Diary of a Network Geek

I finished No Plot? No Problem!: A Low-Stress, High-Velocity Guide to Writing a Novel in 30 Days last night.

It was good, though certainly not the usual writing book. The author, Chris Baty, is a motiviational writing pro who inspires people to attempt writing a novel every year. He’s the founder of NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month. You might have noticed that I’ve been “counting down” to that event on my sidebar and that’s why I read this book. I hope, all things being equal, to attempt NaNoWriMo this year. That is, if I can keep my characters from writing themselves now.

No Plot? No Problem! is first and foremost a motivational writing book. It’s fairly light on any real technique, other than those things that get you writing and keep you writing, but, as long as you keep that in mind, it’s a very good book. I don’t know about other potential writers out there, but one of my major problems has always been motivation and actually making myself write on a regular, consistent basis. I love writing, but it doesn’t pay the bills and likely won’t for quite some time, if ever, so doing my job comes first. After that, and the regular duties of life, if I have time and energy left, I might have something to write about. Maybe, if I’m lucky. So, after reading literally dozens of books on writing, I don’t need more about plot structure or scene description or anything else, but I do need motivation. This book has that in spades.

Mr. Baty bills the book as the “official handbook of NaNoWriMo”, so it might be helpful to know what those parameters are as they’re also the parameters the book uses to motiveate you. The goal of both is to write a 50,000 word novel in one month, not worrying about quality of either prose or story, just get 50,000 words cranked out by a 30/31 day deadline. Why 50,000 words? Well, according to Mr. Baty, because Brave New World by Aldous Huxley was 50,000 words and the first short novel he picked up when they started all this wonderful craziness. So, there it is. Fairly arbitrary, but a goal that is attainable. And, every year, people participate and attain that goal. Not everyone, but enough people that the thought of doing it motivates me and that’s what I need.

We’ll see how well I do and how much advice I follow from the book!
Oh, and at lunch today, I started The Sociopath Next Door. So far, it’s fairly good and giving me ideas for that book!

I finished Angels & Demons by Dan Brown last night.

It was good and only slightly marred by the fact that I’d read the DaVinci Code first, so I knew that Robert Langdon would survive. The rest, however, was a merry chase through the Vatican city.
Ah, but I’m getting a bit ahead of myself. This is the story that introduces us to the hero of the best-selling book and major motion picture, the DaVinci Code, Robert Langdon. He’s well known by now, of course, as a Harvard symbologist specializing in rather strange and occult subjects. In this book, he’s chasing the Illuminati, who were long thought dead or subsumed by the Freemasons. But, with the “invention” of anti-matter, along with a suitable containment device, the Illuminati make a sudden reappearance. They apparently send their agent to steal the highly unstable and explosive antimatter to use as a spectacular act of religious terrorism by blowing up the Vatican City. Robert Langdon is called in by the head of CERN, where the antimatter was created, for his help and to use his expertise regarding the obscure Illuminati to “save the day”. The rest of the plot, I’ll leave you to discover yourself by reading the book.

Okay, this is not quite Nabakov, but it is a fairly good read. I actually liked it better than The Da Vinci Code, but the writing is certainly no better or worse. Dan Brown isn’t the hack that a lot of literary critics make him out to be, but, then again, he’s not Ernest Hemingway or Charles Dickens, either. Angels & Demons is good, light, reading that still has some fairly high-minded premise. As I menitoned earlier, it’s a decent enough book, though I wouldn’t want to make a steady diet of Brown’s work.

Today, at lunch, I started reading No Plot? No Problem!, which is the “official” handbook for NaNoWriMo, hopefully, in preparation for attempting to participate in November. That’s a ways off, so I’m not quite willing to commit to that, but, still, I’m thinking about it.

I did something very new and outside my tiny, little comfort zone last night. I went to see a movie alone. I have never, ever done this before and the mere thought of it terrified me so much I had to tell several people I was going to do it so that they’d ask later to make sure I had. I’m not sure why it was so very frightening to me, but, well, it was. But, I did it anyway.

