June 28, 2005
Five Poems By Friday
I'm always out of the house to work on my identification problems. That should be finished by the end of next month. Ha, and I thought I'd finish the website by the first week of July.
I am going to pass at least five poems by Friday for a compilation, and one story by the end of the month. I'm thinking that I'd use my sample for this site, meaning I'll have to work on another one to replace it. Oh well, as long as there's work.
June 24, 2005
Show Me the Money!
I got a check for our efforts to produce a mobile phone game! That's both good and bad, because I don't have any "legal" identification with me! Hahaha!
I have to go get myself some cards that tell people that I'm me. Then I can shout.
The first draft of my short story is complete. And, I thought of another story on my way home from the bus. Buses are great for making stories. Unfortunately, the fare went up. Argh.
June 23, 2005
I Close My Eyes
I worked on the computer the whole day yesterday doing my part of the user guide for this mobile phone game. I turned the computer off at around 11 PM, with a promise that I'd go back and finish work at 1 in the morning. So I set my alarm to go off at 1 and dozed off.
I woke up at six.
The casting officer never called. That must mean I didn't get the part, which is a good thing, now that I think about it. Since shootings would be on Saturdays and Sundays, I wouldn't be able to attend the Gaiman Tour this July (yes, I'm looking forward to it). What was I thinking then? If they do call I'll probably say no.
On a lighter note, I bought myself a copy of Buy and Sell and found this company looking for a cartoon colorist. I got curious and submitted my resume, and got a call a few hours after. Guess what, it's the same company I worked for two years ago! Same coloring company, different boss, different location. I'm going there to meet the guys and update my contacts list. I missed work.
That doesn't mean I'm going back. Not unless they allow me to go part-time, or make me boss or something.
June 19, 2005
My Thighs Hurt
These usually doesn't even after very long walks, but I haven't in about a month, and now they hurt.
I headed for an audition today for an independent film. With the performance I gave, the best part I could land is cleaning up the mess. Nah. I don't think I still have my acting in me. I would however want to see how the writing is translated into a movie, in detail. As long as I can read the script, I'm all right.
Today's message is about integrity. It's so nice to redefine it to fit our own agendas. If you think about it, integrity can be good or bad since its concern is more on preserving a belief when events challenge the believer to lay it aside in favor to a more advantageous situation. Why isn't it that kids aren't taught nowadays what good is and preserve that all the way into adulthood? Tsk.
As an illustration, think politics.
Ok, enough with the elementary. I spent four hours working on the story and ended up with one paragraph. This is what happens when you want everything perfect all at one time. Note to self: the first draft does not have to be beautiful. Just my excitement. Oh well.
June 18, 2005
Work Work Work
I have two ideas for my sample story; one of them has a rough outline. There really isn't much you could do when you're tired. I spent the night doing color flats for a friend's comic book pages. FYI: color flats mean coloring a page using a computer without the shading. I told him I might go back to coloring comics for his company since the money's good. Of course he said ok. That settled, I might work on my portfolio after the website's finished, with the content and all (might is a good word; coloring is a mind-numbing experience. If I can collect a number of audio books to play while I work, then it’s a go).
That same friend and I (let's call him Melch) got a gig working on content for this mobile phone company, actually a joint project. We provide the content, they work on the programming. I understand a little programming, but I thought it better to leave it to the experts. The html incident this week is still fresh in my mind. Five hours to find a no break space ruining the layout! Of all the things that could drive you insane!
Tomorrow’s acetates might not be a problem anymore. All the songs have been printed out on a typewriting sheet, all ready to be photocopied on acetate. Tomorrow’s a good day for that, during practice (I’ve managed to get the team to practice in the morning).
June 16, 2005
Step 2
I've finished the final design modifications for three other pages. Yes, there will be four main pages in the site. Now I don't have to work in front of the computer all the time since I will be focusing on content. A few stories, a few images, a working profile, and I'm done. I expect content creation to really take long so the web launch might not happen until next month although I'm through with the design. Everything goes as planned.
Now for some sleep. It should be a big day tomorrow.
June 15, 2005
Heroes Are Made of These
I am eating dinner as I type, at 1:30 in the morning. Yesterday was about one thing – coding. It took me five hours to figure out that a misplaced no break space was destroying my table layout. It wasn’t even trying to hide. It was just there, beside a Blogger tag, and it took me five hours to find it. All the while I was thinking of calling the whole website thing off and use one of the templates instead (after spending a week on it? Heck no!). Good thing I procrastinated quitting.
See how I invent stuff? How do I do that?
