All the world is a bore, y'know? That is the problem with my writing. It's not that it's bad, it's just bland. Like plain rice, it can nourish you, but surely not sustain you. I find when I try to avoid this nuisance, my writing sounds like "all punch lines". Not good. That might be why poetry appeals to me. Seems I can arrange some words well but not whole bodies of work. I can create a title in a second, and all the chapter names, but don't ask me to write the whole book. In childhood, I loved designing the worlds, environments, and dungeons in D & D and that's where it stopped. Hated actually creating the adventure and hated even more running it.

It's back to the 3 P's for me (pen, paper, practice). Stephen King is right: Story is more important than plot. I know I can overcome these stumbling blocks and write what I want to.

Back to D and D, check out the new Xbox game--played the demo. Very cool: D and D video game.

I just finished listening to the new CD Single of Reckoning Day (Don't Tread on Me) by Iced Earth with their new lead singer (my favorite and yours) Ripper Owens. Reckoning Day is great, sounds like Judas Priest on steroids. I guess you can say sometimes my musical tastes are like a favorite old shirt, I want something that fits well and looks good. Catch my drift? Music doesn't have to always be new but it does always have to sound good.

I'm suffering from the worst writer's block I've had in years right now. Working hard to keep the self doubt out. Isn't it funny how self destructive we humans are? Somehow, I can't picture a beaver getting pissed off. There's no screaming beaver shouting, "Fuck, this dam sucks! I'm never building a fucking 'nother one as long as I god-damn live!" But man does and he's usually throwing things while he does. Man hates everyone, especially himself. Perhaps, we aren't the most intelligent species or the most important.

I read somewhere that a blog is a living document--always changing and always evolving. My own personal journal could fit that description as well. In the future, I think I will be writing more about my personal experiences, travels, feelings, and thoughts because I am living too. And what else can we do but live?

Still thinking about that new 'From the Journals' entry until then keep dreaming your dream. I am and with it, I sleep good, I sleep tight.

-N-

(Now that was a good ending.)

Kurt Kobain's 'Journals' Paperback Edition Released With Never-Before-Seen Material

Add this to the Christmas list please.

Constantine/Hellblazer Movie Updatel

Good to see the movie is finally being made, but will it stand up to the graphic novels?

Charter airline barred from releasing Jackson tapes.

And the plot thickens, and thickens, as truth again proves stranger than fiction. Everyone knows that every charter jet contains two secret cameras...:)

I recently read that life is a journey in forgiveness. Perhaps I can forgive him, the day I forgive myself.

It is the sound that wakes in the middle of the night, the sound that blocks out every bump in the night, every thing else--the white noise of my dreams. Running through my head, the mania will not stop. Images flash at one thousand miles a second, pulse pounding--a marathon runner. No control of it. My calling is upon me, my mission is to write. There is no mistaking, there is no escaping. The head frequnency that blocks out all the others is this, I am attuned. Creativity is the god...let me be the priest...let us pray. Bow your heads--for only the guilty can be left behind-the ones that did not head the call, their talents now squandered. The White Noise of the Dream, the grey matter of the brain, are yours--use them as you will, use them as you might, or forever let them be lost to you. So sayeth the Source, so sayeth the flock. It is the intensity of the sound of my future.

The Pico Phoenix: The Homepage of Kevin Leong

Very cool site that appears to still be under construction.

Another interesting product review from Kickstart. I have had a lot of inclinations over the years of starting by own business, perhaps this product can help me. Here's the review:

"I've been very unfair to Rebecca Hagel this weekend. I
asked her to 'introduce herself' to Kickstart, but gave
her no idea of what I wanted.

She's risen to the occasion brilliantly, as I knew she
would, and has given us a short 'meet the author'
paragraph or two.

It is always fascinating to read what got people
started, and what motivates them to keep going. Becky
is a really powerful writer - her books and courses are
packed with information but read as if she is right
there in the room with you.

