Random thoughts from a one track mind

Stolen posts

I've stolen this post from E...who stole it from somewhere else. I don't know if that source made it or if it was stolen by her too...I'll give her the benefit though and say that she made it... Anyway...here's my version.

[ ] I've run away from home
[ ] I listen to political music
[X] I collect[ed] comic books.
[ ] I shut others out when I'm sad
[ ] I open up to others easily
[ ] I am keeping a secret from the world
[ ] I watch the news
[ ] I own over 5 rap CDs
[ ] I own something from Hot Topic
[ ] I love Disney movies
[X] I am a sucker for hair/eyes
[X] I don't kill bugs
[ ] I curse regularly
[ ] I have "x"s in my screen name
[ ] I've slipped out a "lol" in a real conversation
[ ] I love Spam
[X] I bake well
[ ] I would wear pajamas to school
[X] I have a job
[ ] I love Martha Stewart
[X] I am in love/like with someone
[ ] I am guilty of tYpInG lIkE tHiS
[ ] I am self conscious
[X] I like to laugh
[ ] I smoke a pack a day
[ ] I loved Go Ask Alice
[ ] I have cough drops when I'm not sick
[ ] I can't swallow pills
[ ] I have many scars
[X] I've been out of this country (meaning Canada)
[X] I can't sleep if there is a spider in the room
[X] I am really ticklish
[X] I love chocolate!!
[ ] I bite my nails
[X] I am comfortable with being me
[ ] I play computer games/video games when I'm bored
[ ] Gotten lost in the city
[X] Saw a shooting star
[ ] I had Surgery
[ ] Gone out in public in your pajamas
[ ] I have kissed a stranger
[ ] Hugged a stranger
[ ] Been in a fist fight with the same sex
[ ] Laughed and had milk/soda come out of your nose
[ ] Pushed all the buttons on an elevator
[X] Made out in an elevator
[ ] Swore at your parents
[ ] Kicked a guy where it hurts
[ ] Been skydiving
[ ] Been bungee jumping
[ ] Broken a bone
[ ] Played spin the bottle
[X] Gotten stitches
[X] Drank a whole gallon of milk in one hour
[ ] Bitten someone
[X] Been to Niagara Falls
[X] Gotten the chicken pox
[X] Crashed into a car (well it crashed int to me does that count?)
[ ] Been to Japan (does China count?)
[X] Ridden in a taxi
[ ] Shoplifted
[ ] Been fired
[X] Had feelings for someone who didn't have them back
[ ] Stole something from your job
[ ] Gone on a blind date
[ ] Had a crush on a teacher/coach
[ ] Celebrated Mardi Gras in New Orleans
[X] Been to Europe
[ ] Slept with a co-worker
[X] Been married
[X] Gotten divorced
[X] Saw someone/something dying
[X] Driven over 400 miles in one day
[X] Been to Canada (Been? I'm there right now!)
[X] Been on a plane
[X] Seen the Rocky Horror Picture Show (it's not that good)
[ ] Thrown up in a bar
[X] Eaten Sushi
[ ] Been snowboarding
[X] Been skiing
[X] Been ice skating
[X] Met someone in person from the internet
[ ] Been to a motocross show
[X] Going to or have gone to college
[ ] Done hard drugs
[X] Taken painkillers

posted by HPL (eh pea ell) @ 2:30 PM 0 comments

One for the books

I don't get the same thrill out of visiting the bookstore as once I did. There was a time when simply walking into a bookstore used to make me happy, and I could spend ages browsing racks and finding things I'd simply love to read. But that doesn't happen anymore. I can go and browse the bookstore, but it doesn't hold the same allure, the same interest it once did.

Maybe it has something to do with books hitting the $10-12 mark for a single paperback. Maybe it's the fact that you no longer find as much variety. Now it seems like I look on the shelf and it's 38 titles by the same author I've tried and don't like. Look at the Horror rack. There's a bazillion Stephen Kings, Dean Koontz, and Anne Rices, and then three pedestrian works by people you don't know.

Maybe that's part of it too. The stuff being churned out these days seems to always be hackneyed plots populated by cardboard, stereotypical characters. I find the sci-fi/fantasy section particularly depressing these days. Every book I see there seems to suffer from delusions of Tolkein (in itself a bad idea, he wasn't that good a writer, Lord of the Rings isn't the best book ever written), and the stories are afflicted with everything that made the first draft of Star Wars unsellable to the studios. They're all:

Ooopson Oodilo has lived in Zaptap all his life, tending his Jagteeks, never suspecting that he was anything more than a simple farmer. But when rebellion breaks out in Flagthurgh, and the Princess Quisha needs help, Ooopson is the only one who can save the Flathurghian Empire. Ooopson sets out with his best friend, Fuzzinks a 9 foot tall living teddy bear, to save the Princess Quisha and reclaim his birthright as Emperor of Flathurghia.

Or words to that effect at least. It seems like all you have to do is stick some bizzare names on things, tie it to a trite plot and Bob's your uncle you've got a Fantasy series. Oh yes, has to be a series. If it's not a 15 story chronicle it's not worth publishing.

sigh

Well, maybe the potential of ebooks and that sort of thing will help reinvent the publishing industry. Maybe that way we'll start to find some new stories (well, new twists on the standards anyway). What I see it as is, in general, a lack of imagination on the part of the creators of this drivel. I don't know if it's the writers, the publisher, both, neither...all I know is that there seems to me to be a lot of chaff for very little wheat.

I'll keep going to the bookstore. I'll even keep looking, and keep hoping for that spark to come back. Someday I know it will.

posted by HPL (eh pea ell) @ 2:13 PM 0 comments