Titanium Spork

Day Zero

2011-07-08T10:34:00.001-07:00

120 hours of vacation time… Two years of planning… One contest later… it all comes down to tomorrow.

For the next three weeks, 12 hours a day, I will be immersed in storytelling. In the room with some of the most knowledgeable and recognized industry people right here in Seattle. Like a kid the night before the first day of school I am nervous, excited, apprehensive, eager, curious and a thousand other emotions that have made sleeping this week a bit of a chore.

What do I intend to bring out of this experience?

I want to know if I have what it takes to be a storyteller. I want to be able to take the ideas out of my head and get them on the page. I want what I put on the page to move the reader. I want to meet others like myself and learn from their struggles. I want to be a better storyteller.

See you tomorrow, that is all.

End of line...

2010-12-20T10:40:00.000-08:00

Spoiling the shit out TRON so if you haven’t seen it stop now.

The movie starts with the Disney Castle all lit up in the TRON style which is awesome. It sets the bar high right off the bat then bangs it’s head on it.

The visuals in this movie are awesome. The action sequences are pretty cool. The light cycles and planes are beyond awesome.

Daft Punk score. I will definitely own this.

My Issues:

There are shades of Star War slash Jedi stuff that kind of make me wince. Some of the costumes and weapons are too similar.

This story feels like fragments of several story lines developed over the production of the movie and they mashed them all together.

Somehow, for some reason, Flynn’s son is brought into the “Grid”. We find out CLU is the one that brought him in and that is it. That story never plays out. Presumably CLU does this to draw Flynn out but that only happens because the son chooses to go out and the father has to follow. Reactive, not proactive.

Quorra is some special, self manifested program. That whole story line was great and I thought the movie was headed in the right direction finally. No. With flashbacks and boring expositional dialogue they puke out the story of that whole mess and that’s it.

CLU creates this massive army and we never see it in action.

There are hints of some insurgency that never gets explored.

WTF was up with ZUES channeling some combination of the Jack Nicholson’s Joker and Jim Carrey’s The Riddler. What the what?

The TRON story line pisses me off the most. The build it up only to let it fizzle at the bottom of the ocean. So frustrating. The movie is called TRON damn it. You can’t even resolve that story line of the namesake? Weak.

This movie is not about video games as it should have been.

The hero brings his physical skills into the Grid instead of learning new skills and using them. This was supposed to be about a geek manifesting greatness. Some spoiled rich kid is not my Hero.

What security guard would walks out on a crane? Come on. So disappointed.

That is all.

-Jim

I suck

2010-12-08T12:55:00.000-08:00

I suck. Seriously, one post in three months?

Still writing though. When I have news I will post it. Hang in there fan(s).

That is all.

-Jim

Yeah... yeah.

2010-08-03T10:21:00.000-07:00

I suck.

A blog post once a month? I can do better than that. So to you fearless reader(s) I promise to do at least two posts a month. Baby steps.

So… Classified Prime. A story I’ve been tossing around for awhile. A retired military man seeks some peace and quiet in a rural town but I DON”T THINK SO! Of course his past is going to come back to haunt him and threaten to destroy everything. But wait! Is there a glimpse of redemption somewhere in the impending doom? We will see!

I am doing some research for this story. Reading a book on several special forces branches as well as a book on the psychological and physiological effects of combat on soldiers. This should give you a hint as to what is about to go down in the tiny, peaceful, but way out of the ordinary town of Red Ridge.

My next story (After C:P) in the queue is a awesome. I can’t wait to get into it. Again it’s going to be a lot of research but I love that shit. Lets just say the human race is in deep shit. Ever the underdog, us scrappy humans are going have to bring our A game to get out of this mess. Awesomeness.

I might have to sneak in a another run on Air Bears at my wife’s request. She likes the story but as with all newb writing it needs a lot of work.

Met some awesome people at a screening of The Machinist followed by an interview of the director Brad Anderson by Warren Etheredge. The networking is really starting to pick up. All it takes is a hello and a handshake. Easier for some than others.

That is all.

-Jim

How being a finalist crushed me.

2010-07-08T08:37:00.000-07:00

I learned a valuable lesson after placing in TheFilmSchool’s short screenplay contest. Everything that is wrong with my stories suddenly slapped me in the face.

I submitted three stores. Click the download link on the right to check them out. Of those three, the one I liked the least placed. “No Such Things.”

After mulling it over for a few weeks and conversing with my wife it suddenly dawned on me why that one was special. Then my other stories started trickling into my mind, and everything that is wrong with them became glaringly obvious.

They are a series of events. Damn cool events but just the same. They are gauntlets that I am running my characters through. That’s fine. But it’s not good enough. It needs to be about the character themselves before we give a shit that they are even going through the gauntlet in the first place.

Yeah, yeah, I could link a hundred books telling me this very thing. But until you see it, and realize it, and live it, and do it, it makes no sense and you don’t really get it.

When someone asks you what your story is about, how do you answer? Is the story about a boy and his car that’s not really a car? Or is about giant transforming robots? Which story do you want to see? Transformers rocked. Transformers II was polished turd.

The good news. I get it now.

The bad news. Holy shit do I have a lot of work to do.

I just finished my second rewrite of I.F.O. I was hoping that it would be done so I could turn it into the guild. Wrong. Last month if someone were to ask me what I.F.O. is about I would have something like; “It’s about a boy who becomes trapped on a UFO.” Today I would answer that question with; “It’s a story about a strained father-son relationship. It just so happens it’s set aboard an alien spacecraft under siege.” That’s not a polished description but it’s a damn sight better than the first sentence.

What is Air Bears about? The dawn of the age of the flying car? Or a comic book geek living a dream only to see it come crashing down…pun intended?

Is Rebooting Andy about a gamer who games to much or a young married couple being driven apart by his gaming descend into a tit for tat game of extremes? I need to work on this one.

Bottom line, I couldn’t be happier. Above that line, I am pissed that I spent hours building those stories only to have them be flawed at the core.

Silver lining, I would not be where I am today had I not written that shit.

That is all.

-Jim

Contest shorts are away!

2010-06-08T22:13:00.000-07:00

I uploaded three short screenplays for the contest. They are in the mail with the check.

Click on the link under Projects to download them.

Wish me luck!

-Jim

Long Weekend

2010-06-01T08:41:00.001-07:00

I trust everyone had a great Memorial Weekend!

Other than the rain mine was good. Aiden and I snuck out during a sunny break and did some bike riding. He was very bummed I couldn’t take him skateboarding.

I also taught him how to play Monopoly at which he crushed me. So that was awesome.

My writing weekend consisted of:

A rewrite of Solo. After a lot of discussion with my readers I went back and added some elements that are intended to clear up some confusion. I also changed the title from Solo, which had some readers thinking something entirely different than what the story was, to The Promise, which hopefully makes sense once you read it.

I edited the final 40 pages of I.F.O. Yes, you read that right, forty fricken pages. I then plowed through 20 pages of the page one rewrite.

Needless to say I am very happy about my writing weekend.

Heading to Seattle tonight for The Film School first Tuesday meeting.

That is all.

-Jim

What's next?

2010-05-26T16:01:00.000-07:00

Two consecutive sci-fi adventures. I think its time to change gears a bit.

Next in the queue will be my geek comedy. Been tossing around the idea for a few years now. It’s time to get it written.

I owe IFO and Air Bears two edits and rewrites each. I will complete those first so that I have some fodder for contests.

My last candidate for The Film School’s short screenplay contest is written. It’s waiting for feedback from readers. Nothing leaves the house until my wife has read it. Unfortunately she is busy with schooling and hasn’t gotten to it. DAMN IT WOMAN!

I’ve added the shorts to the projects list. I’ve also created a MediaFire account and will be posting the complete works once they are ready for human consumption.

That is all.

-Jim

Sophomore effort…

2010-05-19T09:13:00.000-07:00

I have been a writing fool.

Finished my latest script I.F.O. (Identified Flying Object). I learned some things while cranking out my second script.

I was so excited about starting that I didn’t check my scene cards thoroughly. Each card is typically meant to go two pages. I had several that ended up being quick, half a page scenes. Consequently the first draft came in at 85 pages.

Those scene cards weren’t necessarily incorrect, I just need to make sure I know that these are short scenes and make sure I have enough material to come in around 100 pages.

I am modifying my process to include an edit and rewrite prior to putting the script away for a week or two. So I am going to do this for I.F.O. before going back to Air Bears.

I hope to have a link up for I.F.O. in the next month.

I have three candidates for The Film School short screenplay contest.

No Such Things - The struggle of a man destined to repeat history.

Heavy Soul – A Biohazard technician takes one last job to clean up the crime scene of the century, but does he have a solution for cleaning evil?

Solo – A Hiker discovers a vicious beast between him and a promise.

I will post links to the shorts after the contest.

That is all.

-Jim

Story Ideas

2010-04-07T15:34:00.000-07:00

New segment today call What the fuck am I talking about.

Today’s random shit… Story Ideas.

Where do my ideas for stories come from? Personal experience. A conversation overhead. Something someone said on Facebook. I’ve gotten ideas from all of these sources. A TV show here, a novel there, a slew of blogs and web sites I frequent. Ideas are everywhere. I remember asking a question a few years ago at a writing seminar. “What if you only have one good idea?” Wow, was I retarded.

What do I do with these ideas? Write them down. I carry a small leather bound notebook with a pen attached. I write everything that catches my attention. Some just stay on an “Ideas” page waiting to be read again. Others immediately evolve into a title and a story that I can see clearly.

I love those moments. It fuels me to write. I have the next seven stories lined up. All with good titles and I know how they start and how they end. If a better story idea comes along I toss that in the queue.

Why do I write? To get these stories down on paper and out of my head. For so many years I would walk around with these ideas that would show their faces every so often. Every time they would pop up I would think, “Man that would make a great story.” One day I decided to get them out of my head. I love movies so I chose screenplays as the medium.

I can’t break a story unless I have a title. To me, a good title is the corner stone of any story. It’s a warm blanket around me that keeps me warm as I snowplow through a story. Without a great title, I am lost and my writing suffers.

I have to know the opening scene and the ending of the film to consider spending time to break the story. Stories gestate over time. I let them sit there until I allow it to show me what it’s about. I am sounding like a total freak right now but after several years of trying to get a complete story down on paper, I’ve realized what works for me.

Writing isn’t just about typing or writing words. For me it’s about having fun and creating awesome shit out of thin air. To do that I need a process that works for me.

Find your process, in whatever you do. Refine it, learn from it, and enjoy yourself.

-Jim

Max, Maxene, and Marvin go into a bar...

2010-03-31T08:14:00.000-07:00

Coming up with good names for a story can be quite challenging and an enormous pain in the ass.

If Will Farrell's character is named Bobby and Harrison Ford's character is named Berry you are not going to mix those two up on the screen. On the page it's another story. If your character names are too similar they can bleed into one another and make it confusing for the reader. I also stay away from ambiguous names or using girls names for boys and vice versa.

I like strong names for my Hero's but seriously, not everyone can be named Jack. I tend to use names of my friends for the good folks and names of people I can't stand for the assholes in my script. A neat side effect of doing this is that it helps me keeps my characters straight.

I also make an effort to not have any character's name start with the same letter. It's stretching it a bit but it makes me be creative with names.

When I snowplow and I find myself getting hung up on names I default to Hero, BadGuy, Girlfriend, Henchman, Hotshot, etc. This way I can continue getting the good stuff down on the page without staring at the screen. Find and replace is your friend.

-Jim

Do's and Don'ts and everything else

2010-03-30T10:26:00.000-07:00

As a new writer I struggle through the massive mental checklist of all the do's and don'ts of writing a story. Many fall by the wayside as I focus on completing a coherent screenplay.

I suspect, and hope, that as I become more experienced I begin to do and don't some of these things subconsciously, therefore being able to focus more on the complex aspects of creating a story that is simple, clear and fun.

In the mean time it's all about having fun and writing stories that I would pay to see in the theatre.

-Jim

How to train your Dragon and in the mean time write a kick ass movie...

2010-03-29T08:17:00.000-07:00

I'm from the Snyder-Ackerman school. Blake Snyder taught me how to break down a story and Hal Ackerman taught me the process of building a story.

Walking out of the movie theatre this weekend after seeing the excellent "How to Train Your Dragon" I was ticking off beat points, recalling the inciting incident and identifying the universal device. It was awesome. Makes me think I am finally learning something.

Off the top of my head;

**** Minor, vaguely referenced Spoilers ****

The opening image and the final image were complete opposites.
Fun and games were funny, scary and action packed.
All is lost was heart breaking.
A and B stories intersected perfectly at the beginning of Act 3.
They actually stormed the castle.
The universal device was spaced evenly and called back at the end.

**** Done ****

Most people think their rebellious artistic side are selling out by following a template to write their stories. Well who fucking cares? If you can keep a theatre full of six year olds rivited to the screen so much so that my son wouldn't take his eyes off the screen to lean over and tell me he wanted this movie on DVD... 10 minutes before it ends, you're doing it right.

Go see "How to Train Your Dragon". Good stuff.

Oh, and fuck 3D, it's just fine on normal mode.

-Jim

Rewrite strategy

2010-03-26T08:48:00.001-07:00

After reading the "Rewrite" section of the book in the previous post I am changing my tactics a bit.

First off I had a great discussion with my wife about Air Bears. Typical newbie writer issues like fuzzy story lines and I coddled my hero. My secondary characters rocked, she really enjoyed them. On my hero she was kind of meh.

I took down a page and a half of notes on areas that I need to focus on. I have some great ammunition for the rewrite.

Next time, after a first draft and I will send it to two people I trust to get feedback. I have let the draft sit for two weeks however I think I am going to break this next story and write that first draft before going back to Air Bears.

I have to say it was a unique feeling discussing a story that I created from scratch in such detail with someone. How she felt, when she laughed, when she smiled. Even though I have a lot of work to do, it was an awesome feeling.

So this weekend it's SNOWPLOW!

-Jim

This book changed my screenwriting life...

