garmana::blog

Xeno's paradox and success

I spend too much time thinking about success. Whether or not I'm successful, what it means to be successful, and whether I'll make it there someday and look at the view from the pinnacle. And I'm not talking strictly about financial success. I didn't grow up with money, I realize that the happiest moments of my life had no connection to money whatsoever, and so my definition of success doesn't begin with a large bank account.

To me, success has always been about being at the top of my game; whatever it happens to be. I work as a Web professional in my day job, and so I "need" to be at the top of the heap to consider myself successful. Writing is my passion, and so I "need" to be published to be successful at that. Paperback rights or an Oscar would be nice. :-) But would achieving those things really make me successful? I'm not so sure. I know of a lot of well-paid and bestselling authors that I think aren't worth their weight in imitation white gold.

The other issue is that the game is always changing. This is especially true on the Web. A new startup or viral idea is always pulling the legs out from underneath the reigning champion, and in the writing world the fickle taste of the masses moves among romance, pre-adolescent wizards, spy thrillers, and back again. Just when you think you have the race figured out, the track changes and the other cars get more horsepower.

Thinking about this reminded me of Xeno's paradox. Imagine that you are traveling from point A to point B. To get there of course, at some point you'll reach the halfway point. Let's call this your "new Point A." After you resume on your way you'll hit the midpoint again. As you continue your journey and repeat that process over and over again, and you never reach your destination. You're constantly reaching a milestone and discovering you're halfway there.

And so it goes with success today. You think you know what it means to reach the top of your field, but by the time you get there it's a whole new ballgame. Maybe your game doesn't even exist anymore. That realization forced me to change my definition of success. Not as a cop out, but as the recognition that it can never remain stagnant. Success in any industry or creative pursuit is different than it was 10, 100, or 1000 years ago. To truly find success, you'll need to find your passion and go at it full force. If you're lucky you'll be able to do it to support yourself, and if you're really lucky you'll find your fortune along the road. But you'll never reach the end, which is why you need to discover your passion first. Without that, you'll never muster the strength and courage to stay along the infinite journey.

So I wrote a screenplay

You may have noticed the Script Frenzy winner's logo in the right hand column of the site (unless you're using an RSS reader). What is that, you ask? Script Frenzy is a "contest" that challenged writers and wannabes to write a 20,000-word screenplay in the month of June. The basic rules are that you can formulate and outline the story beforehand, but you cannot start writing the script itself until the first of the month. After that you're left typing like a slobbering, rabid pit bull in your spare time over the next thirty days until it's done.

And type I did. I ended up at 20,362 words and 108 pages with two days to spare, which would roughly work out to a movie one hour and fifty minutes long uncut. It's entitled "Milo," and is basically "The Bourne Identity" for the tween crowd. The official tag line reads, "A young boy with no memory of who he is discovers that he has extraordinary abilities, only to find out that unlocking the secret may destroy his newly-adopted family unless he can find the courage to unravel it alone."

Profound, I know. ;-)

I'm not winning an Oscar with this one, but those of you that know me well know that I've always dreamed of being a published writer and this challenge came up just as I was toying around with finally doing it on my own anyway. I actually planned to write another screenplay I've had in the back of my head for ten or twelve years called "Closing In" but the plot line for "Milo" came to me in a flash a couple nights before June 1. I like the concept of "Closing In" better and thought that I'd learn my way through the screenplay writing process with a different idea.

I learned a lot during the writing process, and I came out on July 1st understanding the structure of a "proper" screenplay and story in general much better than before. So after twenty eight days of typing, three books on screenplays, four nights of falling asleep at the keyboard until waking to a cramp in my neck, and way too much Web surfing I ended up with a rough draft of my first real bit of writing. I've started to revise it but this is proving to be just as daunting a task as writing it, and without that month-long timer ticking in my head it's been difficult to complete.

I thought that mentioning it here would encourage me to get back to it, and to get it in a presentable state so I can gather some critiques. After taking my lumps with this one and learning some more about the screenwriting process, it's on to the next one.

May 2007 be the start of my writing career.

