The Days Just Seem Shorter
Mood:  cheeky
Topic: Life in General

There's never nothing going on. That's a line from a favorite film of mine called "Peaceful Warrior," with Nick Nolte. This was also based on a book by Dan Millman. In the book (and film) Millman describes his recovery from a motorcycle accident that shattered his leg. At the time Millman was a gymnast competing for a spot in the Olympics. But the recovery was not only a physical one. With the aid of a garage mechanic/guru (Nolte) Millman learns about the value of things in life as he is guided on a spiritual quest of mind and body healing.

The days are 24 hours for everyone. What you do in those 24 hours is up to you.

92° today. It's been in the 90s for the last few days. But, as my friend Chris says, you don't have to shovel heat, so I'll take it.

Finished a story the other day. Reading, working on a novel, editing, writing articles for medleyville. If I stop to look at it my life is not too bad. There are others who have it worse, much worse. Too many things to do, too little time. 

Carpe Diem. 

Batteries Recharged
Mood:  energetic
Topic: Writing
I've had a lot of time on my hands, mixing fun and work. Compartmentalize, someone told me. I've decided to edit some old manuscripts, work on some stories and for some reason some poetry has been popping into my head. Reading T.S. Eliot has helped get me going. Finding a lot of old friends on facebook has been fun. I have to avoid distractions and concentrate on upgrading some of my graphics skills. I've also gotten out of the habit of exercising due to the harsh winter and the incessant rain. Soon it will be jogging weather and I'll be sucking wind running down the sidewalk 1.25 miles to the RR tracks and back again. Don't die with your music still in you, as Dr. Dyer says. Got to get to work now.

HOLIDAY HANGOVER
Mood:  blue
Now Playing: The Year in Review

Why do we need all these "Year in Review" articles? Didn't we all live through these events, or have we forgotten and need someone else to remind us (in their own skewed fashion) what happened. Is our collective memory that bad? Well, maybe so ... Also, I'm tired of all the Top Ten Lists. Who cares, really? They just exist to create divisiveness.

Anyway, to sum up my year I watched a ton of movies, visited some museums (Tim Burton at MOMA), read far too few books, took some courses at a local Community College, wrote some stories, edited some stories, wrote next to nothing on my new novel, saw Lewis Black perform in Princeton (too funny), visited Poe's house in Philly in honor of the bicentennial of his birth, saw a great play called "Dead Ringer" at a small theater in Long Branch, saw "Waiting for Godot" with John Goodman and Bill Irwin in NYC and enjoyed the trials and tribulations of someone who is in general dissatisfied with life at this point. As Samuel Beckett says: "We go on..."

BEST SHOW ON TV
Mood:  chillin'
Now Playing: FRINGE
Topic: Art and Culture

Currently the best show on TV is FRINGE (FOX-TV) on Thursday nights. It just started it's second season and it's worth checking out. If you can rent/buy the first season on DVD then you'll be ahead of the game.

If it sounds like an X FILES rip-off you might be right, but this show has more heart and a better cast. FRINGE is a division of the FBI responsible for tracking unusual incidents that fit a certain "pattern" of abnormal activity. The shows deal with paranormal activity, psychokinesis and a lot of other big words that are splayed across the opening credits of the show. Things get weird and downright scary in some episodes as the agents track a terrorist organization known as ZFT that may be responsible for genetic manipulations in the populace. There's also a sinister corporation called Massive Dynamic helmed by none other than Leonard Nimoy (with an assist by Altered States' Blair Brown). There are a lot of references to old films and TV shows of the past that spark some homages for people with a vast history of television. The cast is wonderful. Australian actress Anna Torv leads the group as Olivia Dunham, an FBI agent who may have been experimented on in the past as a child. The only person who may know is Dr. Walter Bishop, who has just spent 17 years in a mental hospital and is now released uunder the care of his son, a globe-trotting shady entrepreneur who has been enlisted in the group under duress (or maybe it's just a good place to hide from his enemies). John Noble as Walter is a treat to watch. He's so out of touch with social norms that there's a certain naive quality to him, but his past hides a much darker side that he is trying to repress. There are a lot of skeletons in the respective closets of the main characters to explore. Lance Reddick as FBI chief Broyles is benevolent and sinister at the same time and Kirk Acevedo as Olivia's partner is a cornerstone of humanity and Olivia's right hand man until a shapeshifter took over his body. Oh yes, and that's not all ...

ART THAT INSPIRES
Mood:  a-ok
Topic: Art and Culture

The Wounded Muse
Mood:  don't ask
Topic: Art and Culture
The recent article in Vanity Fair magazine about James Frey has my blood boiling. Here's a kid from a wealthy family who got his foot in the door of the publishing industry and thought he could get away with writing a fictionalized memoir. He lied about his so-called exploits. Let me say this again: He lied. And they weren't little lies. They were big ones. He lied about being in jail while his girlfriend committed suicide. He ws not in jail when this happened. He turned his back on someone who needed help.

Me, Myself & I
On Jan. 13th I attended the new Edward Albee play, "Me, Myself & I," a brilliant absurdist comedy by the world's preeminent playwright. The story concerns twin brothers and their attempt to establish their own identities and trying to over come a control-freak mother (played well by Tyne Daly). The highlight of the show is Brian Murray, as a doctor who is more of a comic observer on the bizarre proceedings. Murray is in fine form and perfectly in tune with Albee's sense of the absurd. Echoes of Pirandello and Beckett abound in this existential farce, well acted and directed. And the ending is a hoot. Recommended.

Underwater Photography
Mood:  a-ok
Topic: Art and Culture

In The Humdrum
Mood:  not sure
Monotony is the enemy. As Beckett says: "I can't go on. I'll go on."

Art and Culture 2008
Mood:  chatty
Topic: Art and Culture
I'll try not to make this diatribe long. The thing that usually ticks me off at this time of year is the AA nominations. Sure, sometimes they get it right, nominating Javier Bardem and Viggo Mortensen, as well as the Coen Brothers for "No Country For Old Men." NCOM was the BEST film of the year. Well acted and written, it was a dark view of contemporary life (although the film was set in 1980) about a battle of good vs. evil that ws slowly being won by the black hats. Tommy Lee Jones (always brilliant) is the wise old sage sheriff who is more appalled at what has happend to this country than he appears to be intyerested in finding the killer (Bardem).