While the ever-in-progress novel does command some of my attention, I have also completed some other projects recently, and have others in the beginning stages as well.
1) Another Temporary Export - this book utilizes my 2011-2012 article series from "The Noise", detailing my March 2011 trip to Italy and Greece. In the book, I make a few minor edits and add some new pics.
2) Last of the Angst - a "reprint" of an unpublished book of free-verse poetry I bubbled out between 1999-2000. Upon a reread, I find, while I have moved beyond many of the themes within, they still resound as universal human themes and ideologies in some cases, pure neuroses in others.
3) The Stew - a second volume of these free-verse poems and babblings from the same timeframe as Last of the Angst.
I currently have two other books in the works:
4) Untitled 2013 trip journal - this is in the same vein as #1 (Another Temporary Export), detailing my trip to Europe in 2013. It was never written up as an article series, but will likely follow the same pattern as the first book (and hopefully be as interesting!)
5) ghosts. - this book details my start into the odd pursuit of dead towns, my friends who joined me along the way, and some sights that disappeared into memory since I last witnessed them.
Anyone who wishes to purchase these books will be able to find them on Amazon.com in their physical form, on blurb.com in either hard copy or PDF, and at least one of them on the Apple iBook store in ebook form.
I appreciate all who have helped me to spread the word on these, and hope to crank out more interesting stuff in the future. Keep an eye out here for any news on current/new projects.
Thursday, December 1, 2016
Tuesday, April 26, 2016
New approach and old bullshit
The old project, which to date hasn't burgeoned as hoped (or at all, really), has been shelved in a sense. Some players remain, while the game plan is up for complete redefinition.
Everyone is "very busy" -- i.e. surfing Facebook for self-empowerment memes and recipes for chocolate no-bakes and plugging their own half-baked projects for ever-valuable "likes". A communal non-community, it doesn't encourage conversation with all, sporting instead an algorithm that separates people into small cliques like a global high-school. A remote server's arithmetic processor decides whose input you'll see, and who will see you. Never mind the fact that it is set up to discourage real discourse, instead formatting itself in a way that encourages small "sound bites". The mobile interface, which is by far the main interface for most, does not make it easy to witness those topics/media that others post which may take the reader away from the Facebook newsfeed, so most quality content - what little there really is - always goes unnoticed. Facebook is like baby food for the brain, easily consumed and flavorless. Great nourishment for the infant, but sorely lacking in adult-level nutrition.
There are many well-meaning folks who use it for a bulletin board to spread useful information, but these articles almost always get ignored in favor of click-bait "EPIC AWESOME ULTIMATE TAKEDOWN OF..." blah blah blah. Or middle-aged women trying to rediscover their self-worth after ending a long-term relationship, via you-are-worth-it memes and i-don't-need-no-man-or-whatever memes. Or men posting up gun or beer pics and American flags and other supposedly manly things. Or aging intellectuals talking about how "simple" the world used to be. Or the fuck-you-I-won't-do-whatcha-tell-me crowd. Or the facebook-sucks crowd (this writer included). Or the forty-somethings who endlessly note how "crazy" they are on the weekends, which means two weak mixed drinks and a lot of bad karaoke.
Typing more than twenty words is done with the sole expectation that no one will read it, not really. We're very busy eating, facebooking, netflixing, working multiple shitty service-industry jobs, sleeping off our bad blood sugar. Passive-aggressively sniping at the reality we created (did I hit the bullseye?) We turn our blind eyes to the rich folk raping our lands to line their overfilled pockets, posting up memes that verbalize our horror so we can imagine ourselves involved in a solution. We mock each other for our political differences, justify our violent solutions, defend old and tired ideas because we've grown up with them unquestioningly.
We tie our notions of religion to identity and fail to speak through kindness, instead panicking and lashing out at anyone who holds a different view. If we don't lash out with hateful words, we lash out with condescending ones. We forget what it means to be a channel of peace, opting instead to be a victim (of our inflexible, untenable ideologies). We use our concepts of a universal Source to condemn one another, or for some, the conviction that there is no creative source to mock those who envision one.
