Er... is this thing on?
Current mood: cheerful

Manic phase begins.

I spend a month or two ignoring this page and I suddenly get it in my head that I ought to post something, at least to remind myself that I do remember how to write something that isn't related to software documentation. And as I do this I realize that, as a 33-year-old struggling artist with a solidly middle class income coming from my day job, I really ought to stop describing myself as a "struggling" artist and call myself a... what?

I mean, I suppose I could use "struggling" in a metaphysical sense -- struggling to be noticed for my art, instead of struggling to, you know, eat. But we live in a world steeped in materialism, and so I would have to wind up explaining the difference in every conversation I had. Which would annoy me and the person I was talking to, and neither of us want that. So I need to come up with a better word.

If just use the term "artist" I encounter two problems -- first, the person I'm talking to is going to want to know what I've done that they've seen, and second, the person I'm talking to is goign to assume that I mean "someone who paints or sculpts things." That's the problem with language when you have a word that means an entire category of things and also one specific sub-category of that category.

Bah.

Mostly when people ask I just talk about my day job. Which is also annoying because 9 times out of 10 people don't know what a Technical Writer is. I *should* just say "I'm a waiter" and be done with it. But I'm sure that will lead to an annoying conversation as well.

Hmmm. I wonder if my problem has to do with the imprecise nature of language, or if it has to do with my tendency towards misanthropy? Hard to say.

At any rate. It looks like the solution is to say "I write computer documentation" and hope that the other persons eyes glaze over and I can change the subject quickly. Meanwhile I spend my spare time working on my webcomic, recording, writing, and apologizing to the wife.

Of course, I have dreams of "making it" some day, and shedding the bonds of day-jobbery, so that I can support myself and my family from the fruit of my artistic endeavours, and all that. And that is when I'll realize that no, it was the misanthropy all along.

Currently listening : The Singles 1983-1995 By Alien Sex Fiend Release date: 16 April, 2002

9:59 AM - 5 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Vogon Poetry (Ode to a refrigerator)
Current mood: a bit off

Oh, refrigerator.
How old art thou?
Check the radio carbon dater.
What doth it say?
I don't know... I'll check later.

Refrigerator! Thy inner light
greets me
when I open thee.

Refrigerator! The constant chill
that is thy toil
prevents produce spoil.

Refrigerator! Thy icebox doth
make me yearn
for no freezer burn.

Currently listening : A Mighty Wind: The Album By Various Artists Release date: 08 April, 2003

9:38 AM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Thought for the Day!
Current mood: cheerful

If you're ever king for a day, make sure you block off enough time at the end of that day to cover up everything you did during the first part of it. Payback's a bitch.

Currently listening : I Often Dream of Trains By Robyn Hitchcock Release date: 24 January, 1995

8:17 AM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Chapter Nine
Current mood: contemplative

I've been trying to write chapter nine for about two and a half weeks.

Chapter eight was pretty easy to get through. It has some structural problems -- essentially, I need to find a way to change perspectives in the middle of the chapter, repeatedly, without the narrative getting too jarring -- but it hit all the marks I wanted to hit, and that's a good thing.

Chapter nine, however, is giving me fits.

In my first attempt the protagonist woke up in a hospital bed, and stayed there through the entire chapter. The chapter was little more than a series of conversations between him and a few supporting characters. Very annoying, pretty boring, not at all what I was going for. So I started over.

In my second attempt the protagonist was discharged from the hospital and trying to unravel one of the Great Mysteries of the previous chapter. In the course of this he ran into all the supporting characters he'd met in the previous version and had roughly the same conversations. It was better... but...

... then I had an idea for a great dramatic moment that required him to be in the hospital bed. So now what? Now I'm wondering whether or not I need to start over.

And then I think, well, maybe instead of working through this problem I'll go play Neverwinter Nights instead. Or EverQuest II. Or City of Heroes...

Of the three NWN grabs me more, because it's about the closest you come to playing a pen and paper roleplaying game you can find on a computer. It's not *quite* the same, because the online, "real-time" nature of the game makes it impossible for it to be a perfect match, but it's damned close, close enough to make you willing to ignore/forget that the NWN graphics engine was mostly outdated back when the game was released, much less now... And I play on an excellent server, with brilliant players and equally brilliant DMs.

