Saturday, July 26, 2008

Open Doors, Last Days

I'm officially done Open Doors today, so it is now time to lie back and cool down until it's time to go to Revel Coffee for tonight's open mike. I'm reading a poem I wrote recently, and which I think is pretty good, maybe one of the best things I've ever written. I'm seriously considering on becoming a poet. At least if I don't write much poetry my prose can have a poeticness about it.
Open Doors was getting pretty depressing and tiresome towards the end. My family was nice enough to come over on Wednesday and we went out to dinner. We also went to Generation X, which is an independent video store much like the Giant Squid of memory. I got The Third Man, which I havn't seen since the Giant Squid closed, and Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, which is a pretty good movie. But the whole Open Doors thing was getting to be tiresome and stressful.
But it was only after supper when I began to feel alone. Ironically, I was with the other people when I felt most lonely. I was having supper on the last day with three other kids and I felt like I was on the outside of the conversation. It made me feel very sad, because I couldn't really connect with these people. I felt a bit sad and went back to Ron Eydt, where I called my parents to see if I could come home, which is what I did. It was good that I lasted as long as I did though, because four days was all I needed to stay for because I don't have any classes on Fridays.

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Open Doors, Days Two & Three

It's been a busy three days and no mistake. I have just spent most of my time running across the campus figuring out where everything is and how the library works. Today I freaked out from all the stress I had to skip most of the day, which was basically a lecture and how to use computers. I'll figure out the whole computer thing later. Now I just have to wait her at Ron Eydt until Friday when I get all the preliminary stuff out of the way.
It was amazing how tired and frustrated I got in such a short time. It's a bit worrying, as I'll have to put up with this for September, when I'll basically not be doing much of anything except this kind of stuff. Also, I havn't written anything of importance except some blog posts since Sunday, which is worrying. I'll try writing later today, but I don't know if I'll be able to update the ol' word meter until later.
On another note, I got a book from the University Bookstore. It's The Metatemporal Detective, by Michael Moorcock. It's a book of pulp-adventure/detective stories based on an old Victorian era detective named Sexton Blake, but since it's by Michael Moorcock there's airships and mentions of other Michael Moorcock books and stuff like that. It's pretty good, and apparently there's a none-to-flattering parody of George Bush and Dick Cheney somewhere. I havn't read it yet, but it's a pretty nice little book I have here anyways.

Monday, July 21, 2008

Open Doors, Day One

Hey faithful readers. I'm currently typing this from Ron Eydt village at the University of Waterloo. Thanks to my status as a person of autism, I am now on a week long program to get me used to the idea of university. I'm living in a dorm, going to various places and learning the ins and outs of U of W. This program is called Open Doors because it's suppose to Open the Doors of University.
So far I have to say that this is a real cool place. They have swimming pool, and a seven floor library which I'm going to check for ancient alchemical texts, a used bookstore on campus and a pub called the Bomber that has open mike nights on Mondays. Unfortunately there aren't any open mike nights in summer, but they will start in September so I'll probably drop by and read some poetry or bits of a novel.
The only problem is that I am starting to feel a bit nervous. I'm spending the night with strange people in a strange place. The bed isn't that comfortable either. I got a lot of familiar stuff, Ralph, my Ipod, On the Road and The Name of the Rose, as well as some poetry by William Blake and Arthur Rimbaud. I picked up the complete works of Arthur Rimbaud at Chapters on Saturday, and will be reading it over the summer.
I'll be updating you on the whole Open Doors thing as I go. I'll post in tomorrow with how things are going. There is a chance that I'll be playing some Dungeons and Dragons while I'm here, but at the moment I'm just going to get my barrings.

Orlando Morningstar

Orlando Morningstar is a character who I've been going over in my mind for a long time. She sort of evolved out of an alter-ego for me in the 1960's story (she was a guy named Roland then). After that it sort of went, what if I was a girl? So that lead me to create Orlando Morningstar, a lesbian with Aspergers Syndrome in 1960's America. For some reason I decided she'd be an albino, because albinism is kind of cool and science fiction writer.

