Writing, reading, ice hockey, politics, original comic book art, feeling insignificant and writing a third book despite few people giving a shit about the first two. The first draft of third book was completed on July 16, 2008, the first edit to follow once I've had some time to forget what I wrote. Fundamentally it's about a guy who remakes the world but has no recollection of doing it. Basically, he's the new God. I postulate that if there was a God, he would succumb to the laws of the universe he created, be stuck in that universe same as the rest of us.
That is Phineas Q. Sugarbottom's plight: he's God but impotent to do anything godly about his own dire situation as he tours the dark landscape of his own soul. I’m keeping the tentative title a secret because I Googled it and came up dry. Why I went with Tall Tales was a case of me being so focused on the content I didn’t care what it was called. Heck, I should have gone with Pus and Succotash. What’s the difference? But on second thought, a subtitle would have done wonders, like Tall Tales or How I Killed the World which is a fair description of what implicitly happens or had happened from the narrators POV. So for this book I’m really thinking through the title. OK. Here it is: The Stand. Catchy, eh?
ALSO: my first foray into screen writing is a "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" script for a season that never was, Season 8, and yes, I know Joss Wheden has published a comic book adaptation of Season 8, I just don't give a hoot in a Hellmouth, I have my own ideas where things ought to have proceeded and that's that.
I'm presently writing an original screen play. My take on the last man on Earth. It's going swell so far. Two dead ends but lots of ideas. The third foray is panning out. Look for it on the Big Screen in 2011, assuming the economy hasn't collapsed under a McCain administration.
Music
Mercyful Fate, King Diamond, Megadeth, Led Zeppelin, Dio, Pink Floyd, Mastodon, Tad, Nirvana, Rage Against the Machine, Black Sabbath, Ozzy, Black Label Society (Mafia rules!), Dream Theater, Death to the Fog Machine, Hyper Camel Log Breakers, Maggot Stew, Hand-Me-Down Garage Brooms, Motel Bible Beaters, The Nabob Trio, Spastic Colon, Mean Jelly Bean, Pogo Lickers, National Leisure, Goat Bottom Corn Holers, Tree Muggers, Delicious Fish, Zebra, The Lemurs, Ten-Foot Barbie Doll, Munchkin Lunch Counter, Deadbeat Plaids, Rhinoceros Horn Dogs, Clean Placemat, Chain Smoke Buzzard Feast, Festering Glad Bags, Copulation, Cream, Gelatinous Devils and Chester, Hymenanted, Jesus Creeps, Karnivorous Klowns, White Snake, Monster Magnet, Monster Faggot, Tea Time Titty Twist, Homogenous Zones, Star Land Vocal Band, Gallactic Cowboys, Five Inches of Mudd, Violent Violets, Dave Against the Kingston Trio, Two, Nun-o-grams, Beastly Balls, Hound Dog Duster Fuckers, Good Niborg, Faltering Fox, The Vague, Winowna Strider, Apple Snort, Trust and so on.
The newest RUSH CD Snakes and Arrows just hit the shelves. While not a traditional "Rush album" it does have a lot to offer. Sonically, this is the best effort since Counterparts. I know that sounds like a danger sign compliment about your pending blind date ("she's so nice and has a great personality" = DOG). So be it. That doesn't diminish it as a fact or a plus. This 13-track stroll through Rush's catalog of influences, from The Who to themselves, greatly benefits from a welcome dose of sonic purity. The muddiness of Vapor Trails or Test for Echo would have killed what Rush was striving for, that being a more straightforward approach to music. If you long for the days of Rush's rock anthems and soaring operatic vocals, S&A will induce a fast and furious punch of the EJECT button. But for those who like good music, it delivers. FOUR out of FIVE stars.
Movies
Yep, I watch 'em. Pretty pictures on the screen. Me likee.
Here's a movie that doesn't get much respect: In the Mouth of Madness, one of John Carpenter's more competent films. An ode to H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos, ITMOM does a better than average job of conveying the subjective nature of madness. The lead character, John Trent (played by Sam Neill of Jurassic Park fame) is hired to find missing pop-culture phenomenon Sutter Kane whose latest novel, In the Mouth of Madness, is missing along with the author. When Trent and his companion Stiles (sent along by the publisher) find the mythical town of Hobb's End, the world quickly begins to become unglued to point where fantasy and reality blur. Aside for a few cheesy moments, ITMOM delivers on the premise with a delightfully evil and satisfying ending guaranteed to drive you mad.