2010-03-25T11:45:00.000-07:00

I struggled mightily over the last several years trying to come up with a process of writing that a) worked for me, and b) worked for my family , and c) worked around my day job.

During a Northwest Screenwriters Guild meeting with Greg Poirier (Rosewood), who by the way is a very cool person, he mentioned that his process was taught to him at UCLA by Hal Ackerman. He didn't have time to go into it but he thought that Ackerman had written a book so go check it out.

I did and I put it on my Amazon wish list. Writing Screenplays That Sell

My lovely wife got it for me as a Christmas present. I read it. Used the processes described inside and I completed my first screenplay three months later.

I'm not saying this is going to work for everyone. But it sure helped me get my shit together and put a story down on paper.

-Jim

Breaking a new story...

2010-03-25T11:29:00.001-07:00

There are no such things and UFO's... they've all been identified.

Snowplowing my new story. My goal is to at least have 7-10 plows done before the weekend (on #3) so I can begin rewriting "Air Bears".

The wife is almost done with her read. Getting some good feedback from her. It was neat for me to learn that she picked up on stuff and even came to the correct conclusions about some story points even though I thought I hadn't explained the parts well enough. That made me smile.

Things are good.

-Jim

Air Bears Complete!

2010-03-18T16:12:00.000-07:00

After all the books, a couple of seminars, several stops and starts, and years of trying to find myself as a writer, I finally completed a script.

I discovered a process that worked for me. I followed it faithfully. I set a schedule that worked for me. I followed it faithfully.

Now I have a 106 page first page of Air Bears in my hands. What a feeling it is.

My plans are to let is simmer in the drawer for two weeks (ending this Sunday). In the mean time I am breaking my next story. Once I get the next story ready to go I will hit Air Bears for a rewrite that I feel comfortable having people read.

I feel like I have finally stopped stumbling around in the dark. I see the light coming from underneath the door. I am walking towards it. Hopefully I can find the handle and open that door...

-Jim

Converstations with my son...

2009-09-01T08:36:00.001-07:00

Wrestling with my son on the floor one day after work..

Son: The floor might feel a bit weird Dad, Mom vacuumed today.

My wife doesn’t wear heals a lot. She has a pair on for parents night out. She and my son are walking down a hallway.

Son: Oh Mommy, you’re a real woman now.
Mom: Why is that?
Son: Your shoes are making noise.

I am cooking breakfast Sunday morning. My son is chatting me up in the kitchen.

Son: Dad, where do eggs come from?
Me: Chickens.
Son: Where do Chickens come from?
Me: Eggs.
Son: If Chickens come from eggs and eggs come from Chickens--
Me: Go ask your mother.

Writing

Going well. Sci-Fi adventure is really clipping along. I have the story played out in my head for the most part. Last week I got my gang in a tough spot that I am trying to get them out of.

Football is around the corner! Go ‘Hawks.

That is all.

-Jim

Sigh-Phi

2009-07-30T11:15:00.000-07:00

Busted out 40 pages on the new sci-fi adventure. The wife read the first 27 pages and didn’t vomit so that’s good news I guess.

Got a wild hair up my ass and wrote the opening scene to my Sci-Fi mystery during my lunch hour. The scene kept playing over and over in my head so I had to get it down on paper. I don’t know if I am capable or even mature enough to convey the story that I want it to be but I am going to give it a try.

I arrived at a title for the Sci-Fi Adventure finally. Took awhile but I think it’s compelling. Everyone I’ve pitched the idea to seems to be interested.

What the fuck is up with Sc-Fi channel going all retarded and renaming itself SyFy? What, is that easier to text or some shit?

Played Munchkin the other night. Fun game. It’s like Magic meets a college drinking game.

Hot as shit here in Seattle. I finally passed out from heat exhaustion around 2am last night.

I finally picked up the last Potter book. Almost done with it. Mixed emotions right now but will wait and see how it ends.

That is all.

-Jim

Just when you think you are doing something write...

2009-06-29T09:34:00.001-07:00

Ugh…

Went to the ScriptShark seminar this weekend hosted by the Northwest Screenwriters guild here in Seattle. Had a great time, learned some good stuff and met some incredible people. Lee Zahavi-Jessup was great. Straight forward, no nonsense and honest answers.

Towards the end we broke into groups and gave two minute pitches of our current stories. I stumbled horribly through mine because I have no clue how to pitch shit at this point. When I was done one of the gentlemen in the group asked a simple plot question.

Fuck.

I just completely overlooked that element. It shatters the base of the story. But it was awesome. It’s exactly what I needed. Input from others. Especially others that are not necessarily into supernatural thrillers or sci-fi.

I really wish IQCrash hadn’t bagged his online writes group. I haven’t been able to find one where I am at. I have to start getting input from other people besides my wife (who I love and adore fiercely) and friends. Hopefully some of the contacts I make at the monthly guild meetings will produce something.

So with that I am shelving my current story until a get an idea of how to fix the issue. I tend to have my best moments in the shower or right when I wake up and can still remember my fucked up dreams. Something will whisper to me sooner or later. Until then it’s on to my spaceship in the clouds adventure!

That is all.

-Jim

P.S. Yes I meant “write” in the title.

Ow my head!

2009-06-18T09:17:00.000-07:00

“One must let go in order to be free.”

I think that you can tell and show a person every lesson in life’s handbook. But its not until that person experiences the situation that they truly understand the lesson.

This happened to me last night in an enlightening moment while I was writing. The last few nights I have not been happy with the way the story has been going. To cluttered. Story wasn’t right. I wasn’t having fun with it.

So I slashed and burned about a dozen pages taking with it two of my supporting characters that weren’t working for me. It was like a huge weight had been lifted from my shoulders.

I find myself writing into these dark and dank places a lot. Last night I learned that it’s easy to back up, use the delete key and head in the right direction.

Wish I could do that with life sometimes. Maybe you can…

That is all.

-Jim

Here I go again on my own...

2009-06-12T09:03:00.000-07:00

Time for a monthly update I suppose…

Struggling to finish my first script. I have several stories queued up to write. I need to get this one out of the way. Doing a good job of writing two hours Saturday mornings at Starbucks. I need to make sure I get a few pages done each day of the week now.

Conversations with my son…

He is reading Dr. Suess’s ABC book. I tell him that the pictures show him what words he is reading so use them. He sounds the next word out; C… a… m… e… l… He struggles a bit. I ask him what the picture is… “It’s a Llama Dad.”

As I am leaving for work one morning.. ‘Dad, don’t forget your iPot”. “Ssshh buddy not so loud”.

Movies...

"Drag Me to Hell" was awesome. I expected it to be another silly movie about weddings and marriage staring that flaming wench Katherine Heigl but I was pleasantly surprised!

“Up” was great. Saw it in Digital 3D. Blew me away. Son loved it. He wanted it on DVD before we got to the car.

That is all.

-Jim

If at first you don't succeed whine and cry until Dad's ears bleed...

2009-05-18T09:28:00.000-07:00

You ever see those commercials on TV where the Dad is teaching his son or daughter how to ride a bike. It’s all smiles right. The Dad runs behind the kids bike and lets go. The kid sails gloriously down the sidewalk, the tall flag attached to the seat waving triumphantly in the air as the kid wobbles his way to bike riding glory…

Well that is total horse shit.

Saturday my wife and I taught my son how to ride his bike. It was nothing but crying, yelling, and cussing… on both sides.

He wanted to quit, ride his scooter, play on the playground, clean his room, do the dishes, wash the car, finish his homework… pretty much anything other than get back on the bike and try again.

But we held strong, refusing to let him quit. And after one of the most miserable hours in our families history… he was up and riding his bike around the park. And I am proud of my little buddy.

Of course we didn’t bring a camera…

Pulled off a double feature this weekend. Angels and Demons Saturday and Star Trek on Sunday night.

A&D was ok. Still think Tom is out of his wheel house on this character. Another scavenger hunt with an foreign hottie-with-a-naughty-body in tow. It was entertaining. The best part was all the shots of the Large Hadron Collider. Worst part was the disorienting shots of the Large Hadron Collider and when the camera spins really fast around character for a reaction shot. C+.

Star Trek was pretty good. I think we are going to see a few more flicks with this crew. Lots of laugh, decent action, good actors. I didn’t get the chills when I first saw the enterprise like I did with the first Star Trek movie. But this is a new crew in an [SPOILER REMOVED – GO SEE THE MOVIE] so I am excited to see where it goes. Who knew Uhura was that fricken hot in her younger days… damn. B.

Writing is moving along. I bought a motivational book at the recommendation of some good friends of mine. The Success Principles. With my daily schedule so tight most of the time writing falls to second or third on the list of shit I do at night. Need to work on moving it up to first.

Pitched a new idea to some friends this weekend. It’s a sci-fi action adventure with a dash of Independence Day mixed in with some Explorers that starts with a very obscure phenomenon that has been occurring throughout history that scientists have not nailed down yet that I attribute to a theory that’s way out there. Fun stuff. More later.

That is all.

-Jim

Where the hell did he come from?

2009-05-04T12:04:00.000-07:00

Slow work day so I thought I would toss a post on the blog…

Saw X-Men Origins: Wolverine last night.

I liked it. Decent twists, great action. Films like these are really hard to pull off in my opinion and here’s why.

Everyone in the comic universe knows where Wolverine is headed through comics or the three X-Men flicks. This makes it hard to create a compelling story that tells us where he started and takes us up to the point in the first X-Men movie where he’s kicking the shit it out of people in a dive somewhere in Canada.

I think Jackman did a decent job holding the story. Plus he runs around a lot of the time shirtless, sometimes pantless, with his muscles glistening which should please the ladies. I thought Liev Schreiber was awesome as Sabertooth.

I suspect they would have been better served had they stayed truer to the Wolverine: Origins comic book series which I found compelling.

I give it a B-.

Writing is going well. On page 30 or so of the rewrite. Would love to get the script registered and passed out to a small circle of folks soon.

I think for my next story I am going to do a thinner outline. I found that while I was doing my rewrite some really good ideas started popping out on the page. While I still think I need at least a high level road map of where I am going I like the freedom of surprising myself on the page.

I highly recommend visiting Scriptshadow (See the blog link on the right side of the page) every weekday and reading the scripts he posts. It’s educational and for me at least it is a very good motivator to write.

That is all.

-Jim

Adding Progress Bars to Blogger

2009-03-12T15:08:00.000-07:00

For those of you wanting to add progress bars to your blogger page here is how to do it.

Go to your Blogger account.

Click on Layout -> Edit HTML.

Scroll down the HTML code of your template until you see something like…

/* Comments Format
--------------------------------------------------*/

Paste the following script just above this line.


/* ~~~~~~~~~~~~Progress Bars~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
----------------------------------------------- */
.prog-border {
  height: 16px;
  width: 214px;
  background: #fff;
  border: 1px solid silver;
  margin: 0
  padding: 0;
}

.prog-bar {
  height: 6px;
  margin: 2px;
  padding: 0;
  background: #33775f;
}

.prog-bar_blu {
  height: 14px;
  margin: 1px;
  padding: 1;
  background: #A4AEC4;
}

.prog-bar_grn {
  height: 14px;
  margin: 1px;
  padding: 1;
  background: #A5D63E
}

.prog-bar_ora {
  height: 14px;
  margin: 1px;
  padding: 0;
  background: #FCBD42
}

.prog-text {
   height: 10px;
   margin: 0px;
   padding: 0;
   white-space: nowrap;
   text-align: left;
   text-indent: 4px;
   font-size: 10px;
   font: 75% Arial,Helvetica,Verdana,Sans-serif;
   color: #000000;
}

Save the template.

Click on Page Elements.

Add a Gadget.

Select HTML/JavaScript.

Open the gadget and paste the following code in the content box.


<pre><code>
<div align="center">Sci-Fi Action</div>
<div class="prog-border">
  <div style="width:90%;" class="prog-bar_grn">
    <div class="prog-text">Editing</div>
  </div>
</div>

<p> <p>

<div align="center">Comedy</div>
<div class="prog-border">
  <div style="width:10%;" class="prog-bar_ora">
    <div class="prog-text">Breaking Story</div>
  </div>
</div></p></p>
</code></pre>

This will give you two progress bars. Obviously you can remove or add however many you want by duplicated the script.

To change the progress increase the “width:80%;” to whatever you need. Only go up to 99% as any more makes the progress bar look odd at the end.

To change colors just change the class=”prog-bar_grn” to one of the following…

class=“prog-bar” for standard.
class=“prog-bar_blu ” for blue.
class=“prog-bar_grn” for green.
class=“prog-bar_ora” for orange.

If you feel adventurous you can go back to editing the HTML and add new progress bars. Find the script progress bar script you added and put in a new progress bar with a new name;


.prog-bar_grat {
  height: 14px;
  margin: 1px;
  padding: 0;
  background: #F8FAF8;

That is all.

-Jim

Capturing Soft Keys Events in Windows Mobile 6

2009-03-12T09:37:00.000-07:00

During the course of a work day I google coding questions or examples at least ten times. The software engineering community is strong and I’ve always gotten the answer or at the very least been lead in the right direction.

It’s not my job to know everything about coding. It’s my job to solve the problem so if I find a solution on the web then I use it.

I recently encountered an issue with capturing soft key events from a Windows Mobile device. I ran across several projects that either didn’t work or the solution was suspect. After a few days of reading and testing applications I created a tailored solution that works for me.

Since I was unable to find an accurate solution to my specific problem I am publishing the finished class. The majority of the code came from Paul Kimmel and this article at developer.com.

http://www.developer.com/net/vb/article.php/10926_2193301_3

His solution is for standard windows and has a few issues. I converted his class to work with Windows Mobile 6 and fixed the bugs and errors that were presented when running the code in the Compact Framework.

I want to give a little something back to the community which I rely on so heavily. Feel free to contact me with any questions by leaving a comment along with your contact information.

The best way to get the code is to copy from the first header down. Paste it in Word so it formats it then cut and paste the code into an empty class in your project.

