsen himself know that you'd be willing to plunk down a mere 3 dollars if Image was willing to publish their Black Terror one-shot -- which in the age of the internet is easy to do, as Mr. Larsen has a Facebook account and, perhaps more enticing, is on Twitter. Which means all you need to do is compose a little 140 character message to @erikjlarsen, and let him know that the Esquivel/Sarabia Black Terror comic is something you'd want to have on your pull list.

Everyone's pretty well aware how fond I am of Ander, both knowing and working with him, and if you check this place regularly you've even gotten to see some of the work he's done with yours truly on the non-super-hero end of things. And while I've never had the pleasure of working or collaborating with Eric [something I hope we can fix some day], I can attest that he is a talented, passionate dude, and even though I've never met him face to face, I am honored to consider him a friend, and when I'm feeling full of myself, a peer. So the work is good. Trust me. Now help generate some buzz so the whole direct market can find that out.

Remember - that's @erikjlarsen on Twitter.

---

Other things. I've actually been sitting on this postcard from my friend Ally a little too long. Back in the post-Christmas season, she went on a long, coastal getaway, and no doubt because she saw my promise to put any postcard I received up on my blog [or maybe just because she's kind of fond of me], she dropped me this postcard of Hemingway House in Key West.

I found this note on the back particularly stirring, as I imagine any writer worth their salt probably would:

"Forget your personal tragedy. We are all bitched from the start and you especially have to be hurt like hell before you can write seriously. But when you get the damned hurt, use it-don't cheat with it."

--Ernest Hemingway

Words to live by. And eventually, in old Hemingway's case, die by too. But let's stay upbeat. Thank you, Ally. I really appreciate being thought of. Especially in the context of Ernest Hemingway [I'm just not cool enough yet to not be flattered by the association].

Ally, along with going to grad school, attending nearly every con on the East Coast, also runs an excellent news site which covers all things geek -- from comics, to movies, to horror -- appropriately titled "Geeking Ally." Go check that out too.

This one I'm more on the ball with -- it just came in the mail a couple of days ago from my friend Jesselyn. She's been teaching Paris, but in her spare time has been making good use of the amazing travel opportunities over in Europe. This amazing piece of architecture [which is so detailed my bargain scanner needed almost 3x the usual among of time to scan] is St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna, which, well... I don't think a lot of people know this, I don't think Jesselyn did, but for an atheist, I'm a really sucker for a beautiful church. I've always loved the colors on this one, and remember, in my short stint as a calendar shill, looking at this picture in lieu of working... well, most days.

Jesselyn managed to get more on the back of postcard than anyone has... well, ever, and her passion for the place, and the history of it, just everything, absolutely shines through in her letter. That she was willing to share that with me was very touching, so much so that I'm keeping the message to myself [I swear it's not just because I don't want to transcribe it], but I will say nothing makes a person more fabulous than note starting with "I am sitting in a café in Vienna..."

Also, it was addressed to "Herr Randall Nichols." So cool.

Thank you, Jesselyn. It's means a great deal.

Been doing a lot of notes for the roller derby script [re: "Mary Hobb"], and may have gotten a bead on at least one person involved in derby to talk to about it. If you know any one else who'd be up for talking [or if you've found this site, and are involved in derby and would be willing to talk to me], make sure to let me know.

Right now, I've actually got a pretty solid beginning and ending for the script, and an outline which covers all the high points. I think the hard part, the thing that's kept me from getting started right out of the gate is how many characters I'm going to have to juggle for this. As is, only two characters have names, and only one of them is actually on the derby team... really, I'm looking at something in the way of 10-13 different girls. Now obviously only a handful of those will be what you'd consider "main characters," but I'd like them all to unique, and not just set pieces. Lot of that will end up getting done when I'm finished, of course, but I'd like everyone to have names.

Probably worried for nothing. Having that outline makes this all feel pretty solid, and real.

For, and inspired by, Amy Klein.

2011-03-02T21:40:00.013-05:00

It's no secret I'm a big fan of Amy Klein. Especially if you follow me on Twitter, I link her there almost anytime she writes something, and the various music projects she's involved in -- Titus Andronicus, Solanin, hilly eye -- have pretty much taken up permanent residence on my iPod. On her blog, she recently did a longer-ish post about staring down 26, turning that age when there's officially more of your twenties behind you than in front of you. To get anything at all out of my post, you should go read hers first:

"A Woman of A Certain Age."

