I want to be like Kurt Vonnegut, but only a little.

I was sitting backstage today during the show and i had an idea for a story. It would be a simple little short story about a man's last thoughts as he fell a very long way. Possibly from the top of the Empire State Building. Now I realize that the ESB isn't exactly easy to fall off of, and that because of it's shape it would be even harder to be in free fall the whole way down, but those are things I would ignore for the sake of the narrative. In doing research for this story I looked up the height of the empire state building. 1,435 feet. I the tried to figure out how long it would take to fall this distance and then the fire alarm went off and the hallway was filled with weird yellow smoke/powder so I left and didn't get back until Monday morning. End of Post.  ¶ 4/29/2007 10:48:00 PM (0) comments

  To Kill a Mockingbird opened last night.

This has been an interesting show for me. ON the one hand I get to be a classic literary character, on the other I'm offstage for 95% of the play. I have enjoyed working on the production but it hasn't been nearly as much fun as Pillowman was. we have three more performances left and they should go well. The audience liked the show and we got a standing Ovation led by the local paper's critic. I've never been sold on the script of the show but if the audiences like it I can't really complain. Jacie got some dust in her and eye and has been temporarily blinded, so hanging out wit her was kinda weird Wednesday night.  ¶ 4/27/2007 12:01:00 PM (0) comments

  The problem with fictionalized autobiography.

A character in a play I once performed in said "I think people who only write about what they know, only write about that they know because they're too stupid to make something up." It's a good philosophy. Making things up is the whole point of fiction. Unfortunately, i also write as a release mechanism. Two nights ago I was woken up by an idea for a play. With out going into too much detail, (If I talk too much about it before I finish it, it won't get done) It deals with some characters loosely based on real life people. Now I don't know if People who read the script would know this unless they knew the real life counterparts but I'm afraid that the counterparts would. It feels wrong to fictionalize peoples life for what some would consider entertainment. The problem is confounded when the fiction comes closer to reality than I could have guessed. One of my characters who wasn't based in Real life just materialized in my world. This raises the question of verisimilitude. If I write truthful characters, there will be people in the nonfiction universe who identify with them. There was an anecdote about John Lennon , where this homeless teenager traveled a long distance to meet John because "your songs were about my life," John replied with something along the lines of "Helter Skelter was just about a roller coaster" Does art imitate life or is it the other way 'round? This new person in my life exhibits characteristics of Steve, my character. Primarily in his relations with others. I was thinking of submitting this play to RROAPS next year but now I'm not so sure.

Also I like the double meaning of the word fecund

Why don't you come right out and say it  ¶ 4/23/2007 03:08:00 PM (0) comments

  Time, again.

Ten days before he died, I wrote about Kurt Vonnegut. Tend days after he died I write about his death. Time is weird. The past three weeks seem to be undefined in terms of time. I had to do some serious thinking and fact checking I determined that the past three weeks had in fact taken exactly three weeks to transpire.

There's a Murder Mystery double feature I shall be attending tonight and it should be interesting. We will be watching two film adaptations of a Mystery novel written in the 1800s. I'll let you know how it goes. I also bought Ferris Bueller's Day Off, and some Of those ice pops in a tube that are basically frozen sugar water. Yum!

You can't be too careful
Make your mind up and go for it.  ¶ 4/21/2007 05:50:00 PM (0) comments

  The Interwebs.

This post has been brought to you through a generous thought donation by remadegold.

Are the interwebs necessary? What has happened to the face to face meeting? Is this a good thing? Is what a good thing? The interwebs.

I believe i made an earlier post on similar themes dealing with the anonymity of the interwebs, but now I want to look at it from a more personal perspective. I use this magic computer box to keep in touch with my friends; that being real people I know and have met. This also includes the A-list whose members I have met and am glad to call a part of my family. In the past 7 years I have met a number pf people with whom I became very good friends. Unfortunately our lives have traveled, and continue to travel in many different directions. My best friend here at Tech won't be next year, my best friend at Tech last year isn't here anymore. These two people helped me more than can be said in the past few months. If I didn't use the interwebs to keep in contact I'm not sure things would have turned out as well as they have. Also the members of the aforementioned A-List helped me put a perspective on my life that I wouldn't have had otherwise. These are people who I would never in my life come across without the technology I'm using right here and now. I should say that the list isn't your typical forum style setting. We all use our real names and we are all held accountable for what we say. This can remove some of the inherent problems with online communication without hurting the benefits.

