CarlHoliday

NO! NO! Don't do that! French is so sexy, so enticing, alluring, so . . . Don't put it into English. Don't!

Gut level . . . Yeah, that about sums it up. I've never explored the actual description of love in any of my writings, but I suppose that might be something to put on the need to do list. In my new story, about the brain damaged boy growing to adulthood, there actually might be a time to do just that. Kevin is fairly articulate, if you can get him to express his feelings, which is difficult because that part of his brain is either damaged or hasn't been opened yet. There are times approaching in his so far unwritten life where he will encounter love, real love for another. So, quite possibly there might come a situation where he has to explain what he is feeling, how he knows he is in love. I can see, possibly in Part IV or V, where someone will express his love for Kevin, and that might be a good time to explore the definition, too. Well, thanks for the writing assignment. I guess I've got some work to do. Carl

I know it's because my mother just died. I know that. On Saturday, I did a posting blitz and posted more in one day than I've ever done since being here. Quality was not my goal. Humor reined supreme. The laughter is gone. I stand at the edge of oblivion. If it wasn't so damned cold, I'd go for a swim. If it wasn't raining, I'd go for a walk on a high bridge. If I didn't want to live, I'd cease to be. Life has been bad before. Oh, god, has life been bad, before. I know it's because my mother died and I can't grieve for the bitch. She was a bitch unto death. Yet, I want to grieve. I want to get beyond this, but it hangs there like a dead weight upon my soul. I had my first diagnosed major depressive event on the death of my father. That was in 1971. I couldn't grieve for him, either. I shouldn't grieve for my mother, either. She isn't worth it. She was not a nice person and got worse as she aged toward death. And, yet, my mind wants to get rid of this feeling, or itself of me. It doesn't seem too particular either way. So, I stand at the edge of oblivion. One step the wrong way and there's little hope for my survival. I actually considered checking myself into a psych hospital today. Doing so would result in all of the psychological deaths I've dreamt about in the past. My life, as it is now, would simple cease to exist. So, I didn't take that desperate step. The website project seems on hold. I don't know what happened. Everything seemed to be going forward and then we stopped. Of course, I said it was okay for things to slow down, but now I'm not certain if we're biding our time or off on some other tangent. It's tough not knowing what's going on. A legal editor stepped forward to read Chapter 6 of the Kevin Project, the last chapter of the first section. I'm working on the next section, which covers Kevin from 16 to 18. The main subordinate character is a transgendered person named Euphorbia Gneiss. Kevin's love interest is a boy named Eric, who is one year older. I posted Chapter 14 of The Pastel Cowboy. I have to get the next chapter of Tim and the Corsair off to the editor. And, yet, I stand on the edge of oblivion. You can't imagine how tempting it is to simply step into scourging flames and give up my spirit to whatever happens next. Oh, my son said my father haunts the workshop in the garage. He also thinks my mother (his grandmother) has returned home. I have a suspicion it is my father, who spent a lot of his life in the workshop, away from my mother. bitch adj. My mother.

I hope you flushed, or at least did the sit ups and saved it for later. For some math is the easiest thing in the world, for others they come to a point when it stops making sense. I lasted until calculus. I looked at it, tried it, looked at it some more, tried it again, and finally came to the conclusion it was total B.S. I hope you buckle down and get through this math problem. The choice is yours. Carl

