Monday, December 31, 2007

2007 comes to an end. Looking at this blog it has been a slow year for things interesting enough to write and also a difficult year to find the time to write. When I started this it was not meant to be much more than a journal for me to record what I'm doing or interested in at any particular time but recently there's been little to add. I am going to keep it going, occasionally, but I'm also going to start doing something new, something that I am going to try and keep up.
A while ago, following on from reading about Wreck This Journal, I set up a notebook with an ever-growing list of creative challenges for me to do. Some were more successful than others but the principle worked - it got me thinking again, it got me writing and drawing again and it was fun. The journal is still with me - there are a lot of pages left to fill. But it's also the starting point for a new set of challenges for the year where I hope to be able to post something new every week on to a new blog. I do not know what that will be - whether a picture, a photo or a story, or something else. I do not doubt that a lot of it will be rubbish, but it is the doing that is the point.
So, I guess I'll see what happens.
If you want to see whether I manage it then point your favourite browser or news reader to:
http://gr-sf.blogspot.com/
Hope to see you there....
Happy 2008!

Sunday, December 02, 2007

As my last post hinted at my efforts towards Nanowrimo this year were slowly failing and I stopped writing anything towards it a couple of weeks ago. In between work, stress, illness and the demands of being creative something had to be left behind and that story was it. Which is a shame because I was enjoying it. I have written over 15000 words and I'm quite happy with what I want to do with the story now so at least it has put me in a strong position to write the novel at some point. A time that I hope will be soon.
Work has been very busy, with long hours, lots of stuff going on and it has left me feeling exhausted and very tense. I have done the occasional nice thing, though. It was good to see Soo when she came over for a writing weekend a couple of weeks ago. It was a very focused and non-boozy weekend but we also managed to go and see Beowulf in Imax 3d. I've heard rumours that 3d is supposed to be the next big thing, with James Cameron looking to release his next film in 3d, but after so many attempts I guess I felt a bit cynical about it all. Beowulf was not the best film I have ever seen but the use of 3d lifted it to be something more than the interesting but shallow film that it is.
Yesterday we went to see Ratatouille which surprised me more than I expected and which I enjoyed more than I expected. It is fairly standard modern kids fare but is greatly helped by a good story and a slightly subversive feel generated by the way that the rats always remain rats - they are not really anthropomorphised in the way of most Disney films so when, as happens a couple of times, you see a large number of them on the screen at the same time you do see them as rats. And despite that you still prefer them to the humans.
The other good thing that I did yesterday was get hold of the Black Dossier, a new League of Extraordinary Gentlemen book by Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill which comprises variously of histories of various members of the League, details of an alternate history of the world that might just be true, a comic story of how the dossier is recovered by a couple of old members, related paraphenalia related to the fascist Big Brother government of IngSoc and a 3d adventure extravaganza at the end. I've barely started it and I already love it. It is something perfect for the coming dark nights over the next week. Assuming I can get home at a reasonable hour from now on.