"Pardon me while I get my shoe phone."

I feel like a lot of the worlds problems could be solved if people went into any kind of negotiations without greed, but with the intention of balance.

There is a fantasy web-comic called Dominic Deegan: Oracle For Hire. Although it takes place in a fantastical world, the author, Mookie, quite clearly integrates a lot of his views about this world into to story. 

The most recent of which has been relating to chauvinistic religions that treat women as sinful and promote the idea of a violent masculine god. One of the characters is dealing with his hatred toward the religion that raised him to be a monstrous person from a very young age.

In an earlier chain of events there is the concept of three champions. The champion of Order, the champion of Chaos, and the champion of Balance. It is shown that too much of either Order or Chaos is a bad thing. While chaos is uncontrollable and has, thus far, driven it's champion mad, Order only seeks to rule and dominate. Order says, follow the rules that we lay down for you whether they are fair or not, any deviation is punished in the worst ways, any one who does not have the right religion or ancestry, is not worthy of life. Order is practically comparable to Hitler. The only way for the universe to be set to rights, is by maintaining a balance between these two factions.

I find it an interesting concept. Majority of stories attempt to convey a very clear idea of Light and Dark. Good vs. Evil. Mookie shows that everybody has their own idea of right and wrong, and it is how they attempt to assert these notions that is the true danger.

Title quote from the TV show Get Smart

We're not "Hippies". We Just Want a Better Earth.

In my 13th post, No Such Thing As Superman, I had originally intended to use the song "Primo Victoria" by Van Canto as my song example.

After watching it in the context of the post, I decided that such a song could be interpreted as the wrong type of inspiration. What I take from the song, is that to achieve our goal, or our happiness, sometimes we must go through heartbreak and terror to get there. "Through the gates of hell, as we make our way to heaven ... aiming for heaven, though serving in hell victory's ours..." More of a personal battle.

Unfortunately the song has a lot to do with war, and the glories of victory over our enemies. The might of the righteous and trained human.

I feel like Flobots, has a much more obviously positive message. It's not that they preach hippy tree-hugging, don't use paper, stop driving cars, so on. At least that's not what I take from it.

They ask to stop wars. Stop greed. So much of the technology to save the planet is tied up by corporations trying to dominate the economy. Money, money, money. Our planet is dying faster than it should because oil moguls make decisions based on their own craving for affluence. All we ask is that as people use the planet's resources, we try and find less harmful ways to do so. Attempting to develop alternate fuel sources, installing low-flow and grey water toilets, these sorts of things. Some of them aren't even expensive: composting, recycling, community outreach and volunteering. It's not about throwing red paint on the people dressed in fur. It's about saving the planet for our children and making the environment that we live in safer and healthier.

No Such Thing As Superman

People say that it is best to never meet your idols. I disagree with this. I can attempt to live up to an ideal all I want, but at some point it's going to kill me if I don't see if the person who I'm basing this ideal on is actually worthy of my admiration. I had the fortune of meeting one of my favorite indie-ish actors who is also a comic artist, and I must say, WORTH IT! I feel like I choose, pretty good heros, because I don't overestimate them. I suppose that I don't choose a person as a hero, I chose the pieces that I like the best. Jeff Hardy's wrestling persona of righteousness and no fear. Take the leap while you can, fly as you fall. His brother, Matt's persona of careful calculation, before you get in the ring, have a strategy ready. CM Punk's do what you wan't, but don't expect me to follow attitude. Terrance Zdunich's patience, persistence, and skewed look at society, which has recently paid off again (I'll put it in a post, I promise). Tamora Pierce's character Alanna who did whatever it took to get through, kept her nose to the grindstone and made no excuses for her failures. Even the song Rise is a source of inspiration. Now I know that you can't meet a song, but meeting the band, and hearing their inspirations can only widen my view of it, not narrow it. Even if they meant something totally different than what I got from it when they put the song together, knowing that isn't going to cause me to find it any less inspirational.

I suppose I mean that I feel that it is important to know what it is that inspires you about your heros, so that look can still look up to those qualities and maybe find them in a better role model if the original inspiration turns out to be a cad. I find that the most intense lessons, I learned by talking directly with the people who taught them to me.

