The Rule of Seven

Even before Winter Storm Alfred tore through Connecticut like it was Winter Storm Batman and knocked our lights out for a week, I wasn't blogging too often. I apologize for my scarcity, but in my defense I've been quite busy of late. And by "busy," I mean I've spent most of my time being lazy  being very lazy  occupying various cities  camping out for Twilight: Breaking Dawn  seeking the GOP presidential nomination being a dad.

Seriously, it's like The Professor has an innate ability to sleep right up until my workday ends, and then need to be held and/or entertained the rest of the night. It's a good thing he's so darned cute.¹

Anyway, last month Heather Henry over at Little Red Henry bestowed upon me the 7x7 Link Award. In the interest of laziness concisity, however, I shall henceforth call it the 49 Link Award.²

As I do every time I receive an award, I promptly redesigned it in Photoshop:

Original:

Nate-ified:

Now, as a recipient of the √2,401 Link Award, I'm supposed to point you to some of my previous blog posts, one in each of seven specific categories. I've never been one for following rules,³ but this one seems benign enough I'll play along.

Of course, I never said I'd stick with the original categories...

Most beautiful Most productive use of bacon: Horrible Puns For The Win

Most popular Greatest contribution to popular culture: That Wasn't All, Paul (The Other 45 Ways to Leave Your Lover)

Most controversial Best Justin Bieber anagram: A Ram Sang a Ragman's Anagrams

Most helpful Most creative use of paper clips: Before The Wheel

Most surprisingly successful Best use of photos to illustrate a story: The Biggest Carrot in the Kitchen

Most underrated Best appearance by Melvin the Wannabe Warlock: Say What?

Most pride-worthy Most topical mention of gefilte fish: Yo Ho Ho, and a Bottle of Manischewitz

I suspect I'm also supposed to pass this award onto seven other bloggers or something like that, but that's not my style. I'm a rebel, not a sheep. I march to the bleat of a different drummer and take the toad less graveled. Or, something like that.

Besides, I don't have time to create more links. I'm far too selfish indecisive devilishly handsome lazy.


¹ Technically, he's only cute, not darned. But some of his clothes are both.
² "Concisity" may not be a real word, but it's more concise than "conciseness," so it should be.
³ I make my own rules. And then I disregard those, too. The only ones I always follow are slide rules, since otherwise kids could fall and get really hurt.

DOOOOOM!

In the past, I’ve called this blog the place where memes go to die. When I’m given a blog award, I redesign it in Photoshop, ignore most (if not all) of the associated rules, and pass it along to absolutely no one. Well, today that’s going to change.

Okay, I may have modified the image, but old habits, like Bruce Willis, die hard. So, why am I breaking from tradition and adhering to the award’s prescribed rules? For my answer, I give you these four simple words:

Blog. Award. Of DOOM.

Today’s DOOM is courtesy of the epically fantastic Joseph L. Selby, who looked at my life and determined it didn’t have nearly enough DOOM in it. If I were you, I’d go check out his blog. Oh, and that’s not a suggestion. In case you forgot, you must now obey me because I am your overlord.

The rules (which I’ve only altered ever so slightly):

1. When you receive the Blog Award of DOOM your task is to post a short selection of your writing, 100 - 300 375 words, in which your favorite a character suffers a horrible fate. It can be your favorite a character from your own writing or from something you've read, it can be from a finished manuscript, a WIP or something you just made up on the spot. Your choice, but it has to be full of DOOM!
    
2. Pass it on to one other blogger and let them know their DOOM has come.
    
3. Remember that the person who gave you the award also received it. Go back to their post to read and comment on their writing sample. Make sure to thank them for sending the DOOM your way.
    
