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cailement and it took me this long to post it. I took some time so that it might sort-of count as a "first post" that wolven was kindly asking his friends to make.( 2400+ word meme. )
- Location:apartment
- Mood:
accomplished - Music:I will not leave you comfortless - Everett Titcomb
BTW, If you would like to see these candleholders, there are pictures here (I think I'm going with the Oak colored ones, but I still can't decide):
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v
X-posted to
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black_cats so I apologize if anyone gets this twice.Neil,I'm in Campinas-Brasil, and it's a 5-hours-car trip to Paraty. If I get there, most likely on Saturday, where can I find you since I don't have a ticket to Flip? I really, REALLY would love to have you sign one of books. I, like many in this sunny country am a major fan of yours. I REALLY love your books! And I'm dying to get my hands on Graveyard Book and Neverwhere...Thanks for the attention Livia
Let's see... first of all, you don't need a ticket for FLIP. You do need a ticket to get into the main tent where the authors are talking, or to sit down and watch the overflow screen -- but you can watch the interview without sitting down or listen from anywhere near where the big screen overflow place is. Richard Price and I will be talking at 11:45 am. As for signing, there will be a signing at about 1.00pm on Saturday in the signing area, which will undoubtedly go on for a while. We will probably have to limit the number of things I sign (so for heaven's sake don't hitchhike or drive carrying all the Sandman books plus another set for a dying friend -- they won't get signed. It will be two, maybe three things are most). I'll stop signing at 7.00pm when Tom Stoppard's talk starts, because I want to hear it.
I'll also be on on Sunday at the DESERT ISLAND BOOKS panel at 5.00pm -- there's no signing planned after that, though.
There may be more signing, there may not -- probably not, as the organisers haven't planned for it. I may sign stuff if you bump into me on the cobblestones or in the town square and ask nicely or just hold something out and smile (I have been so far, but it'll depend a bit on how many people try and whether I need to get from place to place) especially if you can do it without making it look like I've suddenly decided to do a signing in the street.
I enjoyed it muchly, aside from the two guys in front of me who started criticizing the writing during a couple of portions. It's a movie gentlemen. It is an animated family film featuring robots, spaceships, and musicals: You bought all of that, so please, keep your disbelief suspended until the end of the film like the rest of us.
At least a couple of scenes reminded me of my sweetie.
I also appear to have misplaced my debit card sometime in the last 17 hours. Ah well, it's all taken care of now. No extra charges, and a new one is on its way.
- Location:apartment
- Mood:
ecstatic - Music:the fan in the background
this is just a little note to say that I uploaded a new track on my website; Orion for woodwind trio.
What's that, you didn't know I had a composition website? Mind you, I'll have another one going up eventually, but this is a pretty good start.
There's a couple of my other pieces there too, so feel free to check it out.
Hope you enjoy,
-David
- Location:apartment
- Mood:
hungry - Music:If Ye Love Me - Thomas Tallis
Comment on this post and I will choose seven interests from your profile. You will then explain what they mean and why you are interested in them. Post this along with your answers in your own journal so that others can play along.
( Answers...to spare the friendslist )
I wonder if any of that made sense. Hope so. o O
Because for the past four years (ironically) I have been hearing my name called when I'm in a quiet room all by myself. I hear my name being called distinctly so clear, that I turn around and no one's there.
Right now, Saraswati, the Hindu goddess of learning, language and speech, arts and music, and writing is getting my interest. But I haven't found much on her. I know she is respected in the Hindu community, but I also feel weird celebrating a goddess from another religion...
Can it be more obvious one? LOL
- Mood:
cheerful
Went to Milltown to mail a few things, and walked about the town a bit.
On my way across the bridge, I looked down to see a fish against the dam. Obviously dead, but I now know why people fish here; it was two and a half feet long!
Found a new cafe/coffeeshop that isn't open yet, a cafe that was closed, and a bakery-cafe that is delightful. Raspberry poundcake? They've got it. I obtained their last strawberry peach muffin.
There's also a comics store. There I obtained Joss Whedon's "Better Days" series. $9 well-spent, I say.
And now one of my cats is sneezing incessantly. I'm starting to get a little worried.
- Location:apartment
- Mood: chipper
- Music:There is life outside your apartment - Avenue Q
Sorry if it's an innapropriate place to post this :C I've seen other posts of similar nature and figured it couldn't hurt.
( Details under the cut! )
EDIT: Oh! I almost forgot, I have a small baggy of Dragon's Blood resin (big chunks!) and a roll of 9 charcoal tablets, too. $5 + shipping.
- Mood:
hungry
I haven't had a theatrical agent for years, so I don't have as many auditions or opportunities to work as an actor as I once did. I have a fantastic manager, though, who always gets me into quality auditions, where I have a real shot at booking the job.[1]
My manager and I have an understanding that I'm primarily focused on writing at the moment, so he can put his time and energy into his other clients who are full-time actors, while keeping an eye out for parts like NUMB3RS, where I have a better than average shot to nail the audition.[2] This arrangement has worked out really well for both of us.
Last week, he got me an audition for a wonderful role on [awesome show redacted]. I had less than a day to prepare it but I did my best, and when I got into the room . . . I sucked. Oh, man how I sucked. I think the stink of my reading is still sitting in that building, a week after I left. In fact, if you see hazmat teams in Studio City, now you know why.
Luckily for us, the casting director was willing to give good, honest, useful feedback on my audition. The bottom line? He felt like I was really "acting" when I was in there. My performance wasn't organic, it wasn't honest, it wasn't real. In other words, it wasn't very good.
When my manager relayed this to me, it was like Billy Zabka swept my leg. Getting caught acting was one of my worst fears realized. Good actors don't get caught acting, bad actors get caught acting. Ergo . . . well, I'd rather not say it out loud.
