Part one of (at least) a two part series in an attempt to keep the issue of the Electoral College in the minds of the readers.
All in Nerd Stuff
Voting(?) for President
Now the the popular vote for President of the United States has concluded I can reveal to the world, hopefully without repercussion, something that will likely upset a large portion of my readers. I did not vote for President. “But Wes,” you say, “I know I saw the terrible cliche voting booth selfie on your Instagram account showing you were in the voting booth.” That’s true, you did see that picture. I did vote. I always vote. I just never vote for President and I won’t vote in a Presidential election until the Constitution is amended to remove the concept of the Electoral College.
Overexamined Life...Weekly Weight Update
A poem inspired by recent conversations.
Fathers of daughters
I'm nothing else if I'm not a nerd. I like nerdy things. The TV shows I watch all the time are Marvel's Agents of Shield, Marvel's Agent Carter, DC's Legends of Tomorrow, and The Flash. All of these shows are, for sure, about comic books and comic book characters. They are full of action that is, literally, out of this world. They are pure escapism that I love. But sometimes they will, as the kids say, get you in the feels (I feel like such a tool typing that statement that way but it's true).
The Writing on the Wall
How many of you have a favorite book? You all do, I'm sure. Fine, some of you don't have a favorite book because you could never narrow down the endless literature that has accumulated over the course of human history to one volume that you could single out as your favorite. I mean, how could you possibly choose between The Iliad, Catcher in the Rye, and Everybody Poops?
Take a moment to think of your favorite book. What do you think about? Do any of you think about the author and the process to write such an inspiring, exciting, educational, or thought-provoking piece of prose or poetry?
John
For my birthday, Rizzo got me a great gift called The Writer's Toolbox. The toolbox includes lots of creative games and ideas to help writers develop different topics or ideas and to trigger the imagination to go in different places. I'm hoping to use the toolbox to write some different short stories to include as part of the blog and this is my first go at using the toolbox.
Radio Shack
Your local electronics store has just started selling time machines, anywhere doors, and invisibility helmets. You can only afford one. Which of these do you buy, and why?
Sometimes the emails from my blogging group can get pretty weird. There are lots of days I simply click the delete button. There are other days I hit the delete button as fast as I possibly can because I can't believe that someone would offer up that topic as an idea to write about and I wish that I could somehow remove the part of the brain that remembers that email because it is so incredibly stupid. The topic above was one of those days but someone it squeaked through and made it on my "to write" list.
Just picture it...you are slowly trudging through your local mall. You have just finished the Auntie Anne's pretzel that was slightly smaller than a new born baby and are desperately trying to wash down the salt with your 89oz Smoothie King Strawberry-Kiwi Breeze. It is important to stay fueled and hydrated when you are on these day-long mall excursions. Your eye is suddenly drawn to the left towards the shining red lights of the Radio Shack.
5 Things I Love
I have written previously on this blog about podcasts and how much I enjoy them. You can read about that in Video Killed the Radio Star. One of my more recently discovered podcasts that I really enjoy is called Chewin' It with Kevin and Steve. This podcast is hosted by two friends, Kevin Heffernan and Steve Lemme, who just chew the fat and have a few laughs. For those of you who don't k now, these two gentlemen are part of the group that created movie classics like Super Troopers and Beerfest.
One of the topics that the guys discuss is just called "10 Things I love" where the guys literally go through a list of ten things they love. It isn't complicated but just a list of things that the guys really enjoy in life. Some examples from their podcast include Fantasy Football, Drinking on Thanksgiving, and long poops while reading the newspaper. This podcast list inspired me to create my on list of things I love. I cut it down to five so not to bore you with too many things. This is by no means an all inclusive list so I'm sure there are things that I have left out. You should also know that I have excluded my wife, my kid, my cat and my dog from the list because that is just too simple. These loves also take away from the possible humor of the list. Let's get started.
Mission: Movies - The Doom Generation
Warning: This blog is filled with vulgarity that shouldn't be read by most people. Mom, you may want to skip this one but if you don't, I'm sorry.
For a long time I had a fascination with writing a book. The problem I learned with that fascination is that I didn't have anything particular to say but I liked the idea of being an author of something. It wasn't a story that I wanted to share but a thick, hard back volume with my name on the cover. Let me tell you if your goal is simply to write a book because you want to sit it on your coffee table then you will never get it done because it should be the story that dictates a book not the desire to write a book to create a story.
Anyway, since I couldn't think up a good idea for a story I thought I would take on a challenge and write about it. The challenge I gave myself was to watch a movie everyday for a year and then write about my experience. So in 2009 I started my challenge and got reasonably close. I watched 312 movies over that 365 day span. It was about the same time that a movie called Julie and Julia came out about a woman who writes a blog documenting her experience in cooking every recipe in Julia Child's first book.
Seat Guru
From my blog email thread: You get to plan a dinner party for 4-8 of your favorite writers/artists/musicians/other notable figures, whether dead or alive. Who do you seat next to whom in order to inspire the most fun evening?
Of course this is a common question when trying to provoke a thoughtful discussion. Usually it comes in the form of “If you could grab coffee with one person, dead or alive, who would it be?” or something along those lines. This particular idea just expands upon that notion to create a wider net. Here is my list of dinner party guests.