Happy Potter and the Order of OfficeMax

From the AP wire

J.K. Rowling, well into her seventh and final "Harry Potter" book, says the writing is going fine despite one annoying obstacle: the lack of paper.

"Why is it so difficult to buy paper in the middle of town?" the author, a resident of Edinburgh, Scotland, lamented in a diary entry posted Wednesday on her Web site, www.jkrowling.com.

"What is a writer who likes to write longhand supposed to do when she hits her stride and then realizes, to her horror, that she has covered every bit of blank paper in her bag? Forty-five minutes it took me, this morning, to find somewhere that would sell me some normal, lined paper. And there’s a university here! What do the students use? Don’t tell me laptops, it makes me feel like something out of the eighteenth century."

Three things immediately leap out to me

1) Just how damn big will this last Harry Potter book be if she's consuming college-lined pulp like an addict.*

2) You are J.K. Rowling, whose books have defoliated whole forests. There's something darkly humorous about a woman who has so many books in print can't find paper to jot a day's work on. Maybe use the rejection slips given to the tens of thousands of other authors.

3) Again, you are J.K. Rowling. Flash your Almighty J.K. Rowling Badge of Power +5, and tell some office supply store you are commandeering their stash for the greater economic good of publishing and children's fantasy. Failing that, I'm sure you could hold the publishing world hostage by saying, out loud in a public venue, that you can't write another word of the most anticipated novel in the history of the world until someone gets you a pad of paper, a few pens, maybe a cup of chai tea, and a comfy pillow. I'm sure you could eventually work up to getting your own airplane or small island if you held out long enough.

I hear that's how Dorothy Parker did it, until she went too far, climbed the Empire State Building, and got shot down by marauding biplanes. Sad, really. All for the want of a pack of cigarettes and the head of Ernest Hemingway.

I'm not sure about the biplanes, so don't quote me.

*I should talk. I have a virtual sea of notes, from legal pads to post-its, in and around my office. But I can quit any time. Honest!

And my life is just an image of a rollercoaster anyway

Hello again. It's been nearly two weeks since last post, and at first I didn't think i'd post until my life got interesting. I had nothing of interest happen. Last weekend, ordered Massive Attack tickets and my lovely wife and I will be standing on the main floor, gazing up to stage. I have no idea what to expect, but the new single ("Live With Me") is worth your hard-earned 99 centsUSD at ye ol' Apple Music Store. It's a bluesy lament, caked in an imaginary cityscape where the streets are layered in a fresh coat of rain and the sun is coming up over the skyline, black outlines of telephone wires and buildings hiding their souls as they are backlit from a rising sun that can't burn off one man's sorrow.

My second birthday gift is coming in the mail, with the good folks at ThinkGeek and UPS letting me know visage del Miyamoto will be at my door by Monday. All is well.

Or was well. The writing had stalled out, and I was trapped with piles of pages and nothing unified or interesting. Imagine creating a skeleton and surrounding tissue, but unable to design and texture the skin to hold it all together, to give it a smooth, silky appearance to hide the guts and the alien bones underneath. For days I'd be trapped, unable to make any serious headway. I'd sit, and nothing strong would come. There's a saying that sometimes the definition of bravery is to say "I'll try again tomorrow," but really, we all know that's slipping into Lame Excuse Village. Stalling in the artistic void, and eventually the thermals would give out, leading to a catastrophic plummet.

And then everything just accelerated, moving laterally and in swerves. The aircraft morphs into an out-of-control sled that screams down a dark, wintry hill, and everything appears this ghostly blue-black, including the tree racing at you.

In brief.

1) My job might be evaporated sometime in 2007. The newspaper I work at is entering into arbitration with our cross-town rival. Years ago, the two entered into a joint-operating agreement with a clause that if one side could show that they were taking three consecutive years of losses, they could break from the JOA and go their own way. The bad news is, the newspaper I work at can't survive that divorce. We share the printing press as well as the sales/circulation staff. Imagine losing your mouth, legs and veins. It's that bad.