This is not to say that The interwebs have helped me stay in contact with all of my past friends, but through things like facebook I can still check in every now and then and know that they are still out in the world just like I am. My best friend in Kindergarten was Eric Cabral. I don't remember much about him now, but we hung out in his house a lot, and some number of years later i learned that his mother packed him and his brother up one day and left their father. Searching on facebook I find six men with that name. If I was so inclined I could contact them and see if any of them used to go to Dove elementary. I'm not going to do this because our lives have diverted to much; we would have nothing to talk about. This doesn't have to happen nowadays, with the technology we have. I can keep my friends who are separated by distance close through the interwebs. We can share ideas stories happiness and defeat. (the agony of defeat is walking 20 miles in one day. Pun.)

Now I tried branching out with the random people in cyberspace and invited a stranger from Chicago to be my friend on facebook. It was amusing at first but he when he tried to comfort me online it just felt awkward, because I didn't and don't know him. I guess I'm trying to say while the 'net can be used to sustain relationships, they should be formed in the real world.

So far, so good.  ¶ 4/19/2007 05:07:00 PM (1) comments

  Tequila Mockingbird.

The title of this post has little to do with it's contents. Although at the moment I'm not sure what those contents shall be. Things in my life are going well, which makes for some boring blogging. I do have a semi constant wondering if I'm trying to be with Jacie too much, but I'm not sure thats one of those things I should be worrying about. I've been watching a new show called Drive. It's about an illegal cross country road race, and it's staring Nathan Fillion of Firefly/Serenity fame. I am enjoying it. Sometimes i wonder about the people on the internet who fulfill certain stereotypes, and what makes them tick. sorry for the stream of consciousness format but that's how it's coming out. I don;t think i have much else to say, but i want to keep blogging. I noticed that the post after this one will be my 100th in just over three years. I'm thinking of doing some sort of statistical analysis but I probably wont. I recently got the "Up Series" from the library. It's a series of documentaries interviewing the same people every seven years starting when they were 7. It seems like a really neat series but each time I've tried to watch it I fall asleep, so I took it back this morning. My dad has informed me that he wants to meet Jacie, and he might get an opportunity depending on when she goes to see mockingbird. The whole scheduling thing with different parts of my family coming to see the play on different nights thin seems to weird people out, but to me it's just par for the course in my family. We always have conflicting schedules and have for years. My mom used to joke that people thought that her ad my dad were divorced because they always went to separate services at church. I wish i was more religious sometimes. I have my beliefs and I know them but I don't go to church regularly. This is nobody's fault but my own, but I feel so weird going to church by myself and I don't have anybody else here to go with. Also my home church is my church and any other church i go to won't be my church. Yes, after going to a new church for long enough could make it feel more like home, but it's that starting point that's hard. I also don't think I pray enough. Does communion count if it's done with Doritos and Dr Pepper? Does it have to be blessed by a pastor to count? I think it should be between me and God. Do we do mass communion for the same reason we do mass confession? The middleman is unnecessary in confession so why not communion. "Do this in remembrance of me." That was the command, if it's done as a ritual and not in remembrance does it matter? It's not about communion working or not because it's about remembering. If I remember with Ritz crackers and a Cherry Coke Zero, is it sacrilege? I seem to fill my free time with watching the X-Files and not doing the (very small amount of) homework I have left before the end of the semester. This summer is going to be interesting, with contracting Dr. Bert's class, taking Spanish, trying to tutor J in statistics, going to Twin Arrows, The Barbecue, and my grandmother's 80th birthday. I am now dating somebody but she is not yet my girlfriend. I'm pretty sure that the 'yet' is coming and it may just be my imagination, but I think that when I was told it was there. I'll keep you posted. Or maybe not.

Help me take money from my friends.

or

Go, Soterios Johnson, go
All the club kids are watching your glowstick glow
With the light of a truth you can’t hide
That the news is the news, but the dance goes on forever  ¶ 4/18/2007 09:52:00 PM (0) comments

  I turn and walk away from your car. I want nothing but to turn around and yell "Stop I made a mistake!" I want you back in my bed. I want the closeness of your body. I know I made the best decision. I know this is the better way, but this is the hard way. I was telling the truth when I said I wanted to know your mind and heart first, and it's going to be hard to pull back. Tonight was too far. A great friend told me that the reason temptation is so hard to deal with is because it's something that we want. Temptation is tempting. Part of me hopes you know how hard it was for me to say what I did tonight, and I know the best way for me be sure you know is by telling you. I didn't do it to make myself look good, I did it because it was right. But part of me still hopes you saw the goodness of it and now I've earned some of the mysterious 'brownie points.' but this is NOT why I did it.