I've only just realized how much I've put poor Orlando up for. If you haven't gotten that I'll enunciate. She's a LESBIAN with ASPERGER'S SYNDROME in THE SIXTIES. Lesbianism isn't yet as socially acceptable as it is today, and Asperger's Syndrome hasn't even been identified yet. I've already decided she's spent time in an insane asylum, because it would impossible for her to not have. Eventually she will get out and write various cult science fiction novels that will be adopted by the hippies and gay liberation and feminism. Besides that she also has a secret life involving conspiracy theories, sorcerers and all kinds of other weird stuff, because she lives in my fictional world where this sort of thing is normal. Her father is more or less a rouge angel, her lover his a voodoo priestess and her friends are druids, beatnik prophets and circus freaks.

The other thing about Orlando is that I want to give her some credibility as a lesbian. I think I can do this, but I don't know what people will think of a straight male writing about a gay female, even if this character is more or less a female version of me. I suppose I really shouldn't care what people think, but I want to give her at least some credibility as a lesbian in her time and space, even if she lives in a world of magic and conspiracy theories and ancient wars.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

Worst Movie Scenes Ever

I havn't posted a Youtube movie in awhile, so here's some of the worst movie scenes your likely to see. WARNING: There is some profanity so if your not comfortable with that don't watch.

Full Schedule

Yesterday I officially had my right-of-passage into young adulthood. My pastor was there and we did various rituals, some involving sweet-grass. For some reason I had the idea of something sort of Native-American, don't know why since I'm Irish-Mennonite. We had sweet grass anyways, which smelt nice and helped bring in positive energy. My sister says it smells like weed.
This whole right-of-passage thing was mainly designed to help me in my next step to adulthood, which is University. I'm a bit nervous, as I may or may not have told you, because it's new and new and unknownness isn't something that I enjoy much. Also, I've looked at the notes for orientation week at Conrad Grebel and they have something called Koopa training that is making me feel a bit nervous, since I know that Koopas are those turtles that Mario jumps on and I don't want to be jumped on by an Italian with a mushroom problem. That's probably not what it means, but the whole Mario theme is a bit worrying for me.
I'm sure University will be great once I get the handle of it. But other then that I don't know if I'll fit into Conrad Grebel. To be honest, the Mennonite Church does seem to have a sense of humour, but it seems to be on more or less the same plane as Veggie Tales. Not that there's anything wrong with Veggie Tales, it's a great show, but I don't really see it as one I enjoy that much.
Anyways, you may have noticed that the title of this post is "Full Schedule." That's basically because I am going to be a lot of places in the next week or so. Tomorrow, my Dungeons and Dragons buddies are getting married (the people, not there characters). Then I'm off to the Holden County Folk Festival to listen to folk music and eat some good food. After that I'm going to Open Doors, which is an orientation week for people with "learning disabilities" or whatever, which I qualify for. I don't think to much of the name, but I'll get to changing it to the socially transcendent later. Then I have a poetry reading at my favorite local coffee shop, so I need to figure out where I can find something to present, read it a couple times and then enjoy the night. Today however, I will relax as much as possible.
Finally, I'm at the Library and have picked up the following books to look over.
  • Great Short Works of Mark Twain, by Mark Twain
  • The Unabridged Jack London, by Jack London
  • The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, by William Shakespeare. Hopefully I can figure out what all the fuss is about now.
  • The Complete Illustrated Stories, Plays and Poems of Oscar Wilde, by Oscar Wilde
  • Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman, by Haruki Murakami

Sunday, July 13, 2008

The Absurdity Factor of Going to University has Just Reached Noticeable Levels

I'm sitting in my room, minding my own buisness when in comes my Mom going on about a bathroom. She plans on having the wall knocked out so as to increase the bathroom's size. Meanwhile, I'm sitting on my bed thinking "Why are you going on about this while I'm in the room. I'm right here." At least she has the desencey to wait eight years until I get my own place.
Also, you may have noticed that I have added a word counter for my novel, and that I am currently at 29%. I'm very proud of that, and I hope to have the first draft done by the end of summer. Considering the word length and that I'll be doing 1'667 words a day I'll be doing some very good writing this summer.
Also, I am seriously considering sighning up for National Novel Writing Month. The problem is I don't see it as something I'll be able to do it next November, what with all the busy University work I'll be doing. I may do it some November after college, or I may just have to do it during the summer when it's unofficial. Anyways, there's still National Poetry Writing Month in April, I think it is. I could probubly manage that.