Well, our cross-town rival had dragged us to court a few years back saying that, yep, they lost three-years worth of money and now they want out. Our strategy? Stall and bleed them dry, because one of the JOA rules states that if they put their paper up for sale, we get the first shot. Plus, some of their accounting for three years of red ink looked questionable, so the thought was lose their complaint in the courts until they gave up, they went under, or until our future robot masters took over the world.

A couple days ago, the word came down: our rival and our lawyers were moving into arbitration. The good news: everything would be decided by or before May 2007. It would be over, and our rivals (if ruled against) would go back to their cave and lick some wounds and we could go on with thinking about kicking their asses on a daily basis in print and online. The bad news: Nearly everything else.

If the judge rules for them, then we're over with. If the judge comes back in, let's say, December, and says, "The other guys win," then the judge has to set a date for our dissolution that will be anywhere from six-12 months from the ruling date. No appeal. If that happens, then we are all crossing out fingers that our corporate overlords offer us the same severance package our sister paper in San Francisco got when their had their doors closed not too long ago. By my math, it would be six-months pay, a comfy cushion to soften the blow as I try to find gig that doesn't involve a paper hat.

2) Before the news came down, I came across a job listing on Seattle's Craigslist I couldn't pass up. It's a writer/editor job at a local gaming company, with requirements that sing to me with golden notes, practically crafted for yours truly. I submitted my resume and a trio of small writing samples two Tuesdays ago, but I haven't heard back yet. I try to tell myself that they are probably getting bombed with hundreds - if not thousands - of resumes from everyone who games and thinks he can complete a sentence, and that my Zen Jedi perfection is just trapped under a Word document avalanche.

Of course, I'm also reading it in the insecure junior high mindset of "Well, if they really liked me and thought I was pretty, they'd invite me to the big dance on Friday by now." And this was back when I didn't know my job might be lined up in some Death Star target station for demolition. I'm weighing the pros and cons of writing a follow-up note, considering nouns and verbs that don't reek of desperation. Ideally, I'd love to get the job after getting an offer of a severance package from here, but then again my wife wants a pony and we all can't get what we want.

3) I am writing again, but it's on a new project that I think my brain came up with in order to rescue me from the morass I'm in with the current novel. I'd love to spill all the beans on it, but I can't. I'll just reveal this: It's a superhero-ish story about an urban (likely Seattle) woman who inherits a timeless ability as well as set of siblings. It's in the vein of Piers Anthony and Neil Gaiman, a sort of magical realism and mythology of how the metaphysical world works. I'm taking lots of notes at this point, writing a couple fragments as I go in a running brainstorm. I'm not abandoning Rayelle or Divine, but I find myself enjoying this batch of fresh air. Lots of fun to be had here and the critic is almost silent as the glowing amber idea generator in me flares as bright as a supernova.

4) Oh, finally saw "Brokeback Mountain." Sucked, and not in the homoerotic way. As my wife put it, "How can a movie about two hot guys humping each other be so boring." I mean, I understand the movie intellectually, but emotionally it was a dead zone.

A much better mood on Monday

The sun's out in Seattle, and I'm getting the most awesome birthday present in the world.

Massive Attack is touring, at long last.

According to Ticketmaster, they have two U.S dates announced so far.

Denver and Seattle.

That's right, Seattle.

Tickets go on sale Saturday morning, and just last night my wonderful wife was wondering what to get me for my 34th birthday. Well, here you go. The tickets and maybe this to wear at the show. Or this. Or even this (been wanting to get this for a while).

Seeing Massive Attack as a b-day gift would make it the third coolest birthday ever. Second place was having my 31st in Paris (That's France, not Texas). The top vote-getter is a 30th surprise party, put on my wife in a truly Sam Fisher display of covert activity.

Hrm. My wife has been involved in all three. Coincidence? I think not.

St. Patrick's Day

I hate St. Patrick's Day.

I'm half-Irish, and I hate this time of the year, when spring begins to bud and the weather gets warmer. Every March, I know it's coming. I know this is supposedly the day of "my people" (as a teacher in Middle School once described it to me) and that today everyone is Irish. Beer is consumed, people wear green, parades are had, people drunkenly wail through "Oh Danny Boy" and then barf in the streets. Grew up in Chicago, seen it happen. Credit to my heritage, to see frat boys emptying their guts onto the sidewalk, let me tell you.

