New

So, regular readers and link-clickers will be aware that my sister has a blog that is dedicated to her family, and in particular her daughters Madeline and Lydia.

I contemplated doing similar posts on this blog. I mean, why not? If anything, it would make me post more. But then, you'd probably get a lot of "Holy Crap, there was crap everywhere!" posts which, if you're coming for the writing, may not be what you're looking for.

Those who are glad to avoid reading such posts need read no further than the next sentence. You can keep coming here to read all about my writing, trials and tribulations with writing, excuses why I'm not writing, and occasional odd excerpts from my writing. Those who do want to read the kind of family oriented whatnot, can head over to StL Hipster Dad. The first post is actually a review of Arcade Fire's new album The Suburbs thinly veiled as sentimentality and love for my daughter. Enjoy!

Paternity Leave

I'm sure you've all noticed the sudden lack of new posts, and for that, I make no apology other than to say see my previous post. I've got very little time these days, it seems, with adjusting to this crazy awesome new little human being living in my house, with all the visitors streaming in bringing food and eager baby-yearning open arms, and with all the sleep I am not getting. So if the blog kind of falls to the wayside, you would do well, readers, to understand.

Just an update: Juliette is still doing great. Coming home was easier than I thought it would be, and at this point, it's hard to remember life without her. It's easy to see that I am enamored of her; my desktop background on my work computer has always been a silly picture from the internet but now it is my daughter. I even brought in my very first ever physical photograph in a frame and placed it on my desk - a picture of Juliette asleep on my chest. It's something special, I'll tell you, being a father. Even though I'm still very new at it, it's one of the most exciting adventures I've ever been on.

And the good things just seem to keep on happening, too. Monday, as I drove home from work (with the windows down and the radio up because even though it's August in St. Louis it was unseasonably gorgeous), the very first sentence of my novel fell from the sky, through my open moonroof and into my brain. I have been stuck on how to begin my novel since, well, since I began my novel. There's an event (it's no secret, I've said it before, the death of the narrator's father) that I was not sure where to place. Does it take place before the novel begins? In the first chapter? The first page? Later? The first sentence was my answer; the very first sentence saved my sanity and sparked my creativity.

You want to read my first sentence? Really? Okay.

Go buy my book when it comes out.

Zing!

But seriously, I think I'm done posting excerpts and rough chapter fragments from the book for a while. I need to hunker down and write the thing, so it gets done. I'd like to have a complete draft done by March, not completed but with enough polish and revision that it's readable and marketable. So no more dilly-dallying.

So...a few weeks ago I promised album reviews. I have not delivered. I have yet another album review I want to do, but I won't let myself until I get the two I promised done. So the third might just not happen.

Look for those at a future date.

...Okay...

September was a busy month.

I won't bore you with the details because they would bore you.

Sufficed to say, I will not be reviewing the other Douglas Adams books. I urge you to read them on your own, make up your own mind. At this point, reviewing them would just slow me down for what I want to do next. Let me get to that.

There are two posts that are in the works for sure. One is a post about my favorite band, which has reunited and is currently touring again for the first time in ten years (no St. Louis dates, suck). That will be coming soon. After that, I will write a book review. I finished Eoin Colfer's submission to the H2G2 series and have just about finished processing it enough to write about it. Expect both of those posts in the next couple of days.

I want to talk about the blog for a minute, readers. I appreciate everybody who stops by to read what I have to say, even though I may not update as frequently as you visit. I know how frustrating it is to come back to a blog you enjoy reading (and I hope you enjoy reading my blog) only to find that, once again, the deadbeat blogger hasn't updated in a day (a week, a month, several months...the list goes on). It is among the more annoying parts of the internet's culture of individualism; I am my own publisher when it comes to the blog, so I set my own deadlines and I'm very lax. Sometimes, I just get so backed up with work and other writing projects and whatever is going on in my personal life, and I neglect the blog. It's not that I don't want people stoppying by the site, it's just that it's not always at the forefront of my mind.

So, I apologize. I know I have said this before and it therefore has transitioned from reassuring to patronizing to just flat out lip service, but I will try to be more prolific on the blog.

I appreciate each individual hit I get on this site. I've been using Google Analytics for a little over a year and it always pleases me to see the number of hits I'm getting, small as they may be. It's fun to look at the map overlay and find people are visiting my blog from not just concentrated areas of family and friends, but also from places I have never been or places where I may not actually know anybody. Even if they just clicked on a link that turned up in a random search, it's nice to know I can reach people who had no idea I existed until they stumbled onto my corner of the web. I like that. And that brings me to my final point.

I have one request of you, dear readers. A small request, which will be phrased in the form of a statement of fact. I thrive on comments. Each comment I get urges me to return to the blog, clarify or enhance myself, churn out more pointless drivel for you to read while you should be working, etc. The more comments I get, the more I blog. And not just comments like, "You should blog again" or the string of comments that showed up on my last Q&A session (comments which were all in Asian characters and which I have no reason to suspect were not spam). No...thoughtful comments are great. Encouraging comments are great, too. Constructive criticism will be deleted and that person shunned. Ha! Kidding! Jokes are fun! And, well, yeah, jokes are fun. So, to run down: Comments I like include thoughtful, inspiring, encouraging, questions, constructive criticisms, suggestions for future writing projects, answers to my questions, and, um, bank account numbers w/ your mother's maiden name provided. Comments I dislike include angry criticisms, spams of any kind, suggestions that I increase the size of any of my apendages, and requests for my bank account number. You'll never get it, Mom, so stop trying.

Anyway...I hope to get a little more consistent with this blogging thing. November is coming up, and as we all know that is NaNoWriMo, and as it is the first year since 2004 that I am not enrolled in classes, I will set myself the goal of really hammering out some novel during the month of November, so you can bet I'll be easily distracted from that and probably post some musings about anything but the task at hand. So look forward to that.

Other than that, I'm all done except to say a one-day-late (as it is after midnight now, damn it all) Happy Birthday to my sister. Mo, as it is now officially the day after your birthday, you are no longer just thirty but you are in your thirties. I'm still in my twenties. But you still rock as a big sis.

Coming Soon: Blogapalooza 2

I am on Fall Break.

I am taking today and Sunday to wind down a bit. Starting Monday, we've got a week of blogging. Here's the schedule:

Monday: Politics

Tuesday: Excerpt

Wednesday: Video Blog

Thursday: Personal Update and ask for Free Write Friday suggestions

Friday: Free Write

Saturday: Your Questions

Sunday: First half of semester re-cap, Fall Break Wrap up and second-half of semester preview

So you've all got that to look forward to. Yay!

mGk Threw Down Two Gauntlets. I Only Picked One Up.