Pins and Needles

I am getting really tired of human relationships. Everybody needs something from somebody. There's always the opportunity for equality, but it is killed almost instantly due to lack of trust. I'm tired of people taking their abandonment issues out on me. I don't forget my friends. I don't leave my friends. My way of showing friendship is by being honest and by listening with an open heart and mind. I'm tired of being the bad guy for not agreeing with the people who have holier-than-thou attitudes. I'm tired of being the bad guy, even when I'm not. I am NOT a punching bag. There is NOT a sign on my head that says, "She's a bitch, so kick her when you can."

There was a point in my life when I cut myself off from the idea of "humanity" because it was flawed and despicable. It took one day amongst the 90 Day Delinquents Shadowcast troupe to crack the ice that I had encased myself in. Eventually I wondered why I would have even wanted to hide myself away.

In the past month, I have started to more and more regret the breaking of this shell. It has been too long without a taste of my type of crazy in a free environment. The longer I go, the less sure of my footing I feel.

What do you do, when your best friend in the world, is shaking their finger at you?

Skip the Chocolate and Get to the Point

Every Friday night, my family has dinner together. Most of the week, my dad travels on business, and my mum brings her work home. Friday is the one night, when Mum asks that we put down whatever we are doing, and come sit together. She says blessings and we eat.

For the longest time, I resented this tradition. I had other things to do and I don't even believe in a god. Why must I do something that is obviously linked to religion?

The truth is, everything is what you take from it. Now, I simply take it as a time to have dinner with my family and chat about how our week went, and such.

Valentine's Day is similar, to me. I used to resent that day as well. I'm not romantic. I don't have a special somebody. Why does it take a holiday for couples to be sweet to each other? Truth is, humans DO take a lot for granted, including the people who they care about and who care about them. Val-day (as I call it) shouldn't be about getting chocolates and grinding the naughties (though that can be fun, too). It's about taking a moment to appreciate the people around you who you care about. It's about letting those people know that they matter to you.

She's A Beaut

Why are inanimate objects constantly alluded to as female? Is it because in many other languages objects have genders and we just decided that in english, it would make everything simpler to refer to doodads as feminine? Is it because many people consider the physical female form to be more pleasing and wish to imbue such features onto their boat or car? Or perhaps, it's because women used to be seen as property, so the feminine descriptors simply transferred to the other items that the "owner" felt affection towards.

I still don't have an answer

This whole workshopping thing, has brought to mind a question that I have grappled with in the past and still have no answer to: How do you tell a friend that you don't like their creative work?

I find that it is much easier to convey what I'm saying is if I have something constructive to add to it.

I'm not into __ because of __, but if you're going for __, I like __ part works well, and __ part is a little too __.

Unfortunately, there have been times when my honest opinion is, "This piece, that you have put so much heart and energy into, is terrible."

Phrase it as a question? "Is this piece, that you have put so much heart and energy into, supposed to suck?"

Example:

My friend recently started a new band and the first song that they released was not to my liking, and I just had no way of telling him. It wasn't the entire song, just about the last two thirds of it, but I had no explanation or any helpful way of phrasing it.

"Writing" or WRITING

I am unused to artistic freedom when it comes to writing. I have, of course, written my own little stories, letters, emails, and blog posts. The idea of a creative "essay" has, up to this point, never crossed my mind as a possibility. The reason for this being, that I apparently did not have a proper idea of what an essay truly is. I feel like I just stepped into a maze and there are twenty different paths in front of me. They all lead someplace different and I have to figure out which path will take me to a headspace that I am happy with. It's both difficult and super exciting. I've never had so much creative freedom in a class before.

City Suffocation

My first breath out of the Union station is smoke. I know that everyone has the freedom to kill them self as they see fit, but why do I have to die as they see fit as well? I honestly think that saying that people are not allowed to smoke inside of public buildings is dumb. Now the smokers stand around by the entrance and everybody has to walk through their fumes to get into the building. Do I have a solution? Not a cheap one that still allows people to smoke. I'm just really tired of my first breath upon my exit of every city building being somebody else's bad habit.

Generic Swearing

I spent my first school year of college at University of Arizona, in Tucson. My roommate was a very bossy and snarky sort, but in a good way. Mostly. She introduced me to her very lively group of friends. There is more to that story, but it is not related to the point that I am about to make. I very quickly learned that words like "shit" and "fuck" were, in reality, very tame and boring compared to some of the creatively strung together combinations of otherwise harmless words, these people could put together. Why use one general fly swatter to the periphery, when you could articulate your distaste for something much more accurately with a several well aimed bodkins thrust right into the heart of the matter?



