Where Real Life and Dreams Collide

llen @ 2007-08-12T02:52:00

2007-08-12T09:55:28Z

I should probably stop thinking so hard when I hear the [one] hit from the latest Young Unthreatening Modern Rock Band (phrase copyright Rolling Stone) and think, wow, that's really applicable to my life right now...

The song? "Boston" by Augustana. (Which apparently infected my iTunes Library through some free Sony promotion.) Just a little on the nose, methinks.

Things, previously stable, that have changed since I decided to move...

2007-08-08T21:20:41Z

Ristorante Raphael (at whose bar I wasted much of my time and money in the latter part of 2006, early part of 2007) has closed.
My trusty local Albertson's has become Lucky.
The ever-stable AC transit bus routes underwent a complete revamp.
They painted over the years of ~~character~~ graffiti in the Caffe Strada bathroom.
The staff at Comic Relief had a seemingly near-complete changeover.
At least three friends in the Bay Area completed or started a move to elsewhere.
My building manager, after three years of living here, offered to repair anything that needs it in my apartment.

I know there's a few more, but I can't remember them at the moment. (I'll add them in when I do.)

I can conclude only one thing from this: I am the nexus of reality.

Scribbles

2007-07-26T23:31:33Z

Movable Type 4 RC1 Released~! Hopefully I'll be able to move this blog over to ncv.neutralred.org for good soon.

Because of the quickly approaching status quo change, I'm really trying to curb my spending habits, what with the new computer and all. Unfortunately, my beloved Westone UM1s did not get the memo, and are crapping out on me. I'll probably have to replace them with something obscure and awesome. Hopefully they won't run me too much.

Everytime I joke about moving to Boston in December, it scares me a little more than it did before. I just know I'm going to be frozen to the sidewalk as some landlord fishes a thousand dollars of first-month's rent out of my pocket.

As the clock ticks down on my time in the Bay Area, it really seems like I should be in a rush to do something in the time left. I just have no idea what that something is.

We got an email from Andy a few days ago. The lead humvee in his platoon got hit bad by an IED. One survivor from that car, who has burns over 75-80% of his body. As of now, Andy thinks he is the one medic with the most major IED and burn experience in his platoon, possibly his brigade. That is not a distinction I wish he had. Come home safe, buddy.

I'm going to San Diego this weekend to meet up with the usual suspects. Sand and surf is in the offing. As are nerds. (Saturday will be at Comic Con.) I plan to buy nothing... except maybe a Sheldon book or two. And something blessed by Neil Gaiman.

My writing has slowed down, but I am itching to accomplish something with my novel concept. And maybe my comic concept. And that short story I started. I don't think this is related to finishing Harry Potter.

I don't know what to do now.

Retirement, Scene 2

2007-07-12T03:01:08Z

    Contrary to the younger Max’s belief—Maxwell, the elder thought, he’s probably still in his bullshit professional phase—Max was hardly a relic of the neighborhood. He had only moved in three years earlier, two years into the latest leg of his retirement package. The early-21st century reality that the agency sent him to was a nice chaser to the few years in the 18th century analogue he had before.
    Max wasn’t a time traveller, not technically. He wasn’t up on the science, but the Visits jumped realities—dimensions, not times. Each reality had a unique ‘frequency’ that the agency tuned into like an old-style radio. And there were an infinite number of them, showcasing the results of every single choice in existence. Given the mundanity of most of these choices, many realities were effectively exactly the same as the one he called home. The major limitation of their technology, however, was that they could only jump into realities that were effectively “slower” or delayed from their own. For some reason there were plenty of realities that started their reckoning of time some years—or centuries—slower than Max’s own. As far as Max could understand, that changed the dimensional frequency enough that the agency could actually pick up on them. Travel into faster realities had been the grail of scientists for years, but no one could figure out the math. Truly parallel realities were an even bigger problem. The frequency of a reality that more or less synced up with his own was too subtly different to really pin down. Not that it was much more than an academic problem, since spending the time, money, and energy to jump into a reality that was more or less exactly like the one you left wasn’t the most attractive proposition for the corporations.
    However, an unexpected demographic jumped on the possibilities of the technology. The elderly, a population battered by time and tribulation were all too eager to revisit the “idyllic” times of their youth, and there was a decently large (and profitable) group of retirees willing to leave behind the comforts of modern life for the comfort of nostalgia. This reality was supposed to be a close match to the one that Max was familiar with… just the better part of a century behind. Exactly how close of a match was a shock to Max when he decided to visit ‘his’ old stomping grounds, and it was sure to be a surprise to the agency if they ever found out. As a matter of course, they screened the realities for for COIs—Conflicts of Interest, affectionately nicknamed koi, after the fish—and the visitors were strictly instructed to follow the old hiker’s motto, “Take only pictures, leave only footprints.” Visitors were supposed to enjoy the gift of the past, and not mess it up for the other visitors who would follow. People were never supposed to visit realities where their counterparts existed. The temptation for personal gain—even once removed—was too risky.
    Max never thought much of the idea that people couldn’t be trusted around their younger selves. That is, until he saw Maxwell for the first time. Max didn’t know how the agency missed this one. He didn’t much care, really. Not with the chance to correct the biggest regret of his long life staring him in the face.
    They were right about the temptation.