100 things you may or may not know about me:

1. The biggest deterrent to me learning to drive a stick was the car my mom owned at the time I was learning to drive.
2. I eventually wrecked that car.
3. I subsequently put a dent in the bumper of her next car.
4. I still feel terrible about both of those things.
5. If I had cable, I would probably never stop watching crap.
6. I wish I could go back in time to the 1904 World's Fair.
7. I'd really miss internet and air conditioning if I did go back in time.
8. I'm a better hitter and fielder now than I was when I actually played baseball on a team.
9. If it hadn't been for Will Wilcox and John Whalen, I would have quit baseball forever after fifth grade.
10. I don't have a tattoo.
11. I know right where I'd put one if I got one.
12. I don't know what I'd get.
13. Eighteen year-old Elliot could play drums ten times better than twenty-five year old Elliot.
14. I wish that weren't true.
15. I love Acrodyl (my cat) more than Ricky (the cat I grew up with).
16. I feel incredibly guilty about that.
17. Ricky died while I was at school in Minnesota.
18. I can't remember the last thing I said to him.
19. I still have dreams that he's not dead, and that he finally comes home.
20. I've gained twenty-three pounds in a year.
21. They're not the good kind.
22. I always start on the left foot and end on the right foot.
23. I wish I knew how to tap dance.
24. I'm amazed every day Kathy puts up with me.
25. I wish I had gone straight to Webster U right out of high school.
26. But then I never would have met Kathy.
27. I play guitar.
28. I only know about three songs.
29. One of them is "Stairway to Heaven"
30. I love riding my bicycle.
31. I haven't really ridden my bicycle in over a year.
32. I keep justifying spending money on the bicycle in the hopes it will get me to ride more.
33. I know it should work the other way around.
34. If I get nudged/jostled/poked or in any other way called to attention in that twilight just-before-sleep stage, it will take me three hours to fall back to sleep.
35. My work cell phone has the only alarm clock noise that's ever been able to consistently wake me up.
36. I know I don't write enough.
37. I don't really have anybody I call to go hang out with anymore.
38. Considering we don't have cable, we have a really nice gigantic television.
39. My favorite t-shirt when I was 10 looked like a dress on me.
40. My favorite t-shirt when I was 18 was tight accross the chest and sleeves.
41. They were the same shirt.
42. I wish I had met Douglas Adams before he died.
43. In my imagination, he would love that he's number 42 on my list.
44. I have one sister.
45. I hated my sister when I was in middle school and she was in high school.
46. She was a senior when I was a freshman.
47. She was one of my best friends that first year of high school.
48. She still is one of my best friends.
49. I have four nieces and two nephews.
50. I feel guilty that I have a favorite.
51. I hate that I haven't graduated college yet.
52. I think that being an older student makes me a better student.
53. My wife cuts my hair.
54. Yesterday I thought she was going to intentionally cut it badly.
55. I am impossible to play board games with one on one.
56. Especially if I am losing.
57. I ruined one of her favorite childhood board games yesterday.
58. I can't believe that good looking retaining wall in the backyard was built by me and my family.
59. I have a bad habit of leaving my shoes in the middle of the floor.
60. I always push my chairs in at work.
61. I hardly ever push my chairs in at home.
62. I still have dreams that I work at Target.
63. Those are my second-least favorite dreams.
64. My least favorite dreams are about remembering a class I've been skipping all semester on the last day before finals.
65. I know that stems from the way I approached my first foray into college life.
66. Green is my favorite color.
67. I have lost all respect for Aerosmith.
68. My legs and torso are not proportionate to each other.
69. I still laugh at stupid juvenile things (like the number 69).
70. There's a dream catcher in my bedroom.
71. I get mad at it when it doesn't work.
72. If I lived alone, I know I would drink quite a bit more.
73. I thank my lucky stars I do not live alone.
74. But I won't turn down a 7 & 7.
75. I am a beer snob.
76. By which I mean, Budweiser is not real beer.
77. But I still was opposed to In-Bev's takeover of A-B.
78. I love the fall.
79. When I worked in retail, I hated Christmas.
80. I've celebrated it twice since leaving retail.
81. It's only been one year since I left retail.
82. Christmas in July rocks.
83. I am a night person.
84. I drink way too much Coca-Cola.
85. I've only ever left the country once.
86. I spent a week in London with my high school band and choir.
87. I had the perfect opportunity to sneak off and get a pint of Guinness.
88. I couldn't, because I had left my passport at the hotel.
89. There's little in the world better than a good book.
90. Except for a hot woman reading a good book.
91. Kathy is currently reading All the King's Men
92. That's not just a good book, it's a great book.
93. I've been pulled over four times for having a headlight out.
94. I know I could swing dance if I just did it more often.
95. In fourth grade, I was convinced I would become a starship pilot when I got older.
96. I still haven't really let that dream go.
97. I once pulled a bicycle, two water bottles, a bike pump and a cyclo computer out of poison ivy without realizing it was poison ivy.
98. I didn't get a rash or anything.
99. Pictures exist of me wearing a blue dress.
100. I was two years old at the time.

Your turn.

The Return of The Blog Guy

Hey all.

Well, I meant to blog this summer, and here it is almost the end of June and I've blogged, what, five times since school ended? Not a good start.

But that will end NOW! You get this little blurb today, and starting tomorrow, a return to the features you've come to know and love. Starting with Tuesday Excerpts tomorrow. Wednesday I've prepared quite a nice rant for you to all enjoy, Thursday a musing on holidays, and, everybody's favorite, the return of Free Write Fridays. Saturday I'll get on board with a super edition of Your Questions, Answered!.

On top of all of this, you'll be getting updates on the house (A/C sliding down a hill/water seeping into the basement, hey ho!), a little bit of politics (somebody's gotta take over for Tim Russert) and so little more!

Alright, I'll be back tomorrow. For now, just enjoy a little Mel Brooks:

We Are (Almost) Back In Business!

Well, see, silly me and my wanting to maintain a higher video quality...what was I thinking? So, I had to compress it into an mpeg2 (mpeg4 w/mp3 audio was still too big), which is just a suck, but the point is it will soon be posted to Google Video, which means once it goes through review, I can post it on the blog. Yay! A month later!

Right, so, a few new updates to the blog. First off, a new poll is coming for all of you to vote on. And then, there is of course, the updated links list. And in the interest of interesting you all, I am going to go through the links one by one and tell you what they are all about.

NPR

If you don't listen to NPR, you should, and if you do, good. My local station KWMU just came under a bit of fire for what their general manager likes to call her management style, but that doesn't change the fact that NPR itself is great. Sure, sometimes it can be a little, um, ear grating (Diane Rehm's voice), some of the hosts can get a bit sycophantic (hello Terry Gross), but all in all, it's a good source of news and entertainment. I like to play the Wait Wait Don't Tell Me online quiz every day to keep up with odd news.

...But I Am a Cyclist

You see, it's funny because I actually am a writer and not much of a cyclist. But there's a small amount of posts on there, I update very infrequently (even moreso than on here) but I get some good rants in on the state of affairs in cycling. There's also a list of links on that blog, but I won't go into them.

Turbochubs

Formerly the link read "Gerald Has Returned" but he's been returned for a while now, so I figured I'd retitle the link. Gerald's a designer, into hockey and is probably the most politically liberal of all of my friends, which is no bad thing. He's got a healthy mix of NHL, politics, and Daily Show clips interspersed with other tidbits and hilariousness. Check him out, yo.

