Construction in Progress

Yes, it appears that time of the decade again, where I work on updating my website, and my a solemn promise to write more.

If you can find the problem with statement, congratulations, you can also likely find Where's Waldo. However after having just come back from Readercon 21 in Boston, hopefully... again hopefully I will do more then just a few updates, some quick dusting of the website, and instead begin to do some writing again.

I know I have some great ideas, but can I put them down and be happy with them? What about the website? Will real life again distract me from finishing or even updating? All this and more on the next exciting update....

In the meantime, beware the sparks and the occasional 404 Page not found as I redesign my homepage, and try to decide what I'm going to use, and where.

When reading, doesn't enjoy

The fact that you are reading this, means you sometimes read things, not because you enjoy them, but because if you don't read it, you feel you've missed out on something. Not to say that my writing is terrible, just that my blogging has never been terribly consistent. On the other hand, what has brought up this topic isn't blogging, but instead when it comes to reading novels.

Currently, I'm attempting to read a novel, that I will only refer to as "That piece of Crap" or [TPOC] for short. I'm also going to refrain from specifics on the plot, as I am sure that if I discussed it at all, it'd be evident pretty quickly as to what I was reading. All I can say, is that it's science-fiction, it's relatively new, and it's a load of horse manure.

I picked up the novel because it was supposed to be similar to some earlier stories I had enjoyed, although more up to date, and on today's heartbeat. Like other new novelists, the beginning was slow. Fine, I'm used to trudging through a hundred pages to get to the meat of a novel. However in TPOC, I'm half-way done, and I can already tell it's a half-assed merging of three or four other masters of writing, full of plot holes, one-dimensional characters, and a view of the world only an idiot could enjoy. Yet, I still trudge on, with the hopes the author will redeem himself.

My question though, is it worthwhile to finish reading something you consider that atrocious. Especially if you aren't a critic or editor? Or should you continue to give it the benefit of doubt, until you have completed it, then vow to burn the book and never case eyes on the likes of it again?

*UPDATE* Got about two-thirds through the novel and gave it up. Maybe I'll go back and finish it some time, but since then I've found a lot of other books to try that aren't nearly as bad. Also helps I've been enjoying them on a new electronic device, but that's another post far in the future.

Reboot Part Redux

A couple of months ago, I finally decided to look in to re-writing my home page, just to show that a) I'm still alive, and b) I can still web code. However while working on my project offline, I ran into some snags. As such, I again put it off. During this hiatus I was introduced to some nifty little programs to streamline my online reading habits. In the process, I was also finally clued in and up to date on whatever latest web innovation was going on. Much to my surprise, my original blog site was finally undergoing a major facelift. Since my new site hadn't been much active, I realized that I might want to at least put up something, or I might as well throw in the towel.

Since I didn't want to give up on writing, as you can plainly see, I've converted the new site over to the new Blogger and will be in the coming days, weeks, months or even years be trying to post and designing a new blogsite. Maybe even one that I'll finally be happy with. Till then though, write, read, and be merry, for tomorrow you might get writer's block.

[TB] Work vs Blogging

One of the topics I bring up occasionaly is on the various interactions between work, and blogging. Basically in this day and age it has become so very easy to expound in a semi-public forum on such a wide ranging set of topics, that some blogs have become all about what we have to put up with everyday. That is, blogging has become the 21st century water cooler, where we can at no expense to ourselves gossip about the latest going on's of our officemates, our co-workers, and the successes and failures of our umbrella that is the company whom employs us. The downside to having such a marvelous new land to gossip and gripe in, is that it may be a little to public.

Like the old joke about the coworker whose very good at impersonating the boss, in a funny, and not so good way, who one day gets caught by said boss, writing in a blog can inherently be a dangerous medium for even the most average of grippers to easily get caught in. And unfortunately when you are displaying in such an open space the problems of a company and the people in it, it's almost inevitable that when discovered, the usual reward is to be fired. But when the news is dish, and your friends not quite as sympathetic, what are you going to do?

