Here are some photographs of the incredible solar eclipse that swept over the Pacific region this past weekend, including the breathtaking “ring of fire” phenomenon, which makes this event more astounding. There’s nothing like such a spectacle to humble humanity back to its knees.
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“It looks like the people who were worried about his Mormonism, at least that crowd is diminishing somewhat. The question is, if you have two candidates, you don’t have Jesus running against someone else. You have Obama running against Romney.”
– Pat Robertson’s tepid hint at an endorsement of Mitt Romney.
Someone get the smelling salt! I’m about to pass out! Pat Robertson is actually starting to make sense! The Mayan apocalypse really must be near.
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This is as hysterical as it is true. Freelance writer Karen Briggs presents 20 golden bits of wisdom for the dedicated scribe. Raise your hand if you’ve been told you must follow these or die in a sewer clutching your unpublished manuscript?!
1. Write every day, even if it’s not for publication. Oh Christ, like I need to practise just for the sheer sake of practising. While I’m at it, why don’t I get some of those multi-lined sheets and revisit my cursive technique? I always liked doing j’s and q’s …
2. Write for free, in order to get “exposure” (see previous rant here).
3. Enter writing contests. Totally counter productive in a head-spinning number of ways. Not only are you now writing for the privilege of submitting an entry fee, you’re never going to get paid, your material (whether it’s any good or not) will instantly become someone else’s property, and you’re just going to become totally demoralized when it disappears into a black hole and is never heard from again. Trust me, hardly anyone in the history of time and space has ever launched a writing career based on a contest. (And please don’t bother sending me the story of the sister-in-law of your second cousin who won a writing contest and is now J.K. Rowling. I don’t want to know.)
4. Create a business plan and calculate how much you’re worth per hour. Sure, a great idea on paper. Think you’re consistently going to get anything remotely near what you’re worth in this business? If so, you have a way better publicist than I do.
5. Try using ‘bid sites’ or writing for content mills. A great way to break in, if your plan is to establish that you will work for crumbs and never expect to be treated any better. Seriously, 1500 words for $5? Thank you, sir, may I have another? Plus, honestly, the content on the content mills is such shite that you’re not exactly enhancing your resume in such company. The bid sites are even more humiliating: just how much more can you debase yourself than the next guy?
6. Write what you know. Ugh. Just shoot me. Okay, I did begin by focusing on a niche in which I already had good contacts. B ut a journo’s job is not to dispense her own wisdom… it’s to dispense the wisdom of others. I didn’t know anything about shopping for a mid-sized tractor, but I was able to a) locate a few experts and b) ask questions, like, say, “So what’s the deal with mid-sized tractors, then?”, then c) write down their answers. Voila. Article. Write what you DON’T know, and chances are you’ll ask much better questions.
7. Everyone wants to read your autobiography or journal of Deep Thoughts. Hey, it’s even more fun if you write it in the third person, as if you were interviewing yourself. It will simply fly off the shelves because you are just so gosh-darn interesting.
8. Use correct spelling, punctuation, and grammar. Oh. My. Fucking. Gawd. You need to be told this?
9. Get lots of sleep. Sure, as long as deadlines aren’t an issue for you … I’m sure your editor will understand the vital importance of being well-rested.
10. Designate a space for your writing where you can work undisturbed. I can’t even manage this, living alone with two cats. They are all over me like hairy white on rice, and that’s to say nothing of my keyboard. Good luck achieving it if you have a spouse and/or ankle-biters. Unless you build your very own dungeon, and don’t mind emerging to heaven knows what kind of chaos which has occurred in your bleary-eyed absence. The thing about working from home is, you’re not really doing anything important, are you, so you are the first victim people call when they need a couch moved or a horse subdued for the vet …
11. Eat healthy snacks. By all means, make sure your beta-carotene, your psyllium fibre, your spirulina, and your omega-3 intakes are appropriate for the writing life. Pretend you have unlimited leisure time and no bills to pay.
12. Go for long walks, commune with nature, find your bliss etc. Because that’s how articles get written. Certainly not by doing research, interviewing sources, or, um, sitting down and writing.
