Notes from Another Life

thekeyiswitharose: catholicgeek: inmytsinelas: I teach Sunday...

Mon, 01 Apr 2013 20:21:00 -0400

catholicgeek:

inmytsinelas:

I teach Sunday school, motherf*cker

This is perfect.

LOL. When you get religious on Colbert, he knows his stuff, it’s pretty hilarious how he trolls his guests.

kushandwizdom: Click here for more personal quotes

Mon, 01 Apr 2013 20:06:12 -0400

kushandwizdom:

Click here for more personal quotes

Pixar's rules for storytelling:

Mon, 01 Apr 2013 18:21:40 -0400

You admire a character for trying more than you do for their successes.
You gotta keep in mind what’s interesting to you as an audience, not what’s fun to do as a writer. They can be very different.
Trying for theme is important, but you won’t see what the story is actually about til you’re at the end of it. Now rewrite.
Once upon a time there was ___. Every day, ___. One day ___. Because of that, ___. Because of that, ___. Until finally ___.
Simplify. Focus. Combine characters. Hop over detours. You’ll feel like you’re losing valuable stuff but it sets you free.
What is your character good at, comfortable with? Throw the polar opposite at them. Challenge them. How do they deal?
Come up with your ending before you figure out your middle. Seriously. Endings are hard, get yours working up front.
Finish your story, let go even if it’s not perfect. In an ideal world you have both, but move on. Do better next time.
When you’re stuck, make a list of what WOULDN’T happen next. Lots of times the material to get you unstuck will show up.
Pull apart the stories you like. What you like in them is a part of you; you’ve got to recognize it before you can use it.
Putting it on paper lets you start fixing it. If it stays in your head, a perfect idea, you’ll never share it with anyone.
Discount the 1st thing that comes to mind. And the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th – get the obvious out of the way. Surprise yourself.
Give your characters opinions. Passive/malleable might seem likable to you as you write, but it’s poison to the audience.
Why must you tell THIS story? What’s the belief burning within you that your story feeds off of? That’s the heart of it.
If you were your character, in this situation, how would you feel? Honesty lends credibility to unbelievable situations.
What are the stakes? Give us reason to root for the character. What happens if they don’t succeed? Stack the odds against.
No work is ever wasted. If it’s not working, let go and move on – it’ll come back around to be useful later.
You have to know yourself: the difference between doing your best & fussing. Story is testing, not refining.
Coincidences to get characters into trouble are great; coincidences to get them out of it are cheating.
Exercise: take the building blocks of a movie you dislike. How d’you rearrange them into what you DO like?
You gotta identify with your situation/characters, can’t just write ‘cool’. What would make YOU act that way?
What’s the essence of your story? Most economical telling of it? If you know that, you can build out from there.

I’m all about that All-Day Sushi Lifestyle.

Mon, 31 Dec 2012 01:50:10 -0500

I’m all about that All-Day Sushi Lifestyle.

Found this little gem recently. Great little Easter Eggs these...

Sun, 09 Dec 2012 04:56:17 -0500

Found this little gem recently. Great little Easter Eggs these two have with them.

jtotheizzoe: Will we appeal to the crystals and the stars or to...

Tue, 04 Dec 2012 05:13:22 -0500

jtotheizzoe:

Will we appeal to the crystals and the stars or to our minds?

(via Joanne Manaster)

I’m worried this time has already arrived.

zmbabwe: The Cocks got a trophy for rape.

Fri, 30 Nov 2012 20:24:19 -0500

zmbabwe:

The Cocks got a trophy for rape.

elizabeth-antoinette: Precisely He obviously has ideas that...

Mon, 24 Sep 2012 02:56:28 -0400

elizabeth-antoinette:

Precisely

He obviously has ideas that are better than his music. Marilyn Manson speaking the truth.

theblakex: Jimi Hendrix shooting arrow

Wed, 19 Sep 2012 16:03:25 -0400

theblakex:

Jimi Hendrix shooting arrow

Reality Television

Thu, 21 Jun 2012 19:02:20 -0400

I’ve come to realize, after working in reality television for a month, how absurdly fake it all is. The people in these shows are very boring unless there is drama injected into the situation. Cameras bring that drama into these dull situations and make entertaining television for housewives, who have dull lives themselves.

It’s been a pretty enlightening experience for me, but believe it when I say that I will likely never get into reality television, it’s just too fake. An upside to reality shows, though, is that you don’t need to employ writers, and partof why I don’t like reality television is that I hope to be a writer in a year or two.

But, all-in-all, I am thoroughly enjoying my time in New York and am already attempting to make plans to move here after graduation. I hope your Summer is going well and wish you the best of luck with everything.

