Tidying Up

Hey, my blog has a brand new look! And a nifty new banner I made!
What gives??
Well, it's Revision Time around here, which means I'm trying to think clean, organized, well polished thoughts. Some artists and writers talk about the terror of the blank white page. I treasure it. A new, clean page is that much more room to work in.

Historical Fiction? Yeah, I Remember the 80s

Part of writing for children and young adults is, of course, hanging on to that understanding of what it's like to actually be a kid or a "young adult". And increasingly, that is becoming a challenge for this old crusty writer. I find myself occasionally having this internal discussion that starts out "In my day..." and ends in some kind of fogey outrage over "these kids today."
Some days, writing for kids makes me feel old.
Other things that make me feel old-

1. My kid watching Nick Jr.
I didn't have cable, or internet access in my main residence until I moved into my college dorm. And that was 1997, so my parents were about 40 years behind the trend, I know. I also remember those stupid AOL cds that would clog up the mailbox with "free minutes".

2. Hugh Hefner's twin girlfriends were born in 1989. They had to have some bunny from the 70s come over and teach them how to roller skate. When I was a kid, we had real roller rinks. We spent time at them. They were dimly lit pole barns with blacklights and a pervasive smell of feet, but we spent time there, in our brown rental skates, and we had fun, damnit. But you had to pay $2 extra to stay for the second session.

While my mom's house did not have cable, dad did, which means I also remember Yo! MTV Raps. which leads me to

3. I remember when this was hip hop, and this was what the videos looked like.





Do I sound fogey enough yet? Have I started banging on the ceiling with my cane to get the kids to turn down that racket? Cause I also have

4. I remember what it was like to have no cell phones, no ATMs, no central air in the summer.
Yeah, keep chopping that wood, kids, until you understand what it was like growing up on the frontier, because

5. When I watched Sesame Street, it didn't have any Elmo in it. And there were other muppets, and they had their own show, too. Totally different.

I mean, how am I even qualified to write for anyone under the age of 20? I didn't have an iPod when I was ten. I had cassette tapes, and vinyl records. I know what the term "B side" means. It was practically medieval.

The Competition

Mr. Cate and I have been together a while. A whole decade, actually, and seven of those years we've been married.

We have a lot in common, I guess. There's never a lack of things to talk about. We're both writers, in a sense, both artists. I write books, and he's a filmmaker. And boy, do I sympathize with him.

When I want to write a book, I flip open the computer, start a new file, and type away.

I can't even go into how complicated the film making process is. And boring. But he loves it, somehow.

Many years ago, we worked on a sort of guerrilla film project, that has recently turned into something surprisingly watchable. It's piqued his interest in getting behind the camera again, and given him the chance to go out and hunt for some funding. (ah, the least fun part of independent film making)

We live outside of a major city, close enough to head in when we feel like it, far enough away to get some peace and quiet most of the time. Anyway, not a mecca for film and art. A while ago, Mr. Cate was outlining his best case scenario for the old film. He'd like it to be screened once or twice, which will help him both with his grant proposal for the next project, and getting to grad school. Totally reasonable goals, in my opinion. A completely cool indie theater has agreed to give him some screen time in December. Things are looking pretty promising.

"I mean," he joked. "This isn't Citizen Kane. It's not going to make me a famous filmmaker... but I could be the most famous local film maker."

Uh... well.

There's only one problem with that. One which we both found effing hilarious. At the time he made this brilliant statement, we happened to live in Orson Welles's hometown.

But I guess, if you're going to set the bar, set it as high as you can before you decide you can't clear it.

I which I finally learn to play with pictures.

Possibly. I went to two movies of Mr. Cate's choice this week. I know, how selfless of me, right?

Especially because the first one was Paranormal Activity. This is the kind of scary movie I like- no gore, lots of suspense. If it had been Saw XX or something, it would have been No Dice. I can't sit through that kind of crap. However, Mr. Cate doesn't like gore very much either. What he really likes are movies that have interesting histories. Paranormal Activity has a dirt-cheap indie quality about it, but the urban legends, (from audiences "demanding" it's release to Stephen Speilberg bringing the print back to the studio in a trashbag because he thought it was tainted with evil) are campy and have a great hook, but they sound too much like really clever marketing. That's what sold The Blair Witch Project, after all. And like Blair Witch, you're going to get wildly different quotes on what this movie cost, depending on where you look.

I ended up really liking Paranormal Activiy, for a totally erroneous reason.

It had nothing to do with the scares, which were few and far between, and mostly given away by the trailer. Although there is one really terrifying sequence which I won't give away, there are too many lulls, and one of the tension builders totally backfired for me. There's a scene where Micha, the boyfriend, sprinkles powder all over the floor to see if something really is wandering around in the bedroom at night. Footprints do indeed appear. They are round and three toed and are supposed to invoke the image of a big, horrifying demon. But they just reminded me of this-

and then all I could think about for the rest of the movie was Tim Curry from Legend with a little bit of Dr. Frankenfurter thrown in. And demons aren't very scary when they make you laugh.

