Take Some Time Out of Your Day and Do Something Different For A Change

Here is the problem with American television (and movies for that matter). In order to insure a return on your investment audio/visual media must make sure they are producing something everyone will like.

This means 1) Plot by committee 2) Screening groups, screening groups, screening groups

Problem with that is that most of the time, all the creativity is sucked out and the original vision. Even if the idea was fantastic (see "Zombocalypse" for an example) it generally gets so watered down, the final product ends up with about as much emotional punch as a wet sock.

However, this pig has some good news for you.

Because so much money is made in the entertainment industry. Sometimes, just sometimes a little of that scrilla is siphoned off the top and something really cool gets made.

Enter - THE AMAZING SCREW ON HEAD.

Created by "Hellboy" genius Mike Mignola - it's a wild romp through Civil War era America, with a robot James West saving the day from a zombie. It's got a monkey, flame throwers and butlers who tend to have short life spans.

I can't say enough good things about this show.

Well...except that it wasn't picked up by the network after the pilot. (Mostly because it was too original - which in my opinion is an oxymoron).

But, do not despair!

If you're willing to kill twenty minutes and you have an open mind, you can watch the pilot at the link below.

So. Go make some hot tea for the love and all that is holy and watch the damn show already.

You can thank me later.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5434666681046246946&q=The+Amazing+Screw-On+Head

What They Don't Tell You About Weight Loss.

So the world has been kinda topsy turvy lately for me.

One minute I'm up...the next I crash.

One minute I'm telling everyone I'm going to ride out my next three weeks of weight loss and see how far I can go. The next I'm telling them once I reach 180 I'm done.

One minute I'm laughing and joking with the people with whom I work, the next I'm snapping at them over little stuff.

I know my body is going through a huge change (65 pounds in about 4 months)...which must also be doing something to my mind as well.

But here's another problem...

And no one ever thinks about this.

Part of my personality is that I don't really act so much, as RE-act to people.

And once you start loosing weight. I mean serious weight. People start treating you differently.

I mean for the whole part everyone is pretty supportive at work. I get a lot of "Hey man, you're looking good." Or "So how much have you lost?"

But a lot of other people are pulling away from me.

I'm loosing friends and I don't know why.

Perhaps I'm overreacting. I probably am.

But still...it sucks.

Hopper needs...

I got this from my Facebook friend Kelly. You type "(you name) and needs..." into a search engine. Then you write down what comes up. So...

HOPPER NEEDS...

1. Some TLC.

2. Help.

3. Two legs.

4. A home.

5. Sure footing.

6. To go fast.

7. To hurry.

8. Support.

9. To be cleaned.

10. A rail-guided launch sled.

I agree that I need TLC and support.

I don't know why everyone thinks I'm moving too slow.

My favorites are the last two...I'm not sure how they know that I need to be cleaned.

And HELL YEAH - I need a rail guided launch sled...think off all the things I could do with that!

A Day In The Life

I don't know if you have been able to tell, but if truth be told...this pig has been a little depressed lately.

To begin I'm down to losing about a pound a week now - which is about frustrating as hell. So I started working out after work (an hour a day!)...You know what happened? I went UP SEVEN POUNDS!!!!! (Screw this noise)!

I'm over worked and underpaid (nothing new there) but lately I've felt very unappreciated.

Now this entry is not about complaining...instead let me tell you how nice it is, when it all comes together.

Part of my frustration is that I plan to do stuff, and then life gets in the way. DARN YOU LIFE!

Take this weekend for example.

The plan -

-Ten Pages of Zombie Novel.

-Submit, submit, submit (something I've been putting off)
-Clean the house
-Workout

But here's life-

-A wedding on Saturday (which I skipped)...then come to find out on Sunday the wedding had half naked buxom women and a monkey! (Figures...)
-Baby Shower on Sunday (which was very, very awkward) - I left early.
-Birthday party today (this should be fun)

But then the toilet breaks last night. So after weigh-in I go and pick up the parts at the local hardware store. I get the parts, stop at Starbucks and get a gift card for the birthday girl and stop by the grocery store for a card.

Then I get home and fix the toilet in like seven minutes.

You know, last night a friend of mine said. When you try to move mountains it may suck because of how hard you push yourself...but it's pretty damn cool when that mountain moves (paraphrasing here...if you're reading Lauren).

And you know what?

She's right.

To get all that done in less than two hours is pretty cool. I don't know why I'm always complaining about not having enough time. There is time out there, I just need to realize that achieving my three large goals is not going to happen by April...that's why they are goals for the year!

What Wouldn't Jesus Do?

Indeed!

Musings About Zombies

Alright...so I'm waist deep in Zombacolypse! The young adult zombie novel I'm writing.

So far the story goes as thus...

You have a group of high school kids from a Catholic School in Portland, OR. It's summer and their Latin teacher Father Rockford (yes...I know...cool huh?) is taking them on a trip to Rome.

While at the airport they find body bags on the tarmac. The bags are moving - so they go down to stop the beginnings of the zombie invasion.