Everyone should rent Who Killed the Electric Car? Solid documentary on the fate of General Motor's EV1 program. Till I heard about the movie, I didn't know pure electric cars were available in the USA less than a decade ago. Had they been around in Illinois in 2003, that's what I'd be driving now. The "gas" costs were 60 CENTS per "gallon" of electrical charge, the range was 100 miles on one charge, speed/pickup wasn't a problem, and maintenance was exceptionally cheap (tire rotation and wiper fluid). All EV1s (except one disabled model) were CRUSHED by GM, who wouldn't even let the lessees buy or renew their leases. GM actually turned down almost $2,000,000 for the last 78 surviving EV1s. When car companies turn down cash, you KNOW something is up.
What else? Oh, that's it. I highly recommend www.rifftrax.com, Mike Nelson's main post-MST3K project. Each "rifftrack" is a MP3 file you download, for a small fee, like $3-4, and play in sync with any one of about 60 movies, some of which are truly bad (like The Wickerman with Nicholas Cage), while others are merely irresistable to deface (like The Fellowship of the Ring). I was a skeptic, now I am a believer. They also riff short subject matter movies, which you can download and play on your computer with the riff imbedded. Just 99 cents each. Oh, Mr. B. Natural, you're hot!
Television
40" set, Sony HD with HDMI interface...oh, you mean TV programs. Why didn't you say so in the first place?! I hate most of what's on TV. It's one abomination after another. Dumb, dumber, and dumbest. MST3K, Buffy, Angel, Star Trek (aside from Enterprise), X-Files, Farscape and few others are the exceptions. Notice none of these are technically on TV anymore. Deadwood, on cable only, is the diamond in the piss pot that is TV, as is Weeds. Did I mention I'm a total TV snob? Who isn't?
"Deadwood" Season 3 is OVER. Not very bloody at all. In fact, it seems as if Milch was flicking off HBO with the end of this year, since he sidestepped a big finale. Looks to me that he's probably searching for another network who'll pick up "Deadwood". Any takers? If I had my own network, I'd sign him tomorrow.
TV RELATED ANNOUNCEMENT: I am presently writing Buffy SCRIPTS (as in plural) for Season 8. This is entirely my own idea regarding the direction of the show and in no way parallels Joss's comic book adaptation of Season 8, far as I know. I haven't read it and won't, since I don't want my perspective tainted. As to how I plan on releasing this "fan-fic" into the wilderness, I haven't decided. Funny thing is the names above the dialog are copyright Mutant Enemy but everything UNDER those names IS MY WORK AND MINE ALONE (with the exception of one line, the last line ever spoken in a Buffy, by Dawn) and might be adapted someday to another screen play for an original show, who knows? So you can see my dilemma. Someway, somehow, I'll let them roam free, I'm just not sure in what medium. Perhaps I'll submit the first or second one to Joss, for kicks, and see if it nets me a gig or ridicule for being a hopeless fan boy. Either is a possibility.
Books
All of Kurt Vonnegut's offerings are just swell. Hunter Thompson, too, as is Philip K. Dick. Check my Major Influences list to the right and down a piece. About Philip K. Dick's Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said: I dunno what to think about this one. A famous guy wakes up and nobody seems to know who he is and all his IDs are gone (it's one of those Kafkaesque worlds where they send people without proper IDs to work camps). It has a very druggy quality to it, like the main character is tripping balls and is just monumentally confused. I'd say Dick was mostly commenting on the fragility psychology of famous people, as in it's their worst nightmare to be suddenly unknown.
