StandingWater Creations

Well, another week, another series of headaches, another series of sleepy nights and not-so-rested mornings, and another weekend looms ahead of me. Not a whole lot planned, at present, outside of waking up way too early tomorrow morning to help clean the chapel and then, probably, going back to the house and going back to sleep for a spell. It sounds like we might go clothes shopping, I need some new pairs of jeans as the ones I bought back in December (right before becoming engaged) are pretty much going the way of the wildebeest and need to replace them. What that means, more, is that my mom is acquiring more pairs of jeans from me for the long-promised denim quilt.

Waiting! Waiting! Waiting! Waiting! Waiting! Waiting!

Anyway, this weekend precedes the start of school next week. The semester begins on Tuesday September 4, 2007. Erin gets to go to class that day. I get to go to work later in the day.

I am a little excited for the semester to begin. This year I got to work all summer without going to class. Last summer I spent the first part in classes and the second part sleeping and working. Not a bad combination. This summer has been long, long days of sitting in front of a computer assisting customers for the company I work through. Come Tuesday, it will be semi-long, long nights of sitting in front of a computer helping customers.

As it is currently Friday, I am a bit surprised that we are being slammed with the number of calls that are coming through. At the same time, though, I am not too surprised. People are probably calling in hordes (today) because they don’t know we are open weekends (well, there are people here, I am never here) and think we will be closed on the Holiday – or want their issues solved before the holiday. The phones are closed that day and Tuesday, I can guarantee you, will be as busy as a beaver with a group of felled trees and a river needing damming.

Which reminds me, I was walking along the Provo Canyon trail and on the way out of the canyon I like to stop at a bridge where I know a group of beavers live. Sometimes you see them, most times you don’t. When Erin and I walked it late one evening a week or two ago, we saw one in the light of the flashlight I was carrying. That was kind of cool. However, the other night (when I was by myself) and dusk was settling in, I stopped and looked for the beavers and was a little startled to see a white face with black eye mask staring back at me. Then the raccoon made a noise and took off. There, in front of me, where, normally beavers play, was a really large raccoon. It was cool. I’d never, actually, seen a raccoon in the wild and there it was, just staring at me before it decided that disappearing in to the underbrush was a better idea than staring at me.

At one point I was going to be working Monday (sometime) but then decided not too, to spend time with Erin on our last full day before our lives drag us in opposite directions with school and work throwing us in to a very large tizzy and whirlwind of occupational hazards dragging us around and around and around until we wonder if that person we are sleeping next to is really the one we are married to.

Outside of all that, I’ve had a hub here at work that has my name on it. I left it here over the honeymoon and was a bit surprised it was still sitting on the desk, and intact, when I got back. However, it was and next week I may end up losing my seat, which means, also, that I will have to move my being and belongings to a new location; which, in turn, means that I don’t want to leave the hub there for just anyone to think they can take possession of. As I am under the impression that my changing shifts is going to cause a bit of upheaval in my work life, I am taking it with me. Also, I don’t like the way the dude I share the desk with handles the desk, leaves it dirty (I came back after being gone for a couple of weeks and literally had to clean off some sticky scummy mess - AND discovered my hub sitting out in front of everything with the cables sitting wherever the hell the dude felt like they needed to go… I come in most days to have the network cable plugged in to my computer just sitting half-hazardly across the desk and on the ground being stomped upon) that I am done being nice and sharing.

Still, this next week looks as though I get to go to school. I am taking a class from Bennion, again. This one is on fiction writing. I am, actually, kind of excited about it. He asked why I was taking this class… the reason, because BYU requires me to take something at this level and he was teaching it. I am also taking a 400 level class on writing online for business which requires me to get a copy of Dreamweaver. Wicked exciting.

Not really sure what will actually happen this weekend. Not like last weekend (or was it the weekend before???) where we, on a whim, went to a movie. I was hoping the next movie I want to see, Across the Universe would be out this weekend. It’s not. Not until September 21. Too bad. Will have to wait three more weeks to watch it. The first time I watched the trailer for that movie, with Erin, in a theater, I was a little weirded out by the visual imagery being used. It was more of a music video than a trailer; but it stuck with me. The next time I saw it, I was more interested in the movie. Combine that video with the trailers that have been released and I have become increasingly more interested in the movie than I was the first time.

I did find out that the Henson Company (creators of The Muppets and Henson Creature Workshop, group responsible for a lot of Sesame Street) has a new stage production called Puppet Up. I didn’t think that Brian Henson was involved with it, but he is pretty involved as one of the talents. I’ve informed Erin we need to go. Don’t know when we will go, as it requires a trip to L.A. and she made me promise we’d see something worth seeing (stage production along the lines of Phantom of the Opera or Les Miserables), but Puppet Up has become a need-to-see in my list of things to see.

Anyway, guess we’ll have to wait till Monday to find out how the weekend goes. Personally planning on doing a little writing. Spending time with Erin. And doing little else. Guess on Sunday we are going to Bountiful to Jack’s house. That’s about it.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 4:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

While looking at various news articles today I came across one where iTunes (Apple) will be dropping sales of NBC shows. This isn’t too bad, in my opinion, especially given that Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip lasted all of one season, I don’t (really) watch a lot of NBC (specific) shows; but I do watch NBC-Universal shows. Specifically, I am pretty well addicted to Psych and Eureka which reside on the USA Network and the SciFi Channel, respectively. Both of these channels (cable or satellite subscription required) are owned by NBC-Universal and the method for watching them is not to anxiously wait in front of the TV until they are broadcast, I am far too busy a person for that, but rather to pay for and download them via iTunes; then plugging in my iPod in to the television and watching the shows that way.

iTunes will stop selling NBC related shows in the fall of this year (2007), and the contract Apple has with NBC will expire at the end of December 2007.

The reason for this change is because NBC wants iTunes to charge a lot more money per episode download than they are currently charging. NBC, of late, has reached an all-time low of 4th place in the network race, being beaten by (in no particular order) ABC, CBS, and FOX. Not too long ago, NBC was at the top of the heap. They owned Thursday night, they were the network everyone was trying to keep up with… and now, they are declining and fast.

What gets me, here, is not that NBC is on the downward spiral, it happens. A couple of years ago, ABC was the bottom of the top four heap (apparently, the WB and Paramount network, now the CW are not real competitors along with PBS and other broadcast networks) until ABC came up with a powerhouse combination of Lost, Desperate Housewives, and Grey’s Anatomy. Since then, ABC has been able to create show after show that gets viewers attention and keeps it.

NBC does not.

NBC’s shows that I pay attention to are not even on their flagship network. Rather, they show on cable. I get cable. I can actually, if I had the time, watch one of the shows when it is shown (Friday nights, by the by); but I don’t have the time, AND I don’t want to make a special time slot simply because the show is airing. I would rather download it.

This does not mean that NBC and Apple’s little tiff over cost and money is going to cause me to become a rabid supporter of either side. I like Apple because through iTunes they help control a market that I believe needs better money management. A lot of the suppliers of music and media want Apple to raise prices. They see success and then want to raise the price of that success; Apple has refused realizing they are on top of a good thing. If they raise prices, then the outcome will be that they will lose customers to competitors who are forced to charge the same prices.