-John Cuenin

awesomepeoplehangingouttogether: Al Pacino and Christopher...

Thu, 31 May 2012 12:40:56 -0400

awesomepeoplehangingouttogether:

Al Pacino and Christopher Walken

They are two pretty awesome people. Goofy as hell too.

Man, that’s a sweet ride. I’m currently walking on...

Mon, 28 May 2012 16:58:44 -0400

Man, that’s a sweet ride. I’m currently walking on West 24th Street, found my place of work, and now I’m bumming around.

Photo

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 01:05:27 -0400

Gandhi’s Top 10 Fundamentals for Changing the World.

Tue, 27 Mar 2012 08:23:47 -0400

Gandhi’s Top 10 Fundamentals for Changing the World.

thatswilkkid: #Life

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 22:00:52 -0400

thatswilkkid:

#Life

Photo

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 03:33:46 -0500

"It takes courage to grow up and turn out to be who you really are."

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 03:32:49 -0500

““It takes courage to grow up and turn out to be who you really are.””

- e.e. cummings

It was a cool experience, as was last year’s election, but...

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 03:30:00 -0500

It was a cool experience, as was last year’s election, but now I’ve come to understand that I won’t be in politics for a long time, if ever. I will work to improve the world, but in other ways. I have decided to move more towards screenwriting for the time being. My first project is a television show that has the working title “The Valley of the Gun.” More is definitely to come on that.

SWEET!!! minimalmovieposters: The Walking Dead by Katie...

Tue, 10 Jan 2012 03:25:15 -0500

SWEET!!!

minimalmovieposters:

The Walking Dead by Katie Crawford

North Korea, a Blight on the Face of the World

Wed, 04 Jan 2012 21:19:00 -0500

Kim Jong-Il has died. It was a big story for the few days before Christmas, but I’m just getting around to posting about it. Viral videos have shown North Korean citizens mourning in the streets, most definitely having been put to the task by the government of the late dictator. Everyone’s learning more about the “Dear Leader” but little to nothing is known about the government he headed.

The man lived one of the most lavish and fairy tale like lives of any world leader while most North Korean people lived off of one third the daily caloric intake a human requires. He imported more than $700,000 worth of Hennessy each year. His people believed he and his father created the world and controlled the weather. His biography says he doesn’t defecate or urinate like other people. And he reportedly shot a 38 under par with 11 holes-in-one for his first game of golf.

He and his party cohorts lived lavish lives, ate healthy, and made the city of Pyongyang into a “working” socialist society. All the time, his people in the countryside were starving. The famine that took place in North Korea from 1995 to 1998 was one of the worst government sanctioned actions of the post-Cold War period, with some accounts bringing the death toll to two million. Stalin’s famine in Ukraine and Mao’s Great Leap Forward were two other instances where famine has taken place in partially industrialized countries during peacetime. Governments, just like North Korea’s, instituted both famines. This famine killed off the poorer North Koreans in Pyongyang, “cleaning up” the streets as Mr. Kim wanted them. It also killed off many North Koreans in the countryside, a place few foreigners have ever been.

North Korea is most likely in peril, not that anyone outside of the country can verify this. But it’s been in peril for the entirety of his term and is most likely worse now. The international community could do something about this new wave of turmoil that has most likely been created by Kin Jong-Il’s death. But would international intervention really help? I have no first hand knowledge, much like the overwhelming majority of theorists and strategists in the West, but from first hand accounts the people truly believe he is a god. The official status to the people is that Kim Jong-Il and Kim Il Sung created the earth and control the weather. When a western doctor cured a North Korean of blindness, he immediately went over to a picture of the “Dear Leader” and thanked him, never thanking the doctor.

If a foreign force you never believed existed comes in and tries to “help” you by taking down your god, you would be shaken and most likely not accept the foreigners. This is why I am convinced that intervertion would fail. What can the international community do? Push diplomatically. Use soft power to attempt to change the government and culture in North Korea. It will be a hard and irksome task, but it has been done before.

Dictatorships have been toppled before. Kings with heavenly mandates have been deposed and replaced with democratic governments, but the force to bring this about must truly come from within. If the North Koreans are completely brainwashed, which is unlikely in my mind, then it will never happen. But I think there have to be North Koreans who know that life can get better or at least have an idea that it can. All we need is to do something, some propaganda or outreach of our own perhaps, to help those people realize that there is the potential for a better life for this country. One challenge we encounter is the fact that the North Korean language no longer is the same as the South Korean language. This will make the clear communication of the ideas of democracy or freedom difficult to communicate. It may also make any realistic hopes of reunification almost unattainable. However, a free or at least a freer North Korea is not impossible to achieve either and now may be the time to renew our efforts to reach out to the country’s people. This task could be rather difficult.