Kristen and I took our first walk across the Brooklyn Bridge yesterday.  You get a whole new appreciation for the structure walking it, much more so than seeing it from the shore or even driving over it.

The New York City Waterfalls exhibit is currently running. The most striking aspect of it, to me, is how insignificant the falls look in their setting.  I do not mean that in a bad way, they are quite impressive, and when you stand on the eastern side of the Brooklyn Bridge over the falls you get a real sense of their scale.  But what really struck me is that you have these four man-made, 90-100 foot tall structures cycling over 2 million gallons of East River water every hour, and still the structures are dwarfed by their surroundings.

I read that the artist wanted the exhibit to be as much about the negative space as the structures themselves, and on that he truly succeeded.  The Brooklyn Bridge fall is impressive, but completely dwarfed by the Brooklyn Bridge column that it sits adjacent to.  It’s very fitting that a massive exhibit built by man to mimic nature is lost among a massive city built by man.

A year ago I posted how I was quitting my full time job to work on my writing.  I did that, but as with most things in life, it didn’t turn out quite as I expected. No dramatic change to the life of a writer, starting a new life of art and such pursuits, leaving what was far behind.  The truth is, honestly, over that past year I’ve spent approximately half of that time working.  Working at my old place of employment, to be exact.  It turns out that short term project work is something they need, and something I much prefer to a 9-5 with no end in sight.  Take some time off, write, go back, earn some money, repeat as often as I can for as long as I can.

Yesterday was the first day “off” after a 3 month project. I have 8-10 weeks ahead of me to get some writing done. I’ve settled on a novel that will take place during the American Civil War, because the era and people fascinate me, and I want to test my theory that you can write any type of story in any type of setting/period and if the story is told well, the setting and genre should not matter.  I hope to get a good chunk of this project done over the next 10 weeks, but since I’ve decided to keep it historically accurate (in line with David McCullough’s statement that he “always strives to tell the truth”, which I completely agree with), I might spend the bulk of this time doing research for this project and a few others. Regardless, I’m spending the summer paying myself to write – not recommended for those who like to actually earn money – and I hope to keep to my daily regime a bit better than I have in the past.

One of the great joys of New York City is the truly weird but excellent stuff you run across.  Last weekend Kristen and I saw “Jollyship the Whiz-Bang” in an off Broadway theater.  Excellent.  Sure, I’ve seen puppets swear and have sex before (Avenue Q), but the nautical theme and an evangelist crab added just that much more to this show.  I highly recommend catching it before they close next month.

Voluntarily giving up reading for a week is harder than it sounds.

Had I stayed in the Navy, I would be eligible for retirement in two weeks.

Had I stayed in the Navy, I would be a completely different person than I am today.

People’s concepts of my freelancer/writer lifestyle are much cooler than the reality.

Regardless of those people’s concepts of my life being faulty, my life actually does rock right now and I’m damn happy.

Taking up jogging at 38 isn’t as hard as it sounds.

Yet again we’ve gone from cold rainy weather to hot and sunny in no time at all. Spring seems to be something that now only exists for the pharmaceuticals to push allergy medication. But hey, it’s warm and sunny, so I don’t care.

After a long night drinking in Hoboken to celebrate Matt’s exodus to Brooklyn, Kristen and I walked over to Jersey City today and I snapped the above photo of a railroad overpass. As-is the photo was too sharp on the borders, so I plugged it onto a border filter and then tweaked it out a little more on my own. Shot with my Canon SD700is. I was too hung over to be dragging around the big Rebel today.

I used to always wonder why my father, who was essentially a mechanic in his regular job, used to procrastinate when it came time to help me work on my car. Now that I’m a computer tech and I find myself with a crippled computer at home and no desire to work on anything electronic after a full day at the office, I finally understand.

That’s a long way of saying my computer’s busted, I’m waiting on a part to fix it, and until it shows up I’m just not interested in taking any extra steps to keep myself online and connected. Meh, I can use the break.

In the meantime, Matt was good enough to to post about Altered Fluid’s most recent early morning appearance on Hour of the Wolf a week ago, saving me the effort. Thanks, Matt!

While visiting the Rubin Museum this past Friday I saw depictions of a mongoose that spits out promises of wish fulfillment. I’m still trying to decide which is cooler: the wish mongoose or Futurama’s spice weasel.

Too bad they both lose out to the Hypnotoad.

… when you get out the ice cream and tequila at 4 in the afternoon.

Had a bit of an issue with my airbrushes today (both of them) and the paints I was attempting to spray (three different brands and bases). Took a break, let the healing effects of Patron course through my system for a bit, and then was able to successfully finish the major paint work for the day. Don’t let people tell you that tequila isn’t a wonder drug.

I don’t like to read books based on movies after I’ve seen the movie. I can read the book first, but reverse it and the movie almost always fails to live up to the book.

Several weeks ago Kristen and I finally watched “Stardust”. We both loved it. I’m not a huge fan of the fantasy genre, the “Lord of the Rings” and “The Princess Bride” are the main exceptions. The film “Stardust”, however, did not take itself too seriously, had well drawn characters, and really drew me in. I found myself thinking about the film more and more as days passed.

I just finished reading the novel “Stardust” today, and was likewise impressed. There are major differences in aspects of the novel and movie. The ending is completely different, even though it is peppered with the same elements. I found the forgetfulness spell that one character is cursed with handled much better in the book, but I missed the wonderful ship sequence of the movie, relegated to a few pages of exposition in the novel. The novel was able to introduce more characters, but the ending was completely different, lacking the action and resolution of the movie.

There are very few books that make the transition to movies mostly intact (excepting King’s “Shawshank Redemption”).  I think the key is to look at movies and books of the same material as two entirely different stories. You write a story for the page and it is one creature. To move it to film you must create a different creature. Both mediums have their advantages and limitations.  I’ve also come to this mind about stories that are read aloud, I’m often surprised how stories that I read can engross me, but when read aloud they lose me.

“Stardust” changed between the two iterations, print and film, but both were entertaining and well done with the same core to them. That’s good enough for me on both counts, and probably the best we can hope for.

While home over the holidays I was able to shoot a muzzle loading rifle and pistol for the first time. Research for some Civil War stuff I’m pondering. It was quite the experience. I never realized that black powder is completely different than the powder used in modern weapons and fireworks. It reeks of rotten eggs when fired. You’d think with all of the historical accounts and novels I’ve read that someone would have mentioned that at least once. The photo shows a .45 caliber ball flattened by the impact on the metal target support (just shot at some paper, no animals, don’t get yourselves in a lather), and another ball in unfired condition. No photos or video of the actual firings, it was too cold.

Something else that got smushed recently was the stern of the USS Weehawken model. Due to some dumb ass overloading a shelf above my computer (dumb ass=me) the shelf supports gave way and tumbled earthward, taking the shelf below it along for the ride. Fortunately, the literal pile of books cascaded over my computer and nothing expensive was broken, but had I been at my desk when it happened then I’d be typing this from the hospital. So there’s that silver lining. The Weehawken took some collateral damage. First shot shows the worst of it, the second shot shows the same area after a repair of Aves Apoxie Sculpt, lots of Mr. Surfacer, and ample swearing.