(I'm posting this on all of my blogs)
Going through my files, I found this list from my WebTV Webpage. Remember WebTV? It had to be written somewhere around 2000-2002.
Man, I was cocky back then. And sharp. Enjoy.
_____________________________________
So you want to publish your book . . . here's a list of 10 things you ought to do.
1) Sit down and write the book.
That's right. Sit down and write. Lots of writers talk the talk, but they don't walk the walk. They want to live a writer's lifestyle (whatever that is). They are attracted to the writer's celebrity status (whatever they think that is). They are eager to puff their egos by seeing their names on a book jacket on a bookshelf at Barnes and Noble (and yes, that does puff one's ego). They desire to introduce themselves to strangers with a firm handshake and a hearty--"My name is FILLINTHEBLANK, and I am a writer." Cut the crap. Stop posing and get that book written. I have worked with too many clients (when I was editing books) that would hand me six or seven typed pages and say, "Here's where I've gotten so far, Tell me what you think of it." My answer would invariably be: "I think you are a poser. Go write. Come back when this has grown up." Writers write. And publishers publish manuscripts that are longer than six pages. Spend an hour every morning writing two pages. In six months you'll have your first book. It may not be great, but at least it will be finished and we can talk about it.
2) Copyright the book.
Now a few years ago, I would never have wasted your time or mine with this piece of advice. In fact, if you had asked me a question about copyrights back then, I would have told you not to worry about it. "No one is going to steal your book," I would have told you. "If a publisher really likes your writing, they won't steal it. The work is like the golden egg, but you are the goose that lays the egg. If they steal the work, they sell one book. But if they sign you as one of their writers, they can sell a series of your books. That makes more sense." Recent personal events, however, have demonstrated that people do steal a writer's work. Protect yourself. Enough on this.
3) Get another set of eyes to read the book.
Join a writer's group or sign up for a creative writing class at a local college and have someone competent and objective read your book. Listen to their advice on what works and what does not work with your book. As the author, you do not have to take all of their advice, but you should listen to it. This helps you to gauge how an audience will read your book--such information can be valuable when you make later decisions on what to cut and what not to cut. Writing groups and creative writing classes are also good places to help you tighten your prose and fix your grammar and clean up your typos. As writers, we often have a vision of the book in our heads that is quite different from the actual book that is written on the pages. We become blind to our mistakes. Worse yet, our hubris makes us unwilling to cut dull and longwinded passages. So get your book read by an objective reader or two and leave your ego at the door.
4) Find twenty to twenty-five publishers who might be interested in publishing your book.
There are a couple ways of doing this. The first way is to be a good reader. If you are a good reader, then you already have many books on your shelves that are similar to the one you have written. Who published these books? Start writing that list. The second way is to go to a bookstore and pick up books that are similar to yours. Who published these books? You can go online and do the same thing. You can also go to a very important book called the THE NOVEL AND SHORT STORY WRITER'S MARKET and do the same thing. This is your target list.
5) Arrange the target list in order of most prestigious to least prestigious.
When you start sending out your manuscript you will begin with the publishers at the top of the list and work your way down. In the words of author Lynne Barrett told us in grad school, "Your manuscript, like water, will find its own level."
6) Write a MEETS hook.
Think about your book. Think about two other books (or movies) that it is similar to. Then write your MEETS hook. Your MEETS hook should sound something like this: "My novel, CHARITY GARNER'S BOYS is a story of rage, temptation, gangsters, and surprising compassion set in the high plateaus of depression era South Dakota [. . . include a brief description of the book . . . then finish with . . .] It is like BONNIE AND CLYDE meets THE BRIDGES OF MADISON COUNTY.
7) Get an agent.
Once you have tightened up the book, gotten your target list together, and written your MEETS hook, it is time to get an agent. Why do you need an agent? Because you need a friend and guide in the publishing world. Yes, there are writers who have gotten published without agents. They are not the rule--they are lucky. An agent will get 15% commission on your book, and he/she will be worth every penny of that commission. How do you get an agent? There are several ways to do this. Send out query letters to agents listed online or in books such as THE NOVEL AND SHORT STORY WRITER'S MARKET (there are many good books and online sources that will guide you through query-letter writing--do consult them). Ask another writer to introduce you to his/her agent--but expect to be turned down. Writers guard their agents jealously. Go to writer's conferences and take a course with the agent (s), who will read your manuscript and maybe sign you up for representation. Note: It is a good idea to go to writer's conferences regardless. Many authors have gotten their books sold or represented through contacts made at writer's conferences.
8) Beware of agents who charge a fee.
Usually, agents do not charge a fee. Agents take 15% commission on advances and book sales. Think about it: if an agent charged even, say, $25 per manuscript as a reading fee, he/she could make a pretty decent living without ever having to do the hard work of actually selling a book. There are a few, very few, big name New York agents that charge a small fee--if you get a chance to work with one of these, pay the fee by all means! Beware of agents who solicit you--most reputable agents have more clients than they can handle. If an agent contacts you via phone, letter, or email, ask for a list of published clients. There are many writers out there eager to get into print and they are easy prey for predators posing as agents and editors.
9) Help your agent to sell your book.
Once you have gotten your agent, give her/him your plan for selling your book: the target list of publishers, your MEETS hook. The agent will likely modify the target list based on her/his contacts in the publishing world. The agent may also modify your MEETS a bit. The agent will also want to know what audience you wrote the book for: age, race, gender, level of education. You should be able to answer all of these questions. It is also likely that the agent, upon signing you up, already has a few publishers in mind for your book, publishers that he/she has worked with in the past and who are looking for a book such as yours. If this is the case, you have hit the jackpot. Just sit on your hands, and let your agent do his/her job.
10) If All Else Fails . . .
Should I self-publish? Maybe--but hold on there a minute. Did you join a writer's group? Did you leave your ego at the door? Did you edit and then really edit your book? Did you go to a writer's conference and hobnob with agents and publishers? Maybe you should enter your book in a few contests. Try that. If all else has failed, then maybe you should self-publish. Self-publishing is not a bad idea if you are the right kind of person. I hope to build another link in a month or two that addresses the issue of self-publishing with a greater thoroughness. For now, let me leave with you with a few tips. 1) Get a company that is inexpensive. The self-publishing companies that charge $5000 provide roughly the same quality service as the ones that are $750, $450, $250, or free. 2) Make sure your book is copyrighted. 3) Don't purchase any of their add-on services. They are a waste of time and if you need them, you can always get them cheaper at Office Depot. 4) If you plan to get rich on the book, prepare to have a professional marketing plan; in fact, you need to hire a professional publicist. This will cost you money, but it will be worth it. 5) Be prepared to travel to sell your book. 6) Be prepared to make deals with bookstore managers to stock your books. 7) Be prepared to work.
I have more to say on this, and I will on a new link.
Good luck
--Preston
Me at the Pen 2010
© PEN American Center/Susan Horgan. All rights reserved. Please contact media@pen.org for usage and rights.
Monday, September 23, 2013
The Three Wise Men, Caspar, Melchior, Balthazar: Choosing names
Q: It's Sami again with another question. Could you tell me why the characters in the first half of your novel have no names?
A: Are you familiar with the fairytale the three little pigs? Tell me the names of the three pigs. See? Or the princess in Rapunzel.
Names are frequently left out in fairytales. Names are rare in parables and fables. Tell me the name of the prodigal son. The Good Samaritan, what is his name? The three wise men. I know, I know, popular tradition has them down as Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar . . .
But mostly names are an afterthought in narratives that teach a lesson or whose stories are more important than the characters who act out the parts. There are notable exceptions of course. Disney gives us the names of the seven dwarfs, but the original versions did not. We know the names of Santa's Reindeer (if we can remember the song), but only Rudolph with his red nose stands out.
And we know the names of the twelve disciples--"The first Simon who is called Peter; Andrew his brother; James the son of Zebedee; John his brother . . ." and so on, but what does it add to the narrative?
Sure it makes them seem more real as actual people, and this is the way it works in real life--people have names. But I would argue that because of the distraction caused by the names, there may be less focus on the important lessons.
Later on in the list another James appears and a second Simon. In some versions the name "Judas" appears twice in the list.
For some of us the lesson cannot be seen at all. We get too caught up in the minutiae of biography.
Whose son was who? Where did he live? In the desert and was considered a madman? Oh, that was a different John. But I thought you said in another scripture that he was a fisherman. Oh, only his brother was a fisherman. So which Peter was the one that Jesus called the rock? And so on and so forth.
In the prodigal son, a fairly efficient parable, the lesson is the focus, not the names, but the relation between the two sons. Elder son and younger. Or a character's function, Father, Servant, Fatted calf. You see my point.
To demonstrate narrative structure in my creative class, I retell the tale of the two monks. Their names by the way were "Tanzan" and "Ekido," but to teach the lesson I call them "the first monk" and "the second monk." You may remember the story:
Two monks were on their way to a monastery when they passed through a village where everything was wet and muddy from the recent rains. The first monk saw a woman attempting to cross the flooded road and he passed her by.
The second monk saw the same woman and he lifted her up and set her down on the other side of the road.
At the end of the day when the two had reached the monastery, the first monk could not take it anymore, and he turned to the second monk angrily and said, "You know that we have taken an oath never to touch a woman, especially one as beautiful as that one you touched today."
And the second monk said to the first, "I left her at the water. Are you still carrying her?"
Now tell the story again with the names "Tanzan" and "Ekido" inserted. In which is the LESSON easier to understand? I think the answer is the one without names.
"Every Boy Should Have a Man" begins as a fable, turns into a fairytale, becomes scripture, and ends as a traditional prose narrative with Mikel the son of Mike on that bus ride to his father's mansion. There are elements of each of the other parts within each part, of course, so that in the fable section there is a traditional prose narrative told by the mother.
By the way did you notice how that phrase "Mikel the son of Mike on that bus ride to his father's mansion" sounds suspiciously like the way the King James Bible sounds? That happens many times in the book.
Enjoy these additional "cheats," Sami. Good luck with your research paper. Email me a copy of it when it's completed. I am honored to be worthy of research.
Thanks,
Preston
A: Are you familiar with the fairytale the three little pigs? Tell me the names of the three pigs. See? Or the princess in Rapunzel.
Names are frequently left out in fairytales. Names are rare in parables and fables. Tell me the name of the prodigal son. The Good Samaritan, what is his name? The three wise men. I know, I know, popular tradition has them down as Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar . . .
But mostly names are an afterthought in narratives that teach a lesson or whose stories are more important than the characters who act out the parts. There are notable exceptions of course. Disney gives us the names of the seven dwarfs, but the original versions did not. We know the names of Santa's Reindeer (if we can remember the song), but only Rudolph with his red nose stands out.
And we know the names of the twelve disciples--"The first Simon who is called Peter; Andrew his brother; James the son of Zebedee; John his brother . . ." and so on, but what does it add to the narrative?
Sure it makes them seem more real as actual people, and this is the way it works in real life--people have names. But I would argue that because of the distraction caused by the names, there may be less focus on the important lessons.
Later on in the list another James appears and a second Simon. In some versions the name "Judas" appears twice in the list.
For some of us the lesson cannot be seen at all. We get too caught up in the minutiae of biography.
Whose son was who? Where did he live? In the desert and was considered a madman? Oh, that was a different John. But I thought you said in another scripture that he was a fisherman. Oh, only his brother was a fisherman. So which Peter was the one that Jesus called the rock? And so on and so forth.
In the prodigal son, a fairly efficient parable, the lesson is the focus, not the names, but the relation between the two sons. Elder son and younger. Or a character's function, Father, Servant, Fatted calf. You see my point.
To demonstrate narrative structure in my creative class, I retell the tale of the two monks. Their names by the way were "Tanzan" and "Ekido," but to teach the lesson I call them "the first monk" and "the second monk." You may remember the story:
Two monks were on their way to a monastery when they passed through a village where everything was wet and muddy from the recent rains. The first monk saw a woman attempting to cross the flooded road and he passed her by.
The second monk saw the same woman and he lifted her up and set her down on the other side of the road.
At the end of the day when the two had reached the monastery, the first monk could not take it anymore, and he turned to the second monk angrily and said, "You know that we have taken an oath never to touch a woman, especially one as beautiful as that one you touched today."
And the second monk said to the first, "I left her at the water. Are you still carrying her?"
Now tell the story again with the names "Tanzan" and "Ekido" inserted. In which is the LESSON easier to understand? I think the answer is the one without names.
"Every Boy Should Have a Man" begins as a fable, turns into a fairytale, becomes scripture, and ends as a traditional prose narrative with Mikel the son of Mike on that bus ride to his father's mansion. There are elements of each of the other parts within each part, of course, so that in the fable section there is a traditional prose narrative told by the mother.
By the way did you notice how that phrase "Mikel the son of Mike on that bus ride to his father's mansion" sounds suspiciously like the way the King James Bible sounds? That happens many times in the book.
Enjoy these additional "cheats," Sami. Good luck with your research paper. Email me a copy of it when it's completed. I am honored to be worthy of research.
Thanks,
Preston
Friday, September 20, 2013
Lebron James, Sponge Bob, and the environment
I did not know that.
__________________________
"Lebron James Joins Sponge Bob on Eco Mission"
from NBCNEWS.com 7/2/2008
Akron--LeBron James has a new teammate who's just as popular. The guy has a few holes in his game. Oh, and he lives in a pineapple under the sea.
SpongeBob SquarePants won't help James win any NBA titles, but the Cavaliers' superstar has paired up with Nickelodeon, the home of SpongeBob and his ocean-dwelling cartoon chums, to raise awareness about the environment.
Beyond the global-awareness message — part of Nickelodeon's Big Green Help campaign — James is hoping to educate kids on the importance of exercise.
"We're trying to get kids out of the house,'' Cleveland's All-Star forward said while dressing in his trailer after filming the PSA, which will air in mid-July. "Get outside, ride bikes, play hoops. And in this, we're trying to save water and do other things that can help the environment. ... It doesn't take much to recycle a can or turn the faucet off.''
At 23, James is still a kid at heart. A big SpongeBob fan, the two-time Olympian is also a father of two young sons, and he understands the impact he can have on shaping other kids' lives.
"They are our future,'' he said as his 1-year-old, Bryce, begged for daddy's attention. "You never forget things when you're a kid, so every time I do something I like to have it involve kids. I was at my basketball camp earlier and the memories those kids made are going to stay with them the rest of their lives. What I do is kid driven. I don't do it because I have to. I want to.''
Political interests, as well In addition to being more socially conscious on issues like the environment, James has broadened his interest in politics, another sign of his maturity off the floor.
Two weeks ago, he was part of a group who had dinner in New York with Michelle Obama, wife of Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.
"It was an unbelievable experience,'' said James, who took his girlfriend, Savannah, with him. "It was mind-boggling.''
James has no plans to campaign for any candidate, but he intends to stay up to date on important issues.
"I'm not so far into it. I don't feel I need to be hands on into it,'' he said. "You want to keep athletics and politics separate. I don't want to start getting up on panels or talking about Barack or (John) McCain. I'm aware of what's going on not just with the presidential election. You want to be aware of gas prices and other things. Being a father and being responsible for my kids, I want to know what's going on in our world.''
LeBron avatar part of green game
Nickelodeon, famous for kids shows where contestants get "slimed'' with a green, gooey mixture, found that kids — and their parents — wanted to know more about their world, too.
After getting feedback from folks eager to learn more about ways they can help the environment, Nickelodeon developed its Big Green Help initiative and launched it in April.
James is featured on Nick's Web site in a game where kids navigate a bike-riding LeBron avatar down an obstacle-filled dirt road. The animated hoopster delivers "green'' tips along the way on how to help the planet.
"We found that parents weren't sure what they could do,'' said Nickelodeon's Jean Margaret Smith, who overseas all the network's pro-social campaigns. "We're connecting the dots for them.''
As for connecting with kids, that's where James comes in. His easygoing personality and approachable manner, along with being one of the world's most recognizable athletes, has made him popularity with kids and adults.
Everyone seems to like LeBron.
"He's got a real charm and real connection with kids, and it is so genuine,'' said Smith, who noted that James gave his input into the game's design. "He's excited to be involved.''
__________________________
"Lebron James Joins Sponge Bob on Eco Mission"
from NBCNEWS.com 7/2/2008
Akron--LeBron James has a new teammate who's just as popular. The guy has a few holes in his game. Oh, and he lives in a pineapple under the sea.
SpongeBob SquarePants won't help James win any NBA titles, but the Cavaliers' superstar has paired up with Nickelodeon, the home of SpongeBob and his ocean-dwelling cartoon chums, to raise awareness about the environment.
Beyond the global-awareness message — part of Nickelodeon's Big Green Help campaign — James is hoping to educate kids on the importance of exercise.
"We're trying to get kids out of the house,'' Cleveland's All-Star forward said while dressing in his trailer after filming the PSA, which will air in mid-July. "Get outside, ride bikes, play hoops. And in this, we're trying to save water and do other things that can help the environment. ... It doesn't take much to recycle a can or turn the faucet off.''
At 23, James is still a kid at heart. A big SpongeBob fan, the two-time Olympian is also a father of two young sons, and he understands the impact he can have on shaping other kids' lives.
"They are our future,'' he said as his 1-year-old, Bryce, begged for daddy's attention. "You never forget things when you're a kid, so every time I do something I like to have it involve kids. I was at my basketball camp earlier and the memories those kids made are going to stay with them the rest of their lives. What I do is kid driven. I don't do it because I have to. I want to.''
Political interests, as well In addition to being more socially conscious on issues like the environment, James has broadened his interest in politics, another sign of his maturity off the floor.
Two weeks ago, he was part of a group who had dinner in New York with Michelle Obama, wife of Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.
"It was an unbelievable experience,'' said James, who took his girlfriend, Savannah, with him. "It was mind-boggling.''
James has no plans to campaign for any candidate, but he intends to stay up to date on important issues.
"I'm not so far into it. I don't feel I need to be hands on into it,'' he said. "You want to keep athletics and politics separate. I don't want to start getting up on panels or talking about Barack or (John) McCain. I'm aware of what's going on not just with the presidential election. You want to be aware of gas prices and other things. Being a father and being responsible for my kids, I want to know what's going on in our world.''
LeBron avatar part of green game
Nickelodeon, famous for kids shows where contestants get "slimed'' with a green, gooey mixture, found that kids — and their parents — wanted to know more about their world, too.