I also understand NBC wanting to make up revenue on the front end for shows that are being downloaded. With that said, though, I have a top-end price I am willing to spend on downloaded TV shows given that I only pay for downloads of shows I also intend to purchase on DVD. If the total cost-per-download is equal-to or less-than what I can expect to pay for the DVD’s when they come out, I am good with that. On the flipside, though, when the cost-per-download goes far in excess of the cost of the DVD’s when they come out I am less willing to purchase. What will happen, for me, is I will save my money and purchase the DVD’s, watching the show when I can put a disk in my machine rather than plugging my iPod in to the TV and watching.

When it comes to both Eureka and Psych I intend to own the DVD’s. I also have the seasons available to my iPod. The cost of downloading, both, is less than what I can expect to pay for the DVD’s when they are released. The same is true of the other show (singular) that I currently download. It is not an NBC property. However, if NBC thinks that its customers (me in particular) who use iTunes as a way of keeping up with different shows (last season Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip and The Black Donnelly’s were shows I followed almost exclusively through downloads) then they are seriously, seriously, SERIOUSLY mistaken. I am not going to get iTunes to change their policy. In the long run, it saves me money. By not buying downloads I get to wait longer for the shows to arrive on DVD, but at the same time, I don’t have the extra expense of downloading them.

Truth told, I think that NBC will realize this is a poor business decision. In the long run, I think that NBC will decide to allow Apple to set the pricing guidelines for downloadable shows. In the long run, I think that Apple has the better business model and will win out over competitors. However, in the long run I could be entirely wrong. Neither the convenience of downloading television or music or watching those downloads at my convenience is enough to get me to pay more money to purchase through iTunes and NBC is foolish to think that the consumer will side with them.

I believe that NBC is shooting itself in the foot and the winner here will be the consumer.

Go Apple.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 3:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I read somewhere, not so long ago, that some very famous writers did a lot of walking. For example, Charles Dickens would go out every night and walk for hours. I like this trait. It seems to match my own tendencies when I have the opportunities to have them. Though, on the flipside, I think it interesting the change in atmosphere from when Charles Dickens would walk and where and how I would walk today.

When I was living (and going on long walks) in New Hampshire, many days and evenings I would find myself stopping, on occasion, and talking to different people. This was interesting, in the sense that I was clearly a stranger in the neighborhoods; but a stranger with a purpose – putting pavement behind me. I had ulterior motives for walking, mostly health related and surviving the day; but the other side of the coin was that I had a lot of time whenever I went for a walk to just think about things.

As a result, I can see how authors would become walkers. Especially when dealing with a deadline or working through an issue with the piece, the act of walking helps one collect thoughts, work through ideas, look at other options that might be present (or available), and for the truly insane (not really), hold conversations with their characters; or the author can just walk (mentally) through the landscape of the environment that is being written in.

I’ve started walking again, pretty regularly. Sometimes I get in to modes where I forget how much I enjoy walking – mostly that happens when I am not walking, and then I wonder what it is going to take to get me walking again. This week, I don’t know what it was… I just started walking again. Sunday, specifically. After church I told Erin I wanted to go for a walk (she is always invited) and then informed her if she was going to come with me we needed to turn around when I wanted to turn around – which meant a longer walk than normal. Monday, because the length of the walk hurt me, I went most of the way to the Riverwoods and then turned around. Tuesday, Erin went with me again and we made it all the way to the intersection on University – which really means we made it to the Riverwoods. Last night, I walked the Provo Canyon trail (same as Sunday) and was out for a couple of hours.

The cool thing about last night was that I got to focus, more, on my talk for church and I started to think about a decision I made earlier this year dealing with someone I was working for. I’d never thought about the ramifications of what I’d done, quitting a job, until last night or many of the reasons I felt it necessary; and yet, after nearly an hour of working through the reasons why, I realized that I was very comfortable with my decision and the reasons that led up to it and could stand in front of the person I’d worked for and confidently and coherently tell him (if I was ever asked) why I did what I did.

I don’t think that will come up. I don’t see a reason I would ever need to do that. At the same time, it was nice to have a little bit of my past come together at an unexpected time and to realize that, if nothing else, I was true to my own convictions and had gotten to a point where I was really ready to move on.

Walking is so nice and therapeutic. I mean, so much happens between the front door and the front door and all with nothing more in mind than to put one foot in front of another again and again and again – getting halfway to tired, and then turning around and making your way back to the same front door. I find this more helpful than almost anything.

I think, in the long run, when I am done going to school, done with tech-support, and done with other aspects of my current life, I want to be known as a Walking Writer.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 4:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On September 30th, a Sunday, Erin and I will be speaking in church. Anyone in the Provo area that wants to hear us speak about obedience is welcome to come. We meet in the white chapel on North Canyon Road at 9 a.m. I’ve already invited my parents.

The point, though, is that I now have an uphill climb in creating a talk that I think meets the requirements for the topic, and matches my testimony of and belief in the principles of the gospel. Truth told, I look forward to the challenge, and, at the same time, realize that I’ve not followed advice in other areas very well. This does not stop me from writing the talk (and, fingers crossed, memorizing it), it just makes the writing harder than it needs to be.

This is how I am approaching the subject.

First, I am trying to see what the church has to say about the subject of obedience.

Because I am an active member of the church I want to know what the doctrine is.

Second, I want to figure out what I feel about the subject.

Specifically, what experiences and beliefs do I have? And how do those experiences and beliefs come in line with what the church teaches?

Third, I need to discover how I want to share this with other people and what stories and experiences, scriptures and thoughts are pertinent to the discussion.

Interesting, I am sure.

The point, though, is that I am in the process of working on writing, working on inordertowrite.com, about to head in to school where I am actually taking (at least) three classes that will require a bit of writing, and ultimately have to fit this in with work. It’s proving to be an interesting exploration.

The question for me, at the moment, is:

What is obedience?

My tendency with this question is to look at the parent-child relationship and the people I have lived with who have had children of varying shapes and sizes still living in the house. What does it mean for a parent to expect a child to obey? Sub-question: Is tacit obedience a sign of respect or can a child be expected to present their own beliefs or morals in a specific area?

None of these questions need to be answered. They help me come to terms with what I am thinking and, immediately, the stories and experiences I am planning on sharing. One of the aspects to writing the talk is figuring out what my testimony of the subject is, write it out, then try and simplify it so that it pairs with the simplicity of the gospel. I try to approach most (gospel) subjects, and most things in life, as simply as possible. I find that if you are looking for complexities, all you will find are riddles and mazes without answer or exit; whereas, if you realize that most issues will resolve in the simplest way – and sometimes simplicity is removing an entire problem and replacing it brand new (this does not denote least expensive), then the outcome is that you are looking for the most likely and simplest answer to a problem.

Anyway, that’s what I am thinking about, today, outside of Alicia Grey and the start of school, soon, and a whole host of other things.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 4:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Now that Erin is done with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows I will tell the world what I think.

First, Harry DOES NOT DIE. I never thought that J.K. Rowling was writing a book where her principle character would die; and, moreover, was extremely pleased when I got to the end of the book and the dude was still alive. I've said, for a few years, that the prophecy that everyone thought was meant to kill Harry (and Voldy) really meant that Harry could not expect a normal life if Voldemort was still alive. Voldy is the one who misinterpreted the prophesy and, as a result, made a mess of things.

With that, Voldemort dies. Yup. You heard me correct. Voldy dies. I thought, "Great, about time." I also thought, "Interesting that Rowling is allowing all of the principle kid characters have a chance at defeating a piece of Voldemort." Since Voldemort had divided his soul in to six parts and Dumbledore destroyed a couple of those before dying (in book six, shhh... don't tell anyone) that left one for Harry, one for Hermione, one for Ron, and one for Neville.