***

A new project

2007-06-25T21:29:15Z

Well, an old project really, but with a new lease on life. Since I've acquired the new laptop I've been writing a bit more effectively, but as kind of a warmup before my big projects, I decided to try and tackle a short story idea that bounced around my head a couple of months back. It's just a fun little quasi-sci-fi piece that I couldn't really pin down to my satisfaction before, but I'm giving myself another shot at it.

I'll post segments as I finish them, so you can see how much I suck. But this is really about knocking the rust off my pen and doing some genuine world-building (though not too much, because that can get distracting from the real point of writing, the storytelling), plus the hope that I can actually finish something.

Hope you enjoy. Oh, and it's not too autobiographical, but hey, inspiration comes from wherever it wants to.

RETIRED

Prologue

    He never noticed him. Not really. To him, Max was just some old guy that rode the number 51 bus every morning, dressed in the comfortably unfashionable way that all elderly could dress as their just due for living long past caring about the opinions of others. He got on the bus at the same spot, which made him quasi-notable, but only in the respect that he was from the neighborhood. An old relic of the space which was all-too transient to a twenty-two year old college graduate.
    Max studied the young man surreptitiously. He was locked into his own little world, earphones jammed into his ears, nose deep in a book. Oblivious.
    Young.
    Max tried to remember what it was like. It had to be… what, sixty years since he’d been in that place? Before the wars, before the Collapse. Before Marian. He’d had a lifetime since he was that untested, bookish hipster, with his crap first job and endless hopes, waiting for that lifetime to finally begin.
    He studied the young man again, trying to remember what tragedies and triumphs captured his mind back then. Everything was life-changing, he guessed. There was just so much ahead of him to change. So despite his first, tempting impulse, he let the young man leave the bus without speaking to him. Without warning him.
    As the bus pulled away, Max glanced out the scratched and dirty window at his younger self. The kid sprinted across the street as the light changed, showing a spryness that Max sometimes forgot he had once possessed, and he grinned wryly. It had taken Marian a long time to break him of his jaywalking habit.

#

tid•bit

2007-06-20T02:41:58Z

I never realized that I enter a different mode when reading British authors until my brain, unchecked, pronounced "distraught" as "dis-traft" when I was reading a Nick Hornby novel.

llen @ 2007-03-26T12:26:00

2007-03-26T19:33:49Z

I don't talk about work much (mainly because it is boring) but I found this amusing.

I recently got an email from the editorial staff of a journal that we publish. They needed to make a substitution for an already published issue.

A book review that was posted for the [redacted] issue of [redacted] has been amended. This change is very critical, and must be made.

Scrolling down on the email, I find in the quoted text what was so importantly changed.

Anyway, what we need to do is make one small change: take out the phrase "rambling screed" and replace it with "extended critique."

hee.

One down.

2007-02-28T08:44:49Z

First rejection letter. Thanks anyway, UCLA.

This makes it all real again. And scary.

State

2007-02-07T01:37:04Z

So, I'm 25 years old now. (well, and four days. shame on you if you missed those.)
How are things now that I've hit the quarter-century mark? In a word...

Blah.