Whiskey Tastes Better When You Have Problems

My former roommate from college, Chris and I rioted after the U of MN won hockey nationals in 2002. We also drank cheap vodka (read: he drank cheap vodka and I spent money I didn't have on Smirnoff, which I know, is cheap vodka, but if I considered that splurging, just imagine what he was drinking...), played simultaneous Dark Forces (Chris on PSOne, me on PC), pondered rearranging our room once, and he also took a video of me riding my bicycle down the hallway (at a terrifying-for-indoor-riding 26 miles an hour). But, through all of that, it seems we kind of forgot about going to class every so often, and I ended up leaving and he ended up in a little bit of trouble. But hey, you live and if you're lucky (like Chris and I), you learn and you move on with life and you stay friends and such. Check out his blog, he talks a lot about sports in the Twin Cities. Proving once again that all the sportswriters out there with their degrees in Journalism have nothing against a fan with a dangerous amount of time on his hands and a gift for the written word. Check it out.

mGk

Formerly titled "Mo and Kev and Maddy," I liked the simplicity of the look of the mGk, so I went with it. For a while, it was a blog about my sister, her husband, their house and their cat, and then it was about how my sister was dealing with her husband, house and cat while she was pregnant, and then, about a year ago (May 4th, actually, of 2007), it became all about my niece Madeline. She's adorable. Except she watches American Idol, which I just can't get down with. I gotta help that girl out with some serious Good Television Marathons. Mo, Kev, send Maddy over. We're gonna spend the weekend watching Arrested Development.

Idealism Never Goes out of Fashion

A new addition to the list, Becca is another of my Minnesota friends. Memories of her always included either Fiona Apple, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Piggly Wiggly, or her stealing various items from my room and then kicking me in the ding-ding. She's working on her Master's Degree in (appropriately enough) Middle Earth itself, New Zealand. Let's see if I can get this right...she was a clothing design undergrad, and is getting her masters in textiles? Yes? Becca, feel free to correct me if I am wrong (which I almost never am). Her blog is about life in New Zealand, with a fair amount of an emphasis on living a greener life and even, it seems, a bit about clothing design and textiles. Hey alright! Check it.

Auntie Maine

My mother's youngest sister Nora lives in Maine with her husband and two children, and there's not much to do up there in the long winter months, so they find ways to entertain themselves and, sometimes, the readers of their blog. Updates are few and far between, but sometimes you don't need an update, you can just keep reading her old posts and the comments that pop up there from, say, my mother and my other aunt. So click the link; let it never be said that "You can't get theah from heah."

TGSeale.com

A friend of mine from Webster, Tanya Seale is a fellow writer who is a bit further along in her writing career than I am. But what we both have in common is that we both got plays produced at Surfacing 2008. I really liked hers quite a bit, and I am looking forward to seeing more of her work next semester when we have our fiction workshop together. A word to those with slow interweb connections: her site is a bit of a slow loader because it's got a lot of stuff on it. But check out her blog anyway, she writes the same kinds of things that I do, only, you know, more frequently, like, you know, a good blogger.

JMG Design

Like Gerald, John is a friend from my days working in Retail. Of the four of us represented here (Gerald, John, Colleen, me), John was the first to escape to work on his garden, a passion of his which he has turned into a small business of designing gardens for people. Check it out, he's full of information about what to plant where and when, plus he's got recipes for great dinners and drinks.

These Walls Are Paper Thin...

Colleen escaped the drudgery of retail toil only to experience the drudgery of office toil. But, be that as it may, she still finds plenty to keep her mind occupied elsewhere. Lately, she's been doing the Apartment Cure, which is interesting to read about, because she divulges some secrets about how high off the ground to hang pictures and other strange tidbits you didn't know people wrote books and made websites and did bad reality TV shows about.

Annie Get Your Blog

While the link text is not the official title, I will never change it because it came to me in a moment of clear thought, and to me it seemed clever. But "What I Do Not Understand" is one of my favorite blogs; Annie's got a sweet touch to her writing style that makes me forgive her for being a Cubs fan, which is no small feat. And of the bloggers I've linked to, aside from family members Annie is my oldest friend, seeing as how we've known each other since we were like, twelve (oh my God, Annie, we've known each other more than half of our lives. That makes me feel kind of old). And what doesn't Annie understand? Well, actually, she understands quite a bit. I think it's the fact that we live in a world where so many things are understandable that shouldn't be that makes it hard for her to understand the world. If that makes sense. Also, she claims to be married to Yadier Molina, but I haven't confirmed that with either Yadi or Annie's boyfriend.

The McGrath Family

My uncle Dennis is nine years older than my cousin Brian, who is nine years older than me, and I am nine years older than my cousin Maggie. Maggie is the only one who's never lived in Minneapolis. So you know what that means? She better move there to keep up tradition. But in the meantime, you can check out the blog about Dennis' family, maintained mostly by his wife Laurie. It centers mostly on their two beautiful daughters, Mia and Mazlin, both of whom were adopted from Guatemala. Laurie's posts are often hilarious, sometimes heartbreaking (but the good way, not the bad way), occasionally laced with anger (check out the recent post about Teleflora and the Today Show calling adopting mothers "Non-Mothers"), but always written from that cozy spot in Laurie's soul where she keeps her children. Ask her if she is an innie or an outie.

Post Secret

If you don't know what Post Secret is yet, you will be addicted soon.

Stuff White People Like

Um...let's see, how many items from this list have I mentioned on my blog? Well, just in this one post, public radio, the daily show, bicycling and Arrested Development. Let's see, um, we used to like Jettas but now we like the Toyota Prius (but we do still like Jettas). I think I've mentioned Free health care before. If I haven't mentioned Wes Anderson Films, I should have. Arts Degrees, Kathy and I both guilty (or rather, she is guilty and I will be guilty). Microbreweries, I love those. Writing workshops, had plenty and will have more. Coffee, I've talked about coffee. Oh, I talked about Organic Coffee once, and white people love organic food! I have Trader Joe's bags in my car, that's grouped with Whole Foods/Grocery Co-Ops as well...see? White people love being white.

The System is Down

Homestar Runner Dot Net. "It's Dot Com!" Seriously, you guys gotta check it out. Strong Bad E-mails and Teen Girl Squad are a must. And the absolute musts are Strong Bad E-Mail Dragon, Japanese Cartoon, Rock Opera, and...Tape Leg? Seriously.

Daryl Cagle

Okay, I know there are people out there who only get their news from The Daily Show and the Colbert Report (another thing white people like), but I am not one of those people. I get my news from NPR...and also from Daryl Cagle's professional cartoonist index. See, when you look at over a hundred artists' editorial cartoons, you get to see positions from each side of every major story/issue in a very quick, concise way. It works for me.

That's about it for now. Look for the video in a day or so, just gotta let it load up through Google Video and go through the process. Have a wonderful rest of your week all!

Coming Attractions

Coming soon to an Interweb-Gateway-Enhanced Computeroliamatron: Updates Galore! The long-anticipated series of posts from the acclaimed writer/producer of such favorites as "You Think You Know Webster University?", The "Fall Break Blogapalooza Extravaganza," and "Your Questions, Answered: Volumes 1, 2, 4, and 5" comes this season's most exciting epic:

Elliot Is Not A Writer: The Blogpire Strikes Back!

Read as Elliot updates you on Surfacing:

Elliot: It was totally awesome, except for the botched back flipping Ninjas and the untimely pizza delivery. That poor squirrel never saw it coming.

Continue reading as Elliot restarts his Tuesday Excerpts:

from a Term Paper, Spring 2008:

...Oim a gud gohrl, Iyamm! God, just shut up, Liza Doolittle. You make me sick!