I thought that Ron running away from Harry and Hermione when the going got tough was not good. Moreover, I found that ENTIRE section of the book to be boring and far too much exposition. It was like slogging through mud filled with leaches while I was bleeding.

With that said, I thought it sucked the Dobbie died.

I didn't like the fact that Fred died and was a bit off-put by it.

Percy returning to the fold was more a matter of time, for me, than something that wasn't going to happen. I think it was forced in to it.

Having Harry become remus Lupin and Tonk's son's godfather was nice, then they died. Which sucked.

I liked how Harry faked death and that the Malfoy's helped him, semi-redeeming themselves after supporting Voldy.

Moreover, I loved the fact that I was right, all along, about Snape. Snape is a good guy and was under Dumbledore's orders - even if meant that Snape HAD to kill Dumbledore. I loved it. Moreover, I really liked what kept Snape good, and that was Harry's mother Lilly, whom he loved.

Pretty much, I am ruining anything to do with Harry Potter. I might write more later, but, in the past month if you haven't read it; well, it's your own fault.

Erin is a bit nicer than me.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 1:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Was over at MSNBC.com and came across one of their Newsweek articles on a group of men starting what amounts to a PAC (Political Action Commity). The name is the Punchbowl Group and consists of lobyists, ex-members of the fed, ex-politicians, hedge fund managers, corporate leaders, and more who want the government to legislate a change in the way the Fed can change the interest rates.

The article can be found HERE!!!!

Basically, the gist of the group is that interest rates should be legislated to remain low because we, as American's, are a country who has based its economy on borrowing money.

More, there have been more than 14 million people in "X" number of years go in to debt to buy a house, and as the housing market is the one that is currently under attack, it is up to the Federal Government and the Legislative branch (e.g. the House and Senate) to create a bail-out plan that will not cause various industries to lose jobs, have to lay people off, or just get uncomfortable as the market resets itself. Most of the men joining these Punchbowl groups are wealthy because of investments and being industry leaders.

Unfortunately, this group, as a lobbying group, is actually having a great deal of success as it approaches Congress to force an unnaturally low interest rate. Specifically, they want the interest rate to be kept low except for specific conditions they are setting forth. Congress is listening to them.

Part of the big issue with this is that the housing market, which does help fund a lot of other markets... one of the participants in this group, the auto industry.

The auto industry is actually really good at going to Congress for monetary assistance. The outcome, instead of making vehicles that are affordable and getting rid of the cancers that exist within their organizations, one of the worst of which is the unions, they raise prices and then cry , "Foul," when the public does not immediately leap and buy new SUV's or pick-up trucks. This, in turn, forces them to lose money, go through more lay-offs, and have to go through what is termed a restructuring and in my opinion is a way to get Uncle Sam to step in and buy the companies way out of the issues they are presented with.

In the case of the housing market, housing prices have unnaturally been on the rise first because the Fed has kept interest rates lower and mortgage lenders have been handing out hundreds of thousands of dollars at a pop because they could and because interest rates were low due to a recession back in 2001, 2002, and 2003 and forward. Moreover, there has been an active effort to convince every person that has a job that they are also entitled to the joys of home ownership and, as such, that they should go in to debt because building equity within something is better than renting. This I agree with and disagree with, but then, I agree and disagree with a lot of things.

The issue here, is that sub-prime lenders have offered loans based off of variable interest rates with promises that cannot and do not pan out. In other words, lenders have repeatedly and knowingly lied to home buyers doing two things: one, bringing a lot of people who normally would not be able to afford a house in to the housing market; and two, building a time bomb in to the housing market where, invariably, there will be an implosion when interest rates started to rise causing mortgage payments to also rise, considerably. This, in turn, causes people to default on mortgage payments leading them to lose their homes and declare bankruptcy.

Evidences of this can be seen in and around many big

There is a cascading effect to this. People start to lose jobs as different aspects of the economy are affected, which in turn means that those same people cannot spend money, which means that more jobs are lost as more revenue is lost, leading to another recession.

Recessions are bad things in the sense that recession equals a lot of people out of work; however, recessions are also good things as it means the market and economy is in a state of resetting itself to reflect more realistic values. The problem with the punchbowl groups, though, is that they want Uncle Sam, through the Congress, to artificially keep payments and interest rates low thereby allowing for them to also, artificially, keep housing and other prices high. Higher prices mean higher earnings; and higher earnings means that, publicly, it appears that these same individuals are doing extremely well.

The thing that really gets me going, though, is to claim that we, as a nation, need to keep our credit market stable to maintain markets in other countries. However, this, too, is a red herring as other markets will find other outlets and will also look to produce products for less money. China, for example, is in an explosive growth stage. If we were to enter a recession this would affect China negatively. What we fail to acknowledge is that our spending may not be good for the economic growth of China or other nations that produce what we are looking for. Moreover, product manufacturing is sent offshore to reduce costs; the more manufacturing that is sent to a nation, the higher the costs because, as a result of the business sent offshore it is necessary for businesses to become more competitive, salary-wise, to get and maintain employees. This, in case you don't pay attention, is the reason why phone support and manufacturing changes nations semi-frequently - it is to keep corporate costs down and low. When they start to grow because you've invested in India (or China or elsewhere) you move them to another nation that will charge less money.

The point, though, is that the market is in desperate need of resetting. A recession will help reset it. We are better off going through a recession than attempting to maintain the current, explosive, monetary standards we are keeping. If we try to artificially avoid a recession the outcome will be hyper-inflation and an unavoidable massive recession with every nation on the Earth being affected very negatively. The problem is that the movers and shakers in the country care less about what will happen in the near future over what they think should be happening, for them, under their watch, right now.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 4:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, had a chance to change the underlying software for inordertowrite.com by adding a WordPress blog as the main software for the site. I am happy with this because it allows me to operate and manage the site with a lot less stress, plus, with a little effort, I was able to make RSS (reel simple syndication) feeds show up as blog entries. Granted, there are some issues with that, still, like finding the proper URL for the blogs I want to feed in to the inordertowrite.com WordPress install, but I feel that is a small issue and not a large one. As such, I have pubrants.blogspot.com feeding to inordertowrite.com which means that site can become a stop for people wanting updates from various people around the web -- I intend to add links in the Links area on the right side of the page.

Gotta admit, finding, getting Erin and my Mom and a lot of other people to use WordPress has caused me to have to learn a lot more about it. I like the program a lot. Especially since it is open source and is very well supported within that community. You can, pretty much, find all sorts of information, plugins, and themes for the website and with a little effort, you can also edit and change the themes, once downloaded, to reflect what you want them to reflect. This is very cool.

More, I can start working on entries or ideas within the administrative section of my WordPress install and save them until I’ve worked through them enough, upload images, create static pages… pretty much do whatever I want through a gui interface rather than trying to figure out how to code HTML and CSS and make both work together. Don’t get me wrong, I am not interested in changing this blog, just finding it very interesting and entertaining to be able to change inordertowrite.com and Erin’s site, and my Mom’s site whenever we need to – along with the community support that exists for the software.

With all that said, we shall grow inordertowrite.com and hopefully generate traffic that justifies the time, energy, and other efforts that have existed for that website. Of course, I just looked at the current feed and outside of showing what category it belongs in, I am not finding a linkback to the original source. That is important. I will have to mess around with it, maybe create something that links back better, and try again to make sure this is working properly.