I don't mind cultural pride, and I don't mind the inclusiveness of St. Patrick's Day. I'm mildly bothered by people saying their Irish for one day, co-opting a culture under the guise of a good time. And yet if we couldn't have that, I couldn't have celebrated Cinco de Mayo or sat in a Buddhist temple in Houston. Plus, it's a celebration, and there's nothing wrong with that.

What does bother me is the following.

1) Co-opting a culture so you can get shitfaced. Look, just be a drunken asshole and stop with the rationalization that you can get hammered because of an Irish bishop who lived 1,500 years ago. St. Patrick and that Guinness you drink have nothing to do with each other. Just admit you're a lush and go on with your live. If you want to toast and boast, stand up on the table an hoist a pint to the good saint. Bellow that the man wasn't from Ireland, but likely from Wales or northern France. He escaped from the British slave trade and become a man of God, spreading the Good Word to everyone, no matter their class. A mean feat for the 5th century. He also didn't drive out the snakes from Ireland. That's a myth. More likely, his spreading the faith pushed out the Druidic sects from Ireland, and the snake has been linked to Druidism, so St. Patrick's most lasting legacy is a metaphor at best. Finally, Patrick (who wasn't born Patrick, by the way) lived a life dedicated to the abolition of slavery in all forms, something which made him a marked man. After his death, he was named the patron saint of Ireland. Not bad for a runaway slave.

2) We are not history's drunks. Sorry. The Irish are a profoundly stoic and artistic people. The Irish are one of the most resilient people on earth. Religious oppression, famine, discrimination. You name it, the Irish have survived it and come out more hardcore. And yet, there's a profound soul to the Irish. Until the conversion to the Euro, Irish money carried the visage of poets. On the euro coins, it's the harp. It's not a coincidence, either. The Irish have a tremendous history in the arts and letters. In fact, you probably have heard the Irish saved Western Civilization, with learned scholars preserving books and other written works from destruction, copying tomes and securing them so the world didn't fall into a permanent dark age after the fall of Rome. Again, when you hoist a Guinness, thank the monks.

3) St. Patrick's Day parades. Now, as I said, I love a good ethnic celebration as much as the next guy, but any celebration that promotes one idealized version of a group of people makes me shiver in a sort of existential dread. Case in point is the annual St. Patrick's Day celebration and parade in New York, reportedly the largest Irish pride parade in the world. Year after year, the organizers force to keep gay and lesbian Irish-Americans from taking part. And while it's a gross sight to see every year, this year it's coated with an extra topping of vile, trying to deny the New York City Council Speaker, herself Irish and a lesbian, from identifying herself as the latter in the parade. Great. The Irish migrate over from Ireland more than 150 years ago as bottom-rung immigrants, and now, once they have some power, they exclude their own for being gay. Makes me want to pull the organizers aside and scream "The Irish were the shitbucket of the British Empire, we came over to America to excuse discrimination, famine and oppression, and suddenly you want to act like a British asshole king with regard to gays? Short attention span much?" Embrace every Irish person, because at one point in Irish history, the British were content with wiping all of us out through the famines.

In the end, I know it's just a party, and I nod and smile, knowing it'll be over Saturday morning, save for the puke on the sidewalk. People will put away their green shirts and go back to the non-Irish heritage. Still, it'd be nice for once that on just one St. Paddy's Day, we stop the crap with the leprechauns and shamrocks and old-school U2 and the "Kiss Me, I'm Irish." If you're going to celebrate a people, then do it right. Understand where they came from, and once you know that, you'll be amazed at all the strife and heartache the Irish had to endure. And yet, they come out this odd but buoyant blend of stoic and singing. I've seen it in the Irish side of my family, and I know that through all the family trauma and chaos, they'll be there for each other. Get a big Irish family in a room, and you'll see what I mean. It's hard to keep the Irish down, tempered by faith and family and history and a slow-burning optimism.

