Does It Offend You, Yeah?

Does It Offend You, Yeah? – We Are Rockstars

Took me too long to post these guys. I’m pretty sure they’re British. I know for a fact they have sythns and a cowbell. Obviously I’m hooked.

ComicCon Schedule

So, it’s been released. And I, like a neurotic little duck, have made a timetable in Excel.

Dear ComicCon Schedulers:

What the fuck are you thinking?

Overlapping Whedon’s Sing-Along-Blog, Spike and Mike’s Gauntlet, and Simon Pegg on Friday would be acceptable if Saturday was jam-packed with awesome. Instead you give us the Masquerade and some Christian Comics mixer? What?

I’m not coming down on the mixer. I’m just saying that I highly doubt there’s going to be a lot of overlap between them and the “Sick and Twisted Festival of Animation” which featured an animated short called “Titty Bop.”

Shape the fuck up on scheduling and management. I know full-well you’re pissing some names off.

I could tell you how to reorganize this, but I don’t care enough to do so.

At least Saturday’s wide-open for drunken debauchery.

Writerly Meme

I stole it from Writtenwyrdd. I’m allowed to. (Well, who says I’m not?)

Your genre(s)?

Short answer: speculative fiction. Longer answer: last novel was “steampunk-esque, with magic.” This novel is “steampunk, with assassins.” Next novel is fairy tales. Before that it’s been fairy tales or science fiction.

How many books are you working on now?

One. Steady as she goes.

Are you a linear or chunk writer?

Mostly linear, but a little chunky.

The POV you’re partial to?

Third-person limited, followed closely by first person. Currently working on writing in third person omniscient.

The theme that keeps cropping up in your books?

Er. I guess I’d call it the problem nature versus nurture; if someone is born and expected to be a bad seed, will they become evil because it’s their nature or because nobody ever gave them a shot? Perceived versus actual nature. The tension between the They and the Self. Willingness to allow yourself to trust and be hurt.

How many days a week do you write?

Six days a week, Sunday through Friday.

What time of day do you get your best writing done?

After 7pm. Writing before then is a rare thing and usually fraught with disappointing letters. Though I do try.

Who are your mentors?

Er… I don’t have any. Not in the traditional sense. My parents never encouraged my writing except to say “You’ve got a way with words, but you’ll never be published.” No teachers ever saw promise in me; I don’t expect them to, as I never showed them anything. Closest thing I have to a mentor would have to be Mme Harker*, who patiently deals with my naiveté.

Favorite authors to read?

Neil Gaiman (everything), Tom Stoppard(Rosencrantz and Guildentern are Dead, Arcadia), Kurt Vonnegut (Slaughterhouse Five, Mother Night, Cat’s Cradle, Player Piano), Albert Camus (The Stranger, The Fall, The Plague, The Myth of Sisyphus), David Hume (A Treatise of Human Nature, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, ), Douglas Adams, Soren Kierkegaard (Repetition, The Sickness Unto Death, Fear and Tembling), Frederich Nietzsche (The Gay Science, Thus Spake Zarathustra), and probably others I’m forgetting at this moment.

* Maybe not…

me: Heads up: I’m doing this meme, and one of the questions was “Who are your mentors?” And I realized, you’re the closest thing to a writing mentor I’ve ever had. Just letting you know, so that you don’t see that in my blog and go “WTF?”

Carla: Now I’m gonna totally fuck with your head. Did you know you should be submitting everything in single-spaced, 9-point Comic Sans?

me: I hate you.

Carla: And margins greater than .25″ are out. Also, every story should have cyborgs in it.

Me: I’m going to delete my answer now.

Marjorie Faire

Marjorie Faire – Empty Room

I’m guessing Miss Harker will not be much a fan of this one. Too soft and namby-pamby, I’d say. Still, I spent an entire summer absolutely addicted to this song and felt a need to share it.

I also feel a need to share how utterly irritated I am at the distinct lack of any Red West on youtube. Sure, they don’t really, er, exist as a band. At least, I haven’t heard anything from them in ages. But damnit, that was one hell of a lead singer and, if you ask me, a perfect opener for Silverchair (Henry Fonda, 2003? Anyone?).

Man, I would have even taken the video for Crazy Cold (despite that I think Don’t Fall In was a stronger single, and next to that Disappear is my favorite song off that album).

Doing Something With My Life

A post at The Last Psychiatrist made me feel very good about myself.

What Did You (Not) Do In 2008?

To the twenty-somethings out there:

Twenty years from now, when you look back on this year:

you had ideas

And you had youth and energy

you had interest rates so low they were negative relative to inflation– you could borrow money at literally no cost.

and a ready made excuse in case of failure– Oh, I was young then

and little responsibility, no family

You had the internet– global distribution or marketing, for free
          information on anything, for free

And then the time passes.

At least you got your file ready for the promotions committee. At least you got that summer job that’ll look good on your college application. At least you watched the whole season of Grey’s Anatomy and only vomited twice.

I’m sure, in twenty years, it will have been worth it.

Stop trying to figure out what you want to do with your life, and just do something with it.

I’ve finished a novel. I’m working on my second one right now.

I’m buying a condo.

I’m applying for my master’s in engineering.

As I said in my comment on that post, maybe this message would be a wakeup call for some, but for me, it’s an affirmation that I’m Doing The Right Thing(tm).

Movie Review: The Fall

As you can see above it’s obviously beautifully filmed. Doing a little research, I found that this was an intense labor of love on Tarsem’s part, self-funded and piggybacking off of commercial shoots for locations. Sure. This kind of thing wouldn’t be openly funded by any studio.

The story itself is one of–you guessed it–a fall and redemption. Angry, suicidal man saved by a little girl. I want to say I felt that the “message” of the movie was unabashedly overt, to the point of clubbing me over the head; but I may just be smart.

Hear me out on that one.

As I left the movie, I heard three girls who utterly missed the point. It’s as if we weren’t watching the same movie. The content of their conversation reveals major plot points, and is also absolutely laughable; I’ll spare you. But being that this film was not widely advertised, I would have assumed the audience was slightly more incisive in their analysis of story than the average moviegoer. Lo, I stand corrected.

My friend argued that the point was to be overt, as it is seen through the eyes of a child; the world she lives in is in fact very dark yet she cannot understand it. I saw what she meant, but I think that it would be better if they actually took into account their audience. You can write through the eyes of an “idiot”–Faulkner pulled it off. But it’s a filter better suited for written form, I feel.

But can you hate any movie where one of the characters is Charles Darwin? I mean, honestly? And there was a monkey. A monkey. His name was Wallace.

I want to say this movie was pretentious, but I think it was more like a child with a poorly-guarded secret that it cherished as its own. Ostentatious, but doing it wrong. Still, I enjoyed the message enough–it’s the sort of intellectual wankery that I go in for.

Oh, and if you’re wondering, the music used in the trailer is Beethoven’s 7th (second movement). Though this is probably one of the few instances where Mozart’s Lacrymosa could actually be legitimately used, I think the use of Beethoven was probably for the best.

Fireworks

I haven’t watched fireworks in years. As such, I was not aware of the startling developments in fractal-firework technology.

These fireworks blossom out like a normal firework does, like dahlias. As the lights fade, the ends burst fresh, flowers from flowers. Set against the falling, twinkling cracklers, it really is a sight.

Mandelbrot would be proud to see how far we’ve come.

Justice

Justice – DVNO

I know TheCDP posted this awhile ago. Well, I’m posting it because seriously, that video is mesmerizing and if you’re going to learn of Justice, this is a pretty good way to go.

Great album, though I wasn’t much a fan of Tthhee Ppaarrttyy.