I mean, things aren't that bad. To wit:

Steady job.

(A steady, unfulfilling job that I don't care about.)

Decent apartment.

(A decent apartment that I don't care to personalize that much, because I feel that I won't be there that much longer.)

Good friends

(that I don't see.)

I haven't been to the gym in three weeks, nor been at work on time for about as long. Quite simply, I just stopped caring about a lot of things. I recognize it, I want to change it, but I just haven't dredged up the energy to do it. I've barely written a word since I finished applications. So, professionally, creatively, and socially, I've been... static. Inert.

There have been some oases against this, of course. There was an ultimately dead-end flirtation with a cute bartender that was an interesting diversion. I'm seeing some friends more (sporadically, of course, but the company is unerringly good.) even as I see others less. I have an active instant messenger life, to fill in the gaps. And I've found that my boredom-driven phone calls are sometimes welcome among my far-flung friendships.

I'm just bored.

I want out of this place. This little box that my mind is locked into, that I have locked my mind into, between college and career, between young and old, between life before and the life I want. I've been in transition for three years. I haven't been going forward at all. (I spent about ten minutes here trying to make a horrible metaphor about gear shifts and slipping clutches, but I have since abandoned the enterprise. You're welcome.)

I don't know what to do, really. Except wait for application decisions to come in, while going insane in the meantime. And if I don't get in anywhere, then I know I'm free to shake the dust of the last two years+ from my feet and head away.

Away sounds like a nice place.

25

2007-02-02T23:27:10Z

Another year...

meh.

07

2007-01-06T00:53:56Z

As I prepare a lengthier (perhaps artier) entry for later posting, I shall take this time to wish you all a happy 2007.

And to reassure you that I'm neither dead nor have I been kidnapped and sold into slavery.

Two down.

2006-11-14T23:27:14Z

USC done! All mailed out and off my mind. And again, much love!

And again, ...except for your football team. I would still very much like for Cal to kick your asses this Saturday.

'tis the season. I guess.

2006-11-14T00:46:00Z

11/13/06. 3:00 PM. - First Christmas Carol of the season. Heard on the radio at Bongo Burger (on Center), "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas."

Thanks. I will. In six weeks.

llen @ 2006-11-12T18:00:00

2006-11-13T02:00:01Z

Well, looks like my instincts were partially right. An excellent election for Democrats, followed by a disappointing showing from my beloved Golden Bears.

I guess the more important victory occurred.

Now we just look to the future. We control our destiny, on arenas both political and gridiron. And we involved spectators can just hope that the players don't screw it up.

This is the best analogy ever.

llen @ 2006-11-06T23:50:00

2006-11-07T07:50:49Z

Is it odd that I have nearly identical feelings of worry entering this supposedly blowout Dem election day as I do when I think about this weekend's coming Cal game against Arizona?

Damn the past few years and my "teams'" ability to dash my hopes no matter the forecast...

I'm knocking on wood like mad, for Blue and Gold and States of Blue.

Oh, 'lo the NoWriMo, this I say, d'oh.

2006-11-02T20:16:48Z

I reallly wanted to participate in NaNoWriMo this year, but given the heavy workload of all my apps, I'll have to give it a miss. I was finally going to get a bead on my realistic fantasy/magic realism project, but c'est la vie.

Anyone who is participating in the month o' much writing, good luck. And post in the comments about it!

Maybe next year.

One down, uh, half a dozen to go!

2006-11-02T09:03:44Z

Finished my first app of this grad app season. Much love for you, UCLA!

...except for your football team. I would still very much like for Cal to kick your asses this Saturday.

Also, seriously, I hate the Republican party. At least, the ones capable of speech.

Hallowe'en

2006-11-01T09:41:32Z

Talk about the worst night ever for me to have to buy a new BART ticket. Every aspiring public drunk and exhibitionist in Berkeley was at the station around 8:30 to go to the Castro.

And I'm not complaining about the ladies showing skin, but wasn't it like 50 degrees out?

Bad poetry

2006-10-25T06:27:26Z

I've been at Caf(f)es Milano or Strada every weeknight (and some weekends) for the past few weeks, just writing. My output has slowed down a little, and I've found that I've needed to flex the mind-muscle a bit to get it going again.