That is all.

-Jim

---------------- CODE ----------------

'***********************************************************************
'* Class: cKeyBoardHook
'* Description:
'* Encapsulates the keyboard hook functions.
'***********************************************************************

Imports System.Runtime.InteropServices
Imports System.Reflection
Imports System.Drawing
Imports System.Threading

Public Class cKeyboardHook

' Passes on the key to be processed by the form.
Public Event ProcessKey(ByVal pKey As Keys)

#Region "P/Invoke Declarations"

<dllimport("coredll.dll", SetLastError:=True)> _
Private Shared Function UnhookWindowsHookEx(ByVal hHook As Integer) as Integer
End Function

<dllimport("coredll.dll")> _
Private Shared Function SetWindowsHookEx(ByVal idHook As Integer, _
ByVal lpfn As KeyboardHookDelegate, _
ByVal hmod As Integer, _
ByVal dwThreadId As Integer) As Integer
End Function

<dllimport("coredll.dll")> _
Private Shared Function GetAsyncKeyState(ByVal vKey As Integer) As Int16
End Function

<dllimport("coredll.dll")> _
Private Shared Function CallNextHookEx(ByVal hHook As Integer, _
ByVal nCode As Integer, _
ByVal wParam As Integer, _
ByVal lParam As KBDLLHOOKSTRUCT) As Integer
End Function

<dllimport("coredll.dll")> _
Private Shared Function GetModuleHandle(ByVal moduleName As String) As Integer
End Function

#End Region

#Region "Structures/Constants"

' Keyboard structure
Public Structure KBDLLHOOKSTRUCT
Public vkCode As Integer
Public scanCode As Integer
Public flags As Integer
Public time As Integer
Public dwExtraInfo As Integer
End Structure

' Low-Level Keyboard Constants
Private Const HC_ACTION As Integer = 0
Private Const WM_KEYDOWN As Integer = &H100
Private Const WM_KEYUP As Integer = &H101
Private Const WM_SYSKEYDOWN As Integer = &H104
Private Const WM_SYSKEYUP As Integer = &H105

' Virtual Keys
Private Const VK_TAB As Integer = &H9
Private Const VK_CONTROL As Integer = &H11
Private Const VK_ESCAPE As Integer = &H1B
Private Const VK_DELETE As Integer = &H2E

Private Const VK_F1 As Integer = &H70
Private Const VK_F2 As Integer = &H71

Private Const VK_LWIN As Integer = &H5B
Private Const VK_RWIN As Integer = &H5C
Private Const VK_APPS As Integer = &H5D
Private Const VK_OEMC5 As Integer = &HC5

' Common mistake to make this value 13...
Private Const WH_KEYBOARD_LL As Integer = 20

#End Region

#Region "Variables"
Private KeyboardHandle As Integer
#End Region

#Region "Delegates"
Private Delegate Function KeyboardHookDelegate(ByVal Code As Integer, _
ByVal wParam As Integer, _
ByRef lParam As KBDLLHOOKSTRUCT) As Integer
Private callBack As KeyboardHookDelegate
#End Region

#Region "Keyboard Hook Functions"

'********************************************************************************
'* Procedure: HookKeyboard
'* Description:
'* Hooks the keyboard.
'********************************************************************************
Public Function HookKeyboard() As Boolean
Dim iHwnd As Integer = 0

Try
'Assign a function for the callback.
callBack = New KeyboardHookDelegate(AddressOf KeyboardCallback)
'Create the hook, return the handle to the keyboard
KeyboardHandle = SetWindowsHookEx(WH_KEYBOARD_LL, _
callBack, _
GetModuleHandle(Nothing), 0)

'If the handle is zero we're in trouble.
If KeyboardHandle = 0 Then
DebugMessage("ERROR - hook unsuccessful.")
Return False
Else
'Double check the hook.
Return CheckHooked()
End If

Catch ex As Exception
MessageBox.Show(String.Format("cKeyBoardHook::HookKeyboard - {0}", ex.Message))
End Try

End Function

'********************************************************************************
'* Procedure: UnhookKeyboard
'* Description:
'* Unhooks the keyboard.
'********************************************************************************
Public Sub UnhookKeyboard()
If (Hooked()) Then
DebugMessage("Keyboard unhooked")
Call UnhookWindowsHookEx(KeyboardHandle)
End If
End Sub

'********************************************************************************
'* Procedure: CheckHooked
'* Description:
'* Checks to see if we have a hook to the keyboard.
'********************************************************************************
Public Function CheckHooked() As Boolean
If (Hooked()) Then
Return True
DebugMessage("Keyboard hooked")
Else
Return False
DebugMessage("Keyboard hook failed: " & Err.LastDllError)
End If
End Function

'********************************************************************************
'* Procedure: KeyboardCallback
'* Description:
'* Delegate function for the keyboard hook to call.
'********************************************************************************
Private Function KeyboardCallback(ByVal Code As Integer, _
ByVal wParam As Integer, _
ByRef lParam As KBDLLHOOKSTRUCT) As Integer

Try
If (Code = HC_ACTION) Then
'Define Key event otherwise it will fire for both KeyUp and KeyDown
If (wParam = WM_KEYUP Or wParam = WM_SYSKEYUP) Then
DebugMessage("Calling IsHooked")
'Pass the structure in.
If (IsHooked(lParam)) Then
'If we processed the key do NOT pass it on.
Return 0
Else
'Not a keystroke we care about so send it on.
Return CallNextHookEx(KeyboardHandle, Code, wParam, lParam)
End If

End If

Catch ex As Exception
MessageBox.Show(String.Format("cKeyBoardHook::KeyboardCallback - {0}", _
ex.Message))
End Try

End Function

'********************************************************************************
'* Procedure: IsHooked
'* Description:
'* Implement this function to trap as many key combinations as you'd like.
'* Return true if you want to block the key, False to pass it on.
'********************************************************************************
Private Function IsHooked(ByRef Hookstruct As KBDLLHOOKSTRUCT) As Boolean

Dim retVal As Boolean = False

Try
'Use GetAsyncKeyState to see if an additional key was pressed.
'I.E. Tab, Shift, Control etc.

'Example:
'If CInt(GetAsyncKeyState(VK_CONTROL)) <> 0 Then
' 'Control Key has been pressed.
'End If

'F1 & F2 are the predefined soft keys for the device.
Select Case Hookstruct.vkCode
Case VK_F1
DebugMessage("F1")
'Send the key on to the application.
RaiseEvent ProcessKey(Keys.F1)
retVal = True

Case VK_F2
DebugMessage("F2")
'Send the key on to the application.
RaiseEvent ProcessKey(Keys.F2)
retVal = True

Case VK_LWIN
'Block left windows key
DebugMessage("Left Windows Key")
retVal = True

Case VK_RWIN
'Block right windows key
DebugMessage("Right Windows Key")
retVal = True

Case VK_APPS
'Block Applications key
DebugMessage("Windows Application Key")
retVal = True

Case VK_OEMC5
'Blocking this key to prevent window launch
DebugMessage("OEM C5")
retVal = True

Case Else
DebugMessage(Hookstruct.vkCode.ToString())
retVal = False
End Select

Return retVal

Catch ex As Exception
MessageBox.Show(String.Format("cKeyBoardHook::IsHooked - {0}", ex.Message))
End Try

End Function

'********************************************************************************
'* Procedure: DebugMessage
'* Description:
'* Post the message to debug or a log.
'********************************************************************************
Private Sub DebugMessage(ByVal Text As String)
Debug.WriteLine(Text)
End Sub

'********************************************************************************
'* Procedure: Hooked
'* Description:
'* Are we hooked?
'********************************************************************************
Public Function Hooked() As Boolean
Hooked = KeyboardHandle <> 0
End Function

#End Region

End Class

Cookin

2009-02-11T10:38:00.000-08:00

Second draft of my first screen is completed, printed out, and simmering on my desk. I am breaking the story of my next project for the next few days. Then it's back for a final edit before I send it out to folks for a read.

Stay tuned.

-Jim

Damn I love google...

2009-01-26T14:30:00.000-08:00

I've been muscling with a story point for the last week. I decided to toss out some ideas into google and see what comes back.

To my utter suprise and delight I found my answer...

Cold Forging! I know it doesn't make a lot of sense now but it will really take my story in a neat and unexpected direction.

Forging ahead!

-Jim

Conversations with my son....

2009-01-25T14:06:00.000-08:00

A new series for my faithful readers which includes my wife and the two hack bots scanning my blog for emails.

Conversations with my son...

Back to School
Son: Where is Mommy?
Me: She is at school .(Regsitration but I didn't feel the need to make the distinction.)
Son: (Incredulous) School?
Me: Yes, she is going back to school.
Son: Why? (You learn to love this word as a parent.)
Me: It's like your Mario Galaxy game. Each level gets harder. As you gain more levels in school you get payed more (in theory).
Son: Can you pause it?
Me: Yes, Mommy paused it for 8 years.

The Great Avocado Debate
Mommy: I don't like them.
Son: Why? (Awesome.)
Mommy: I don't like the texture.
Son: Take the texture out (duh).

Death
Son: Daddy, are you old?
Me: ....

Stay tuned!

-Jim

2009-01-23T10:53:00.000-08:00

Testing John Augusts Scrippets... Slightly modified for Blogger and my theme.

In the final scene, Mia and Josh both admit they don’t really understand what happened. That's important.

MIA

I don’t know if the world got invaded, or if this is something we created ourselves...

JOSH

It’s nano-technology from the future.

MIA

Really.

JOSH

I have no idea.

IQ Crash is back...

2009-01-16T16:19:00.000-08:00

On a whim I checked a blog that had been dormant for some time.... IQCrash. Sure enough he started back up again this year.

He is a crazy bastard and unfortunately some of the shit he spews actually sounds like myself sometimes.

Good to see your posting again. Writing an hour a day has been a huge boost to me. Here's to you keeping it up.

-Jim

Side effects include...

2009-01-12T10:20:00.000-08:00

I love me some football.

I watched the majority of the bowl games even though I think the bowl system is a sham by greedy corporations. Of course judging by the empty stadium at the GMAC bowl and the downfall of Detroit I suspect we might be a few bowls shorter by the end of this year. Raise your hand if you had Robocop as the first Sci-Fi movie to come true.

My Seahawks were a mess this year but I still managed to catch at least one game on Sunday and I’ve watched most of the playoff games to date. Raise your hand if you thought home field advantage meant something.

During my viewership I've noticed a disturbing trend. Something wicked this way comes my friends. A dark cloud descends upon my grid iron gladiators. I’m not talking about Football in the great Northwest. I’m talking about commercials.

Not the sweet catchy tune of “Feeling kinda Sunday” that my son likes to hum as he colors or the short dude that wrecks the DJ table as he shows off his dance moves that makes me laugh every time.

I’m talking about the dick pills.

For some insane reason the marketing geniuses have figured out that the only males that watch football these days have one or both of the following problems.

I can’t pee regularly and when I do I can only squeeze out a few drops.

OR

I can’t achieve an erection at just the right moment.

Every commercial break, without fail, in this years College and NFL games had a commercial advertising a pill that cured one of these disorders. Hell, sometimes they bookended the commercial break with both them in an bid to solve both my problems in just two minutes and two seconds. AWESOME.

First we have a group of gray haired men doing all sorts of neat shit. Golfing, taking a plane ride, taking a boat ride, cruising along in a convertible. The narrator is lamenting the fact that one or more of the gentlemen could not make the group pictures because he was trying to go pee. As his buddies are having the time of their empty bladder lives the “dude with a problem” is walking out of the bathroom regretting the six-pack he just chugged.

But help is on the way my good man. If by chance your problem is caused by an enlarged prostate there is a pill that can help. The even better news is the side effects are so fucking severe that you will be in the bathroom vomiting or shitting out of your ear so peeing regularly will be an afterthought.

Lets move on to my personal favorite. E.D. Yes, it’s so hush, hush that is has a two letter designation. Erectile Dysfunction. These little blue pieces of heaven come in three flavors. 12 hour, 24 hour and the mind blowing 36 hour jackhammer. They do this so that you can absolutely be certain that whatever window of opportunity comes your way to nail the lady friend, your ready to rock.

My question is, can you turn it off? Lets say I know the kid will be out of the house in the next 24 hours. I pop a pill and spend the rest of the day hunched over at my desk because I don’t want to be walking around the house knocking shit off the shelves with my chemically induced ram rod. He leaves, the wife and I get frisky for about… 3-20 minutes depending on what’s on the TV. Now what? I’ve got 1-23 hours left of Barry Bonds in my pants. Do we lance it to let the blood out?

The side effects seem pretty reasonable. Don’t use it in case of a weak heart because you can’t afford too divert any blood flow. If the erection lasts longer than 36 hours take pictures and head to the Bunny Ranch in Nevada.

Now I know that showing these commercials during The View or Regis isn’t hitting the target demographic but come on folks. Once a game is fine. Showing them every commercial break is ridiculous.

Anyway that’s my rant. I will post on my writing which is coming together soon.

Have a great new year.

Also if you suffer from any of the above issues I apologize and suggest you catch a game or two.

-Jim

Dear Santa...

2008-11-12T16:20:00.000-08:00

I asked my son what he was going to ask Santa for this year. Pokemon and Bionacles topped the list. My wife then asked me what I was going to ask for. My five year old son pipes up and says, “Maybe you can get some new football players dad?” “What do you mean son?” I said quite confused. “The Seahawks are not good Dad. You should ask for a new football team”.

This is me asking Santa for a new football team.

You never really appreciate how retarded the English language is until you attempt to teach someone how to spell. I am positive that the letter “c” was inserted into the alphabet by the French just to piss us off. Does it make a KUH sound or an “ESS sound?” Nope, this time it’s silent.

Kick the damn letter “c” to the curb along with “ph”.

I am on the second draft of my current screenplay and breaking the story on my second idea. Things have been slow lately but should pick up again. Previously I was busy roaming the wasteland in Fallout 3 but now that is finished I have some more time on my hands.

