And Then There Was One: The Book of Eli

Two posts in one day. Must be a holiday or something.

I enjoy watching movies but I hardly ever go to the theater any more. Seriously, I don’t see the point of spending $10 to watch a movie when I can buy the DVD for the same price a few months later.

This evening The Book of Eli came on HBO and I decided to watch it since it was free. Denzel Washington and Gary Oldman are two actors whose work I enjoy so I expected the movie to be decent. It was.

The Book of Eli is set in a post apocalyptic world. 30 years have passed since war broke out and civilization was destroyed by, what we are led to assume, an exchange of nuclear bombs. The movie follows the basic hero’s journey plotline. We meet Eli, a lone wanderer, as he is hunting for food in the woods. But soon it becomes clear that he is not walking around the U.S. for fun and hijinks. He is on a mission.

Happy Thanksgiving

I wanted to take a moment from shoving food into my face to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving. Despite the personal challenges I have faced in my life, I have much to be thankful for. I am thankful for my family and friends, for my good health, my home, the food I eat, my skills and talents, and the abundance of opportunity that surrounds me.

Life is what it is. I say this all the time but I really should start saying is life is what you make of it. If you spend most of your time complaining and reflecting on the bad things that happen to you, then life is going to suck pennies. If you spend time appreciating the good things in your life, though, then you will always have double rainbows.

So once you have your fill of L-Tryptophan, take a moment to reflect on all that is right with your world. You may find that life is much more wonderful than you first thought.

And now, back to the feast!

P.S. Also take time to remember those people who aren’t fortunate enough to have food or family this Thanksgiving. Fill up a couple of plates and visit neighbors, friends, or associates who may be spending Thanksgiving alone. They’ll appreciate the company.

Or make a donation to the hunger relief organization of your choice so that others may be blessed with healthy meals too.

Namaste

(Thanksgiving Graphics from WishAFriend.com)

Twitter Doppelganger

The last time I blogged, I got the bright idea to join Twitter. I’m not sure why. I guess because all the cool kids were doing it, I figured I should be too. You know, since I’m a cool kid. And, yes, if all the cool kids were jumping off bridges, I’d so be right there doing it too.

Anyway, imagine my surprise when I went to register my name and found there was someone else in the world named Daria Black. Imagine that. Worse, they beat me to the punch and registered the username. Double worse, they are actually using it. I tried to resort to using my old internet handle, Smutwriter but, once again, my plan for Twitter domination was spoiled. Someone is using that one too.

After about 10 minutes, I finally came up with a handle that no one was using and that I actually liked. The only problem is that the domain name is registered to a popular porn blog. So I’m stuck in this strange place of having to decide whether to a) butcher my name b) resort to using my middle name again c) come up with something equally cool that no one is using, or d) keep using my current handle and cross my fingers that no confusion arises in the blogosphere.

I’m kind of leaning towards option C but between NaNo and my day job, I’m kind of tapped out in the creativity department. For now, I think I’ll use option D until I can come up with something clever.

I finally decided that I’m going to start blogging again. Don’t expect too much, though, until after the New Year. I’ll be way too busy jumping off bridges with the rest of the cool kids.

Namaste

Theme Change

As you may have noticed, the theme has changed. Not because I’ve decided to start blogging again (though I am giving it some thought) but because I received notice that the PressRow theme by Chris Pearson is being retired from the WordPress.com database.

I’m irritated by this. I really liked that theme and the only reason it is being removed is because of a petty argument that Matt is having with Chris. In fact, I would go so far as to say that Matt is trying to bully Chris in to making changes to the license his themes are under which are not opensource friendly, apparently.

I’m giving a lot of thought to moving my blog back to my domain. The reason I had it sitting here was because I didn’t want to pay for web hosting or have to worry about updating it etc. *Sigh*. I don’t know. I’ll see. If I decide to start blogging again, I’m going to have to move it anyway. So, I guess I should just do it and get it over with.

News

Life hasn’t changed that much. I’m single again and back on the East coast. A friend of mine has invited me to move up North where she is and I’m seriously considering it just because, well, I’m not really doing anything else at the moment. I’m letting life catch me up in its breeze and carry me wherever it goes.

I’m participating in NaNoWriMo this year and am up to about 20,000 words. Not quite halfway but still doing pretty good. This is the reason why I have been thinking about blogging again. I figure that if I finish a book and want to sell it, I should probably build up some sort of readership who would buy it. It’ll be awhile before the book is polished enough to start shopping it around to publishers so I’ve got lots of time to think it over.

Lastly, I’ve sold Figmeant.com to a really nice lady whose last name is Figlar. She’s starting a copywriting site and thought it would be an awesome play on words. I have to admit, I was really sad to let it go. But, since it was just sitting there, I figured someone should get some use out of it. I had held out the hope that one day I would start a writing community again but it was really just wishful thinking on my part. Oh well, such is life.

Anyway, I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season and that you laugh loud and dance without inhibitions. Namaste.

I Be A Writer

I did it! I did it! I did it! I did it!

*Continues screaming and jumping around for five minutes*

What did I do? I published something and will get paid for it. Yay!

Brijit is an online magazine that publishes abstracts (or reviews really) of articles from other magazines. The job entails reading the article and doing a quick write up on what it is about as well as rating whether it it worth taking time out to read. The magazine is marketed towards business professionals who what to stay abreast of what is happening in the world but don’t have time to read magazines, newspapers or watch television.

Well, about a week ago I decided to sign up and submit a few abstracts and today, I got an email saying one of them is being published. Read it here:

Breaking Through the Bias

Okay so it’s not, you know, The New York Times and I can only buy lunch at McDonalds with the pay but those are my words! And I’m getting paid for them! At the beginning of the year my goal was that I would become and official freelance writer by getting paid for my writing. And I did it!

I did it! I did it! I did it!

And I couldn’t have done it without my friend’s filling my head up with crazy ideas like I could actually do it. Thank you Katie and Ms. Karen for giving me the confidence I needed to make this happen. I couldn’t have paid for a better support group. Yay!