Old beginnings

I didn't know if his wife and sons would recognize me since I look quite a bit different than I did 14 years ago, but their faces lit with recognition and we shook hands.

"Thank you so much for coming, Mark. It means a lot to me, and it would mean a lot to John."

"You're welcome, and thank you. He meant a lot to me."

"It's so good to see you all grown up."

"It's good to see you, too, though I wish we were visiting in happier circumstances."

His wife, Sarah, squeezed my hands tighter and her gaze cast down towards her husband. I looked at him also and my eyes started to well up a little bit. He was older, grayer, and twenty pounds lighter than I remembered him, but still looked as kind as he ever had.

Aaron squirmed in Jessica's arms and I grabbed his hand to get him to smile. Sarah and I talked about Aaron and how he's growing, and the moment didn't seem quite so dismal. The line pushed forward a little bit, and now Sarah was talking to my sister behind us.

"Be sure to look at the front of that album," Sarah called back. "John stored his favorite photos in there."

The small card table next to me held a photo album, his stole and robe, and a hand-carved wooden name plate from his office. I flipped the album to the front page, and an eight-year old me smiled out from four of the five pictures. Two Polaroids with my sister and parents, another with my sister, John, and Sarah, and another with just me and my sister holding our Lhaso Apso, Rags near the front porch of our old house.

"That was our first memory of Illinois," Sarah said. "That first picture is at the airport where you and your parents picked us up when we stayed with you for the weekend."

I vaguely remembered that April weekend, touring small towns around the area and scoping out the local high school. That fall, they moved from Texas and he was the minister at my hometown church for the next nine years. In that time John had a profound effect on me, because he was one of the few adults that I felt "got me." He was in his mid 50s when I was in junior high, but he loved to talk with me about books, particularly science fiction and comics. He had a large collection of #1 issue comics going back to the 40's, and every summer we drove an hour to Decatur's used book store that dedicated a room to comics and pulp magazines. We would spend the morning rifling through old dusty boxes, break for lunch, and then head back to the store to resume our treasure hunting. He also introduced me to Jules Verne and C.S. Lewis' non-Narnia novels. He first inspired me to mature my reading list beyond The Hardy Boys and The Cat from Outer Space (though that book rocked the casba). My love of writing really grew then when my reading experiences broadened, and it also taught me to discover other writers of my own.

He also always told my parents and me that he thought I would grow up to be a minister. "Not that you have to," he'd always say, "but we'd be lucky to have you. No matter what you do, make sure it's inspiring to people."

I'm not sure I've found my avenue to fulfill that sentiment yet, but hopefully someday I will. I'm grateful that someone took the time to do that with me. Thank you, John.

All ready

A dad can nest, too, right?



Jessica and I have been getting the nursery ready for the new addition to our family: painting, getting the crib set up, buying some clothes, etc. I wanted to add a little something extra for him when he comes, something personal from Dad.

When I was a kid I was a huge fan of Calvin and Hobbes (still a fan, really). It was the first comic I read every day in the paper, and I was sad to see it end ten or so years ago. To me, the strip represented all of the fun, questions, and mischief of which childhood is supposed to be stuffed full. I used to draw pictures from the strip in a sketchbook in my room, and so I thought that my son may like having some of my favorite pictures in his room.

I borrowed an LCD projector so that I could sketch in pencil on the walls (versus repainting and repainting), and then followed that with the paint. I think it's turned out pretty well! As he grows up, I hope he likes the characters as much as I always did.

You can click here to see some pictures from the nursery, or click the thumbnail at the top of the post.

2922 days and counting

Eight years ago today I bought my Honda Prelude. It looks little more worn and a little less red than when I drove it home for the first time, but I'm still in love with it. It's been a reliable car for me minus one $1000 timing belt mishap (knock on wood), and it's really only in need of some new tires. Okay, and brakes. And shocks. But it's been paid off for four years and gotten me 103,000 miles, and so I'm not complaining.