So, over to Rebecca Hagel:

"By training I am an Evolutionary Biopsychologist, but
I started working online while I was still in
psychology grad school.

The first money I made online was selling bayonets on
eBay. This sprang from a hobby of collecting bayonets.
My Significant Other informed me I was spending way too
much money on bayonets, so by necessity I started
selling them on. Figured out how to buy low and sell
high - and the business was born.

Of course, I only really started making money online
when I stopped chasing the money and started crafting
products and sites based around my hobbies and
interests.

For a while I worked as a marketer at an online casino
down in Costa Rica. This led to a whole world of
opportunity as I carved out a niche for myself in the
world of online gambling.

About four years ago I noticed something peculiar, or
at least peculiar to my mind at the time. People talked
of wanting to start a business, create a website,
and/or write a book. Six months later you would talk to
these same people, and they had the same inspirations.
Another six months, and they're still not doing what
they aspire to do.

At that time, I wanted to create a web business and I
did. In fact, I pretty much had one up within a few
weeks after first contemplating the idea. So I found
myself asking - why did so many people stumble and make
excuses instead of seriously, honestly reaching for
their goals?

As it turns out, it's pretty common. All sorts of fears
and 'ailments' abound, from fear of failure to analysis
paralysis. I also discovered that all these stumbling
blocks on the road to success could be overcome.

A combination of my thinking about these problems and
my own steps to overcoming them have led to my writing
The Essential Business Success Package. I figured if I
could overcome the blocks that held me back in various
aspects of my life, anyone could. And in fact, I've
helped several people go from a place of inaction, to
putting the wheels in motion on their dreams. It's
really exciting for me to share these moments with my
clients and friends as they move towards their goals.

The first part of the package, "How to Unlock Your
Potential to Succeed" gets people started. But I felt
that many 'how to do it' courses leave people looking a
bit like cartoon characters running off a cliff -
suspended in midair, feet moving at top speed, but
making no headway. They fall because they don't have
the necessary business knowledge to move forward.

That's why "The Beginner's Guide to Marketing and
Making Love" is the second course in my package. It's
designed to put a solid foundation under the reader, so
when they start running with their business idea, they
have something to run on."


Thanks Becky. It is always good to see a flash of the
real person behind the by-line.

You can read a lot more about Rebecca Hagel's
'Essential Business Success Package' at this link:
http://www.kickstartdaily.com/recommends/hagel.htm

I'm part way through reading it right now and am very
impressed so far!"

Comdex hosts robotic petting zoo

I'm archiving this link for future reference especially with some ideas I have for my Opus Magnum "Synaptic". "There will be a day when PDA stands for Personal Droid Assistant"...that's the first line of the article...check it out. Consumer robots may be on store shelves by Xmas 2004.

Authorities await Jackson's surrender

I want to know how I can negotiate my surrender with the police instead of them kicking my ass and throwing the hand cuffs on? I guess money does buy everything. There's trouble in Neverland again for the man who never grew up.

Now, did he do it? Does Michael Jackson have a fetish for young boys? Who knows? Jackson is clearly not a stable man, and he had the great Johnny Cochran defending him the last time. His tabloid antics are a never ending source of amusement, but just because the guy is weird is he guilty? With all the money he has one can't help but wonder if ulterior motives aren't abounding. Only time will tell, only time will tell.

U.N. details al Qaeda threat

Perhaps our government will realize Al Qaeda is still a threat, and Bin Laden remains at large. Perhaps not.

As I watched the news today, two headlines were about terrorist attacks, one headline was about an American military casualty in Iraq, and still another one about Bush's trip to England where he is of course defending our invasion of Iraq. As I read CNN.com this morning, I found this link, and another one about a tourist being killed by a Palestinian gunman.

The pattern is overwhelming. We are at war. A war some say was preordained, but if it wasn't. it seems it's a self fulfilling prophecy. Make no mistake, the stakes of this war are high: everything America is.