4. Whenever you use the word DOOM in your post, you must capitalize the whole thing.

Of course, when I received this award, the first thing I thought of was this exchange from the first episode of Invader Zim:

Zim: Let us rain some DOOM down upon the filthy heads of our DOOMed enemies.
GIR: I'm gonna sing the DOOM Song now. [singing] DOOM DOOOM DOOM DOOM DOOOM DOOM DOOM DOOM DOOOOOM... (watch video)

The award is also quite fitting, since I’ve performed with the Rod Knobs of DOOOOOOOM!, my friends’ Rock Band band. (And by the way, “rod knobs” are not what you think they are. Get your mind out of the gutter. They’re actually what an interior decorator would call “finials,” or what a normal person would call “those things at the end of curtain rods.” Okay, you can put your mind back in the gutter now, if you so choose.)

Anyway, I shall pass the DOOM on to Hannah Kincade over at The Palindrome Effect, even though she’s on a semi-hiatus, because I’m curious to see what sort of DOOM she might throw at her characters. Of course, she may choose to DOOM The Picard instead, but that could be just as fun.

Getting back to rule #1, the selection below is the end of the first chapter in my WIP. I wrote this passage over four years ago and it’s in dire need of copious editing, but it should be fine for the purposes of DOOMY DOOMY DOOM. For reference, the main character has just been turned invisible by Army scientists, and he’s decided to play a little trick on them while they’re out of the room.

Behold, the excerpt of DOOM:

Sean pulled out the IV and let it fall to the floor. Shedding his hospital gown, he started toward the door, but a tug at his chest stopped him short. He glanced back and caught his reflection in the mirror: three electrodes floating in mid-air, straining at their wires like miniature kites in a gale-strength wind. That was it. He couldn’t help but smile.

He peeled one of the electrodes off, and then jumped as a sharp crack shattered the silence of the room. Before he could turn to see the source, another three bangs rang out in quick succession. His left shoulder erupted in a burst of searing pain.

What the hell?! His attempt to scream this sentiment, however, came out as more of a gurgle, and he tasted blood. He brought his right hand up to his throat, which was wet to the touch and had a small hole in it on the left side. His fingers found its twin on the right, his blood seeping out in spurts. Oh fuck, this was not good. He applied pressure to both neck and shoulder to try to stymie the flow.

Something clattered off to his right. He swiveled cautiously to look, wincing as his shoulder throbbed. A close grouping of black circles now stood out against the white tile of the back wall, a series of minute cracks radiating outward from each one. A couple adjacent tiles had unburdened themselves and fallen to pieces on the floor below.

The dizziness hit him all at once. His vision blurred. He needed to get to the bed. He needed the doctors. A violent cough sent him staggering backward into the heart rate monitor, which fell to the ground. Spun around by the impact and entangled in electrode wires, he tumbled forward onto the machine and collapsed in an invisible heap, his invisible blood collecting in invisible puddles on the floor.

Beneath him, the monitor sounded out a half-dozen more quick beeps, and then settled into one steady, high-pitched tone.

* * *

Standing in the doorway, Colonel Jack Buckworth sighed and re-holstered his weapon. “Well, that was a waste of money.”

The colonel spun on his heels and strode back down the hallway, past the trio of stunned doctors.

It’s not my best work, but I hope with some spit shine and/or elbow grease it’ll turn out alright in the rewrite. Oh, who am I kidding? I think it’s pretty obvious my writing career is DOOMED.

And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I, For One, Welcome Our New Fiery Overlord

...because it is me. And before you start to argue how that should be "...because it is I," you might want to remember that I'm an overlord now. Never dispute grammar with an overlord.

So how did I gain my new title? Laurie Peel over at Earth Dragon Healing bestowed the Overlord Award upon me because she feels I'm changing the world one blog post at a time. Now, I know me pretty well, so that seems rather unlikely,¹ but I daresay it's about time I got me some minions. Welcome, minions.

Anyway, the first thing I did as Overlord was the same thing I do every time I get an award: I redesigned it.

Original:	Overlorded:

I'm also supposed to list three things I will change about the world now that I'm all-powerful. You can expect many, many improvements during my reign, my dear minions, but here are the first three pronouncements that come to mind:

1. You must make me a sammich. I'm not saying you should all gang together and build me a sandwich of monumental proportions, since overlord or not I'm still just one man. My mouth only opens so far, and my stomach only holds so much. It'd be a shame for so much deliciousness to go to waste.
   
