The Writer's Poke

For Writers: When you start to go bald, my wife tells me, just shave off your hair. Don't do a comb-over. I have no intention of doing a comb-over, but that's a choice a lot of men make. Don't they know better? They must, but something about vanity blinds them to the fact that they are doing something that most swore they'd never do. Does hair still equal masculinity in our culture? Chest hair is no longer sexy, unless you're David Hasselhoff or Paul Stanley. Leg hair doesn't seem to be important either, although I remember when I was growing up that kids would point out that I didn't have a lot of it, as if not having a sufficient amount of leg hair made me less of a man. I've kept a goatee for years, but that's simply out of convenience. Shaving every day is a drag, as I found out when I experimented with the bald look -- both face and head -- in my early 20s. But assuming I do start going bald like my dad and his dad before him, I have no problem ...

For Writers: Eva Kor decided that she couldn't live with hate any longer; she forgave the human beings that experimented on her and her twin sister; she forgave people involved in a great evil. She forgave people, not the evil. Somehow, she recognized that forgiving the former was possible without also forgiving the latter. People hated her for her willingness to forgive, claiming that she had no right to forgive. But Eva's point was this: forgiveness is the only way to move on. It is the only real path forward. And it's an individual choice. She didn't need anyone to ask for her forgiveness. Forgiveness is something freely offered. Forgiveness is power. Forgiveness is liberation. To forgive is not to forget. How could the Holocaust ever be forgotten? But what purpose is gained by holding on to hate? In what ways have you allowed hate to control you? "You cannot hate other people without hating yourself." -- Oprah Winfrey

"What Was Palin Thinking?" Sure to be a great DVD board game. Look for it at a Walmart near you during the X-mas Season.

Now that their political stock has dropped more than the Dow Jones, McCain and Palin have decided it's time to plan for life after politics. Interestingly, both have landed roles in the popular Batman movie franchise. McCain will assume the role of Harvey Two-Face, and Palin will be the first female to play the Joker. Courtesy of: http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/10/12/18544195.php

This photo, taken at the conclusion of the third McCain/Obama debate, screams for a caption contest. Pundits have noted that McCain was a lot more animated in the last debate, but perhaps that's not always a good thing. Anyway, if you were to put a caption to this photo, what would it say? Here's my lame attempt --> McCain: the Original White Zombie Or how about --> Here McCain attempts to solitify his conservative zombie base. Now I just know you can come up with something better than that!

The people have called, and I have listened to their call. The country is hungry, and I will feed their bellies. Yes, I am happy to announce that I am running for president of the United States of America. Please click the following link to see a news story about my surprise entry into this year's political campaign. There are only three weeks left, but together, we can change the world! http://www.tsgnet.com/pres.php?id=370617&altf=Csfu&altl=Gvmmfs

November is National Novel Writing Month, affectionately known as NaNoWriMo . Now in its tenth year, NaNoWriMo's goal is to get writers to, well, write. No more procrastination, and no more excuses. The rules of the "contest" are simple: Just write a 50,000 word novel during the month of November. Last year, over 100,000 would-be writers signed up, and over 15,000 crossed the 50,000 word finish line. What do you win? Well, you win the fact that you've written a novel, and once the organization confirms your word count, it sends you a nice certificate, suitable for framing no doubt. According to the organization's website, a number of NaNoWriMo novels have found publishers, and at least one was a #1 New York Times best seller. November sounds like a great time to write a novel, and I plan to enter the contest. Check out the link, and if you're interested in entering, too, email me. ( bret.fuller@roch.edu ) Together, maybe we can encourage each other to write ...

Christopher Buckley, son of National Review founder William F. Buckley, has decided to jump the sinking McCain ship to support Obama! Buckley who still writes for National Review himself notes that he decided to post his endorsement to thedailybeast blog rather than in the conservative magazine because he didn't have the stomach for the amount of hate mail he knew it would generate. (That's probably the longest sentence I've ever written without any controlling punctuation marks.) It's time for more Republicans to attempt that McCain's ship is sinking. More importantly, it's time for more Republicans to come out for Obama. Click on the link below to read the Buckley piece. http://thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2008-10-10/the-conservative-case-for-obama/

For the past few days, McCain and Palin have been calling Obama a plethora of things as I've noted in a previous post. Not surprisingly, impressionable Republican minds have been soaking up these warnings like sponges. Friday night McCain seemed to understand that his campaign was taking things too far. He actually took the unusual step of defending Obama's character! Yes, McCain told his crowd that Obama was an honorable man, and a good American. He told them that they had nothing to fear from Obama as president of the United States. Incredible. Question: Will McCain now tone down the rhetoric in his stump speeches and in his commercials? Will he put a leash on pitbull Palin? Or, will he continue taking the low road, while attempting to take the high road simultaneously? Pundits on MSNBC tonight suggested that perhaps McCain knows that he's fighting a losing battle, and perhaps the so-called "old McCain" is coming out. Perhaps the McCain that really does believe ...

