A Brief Reflection on Narrative

          Last week a gaming culture and media site did something every agency dreads. It broke narrative. I will not go into the specifics of the event, but I will use it as a way to jump into this commentary. Narrative is the story that news agencies want to tell you, or make you believe. Different news agencies have different narratives depending on which politician their sponsors have bought. Both left, and right wing news agencies do this. The events they choose to report on and filtered down to only those that fit their narrative, then they use dishonest rhetoric to sell it even further. The result being that unless you diversify your media intake between stations representing multiple interests, foreign and domestic, you're only being feed one sided propaganda. 

          Of course, nothing really matters. Huff Po, Fox, and MSNBC are the worst. None of us owes anyone else anything, and we all have to die someday. - Cheers

A Writer's Thoughts on The Mondays

Something that I've noticed in this year of 2015 is a sudden acceptance of Monday by several influential people. Say what you will about the Illuminati, but when people aren't content with the status quo they try their darnedist. Personally, as a writer, Mondays don't matter. They have always not mattered. I'm sorry Monday, I'm not trying to be rude.

Writing is an interesting profession, since you can do it everyday. I usually do a lot of writing on Sunday, because I'm bored, and go skateboarding on Monday. Not dreading any day of the week is pretty awesome. I can just flow from thing to the next, but then again I also loose track of the days, months, years, millennia etc. Spreading out work across several days is super helpful when it comes to stress, in general, so do that.

If some of you still hate the idea of Monday, here is a tip: don't. Also stop procrastinating, clean your house on the weekend, and yes the milk is spoiled, so get some more on Saturday. - Cheers

The Pain of Dyed Hair In Florida

          This one isn't going to be related to writing, but rather a journal of a personal struggle. I am one of those individuals who keeps my hair new and exciting colors. Right now, my hair is gradient of blue, so that's fun. This does come with a multitude of complications. For about the next week, until all the excess rinses out, the tub of my shower will look as if I had been committing ritual sacrifice of Smurfs.
          Another problem comes from my place of residence itself, Florida. Which is always hot, and is most accurately described as sweaty. I do not have my beloved Ford with me so I walk, or ride my skateboard to get around. This process leads to voluminous amounts of sweat. This little beads of despair like to carry dye that still sits on my scalp and transport them all over the freaking place. By the time i get to where I am going I have runoff in my ears, nose, eyes, and covering my face. I look like I was at the center of a blueberry themed frat house hazing, in that teal vomit is commonplace and it gets everywhere. Don't ask.

Screenwriter Plus Is A Hellhole

Screenwriters now have the ability to work on set, and during post in order to make to maintain a synergy between the script and the director's vision. While it is nice being able to see after the creative path of your baby project, it also leads to hours of pain and suffering. As I'm writing this, I'm sitting in a energy drink and cigarette filled editing office, learning about the "wonders" of working with raw footage in premiere. I don't mind the previously mentioned items, in fact I welcome them, but good lord, it's three in the morning,  and we haven't even got this thing looking like the short it's supposed to be. I plan on sleeping for the entirety of Monday, and just letting every DOP ever just destroy my beautiful babies. For now, I will flood my blood stream with Monster. Cheers, or whatever.

Regarding The Fact That I Hate Talking

          One thing thatI have noticed about myself, and I sincerely hope others will empathize with me on this one, is that I am the most awkward person I know when it comes to conversing. I can handle myself in groups of three or more, but that is only because I can bounce off of others, and interject whenever I have a joke, then remain quiet the rest of the time. One on one is where it gets weird. It probably has to do with anxiety, and my ADD, but I have no idea what to say most of the time. My go to phrase is, "that's dope, man", and that makes up about 70% of what I say on a daily basis. Other than that I mostly ramble on about unimportant subjects, and, afterwards, feel guilty about not shutting up. I find it much easier to put my thoughts to writing, but unfortunately this is not the 1800's, and I can not like myself away as a monk, and commune with the world only in letters.
          That being said, I do have a solid group of close friends that I can interact fairly normally with. I still prefer to listen though. Others peoples lives, and stories are fascinating. Taking time to listen to people connects us to them. In a sense it makes them more real. Their experience, emotions, and all the immaterial matter in them becomes tangible in their words. A lot of my creative work is inspired by others stories. I would encourage you to take time to listen to others, and just ask people about their day, and how they feel on a regular basis. Most people are fine with talking about themselves, and will actually appreciate a good listener. Connect yourself with others, and try to avoid saying "dope" on repeat, as I do.