See, it’s like this… Movies, for me, are social events. They are things I go to with people, to share in the social aspect of the whole movie theater experience. It’s an event, even if a small one. A social occasion. A safe way to interact with my not so safe fellow man, or, if I’m lucky, fellow woman. But, LK (aka Ms. NewGal) was busy burning the candle at both ends and I didn’t really want to see more of my friends than I did this weekend and, well, a guy I’ve always admired for his social poise used to go to movies by himself, so… So, I screwed up my courage and went and did it. And had a very enjoyable time.

The movie itself was quite good, even though this is the third or fourth time it’s been done. Very exciting and filled with the very best special effects. The CG work on the ship rolling over alone is worth the $8.50 admission. Then, the whole upside-down ship with explosions and fire and madness and mayhem… Well, it’s very tense and very suspenseful and I loved it. If LK had been with me, she would have squeezed my arm so hard I think she’d have broken it. (She doesn’t do quite so well with suspensefull movies, by her own admission.) I mean, it had me squirming in my seat more than once and I could more or less see how things were going to work out the whole way through.
The best thing, though, was that there was no Shelly Winters character. She was replaced with a single, South American hottie. Horay for Hollywood!

I finished A Dirty Job : A Novel by Christopther Moore the other day.

Now, if you’ve never read anything by Christopher Moore, you simply must. I reccomend starting with Practical Demon Keeping. It was his earliest work, if I recall correctly, and what I started reading. I do not reccomend this lightly. There are tonnes of “in jokes” that refer back to his earlier writing that yo won’t get if you start with A Dirty Job. Other than that, though, I cannot say enough about how wonderful this book is. Truly, as he gets older, Moore’s writing gets better and better.

The book opens with the birth of Sophie Asher, an event that sends her father, Charlie, into quite a state. This emotional whirlwind is not improved by his wife’s death or the mysterious stranger in the lime-green suit that only Charlie can see hovering over his wife’s death bed. What’s more, having a somewhat self-involved, slightly closeted lesbian sister who meddles a bit too much probably didn’t improve things much for poor Charlie, either. Certainly, getting his copy of the Great Big Book of Death redirected out of his mail by an employee didn’t help one bit, either. Turns out, old Charlie is a Death Merchant and, according to Minty Fresh, the man in the lime-green suit, his “job” is to collect soul containers from the recently deceased and pass them on to their new homes, thus aiding the transmigration of souls and holding back the forces of darkness.
Believe it or not, this book is a relatively light-hearted comedic romp through a strange and dark San Francisco that touches on the topics of death, life and everything inbetween along the way. As in one of his earlier books, Lamb, Moore handles some delicate ideas surrounding spirituality with grace and skill and wit.  In spite of being about a rather heavy and potentially “dark” subject (eg. Death), Moore manages to spin a fun yarn filled with magic, mystery and delight.

In short, as with all of his work that I’ve read, I highly reccomend A Dirty Job : A Novel by Christopther Moore.  It’s brilliant work and a fun, breezy read that will have you looking for ways to make more time to read.  One warning, though, once you start reading Moore, you’ll want to read more.

Oh, I also read the inspirational book  A Better Way to Live : Og Mandino’s Own Personal Story of Success Featuring 17 Rules to Live By, which was a fairly good, if short read.  Given a choice, go with the Moore books.

Currently, I’m reading Angels & Demons because, well, because I have it, and it was reccomended to me by several people.  Besides, all this nice weather demands fiction that’s fun, not non-fiction that’s going to teach me something.

I keep meaning to mention this, but I’ve recently upgraded my blogs to the latest version of WordPress. Now, no one has probably noticed that, but I thought it was noteworthy. Well, if I did the upgrade right, no one noticed. Certainly, no one said anything if they did notice.

Mostly, it was a Very Good Thing to have upgraded, but there are some differences that still throw me off a bit. First, there’s the whole new interface deal. It used to be that I had to deal with a pretty simple, text-only interface. Now, though, the whole thing has gone all WYSIWYG and it’s totally throwing me off. Especially because it edits HTML natively. I’m getting used to it, but, still, I have to remember little details like not just hitting “enter” when I want a new line instead of a whole new section/paragraph. Secondly, the tools have really been improved. Linking and formating and everything else have been upgraded to match that slick new WYSIWYG interface, but they’ve added some HTML tools that they didn’t have before. Or, if they had them, didn’t showcase very well. Also improved is the preview section. Now, instead of just showing me a preview of the code in the post itself, WordPress previews the post as it would appear on the blog, with headers and footers and everything.
The one thing, so far, that I don’t like is the way the new version updates the timestamp on the post. For the most part, it doesn’t. Once you save a post as a draft, it takes a timestamp and seems to hold that until you manually change it. Other than that, though, I really adore the new version.