I'm just trying to create a fantasy world and some characters to walk through it. To fiendishly use them as a conduit for my old ideas or questions or concerns. But maybe I don't fear much of anything. Maybe I know what my big, umbrella answer is to all of man's problems -- look at them from the moon. Can't see a single one? And just imagine how much farther the universe stretches. From that perspective, man is very insignificant. The earth will not be destroyed by man's carelessness; man will only alter nature to a point where human life is unsustainable. And nature will move on from their in its own way, well rid of a problem.
So, with all this to consider, what story does one tell? And, in my experience, how do I get one to read it anyway? Enthusiasm for new material vs. Having to actually read the material, that's the usual (majority, not total) response. So it can't be for them. But do I need it for me?
Everyone is "very busy" -- i.e. surfing Facebook for self-empowerment memes and recipes for chocolate no-bakes and plugging their own half-baked projects for ever-valuable "likes". A communal non-community, it doesn't encourage conversation with all, sporting instead an algorithm that separates people into small cliques like a global high-school. A remote server's arithmetic processor decides whose input you'll see, and who will see you. Never mind the fact that it is set up to discourage real discourse, instead formatting itself in a way that encourages small "sound bites". The mobile interface, which is by far the main interface for most, does not make it easy to witness those topics/media that others post which may take the reader away from the Facebook newsfeed, so most quality content - what little there really is - always goes unnoticed. Facebook is like baby food for the brain, easily consumed and flavorless. Great nourishment for the infant, but sorely lacking in adult-level nutrition.
There are many well-meaning folks who use it for a bulletin board to spread useful information, but these articles almost always get ignored in favor of click-bait "EPIC AWESOME ULTIMATE TAKEDOWN OF..." blah blah blah. Or middle-aged women trying to rediscover their self-worth after ending a long-term relationship, via you-are-worth-it memes and i-don't-need-no-man-or-whatever memes. Or men posting up gun or beer pics and American flags and other supposedly manly things. Or aging intellectuals talking about how "simple" the world used to be. Or the fuck-you-I-won't-do-whatcha-tell-me crowd. Or the facebook-sucks crowd (this writer included). Or the forty-somethings who endlessly note how "crazy" they are on the weekends, which means two weak mixed drinks and a lot of bad karaoke.
Typing more than twenty words is done with the sole expectation that no one will read it, not really. We're very busy eating, facebooking, netflixing, working multiple shitty service-industry jobs, sleeping off our bad blood sugar. Passive-aggressively sniping at the reality we created (did I hit the bullseye?) We turn our blind eyes to the rich folk raping our lands to line their overfilled pockets, posting up memes that verbalize our horror so we can imagine ourselves involved in a solution. We mock each other for our political differences, justify our violent solutions, defend old and tired ideas because we've grown up with them unquestioningly.
We tie our notions of religion to identity and fail to speak through kindness, instead panicking and lashing out at anyone who holds a different view. If we don't lash out with hateful words, we lash out with condescending ones. We forget what it means to be a channel of peace, opting instead to be a victim (of our inflexible, untenable ideologies). We use our concepts of a universal Source to condemn one another, or for some, the conviction that there is no creative source to mock those who envision one.
I'm just trying to create a fantasy world and some characters to walk through it. To fiendishly use them as a conduit for my old ideas or questions or concerns. But maybe I don't fear much of anything. Maybe I know what my big, umbrella answer is to all of man's problems -- look at them from the moon. Can't see a single one? And just imagine how much farther the universe stretches. From that perspective, man is very insignificant. The earth will not be destroyed by man's carelessness; man will only alter nature to a point where human life is unsustainable. And nature will move on from their in its own way, well rid of a problem.
So, with all this to consider, what story does one tell? And, in my experience, how do I get one to read it anyway? Enthusiasm for new material vs. Having to actually read the material, that's the usual (majority, not total) response. So it can't be for them. But do I need it for me?
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