Yawn. Stretch. Scratchscratch.

Finger thingies.

It’s been a while since I’ve posted here, but I gotta admit my fingers are getting all twitchy and my brain is beginning to itch. Words are beginning to bounce around inside there, co-mingling with a few rational thoughts from time to time, and I know it’s just a matter of time before they hitch a ride down the ol’ spinal column and link up with whatever mechanism it is that shimmy-shoots those words into phrases (and perhaps even a proper sentence while en route) trickling them down past the elbows to my hands, which Wekipedia informs me are the “multi-fingered extremity(ies) located at the end of an arm or forelimb of primates such as humans, chimpanzees, monkeys, and lemurs”.

In other words, my confused hunt-and-peck metacarpals.

It seems I still have no problem throwing words together, even though I’ve taken an extended leave from having done so these past many weeks. So, I suppose it’s safe to say something like, “Be on the lookout. Fair warning.” Just in case.

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Never Again (yeah, right)

I’ve said “DON’T DO IT!” to myself a zillion times. And yet I still DO IT in moments of weakness. I’m talking about buying those cheap, store-brand Ziploc-types of zipper freezer bags with prices so low they’re hard to pass up. And, every time I falter in order to save a few bucks, I wind up cursing myself for being so stupid. Either the zippers work one time only and then derail, or the bag itself splits open upon trying to seal it up. And every time it happens I say “NEVER AGAIN!” out loud one more time.

Yeah, right.

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Goodbye, Mr. Bradbury

I remember writer, author, lifetime friend, Ray Bradbury’s past television series in which — at the beginning of each episode — Mr. Bradbury climbs a set of stairs next to a garage, unlocks a door, and steps into his mysterious writing chamber. The room is filled with curiosities of all sorts. Knickknack items crowd every square inch of shelf space and windowsills. While the television show’s credit music dies down, Mr. Bradbury peers around the room through his thick glasses and explains he’s waiting for inspiration: that broken clock over there or that odd piece of jigsaw puzzle here; or perhaps the cracked African voodoo mask in the corner sitting next to a mirror in whose reflection dangles a Cupie Doll hanging by the neck from the ceiling. He feels a story in that one, he tells us. A story waiting to be written if he but — listens.

Mr. Bradbury passed away on June 5th at the age of 91. His contributions to the literary world are far too numerous to mention. He opened up my teenage mind to the wonders of what if like no other writer, an unsung and secret mentor to, I’m sure, millions of aspiring writers like me. I admired him. I will miss him. And, thanks to him, I will always remain a — listener.

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Sooner than We Think

VIDEO CURIOSITY

I was chatting with an UberStrike gamer earlier today, discussing how my generation became the “TV Generation”, and how today’s generation is one of “technology”.  Every time I turn on the Discovery Channel, or the Science Channel, or the Smithsonian Channel, I am reminded that, in a sense, we all are still living in the “TV” generation, that the Information Age is everywhere. But, I have to admit, when I peek at, purchase, play with all those things that technology is putting in our grasp, I am more than a little bit jealous about not being more of a part of it.

I suppose that’s what every generation has felt since civilization first began to crawl from the primordial muck: a feeling of being left out of a grander scheme of things we can never quite obtain, but one destined for — in the words of “The Moody Blues“, circa 1969, “our Children’s Children’s Children”.

Here is a video link my new UberStrike friend, Adam, passed along to me. He said, “Next generation will have…”

–submitted by “Adam”

Can you imagine?

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Tim says: if you’d like to submit one of your own You Tube “Video Curiosity” discoveries for consideration, use the “Contact” form at the top of the blog. Include the link and your first name only. Email addresses (if any) will not be published.

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It was a Penny Kind of Day

I was in a Mom & Pop fast food joint the other day. When the cashier was making my change, he noticed an off-color penny sitting in the change drawer. He fished the penny out of the penny compartment and examined the coin. “Wow, this is OLD!” he exclaimed, showing it excitedly to a fellow worker. He put the penny back in the drawer. After a while, he handed me my bag of burgers and fries. I couldn’t stand it.

“Uh — just how old is that penny?” I asked.

“Nineteen eighty-five,” he said. “It’s older than I am!”

I sat down with my meal at a very tiny table, feeling a little less hungry and a whole lot older than I did a few moments before.

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Small UberVictories

Sometimes, small victories are the best kind.

As many of you know, about a year ago I became heavily involved with the free, online shoot-em-up video game, UberStrike, where my screen name is “Gray Mouser”, a fictional character introduced in 1939 by the famous science fiction author, Fritz Leiber.