13. Read lots of stuff. I am absolutely convinced that the bilingual text on my morning box of Cap’n Crunch has made me a better writer. Seriously, there are people with writing ambitions who never read anything? Plus, plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery.
14. You are a “real writer” if you believe you are. I believe I’m the heiress to the Thomson media empire, too, but my bank balance, tragically, disagrees. I’m sorry, but if you’ve never had anything published, you are a hobbyist scribbler. Maybe an ambitious one, maybe just a delusional one, but your writing needs to be able to stand up to professional scrutiny before you can use the appellation. Just sayin’.
15. Do creative cross-training to stimulate the ‘writing juices’. Oh, yes. Make greeting cards out of coloured construction paper and compose a delightful handwritten verse for the innards. Create bombs from pipecleaners, an old deadbolt, and some glitter glue. And while you’re at it, sell your crafty creations on Etsy — you might at least make some money that way.
16. If you’re writing for children, use simple words. Distressingly conspicuous, wouldn’t you say?
17. Don’t fear what you write. Huh? Well, I guess if what you write exposes your secret, festering desire to become a pedophilic serial killer, you might want to be a little afraid. Or at least surrender yourself to the authorities before things get messy. Trust me, it’s better this way.
18. Come up with catchy titles. a.k.a., You Can Never Have Too Much Alliteration.
19. I confess, I love, love, love this one: ”If you’re writing fiction, it’s a great idea to have a plot. It will coordinate your thoughts and add consistency to the text.” (This was actually taken from one of those writing-tips blogs.) Good Christ on a donkey, why didn’t I think of that?
20. A writer is someone who needs to write, has to write, is consumed by the passion to write. Two words: sheer bollocks.
Carlos Fuentes at home in México City in 2001. Photo courtesy Henry Romero/Reuters.
Carlos Fuentes, México’s most elegant and renowned writer, died at a hospital in México City May 15. He was 83. Fuentes published his first novel Where the Air Is Clear in 1958 at age 29, which set off an explosion of literary genius and introduced the English-speaking world to Latin American literature. Fuentes gained famed in the United States with 1985’s El Gringo, a tale about American writer Ambrose Bierce, who disappeared during the Mexican Revolution. It was the first book by a Mexican novelist to become a best seller in the U.S.
Like many writers, Fuentes was more ideological than political; choosing to embrace justice and essential human rights regardless of political labels. He supported Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution that overthrew the regime of Cuba’s Fulgencio Batista. But, Fuentes eventually turned against Castro when he saw the latter had become much like his predecessor. He sympathized with Latin America’s indigenous peoples and opposed the administration of President George W. Bush because of its anti-terrorism tactics and immigration stance. But, he also criticized Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, dubbing him a “tropical Mussolini,” and condemned México’s failed war on drugs, which has taken some 50,000 lives over the past 5 years.
Like any passionate scribe, Fuentes communicated best through his works. He wrote with fervor, becoming one of modern literature’s most prolific writers. In The Death of Artemio Cruz, a 1962 novel considered his masterpiece, his title character, an ailing newspaper baron confined to his bed, looks back at his climb out of poverty and his heroic exploits in the Mexican Revolution, concluding that it had failed in its promise of a more egalitarian society.
Though Fuentes wrote in just about every genre, including opera – a 2008 work inspired by the life of Gen. Antonio López de Santa Anna, the wooden-legged president of México during the Texas Revolution – he declined to write an autobiography. “One puts off the biography like you put off death,” he once said. “To write an autobiography is to etch the words on your own gravestone.”
Carlos Fuentes was born on November 11, 1928, in Panama, the son of Berta Macías and Rafael Fuentes, a Mexican diplomat. As his father moved among Mexican embassies, Fuentes spent his early childhood in several South American countries. In 1936, the family arrived in Washington, D.C., where Fuentes learned to speak English fluently while enrolled in a public school.
In 1940 the family was transferred again, this time to Santiago, Chile, where young Carlos began to experiment with writing. In an interview with The Times in 1985, Fuentes said he first had to decide “whether to write in the language of my father or the language of my teachers.” He chose Spanish because he believed that it offered more flexibility than English, but there was also a practical reason. English, he said, “with a long and uninterrupted literary tradition, did not need one more writer.”
