Stolen from Vincent

Captured here.

2009-01-23 : Making Stuff
Learned from Ben.

The first five people to respond to this post will get something made by me! My choice. For you.

This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:
1) I make no guarantees that you will like what I make;
2) It'll be done this year;
3) You have no clue what it's going to be. It could be anything but it will most likely be made of paper;
and
4) I will probably make something pretty nerdy.

If you post, you must agree to spread this sort of "meme" only if you actually want to, rather than paying attention to the instructions for spreading.

And ... Done!

A caveat to make this Willish:

You must mail me in addition to posting a comment, if a couple of weeks have gone by with no response in the comments thread for this.

Best,

Growing Pains

Being an open letter to those experiencing some vagaries of discomfort, having exceeded the design specifications of homo sapiens sapiens:

The body that clothes your soul, your sense of feeling and fact and your vehicle of physical expression, arose out of some specific pressures over a few million years. It historically is called upon to outrun wolves by fifty miles a day and outfight the tigers whose teeth are swords. It is strong to these tasks, and lives on--is fueled by--stories and meaning, meat and nuts and berries, beauty, kith and kin (these last called commonly your tribe).

Traditionally it has perished with use at the ripe old age of thirty and five. Having, by the by, a stomach full of intesinal parasites, a head empty of teeth and cruel, cold, practiced wisdom.

Therefore, if you have over or radically underused these capacities, it will not be unusual if your body's instruments, your feelings, tell you from time to time that something is terribly,terribly wrong. Something usually is.

And even if there isn't, your body thinks you need something to complain about just to keep in practice anyway.

Commercialism

http://www.goldsgym.com/golds/commercials.php

The first one, called Reps, is somehow immensely pleasing to me.

I imagine it's partly the melding of loveliness and determination in the woman, but the music is shockingly delightful to me as well.

Why He Isn't a Very Good Friend

I have only really really liked a few musicians' work. I remember having an immoderate love for Tchaikovsky when I was a child. I grew to love Bach, Stravinsky, and Rachmaninov.

Then I hit puberty. Five years passed, during which little of note to our story occured, and then there was Evanescence.

I had known folks who fanatically followed, who changed their lifestyles to reflect the culture of the band. I never thought I would even come close to that level of commitment.

Oh, but Amy Lee's wistful soprano made short work of that. Although I didn't ever change my lifestyle, so began and enduring love of goth girls.

Then a friend of mine introduced me to Andrew Peterson, an explicitly Christian poet and novelist, whose primary expression is writing terribly, wonderfully true songs.

More recently, an unfriend of mine pointed out Priscilla Ahn to me for



a listen. While I don't think she'll turn out to be quite as major as Andrew or Amy, she definitely appeals to my weakness for dark haired women who sing.

Which is why my friend Chris is a bad, bad man. No one should have a haunting temptress lowered on himm like a boom.

So beware of Chris Newton. He might introduce you to some winsome singer who alters your worldview.

New Words, Same Heard Voice(s)

I had no idea how self indulgent my identification with the Prince in Black might be until a good man was asking me about this space the last quarter of last year. Thus I must change my splash text for this blog.

I was reminded that is not, in fact, easy to be green the day before yesterday, and thus--

Old and bust3d:

Actually, the quote from Hamlet is:

If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart
Absent thee from felicity awhile,
And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain,
To tell my story.

New and shiny:

Being Subtitled: The Lovers, the Dreamers, and Me (link to song to follow)

One Thousand Hours

Either we see another day, or we don't.

I have fifty odd years to live, statiscally speaking. I should plan for that time; if I endure so long, the time will pass anyway whether I am intentional in my use of it or not.

A friend of mine started playing guitar when he was thirteen. He's thirty three now, and he estimates he's got 23,000 hours or so logged on guitar. It shows.

In one thousand hours I might:

*learn to please myself calligraphically
*finish the first draft of a novel
*write a cycle of sonnets or songs
*finish and produce a game, from soup to nuts (or apple to egg, as the Romans said)
*read a couple hundred novels
*watch all the movies I must for my Master's in Creative, as well as make my own forty minute film
*work half a year full time (40/168 h per week)

What could you do, if you started now?

Remember, you can't start, except where you are.