   Nor am I saying that each of you should make me a sandwich right now. My benevolence and cruelty may know no bounds, but my appetite doesn't. Tell you what: I'll have my underlord put together a schedule, and you'll each be responsible for preparing a sandwich for me on one date in the future.
    
2. Turn signals: Use 'em or lose 'em. The first 'em, of course, refers to your car's turn signals. The second 'em, however, refers to your arms. Under my rule, if you don't use your turn signals, you will lose your limbs.² Then again, it's likely the limbless will be even more unlikely to use their turn signals, and I can't have that. Thus, I also decree that it's illegal to drive without arms. And you must come to a full stop at red lights and stop signs. What? I can totally combine three pronouncements into one. Shut up.
    
3. No, you shut up. As overlord, I can't be bothered to listen to you blathering on about this, that, and whatnot. I simply have too much to do. If I start to look bored, you'd better shut up, or I'll send you to work in the pepper mines.³
   
   If you feel I'm blathering on too long myself, a) you're wrong, and b) it's to the parsley mines for you. But if, in the midst of my impressively important diatribe, you utter the phrase, "This is my favorite story," I may eventually stop talking. Maybe.

So there you have it, my first three changes to the world order. I believe I'm also supposed to pass this award on to a bunch of other bloggers, but fat chance at that happening. There are already too many other overlords as it is. So you be good little minions, and get cracking on those sandwiches.

Oh, and make sure to come back next week, for there shall be DOOM!


¹ About as unlikely as some firm offering to rep Rep. Weiner's wiener.
² And it won't be just a flesh wound.
³ What? There are salt mines; there have got to be pepper mines, too. No? How about oregano? Paprika?

Virtue May Be Its Own Reward, But I'll Take These

As much as I enjoyed the A to Z Challenge, I was also relieved when May rolled around and I could get back to my regular "whenever I damn well please" posting schedule. But after spending the past two weeks recovering from blog overload (or "bloverload") by retreating into the real world, I feel it's time I finally gave some recognition.

Of course, since my ego is the size of a Buick, what I want to recognize is that my blog has been recognized. I'm talking blog awards, people. I've recently received three of them from four fellow bloggers (only one of whom is a fellow), and as is my practice, I've Photoshopped them into oblivion.

Matthew Vanacore over at FilmMattic was the first to bestow the Stylish Blogger Award upon me. If you like movies like I like movies (and I like movies), you owe it to yourself to check out his blog.

Then check out Marian Allen, who determined I was "crazy all over the inside of [my] head," and then also gave me this award, presumably because my craziness is so stylish. Nonetheless, I didn't think the award really lived up to its name, so I went to work:

Before:

After:

Marian's award also came with the stipulation that I share seven things about myself. Normally, I ignore stipulations, but luckily for Marian, I enjoy making lists:

1. For Halloween in kindergarten, I dressed as a carrot.
2. The day I bought my first car, I got into an accident... before I left the dealership.
3. For Halloween in first grade, I dressed as a carrot.¹
4. I haven't set my alarm clock for a time ending in 0 or 5 since I was 15 14.
5. Once, while playing volleyball, I dislocated a thumb. The thumb wasn't mine.²
6. I can hold my breath for upwards of 15 seconds.
7. When I was two years old, I tried to jump into the Grand Canyon.³

At the tail end of the Challenge, Elizabeth Mueller passed this award along to everyone who made it through to Z, which I thought was a very nice gesture on her part. My decision to embellish the award wasn't nearly as nice a gesture, but I didn't let that stop me:

Before:

After:

And finally, Deirdra Coppel over at A Storybook World handed out an award to everyone in the Challenge. She chose the Creative Blog Award for me, though for the life of me I can't think of why. I couldn't even come up with a inventive way to improve her award; all I did was add depth, contrast, and color:

Before:

After:

Well, that's it for today. Maybe next time I'll do something more stylish, or creative, or survivory.⁴ But for now, I'm going to retreat once again into the real world, and see if I can maybe win an award there. Wish me luck.