No lyrics tonight.  ¶ 4/14/2007 12:33:00 AM (0) comments

  Sensory Deprivation.

I like showers, they're a great opportunity to think. I've heard of people paying lots of money to sit in a dark tank full of water and let their minds wander. I don't know why people would do this when they have a shower and can do basically the same thing. A lot of times when I take a shower they end up being longer than they should. I think that this is because, like a sensory deprivation tank, there is no concept of time in a shower. Also the rhythmic sound and feelings of the water can lull one into a sense of deep relaxation. I think a lot in the shower, and often I think more clearly than when I'm in the 'real world.' I can always seem to plan things out and come to conclusions when I'm not even trying to think about things. Archimedes reportedly solved his problem of testing the kings crown for purity when his wife told him to take a bath. He did and whil his mind was distracted he found the answer. I think this holds true today, but I don't fit in most bathtubs, so I stick to showers. Unfortunately if I come to some great conclusion, I seem to lose it as soon as I turn off the water, and the world comes crashing back in. On a side note, Bobcat Goldthwait once did an entire stand-up routine in a shower on stage because that's where he said he did his best thinking. You may remember him from such movies as the police Academy sequels. I'm pretty sure I had some sort of discovery in the shower I took not too long ago but the only thing I can remember is the water dripping off me once the water was off. It's really annoying.

Change of subject: I'm in a directing scene for one of the grad students here at Tech. I literally play a spear carrier, and I try to attack Richard III, but he schools me and then seduces my queen. Mockingbird is going well, and we did our fist full run through last week. I'm pretty sure I get cast because of my size and not my acting talent. This isn't necessarily a bad thing but because I don't think I'm much of an actor I feel bad when directors have to work to get me to do what they want.

Things with Jacie are interesting, but as a friend told me "why worry about labels? Just enjoy it for what it is." Unfortunately I don't know what it is. This was more in reference to Man of La Mancha this weekend, but I think it can apply overall.

I'm bored.  ¶ 4/12/2007 05:06:00 PM (0) comments

  Another perfect day in Rhododendron Park

So it's Easter and I went home for the weekend. It's been a nice weekend as long as you don't count the weather. It's been a constant temperature of cold and cloudy all weekend. I'm pretty sure I left Lubbock to get away from all that. Oh well, from what I've heard it was snowing there. Kat finished blocking my scarf and I've been wearing it all weekend I'm just sad that I can't take it back to school with me. It's a full 17 feet including the six inches of tassel on each end. We took pictures of me wearing it as well as holding it over the balcony in our house. I managed to touch it to the highest point of the ceiling and the floor at the same time. When I wear it, it goes from about my knees with a loop at my knees as well. Not as long as i expected but i'm pretty sure the actual Doctor was shorter than I am. Anyway it fits awesomely, and at church this morning someone asked if I came in my TARDIS. I didn't hear him and I when i asked him to repeat himself he asked if I knew about Doctor Who. Of course I do! But it's awesome that the scarf was recognized for what it was.

Also at church today I got to see an old friend who moved to Rhode Island two years ago. When I was active in the youth group at church, she acted as the assistant youth director and was a second mother to many of the high schoolers including myself. Just this weekend My mother, when telling me that Jo might be here this weekend, mentioned that Jo had never really liked Kels and thought that if I ended up with her I would be settling. When I told her that Kels and I broke up, she said that she expected me to get rid of her a long time ago. Thanks Jo, I love you. I also talked to Chris who is the youth praise team leader and he asked if I was still "Together with ..." (he really did trail off like that, I don't think he remembered her name.) and I said that no we broke up, because she did some things. It's kind of weird, I always imagine myself talking bad about her when people ask, but it seems I just might be too nice. In my head I was the victim here and she was the bad guy. on the other hand I Probably look like the better person when I don't talk about it much. I am pretty sure that RT was only invited to stay at the Keltner's for the weekend to save her parent's some money on airfare. The farther I het away from the relationship, the better i can see the bad in it. Whcih is a good thing. I should probably write some of this down so I can talk to my therapist about it. Well I guess I am writing it down, now lets see if I can remember it.