So, now you know. Doesn’t that make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside?

Anyway, one of the reasons for the upgrade was because I was developing plugins for WordPress. You can get to one of them right from this blog. Moonie, the name of the plugin, is a little dodad that let’s you add the neat moonphase stuff to your WordPress blog. Now, after admiring it on my blog, you can have it for yourself. Enjoy!

Speaking of music…
Some time ago, I mentioned buying a bunch of CDs at my favorite bookstore. Several of them were “local” talent, though, I think that covers a pretty broad geographic area. Anyway, I’ve finally listened to them enough to get a good feel for their sound and I’m totally ready to give you all a review. Or, at least, as ready as I’ll ever be.
The four CDs are To the Afterglow by SiennaBlu , Dance Cry Swing by Eileen Faxas, and The Storms Inside and A Little Gun Shy, both by Brian Douglas.

SiennaBlu reminds me of an unholy cross between Bon Jovi, REM and a high-school garage band. Though, they’re not bad at all, they do sound very raw and unpolished. There’s a lot of heart in their music, but, well, not much else. Don’t pay full price.

Dance Cry Swing by Eileen Faxas, though, is pretty good. This looks to be her first CD, but, if she keeps at it, she could be the Texas version of Gloria Estefan. No, really, her work has the same kind of sound and rythym. It’s not all that remarkable at this stage, but, you can see the potential here.

Of all these four, though, the two by Brian Douglas are my favorites. I have to admit, when I first got them, I didn’t realize they were the same guy. I purchased the second one, A Little Gun Shy, days after the first and just didn’t make the connection, until I heard the music. Douglas has a really personal sound, reminds me of Aqualung, a little bit, but with a lot heavier American influence. Mainly a balladeer, at least on these two CDs, his voice grabs hold of you and drags you down the paths of his memories, painful and joyful alike.

I stayed up late last night to finish The Torturer’s Apprentice.
It’s not my usual fare, and I really should have been through it much sooner. It wasn’t a long book, and very good, but I’ve been a little, er, “scattered” lately. Well, that and the Advanced Ripped Fuel I’ve been taking to try and up my metabolic rate so that I actually have the energy to do aerobic exercise again. (I keep reading about people running marathons and such, but my knees are too bad for that sort of thing. Besides, I think hitting the heavy bag would be better for my repressed rage.) Right, sorry, what was on about?
Ah, the book! Yes, quite well done, actually. A series of short stories, none related, several taking place in and around New Orleans before Katrina was even a tropical depression. As I mentioned this is quite a departure from my normal trash reading, but I was well rewarded for my risk. John Biguenet writes about wounded people trying to make their way in the world. The Vulgar Soul, which is the first story, is about an unbeliever, or, at best, an agnostic, who comes down with a case of stigmata. It’s a touching tale of loss and redemption, though, with a bit of a twist. Then, there was Lunch With My Daughter. I was touched deeper than I thought possible by this one. In fact, that may have been why I set the book aside for a bit. Very powerful writing, though it’s my personal life that triggered the deep emotion. The Work of Art, frankly, left me longing for love. It made me think about what I was looking for in a relationship and who might embody that. This was the story that had me reading late into the night last night. Do Me almost finished me off. A disturbing tale of passion and erotisicm, which I honestly didn’t expect, and pain. Always with love and passion the pain. Frankly, it hit a little close to home and I was relieved it ended in a way that resembled my life not at all. Any other alternative would have been far, far too disturbing.
In any case, everything was well written and thought-provoking, but those stories stuck out for me. Over all it was well done. The writing disappeared behind the story, which is always a good thing for me. It’s a short book and well worth picking up.

Today at lunch, I started A practical guide to Buddhist Meditation, which promises to be a good one. I’ve been meaning to start meditating again for some time. I used to do it when I was in college, but, then, I got consumed with my consumer life and much of my spirituality slipped away. Unless you count the girls I pursued to no avail. That’s fairly Zen-like, pursuing that which cannot be attained. Isn’t that the definition of Zen? “That which, when sought, cannot be found, but is found when the search is abandoned”?
Oh, that reminds me of something. The other day, I reccomended a book to someone via e-mail, but it’s been hard to get. Well, the book, the Science of Breath, is now online! Well worth checking out.