A few nights ago that manifested in some bad poetry. I just jotted it down as a lark, but here you go (since I told my sister I would.)

How is it, she said
to me on that crisp autumn day,
that you create whole cloth
the world without you
within you?
Your words change things
to your whim and wonder
and carry us all with them
I thought a bit, and answered thus:
Simply, said I,
I try.

---

A bit of ink
a sheaf of leaves
and a morning
noon
and night
Just with this,
(and silence too)
a masochists delight.

Hey, I'm not saying I'm William Carlos Williams or anything, but it was fun.

Overheard on the street:

2006-10-18T19:48:50Z

I was walking to Cafe Milano to get some more writing done before the Hold Steady concert last night, and passed a rally concerning Bush's new TortureBill.

As I was walking away, I was in front of two women who were arguing about the bill. One seemed to be in (Bay Area fashion) disgust at it, but she was overshadowed by her friend, who was arguing that it was a good thing. (Most of this is paraphrased.)

#1: "Why? Why do we have to hold back when they're decapitating hostages, when they're not held to any rules?"
#2: "We're a democracy. We should be above that."
#1: (protesting) "We're not above homophobia, we're not above the separation of church and state..."

They turned and walked down a different street at that point, but my mind boggled at the turn of phrase for another few blocks.

Nouveau

2006-10-17T00:24:45Z

So, new journal name (yeah, it's an Oasis lyric, so sue me), new (pre-packaged, no-effort) journal layout, and, hey, a new post.

It's application season again, so I've been working on improving my creative output. I'm working on a short film script that I'm planning to shoot with Mila soon (for that increasingly necessary film submission for my creative portfolio) and I'm currently writing a film treatment that's really the hardest part of my UCLA app (due November 1st, yikes.)

Sometimes I need a break from my standing projects, something that has a little less pressure attached, so in lieu of goofing off and watching TV all the time when I need those breaks, I'm trying to write other things. Here's my latest short story, which started with a blank page and a blank mind. Every single word went down on the page about when I thought of them, which was an interesting experience. I planned none of the story in advance. Not even a minute in advance. So, if you can tell where the story is going before it gets there, you've got me beat on insight into myself.

I'll spare the RSS peoples the pain of having all six pages of it hidden in a cut, so I've attached a PDF manuscript. (My real name oh-so-cleverly excised.) All rights reserved by me, and all that blather.

You can find it here. This is draft 1.1, meaning it's more or less transcribed from what I wrote down the first time, save a word choice or two. It's not supposed to mean anything, I was just writing.

Leave comments if you wanna. Constructive criticism is always welcomed.

-l

Warning: Nigh-unreadable drivel

2006-10-04T00:27:07Z

Hello long-neglected readers... Let's get right to it, shall we?

One of the things I did a lot of in classes as an undergrad was something I called 'subconscious drawing.' (i.e., doodling.) I put the pen on paper, and moved it in seemingly random directions and lines and whorls until it started looking like something, despite myself. I ended up with a pretty snazzy pirate once. It's a decently fun exercise when you have nothing in mind.

So, I thought I'd see how it'd go if I applied it to writing. aka, Stream of Consciousness.

So, I was sitting in a dimly lit coffee-and-gelato lounge trying to work up some inspiration, when I decided to try this tactic. My first attempt follows.

Thinking writing feeling like a jerk a no one a sole entity with no connections.No branches. the tree, the pole aloft and proud and a lone. Standing tall and in a place of honor he is respected and saluted and loved it seems, but no, it is just what he carries, a field a cloth of colors and meaning which he holds aloft above all the masses.
But still, they turn and their pride and adulation and respect shines forth to him. Is it any lesser because he just happens to be in the path of it?
It is, and how does he live with it? Steadily doing his duty, holding aloft his tormentor, his beloved, his purpose. And even worse, at night, in the rain, in the dark, his purpose his brightness is taken to safety and warmth of a cherished place and he is stark, naked, open to the elements and unseeing eyes and alone.

So, yeah, fifteen minutes of musing about a flagpole's lot in life. Woohoo!

Serviceable enough, and some decent imagery, I figured it's not a complete flop. So I try again.

