A week ago we got our first real snow of the season, and it was a bit more than usual for this time of year (if we get snow it usually comes in January).This was just the warm-up for the first official day of winter, though. This was the backyard on December 21st (click to enlarge):
Sadly, the shelter protecting the 1964 Ford Fairlane collapsed under the weight of the snow. Hopefully the car isn’t banged up too much as a result. More snow is forecast (followed by rain, naturally). Ho ho ho.
Deadline is a one-act play I wrote and co-directed in the 1989 Vancouver Fringe Festival. It was the second (and last) time I worked on the Fringe, having acted in a friend’s play, The Peanut Shell, a year earlier. You can find Deadline in 1980s fiction.
This is the third and final draft that was used in production. Below is the playbill a graphic designer friend made for the show. I think we made the tiniest profit after expenses. I recall a 10 day stretch during rehearsals where I developed a mystery cough. It came out of nowhere and was so maddeningly persistent that I often had to excuse myself so the actors could actually speak their lines. Just as I was about to go to a doctor, the coughing abruptly vanished, never to return.
The actors were all decent enough that we didn’t have any calamities, though one actor backed up a little more than he should have one night, nearly falling off the stage. Breaking the fourth wall, as it were. Reaction to the play was mixed at best (the written text got eviscerated when the director submitted it to another writer for assessment). It’s a nice concept and while it has its moments, the final result was less than satisfying to me. Love the playbill, though!
The Famous Polka is an unfinished play I wrote back in 1996 and takes its title from the They Might Be Giants’ song of the same name. While I like the characters and the breezy dialogue, there’s a slim chance I’ll ever finish the play so I figured I may as well put it on the site for perusal. I’ll be adding more unfinished (and finished) works soon. You can find The Famous Polka in the 1990s fiction section.
Here’s a sample from the play:
CHRISTINE: So who do you think in the theater department would be a good match for Eric?
KEVIN: There’s Mark.
CHRISTINE: Mark? Hmm…
ERIC: Is he the one with the blond hair, the bowl cut?
CHRISTINE: Yes.
ERIC: Fag!
CHRISTINE: You’re a fag.
ERIC: No, forget it. He’s too gay.
CHRISTINE: Too gay?
KEVIN: The gradations are fascinating.
Today EA revealed that its previously-announced job reductions are cutting deeper than originally forecast, from about 6% of their workforce to 10%. The local Vancouver studio Black Box is being absorbed into the larger Burnaby facility (which had its expansion canceled). But the best part is this statement as seen on Blue’s News:
EA is implementing a plan to narrow its product portfolio to focus on hit games with higher margin opportunities. The company remains committed to taking creative risks, investing in new games, leading the industry in the growing mobile and online businesses, and delivering high-quality games to consumers.
On the one hand they are going to “narrow its product portfolio to focus on hit games” (ie wall-to-wall Madden and Sims) and yet they remain commited to taking “creative risks”. What does that mean? Turning Madden into an MMO? Putting The Sims onto calculators?
Fortunately there’s less than two weeks left in the year, so the forced inanity will end soon.
I don’t have anything to write about today so instead I offer a picture of my hobbit minstrel Beridoc being stalked by a chicken in Lord of the Rings Online:
I’ve added a trio of short stories that were written as exercises for WRITE! And yes, it is correct to shout the title of the site, preferably around others to see if it inspires and/or frightens them.
The stories can be found on the new 2000s fiction page. They are:
I’ve also re-organized the way stories are grouped, removing the individual pages and instead dividing them up by decades, resulting in less bloat but the same delicious and nutritious content. Enjoy!
Whoever said change was as good as a vacation probably took a lot of vacations. But in the spirit of renewal, I have updated the site’s theme to techmania. In looking for a new theme, I wanted something clean and simple, nothing more than that. As I traversed the web in my search I discovered a few things about WordPress themes:
Fortunately, a few designers still show enough restraint to provide a few reasonable options, which is why I am bothering to highlight techmania in the first place.
In the meantime we are getting our first real dump of snow as winter officially approaches. My bike is stored in the workshop, feeling cold and unloved.
A short writing exercise written just before lunch, I give you The Lunch Gnome.
Whoops, I forgot to add back The Sometimes Island when I set up the site on the new host. Here it is.
Earlier this week I went over to the island (that’s Vancouver Island, we just call it “the island” because it’s bigger than some countries) to visit mom and took a few pics. Click the Photo Galleries link at the top of the site and select Duncan July 2008.
Duncan has changed quite a bit since I moved away in 1986. Back then it was only eight years since we got a McDonald’s. To me that was how you knew your town had arrived, you got a McDonald’s. Today, Duncan has nearly every fast food franchise you can think of. Not surprisingly a lot of the people I saw walking around were fat. Really fat. I don’t have anything against fat people, really, even fat people who like to wear skin-tight clothing that reveals every bulge in lurid 3D. But come on, Big Macs and Super Big Gulps are not food groups. The ground would often shake while we walked around town as these porcine citizens thundered about like big fat people who ate too much crappy food.
On the other hand, there is something very calming and wonderful about being able to drive only a few minutes out of town to get fresh eggs from a local farm or to watch deer, quail or other wildlife foraging within sight of your home. As long as they don’t poop on the lawn or eat your garden, of course.
I’ve finished restoring all of the old posts and stories to the site. This means from this point forward all additions to the site will be freshly-baked writings and doodlings.
See you in six months!
One of the things I’ll be doing is using this space to relive the wonder and occasionally the horrors of my childhood. I present to you one small example below. This photo was taken in 1973 when I was about 9 years old. I was dressed up for my uncle’s wedding. There are so many fascinating things in this image one is almost rendered speechless as to where to begin.
The handlebars on the bike seem impossibly wide for someone with such spindly (but nicely tanned) arms. The collar on the shirt, if turned up, would probably cover most of my face. The hair — believe it or not, it got much worse. It’s probably safe to assume that the real focal point here are the pants. That is serious plaid. I never wore them again. For me, it was simply because they were not jeans, not because I was committing a crime against fashion. The shoes, which look like formal sneakers, I also never wore again. Quite the look, overall. Quite the look indeed. The best part is this ensemble did not raise an eyebrow in 1973. In fact, I was told what a sharp-dressed young man I was.
We were all mad, obviously.
This stunning photo and others equally charming will be added to galleries in the near future.