Helen Hunt in The Waterdance, yeah, love her! Carl

Happy 16th Irony! Carl

Only four? Are you sure you looked everywhere? Gray hairs usually show up in odd numbers, at least in the beginning. Hopefully, yours will come in evenly. I've got splotches of gray on my head and they're definitely off-putting. The stares I get in public are so unnerving I've actually had to get used to wearing a hat. You know, one of those hats farmers and truckers wear. The ones with their favorite college logo on them. What part of Washington State were you in? Around the Seattle-Tacoma-Olympia-Bellevue-Everett metro area, the posted speed limit is actually the minimum you can go without people honking their horns; showing you their sperm count, bra size, or IQ; or, mouthing all sorts of expletives your mother never taught you. In a recent newspaper article, the State Patrol actually admitted their equipment doesn't measure speeds unless the speeder is at least 15 MPH over the limit and even then they're more than willing to give you a good talking to rather than going through the hassle of issuing a citation. Actually, I've found traffic in the LA metro area to be almost like a parking lot. At times, I'm lucky if the big truck gets out of sixth gear and most of the time I'm in low-range for hours. Now, I do admit to having a bit of a problem with all those cars speeding down the breakdown lanes, but I figure they just have incontinence issues and can't be dillydallying around in traffic. Carl

Sorry, but this was not a sad story. Any story about saving another's life is never sad. Thanks for the good words. Carl

Fran

What does one write about a dead mother? (It was last night around 2100.) Well, I

I can't remember ever going shopping on the day after Thanksgiving. What's the point of joining the throng to save a dime. The real sales don't come along until closer to Christmas when the stores are a little more anxious to move some inventory; plus there aren't that many other shoppers because they all went today. Carl

I don't know why, but I have a problem with lists of celebrities that do something or are something. Celebrities who own dogs, celebrities who have children, celebrities who've adopted African or Asian children, celebrities who are GLBT. It goes on and on. I don't care. What I do care about, like Graeme, are the CEOs, board members, and even the politicians who are out. It's nice those celebrities are proud to be out, but it'd be a lot more newsworthy if a few notable CEOs and politicians were proud to be out and who didn't wait until they were 68 or 69 to announce it to the world in a autobiography. Carl (who waited until he was 53 to come out)

Happy Turkey Day everyone! Even if this is not Thanksgiving for you, please take a moment and say thank you to someone you love; and, please remember to smile when you do it. I would like to thank each and everyone of you for allowing me to be a small part of your lives. Carl

I had one of those "oblivion" thoughts yesterday. I don't know if you have them, but they kind of go like this: "Religion is good because it keeps the masses in line. If most people did not have religion, they might come to the realization that life doesn't make a bit of sense. We're all pretty much like a herd of gnus. We plod through our lives according to society's plan and then die. Everyting we were, everything we did, everything we might have thought, everything of us dies, comes to an end, ceases to exist. It doesn't matter how good you are or how famous you become, once you're dead all of your thoughts die with you." The problem with that train of thought is that it inevitably ends with looking for a place to die. I mean what's the point, right? Well, that's the whole point. Most people aren't thinking those things. They're too busy being so they don't have time to contemplate the obvious, which is a good thing because if a lot of people came to the realization there's no point to any of this, they might just end it all right then and there. The one thing that keeps me going is my stories. There are a few people out there you like what I write. A lot of people get really pissed when I stomp on a character like Zach. He's a pretty likeable guy, but he's going through a horrendous time and gets stomped physically and emotionally quite a bit. I've thought about writing a nice, regular story about nice, regular guys who live nice, regular lives going through the motions of living, agonizing over whether so-and-so thinks they're as hot as they know they are, having unbelievable sex, going to the mall and seeing their ex in the food court, having unbelievable sex, going to the water park and see one really hot dude, having unbelieavable sex, etc., etc., etc. But, I can't. My new story has a boy who had bacterial meningitis and lived; except, he's not quite right in the head. He can't remember very well. He sees things we don't see. He talks "funny." And, well, in the beginning, he's hornier than a rabbit and is almost entirely focused on sex. He gets involved with someone who is a whole lot crazier than he is and tragedy strikes, but this is a long story so we know he's going to come out of it in the end. I think what I like most about Kevin is he's vulnerable. He's easily led down the path of destruction and he almost doesn't get out with his life. But, this is a "bunnies frolicking in a flowery meadow" story, so he gets the chance to not be so vulnerable, which may put him in greater danger because he'll be more like the rest of us. Oh, yes, I'm a little down. Things haven't been going well recently. I know I've been way up there these past few days, but all good things must, eventually, come to an end. I try to stay up because I really like feeling really, really good. The opposite of down is a nice place to be, but I'm down more than up so you have to learn to deal with down, too. So I write stories that are a little down. Sorry for dumping, but like I said, things haven't been going well, recently. You know, I dread the day when I can't think of any more stories.