And, now, it’s off to a cheap dinner at the local Vietnamese noodly shop and thence to Half-Price Books. Anyone have suggestions for what to keep an eye out for?

My favorite Thai restaurant is closing.
At least, according to rumors I’ve heard from a reliable source, the family that has run Paddy Thai since before I came to Houston is retiring and going back to Thailand. Sadly, though understandably, they have chosen not to sell the business to someone they neither know nor trust and are just shutting down. At the end of the year! Yikes! So, you have roughly two-and-a-half weeks to get to Paddy Thai and get the best Thai food this side of the International Dateline.
Now, please, understand, I am not exaggerating at all when I write that this is the best Thai food ever. I’ve had Thai all over this city and the entire US, but nothing compares to this. The restaurant itself is small and rather unassuming. A quaint, candle-lit Thai-style house, shrouded by palm trees and tucked in-between two larger buildings, this little gem is one of the best-kept culinary secrets in Houston. Sadly, there won’t be enough good weather to eat outside on the front porch, enjoying the cool breezes of an early Houston Spring, but, if that were the only place to sit and get their Mus-Man Beef, it would be worth it. All their beef dishes melt in your mouth and if super-spicy Mus-Man isn’t your thing, then they have several curries that are worthy of a last meal.
I usually start with their chicken satay, which is so tender that it glides off the skewers, and peanut sauce. Often, I order spring rolls, too, just so I can soak up the rest of the unique peanut sauce left over from the satay. Then, if I’m feeling brave, I’ll order the white-hot “Tiger Cries”, which is a beef dish that, would indeed, make a tiger cry. If I’m not able to drink copious amounts of Singha to drown that burn, I’ll get their Chicken in Peanut Sauce (just for that sauce!) or their Beef Ginger. If I’m feeling like seafood, I might get the sweeter Garlic Shrimp or the more interesting Shrimp Basil, which I can’t remember seeing on anyone else’s menu. I’ve also enjoyed their unique “Steamed Mussels in Clay Pot”, which is actually served in a fired clay pot. Then, dessert….
Oh, dessert at Paddy Thai is worth the trip all by itself. In season, the mangoes with sweet rice are just the thing to end a perfect meal. The ladies always laugh when I ask them to tell me how they cut those mangoes so well and evenly! I’ve almost lost fingers at home trying to duplicate their best dessert! And, no matter how many places I have sweet rice and Thai egg custard, it’s never been better than here. Add a Thai coffee to that, so you can stay up into the wee hours talking with whomever you thought was special enough to share this hidden treasure and you have my idea of a near perfect evening.

I’ve never had a bad meal at Paddy Thai and I’ve never heard anyone ever complain, either. When I lived inside the 610 Loop, I found any excuse I could to jet over there for dinner. For the longest time, the sisters who ran the restaurant knew me on sight and could probably predict what I would order, too! These two tiny women are so full of life and energy that you can’t help but smile at them as they make recommendations. They’re never wrong, though, sometimes, they underestimate just how much a Westerner can pack away at one sitting. Thankfully, their entrees are better after they’ve sat in the fridge for a day or two. Oh, and then, you get to relive the culinary ecstasy!
Yes, I definitely need to get back there before the end of the month.
But, now, I think I need a cigarette.

Not the worst book I’ve read.
Well, I finally finished Numbered Account this weekend. It was okay. Not great and not terrible, but obviously a first novel and probably a “one hit wonder”. The author notes say that he was in Swiss banking for a long time and he obviously wrote what he knew. I suppose this was meant to be a kind of murder mystery/terrorist intrigue set against the fast-paced backdrop of Swiss banking. And, yeah, it’s about as exciting as it sounds. Oh, I suppose that a banker or an accountant might have found the technical details fascinating, but, frankly, at just over 750 pages, I found it mainly tedious. There was just enough to keep my resolve to finish every book I start and play it all the way through, but just barely. Honestly, most of the reversals were so obvious that I couldn’t figure out why the author took so long to reveal them. Who was sleeping with who and who was betraying who simply were NOT a mystery to me at all and that level of obviousness detracted quite a bit from the story. Anything that disturbs my willing suspension of disbelief ruins the purpose of reading fiction, for me, and the blatant exposure of clunky technique did that in this case. Frankly, I cannot reccomend anyone read this book. But, if you still feel the pull of daring-do in the fascinating world of banking, let me know and I’ll GIVE you the book.