After getting feedback from folks eager to learn more about ways they can help the environment, Nickelodeon developed its Big Green Help initiative and launched it in April.
James is featured on Nick's Web site in a game where kids navigate a bike-riding LeBron avatar down an obstacle-filled dirt road. The animated hoopster delivers "green'' tips along the way on how to help the planet.
"We found that parents weren't sure what they could do,'' said Nickelodeon's Jean Margaret Smith, who overseas all the network's pro-social campaigns. "We're connecting the dots for them.''
As for connecting with kids, that's where James comes in. His easygoing personality and approachable manner, along with being one of the world's most recognizable athletes, has made him popularity with kids and adults.
Everyone seems to like LeBron.
"He's got a real charm and real connection with kids, and it is so genuine,'' said Smith, who noted that James gave his input into the game's design. "He's excited to be involved.''
Research Paper Writing Tip AAA: Allegory, Allusion, Archetype
Q: This is for a research paper that I am writing. I'm looking at the definition of "allegory" and the model they mention is the novel "Pilgrim's Progress." That also is one of the books the teacher suggested we use, but I just barely got through that novel and I don't think I understood it very well. I would like to use your novel to write my paper. I found it easier to understand than "PP" and I liked it so much I finished it in one day. Could you please explain your definition of "allegory?" How do you use them in "Every Boy Should Have a Man?" Can I quote you in my paper?
A: Flattery will get you everywhere, young man. Young woman? Sami? I am an English teacher myself, a professor actually, so I don't know how much I should tell you about my own novel, Sami, except to say thank you for reading and enjoying it. That's why I wrote it. To be enjoyed.
Hmmmmm. So how do I explain "allegory," give you a few juicy, quotable lines for your assignment, all the while withholding spoilers for those who have not yet read the novel? Am I up to the task? Let's see. Allegory.
*******************
Well, I see an allegory as the meat of one story laid over the bones of another. It must be eaten on two levels—the succulent meat above and the tougher bones and skeleton beneath.
While you’re enjoying the story above, you might feel that there is something going on here. This seems familiar. Have I read this before? Have I been told this? What is the nature of this bone that I’m chewing on? What is this marrow?
Chew that bone. Suck out and swallow that marrow, for therein resides the message.
It is often a religious one—sometimes political, sometimes a retelling of history. Its nearest literary kin is "analogy."
It’s a narrative paralleling another, more familiar narrative that is buried deeply, and thus perhaps forgotten.
In that way, then, the basic structure of "Every Boy Should Have a Man" is threefold allegoric:
(1) It is the creation story as told with giants—what the bible calls the "Nephilim." The famous giant Goliath is one of them, or rather related to one:
**"There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown." (Genesis 6:4 KJV)**
Goliath was actually a mixed breed—half, angel/half man—and therefore he loomed head and shoulders above other men as a giant.
**“And there went out a champion out of the camp of the Philistines, named Goliath, of Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span.” (1 Samuel 17:4 KJV)**
Thus, he had the proportions of a gargantuan human being.
Quite a few bible stories appear in the novel. In fact, among them appears a retelling of “Samson” as well as “Noah’s Ark.” A key one is “The Tower of Babel.”
The Nephilim is the archetypical giant being: fearsome, conflicted, of religious origin, and quite human.
**“Indeed, some among the educated say that mans are related to us. Some go so far as to speculate that we are descended from them. That they are an unevolved form of us. Or that from the mixing of their blood and angels’, came we.” (Every Boy Should Have a Man 45)**
If you miss this key allusion, the book is written in such a way that it won’t hurt your reading and enjoyment of the narrative.
There are many hints and allusions indicating that the giant oafs in the novel are angelic beings: their realm is above the biblical firmament; it can be reached by climbing the remnant steps of the Tower of Babel; they tower over normal humans; they call their god the “Great Creator”; their holy book is called “Great Scripture.”
(2) It is also a retelling that is scientific: paleontological; archeological; biological.
It is the history of human kind according to Darwinian theory. As evolutionary theory once upon a time did claim, no two species of humans ever existed on earth at the same time. They all proceeded single file down a line of evolutionary transformation that ended with us—homo sapiens.
Recently, however, there has come to light indisputable paleontological evidence indicating that there was a time on earth (20,000 to 30,000 years ago) when two types of humans occupied the same island off the coast of New Zealand.
The two types of humans are classified as the gigantic "homo heidelbergensis," which we have ironically nicknamed “Goliath”; and a smaller one "Homo Floresiensis," which we nicknamed “Hobbit.” The question in my book is what the two species night have thought of each other. Would each recognize the humanness of the other? If not, would one see the other as food?
(3) It is also a retelling that is much like a Fairytale. Fairytales. Ah. In the novel there are too many to count, but an important one is “Jack and the Beanstalk.” Rufus behaves in many ways like the archetypical trickster figure Jack, right down to the stealing of the small singing harp as well as making trip after trip to plunder loot from the oafs (to him they are giants). Also note that the novel’s main protagonist, the female man named Red Locks, calls Rufus a rascal as he rescues her by climbing down the remnant stairs (his beanstalk) to our world and all its woes.
All that being said, the novel should be read the way I hope you will read it: without considering any of the aforementioned literary technique and application. Read it for its beauty, the elegance of its narrative, its simple truths, its poignant scenes of action, of heroism, of hope. Read it for its great characters and its humor. Read it because you want to see what happens next. Read it because it is a page turner that you can’t put down. Later on after you go to sleep and you are haunted in your dreams by the questions raised by the book, read this humble English major’s analysis of it.
I hope this helps, Sami.
Thanks,
Preston L. Allen, 20 September 2013
A: Flattery will get you everywhere, young man. Young woman? Sami? I am an English teacher myself, a professor actually, so I don't know how much I should tell you about my own novel, Sami, except to say thank you for reading and enjoying it. That's why I wrote it. To be enjoyed.
Hmmmmm. So how do I explain "allegory," give you a few juicy, quotable lines for your assignment, all the while withholding spoilers for those who have not yet read the novel? Am I up to the task? Let's see. Allegory.
*******************
Well, I see an allegory as the meat of one story laid over the bones of another. It must be eaten on two levels—the succulent meat above and the tougher bones and skeleton beneath.
While you’re enjoying the story above, you might feel that there is something going on here. This seems familiar. Have I read this before? Have I been told this? What is the nature of this bone that I’m chewing on? What is this marrow?
Chew that bone. Suck out and swallow that marrow, for therein resides the message.
It is often a religious one—sometimes political, sometimes a retelling of history. Its nearest literary kin is "analogy."
It’s a narrative paralleling another, more familiar narrative that is buried deeply, and thus perhaps forgotten.
In that way, then, the basic structure of "Every Boy Should Have a Man" is threefold allegoric:
(1) It is the creation story as told with giants—what the bible calls the "Nephilim." The famous giant Goliath is one of them, or rather related to one:
**"There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown." (Genesis 6:4 KJV)**
Goliath was actually a mixed breed—half, angel/half man—and therefore he loomed head and shoulders above other men as a giant.
**“And there went out a champion out of the camp of the Philistines, named Goliath, of Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span.” (1 Samuel 17:4 KJV)**
Thus, he had the proportions of a gargantuan human being.
Quite a few bible stories appear in the novel. In fact, among them appears a retelling of “Samson” as well as “Noah’s Ark.” A key one is “The Tower of Babel.”
The Nephilim is the archetypical giant being: fearsome, conflicted, of religious origin, and quite human.
**“Indeed, some among the educated say that mans are related to us. Some go so far as to speculate that we are descended from them. That they are an unevolved form of us. Or that from the mixing of their blood and angels’, came we.” (Every Boy Should Have a Man 45)**
If you miss this key allusion, the book is written in such a way that it won’t hurt your reading and enjoyment of the narrative.
There are many hints and allusions indicating that the giant oafs in the novel are angelic beings: their realm is above the biblical firmament; it can be reached by climbing the remnant steps of the Tower of Babel; they tower over normal humans; they call their god the “Great Creator”; their holy book is called “Great Scripture.”
(2) It is also a retelling that is scientific: paleontological; archeological; biological.
It is the history of human kind according to Darwinian theory. As evolutionary theory once upon a time did claim, no two species of humans ever existed on earth at the same time. They all proceeded single file down a line of evolutionary transformation that ended with us—homo sapiens.
Recently, however, there has come to light indisputable paleontological evidence indicating that there was a time on earth (20,000 to 30,000 years ago) when two types of humans occupied the same island off the coast of New Zealand.
The two types of humans are classified as the gigantic "homo heidelbergensis," which we have ironically nicknamed “Goliath”; and a smaller one "Homo Floresiensis," which we nicknamed “Hobbit.” The question in my book is what the two species night have thought of each other. Would each recognize the humanness of the other? If not, would one see the other as food?
(3) It is also a retelling that is much like a Fairytale. Fairytales. Ah. In the novel there are too many to count, but an important one is “Jack and the Beanstalk.” Rufus behaves in many ways like the archetypical trickster figure Jack, right down to the stealing of the small singing harp as well as making trip after trip to plunder loot from the oafs (to him they are giants). Also note that the novel’s main protagonist, the female man named Red Locks, calls Rufus a rascal as he rescues her by climbing down the remnant stairs (his beanstalk) to our world and all its woes.
All that being said, the novel should be read the way I hope you will read it: without considering any of the aforementioned literary technique and application. Read it for its beauty, the elegance of its narrative, its simple truths, its poignant scenes of action, of heroism, of hope. Read it for its great characters and its humor. Read it because you want to see what happens next. Read it because it is a page turner that you can’t put down. Later on after you go to sleep and you are haunted in your dreams by the questions raised by the book, read this humble English major’s analysis of it.
I hope this helps, Sami.
Thanks,
Preston L. Allen, 20 September 2013
Saturday, September 14, 2013
Writing Tip: Writer's Block
Q: Writer's Block . . . blah, blah, blah
A: I've had at least a dozen questions in the last month about writer's block, so it's time to post my official response to it again.
Thanks,
Preston
___________________________
Writer's Block?
The question of writer's block comes up every time I teach a creative writing class, so I'm going to answer it for once and for all.
If you ever get writer's block, do what I do. Go swing a golf club.
Or go watch a movie. Or read a book. Or talk with a friend. Do something. Eat a pizza. Do anything. Just don't worry about writer's block. It goes away eventually, especially since it does not exist in the first place.
Here's the deal. If I commissioned you to write a play about a group of friends united by their love of fried conch, you'd go out and do it because, one, it's a job, and, two, you can write. Piece of cake. Your biggest problem would be doing the research on conch, but the actual writing would be a cinch.
On the other hand, if I commissioned you to go sit down and write a great play and I gave you no further directions, you'd sit on your butt and ponder suicide.
That sitting on your butt and pondering self immolation is what the layman calls writer's block. What do I write? What the heck do I write? My god, I have nothing to write about. My god, nothing is coming out of me. I'm blocked.
No you're not blocked.
Are you deaf? Can you not hear what your inner writer is really saying? I HAVE nothing to write about. Again, there is no such thing as writer's block, but there is such a thing as no assignment.
Writing is a job. Sometimes you have a boss. Sometimes you're self-employed. Either way, you've got lots of work to do. The writer with the boss (journalist, script doctor, ad person, jinglist, jingoist) never has writer's block. Heck, the writer with the boss has too much writing to do.
The self-employed writer, on the other hand, is her own boss, and now I think you see the problem. The self-employed writer has to do TWO jobs: write AND come up with the assignments. When she can't find an assignment, she says she has writer's block. The big lie. That's like a teacher saying he has teacher's block because it's summer and he can't find any kids to teach.
Follow the pen, my brothers and sisters. Follow the pen.
What the self-employed writer has to do, when he can't find an assignment is pick up the pen and write. Just write. It's your job, buddy. So write. Write anything.
"I can't find anything to write about. There is absolutely nothing to write about. The only interesting thing is that story about the dog and the necktie I was putting off to work on over the summer. Actually, that story is pretty good. It kind of reminds me of the way I used to write when . . . ."
And voila! Writer's block is gone, because it never existed.
The other thing you have to remember is that as a self-employed writer, you are not restricted to writing plays--you can write anything. So start following the pen, and maybe it will become an essay, a poem, a page in the journal, some crappy ten pages of ramblings about a mutt and a necktie, a play, a great play, whatever. It doesn't matter because you are your own boss, and thus, the only standard you set for yourself is that you find TRUTH in everything you write.
So . . . if you want to write more and feel less of that thing called writer's block that we both agree does not exist, then you must go out and get yourself a job as a writer (see list above in paragraph 7).
Or give yourself more structure as a
self-employed writer. "I am going to write two pages of dialogue in my new play every day for a month. Then I am going to write a page of synopsis of a future project every night." Then follow your rules. This rigor will work to trick the mind into thinking that you are answering to some boss who requires two pages of this or that each day or she will withhold your paycheck. There are other techniques like that, which you can find in every beginning creative writing textbook.
But, come on, it's all smoke and mirrors, really. You don't need that stuff. Structure. Groannn. Yuck. That's why you're self-employed in the first place! You hate structure. You want the freedom of writing only when it is fresh and original and novel . . . I think the word I'm searching for here is "inspired." You want the freedom to write only when you're inspired. INSPIRATION is your boss. INSPIRATION tells you what assignments to work on.
But sometimes when you sit around waiting for inspiration, you kinda feel like nothing will ever come. You kinda feel like you have writer's block. Here we go again.
Your problem is you want to have your cake and eat it, too. You want brilliant inspiration to flow from your pen, but you're too lazy to treat writing like a job and do it every day so that you get better at it and better at it until every time you pick up your pen the muses obey YOUR commands.
You want to spend months away from writing while you PLAY AT being a writer, in your smoking jacket, at those chic gatherings, where all the cool writers who, like you, have mastered the "writer's look" hang out--and then, finally, when all the parties have ended, you, with your writing muscles flabby from disuse, expect to just sit down and demand brilliance to flow.
Then when, surprise, surprise, it does not come, you claim writer's block.
That's not the way it's done, my brothers and sisters. If you want to be a writer, you'd better pick up that pen.
Every day.
And enjoy the pizza
--Preston L. Allen,
A: I've had at least a dozen questions in the last month about writer's block, so it's time to post my official response to it again.
Thanks,
Preston
___________________________
Writer's Block?
The question of writer's block comes up every time I teach a creative writing class, so I'm going to answer it for once and for all.
If you ever get writer's block, do what I do. Go swing a golf club.
Or go watch a movie. Or read a book. Or talk with a friend. Do something. Eat a pizza. Do anything. Just don't worry about writer's block. It goes away eventually, especially since it does not exist in the first place.
Here's the deal. If I commissioned you to write a play about a group of friends united by their love of fried conch, you'd go out and do it because, one, it's a job, and, two, you can write. Piece of cake. Your biggest problem would be doing the research on conch, but the actual writing would be a cinch.
On the other hand, if I commissioned you to go sit down and write a great play and I gave you no further directions, you'd sit on your butt and ponder suicide.
That sitting on your butt and pondering self immolation is what the layman calls writer's block. What do I write? What the heck do I write? My god, I have nothing to write about. My god, nothing is coming out of me. I'm blocked.
No you're not blocked.
Are you deaf? Can you not hear what your inner writer is really saying? I HAVE nothing to write about. Again, there is no such thing as writer's block, but there is such a thing as no assignment.
Writing is a job. Sometimes you have a boss. Sometimes you're self-employed. Either way, you've got lots of work to do. The writer with the boss (journalist, script doctor, ad person, jinglist, jingoist) never has writer's block. Heck, the writer with the boss has too much writing to do.
The self-employed writer, on the other hand, is her own boss, and now I think you see the problem. The self-employed writer has to do TWO jobs: write AND come up with the assignments. When she can't find an assignment, she says she has writer's block. The big lie. That's like a teacher saying he has teacher's block because it's summer and he can't find any kids to teach.
Follow the pen, my brothers and sisters. Follow the pen.
What the self-employed writer has to do, when he can't find an assignment is pick up the pen and write. Just write. It's your job, buddy. So write. Write anything.
"I can't find anything to write about. There is absolutely nothing to write about. The only interesting thing is that story about the dog and the necktie I was putting off to work on over the summer. Actually, that story is pretty good. It kind of reminds me of the way I used to write when . . . ."
And voila! Writer's block is gone, because it never existed.
The other thing you have to remember is that as a self-employed writer, you are not restricted to writing plays--you can write anything. So start following the pen, and maybe it will become an essay, a poem, a page in the journal, some crappy ten pages of ramblings about a mutt and a necktie, a play, a great play, whatever. It doesn't matter because you are your own boss, and thus, the only standard you set for yourself is that you find TRUTH in everything you write.
So . . . if you want to write more and feel less of that thing called writer's block that we both agree does not exist, then you must go out and get yourself a job as a writer (see list above in paragraph 7).
Or give yourself more structure as a
self-employed writer. "I am going to write two pages of dialogue in my new play every day for a month. Then I am going to write a page of synopsis of a future project every night." Then follow your rules. This rigor will work to trick the mind into thinking that you are answering to some boss who requires two pages of this or that each day or she will withhold your paycheck. There are other techniques like that, which you can find in every beginning creative writing textbook.
But, come on, it's all smoke and mirrors, really. You don't need that stuff. Structure. Groannn. Yuck. That's why you're self-employed in the first place! You hate structure. You want the freedom of writing only when it is fresh and original and novel . . . I think the word I'm searching for here is "inspired." You want the freedom to write only when you're inspired. INSPIRATION is your boss. INSPIRATION tells you what assignments to work on.
But sometimes when you sit around waiting for inspiration, you kinda feel like nothing will ever come. You kinda feel like you have writer's block. Here we go again.
Your problem is you want to have your cake and eat it, too. You want brilliant inspiration to flow from your pen, but you're too lazy to treat writing like a job and do it every day so that you get better at it and better at it until every time you pick up your pen the muses obey YOUR commands.
You want to spend months away from writing while you PLAY AT being a writer, in your smoking jacket, at those chic gatherings, where all the cool writers who, like you, have mastered the "writer's look" hang out--and then, finally, when all the parties have ended, you, with your writing muscles flabby from disuse, expect to just sit down and demand brilliance to flow.
Then when, surprise, surprise, it does not come, you claim writer's block.
That's not the way it's done, my brothers and sisters. If you want to be a writer, you'd better pick up that pen.
Every day.