McCain is angry. A University of Wisconsin study found that 100% of McCain's TV ads are negative. In comparison, only 34% of Obama's ads are "negative." And in his desperation, it looks like McCain has nowhere to go but deeper into the gutter. He will continue to attack Obama and try to make his "character" an issue. Great move, McCain. Don't attack Obama on the issues. Just try to attack him personally. Yeah, I'm sure that will work for you. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/oct/09/uselections2008.johnmccain4 Interestingly, Minnesota Senator Norm Coleman announced today that he will pull all negative ads in his race against challenger Al Franken. He's also going to skip a McCain rally today... "to 'dedicate his time to implementing his suspension' of negative ads. " http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/10/10/coleman_ads/?refid=0 Hmmm... interesting... This indicates to me that Coleman is no dummy. McCain is a s...

I say, you just gotta love capitalism, don'tcha? http://www.cafepress.com/palinfear.311403650 After Nov. 4 when Palin goes back to her igloo in defeat, this shirt will be worth what your stocks are currently. But at least the shirts will still make good cleaning rags. :)

John McCain claims that he can "work across party lines." Really? This man's campaign offers no sense of working collaboratively with people. Look at how he and Palin (and their ads) have described Obama: 1. Liar 2. Hypocrite 3. Naive 4. Terrorist 5. Dangerous 6. Liberal 7. Dishonorable Those are just the first seven descriptors that easily come to my mind. Let me ask you: If someone described you in these terms, would you be willing to work with that person with a smile on your face? Of course not. Name-calling is not the way to form alliances and to work with people that disagree with you. Now look at the other side. Has Obama and Biden (and their ads) described McCain in the same ways? For the most part, clearly not. Yes, they have tried to tie McCain to Bush, but they've never criticized him as a person . McCain's tactics bother me. Yes, he's just playing the political game, but Obama is showing that you don't have to play that game. For the most part,...

You cannot win a metaphorical war. The next time you hear someone say "We must stay in Iraq and win the War on Terror," please remind them: The War on Poverty started in 1964 -- and there are still poor people. The War on Drugs started in 1971 -- and there are still drugs. Terrorism as a term has been around since at least the French Revolution (that, by the way, began in 1789). The point is: There is no such thing as "The War on Terror," and therefore, there is no "front" to this war -- not in Iraq, and sorry, not in Afghanistan, either. Further, there really is no "enemy" for our military to attack. Can you defeat terrorism by dropping bombs and locking up people in Cuba? Nope.

For some reason, I found yesterday's Zits comic (above) a lot more funny than my wife did. But it made me think: what's the best way to read Elizabethan poetry? Amazingly, someone has posted an article on the Internet to address that very question: http://www.ehow.com/how_2094353_read-elizabethan-poetry.html?ref=fuel&utm_source=yahoo&utm_medium=ssp&utm_campaign=yssp_art Pulleys are optional.

Octavia turns one next Thursday; don't forget to wish her a happy first birthday -- she'll never have another first birthday, folks. :) Why is this girl so darn happy?

For Writers: "You're never satisfied," my wife tells me, and I know that she's right. But is that a bad thing? If I were easily satisfied, I might still be working in a factory, or I might still be an adjunct instructor in Illinois, or I might still be a full-time instructor in South Carolina. The point is, whenever I've felt unsatisfied, I've tried to do something about it. But when do the feelings of dissatisfaction end? For some people, never. Some of us were raised to believe that "good" in the enemy of "great," and if we're not striving for perfection, then there's something wrong with us. This is a tough lesson to discard. And for me, just being satisfied with who I am and where I am in life is one of the most difficult problems I deal with on a daily basis. Part of it is this: I don't want to live a "satisfactory" life. To me, that smacks of living a cliche. But how to avoid being trapped in the cliche is the ru...

After last night's debates, I was left wondering: why even have debates? Palin admitted early on that she wasn't planning to address the questions asked by the moderator; instead, her strategy was simply to vomit out all the talking points that she had memorized at McCain's ranch. And it's probably a good thing she did that, of course. When she was interviewed by Charles Gibson and Katie Couric, she got herself in trouble when she didn't stick to her talking points (i.e. when she had to come up with an original thought on her own). If you compare Biden's answers with Palin's, it's pretty clear that Biden knew a lot more. Biden, I'd betcha (to use Palin talk), didn't have to prep or study for the debate. He already knew the issues, and he clearly knew what he was talking about. Palin, on the other hand, didn't express a deep understanding of the issues. However, Palin does have an ideology, and she stuck to that ideology, but what use is havin...

Have you read John Updike's "A&P"? It's a short story, and the narrator asks what pretty girls have for brains -- perhaps just a fly buzzing around in a jar. Personally, I don't think Palin is stupid, but based on the limited number of interviews she's granted over the past couple of weeks, it's painfully evident that political issues aren't her forte. And that's unfortunate; since she somehow got elected governor of a state, and was "tapped" by McCain to be VP, you'd expect her to know something about political issues... Most of you have probably seen her response to Katie Couric's question about supreme court decisions, other than Roe v. Wade, that she disagrees with. Amazingly, she cannot come up with a single case. I look for patterns. It might even be excuseable for her just to be off for one question, or even one interview, but let's look at the pattern: 1. Charley Gibson asked her about the Bush Doctrine, and she ha...

I'm sure this cartoon was designed with science fiction in mind, but it also is a pretty good attack on James Joyce. Question: If a book is written by an author for his own amusement (i.e. Joyce, Pynchon, most post-modernists), can it ever really be considered "good"? When is it okay to break the rule of clarity in fiction?