Which brings us to the double-edged sword that is roleplaying in general.

See, in a previous post I talked about how it was the presence of friends and gaming that helped me improve my writing and my discipline when it comes to writing... and that's true. But roleplaying has this other side that can actually make it more *difficult* to write: on a creative level, it fills almost exactly the same urges that writing fiction does.

That was one of the very things that drew me into games like D&D in the first place! It takes a long time to write a novel. When you play a single session of a roleplaying game, though, you are in effect living a novel that all of you -- players and DMs alike -- are writing together. The DM/GM/ST/whatever creates the structure of the world and sets things in motion, the players react and add their own layers to the world, the DM plays off that... good roleplaying is like good jazz. (Unfortunately, bad roleplaying is like *bad* jazz. But that's a topic for a different post).

And so there you are, *doing* it, and you've got a built in audience... the people you're playing the game with. And they experience it as it happens, just like you do...

So when I'm faced with this desire to complete chapter 9 of a book that isn't even a quarter finished yet, and I have the choice to play a roleplaying game instead -- a good one -- well, chapter 9 gets that much more challenging.

Which isn't to say the book will never be finished. It will. But I'm fighting against something that provides the immediate kick that I'm looking to get out of writing in the long term.

That's right, boys and girls, roleplaying is literary crack.

Currently listening : Killing Joke By Killing Joke Release date: 05 August, 2003

7:51 AM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Yes. I DO want a medal.
Current mood: cranky

You heard me, pal.

You think I told you the trouble I went through just so you could, what, ignore it? Thought I was just making conversation, maybe? "Hey, this is a humorous anecdote -- I put myself in fits trying to get this done just to make your life a little more *convenient*. Ha ha ha, let's get some coffee."

No, I want a medal. More than that, I want a parade. I want a big fucking parade with a full marching band, divisions of baton-wielding cheerleaders hopping around, five or six ridiculously large and mildly grotesque helium balloons representing popular cartoon characters, at least one former Miss America on hand in one of no less than five themed floats, and an army of Shriners in the front riding their little carts, honking their little rubber horns and wearing their fezzes proudly.

I want the President of the United States of America to proclaim that this day is a Federal holiday in recognition for the fact that I was willing to put aside my self-involved baggage just long enough to thoroughly annoy myself in order to accomplish something that I have no personal stake in whatsoever, just so you can sit there and apparently feel entitled to my public service -- due to your, I don't know, exceptional personal hygiene or something. I want a moment of silence in every elementary, middle and high school in the United States where all those students can reflect on exactly what I went through to make your day easier. I want a billboard in every city of the United States with my picture on it, with the simple and tasteful phrase "THANK YOU" printed under it in clear block letters. I want at least four "made for TV movies," each run on different networks, and on at least one of them I want to be played by Miguel Ferrer, not because he looks in the least bit like me but because I think he's an excellent actor.

What's more, I want a pony, a light brown pony with little white splotches on its fur. Then I want a boat which I can sail on the ocean... that's right I *will* ride upon my pony on my boat, thank you very much. While I'm on the subject, I'd like Lyle Lovett to write a song in my honor, commemorating the occasion. It doesn't have to be a serious song... tongue-in-cheek and mildly ribbing is fine. It's *Lyle Lovett*. I'll cope.

Got that? Hey, *you* asked... if you didn't really want to know you should have said "thanks for going to all the trouble, I really appreciate it" instead of trying to be cute.

Currently listening : Revelations By Fields of the Nephilim Release date: 09 December, 1997

8:11 AM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Gaming and Writing
Current mood: thoughtful

I write a lot.

When I was young lad -- back in the days when I was a teenager and much thinner and wearing braces and ridiculously short for my age -- I had grandiose ideas about stories I would write, entire books. And I'd corner one of my friends (more often than not, the guy who introduced me to these boards -- sorry 'bout that!) and explain, in laborious detail, exactly what would happen to the characters in the book.

Then I'd write about half a chapter, get bored, and quit. Which was OK... because God help me, the stories weren't really any good.