Fahrenheit 451 is on the spit once again. A classic that never gets old. It's such a simple concept, too. People just stop reading and thinking to the point where burning books and rewriting history become social institutions. This is due in part to the growth of minority group interests, the homogenizing of language as to not offend anyone. Bradbury didn't know it but he was describing political correctness decades before the term was invented. Side note: every writer should read the coda at the end of recent editions. In a quirky way, it's hysterically funny, and quite enlightening. In short, it's Bradbury raging about publishers censoring a collection of short stories and F. 451. Imagine the intellectual vacuum necessary to miss the irony of censoring a book about burning books. As he says the coda, "There's more than one way to burn a book." However, there's another layer to his message, one crucial to all aspiring writers: Don't write what you think the editors at Putnam Press want to read or what has agents in $3,000 suits licking their lips. WRITE WHAT YOU WANT. You are the one in control. Assert your power to see your dream unfold however it pleases YOU. Eschew homogeny and synchronicity and lockstep formulas for success. These are surest road to disaster and disappointment. Consider the tragedy you are setting yourself up for by writing something you dislike. What if THAT becomes your definitive work? Remember the Bangles? They caved in and let a shithead producer talk them into a terribly overproduced pop song, "Walk Like an Egyptian", and guess what? That's what they are known for. The members of the Bangles are forever haunted by a song they don't like, all because the Devil promised them a taste of spotlight fame. Don't fall victim to a desire for IMMEDIATE gratification. Today's gratification and celebrity is tomorrow's pop culture prison, one from which you will never escape. Typecasting can extend beyond actors. Writers can be typecast and all the pseudonyms on Earth won't turn people's heads away from that ONE instance of fatal genius, when you broke down and pot-boiled a hokey mystery novel which everyone LOVED, so now that's all anyone wants to talk about. I wonder how many of those "serial novelists" HATE what they write, but it's lucrative, so they endure, they endure.
Endure is just another word for suffering.
Just reread Picture of Dorian Gray. Oscar Wilde was very, very witty. I can't help but read it as though Graham Chapman of Monty Python fame were playing the lead role. He was gay, as was Wilde, whose homoerotic fantasties are laced throughout Dorian Gray. The moral of the story is blatant: one cannot kill one's sins without killing one's self. Also, hiding them doesn't purify one in the public eye, for the public sees you for who you are, perfectly.
Check out my book review! The text and the numeric grades don't mesh (text says they loved it, numbers say they were unimpressed), but I'd go with the words, not the numbers.
I removed the image because it fucks up my profile. Root around in my past blogs and you'll find it there, if you give a hoot.
Heroes
Kurt Vonnegut and Richard Corben, the greatest artist of our time, and I bet not a one of you knows who the fuck he is. Sad, sad, sad…
I recently changed my "religion" from atheist to other because, first of all, ATHEISM IS NOT A FORM OF RELIGION. It's the ABSENCE of religion. Secondly, why must I state my refusal to believe in fairy tales in relation to the bastion of beliefs I am repudiating? Nobody goes around saying they're a "non-astrologist" because they think astrology is bunk. I'm not an atheist, I'm just RATIONAL. I need no label or term or pidgeonhole. I just AM. Jumping fucking Jesus, are people annoying!
University Of Illinois At Urbana-Champaign
Champaign,IL
Graduated: 1989
Student status: Alumni
Degree: Master's Degree
Major: Accounting
Minor: Business Administration
Clubs: O'Malley's and assorted drinkeries
I write iconoclastic sociopolitical satire, not for the lazy mind; layered, sophisticated batter-dipped onion blossoms of words. Looking for mainstream publisher who isn’t afraid to take a chance with an unproven talent.
Tralfamadorific has signed an agent contract; getting closer! Buy the self-version as a collectible, while it lasts! Amazonlink: http://lnk.ms/07YHg view more
CLICK on the cover above and follow the link to purchase a copy of Leisure Time, as a printable book or download!
"I prefer people with imagination: dictators, serial killers, schizophrenics, assassins, skinheads, drug lords, violent bikers, devil worshipers. To me, these are the interesting people. To get its edge back, I think what America really needs is more evil. Intense, unalloyed, concentrated evil."
- George Carlin
Religulous! (by Bill Maher) trailer!
Olivia Munn as Slave Leia at the Star Wars at 30 convention in L.A. Need I say more?
So, how dumb IS America? Watch this and be AMAZED!