Eight years ago today I was the textbook lesson in how not to buy a car. I had been having problem after problem with my old car. I had replaced the timing belt, tires, brakes, and exhaust system all in the last two months. It was ten years old with 170,000 miles and it was beyond worse for wear. The night before the alternator had conked out, and so I had the car towed to the local Honda dealership. Lesson in stupid car buying #1.

I was intending to get a 3-4 year old Accord, thinking that it would be reliable and affordable. Somehow the dealer got me behind the wheel of the brand new black Prelude SH in the showroom, and somewhere through the cloud of New Car Smell® I heard him tell me that he would open the double doors and let me drive the car off of the showroom floor for a test drive by myself. I was 22, single, and three months into a full-time salary. And of course the carcass of my last car was rotting behind the building, junkyard buzzards circling. He had me.

I drove the car out of rush hour traffic and into the country, opened the sunroof and windows, and cranked the stereo. I had ascended out of Jalopy Hell and landed in New Car Heaven. I floated back into the dealership parking lot and the smile plastered across my face let my salesman know that the 94 Accords just weren't doing it for me anymore. I feigned boredom but I was as transparent as the windshield. Lesson stupid car buying #2. We started negotiating price, and soon I was signing my name on the dotted line.

Fast forward eight years, and I still love the feeling I get sitting behind the wheel. I love the handling and the styling, and it fits me like a glove. It's just a car, but after all this time it's become my car. I'd love to hit 200,000 miles in it...

I admit, it's for the popcorn

There are some days that I don't want to do anything other than go watch a movie. I want to get my ticket and a huge bucket of popcorn, shuffle my way between the seats over the sticky floor, and wait for the lights to go down. I want to see previews, and a good movie. I don't want to rent a movie or watch a good show on TV; I just want to go to the theater and see a movie.

When I get that itch I can't concentrate on anything else. I can't read, I can't go work out, I can't do homework, and I can't mow the lawn. Today is one of those days.

Brad Barker's customer service is

We bought a "pre-owned certified" Accord from Brad Barker Honda about nine months ago, and the factory warranty still applies. The previous owner lived nearby, and the salesman showed us the service records to prove that the owner had always come to the dealer to have the car serviced. We have not taken the car anywhere else other than for oil changes and tire balancing.

The inside cover on the ceiling of the car started falling down and so we took the car in to have that repaired presuming it was under warranty. However, the cover plate to an electrical access box shows signs that it has been removed, and that box sits under the area of the roof that is falling down. Brad Barker claims that this violates the warranty, and so now we have a $250 bill for a simple glue job.

This is inexcusable. We bought the car with a full warranty, and they certified the car as being in new operating condition. Since we've never accessed that plate in any way, it had to have been done before we purchased the car. I realize this is an easy thing to overlook, but technically this should have been disclosed to us (and I question the "pre-owned certified" inspection if it does not cover all items that would void a warranty).

The burden of proof is on us of course, and there is no way to prove that we didn't open the access panel and void the warranty. It kills me, though, that Brad Barker certified and guaranteed the vehicle, and now won't stand by their product. I have bought both of my vehicles from them, and chose Honda because of its quality and reputation for customer service.

I'll likely get another Honda in the future, but not from Brad Barker.

Marmaduke Explained

This just struck me as hilarious today. ;-)

O'Reilly Labs Code Search

O'Reilly has made "O'Reilly Labs Code Search" available to the public.

This looks like it will be a great technical resource for programmers and Web developers, whether you are a fan of the O'Reilly books or not. This site is a search index of all of the coding examples in the O'Reilly library. I came across the link a few hours ago and have already used it twice.

To search on an example for a specific language, just search for "cat:whateverlanguage yourquestion." For example, if you want to search on examples for using a browser session in PHP, enter:

cat:php session

If you're interested, be sure to check out the other query formats for searches based on year published, author, ISBN, and chapter number.

You know you've been working on t

... you're proofreading a research paper, and when you read through your scribblings to type the changes you find a mix of traditional edit marks and HTML. Okay, about 50% HTML.

My section headings have <b> scrawled next to them in red ink to indicate they should be bold, and I circled a handful of phrases and marked them with an <em> for italics (no <i> tags here, no Sir!).