I'm turning 26 in June myself, and a lot of what she wrote about has been on my mind, even, in some ways, the things she accredits to be more of a worry for women than men. I don't exactly feel like I'm getting more handsome or distinguished as I age, and I feel like a lot of men in their 30s aren't looked to for what's cool, or smart, or cutting edge. Like somehow not be prodigal will keep me from ever being significant. Ever doing... whatever the hell it is I want to do.

Still, she's right. It's all disheartening, and when you see something happen to someone whose work you value, who does something that makes it so you don't ever want to see them discouraged, there's that impulse to reach out. In a short discourse on Twitter, I tried... but the medium failed, and me trying to express myself in haste [that need to stay relevant] jammed me up too. 140 quickly typed-up characters just doesn't do the job. I don't know if Amy reads this, but if she does, this is just my quick do-over, something I was trying to say, something that I discovered recently that after reading your thing, I wanted to share.

Norris and I are standing around the Panhandle and Norris is telling be how it is all set up for a friend to take me to Big Sur. I say what I really want to do is spend a few days with Norris and his wide and the rest of the people in their house. Norris says it would be a lot easier if I'd take some acid. I say I'm unstable. Norris says all right, anyway, grass, and he squeezes my hand.

One day Norris asks how old I am. I tell him I thirty-two. It takes a few minutes, but Norris rises to it. "Don't worry," he says at last. "There's old hippies too."

--Joan Didion, "Slouching Towards Bethlehem" (1968)

I don't know if that will do the same for her as it does for me. Explaining it to others isn't something I've been particularly adept at, either so... here's hoping.

More importantly than all that, and still concerning Amy, is the release of her solo album "I Know What You Want." I've only had the album for a day, but I'm really taken with the sound, and like how it feels as much about storytelling as it is about the stories she's telling with the songs themselves. There's so much going on in each song, but it never sounds over-produced either... it's just all quality, with the opening track, "Fireflies" currently my favorite. Speaking in pure economics, the albums just six tracks, but as each of the songs come in at least four minutes [some of them more], five dollars is more than worth the download, and I wholeheartedly recommend you check it out. It's well worth it.

---

As to where I've been [going more than a week without blogging is a little strange for me], I really don't have much in the way of excuses. Seth sent me a nice note on Facebook about my previous entry, and it meant a lot to me that it meant so much to him. It was a little exhausting to get out, and I felt kind of... sideways about doing it here, but I just knew I could write what I was feeling more comfortably here than I could any other way. It reminds me a lot of the lyrics from "Wingo Lamo," Zapata's claim that she "can't make any sense/Unless it's in a song." Sometimes I feel like this blog is the closest I get to my song.

Then again, there are probably a lot of people who would debate that I make any sense here, either.

I guess I've been a little down lately. Half-way through last week, I kind of got sick of everything, of "social media," because as great as it is when it brings me things like Amy's stuff, the writing and music I talked about in the beginning of this post, it never really stops. For every awesome thing by Eric, or Lauren, or John, or Hannah, or Dave, or Kimberly Kaye [or so many others], there's also a never ending stream of bad news, stupid news, or just banal intolerance. And what's hilarious is, it's not like there isn't an off switch -- there is, it's right there on my keyboard. But walking away isn't the problem, it's just the weight of it, and the possibilities inherent in the medium. I constantly look at this blog, Twitter, even Facebook, and think I must be doing something wrong, I am somehow failing to take advantage of this in the proper way. It's like the first time I saw Youtube -- the potential was apparent immediately, and the fact that I didn't immediately order a video camera haunts me to this day. And even if I had, I'm not entirely sure what it is that I'd do with it.

Ultimately that... impotence just got to me. I had to get away from it from a little while. Had to get away from all the amazing things people were doing. I'm not... proud of that. I just haven't figured out how to cut a place for myself yet, and eats at you when you realize so many others have. Especially if you're worried there won't be any places once you figure it out.

Oh, yeah. And there's this. Which I'm just... god. If it were anything else, if it were something smarter, or more significant. I mean, I know there's nothing in the way of original ideas left out there. But it just seems almost too close, and too stupid for what it is because of that. Discouraging. Like every time I show "Nova" now, it's going to have the taint of that... abomination all over it.