Anyway, thought all my loyal readers would love to hear about inordertowrite.com and the most recent changes.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 3:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I need a little bit of sleep. I need a lot of sleep. Need. Sleep. Yes, it is true. After more than 30 years of living, I have been forced (years ago, actually) to realize that I need sleep.

So, when I got engaged (back in January) and after dating Erin for a period of time (starting last year) and I realized that I was lacking a lot of sleep. When I complained about this, and complain is the right word, my mom would say, “Wait until you get married.” The implication with this admonition was that marriage would equate to more sleep.

You see, before marriage, the objective of most nights (and days) was to spend as much time together as possible. The outcome, of that, was that we (Erin and I) would not want to say goodnight and would put it off for as long as possible. Which means, for those who are paying attention, that I would get to bed pretty late and get up pretty early (for work and other things) which meant that I didn’t sleep a whole lot.

One of the last things I do at night is read various things. Some of those things (and I am being intentionally vague here) are not optional. I don’t get to say, “Not today,” for them. I read no matter what, which then translates my nights in to a lot later. So, leave Erin at midnight and get to bed between 1 a.m. and 1:30 a.m.

So, getting married was supposed to help me get more sleep. And, while on the honeymoon, Erin and I spent a lot of our time sleeping. Literally sleeping. Not the fake kind of sleeping where you are just lounging about. It was as though we needed to get as much sleep as we could.

Move forward, in time, to getting home, starting lives over again, going back to work, and then… dum dum dum dummmmm!... we’re back to what feels like a lack of sleep. Sure, sure, I’m married, I always feel tired between work, school (well, next week) and family life; but the sleep issue has not been taken care of. If, by waiting until I got married, what was meant that sleep patterns would start to normalize because I wasn’t having to go home at night; then my mother was probably very correct. We try to go to bed earlier, but that doesn’t mean that I am getting more sleep.

However, I am getting more consistent sleep. Like on Sunday. Apparently, going to church with me has proven to be an interesting experience since church = 9 a.m. and John not getting a lot of sleep (even with promises of a nice long nap) does not equal friendly, nice, or courteous when in church. The outcome, going to church with me not fun. However, this previous Sunday, after sleep time, going to church with me did not suck.

See, a positive side effect of better sleeping patterns.

With that said, in less than a week, I get to change work schedules and work from 5 to 11 p.m. What this means is that I go home and have to go to bed relatively quickly. This, in turn, means that Erin/John time gets to shift. At present, we have all evening/night to spend together; when school starts that will change as school, for the both of us, starts at 10:00 a.m. and then we go our different ways for most of the day. For me, it’s mostly class; for Erin it’s class and work. The current complaint or observation is that my work and school schedule and Erin’s work and school schedules don’t mesh very well. We will get to feel what it is like to be two busy individuals.

Anywho, the notion of marriage equaling more sleep is a load of crap. More specifically, the more busy we become, throw in the potential for children (not yet, actually; but the potential does exist) and you then create a scenario where less sleep becomes the norm and not more sleep. Throw in needs for family, work, school, etc., and the outcome can prove to be marriage equating to less sleep than every before.

Just some observations.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 2:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

To begin, I’ve updated, I hope for the final time, inordertowrite.com. I’ve decided on a blog, Wordpress to be specific, as the base tool for content management and plan to use it more of an easy-update option than other applications I was looking at. The thing with Wordpress is that it allows me greater latitude to create subjects and categories to file things under – and since I wanted all new material to go through the main page, I am pretty excited about the development. Now I just need to start creating content.

I don’t think, at the moment, that we have too much planned for the weekend. Maybe some house maintenance; hopefully a late morning on Saturday; church on Sunday; and then the start of the week before school and all the little things that get to be tied together (in a cute little bow) before we start going to school every day (actually, I just go Mondays. Wednesdays, and Fridays) and then homework, reading, work, and trying to find time to spend together between my new (in a week) work schedule of 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. (that became official last night).

Erin did get her new SSN card in the mail yesterday. According to Amazon.com and UPS.com the monitor we ordered (through Amazon.com) arrived at our house and is ready to be put on to Erin’s new desktop computer (courtesy of my brother Jared). And, I am sure, I may have to make some phone calls to get an office suite up and running on that system so that it can be used for school, freelance work, at home work for our respective jobs, blogging, screenwriting, and updating of many websites. On top of which, we will probably use the desktop as a backup resource for music, movies, tv shows, etc.

For those who were “in the know” Erin was also looking for specific dates of things like our first date (found by figuring out when I spilled queso in the back seat of my car), and other things like the first kiss (discovered through bank records (mine, not hers) and circumstantial evidence). In short, she is pretty comfortable with the important dates and when things happened. Which, really, means I don’t have to look at bank statements anymore to find out what was happening AROUND what we think was happening. It occurred to me that I paid for our first date with my check card and then hot chocolate at Borders and could find the exact date that way… please, PLEASE, don’t ask me to.

Outside of that, you know, it’s a weekend.

To update the important things though, I have still done no progressive writing on Alicia Grey, though I have spent some time writing origins, or pseudo-origins, for some of the characters that will, ultimately, play roles in the lives of the character(s). I need to sit and write, but at the end of the day, I think it is one of the few things I want to be doing. Maybe some this weekend. Guess we’ll have to wait until Monday to find out.

With Alicia Grey I have a short piece for another character I have been thinking about and discovered a new character that I need to integrate somehow.

And, as you know from the start of this, I’ve done some work on inordertowrite.com, effectively launching the site today.

As a side note, Jordan sent me an article on new technology using unique steam power to provide the electrical needs of a modern prosthetic arm. It was interesting to read about and adds to the scope of another story I want to write, though that gets filed under “Future Projects” and not in “Active Projects”. I mention this as much because Jordan likes to have things like this mentioned, and because it adds to the scope of what I am writing.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 4:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Some years ago it was a joke around Provo, UT that people who went to Utah Valley State College (UVSC, it was actually a different name back then like UVC or Utah Valley College) were really people who’d come in to town, wanted to live in Provo (girls and boys who want to hook up with each other) but didn’t have the grades of moxie to get in to BYU (Brigham Young University). As a result, UVSC became little BYU.

I don’t know, mostly because I don’t care, whether or not that stigma still exists. Over the years the student population has changed, considerably, and as such, the ideas that were present, more than ten years ago, when I first attempted to be a student at BYU have changed… a lot. For example, when I first started attending the university as a part-time student, students were not allowed to wear sandals because leg hair is connected to pubic hair and exposed pubic hair (on the feet specifically) was not allowed. This time back, the school had changed that rule.

All of that lead-up is to say that today Erin is at UVSC for her work at a job fair attempting to recruit people. This shouldn’t be a joke, to me, and yet… it kind of is. I mean, I do come from an entirely different era in education than the people, mostly, who are attending the schools around me. Because of where I am, the students are very traditional. Traditional students are generally between the ages of 18 and 23 with a slight offset for LDS missions which then trends (only in this area and mostly with male students) the top-end age to 25. This does not change the nature of the university. It is still traditional.