¹ In both instances, it was an orange felt costume, with a green felt cap, and had C-A-R-R-O-T in bold black letters down the front. Booya.
² Despite being a short white guy, I can jump high and spike hard. (Unlike Nathan Fillion's character, my nickname of "The Hammer" is because of my fist.) Anyway, after his partial block, the guy popped his thumb back into place and proudly played through the pain the rest of the night. I have no idea why. They were just pick-up games.
³ I failed.
⁴ For instance, Bridget, I know you still want me to create the Deviant Blogger Award. I'll get started on that once I finish the Procrastinating Blogger Award.

Colon, Right Parenthesis

Back in September, I received my first blog award. To show my gratitude, I promptly redesigned it in Photoshop, and then ignored half the rules that came with it.

Today is no different.

This past weekend, I received the Making Smiles on Faces Award from Jeffrey Beesler over at World of the Scribe. I don't know how he found out I like to forcibly push the corners of people's mouths upward when they're unhappy, but just to be safe I've changed my locks. Or, maybe that's not it at all. Maybe he just remembered this picture.

Either way, Jeffrey's a great guy and a fellow writer, and you should check out his blog. Go, do it.

And behold! The Photoshop transformation:

Before:


After:

I'm probably also supposed to pass this thing along to some other people, so if you've read this far, congratulations! You are the latest recipient of the Making Smiles on Faces Award! Feel free to add either of the above images to your blog's sidebar.

Don't have a blog? Even better! Just print out the award and pin it to your shirt.

Don't have a shirt? Even better! Just print out the award, lick the back of it, and stick it to your forehead.

Let's spread the smiles, people! Spread 'em wide.

Use your fingers if you have to.

Where Memes Go to Die

A couple days ago, the wonderful Angela over at Jaded Love Junkie bestowed upon me The Versatile Blogger award. Thanks, Angela!

It's the first award I've received for my work at The Wheel, and to show my appreciation, I decided the first thing I'd do was demonstrate my versatility. Behold:

Before:

After:

That's right, I gave it a Photoshop upgrade. TVB, you're welcome.

Anyway, the award also came with a set of rules to which I'm supposed to adhere. And that's where I stop playing along.

Rules. They're all well and good in some situations, but I pretty much ignore any rule contrived just to spread a meme. A few examples:

Meme	Rule	Reaction
Forwarded surveys	Answer 21 questions about myself, then send to 21 friends	I don't answer any question seriously, then only send it to those who sent it to me
Chain letters	Send to 10 friends, or never find true love	I send it out, but only after converting it into a Mad-Lib
Certain dances	Do the exact same moves as everyone else at the exact same time, because we said so	I avoid them like the plague avoids them1

The first couple rules were fine. Thank the person who gave you the award. Post the award. You know, that sort of thing. But then I got to rule #3:

Nominate 15 other bloggers to pass the luv.

First of all, if I'm going to pass along a misspelled word, it's going to be a misspelled word of my choosing, such as "sammich" or "Canadia." And secondly, it's too hard to pick which 15 bloggers to give this award. Instead, I'll fall back on my versatility once again:

Nominate 15 other bloggers to pass the luv Louvre.

Who am I nominating? You. That's right! If you're among the first 15 to read this, I've just nominated you for an all-expense paid trip to Paris!² Just think about it: la Tour Eiffel (the Eiffel tower), la Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris (the Cathedral of Notre Dame), and l'Arc de Triomphe (the Lark of Triumph) are all now within your grasp.

I know what you're thinking, and: You're welcome.

Au revoir!


¹ Okay, so I may have inadvertently been pulled into a conga line once or twice. And I've done the Hokey Pokey. But, in my defense, so has the plague.
² All expenses paid by you, the aforementioned blogger.

