Sentential Links #256

OOPS! I had this post done yesterday and saved it as a Draft, instead of actually scheduling it to appear at its normal time. Whoopsies. Anyway, cruisin' right along!

:: The last leg of the half marathon was the hardest. People gather down the home stretch to cheer you to the finish line. They wouldn't shut up no matter how much I yelled at them. I couldn't concentrate and forgot what I was doing. Someone brought their dog with them and I remember thinking how easily I could beat it up. (Greg Bauch is a radio producer in Buffalo, with WGR, the local sports-talk station. He's also an extremely funny guy -- he's the voice in WGR's "Greg Buck" segments, such as this hilarious example.)

:: Ever have a bad editor?

It is the Tenth Level of Hell. (Former Marvel Comics editor-in-chief Jim Shooter has a blog! It's interesting reading, especially since his stewardship of Marvel was when I was at my height as a comics fan and reader.)

:: I too am an analog man. While I bought CDs, eventually, my first love is the LP. (I keep thinking about these kinds of things. I tend to get sad whenever something new supplants something I used to use and like a lot, but I tend to adapt fairly well. But I suppose everybody has their point, and I'm not sure I'll ever give up paper books, even though I know that I'll have to get an e-reader at some point. Hmmmm.)

:: I suppose every writer eventually gets to this place. The place where the words pour onto the keyboard relatively effortlessly (relative to the previous place where writing is, as RW so aptly put it, "like shoveling sludge"). The hands become robotic and are connected to the brain through a direct, straight-lined channel. You hear, view, smell, taste, and feel life around you through the writing. Everything and everyone you encounter is material that can be used somewhere. It gets weird. Multi-dimensional. Surreal. (In my experience, this state is the reward for writing every day. The mistake many make is in waiting for this state to happen, all on its own. Doesn't work that way.)

:: Yet, as I contemplated the possibility of change, I came to the conclusion that -- just because my story has a fantasy trope or three -- I don't have to fall into any ruts or cliches.

:: Incidentally, what the hell is Goofy anyhow? I never have gotten an answer to that question... (Stand By Me is twenty-five years old. Wow. You know what was really stupid about this movie? It was rated R. I had to have my mom take me to see it. That's insane.)

:: No, really. The man was buried with a power saw.

More next week!