And enjoy the pizza
--Preston L. Allen,
Writing Tip: How Many Drafts Does It Take?
Q: Preston, you are known for revising a lot. How do you know when you have revised enough?
A: After I revise many times, my mind begins to worry about typos and other errors I may have missed. So I revise some more.
After I revise many more times, my mind says this is great, this is publishable, excellent! But then after a few days I get anxious about how reviewers like the NY Times or Publishers Weekly or even Black Voices and the Feminist Review will feel about the book. I worry that they may not like it because they think that I am saying something or implying something that I am not. So I revise some more.
After I revise many more times, I read the manuscript and my mind says, the book is saying what it has to say. The book is saying what it needs to say. The book is saying what you want it to say, Preston. You've done it, kiddo!
At this point, I cease to be concerned about reviewers because I am no longer concerned about getting a bad review.
This is not to say that I want a bad review, but that a bad review does not matter because the book has been polished to the point where it is taking a stand. Its message is clear--if you dislike it, you are disliking it because you dislike the message not because I have written it so poorly that you miss the message or that you cannot understand the message. I do not write to be loved, necessarily. I write to be understood.
Good Question
Preston
A: After I revise many times, my mind begins to worry about typos and other errors I may have missed. So I revise some more.
After I revise many more times, my mind says this is great, this is publishable, excellent! But then after a few days I get anxious about how reviewers like the NY Times or Publishers Weekly or even Black Voices and the Feminist Review will feel about the book. I worry that they may not like it because they think that I am saying something or implying something that I am not. So I revise some more.
After I revise many more times, I read the manuscript and my mind says, the book is saying what it has to say. The book is saying what it needs to say. The book is saying what you want it to say, Preston. You've done it, kiddo!
At this point, I cease to be concerned about reviewers because I am no longer concerned about getting a bad review.
This is not to say that I want a bad review, but that a bad review does not matter because the book has been polished to the point where it is taking a stand. Its message is clear--if you dislike it, you are disliking it because you dislike the message not because I have written it so poorly that you miss the message or that you cannot understand the message. I do not write to be loved, necessarily. I write to be understood.
Good Question
Preston
Friday, September 6, 2013
Writing Tip:Humor
Q:How do you write so that your readers will laugh? Not at you but with you. You seem to do it so well.
A:I'm tickled by your compliment. It made me laugh. See? You can write humor.
But the serious answer is simple: Don't try. Just show people being people. In fact, let me post a short interview I did with Michele Jessica Fievre.
MJ: Where did the idea for Every Boy Should Have a Man come from?
PRESTON: I was in the Everglades up to my knees in swamp water for a class I was taking. I was wary of the alligators that were lurking unseen and unfriendly nearby, of the buzzing insects and creepy crawly things slithering past, of the swarms of birds singing above my head when the thought hit me—man is an animal too. Now this was not an original idea, nor was it the first time it had come to me, but never so forcefully and with such meaning. The alligator is at the top of the food chain in this bioregion, and though I fear him, my species occupies the link above his. We can hunt him, cage him, make of him an amusement in our zoos, or even a somewhat exotic meal. I remembered my childhood in Boston when I brought tadpoles home in my pockets, pulled them out, and handed them dead to my mother. I was not cruel. I did not mean to kill them. I was simply a child—but a child who occupied the link above the tadpoles. I did not mean to hurt them, but again I was a child of that higher order species. But who is above us? Who would make us pets? Who would make of us a meal? What would be the species of the child who brought us home dead in his pockets to give to his mother? What would be the species of the child who brought us home trailing after him on a makeshift leash to his mother and heard her exclaim, “Take that stinky thing out of this house right now!” What child with tears already welling in his eyes would plead to his mother, “But, Mom, every boy should have a man?”
MJ: Your books are usually full of humor. Can we expect humor from Every Boy Should Have a Man?
PRESTON: Yes. Oh, my, yes. The book is very funny, but deep.
MJ: Speaking of humor, tell us about where your appreciation for humor comes from. I’m curious about your models.
PRESTON: I have learned that there are many roads to the land of funny. But most of them start with this piece of sage advice: Don’t try too hard to be funny. People are funny enough already. Simply depict people doing people things in the way people do them and you will have humor. Look carefully at what stand up comics do. I learned this lesson way back in my Freshman Composition class from a textbook by Ken Macrorie, Telling Writing. Study his section on fabulous realities. But I already had a pretty good instinct for funny growing up in a home with five boys. We were funny. Funny as hell.
A:I'm tickled by your compliment. It made me laugh. See? You can write humor.
But the serious answer is simple: Don't try. Just show people being people. In fact, let me post a short interview I did with Michele Jessica Fievre.
MJ: Where did the idea for Every Boy Should Have a Man come from?
PRESTON: I was in the Everglades up to my knees in swamp water for a class I was taking. I was wary of the alligators that were lurking unseen and unfriendly nearby, of the buzzing insects and creepy crawly things slithering past, of the swarms of birds singing above my head when the thought hit me—man is an animal too. Now this was not an original idea, nor was it the first time it had come to me, but never so forcefully and with such meaning. The alligator is at the top of the food chain in this bioregion, and though I fear him, my species occupies the link above his. We can hunt him, cage him, make of him an amusement in our zoos, or even a somewhat exotic meal. I remembered my childhood in Boston when I brought tadpoles home in my pockets, pulled them out, and handed them dead to my mother. I was not cruel. I did not mean to kill them. I was simply a child—but a child who occupied the link above the tadpoles. I did not mean to hurt them, but again I was a child of that higher order species. But who is above us? Who would make us pets? Who would make of us a meal? What would be the species of the child who brought us home dead in his pockets to give to his mother? What would be the species of the child who brought us home trailing after him on a makeshift leash to his mother and heard her exclaim, “Take that stinky thing out of this house right now!” What child with tears already welling in his eyes would plead to his mother, “But, Mom, every boy should have a man?”
MJ: Your books are usually full of humor. Can we expect humor from Every Boy Should Have a Man?
PRESTON: Yes. Oh, my, yes. The book is very funny, but deep.
MJ: Speaking of humor, tell us about where your appreciation for humor comes from. I’m curious about your models.
PRESTON: I have learned that there are many roads to the land of funny. But most of them start with this piece of sage advice: Don’t try too hard to be funny. People are funny enough already. Simply depict people doing people things in the way people do them and you will have humor. Look carefully at what stand up comics do. I learned this lesson way back in my Freshman Composition class from a textbook by Ken Macrorie, Telling Writing. Study his section on fabulous realities. But I already had a pretty good instinct for funny growing up in a home with five boys. We were funny. Funny as hell.
Sociological Musings
From Sociologicalmusings.com
Where sociology and real life intersect.
"Every Boy Should Have a Man: Valuing Humanity"
People kept in kennels. People hunted for food. Babies sold as pets. The sci-fi book Every Boy Should Have a Man by Preston L. Allen indirectly asks what sets people apart from animals. Why is our species alone considered worth extraordinary care while others are destined for the slaughter-house?
The work could be read as a commentary on slavery, or on meat-eating, or on ecology. In either case, it is a book that paints a startling image–people or “mans” as a part of nature, yet apart from it. Allen’s book also illustrates the way a caste system’s ideology works. “Mans” are thought by the dominant group to have different capacities, needs, and wants than the oafs, those in control.
The book is a quick read with a long-lasting impression. Perfect for studying values, culture, and caste. It would help introductory sociology students think about big questions.
Where sociology and real life intersect.
"Every Boy Should Have a Man: Valuing Humanity"
People kept in kennels. People hunted for food. Babies sold as pets. The sci-fi book Every Boy Should Have a Man by Preston L. Allen indirectly asks what sets people apart from animals. Why is our species alone considered worth extraordinary care while others are destined for the slaughter-house?
The work could be read as a commentary on slavery, or on meat-eating, or on ecology. In either case, it is a book that paints a startling image–people or “mans” as a part of nature, yet apart from it. Allen’s book also illustrates the way a caste system’s ideology works. “Mans” are thought by the dominant group to have different capacities, needs, and wants than the oafs, those in control.
The book is a quick read with a long-lasting impression. Perfect for studying values, culture, and caste. It would help introductory sociology students think about big questions.
Friday, August 30, 2013
Police Crackdown on Law-Breaking Cyclists in Canada
By: Rob Ferguson "Provincial Politics," Published on Fri Aug 30 2013
"Police crackdown on law-breaking cyclists could boost pedal power, says Transportation Minister Glen Murray"
A police crackdown on bike riders who ignore traffic rules could boost safety and make getting around by pedal power more popular, says Ontario’s new cycling strategy obtained by the Star.
To be released Friday by Transportation Minister Glen Murray, the 20-year plan is aimed at creating an environment where more people will take their bikes to work, school and on errands to ease smog, gridlock and boost their health.
It also hopes the province can interconnect more bike lanes and trails locally and between municipalities to better cash in on the boom of cycle tourism sweeping the world.
That means more bike lanes — although there is no mention of financial support from the government, which is facing an $11.7-billion deficit it has promised to eliminate by 2018.
“Ontarians have told us they want transportation options that are convenient and affordable,” Murray says in the 42-page document called #CycleON in hopes the title will become a Twitter hashtag.
“They want transportation that uses less fuel, is safer, causes less pollution and requires less expensive infrastructure.”
Murray’s goal is to make bikes the first transportation choice in peoples’ minds for trips of five kilometres or less. In Toronto, for example, about 1.7 per cent of commuters or an average of 19,780 people cycle to work daily.
Toronto has been waiting for the strategy while it mulls a rule requiring motorists to leave at least one metre of space when passing bikes.
On scofflaw riders, the strategy cites a survey in which only 18 per cent of cyclists say their fellow bike riders follow the rules of the road — such as stopping at stop signs and traffic lights.
“This suggests that higher and more consistent levels of enforcement for cyclists and drivers would increase both the reality and perception of cycling as a safe activity,” states the plan.
It was prompted by a 2012 review of accidental cycling deaths in Ontario by the office of the provincial coroner, which counted 129 such fatalities in the four years ending in 2010.
“If we’re telling kids to go ride a bike instead of sitting in front of a TV or computer screen, we all have a responsibility to ensure our roads are safe,” the strategy quotes Ontario Medical Association president Dr. Scott Wooder as saying.
To get Ontario to be one of the premier cycling jurisdictions by 2033, the strategy also calls for:
*Making sure all new laws and planning policies are bike-friendly, from roads to providing space for cyclists and their needs in residential, commercial and institutional buildings.
*Partnering with municipalities to make sure public transit and cycling are better integrated, so bike riders can more easily take their wheels on trains and buses.
*Working with the federal and municipal governments on funding programs to boost cycling infrastructure. *Better educate cyclists on rules of the road and promote cycling skills, particularly in school classrooms.
*Make roads “complete streets” to accommodate cyclists, cars and pedestrians.
*Develop province-wide advertising campaigns encouraging people to cycle more often.
Read more at "The Star." (thestar.com)
"Police crackdown on law-breaking cyclists could boost pedal power, says Transportation Minister Glen Murray"
A police crackdown on bike riders who ignore traffic rules could boost safety and make getting around by pedal power more popular, says Ontario’s new cycling strategy obtained by the Star.
To be released Friday by Transportation Minister Glen Murray, the 20-year plan is aimed at creating an environment where more people will take their bikes to work, school and on errands to ease smog, gridlock and boost their health.
It also hopes the province can interconnect more bike lanes and trails locally and between municipalities to better cash in on the boom of cycle tourism sweeping the world.
That means more bike lanes — although there is no mention of financial support from the government, which is facing an $11.7-billion deficit it has promised to eliminate by 2018.
“Ontarians have told us they want transportation options that are convenient and affordable,” Murray says in the 42-page document called #CycleON in hopes the title will become a Twitter hashtag.
“They want transportation that uses less fuel, is safer, causes less pollution and requires less expensive infrastructure.”
Murray’s goal is to make bikes the first transportation choice in peoples’ minds for trips of five kilometres or less. In Toronto, for example, about 1.7 per cent of commuters or an average of 19,780 people cycle to work daily.
Toronto has been waiting for the strategy while it mulls a rule requiring motorists to leave at least one metre of space when passing bikes.
On scofflaw riders, the strategy cites a survey in which only 18 per cent of cyclists say their fellow bike riders follow the rules of the road — such as stopping at stop signs and traffic lights.
“This suggests that higher and more consistent levels of enforcement for cyclists and drivers would increase both the reality and perception of cycling as a safe activity,” states the plan.
It was prompted by a 2012 review of accidental cycling deaths in Ontario by the office of the provincial coroner, which counted 129 such fatalities in the four years ending in 2010.
“If we’re telling kids to go ride a bike instead of sitting in front of a TV or computer screen, we all have a responsibility to ensure our roads are safe,” the strategy quotes Ontario Medical Association president Dr. Scott Wooder as saying.
To get Ontario to be one of the premier cycling jurisdictions by 2033, the strategy also calls for:
*Making sure all new laws and planning policies are bike-friendly, from roads to providing space for cyclists and their needs in residential, commercial and institutional buildings.
*Partnering with municipalities to make sure public transit and cycling are better integrated, so bike riders can more easily take their wheels on trains and buses.
*Working with the federal and municipal governments on funding programs to boost cycling infrastructure. *Better educate cyclists on rules of the road and promote cycling skills, particularly in school classrooms.
*Make roads “complete streets” to accommodate cyclists, cars and pedestrians.
*Develop province-wide advertising campaigns encouraging people to cycle more often.
Read more at "The Star." (thestar.com)
Tuesday, August 27, 2013
Roxbury Story
Q: I read in your bio that you grew up in Roxbury. I'm from there too and I'm just wondering if you ever plan to set a story in Roxbury or Massachusetts.
A: Boston was a long time ago . . . I left when I was in the fourth grade, but if I ever do write my life story that period will be one of the main focuses. Lots of good memories. My personality was formed there. My characteristic quirks were all born there. My feelings for the preservation of our planet were born there. Some sections of "Every Boy Should Have a Man" came directly form my adventures there. So yeah, I plan to write that story. The protagonist will be a kid of 6 to 10.
A: Boston was a long time ago . . . I left when I was in the fourth grade, but if I ever do write my life story that period will be one of the main focuses. Lots of good memories. My personality was formed there. My characteristic quirks were all born there. My feelings for the preservation of our planet were born there. Some sections of "Every Boy Should Have a Man" came directly form my adventures there. So yeah, I plan to write that story. The protagonist will be a kid of 6 to 10.
Creative Writing Advice
The following advice will appear on Bridle Path Press's website in September.
Thanks. Preston
______________
Rhyme and Reason in Fiction
In fiction, rhyme can be defined as the form it takes, the sound it makes when it quakes, the taste and shape of the bread it bakes.
Reason, of course, is the tale it tells, the storm it quells when it casts its spell, the sense that it makes.
Let's say you've written a piece that sits on the page dishwater dull. It just doesn't feel right, it doesn't sound right, though it tells the tale you wish it to tell.
Reason is easy, but you already know that; the problem is in the rhyme.
Perhaps you might try writing it as a letter, a diary, a short story, a novel, a song.
Try writing it as a ditty, a screenplay, or even a poem--maybe a very long poem, like Don Juan.
Even if the story is mostly true,
Feel free to lie;
To paraphrase John Dufresne,
Fiction is the truth borne by the lie.
And what words should be used, in the expressing of this most of honest lies?
To find out, experiment with point of view. Change from third person to first. Consider who is telling the story and how.
Is it told in a Northern, a Midwestern, a Southern accent? Or uttered with a shy, embarrassed lisp? Is the teller of the tale wise or foolish? Is the tale told about, or told by, the semiliterate, the genius? Is the teller telling it to you, or do you eavesdrop as she, or he, tells it to someone else?
Remember: What your fiction sounds like is as important as what it means.
You must also consider the time of the story. Does it take place now or back then? Is it told as a memory? Is it told in present or past tense?
Does it start at the rather pedestrian beginning, or at the end retracing its steps? Or even in medias res?
And the pacing, you can feel the time in this too. Is it slow like a leisurely walk or breathless like running?
Finally, for best effect, these rhyme choices must be consistent with each other.
Always remember:
The way the story is told
Must be on one accord
With what is being told
And who is telling it.
Thanks. Preston
______________
Rhyme and Reason in Fiction
In fiction, rhyme can be defined as the form it takes, the sound it makes when it quakes, the taste and shape of the bread it bakes.
Reason, of course, is the tale it tells, the storm it quells when it casts its spell, the sense that it makes.
Let's say you've written a piece that sits on the page dishwater dull. It just doesn't feel right, it doesn't sound right, though it tells the tale you wish it to tell.
Reason is easy, but you already know that; the problem is in the rhyme.
Perhaps you might try writing it as a letter, a diary, a short story, a novel, a song.
Try writing it as a ditty, a screenplay, or even a poem--maybe a very long poem, like Don Juan.
Even if the story is mostly true,
Feel free to lie;
To paraphrase John Dufresne,
Fiction is the truth borne by the lie.
And what words should be used, in the expressing of this most of honest lies?
To find out, experiment with point of view. Change from third person to first. Consider who is telling the story and how.
Is it told in a Northern, a Midwestern, a Southern accent? Or uttered with a shy, embarrassed lisp? Is the teller of the tale wise or foolish? Is the tale told about, or told by, the semiliterate, the genius? Is the teller telling it to you, or do you eavesdrop as she, or he, tells it to someone else?
Remember: What your fiction sounds like is as important as what it means.
You must also consider the time of the story. Does it take place now or back then? Is it told as a memory? Is it told in present or past tense?
Does it start at the rather pedestrian beginning, or at the end retracing its steps? Or even in medias res?
And the pacing, you can feel the time in this too. Is it slow like a leisurely walk or breathless like running?
Finally, for best effect, these rhyme choices must be consistent with each other.
Always remember:
The way the story is told
Must be on one accord
With what is being told
And who is telling it.
More Good Deeds!
Make the world a better place by doing good deeds.
________________
*Bring your old magazines to a hospital waiting room to make patients' waits a little less nerve racking.
*Write a letter or e-mail to a good friend or family member to let them know how much you value them. Can you imagine opening a letter of that sort? Go on, start the trend.
*Volunteer yourself to walk an elderly neighbour's dog once a week. Getting out for a walk isn't overly easy for many elderly folk, so they'd most likely appreciate this gesture.
*Instead of dropping your head and pretending you don't notice (like the rest of the rush-hour crowd) someone struggling to get a stroller down the stairs, take a second and offer to help.
