back here again

 

You know —

When something bad happens but everything is crazy and you have to be places and do things and cope so you just stuff the bad somewhere else so you can keep going and do what needs to be done and then things slow down and you are in a still place and —

Wham! The bad sweeps out of wherever you had it stashed and hits you hard and knocks you down?

I am in that place.

 

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I really hate this place.

 

where the art work comes from :
that is the abduction of persephone by bernini

another day another christmas miracle

 

So —

Despite travel and sleeping in strange places and hauling suit cases about, the shoulder is [remarkably] still improving. Really. I can actually sort of lie on my right side if I am careful. Which is totally a Christmas miracle and maybe come 2010 I will actually have a fully functional right shoulder.

The downside to this is, after almost nine months of no exercise because of a shoulder down, now the shoulder is getting better, I have to start exercising again –– starting from a really tragic place.

Again!

[Didn’t I do this last year with the cracked rib?]

[Okay cracked ribs only last a couple months. This was nine months. Ahhh!]

This is so going to hurt.

:::sigh:::

 

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*not one word from the preggo corner either i know just what you are thinking

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from stellazinë

what i learned in new york

 

Back —

From New York. It was sort of an impromptu trip and I was moving heaven and earth to get things done so I could leave for a week so did not get much sleep before I left and definitely did not get much sleep after I got there. Got back last night, got into bed and slept! Tired! I do not remember the last time I slept that hard. Or was that tired. Then I had adjusted my clock wrong and oops thought I got up at 8 PM [that is what the computer clock said it was] but no it was 8 AM I just screwed up the clock. Oops again. The cool thing about hard sleep is, after that kind of sleep, my face is starting to look like my face again instead of like some apple head fair exhibit. Yay! But I screwed up appointments big time because of that clock maladjustment. Irrefutable proof clocks can be maladjusted.

In keeping with the rule where Max goes big things follow a huge blizzard hit New York while I was there. It was questionable whether I would even have a plane to get onto to come home lots of flight frenzy but the storm cleared up enough to get snow off [one yegads] runway and for me to get out only an hour and a half behind schedule. And here are —

 

Things I Learned On The Trip To New York :

•Red lights are just suggestions, nobody really stops walking because of some silly light.

•Cab drivers are not at your disposal, you are at theirs.

•Some cab drivers, if you look confused and worried enough over whether you are at the right address on that dark little street, will wait to make sure you get into the building. [nice man]

•Buildings in New York all have formal names. Seriously, forget street addresses, formal names. And New Yorkers all know the buildings by name.

•It is impossible to actually have any idea of where you are unless you climb onto a roof, then you know why buildings all have formal names, they are landmarks and how people in New York orient themselves to get from place to place. [Do not ask me how New Yorkers do that traveling underground though, I think they have special sensors in their noses like sharks or something and me, I had to climb onto a roof to figure it out.]

•People from New York do not know all people in the U.S. do not own metro passes or even necessarily know what they are.

•El train in New York does not mean elevated train it means “L” train and is underground not up in the air where you are looking for it but if you spin in circles on the corner cursing looking up into the air for a while people do give you more elbow room.

•Smoking outside in 17 degree weather leaves interesting cold burn marks on your hand.

•Uggs stand up surprisingly well wading through three foot snow drifts. Seriously, almost as well as Sorels though I would not push that in the Alps.

•Warm coat in California does not equal warm coat in New York.

•Metal hair combs set off airport metal detectors and will send you to the back of the line — with really interesting hair.

•Always wear a T-Shirt under that big bulky sweater to the airport unless you want to become way more intimate with airport security guards than you intended.

•48 hours without sleep will erase any indication you have ever heard rumors of anti-oxidents let alone taken any in your life.

•Never lose track of your phone charger on a cross continent adventure.

•Love and alcohol do not mix.

 

where the art work comes from :
the owner of that photo wishes to remain anonymous

the character course

 

Jan 5 —

January 5 SeeMaxRun Character Workshop :

The 6 Week Character Workshop begins Tuesday January 5th. This is an online 6 week advanced course on characterization taught by yours truly Max Adams. Subjects include introductions [aka authorial intrusion is your friend]; protagonists vs. antagonists; using point of view characters; defining characters through action & tension; likable vs. empathetic characters; maintaining interest withholding character details; illuminating character through subplots; and if we have time we may throw a kitchen sink in there too.

 

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Course fee is $240. Course length is 6 weeks. Seating is limited. Send email for course sign up info to : courses @ seemaxrun.com

[You must type out the above email address without the spaces --- we are trying to outwit spam bandits here.]

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:::more info:::

 

bunkers need feng shui too dammit

 

I keep wondering —

What I would do if I didn’t write for Hollywood any more? I almost do not write for Hollywood anymore. I have been working years to make this one movie happen and it looks a little bleak on that front. So I could real soon be chalking up more years of my life making a movie happen that, hello, does not happen.

[Wow does that suck. Hollywood I so wish I could quit you.]