America soon to be land of the not so free.

On Sunday, I began reading yet another autobiography of a writer. This time the writer is Isaac Asimov and the book is "I.Asimov: A Memoir". Time will remember Isaac as one of the most prolific giants of modern day literature. The book weighs in at a hefty 572 pages and is actually his 3rd autobiography, the first two combined were over 640,000 words! It was Isaac who said, "I write for the same reason I breathe, because if I didn't I would die." I'll let you know more about the book when I finish it but so far I can say this, the book is divided into 166 chapters and each chapter talks about an event in his life, a person he met, or an opinion, for example. It is not chronological and the events are secondary to his thoughts as the introduction states. The 20 chapters I've read so far have conjured images in my mind just as a great novel would. Isaac died two years after completing the book.

Talking about the book reminds me of the Navy commercial with the line, "If someone wrote a biography of your life...would anyone want to read it?" Point taken.

In today's Bad Signal, Warren mentioned an idea that I think is great: "Christmas, as those in societies who celebrate it will be horribly aware, is now some five weeks away. Do me a favor this year. Grab your Yellow Pages and find a local charity that provides the children of homeless families with presents. If you're anything like me, you've got a stack of books, comics and graphic novels that you neither need nor want. Sort out the kid-safe ones and get them to that charity. You'd be doing a good thing." He's right you would, and I think I will.

I've been wanting to mention this for a while and my comments from Warren lead perfectly into this. My charity of choice is called Feed the Children. Here's a link: Feed the Children. I won't preach to you, I'll only say that God loves children and they help take care of them--both here and abroad. Isn't it a shame, that in the richest nation in the world, we have to have organizations like this helping Americans? But that's a topic for another time.

I've been reading, writing, and journaling a lot lately. I know I am on the cusp of something great but I'm not quite sure what that is yet. Making plans to take some more writing classes, to read all I can, buy some writing books, and most importantly practice.

I had to laugh. Last night, a friend said to me and my wife: "You guys and your books!" After I mentioned that I was about to go and read for a half hour before I went to bed. I guess her comment summons it up. If you don't read, you can't appreciate how enjoyable it is. I read every night before I go to bed, and I mean every night.

I am thinking about focusing on my poetry writing more because it seems to be what I have a natural talent for.

I've said many things in this post and we're still not "caught up" however I need to spend a little time with my kids now. I'll be posting some more later in the week. I have so much to say and I am itching to do another "From The Journals" entry.

Be well and dream your dream because no one else will.

-N-

Why Computers Are Screwed Up

Andy Rooney is at it again and he's absolutely right. I just kick mine when it upsets me. I like to kick things. Don't know if it fixes the problem but I sure feel a lot better...:)

Coleco Adam

Lately, I have been reminiscing about the things of my youth. The Adam was my first computer system which of course was discontinued about a year after I purchased it. It was an expansion of the Coleco Video Game console and The Basic language contained within was Applesoft compatible. I have very fond memories of programming it with my next door neighbor Terry, who also had one. The Adam was so technilogically advanced it had a built in word processor and a cassette tape drive that was searchable. LOL...a cassette drive. And look out if you're printer went down all the memory was contained within it! Those were the days!

Funny thing is there are quite a few websites out there still dedicated to Adam. And there is an even an annual Adam convention.

Speaking of programming, we used to get alot of our programs out of a magazine called Family Computing. They would list the same BASIC language program (for example a simple skiing game) for Adam, Apple IIe, Vic 20, TI-99 4a, IBM PC, and the Commodore 64. Too bad something like that doesn't still exist, I learned a lot about computers that way.

My friend Scott and I used to program our own games as well. We programmed a great Craps game and a knock off of Kaboom amongst others. Perhaps, I should learn BASIC again. All these great memories flooding back into my head, just by remembering my first computer.