At a traditional university you get a lot of people that realize the path, or road, to success is through college. Not everyone needs, or wants to go to college. And yet, in order to have a higher standard of living they go because that is what is expected of them. It’s a nasty sequence of events. Wouldn’t you be happier to be a homebody or a mechanic or a lumberjack or a firefighter? Chances are, “Yes,” and yet, you go to school because the world has dictated that success denotes higher education. The outcome is that Utah Valley College turns into Utah Valley State College which, some years ago, claimed they wanted to become Utah Valley University.

None of that really matters. What matters in this area is that Erin was there to recruit potential new persons for a variety of jobs her company is advertising for. Apparently, Utah County, the home of the overqualified little person who also happens to speak a dozen different languages (which does not matter), is having a hard time coming up with a sufficient number of actually qualified people for the jobs her employers are wanting to hire for. So, they end up on a college campus that, when I give any thought to it, makes me chuckle on the inside.

Yes. I am a BYU snob. At least, in Utah I am a BYU snob. Outside of Utah I don’t know that BYU (well outside of Utah and outside of the LDS community) holds any weight or water whatsoever. I know that the school has an academic reputation in a couple of areas. 1) It produces good, hard workers; and 2) many Ivy league universities, for graduate programs, recruit and accept applicants from these here parts. For the world of true-academia, the hard worker is a negative connotation; for the world if Ivy League and tier one schools (very important) the connotation is very good. The problem, though, is similar in structure to the issue that exists when you consider the notion of UVSC growing as a school because we are duped in to thinking that we have to have a college degree to be happy: most people that get a bachelors degree are not going to go on and get an MA or PhD. That is for the exception and not the rule; moreover, to properly progress you have to leave the land of happy valley (scary, I realize) and go to another school to truly be considered an academic. Since a good portion of the people who come to Utah, Provo/Orem and get a degree never leave, and they are willing to work crap jobs to make ends meet without ever once pursuing a job related to their degree, the outcome is that the degree is meaningless in an area where too many people (a higher percentage of the working population) has one.

You have to leave Utah.

The thing with UVSC is that I don’t really see it as a real school. Yes. Yes. Yes. I know, it is fully qualified in the degrees it offers; but still, it’s UVSC. I can’t imagine what it would be like to actually be from this area and think, “Oh, sure, that’s a good school.” I’ve spent, on and off, a bit of time in Utah and in Utah County (home to BYU and UVSC and other schools) and, honestly, I don’t see it. If all you want is a degree, sure, go. If what you want is a better chance at something better, come on, go somewhere that will get you that chance.

I guess, for me, the interesting thing would be whether or not someone worth having actually developed from UVSC. I know that people go there. I know they are intelligent people. And yet, I have this stigma about the school. Maybe it is unfair; yet, when Erin told me she was going all I could do, inside, was snigger because I thought, “Yeah, good luck with that.” My thoughts became even more unruly when I realized she had to park far enough away from the building she had to sit in handing out papers to potential employees. The shuttle was nice, but what happens if you need to make a quick exit? You have a long run ahead of you and then, Erin is a girl, what happens if she’d dressed in heels? Not only a long run, but one that requires the removal of footwear. Couple all of that with the potential lack of direction to where the car is parked and, wow! you've got yourself a problem.

Not that you’d have to make a quick getaway from that place; but suppose you did.

Things happen.

Honestly, I hope they found some real candidates. People that can do the job, because I think that would be great. But, truth told, I don’t think they had much success.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 4:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I think it was about a year ago I was reading Neil Gaiman’s website and he mentioned he’d purchased a book titled Adventures in Unhistory. I ordered a copy because I liked the title and the premise (though I think most names beginning with the prefix un- are kinda lame) and as a result have had the book sitting on a shelf between, now, three different apartments and one house.

Well, several weeks ago I picked up my copy, placed, gently, the dust jacket on a shelf, and started to read it. I have, at the same time, found it interesting and not a page-turner by any stretch of the imagination; though the book is interesting enough in the information it attempts to impart that it does draw me back again and again and again. I can’t say this about a lot of books I read.

Not like I don’t have stacks of books to read. Every once in a while I think, “I should add some kind of applet to the sidebar to show people which books (non-school) I am carrying around and working my way through,” and then I realize that is one more thing to try and update; and, for the most part, it’s a list that is actually very boring. Most of those books are on writing. Fiction, mostly. Picked up one last night on writing magazine articles. I am thinking that I’ve had some ideas for articles and, as a result, want to get out there and see what kinds of markets exist for that aspect of freelancing. Specifically, there is an article about Maine for a Maine publication I want to write. As I looked at the publications information, the other day, their guidelines indicate that I not talk about it in advance of my attempting to get them to take me seriously.

Anyway, most of what I am working through are non-fiction works specifically on writing and, unless you are really in to the whole writing thing (like me) they are boring books. Though, with that said, I plan to talk about them more on inordertowrite.com (.net, .org) – which, also, incidentally got a facelift as I realized that for CMS I prefer blogs and of the blogging software I am currently running, wordpress seems to be the most user friendly for the things (and changes) I want to be doing. Plus, it took little/no effort to uninstall the CMS I was using (mambo) and install Wordpress on the website(s).

And yet, that doesn’t talk about what I want to be talking about, now does it?

Specifically, Adventures in Unhistory is a book that takes some popular mythologies, fantasies, and then dissects the etymology of the myth in to aspects that make it possible for the story, creature, or character to have existed in some form or another. Take, for example, my current favorite item in the book, the phoenix.

Basically, the author (Avram Davidson) takes apart the pieces of the phoenix and tries to explain them. For example, the color of the phoenix is red and a brilliant blue. There are only a handful of birds, and none native to the middle east, that are this color. He posits that for a bird to be this color it would have to come from a remote location, and, one of those locations would be China where a specifically red hued and were also protected by the government… it would make sense that if this bird were to escape or be smuggled out rarely, it would also make sense the idea that the phoenix dies in fire and is reborn every 500 or 1000 years.

Anyway, there is a lot more like anting. I did not know that birds, especially large wild ones, anted. Or that anting even existed. This is, for those that don’t know (I am assuming this is everyone) where a bird takes an object, ants in ancient times, and rubs them all over their bodies and especially under the wings. It causes the bird to go into an almost orgasmic state after which the bird frequently falls over. That’s interesting, but what is more interesting is that a lot of large birds actually like to do this in and around fire all without burning themselves or singeing their feathers. And then the bird falls over.

For hundreds, nay THOUSANDS, of years no one has actually witnessed this happening, or no one of enough authority with some kind of video or photographic evidence. And then someone with evidence did see it happening and suddenly, it is possible for a bird to dance in flames and fall over to be a part of the origin of the phoenix myth.

Davidson begins his book with Sinbad the Sailor and I am currently reading about the origin of dragon mythologies and how most peoples (ancient) had a dragon guarding something (gold) in different directions (e.g. north, south, east, and west) with the Chinese actually having a dragon for each of these (Green dragon was for south, kind of baffles me as south, in my mind, is more indicative of a different color, like blue or yellow; but then, that is me).

Anyway, the book is very interesting. I like it.

Thought I’d take the time and share that with y’all.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 4:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Erin and I, last Saturday, went to see Stardust at the Provo Towncenter (I think) mall at the Cinemark movie theater there. We were in the mall, primarily, to find something for Erin and decided to pick up tickets only to discover that the movie was starting in ten minutes. On a whim, we went. We were not disappointed.

Generally speaking, Stardust is a fantasy epic with touches on steampunk and a nod to movies like The Princess Bride without actually touching on either element. It was an amazing movie that deserves to be watched; moreover, it is a movie that makes you wonder how Hollywood does not catch a clue and make more movies like this. Both Erin and I, amazingly, enjoyed the movie – a lot.