*Offer an elderly person, a pregnant woman, a physically disabled person - or just someone who looks tired - your seat on the bus.
Go to CanadianLiving.com to find more easy good deeds.
________________
*Bring your old magazines to a hospital waiting room to make patients' waits a little less nerve racking.
*Write a letter or e-mail to a good friend or family member to let them know how much you value them. Can you imagine opening a letter of that sort? Go on, start the trend.
*Volunteer yourself to walk an elderly neighbour's dog once a week. Getting out for a walk isn't overly easy for many elderly folk, so they'd most likely appreciate this gesture.
*Instead of dropping your head and pretending you don't notice (like the rest of the rush-hour crowd) someone struggling to get a stroller down the stairs, take a second and offer to help.
*Offer an elderly person, a pregnant woman, a physically disabled person - or just someone who looks tired - your seat on the bus.
Go to CanadianLiving.com to find more easy good deeds.
Friday, August 9, 2013
Good Deeds Are as Eay as . . .
Here Are two good deeds that are quite easy to do. I found them on CanadianLiving.com.
*Put together a basket of treats for a friend who had a death in the family. Deliver it after the funeral has taken place, when most friends have gone back to their day-to-day lives.
*f you're in line at the grocery store with a full cart, let the person behind you who only has 5-10 items go in front of you.
Here is a bonus one that I caught my son doing one day.
*Take your neighbors trash to the curb while you're taking yours. Imagine their surprise when they see that the chore is already done.
*Put together a basket of treats for a friend who had a death in the family. Deliver it after the funeral has taken place, when most friends have gone back to their day-to-day lives.
*f you're in line at the grocery store with a full cart, let the person behind you who only has 5-10 items go in front of you.
Here is a bonus one that I caught my son doing one day.
*Take your neighbors trash to the curb while you're taking yours. Imagine their surprise when they see that the chore is already done.
Quote of the Day 9 August 2013
You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.
--Mahatma Gandhi
--Mahatma Gandhi
Thursday, August 1, 2013
Fred Flinstone Is Asking Mr. Slate: If the Brontosaurus Doesn't exist, Do I get a day off?
I found this on the NPR website. Yeah. If you recall, Fred uses a Brontosaurus as a crane in Mr. Slate's quarry. So yeah. He gets a day off.
________________
It may have something to do with all those Brontosaurus burgers everyone's favorite modern stone-age family ate, but when you think of a giant dinosaur with a tiny head and long, swooping tail, the Brontosaurus is probably what you're seeing in your mind.
Well hold on: Scientifically speaking, there's no such thing as a Brontosaurus.
Even if you knew that, you may not know how the fictional dinosaur came to star in the prehistoric landscape of popular imagination for so long.
It dates back 130 years, to a period of early U.S. paleontology known as the Bone Wars, says Matt Lamanna, curator at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh.
The Bone Wars was the name given to a bitter competition between two paleontologists, Yale's O.C. Marsh and Edward Drinker Cope of Philadelphia. Lamanna says their mutual dislike, paired with their scientific ambition, led them to race dinosaur names into publication, each trying to outdo the other.
"There are stories of either Cope or Marsh telling their fossil collectors to smash skeletons that were still in the ground, just so the other guy couldn't get them," Lamanna tells Guy Raz, host of weekends on All Things Considered. "It was definitely a bitter, bitter rivalry."
The two burned through money, and were as much fame-hungry trailblazers as scientists.
It was in the heat of this competition, in 1877, that Marsh discovered the partial skeleton of a long-necked, long-tailed, leaf-eating dinosaur he dubbed Apatosaurus. It was missing a skull, so in 1883 when Marsh published a reconstruction of his Apatosaurus, Lamanna says he used the head of another dinosaur — thought to be a Camarasaurus — to complete the skeleton.
"Two years later," Lamanna says, "his fossil collectors that were working out West sent him a second skeleton that he thought belonged to a different dinosaur that he named Brontosaurus."
But it wasn't a different dinosaur. It was simply a more complete Apatosaurus — one that Marsh, in his rush to one-up Cope, carelessly and quickly mistook for something new.
Although the mistake was spotted by scientists by 1903, the Brontosaurus lived on, in movies, books and children's imaginations. The Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh even topped its Apatosaurus skeleton with the wrong head in 1932. The apathy of the scientific community and a dearth of well-preserved Apatosaurus skulls kept it there for nearly 50 years.
That Brontosaurus finally met its end in the 1970s when two Carnegie researchers took a second look at the controversy. They determined a skull found in a quarry in Utah in 1910 was the true Apatosaurus skull. In 1979 the correct head was placed atop the museum's skeleton.
The Brontosaurus was gone at last, but Lamanna suggests the name stuck in part because it was given at a time when the Bone Wars fueled intense public interest in the discovery of new dinosaurs. And, he says, it's just a better name.
"Brontosaurus means 'thunder lizard,'" he says. "It's a big, evocative name, whereas Apatosaurus means 'deceptive lizard.' It's quite a bit more boring."
________________
It may have something to do with all those Brontosaurus burgers everyone's favorite modern stone-age family ate, but when you think of a giant dinosaur with a tiny head and long, swooping tail, the Brontosaurus is probably what you're seeing in your mind.
Well hold on: Scientifically speaking, there's no such thing as a Brontosaurus.
Even if you knew that, you may not know how the fictional dinosaur came to star in the prehistoric landscape of popular imagination for so long.
It dates back 130 years, to a period of early U.S. paleontology known as the Bone Wars, says Matt Lamanna, curator at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh.
The Bone Wars was the name given to a bitter competition between two paleontologists, Yale's O.C. Marsh and Edward Drinker Cope of Philadelphia. Lamanna says their mutual dislike, paired with their scientific ambition, led them to race dinosaur names into publication, each trying to outdo the other.
"There are stories of either Cope or Marsh telling their fossil collectors to smash skeletons that were still in the ground, just so the other guy couldn't get them," Lamanna tells Guy Raz, host of weekends on All Things Considered. "It was definitely a bitter, bitter rivalry."
The two burned through money, and were as much fame-hungry trailblazers as scientists.
It was in the heat of this competition, in 1877, that Marsh discovered the partial skeleton of a long-necked, long-tailed, leaf-eating dinosaur he dubbed Apatosaurus. It was missing a skull, so in 1883 when Marsh published a reconstruction of his Apatosaurus, Lamanna says he used the head of another dinosaur — thought to be a Camarasaurus — to complete the skeleton.
"Two years later," Lamanna says, "his fossil collectors that were working out West sent him a second skeleton that he thought belonged to a different dinosaur that he named Brontosaurus."
But it wasn't a different dinosaur. It was simply a more complete Apatosaurus — one that Marsh, in his rush to one-up Cope, carelessly and quickly mistook for something new.
Although the mistake was spotted by scientists by 1903, the Brontosaurus lived on, in movies, books and children's imaginations. The Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh even topped its Apatosaurus skeleton with the wrong head in 1932. The apathy of the scientific community and a dearth of well-preserved Apatosaurus skulls kept it there for nearly 50 years.
That Brontosaurus finally met its end in the 1970s when two Carnegie researchers took a second look at the controversy. They determined a skull found in a quarry in Utah in 1910 was the true Apatosaurus skull. In 1979 the correct head was placed atop the museum's skeleton.
The Brontosaurus was gone at last, but Lamanna suggests the name stuck in part because it was given at a time when the Bone Wars fueled intense public interest in the discovery of new dinosaurs. And, he says, it's just a better name.
"Brontosaurus means 'thunder lizard,'" he says. "It's a big, evocative name, whereas Apatosaurus means 'deceptive lizard.' It's quite a bit more boring."
10 Amazing Things You Didn't Know about Animals
Genesis 7:14
"They, and every beast after his kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind, and every fowl after his kind, every bird of every sort."
Livescience.com
10 Parrot Talk More than Just Squawking
Credit: © Sandra Mikolasch
Parrot speech is commonly regarded as the brainless squawking of a feathered voice recorder. But studies over the past 30 years continually show that parrots engage in much more than mere mimicry. Our avian friends can solve certain linguistic processing tasks as deftly as 4-6 year-old children. Parrots appear to grasp concepts like "same" and "different", "bigger" and "smaller", "none" and numbers. Perhaps most interestingly, they can combine labels and phrases in novel ways. A January 2007 study in Language Sciences suggests using patterns of parrot speech learning to develop artificial speech skills in robots.
9 Elephants Do Forget, but They're Not Dumb
Credit: Houston Zoo
Elephants have the largest brain — nearly 11 pounds on average — of any mammal that ever walked the earth. Do they use that gray matter to the fullest? Intelligence is hard to quantify in humans or animals, but the encephalization quotient (EQ), a ratio of an animal's observed brain size to the expected brain size given the animal's mass, correlates well with an ability to navigate novel challenges and obstacles. The average elephant EQ is 1.88. (Humans range from 7.33 to 7.69, chimpanzees average 2.45, pigs 0.27.) Intelligence and memory are thought to go hand in hand, suggesting that elephant memories, while not infallible, are quite good.
8 Giraffes Compensate for Height with Unique Blood Flow
Credit: Wikimedia Commons user William Scot
The stately giraffe, whose head sits some 16 feet up atop an unlikely pedestal, adapted his long neck to compete for foliage with other grazers. While the advantage of reach is obvious, some difficulties arise at such a height. The heart must pump twice as hard as a cow's to get blood up to the brain, and a complex blood vessel system is needed to ensure that blood doesn't rush to the head when bent over. Six feet below the heart, the skin of the legs must then be extremely tight to prevent blood from pooling at the hooves.
7 Many Fish Swap Sex Organs
Credit: Massachusetts Department of Fish & Game.
With so many land creatures to wonder at, it's easy to forget that some of the weirdest activities take place deep in the ocean. The strange practice of hermaphroditism is more common among species of fish than within any other group of vertebrates. Some fish change sex in response to hormonal cycle or environmental changes. Others simultaneously possess both male and female sex organs.
6 Baby Chicks and Brotherhood
Credit: dreamstime.
It's a mistake to think of evolution as producing selfish animals concerned only with their own survival. Altruism abounds in cases where a helping hand will encourage the survival of genetic material similar to one's own. Baby chicks practice this "kin selection" by making a special chirp while feeding. This call announces the food find to nearby chicks, who are probably close relations and so share many of the chick's genes. The key to natural selection isn't survival of the fittest animal. It's survival of the fittest genetic material, and so brotherly behavior that favors close relations will thrive.
5 Mole-Rats aren't Blind
Credit: UIC.
With their puny eyes and underground lifestyle, African mole-rats have long been considered the Mr. Magoos of rodents, detecting little light and, it has been suggested, using their eyes more for sensing changes in air currents than for actual vision. But findings of the past few years have shown that African mole-rats have a keen, if limited, sense of sight. And they don't like what they see, according to a report in the November 2006 Animal Behaviour. Light may suggest that a predator has broken into a tunnel, which could explain why subterranean diggers developed sight in the first place.
4 For Beavers, Days Get Longer in Winter
Credit: Tom Smylie, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Beavers become near shut-ins during winter, living off of previously stored food or the deposits of fat in their distinctive tails. They conserve energy by avoiding the cold outdoors, opting instead to remain in dark lodgings inside their pile of wood and mud. As a result these rodents, which normally emerge at sunset and turn in at sunrise, have no light cues to entrain their sleep cycle. The beaver's biological sense of time shifts, and she develops a "free running circadian rhythm" of 29-hour days.
3 Birds Use Landmarks to Navigate Long Journeys
Credit: Robin Freeman
Can you imagine a road trip vacation without missed exits, stubborn drivers, loss of GPS signal or map-folding disasters? Of course not, you're not a bird. Pigeons can fly thousands of miles to find the same roosting spot with no navigational difficulties. Some species of birds, like the Arctic tern, make a 25,000 mile round-trip journey every year. Many species use built-in ferromagnets to detect their orientation with respect to the Earth's magnetic field. A November 2006 study published in Animal Behaviour suggests that pigeons also use familiar landmarks on the ground below to help find their way home.
2 Whale Milk Not On Low-Fat Diets
Credit: Shane Gero
Nursing a newborn is no "small" feat for the whale, whose calf emerges, after 10 to 12 months in the womb, about a third the mother's length (that's a 30-foot baby for the Blue whale). The mother squirts milk into the newborn's mouth using muscles around the mammary gland while the baby holds tight to a nipple (yes, whales have them). At nearly 50 percent fat, whale milk has around 10 times the fat content of human milk, which helps calves achieve some serious growth spurts — as much as 200 pounds per day.
1 Crocodiles Swallow Stones for Swimming
Credit: Steve Zack | Wildlife Conservation Society
The stomach of a crocodile is a rocky place to be, for more than one reason. To begin with, a croc's digestive system encounters everything from turtles, fish and birds to giraffes, buffalo, lions and even (when defending territory) other crocodiles. In addition to that bellyful-o'-ecosystem, rocks show up too. The reptiles swallow large stones that stay permanently in their bellies. It's been suggested these are used for ballast in diving.
"They, and every beast after his kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind, and every fowl after his kind, every bird of every sort."
Livescience.com
10 Parrot Talk More than Just Squawking
Credit: © Sandra Mikolasch
Parrot speech is commonly regarded as the brainless squawking of a feathered voice recorder. But studies over the past 30 years continually show that parrots engage in much more than mere mimicry. Our avian friends can solve certain linguistic processing tasks as deftly as 4-6 year-old children. Parrots appear to grasp concepts like "same" and "different", "bigger" and "smaller", "none" and numbers. Perhaps most interestingly, they can combine labels and phrases in novel ways. A January 2007 study in Language Sciences suggests using patterns of parrot speech learning to develop artificial speech skills in robots.
9 Elephants Do Forget, but They're Not Dumb
Credit: Houston Zoo
Elephants have the largest brain — nearly 11 pounds on average — of any mammal that ever walked the earth. Do they use that gray matter to the fullest? Intelligence is hard to quantify in humans or animals, but the encephalization quotient (EQ), a ratio of an animal's observed brain size to the expected brain size given the animal's mass, correlates well with an ability to navigate novel challenges and obstacles. The average elephant EQ is 1.88. (Humans range from 7.33 to 7.69, chimpanzees average 2.45, pigs 0.27.) Intelligence and memory are thought to go hand in hand, suggesting that elephant memories, while not infallible, are quite good.
8 Giraffes Compensate for Height with Unique Blood Flow
Credit: Wikimedia Commons user William Scot
The stately giraffe, whose head sits some 16 feet up atop an unlikely pedestal, adapted his long neck to compete for foliage with other grazers. While the advantage of reach is obvious, some difficulties arise at such a height. The heart must pump twice as hard as a cow's to get blood up to the brain, and a complex blood vessel system is needed to ensure that blood doesn't rush to the head when bent over. Six feet below the heart, the skin of the legs must then be extremely tight to prevent blood from pooling at the hooves.
7 Many Fish Swap Sex Organs
Credit: Massachusetts Department of Fish & Game.
With so many land creatures to wonder at, it's easy to forget that some of the weirdest activities take place deep in the ocean. The strange practice of hermaphroditism is more common among species of fish than within any other group of vertebrates. Some fish change sex in response to hormonal cycle or environmental changes. Others simultaneously possess both male and female sex organs.
6 Baby Chicks and Brotherhood
Credit: dreamstime.
It's a mistake to think of evolution as producing selfish animals concerned only with their own survival. Altruism abounds in cases where a helping hand will encourage the survival of genetic material similar to one's own. Baby chicks practice this "kin selection" by making a special chirp while feeding. This call announces the food find to nearby chicks, who are probably close relations and so share many of the chick's genes. The key to natural selection isn't survival of the fittest animal. It's survival of the fittest genetic material, and so brotherly behavior that favors close relations will thrive.
5 Mole-Rats aren't Blind
Credit: UIC.
With their puny eyes and underground lifestyle, African mole-rats have long been considered the Mr. Magoos of rodents, detecting little light and, it has been suggested, using their eyes more for sensing changes in air currents than for actual vision. But findings of the past few years have shown that African mole-rats have a keen, if limited, sense of sight. And they don't like what they see, according to a report in the November 2006 Animal Behaviour. Light may suggest that a predator has broken into a tunnel, which could explain why subterranean diggers developed sight in the first place.
4 For Beavers, Days Get Longer in Winter
Credit: Tom Smylie, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Beavers become near shut-ins during winter, living off of previously stored food or the deposits of fat in their distinctive tails. They conserve energy by avoiding the cold outdoors, opting instead to remain in dark lodgings inside their pile of wood and mud. As a result these rodents, which normally emerge at sunset and turn in at sunrise, have no light cues to entrain their sleep cycle. The beaver's biological sense of time shifts, and she develops a "free running circadian rhythm" of 29-hour days.
3 Birds Use Landmarks to Navigate Long Journeys
Credit: Robin Freeman
Can you imagine a road trip vacation without missed exits, stubborn drivers, loss of GPS signal or map-folding disasters? Of course not, you're not a bird. Pigeons can fly thousands of miles to find the same roosting spot with no navigational difficulties. Some species of birds, like the Arctic tern, make a 25,000 mile round-trip journey every year. Many species use built-in ferromagnets to detect their orientation with respect to the Earth's magnetic field. A November 2006 study published in Animal Behaviour suggests that pigeons also use familiar landmarks on the ground below to help find their way home.
2 Whale Milk Not On Low-Fat Diets
Credit: Shane Gero
Nursing a newborn is no "small" feat for the whale, whose calf emerges, after 10 to 12 months in the womb, about a third the mother's length (that's a 30-foot baby for the Blue whale). The mother squirts milk into the newborn's mouth using muscles around the mammary gland while the baby holds tight to a nipple (yes, whales have them). At nearly 50 percent fat, whale milk has around 10 times the fat content of human milk, which helps calves achieve some serious growth spurts — as much as 200 pounds per day.
1 Crocodiles Swallow Stones for Swimming
Credit: Steve Zack | Wildlife Conservation Society
The stomach of a crocodile is a rocky place to be, for more than one reason. To begin with, a croc's digestive system encounters everything from turtles, fish and birds to giraffes, buffalo, lions and even (when defending territory) other crocodiles. In addition to that bellyful-o'-ecosystem, rocks show up too. The reptiles swallow large stones that stay permanently in their bellies. It's been suggested these are used for ballast in diving.
Holy (Giant) Cow!
Nature is great.