Archon: Evolution

Free Fall has been working on this for sometime but hopefully soon a new Archon game will be released. Archon was one of the greatest games ever created for the Commodore 64. The premise of Archon is this: You have a chess type board and instead of jumping your opponents, you have to fight them (literally). The best part of the game for me, was having the black pieces which included a 'shape shifter'. Your shifter turned into whatever piece he was fighting, that was great.

Welcome to the World of Drake




Just finished the demo for Drake the Game. Excellent, this game goes to the top of my Xbox wish list. It's a comic book come to life, and you've never played a comic book before. Website includes a PDF comic book for downloading.

To answer your question: "No, I've never loved someone so much that I
cried. However, I did love someone so much that I buried her in my
back yard."

Kickstart Daily Online

Kickstart is a great inspirational newsletter and website. Though the publisher's products are more toward Internet marketing, his inspirational articles will inspire anyone. They inspire me frequently. I've been thinking about an Internet business possibly in the future. Something revolving around the 'niches' of sci-fi and/or comics. Anyway found this review of Martin's interesting. Down the road I might purchase 'Strike it Niche' though his affiliate link.

From Kickstart Daily by Martin Avis:

I was sitting up in bed last night, unable to get to
sleep, wondering what to do next with my Internet
business, and found myself unusually devoid of ideas.

Blame the fact that I'd spent 12 hours straight on my
annual accounts for sapping my inspiration.

My bedside cabinet is like a mini library - filled with
books, ebooks, magazines and note on all kinds of
things. I rummaged around and found a print-out of
Michael J. Holland's ebook, 'Strike it Niche'.

Although I've read the book through a couple of times,
and skimmed it on other occasions, it is one of those
books that has so much in it that you just don't take
it all in.

Briefly, the book is a collection of 70 niche market
ideas that Michael has researched. He has identified
keywords, affiliate programs and opportunities for an
incredibly wide array of niches that people are
actively searching on, but that have few people
actively marketing.

Well to cut a long story short, I opened the book at
random and suddenly found myself engrossed. A niche
market that I'd read about several times and ignored
suddenly seemed to make a huge amount of sense to me.

I read the chapter twice, made a few notes, and tried
to go to sleep. But more ideas started to flow -
stimulated by the seeds that 'Strike it Niche' had
planted.

Eventually I did get to sleep, but only to wake up
again at 5:45 this morning when I couldn't wait to get
started - I've already registered a domain name and
arranged hosting, planned the broad structure of the
website and written an article to go on it.

There is nothing hard about what I've done, and
hopefully, in few days I'll have a fully functional
website up and running. In a few weeks I should start
to see traffic, and shortly after that I fully expect
to see the beginnings of another automatic income
stream.

And all because I couldn't sleep last night.

'Strike it Niche' is definitely inspirational - I can
attest to that - if you read it with an open mind, your
subconscious will mull it all over and present you with
wonderful opportunities.

Give it a try - you only have to take action to
succeed!

Five hot things happening in entertainment

I guess it all depends on your definition of hot. I wanna know how I can get a gig writing things like this, 'cus where ever that gig is...I'm there.

- The Revolution that saved Rock

I can't confess to be a fan of punk, Nobius is more of a thrash man personally. However, I have always respected the fact that true Punk did what it wanted to. That spirit is sadly missing from music today. It's time for another revolution.

CNN.com - Takei treks back to WWII internment camp

I did not know Takei of Star Trek was relocated to two different Japanese internment camps when he was a child. It's a scary thought and something we may see again if we get hit in another 9-11 style attack.

While reading this, I couldn't help but think, the only attrocities men commit that are worse then the ones committed against our neighbors, are the ones committed against our own children. Not sure where that connection came from. How sick am I?

I've been the queen, man....
I've been a royal mother fucker.
Little princess turned her back on Daddy
then on the rest of the family.
Juiced up for life,
I pour it out--
So you can suck me dry
In this fairy tale wrong.
Ain't no knights or magic spells,
Just this needle of dope with
My willingness to get high.
Shootin' it up --spittin' it out,
My Prince Alarming (never Charming) is a crack dealer on Burnaby street.
Our kingdom-an abandoned bus shelter,
in a hollow of a town,
where I'm a burned out horror
In a fairy tale wrong.
Rumplestiltskin--give it all back.