And, yes, they brew some good beer, too.

A Verdict on Visionary Vindicating Violence

Or "V for Vendetta," the longer review.

First, if you are in love with the source material, you are going to get your heart broken. This isn't Alan Moore's and David Lloyd's flawed gem of a graphic novel about a modern-day Guy Fawkes running around a hyper-Thatcheresque London. No, this is more akin to Peter Jackson's version of the "Lord of the Rings" novels. Distilled to its essence, the story remains but the order is switched around, re-written, updated, polished. For someone who has read (meaning devoured and picked apart) the Moore/Lloyd work which was first published nearly two decades ago, it came as a shock to see characters acting differently, back plots and resolutions dropped, and subplots introduced. Bits and pieces of the original script from the novel float in and out, and observant viewers will get the nods given to the graphic novel laced throughout the film. If there's a way you can do it, put aside the original work before you see the film. It'll work out better in the long run.

Okay, that overture out of the way, it's time to get to the symphony (an in-joke left for you to discover). "V for Vendetta" is likely the bravest thing you'll see come out of Hollywood in a while. It's a film (if you haven't figured it out from the trailers) about a terrorist in a future fascist London who is bent on destroying the system. First by going after the people responsible for his past suffering, and then the whole she-bang itself. It's more of a study of fascism and power than an action film. V (the terrorist, placed by Hugo Weaving, who goes faceless throughout the film) isn't Batman or Wolverine. He relies far more on guile than guns, although he does pack a mighty nasty set of knives. With his Guy Fawkes mask in a perpetual smirk, he becomes a murderous ghost of Christmas Past, killing anyone part of the ruling class.

Which all leads to Natalie Portman as Evey, the young girl V rescues from plainclothes policemen who were about to rape her for violating curfew. V for Vigilante? Nothing so simple. Evey becomes the conduit for us to enter V's world. We learn about his plan, which is far larger than it first appears, and how the killing of a few party officials isn't the end, but merely the beginning of a much larger destruction. Evey's also the audience's voice, questioning how murder and mayhem can be good, if ever. Is there a point where violence works, and when, and can we live with the consequences? Can a society pacified by government-sponsored fear can aroused to take a stand? Is V justified in taking his revenge, once we learn the back stories of both his creation and the government that twisted him into being? And what if V is right, that there is a time when violence is the only solution left for a society rules by cruel masters? Speaking of which, V doesn't stop to console a fearful Britain. In one of the film's best moments, V hijacks the TV signal and speaks directly to the British people, giving them the hard truth that to find the true culprits of today's woes, they only need to look in the mirror. To paraphrase the man, it hurts because it's true.

There's nods and pokes at where we are now as a society. Hate-based pundits, fear-based newscasts to keep the populace cowering, government surveillance, heated political rhetoric labeling anyone against the system as a terrorist. It's achingly familiar, done to make the absurd (a man in a mask running around causing havoc, avoiding capture) a little more real. And compared to a mess of other graphic novel/comic book films out there, V for Vendetta has the bravery to not be about just the action, but to explore the ideas behind them.

"V for Vendetta" is a fable about living in fear, living in a society where anything is done for absolute control, and the power of standing up and saying "no." And V understands what other superhero/graphic novel-made movies don't: Heroes exist as part of the time they live in. And the smart ones play their cards to bow out at the right time. V lasts as long in any given room and with any given character he's supposed to, and his finale is masterfully played.

"V for Vendetta" is about finding a point past fear, and being liberated from a life of terror. It's a violent film, violent in ideas and actions, and it is as fearless as its lead character. It's slow and awkward in places, and there's at least one "wait a minute" moment involving the British Mail system, but on the whole it's worth your time in the audience and afterward, thinking about how (as Stephen Rea's police investigator character deciphers) the chain reaction of events in the film was arranged years in advance by V. It'll get you thinking about how the words "freedom fighter" and "terrorist" are easily interchanged. And yes, it'll get you thinking about war, terrorism and freedom. It's not an simple film, but a necessary one, an allegory for mad times. It is a film about an idea, which V tells us can't be killed.

And you should go see it.