It might help if you gave him an expertise in something most people are not interested in, something off the wall. The story I working on now will mostly take place on a small island in northwest Washington state starting in the Sixties and moving forward. There will be lots of "space cadets" and others, who don't seem to fit into regular everyday society. Hippies, maybe? That's a very general term that includes a lot of people who were outside the norm and quite often came across as blithering idiots, until you talked to them and found out they were on the ball, except it was a different color than yours. A character like this can be fun, interesting, complex, and quite likeable, and still be an air-head off somewhere fighting aliens. Carl

Okay, I'll admit right up front I'm trying to lose a little weight. Heck, I've been trying to lose a little weight since I don't remember when, probably around the time my nickname was "Tubby" and I figured out the other kids weren't trying to be nice. So, my latest ploy at losing weight is to do it metrically. Using kg's I only have to go down 21.9. Using good ol' avoidupois, I need to drop over 40 and that's a lot to drop. Plus when losing kg's a little goes a long way. I broke the 122 barrier today when I checked my weight in Madera after delivering my load to a box plant in Tulare, which reminds me of the song Volare. I think the most important factor helping me lose weight is I've told Little Debbie to take a hike. I'd like to say more, but I'm starting to nod off. I've been up since 0500 and have to get out on the road by 0630 tomorrow so I have a chance of getting home some time on Thanksgiving, not that we're going to have turkey because we aren't. We'll go out because that's what we do.

Nice story, kind of reminded me of my in-laws down in rural Arkansas and all the other animal signs. Funny thing about philosophy, you can't learn to be a philospher by studying philosphy. What seems to be the trick to being a good philospher is being a good storyteller and you've got that down pat. Carl

A small gift always seems appropriate in situations like this. A meal seems to work miracles, even if you go to your favorite place or possibly to a place neither of you frequent, some place very special. Either of these will certainly ensure a good memory of your appreciation. Carl

I'd like to use colour and all the other "Commonwealth" spellings, but my spell checker runs American English and it's Color all the way. I suppose I could change my spell checker to the other way, but I'd probably end up speaking with an accent. Carl

Movie? I haven't been to a movie theatre in ... in ... it's been a long, long time. If I was going to recommend a movie, any movie, the list would start with Harvey because it has the all-time greatest double take ever. Just thinking about Jesse White doing it makes me chuckle. For action, I'd go with Garden of Evil only because I'm a Gary Cooper fan. Just to watch Brandon De Wilde, I'd see Hud. For fun, I'd watch *batteries not included. Probably the best recent movie I've seen is De Zaak Alzheimer (The Memory of a Killer, USA). It's a good detective movie with Koen De Bouw (who is HOT!) playing Eric Vinke who is tracking down a murderer. But, if it was a rainy Saturday afternoon and I didn't have anything to do, I'd glady spend 3 hours watching Fanny and Alexander. Carl

A great big THANK YOU goes out to Old Bob for coming up with the word sombre in a comment to my blog. Without that sweet word I couldn't have renamed my blog, used a credible reference to deSelby, and had a very good time doing it. Thanks, again, Old Bob for making this day special. Carl

