Wednesday, January 26, 2005

Window dressing

It appears since I've been gone, Blogger has opted for new templates without a carved-out niche for links. Apparently you are your own island.

So, I fiddled around, like a drunk with a scalpel, with the template code and have slapped together a crude patchwork to create a Links section. This is all a work in progress, so I'll be adding new diversions over time. For now, go play with 100 Words and One Word. Down there, on your right.

The sky in Seattle is this listless, monotone gray. Dry concrete. Imagine being inside of a giant pillow.

Writing class went well last night, or at least better than I thought. Don't have nearly as much homework, leaving me time to write up my contest entry for Pacific Northwest Writers Association. Much less stress and growling from Mission Control. Before class, I got to play with a sinfully righteous Macintosh outfitted with Bose speakers that look like unmanned landing probes sent to Mars. Massive screen, maybe 36 inches. Colors to shame nature. Opera music coming out of iTunes, making you feel as if you are in Heaven's computer lab as you step up to the transculent white keyboard. There's no way I'd ever need anything as big as that screen for writing, but it's kid-in-candy-store fun to put my mortal fingers against something so tech-decadent.

Tonight, we are having a friend come over. We're adultsitting her since her husband is out of town on business. Pizza and "Lost" (although I think it's a rerun).

Listening to: Radiohead's "OK Computer"
Reading: "Brass," "Voices, a People's History of the United States," "Fever," "What We Knew."
Playing: "Star Wars: Battlefront" for Xbox.

3 comments:

poppycock said...

your picture looks like jude law.

i yearn for listless monotone gray when i get overwhelmed with the drone of too much life and the glare of sun. seattle is beginning to look really good to me in that sense.

would you ever post any one of the pieces you submitted to the writing competitions from before?

and i've been meaning to ask, who/what is isis iago?

mm

John said...

Dear MM

Jude Law? My wife thinks I look nothing like him, and I never considered it. My picture is a crude avatar. My hair is darker with gray side walls. I'm nowhere that andro and my lips aren't silver. It's the Anime me, minus spiky hair.

As for posting contest entries, I'll think about it. I might post homework (works from the novel). Author Tad Williams did that with the novel Shadowmarch, putting vast swaths of novel up online and having the whole world turn into a critique group (a scenario that probably gave Tad nightmares).

Isis Iago is a long story. She's a minor character in the novel. She's a washed-up rock/media star who is a culture vulture. She's popular because she's an institution (an artist playing to a captive fan base in an isolated America), and because she rips off everyone around her to stay famous a little longer. Think Madonna/Paris Hilton 20 years from now.

poppycock said...

ok, no green eyes and jude law ;)

oh, so that's isis iago, an interesting character, and sounds egyptian to me. i'm now trying to imagine what she looks like. a name like that has got to be someone remarkable looking.