Watch as he answers your questions:

Q: Are you...do you like...you like girls right?

A: Yes, mother.

Read his All New Free Write Fridays:

And suddenly, without warning, the sentence ended before it was finishe.

Coming soon.

Surfacing Update and A New Link!

For those who were wanting it, here's an update on the play. Our first casting session was very disappointing. We only had ten people show up, and of those ten, only four struck me as right for any of the roles in my play. One of the guys, and three of the girls, two of which would have been great in the role of Edna (the old lady), and one of which would have been great for Melissa...until she said she was not comfortable reading a bit of dialogue (the bit that made me want to cast her in the role of course...) because that part is, um...have you ever seen When Harry Met Sally, most specifically, the scene in the deli, where Rob Reiner's mother says "I'll have what she's having"? Yeah. It's kinda like that.

And then, our second session got cancelled due to bad weather. So we had to wait a week, and then we had to contend with a basketball game.

Since when do students at Webster University care about/go to basketball games? I mean...the type of people who would audition for surfacing? It's just weird. To me, anyway. Maybe not to you.

But, we got enough people to cast all six plays (only one person doubled up on roles, the guy I wanted from the first night). We didn't get the exact cast we wanted, but we got the Edna, Delivery Man and Melissa I wanted. We got our third choice for Ben, but that's because our first choice for Ben was everybody's first choice for something. So, should be good. Rehearsals start after spring break. The show is April 18, 19 and 20 at the Loretto Hilton theater, downstairs in the black box theatre (possibly set up as a theatre in the round, which could cause problems for some of the shows but we'll work around it).

Okay, so, there's your update. And now, let me point out some new stuff. First off, I removed a couple of links from my list, most notably Memory Machine's Urban Exploration blog and Alan's Sports blog, because neither of them had been updated in quite some time. I set up a new poll so you can all help me shape my spring break plans. And I added a new link: Whiskey Tastes Better When You Have Problems. Written by my old room mate Chris, it's got all your information on Gopher Football and the daily life of an unemployed Minnesotan you could desire. Go check him out. Tell him Elliot sent ya.

It's 60 here. Last week, it was ice storming. Go figure.

Musings

So, nobody seems to have noticed/cared that I didn't blog on Friday? Even though I said I was going to?

Well, we went out of town this weekend, so we were busy shopping (unsuccessfully) for Halloween costumes and then packing/cleaning up a bit, so it slipped my mind. Sorry. Bad blogger.

I'm going to ask you all a question, and I hope I get some responses here. I wrote a short play that is very dark, disturbing, and horrific. I am debating whether or not I should post it as my excerpt tomorrow. I mean, it's Halloween time, it makes sense...but on the other hand, it may shock and disturb some of you. Well...I think I'll do it, unless I get a lot of "Don't post a horror play! No! Ah! I'll hate you forever!" answers. So, if you do or do not want to see it, let me know.

As I was driving home from Chicago Sunday, my passenger side blinker decided to go all crazy. Instead of the steady "click, clack, click, clack..." it's now become a hyperactive five year old "clickclackclickclackclickclack!!!!" Hmm. Any ideas there?

Still waiting for more answers to my question about novels. Go figure. I think I'm going to take the answers I get and if I haven't read them, put them on my "To Read" list (under the pile of plays and books for class).

So, as I mentioned earlier, we went to Chicago this weekend, had a grand time. Played some cards, finally played some Wii (I'm so-so with the bowling and terrible at golf), and sacrificed my health in the hopes of winning the McDonalds Monopoly game. I didn't. All we won is more food, which I don't want to eat any more of. Ever. Period. Again. EVER! Just to drive home the point, since I am feeling so blah about fast food right now, I should read Fast Food Nation again and then swear off fast food for life. Sounds like a good plan.

Well...it's Halloween week. What are you going to be dressed up as? I gather lots of people went to parties this past weekend...that's what I was doing in Chicago..but what's the 2007 costume? I went as The Yellow Jersey, complete with leg warmers, cycling socks, helmet, sunglasses, (no spandex shorts, those get way too uncomfortable to wear at a party, trust me), gloves, stuffed Lion (some of you know what I'm talking about there)...and some syringes. Just call me Bjarne Riis (ooh dang!). Kathy went as a 50's housewife, complete with hairnet, apron, and wooden spoon. It was all good.

I'm at work...and the work computer says it's 12:25 when it is clearly not. I hope that whoever gets elected as president in 2008 repeals the stupid Bush Daylight Savings reform. Worthless, really. It should just go away.

Thursday Thursday Thursday

I have a feature where I answer questions, but I do not meet certain comments head on. But this week, I think I will. I'll be answering some comments people left for me in the past.

A messenger bag is not a man purse. It is a messenger bag. If I were to coordinate it with my outfits, it would become a man purse. But I do not coordinate. Yet.

If there is a string of Mojito Related deaths in New Zealand, I know nothing about it.

Brevity is not for me. I have already discussed this.

Cats doing back flips would be hilarious. And is if you search it on youtube.

I spend a lot of time in the city, but it's all during the day, so no cops would pull me over even in Webster.

Okay, this is no fun. Really, my point here was that my messenger bag is not a man purse. It's more of a soft briefcase with a strap.

Okay. So we're clear:

purse (n) a woman's handbag or pocketbook.

I don't care how selective with my definitions you think I'm being, but that is the standard definition of purse.

From Wikipedia:

"A messenger bag (also called a courier bag) is a type of sack, usually made out of some kind of cloth (natural or synthetic), that is worn over one shoulder with a strap that winds around the chest resting the bag on the lower back. Messenger bags are often used by bicycle messengers, though they are increasingly becoming an urban fashion icon."

And there you go. It does not say anywhere that it is a purse.

Okay. That's out of the way.

I played on a softball team this fall with Kathy and a large group of my boss' family and friends. And we were absolutely terrible. Well, no to be fair, not terrible. We onl got shut out the one time. Nineteen to nothing. Yikes.

But we all know what adult coed recreational softball leagues are not about winning, they are about having fun, drinking beer, and pretending like you're a good athlete. But we're not really good athletes. Well, except for that one team...the girls were better hitters than anybody on our team. Better hitters than the guys on their team. In fact, they were the best hitters we faced in the league.

How is that even fun for that team, though? There's no challenge to every week crushing your opponent in a rec league. I mean FO REAL!!

Sorry this is so disjointed. I promise tomorrow's Free Write Friday will be better. Just a reminder om that:

Give me a character, a situation, and a format (short story/play) and I will run with it. And keep asking questions! It'll be a good time.

Fall Break = Blogapalooza!

Alright, my few and faithfuls, I apologize for the long silence interspersed with sporadic bursts of incoherent blogobabble. But no more! Um, at least, not for, uh, this week...

Because, my friends, this is one of those few weeks between August and May when my obligations are fewer, my responsibilities slacken, my free time becomes recognizable as both freedom and timeliness. Yes, my comrades in arms, it's...

FALL BREAK!!

What does this mean for you, my reader? Well, to start, it means you get to actually read something fresh for the first time since October 4th. And it also means a week in blogging that will live forever in tales, songs, poetry, and Internet folkdom. I will blog every day starting today, Monday, October 15th, through Sunday, October 21st. That's right! Just like a farmer's market, it's pulled right from the field and delivered ripe for you. Just like a fish market on the wharf in Maine, it's coming fresh off the boat and still wriggling until I chop it's head off and wrap it up for you. Just like Radiohead's approach to each and every album...we're talking fresh!

