The Blind Side
I read (and loved) The Blind Side a few years ago. It's a great piece of sports writing with a great story in the middle of it. That story makes up the core of the movie adaptation. And generally, the movie stays pretty true to what actually happened. The biggest change from the book, and the hardest for me to get past, is the focus on the adopting mother (Sandra Bullock) as opposed to Michael. This is like watching the story of Hamlet through Gertrude's eyes–the most interesting character is not the focus. Even so, it's an affecting story and Read more…
Foss Marina announces 2010 lease rates … in verse. Really. (And it’s a pretty good poem too!)
A sample … And the expenses encircled his head like a wreath,So the budget bore down and growled his big teeth. Keeping the same rates would take a large toll, To keep expenses in check was now his big goal. Full poem here.
Charlie McManus speaks at City Club December 2. RSVP by Monday!
Chef Charlie McManus, owner of Primo Grill and Crown Bar in Tacoma, will speak at City Club of Tacoma Wednesday Dec. 2 at the University of Puget Sound. via blog.thenewstribune.com This promises to be really interesting, especially for those who like local food. Email office@cityclubtacoma.org asap to sign up.
Eee gads.
I had no idea my sister was such a fisherman.
Gobble Gobble
image taken from the first ever Mary Holste Design Thanksgiving card.
An Evening With Kevin Smith
I spent two evenings with Kevin Smith, actually. The two disc set has about 3 1/2 hours of Kevin Smith. The DVD is a compilation of 5 Q&A sessions he did at universities around the country. They are funny, irreverent, interesting, full of penis jokes, and then sometimes really graphic. Pretty much your basic Kevin Smith movie. He has some wonderfully funny stories in there. His story about writing a draft for a never-to-be-made Superman movie in the mid-90s was great; as was his week of making a documentary for Prince that never went anywhere; and picketing his own movie Read more…
21,000 words on the cutting room floor …
After a major edit of my novel, I dropped it down by about 21,000 words. That ends up to be just about 21% of the words. And the story didn’t change a bit. Like. At all. That’s a good sign I had a problem. I’m going to go through it again soon. This time for pacing, to make sure I didn’t take out anything important or rush anything too badly. It’ll probably grow again. But I feel good about the edits I made.
Living and Working in a Virtual World
(with an emphasis on the working part) After a wonderful weekend away in Portland, I'm starting today off by guest-teaching Andrew Fry's class on Living and Working in a Virtual World. I felt like my Pecha Kucha presentation focused pretty heavily on the "living" side, so for today's class I'm going to talk about the working side of the equation. I feel like Homer Simpson, when he knocks on Flanders' door and immediately runs away. "Can't talk now, Flanders. I've got a class to teach!" It's even better when he does it at the Drive Thru. Anyway. Very excited!
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