Okay, so you didn't get to vote. Maybe you should've sent a comment like Old Bob. If you've got any complaints, send them his way. No, I'm not going to change the title every month, but I might do it annually. I'm still riding a euphoric high right now, so enjoy this happy mood while you can. I'm working very hard on the Kevin project. The words are coming together and if all goes according to plan (i.e., I don't have a setback on the depression front, etc.) Kevin should be ready to roll-out just about the time Pastel completes. On the local front, my mother is still dying. Take it from me, pray for the big one. You don't want to go through what's happening to her. Actually, it's her body that's going through this. Mother checked out a while ago. She was taken out of her latest residence and moved to hospice because the hospice nurses thought she was very close to finding the exit door. But, she isn't, so now we have to put her somewhere else. A friend of the family says I should bury the hatchet and go see my mother and tell her it's okay for her to die. You know, give my permission so she can die in peace. F**k that! She's never needed or asked my permission to do anything. Okay, so I'm being petty about this, but I've been going through some old memories over the past year as mother has ever steadily progressed toward her final breath. Ridicule. That's the lastest word to pop up out of Memory Lane. My parents loved me so much they felt they could ridicule me along with everyone else. When you have the self-esteem of the underside of a doormat a little ridicule goes a long way toward making you feel so good. What makes me really sad is that I took the crap they were dishing out. I was the good son. Well, I was an only child so I was also the bad son, the mediocre son, and the "I'll never understand why you didn't come out as a girl" son. I think the favorite phrase around the house always seemed to be "why can't you be more like _________?" And, I hung my head in shame for failing to be more like everyone else in the world who was better than me at everything. Now, don't we feel better? Got some of the icky bile stuff out of our system and now we're ready to be our old happy self. And, thanks again Old Bob for the train of thought that led to the renaming of this blog.

It's not totally black. Look at it as shades of darkness; or, as de Selby might have been leading up to, some places have greater accumulations of black air than others. I kind of look at it as a few of the darker shades of gray. I am not sombre. Of all the new choices, this one seemed to express more emotions than the others. Plus, sombre can be melancholy, which is reputedly caused by an excess of black bile. Oooh! That's just the ticket! Thanks Old Bob!

As I was driving back from Portland today I thought about changing the title of this blog. When I first started this, I took the title from my LiveJournal blog, which has suffered significantly from a general lack of entries since this was begun. So, I was thinking maybe I could actually have two blogs if they were named differently. So, I came up with a few ideas and thought, "Why not give my readers a chance to influence my generally obstinate mental processes?" I don't have to change, but I thought maybe now was a good time to consider it. Anyway, I am open to any and all suggestions offered.

Well, I gone and done it this time. I saw that Graeme was celebrating his 17th anniversary and, of course, I had to congratulate him. Seventeen years is quite an accomplishment. (I don't exactly remember number 17, but I'm sure we had fun. We'll be doing number 34 this year. Can you imagine living with the same person for 34 years?) Well, that post put me over the hump. I've been worried I wouldn't hit 100 posts before my 1st anniversary here, but Graeme did it to me. Now, I suppose I'll have to aim for doubling my total before my second annivesary. It's only logical. I finished the stuff I was doing for the website and sent it off to the techies to do their magic wanding stuff. Personally, I think I did a fairly pathetic job of it. Well, I did the words okay, but the meager graphics aren't anything to write home about. The techie person who is helping me said he'd look at the mess I've made and try to sort things out into to some semblance of a presentable product. I think that's what he said. I guess. So, that means I'm back on the Kevin project; and, I am working on it. Now that I know how I want Kevin to see the world through his disease damaged brain, I think everything will start to fall into place. I think I'm going to try very hard to make this story as poignant as possible without actually killing a lot of the characters, which is sort of the easy way to get a reader teary eyed, especially if you can do it in some horrendously bloody accident or something. A graphic decapitation has always been one of my favorites, but I remember reading somewhere about a kid who was severed in half at the waist. Now, that would be poignant as hell, but I'm not going to do that to my readers. Maybe a lost love or an impossible love, but no killing off characters just to draw a tear or two. I finally had a volunteer step forward to look at my winter anthology story. The volunteer sort of came out of left field, but I'll take any opinion I can get. I'm back to work tomorrow. I pick up a load in Tacoma tomorrow morning and I'll be heading for sunny California. I hope it's sunny. Last time the rain followed my down the valley.