New start. Blank page. Freedom to try or fail or peter out to nothing. A gradient, dark to light as twilight gives in to night and the air becomes chill and we breathe in. The cool feels good in our lungs as we exhale and wonder where our breath is. has been. will be. As we fuel the gusts that travel further and faster and away, to where we wish to be and have been a billion times before. To enter a stranger, to kiss an unknown lover, to mingle with humanity and bind us as friends. The carbon oxygen soul of the living breathing earth. And it flies. It floats and hovers, what was once a part of us but becomes part of more, carrying a part of us, changed in ways just for knowing us. And will continue to change as it travels from being to being forever searching for... what? The destiny. The destination. And as it fuels the fires of hearts and candles alike, it becomes the universe, until it fuels the trees and becomes ready for us again.

And another fifteen minutes about breath. On the plus side, that second one gave me the idea for the short film I'm going to put together for my grad portfolio. I've started the script on that one already.

Other than that, life is consummately unexciting. Work is meh. Life is meh. The only thing not currently meh is Cal football. I am so looking forward to this Saturday's game against Oregon! Go Bears! Oh! And I went to Neil Gaiman's reading/Q&A last night at the Berkeley Rep. It was awesome. If I ever look back and try to choose the person that is my role model as a writer and author, it'd be him.

This is nuts.

2006-08-08T22:00:16Z

For the English majors and legal eagles in the audience. Much love to ya.

globeandmail.com : Comma quirk irks Rogers

That's just... wow. And if you look at it closely, the winners are completely right.

Yes, proceed.

2006-08-03T18:23:01Z

It's no secret that I'm a fan of the band OK Go. Besides their music, which I love, they also have a sense of humor and showmanship that make their shows excellent. On their first album they wrote a song (C-C-C-Cinnamon Lips) that didn't really fit in with their usual style. It was, however, roughly reminiscent of the boy bands who were beating music culture into submission at the time. So they ran with it in a brilliantly choreographed routine that became their encore piece.

Flash-forward to today, and due to the popularity (and sheer fun!) of the original dance, they come up with more for their more "OK Go-ish" songs. Here's the latest, for the song "Here It Goes Again."

On Writing

2006-07-14T00:51:19Z

It's kind of amazing to me how slack I've become in creative pursuits. Over the past year I've output nothing as a complete whole in terms of writing, art, or film, save what I shoehorned into my application portfolio last fall. And, given that I really, really want to do *that* instead of my current living for a living, it really befuddles me how I continue to show a lack of motivation when I have all the motivation in the world. (i.e., the WORLD OUTSIDE THE EAST BAY.)

So, I've had my third jumpstart of the year, and actually started serious work on a comic project that hopefully will bear fruit in the coming months. I've also started brainstorming on a short film that hopefully will hit completed script stage before the summer's out. (After that, I'm hitting you up and generally planning to make a complete nuisance of myself, Mila.) The novel concept that I've fleshed out over the last two years will continue to lay fallow, until I can really convince myself I have the discipline to do it right, and stick to it.

Luckily, all of these projects can hopefully contribue to my application portfolio for this year, and maybe give me a chance of quitting this current existence with relative ease.

So, as a preview, and so people have an actual project they can confront and shame me with, the general synopsis of the comic project. It's a lot of fun to write, actually. And I've given up my teenage aspirations to draw the whole thing. Consistent art is definately not my forte. (Oh, and all rights reserved. Legal mumbo jumbo. Don't steal my stuff, and what have you.)

Penny Dreadful

Penelope Davies is a normal, suburban, sixteen-year old girl who’s too cool for school, family, most of her peers, and the majority of the planet Earth. She's started to rebel against, well, everything. Especially her mother. She's "old enough to control her own life, dammit!" So what's going to happen now that the birth father she never knew, that she thought dead and unnotable, comes back into her life curious about her? And what if he turns out to be the world's most notorious supervillain, the man called Doctor Dreadful?

It's a ton of fun coming up with stuff with this. I have a good idea on how it's starting, but not really of where it's going to go. I'm going to let the characters take me on the journey. Hopefully I can get it done well.

I asked my friend Kelvin to co-create/consult and try his hand at art duties on it, so I don't have the speedbump of my own spotty illustrating to hold me back. So, things look promising from this vantage point. Woo!