____________
By Lynnette CurtisSPECIAL TO LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNALAMARGOSA VALLEY
Holy cow, that's one big bovine.
We're talking the Mack truck of livestock, with hooves like hubcaps and haunches the size of your car trunk.
He weighs nearly 3,000 pounds and goes by Herman.
The beefy black-and-white Holstein spends his days munching on hay and soaking up sun outside the Longstreet Inn and Casino in lonely Amargosa Valley, at the southwestern edge of Nye County near the California line.
When Herman first got here, eight years ago, he was about 4 feet tall. At last measure, he stood 6 feet, 4 inches from hoof to withers. His owner, Jim Marsh, believes Herman may be the tallest steer in the world.
"He just kept growing and growing," said Marsh, an animal lover and longtime Las Vegas car dealership proprietor known for appearing in commercials with his daughter, Stacy, and his grandson.
Marsh, 78, also is known in small towns and cow counties for being a community booster and historic preservationist. He owns a bunch of rural Nevada properties, including the 60-room Longstreet.
Herman was born at a nearby dairy, where he was briefly kept as a pet by one of the workers. He ended up in Beatty, where a friend of Marsh's was fattening up the animal for slaughter.
"You hate to see a pet steer end up on your dinner table," Marsh said.
So he paid $600 to rescue Herman from the barbecue. Then Marsh had the steer hauled to the Longstreet, built in 1995 on state Route 373 about 95 miles northwest of Las Vegas. There Herman grew. And grew. Soon he was towering over Marsh, who is 6 feet tall.
"I was amazed at how big he got," Marsh said.
Herman shares a corral with Bambi and Jill - both burros - and one nameless goat.
Tourists on their way to and from Death Valley sometimes stop to gawk at Herman. He's good for business.
"It's generally word-of-mouth," Marsh said. "It's good people come to see him."
It's also good Herman's disposition is as sweet as he is large.
"He's very laid-back," Marsh said. "He doesn't have a mean bone in his body."
But Herman doesn't shy away from adventure. He got out of his corral a couple of years ago and "was wandering all over Amargosa," said Monica Chavez, the Longstreet's manager.
Herman likes to eat apples and Saltines. He also shares a bale of hay with his corral mates and downs four bucket-sized scoops of grain each day.
Marsh thought about calling Guinness World Records about Herman, but hasn't gotten around to it.
A Guinness spokeswoman said there is no record holder in the category of "World's Tallest Steer." The famous record-keepers are willing to entertain a proposal if Marsh registers it.
Guinness does have a very tall ox on record. Bellino, a Chianina ox, lives in Italy and measures 6 feet, 7 inches to his withers.
Both steers and oxen are castrated male bovines.
While oxen are known more as work animals, steers are associated with "rodeo and hamburger," said Clark County Commissioner Tom Collins, a well-known local cowboy.
"Think the difference between a draft horse and a quarter horse," he said.
Collins was impressed when he heard about Herman. The commissioner also is 6 feet, 4 inches tall.
Herman "might be setting a record," Collins said.
The steer's mammoth size has brought its share of problems. He has arthritis, and his knees swell from carrying all that weight. He gets regular checkups and medication from a veterinarian who visits from Pahrump.
The steer is loaded into a horse trailer and taken to the dairy to get weighed and have his hooves trimmed.
Herman is not the only bovine at the Longstreet. Marsh also bought the 14-foot-tall fiberglass cow that used to stand on the roof of the Holy Cow! casino and brewery at Las Vegas Boulevard and Sahara Avenue. He had it shipped to Amargosa Valley and placed outside the hotel.
A few years ago, a man who belonged to a notorious motorcycle club got drunk, stripped off his clothes, climbed a ladder and rode the cow, Chavez said.
Thankfully, nobody's tried that with Herman.
____________
By Lynnette CurtisSPECIAL TO LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNALAMARGOSA VALLEY
Holy cow, that's one big bovine.
We're talking the Mack truck of livestock, with hooves like hubcaps and haunches the size of your car trunk.
He weighs nearly 3,000 pounds and goes by Herman.
The beefy black-and-white Holstein spends his days munching on hay and soaking up sun outside the Longstreet Inn and Casino in lonely Amargosa Valley, at the southwestern edge of Nye County near the California line.
When Herman first got here, eight years ago, he was about 4 feet tall. At last measure, he stood 6 feet, 4 inches from hoof to withers. His owner, Jim Marsh, believes Herman may be the tallest steer in the world.
"He just kept growing and growing," said Marsh, an animal lover and longtime Las Vegas car dealership proprietor known for appearing in commercials with his daughter, Stacy, and his grandson.
Marsh, 78, also is known in small towns and cow counties for being a community booster and historic preservationist. He owns a bunch of rural Nevada properties, including the 60-room Longstreet.
Herman was born at a nearby dairy, where he was briefly kept as a pet by one of the workers. He ended up in Beatty, where a friend of Marsh's was fattening up the animal for slaughter.
"You hate to see a pet steer end up on your dinner table," Marsh said.
So he paid $600 to rescue Herman from the barbecue. Then Marsh had the steer hauled to the Longstreet, built in 1995 on state Route 373 about 95 miles northwest of Las Vegas. There Herman grew. And grew. Soon he was towering over Marsh, who is 6 feet tall.
"I was amazed at how big he got," Marsh said.
Herman shares a corral with Bambi and Jill - both burros - and one nameless goat.
Tourists on their way to and from Death Valley sometimes stop to gawk at Herman. He's good for business.
"It's generally word-of-mouth," Marsh said. "It's good people come to see him."
It's also good Herman's disposition is as sweet as he is large.
"He's very laid-back," Marsh said. "He doesn't have a mean bone in his body."
But Herman doesn't shy away from adventure. He got out of his corral a couple of years ago and "was wandering all over Amargosa," said Monica Chavez, the Longstreet's manager.
Herman likes to eat apples and Saltines. He also shares a bale of hay with his corral mates and downs four bucket-sized scoops of grain each day.
Marsh thought about calling Guinness World Records about Herman, but hasn't gotten around to it.
A Guinness spokeswoman said there is no record holder in the category of "World's Tallest Steer." The famous record-keepers are willing to entertain a proposal if Marsh registers it.
Guinness does have a very tall ox on record. Bellino, a Chianina ox, lives in Italy and measures 6 feet, 7 inches to his withers.
Both steers and oxen are castrated male bovines.
While oxen are known more as work animals, steers are associated with "rodeo and hamburger," said Clark County Commissioner Tom Collins, a well-known local cowboy.
"Think the difference between a draft horse and a quarter horse," he said.
Collins was impressed when he heard about Herman. The commissioner also is 6 feet, 4 inches tall.
Herman "might be setting a record," Collins said.
The steer's mammoth size has brought its share of problems. He has arthritis, and his knees swell from carrying all that weight. He gets regular checkups and medication from a veterinarian who visits from Pahrump.
The steer is loaded into a horse trailer and taken to the dairy to get weighed and have his hooves trimmed.
Herman is not the only bovine at the Longstreet. Marsh also bought the 14-foot-tall fiberglass cow that used to stand on the roof of the Holy Cow! casino and brewery at Las Vegas Boulevard and Sahara Avenue. He had it shipped to Amargosa Valley and placed outside the hotel.
A few years ago, a man who belonged to a notorious motorcycle club got drunk, stripped off his clothes, climbed a ladder and rode the cow, Chavez said.
Thankfully, nobody's tried that with Herman.
Monday, July 22, 2013
All Bad things Must Come to an End: Breaking Bad Finale
It has been said that death is the end of all things. From the dust of the earth came our flesh, and back to the earth it will return. Great Nature gives, but only for a while. The circle of like goes on, but not we.
And so it shall be for Walter White at the end of the series, or so we suspect. What else could be meant by that look on Hank's face that brought the first half of season 5 to a close?
So tarry, my friend, for awhile and tell us how the series will end.
And so it shall be for Walter White at the end of the series, or so we suspect. What else could be meant by that look on Hank's face that brought the first half of season 5 to a close?
So tarry, my friend, for awhile and tell us how the series will end.
Game of Thrones Dragon Head
Get ready. Here it comes. Dragon. Come to think of it, I have a story called "I Am Dragon" in John Dufresne's collection "Blue Christmas."
______________
A 40-foot “dragon skull” was placed on Charmouth beach in the UK by video streaming service blinkbox to celebrate the arrival of the third season of Game of Thrones. The beach was chosen because dinosaur fossils have been found there in the past.
The sculpture, which is the size of a London bus, surprised fossil hunters, holiday makers and local dog walkers on the Dorset beach. A team of three sculptors spent over two months designing, constructing and painting the skull, which measures 40ft long by 8ft wide and stands over 9ft tall. Ben Ayers from blinkbox said:
______________________
Game of Thrones is easily the most talked about TV show of the moment. We wanted to mark its arrival on blinkbox with a spectacle every bit as dramatic as this amazing series. We’re expecting this season to be hugely popular as the previous two series top the TV charts on blinkbox every week and we have season 3 months before it will available on DVD or Blu-ray.
Read more at PSFK.com
______________
A 40-foot “dragon skull” was placed on Charmouth beach in the UK by video streaming service blinkbox to celebrate the arrival of the third season of Game of Thrones. The beach was chosen because dinosaur fossils have been found there in the past.
The sculpture, which is the size of a London bus, surprised fossil hunters, holiday makers and local dog walkers on the Dorset beach. A team of three sculptors spent over two months designing, constructing and painting the skull, which measures 40ft long by 8ft wide and stands over 9ft tall. Ben Ayers from blinkbox said:
______________________
Game of Thrones is easily the most talked about TV show of the moment. We wanted to mark its arrival on blinkbox with a spectacle every bit as dramatic as this amazing series. We’re expecting this season to be hugely popular as the previous two series top the TV charts on blinkbox every week and we have season 3 months before it will available on DVD or Blu-ray.
Read more at PSFK.com
Wednesday, July 17, 2013
Only God Forgives
That title. What does it mean? Hmmmmm. Sounds Interesting.
_____________
“Ryan Gosling and 'Drive' director reunite for 'Only God Forgives”
By RENE RODRIGUEZ
The Miami Herald
MIAMI - At first glance, "Only God Forgives," director Nicolas Winding Refn's follow-up to his highly acclaimed 2011 crime drama "Drive," appears to be more of the same: Ryan Gosling once again stars as a man of few words who gets dragged into the criminal underworld, with Bangkok replacing Los Angeles this time.
Ten minutes in, though, you realize that the new movie is an entirely different beast - a more primal, brutal, near-plotless experience.
"There's a record I really love called 'Metal Machine Music' by Lou Reed," Refn says. "It's an album he made after 'Transformer,' which was a wonderful, lyrical record. But with 'Metal Machine Music,' what you hear is what you get - just guitar feedback mixed at different speeds. I thought it would be interesting to make a film that worked in a similar way, a movie almost designed like a pin-up magazine that was purely about what arouses me and what frightens me."
Like Reed's record, the result is much less accessible than Refn's previous films. "Only God Forgives," which co-stars Kristin Scott Thomas as Gosling's monstrous mother and Vithaya Pansringarm as a cop who metes out justice like an avenging angel, was booed by some critics when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, the same place where Refn won the Best Director prize for "Drive" two years earlier. Among the most common complaints was the film was laughably pretentious, hollow and needlessly violent.
"A lot of people have seen the film and immediately dismissed it," says Thomas, whose flamboyantly evil character was designed as a cross between Lady Macbeth and Donatella Versace. "But then they wake up the next morning, and the movie is still in their heads. People watch movies on different levels, but the surface level of this one is not the most interesting. It's a film that needs a great deal of personal interpretation. It has this way of getting into your head, because it's so beautiful but also so frightening. If you can give into it and stop worrying about plot and stuff like that, you will have an amazing experience."
Thomas, who is usually cast in tony, upscale dramas ("The English Patient," "Gosford Park"), admits she initially thought her agent had made a mistake when he sent her the script and she read it. But she took the role after watching some of Refn's previous films, including "Bronson" and "Valhalla Rising." Her volcanic performance as a manipulative, demanding shrew with a voracious sense of entitlement and no redeeming qualities is unlike any she's given before.
"It was hard to play, because she is so outrageous and unpleasant and horrible," Thomas says of her character. "There is a scene in which Ryan meets me at a restaurant for dinner and brings a prostitute as his date. Nicolas said we needed something really horrible for me to say to her. He asked us 'What's the worst thing you've ever heard someone say to describe a woman?' Ryan suggested that word (a profane sexual slur). But I couldn't say it. I just couldn't. I kept flubbing the line, and we had to do multiple takes. You start feeling down when you have to be mean to people all the time. I wanted to have something nice to say!"
Unlike Thomas, Gosling didn't have much dialogue to wrangle: His character in "Only God Forgives" speaks even less than his taciturn driver in "Drive."
"Silent acting is the oldest form of acting in the world," Refn says. "But it's also the hardest to play, because we're used to using words to make the audience understand what's happening. Silence makes it much more about interpretation. Because there was so much attention paid to Gosling's stillness in 'Drive,' there's this perception that his performance in this movie is just the same thing.
"But 'Drive' was designed entirely around that character's silence. This one is very different. Ryan and I talked about the idea of a man who is chained to his mother and controlled by her. It's almost as if she's put a spell on him and has taken away his willpower. He's like the sleepwalker in 'The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.' It's an extreme and heightened reality.
"People tend to forget that Hamlet is a man who has no will of his own. He's constantly pushed around by other people who are taking advantage of him. But audiences are used to seeing male protagonists in movies be all about action and decisiveness. That's what defines the gender. Just because you reverse that doesn't mean you remove the urgency of the story. It just becomes quiet. And that can be very provocative, especially nowadays, because filmmaking has become so traditional and conventional. This movie requires you to engage with it in a different way than most other movies and interpret things for yourself. That's when art becomes interesting."
Although there isn't anything quite as graphic as the elevator scene in "Drive," "Only God Forgives" has moments of hair-raising violence, although a lot of the brutality happens outside the frame this time, making you think you've seen more than you did.
Still, there are sequences in which the camera doesn't look away, including a surreal torture scene inside an elegant karaoke bar that is as hard to watch as the ear slicing in "Reservoir Dogs."
"There's a great satisfaction in watching cinematic violence," Refn says. "It's designed in a way that feels like this great release. It arouses us. We fear it, but we also accept it as a savior. It can be very pleasurable or very horrifying. The violence in this film has a sexual aesthetic to it. The character of the policeman is like God walking the Earth, the Old Testament version of God. Even though we're taught not to enjoy the oldest form of justice, which is an eye for an eye, we're still rooted in it and take pleasure from it."
_____________
“Ryan Gosling and 'Drive' director reunite for 'Only God Forgives”
By RENE RODRIGUEZ
The Miami Herald
MIAMI - At first glance, "Only God Forgives," director Nicolas Winding Refn's follow-up to his highly acclaimed 2011 crime drama "Drive," appears to be more of the same: Ryan Gosling once again stars as a man of few words who gets dragged into the criminal underworld, with Bangkok replacing Los Angeles this time.
Ten minutes in, though, you realize that the new movie is an entirely different beast - a more primal, brutal, near-plotless experience.
"There's a record I really love called 'Metal Machine Music' by Lou Reed," Refn says. "It's an album he made after 'Transformer,' which was a wonderful, lyrical record. But with 'Metal Machine Music,' what you hear is what you get - just guitar feedback mixed at different speeds. I thought it would be interesting to make a film that worked in a similar way, a movie almost designed like a pin-up magazine that was purely about what arouses me and what frightens me."
Like Reed's record, the result is much less accessible than Refn's previous films. "Only God Forgives," which co-stars Kristin Scott Thomas as Gosling's monstrous mother and Vithaya Pansringarm as a cop who metes out justice like an avenging angel, was booed by some critics when it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, the same place where Refn won the Best Director prize for "Drive" two years earlier. Among the most common complaints was the film was laughably pretentious, hollow and needlessly violent.
"A lot of people have seen the film and immediately dismissed it," says Thomas, whose flamboyantly evil character was designed as a cross between Lady Macbeth and Donatella Versace. "But then they wake up the next morning, and the movie is still in their heads. People watch movies on different levels, but the surface level of this one is not the most interesting. It's a film that needs a great deal of personal interpretation. It has this way of getting into your head, because it's so beautiful but also so frightening. If you can give into it and stop worrying about plot and stuff like that, you will have an amazing experience."
Thomas, who is usually cast in tony, upscale dramas ("The English Patient," "Gosford Park"), admits she initially thought her agent had made a mistake when he sent her the script and she read it. But she took the role after watching some of Refn's previous films, including "Bronson" and "Valhalla Rising." Her volcanic performance as a manipulative, demanding shrew with a voracious sense of entitlement and no redeeming qualities is unlike any she's given before.
"It was hard to play, because she is so outrageous and unpleasant and horrible," Thomas says of her character. "There is a scene in which Ryan meets me at a restaurant for dinner and brings a prostitute as his date. Nicolas said we needed something really horrible for me to say to her. He asked us 'What's the worst thing you've ever heard someone say to describe a woman?' Ryan suggested that word (a profane sexual slur). But I couldn't say it. I just couldn't. I kept flubbing the line, and we had to do multiple takes. You start feeling down when you have to be mean to people all the time. I wanted to have something nice to say!"
Unlike Thomas, Gosling didn't have much dialogue to wrangle: His character in "Only God Forgives" speaks even less than his taciturn driver in "Drive."
"Silent acting is the oldest form of acting in the world," Refn says. "But it's also the hardest to play, because we're used to using words to make the audience understand what's happening. Silence makes it much more about interpretation. Because there was so much attention paid to Gosling's stillness in 'Drive,' there's this perception that his performance in this movie is just the same thing.
"But 'Drive' was designed entirely around that character's silence. This one is very different. Ryan and I talked about the idea of a man who is chained to his mother and controlled by her. It's almost as if she's put a spell on him and has taken away his willpower. He's like the sleepwalker in 'The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.' It's an extreme and heightened reality.
"People tend to forget that Hamlet is a man who has no will of his own. He's constantly pushed around by other people who are taking advantage of him. But audiences are used to seeing male protagonists in movies be all about action and decisiveness. That's what defines the gender. Just because you reverse that doesn't mean you remove the urgency of the story. It just becomes quiet. And that can be very provocative, especially nowadays, because filmmaking has become so traditional and conventional. This movie requires you to engage with it in a different way than most other movies and interpret things for yourself. That's when art becomes interesting."