One early trend that seems to be most popular is to learn how to be both anonymous, and amphorous about what you are writing. You hide the details, bury the real names of everyone involved and try to keep the story intact while not giving away to those home-brewed detectives the who, what, and where that could get you spotted and exiled. This method of course has it's own drawbacks, as you have to bend backwards daily and you are constantly looking of your shoulder to make sure no one is watching you, watching them.

On the other hand you can do like me. Avoid the problem by not mentioning friends problems, company gossip, or even your neighbor's actions. Instead if you have to comment, make it insightful, not backstabbing, put out both sides, even if one is extreme, and is moderate. Above all, learn to have fun with it and not worry, because you know what? In the end life is like a box of choclates, sweet, messy, and fatening, but horribly delicous once you get done.

[TB] Reboot

Due to various stuff going on, I'm trying to consolidate my blogs a little. I'm going to eliminate the one at Mindspring.com , keep the one at whtedrgn.blogs.com active as my main, while keeping this one at whtedrgn.blogspot.com as my backup and play toy for the time being. In the coming days hopefully I'll be able to rassle this blog around to look more like my main blog. From there it's an "I have no clue" as to which I'll stay with.

Ya'll cool with that?

[TB] Why Can I Never Leave Well Enough Alone?

As you may have noticed or not, this page has been updated. Ahem, as I said, as you may or may not have noticed, this page has been UPDATED. Spooky, ain't it?

So Two years, 8 months, and something like 25 days later, I finally get back to update my personal webpage. You'd think I was lazy or something? Au Contraie monfeit, not lazy, just nothing to really update. In its previous life, all the webpage had been, was a kind of world bookmark. Now some of the subpages could and should have been updated, but a very busy work like, plus an up and down social life, lead to a such a gigantic case of writer's block that, well, you get the idea. Hmmm, maybe I should watch those run-on's, ney? Sidetrack time boys and girls!

As Robin Williams once said, "F*** It!"

I'll give you a warning, as part of this mega web update that is going on, I'm also forcing myself to write once more. Since this is part carthesis, part training myself again, a lot of grammar and spelling mistakes will appear in what I write. Thats not to say this will continue on forever, just while I working myself into this, expect some odd sentences, gramartizations, and plain bad spelling. 'Cause the whole point of this, is not to be a perfect writer, but to write. To write anything, every day, at any hour, and force this voodo block out of my fingertips. Also, eventually I will want to pride myself on a good story, and thus will get myself a spell checker to help out. As for today, "F*** It".

Alas, don't be surprised to see a few four letter words in these columns. As rants are primarily based on emotions, cuss words are sometimes the only thing to properly expound the emotion. And frankly, even I need to cuss every now and then.

Anyways, getting back to the thing at hand. A few days ago I was reminded that I started a webjournal a year ago, and never followed through on it. I'm not quite sure why, but I never did. Lately, I've also begun to read a few, very well written and interesting blogs. Thus on the way to work today, mulling over a possible columnist position with a website, I was struck dumb by an idea (Yes, yes, not far to go for me to be dumb). Why not update my personal page, updating and indexing the subpages I have and want to build, put up a place to archive my columns, and even further my personal blog. Hey, you doing the raspberry, pipe down!

As I said, this was an idea, and one I particularly like. And as stated above, it also produced a goal I had really, really, been wanting to obtain for most of my life, that is to finally become a "Writer". Not a hack, not an amatuer, but a real honest to god writer. So here we are.

Each day I'll be back to write something, anything at all. And just to be fair, the four major subjects will also be indexed seperately to provide a little spice (that and another simultaneous goal of learning a new html programming feature). As I move along, I might also adjust this main page to reflect the different columns. However, right now, I'll just use it as the springboard, and archive the rants/editorials/columns in there sub-sections.

For now, Pip-pip and all that jazz!