A preview, you demand? Well, who am I to withhold such a gem. Especially because there are those amongst you (the naysayers, the doomsday prophets, the skeptics, the cynics, the Libertarians perhaps?) who are reading this and laughing under your breath. "Sure, Elliot...right. You'll blog every day for a week. Yup. And you'll also get on your bicycle and ride it more often, too. And your cat will be voted sweetest cat of the year. And the Cardinals will win the world series this year. And pink elephants exist. And pigs fly on Tuesdays and odd dated Thursdays." Well...okay, my track record runs against me, but this is for reals, yo!

To start, there's this blog, today. Tomorrow, get ready for a super de duper Tuesday Excerpt Extravaganza! Wednesday, look for a well thought piece of politics emanating from this writer's fingertips to your browser! Thursday, get ready for an off-the-wall posting you may be talking about until Friday morning! And speaking of Friday, start firing up your creative juices now, because I am reinstating Free Write Fridays for this week only (and possibly again in the future, but for sure it's happening this week)! Will it be a play? Will it be a short story? Will it be about a guy with a thing? Will it be about a thing with a guy? Will it be about a girl with a thing for a guy? Will it be about a guy with a girl for a thing? Or about a thing with an eye for a guy with a thing for a girl with a thing for the thing? Or will it be even more perplexing, exhaustive, time-consuming, and mind bending than all previous Free Write Fridays put together? Tune in Friday! And don't forget to make suggestions! (Go ahead and start now!)

Saturday, I will revisit my "Your Questions, Answered!" feature (a week or two late to be sure) and on Sunday, a quiet reflection on Fall Break and how it compares to it's cooler Varsity-Captain-of-Every-Sport older brother, Spring Break.

Get ready!

Okay, to start the week off, I just have a few things to say.

You need to hobble on over to my links section and read Annie's blog. This fellow WGHS Class of 2001 member and Webster University Alumna is clever, insightful, hilarious, and also both gorgeous and adorable. I have been reading her blog and, to be honest, that is part of the reason I have not blogged myself in a while. You know how sometimes, you want to say something about a topic, and bam! All of a sudden, somebody says it better themselves? Well, that's Annie. And for the record, she and I have been friends for several years, but even if we didn't know each other (and I had found her blog) I would check it all the time. It's just that good.

And speaking of people saying what you wanted to say better than you could have said it, and also speaking of Annie (read her post for 10/15/07 "If You Want to Drive a Hummer, Join the Army), I would just like to talk about downtown Clayton, Missouri for a moment.

Clayton is a place where you are not judged merely by the car you drive, but also by how you drive it, and mainly by how you park it. Me? I drive a 2002 VW Jetta, which is a fairly small car. I yield to pedestrians. Often, if I am parked in the metered lot in front of the County offices where the Recorder of Deeds and Collector of Revenue are located, and somebody is desperately searching for a parking spot, I will wave to that person in their vehicle and point to my car. This has been met with a very gracious attitude for all concerned, at least at first. And most of the time, it continues with that (with maybe a little bit of a hardening when the person who takes my vacated parking spot sees how little time I've left on the meter, but I have become such a good judge of knowing just how much time it will take me to do a specific deed search that I have almost gotten meter-feeding down to a science). However, every once in a while this gracious person will be well placed to take my spot, only to be edged out at the last second because I pointed my car in the perfect direction to cut them off and leave my spot open to a spot-sharker from the other side of me. Now, one or two times I have caught this before it happened, and have either pointed my car in the direction to block the offender and allow my nameless parking-lot friend access to my spot or (as I did once last week) I suddenly "remember" something I forgot and pull back into my spot and get out, ready to feed the meter...the offender will invariably speed off and then I will flag down the original person and quietly reassure them with hand gestures that this is their parking spot and nobody else's. Now, nobody has ever done this for me, but that's okay. Parking in Clayton is, after all, a dog-eat-dog world, as is evidenced by the number of times I have sat with my blinker on, waiting seemingly interminable minutes while somebody who has just gotten into their car starts it, gets settled, changes CDs, makes a phone call, adjusts their mirrors, rolls down their windows and whatever else they may be doing, only to be blocked out by the way they reverse and then to subsequently lose the spot to somebody who just drove up in the last three seconds...and it is invariably a white pick-up truck with a cover over the truck bed. I am not a mean person, but I have been tempted to spit on this truck or park next to it and haphazardly open my door into it. But spitting has only ever backfired on me, and opening my door into somebody else's car damages both of those cars. I once approached him after one of this parking-space usurping moments and he made snide comments, so in retaliation, I left a note like this under his windshield wiper:

"Excuse me - I was waiting for this spot. I clearly had my blinker on. There was a line of cars behind me patiently waiting for me to pull into this spot so they could continue their trek to find a parking spot. When you swooped in, you made me incredibly angry and made it useless for those people behind me to have waited. And then, when I very rightfully approached you about it, because it was clearly a space I had been waiting patiently for-as any of the people behind me or the person who left the spot before you took it could tell you-you decided to act like more of a jerk and tell me it was too bad I didn't get into the spot, because there was an hour and a half on the meter. You're an extremely terrible person, an asshole, and I sincerely hope that one day your bad driving habits land you in a ditch. Signed, The Silver Jetta."

Since there are numerous silver Jettas that park in and around this parking lot on a daily basis, I do not fear retaliation of any kind.

Now...crossing the street is another matter I wish to address. And most of the drivers in Clayton are very good about letting pedestrians cross, even if it does make them sit for longer than the standard three seconds at the stop sign (of course, it's St. Louis, so the tradition is to actually roll the stop sign, but...). However, last week I encountered somebody so rude, so terribly rude that I actually called them on it. You see, there was a crowd of people waiting at the crosswalk to cross from Memorial Square to the aforementioned parking lot (I was parked on the street and not in the lot, but I still had to cross towards the lot to get to my car. I like to park on the street. Nobody can open their car door into mine on the street), and this jerk in a black H2 came up to the intersection. Feeling assured that this person would stop, the other pedestrians and I began crossing. I was at the front of this intrepid troupe of foot-commuters (I also try to park as far away as I can to get some exercise), when the guy did not stop but rolled right through the stop sign, it was my head that would have been taken off by his enormous rear view mirror if I had not at the last moment realized his intentions. Seriously, my nose was inches from that mirror. So, he blew by and I stormed past the back of his car as he drove on, made myself visible in the driver's side rear view mirror and raised my arms in the classic "Hey, asshole, what the hell are you doing?" pose.

And he stopped. And so did all of the people crossing the street with me, and so did all the people crossing from the opposite side. And then I shouted loud enough for the asshole to hear me through his open window, "What?" I wanted him to get out. I wanted him to come up to me and size me up and realize he could kick the crap out of me. I wanted him to do that. I was ready to sacrifice myself to the beating so that his H2 would idle for five minutes and burn twelve gallons of gas. But that wasn't about to happen. He would have to have gotten out of his H2 and sized up a round two dozen people who were stopped in the crosswalk. So he peeled off without word, without gesture. His only response was the very timid and brief squeal of his tires as he slammed on the gas pedal...and in the process, probably burned those twelve gallons I wanted him to waste. On my way back to the office, I noticed a black H2 at the gas station across Clayton Road from my office. Was it him? Unfortunately, black H2s are a dime a dozen in Clayton, so probably not. But there it was, at a gas station. Pumping an entire Saudi oil field's daily production into its tank. And I felt good about the 34 mpg I was getting driving around the city.