Although there isn't anything quite as graphic as the elevator scene in "Drive," "Only God Forgives" has moments of hair-raising violence, although a lot of the brutality happens outside the frame this time, making you think you've seen more than you did.
Still, there are sequences in which the camera doesn't look away, including a surreal torture scene inside an elegant karaoke bar that is as hard to watch as the ear slicing in "Reservoir Dogs."
"There's a great satisfaction in watching cinematic violence," Refn says. "It's designed in a way that feels like this great release. It arouses us. We fear it, but we also accept it as a savior. It can be very pleasurable or very horrifying. The violence in this film has a sexual aesthetic to it. The character of the policeman is like God walking the Earth, the Old Testament version of God. Even though we're taught not to enjoy the oldest form of justice, which is an eye for an eye, we're still rooted in it and take pleasure from it."
Monday, July 15, 2013
Race
Then he asked her to explain racism, which translated poorly
into his language as hatred of the difference in the hue of the fruit on a
single branch.
She struggled for the words to explain.
“Well, as you can see,” she said, “my husband Rufus has dark skin and my skin is pale.”
“Frecked,” he corrected.
“Well, okay, but see, Rufus and I are considered to be from different races, uhm, er, from different family trees, understand? And this causes a problem for some people down there.”
He snorted.
“You are pulling my leg, right? I’m no pinhead. You come from the same racing fruit tree, or whatever you call it. You are both mans. A little female man and a little man man.”
They both laughed at that but for different reasons; he at the truth in it, and she for the irony of it.
Even an oaf can understand that, she mused.
--Every Boy Should Have a Man, page 138
O Lord, bless us as a nation, and touch each of our hearts with love. Let us see the truth in each of our notions of race, and let us see the irony of it. Let us like the simple oafs see that we, on both sides of the issue, come from the same branch on the same tree.
She struggled for the words to explain.
“Well, as you can see,” she said, “my husband Rufus has dark skin and my skin is pale.”
“Frecked,” he corrected.
“Well, okay, but see, Rufus and I are considered to be from different races, uhm, er, from different family trees, understand? And this causes a problem for some people down there.”
He snorted.
“You are pulling my leg, right? I’m no pinhead. You come from the same racing fruit tree, or whatever you call it. You are both mans. A little female man and a little man man.”
They both laughed at that but for different reasons; he at the truth in it, and she for the irony of it.
Even an oaf can understand that, she mused.
--Every Boy Should Have a Man, page 138
O Lord, bless us as a nation, and touch each of our hearts with love. Let us see the truth in each of our notions of race, and let us see the irony of it. Let us like the simple oafs see that we, on both sides of the issue, come from the same branch on the same tree.
Friday, July 12, 2013
Giants
Q: I heard somewhere that the book is about giants, the tower of Babel, and religion. As a Christian, I come to your book cautiously wondering how I should read it or even if I should. Your previous novel was JESUS BOY which I cautiously read to my surprising pleasure. I am certain you are a good writer and knowledgeable about the bible. Will I understand it?
A: I am rereading your email to see if if I understand the question. Are you saying will you get it? Well, if you are a religious person of any Judeo-Christian faith you are most certainly familiar with the things the book refers to.
What follows is probably going to be used later on in high school and college essays about the book. So me just say--SPLOILER ALERT! SPOILER ALERT!
You mentioned giants. I've always had a fascination with mythological giants as well as giants in popular lore and art. Thus, I am offended and much disappointed that Marvel Comics in making the Avengers movie left out one of the originals. Hank Pym. Giant Man. And of course his wife Janet, the Wasp.
In Norse mythology, there were the Jotnar, among them Fafner who I think played an important role in Ragnarok, or twilight of the Gods, a doomsday that saw the deaths of several major gods of the Aesir, such as Thor, Odin, Loki, Baldr, Frigg, and so on. But I'd have to look that up to be sure, which I will do later and come back and edit this post. Oh, and there is the Basque giant Olentzero (who appears in the novel as Olentzlero with that "L" stuck in the middle).
You remember your Greek and Roman myths? You have the Titans that are giants as well as the Gods themselves, though I think the Titans are larger and ironically less powerful and less important as far as cosmology is concerned. Even so, the giant Prometheus gives fire to man and another Titan, Atlas, bears the earth on his shoulders. Then there is the one-eyed Cyclops who is described as a giant but may not be as large as the Titans.
In the bible, you find the Nephilim, who are fallen angels, perhaps, or simply angels, some of whom got their forbidden sexual groove on with the daughters of men (check out Deuteronomy 2:10-11, 2:21, and 3:11 Numbers 13:31-33), which produced offspring who like their pappies before them were enormous in size. From this groove came David's gigantic opponent Goliath (Check the Books of 2 Samuel and 1 Chronicles).
I have fun with this in the novel's apocrypha with the giant of giants, the largest giant ever, named Gewargerulf and a regular-sized boy giant named Wiftet (sort of like the biblical David). Their episode is about courage, about faith in the great creator, and about . . . music.
By the way, you may recognize Gewargerulf's father Uulf. He is the book's Samson. The biblical strongman who was brought down for the love a woman.
After the apocrypha, the book ends with a character based on the tallest man that we know of, or rather whose height was documented by modern means, Robert Wadlow. The way his story is told, I hope it will remind you of what I said about the Nephilim.
So yeah, it's a book about giants. Sort of.
I don't think the book will offend you as a Christian.
It will, I hope, make you think about . . .
Heidelbergensis.
About what? Heidelber-what?
Don't ask me. If you want that "A" on your essay, go look it up.
Preston
A: I am rereading your email to see if if I understand the question. Are you saying will you get it? Well, if you are a religious person of any Judeo-Christian faith you are most certainly familiar with the things the book refers to.
What follows is probably going to be used later on in high school and college essays about the book. So me just say--SPLOILER ALERT! SPOILER ALERT!
You mentioned giants. I've always had a fascination with mythological giants as well as giants in popular lore and art. Thus, I am offended and much disappointed that Marvel Comics in making the Avengers movie left out one of the originals. Hank Pym. Giant Man. And of course his wife Janet, the Wasp.
In Norse mythology, there were the Jotnar, among them Fafner who I think played an important role in Ragnarok, or twilight of the Gods, a doomsday that saw the deaths of several major gods of the Aesir, such as Thor, Odin, Loki, Baldr, Frigg, and so on. But I'd have to look that up to be sure, which I will do later and come back and edit this post. Oh, and there is the Basque giant Olentzero (who appears in the novel as Olentzlero with that "L" stuck in the middle).
You remember your Greek and Roman myths? You have the Titans that are giants as well as the Gods themselves, though I think the Titans are larger and ironically less powerful and less important as far as cosmology is concerned. Even so, the giant Prometheus gives fire to man and another Titan, Atlas, bears the earth on his shoulders. Then there is the one-eyed Cyclops who is described as a giant but may not be as large as the Titans.
In the bible, you find the Nephilim, who are fallen angels, perhaps, or simply angels, some of whom got their forbidden sexual groove on with the daughters of men (check out Deuteronomy 2:10-11, 2:21, and 3:11 Numbers 13:31-33), which produced offspring who like their pappies before them were enormous in size. From this groove came David's gigantic opponent Goliath (Check the Books of 2 Samuel and 1 Chronicles).
I have fun with this in the novel's apocrypha with the giant of giants, the largest giant ever, named Gewargerulf and a regular-sized boy giant named Wiftet (sort of like the biblical David). Their episode is about courage, about faith in the great creator, and about . . . music.
By the way, you may recognize Gewargerulf's father Uulf. He is the book's Samson. The biblical strongman who was brought down for the love a woman.
After the apocrypha, the book ends with a character based on the tallest man that we know of, or rather whose height was documented by modern means, Robert Wadlow. The way his story is told, I hope it will remind you of what I said about the Nephilim.
So yeah, it's a book about giants. Sort of.
I don't think the book will offend you as a Christian.
It will, I hope, make you think about . . .
Heidelbergensis.
About what? Heidelber-what?
Don't ask me. If you want that "A" on your essay, go look it up.
Preston
Tuesday, July 9, 2013
Zombie Novel
It suddenly occurred to me why zombies, werewolves, and vampires are so popular these days. The first generation of goths are now in their thirties and forties. Not only are they reading books and watching scary (albeit kid friendly) movies, but they are also in the business of writing and producing such material. This accounts for zombie and assorted undead lore. Remember Buffy the Vampire Slayer? Blade? Harry Potter? Twilight? The hundred or so zombie novels and zombie tv shows and zombie movies? Scary stuff. Not always. No. There is an entire line of undead romances, literature about loving undead things--gaaak--but I'm sure this comes as no surprise to you unless you've been living under a rock--or maybe it comes as no surprise to you BECAUSE you have been living under a rock. Wink. Wink. I said all of this to say that I'm thinking of writing a zombie novel. But Preston, my god, you're a serious writer. A zombie book? No. Say it isn't so. Ah, but that's because you haven't read it yet. And when you do, keep in mind that I strive for Excellence in all of my work. So don't scoff, my friend. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
Save the Trees--Cut Down on Paper
Are you a paper pusher?
The typical workplace is hooked on the stuff, with some shocking statistics.
The average office worker uses 10,000 sheets of copy paper each year.
The United States alone, which has less than 5% of the world's population, consumes 30% of the world's paper.
Over 40% of wood pulp goes toward the production of paper.
Printing and writing paper equals about one-half of U.S. paper production.
The costs of using paper in the office can run 13 to 31 times the cost of purchasing the paper in the first place!
learn more at Reduce.org
The typical workplace is hooked on the stuff, with some shocking statistics.
The average office worker uses 10,000 sheets of copy paper each year.
The United States alone, which has less than 5% of the world's population, consumes 30% of the world's paper.
Over 40% of wood pulp goes toward the production of paper.
Printing and writing paper equals about one-half of U.S. paper production.
The costs of using paper in the office can run 13 to 31 times the cost of purchasing the paper in the first place!
learn more at Reduce.org
Fur People by Vicki Hendricks
I just read a pretty good book a few days ago called "Fur People" by Vicki Hendricks. It's not out yet, but as soon as it does go and get a copy. Check back. Check back often. LOL. I'll keep you posted.
Davenport Library
I just saw this review from the Davenport Library.
Trying to put into words how I feel about Preston L. Allen’s Every Boy Should Have a Man isn’t easy. I keep trying to avoid calling the book weird — as not to turn away potential readers — while still imparting the distinct oddness of this novel. I want to explain how unnerving the novel can be at times, while making sure that I don’t forgot to tell you that the book was also subtly funny and wickedly smart. Part science-fiction, part allegory, part fairy tale, and part scripture, Allen has created a work of fiction that isn’t easy to pin down. Allen deftly employs irony, playing with the reader’s perception of humanity and challenging the way we interact with the earth.
Every Boy Should Have a Man takes place in a world in which Oafs keep “mans” as both pets and as potential food. In this land, a poor boy Oaf owns three mans throughout his life; something that is typically only a privilege of the wealthy. Spanning the lifetime of the boy Oaf (and a short time following), the book examines what it means to be civilized through a lens of a long list of divisive subjects including war, racism, global warming, and the ethics of domesticating animals for pets and livestock. To say that the novel is unique is an understatement, but there is evidence of a wide range of influences from Jack and the Beanstalk and Gulliver’s Travels to Ursula K. Le Guin and Margaret Atwood.
Trying to put into words how I feel about Preston L. Allen’s Every Boy Should Have a Man isn’t easy. I keep trying to avoid calling the book weird — as not to turn away potential readers — while still imparting the distinct oddness of this novel. I want to explain how unnerving the novel can be at times, while making sure that I don’t forgot to tell you that the book was also subtly funny and wickedly smart. Part science-fiction, part allegory, part fairy tale, and part scripture, Allen has created a work of fiction that isn’t easy to pin down. Allen deftly employs irony, playing with the reader’s perception of humanity and challenging the way we interact with the earth.
Every Boy Should Have a Man takes place in a world in which Oafs keep “mans” as both pets and as potential food. In this land, a poor boy Oaf owns three mans throughout his life; something that is typically only a privilege of the wealthy. Spanning the lifetime of the boy Oaf (and a short time following), the book examines what it means to be civilized through a lens of a long list of divisive subjects including war, racism, global warming, and the ethics of domesticating animals for pets and livestock. To say that the novel is unique is an understatement, but there is evidence of a wide range of influences from Jack and the Beanstalk and Gulliver’s Travels to Ursula K. Le Guin and Margaret Atwood.
Wednesday, July 3, 2013
We all need this right now as we reflect on the brave deeds of the 19.
"It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light."
--Aristotle Onassis
The 19
I found this on a site coincidentally called "The Blaze" (Theblaze.com). It's a pretty good article giving us a personal look at each of the brave 19. Read it. It'll bring you to tears because of the tragedy that these guys were taken away so suddenly, but then raise your spirits somewhat when you realize that as screwed up as our world seems sometimes there are still good people being born. God Bless.
PRESCOTT, Ariz. (AP) — Nineteen members of the Granite Mountain Hotshots, based in Prescott, Ariz., were killed Sunday when a windblown wildfire overcame them north of Phoenix. It was the deadliest single day for U.S. firefighters since Sept. 11. Fourteen of the victims were in their 20s.
ANDREW ASHCRAFT: AN ATHLETIC, GO-GETTER
Prescott High School physical education teacher and coach Lou Beneitone taught many of the Hotshots, and remembered 29-year-old Andrew Ashcraft as a fitness-oriented student.
“He had some athletic ability in him and he was a go-getter, too. You could pretty much see, from young freshman all the way, he was going to be physically active.”
Beneitone said athletic prowess was a must for the Hotshots. “That’s what it takes. You gotta be very physically fit, and you gotta like it, gotta like the hard work.”
Ashcraft, a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, was honored to be a member of the Hotshot crew, and “he just had a really sweet spirit about him,” Elise Smith, a Prescott, Ariz., resident, told The Deseret News of Salt Lake City.
Ashcraft left behind a wife, Juliann, and four children, the newspaper reported.
—
ROBERT CALDWELL: THE SMART ONE
Friends characterized Robert Caldwell, 23, as the smart man in the bunch.
“He was really smart, he had a good sense of humor,” said Chase Madrid, worked as a Hotshot for two years, but sat this year out.
“He was one of the smart guys in the crew who could get the weather, figure out the mathematics. It was just natural for him,” Madrid said.
It was Caldwell’s intelligence and know-how that got him appointed as a squad boss.
His cousin, Grant McKee, was also a Hotshots member and also was killed on Sunday.
“Robert was a gentle giant – he was man of few words,” said his aunt, Laurie McKee.
He had just gotten married in November, and had a five year old step-son.
“Both of these boys were only interested in having a family life. Robert was newly married, and Grant was engaged. They just wanted the house and the dog,” she said.
Mary Hoffmann was grandmother to both boys.
“To have two grandson’s gone, it’s devastation,” she said.
—
TRAVIS CARTER: STRONG AND HUMBLE
At Captain Crossfit, a gym near the firehouse where the Hotshots were stationed, Travis Carter was known as the strongest one out of the crew – but also the most humble.
“No one could beat him,” trainer Janine Pereira said. “But the thing about him, was he would never brag about it. He would just kill everyone and then go and start helping someone else finish.”
Carter, 31, was famous for once holding a plank for 45 minutes, and he was notorious for making up brutal workouts.
The crew recently did a five mile run during wilderness training, then he made them go to Captain Crossfit in the afternoon for another really hard workout.
“The other guys who came in here always said that even though he was in charge, he was always the first one at the fire, the first one in action,” Pereira said.
—
DUSTIN DEFORD: DRY SENSE OF HUMOR
Dustin DeFord, 24, tried out for the Hotshot crew in January 2012, telling friends on Twitter that he had passed the physical fitness test and asking for prayers as he moved on to the interview stage of the process.
He moved to Arizona from Montana after he was hired, and he worked to improve his skills on the climbing wall at a gym near the firehouse.
“He listened very well. He was very respectful,” said Tony Burris, a trainer at Captain Crossfit. “He kind of had a dry sense of humor.”
Another trainer, Janine Pereira, echoed that sentiment.
“You would say something to him, and he would respond with a crack, which was funny because he was so shy,” she said.
Soon after he interviewed for the Hotshots, DeFord signed up for the Spartan Race, a rugged, eight-mile challenge through the mud and around various obstacles in Chandler, a suburb of Phoenix.
“I am being amazing,” he wrote on Twitter, in reference to the race.
Several months later, in June 2012, he tweeted: “First Fire of the season.”
—
CHRIS MACKENZIE: `JUST LIKE HIS DAD’
An avid snowboarder, 30-year-old Chris MacKenzie grew up in California’s San Jacinto Valley, where he was a 2001 graduate of Hemet High School and a former member of the town’s fire department. He joined the U.S. Forest Service in 2004, then transferred two years ago to the Prescott Fire Department, longtime friend Dav Fulford-Brown told The Riverside Press-Enterprise.
MacKenzie, like at least one other member of the Granite Mountain Hotshots, had followed his father into firefighting. Michael MacKenzie, a former Moreno Valley Fire Department captain, confirmed that he had been informed of his son’s death.
“I can’t talk about it,” he said.
Fulford-Brown, also a former firefighter, feared for the worst as soon as he heard the news of the Arizona firefighters. “I said, `Oh my God, that’s Chris’ crew.’ I started calling him and calling him and got no answer,” he told The Press-Enterprise. MacKenzie, he said, “lived life to the fullest … and was fighting fire just like his dad.”
“He was finishing his credentials to get promoted and loved the people. It’s an insane tragedy.
—
ERIC MARSH: HOOKED ON FIREFIGHTING
Eric Marsh, 43, was an avid mountain biker who grew up in Ashe County, N.C., but became hooked on firefighting while studying biology at Arizona State University, said Leanna Racquer, the ex-wife of his cousin. Marsh lived with Racquer and her then-husband during the winters from 1992 through 1996 in North Carolina, but kept returning to Arizona during fire season.
After college, he kept working as a firefighter, eventually landing a full-time job and settling in northern Arizona. He even moved his parents to the state, she said. Marsh was superintendent of the Hotshot crew and the oldest of the 19 who died.
“He’s was great – he was the best at what he did,” Racquer said. “He is awesome and well-loved and they are hurting,” she said of his family.