Now it's come to this
It's like we're back in the Dark Ages
From the Middle East to the Middle West
It's a world of superstition
Now it's come to this
Wide-eyed armies of the faithful
From the Middle East to the Middle West
Pray, and pass the ammunition
- "The Way the Wind Blows", from Rush's Snakes and Arrows
"What you own is your own kingdom,
What you do is your own glory,
What you love is your own power,
What you live is your own story."
- Neil Peart of Rush, "Something for Nothing", from their epic 2112
"Anyway, no drug, not even alcohol, causes the fundamental ills of society. If we're looking for the source of our troubles, we shouldn't test people for drugs, we should test them for stupidity, ignorance, greed and love of power." - PJ Rourke
"Guard against those men who make a great noise about religion, in choosing representatives. It is electioneering. If they knew the nature and worth of religion, they would not debauch it to such shameful purposes. If pure religion is the criterion to denominate candidates, those who make a noise about it must be rejected; for their wrangle about it, proves that they are void of it." - Rev. John Leland, July 4th 1802
About me (for real):
Author, writer, teacher. Trying out new laconic style.
I took down the excerpt because to me it's ancient history. Look for an excerpt of my THIRD book, coming soon.
Who I'd like to meet: Dedicated, smart, fearless readers looking for a new take on the modern novel, which, you must admit, has steadily become as stodgy, dull, and milquetoast as a Henry James drawing room drama.
What is this obsession with writing HISTORICAL NOVELS? This is unimaginative laziness on an epic scale. Research some span of world history that you fancy, make up a few contemporary characters, insert them into said time frame, add a dash of drama and the inability to discriminate when to story TELL and story SHOW and poof! you have just written an 800 page historical novel. Speaking of historical novels: I am proud to report I never “cracked” The Da Vinci Code. However, I did have the displeasure of wading through Angels and Demons. I admittedly write absurdist material that tenuously takes place in reality. Vonnegut did as well. All writers should try it. It’s liberating. Here’s the catch: you don’t get to have it both ways. If you branch into absurd territory, there you are. You cannot back track to “reality” whenever you feel like. Otherwise, it reads like an “ABC Movie of the Week:” involving a boarding house, Satan and Gidget. So when Dan Brown throws the utterly fake antimatter science crap at the hapless reader, which in this case was me, the reaction is incredulity followed by slight nausea and the urge to slap or toss a drink in the author’s face, which ever is appropriate and least injurious to the wall-to-wall carpeting. The only interesting thing in A & D is the Catholic Church’s long and bloody history of misogyny. So I stopped in the middle of Brown’s Bataan Death March narrative and dug up more dirt on the Catholic Church and the Vatican, which, by the way, has never been almost blown up by an antimatter device, which is absurd, which is mine and Vonnegut’s turf, which is not for the dilettante absurdist, being Dan Brown. Stick to reality, Danny. Feel free to twist and bend it within the limits of believability. Or take a walk on the wild side and let your freakishly absurd flag fly. Here’s an idea: make the pope a cross dressing Nazi who is hell bent on taking over Disney’s theme park franchise and raises an army of undead Holocaust victims to man the concession stands, operate the rides and don the mascot uniforms, which is totally absurd, which is why all of it is destined for my third book.
Also: everyone please SAY NO TO THESE VACUOUS SERIAL MYSTERY NOVELS. How many permutations of private detectives grilling suspect about a criminal investigation are there? They cooperate with the gumshoe, do not cooperate, pretend to cooperate, are missing or found dead. That’s five. Reading the label on a depilatory is more exciting and challenging than fanning through obvious dialogue chocked full of an inordinate amount of stage direction and emotional cues. I guess I should be happy you are reading something. But please, for your next literary endeavor, try challenging your mind, just a skosh.
hey! just stopping by with some of my newest creations.. feel free to
spread 'em around! i finally replied to all the comments on my last
blog (sorry it took a couple days), and i just wrote a new one today
(click on any of the graphix to come by, it's absolutely mind boggling,
republicans just keep getting crazier and crazier!! and if you already
commented: thank you so much!)..
have a groovy rest of the week and keep fighting the good fight!
hey! just wanted to show my appreciation for your help and support while me and mama are having rough times... so i made u a custom siggie with your name on it as a small token of my gratitude.. please click the link to check out your customized signature i made for you on the 1st or 2nd page of la chicas blog!
Online Now!
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