Monthly Archives: December 2011

Reflection!

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When we reflect I cannot help but wonder why. People I speak to seem to reflect back on there life with the filter of  regret. I can honestly say there are only a handful of friends and family in my life that follow my interpretation of reflection.

Above is a collage of words from my tags of the last year. I can say that these are the most important words from my last year of posts. When I look over these, it makes me reflect with in, I see happy, sad and great social times. The last year has brought me the death of my father. The finish of my book. The realisation that I need to do more. Also a great growth within my self. My first blog almost a year ago was (and you can look this up in my archives if you wish) To Van Dyke or not To Van Dyke That is the Question. Since than I have posted fifty seven times subjects ranging from information about my writing  to family holidays, great social events such as the Royal Wedding and some very personal events too.

This is the past and we should learn from this, not repeat it.

We hold onto the past with notions that to persist and repeat will bring better results. It will not.

Most conversations I will have over the next twenty four hours about the future, will involve the past. Trying to make a better future by clinging onto a changed or modified past.

The glory days are just that.

We anchor ourselves with Memories but we set ourselves free with Dreams.

We look forward and shape the future, use your glory days, don’t repeat them.

On this I wish you all a very happy and productive New Year. I look forward to the new challenges it will bring.

 

It’s a finger nail biting moment

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The time is 07:46am I received an email last night from a popular podcast show called The Writing Show. It’s hosted by Paula B and she informed me that she will be looking at my book in her next show. The show is posted today and because it’s in America I’m not sure what time. I have checked twice already. They are a few hours behind and I have no clue as to what time zone she lives in.
Oh he’ll I’m nervous, its that someone else is reading my work with a critical eye. I have listened to Paula B’s podcast for years now and very much respect her view, I even look forward to listening to it because I know it will help me with the book. Still the nerves are here.
You will be able to find this podcast at http://www.writingshow.com or on iTunes it’s labeled as slush pile workshop 22.

The time is 8:22pm I have now listened to the podcast and before I give you my update I thought I would explain why I time stamped the post. Why not post the bit above this morning then post this update? Well because I think i wanted to keep it together and I like the format it’s like a diary of today’s events. And who wants to keep getting emails that I’m posting every two hours.
Back to the podcast, Paula B read my chapter and that was strange in its self. I have listened to her read other peoples writings for years. She was kind with a large scoop of honesty. In brief my story is good, my plot is good. It’s very cinematic. These are some of the good points that she talked about on the show. The main point was copy edit, copy edit, copy edit.
I have to say that this does not come as to much of a shock, I must be the worst speller in the world and punctuation, well I’m still on that learning curve.
In my defence I wrote the first chapter to Purple back in 2008 and I have learnt so much since then. I suppose my challenge now is to bring that what i have learned to the book and stop being lazy. Give it a listen and by all means give me your opinion especially with the word tw*t (for a full disclosure of this word listen to the podcast) as this seems to have a different meaning in the states and I think I may need to change it.

A Christmas play

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I have two children and they are both boys. This year is the first year that they are both in the same school and playing in separate plays.

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My oldest son is playing a solder from world war one, the play is called Silent Night, Holy Night. He reinacted through dance the game of football played by opposing sides on that famous Christmas eve in nineteen fourteen. For a group of ten year olds I have to say it was a very
Moving and special performance. It left me feeling good about the human spirit at such times.

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My younger son is dancing in the Nut Cracker, I’m forever impressed and so proud of my children.

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I was one of the three kings in the christmas plays when I was young. Now a days it’s a historic point of history by my oldest and one of the most successful plays of all time by my youngest. Who says the world has not moved on for the better. In my house my children are surpassing me at the ages of ten and seven.

How time can stand still

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I met my wife when she was eight-teen and she worked on a market stall selling clothing. I would wait for her at a food stall in sight of her while she would finish each day. Usually i was eating a bacon and egg sandwich.(the good old days when this was not a treat) I was twenty-one at the time and Never realised what impression this made in me.
This morning I revisited the food stall by pure chance, again waiting for my wife, this time she is not in sight of me because she now managers an outlet for a company called Biotherm. Seventeen years on I’m sitting on the same chair as I did back then and like a unbroken habit I order a coffee and a bacon and egg sandwich, it was like i had never left.

We may move jobs and grow into more experienced people but as I sit here now I feel the same as I did back then. Time truly stands still in some places.

Techno gremlins have found me

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Yes they have found me, technology gremlins have sort me for a while now and ten days into November they found my desktop and did something to the hard drive. Now let’s remember this is ten days into nanowrimo and I was at about seventeen thousand words and on a good run. After two trips to the mac tech guys and over £200 worse off I was again at home. Only by this time It was well in to the last quarter of november.

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Strike two game this Saturday just gone. I was having a glass of wine with some friends when a nasty gremlin managed to nock my foot (I mean my foot, not anyone else’s it had to be mine) into an almost empty glass of red wine and the subsequent splash of red stuff just nipped the MacBook air that was on a small table in my lounge. Instantly I switched it off and left it for many a hour only to look at a blank screen and no sound.
Well they say it comes in threes, I don’t know why it has to be three but that’s what they say. Any suggestions on how to defend myself from such gremlin threats would be much appreciated.

Not long now before the big red one comes a calling.

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They have found a new world

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Yes it’s true they have found a new planet that seems to be a lot like earth.
I woke this morning to the news that a world orbiting a sun like ours in an orbital position similar to ours. It may even have water and oceans.
It would take us over seventeen million year to get there(so no quick trip) and its two and a half times bigger than the earth. (wouldn’t that make the gravity greater than ours, so if there be Aliens they will be big and strong aaaaah. Sorry getting carried away)
Fun aside this is always good stuff but it alway amazes me how little news coverage this kind of stuff gets. People are so de-sensitised by the movies that I think it would take an alien space ship to land and even then it would be on page two after the split up of some A list stars.
Recently there has been a lunch to mars and soon there will be a new telescope up in orbit to replace Hubble. But no one I speak too knows anything about it. The media priorities have definitely changed since I was a boy sitting in my school classroom watching the space shuttle take off in the eighties. Cool days.