"How so?" You ask.

Well these kids are not really Latin students...they have been hand picked to be members of a secret society based out of The Vatican called "The Order of Lux Lucis" or "The Order of Daylight". They have been trained to use magic to fight the forces of evil.

So, our little band of students nuke the zombies, but one gets loose. Homeland Security arrests our heroes and while in custody all hell breaks loose.

So you got about thirty pages of them getting out the airport.

Another twenty pages where they call the local Catholic Vampire Hunter (trained trough a different branch at the Vatican) who promptly comes to save them.

Another twenty pages where the zombies attack and they all get separated.

Anyway, these two kids (Randy and Lunchbox) end up with another priest, and they go to this church where Father John thinks they'll be safe.

Problem is, the zombies got there first. Total carnage. The zombies have desecrated the church. The kids ask the priest why the zombies would do such a thing. And Father John says...well, here. Let me just show you...

Randy shrugged, "But can you tell me something Father?"
"I can try."
"Why would they do this," he waved his hand across the room,
encompassing everything with one motion. "I mean, what
exactly did they hope to accomplish?"
"Whether or not you call them zombies or vampires," the priest
said. "They are still just the living dead. And the living dead work
much the same way as demons. They wait for the soul to leave the
body and then they swoop in and take over. In essence you end up
with a corpse that for all practical purposes is alive, but without a
soul."
"That doesn't explain what happened here," Lunchbox interrupted.
"Without a soul you aren't connected to God," Father John turned to
Lunchbox. "Let me ask you. If you were disconnected from God, how
would that make you feel?"
"I think I'd be sad," Lunchbox admitted.
"Naw," Randy looked around the desecrated church. "You'd be

very, very pissed."

Now I don't know why I put this scene in. As a matter of fact I considered cutting the whole thing all together, because it didn't really fit with anything. But I thought it was cool so I kept it.

And then something strange happened.

As the story has progressed, the zombies have been evolving. To make things harder for the main characters I've been making them progressively smarter.

In the last scene I wrote Father Rockford is about to cut a swath through a massive mob of zombies, and then one of them speaks! The evolved zombie asks his help, so they can find out what or who has created them.

You know, when I started writing this book, it was just supposed to be about a bunch of kids with super powers fighting the undead in an abandoned city.

Which by itself would have been pretty cool.

But now it's taken on these huge life, theological, philosophical questions. The scene above now fits in with what the zombies are up to. They are angry at God because they feel abandoned by him.

Now, I've got the military killing them and the kids are beginning to ask if the evolved zombies deserve to live or die. They are beginning to question who the monsters are...the zombies or the military.

And that's what's so cool about writing! This story has begun to take on a much larger life on it's own...it's almost out of my control, and I'm just transcribing at this point.

You know, something just occurred to me! This novel has become MY evolved zombie!

Whoa...

That's pretty deep...

Wombats

I love Wombats!



I love mother and baby wombats...


I love just baby wombats...

I even love the band The Wombats...

He He He...Wombats...koooool

This Guy Rocks!

Let's build a funky looking bike that isn't street legal (or probably very safe for that matter) then dress up like a Victorian Undertaker and ride it around the park!

I want to hang with this dude.

No.

Seriously...I really want to hang with this dude!

Musings About Writers

So due to my current Facebook obsession, I was contacted by a girl I vaguely remember from high school. I accepted her request because she's into vampire/zombie stuff (which makes her cool) and because she got a BFA in poetry from Iowa (which makes her cool and a much better writer than myself...academic-wise and all). So I asked her about Iowa and she tells me how brutal it was. There were only so many graduate slots to fill, so the undergraduates had to do this Thunderdome type thing where they all enter a workshop and only one leaves alive. She talked about the backstabbing, the cut-throat critiques. She talked about how if anyone wrote anything good, it was ripped apart in an attempt to kill the writer's spirit...

Sad...

So that go me thinking. Why is it that Iowa restricted their slots? Since when in our society has being chosen to be among 'the elite' a good thing? See...this is what I think...stay with me here.

1. There is a misconception that there is not enough in our world. Not enough money, not enough energy, not enough love or success. But I think that's all crap. There is more than enough for everyone out there...of everything.

Consider this.

A friend of mine came into the area I supervise the other day and he starts joking with the kids who work under me. Then later he apologizes for stealing my mojo.

My reply, "Buddy, there's enough mojo to go around."

It's like, there was no competition between us in my mind. There really is more than enough love to go around.

You know?

Haven't you ever been in love with someone and then found you 'loved' someone else? Maybe not in a romantic way, and it's not like you loved the first person any less...it's just there is an infinite amount of love out there, so you can love multiple people and still not take anything away from anyone else.

2. OK - so how does this apply to Iowa? Well, I'm assuming they want only the best of the best right? But why make it so selective? Accept everyone! More money rolls in (I have not seen a university yet that doesn't like that) - more people mean more opportunities to get published (which is a pretty good feather in your cap if you're a school who bases your success on published writers).

