I started this blog three times, chucked out each attempt, and settled at last on this version. Caveats in place, let’s consider a new pet theory of mine – layering. To the graphics gurus, this is not an Adobe photoshop tutorial. Perhaps an eclectic name might be more impressive. I like this one best. Layering is a way of approaching a situation or problem and requires more ink than a single entry, so I’ll blog more in the future. The first principle is perspective.

Over the past few years I’ve shifted from seeing life as a balance between happiness and less happiness, and where my head doubles as the fulcrum supporting a see saw of highs and lows. Before the see saw model, my attitude was even more brusque, but that’s another blog and a few bottles of good scotch. My doctor warned me to lay off the Chivas, so we’ll not go there. Anyway, my view now is that a life is more journey based, with the goal always moving along on the path, rather than gunning for a specific destination without thought for what is happening. Once en route the direction, rate of travel and distance vary and change by the day, but as long as the journey continues – a traveler in motion never fails. Even when a traveler gets lost, strays, or pursues a “bad” lead, in the end every effort forms an experience and possible lesson.

So far layering is very close to Zen in practice, yet I doubt the great masters will sue me over the strong and coincidental similarities.

More tomorrow. I have to get some writing done….

Warning: Weak blog entry! Danger! This entry is all fluff, just some links for new site content.

Enjoy movie review for Crash and Monster in Law.

And most importantly, have a great weekend!

With the change of the seasons, so goes my scheduling abilities. Lately, either there’s 30 seconds left till midnight, or it’s 1AM and the blog is already past due. Ack. Deadlines are suggestions. Certain deadlines, at least.

For instance, I know of a library in Maryland that is short one title. I know this because I borrowed said book in 1995 and just unpacked it today. Perhaps there’s a warrant for my arrest in this matter. This talk of broken deadlines brings me to my writing situation.

Tis true, the eternal struggle with Velocity continues. I never dreamed I might write at such a tepid pace. Net for a productive week: 5-7 pages. To some authors that’s barely a days work. Stephen King espouses the 4 page a day plan. A nice goal that’s way in the distance. If I write 4 pages in a day, 3 go in the garbage and the remainder lingers in revision hell. There’s just no forcing more content out. Maybe the next book will be different. Or so I pray.

The new short story is coming very soon. Just waiting for it to arrive in the mail. Why mail a story I wrote to myself? A good question. For the answer read tomorrow’s entry.

It can’t be Tuesday. That’s just simply impossible. I blinked twice on Monday morning and the day was over. And I forgot to blog. Ouch.

Here’s the haps at 30,000 feet:
1) Buddhapuss Books – built an automated repricing tool to stay on top of prices and listings. Coding that much sucked the life out of me for a few days but if sales stay consistent, the time invested was worthwhile.
2) A cool question arrived for Buddhapuss yesterday. The cat will try and answer on Wednesday or Thursday.
3) Writing. Very slow the past 2 days due to BB business. Got a new short story in the can that I’ll post in a few days, next week at the latest.
4) Movies reviews. There’s not been a one since Hitch. This has less to do with my viewing habits, I still go often, and everything to do with the fact that few grabbed my interest. Mostly, they sucked and rather than trash talk a few hundred million dollars of celluloid, I’ve waited for the right film to jump back in. I have tickets to the Thursday morning 12:01 AM showing of Episode III. Certainly that will inspire a review.