So there's that. The Oscars also happened. I sort of came back online to a lot of people really excited/dreading that, and then the waves of disappointment crested pretty high after the night was over. I can't really complain -- "The Kings Speech" is everything that an Oscar winner should be, and that's sort of the point. People bemoaning that the Academy is out of touch aren't wrong, but we shouldn't be expecting a group of industry people to somehow represent our generation. That's... wildly unrealistic. So those upset by "The Social Network" not taking home the big prize, it's important to remember that if it truly is the film that captures some aspect of us, the twenty-somethings, then nothing better encapsulates that fact than the Academy not getting it, not giving it that recognition. It's not why they're there. The same is true for the other films, like "The Kids Are All Right" and "Toy Story 3." Both are fine films, but in the former's case, I think we all have to admit it's more about the boundaries it broke as opposed to quality of the movie itself, and in the latter's case as moving as it was, it really didn't do or say much more or different from the previous two movies in the series -- that is, they're all about faith.

If you wanted "Inception" to win... I don't know. Here's a consolation prize people seem to enjoy.

I personally think the best film of last year was "Winter's Bone." That it only got a nomination because of the ten nominee field tells me we have a much bigger problem than the Academy just being out of touch with the Facebook generation -- I feel Hollywood may have forgotten everything a good movie's supposed to be. As for the rest... well, I could talk all day about each one. I had the rare pleasure of being able to see everything pertinent before the big night. But I don't feel up to it, and that's one of those things that could just go on and on if I got started.

So, all that happened, and there was a dentist appointment in there too. All and all, it's just a lot of hemming and hawing that I haven't really been writing lately.

I've talked about this recently, but I haven't felt overly inspired these days, nor have I had that one big project to put the bulk of my efforts towards. I've been toying with some older stuff and not getting anywhere, but when I got up this morning, I just felt like I had this germ of an idea starting to form. I am not sure... I guess you could say I'm being cautiously optimistic here, but the three or four hours I spent after that, scribbling into the moleskin notebook my friend Beck gave me, led me to believe things might be looking up. I'll write more more comes, I'm sure. Look out for that new label at the end of posts, as always.

Related to that, if you're reading this and you know anybody who is big into roller derby - whose actually played, or been involved in some way, I'd be interested in talking to them, if you think they'd be willing. I sort of need a crash course in it [no pun intended], and as sure as I am that I could pick up the basics and such from Wikipedia, or even some book snagged off Amazon, I'd prefer to get a first hand account of things like the atmosphere, the psychology, the camaraderie or derby life, not to mention a quick and dirty way to pick up the rules. But mostly, the pathos.

Probably be an entry later in the week just about that, to try and use the title to grab some helpful people through Google. I've also got some postcards scanned in, that I'd like to get posted. I'm a little behind on them.

With Great Reverence and Love to the Martin Family

2011-02-22T06:59:00.010-05:00

It says a little too much about me that I'm more comfortable doing this here, but... ah, well.

I'd like to start by sending my best wishes to my friend Seth, and his wife, Nichole, who just yesterday welcomed into the world a beautiful baby daughter, Chloe Martin. I hardly even know where to begin, and my only message to Seth, up until now, has been a "Congratulations" on his Facebook page at the posting of the picture of their wonderful new addition. It's... just how these things are done nowadays, especially with Seth several hours from here, and me with next to no idea how I'd word that phone conversation.

I have had the privilege of knowing Seth for several years now. Not what I think most people would consider well, certainly not as well as I'd like, a fact that remains true for... a lot of people I have the pleasure of knowing, actually. I'd honestly like to fix that, and heaven knows I've tried, but let's face it, anyone reading here is well aware that I'm that rare-mix of socially-retarded and self-obsessed, which generally leaves my friends getting this reserved admiration from me, that I'm sure reads less like admiration, and far too often as self-satisfied interest. It isn't, but genetics are against me - my nose just naturally turns up. Add to that the distance, and my not driving, and it's a wonder that I have gotten to know Seth at all, but I have, a little, and as strange as this is to say, every single time has been nothing short of an 'event,' at least in my mind.

Some of them are fairly obvious. You don't often get to see a man spin-kick a guy while starring in his own motion picture, or perform a shooting star press on one of the fatter wrestlers on the indie circuit, and unless you travel in far different circles than I do, you very rarely get to see the same guy dolled up for a friend's wedding, or in the sweltering back seat of a station wagon on its way home from Chicago. Probably don't get the opportunity to say your first prolonged exposure to such an interesting dude involved way too many gay jokes, and a softcore porn version of Spider-Man chased with a Melvin Van Peebles biopic. So I guess you can see why so many of my run-ins with Seth have seemed like such big deals, so epic, if you will, though none of those mentioned are necessarily my favorites. My favorite, really, is much more selfish than all that.

