Haiku of the Week: Search

Looking high and low;
But hidden my goal remains.
When will my quest end.

Things to Come

In this post, I made reference for an idea for a Wednesday feature that I didn't plan to start before the new year. Well, New Year's is almost upon us, so I'll share my big idea. I was inspired by the "A Movie A Day" column over on Ain't It Cool News. In the interest of expanding my own movie knowledge, I'd like to do something similar. However, I don't have a massive collection of unwatched DVD's like that feature's writer, so I have to come up with another way to find movies. I've decided to start by looking at the winners of the Best Picture Oscar chronologically starting with 1929's "The Broadway Melody". Now, this isn't going to simply be a series of reviews (though I'm sure my opinion of the film will figure in). I hope to be able to discuss technical and storytelling aspects of the film as well as, maybe, introducing a little historical perspective. To this end, I've established a couple of rules for myself: first, I will watch each movie at least twice (which may prove to be more of a chore with some films). This is to ensure that I don't miss anything important and hopefully to keep outside influences from coloring my feelings toward the film. Second, I will refrain from multi-tasking while watching the movie. I have a bad habit when watching movies at home, of trying to do other things while I watch. When I do this, I usually end up missing small chunks of the movie and that would be counter-productive to my purposes here.

So, that's my plan. I'll start as soon as I get the chance to view "The Broadway Melody". I welcome any input anybody's got.

Movie Review: Seven Pounds

I wasn't sure what to expect going into "Seven Pounds", largely because of how vague the ad campaing had been, but I did know that it had a solid cast. So, I went to see it.

It turns out that this is the sort of film that it's difficult to write about. I didn't hate it. It was entertaining enough and I didn't find myself checking my watch in the middle. However, I wasn't really engaged emotionally by the film either. Part of the problem is with the structure of the film. It begins with a scene that, chronologically takes place toward the end of the movie and the rest of the story is told in flashback. Unfortunately, this is not a story suited to this sort of structure. Too much is given away in that first scene, the trajectory of the main character made a little too obvious. It becomes an obstacle to any emotional investment in the character.

The other thing that the film was missing was a powerful score. Nothing can push emotional buttons quite like music, so a particularly moving score may have been able to compensate for the weaknesses created by the structure. Sadly, the music that was in the movie wasn't quite up to the job.

As I said at the top, "Seven Pounds" isn't a bad move, but niether is it an especially good one.

Words & Pictures No. 4 - Happy Thursday!

Happy Thursday, everyone!

As you sit around your Thursday tree and open your Thursday gifts, it's important to remember the reason for our celebration, the birth of Thor. Thor, god of thunder, son of Odin, and wielder of mighty Mjolnir, we honor you on this holiest of weekdays.




Oh, and apparently it's Christmas, too. Merry Christmas!

Haiku of the Week: Christmas

Hey Merry Christmas.
Time for family and friends,
Both here and absent.

Words & Pictures No. 3 - The Move

That's my apartment building. Or rather, my former apartment building. At this moment (I wrote this thing ahead of time, you see) I am either in the process of loading up my moving truck or on the road heading for Atlanta. Unless, of course, you're reading this a few days after the fact, in which case I am already firmly ensconced back in Atlanta. Oh, and for those of you in 2015 reading this via the Internet Wayback Machine, I'm now back at home, recovering nicely for the injuries I recieved from the attack of the radioactive man-eating hamsters.

It's been a nice apartment for me. Not too big, not too small. Centrally located, so there were plenty of places to walk. Even the neighbor who liked to occasionally practice his guitar at 3 AM didn't sour the experience. I enjoyed my time there, and hope the next tenant enjoys it as much. But my New Orleans experience is at an end and it is back to Georgia for me. So, I just wanted to take a moment to say goodbye to my happy little apartment.

Scheduling Note

Since I postponed the return of my fiction writing project until the new year I've notice that the only two things I've got scheduled currently are on Monday and Tuesday, which is making the week feel a little top-heavy content-wise. Therefore, I've decided to move Words & Pictures to Thursday, to space things out a bit better.

Haiku of the Week: Books

Piles and piles of books.
More of them unread than read,
Hard to get packed up.

Words & Pictures No. 2 - Comic Book Inflation

This is the first comic book that I remember owning (there may have been others before it, but it's the first I remember). G.I. Joe #14 has a cover date of August 1983. In the 25 years since (and the idea that I've been reading these things for 25 years is kind of mind-blowing to me) comic prices, like the prices for most things have gone up. Notice the price in the corner of $0.60 for this issue. The final issue of Secret Invasion, which came out last week, had a cover price of $3.99. That's quite an increase and has been a topic of conversation on various comics-related sites this week. The majority of the books from the big two publishers are still $2.99, but the move to $3.99 is coming and most small-press books already cost more than that.

I'll save the commentary, others have more than covered that, I just found it interesting to note how this once cheap and disposable form of entertainment is no longer either one.

Haiku of the Week: Yuck

Slimy and ugly;
What is it even made from?
I cannot eat this.

December Frappr Update

I seem to get a couple more pins in my map whenever I put it up, so here it is again. I'm up to 53, though there are a lot of unknown locations.

Return of 200 Word Writing Project Delayed

I know, I know, I said I'd try to start back up today, but I find that I need a little more time to think about where I want to go with the story. To that end, I'm going to wait to start back up until after the new year.

Words & Pictures No. 1 - What's it all about

Today's picture is one of me. That's because today's entry is going to be me explaining my intentions with my new Tuesday feature. The idea goes back a few years ago with an idea I had for an ongoing writing project. I would take a picture a day and write something about that picture (I was inspired by reading an interview with Christopher Nolan talking about his then new movie, Momento). Maybe it would be a story or a poem or an essay or even a short quip, something. As with most of my overly ambitious projects, I abandoned it fairly quickly. Still, I like the idea, so I intend to try to revive it here. Every Tuesday I'll post a picture along with some bit of writing that it has inspired from me. Hopefully, as with the haiku project, once a week will prove an easier timetable to sustain than once a day.

Oh, and I imagine this is the last time you'll see me put a picture of myself up.

>Looks at picture and shudders<

Haiku of the Week: Beginning

Begin with step one.
It is an obvious start;
Sometimes skipped in haste.

The Plan

Between the holidays, business, laziness, and a lack of inspiration, I've been neglecting my blog of late. I'm back now, and I've decided to create more of a structure for this thing. Partly as an excersise to see if I can operate under a set structure and set of deadlines, and partly because structure can help to bring my ideas of what to write into focus. Here's the new weekly schedule I'm going to try (TBD means To Be Determined, which means that I've got no idea what I want to do on that day yet.):

Sunday - TBD (Though I'm thinking I might use it to talk about interesting things coming up in the week)

Monday - Haiku of the Week - My Haiku of the Day blog becomes more inaccurately named by the day, so I think I'll just fold it into the main blog and cut back to once a week, a schedule I'll probably be better able to maintain.

Tuesday - Words and Pictures - I'll explain more about this idea on Tuesday.

Wednesday - TBD (I acutally have an idea for this, but it's a bit more time consuming, so I probably won't start before the new year).

Thursday - TBD

Friday - My 200 Word writing project which I will hopefully be able to start back this Friday.

Saturday - TBD

This plan probably seems a little gradiose for a simple blog without a whole lot of traffic, but really I'm much more interested in using this as an intellectual and creative excersise than as an online diary. To that end, I do welcome feedback. If there's something you want to see more of, let me know. If there's something you want to see less of, let me know that, too.