So I took This Quiz a couple weeks ago to help me find out who I should vote for. It's a series of questions about issues such as health care, defense, education, abortion, gay marriage, taxes, etc., and you either agree, disagree, or don't care about the issue. Then you rate it in importance, in five steps I think, from not important to very important. At the end, it tells you who your candidate is. I got Kucinich, agreed with him on everything it seems, followed by Hilary, Edwards, Obama, and then on down the line. This works great, I mean, it's not scientific or anything, but it does match you with the candidate that correlates more or less to your political ideals. However, a lot of Americans seem to vote not on the issues as a whole, but on one or two issues. I also see a lot of political apatheticness in the ranks of people who want Bush out. The attitude, it seems, is "Anybody but Bush." This hardly seems like a good deal. Do we want Cheney? I think he'd make an even worse president. I mean...if everybody took the time to think about the issues and say, "This is what I believe to be important, and this is how I feel this should be approached..." and then sat down and really took a look at the people who are in the running for the job of President of the United States...I mean, that's president of the entire country people...then I don't know that we'd have as much support for Hilary and Obama. Look, it's not like they're not strong candidates. I happen to agree with Hilary's health care stance. I happen to think that Obama is a charismatic individual with great ideas. Politically, they are both very clever. Obama's already aired his dirty laundry, so he is immune to the "Did you inhale?" attacks that plagued Clinton (however briefly). But I think both of these candidates have a lot of appeal to the masses because of attributes not related to how effectively they could do the job. Lots of people are behind these candidates because it would be a first with either one of them; a black president? A female president? Huge strides in America, yes. I want to see both of these things happen. But before I put anyone in office, I am going to look not at their race, or their gender, or their religion, but at their ideas and their ideals. And their game plan. If Kucinich could garner some of that Rock Star persona that Obama has, or some of that instant recognition that Hilary has, that would be great. I would love to have everybody I know casting their vote for Kuninich. But even that's not true, because not everybody I know agrees with his political ideals. What am I trying to say here? Take the quiz. Answer as truthfully as you can. Find out more about whoever comes out on top. Do yourself that favor. I would rather you vote for the candidate who would build the America you want to see than voting for the one who is the most popular, even if that candidate is the one I am voting for.

That having all been said...vote Kucinich.

Work work work, work work work work, work work work work work. Oh, and school.

I have not fallen off the face of the Earth. I am just busy. All day with work and school, except for Friday when it's just work, and then the weekends when it's homework for school and spending time with Kathy, friends, family, softball, bike races (but it's the off season now), more homework, and other such stuff.

I warned you at the end of the summer, that my blogging would become scarce as the school year stepped up. And after fall break, I'll be doing CSO Tuesday nights (come to our concerts, I will post about them).

All that having been said, I need to write more for myself, while not letting up on the writing for school. I wrote some great stuff for school, but I don't want to post it yet, or some of it, at all.

I do need to go and pick up some more copies of Currents at Meramec. There have been some people asking for copies, and I find that I have either handed all of mine out or (as is the case with one copy I found recently) spilled coffee (tea? Coke?) on them.

I want more people to check out my blog, too, but I don't have much product to talk up at the moment.

Alright, I will make a concerted effort to blog more consistently. I can't promise a return to the bloggin' golden age of three months ago, but I can promise more than one update every week and a half.

I received word from the Three Day Novel Contest that they have my manuscript. Four months or so until they announce the winners. And while I know I produced a manuscript that was twice as long and at least ten times the quality of my 2004 offering, I wish they'd give me feedback very soon as opposed to never. I don't know. Anybody want to read it? Let me know, I'll, I don't know...pdf it somehow and e-mail it? I can't post it, that violates contest rules. Let me know if you want to read it, I'll try and get it to you. Should be easy for most people. No, I will not print it out and mail it to you, though. It's 101 pages. I already mailed it to Canada once, the last thing I need is to mail it to, oh, I don't know...just out of the blue, New Zealand or some place. Sorry to any of my readers in that part of the world.

Current score at school:

Webster University Eleventy Billion, Elliot 915.2 x 10^-i

Just a little math humor that I don't get but that should give one or two readers a chuckle. Oh wait, I don't think any of my calculus-joking friends read my blog. Hm.

Oh well.

Added a new poll to replace my appallingly stone-aged poll I paid little to no attention to.

School Week 1 Recap

Right folks, I was told to "brief it up" on my blog by one of my toughest blog critics out there. So, in the spirit of completely ignoring her (which is what I spent most of my teenage years doing so I have lots of practice), I am going to give you a play-by-play rundown of the first week of classes.

Monday started out fresh and bright at 5:30...pm. Well, no, not really, I mean, I got up, went to work, worked the day away, left work and bought all of my books, all $240 worth...pretty light when you consider all the textbooks a med student or a law student might have to buy, and actually considering I am an English major, shouldn't I relish in buying books? I suppose...anyway, bought them all, checked 'em down, and went to my Intro to Media Research class. Yikes.

My instructor started out by explaining that her background is in theatre. Yeah, no joke there. But, I thank her, because of the $240 I spent on books, not one penny was spent on a book for her class because she hasn't been able to find a book she likes. Yay! So, this class is basically an 8 week intensive pilot study on some sort of media of my choice...and I have no clue what to do or how to go about it. So far for the semester, College 1, Elliot 0.

Tuesday morning rolls around, I get a little bit of a lie-in, I guess. Class at 10, as opposed to the usual work at 9 (but it's still better than Target any day). We gather, it's a small class. It's my advanced playwriting class, and of all the people on the roster, there is only one with whom I have never had class, and only two that were not in my playwriting class last semester. John returned, Chelsea and Anne as well, plus Shannon, with whom I have had a class every semester since I started at Webster, and then the last person is Alan, who seems like a good fit with the group. Sadly, Pat didn't show up, so the score kinda evened out for the day, leaving College ahead, 2-1, but I still had work to go to, and after that...class with Sheila Hwang. Now, don't get me wrong, I actually really like her, so I didn't want that to sound like a terrible thing. It is not, not by a long shot. But it seems that once a semester, just like it is inevitable I will have a class with Shannon, it is inevitable I will be one of a very small number of men-if not the only man-in a class packed with women. Webster's English program is not very evenly distributed amongst men and women, and the men all pick lit classes like "Heroic Themes" and "Lit Into Film; Tinsel Town" and so forth. Not "Contemporary Multiethnic Literature of the United States." That just draws a crowd of women. Plus, the only other guy in this class is a guy who I worked on a project with last fall...a project that he got a worse grade on than our other group member and I (that other person happened to be Shannon...Ah! Small schools are so much better than the U of M (your experience may differ (especially if you were in a small program at the U of M (like design))), because he flaked out a lot. So...Webster 4, Elliot 1.