I've been playing with Free Find to get it to look at individual entries. What a waste of time. It will look at my blog as whole pages but if I try to look at it in indivdual posts I get some error message about my robots.txt?? Look, if I wanted to be a web master I would of taken up HTML in college, I just want to write on a BLOG that looks good and runs like a real website. Back to the drawing boards...as they say.

Miss Digital World

And more and more each day I see William Gibson's Idoru coming to life.

Running naked through fields of glass
wearing only Mommy's blue shoes.
With shards falling
life's cuts start bleeding so I stitch the wounds.
I start needing so I stitch the past.
Holding the hair of that gentle lass,
holding my dear daughter love.
In every conversation with every breath,
we fight--
driving ninety dead-on toward the wall of you.
Blinding crash, bloody wreck
to feel free, to be free.
From you.
In the afermath of our lives, she said to to me,
"Putting yourself together, pulling yourself up is the hardest part of getting up."
And-Oh My God-it was sealed in your eyes,
sealed in those lies,
that look before leaping without looking back.
With empty noose hanging, to angels you went.
Jimmy's toy blocks, toy blocks tumbling with but one breath
My baby boy cries.

I picked up the Neil Gaiman Endless Nights Special two days ago at the comic shop. I'm saving my pennies for the actual book, the Special being a preview. It contains Dream's first ever story "The Heart of a Star"--chronologically speaking. The unique thing about the story was that events in the Green Lantern mythos start here. According to the preface there are also beginnings to stories that take place in Superman and The Books of Magic...but I didn't figure those out. The preview was great, hope to get my hands on the real thing soon.

The ink - it cries -it sobs-
penning tears, running on to fingers
spilling the heart onto the page.

This is for the living, not the dead
my penning of tears
my writing of words
a torture of me.

I am creating worlds,
Bringing life out of thought
and nothingness
head form to image.

If only my thought could bring you back.

It is a sad pen I hold today,
missing you
crying ink
kissing the paper
pressing against the pain
spilling the heart onto the page.

ABC Jesus special

Some people say that a man is an animal, a mammal, an evolved beast. Nobius has a different take. The thing that sets humans apart from any other creatures is religion. Man is a spiritual being, we can't help ourselves. We have more religions and beliefs then we know what to do with. The above link is a news article about a show that sets forth the theory Jesus and Mary Magdalene may have been married. There's a book based on the premise called the 'Davinci Code.' It still leaves me wondering. Who is and who was Jesus and does it matter? Everyone has a different answer...I mean everyone. Think about your answer a while and tell me what you think by leaving a comment. It could be an interesting conversation. Too bad we can't dial down the center and ask Him. Instead we were given faith. Or lack thereof.
In a few days, I'll tell you what I think.

And now the stew is blue....

If at first you don't succeed...try and try again. Looks better now, think I'll keep it, can't seem to get the outline of the rabbit to turn blue though...

I'd like to get this rabbit into my daily posts but I can't seem to get it to look good.

BigJoy.com

Just when you thought I'd run out of weird sh** on the web for you. Actually this one is a good idea. Big Joy is just that, she's big and she's named Joy. Just open your check book and Joy will show up at your party as one of her colorful characters including Pig Bundy, Whippin' Wanda, or my favorite Chunkerbelle. Note to wife: don't get any ideas.

My live has passed me by,
No pulse, I'm not alive.
Can't feel you
Can't feel anything.
Cold.
Bring the blackness on.
Back then
I said, "I'm not afraid to die."
Now, we see.
Now, we see.

Warren Ellis's NATURE article

I like to consider myself an 'information broker' when it comes to looking things up on the Internet...but even this one eluded me. Check it out. It's a story about human life in the future.