Friday, January 21, 2005

Into the eye of the storm

Gotta leave for Jersey in the morning. Right into the snow. Supposed to be 10 to 15 inches. Yee hah!
Princeton should be fun. Will be nice to stay in a hotel, and pretend it's a winter vacation. Maybe I can work on Kat story some more.
Will try to post when I can.

Monday, January 17, 2005

Museum, Binnacle

Entered the UMM Binnacle ultra short contest with 150 words about the Gettysburg address. At the very least, felt a sense of accomplishment when finished.

This is a photo of one of the aisles of the New England Muscle Bike museum, near Hartford, CT.

Friday, January 14, 2005

Choppers, Kat

Updating some pics on the chopper rides. Posting one here of Daren riding the wind.

Come visit the New England muscle bike site at http://www.angelfire.com/wa3/nemusclebikeevent/2004htfdswap.html for some updated photos of our rides.

Here's a great link of the guys hangin' in Hartford. Thanks to Wanda for the pics.

Am submitting this to http://www.boingboing.net to see if they link to it.
THINK SPRING!

Thought some more about the Kat story and hope to write some up tomorrow. Also saw the UMM short story competition due Feb 15 and plan to enter with something.

Wednesday, January 12, 2005

webMethods, Kat, longtail

Having oodles of trouble trying to get canonicals straightened out for one of the apps accessing the bus today. I think we finally agreed that the apps can use their own doc types as desired within their own app, and I will define a canonical for outsiders to use. Whew! Even the terms and syntax are tough with this stuff.

Not much time to think about the Kat story. There is an important underlying issue here which I need to define in my head and then it should all fall into place (ha ha!). Reading Katicus' blog today, she is brought low by the challenge of learning other languages, in spite of picking up calculus in a week, orgo chem for fun, well, you get the picture. I think the challenges of a Stanford student can be applied to my character, I just need to figure out how to do it.

The longtail had a blog ref that spoke well to my idea of the long tail providing quality products even if they are not huge market successes. Here is the link: http://www.mcgeesmusings.net/2004/10/07.html#a4396
The marketers are missing the creativity blast in their zeal to reap from the long tail.

Weather (CT, USA) is totally a bummer, but I guess that it beats mudslides and Tsunami's.

Need to speak to the lawyers about my Mom and her inability to manage $$$ anymore. Been taking this transition hard.

Saturday, January 08, 2005

New photo;Circadiana

Got a new photo up on aol hometown to reference here.
This is one Wanda caught of me in Boston right after they won the pennant. You won't see me with a Bosox hat on again!

Brainstorming a new name for this blog.

Started work on first scene of Kat story.

Disappointed in Closer movie. I couldn't relate to the cold characters.

From BoingBoing, this sleep blog is right on the money. Here is the link: http://circadiana.blogspot.com/
Our culture in the US is totally whacked out on the topics of sleep (and sex).

Here is a trackback for thelongtail.com: http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/1608095
Folks are reporting trouble getting trackback working.





Friday, January 07, 2005

Turning on some more blog settings

Turning on some recommended settings to get more traffic.
Also spent some time with Wanda working on upgrading her site: http://www.mostlymusclebikes.com

Thursday, January 06, 2005

Committed now

Just finished polishing my Stalker story and sent out to EQ Mystery Mag. I am certain there are flaws in it, but this story is ready for some feedback (well, at least some educated rejection). As reporter friend Mr. Powell said, it's time to start submitting! At the least it produces some very strong feelings of accomplishment.

Now I can get back to Kat story. What I could get away with in Stalker, meaning lack of character development and objectives, I need to clearly define in Kat. Great feeling to carry creation of building a story around in my head.

Sad news that my Mom is having trouble again, and is having trouble managing her affairs. I'll be gettting more involved in the near future. Gotta respect her great fight to come this far (80's) with the body she was blessed with.

Received email from WritersDigest asking for blog listing nominations, for blogs with a writing slant. Nominated this here blog (aw, shucks).

Rose Wilder Lane

Have you ever heard of this lady? She wrote The Discovery of Freedom,
among other things. She is the daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder, from
Little House on the Prairie fame. I guess there is a lot of buzz about
this Freedom book, and I am trying to find a copy still in print. Before her
death, she admitted there were a few factual errors in it and tried to
suppress further copies going into print. She was an original Libertarian,
which most of us Northeast liberals don't care for, but the purity of her position sounds worthy of respect. She has been linked to Ayn Rand as one of the original freedom thinkers, but Rand's works are didactic and, in today's terms, neocon.

Skipped night out to see Chillum (local cover band) and will go to see Closer (movie) instead. Sideways sounds interesting because of the wine subject, but skimming thru the book at Border's turned me off.

Still working on object and obstacles for Stalker protagonist.

Wednesday, January 05, 2005

Working on blog promotion

Starting to look into what it takes to get this site a little better known.

Also working on next draft of Stalker story. Will keep you posted.

Here's a plug for Wanda's bike sales site: http://www.mostlymusclebikes.com. Lots of stuff to buy plus some info about recent bike rides.

Monday, January 03, 2005

New piece

Outlined and wrote first draft of Stalker, a short murder mystery story. Wanda liked it, but said the protagonist was too nice to be a killer.
Lots of short story contests out there, so there is lots of motivation for me. We'll see where that goes. Still working on the Kat story.
New year with new boss at work. Off to a good start, let's hope that holds.
Starting to plan for England trip.

Saturday, January 01, 2005

Happy New Year!

Fun night last night at a house party.
Today is warm sunny day so we took the bikes out. Wanda has an antique bike ride in Hartford tomorrow.

Started Stalker story yesterday. Did the character analysis and started the first scene.