Also, the ending was clearly tinkered with. I would love to see what the filmmakers originally had in place of the dopy CGI effect right at the end.

Of course, this isn't totally fair to the movie. The filmmakers couldn't have predicted that I had a thing for Tim Curry, and that when someone says "Demon" I think of him smirking his way through Clue, and then I just get nostalgic for 80s flicks.

What I liked most about Paranormal Activity was the lead actress, Katie Featherstone, apparently using her own name for the character. Same with the Boyfriend, Micha Sloat, although the two other actors were clearly playing roles. There are no credits on the beginning or the end, adding to the mystique that this is real, found footage.

To my point, Katie Featherstone is, beyond a good actress, a beautifully real woman. She certainly isn't the emaciated stick we're used to seeing in every movie, advertisement and TV show.

This is her, and Sloat, and director Oren Peli, who must have had a dog of a time directing this.
(Another distraction for me was how well the actors did without any crew around. Clearly, most of the time it is just them with the camera in a real house, making for insanely difficult blocking.)

I'm going to contrast this with the movie I saw last night, Couple's Retreat. Yes, Mr. Cate wanted to see that. Why? Because Peter Billingsly directed it. You know, the kid from A Christmas Story.

It wasn't terrible. I still like watching Vince Vaughn and Jon Favreau argue like an old married couple. And some of it was funny, if you have a dirty sense of humor like me. The therapy stuff was a drag, and while Faizon Love was hysterical, the girlfriend was purposely so annoying that they had to find every excuse they could to keep her off screen. Here's my problem-

Okay, so these are all supposed to be women in their late thirties, pushing forties, (Kristen Davis really is 44, Malin Akerman and Kristen Bell are 31& 29, respectively, but by timeline logic, they should be about 10 years older) who have kids, and are all stressed out about life. But they still also must look like seventeen year old cross country runners, even though their partners are all shlubs in the doughy to obese range.

Sadly, I fear this is what's going to happen to Katie Featherstone. She's going to get lots of attention, and lots of roles, and some of them will come with ridiculous stipulations that she start meg ryanifying her self. Really. Remember the scene in Knocked Up when the E! execs tell hat-pin Katherine Heigl to weigh herself and then subtract 20? That's probably not an exaggeration.

Don't do it, Katie! Seriously, she's cute, and bright, and curvy and natural looking, and pretty damned slender. I don't need anyone thinking that this gal fits my definition of the f-word. It's just refreshing not to see tendons and sternum bones on your actresses these days. Seriously, when did it become hot to sport a set of ribs in between your breasts?? To have a concave pelvis? To have upper thighs thinner than your knees, for @!#*'s sake. That's just gross.

Aww, He's Dreamy...

First of all... FROST on my WINDSHIELD??? Already? Really? Fine, I'll get out there and scrape it off like a chump, but I'm going to be a real pill about it.

Second, look at my man. He can climb rocks and fix showers and everything!

This picture was seriously only taken about two weeks ago, and look at all the green- it's gone now, along with half the leaves.

Now a nonsensical segue- this week I think I'll hit the halfway point on a brand new book. It's been pretty quiet around my little circle of blogs lately. Not very much new stuff filling up the reader these past few weeks. All my writer comrades must be gearing up for NaNoWriMo. I have never participated, nor will I participate this year. Instead, I'm setting a goal of having this newest ms polished up and ready to hit the road in '10. (what are we calling it? 20- 10, 0-10? Kubrescopic? What's the consensus, I don't need to sound like a bigger idiot than usual)

I also need to distract myself from the agent shuffle. I have a ms in the hands of three different agents right now, and putting a few thousand words down on the ms every day helps keep me out of the inbox.

Workin' it out.

Okay followers, I'd like to get traffic up, both at this ol' blog and the etsy site, so I'm working on a cross-promotion writing contest/bag give away.
Still working out the details, so if there are any awesome suggestions, leave 'em below.
Something fun, guys, I'd like to make us all laugh a little.

Big New Project!

I've gone and started an Etsy shop.

I'm starting with purses and totes and fabric creations, and planning to start putting up some art prints and such very soon.

I used to do the art fair thing in college, and that was a ton of fun. I still love to make things and work on other projects in between all the writing. It's a good way to sit and puzzle out the details. I thought it was time to focus the non-writing creative energy on something specific. Hauling out to shows is a bit of a stretch right now, but then I found this great place. It's like a never ending art fair. So, if you care to, take a look at my shop.

And there are a few Blueboarders there, too, so look out for them as well!