It wasn’t long before — with some amount of trepidation — I joined the UberStrike Forum, a game-related “chat room” of sorts. As the year progressed, I became fascinated with a particular section of the UberStrike Forum called “Cmunity“, a special area where appointed UberStrike gamer-”WRITERS” published Uber-related articles.

I couldn’t stand it. I wanted to become a part of it. After wrangling with UberStrike’s Manager, I was quickly accepted as an official Cmunity Writer. It wasn’t long before I was promoted to Cmunity LEADER, the equivalent of Spider-Man’s boss, Jonah Jameson. Gray Mouser had suddenly become Cmunity Newsroom’s Editor-in-Chief!

Soon, word got out there was a new, 62-year old UberKid on the block.

Cmunity Writers are hot stuff, all of them volunteers and highly admired by the mostly 13-19 year old UberStrike gamers. Everyone wants to become one.

It was somewhere along this timeline that I decided I wanted to help these aspiring wannabe writers. It was time to give something back.

After much juggling and jostling, I managed to get my boss (screen name: “Lady Daga”) to agree to something I called the  [Cmunity FREELANCE] Program, a program designed to encourage these aspiring non-Cmunity Writers in a self-discovery kind of way, by giving them a taste of the real publishing world complete with rejection letters. The Cmunity FREELANCE program gives these young wannabes the chance to have their writing displayed right beside the Cmunity Writer big dogs.

This past weekend, I “accepted” the first [Cmunity FREELANCE] Program article, a small victory made larger for me by the fact that I shot and edited a YouTube video to enhance the writer’s (screen-name “Elite|Phoenix”) article. I had spent 20 years of my working career as a television editor-writer-story producer, shooting and editing all kinds of stories, but none of them as rewarding as “Springs for the Win“, my personal return — after 30 years — to the world of editing. It was like riding a bike once again, a bike super-powered by light years of technological editing advances.

Sometimes, small victories are the best kind.

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Tim says: Point-and-shoot games like UberStrike are not for everyone. But if you geezers out there want to join me in jump-starting your heart rate, getting those hand-eye coordination brain cell synapses firing again, and discovering that today’s international youth are pretty damned amazing after all, I invite you to get off your butts and give UberStrike a shot. The game needs more of us seniors showing these young whippersnappers a thing or two. Mac user? A free Mac App version is available in the Apple App Store.

Cya in game!

–Mouser

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Maybe, Maybe Not

Sometimes it’s difficult figuring out why we’re all here. I mean — no matter what ones’ beliefs — we’re born, we die, we live on forever or we don’t; we’re alone or we’re not; there’s a plan, or maybe not; order, chaos, the same (but different?) or — maybe not. No matter what, one thing’s for certain: we’re born, we die, we live on forever or we don’t; we’re alone or we’re not; there’s a plan or maybe not.

And, no matter what, we’re a part of it.

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RTFM

Today I’m going to sit here and type for a while so you can see how my brain works when I don’t know exactly what it is I’m writing. Pretty much, I am zoned in on the key word “archives” as being the destination point of this article. So, when you see the word “archives” mentioned, you’ll know we’re getting close.

But first, I was reminded of a period of time in my life when writing software manuals was a large part of my job. That, plus providing customer support for the same software about which I wrote. Our customers were television stations who paid hefty monthly license fees to use our television ratings software. As such, the amount of money our customers paid to use our software placed them uniquely high up on the hierarchical food chain. Forget them ever reading my manual: these were people who demanded to bitch to someone — LIVE.

In those days, we support folks had a wonderful term that, unfortunately, we could never use publicly. “RTFM!” Which loosely translates, “Read The Fancy Manual”. After almost every support call — after the phone was politely and safely hung up — you would usually hear a frustrated support person, exclaiming “RTFM!” to nobody but everyone in particular. Since it was MY manual our customers weren’t reading, I was often one of these post phone call “RTFM!” chanters. It was personal.

The other day I was poking around my blog’s “administration” area and discovered something called the “archives widget”, which I slid into my navigation bar without really knowing what it was going to do. Turns out, the archives feature neatly categorizes and places all my past articles in a nifty “archives” pull down window near the top right of my “widgets” bar, immediately underneath the “blogroll” section.

By golly, how cool is that?

Perhaps if my blog folks had written a manual, I would have RTFM-ed it years ago.

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Tim says. It is now 24 hours later and I am sitting here again, this time wondering why I hadn’t placed the “archives widget” immediately  ABOVE my blogroll widget. Hang on. There we go.