Saturday, July 12, 2008

No Summer Job so I Start Writing Stupid

Because of my coming assent into the world of University and academia, I am not going to be searching for a summer job. This means I am still living off my parents money for books and Itunes. I used my Itunes money to by two albums of off Itunes. Blood on the Tracks, by Bob Dylan and Hunky Dory, by David Bowie. I enjoy both albums alot. If I was a musician, then I'd make albums like this, where all the songs are really good and you need to lisean to them all at the same time for it to be really good. Maybe I could do that for short stories and poems and things.
On the subject of writing, I am getting on the Last Dance Revolution train again. I decided that I need to write it from a different perspective. To do that I am going to write part of it as a biography of Naos and Helen. I got the ide from reading about this book called Lint by a guy called Steve Aylett. It's about a cult writer who never existed. I think that's a pretty interesting idea, since cult writers generally lead very interesting lives. I don't really know how I'll do this, maybe the biographer will be some version of myself or some really odd Gonzo Hyunter S. Thompson type person who's writing this from an insane asylum.
I've been wondering what I should do with this blog once I become a famous writer. I was thinking I'd get my own website or something and link to it. The website would basically give updates to when my next book will be out. I'd concentrate on my blog mostly, or start another blog. By that time I'd be using my actual name instead of my some-what unimaginative screen name.

Wednesday, July 09, 2008

The Wonderful Magazine Finder Dingus

Steph, who should be beatified by the Catholic Church (and would be if they where beatifying anyone of importance), has given me a handy little website called Duotrope's Digest that allows me to track down magazines that are weird and off-beat enough to hold my own brand of absurdist historical-mystery sci-fi-magic-realism-romance genre bending. Here's what I hope will be places you be able to see me in.
  • Bust Down the Door and Eat All the Chickens, I found out about these fellas from my interest in the Bizarro genre. It features writing that is weird, surreal and dosn't make any sense. I like to think what I write makes some kind of sense, but I've got a story I could send here.
  • The Capilano Review, This is a pretty well established Canadian magazine, so it's A) Established and B) Local. I'd like to be published in local areas, if only because it would allow my friends to buy a copy.
  • Susurrus Press, My mom may have questions about this, but I think it may be something I should pay attention to. If it's legitimate I'll try writing things in there anthologies. They have anthologies now and I may have time to write in them.
  • Ambit Magazine, These guys are British, so I don't know if they are likely to publish someone from across the pond. Thankfully, everyone I know says I'm a genius. If I am to try and get published here, then I'm probubly going to wait awhile until I have published a few things in other magazines on this continent.
  • Storyteller Magazine, This is a local Canadian magazine that promotes short stories.

Friday, July 04, 2008

University Update

Yesterday my mom took me over to the University of Waterloo to get all my course information out. I'm going to be taking three courses, which is the bare minimum I can take while still staying there full time. I'm doing an English, Religious Studies and Film Studies Course. I'm also thinking of picking up a few language courses. Maybe Spanish or Russian. I don't know. Apparently I can't take French because Waterloo expects me to have taken at least Grade 9, which I havn't. The lady we saw said I should look at taking a French course at Waterloo. I might, know that I know what I can read in French.
I even got to go to a used bookstore. My mom said that we wouldn't be going to any used bookstores, but I've been meaning to find a copy of Mumbo Jumbo, by Ishmael Reed. I didn't find it at the place we went to, but I did get The Miracle of the Rose, bu Jean Genet, Nova by Samuel R. Delany and what appears to be a Michael Moorcock novel written about a fictional version of the band Hawkwind I never heard off. I also found a copy of the book You Can't Win, by Jack Black (not the comedian) which was a major influence on the thought of William S. Burroughs, but I didn't buy it. I look forward to frequenting this bookstore while I'm in University, as well as any other cool bookstores in Waterloo.