Stardust is a movie based off of a Neil Gaiman work. Basically, a young man sees a star fall as he is spending time with a girl he thinks he is in love with. She is about to marry a rival and, as a result, the young man promises to cross a wall in to another land and retrieve the falling star for her. She agrees that if in a week he can bring back the fallen star she will marry him. So off he goes on his adventure to retrieve the falling star.

Enter Stormhold a land that sits alongside England… or… well… a land you get to through a small town called Wall in England. It is a magical land that does not follow the same rules as our world. There are witches and ghosts, flying ships that collect lightning, there are merchants, princesses, princes, sword fights, and all sorts of things not to forget unicorns and magical chains that grow and shrink and keep the person chained, well… chained.

From what I understand as I’ve not read the book there is a battle between some kind of a large cat and the unicorn, but, truth told, it was kind of cool to see the unicorn and to have the protagonist lose the star and… oh, did I mention the star was really a girl.

Anyway, as the protagonist, Tristen, takes the star, who is also a girl, back to the town of Wall, they have adventures like running in to a witch (Michelle Pfeiffer) who is obsessed with eternal youth and who wants to kill the star to get her heart which will, also, allow her to maintain her youth. They run in to a group of pirates who sail on a ship (that also floats) through the sky under a large balloon with a captain (Robert De Niro) who is a little weird and also very fun to watch.

The whole movie is really a love story. It is an adventure in a strange land where almost everything turns out the way it is supposed to be and the evil princes who are trying to change a ruby from clear back to red (you have to either read the book or see the movie as to why) all end up dying and hanging around until the end, seemingly haunting each other until Tristan succeeds in destroying the witches and discovering what it means to grow up, be an adult, fall in love, and do what is necessary to get what he really wants out of life.

In the end, Erin and I both felt like the movie was totally one that was worth watching. It was worth the cost of the ticket, it may be one we purchase when it comes out on DVD and it is a movie that makes you feel better about yourself having watched it. Not all movies do that. In this case, we liked the movie that when her brother started talking about what he was going to do with the girl he has started dating, is dating (I really don’t know what is going on there as she has a countdown on her myspace page for when her missionary comes home and yet they’ve spent their free time together the last few days), that he take her to the movie because, well, it is that kind of a movie. You want to take your sweetheart to it because… well… think Return of the Jedi and the Ewoks or The Princess Bride where the mere presence of the movie is enough to make her all touchy feely and yadda. Anyway, great, GREAT, date movie.

The point is that I really enjoyed this movie. I liked how it was acted. I enjoyed the adventure. It spoke to a lot of things that I enjoy in fiction and stories and enjoy when they are done in movies. In the end, I highly recommend this movie if you just want to go and see a movie.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 11:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Erin and I spent our honeymoon in Maine. Many people, upon hearing this, get all weird and say things like, “Wouldn’t Hawaii have been more fun?” I look at them and just think, “Why does your choice for a honeymoon have to be my choice for a honeymoon?” Erin and I, together, made the choice to go to Maine. We had multiple reasons, not the least of which was that I had never been to the state before. On top of which, we wanted to look at the campuses of some schools and we needed to be on the east coast for a ring ceremony approximately (a little more by hours) one week from when we got married.

With that said, the honeymoon was a very relaxing experience. Erin and I got to sleep a lot. Are you supposed to sleep a lot on a honeymoon? On top of which, we stayed on the top floor of the Morrill Mansion that used to be a tenement building and is now a Bed and Breakfast in a room that was very nice. The bathroom had a very large window next to it that, when closed, didn’t show anything to the neighbors, and still allowed a ton of light through. It was very nice. Very well situated. Erin found it. And we didn’t spend a ton of money for the days we spent there.

Although, heading to Maine Erin suggested an alternative route that took us in to New Hampshire, not the little bit that touches the ocean, make the trip hours longer. It was fun. We got to adventure. Make a lot of stops. See things we probably wouldn’t have seen before. And ended up in Portland, ME and at the B&B a little later than we’d initially intended.

We actually spent a couple of days just recovering from the wedding (sealing) and the first reception at the Springville Museum of Art. I didn’t know I’d gotten so tired and so under-the-weather until we were laying in our bed in the Morrill Mansion and life just seemed to collapse around us. We did, for those who care, end up finding the Maine Mall, which caused me to think, “main mall,” and a lot of little shops while in Portland. We bought a map so we didn’t get too lost while avoiding the toll roads (hate toll roads) and Erin pointed out that I learn places pretty darn quickly. Oh, and for the two of us, we also ended up at Borders to purchase a couple of books AND a movie.

We ended up, Tuesday (we drove to Dalton, MA on Wednesday) heading up to the University of Southern Maine’s Stonecoast campus… it’s called The Stone House. It is a stone house. I wanted to see where an MFA Writing program took place. As I am getting more serious about graduating and have University requirements, mostly, to deal with to get done, one of which is a language requirement for my degree that requires four semesters, we are starting to look at what is coming next. I am specifically looking at low residency programs that require ten to twenty days every six months rather than full time residency at some university; moreover, we are also looking at potential jobs that will allow us to continue following what we’ve stated we want to be doing.

Anyway, on the way from Maine to Dalton we took a detour through UMASS Amherst and saw the campus. I liked it. They had a combination of old style buildings with more modern (modern meaning 80’s cement) architecture. The campus seemed very nice and inviting. I was, actually, very surprised. We didn’t stay very long.

Once back in Dalton we collected more of our things and then went down to Otis. Otis is a little nothing town. We were borrowing a house down there to stay in away from everyone else. The house was nice, a mix of farmhouse and cabin. No A/C and I discovered, in the process, that my allergies to New England (mostly plantlife, if’n you needed or wanted to know) came raging back. I had red eyes and a stuffy nose the entire time we stayed there.

On Friday we did the whole ring ceremony thing. Andy, Debbie, and the girls came for that one. It was very nice to see them. My friend Linda and her husband came as well. That was really exciting. I like Linda and I like Andy and Debbie and the girls. Seeing them, again, was fun. On top of which, I also got to meet Erin’s extended family and the Scranton Girls. There are three of them, well, there are, technically, more than three, but there will forever only be three Scranton Girls in my book. I was excited to meet Erin’s Auntie and the three girls and the cousins and my favorite part of the event was Kayla.

About Kayla, 2nd cousin to Erin. She was a little standoffish to me, but by the end of the night she’d gathered a lot of gift bags and told me not to touch they were hers. Within 30 minutes Erin’s dad said, “She can have them, but I am bigger and I am moving them.” Just prior to this Erin and I were dancing and stopped for water. Kayla was standing on a chair and trying to get at the Gluten-free cake. I moved it closer and showed her how to cut the cake before realizing she was more interested in the icing on the cake. I then showed her how to get at the icing. We then destroyed the cake because, like 2 year olds, I like icing. Her mom came over, it was pointed out to her what I had done, what Kayla was doing, and the outcome was that she said, “So what?” Well, not exactly, but the sentiment is pretty much the same.

The next morning, rather than attributing illness to too much icing provided by me, she told Erin’s mom that she was sick because she’d danced too much. Apparently, Kayla had thrown up most of the night. It was a good party.