Friday night I talked to Jacie's self proclaimed best friend for about 45 minutes. I called Jacie but she had left her phone in Debbi's room. Debbi made it very clear that I "Can't have Her(Jacie)" but seems like a pretty cool gal. we traded info for a while and i asked questions about Jacie in return for dishing out info on myself so Deb could look like she grilled me instead of the other way around. I then spoke briefly with Jacie when she got back from making her rounds as a CA, but she was distracted by whatever was happening on that end of the phone. Unfortunately Debbi and Jacie probably came out ahead because I don't remember things over the phone very well, so the balance of info is probably on their side.  ¶ 4/08/2007 07:26:00 PM (0) comments

  Wal-Mart

I like Wal-mart I think it's a good store, wit lots of cool stuff at cheap prices. The only problem is that they put some sort of chemical in the air that causes people to buy useless junk that once purchased seems much less cool. The only experience I can relate to it is when I went to an oxygen bar in Colorado. Immediately after I left the bar i entered a movie memorabilia shop and found the awsomest shirt ever. It was based on a scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. I loved it and ought it for probably ten dollars more than it was worth. I carried that shirt back to our buss and held the bag for the entire duration of the ride back to Texas (eighteen hours.) Upon Disembarking the bus my brain re-pressurized and I realized what had happened. I still like the shirt and I'm not upset that I bought it, I just wish that I had been more aware of the decision. Anyway at Wal-Mart today i bought a couple DVDs and when I was wandering around the toy isle I saw some water guns for a buck each. I immediately had a vision of how much fun I could possibly have with these things and it seemed infinite. I quickly grabbed two blue ones, and bought them upon checkout. Once I returned to my dorm, I realized what I had done and knew that the fun I was going to have was unpractical and limited at best. However they do fit in the sleeves of my coat very well and I have been practicing and mastered the double draw, as well as a number of cool poses, so I can look really cool in the mirror.

I must have done something right.  ¶ 4/06/2007 01:48:00 AM (0) comments

  Time is an illusion.

Three Months ago I was happy.
Ten weeks ago I was in shock
Two months ago I was alone.
One month ago I was jealous.
Two weeks ago I was alone.
Two nights ago I was in shock.
Now I am Happy.

The present seems to last forever. I am reminded of George Orwell's 1984, which i haven't read since sixth grade. In it The protagonist's home country is aligned with another and enemies against another. He says it has always been so and will always be so. Later the allegiance shifts and the other two countries switch positions. The protagonist again states that it has always been this way and always would. Forever and Never are the same thing. Memory is our pretending that we fell different than we do now. Kurt Vonnegut wrote of a man who, when enjoying life, would exclaim "Somebody shoot me while I'm happy!" Jasper Fforde wrote of what fictional characters' lives might be like, having existence only in what has been written, all of the mundane detail ignored, being able to relive any moment you chose and choosing both the happy and sad so as to appreciate both. Doctor Manhattan in the graphic novel Watchmen could see his time outside of itself, experienced everything that had happened to him as well as everything that would happen to him. He understood everything but even his reactions of surprise were preprogrammed. He was a fixed point in time while all of us just washed around him. At least that's what we thought was happening. That was how we saw it. Because time is constant we can't see that it's changing. we are traveling through time into the future right now at a temporal speed of exactly one second per second. we think about our future and we make plans, and those plans eventually come to fruition and become something in our past and no longer our future or even our present. The present is now, the present is infinitely small and it goes on forever. The past is huge and just as long as the present. The future is unknown an always moving quickly towards us, but we overdrive our headlights so that when we see something by the time we register it, it has moved into out present or even our past. Embrace the present before it becomes your past. I understand the Absurdist playwrights now. Many things they wrote were cyclical, they repeat the same things over and over again, and nothing really changes *cough*Beckett*cough* As shown in my little poem up there life goes in circles, we find ourselves doing the same things and experiences. There is nothing new under the sun. This planet has 6 Billion people on it so if something happens to one in a million people 6,000 people have experienced it. There are 6,000 people at my local high school. The things that are more common are even more so, but that's OK. All we can do is hope a bluebird sings its song. The moments that last forever don't and time is still walking no matter how much fun is being had. You can't save time and keep it somewhere until you need it, you just have to use it as best as you can. The man who told that to me died a few months later.

Somebody shoot me while I'm happy!

EDIT: I've realized that the above post is part of why I keep this blog. When all we have of our past is our memory then it's not real. Memories can change to fit what we want. Eyewitness accounts are no longer viable testimony because of this. But here I have a written record of what I am feeling and doing in this eternal present.

EDIT II: When i started this i wanted to point out how the past week is an example of how time is weird. Just look at my post from last Saturday, and you can see that what was then is not now, but then it was now. Follow that? Good, explain it to me.

EDIT III: (This should be the last one) A quote from Groucho Marx - “I, not events, have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be. Yesterday is dead, tomorrow hasn't arrived yet. I have just one day, today, and I'm going to be happy in it.”  ¶ 4/01/2007 03:06:00 PM (0) comments