Buddha's Rhubarb Of Opinions On Media

My latest Video poem: Imagine Sailor, Man. 

 Continuing my meandering through my personal bugaboos... I'm not going to go into a big thing here re-investigating my gender dysphoria, something that still holds me back self image wise, but more so now because of my history of dealing/not dealing with it, than my current state of mind or being. All I will say is that It's one of my core issues of regret and shame, that holds me back if not on a conscious level, definitely as an undermining force in regards to my confidence with meeting someone I might be interested in dating. As well, it's a distraction from "the work" (the work being writing, publishing, making videos, whatever creative enterprises I am involved in.) I often feel like I spend an inordinate amount of time making negative reasons why I can't do the things I'd like to be doing, and my "history" or baggage as it were in this area is the easiest place to go for me. Where I think I am dealing in a positive light with all th...

"The Event"... (Finishing my tale of fear and why that emotion has led me to self-publishing again.) The day started like any other Saturday in my life at the time. I woke up with a headache, and a continuation of the sniffles/cough I'd had for like 6 weeks. I downed some antihistamines, and found that I'd run out of coffee, so I threw on my scarf, jacket and toque and started trudging through the freshly fallen snow to a local greasy spoon where I often went (and still go much less often) for Ukrainian sausage & eggs. As I was walking down the street, I noticed my nose running, and when I looked at my scarf, there were drops of blood. "Weird" I said aloud, thinking that I hadn't had a nosebleed in a hell of a long time, possibly never as an adult as I could recall. I had been taking a lot of antihistamines to fight of this cold that wouldn't go away. So I ran back home holding my scarf to my nose, and eventually got the bleeding stopped (t...

My Book is up and ready for order... 12 bucks a pop.

Sort of... I want to write something about fear. As it's the emotion/state of being that dominates my life in a quieter way than it does some people. I don't mean the Capital "F" Fear mongering by the mainstream media, government etc, as it only affects me peripherally vis a vie my abhoration (to coin an odd but cool sounding word) of those institutions. My fears are pretty simple. Mostly it comes down to a fear of failure and that old bugaboo that haunts a great many people: that people will find out you aren't worthy of whatever attention they have been paying to you, or the attention you want from them. It's a hard thing to define as I guess everyone has some degree of feeling like a faker in life no matter how confident you project yourself. I have been writing/creating art pretty much my whole life. I have a certain inborn facility for it. What I don't have is discipline. I have quite a bit of education, but I've never ever tried very hard at any ...

Well, I managed to de-frustrate myself with the Blurb.com "Booksmart" tool. (Which is more of an adjective in this case than a noun - "tool") Do not take them up on the "just import your "word docs" into it and it'll all be good. It won't. i had to cut and paste each page separately (not each piece, but each page. Sheesh. I think they make all their money on photo books etc. the forums were filled with people talking about hardcovers and expensive costs, but if you go softcover it's very reasonably priced. i;ll be able to retail for 12 bucks (There's shipping and taxes if you buy online, but not everyone can get a copy from me directly) or at least that's my plan. More on this hopefully including a link on this blog to my blurb page with how to buy. you might get one before me. I plan to order some on the weekend. Just a small order to start with. Then once I sell a few, turn that money over into more copies. no TV No Movies in th...

Well, I've been plugging away trying to get my book to be formatted properly with Blurb.com's "booksmart" editor. There are no default poetry book settings it seems. The text flow thing keeps readjusting itself in ways I don't want. I will have to, I figured out last night, I think: import each piece separately perhaps. (or maybe do it up in word and save as a pdf and then import it. the margins may work better) All their "help" stuff is on videos, I'd much rather read a few lines of FAQ than sit through videos to see if they solve my issue. I do however like how easy it was to make a spanking nice cover. I have that part all figured out. Given myself the next week (til payday) to figure out the formatting. The little chapbook I was going to publish is now an actual book of poetry at 80+ pages. I think I will also then apply for an ISBN number through the Gubmint.(sic) Then I can bring it to bookstores maybe? I am getting antsy that and having a lot...

looking for the right fit for doing a Print On Demand thing has led me to sign up on www.blurb.com they have (cross platform even) a nice little imposition editor that you can download for free to get your document to fit their specs. You can use your own cover images etc.... and the price is competitive. So I'm re-editing for the next week or so, taking out some weaker pieces and actually bulking the book up a bit with some poems I think share more of a tone, though not content. There's a real melange of themes and ideas, which if you know me is pretty much how I roll. :p Seriously, I do prefer that kind of book, maybe a few loosely connected poems, or a really long poem or two, but mostly different topics, styles almost every page. It reflects who I am as a writer more. I'm sure I will do more singly themed books in the future as I'm already planning a future chapbook of my Arthurian Cycle. I think that one though will also be a bit of a photo book as well. But more ...

Another update. I'm planning on publishing a chapbook that includes a series of poems I wrote based on a suite of classical music, some random Haiku, the first third of my very own Arthurian Cycle, and at least one biblically inspired (if heretical) inspired piece. It just might be called "A Cure For Mirrors".... Tentative title from one of the poems. Figuring out the how to finance on my very limited budget is what I've been concentrating on all morning. It looks at first glance that my idea of doing Print On Demand is a no go, mostly because of the prohibitive pricing, and distro options (most bookstores pretend these kinds of books don't exist) and lack of being able to do the book exactly how I want to. I looked into a local "Espresso Book Publishing Machine over at Oscar's Books on Granville. Too steep again, they've raised their prices since my initial inquiry in the summer, also my chapbook is too short for many of these options. I do also pla...

Okay so I'm going to start updating this blog with the odd rant, essay, story, poem, short film, and/or the usual goofy links from the Internets that I run across in my daily surfing excursions. Sometimes these rants etc may be of a personal TMI kind of thing, sometimes they may be quirky half assed opinions on things happening in the world, or reviews, opinions slightly less than half assed film, TV, music & pop culture reviews/rants etc. Whatever it is though that I'm regurgitating on here, I hope will be regularly done, actually. I need to develop more discipline in my artistic endeavors. Eventually I'd like to be filing one "Report" daily, whether it's a new poem, movie review, intellectually bereft, but impassioned screed on some topic I only vaguely understand, or something else. I think I'll start with a poem, one that I wrote fairly recently and thus is likely unfinished, as I tend to keep editing poems forever, like Walt W...