Fallout 3 is a great game, very well done. I am considering picking up Dead Space but I am a jumpy fella by nature and I am worried that it will freak me out.

That is all.

"...press one for English"

2008-09-09T14:52:00.000-07:00

Fuck you!

-Jim

Sweet... sweet pages.

2008-09-02T11:42:00.000-07:00

Thirteen glorious pages completed over the long weekend!

Saturday was mostly spent watching football and checking out PAX. Sunday was a lot of sleeping and some gaming… but Monday I knocked that shit out.

I had a chance to run down some story points with a friend of mine over Thai food on Saturday. He liked the story points and said the story thus far was strong. He is pretty critical when it comes to sci-fi fantasy action stuff so coming from him that was a huge boost. I spent the next day or so visualizing the ending of the story and when Monday came around I banged it out.

It felt tremendously good but damn it wore me out. I guess expending that much brain power for that long takes its toll. Good think I engineer software for a living. Writing is easy… creating something from your mind out of thin air is an entirely exhausting process.

Go Ducks!

PAX was really cool. I had never been to a Gaming convention before and seeing all of the demo’s and even a few familiar faces from the videos and interviews online was cool. As fun as it was I doubt I will go again. $30 cover charge and huge crowds to see demo’s of stuff that I have seen on the internet isn’t going to draw me back.

Warhammer Online open beta begins this Sunday. WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!

My goal is to get my first ever completed draft of a screen play done by September 21st… my birthday. I am well on my way and confident I will reach the milestone.

Go Seahawks!

-Jim

Monthly Post

2008-08-25T14:18:00.000-07:00

I suck. I need to post more. Been busy and shit… anyways…

I am failing miserably in trying to teach my five year old son football. We recently picked up Madden 09 for the Wii and he and I were playing on the same team. I was the quarterback and he was the running back. He does ok with runs up the middle but anything to the outside he would turn around and run backwards.

With my patience wearing thin after another 40 yard loss and asked him why he kept running the wrong way. “They were chasing me daddy…”

I highly recommend Madden 09 for the Wii. They did a good job of incorporating the control movements to play the game. They also have an awesome "All Play" mode which tailors the game difficulty down to the players as you go along. Good stuff.

My new favorite shows are Dexter and Weeds, both on Showtime. You can catch the first few season of these on the Watch Now feature at www.netflix.com. There are also some episodes on www.hulu.com.

Dexter is based on a set of novels by Jeff Lindsay. It’s about a man who experienced and severely traumatic event as a child and grew up a serial killer. His foster dad recognized him for what he was at a young age so he instilled a strict moral code in the boy to focus his killing urges on other murderers. The show is awesome. Dexter cleans up the streets but chopping up murderers at night and is a blood splatter expert for the Miami police by day. I recommend watching it.

The novels are good but they are all in first person so you don’t get the added story lines and drama that you do in the series.

Weeds is an odd show about a widow forced to sell weed to make ends meet for her family. Obviously the occupation comes with all sorts of drama and the writers make it compelling.

I find it interesting that both shows are about someone who has to make a choice that on the outside looks horribly wrong but on the inside it’s really all they have. Kind of makes one view the world in a few more shades of grey.

Football is finally here, the Mariners just breathed a sigh of relief. Not that we gave a shit about them anyway…

Writing is cruising along, at least a few pages every day. The rewrite is going to be brutal but I like what I have so far. I visualize the day I register my script with the WGA and hamd it too a few choice people to read for the first time.

-Jim

Getting it done!

2008-07-11T11:28:00.000-07:00

This is the longest continuous stretch of writing that I have been on. I am approaching two weeks now of writing something each day and I feel really good about the story I am building.

A lot of my struggle comes from process. How does one go about fabricating a compelling story out of thin air? There is no right or wrong way, only what works for you.

After reading countless screenwriting books, blogs and forums I have tried several different methods. All of them have some merits but they just weren’t working for me. So after trying and failing numerous times I arrived at my current scheme and things are moving along quite nicely. It is a good feeling to see progress on my story and most importantly feel good about how it’s shaping up and where it’s going.

This go round I started with a two page short story. I revised that a few times to get a good high level idea of the story I want to tell. I then took that and translated it into a beat sheet. Blake Snyder’s beat sheet to be exact. Love him or hate him I don’t really care. I can sit down with his template and go beat for beat with any successful film made to date. It works and I like it.

As I revise the beat sheet it turns into an outline. Still using the beat sheet framework I begin to add scene blocks under each beat header and add story notes and “trailer moments” I want to include but not sure where they go yet at the end. I think I am on my fourth revision and as you can tell excited about my progress. I hope to begin writing the actual script by the end of the weekend.

I am excited, motivated and can see the scenes in my minds eye. I am having fun.

Have a good weekend.

-Jim

Multitasking

2008-07-09T10:26:00.000-07:00

When my son brushes his teeth we have a little “two minute” hour glass timer that he flips over so he knows how long brush for. I walk into the bathroom last night and he is bent over the sink bucking like a mule and trying to brush at the same time. I ask the obvious question;

“What in the hell are you doing son?”

“I have to go to pee.”

“Put the toothbrush down and go!”

“I can’t, the timer is running.”

Mom came in and rescued us both but tipping the hourglass on its side to stop if from running. Way to go Mom!

Come to think of it I don’t think I’ve ever taken a whiz and brushed my teeth at the same time so I can’t blame the lad.

-Jim

Precious Snowflakes

2008-06-26T11:29:00.000-07:00

http://www.wtam.com/cc-common/news/sections/newsarticle.html?feed=122520&article=3881429

Reading this article is a dead on example of what’s fucking wrong with country. Let’s make sure everyone feels good about themselves. Lets not celebrate those who work their asses off and excel at something, oh no. Let’s push him back in line with the rest of the herd. And while were at it lets not give those who haven’t quite reached their potential a yard stick to measure themselves and give them something to strive for. Keep lowering that bar to the weakest link and in a hundred years we’ll all be fucking retarded.

Let’s dumb down the test in our school system so that everyone passes equally. Let’s accept personal finance as a math credits instead of Algebra so that your precious snowflake can graduate with everyone else. Never mind that when they get into the real world, try to get into college or get a real job they are fucked cause they can’t add.

Lets have a graduation ceremony for every fucking grade level up to middle school so we can tell these kids how fucking special they are. That way when they grow up and someone isn’t constantly hugging and telling them how great they are they can slip into depression, get all fucked up on whatever medication the ass hat pharmaceutical companies are peddling that decade and then shoot all their fucking coworkers when their shitty health insurance won’t cover the prescription anymore.

Next time you watch whatever biased, horseshit news channel you watch, and see how the other countries in this world are kicking our ass in education, scientific and technological progress think about how mediocrity is celebrated in this country.

If you have a child, nurture it. Teach them too always strive to better themselves and if they can, those around them. Teach it to do the best it can. And when someone lets them down, teach them that that person did the best they could.

Mediocrity is not ok. Making sure you think like everyone else is not ok. Strive to do better and part of that is finding a skill that you can do better than most others. This is what makes a great society.

And bring back the fucking all-star games you dumb asses.

On a personal note my son called Tacoma, Washington “Tacoland” this morning. See, he’s already making improvements.

Love and shit.

-Jim

Little Boys Day!

2008-06-16T10:00:00.000-07:00

Sunday was a good day. I was awakened by my five year old son bearing gifts. He shoved them into my arms and hopped up on the bed barely missing my tender bits (shout out to Kung Fu Panda... awesome, go see it) and clapped excitedly.

His favorite thing to get these days is the “talking” card, the ones where you open them and they sing a song or play a recorded message. He gave me a superman card with a personal message telling me to have a good Fathers Day and enjoy my sandwich, which was apparently to come later.

I also got the fourth season of Scrubs and a baseball game for the Wii along with a lovely card from my wife!

So later on I am giving my son a shower and he says to me, “Dad, when is little boys day?” “Little boys day?” I replied. “Yeah Dad, I want what you got today, when is my day to get presents”.

It was a good day.

Saturday, as mentioned above, the family went to a 10 am showing of Kung Fu Panda. First of all 10 am is a great time to take the kids to a movie. It’s like a kindergarten in the theatre and its fun to hear the children laughing above the movie sound and the children crying, complaining, eating popcorn and what not. It was a good time and we all enjoyed the movie. I am a huge Jack Black fan and will definitely add his cover of “Kung Fu Fighting” to my iPod when I can.

Happy belated Fathers day to everyone out there in the scribosphere!

Note: I tried to air brush out the "Mariners are #1" foam finger and replace it with a fork cause they are seriously done for the year but I couldn't get it to look right. I apologize for the inconvenience.

-Jim

Oiy!

2008-06-05T14:56:00.000-07:00

Been awhile…

I am bored and cranky at work. I can do only so much in Crystal Reports before my grape shuts down so I thought I would hop on and post. Problem is I really don’t have anything important to say.

Mariners are sucking horribly this year. I am regretting the purchase of a six game package back when they thought they were going to kick some ass. I guess we should just be happy to pay $70+ for the chance to buy garlic fries and shishkaberry’s.

My sister-in-law has a white cat named “cracker”. When my wife told me this I almost died laughing. I spent the rest of that day walking around the house doing my best Chris Rock impression of “cracka-ass-cracker”.

I am working on a new story while I manifest the energy to finish Red Vector. Keeping it under wraps for now although I will say it’s inspired by events in or around Mt. St. Helens. Should be fun!

I’ve been playing a bit of Age of Conan online. There’s a lot of blood and gore and even a naked booby or two. The game has a lot of work that needs to be done but the world is beautiful and if FunCom stays the course it will be a great game.

-Jim

Can anyone recommend a good home brewing kit?

2008-05-01T15:43:00.000-07:00

Throw it to first!

2008-04-28T12:10:00.000-07:00

On Sunday my son had a T-Ball game down at the local high school. They played on the softball field which had the really nice artificial turf field, the kind they put in Qwest field. It was raining a bit so it was nice to be there and not some quagmire.

If you ever get a chance to take in a T-Ball game with four to six year old boys and girls hanging out, having fun, playing with their gloves and occasionally paying attention long enough to actually field the ball I would recommend it. Watching all the young minds trying to decipher the game with 20 parents and coaches screaming at them to throw here or run there is quite comical.

We are constantly telling the kids that if you get the ball throw it to first base to get the out. At one point the ball was hit right to the boy playing first base and he charged it, fielded it cleanly turned and through the ball to first base. I mean AT the first base, bouncing the ball off it. The kid did exactly what we asked, good boy!

My wife’s computer is finally on its last legs. So I did what every good husband should. I bought myself a new one and gave her mine…

It shipped today and I should have it assembled and running by the weekend. This is my first new computer in about three years so I am really excited.

Writing is going well. The story is moving forward and even though I am not going back to rewrite my previous pages as I need to keep pressing forward, I already have several notes for myself for changes. I am enjoying the process, much more fun this time around instead of feeling like a chore.

Seahawks had an interesting draft. The experts seem to be a bit down on our selections but I like the fact that the Seahawks look for quality PEOPLE, not quality players.

-Jim

NFL Draft

2008-04-25T20:03:00.001-07:00

Go Seahawks! Don't do anything retarded...

-Jim

Get off your ass and play video games!

2008-04-25T10:33:00.000-07:00

I cranked out about 10 pages of “Red Vector” in and around a busy week that included my son’s fifth birthday.

We got him a Wii, which was a bit hard to find as they are flying off the shelves. Thanks to a friend of mine we scored one and I couldn’t be happier.

The console is just awesome. The night he got it we played baseball, tennis and bowling together. We stood in the middle of the living room swinging wildly with the remotes in our hands. We both were winded and he was sweating by the time we quit. I truly believe this is the future of gaming. Actually having to get off our ass and play the game. I love it.

I got him Mario Galaxy and even at five years old he is able to play it and do very well. It’s also teaching him letters and numbers and to a small degree to read. I have to read him the text but he is starting to recognize some words which is really cool.

So I have to give the Wii huge thumbs up in terms of game play and family fun. Get one if you can, you won’t be disappointed.

-Jim

Red Vector Update

2008-04-18T13:17:00.000-07:00

April 18th and it is snowing where I work North of Seattle…

A quick update this afternoon. I busted out another six pages on my new screenplay tentatively called “Red Vector”.

This time around I took the time to really beat out the story and make sure I knew where I was starting and where I was ending. I left enough out to give myself room for creative thought during the writing process. So far it is a lot of fun and feels like I am writing downhill this time instead of battling to fill pages.

Holler at you later.

-Jim

Have fun with your peoples!

2008-04-15T10:25:00.000-07:00

I have no idea where my son got the saying, but every morning when he sees me out the door for work exclaims, “Have fun with your peoples!” It is a great way to start the work day.

I finished beating out my story yesterday. I was getting antsy because I wanted to start writing it ASAP. But I am getting know my writing self and knew that unless I had the story beat out I would flounder. I have about 40 pages of two unfinished scripts sitting in a folder. If I don’t have a decent notion of where I am headed I go off on tangents and find myself off the path of the story I wanted to tell.

For some this is a good thing however I need at least a framework in place to keep me focused and on task. So last night I added a few more lines to the beat sheet and knocked out five pages. It felt real good to be writing and for now I am happy with what I have so far.

I am struggling with a title for the new project. The story can be described as “No Escape” meets “Pigs in Space”….

OK I am kidding about the “Pigs in Space” but how many of you now have those Muppet segments in your head? “Piiiiigssss innnnn Spaaaaaaace?”

So it’s “No Escape” in space. My screenplay credits are piling up on TriggerStreet so I am excited to get a story done and uploaded.

FHoD:
“Plumber jailed for crack”

-Jim

Sweat Circles

2008-04-07T09:45:00.000-07:00

I took my family to the mall this weekend. Inevitably at some point my son will get tired and he will want to ride on Daddy’s shoulder. It’s one of the hallmarks of being a Dad to carry your son or daughter on your shoulders. To bear their weight, to watch the people passing you look up and smile at them and have them hold on to your face and in my case tug, rub and scratch my goatee until it’s painfully raw.