In one of our first writing exercises for class, I used the phrase "bored out of her fucking mind." Almost instantaneously, I became agitated with the decision. "Fucking" was such a boring word choice! Why not "hormonal", "simplistic", "overly dramatic", "teenaged", or any combination thereof? Those words would have actually given the audience relevant information about the character.



While I do not have as well honed an ability to colourfully elaborate my distaste for something, I have decided that normal swearing is just plain lazy. From now on I will shy away from such mundane descriptors in favor of attempting to actually enhance the listener or reader's understanding of the character or situation.

Not A Fan

So the new show Smash has finally premiered! Finally a show about Broadway! About theater! The awesome that is behind the scenes of every major play and musical! What a great idea! What an inspiration to theater geeks everywhere!

What a disappointment.

It seem like the writers are trying to show the good and the bad, the conniving and the genuine, the shallow and the brilliant. The problem being that it winds up as one huge dramatic mess. Everything that can go wrong will go wrong because so many different personality types are battling each other. Reality check: Not every play is backed by someone who can't pay for it. Not every writer has a conniving little bitch for an assistant. Not every other writer is going to have family issues because they're trying to adopt and feeling an attraction to some one to whom they are not married. Not every writer and director are THAT terrible to each other. Also, when they are, they tend to be quiet about it so as not to garner bad press. The whole "casting couch" thing, I have no comment on. It's not something that people talk about.

Basically, while all of these things can happen, to have it all happen at once is utterly ridiculous. You cannot have a successful show if absolutely nobody behind it has their shit together. In an attempt to interest audiences they have injected more drama than is even close to necessary and sped up the time line beyond reality. Plays get workshopped for years and many times the workshop actors and director(s) don't make it to the stage with the show. Also, this wasn't implied but I thought I'd make a pre-emptive correction, it is very difficult to get a show a world debut on Broadway. They are 'tried out' at smaller theaters. I have done intern work at two that were debuting a new play in the hope that it would be seen and picked up by Big Apple big shots. 

I'm not saying that Smash will flop. The actors are great, and the individual characters are cleverly written. I'm just saying that I will not be watching it.

A State of Constant Chaos

I am very bad at organization. I am very good at organization. I am very bad at committing to keeping organized. This semester I have been running on almost no sleep, due to lack of organization. So far I have been doing my homework the day before it is due. Many times this means that I stay up late in an attempt to ensure project completion. As a result the moment I manage to drag myself home from class, I pass out and the next assignment is left until I wake up. Except that when I wake up, I must start on the project for the next day, and the next day, and so on. This week, as my friends can attest, I have quite literally been surviving via a combination of cat naps and nerves. I suppose that I ate a bit as well.
This weekend I will be making a serious effort to turn around this crazy train. This means completing the work for all of my courses very early in the weekend. The hope being that I will be able to proceed forward, from now on, by finishing work soon after it is given instead of having to put it off in favor of more pressing projects.
Fingers crossed.

Alright, I admit it!

I am terrible at grammar!

Image courtesy of Facebook shenanigans.

What little grammar I know or understand has been scraped together as a survival tactic. I can understand it if some one takes the time to explain. Unfortunately when my teachers did take the time, I was in elementary school and still trying to figure out why they were telling me to write an umbrella. Grammar talk simply skipped right over my head. I have slowly been attempting to acquire a basic understanding, but much of it still has trouble processing.

Scrambled With A Side Of Brains

When I was a child. I liked reading fun stories. I liked to know what happened to the character. I don't ever remember being particularly interested in a book that was actually secretly trying to teach me anything that I could discern. I distinctly remember sitting down and forcing myself to read a short book about making rainbows, because I wanted to know if the mouse explaining it actually did anything interesting. He didn't. I don't remember picking the book up ever again, though it's fellows on the shelf were constantly revisited. I also remember noticing that a lot of children's television programs involved the character learning an important moral lesson at the end of each episode. I dare say that I would have stopped watching a couple of those shows had I the opportunity. One cannot give up what one does not actually have. My mum is convinced that the television is too addictive for young minds to be exposed to, so any access I had to the pretty moving pictures was limited to her prolonged absences.
I write this entry out of pure frustration.
How does one write a story to teach children anything?