... whilst Deirdre' wept cool tears...

I've been doing my due diligence with my writing and learning what I can where I can. I've learned a lot and hope to be successful from taking the advice of people who know, even if they seem an unlikely source for that knowledge. I've discovered something through the advice though;

Like the TLC show "What Not to Wear" I think there should be a show called "What Not to Write". Sadly, many of the people who need this valuable lesson probably see themselves as too professional to need the advice.

Such is a writer for the Los Angeles Times, Shari Roan.

Shari wrote a piece that appeared in today's issue about a little boy, born deaf, that has received cochlear implants . While her article offers hope for the boy, and I'm happy for him, she apparently was absent the day they taught the lesson "make sure your article and title don't piss off people" The initial title on this article is "The Sound of One Boy Healing". The subsequent title is "Cochlear implants open deaf kids' ears to the world"

Lesson 1: Healing. Was his hearing loss due to an injury? Nope, he was born deaf. It happens. He's healing from surgery yes, but the title alone, as it always has, makes deafness sound like an illness. If you believe that, I have about 8,000 people in the Chicago area alone that I can text and have them share with you how wrong that is.

Lesson 2: This is nitpicky, but I'm pissed so I can be nitpicky. "...open deaf kids' ears to the world" If you paid attention to the "how the implants work" section in your own article, Ms. Roan, you'd see that the technology bypasses the ear entirely. So there! NYEAHHHH!

Lesson three: Not a "What Not to Write" but just a point to my readers who may not know. The father of the child says:

"We just want him to hear," says his father, Michael, 38, a registered nurse, on an October day at the couple's town house in Harbor City. "We want him to be independent."

Talk about pigeon-holing your kid early?!?! I guess I had better tell my Deaf friend Raymond who owns the largest interpreting and Deaf services agency in Chicago who just purchased a vacation home in Michigan, owns a gorgeous condo and just bought a nice new Lexus that he better give it all back since being deaf means not being able to fend for yourself. And a NURSE said that....

Lesson Four: Wouldn't it be simpler to say...?
This reminded me of a bit in "Auntie Mame" when she's writing her memoirs with a wordy ghost writer:

"I wonder if the general public is going to understand all this symbolism. (She reads) 'Like an echo from the caves of Coccamaura, I came forth whilst Deirdre wept cool tears.' Wouldn't it be simpler to say, 'On the day I was born, it rained in Buffalo?'"

Yes, Ms. Roan, instead of your sensationalizing with "some sliver of the racket... can penetrate his brain" wouldn't it be simpler to say "He can hear"? (thanks Just Kevin for the reference!)

Anyway, I will tip my hat to Ms. Roan for one thing. As I found out in my short and ill-fated job when I lived in Southern California, nothing is a complete waste. If nothing else, from that job, I learned what NOT to do in convention & event planning. As with Ms. Roan, (and as if I didn't know this already... called common sense) I have strengthened my knowledge of What Not to Write!

And Stephen King is the key.....

I've always been amazed at people who've been at their jobs for 15, 25, 30 or more years. My personal best was 5 years at Roper Hospital in Charleston, SC. That's not to say I'm flighty with jobs, but between downsizing, changing careers, etc. I've just been a bit of a nomad.

While security is a great thing, I think I was meant to be one of those people who wasn't necessarily meant to stay in one career path or one place for good. I may have had a longer tenure with a company if I hadn't had such a burning curiosity for a variety of things. Even growing up this was the case. I couldn't be in band and on day one play the tenor sax and end my musical life on tenor sax. I explored everything and now I've played (or played at) tenor, alto, soprano sax, clarinet, bass clarinet, flute, Irish fiddle, didgeridoo and had a fun stint with rifle/color guard.

My career has seen the same multi-interest translate into new careers. Sign Language interpreting, medical technology, nursing, convention planning, etc. And now, while this isn't a career change, I am finally looking to pay long-absent attention to a creative skill I've seemed to always enjoy, but didn't realize I was always enjoying it. I like writing.

I don't plan to hash out the great American novel or even have writing a novel as a goal, but it could happen. As with any new topic my mind sparks an interest in, I first started with the Dummies books. As usual, it was a great overview and skimming of not only the writing process, but the business side as well. There were references to other books galore, but one that stuck out in my mind was Stephen King's On Writing. I started reading it this past week and I'm really impressed and surprised by this book. It's so conversational you feel as if he's sitting with you.

If you like Stephen King's fiction in the past get this book if you haven't read it already. The first nearly half of the book is almost a biography, but you see in his biography where his past created his future. The portion on where the idea(s) for Carrie came from out of his being a janitor in a high school were informative. Especially how it almost wasn't written.

So building on his very first bit of advice from writer and fellow blogger SueBob (who I get the extreme pleasure of meeting face to face this week while she's attending BlogHer here in Chicago!) I'll be adding Stephen King's fun and not so fun advice. I hope to start sharing some work, both old and new, with you soon.

Just wanted to share...

This was posted over at Neatorama. It's got a little bit of the "Watch out... white boy dancing" feeling to it, but still... What a way to get down the aisle vs. the usual, overly somber, march of death?!?!

Congrats Jill & Kevin!!

I'm Baaaack

I've been off-line for a while but I'm back(ish).
(yeah, that's all the explanation you're getting)

I was a couch potato yesterday as I was home sick from work yesterday. There wasn't anything on TV and I've seen every movie in my DVD collection at least 10 times. I had 3 movies from Netflix, but being sick and down, I didn't really feel like I was in the mood for the downer messages they all seemed to have. One I had seen, Milk with Sean Penn, and while it was the beacon of hope, he still dies and that seemed a little depressive to me for yesterday.

The other two I had not seen and now I kind of wish I hadn't. By the way, possible spoilers ahead. Look at the pictures. If you have not seen these movies and plan to, don't read on... be warned in more ways than one.

DOUBT

I can hear everyone getting up in arms for tagging out this movie with all it's power house actors and award nominations. Phillip Seymour Hoffman, whom I respect as an actor, but haven't really cared for since his icky part in Flawless (can you say acting every stereotype? I mean, he put an S in "Cracker") But to his credit, he was, from what this Southern Baptist turned Lutheran understands, the proper character for a priest and did the part proud.

Meryl Streep was great, as always. I think after watching her performance I've learned that it's not that I think actors can't do well with accents, it's just I hate the accent they're portraying. It must mean that they're doing it very well!

My problem with the movie you ask?? After so much set up and character build and silent shots of that blond boy with a self inflicted nose bleed, the story almost seemed chopped. And after an entire movie showing how Meryl Streep's character had a bigger penis than Philip Seymour Hoffman's did, it's at the END.. and I mean the LAST friggin' line of the movie, that she breaks down and says "I Have Doubts". I didn't read the book, but it felt like the writer was scribbling furiously through the last chapter and it was 4:58pm and the final product had to be in the producer's hands by 5pm or the deal was off.

Performances: 10 Storyline: meh

The other movie I think you'll agree with me on...

The Happening

I can hear some of you saying

"Why the hell did you rent it in the first place?"

I knew it wouldn't be as good as M.NS's other movies. Each as been a grade lower than before. But the most vocal opponent of The Happening (yes, you J.Kev) was also a very vocal opponent of The Sixth Sense, which I liked. I thought maybe it wasn't that bad.

yeah it was

The grass? The trees? Let me get this right.....
Not only can the plants produce a toxin that causes humans to NOT ONLY lose that self preservation part of our psyche that keeps us from allowing ourselves to be harmed, but it also makes you seek out a way to off yourself at that moment!

And that's not all!

They can apparently count also and really stick to that law about how many people constitute a mob... which is apparently 6 and up... 5 if one of you is a little girl.
And, if you think that all this cognitive ability is just way too out of line for the photosynthesis crowd, they can apparently control the wind too. It's just too coincidental that when the plants wanted to off that group of 12 people, the wind JUST happened to whip up when they finished their tally and farted their toxins to kill.

One site gag that I had a laugh at was when two smaller groups of people converged, they exceeded the allowable limit of humans so the plants pooted their "go f*#k yourself" pollen and one man had only one choice for offing himself.... laying down in the path of a riding lawnmower. I can hear the grass blades laughing their asses off over that one!

I will give the plants this though. They hit New York City first and then they hit the French.... at least they know good targets when they see them. To quote my friend Stephen, 'atta girl

When looking around for The Happening I saw the heading The Happening 2 for a sequel. After my jaw dropped, I found this.

Yeah, I'm a Dummy

I've been working on a long term project called Spring Cleaning. I say long term because I actually started this particular project back in winter. And given that Chicago had exactly 2 hours and 35 minutes of actual spring this year, I will take that to mean that it is Spring only in name and I can start/finish it at my leisure.

One of the things I'm doing is getting rid of a lot of stuff I keep carrying around. Part of that stuff is a lot of books. I'd forgotten how many of these I had and I noticed this weekend that I had a large number of the "_______ for Dummies" books. My first one was back in 1999 when I first moved to California and it was Investing for Dummies. I must have either been a real dummy or lost interest pretty quickly as I don't remember finishing the book. However, I did find that the premise and layout of the books were very favorable and were an easy read...unless it was about investing apparently.

Over the years whenever my interest in something peaked enough to go beyond the initial "Hmmmm... that's interesting" I found myself going to the book store and the first level of research would begin with one of the Dummies books.

They are a great source of general information. You may not learn every little detail about a subject, but you'll learn a very good, general overview of the subject. The authors are always very conversational, but never talk down to the reader. They do treat the topic as if you don't know anything about it to start, but they also say that (in most topics) you can skip around the book and not lose anything for not reading straight through.

The Dummies website even has online 'how-to' information like today's top topics, "How to Zest citrus fruit" and "How to play music on your iPod" These may sound simplistic and stupid, but I didn't know how to zest citrus and if my Mom were alive, she'd have watched that iPod video about 5 times before she tried it. (Never was one to just dive in, she actually read the owner's manuals.... go figure)

So if you're curious about something, go look into the Dummies books. While I'm no expert, I can safely say I know far more about Investing, Creating a Business Plan, Starting a Not-for-Profit organization, Judaism, Law School, the LSAT and Writing a Novel than I did before I admitted that Yeah, I'm a Dummy.

3 Monkey Stories

Kids say the darnedest things....

Once I was finished with college (the first time) it was about the time that many of my friends were getting married and having their first children. It was also the age where you're responsible... but still young enough to be goofy and get away with it. When the time would come and my friend's kids were being shown around I used to get a kick out of taking those that were just on the verge of saying their first words and all I would say to them was "monkeybutt" It became a running joke with my friends. Until one time it took....

I got a call from one friend who, let's be truthful, all the guys were afraid of her because she was no nonsense. Even though the names are changed to protect the innocent (me) the call went like this:

"Hello?"
"Chris, this is Susan"
"Hey! How are..."
"Shut up" she said cutting me off, "I wanted to call you and let you know David just said his first word. I wanted YOU to know what his first word was because I am coming over so I can hear your LAST word... and it better fucking not be MONKEYBUTT!"

I don't know at what point she actually hung up because I could never have heard the click of the line for my guffawing out loud! Sadly I've only ever seen pictures of David and his younger brother. I'd like to think that it's because of distance and time that puts friends in different locations, but still in each other's hearts. However I have a distinct feeling that Susan doesn't want me around until all her offspring have uttered their first words....

A Scientific Breakthrough

With the exception of my brother, everyone in my immediate family was in Health care. I remember growing up with my parents talking medicine at the dinner table. Then my sister joined the fray discussing blood, urine and stool at the table like it was as common as the recipe for the casserole we were eating. My brother and I would just hunker down and eat hoping to get through dinner before color and consistency became more graphic than it already was.

When I announced I was heading into nursing my brother threw up his hands "You were my last hold out! Will I be able to eat with you all anymore?"

Once in the early to mid 90's I lived in Charleston, SC and it was the period where they were finally starting to make big steps forward in HIV/AIDS research. It was found that a certain species of baboon was immune to the HIV virus. I was home in Clemson visiting my mother and we were discussing the physiological aspects of HIV and how this type of monkey could be immune. Perhaps it was the hemoglobin that was different from ours, perhaps they had a natural immunity much like dogs have in their saliva that allows them to eat... anything. It was then, in the middle of this educated, scientific discussion that my mom offered this hypothesis:

I think I know why they can't get HIV... their butts are just so ugly!

It took me a minute to actually get that she'd just made a funny gay joke. It was that moment that I remembered forever and was useful in a discussion of ours much later... but we weren't curing HIV then.

Only in the animal kingdom....

This isn't so much a story as it is a video I found from a friend on Facebook. Lucky Monkey... 3

Thursday Cheeeeez!

As a possible lead in to a new Fiesty Friday.... I ran across this video today. Been one of those days where I'm just getting pissed off left and right so cheese and a catchy slogan can keep me going.

This is a shout out for Lea in SC....