My son is tipping the scales at a healthy 47lbs these days so it’s a work out. When we got back to the car and got buckled in I was sweaty and a bit winded. He jumps in the back and buckles himself into his booster seat and declares, “Whew… all that walking really made me tired. I think I need a rest”.

I watched a Blades of Glory this weekend and followed along with my trustee Blake Snyder beat sheet. In my opinion an interesting way to study a film and still be able to enjoy it. The filmed followed the structure really closely. Although I liked the movie I thought some of the story points were weak and that the creative team could have done a better job with callbacks and tying up loose ends.

I would like to see Will Farrell in some more movies like Stranger than Fiction. I enjoyed that story and I think Will is a good actor. His comedy is getting a bit tired. Anchorman remains my favorite.

FHoD:
“Man jailed after punching a police horse in the ass.” I never have to brainstorm for story ideas. I just read www.fark.com.

-Jim

My Eyes are Bleeding

2008-04-04T09:15:00.000-07:00

I’ve been reading spec scripts from www.triggerstreet.com lately. It’s a great way to learn and you need to prime your account with reviews before you can post your own work. I will be the first to admit I don’t know shit about shit when it comes to screenwriting but son of a bitch there are some brutally crappy scripts out there.

Simple grammar and spelling errors make me groan. Then I read an action block where the writer tells me the same information over and over, drilling it into my skull with a dull spoon.

Hey, hats off to them for finishing a script. Something I have yet to accomplish as of this posting. It takes a lot of work to complete and a lot of guts to post it on the internet so ass hats like me can rip it apart.

However, at least spare me the pain and bring you’re A game OK? The good news is when you read scripts you see what works and what doesn’t. Every now and then you get a good one that is enjoyable and you blaze right through it. The not so good ones feel like your trying to run in knee deep water.

I can only hope I am this objective on my own writing to recognize my screw ups.

-Jim

The Horror

2008-04-02T08:32:00.000-07:00

I am sitting at light yesterday when through my side view mirror a catch a glimpse of a fairly attractive blond sitting in a massive gray Ford 150. I can see her designer nails on the steering wheel from two cars down, we’re talking one of those high maintenance chicks.

I glance up to check the light and back over to the mirror to see, to my amusement, the lady has her $60 nail knuckle deep in her nose. Now I know objects in the mirror may appear closer than they are, but this bitch was strip mining.

Hey, who am I to judge right? So I shrug it off and laugh about it until I look back and the unthinkable happens. If I’m lying I’m dying and you can iron the wrinkles out of my nut sack, this chick ATE THE BOOGERS.

Like she was spooning Rocky Road out of her snot locker she was digging that shit out and going right to the mouth with it. Congratulations to whoever she’s banging, I doubt she brushes or flosses after the drive at five snacks.

A woman down in California needed her appendix removed but didn’t want the scares. So some doctors got together and decided to remove it, through her vagina. How awesome is that? I think more surgeries should be done through random orifices. Laser eye surgery through the ass, tummy tuck through my pee whole. Come on guys lets get crazy here.

Brainstorming a few more story points on my space adventure script, I’ve almost completed the beat sheet. The title sucks but like most of my ideas I will have an epiphany at some point and it will work.

My scribosphere mate Matt has taken down his blog shingle. I wish him the best.

-Jim

Pulling Teeth

2008-03-26T11:16:00.000-07:00

Stingrays have apparently declared jihad on the human race. First Steve Irwin gets one in the chest now they are leaping into boats and killing soccer moms. Stay tuned for "Open Water 2: Stingray". The plot will of course blame global warming.

The Euro is crushing the American dollar. Exchange rate is something like $1.57 per. I can’t wait for the “Amero” (google that shit).

I love the interweb and all its tubes and highways. I truly think that the only way we are going to survive as a society is if people educate themselves. Not only within your own comfort zone and belief system but go outside and see what the other folks are thinking and talking about. Fanaticism on any level about anything is unhealthy.

Just ask my wife about me and my Seahawks….

Fark Headline of the Day:
McCartney fans say his latest album contains hidden jibes at Heather Mills, because "Mister Bellamy" is an anagram of "Mills Betray Me." In other news, Sir Paul McCartney is an anagram of "Crispy Anal Rectum"

-Jim

Random Synchronicity

2008-03-25T08:57:00.000-07:00

If you’re caged in a cubicle all day like myself and enjoy your music head over to www.pandora.com. It’s a streaming site that allows you to set up “stations” and tweak the content based on songs or artists. I think I discovered it from Emily over at www.whiteboardmarkers.com so credit goes to her. I have a techno-industrial channel and an alternative rock channel that I switch back and forth between. Nothing like crankin out code to KMFDM! Anyways check it out.

I’m bored so I thought I would toss out some odd shit about me…

I think the moon landing was a hoax. For those of you who are still here it’s just one of those fun conspiracy theories that I indulge. I would go into an explanation of why but I will leave that for another post. In the mean time raise your hand if you can tell me why the flag in the above picture is waving, on the moon, with no atmosphere, and no wind?

I think we are the remnants of a much more advanced civilization. I think we achieved as a society then wiped ourselves out. We are in the process of rebuilding. Lets hope we don’t fuck up this time.

I hate watermelon. Got sick on it as a kid not I can’t stand the smell.

I think oil is abiotic and not a fossil fuel. I think we purchase oil from OPEC as a concession for keeping Israel safe and on the map.

I lived a large portion of my teenage life overseas.

I finished high school in a small logging town in Oregon. Watch “Ax Men” on the History channel if you get the chance. Those boys are some grizzled sons of bitches let me tell you. That and Deadliest Catch on Discovery are the only “reality” shows I watch.

I don’t believe, I think.

-Jim

Fruit Salad... yummy yummy

2008-03-21T08:57:00.000-07:00

Taking my son to see The Wiggles today. He is jacked up about it, running around and bouncing off the walls. For those of you that don’t know who The Wiggles are its four Australians singing about fruit salad while a guy dressed up as a pirate wielding a sword made of feathers chases a female dinsoaur around the stage while a large dog and octopus frolic in the background. It's my goal in life to pitch that movie some day. I love my son, what can I say?

Took a beating on my March Madness bracket yesterday. I am all about the underdog and I think only one lower seed won yesterday. Oh well… GO WASHINGTON ST. COUGARS!

Barry Bonds has not signed with a team yet. The league is investigating collusion charges because of it. Come on. The guy is a douche nozzle and any team that signs that bloated prick will be hated for a decade. I predict the newest curse in baseball will be the Bonds curse. Anyone who signs that ass hat will spend the next century in the cellar. I hear the Mariners are looking for a bench weight…

Looking more and more like the “Hawks are gonna boot Alexander to the curb. To bad, I liked the guy, wish he ran harder. Should have put and APB out on his nuts a few years ago, maybe he would still be running like he had a pair.

Couple more paragraphs of writing done yesterday. I’ve “shot” my heroes up a tree and threw a massive asteroid at them… trying to figure out how to get them down now. Having fun.

The Everett Silvertips face off against the Spokane Chiefs tonight in the first round of the WHL Playoffs. GO TIPS!

No stock market activity today, they all get Good Friday off. WTF is that about? Answer coming tomorrow.

Fark Headline of the Day (from here on out known as FHD)
“Turkey bombs Kurds, claims they're getting in the whey”

Off like a dirty shirt

-Jim

Hump day + 1

2008-03-20T09:10:00.000-07:00

In an effort to post more often I will attempt to write something, anything, every day.

Working on a space story that my brother Haans and I have been tossing back and forth, high concept wise think Con-Air in space. Wouldn't it be a bitch if first contact with an alien intelligence was a prison ship?

March madness starts today. Go Portland State!

Grats to my Hustlin' Owls of the Oregon Institute of Technology (class of 2001) for capturing the NAIA Div II National Championship. GO HOOTERS!

Doing lots of math these days at work. Writing a graphing engine and had to bust out the trigonometry to figure out some shit. When was the last time you used SOH-CAH-TOA in your daily life? I collapsed shortly after the build.

Fark Headline of the Day
“Man facing 40 years in prison after his wife turned off his television and he used his gun as universal remote” The strange part is it isn’t even football season yet…

This is me, tonsil free, signing off...

-Jim

A legend in my mind

2008-03-05T09:36:00.000-08:00

Yesterday Gary Gygax died in his home in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. Any correlation between this and Brett Farve retiring has yet to be determined…

In all seriousness, for those of you nubs not in the know, he was the creator of Dungeons & Dragons. As I read the articles about his death I started thinking about my early experiences of D&D and what an awesome time it was. Freshman year in high school I discovered this wonderful game. Using the mighty number two pencil and any paper (never use a pen, almost sacrilegious) I could get my hands on my friends and I created avatars, monsters, encounters, traps, puzzles, drama, conflict, resolution, reward, and death. No computers, TV’s, joysticks, or consoles needed, we used our minds and created worlds.

I can’t remember all of the D&D clones I’ve played over my life time. Some of the more memorable ones were Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles RPG (I know that sounds corny but their pen and paper game rocked the house), ShadowRun (A sci-fi / fantasy post-apocalyptic world set on the west coast), Marvel Superheroes, and Twilight 2000 (A WWIII infantry RPG).

My friend Jason and I played TMNT constantly for almost a year. Using the “Road Hogs”, “After the Bomb” and “Mutants Down Under” source books we reeked havoc with our mutated animal heroes, hands down my favorite RPG game. During that time the Nightmare on Elm Street movies were big and together we created an entire system and rule set for a dream warrior type game. Each hero had a specific nightmare type and using a unique power set had to battle his nightmares to stay alive. We spent hours building and playing this game. To this day my father mentions how impressed he was at the amount of material and the complexity of rules we created.

A low point was when my parents came and tried to forbid me from playing these games. Apparently the church I belonged to at the time (I’ve since become a free thinker and actually make decisions based on what I think) decided to tell its followers that D&D and games of this ilk were satanic! Bullshit and completely unfounded. God forbid the little sheep begin to think for themselves and use our imaginations. Another scathing post for another time.

Since then I’ve followed the genre as it has grown and morphed into what we have today. Video games (World of Warcraft), movies (most of them suck but I am working on that) and the occasional table top game (Warhammer 40k). I play a lot of these games and to my wife’s horror my son has also caught the gaming bug a bit. I am so proud… tears of joy I tell you.

I think for me it opened my mind into what can be accomplished, literally, out of thin air. All of my early writings were rooted in my gaming experience. It taught me how to imagine. It taught me how to create an avatar on paper and actually fear for its life as I navigated it through perilous adventures. Laugh; call me a geek or a nerd if you will. But I challenge anyone that loves a good movie or book to tell me that that is not what deep down they are looking for when they experience a story.

So I wanted to give Mr. Gygax his proper due. Without ever having met the man, he had a monumental effect on my life. Thank you sir.

-Jim

A moment of deafening roar

2008-03-04T08:22:00.000-08:00

Some day in the future I will be watching football with my son and Brett Farve will pop on the screen. When that moment happens I will tell my son that Brett Fah-verrr-ruh was one of the grittiest, hard working, toughest, highlight-reel-waiting-to-happen quarterbacks I've ever had the pleasure of watching.

That 4th down play in the playoffs this year against the 'Hawks where he underhanded the ball to the reciever as he was stumbling was heartbreaking but when I see it now I just shake my head and file it under "Vintage Farve". Thanks for playing Brett. I will miss you...

On a side note did anyone in Greenbay go to work today? How bad are they gonna suck next year?

Josh Brown can eat my ass. That's all I have to say about that. If the 'Hawks don't make some moves soon in Free Agency I suspect this will be the lame year heading into a rebuilding cycle. It was fun while it lasted but getting some young new stars from the draft will be exciting.

Baseball is in full spring training. Mariners are looking good. Baring any Mariner Moose incidents our staff should be pretty strong. Should be a good year. Got my six game package for me and my family. Out of sheer luck we have tickets for both Mother's and Father's day. Awesome!

Silvertips are rockin. Got tickets to their last home game. Playoffs start in a month or so. GO TIPS!

I love the Seattle area. So much sports... and culture. But really a lot of sports.

I purchased a mountain bike last week. Looking to get in shape. Went on a ride with the family and had a blast. They forgot to mention that the seats on the bikes these days are fairly hard, so as you can imagine I am sore as shit. Feels like I got fucked by a Rhino who went horns deep. I love it though. Riding a bike is so much fun, I am puzzled as to why I ever stopped.

Writing is slow. I have a lot of ideas but nothing that's jumping out at me as a great story. I am tinkering with a few lines so we will see if something gains momentum.

That's it.

-Jim

[Witty Title]

2008-02-20T16:19:00.000-08:00

What a two weeks since my lost post….

I am on day three of my new job. So much to learn my head feels like mush. The people are nice and the projects are exciting. I’ve cut my one-way commute from 90 minutes down to 10 minutes. I have to time to hit the Y and work out. I am happy.

The writers strike seems to be over which is awesome. Here’s to everyone getting back to work and coming up with some great shows! Cheers!

Looks like Blu-Ray has come out on top over HD-DVD to win that war. I am so glad I waited until they sorted that shit out before buying any new DVD’s or a player. Somewhere in a secluded pawn shop a Betamax silently weeps…

I caught the last few episodes of Psych on TBS. That show is funny as hell. The season finale had me laughing out loud. I tried to watch Monk but that show is tired and I am still pissed at them for dropping the first blonde assistant. I don’t care for the new chick at all.

My four your old son is making his way through a PacMan adventure game on the original X-Box. When he gets stuck he comes and grabs me for help. Unfortunately I suck at arcade games. Here I am a grown man screaming at the TV cause I can’t make this double back flip jump twist or some shit and my son is calmly patting my on the arm saying “It’s ok daddy. Just try, try again”.

Aside from the fact that Lindsay has some nice Lohan’s I am not impressed with her comparing herself to Marilyn. To my knowledge Lindsay hasn’t porked a president or even been to the white house for that matter. Between her busy schedule of rehab and driving while under the influence I guess kudos to her for finding the time for a photo shoot.