I also read The Lazy Man’s Guide to Enlightenment this morning. Before you get all impressed, remember, this book is less than 80 pages long and is meant for a LAZY person, as the title suggests. Still, I like to reread this particular book on a regular basis to remind myself that being at peace with the world is as easy as making a decision to not let things bother me. Phrases like “Love as much as you can from wherever you are.” and ” Love is the only dimension that needs to be changed” and “Go beyond reason to love: it is safe. It is the only safety.” and “Enlightenment doesn’t care how you get there.” all remind me about what’s important and what I should be concerned with in this life. The whole attitude in this book makes life easier to live. It’s a great book and I highly reccomend it.

Advice from your Uncle Jim:
"When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us."
   --Helen Keller

I finished I Heard You Paint Houses last week.
I meant to do a review over the weekend, but that thing with the birds rattled me and I forgot. Anyway, it was a good book. I read a fair amount of “true crime” sort of books and they vary widely in quality, but this was pretty well written. Of course, a lot of the book is actually taken directly from taped interviews with Frank “The Irishman” Sheeran who, before his death, claimed to be the guy who “took care” of Jimmy Hoffa.
In fact, that was one of the interesting things about this book. See, Sheeran was a long-time friend of Hoffa. But, I’m getting ahead of myself. The book starts out with Sheeran recalling his rather rough childhood on the mean streets of Philadelphia. Coming from a home with a poor, alchoholic and abusive father made Frank Sheeran a tough Mick in an already tough neighborhood. That toughness would serve him well after he enlisted during World War II and served in the most active Army unit in the European theatre. Most of his friends didn’t make it through the first few weeks, much less make it through the whole war, so Frank learned to not get too attached. Well, not to anything but red wine and a “good time”. Mainly, though, he took after his old man and drank. After making it through the war, Frank came back to tough times. To make ends meet, he started stealing from the companies who hired him to drive trucks. It was through some of these crooked contacts that he met crime boss Russell Bufalino. Later, after doing way too many favors for Bufalino, Frank would find out, like the rest of the nation, that there was not only “organized crime”, but that his friend Russell was one of the top Godfathers.
Along the way to that discovery, Sheeran would get involved in the quickly growing Teamster’s Union. Remember, this was back in the days when things like unions might be all that stood in the way of gross abuses perpetrated against the American worker by big business. Many of the current government legislation to protect the working man simply didn’t exist and it was all out war between the Corporation and the Worker. And, that kind of bloody war was right where both Sheeran and Hoffa were at home.
I won’t spoil the whole book, but I will say that, if it’s all true, the “mystery” of Jimmy Hoffa’s disappearance, who was behind the assasination of JFK, and why the Bay of Pigs failed are all made clear. Sometimes, I wonder if any of it’s true, but, well, either way, it’s still a good read. Fast paced and informative, it’s some of the best writing and story-telling I’ve read in a long time.
Oh, the title comes from the first conversation Sheeran had with Hoffa. Introduced over the phone by Russell Bufalino, the first question Hoffa asked was “I heard you paint houses”, which is slang for “I hear you kill people for the mob” and comes from the fact that killing someone in a house “paints” it red with their blood. Sheeran’s reply was “Yeah, I do my own carpentry, too.” That’s slang for “I build the coffins to get rid of the bodies myself, too”, though, most of the time, there aren’t any actual coffins.
In any case, it’s a great book and I reccomend it highly to anyone who’s interested in either Jimmy Hoffa or the Mob.

I also read Tarnsman of Gor this week, because it was close to hand. I don’t reccomend it though, unless you’re an undersexed adolescent boy, that is. That’s the primary audience. Personally, I read it hoping with each page that it would get better, but it never did. And, still, that stinker sells like hotcakes. Go figure.

Currently, I’m reading Jesus in Blue Jeans, which is an interesting counter-point to the last two books! I’m not sure what I’ll pull out of the pile o’ books by my bed to read after that. With my eclectic taste, it could be anything!