Marsh was married but had no children, said his cousin, Scott Marsh of Pisgah Forest, N.C. His father, John Marsh, told the Jefferson Post newspaper in Jefferson, N.C., that his only child “was a great son.”
“He was compassionate and caring about his crew.”
—
GRANT MCKEE: GIVING NATURE
Grant McKee, 21, loved to give things away.
“Even as a child, I’d ask him where things were, and he’d say, `Oh such and such liked it.’ And sometimes it really cost a lot! But he’d say, `Oh he liked it so much,’” said his grandmother, Mary Hoffmann.
“So on his birthday, I started to say, `I hope you’re going to keep this!’” she said.
McKee’s cousin, Robert Caldwell, also was a Hotshot and also was killed on Sunday.
“I had four grandchildren, but Grant was the sweetest most giving nature of any of my grandkids,” Hoffman said. “We used to think he was a little angel.”
McKee’s mother said Grant was training to be an emergency medical technician and only intended to work with the Hotshots for the summer.
During EMT training, he would ask for extra shifts at the emergency room. And because his superiors liked him, they would give them to him, Laurie McKee said.
“Grant was one of the most likable people you could ever meet,” she said. “Grant was friendly, he was outgoing. Everybody loved Grant.”
—
SEAN MISNER: `TREMENDOUS HEART AND DESIRE’
Sean Misner, 26, leaves behind a wife who is seven months pregnant, said Mark Swanitz, principal of Santa Ynez Valley Union High School in Santa Barbara County, where Misner graduated in 2005.
Misner played varsity football and also participated in the school’s sports medicine program where he wrapped sprained ankles and took care of sidelined athletes.
“He was a team player, a real helper,” Swanitz told The Associated Press on Monday.
In high school, Misner played several positions including wide receiver and defensive back. He was slim for a high school football player, but that didn’t stop him from tackling his opponents, recalled retired football coach Ken Gruendyke.
“He played with tremendous heart and desire,” Gruendyke said. “He wasn’t the biggest or fastest guy on the team but he played with great emotion and intensity.”
—
SCOTT NORRIS: THE `IDEAL AMERICAN GENTELMAN’
Scott Norris, 28, was known around Prescott through his part-time job at Bucky O’Neill Guns.
“Here in Arizona the gun shops are a lot like barbershops. Sometimes you don’t go in there to buy anything at all, you just go to talk,” said resident William O’Hara. “I never heard a dirty word out of the guy. He was the kind of guy who if he dated your daughter, you’d be OK with it.
“He was just a model of a young, ideal American gentleman.”
O’Hara’s son Ryan, 19, said Norris’ life and tragic death had inspired him to live a more meaningful life.
“He was a loving guy. He loved life. And I’ve been guilty of not looking as happy as I should, and letting things get to me, and Scott wasn’t like that at all.”
—
WADE PARKER: ANOTHER SECOND GENERATION FIREFIGHTER
At 22, Wade Parker had just joined the Hotshots team. His father works for the nearby Chino Valley Fire Department, said retired Prescott Fire Department Capt. Jeff Knotek, who had known Wade since he was “just a little guy.”
The younger Parker had been very excited about being part of the Hotshot crew, Knotek said.
“He was another guy who wanted to be a second generation firefighter,” Knotek said. “Big, athletic kid who loved it, aggressive, assertive and in great shape.”
“It’s just a shame to see this happen,” Knotek said.
—
JOHN PERCIN JR.: STRONG, BRAVE, AMAZING
He loved baseball and had an unforgettable laugh. In his aunt’s eyes, John Percin Jr. was, simply, “an amazing young man.”
“He was probably the strongest and bravest young man I have ever met in my life,” Donna Percin Pederson said in an interview with The Associated Press from her home in Portland, Ore.
John Percin Sr., declined to comment Monday. “It’s not a good time right now.”
Percin, 24, was a multisport high school athlete who graduated in 2007 from West Linn High School, southeast of Portland.
Geoff McEvers grew up playing baseball with Percin and remembered Percin as a fun-loving guy with an unforgettable laugh, The Oregonian newspaper reported.
McEvers said he learned about the Percin’s death through friends.
“It’s already tragic when you hear about those who died,” McEvers told the newspaper, “but when you find out it’s someone you know personally, it’s tough.”
—
ANTHONY ROSE: `BLOSSOMED’ AS FIREMAN
Anthony Rose, 23, was one of the youngest victims. He grew up in Wisconsin and previously worked as a firefighter in nearby Crown King before moving on to become a Hotshot.
Retired Crown King firefighter Greg Flores said Rose “just blossomed in the fire department. He did so well and helped so much in Crown King. We were all so very proud of him.”
Flores said the town was planning a fundraiser for Rose and hoped to also have a memorial to honor him.
“He was the kind of guy that his smile lit up the whole room and everyone would just rally around him,” he said. “He loved what he was doing, and that brings me some peace of heart.”
—
JESSE STEED: `GREAT FOR MORALE’
Jesse Steed’s former colleagues remember him as a joker.
“He was a character. If you look at all the old photos of him, he was doing things to make people laugh,” said Cooper Carr, who worked with Steed in the Hotshots from 2001 to 2003.
“He was good at impressions, and he sang songs; he was just great for morale. He’d just talk in a funny voice and have us all in stiches,” Carr said. “And he was strong as an ox.”
Carr remembers that Steed once spent the better part of an hour positioning a water bottle just right for a photo so that it would look like Yosemite falls was cascading into it.
Steed was also remembered for his dedication to fighting wildfires.
“He did it for a long, long time. I think he started in 2001, when he got out of the Marines. A job like the Hotshots is hard, hard work, and you don’t stay in it if you don’t love it,” Carr said.
Steed, 36, was one of the older members of the crew. Renton, Wash., police officer Cassidy Steed said his brother “always put his life on the line for people who he knew he would never meet.”
—
JOE THURSTON: Daring and Determined
Back home in Utah, Joe Thurston used to go to an area reservoir with friends and promptly show how fearless he could be.
“He was definitely one of the daredevil types,” longtime friend Scott Goodrich told the Salt Lake Tribune. “We went to Quail (Creek) Reservoir, and we’d be finding 40- to 50-foot cliffs that people would be scared to jump off. He would just show up and be front-flipping off of them.”
He brought this bold streak to the Granite Mountain Hotshots.
“He had all the qualities that a firefighter would need to possess,” E.J. Overson, another friend, told the Salt Lake City newspaper. “He was service-oriented, very caring and willing to do some things that many others would say, `I don’t want to get involved.’”
The 32-year-old Thurston, of Cedar City, was also determined, generous and hardworking, his friends said.
He went to Cedar High School and Southern Utah University, played in a band and rode skateboards.
“He was one of the best guys I ever met,” Goodrich said.
—
TRAVIS TURBYFILL: `BIG, HUGE MARINE’
Known as “Turby” among crew members, Travis Turbyfill got a fulltime position with the Hotshots when another member’s girlfriend asked him to quit.
Turbyfill, 27, often worked with other Hotshots at Captain Crossfit, a warehouse filled with mats, obstacle courses, climbing walls and acrobatic rings near the firehouse. He would train in the morning and then return in the afternoon with his wife and kids.
Trainer Janine Pereira said she recently kidded Turbyfill for skipping workouts. His excuse was that he wanted to spend some quality time at Dairy Queen.
“He was telling me that it’s because it was Blizzard week, and he was just going to eat a Blizzard every night,” she said.
Tony Burris, another trainer, said he enjoyed watching Turby with his two daughters.
“Because he’s this big, huge Marine, Hotshot guy, and he has two little girls, reddish, blonde curly hair, and they just loved their dad,” he said.
—
BILLY WARNEKE: `DOING WHAT HE LOVED’
Billy Warneke, 25, and his wife, Roxanne, were expecting their first child in December, his grandmother, Nancy Warneke, told The Press-Enterprise newspaper in Riverside, Calif. Warneke grew up in Hemet, Calif., along with his fellow Granite Mountain hotshot, Chris MacKenzie. He was a four-year Marine Corps veteran who served a tour in Iraq and had joined the hotshot crew in April, buying a property in Prescott, near where his sister lived, the newspaper reported.
Nancy Warneke said she called her sister after seeing the fire on the news.
“She said, `He’s gone. They’re all gone,’” Nancy Warneke told The Press-Enterprise. “Even though it’s a tragedy for the whole family, he was doing what he loved to do. He loved nature and was helping preserve nature.”
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CLAYTON WHITTED: HE’D `LIGHT IT UP’
Full of heart and determination, Clayton Whitted, 28, might not have been the biggest guy around, but he was among the hardest-working. His former Prescott High School coach, Lou Beneitone, said Whitted was a “wonderful kid” who always had a big smile on his face. Whitted played for the football team as an offensive and defensive lineman.
“He was a smart young man with a great personality, just a wonderful personality,” said Beneitone. “When he walked into a room, he could really light it up.”
Beneitone said Whitted loved being a firefighter and was well-respected among his crew. He says he ran into Whitted about two months ago and they shook hands and hugged, and talked about the upcoming fire season.
“I told him to be careful,” Beneitone said.
—
KEVIN WOYJECK: FOLLOWING IN HIS FATHER’S FOOTSTEPS
For 21-year-old Kevin Woyjeck, the fire station was always a second home. His father, Capt. Joe Woyjeck, is a nearly 30-year veteran of the Los Angeles County Fire Department. Keith Mora, an inspector with that agency, said Kevin often accompanied his dad to the station and on ride-alongs, and always intended to follow in his footsteps.
“He wanted to become a firefighter like his dad and hopefully work hand-in-hand,” Mora said Monday outside of the fire station in Seal Beach, Calif., where the Woyjeck family lives.
Mora remembered the younger Woyjeck as a “joy to be around,” a man who always had a smile on his face. He had been trained as an EMT and worked as an Explorer, which is a mentorship training program to become a professional firefighter.
“He was a great kid. Unbelievable sense of humor, work ethic that was not parallel to many kids I’ve seen at that age. He wanted to work very hard.”
As he spoke, Mora stood before an American flag that had been lowered to half-staff. His own fire badge was covered with a black elastic band, a show of respect and mourning for those lost in the line of duty.
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GARRET ZUPPIGER: A RED BEARD, AND A SENSE OF HUMOR
Garret Zuppiger, 27, loved to be funny, said Tony Burris, a trainer at a gym where many of the Hotshots worked out.
Burris said the two bonded over their hyper-manly ginger facial hair.
“We both had a red beard and so we would always admire each other’s beards,” he said. “We also had a few conversations about beer.”
Zuppiger’s humor was evident on his blog where he wrote about his grandmother’s one-eyed Chihuahua, his “best hair day ever” and a hike with his mother on Camelback Mountain in Phoenix. There’s also photos of a tongue-in-cheek project to build a “ski-chair,” in which a living room recliner was placed atop two skis.
“Garret Zuppiger turns 25!” he wrote in a post several years ago. “Everyday is like a gift!!”
—
Associated Press reporters Raquel Maria Dillon in Seal Beach, Calif., Sue Manning in Los Angeles; and Felicia Fonseca and Hannah Dreier in Prescott contributed to this story.
PRESCOTT, Ariz. (AP) — Nineteen members of the Granite Mountain Hotshots, based in Prescott, Ariz., were killed Sunday when a windblown wildfire overcame them north of Phoenix. It was the deadliest single day for U.S. firefighters since Sept. 11. Fourteen of the victims were in their 20s.
ANDREW ASHCRAFT: AN ATHLETIC, GO-GETTER
Prescott High School physical education teacher and coach Lou Beneitone taught many of the Hotshots, and remembered 29-year-old Andrew Ashcraft as a fitness-oriented student.
“He had some athletic ability in him and he was a go-getter, too. You could pretty much see, from young freshman all the way, he was going to be physically active.”
Beneitone said athletic prowess was a must for the Hotshots. “That’s what it takes. You gotta be very physically fit, and you gotta like it, gotta like the hard work.”
Ashcraft, a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, was honored to be a member of the Hotshot crew, and “he just had a really sweet spirit about him,” Elise Smith, a Prescott, Ariz., resident, told The Deseret News of Salt Lake City.
Ashcraft left behind a wife, Juliann, and four children, the newspaper reported.
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ROBERT CALDWELL: THE SMART ONE
Friends characterized Robert Caldwell, 23, as the smart man in the bunch.
“He was really smart, he had a good sense of humor,” said Chase Madrid, worked as a Hotshot for two years, but sat this year out.
“He was one of the smart guys in the crew who could get the weather, figure out the mathematics. It was just natural for him,” Madrid said.
It was Caldwell’s intelligence and know-how that got him appointed as a squad boss.
His cousin, Grant McKee, was also a Hotshots member and also was killed on Sunday.
“Robert was a gentle giant – he was man of few words,” said his aunt, Laurie McKee.
He had just gotten married in November, and had a five year old step-son.
“Both of these boys were only interested in having a family life. Robert was newly married, and Grant was engaged. They just wanted the house and the dog,” she said.
Mary Hoffmann was grandmother to both boys.
“To have two grandson’s gone, it’s devastation,” she said.
—
TRAVIS CARTER: STRONG AND HUMBLE
At Captain Crossfit, a gym near the firehouse where the Hotshots were stationed, Travis Carter was known as the strongest one out of the crew – but also the most humble.
“No one could beat him,” trainer Janine Pereira said. “But the thing about him, was he would never brag about it. He would just kill everyone and then go and start helping someone else finish.”
Carter, 31, was famous for once holding a plank for 45 minutes, and he was notorious for making up brutal workouts.
The crew recently did a five mile run during wilderness training, then he made them go to Captain Crossfit in the afternoon for another really hard workout.
“The other guys who came in here always said that even though he was in charge, he was always the first one at the fire, the first one in action,” Pereira said.
—
DUSTIN DEFORD: DRY SENSE OF HUMOR
Dustin DeFord, 24, tried out for the Hotshot crew in January 2012, telling friends on Twitter that he had passed the physical fitness test and asking for prayers as he moved on to the interview stage of the process.
He moved to Arizona from Montana after he was hired, and he worked to improve his skills on the climbing wall at a gym near the firehouse.
“He listened very well. He was very respectful,” said Tony Burris, a trainer at Captain Crossfit. “He kind of had a dry sense of humor.”
Another trainer, Janine Pereira, echoed that sentiment.
“You would say something to him, and he would respond with a crack, which was funny because he was so shy,” she said.
Soon after he interviewed for the Hotshots, DeFord signed up for the Spartan Race, a rugged, eight-mile challenge through the mud and around various obstacles in Chandler, a suburb of Phoenix.
“I am being amazing,” he wrote on Twitter, in reference to the race.
Several months later, in June 2012, he tweeted: “First Fire of the season.”
—
CHRIS MACKENZIE: `JUST LIKE HIS DAD’
An avid snowboarder, 30-year-old Chris MacKenzie grew up in California’s San Jacinto Valley, where he was a 2001 graduate of Hemet High School and a former member of the town’s fire department. He joined the U.S. Forest Service in 2004, then transferred two years ago to the Prescott Fire Department, longtime friend Dav Fulford-Brown told The Riverside Press-Enterprise.
MacKenzie, like at least one other member of the Granite Mountain Hotshots, had followed his father into firefighting. Michael MacKenzie, a former Moreno Valley Fire Department captain, confirmed that he had been informed of his son’s death.
“I can’t talk about it,” he said.
Fulford-Brown, also a former firefighter, feared for the worst as soon as he heard the news of the Arizona firefighters. “I said, `Oh my God, that’s Chris’ crew.’ I started calling him and calling him and got no answer,” he told The Press-Enterprise. MacKenzie, he said, “lived life to the fullest … and was fighting fire just like his dad.”
“He was finishing his credentials to get promoted and loved the people. It’s an insane tragedy.
—
ERIC MARSH: HOOKED ON FIREFIGHTING
Eric Marsh, 43, was an avid mountain biker who grew up in Ashe County, N.C., but became hooked on firefighting while studying biology at Arizona State University, said Leanna Racquer, the ex-wife of his cousin. Marsh lived with Racquer and her then-husband during the winters from 1992 through 1996 in North Carolina, but kept returning to Arizona during fire season.
After college, he kept working as a firefighter, eventually landing a full-time job and settling in northern Arizona. He even moved his parents to the state, she said. Marsh was superintendent of the Hotshot crew and the oldest of the 19 who died.
“He’s was great – he was the best at what he did,” Racquer said. “He is awesome and well-loved and they are hurting,” she said of his family.
Marsh was married but had no children, said his cousin, Scott Marsh of Pisgah Forest, N.C. His father, John Marsh, told the Jefferson Post newspaper in Jefferson, N.C., that his only child “was a great son.”
“He was compassionate and caring about his crew.”
—
GRANT MCKEE: GIVING NATURE
Grant McKee, 21, loved to give things away.
“Even as a child, I’d ask him where things were, and he’d say, `Oh such and such liked it.’ And sometimes it really cost a lot! But he’d say, `Oh he liked it so much,’” said his grandmother, Mary Hoffmann.
“So on his birthday, I started to say, `I hope you’re going to keep this!’” she said.
McKee’s cousin, Robert Caldwell, also was a Hotshot and also was killed on Sunday.
“I had four grandchildren, but Grant was the sweetest most giving nature of any of my grandkids,” Hoffman said. “We used to think he was a little angel.”
McKee’s mother said Grant was training to be an emergency medical technician and only intended to work with the Hotshots for the summer.
During EMT training, he would ask for extra shifts at the emergency room. And because his superiors liked him, they would give them to him, Laurie McKee said.
“Grant was one of the most likable people you could ever meet,” she said. “Grant was friendly, he was outgoing. Everybody loved Grant.”
—
SEAN MISNER: `TREMENDOUS HEART AND DESIRE’
Sean Misner, 26, leaves behind a wife who is seven months pregnant, said Mark Swanitz, principal of Santa Ynez Valley Union High School in Santa Barbara County, where Misner graduated in 2005.
Misner played varsity football and also participated in the school’s sports medicine program where he wrapped sprained ankles and took care of sidelined athletes.
“He was a team player, a real helper,” Swanitz told The Associated Press on Monday.
In high school, Misner played several positions including wide receiver and defensive back. He was slim for a high school football player, but that didn’t stop him from tackling his opponents, recalled retired football coach Ken Gruendyke.
“He played with tremendous heart and desire,” Gruendyke said. “He wasn’t the biggest or fastest guy on the team but he played with great emotion and intensity.”
