Smiles, Support and Lego Studs

The word of the week is resplendent.

June 2 - Writing Folk

Having a 'real day job' is great!

My plan is to work with numbers by day and words by night, to get my second book finished in the next six months. While I won't be writing every single night, the majority of each week's evenings we'll see many words put to page initially for revision later as I progress through each chapter as I go.

Without my writing group however, I wouldn't even be close to being finished my first book. The support and feedback I've received from the people there has been instrumental in my initial growth as a writer and I'm really hitting my stride now as one of the people who run the group month-to-month.

I've mentioned previously that many of the local writers who belong to the group have been effusive in their praise of how well it's being run. I'm not letting that go to my head, save as a goad to do the best job I can( for free, after all it’s a voluntary group run through Meetup.com )to ensure everyone has a good time and come away from the meeting with a few more tools for their 'writers toolbox.'

It feels like this... only in colour.

Tonight's meeting was another rousing success along those lines. There was no set topic, it was just a 'Meet And Greet' where everyone could get together and discuss the craft of writing… or anything else that struck their fancy. For me, it's been a fascinating exercise in leadership, reading body language and generally learning to run a group while shedding my fears of speaking in front of others. For the most part, I believe I've succeeded in all those areas, especially in gaining the confidence in my own abilities to allow me to speak with that same confidence in front of others. If I was a D&D character, I definitively would have seen a few points being added to my Charisma score… but I'm no Narcissus, that's for certain.

The results have spoken for themselves: people keep coming back to hear me speak. Huzzah!

June 3 - New Job Goodness

Here's a quick lowdown on how my new job's going...

There's a ton of details for me to remember, but that's just me learning how to do what I'm being paid to do now. The tools that I've been given, the space that I'm working in and the people that I'm working with all make a world of difference to how I go about learning and doing every day.

Take my standard-issue desktop work computer for example: it's a fast i5 CPU with plenty of memory, running software that is fairly quick and bug-free, if seeming somewhat complicated to me after only a few weeks. I don't have to twiddle my thumbs while I wait for it to process, or come back after a crash that happens every few minutes; honestly, it's such a fantastic difference to have a computer that is up to date to do my job with.

There's also that strange( to me! )lack of CONSTANT pressure to 'perform or else' while I'm learning my new job. I'm expected to do work, sure, but nobody's leaning over my shoulder every few minutes to see that each keystroke I make is up to what they expect me to be doing that particular minute of the day. I can ask questions of my coworkers at any time without fearing they'll tell me they're too busy or looking at me like I'm an idiot for not immediately guessing what I'm supposed to do in a certain situation.

It's a wonderful work environment; I am SO not used to that.

Breaks, well let me tell you: being able to simply leave my desk and go to the bathroom whenever I want( within reason, of course )is hands-down fantastic. Having often stood at the counter serving customers by myself for six to eight hours straight without a bathroom break at MMart, this whole 'go whenever you need to' is a hard thing to get my mind around. Especially combined with taking my scheduled breaks like clockwork every day AND not being watched like a hawk to ensure that I come back without having taken an extra 30 seconds of the company's time without their prior leave.

The real kicker that makes me smile every time I think about my new job is this though: I can listen to music all day long at my desk through my headphones. Whatever I like. I can enjoy long mixes of classical music from YouTube that are wonderfully soothing to my training mind as I learn my new tasks. I've never had a job where that was possible; at most, I was able to choose a radio station to blare in the background and generally ignore during a busy workday.

Not here at my new job. I'm re-discovering all the classical musicians every day, and loving it.

June 4 - SNOT Brick Masterpiece

Okay, I'll admit it: I like Lego. A lot.

When I was younger, I had a whole suitcase full of Lego. That's still in storage here, though I haven't dragged it out in many years; unlike those who kept their Lego skills and sharpened them into adulthood to become Master Lego Builders, I was always a dabbler by comparison.

Especially in comparison to the person who built this:

Click the article link for the incredible detail about this SD model!

I'm not afraid to admit that I don't know the first thing about how to start a project like this, let alone complete it within a year with such stunning results. According to the article at io9.com, the model's creator goes by the name of Jerac. He lives in Poland and it took him a year to create the model which is over 2 m long, costing around $5000 US in materials - 50 kg of Lego bricks, if you must know.

I think it's a stunning achievement and perhaps one day I'll even traveled to Poland to have a look at it with my own eyes.

Though I'm pretty sure that Jerac won't let anybody play with it.

June 5 - We Lost Ray 2 Years Ago Today

It's been two years today since we lost Ray Bradbury.

One of the luminaries of the science fiction world for decades, Ray was an inspiring figure in many ways. Today, on the anniversary of his passing, I learned something new, thanks to his wisdom:

"The great thing about growing up with science fiction is that you have an interest in everything." - Ray Bradbury

Unbelievably, this simple sentence from the science fiction master sums up a philosophy I've held inside myself for many years but could never fully articulate in words - until today. It helps explain why I have such wide-ranging fields of interest in so many things and why I'm constantly trying to keep up with what my mind tells me it wants to investigate. 

It also shows how a truly great writer can reach out from the beyond, bridging the unimaginable distance and time itself to impart truthful messages to their readers. Thanks to Ray Bradbury, I have another example of this wonderful form of time travel, of allowing an author to reach a new audience many years after their passing beyond the veil.

Thanks Ray. We'll always miss you.

June 6 - D-Day +70

Lest We Forget.

Today was D-Day, on which in 1944 the Allies launched their invasion of Normandy which began the downfall of the Axis powers in the West… and led to the victory of the Allies, leading to our present world that we enjoy without the threat of a world-spanning conflict.

Below is unique, FULL-COLOUR footage taken of WWII. It is extraordinarily rare and most likely, you've never seen it before. Colour brings a whole new level of meaning to remember the war and the sacrifices made by those who gave us what we have today.

June 7 - The Return of Bill

Holy cow!

Bill Watterson, of Calvin & Hobbes fame, guest-drew a comic recently!

As noted over on this blog entry by Stephan Pastis, the famously reclusive Watterson secretly drew three of the recent releases of Pearls Before Swine, a webcomic of some renown online.

I'm flabbergasted and thrilled to hear that Bill Watterson put on his artists hat once more, almost 20 years after leaving the comics world in 1995. Here's the comic he drew( and you can see more about the guest spot here ):

My evening after work was happily spent gaming with my new D&D group.

It was another wonderful session, although again too brief compared to those of many years ago that would often run the entire day until late evening but that sort of time is hard to come by nowadays. As it turns out, I've been gaming entirely using my phone and a small Pathfinder app to keep track of my character… necessitated by the fact that I still can't find my dice bag, darn the luck! The group games with anywhere from 5 to 7 people at any point, each of whom appreciates a good pun and all of whom have relaxed attitudes. Meaning they're there for the fun and the social enjoyment more than anything else, which is exactly what I need in a gaming group right now. It's a great experience and though I miss my friends from my years playing Neverwinter Nights online, this is as good an alternative as I've been able to find in many years.

Now, if my thief can just get his hands on some decent loot next session…

June 8 - Rest!

After working six days this week, including yesterday, today was a welcome day off.

It was also my parent's 45th wedding anniversary, so my sister and I took them out to a lovely lunch at a local restaurant in Cordova Bay. We sat in a cozy sunroom next to a sunny patio, enjoying each other's company and listening to them tell us more about their recent trip to England. Hearing their stories, I knew that I'm going to have to make the trip myself someday, to touch the stones of so many historic places with my own hands and to feel the ghosts of those who live there standing nearby.

There's not a lot more to say about today, other than to comment on how life seems to be a series of fortuitous convergences lately. A good example of which would be when I went down to Moka House late this afternoon for little break from preparing tomorrow evenings presentation for my writers group. No sooner had I sat down on the patio but who should come along but two of the newest members of the group? We ended up chatting for several hours before we all had to part ways and I was struck again by how fortuitous a choice living in Victoria has been for me both as a person and as a writer. Good things have headed my way for the last little while and I'm quite enjoying each day as it comes.

Especially if it brings cookies.

A few new people have been added to the blog this week, so I'll remind folks that you can click on ANY of the date-links on the left side of the blog to view the entries for that year. You can also use the Search bar at the top of the blog to browse through the 350+ entries by keyword; pick something and see what results you get. I'll bet they're interesting. See you all next week!