Seth has the unique distinction of being one of only two people I know to really connect themselves to something I've written. The first person, she... overtook me, somehow, and I wrote for her as much as what I wrote became, at least in my mind, very much a part of her. But Seth worked his way into my head in an entirely different matter, digging out a place for himself in "Nova" [now the project which may never happen] during an early table read that forever connected him to a character I had actually written with no true, discernible person in mind. He found the rhythm of the dialogue, the one thing I always work so hard on, and nailed it so completely I remain amazed when recalling it even to this day [and I probably shouldn't be - as in all things, Seth never fails to excel]. I am not a man used to being understood, I suppose, and this went a step farther, for the first time in my life, Seth, being an genuinely talented, exceptional fucking guy, just "got it," and this, this tied him to a part of me in way [in a totally hetero, non-bondage way] that I'll never forget. Always be grateful for it, always felt... less lonely for it, I guess.

I don't have a lot of friends who have kids. Seth's not the first, of course [unless I'm forgetting somebody], I think the first is probably my friend Lisa, who I know reads this space occasionally, and who I have also done a real shit job of keeping up with, and who has started a wonderful family in her own right [I doubt there's a more sly and loving mother out there]. But again, with the company I keep, it's not something you ever expect, even at this age, and while I have been aware that Nichole was pregnant since Christmas, it hadn't yet crossed my mind that the baby would soon be with us, late to the party though I was already. And it's truly a special occasion, a real achievement in a world where achievement isn't so easy to gage.

There's no doubt in my mind that Seth and Nichole will be amazing parents. I hope I'm not insulting anyone by saying this, but I can't imagine a better father than Seth, and though I do not know Nichole well, every time I have met her she has seemed warm, and kind, and affable, a true beauty both inside and out. If she is like Seth [and I imagine she would have to be to keep up with him] she too must excel in so many of her pursuits. I'm sure this will be no different. I think, all of us, looking back, even if you loved your parents and thought they were the greatest in the world, might give pause if offered the possibility of being raised by Seth and Nichole Martin. And their daughter Chloe is truly blessed with just such an opportunity.

They are, of course, blessed to have Chloe too - which, I think, now, has to go down in history as the most obvious and unnecessary sentiment I've ever felt need to voice. But it's my way. It is also my way to wish them well, to send them good feelings and all the love that can be spared. I am just so truly happy for them both... I can only imagine how their own hearts must be bursting, I can only imagine what they must feel.

Welcome to the world, Chloe Martin. We're glad to have you, and the place is a damn sight better now that you're here.

---

Not much has been done on my side of things. I have been feeling very much under the weather the past few days, a weird combination of not quite sick and not quite depressed [all right, quite a bit of both, but I'm not fishing for pity here] that has left me ill-equipped to much in the way of usefulness. I am still without one, over-arching project, and so I've spent what little coherency I've had looking at some old things, and will probably continue to do just that until something new crops up, or a breakthrough is made. The passion still isn't there, and it may just be the coming of spring, or it may just be the accumulation of winter goings-on, but for the most part I feel largely unmotivated, and until that changes, I'm not entirely sure what to do next.

Even the exercises I try to get in, the little bit of writing each day, have been clumsy and weird, and I abandoned one yesterday in disgust when I could no longer look at the jagged red lines each time I misspelled "delivery." It's very odd for me to walk away from the page angry - sure, unproductive spells might make me anxious, or depressed, but to be actually annoyed was odd and not something I want to make a regular habit of. I've never minded when it wasn't easy; I can even handle it not being fun sometimes. But I'm not sure what to do with that.

I've filled most of my non-productive hours with television, specifically "Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood," which I got sick of waiting on and crammed all 64 episodes into a week-long marathon. I'm always interested in seeing different interpretations and adaptations, and this filled that need pretty spectacularly, and I found myself especially charmed by how even with the sleeker animation - the more cartoon-y visuals, if you will - this story was quite a bit darker than the previous series, with a great deal more emotional weight. I've always liked that [it's why Todd Nauck always wowed me], and it was nice to see here. The empathy, the willingness to sympathize with almost every character, even if they were "bad guys" was also sort of... stirring, with one scene with an enemy soldier pinned down on a stairwell doing more than some of the best war movies every have, as far as it concerned "the other side." I think if there is a lesson, something in FMA: Brotherhood to be looked at and emulated, it's probably that, and I might try and explore it further, down the line, though it is admittedly a little outside my usual subject matter.