We’ll call the new method, “reverse procrastination”. It’s like your usual procrastination, but you put off doing something bad instead of doing something good or important. When you feel like quitting, you just tell yourself, “I’ll quit after thirty minutes,” and you tell yourself that again after half an hour, and the next half an hour, until finally, having solved that seemingly-minute-now-but-was-humongous-then problem, you don’t need to quit.
I was this close to quitting (extends both thumb and pointer with both tips almost touching each other), but thanks to this reverse procrastination principle, I’ve finished my project! Now I can eat well and sleep peacefully, without the help of food supplements or well-engineered airbeds.
The Reverse Procrastination by Erwin Robledo Kit includes a .jpg image of the Reverse Procrastination method discoverer and founder, Mr. Erwin Robledo; a five-page instructional email guide on how to work from being a quitter to a winner; 20 pages of blank legal-size typewriting paper to record your progress; a one-year calendar for easy progress tracking. And, as an added bonus, I’m giving away not one, not two, not even three, but four, meaningful pats on the back that would boost your self-esteem and relax your back muscles at the same time.
This offer is incredibly price at only $19.95! But wait! Order within the next 24 hours and you will receive three words to live by taken from the world’s top encouragers of all time! So what are you waiting for? Order now!
So this is what I’m like when I’m tired. Interesting.
June 14, 2005
Brain Went Boom!
A new problem arose - Blogger tags. Everything was easy until the comments part. That's when my head started spinning and I began to wonder why I couldn't settle for one of the many templates Blogger has in its library. I'm a writer for crying out loud, not a programmer! Why, oh why do I keep on doing everything from scratch?
Stupid artistic tendencies.
I've finished working on the site's CSS and the content is being worked out as I type. I am really praying that the only reason I couldn't understand the tags is because I am so drained and in need of sleep.
June 13, 2005
The Website is 60% Complete
I just realized how absent-minded I've been for the past week. Yesterday for instance, two of the acetates I prepared had errors: one had the wrong lyrics, the other had the wrong song. P&W continued without further incident though, thank God. I'm putting all the blame on the website, which would be finished sooner than expected. The layout and images have been finalized, so this week I'll be working on css and the web content. I won't be doing any more websites after that. This project is so time consuming. Fun, but time consuming.
Yesterday's preaching was about commitment and how committed people were able to change the world. You don't need to be a Christian to understand that. Now if Christians acted like Christians this world would change in a day. That is not the case unfortunately, and the lot of Christian impostors and dilly-dalliers have made the world apathetic to the Gospel.
Dilly-dalliers. I think I just made a new word.
New or not, I'm one of them. Please excuse me if I post what I know about Christ every now and then. It's not too late to change.
June 12 is Philippine Independence Day. To celebrate the occasion, I watched tv. Yes I know, that wasn't much. Don't rub it in.
June 12, 2005
Late for Practice
I've finally figured out how my website's going to look. I may be able to upload the site by the end of June!
Church band practice usually starts at 8 PM, so I thought something was wrong when I arrived fifteen minutes late and found the place empty. It turned out that the band decided to practice early (very early, at 9 AM) which was fine since I'm not scheduled to play for tomorrow's (today's?) service. But some of the songs haven't been typed and photocopied on acetate yet, and that meant a trip to the nearest internet cafe, one jeepney ride from home.
But why ride when you can walk?
I am definitely changing the practice schedule from PM to AM if the guys prefer it. I know I do. The neighbors do not agree that playing P&W songs in the loudest possible volume at midnight conduces a blissful sleeping atmosphere.
So that's what the recover post button's for. I wish I knew about it yesterday.
June 11, 2005
Caution While Working Overnight
There is a disadvantage when you're working late at night: you don't know what you're doing until you've spilt the milk. I was working on my thoughts regarding an article I read about Image Comics for hours, until I pulled my leg and tripped the computer plug. Boy, did I wake up after seeing the screen become black. And I was so proud with what I've already written.
Take a look at http://www.tcj.com/3_online/n_image1.html to see where I've based my now nonexistent essay.
I am by the way an independent comic book writer trying to become a rich and famous independent comic book writer among other things, so I take more interest in historical notes such as this than the average fan.
June 10, 2005
I Have to Start Somewhere
This is a first. I've taken interest in html once again since the start of the week, and am determined to put a website out by the end of the month. Web logging of course crossed my mind, although I feel a bit apprehensive about it (aren't diaries supposed to be kept secret?) In the end, necessity won the debate, and so my life will be one big open book.
What is the necessity, you ask? Why, the necessity to write of course. I fancy myself as one (though forgive my talent if it seems lacking) so I might as well try and prove it.
And yes, concerning the one year project thing. If I get bored writing journals, I'll end it, hopefully after a year. IF. Of course, if things turn out fine, then there won't be any problems now, would there?
I guess that's the most I could write without falling asleep and making a typo.