I keep coming back to feng shui.

 

---

 

I am not sure being a feng shui person would get me a spot in any bunkers if WWIII broke out. I am not even sure feng shui is a profession the international community wants to import if I tried to make a run for the border. But feng shui is something I am good at.

 

---

 

Bunkers need feng shui too dammit.

 

 

sufi

 

A small —

Unidentified flying insect is buzzing around the computer. Making me crazy. Get away from my screen. Get away from my face. Get away from my beverage. I am trying to work!

I snatch it out of the air.

This surprises me AND the small unidentified flying insect.

 

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I let it loose on the balcony.

Any insect that inspires that kind of hand eye coordination deserves to live.

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from chez elan

minimal christmas

 

You are —

A Minimal Christmas Tree

You’re not a total Scrooge, but you feel no need to go overboard at Christmas. Less is more and your Christmas reflects refined quality.

 

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:::what kind of christmas tree are you:::

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from sheridesabeemer

where i snagged that quiz :
i snagged that quiz at rain’s

killing ourselves softly

 

You know some dogs —

Cannot be delivered without human intervention? It is true. Some of the Bulldog smushed face dogs simply cannot be born without human involvement. Their heads are too big, their breathing apparatus too complicated, a human being has to be present to help with the birth to keep the puppies alive.

Also, many human babies cannot be delivered without human intervention. To make pregnancies hold we administer drugs, to make pregnancies take, we do in vitro, and carrying difficult pregnancies in extreme cases? Doctors sew women’s wombs shut to make pregnancies hold.

How weird is that? Sewing someone’s cervix shut? I did not learn that in embroidery school. Jeez. But there is more —

We cut women’s abdomens open to deliver babies.

 

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I wonder sometimes if we are becoming like specialized breeds of dogs, too dependent on outside forces to be born or to continue to exist if everything went heads up.

Some anthropologists think that is what happened to the bun heads.

Anthropologists do not call them bun heads. That is just what I call them. Long long ago, according to anthropologists, there were two kinds of humans, they had branched off, and one had a really long gestation time and really big heads and the other was us, smaller heads, shorter gestation.

[Kind of a blessing, according to anthropologists their gestation was twelve months, gah!]

But anyway.

In some theories, the other group just died off. In others, we converged.

 

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A lot of anthropology theory depends on whom you talk to, physical anthropologists or cultural anthropologists. Cultural anthropologists tend to get really philosophical and miss a lot of physical clues. They think this other group was nicer and kinder and less violent and just either died off [the gentler theory] or got killed off by our current set of Homo Sapiens sapiens. [Which means wise wise man, kind of questionable, also that is all about genus, family, order, which I tend to mix up so I may have something backwards there –-- I usually forget which parts to capitalize --- but I did actually try to check it on Wikipedia and I think Wikipedia has it wrong, oh nos, Wikipedia fail!] The physical anthropologists have noticed that this bun shaped construction at the base of the skull of the other group did not disappear though. It just started to appear in various forms in our group.

 

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I call them the bun people because of that skull configuration. That bun shaped lump at the base of the skull. It is very recognizable and distinct. It is also why I know the bun people are not gone and the cultural anthropologists missed something. Because that bun configuration did not go missing. It just started showing up smaller and less defined in our group. And. In dark moments?

I figure that bun shape at the base of the skull starting to show up in our group? When the bun people as a whole went entirely missing from the face of the earth? Just means our group went in, tore up the other villages and men, and raped all the women. So now the only bun people left are descendents of rape and pillaging by our group.

[Nicer more philosophical cultural anthropologists think we all fell in love and just merged.]

 

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Now is when I get to say something all erudite like, “Oh but I degress.”

Oh but I digress.

 

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I am worried about human beings being unable to be born unless medical intervention is employed.

I am also fully aware I would not have survived my birth without medical intervention.

Kind of a conundrum.

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from cinemagypsy

lars & the real girl

 

This is a really sweet film. It is Lars and the Real Girl. I put off watching it for a long time [like, um, two years] because I was just thinking about the subject matter thinking, um? But it surprised me and has heart and is something special.

 

 

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*by the way, the more i see emily mortimer the more i like her she is always in really interesting material she is also in dear frankie and howl’s moving castle

 

the boyfriend card

 

I am outside —

A club in San Diego. I am there seeing Thicker Than Thieves. Brian the guitar player is a friend — also so is his wife do not get ideas.

We [the girls] have had a lot to drink and are outside getting air [or in my case, inhaling cigarettes] and this guy outside is jumping up and down like he is in a mosh pit and “accidentally” slamming into us.

Even a non-smoker might have probs with this and I tell him to knock it off. Then my girlfriends and he get into some kind of stand off. “My boyfriend is this cool guy so much better than you and you suck so go away.” “My boyfriend is this cool guy so much better than you you suck so go away.”

Then the guy turns to me.

I say, “I don’t have a boyfriend I just don’t like you.”

 

where the art work comes from :
that is from markusram