Wednesday was a mess...the third day in a row I am down at St. Louis City Hall trying to locate a deed to plug up a hole in this chain, plus I had to run to Madison Illinois first thing in the morning, about which the best thing I can say is that at 9:45, it is much easier to find a parking spot in downtown Edwardsville, but it's still fairly close to impossible to find a parking spot which should give you some indication of how my visits to Madison normally go. While that is not the game we are recapping, it's a good time to tell you that the score so far is Edwardsville 23,955,201, Elliot 17. So I took off from work finally, ran to my parents' house and grabbed a sammich for dinner, then over to campus, where the only parking spots I can find are way over by Pearson, and my photography class is all the way over in Sverdrup. Now, this is not a substantial hike, but in the heat, hauling a bag you're not quite sure what the contents thereof are, and you're cutting it close on the first night of class, it might as well be sixty miles uphill. Webster 5, Elliot 1. Get to the classroom, and it's ten degrees WARMER in this classroom. Webster 6, Elliot 1. But then...the teacher turns out to be a really cool French guy who talked about le tour with me a little bit. Nice, Webster 6, Elliot 2. Ah, but then the annoying freshman expert girl, as I will call her (reminiscent of "Poetry Award" girl from Fiction Writing at Meramec...) pipes up about how she loves photography and already knows everything and is only taking the intro class because they wouldn't let her sign up for the advanced one...mm. Hm. It's looking like a runaway win for Webster, they're on the verge of their seventh point when all of a sudden...I know more about things like shutter speed, and how depth of field can be controlled by aperture, and most importantly, how to use the Nikons we were looking at. Webster 6, Elliot 3, then Elliot 4! Yeah! But then, after class, as I am walking back to my car...my car is the ONLY CAR in the ENTIRE EAST PARKING LOT. Elliot 3, Webster 90.

You read that right, 90 points.

So, this morning I went back to my playwriting class, and still no sign of Pat. Fortunately, my monologue went over well, and John has not lost his touch over the summer, and it turns out Alan is a teriffic fit in the group, and Shannon's not doing too terrible herself. So, I left class for work with my head held proudly...it had been a solid win for Webster, but it's only the first week, and I think I held myself in pretty good standing in the face of significant adversity.

Final score for Fall Semester 2007 Week 1:

Webster 91
Elliot 6

"We've seen photo-shopped pictures of French President Nicolas Sarkozy with big love handles, and we've seen massive abs placed on Barack Obama, so what is next?"

"Dennis Kucinich in a Speedo with fantastic abs and a great tan."

"There's only so much photoshop can do, you realize."

-An actual conversation between my photo instructor and I.

Last Monday

Today was my last Monday working at Target.

I feel like flying. And also, I liked Gerald's comment on my last FWF, and I think I may take him up on it.

Alrighty folks, not much of a blog today as I am fairly exhausted and going to try and sneak in a quick nap here before heading off to the Muny to catch a show this evening. Hopefully it doesn't rain on us.

This weekend is my "Your Questions Answered" weekend, as it will be the first full weekend in August. So, what are your questions? I have the answers! And...coming next week, a book review of a book I have read recently. Will it be Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows or will it be The Ministry of Special Cases? Only time will tell. So check back next week. And check back tomorrow, when I promise there really will for real be a really real Tuesday Excerpt for real really. Seriously. For real.

Ah...I Can Always Count on Comments For This One

It's that time of the week again! That's right, it's time for me to ask you, my readers, to shower me with suggestions for Free Write Friday, which I promise will get done tomorrow.

On a different note, today marks my 70th post ever. Only thirty more and I turn 100! I'm approaching Strong Bad's e-mail count.

Alright, so, let the suggesting begin.

Also, if anybody has any questions they'd like to ask me, go right ahead. I'll try and answer them here on the blog. Let's get interactive, people!

First question I am going to go ahead and ask myself:

Hey, Elliot, do you listen to music when you blog, and if so, what do you listen to?

Well, Elliot, most of the time I do listen to music, because it helps as a sort of outside distraction to ground my thought process a little. Music itself is so creative and can be inspiring, so I listen to it both to humble myself and inspire myself. The only times I don't listen to music when I blog is usually Tuesday Excerpts because I do those in a hurry, and Free Write Fridays because I don't want to be distracted by anything outside; it's all internal. So, to answer your first question, yes, and to answer your second, well, I listen to a lot. I am, for some reason, on a huge Emo kick right now, but I'm not talking just Sunny Day Real Estate, The Anniversary, The Get Up Kids and Alkaline Trio. I got into some other bands within the genre (and borderline Emo as well) such as Bright Eyes, Thursday, Further Seems Forever, The Juliana Theory, Texas is the Reason, Cursive, and some others. But I've been known to listen to just about anything from classical to new wave to punk to rock to super-duper obscure, which brings me to what I am listening to today.

Music to Blog by:

Heroic Doses - Pushy Girl and Crystals

So, post your suggestions and your questions. If I get enough questions, I'll add a monthly "Your Questions Answered" post.

That is all, so until tomorrow;

Write On!

Call For Submissions!

Ahem...I would like to ask my readers to begin contributing for this week's Free Write Fridays.

There seems to be a bit of confusion about this, so let me just explain:

I will post on Wednesdays, usually doing something other than explaining the procedures like I'm doing now...you know, like a "This is how revising works" or a "boy, editors can go screw themselves" or a "Hey, sa-weet, I got an interview at Master File on Tuesday morning, it's sounding promising and like it may work well with my school schedule next semester, tan-fastic!" followed by an explanation, rounding off with a concluding statement, then a PS in which I will ask for suggestions for that week's Free Write Friday.

Understand that at some point I intend to recieve several more than three suggestions per week, and I would like to be able to go to one place to find them, rather than to the comments sections for a couple of different posts for the suggestions.

Basically, what I am saying is, hold your suggestions until I ask for them. It may even come to pass that there will come a week in which I will not be doing a Free Write Friday (I'm looking at the last weekend in June, which may be free of all regular blog features...I'll do a clip show or rerun a classic or something), so don't jump the gun...MOTHER...although I liked your suggestion.

So yes. That is how things work around here, and I apologize, I should have made that more clear.

Hey, Steve from Master File called me today and I've got an interview scheduled for Tuesday Morning. Woot!

Please leave your FWF suggestions on this post.

So Long, and Thanks!

An Update on Some Things and a Preview of a Couple New Features!

Well, Friday I e-mailed the president of Master File St. Louis, which as far as I can tell is a legal document service based in Clayton. They need a person to do a bit of research and deliver court documents, and yesterday he e-mailed me back and today I sent him my resume. Check it out! I said I would look for a new job and I'm on it! Go me! Granted, I still have not gotten a new job, nor have I rode my bicycle once since that last [20] time[s] I said I would, but it's only been a [few dozen] week[s] so I don't feel too bad.

I feel just a little uneasy about having sent him an e-mail telling him how detail oriented I can be, then thirty seconds later having to send him another one because I forgot to attach my resume like I said I was going to. Oops. And yes, I am aware of how ironic that was, please stop pointing it out.

Alright, so, from now on I will announce on my blog when I start reading a new book I haven't read before, and the first weekend after I finish it, I will post a review. This is just a way of keeping myself reading as well as flexing my undeveloped and rusty journalism skills. Or, Skeelz, as some people call them. I still call them skills, though.