I wound up a little uncomfortable with the ending, as everything tied up a bit too neat for my tastes, but considering this one had to live up to the experience of watching the original series with friends at Bennington, it more than held its own. Regrettable that it too can't be shared in a similar fashion, but...

Well, anyway.

Want to thank everyone who took the time to read "Conversation Between Future Lovers in the Psych Ward." I will admit to being a little disappointed... I quite liked this one, I mean I didn't at first, but once I did the edits and really got everything hitting just so, I thought there might be something to it, but I didn't get quite the response I was hoping for. I'm starting to think there's really no point to writing up these dialogue pieces anyway. If I can't fit them in scripts, there may just be no future for them. I poked around a little, too, just to see what some places take in the way of submissions, and didn't feel much like they'd be welcome, either, so... At least they're nice to play with. Again, really appreciate all those who said supportive things, "liked" it on Facebook. I may just have to think about their applications a little more.

Comic stuff is still going strong. Justin set up a private website for me to keep up with Calamity Cash work, particularly the thumbnails he's been doing in his spare time, and I expect to have more updates about that project in the near future. I'm actually really into what he did with the website, as now we can both make comments on things, but we don't have to be free at the same time. It's a lot like me and Ander's e-mails, now, which is a nice, and yeah, I expect to have some more news about our project together [re: VHS Generation] soon.

But I'm not really rushing anyone. Again, I've hardly felt like I've had it together, lately, and I've still got some little things to do. Still have to file my taxes, still have books coming in to review.

Feel so exhausted lately. More soon.

Conversation Between Future Lovers in the Psych Ward

2011-02-18T09:00:00.002-05:00

“It’s all serious shit here, isn’t it?”

“Probably. But how do you mean?”

“Oh you know. ‘Getting better.’ We work on getting better, we talk about getting better, and we follow all the little rules that, if we follow just right, will get us... better.”

“Well, considering the venue.”

“And it doesn’t bug you? That it’s everything, all the time. That it’s what our whole life is now.”

“I don’t really plan on being here my whole life.”

“Really. You have plans?”

“Yeah. I mean, after I get...”

“Better?”

“Out of here.”

“Same thing. And that’s all this place is about.”

“They want us to stay focused, I guess.”

“Right. But there’s staying focused and then there’s... ennui.”

“No. No, I’m pretty sure they took the board games away.”

“Oh god.”

“Sorry.”

“No, but that’s just it. You have a sense a humor! And I had no idea. Because here, anything not about getting better doesn’t matter. Like when we watch TV in the rec room, we just all sit there, quiet. No one says anything, or bitches about what’s on. We don’t even quote from The Simpsons. If whatever you’re watching blows, what do you usually do?”

“I don’t know. Put up with it, or just fuck off back to my room.”

“Exactly.”

“So what? Do you really miss all those scintillating conversations about nothing? Are you suddenly feeling nostalgic to talk about the weather?”

“No... small talk makes me nervous anyway.”

“You’d never know.”

“Sometimes what it leads to is nice, though. As a for instance, ‘What medications are you on?’ has never got anyone fucked.”

“...pass.”

“I wasn’t asking!”

“Right.”

“Well... so what if I was? Maybe.”

“Nothing personal. I mean don’t get me wrong, you really know how to rock the whole hospital gown and robe combo, but...

“You’re not exactly someone to get broken up over.”

“...pretty much.”

“No, look, I just meant...”

“Don’t worry about it. It’s not what I’m here for.”

“So what are you here for?”

“To get – oh, fuck you.”

“Now who’s asking?”

“Jesus.”

“Come on. Chill. Part of my point, you know? They put us all together like this, and make it so it’s all we are. Coke addicts, wrist cutters, and pukers.”

“Interesting order, there.”

“Not like outside. In here, it’s important. Out there, it’s just a footnote.”

“Right. Because we’ll never have to tell anyone.”

“Yeah, but then it’ll only be like, I don’t know, serious talk on a fourth date. Or getting to know you pillow talk in bed.”

“I always liked it on the couch.”

“Or in the back seat.”

“Or in the bushes. Once.”

“...or in the hall supply closet?”

“...all right.”

“I was kidding.”

“It’s why I said yes.”

“You really know how to hurt a girl’s feelings.”

“I’m told it gets better.”

“Yeah, well, until then?”

“We could always go bitch about what’s on TV.”