Regarding Work Load And Schedules

          As a writer, it is common to maintain a steady job working in-house at a publication, while also freelancing. This can mean fighting to complete multiple projects within certain deadlines. There is a way to avoid this, however, and I call it constructive procrastination. Most people just call it a work order, but most people are dumb. In a certain cases, freelance work will not have a deadline that is set in stone. One should still try to complete the work as soon as possible, but one should also avoid burning oneself out. If one's attention is divided creativity will fade, the work will seem rushed, and there will more errors than Triple H has sledgehammers. Focus on the in-house work alone, get that done before its deadline, and take a break from writing. Giving one's creative side a rest will give one time to unconsciously work out plots, characters, and figure out where the story should go.
          I cannot tell you the amount of times I had put a project on the back-burner, and blasted out an analytical report, requisition form, or proposal, and then wrote half, or the last quarter of a project over night just because I was fresh creatively. I am currently doing just that. My upcoming novel accompaniment to Zardonic's AntiHero album is currently being postponed. During this time I am working on a serious of short stories, and scripts that will probably pop up on here. These will be around a 2000-4000 word count, so they should offer a quick read for your lunch break. I sincerely hope to hope to have at least the first act of the novel up for free on halloween. The rest will released in the novel's entirety as an ebook on Amazon, and other major ebook retailers. Cheers!

In Which I Complain About My Profession

          Writing schedules are a pain. While it is true that this an occupation that often times allows one to work from home, and keep the hours they choose, it also has some of the strictest deadlines. Some writers who have managed to land in-house jobs at publishers, studios, or magazines do maintain a nine-to-five work day, but they also have to spend most of their evenings either corresponding with other writers, working on their own projects, or, in most cases, both.
          Those who strictly write also have to take time to communicate with editors at these establishments since that provides them with updated deadlines, and suggestions to keep their work on track and in theme, but they also have to manage their own daily completion schedule on whatever it is they hope to have published. This is done by maintaining a word count, and it is the bane of my existence. A writer usually has an idea of how many words they want their work to be. Usually it's a rough estimate rounding up or down to the nearest ten thousand, or hundred thousand words. Then divide this by the number of days between now, and a week before you want to get it to your editor, (trust me you still won't have it done in time) and you have an idea of how many words you need to write each day. As a daily goal it's great, it serves as a simple, achievable goal to do whenever throughout the day. In most cases, however, your personally set deadline is a matter of weeks, and if you are doing anything bigger than a small novella, your word counts will give you carpal tunnel just by looking at them.
          God forbid you go grocery shopping, meet up with a family member, or do some dumb adult thing during the normal hours of the day. This will, most likely, cause you to stay up until two, one eye tracking the words you write, the other looking at your counter in the bottom of your screen. Sooner or later, we all go a little cross-eyed. For our editors who have to deal with similar problems, and maintain a nine-to-five schedule, my heart goes to out to you. Of course, most of us don't complain, without a little tongue-in-cheek. We have one of the best jobs in the world, we get to create worlds, and give people fun. This is something I, and many of my peers, are very passionate about.
          We usually lose track of time when writing, and I find myself, more often than not, going over my word count at three in the morning. This still does not mean the work gets done on time. Usually our visions are more grandiose than time permits. If you recall, or simply rotate your eyes to look at paragraph two, I said that it's good practice to set your personal deadline at least a week before your actual deadline. That week will be you frantically trying to tie up lose strings in the story, condensing and revising chapters, and giving your story a conclusion that doesn't feel as abrupt as it actually is. Of course the time for this varies. If it's a short fiction, or novella one to two weeks should suffice. If you have written a full novella, you may want to give yourself a month for damage control, as you probably forgot a character you introduced in chapter two by the time you wrote chapter five.
          This job is a lot of not sleeping. Whether you're writing comics, films, games, or books you will dedicate yourself to perfecting each work, while your publishers believe you can crap each one out in one night. It's an amazing ride though, so grab some coffee, find a place with a view, and start smashing your keyboard for weeks at a time.