Another feature I would like to add, though I am not sure how this will work, is something I would like to call Free Write Fridays. I think what I'll do is at some time during the week, I will call for suggestions, and readers can post suggestions as comments on that post. Then, on Friday, I will select one of those suggestions and do a half hour to hour long freewrite right into the blog. We'll see how that works out. So, I'll go ahead and call for the first suggestions for Free Write Fridays!

Some guidelines:

Your suggestions should consist of three parts; type of writing, one character, and a situation. For instance:

Short story, Bob Jones, Lost his wedding ring.
...or...
Play, a UPS delivery man, a suburban hostage situation
...or...
Film script, BBQ master Bobby Slay, getting his ass handed to him by Iron Chef Japanese Masaharu Morimoto

Something along those lines. Okay. suggestion box is opened. And...GO!

Friday and Weekend Blog Combined...This Week Only.

I promise, I will be better about this.

I sort of ran out of time Friday, with Kari coming into town and Kathy being called back into work at 3, then going out to dinner/sightseeing and all. And then Saturday was all goofed up, because of Kari being here, the cat being a nuisance and working overnight, and today was no different, plus family dinner and celebrating Kevin's birthday a month and a half late. So, all I got is this little bit I sketched out and would have blogged overnight Saturday if I had had my computer with me at work (if there were such thing as a network to use there).

There was a time-and it doesn't feel that long ago, really, but it must be because it was before I graduated from high school and that was six years ago-when i could stay up all night. Well, let me put that in a different context, actually, because anybody can stay up all night if they just sleep all day. But that's cheating. I can still do that.

I'm thinking back to Fridays in January my senior year of high school. It's Basketball season, which is important to the story here. Prior to January of 2001, I had always gotten a ride to school with my dad. Since he had to get to work (he's a teacher in a different district) super early, and his school is a 20-40 minute drive from where I went, it was not uncommon for me to roll into school before 7 am. Amazingly, I got used to this, and often used this extra early time to catch up on reading or other homework (or going back to sleep against my locker). When my sister took an extended six month trip to Norway after the new year, she left me her car, so I could drive myself to school. Rather than taking advantage of this and sleeping in, I continued to wake up as early as 5 am to shower, eat watch the news with my dad and still leave the house at roughly the same time as he did.

So, even on a Friday, I would get to school at 6:45, almost an hour before the 7:40 bell. I'd make it through the morning in one piece, breeze through lunch and the afternoon (because I took SLACK OFF classes my senior year for sure), and take my girlfriend home, stopping on the way to pick up my paycheck from the Rep. I'd take the check to the bank, pick up some cash for the weekend, head home and eat a snack, maybe a dinner, only to be back up at school at 5:30 to set up for the pep band, of which I was the student director.

Basketball games would last until 8:30 or later, then it would be around 9 or so before the pep band equipment was all locked up. After that, it was off to Steak 'n Shake or some other such place for some food and ice cream, maybe some coffee. Then, I'd get in touch with Zach and the Penningtons, and the four of us would congregate somewhere and watch Iron Chef until one in the morning, followed by an hours-long N64 Goldeneye tournament which would only be broken when somebody realized the sun was about to come up in an hour or so. I'd run home, jump in the shower, eat some breakfast, and then high-tail it back to school where the Jazz Band was meeting up to take a three or four hour bus trip to a competition. This would usually afford me about an hour or so of restless bus-sleep, but you can't really call that sleep anyway. The competition would last until 5 in the evening, after which was another bus ride, again affording only minimal sleeping opportunities but, because it was the subdued ride home one was more likely to actually catch some sleep.

When the bus finally pulled up in front of the school, it would be a dash home, change into some more suitable clothes and right back out, usually to a late dinner in The Loop or a nice long stay at Coffee Cartel, followed by midnight Iron Chef and more Goldeneye, only this time we'd go home around 2 or 3. And finally sleep...only for me to have to wake up at 10 (at the latest) for the Matinee at the rep...during which it was either homework during the show or nap. And I always picked homework.

How did I do it? I was sitting in the office last night, working overnight setting up the ad, and I realized that even with sleeping until one o'clock on Saturday, it was only midnight and I was already crashing hard. What made me more energetic? Youth? Caffiene? Iron Chef/Goldeneye? Or did I just have a built-in filter that made me not feel so tired? Personally, I think it's probably got something to do with the fact that, at the time, I was non-stop with both the I-Gotta-Do-It stuff and the I-Wanna-Do-It stuff. I had a nice balance of work/school and social life. Unfortunately, now I have to balance work and school against each other, as opposed to grouping them on one end and counteracting it with a social life. I have a miniscule social life. Though, the past two weeks have not been so bad, in that since I am out of school that part is no longer a controlling influence, I might have time for a social life, or at least some semblance of one. Maybe that's the secret to longevity, and to limitless energy; you have to balance out activities that require energy with activities that have their own energy. Yes, that sounds like a good idea.

Comments? Thoughts? Let me know. And hey, if you want to hang out, let me know. I'll make some time for sure*.

*If you live in Boston, NYC, MN, New Zealand, or anywhere else that is not in the greater St. Louis metro vicinity, it may be hard to live up to this promise, so, offer strictly limited in those areas.

Yes, Yes, I know...

All the trash talk I throw at my aunt Nora, at Mo and Kevin, and at Will-er-Alan, and all the trash talk I threw at Jerry before he decided to deblog himself, and here it's been about two months since my last post. Well, yeah. Sorry.

Lots happened. Won't go into it all. My sister had her baby, run over to her blog to see pictures. I finished up the semester (no pictures there), went to NYC for Spring Break and had a good time running around and all, met up with Joanna and Koushik, got inspired to write a play, wrote the play, added a Journalism minor to my studies, and generally had an okay time running down the clock to May where I now face a summer of drudgery at work with no school to break up the monotony.

But I pledge myself anew at this! I am about to embark on a very rigid search. Soul searching, perhaps. Perhaps a bit of job-searching as well. Somebody asked me a question last night, and it's going to stick with me until I can truthfully and one hundred percent actually answer it. "What do you want to happen?" I have to find that out, then take the steps to make it happen. I need to make it happen.

With that being said, you will be seeing a lot more of me in the Blogniverse (I know that the popular term is Blogisphere, but damn it all, I came up with Blogniverse and that is what I am sticking with!), at least in this realm...probably not so much on the bike side. Frankly, I'm embarassed to even have it exist at this point, because I am a bad cyclist. A good cyclist is one who actually rides his bike. I am not one of those.

So, this is just a "Hey, yes, I know I've been a deadbeat blogger, but I promise to be better, honest!" kind of a post. Upcoming highlights include:

Ruminations on Professor Overmann's comments on my Media Literacy paper.

Commentary on why hiding from your true self is a bad thing (and it is).

Ruminations on Sheila Hwang's grade of A given on my second to last paper of the semester, and why I think it means she wants to do bad things to me in the dark.

Excerpts from works in progress.

Explanations of my preparations for the Three Day Novel contest (in which I will be participating this year, come Hell, High Water or organized Bike Ride).

And, of course, in a month or so, another long-winded explanation of why it's been a month since I posted anything despite my insistince right now, at this moment, that I will post at least every other day the whole summer.

Music to Blog By:
Elliott Smith - Needle in the Hay

Discussed in this post: