Posts
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On Reading
I've been reading. That's my excuse for not writing something new (except for my late night Beatle review) for a while. It's the best excuse I've had for anything in a while. It started with a trip to the library and a promise to myself that I'd read everything I checked out before the due date. Ten books in three weeks isn't easy for me. I don't skim (a.k.a. Speed reading) or jump forward during those moments when your eyes want to know whodunit despite the author's careful planning. So I spent three weeks filling every spare moment with words.I didn't make it, managing to read a measly eight books and feeling disappointed at my lack of dedication before the three weeks were up. Then I did something worse. I dropped off the books I had read, renewed the two I hadn't, and picked up six more. So I began the rush again. Not that it mattered. I'm reading like it was something stolen from me that I've found again by chance. I fucking love it.It's an insidious process. You pick up a book, it mentions another, you pick that one up, it mentions another... The original hyperlink. It's worse when they gang up on you. I had three consecutive books mention Paradise Lost. So I'm off to get a copy. It's a thick sucker, but it must be good. I'm gonna get to it as soon as these other twelve have been nicely filed somewhere in the watery mass above my shoulders.My father once tried to ban me from reading. I was in my mystery phase, sucking up Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew. My absolute favorite series was The Three Investigators. I anxiously waited for each volume, like the geek I was/am. I was also goofy and absent-minded. My dad took this as a bad sign, perhaps predicting the social ineptness in my future, and blamed it on the thing he least understood. No more brainwashing adventures with the gang for me.So I read Steinbeck, Hemingway, and Shakespeare instead. The teacher gladly handed me the beat-up paperbacks during lunchtime, where my father wouldn't know. Thank god for ignorance and oppression. He could have banned me from gang violence.I've been reading between more reading, tests, and earning a few bucks for the weekend. That has left me with a minuscule amount of time for writing. A story that started as a short has turned into a series. I'm proud of it, and hope that I have the courage to let others read it soon enough.See you soon.Ja.
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The Current Obsession
Going from one obsession to the other is way of life for me. Just as some live from deadline to deadline, check to check, and game to game, I live from mania to mania. And it just so happens to be Beatle-mania at the moment.It’s happens occasionally, and is usually triggered by the spontaneous humming of Come Together at wildly inappropriate times. Never, ever hum a Beatle song during math finals. Everyone will take it the wrong way, including your professor.My current infatuation was the result of irresponsible clicking. My biological-psych textbook has elegantly achieved the goal of all textbooks: to be written so poorly that you must absolutely attend class. A noble objective, if your professor were available at your disposal. Browsing a Wikipedia entry on Gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) in search of actually comprehensible prose on the topic, I began clicking on the numerous links it contains. I then clicked on the links that those pages contained, and so on. A couple of hours later, I had landed at the main “The Beatles” entry. The path I took was wild and exciting, but apparently, forgettable. I don’t remember half of it. It did involve testosterone, eunuchs, and alternative guitar tunings. I wish you good luck in attempting to recreate my path. As always, it’s easier to stumble into remarkable than to actively seek it.The Beatles entry is quite complete. If you follow the majority of links, you can, by spatial devices or simple memorization, become an expert on the Fab Four in thirty minutes or so. If you like the Beatles at all, I suggest you skim it. You can follow links to entries on each of the individual members, and producer George Martin and, perhaps contemptuously, Yoko Ono.My favorite Beatle is John Lennon. People often accuse me of picking him based on his being, hmm, indefinitely detained. This is hogwash. Dead or alive, he was a musician without peers. The fact that he was a great human being is merely icing on the cake. Oh, how I love icing.After reading the entry, I got myself the Let It Be documentary, listened to Beatles music exclusively for a whole week, and learned to play a ton of Beatles songs (which I promptly forgot).Time to wrap this up, but first: Come Together has been joined by another Lennon penned ditty, Don’t Let Me Down. I plan to hum this one during various solemn occasions, such as while attending Mass, Funerals, Jubilee and while taking a shit.Ja.
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An excuse you might wish to belive?