At the ring ceremony we’d asked my dad to tell the congregated group about why we are sealed in the temple. He did an amazing job. Erin’s dad shared a scripture and offered us advice. Erin’s friend (one of the Scranton Girls) Christine (I hope I have the spelling right) sang Push by Sarah McLachlan. Andy was my best man and his two girls were the flower girls; before the end of the ring ceremony he was holding the flowers and his youngest daughter had fallen off the step she was standing on.

Pretty much everything went perfectly from the wedding (sealing) in Manti where they had unseasonable cool weather (80’s instead of 90’s and chances for rain) to the reception in Springville to the ring ceremony and party in Massachusetts. It was perfect and hold a lifetime full of memories. I think we are still waiting for the photographer to get pictures to us, but she was amazing and I would suggest her to my closest friends (though she would not be suggested to people I dislike immensely).

Anyway, the honeymoon portion of things extended through last week. The plans were Monday last, fly home. Tuesday, sleep (we lasted till 11 a.m.), and the rest of the week clean, organize, and spend a lot of time together. And that is what we did.

As for writing, outside of a couple of blog entries I didn’t do anything significant last week. I’ve not done a lot this week. I still need to write a review of Stardust and Erin is encouraging me to do some serious writing beginning tonight. Hopefully, there will be more information to share in the coming days. Beyond that, life is progressing. We start school two weeks from today, I, more specifically, start school two weeks from tomorrow as I got out of Tuesday/Thursday classes. I am excited, I am not sure where Erin sits with school excitement. This is her last semester and then she is a graduate with a B.A. in Philosophy.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 3:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last night ended with Erin and I driving, after midnight, to Jared’s house to pick up Erin’s brother’s car. We were hoping for an earlier evening as we both had to get up this morning and go to work. We’ve been off work for about three weeks (more or less) and as a result, were both (I think) excited and a little put-off by having to go back to work. This does not mean we didn’t want to, it was just a nice, long, fun, relaxing vacation -- until we hit the organize John’s life portion of it.

And yet, I think it is proving to be nice getting back to work and the routine of working and all that.

However, with that said, I got to work to discover two things.

1) My hub I purchased for my laptop computer was still on my desk; and that my desk was still my desk.

2) That the desk I share with a graveyard person-type was dirty and needed to be cleaned and excised of evil spirits. So, a priest and a lot of wet paper towels later (no access that I am aware of to cleaning wipey thingies) my desk is somewhat habitable.

What was a bit strange to me, though, was that all of the things I’d written on the white board at my cubicle/desk were still on the white board. What was disgusting to me was the amount of mess that had accumulated while I was gone. None of it mine…

Of course, getting back and cleaning out a) e-mail; and b) the dirt on the desk wasn’t the only things going down with me today. I had to get my manager to sit down and recreate my account on my computer for me. Nothing wanted to come up. Since I sit down, log in to the phones, and start taking calls as I open the rest of the applications on my computer, and nothing was working I had to get him to reinstall me on the computer. Apparently, he’d been deleting all the unnecessary accounts on the system, started to delete mine (bad omen???), and then realized I was coming back and cancelled the delete, only it was too late. I lost some files that are backed up on my personal PC.

Moving on…

Erin and I did go and see Stardust on Saturday. We’d been trying to see it most of last week, but the aforementionedreoganizationproject got in the way most days. No one wants to walk away from a giant mess only to come back to it. However, by Saturday afternoon, during a crusade to find Erin something, we decided to get tickets only to discover that the movie was starting in ten minutes so… we went. It was good.

Stardust is a movie based off of Neil Gaiman’s book of the same title. I will have to review it later. For now, the movie was exceptionally well done and I love LOVED Robert DeNiro’s character. LOVED.

I guess on a different (slightly) note, we did acquire (legally???) an A/C that will fit in one of the windows. I get to look at cleaning it and installing it in one of the windows and then seeing how well it works. Should prove to be fun. Of course, what will REALLY be fun is finding an outlet for it. I kind of feel bad, now, given that Erin’s parents, both, would’ve killed for me to find a solution to the non-air-conditioned environ before the wedding.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 2:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today is Friday. I don’t plan to update tomorrow or Sunday. Tomorrow I think the plan is more of the same, clean up, organize John (that’s me) and maybe see Stardust the Neil Gaiman movie… well, it is a movie based off of his book of the same title.

We did go to Bed, Bath and Beyond to return some things we didn’t want, were shipped so they arrived broken, and ended up causing me to finally hit shopping overload by the time we went to Wal-Mart for additional things that needed getting… like different kinds of containers with more drawers for me to organize my things. At that point, I WAS in shopping overload and was ready to leave Utah, people in Utah, and large box shopping locations so far behind me that if Erin had said, “Let’s go to...” I might’ve exploded all over everything.

However, before the shopping overload we did change our official married/single status at BYU to “married” so that we didn’t have to deal with the housing office, so much, come two weeks from now. BYU has a thing about single men and single women living together.

Beyond realizing that I had a professor last year that I almost total abhor, it just took me a year to realize it, it’s been a pretty interestingly slow day.

Again, no real progress on the writing front, thinking I will have to go back to the day job before I really start writing again.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 5:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday Erin and I spent the day taking care of odds and ends that needed taking care of, insurance of cars, where things are going to be registered, name changes (okay, okay, here there is only one name change, hers, but, still, had to go and sit in the Social Security Administration office and wait talking to a mechanic from Nephi, UT), and then hanging things on walls after purchasing the wire and pieces to make sure the frames hang on the wall. Oh, and Erin’s parents, for the wedding, bought me a dresser and that went together a couple of nights ago as well which meant that I got to put my clothes in (personal space) and then Morris and his posse… actually, looking up the congregation of deer, which the moose is a subspecies of, Morris, which is a moose, and his crew would be a herd, a bevy, or a leash. Yes, I have more moose than just Morris, though, admittedly, Erin took to the latest one, out of Maine, and when I looked at her, and it (Maple Butter is its name) I realized that the moose was more hers than mine even if it is in Morris’s bevy.

Of course, when dealing with state mandated insurance companies the outcome is pretty frustrating. When I got done doing stuff and walked in to the bedroom, yesterday, Erin was not exactly happy after having spoken to the Massachusetts insurance people – by law there are three allowable insurance companies you can use – though this does not, in any way denote the number of agents that exist in the state – and when she called to tell them her insurance had changed, they told her that she was more than welcome to change insurance companies, just send in the license plates since she also had to change where the car was registered. This was after we added her to my insurance and at that point I had to go back and remove her from my insurance; which wasn’t hard, and, actually, caused my insurance rates to drop like three times; however, on the flip side of that, her rate will probably go up as a result of the conversations with insurance companies. We also looked in to, and discussed, where we would like to have our cars registered for the next several whiles as we finish school here and then look at graduate programs in other places around the immediate world (most United States).

Then, after ALL of that, we went to Costco and changed Erin’s name there (we’ve been toting around our marriage certificate for, like, days now) and added me to Erin’s membership… they took a picture, I now have a card from there to add to my ever growing collection of cards from places. Then we were off again thinking we needed to go to the post office to do a cursory change of name on her passport only to discover there are forms and more pictures that need to be taken and headaches and other things all in the name of having the ability to leave the country on a moments notice and with plenty of planning and more money than either of us have on hand because, having a passport is important… at least, we both seem to think so. Which reminds me I need to remember where I stowed my passport and other vital documents.

