Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Realization No. 1

I am no blogger. I could go into an in-depth analysis of how I came to this realization ... but I am no blogger.

I should have kept my livejournal.

Monday, April 21, 2008

Monday's favorite expressions.

Roger dodger.
Bob is your uncle.

Can't say I know what either of them really mean, but...
Not the point is it?

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

The internets are trying to tell me something

The ad at the top of my g-mail page says: "10 reasons you shouldn't sleep with him." I did send an e-mail with a link to this, which could be reason number one. I didn't click to find out.
***
The wind was spooky last night, no? Like howling-at-the-door spooky. Those sounds they do in horror movies, those sounds are real and they were all over my apartment last night. Boo!
***
The wind also makes it hard to ride your bike. Or really easy. I get both on my way two block ride to and from work.
***
Reading, "Have a Nice Doomsday," this great little piece of non-fiction about evangelical Christians and how they love Isreal because it means Jesus can come back any time now. So, don't be fooled Jews of the world, America doesn't care about you, we just want to make sure we get a good seat for the Rapture.

***

Friday, April 11, 2008

BEST. WRITING. EVER.

I recieved this e-mail from my boss as a forward. It is hillarious. I so wish I'd come up with at least five these.

Every year, English teachers from across the USA can submit their collections of actual analogies and metaphors found in high school essays in order to have them published and sent out for the amusement of other teachers across the country. Recent winners:
1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.

2. His thoughts tumbled around inside his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.

3. He spoke with the kind of wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who goes blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. Coli, and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.

5. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like the sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.

7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.

8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine.

9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.

10. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.

11. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.

12. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling west at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at4:19 p.m. traveling east at a speed of 35 mph.

13. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth.

14. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.

15. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East River.

16. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.

17. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

18. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.

19. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

20. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.

Blogging

Do you remember when you realized you really don't have anything interesting to say?

I do.

It was yesterday.

Thursday, April 3, 2008

Journalisms

Yes, I pluralized it. It's what I do. I'm like 'Lil Kims that way.

So, I haven't thought much about journalism, or the institution of such, since I was in college, even though the word around the water cooler is that we're in some kind of "transitional" phase. Us newspaper types. Of course, I've never really thought of myself as a journalist. I'm definitely not a reporter. I am a writer. A staff writer. I work for a media company. Newspaper is an old term, it seems.

Anyway, me and a buddy are at lunch today and we start talking about journalism and how the role of the newspaper has changed, not changing, but changed. And that being said, how do we move forward. What is the "new" newspaper, and what will it look like. What will its business model be. That's assuming of course that people still want to receive information from a "qualified" news source, which could be questionable.

And suddenly I realized how "in the box" I am. I couldn't even image what this possible "new" media might look, or feel, or read. What I think about is the Internets and social-networking sites and the like. But that's all established stuff. This "new" thing is for sure going to come out of left field. And then I realized that there are people who really do think "outside the box." There are probably a whole crew of guys and gals mulling this problem over in all sorts of ways I can't even imagine. For instance: If 10 years ago someone said MySpace was going to revolutionize the way people communicated, would anyone thought anything of it? Because someone was probably saying it and a bunch of other people probably weren't listening.

I'm not sure there is a point here other than to question my deficency as a unique and independent thinking human. And my awe at those who are can through current issues toward the possibilites of the future. Like the science-fiction guys writing about 2012. Those dudes were smart.

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Listings.

Books: Something called Bad Monkeys. Sort of silly, but not bad. Before that The End of California. Before that Adverbs, by Lemony Snicket, or the guy who writes as Lemony Snicket.
Music: Cherry Red Records punk-rock-something-or-other. It's a collection of punk stuff from the late seventies, early 80s. After Blondie and the Ramones, but before the huge 80s hard-core punk-rock explosion. There a bunch of Dead Kennedys songs.
Movies: None. Last movie I saw was ... No Country For Old Men. It was good.
Television: New Adventures of Old Christine, Oprah's Big Give, Top Chef, America's Next Top Model.
Food: Mr. Mr. Sushi. The sport burrito from Robertito's. If I'm eating at home it's pasta or eggs. There's some flax-and-pumpkin granola cereal from Trader Joes that I'm loving these days.
Drink: Red beer (any Mexican beer mixed with hot sause), porter (any brewing co).
Work: Green Living, the Grizzlies section, Imagine Fresno, Fig Garden Villager, Fresno Famous
Off time: Bowling, Aikido, band practice, Creative Fresno, Biz, Shannon, badminton, Matt and Lauren, Smog City Roller Grrls