He was 16 when his family finally returned to México. He knew his homeland through the stories his grandmothers had told during the summers he spent with them.
For much of his career Fuentes competed for recognition and influence in Mexico and abroad with another titan of Mexican letters, the poet Octavio Paz. Fuentes received the National Order of Merit, France’s highest civilian award given to a foreigner; Spain’s Prince of Asturias Award for literature in 1994; and, in 1987, the Cervantes Prize, the Spanish-speaking world’s highest literary honor. Paz, however, won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1990. Fuentes, a perennial on the shortlist for the honor, never did. His final work, an essay on French politics, was published the day he died.
Regardless of awards, Fuentes’ body work speaks without such accoutrements. Search here for a complete selection of Carlos Fuentes’ books.
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Justice was recovering in a Dallas animal shelter before he died last month.
I reported last month about the case of a 4-month-old puppy that was doused in lighter fluid and set afire in South Dallas apartment complex. The animal suffered severe burns over 70% of his body and died 4 days after the incident. Police named him “Justice” and sought information about the perpetrator. A woman who lived in the complex and witnessed the attack finally came forward to identify 18-year-old Darius Ewing as the perpetrator. Ewing turned in himself shortly afterwards. A judge set Ewing’s bond at $100,000, but at a hearing this morning in Dallas County, the amount was reduced to $50,000. Ewing’s mother testified that her son is not a flight risk and complained that the bond was too high because he didn’t kill a person. Despite his age, Ewing already has an extensive juvenile criminal record going back 4 years. He’s been charged previously with assault and has gang ties.
His mother’s comment pisses me off. Stupid bitch! I don’t care that her precious baby didn’t kill a person. Just because she doesn’t seem to view him far removed from Pampers doesn’t mean he’s not a danger to society as a whole. I’ve noticed a lot of these punks have mothers who appear clueless. If Ewing set a dog on fire, who’s to say he wouldn’t do the same to a human? A child? An elderly person? Gang members have no soul and therefore, deserve no sympathy or compassion – no matter how badly their mothers cry. I’ll keep everyone updated, as this case strikes a personal chord with this animal lover.
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This past weekend hundreds paid tribute to the first anniversary of the birth of a rare white buffalo on the Lakota Ranch in Hunt County, Texas, northeast of Dallas. As I’d reported previously, Lightning Medicine Cloud was found dead by his owners a couple of weeks ago, skinned and mutilated. To make matters worse, his mother was found dead the next day; delivering a double shock to the ranch. A $5,000 reward that owner Arby Little Soldier offered for information leading to the perpetrator or perpetrators has ballooned to $50,000. But, officials haven’t advised of any positive leads. Since white buffalo are considered sacred to the Lakota Sioux and other Native American people, the ranch wants Hunt County authorities to consider the possibility of this being a hate crime.
Lightning Medicine Cloud would have turned 1 year old on May 12. A long-planned birthday celebration metamorphosed unexpectedly into a memorial service with scores of people coming from around the state and the nation to honor the slain calf. The animal had been named for the lightning storm in which he was born last year. Solid white buffalo are extremely rare; only 1 in a million buffalo births are pure white. Lightning Medicine Cloud also was the first white buffalo born to a Native American ranch owner in decades.
Anyone with information is asked to call the Hunt County Sheriff’s Department at (903) 453-6800 and ask for either Sheriff Randy Meeks or Lt. Tommy Grandfield.
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“This is not how we want to run a business.”
– Jamie Dimon, CEO of JP Morgan Chase, the biggest bank in the United States, on its $2 billion loss through what he called “sloppiness” in stock market bets.
I’ve seen garage sales function better than some of these banks!
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Tigryulia holds one of her newborn cubs at the Skazka Zoo in Yalta, Ukraine. Photo courtesy of the Associated Press.
The three white male cubs cuddle with their albino sister shortly after being born at the Skazka Zoo. The zoo has launched a competition to find names for all of them inspired by former Ukraine presidential candidate Yulia Tymoshenko. Photo courtesy of the Associated Press.
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Chief Writing Wolf 