So you say - "OK Crimson Pig - that's all well and good, but what about all the bad people you let into the school?"

Good point! But I say, if your standards are high enough two things are going to happen. Those who can not cut it will leave. Those who don't start out good writers will rise to the occasion and become good writers. Which leads to success for you and your school!

3. Which brings me to my point!

How many truly great writers have we lost due to the fact that they were 'weeded out' of a college workshop? For that matter, why do they even need to be weeded out?

And you want to know the answer!

Because they'll get the book contract I could have gotten. They'll take my spot or my money or my mojo!

Well, if someone writes a better book than I do, they should get the freakin' contract!

And that's what pisses me off so much. We don't try to become better writers, we take 'our competition' and try to ruin them so our mediocre crap can get published.

You know, people are always bitching that kids don't read today. Kids read. Kids want to read! "Harry Potter" proves that. It's just that we're not turning out anything they want to read, so can you really blame them?

4. Finally, consider this. I write horror stuff. It's what I dig. I subscribe to magazines and read other budding horror writer's work. I support them and they support me. Because there is enough out there...for everyone! Let's encourage those writers. The more of them who pop up, the more magazines they will read. Which will cause more magazines to pop up. Which means more publishing opportunities, which means more opportunities for young writers. Which means more writers pop up. You see how it goes?

Seems simple...huh?

Top Five Reasons Why I Love Being An Episcopalian

#1. We're Church of England which, by default makes us classy.

As my priest once said, "The Catholics will tell you that you'll go to hell for eating meat on Friday. The Baptists will tell you that you'll go to hell for dancing. The Episcopals will tell you that you'll go to hell for using your salad fork to eat your main course."

#2. Being Church of England, that means when you die you get to go to BRITISH HEAVEN!



#3. We are a progressive church which means we're gay friendly.



It also allows us to have...female priests

#4. Our bishop...The Most Reverend Barry R. Howe... looks alot like Sir Laurence Oliver playing Shylock in The Merchant of Venice

#5. All the cool kids are doing it.

Watch Yourself

This is an actual sign at the London Zoo. It's up near the bear or tiger cages or something like that. You'll be seeing a lot of these things up when the zombies attack.

By the way...my favorite part of the whole thing is the pinky finger off by itself.

I'm Soooooo Bad

All right. Due to overwhelming peer pressure from my friends at church I joined Facebook. Now it takes up way - way - way - way too much time. I can now see why teenagers get nothing done.

This is not a good thing. I have fallen behind on stuff that needs to be done. You know, important stuff. Like...

Watching the Rockford Files.

Writing my Zombie Novel.

Trying to get published.

As my friend Marisa said, This Facebook thing is going to end poorly (I'm paraphrasing here).

Oh yeah...

Janurary Update

As I started re-blogging so late this month there is very little to recap, but I'll do my best.

1. As of right now I am not considering a career change. If my friend Nathan moves and finds me a job working with him, well...just for coolness alone I gotta go with him (he knows the score if he gets a new job he's gotta try like hell to take me with him). However I never did say what my new career choice was going to be. I know it's hard to believe but I considered becoming an Undertaker. They offer classes in Kansas, but the wife-unit and I crunched the numbers and I'd have to go back to school for like two years...and that's a lot of scrilla!

2. Every evening we've been watching "The Rockford Files", an episode a night as we eat. The best part is, I check them out at the library so it costs nothing! We're on season two right now and as the wife-unit said the other day, "This show is actually growing on me." I mean, come on, how couldn't it? Issac Hayes was in the episode last night!

3. I've had a script accepted for an online radio group. Right now they're trying to get the actors together to record the thing. Once it's available for download to your I-pod I'll let you know.

4. The massive stabbing pains behind my forehead abated this morning, and I can talk again so I must be on the mend. The bad news is the wife-unit almost passed out today at church. I brought her home early, feed her soup and Naked "Vit. C Powerboost" (or something like that) and then laid her down, tucked her in and left her. She's been passed out for over four hours now. I'll make her dinner later and then tuck her back in. (I feel a little guilty getting her sick and all).

5. Hot tea sounds good...I think I'll have some here in a moment.

6. My goals get closer to being realized. I discovered something about myself. I push real hard thinking things will happen all at once, then get discouraged and give up when they don't. So now I'm chipping away at these big things daily and guess what? I get closer and closer to realizing my dreams everyday. For example, I weighed on Saturday and I'm down to 195 pounds. Now I'm only fifteen pounds away from my target goal. (I'd say that's a big improvement from when I started)

7. Oh yeah...I told the Bible Quote for masturbation to the wife-unit. After telling me how immature I am, she pointed out there are other quotes in the same book stating how masturbation is wrong....sigh...(you can't win 'em all)

8. Well, as you already know this pig is all about happiness. Happiness for his own little piggy self and happiness for others...this will continue until he dies...but it's gonna be one hell of a ride...

CAN'T WAIT FOR FEBRUARY!!!!