—
SCOTT NORRIS: THE `IDEAL AMERICAN GENTELMAN’
Scott Norris, 28, was known around Prescott through his part-time job at Bucky O’Neill Guns.
“Here in Arizona the gun shops are a lot like barbershops. Sometimes you don’t go in there to buy anything at all, you just go to talk,” said resident William O’Hara. “I never heard a dirty word out of the guy. He was the kind of guy who if he dated your daughter, you’d be OK with it.
“He was just a model of a young, ideal American gentleman.”
O’Hara’s son Ryan, 19, said Norris’ life and tragic death had inspired him to live a more meaningful life.
“He was a loving guy. He loved life. And I’ve been guilty of not looking as happy as I should, and letting things get to me, and Scott wasn’t like that at all.”
—
WADE PARKER: ANOTHER SECOND GENERATION FIREFIGHTER
At 22, Wade Parker had just joined the Hotshots team. His father works for the nearby Chino Valley Fire Department, said retired Prescott Fire Department Capt. Jeff Knotek, who had known Wade since he was “just a little guy.”
The younger Parker had been very excited about being part of the Hotshot crew, Knotek said.
“He was another guy who wanted to be a second generation firefighter,” Knotek said. “Big, athletic kid who loved it, aggressive, assertive and in great shape.”
“It’s just a shame to see this happen,” Knotek said.
—
JOHN PERCIN JR.: STRONG, BRAVE, AMAZING
He loved baseball and had an unforgettable laugh. In his aunt’s eyes, John Percin Jr. was, simply, “an amazing young man.”
“He was probably the strongest and bravest young man I have ever met in my life,” Donna Percin Pederson said in an interview with The Associated Press from her home in Portland, Ore.
John Percin Sr., declined to comment Monday. “It’s not a good time right now.”
Percin, 24, was a multisport high school athlete who graduated in 2007 from West Linn High School, southeast of Portland.
Geoff McEvers grew up playing baseball with Percin and remembered Percin as a fun-loving guy with an unforgettable laugh, The Oregonian newspaper reported.
McEvers said he learned about the Percin’s death through friends.
“It’s already tragic when you hear about those who died,” McEvers told the newspaper, “but when you find out it’s someone you know personally, it’s tough.”
—
ANTHONY ROSE: `BLOSSOMED’ AS FIREMAN
Anthony Rose, 23, was one of the youngest victims. He grew up in Wisconsin and previously worked as a firefighter in nearby Crown King before moving on to become a Hotshot.
Retired Crown King firefighter Greg Flores said Rose “just blossomed in the fire department. He did so well and helped so much in Crown King. We were all so very proud of him.”
Flores said the town was planning a fundraiser for Rose and hoped to also have a memorial to honor him.
“He was the kind of guy that his smile lit up the whole room and everyone would just rally around him,” he said. “He loved what he was doing, and that brings me some peace of heart.”
—
JESSE STEED: `GREAT FOR MORALE’
Jesse Steed’s former colleagues remember him as a joker.
“He was a character. If you look at all the old photos of him, he was doing things to make people laugh,” said Cooper Carr, who worked with Steed in the Hotshots from 2001 to 2003.
“He was good at impressions, and he sang songs; he was just great for morale. He’d just talk in a funny voice and have us all in stiches,” Carr said. “And he was strong as an ox.”
Carr remembers that Steed once spent the better part of an hour positioning a water bottle just right for a photo so that it would look like Yosemite falls was cascading into it.
Steed was also remembered for his dedication to fighting wildfires.
“He did it for a long, long time. I think he started in 2001, when he got out of the Marines. A job like the Hotshots is hard, hard work, and you don’t stay in it if you don’t love it,” Carr said.
Steed, 36, was one of the older members of the crew. Renton, Wash., police officer Cassidy Steed said his brother “always put his life on the line for people who he knew he would never meet.”
—
JOE THURSTON: Daring and Determined
Back home in Utah, Joe Thurston used to go to an area reservoir with friends and promptly show how fearless he could be.
“He was definitely one of the daredevil types,” longtime friend Scott Goodrich told the Salt Lake Tribune. “We went to Quail (Creek) Reservoir, and we’d be finding 40- to 50-foot cliffs that people would be scared to jump off. He would just show up and be front-flipping off of them.”
He brought this bold streak to the Granite Mountain Hotshots.
“He had all the qualities that a firefighter would need to possess,” E.J. Overson, another friend, told the Salt Lake City newspaper. “He was service-oriented, very caring and willing to do some things that many others would say, `I don’t want to get involved.’”
The 32-year-old Thurston, of Cedar City, was also determined, generous and hardworking, his friends said.
He went to Cedar High School and Southern Utah University, played in a band and rode skateboards.
“He was one of the best guys I ever met,” Goodrich said.
—
TRAVIS TURBYFILL: `BIG, HUGE MARINE’
Known as “Turby” among crew members, Travis Turbyfill got a fulltime position with the Hotshots when another member’s girlfriend asked him to quit.
Turbyfill, 27, often worked with other Hotshots at Captain Crossfit, a warehouse filled with mats, obstacle courses, climbing walls and acrobatic rings near the firehouse. He would train in the morning and then return in the afternoon with his wife and kids.
Trainer Janine Pereira said she recently kidded Turbyfill for skipping workouts. His excuse was that he wanted to spend some quality time at Dairy Queen.
“He was telling me that it’s because it was Blizzard week, and he was just going to eat a Blizzard every night,” she said.
Tony Burris, another trainer, said he enjoyed watching Turby with his two daughters.
“Because he’s this big, huge Marine, Hotshot guy, and he has two little girls, reddish, blonde curly hair, and they just loved their dad,” he said.
—
BILLY WARNEKE: `DOING WHAT HE LOVED’
Billy Warneke, 25, and his wife, Roxanne, were expecting their first child in December, his grandmother, Nancy Warneke, told The Press-Enterprise newspaper in Riverside, Calif. Warneke grew up in Hemet, Calif., along with his fellow Granite Mountain hotshot, Chris MacKenzie. He was a four-year Marine Corps veteran who served a tour in Iraq and had joined the hotshot crew in April, buying a property in Prescott, near where his sister lived, the newspaper reported.
Nancy Warneke said she called her sister after seeing the fire on the news.
“She said, `He’s gone. They’re all gone,’” Nancy Warneke told The Press-Enterprise. “Even though it’s a tragedy for the whole family, he was doing what he loved to do. He loved nature and was helping preserve nature.”
—
CLAYTON WHITTED: HE’D `LIGHT IT UP’
Full of heart and determination, Clayton Whitted, 28, might not have been the biggest guy around, but he was among the hardest-working. His former Prescott High School coach, Lou Beneitone, said Whitted was a “wonderful kid” who always had a big smile on his face. Whitted played for the football team as an offensive and defensive lineman.
“He was a smart young man with a great personality, just a wonderful personality,” said Beneitone. “When he walked into a room, he could really light it up.”
Beneitone said Whitted loved being a firefighter and was well-respected among his crew. He says he ran into Whitted about two months ago and they shook hands and hugged, and talked about the upcoming fire season.
“I told him to be careful,” Beneitone said.
—
KEVIN WOYJECK: FOLLOWING IN HIS FATHER’S FOOTSTEPS
For 21-year-old Kevin Woyjeck, the fire station was always a second home. His father, Capt. Joe Woyjeck, is a nearly 30-year veteran of the Los Angeles County Fire Department. Keith Mora, an inspector with that agency, said Kevin often accompanied his dad to the station and on ride-alongs, and always intended to follow in his footsteps.
“He wanted to become a firefighter like his dad and hopefully work hand-in-hand,” Mora said Monday outside of the fire station in Seal Beach, Calif., where the Woyjeck family lives.
Mora remembered the younger Woyjeck as a “joy to be around,” a man who always had a smile on his face. He had been trained as an EMT and worked as an Explorer, which is a mentorship training program to become a professional firefighter.
“He was a great kid. Unbelievable sense of humor, work ethic that was not parallel to many kids I’ve seen at that age. He wanted to work very hard.”
As he spoke, Mora stood before an American flag that had been lowered to half-staff. His own fire badge was covered with a black elastic band, a show of respect and mourning for those lost in the line of duty.
—
GARRET ZUPPIGER: A RED BEARD, AND A SENSE OF HUMOR
Garret Zuppiger, 27, loved to be funny, said Tony Burris, a trainer at a gym where many of the Hotshots worked out.
Burris said the two bonded over their hyper-manly ginger facial hair.
“We both had a red beard and so we would always admire each other’s beards,” he said. “We also had a few conversations about beer.”
Zuppiger’s humor was evident on his blog where he wrote about his grandmother’s one-eyed Chihuahua, his “best hair day ever” and a hike with his mother on Camelback Mountain in Phoenix. There’s also photos of a tongue-in-cheek project to build a “ski-chair,” in which a living room recliner was placed atop two skis.
“Garret Zuppiger turns 25!” he wrote in a post several years ago. “Everyday is like a gift!!”
—
Associated Press reporters Raquel Maria Dillon in Seal Beach, Calif., Sue Manning in Los Angeles; and Felicia Fonseca and Hannah Dreier in Prescott contributed to this story.
Tuesday, July 2, 2013
Psalms 116:7-9
7Return unto thy rest, O my soul; for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee.
8For thou hast delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, and my feet from falling.
9I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living.
8For thou hast delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, and my feet from falling.
9I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living.
Monday, July 1, 2013
What's the Book About?
Q: What's the book about?
A:
It's a book of adventure, mystery, and magic in a land far, far, far away,
and not too far at all.
A land of silver and a golden harp, of rock, sand, wood and water.
A land of trees.
A land of darkness, a land of color and light.
Of mothers and daughters and sons and mans and man,
and wars. A troubled land, yes,
but also a land of hope and beauty and goodness and
once upon a time,
in a land just beyond the sky.
And it all begins with a boy who one day,
brought home a man.
I hope that helped.
Thanks.
Preston
A:
It's a book of adventure, mystery, and magic in a land far, far, far away,
and not too far at all.
A land of silver and a golden harp, of rock, sand, wood and water.
A land of trees.
A land of darkness, a land of color and light.
Of mothers and daughters and sons and mans and man,
and wars. A troubled land, yes,
but also a land of hope and beauty and goodness and
once upon a time,
in a land just beyond the sky.
And it all begins with a boy who one day,
brought home a man.
I hope that helped.
Thanks.
Preston
Shakespeare
And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything.
Alice Walker
Don't wait around for other people to be happy for you. Any happiness you get you've got to make yourself.
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Happiness
"Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony."
--Mahatma Gandhi
--Mahatma Gandhi
Monday, June 17, 2013
The Chicago Tribune
Preston Allen Offers a Fable from the Future
Genre mash-ups are de rigueur these days. Of course, writers like Margaret Atwood have been tight-roping the misty border between literary fiction and speculative fiction, fantasy and mystery for years. But a new outcropping of younger upstarts, such as Michael Chabon, Charles Yu and Jonathan Letham, have been contorting the lines in new and unexpected directions. Genre fiction, it would seem, is no longer relegated to the back of the bookstore or the dominion of the geek. Examining the borderlands between what is traditionally deemed "literary" and what is "genre," inverting, twisting, defying and fusing traditional genre tropes with meta-modernist craft, is all part of this new genre renaissance.
There is a precedent for the renewed interest in genre as literature. Charles Dickens, Edgar Allan Poe, Shirley Jackson, Tennessee Williams, Jorge Luis Borges, Ray Bradbury and a good many others all wrote what could be deemed literary genre fiction. Summed up, these writers welded tales of the future, tales of the fantastic, tales of the macabre with stories that, ultimately, looked at what it means to be human. But it is the pushing of the form, the muddying of the borders — and the sheer originality of story, point-of-view and structure — that make the new lit-genre rebirth something fresh and rather exciting to behold.
And now author Preston L. Allen joins the party. In "Every Boy Should Have a Man," Allen takes genre bending into unexplored territory. Allen, the author of the 2010 African-American sendup of sexuality and religion "Jesus Boy," has crafted a highly imaginative, unsettling work of social satire that melds multiple genres while ruminating on a host of contemporary ills.
A fearless amalgam of biblical language and allegory, fantasy and fable, "Every Boy Should Have a Man" is set in a world ruled by humanoid oafs — oversized humans who keep surviving humans ("Mans," as they are called) as pets. In "Every Boy," Allen utilizes a speculative fable as a way to muse on race, slavery, civil rights and even climate change.
Allen's post-apocalyptic world is ravaged by war, environmental destruction and vast economic disparity. The rich have gotten richer, the poor are down and out. More troubling: Cannibalism is rampant in Allen's fabulist tale. "Pets" are often stolen and eaten in this desperate world of poverty and hunger.
The novel tells the story of a poor boy and the three "mans" he owns as child. The boy finds his first man wandering in the bramble and brings him home, much like a child in our own world would shelter a stray dog or cat. The boy's parents are not happy with the new houseguest. The boy is accused of stealing this man, whom he names "Brown Skin" for his dark complexion. The man is handsome and — rare for a man — has the ability to speak. The boy's heart is broken when he is forced to give his "man" away. But the oaf boys' father loves his son and, recognizing his child's broken heart, brings home a female "man," wrapped in a red ribbon with the attached note:
"Every Boy Should Have a Man. You're a Fine Son. Love Dad."
The female man is fair, with red hair and freckles up and down her arms. The boy names her "Red Sleeves." The boy's second "man" vanishes, too, but not before she is impregnated and gives birth to his third and final man, the baby he names "Redlocks," for the red hair she inherited from her mother.
Redlocks is fiery, scrappy, a survivor with an attitude. The novel focuses on the story of Redlocks — a fairy tale archetype down to her very name (a play on "Goldilocks"). But Redlocks' story is flipped upside down by the world she lives in. The novel tracks her trials, travails and quest for survival in this dark and somber vision of a future run over by everything from war to strip mining to cannibalism.
"Every Boy Should Have a Man" is James Baldwin meets Aldous Huxley, a twisted contortion of a weird fairy tale future gone wrong, all told from high atop the mountain in a sort of New Testament prose. As the mixologist of this mad and unpredictable genre tableau, Allen has navigated into wholly uncharted territory. He comments on everything from slave ownership to pet ownership to the way we treat our planet and ourselves. His novel is ambitious yet understated, cautionary while rarely politically preachy. "Every Boy Should Have a Man" is that rare novel that is derived from such a disparate scope of literary influences that it waxes entirely original.
Sam Weller is the award-winning author of three books about Ray Bradbury and an associate professor in the creative writing department at Columbia College Chicago.
Genre mash-ups are de rigueur these days. Of course, writers like Margaret Atwood have been tight-roping the misty border between literary fiction and speculative fiction, fantasy and mystery for years. But a new outcropping of younger upstarts, such as Michael Chabon, Charles Yu and Jonathan Letham, have been contorting the lines in new and unexpected directions. Genre fiction, it would seem, is no longer relegated to the back of the bookstore or the dominion of the geek. Examining the borderlands between what is traditionally deemed "literary" and what is "genre," inverting, twisting, defying and fusing traditional genre tropes with meta-modernist craft, is all part of this new genre renaissance.
There is a precedent for the renewed interest in genre as literature. Charles Dickens, Edgar Allan Poe, Shirley Jackson, Tennessee Williams, Jorge Luis Borges, Ray Bradbury and a good many others all wrote what could be deemed literary genre fiction. Summed up, these writers welded tales of the future, tales of the fantastic, tales of the macabre with stories that, ultimately, looked at what it means to be human. But it is the pushing of the form, the muddying of the borders — and the sheer originality of story, point-of-view and structure — that make the new lit-genre rebirth something fresh and rather exciting to behold.
And now author Preston L. Allen joins the party. In "Every Boy Should Have a Man," Allen takes genre bending into unexplored territory. Allen, the author of the 2010 African-American sendup of sexuality and religion "Jesus Boy," has crafted a highly imaginative, unsettling work of social satire that melds multiple genres while ruminating on a host of contemporary ills.
A fearless amalgam of biblical language and allegory, fantasy and fable, "Every Boy Should Have a Man" is set in a world ruled by humanoid oafs — oversized humans who keep surviving humans ("Mans," as they are called) as pets. In "Every Boy," Allen utilizes a speculative fable as a way to muse on race, slavery, civil rights and even climate change.
Allen's post-apocalyptic world is ravaged by war, environmental destruction and vast economic disparity. The rich have gotten richer, the poor are down and out. More troubling: Cannibalism is rampant in Allen's fabulist tale. "Pets" are often stolen and eaten in this desperate world of poverty and hunger.
The novel tells the story of a poor boy and the three "mans" he owns as child. The boy finds his first man wandering in the bramble and brings him home, much like a child in our own world would shelter a stray dog or cat. The boy's parents are not happy with the new houseguest. The boy is accused of stealing this man, whom he names "Brown Skin" for his dark complexion. The man is handsome and — rare for a man — has the ability to speak. The boy's heart is broken when he is forced to give his "man" away. But the oaf boys' father loves his son and, recognizing his child's broken heart, brings home a female "man," wrapped in a red ribbon with the attached note:
"Every Boy Should Have a Man. You're a Fine Son. Love Dad."
The female man is fair, with red hair and freckles up and down her arms. The boy names her "Red Sleeves." The boy's second "man" vanishes, too, but not before she is impregnated and gives birth to his third and final man, the baby he names "Redlocks," for the red hair she inherited from her mother.
Redlocks is fiery, scrappy, a survivor with an attitude. The novel focuses on the story of Redlocks — a fairy tale archetype down to her very name (a play on "Goldilocks"). But Redlocks' story is flipped upside down by the world she lives in. The novel tracks her trials, travails and quest for survival in this dark and somber vision of a future run over by everything from war to strip mining to cannibalism.
"Every Boy Should Have a Man" is James Baldwin meets Aldous Huxley, a twisted contortion of a weird fairy tale future gone wrong, all told from high atop the mountain in a sort of New Testament prose. As the mixologist of this mad and unpredictable genre tableau, Allen has navigated into wholly uncharted territory. He comments on everything from slave ownership to pet ownership to the way we treat our planet and ourselves. His novel is ambitious yet understated, cautionary while rarely politically preachy. "Every Boy Should Have a Man" is that rare novel that is derived from such a disparate scope of literary influences that it waxes entirely original.
Sam Weller is the award-winning author of three books about Ray Bradbury and an associate professor in the creative writing department at Columbia College Chicago.
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