Anyway, time has passed since I started working on this. What that means is that where I started writing in the morning/early afternoon, it is now about 10 o’clock at night. In the interim we went to IKEA, which is always an interesting experience. Going to IKEA means we are planning some changes. The changes, today, were twofold; first, to get Erin a desk, this was actually the main reason we went; and second, to get shelves and storage items for TBW DVD’s (TBW = To Be Watched).

We took Erin’s car and ended up with a pile of things I was certain we would get in to the car; but, at the same time, was uncertain whether or not we would get the car closed after we got the items inside. They went in, Erin’s brother, who went along to find some kind of storage medium for his clothes, laid on top of the boxes, Erin and I drove with our seats as far forward as we could, and in the end we ended up with a desk, a bookshelf, some drawers for the desk, a DVD rack that I will mount on a wall in the next day or so, an apron, and a couple of chairs intended for the bedroom. After getting home Erin and I spent a lot of time putting the furniture together. The bookshelf, desk, and DVD rack were not hard, though to say they did not take some time to put together.

All-in-all, I think we went a long way from getting in town and waiting for Erin’s brother to get in last night (12:30 a.m. for those who are interested, we didn’t get home and in bed until closer to 2:00 a.m., which is why the day started so late), his stuff moved to his new apartment and the room he’s been using converted in to an office with the bed at one end (coincidentally, right next to my desk… nice, very nice) and all of the tubs moved in to the front room where my desk used to be so that we can go through them and put things where they need to be, get rid of things, etc.

That’s about it for today. I’m sure I had some pithy thoughts earlier. Again, I didn’t do any writing on Alicia Grey, though the town and area she lives in is solidifying in my head and I am beginning to see the over-conflict that exists between her and the main bad guy. I am also seeing relationships and how they affect things. I need to write many of these notes down. I am actually avoiding my computer, for the most part, until we are more settled and things are a bit more taken care of.

I anticipate, outside of getting our life organized, I will be hanging the two white boards at either end of the office.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond

Posted by smokingpen at 9:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, as many can tell, I’ve not updated the website since before the wedding. Yeah, I’ve been a bit bad about that. Mostly absent, really. I took my computer, had internet access, and yet, didn’t think to turn the computer on, much, or do anything on-line except for checking for directions and clearing out the e-mail from a variety of accounts that I have… even then, I think it happened a total of three times for less than ten minutes a spell.

I do have to say that the build up to the wedding and the successive celebration of Erin and I getting married was a total success. The whole affair was done very nicely. We had a lot of fun. I should, probably, think about writing up a play-by-play of events, but, really, at this point I will say that we had a good time; we are married; and we did disappear on our honeymoon where we are still disappeared to, just a little more predictably now than last week.

Of course, on a side note, I still REALLY hate airports and don’t enjoy flying, so much, anymore. As anyone who is anyone who is anyone will know, I used to fly a lot (couple of the other brothers did as well) and as a result, before 9/11, you get used to different things about airports. After 9/11, things changed a lot and as a result I’ve been willing to get on airplanes, e.g. honeymoon, but not exactly excited to get on them or on an airplane. Like my dad, I have a tendency to think that you should just plan extra time to get from point “A” to point “B” and back again, however, when work, school, and other things are taken in to consideration, the outcome is that, sometimes, you have to get on the less-desirable modes-de-transportation and fly our friendly (not so much) skies.

With that said, we flew Delta and, still, Delta is a much better airline to fly over the other ones. Delta used to be known for all its extras it gave to customers. Kill them with kindness, and that was still the case. Back in December flew on United and most of the extras had a charge to them; however, Delta gave us snacks and food (food on the eastward leg of the journey) and only asked for money on the things that EVERYONE asks for money (headphones and alcohol). In short, Delta tried to make us as comfortable as they could packing their plane full of people.

To recap: I still hate flying. Erin gets bored easily on airplanes. Airports don’t make me feel safe and when you have the old and infirm running the security checks, you don’t improve the feeling that we (nation) are safe. And, someday, I want to be able to say, “Let’s take a train or boat and take some extra time,” rather than depending on the government or airlines to protect me.

I think, for the moment, that shall be enough of my zaniness. A shower is calling my name, after which I intend to spend time with my wife (in case you missed it, Erin Hattaway).

Oh, I’ve not done ANY significant or noteable work on Alicia Grey though, I am sure, for the truly curious, you can find things “Out There” if you look hard enough.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Bond. James Bond.

Posted by smokingpen at 9:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The time is going on 4 a.m. and I am, currently, awake. I guess it is a good thing that because of how I felt most of yesterday I have no intention of going to work; on top of which, I need to be in Salt Lake for a bit picking up a tuxedo for the wedding on Friday and I am getting married on Friday.

However, this does not change the fact that I am awake at four in the morning. I am awake. I am awake. I am awake. Hey! Erin, I am awake.

I’m finding this life change to be interesting in how I react to the change that is coming down the pipe. Instead of sleeping like a baby, I can normally sleep through anything, I am awake tonight. Last night I felt like I had a raging fever. I don’t, exactly, feel a lot better at the moment; but, truth told, I think that I am just suffering from some kind of anxiety.

Problem is, I don’t know where the anxiety comes from. I know that I am meant to marry Erin on Friday. I know that we are meant to start our lives together. I know that we love each other, and that she really, really loves me (and I her, in return); but I am awake.

Which is fine, I guess. It means you get a more train of thought entry than I normally do. Normally, I sit and stare at a computer screen, I consider what it is I am going to write. Sometimes I sketch out a brief outline of the thoughts, occasionally I just sit and stare at a few lines for a couple of days, with the outcome that, eventually, I write whatever I feel like writing.

Of late, that has been about writing.

For example, I was visiting my friend Lewin and his wife (and child), finishing up a CD with music on it for the reception at the Springville Museum of Art, and Lewin handed me a grant proposal paper that a potential employer asked him to read. There were some editing mars on the paper. That is not what is important. What is important is that when you write, more often than not, you should be writing in a left leaning manner.

Left leaning is where you place your subject in relation to what you are writing in a sentence, paragraph, and paper, piece of fiction, etc. The subject of a paper should normally, and naturally, orient to the left (we read left to right). However, in the proposal the original author had his subjects in paragraphs and sentences stuck anywhere. The outcome was a paper that lacked in cohesion and coherence.

I stated that the paper lacked that particular point of cohesion and it confused Lewin. His wife, thinking she understood where I was going, pointed out, “Left brain, right brain,” and I said, “It could be looked at like that, but that’s not quite it either.” And then proceeded to see in my head a box with lines drawn in it and red markings showing what I was meaning. When you read a sentence, the subject of said sentence should be close to the beginning; however, as you build more complex thoughts and start to add different marks like the semi-colonm (;), the colon (:), full stops or periods (.), and other marks, you begin to obfuscate where, exactly, the original subject is. This is why paragraphs, also, are left leaning.

The subject of a paragraph shows what the objective of that paragraph will be. If you are talking about writing and you are changing topics without changing paragraphs you have just obfuscated the purpose of the greater thought. In essence, you are in need of starting another paragraph rather than following the (not) hard and fast rule of four sentences per paragraph with the first sentence being the subject and all other sentences supporting that subject.

To understand this is to further improve the craft of writing; and yet, this should never be something you have to consciously work on, otherwise, the outcome is something that will never appear to turn out right. That is a lie. You, as writer, do have to consciously work on writing, on the various aspects of what you are writing. The objective, though, is to get to the point where, when writing