When thing settle down with the new schedule I will work in a writing schedule. I am still holding myself to getting at least a first draft done by June. With all the major worries and issues solved for now I think I can devote some brain cycles.

Until next time…

-Jim

Thank god Eli is single...

2008-02-05T08:58:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to the New York “Football” Giants! What a great game. The Giants took it right to the Patriots and smashed them in the mouth. Sure looked like an aging Patriot linebacking core lost a step or two in the fourth quarter…

Does anyone in this country like that fucker Belichick? I was SHOCKED to find out has a kid. Dear god my heart goes out to him. I think the Patriots and that ass hat of a coach need to be fined for not being out on the field for the final play. Hell I am not even sure they had 11 men on defense for the final kneel down.

Belichick completely disrespected the referee that was trying to tell him there was another play then he disrespected Coughlin and the Giants by leaving the field early. The guy is a prick and needs to be fined a seasons paycheck for his bullshit.

His players and organization must be so proud of him and his antics. A stain on an what I felt was one of the best Superbowls I’ve ever watched.

**News Flash**

New England has an APB out for this woman....

Do not approach her if you play professional sports. She is armed and dangerous.

Pitchers and Catchers report this month… Go Mariners!

Where the hell have I been? Well let’s see.

I start a new job on the 18th at a small software company about 15 minutes from the house. No more hour long bus commutes to downtown Seattle. No more corporate bullshit to deal with, just creating great software for customers who will use it. My kind of gig.

Writing has been sparse lately due to lots of distractions that I really can’t use as an excuse but will anyway. Things are looking up so I find myself wandering back to my stories and they take life again.

Talk of the writers strike nearing and end is good. TV is sucking horribly these days. I hope they finish out the Scrubs final season.

I will holler at you all later.

-Jim

Happy New Year and shit

2008-01-14T13:06:00.000-08:00

My ‘Hawks are done. Blasted in the “..Frozen tundra of Lambeau field”. Congrats on a good run guys. I am rooting for Brett to go all the way. I think the Packers have a good shot and beating the Pats.

Holidays were good. I got very little writing done. I’ve been in a funk at work so my attitude and demeanor haven’t been the best. I find it hard to creating conflict on paper when I have real life problems to hammer out. I should probably figure out a way to marry those two, might come up with a half way decent story.

For awhile there I was consuming any and all information about the strike I could. It was kind of exhilarating, a war at home sort of thing. Now it just pisses me off. I hope everyone gets their shit together and starts treating each other with what used to be called respect. They keep fucking around and you’re going to see a whole generation playing video games and interacting online instead of watching TV and Movies.

My goals for this year are to get in shape, lose some weight and get at least one script done and have two or three more in various stages of development.

Here’s to all my reader(s) and wishing you a happy new year.

-Jim

364 Days shopping days left!

2007-12-26T10:05:00.001-08:00

Now that I’ve got your attention…

I’m not a big fan of Christmas (above picture not withstanding). My experiences growing up weren’t all that good. I’m not sure it would have mattered if it weren’t for the society surrounding you that places such a high priority on your Christmas haul. I dreaded going back to school after Christmas break. The obligatory “What I got for Christmas” essay was painful and to this day I wonder if the teachers ever realized. Sometimes I made stuff up, other times I just didn’t do the assignment. God blesses everyone my ass…

My wife is the polar opposite of me when it comes to Christmas. Her family goes ape shit with presents and shopping and holiday cheer and all that bullshit. I’ve done my best to stay cold but over the years my lovely wife has warmed me up. Then my son arrived.

The first few years he just rolled around and ripped paper. This year he was four and a half and it was a blast. We took him to see Santa and he actually sat on his lap this time and gave him his list. He watched Christmas movies all month. On Christmas Eve he sprinkled oatmeal on the lawn for the Reindeer. We made a ginger bread house that barely stood up. He ran around with a constant grin for days.

Christmas morning was awesome. Santa brought him all the things he asked for but one which, disturbingly, he remembered and asked Mom if Santa forgot the skateboard he wanted. Mom told him Santa probably thought the scooter was good enough for now. She's on her game when it comes to all things Santa.

As a side note-- how fun is it to remove toys from their packaging these days? Either they are vacuumed sealed like they are being shipped in cyro-statis to fucking Mars or their tied down with steel twisty like suspected Al Qaeda. For the love of time and sore fingers can we please back off the security measures? My son was continually hoping up in down in front of me dying to play with his new toy and I couldn't find the hidden tie down holding the fricken toy hostage. The pressure was amazing.

Anyway, we stayed in our jammies all afternoon, played with his new toys, and watched “A Christmas Story” two and a half times over the course of the day (Best Christmas Movie EVER). He told us over and over how much he loved his new things, he was such a good boy. My wife made sure everything was perfect for us.

It was the best Christmas I’ve ever had.

Oh and the Seahawks won. GO ‘HAWKS!!!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year… and shit.

-Jim

Holy shit I won something!

2007-12-20T11:48:00.000-08:00

I met Blake Snyder when he came to Seattle to talk to the Northwest Screenwriters Guild. He is the author of two screenwriting books; “Save the Cat” and "Save the Cat Goes to the Movies”. He is a really fun man to listen too and his screenwriting techniques are fun in my opinion. The books are good reads and I recommend them.

A few weeks back Blake posted a contest on his blog…

Basically you had to pick three names from a list of made up ones from email spammers and create one or two word sentences for each one, totaling 100 words. This little rule escaped most folks as they went long on their descriptions. You can read the entries in the comment section of the link above, but here were my entries...

Jim Endecott Says: December 10th, 2007 at 3:03 pm

Millie Willimeter, 89, a retired schoolmarm and town harlot, loves her 69 cats and knits banana hammocks. “I’ve just always been able to size up a man, born with it I guess.”

Jane Puppums, 21, a junior at Chico State majoring in Custodial Avoidance, loves long walks in the mall and collects credit cards. “I live everyday like it’s the prom!”

Ollie Gause, 45, a mechanic from Dear Lick, Ohio hates foreign cars and thinks the metric system is trick-or-treating solo. Favorite color: Foreign Oil Black.

When slap my ass and call my JUDY! I won. Mainly it was because others don’t follow the rules. Let that be a lesson to you! I was thrilled to get a personal email from Blake complimenting my on my entries when I posted them. I was floored when I won.

In the grand scheme of things it’s small I guess but to me it’s huge. It’s my first “win” in the writing world and I think it’s pretty damn neat and I am proud as hell

Thank you Blake! So I have both books and his software headed to my house right now. Merry F’N Christmas to me!

-Jim

The more I know the less I know.

2007-12-17T10:51:00.000-08:00

The scribosphere is a vast cyber-verse that is full of all types of theorycraft regarding screenwriting of which I am thankful… most of the time.

I had a dream the other night that I got caught in a huge tsunami. I kept telling myself that as long as I held my breath and covered my face I would be ok…. (Don’t ask, it was a fucking dream OK.) Eventually surfaced and I was fine.

I think it was my way of telling me that even as I read the tidal wave of blogs and articles on the subject of screenwriting and feel like I am drowning I just need to hold my breath and swim for the surface.

Tomorrow I suspect my evil subconscious will be adding sharks… It’s just how I think I guess.

Sunday as I watched the Seahawks vomit all over Carolina’s field their shitty version of offense I got really fed up with all the frontloaded preconceptions of what a story and screenplay needed. I said fuck it and wrote the scene I had been working on in my head for quite awhile. It was completely out of sequence and it is not complete as is it will be intercut with another scene but it felt good, it came easily and it was fun.

I remember a workshop I attended by Cynthia Whitcomb where she said that she would sit down and flip through her scene cards as she wrote. If she didn’t see the scene she went to the next card.

Somewhere in the shuffle I keep forgetting that. My vision is clouded with the big picture. The 110 page, act broken, twist filled masterpiece that you need to have before you peek your head into the screenwriting world. Sensory overload and frankly I think it prevents me from writing.

I want to grow the story. Write the fun, pivotal “trailer scenes” that gave me the idea for the story in the first place. Then go back and write some more scenes that complement those and so forth. Who knows, I might be completely crazy. But I find when I do sit down with just an idea crazy shit starts popping into my head as I write that I find a lot of fun.

It’s all about finding my stride. I don’t believe I can follow any one person’s technique. I am going to have to write to find my own. Self flagellation for the win!

That is all.

-Jim

Weekend Update

2007-12-10T11:06:00.000-08:00

My wife and son drove down to California to see her Dad for the holidays. An empty house sucks and they will be gone for a week. Showering has become optional and dinner consists of cereal and lunch meat straight out of the package. My wife, bless her heart, bought me all sorts of meat and vegetables to cook. Eating healthy is a distant second when having to do dishes is involved.

I saw Beowulf this weekend. I liked it, good stuff. My buddy commented on the Angelina scene as we walked out to the lobby, “No wonder Brad is hitting that”. I concur.

I fail to understand why people, young and old, think that they can act like total jackasses when they go to the theatre. Talking through the movie, laughing at inappropriate times, eating like fucking pigs, you name it. Well I reached a boiling point on Friday.

Two guys and a girl, high school’ish, were behind me and a few seats down. They were yacking it up through most of the trailers and in the beginning. At one point where Beowulf was screaming in victory they were laughing out loud. When one of the maidens with big hooters bent over to clean a table and they were bulging out the girl loudly stated a few times that they were “gross”. For the record they weren’t and the guys beside her were strangely quiet. I suspect she will be buying a set once she realizes that men like that kind of shit.

I let it go for a bit but they were really ruining the movie. So I stood up, walked down the aisle, leaned over the seat directly in front of them and said, “We all payed our money to see this movie, I would like to enjoy IT instead of you”. Paused for a moment and walked back to my seat. I used a very low tone so only the three “trouble makers” could hear me.

I was sincere, polite and didn’t use the normally colorful language that I am prone to. They were respectful and quiet the rest of the film. In fact I would say that they got into the movie and perhaps even enjoyed it more. It just pisses me off that it even has to happen.

Seahawks won the division with a 42-21 spanking of the Cardinals. Congratulations and Go ‘Hawks!

Seems like WGA-AMPTP negotiations took step back last week which is unfortunate. Twenty years ago the AMPTP might have got away with acting like buttheads then releasing a statement to the press that they own and spinning the shit out of it. What’s puzzling is apparently they haven’t really kept up with the times. The newspapers are becoming obsolete. There are hundreds of new information streams available to the public that they have no control over. Information, good and bad, is free flowing. It’s up to us to read them all and disseminate in our own minds what is going on...

Or just read Nikki.

My take is the AMPTP are being assholes and the WGA is being a little stiff on some things. Figure this thing out so everyone can get back to work. Merry Christmas guys.

Writing is going OK. I am having some good discussion about my logline over on Blake Snyder’s forums. I don’t have a writers group here in Seattle so it’s nice to get some feedback. Thanks guys.

-Jim

Writing in Pain

2007-12-05T14:00:00.000-08:00

I received a “deep cleaning” to the right side of my mouth at my last dentist appointment. I was schedule to do the other side but canceled it until the first of the year. I don’t want to be in uncomfortable pain through the holidays.

For those of you who don’t know what a “deep cleaning” is, it’s where they numb the shit out of the side of your face and proceed to dig way down into your gums and pry out all of the crap that’s settled in there. I’ve read it’s supposed to be good for you. Well I hope so cause one week later I am still a wreck. I am on a steady dose of Ibu and Tylenol. My gums do look better except the area around my wisdom tooth. He had to dig in a little deep there cause it’s nestled up against my cheek and it’s taking awhile to heal.

If ever I needed a wake up call to floss everyday I got it. Other things I have learned are; gargling with saltwater isn’t as bad as I thought it would be; gargling with hydrogen peroxide is. Man that shit is nasty.

I’ve also discovered that, at least for me, it’s kind of hard to create when you’re in pain. Every night since, “the cleaning”, I sit there with my laptop staring at the screen. I know what I want to write. I’ve played the scenes out a hundred times in my head. I just can’t shake the dull throbbing of my gums. It’s like an air horn that interrupts my thoughts anytime I clench my teeth or my tongue brushes a sensitive spot. I’ve also found this to be the case when I am mad, really depressed or worried about something.

I am not sure if this is something that, over time, as you get more experience writing you can push through or if it’s a common problem. To me a professional writer would have to be able to write under any condition and all kinds of pressure.

Right now my writing “space” seems very fragile. I have to be in a good mood and have my story “loaded” in my head where I can visualize the characters, setting and tone. Only thing I can do is forge ahead the best I can.

A few other thoughts:

The BCS is total horseshit and the bowl system overall is outdated and retarded. So here’s to all us football fans who get to see Viagra’s Rock Hard Man-Meat Bowl between two 5-7 teams instead of a thrilling 16 team tournament that they could still piggy back onto with their sponsorships.

Seahawk’s rocked the house last Sunday. Eagles are a tough team to beat at home. I was listening to the game on the freeway coming back from a road trip and screaming at the radio, “Don’t kick it to Westbrook”! Well fuck me in the beard they did it anyway and almost lost the game. Little mistakes like that make you a mediocre team.

I watched Polar Express with my son last night. I really enjoy that movie. My son also informed me that he was not happy that Christmas wasn't here yet and that he didn't want to wait anymore. I told him I would take it up with the big guy.

That is all.

-Jim

Meaningless deaths or just being a wuss?

2007-11-29T18:55:00.000-08:00

I want to discuss two movies that will involve spoilers. So if you haven’t seen “Disturbia” or “The Lookout” then please skip this post.

As if anyone reads this tripe… whatever, here goes.

The first case is “Disturbia”, specifically Officer Gutierrez (played by Jose Pablo Cantillo), that gets called every time Kale, (played by Shia LeBeouf) activates his ankle bracelet. Jose introduces himself as the brother of the teacher Shia hit thus his punishment of house arrest for the summer. This story point establishes added tension to the scenes with these two in it throughout the movie.