For the First Time Ever

Five months ago today I plummeted into a ravine, prompting me to start this blog. Though I had been working on a novel for over two years by that point, for the first time ever I began to share my writing.¹ The novel has since gone through long periods of neglect,² but I enjoy the feedback I get from the blog. I like knowing that my words are entertaining (and/or completely nonplussing) people.

A couple weeks ago, I decided to take it one step further. With helpful prodding from my friend Jen — the same Jen, I might add, who got me started on my novel in the first place — I joined a writing class. It’s held online, with one assignment per week, and everyone in the class provides feedback on each others’ stories. It, too, keeps me from my novel, but for the first time ever, my writing is finally getting constructive criticism. I thought my work might garner harsher critiques, but so far it’s all been pretty helpful, both in terms of the writing and the ego boost.

The first assignment wasn’t too difficult, but this past week’s was mighty challenging: to write a scene between two people in love, without dialogue, that demonstrated their love through action rather than telling. I had all these great ideas for wicked little tales, but couldn’t manage to both “show, not tell” and go without dialogue. I would have figured out how eventually, but before I did, I came up with a way to challenge myself even further. And that is how I simultaneously, with one exercise:

• wrote a serious story, without any humor or a twist ending, for the first time ever;
• adapted part of someone else’s life for use in a story, for the first time ever;
• wrote a story in the present tense, for the first time ever; and
• amazed even myself with my descriptive imagery. For the first time ever.

I know I still have a long way to go. In general, my physical descriptions are weak, I use adverbs and the passive voice too often, and I certainly tell more than I show. This class will hopefully change that. Little by little, I’ll chip away the flaws in my writing until I’m left holding a literary masterpiece.

That, or a giant pile of flaws.


¹ Okay, that’s just an outright lie on my part. I had a web site between 1997-2001, and at least 103 people visited. How do I know this? I know this because that’s how many people commented in my guestbook. Remember back when sites still had guestbooks? Or when they received awards from other random sites? Mine got 22 awards in its first year of existence, including the “Cow Patrol Top 10” and “The Fishing Pier Award of Excellence.” I even had one of those lame counters at the bottom of the home page, which… wait, what was I talking about again? Oh yeah... For the second time ever, I began to share my writing.
² The current drought stands at 34 days. (And counting...)

Give That Man a Medal

Much has been said over the last few days about President Obama winning the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize. Many people are of the opinion that he doesn’t deserve the award, to which I say: They’re absolutely right.

I wholeheartedly believe in Obama’s ideals and his vision, and I hope he'll be able to achieve most of what he has set out to do. However, the selection committee has bestowed this honor upon him only eight and a half months into his presidency, based more on his intentions and the world’s expectations than on his actual accomplishments. This isn’t only premature, it’s also unfair to the candidates with far greater achievements to date, those who don’t have the backing of the U.S. Treasury and might actually need the $1.4 million prize to help further their cause. I’d say the selection committee put the cart before the horse, but that wouldn’t be a particularly apt metaphor. It’s more like they gave the cart and the horse credit for traversing the whole of the Oregon Trail without ever setting foot outside of Missouri.¹

Wait a minute... I’m two-thirds of the way into the first draft of my debut novel. I’ve already fostered exceedingly high expectations for the book among friends, family, and co-workers by merely divulging a few minor details.² And once my masterpiece is finished, I intend to take the world by storm. So, why haven’t they handed me the Nobel Prize for Literature yet? Or, at least a lesser prize like the National Book Award? It hardly seems fair.

Obama hasn’t yet earned all of the acclaim he's received, but he’s just getting started. Over the next three (or seven) years, he’s sure to undertake initiatives far more worthy of the Peace Prize than anything he’s done so far. Of course, when that day rolls around, they’ll give it someone else.

I’d stake my Pulitzer on it.


¹ Will Obama even be able to overcome the obstacles ahead? In another month, he might fail in his attempt to ford the Colorado River and lose 2 axles, 167 lbs of food, 3 sets of clothing, and Hillary (drowned).
² Political assassination and invisible monkeys.