Been rather busy with a wide variety of things which, being quite a responsible person, need to be attended to before writing ridiculously horrible fictions. This is merely an excuse to cover for the following:I've been writing a story for the past three weeks. I'm actually quite angry at it at the moment for the simple reason that it refuses to end. It also likes to rewrite itself every few hours; not because it is imperative to the plot, but rather “because I can.” You might be surprised that a story would literally talk to me. However, I've learned not to worry too much about such things, as it tends to make you decide to jump off elevated surfaces while on lunch break. Especially if you've just been in an argument with an insolent streetlight.When it is done, it will be here; talking to you.Ja.
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Another Boy with No Imagination
“I've got you this time,” I said mockingly. “You'll never escape.” The creature trembled, and tried again to climb the tree it was pressed against. I decided the moment had come to pounce, and in a flash, it was over. I had finally captured my prize. Who dare oppose th... “Timmy! Timmy!” “Yes, mom,” I screamed back. “Stop doing that to your sister. I'm not gonna tell you again.” “Sorry mom.” Globular starclusters, foiled again! Someday, someday, I tell you. “Now that I think about it, didn't I tell you to take out the trash?” “Ah, but... mom.” “Timothy.” “But...” “No buts, I'm tired of your buts.” My sister giggled softly from her perch on the slide. “OK, OK, I'll do it in a second.” “Now, Timmy!” “Yeah, yeah. I'm going, I'm going.” “News Flash! News Flash! It appears that Super Trash man is on the move. He has come to rid us of the abominable filth.” “Vrooom, vrooom.” “This is Trash Alpha to base. Copy.” “This is base, over.” “I'm reading a high-density asteroid field up ahead. Confirm.” “Yes, sir, it's a tough one.” “Hmm. Request permission to activate Duper Shields.” “Do you really believe that necessary, Captain Rubbage?” “I'm not gonna endanger my crew. If we have it, let's use it.” “Council grants permission. Godspeed.” “This is Trash Alpha, out.” Unexpected magnetic fields created interference with the onboard controls. The Captain took control of the ship. “Computer, please give me manual controls. We're gonna ram these suckers out of our way.” “Bam.... Bam.... BamBam.” “Tiiiiiimyyy!” “What are you doing!? We just had those bushes put in yesterday!” “Go to the garage, Timmy, now!” “Get the broom and a pail. Clean this up before your Dad gets home. And finish taking out the trash cans. No games.” Mother always made everything totally boring. “Professor, are you sure that this cave is totally safe?” “Absolutely, Gary. When have you known me to be wrong?” “Never, sir. Well, hmm, if we are to get the Golden Broom of Gar before those savages, we best be on our way.” “Keep your wits about you, Gary. You never know what to expect.”
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I wrote that sometime during sophomore year of high school. After this story, Timmy was somebody that kept popping up all over the place in stories, though he's never as fun to write as when he's six. Rereading this one, I have a new idea for Timmy, so I'll tack that one onto my list.
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Stop making me look bad, you bastard!
I'm tied up with a particular story and several horribly depressing essays. In an attempt to keep these pages current, in the next few days, a look at all the scribblings I make in the few dozen notebooks I keep. Note that I'm only posting things that are incomplete, or terribly crude; things I've abandoned. Some of these tidbits actually date back to my freshman year of high school. I won't say they represent some of the worst things I've written, but I hope they do.I've heard more than one writer comment that the worst thing you can do is not finish things. It took me the better part of the decade to stop breaking that rule:***The sky is never blue here. Sometimes it teases our eyes with sinewy grays, who murmur cyan dreams of home. I miss them here, in the seemingly endless darkness. The only friends I had, lost to the living. I've watched them grow, unaware of insignificance, trying to find happiness in a world where such a thing is but an idea. And one by one they come and learn. I have inherited a kingdom without dreams. Awake and find me dying. I am reality. Come dream of me.***Some poems are like rays of light.Other are flashes in the dark.There are some like shooting stars;one I heard, like love at first sight.But there are few that stray too far.There for one, remembered for another,fleeting second.***Waiting is,swimming against the rapid stream,running through the dense grass,flying through your mind's eye.Definitely dreadful.***Isn't it just like the sun to forgetfully fail to illuminate my house?***Now that I think about it, this stuff makes me look real bad. hmm. More crap soon...
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