Which isn't to say I shouldn't have written them. My writing has improved over the years primarily because I started out writing poorly (but with enthusiasm) and DIDN'T STOP WRITING. The more I wrote the better I got, until one day I looked up and noticed that, much to my surprise, I had written an entire novel from start to finish. 114,000 words, if you're curious, and yes, it was a tremendous rush.

Looking back on the time it took for me to get from point A to point B, I realized there were two main factors in my life that were present when I was actually making progress:

1. I was involved in some kind of gaming community. That is to say, I was either playing a tabletop roleplaying game with a group of local friends, or an online roleplaying game with a group of internet friends, or a mix of both.

2. I was involved in some kind of creative community, usually with people involved in either the tabletop game or the internet game.

When I first started out my gaming friends and I would talk about comic books and discuss what constituted a "good story." Though we didn't actually say "constituted," we would say "this totally sucks" or "Wolverine is complete badass." During that time some of my friends were also avid writers (even then), and that served as a great inspiration to me, mostly because I was jealous. Yes, I admit it. I was an insecure teenage kid who was jealous of any of my friends who were better at anything I wanted to be good at. BUT, and this is the important part, that jealousy woke up a real desire to tell stories, first through music and then through prose, and I'm lucky to have both.

Later in life, when I couldn't find a local gaming group to save my life, I got involved in internet-run games and fiction bulletin boards. And in both of those communities I found like-minded lunatics -- some of whom I continue to write with even now -- who really pushed and challenged me to do better and to not stop writing... even if I *was* addicted to a computer game that was sucking up all my time, and I'm going to stop using this example right now because it's hitting a little too close to home right this very moment. There's nothing like working with someone who is a much better writer than you are to force you to really work to keep up.

And it occurred to me that what makes both experiences so valuable to my writing is that in both cases you're interacting with other very creative people, and you're playing off what the other person does. In this case real roleplaying is a lot like jazz, where you take your cues off the other people in your group and go your own way with it (while preserving the basic structure), and then they take what you did and add to that. Collaborative writing and collaborative gaming... both were invaluable to getting to the point where I could sit down and finish something I'd started.

Of course, when you're writing your own book it's a time-consuming and solitary process... at least, it is for me. I can't have a conversation and write at the same time... I get too distracted with the conversation to write. But even so, writing appears to be just as much a social activity as it does a solitary one.

"So what's your point?" you ask...

Well, I couldn't tell you. I think this blog is going to turn into yet another forum where I pontificate about absurdly self-important nonsense.

Currently listening : Doolittle By Pixies Release date: 20 May, 2003

1:54 PM - 2 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment

!@.$% Time Zones
Current mood: annoyed

So when I created my previous entry, the page settings were configured for PST. Apparently the guy who created MySpace is a Left-Coaster.

So when I set the time for that post, did I do the logical thing and search for the global setting that would set my posting time three hours forward? No. I did the lazy thing, and just switched the posted time ahead three hours.

So when I finally find the stupid global setting, what happens? It automatically adds three hours to the time of my post... so apparently my first post occurred an hour from now.

I never should have bought that !@..$ time machine on eBay.

But it seems to be fixed now.

Currently listening : Rich Man's 8-Track By Big Black Release date: 27 November, 1992

12:30 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

And so it begins, perhaps, for a while, until it stops
Current mood: nonplussed

So a buddy of mine from way back drops me a line and tells me "hey I've got these pictures of me and another friend in Hawaii" and gives me a link. So I click the link, and wouldn't you know it, you need to be a member here in order to actually view the pictures. Next thing I know I find myself saddled with yet another blog and I'm feeling a bit like a guy looking for a bathroom when he stumbles into an Amway convention.

OK, it's not that bad. Actually, my friends blog is very amusing, and I had to get this space in order to view his, so I figured I might as well put something on it. And maybe it'll be something I do regularly, who can say... I mean, what's another thing to spend time on? I'm sure Mrs. Death Ray won't mind in the least... ahem... changing the subject now.

I'm still trying to decide if this is a legimate means of social expression or just an excuse to post mildly dirty pictures on the internet. I did see one very disturbing picture of Santa Claus that makes me suspect the answer takes a little bit out of both column a and column b. Only time will tell.

Currently listening : Let It Be By Laibach Release date: 28 July, 1992

10:57 AM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment