Debates.

Ah, politics. I haven't written about it for quote a while. But this is probably a good week for it, what with some of the things going on in the news, and things going on in my life. Political things, because I'm not ready to write about the other bollocks yet. First, the debate between Sharron Angle and Harry Reid a couple nights ago. Now, I've never pretended to be impartial. I'm not. I think Sharron Angle would be as big a mistake as Sarah Palin. Having said that, the debate was boring. Both of them trotted out the same points I've heard before. I read an article claiming that their debate could decide the election here in Nevada cos its so close. I walked away thinking that nothing was decided. She dodged questions, made the same false claims she's already made in attack ads. But I heard from people I work with that she destroyed him. she had him like a rabbit in headlights. He was flustered and unable to answer. She answered all the questions well. She was a freight train.

I think we must have been watching different debates, cos that wasn't what I saw. And when I said I thought that he have the better answers, it's because I'm biased. well, yes, I am biased. But if I had my way, I'd be able to vote for a real progressive, instead of someone who has done too much to appease an obstructionist minority in the past couple years. Politics should have some element of bipartisanship, but not when you bend over backwards to work with someone, and they continue to trip you. Anyway.

The point is, I can admit that I'm biased. But when I call out someone else, someone who is of a, shall we say, Libertarian streak, and say that they have some sort of bias, they look at me like I just called them a rapist or something. People don't seem to understand that objectivity in politics has become almost as rare as honesty these days. And if I call someone out for bias, then I'm just being a liberal elitist, whereas they're being an objective observer if they do the same to me.

My boss doesn't do this. He has a hell of a time, because most of us that work under him are liberal leaning, pro-Democrat, and he's much more conservative. We give him grief about it all the time, ask him if he wants to go to see Harry Reid give a speech, or if he watched the Daily Show last night, and so on. He takes it all with a grumble. But after the Angle/Reid debate, he actually had the same conclusions that I did. He didn't see it as anyone beating the other person, and he thought they were both rehashing old points. His ability to see the same debate as I did, rather than the debate he wanted based on his political leanings, gives me hope that maybe the divide in this country can be overcome. Hope, but I'm not holding my breath.

The other fun bit of politics was that I got to see Bill Clinton speak last week. If you get a chance, go see him talk. I'd have rather it not been a rally for Reid, because I'd have like to hear him give a real speech rather than something directed at a bunch of hardcore Democrats, but he's a great speaker. That's how politicians should be able to present themselves and their ideas. Whether you like the guy or not, go see him speak. And if you don't like him, why not? Cos he got head? Why do you give a shit. It's got nothing to do with that, and everything to do with the fact you don't like his policies. Attack someone for their policies, debate them based on their policies, and here's a novel idea. . .talk about their actual policies, rather than some made up crap that when you're given a chance to prove your attack in a debate, you can actually prove instead of commenting that you'd love to have the chance to prove it, and then completely failing to do so. Yes, that was a jab at Sharron Angle.

Well, that's politics for now. I'll probably be back to the woe is me bollocks next blog, because October's been a very strange month. I'll be glad to move on from it, to tell the truth. But that's for another time.

Mappage.

Today, I bought my first Nautical Chart. Actually, I bought it a couple of days ago online, but it arrived today. It's of the Oregon Coast, from Yaquina (oh, those crazy Oregon names) Head to Columbia River. The measurements are in fathoms, degrees, minutes and seconds, and if I hadn't run out of pins I'd have put it up on my bedroom wall tonight.

It's much more fun to look at the chart than read the news online. More bullshit from politicians. The Republicans want to cut the deficit and taxes. The Democrats want to cut taxes for some, but don't want to vote on it because they're already winning. Christine O'Donnell wants people to stop masturbating (from now on, if I say I'm going home to disappoint O'Donnell, you know what I'm saying. Yeah you do.) Don't Ask Don't tell isn't being repealed. Lindsay Lohan's in jail. Blockbuster filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Whereas when I look at the chart, with its underwater pipelines marked, and low tide levels shown, and names of places I know almost scribbled on as an afterthought (after all, they're on land, and who cares about the land?), I can forget about most of the crap that's being dealt to us by the people we elected, and the people we pay to report on the people we elected.

I've been having a really productive month so far. I talked about motivation last post, and again it's pretty much all I want to talk about now. Yes, I'm quite political, and I talk about it, but I'm just not all that fond of writing about it at the moment. I want to write Book II in the trilogy, and find out how Brokes and the rest of them are going to get to where I'm sending them. I want to write the screenplay for Taras, and find out if Jake and Brett are going to be friends at the end of everything I'm putting them through. I've got ideas for short stories, and different genres to dabble in. I don't want to write about the Democrats inability to organize their party, and I don't want to write about the Republicans ability to organize their party around no platform. It just pisses me off, and there's enough going on to piss me off without putting that into my writing as well. Will I write about politics again? Probably, it's too fascinatingly frustrating for me to stay away from, but for now I need to work on things for myself. Gods know that the bloody politicians aren't working on things for me.

So if all the crap is getting you down, do what I've done. Find something you like. Focus on that, instead of the ratings battles, or the career politicians. Keep a picture of it on your desktop, or bedroom wall, or office cubicle partition. I've got my boat, and now I've got a nautical map to imagine plotting a course across.

Just got to learn to read the bloody thing properly. And plot a course. . .

Gonna.

I'm hoping that history repeats itself. When I was in University, I lived in Kenna Hall. We'd have parties there. But one particular party, I went outside for a breath of fresh air, and took a walk along the bluff. (The University I attended, University of Portland, is situated on a bluff overlooking the docks in Portland) I walked out there, in a mildly alcoholic haze, watching the lights below me and just able to hear the sounds of machinery as the kept working late into the night. The activity was almost all focused on a cruise ship in dry dock. I made up my mind there and then that I would work on a cruise ship when I graduated. I went back to the party, and started telling people that I was going to work on ships. I thought about doing it for a summer or two, but going to Salzburg for a year got in the way of doing that, so it would have to wait until after graduation. But for three years, I told people I was going to work on cruise ships.

I joined my first ship in July of 2001, six weeks after graduation, and worked on them for almost 3 years.

While working on ships I learned Automation. That is to say, I got taught the order in which to push buttons on an Automation console, which is what passed for training. The learning happened later, when things broke and I had to pull some sort of show out of my arse using a couple of joysticks and no variable speed, or overnight phone calls to London from the middle of the Pacific Ocean to troubleshoot problems. When contractors were sent out for jobs that were too big to do on the ship, or we went into dry dock ourselves, I tried to pick their brains and learn more about the systems (and generally realized that they were bluffing as much or more than I was). It was my first contract, before I learned Automation, that I learned about Cirque Du Soleil, from an Argentinian guy I worked with, Jeronimo. He talked about the shows they put on and the equipment they got to use, so I decided, like him, that I would work for them some day and started telling people this.

I started at Zumanity 10th June, 2004. (And Jero went on to get a job with them on tour).

So now, I'm going to be a writer. I've been telling people that for about two years. I'm not sure when I went from just writing for the hell of it to deciding I want to make a living doing it, but I did, and I do, so I will. I know everyone keeps saying it's hard to get into it, it's hard to make a living at it, but I've been successful so far when I've put myself out there by saying 'this is what I'm going to do.' There's no point in aiming to have just one thing published, make enough for a week long vacation in the Azores and then going back to your regular life. Sod that. I'm going to make a living as a writer.

Now maybe I should start making other statements of intent, if that's the right phrase. Statements of desire? Statements of . . .of the future? I intend to be a writer, I desire to be a writer, I shall be a writer? Well, whatever statements I'm making, I'm also going to start saying I will get in shape, I will travel more, I will make it to space one day.

There, I've said it, so now it's going to happen. I'm just not going to lie back and wait for any of it, I'm going to work for it. Now.

Lull

I haven't been accomplishing much in the past couple of weeks. I've sat here almost every day looking at one of my screenplays and draft the second of the book, keeping them always open in the hopes that I'll get back into the swing of it. Hasn't worked so far. I'm not worried yet. There's been a bit of adjustment at work while I get a temporary promotion (I'm filling in for my supervisor who's out right now after surgery). We've got a show opening on Tuesday evening. I've started going to the gym and playing racquetball (read: getting my arse handed to me on the court) one night a week after work. So it's not like I haven't accomplished anything, it's just not what I want to be accomplishing.

Being put into a supervisory position at work has been interesting, although probably not the best thing for me. Now that I've seen it from their point of view, and everything they have to deal with, I'm completely convinced I can do it, and possibly better. Definitely better than some. But the question is, do I want to? Working for Cirque is great: the bragging rights, the attachment to something so instantly recognizable and well-perceived by the rest of the world, the 5-year anniversary leather jacket. But I look around at the guys I work with, and I can't decide if I want it or not. Even working for a show such as LOVE can get a little. . . samey. Same music, same show, same people, and as fickle and easily distractable as I am, I don't think I have the patience to work my way up in the company. And there's no way I want to stay in the same position forever.

So why, then, am I slacking with the writing? I see it as my first best chance for a change of pace, and should be going at it hammer and tongs, but it's more like no hammer and just a pair of tweezers. It still feels good when I get a couple pages written, or edited, or scribble down more ideas on this big effing white board that now lives on the wall by my bed. I'm just not doing it right now.

Maybe I've had too many people compliment me on my writing. Not that they've read it yet; just that I actually got through the first draft, all seventy-something thousand words. I've had more than one person tell me how proud they are of me (even though it's probable that what I've written is pants), and I've always been one to rest on my laurels. The trouble is here, that the laurels are only supposed. I haven't earned anything- even though I got further than a lot of people, I'm starting to see a first draft as almost the same as never writing it.

So here's the plan. Finish the screenplay for Taras in the next week. The get cracking on my edit- I said I'd have it done by the end of March, so I gotsta get a move on with the bloody thing. And after that? Start something else. No more down time. Not until I've earned it, and I've got a comfy bunch of laurels that I can make a nest out of to rest in, just like I used to do with the blankets in the airing cupboard at the Coombe Road house.