Now, what am I going to write about for today’s article? I think coffee, Coffee, COFFEE will be today’s key words…

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Drummer

Tim says: I found this story in my “unpublished” archives. I have no idea if I ever got around to publishing it.

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Sometimes folks amaze me. In the aftermath of Hurricane Isabel (September 18, 2003) — and due to the fact that Rich, Walt, and I lived in the hurricane’s path — Recipe du Jour received literally hundreds of emails wishing us well. And then, for no apparent reason, we received an odoriferous email like this one:

Damage: $4.3 billion (2012 USD)

“I always find it difficult to feel sorry for victims of hurricanes. People who move into these areas get to enjoy the best of locations . . . summer home resort quality living . . . year around. They know full well they are moving into a hurricane prone area. Unlike a tornado victim, they get plenty of warning and not a surprise attack at 2am in the morning. Knowing this, I feel they should prepare for living in such an area by carrying proper insurance instead of relying on donations as heavily as they do. I’m relieved you all are okay but I just can’t drum up the sympathy.

An Ohio resident“

Usually I just let these types of emails roll off my back. They don’t even deserve a response. But this particular one kept haunting me. Why would anyone write a note like this? What purpose could it possibly serve? Should I reply? What should I say?

I attempted to write a response several times, but I realized nothing nice would come of it.

Hurricane Isabel cut a path along the eastern United States hundreds of miles long, reaching more than 400 miles inland. Look at a map. Find Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, which is about 50 miles from the Ohio state line. Spring Mills, the tiny town where Walt lives, is nearby. Certainly a summer home resort area if I ever saw one. Same with Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina (near where I live), to which tourists flock year around. (Humor!)

Strikes me as strange that an Ohio resident living in the infamous “Tornado Alley” could write such an ignorant and insensitive email. Even though “people who move into these areas . . . should prepare for living in such an area by carrying proper insurance instead of relying on donations as heavily as they do”, I certainly remain sympathetic when tornadoes touch down, devastating entire communities and causing millions of dollars in property damage.

Hereto forthwith nameless Ohio resident, you need to get out more, take more time sniffing the roses. Maybe even join the human race.

That, and buy a lot more insurance.

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Photoshop Poverty Reminders

Dear Tim,

Your NAPP (National Association of Photoshop Professionals) membership expired last month, which means it’s been a month since you…

- Logged on at the members-only website to watch a new video tutorial.
- Cashed in on our outstanding discounts from Adobe, Apple, B&H, onOne, Adorama, and more.
- Networked with over 71,000 members on the forums.
- Read an issue of Photoshop User magazine.
- Received free tech support from our Help Desk.
- Caught a free Kelby Training class.
- Watched a rebroadcast of one of our live webcasts (or watched a live one for that matter).
- Continued to learn new things about Photoshop and photography from the best instructors in the industry.

It’s easy to renew using our secure server here, or call us at 800-738-8513, Monday-Friday, 8:30am to 7:00pm EST.

Please renew today and because your continued membership means so much to us, we’ll send you one of our bestselling books to you free as part of your renewal.

Thank you for continuing your membership with NAPP!

+ + + + + + + + + +

Dear Photoshop,

By golly, YES — you are CORRECT! My NAPP membership expired last month, which means it’s been a month since I’ve…

- Logged on at the members-only website to watch a new video tutorial.
- Cashed in on our outstanding discounts from Adobe, Apple, B&H, onOne, Adorama, and more.
- Networked with over 71,000 members on the forums.
- Read an issue of Photoshop User magazine.
- Received free tech support from your Help Desk.
- Caught a free Kelby Training class.
- Watched a rebroadcast of one of your live webcasts (or watched a live one for that matter).
- Continued to learn new things about Photoshop and photography from the best instructors in the industry.

Truth is, I can no longer AFFORD doing ANY of the above!  (Thank you, though,  for your continued reminders that I can no longer afford it!)

When I CAN afford it, I’d love to once again:

- Log on at the members-only website to watch a new video tutorial.
- Cash in on our outstanding discounts from Adobe, Apple, B&H, onOne, Adorama, and more.
- Network with over 71,000 members on the forums.
- Read an issue of Photoshop User magazine.
- Receive free tech support from your Help Desk.
- Catch a free Kelby Training class.
- Watch a rebroadcast of one of your live webcasts (or watched a live one for that matter).
- Continue to learn new things about Photoshop and photography from the best instructors in the industry.

I will let you know when I am able to do so!

–Simply Tim

 

Tim says: it worked –never received another renewal email!

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