During the climax Jose is called to the house because Shia is again beyond the bracelet boundary as he fights his serial killer neighbor, (played menacingly by David Morse), and tries to rescue his mom. As Jose is checking out David’s house David snaps his neck.

I don’t’ see the significance of this event. It served no purpose for the last 10 minutes of the movie. I found myself wondering why the creators decided to go with it. David had already been established as a stone cold killer. Would it not have been better for Jose to be disabled in someway so that Shia could save him? In a round about way this would have made up for hitting his brother the teacher. Instead I left the movie hanging Jose death, in a way, on Shia's head.

The second case is “The Lookout”. Deputy Ted, (played by Sergio Di Zio), is an expecting father who looks in on Chris Pratt, (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt), and brings him doughnuts as Joseph cleans a bank a night.

The scene where Sergio comes into the bank, gun drawn, as the robbers are hiding is seriously intense. His wife has beeped him because she is going into labor and you know he is fucked. Sergio gets shot and then “finished off” with a shotgun to the head.

I love the tension and “aw shit” moment that was created for the film – just awesome. My problem was any empathy I had developed for Joseph’s character to that point went right out the window, to the point that I was pissed. Was this what the creators wanted? I’m not sure. I can tell you that in my perspective the movie really lost all appeal to the point that I really didn’t give a shit what happened to Joseph. He probably needed to die as well for the movie to end well for me.

I loved the scene but I didn’t think they needed to kill the deputy. Perhaps I was supposed to lay blame on the bank robbers but I didn’t. I put it on Josephs head and it ruined the rest of the movie for me.

So there you have it. Tell me what you think. I am interested in hearing other peoples takes and angles on these two story points. I could be that I am just a wuss and need to be a hell of a lot more ruthless with my antagonists. If so, show me the way.

That is all.

-Jim

Long Weekend

2007-11-26T10:46:00.000-08:00

I hope everyone had a great thanksgiving. Hold on to your butts this is a long one.

My pre New Years resolution is too post at least three times a week from now on. Not that anyone outside my immediate family reads this blog but that doesn’t mean I don’t have shit to say. The whole “If a tree falls in the woods does it make a sound” theory will be put to the test.

Weekend football roundup:

Sorry Ducks. Season is over. Let’s hope Dixon can get healthy for the draft.

Go Cougars!!!! Great win for the Apple Cup this year.

Go Seahawks! The ball bounces funny sometimes. Thank goodness it bounces our way once in awhile. Note to Mike Holmgren: Loosen the fuck up with the play calling in the 4th quarter and trust your offense. That’s two games you’ve almost lost with your three and out run plays. I like Mike but I think he’s at the end of his career and playing a little tight. Maybe he should take a few during halftime and tug one out… loosen up a little.

Good try Philly. A.J. is gonna be sick until Sundays kick off this week thinking about those interceptions. Was awesome seeing Brady and Moss get knocked on their asses a few plays. They are still the team to beat though. By the way does anyone else have the sneaking suspicion that Belichick is gay?

I saw two movies over the long weekend, both rocked. The first was “No Country For Old Men.” I suspect most of the country, like myself, had no idea who Javier Bardem was. Well holy shit is that about to change. After he cleans house at the award ceremonies expect to see a lot of him in the future.

There is nothing better than a slow moving, deliberate psychopath and Javier pulls it off scene after scene. Anytime he interacted with another human being on screen my ass was clenched so tight I walked out of the theatre feeling like I just got pounded by a rhino. Great toning exercise though, the DVD can double as a workout tape.

Good movie. I won’t give it a “great” because of the ending. I’ve taken to staying put after movies too listen to peoples reactions as they leave. I heard a lot of confused grunting and murmurs. I had flashbacks of the Soprano’s final episode. Overall I enjoyed it.

The second was “The Mist”. It was not what I expected, but in a good way. I liked it, it made me think, and I was disturbed by it. I kept going over in my head what I would have done.

For those of you on the fence about whether or not to go see it I will say this. The “Mist” and the creatures it brings are, in my opinion, secondary to the characters, humanity, and what happens when you put them all in a pressure cooker and turn up the heat. Good, good movie that I will never watch again.

Good reactions from the audience. Been a long time since I was at a movie where people clapped and cheered at pivotal moments. Lots of positive chatter, it’s a thinker.

Audience disturbance wasn’t too bad. My wife would be so proud of me. I restrained myself from turning around halfway during a movie as the ass hat behind me couldn’t handle being “off the grid” for more than an hour so he had to start texting someone. At least have the courtesy to turn off the key stroke beeps dick head.

Moment two was when some lady beside me (a grunter) decided to wait until the movie started to unwrap her ungodly loud cellophane wrapped candy or whatever the fuck it was. Me and another guy on the other side of her leaned forward and stared at her until she stopped. Good times.

Note to moviegoers: Unwrap you shit during the trailers.

For those of you who don’t know what a “grunter” is. It’s the person that grunts every time something happens during the movie like a revelation, gory part, or they are just plain fucking confused. Annoying as hell.

I had a lovely moment when I tried to open my bag of Reeses Pieces. I couldn’t find the pre-cut tear on the package so I grabbed it at the seems and pulled. I must have had a defective package cause this thing was fucking welded shut. It was too late to get the jaws-of-life from the car so I cowboyed up and tugged that fucker like I had a pair…

If you’ve never seen an explosive shower of Reeses Pieces in the dim flicker of a movie light your really missing something. The way the tumbling pieces catch the light as they come crashing down loudly on the cement floor is just…beautiful.

Note to self: Unwrap your shit in the lobby.

Took my son to see Santa Clause. He could barely contain himself until we walked into the room where Santa was sitting. The awe and reverence as he walked up to Santa, hoped on his lap and gave him his list was just priceless. It was a good day.

I video taped the whole thing, I guess I lingered a little long on “Santa’s Little Helper”. When the wife reviewed the tape she congratulated me on the nice “leg shot” I got. Nice of Santa to include something for the adults.

Writing:
Finished the preliminary outline and busted out 15 pages this weekend. Even the wife commented that this one seems to be coming easier for me. We will see.

Going to finish catching up on Sam and Jim go to Hollywood this week. I am really enjoying their podcast.

That is all.

-Jim

Band-Aid Sauce

2007-11-20T13:21:00.001-08:00

My son came to me other night and requested a band-aid for a small cut underneath his pinky-toe. I of course referred him to his mother. As my dear wife was about to place the band-aid he stopped her. “No mommy, you forgot the band-aid sauce.”

I am in the other room and hear this statement so I poke my head in the room. “Did he just say band-aid sauce?”

With my wife and I puzzled about this mystery product my son hops off the desk and goes to the hall closet and grabs the tube of Neosporin.

“See Mommy, band-aid sauce.”

I will be telling this story to my grandchildren.

Writing is moving forward. Glacially but moving just the same. I’ve switched gears and working on my techie comedy.

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! Best of luck to the WGA and AMPTP next Monday at the table.

-Jim

A shout out!

2007-11-05T10:40:00.000-08:00

Thank you to all the WGA writers out there sacrificing today so that scrubs like me who hope to join your ranks tomorrow can benefit. If you were picketing in Seattle I would join you.

Let’s hope both sides can get some compromising done and everyone can get back to work feeling good about the next three years.

-Jim

The disturbing truth...

2007-11-02T10:35:00.000-07:00

I added a new link to the blog today. “The Guild” is a hilarious online series about a group of gamers. It’s really good, really funny and disturbingly accurate on a few levels.

http://www.watchtheguild.com/

Check it out when you get the chance.

-Jim

Harvest Festival My Ass...

2007-10-30T09:52:00.000-07:00

I’m a big horror fan. I love the gore, a good scare, an intense story and best all-- I love it when the bag guys win! Needless to say I dig the movie channels during Halloween. IFC and TMC are the shit this time of year. Old school scary movies with campy effects and young actors who are on their way to becoming stars or forever type cast in the characters they are inadvertently developing.

So HAPPY HALLOWEEN to the scribosphere!

Around this time of year I am reminded of a story about my mother who’s been gone 13 years now. It’s one of my favorites.

Mom would sometimes stop by the video store on the way home and pick up some movies to watch. She liked the standard fare and I was in high school at the time so she often tried to grab some sort of action or scary movie for me.

One night I came home after practice and she mentions to me that she got me a scary movie. I said cool and asked what the title was. She couldn’t remember, just that it was some horror movie. Cool Mom thanks…

Later that evening she went to bed and I popped in the movie and settled down for a good scare. The movie started well enough, as far as I can remember, and then… it got a little weird. Then it got really fucking weird. At this point I stop it and check the title, thinking that maybe I got the wrong tape or something. Nope…

Thus the night I was introduced too… The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Maybe it was my sudden plunge into this “horror movie” that has damage my ability to stomach this film to this day. Much like my utter distaste for watermelon after the time I ate too much at a BBQ and vomited all that red fleshly fruit all over the deck.

Either way Mom thought it was just fucking hilarious the next morning when I told what she had exposed her son too. She let me pick my own movies after that.

Good times though. I love you Mom. Miss ya.

-Jim

Sunday Night Meltdown

2007-10-15T12:45:00.000-07:00

My good friend Achim calls me up around 3pm yesterday to tell me he scored some sweet tickets to the Sunday night game here in Seattle. We hustle down to the stadium and park it in the plush club level seats for a great game… Whatever.

The moment the ball rocketed through the punters leg and both teams proceeded to muff it all the way to the end zone I should have known we were in trouble.

To put in perspective I’ve been too two regular season games at Quest field. The first was last year; Seattle vs. Minnesota. Not only did we get our ass handed to us but we lost Hasselbeck for several weeks. What a shity day.

Last nights game managed to top that game on an unprecedented level of suckiness. The Seahawks are broke. Alexander is runs like my four year old son, the first time anyone gets near him he falls down and curls up into the fetal position. We showed brief flashes of promise but our O-line couldn’t run block for shit and our D-line looked like it was playing Red Rover with the Saints… and losing horribly.

Ah well. The club seats were awesome and Quest field is just a neat place to go and free tickets are always nice.

Writing is cruising. I feel the momentum really starting to roll. I am enjoying my story and getting 2-5 pages done a day. It feels great.

-Jim

Helpful Safety Tip

2007-10-11T09:54:00.000-07:00

Never been a fan of bicycle pants, or bicycling for that matter. I, like the majority of non bicyclers, think of these four way, 7 1/2 oz, nylon/lycra, tricot knit second skins as some vain way to expose your man junk, camel toe or if your unfortunate the unsightly terrain of your ass and thighs.

NOT SO!

During a break between DOTA games the other night (Warcraft III mod, leave a note if you want to know more) one of my friends relayed the following story.

Apparently some poor fellow decided to go riding in regular shorts. During his xtreme bike ride he somehow hung his ass out over the back tire. Well, Lance hit a bump and he landed on the back tire, which quickly grabbed his sack and rammed it through the metal cross bar. There was tearing, I am not sure the boys were completely detached but the damage was done.

So, while it pains me to say this, please, for the sake of mankind and those of you reading this blog, mouth agape and holding your jiggly bits in empathy, wear the silly shorts. I certainly have a new found respect for these fine articles of plum smuggling.

Oh and I guess they come padded for comfort as well.

Writing is going good. The ending scene to "MvA" is really starting to become clear in my mind which is very cool. I am going to start outlining my next story soon. I have some key trailer moments I want to get down on paper before they fade away.

-Jim

Weekly roundup

2007-10-05T09:45:00.000-07:00

The Unit has finally drawn my wife in. The show does a good job of going from the warfare to the emotional strain of the families left behind. Dennis Haysbert for president.

I was a little worried with the pilot of K-Ville. The camera was in constant motion and I hate cinematography like that. If I wanted to watch music videos I would YouTube MTV footage of the late 80’s when those ass hats still played them. The quick cuts and head shots where it looks like the camera is sliding off the table makes me feel like I need to watch the show with a wallet in my mouth so I don’t swallow my tongue.

The second episode was much better. I like Cole Hauser, I wish Anthony Anderson was bit funnier. I hope the show continues.

Life rocks. Damian Lewis has been a favorite since Band of Brothers, although he’s a little more “Dreamcatcher” here. The show is really laying down some good plot lines. I am struggling with the LT played by Robin Weigart. I’ve only ever seen her in Deadwood so seeing here looking somewhat attractive and not spewing out obscenities every third word is a huge stretch for me. Keep it up folks!

Chuck is ok. The super agent is hot. I caught some inaccurate techno jargon and that distracts me from the story. Chuck flying a helicopter was a stretch. Homage to “Last Starfighter” I suppose. It’s a great premise; let’s hope they hire a few nerds to get their shit straight and some better show stories.

Writing is going well. Crankin out scenes at lunch time at work and emailing them home so I can get them into Final Draft.

Listening to the Creative Screenwriting podcasts on iTunes, great stuff.

I have a short term goal of getting some scenes put together for submission to get into an online writers group. I need the deadlines and support to help me get over the edge. I am working hard to get daily writing a habit. Way to many story ideas to get down on paper, not enough time to do it.

-Jim

2007-09-27T08:36:00.000-07:00

DVR/Tivo run down this week

-Reaper

I laughed my ass off. I came in knowing it was light hearted and riding on the coat tails of the current comic-superhero trend going on. I will be watching it again although Kevin Smith only directed the pilot so far as I know so we will see where this goes. I wonder if there was a run on Dirt Devil hand-held’s.

-Chuck

Once again, I laughed quite a bit. Being a software engineer by trade I got all of the jokes and enjoyed the set up. I like Adam Baldwin from his FireFly/Serenity days. I am excited to see where this goes. Gratuitous underwear scenes of the hot secret agent are worth at least another weeks worth of attention. I have yet to encounter a porn site that melts your computer. I wonder if Al Gore was the tech consultant.

-Heroes

The whole rehash of the cheerleader conflict was a huge let down for me. The Japanese hero being an Englishman was good. The rest of the story lines were ok. I am dying to know what Mommy Petrelli and Daddy Hero’s powers are. Parkman is my favorite story line. I want to see Noah wtf own some ass for the good guys this season.

-Eureka

This week’s episode was the first one in a long time that I have not laughed out loud. I feel like they are getting too dramatic for the shows premise. I like this show a lot and hope it stays strong but they will need to swing it back to the comedic side of things with deadly consequences. I think they made a mistake by weakening the sexual tension between Jack and Allison. But what the fuck do I know?

What’s Left?

Journeyman – Not sure about this one. Guy reminds me of Anthony Michael Hall for some reason.

The Unit – Dennis Haysbert is the shit and the rest of the cast and show are pretty damn good as well.

Haunted – Some Mathew Fox show on Sci-Fi I hadn’t seen or heard of. Fallen – Kind of a nut when it comes to guardian-fallen-death angels for reasons which will become apparently shortly…

And now I want to talk about Scrubs.

I hadn’t watched the show until recently when 80% of the Comcast cable line up syndicated it. I am fairly certain you can watch scrubs 24 hours a day if your channel surfing skills are above average.

It dragged me. I love the characters, the dialogue, the stories and it makes me laugh all the time. So for my 35th birthday my dear wife bought me the first season on DVD. I am almost done with all of the episodes and I will go back and watch the commentary on them as well.
It’s a great show and I recommend it to anyone who’s likes quirky comedy (give a shout out if you remember Herman’s Head!) with a lot of heart and great dialogue.

"I'm no Superman"

-Jim

Brief Notes

2007-09-20T09:17:00.000-07:00

I will be 35 tomorrow.

So many clocks are ticking its making my head spin. A good portion of the writing community seems to think that I am too old to start a writing career. My hair has noticeable gray (thanks sweetie). And to top it all off I can’t find a decent MMO to play to save my life. It feels like the entire gaming industry is incapable of an original thought and afraid to pop that Blizzard tit out of their mouth and quit making World of Warcraft clones.

Writing is going well despite my age. After frustrating iterations of attempting to write off of weak outlines I went back to square one. Grabbed a well known beat sheet example and filled that out. Yes it was Blake Snyders. I’ve met the guy personally and I like him and his approach. I then expanded the beat sheet into scene headings, added a few descriptions, included some notes on twists I wanted to include and a list of characters. I jotted down some general settings/location notes on some of the scenes to get me thinking about where all this takes place and started writing.

What a fricken difference let me tell ya. I’ve read quite a few screenwriting books up to this point; my night stand is piled high with them. Until you start doing it yourself, fail, and then go back and tweak-merge-adopt-adapt-modify a system that works for you, writing isn’t a whole lot of fun. It’s really is a breath of fresh air and the wheels are really starting to turn.

I also began preliminary writings on the other projects I want to do. Wordplay and John August are big on having several projects in some stage of development. I took that to heart and off I went creating a high level beat sheet of my “techie comedy” and a short story piece on my sci-fi space adventure. With three stories at various stages and my “primordial soup” notebook full of ideas and tidbits writing is constantly in my head and it’s a blast.

I also find myself really excited when I find a good title. Some people like to leave that open till later. I find myself really wrapping myself around a good clever title and it seems to drive me to write and keeps things exciting.

Most of these are newbish revelations to the pros but like any job, career or hobby you really don’t get it until you work things out for yourself. It is nice to be pointed in the right direction by a very helpful and giving scribosphere.

A few other thoughts….

Once again the Mariners suck. Thank god my wife bought tickets to early season games when they were still worth the price of admission.

The Seahawks killed me last week. Hasselbeck and Alexander decided to have a team meeting on the Arizona 37 yard line with less than 2 minutes to go, and dropped the fricken ball a which point the rest of the game went like this:
Denial - Oh hell no that just didn’t happen.
Anger - What the fuck are you ass clowns doing? Son of a bitch are you kidding me?
Bargaining - Is there a flag? Call time out? Do over? Mike, say something!
Depression- Fuck, the season is over.
Acceptance - Who’s playing the late game?

After I slipped into a semi-coma on the couch from being blown through the grief fire hose my son came up to me, patted me on the head and told me it would be ok. It was.

If you value your cuddle time or being able to roll over and spoon your wife/husband/whatever, do NOT buy a sleep number bed. The bed is split into two sides where in each person can set the firmness of his/her/it’s side using a control. As comfortable as this is, any attempt to traverse to the other side of the bed to see your hopefully better half is problematic. Let me explain.

I have a fairly high sleep number which means my mattress if firm, i.e. pumped up with air. My wife sleeps on a cloud thus her side of the mattress is deflated quite a bit. I literally fall of a fucking cliff anytime I cross midfield. So now I am wedged in between my mattress and the wife who is elbowing the shit out of me to get the fuck back on my side. Inversely my lovely wife has to clip caribiners to the headboard and use a rope system to get onto my side of the bed. In the event that one of us makes it successfully onto each others sleep space the sleep number is all screwed up because it doesn’t adjust for two people. So you’re together yet bitchy and uncomfortable. That’s hot.

For added difficulty have your 4 year old son constantly fuck with your controller so you truly never know what setting your bed will be at when you get in. There is good news however! Hours of fun can be had if you wait until your partner begins to set their number. As the mattress is inflating/deflating to reach the desired firmness secretly place a leg or appendage on their side of the bed thus screwing with the pressure calibration. They will spend hours tossing and turning and readjusting their number. I advise you do this only on the weekend.

Thanks for reading.

-Jim

The Mistress

2007-08-16T09:55:00.000-07:00

I’ve had a mistress off and on for better part of a decade now.

She is a sweet, loving, nurturing, torturous, life sucking, murderous, attention whore. I’ve encouraged my brothers, friends, even my wife to jump on her over the years. I suspect when my son comes of age I will encourage him to get a piece as well.

As you would expect my wife hates her. We’ve had our share of fights over her and who I spend my time with. My argument is would she rather me be down at the bar getting smashed or playing with the mistress?

The good news is she is cheap, coming in around $10-$15 a month with an initial “get to know you fee” of around $50.

I am of course referring too MMORPG’s. In layman terms Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. If you haven’t heard of World of Warcraft by now I suspect you still get your news in paper form.

There is no bigger obstacle in my writing that this wench. It takes so much will power to step away from the keyboard and do some writing. I am not the only with this problem of course. http://johnaugust.com/archives/2007/seven-things-warcraft

After reading that blog I kicked my mistress to the curb. Uninstalled WoW and haven’t looked back. Even when my gamers group posted the link to the new WoW expansion I could care less. It’s a good feeling.

But like any good feeling it calls me…every day. So now I play a Warcraft III mod called DoTA. Complex, fun and games usually last an hour. I can get one in before I settle down to write. Problem is I’ve been getting in 2-3 before I start writing and its slowing progress. Gonna have to kick in the will power and bring it back down to moderation.

The thing is I love these games. I love the worlds, being something powerful and cool on the screen, accomplishing tasks, defeating enemies, being recognized for good play. Pretty much all the things any normal human being would want right?

What better way to get all of these things and more than to create it? Build the worlds, make your own rules, imagine the heroes, live their adventures, pit them against your worst fears and conquer them. This, to me is what writing is about. This is what motivates me to create stories.

Cack-handed

2007-07-31T15:55:00.000-07:00

“There are many colloquial terms used to refer to a left-handed person. Some are just slang or jargon words ('cack-handed'), while others may be offensive or demeaning, either in context or in origin. In more technical contexts, 'sinistral' may be used in place of 'left-handed' and 'sinistrality' in place of 'left-handedness'. Both of these technical terms derive from sinister, a Latin word meaning 'left’” – Wikipedia

I new something was wrong with me but holy shit.

According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-handed I am a stuttering, dyslexic, schizoid devil child who needs a sound beating anytime I use my left hand.

Oh but wait! While I am not stu…stu…stuttering through my plans for world domination with the evil twin (in my head) apparently I have a predisposition to creativity and intelligence!

“While there is an unresolved debate within the scientific community on how to operationalize both intelligence and creativity, some studies have demonstrated a small positive correlation between left-handedness and creativity/intelligence.” - Wikipedia

Although a small one…shit.

At the moment I am locked in a mortal battle with my left brain that wants me to go back and fix the writing I have up to this point but so far right brain and I are beating him back and things are progressing. If I allow evil lefty to overcome me I will literately write the same damn scene for-bloody-ever.

The story line is a little shaky but I am letting things flow naturally. I have no idea where I am going but I am having fun and good old righty hasn’t let me down yet. I like the free flow of ideas as I write. I don’t judge, I just listen and type.

-Jim

Dreams on Spec

2007-07-25T10:06:00.000-07:00

A documentary following three aspiring screenwriters through their painful journey of trying to get their shit bought, made, noticed…anything.

All three subjects had industry contacts of some sort. I would have liked to have seen at least one of the subjects living in a dumpster and knocking on doors of agents trying to get noticed, on the outside looking in so to speak.

It seemed like the subjects were concentrating on their one great script that would ascend them to their WGA cards. One of the first things I learned when I began researching screenwriting was always be working on your next script, always be writing. The two subjects that really put all their energies in their current scripts for months, even years were unsuccessful. We entered the story of the third subject at the point where he already had a director interested.

I liked the show. It was funny and sad. It didn’t pull any punches on how tough the industry can be. The interviews with successful screenwriters throughout the movie were great. The DVD has an extended interview extra that’s worth the price in and of itself.

While the realities of becoming a screenwriter are far out there it doesn’t stop me from visualizing what I want and working towards those goals. I want to tell stories for a living.

-Jim

Up a creek with a map and a GPS and still don't know where the hell I am...

2007-07-22T19:57:00.000-07:00

I spent the last few weeks filling out beat sheets and outlining my story. Forging ahead with great expectations and the thrill of the hunt I blasted through the first two scenes…

…and effectively dismantled the rest of my outline.

I am not sure if it’s my outline that’s too vague, I am not being strict enough in following the outline, or if this is the way story writing works and I should go with the flow and let it be.

I wish I could describe how the scenes unfold and where the story comes. I sit down, read the outline header and start typing. Most of it is crap, some parts I read and go, wow. Hopefully as the pages mount up I will find myself saying, “wow” a lot more often.

I don’t have a clue and time will tell. For now I am letting the story tell itself and having fun.

-Jim

Smokin' Aces

2007-07-19T14:07:00.000-07:00

A quick note on NetFlix:

If NetFlix shipped porn it would be the all time greatest internet business model ever. There is more than enough room in the small white envelope for a wet wipe, they need to consider it.

What would be really neat is if IMDB hooked up with NetFlix and as I research movies on IMDB I can click somewhere on the page and add the current movie to my Queue.

So on to Smokin’ Aces…

Not a review per se, more like a short rant.

This was the first movie I could tell a scene was cut immediately.

The small Tremor brother is peeing on the car and the tall buff Tremor brother, (played by Kevin Durand who by the way was voted the funniest new COMEDIAN in CANADA in 1994! Who’d a thought that shit?), looks back at him and all of the sudden they are mad at each other and fighting. I rewound that scene twice to figure out why the hell they were all of the sudden beating the crap out of each other. Totally lost me. Well after the movie I headed over to the extended and cut scene features on the disk and there it was. About a minute worth of dialog triggers the fight. Not sure why the cut it but I thought it was cool I caught it.

Entertaining film over all. Alicia Keys is hot. Lot’s of gun play. The ADD Karate Kid was disturbing yet funny. I was hoping to see more of Jeremy Piven but there were too many other characters to cover. Still holding out for PCU 2.

There is a short documentary about the director that I think I enjoyed more than the movie.

-Jim

Sophomore

2007-07-18T10:28:00.000-07:00

The bad news:
I don’t live in LA.
I have no formal training in writing other than creative and technical writing classes in college.
I have never written a screenplay.
I have a full time job and a family that makes it tough as hell to find time to write.
I am 34 years old.

Who cares? Cry more newb.

I like stories. I like movies. I've always wanted to write. As long as I write good stories that I would want to see the rest will take care of itself.

It’s odd how invigorating this is. I created this blog yesterday, went home and did a complete rewrite of my beat sheet and outline. I have a few more plot points to put in and I will begin a draft. My first major hurdle is to not allow my self to stop, rethink or edit during this draft. I am horrible at writing a scene then scrapping it two minutes later.

Write the whole damn thing, let it age a bit then hit it again. I have four other high level ideas waiting in the wings that call out to me from time to time. I have to get this one written and move on.

Spellchecker owned me yesterday. I sent out a company email where I ment to apologized for any "inconvenience" an issue had caused folks. I hit send, the spellchecker popped up and I hit change because I knew I had spelled inconvenience wrong and sent it on its way.

I ended up apologizing for any incontinence I had caused anyone.

My writing career is off to a good start.

-Jim

Post 0

2007-07-17T14:40:00.000-07:00

Hello all,

My first post here on my blog. My name is Jim. I am a software engineer working in Seattle striving to be a screenwriter.

I try and stay current on quite a few boards and blogs. The screenwriting community online is entertaining and helpful. I will include the links to my favorites as I go.

I am currently in the outlining stages of my screenplay. It’s tough to work an eight hour day, commute two hours, spend as much time with my four year old son and wife as I can at night and still get writing done. It doesn’t help that I am avid gamer as well. You can’t take the game out of the gamer so I try and limit myself to a few hours a week. Good luck.

My goal with this blog is to keep a record as I travel down the screenwriting path. The odds are against me but I am determined to give it a go. All I want to do is write movies that I want to see, tell good stories, and perhaps make a living doing so.

A quick word on the title. I've always been a big Dungeon's and Dragon's fan. Of course that translated into MMO's as the pen and paper games found a new life online. One day a group of us were geeking out and telling stories about our gaming exploits and somehow it came around to weapons. The Titanium Spork (+5) was born. I know it sounds wierd but it was funny had you been there.

Anyways I have been carrying that around for quite awhile. Apparently it has gained some popularity as titaniumspork.blogspot.com was already taken when I created this. No worries though. I own http://www.titaniumspork.com/ and http://www.titaniumspork.net/. Someday I will turn those sites into something.

-Jim