For the next couple of days, I spent a lot of time thinking about how that happened, and I had to face an uncomfortable reality: maybe I was so out of practice, and so focused on writing (instead of acting), maybe I just don't have what it takes to be a successful on-camera actor anymore.
I had a real crisis on my hands, but before I could call my manager and discuss it yesterday, he called me with another audition.
"Okay," I thought, "I'll just go on this audition, and after the holiday weekend, I'll see if we can have lunch, and face this reality together."
I prepared the audition, keenly aware of all the things I'd done wrong with the [awesome show redacted] audition. I went through all the things I've written about acting and auditioning, and listened to a lot of my own advice and experience. I decided that I'd get in, do my thing, and get out.[3] I thought about a number of conversations I've recently had with a friend of mine who just booked a similar role on [very very very awesome show redacted], and applied some of his decision making to my own. I kept it simple, and I never thought, "Well, this is it. If this one doesn't work, I'm hanging up my dance belt."[4] Instead, I just prepared my take on this character, made some deliberate-but-risky choices, and went to work.
When I was in the room, I didn't think about the people there, I didn't think about what was at stake (directly or indirectly) and I just focused on the person I was reading with. I didn't do anything fancy, just gave them my simple-but-deliberate take on this guy.
I felt better than I felt after I sucked out loud last week. I didn't know if I nailed it, but I'd made my deliberate-but-risky choices, and I'd committed to them entirely. Whether I got the job or not, at least I had that to take home with me and keep in a box on the shelf for the weekend.
A few hours after I got home, my manager called me.
"Well, I have some feedback," he said.
"That was fast," I said.
"Yeah, I guess they wanted you to know right away that you're hired."
"Really?!" I said. I always say that, even though I know that my manager is never going to call me up, tell me a got a job, and then say, "Ha! PSYKE!"
"Yes, really." He said.
So I squeed, and he outlined the deal for me. I get guest-starring billing at the beginning of the show on my own card, I work for eight days, and -- best of all -- I'll earn enough to qualify for SAG's "good" health insurance for at least another year.
I can't say anything about the role, because I don't have permission from the producers and the network, but I think I can safely reveal that it's for Criminal Minds on CBS, and it's a part that I am going to love bringing to life.
There is a lesson here about not giving up. There's a lesson here about learning from your mistakes and applying that knowledge, instead of wallowing in self-pity. I'm not pointing that out because I think anyone else needs to hear it; I'm pointing it out because I'm going to forget it sooner or later, and I want to remember it the next time I go searching through my writing for advice from myself.
One more thing: when I had the audition last week, I did my best, even though my best was crap. When I did my audition yesterday, I did my best, and it was much better than what "my best" was just a week ago. Someone once said to me that we should always do our best, and understand and accept that "our best" will vary from time to time. I'm glad I remembered that.
And now, footnotes:
[1] That may not make sense. Let me explain: pretty much every agent I ever had would submit me on as many projects as possible, whether I was really right for the role or not. I guess the logic here is that you get more chances to score when you take more shots, which makes a certain amount of sense, but in practice is pretty frustrating for actors who keep getting sent out for roles that they have no chance of booking. (I realize that, to actors who are struggling for any auditions, this seems like a wonderful problem to have, but it really isn't.)
[2]Years ago, I took an extensive and comprehensive marketing class, where I learned a whole bunch of stuff about how to market myself as an actor, and how to find breakout roles that are supported by five or six things that define my personality -- my essences, in the language of this course. My manager looks for roles that match up with my essences, while a larger team of agents may just look for parts that call for a white male, 30-36.
[3]This is one of the valuable things I learned while writing sketch comedy.
[4]What? You don't wear a dance belt to every audition?
I have been studying at university in London for 2 years now. But the past year has been the worst of my life, ive made so many bad decisions, got myself in so much shit that its pretty much destroyed me. So i took the decision to repeat my second year, move home to my parents house in nottingham and earn a little bit of money so my boyfriend and i could move in together in London. But now I'm stuck....
You see i can't find anywhere for us to live in london, not somewhere we can afford. Its looking like £700+ for a studio flat, not even somewhere with any space for us to live in realistically. And i dont trust 90% of the people i know in london anymore, they all seem to have screwed me over time and time again. So my boyfriend and I are now considering a very different move- to nottingham. We could get, for a lot less then the studio in london, a 3 bedroomed house with a garden right in the center of town. And i could transfer to the uni and daniel can go to college.
It's just such a big decision, the biggest of my life really. It would mean a complete and utter change. I dont know anyone in notts apart from my family. I would be going to a completely different school, everything would be new.
I just cant decide. So what im asking for is a little advice. When you have to choose between two very important things what do you do? Meditate? Tarot? A spell? Im so stuck, and im running out of time.
Blessed be!
Jenny-Rhiann
- Location:nottingham
- Mood:
confused
fc4est) encouraged me and even gave me the extremely generous gift of a 4-track.I talked myself out of this dream, but looking back, it means so much to me that he supported me so fully.
When will I learn not to be afraid to enact my dreams?
My name's Kayla and I recently moved to Kentucky, and a good deal away from my family. My family is pretty religious, but I'd never been to anything but a Christian-Methodist church. I'd always felt really out of place. Like, almost holding on a charade while there. I just never felt connected to the religion. Now, I understand that when you're little religion, is pretty blurry to you. But as I went through the traditional church experiences, I started to realize, this wasn't for me. I stopped going around sixteen, and I think my family held it against me.
Now that I've moved away, I've started to branch out in my line of thinking. And this just makes sense to me. I was raised on a farm, and being outdoors has always calmed me to amazing levels. My parents were abusive and so growing up I'd go and sit in one of our pastures and, at the time, I hadn't realized it, but almost meditated?... It's odd to describe, I would just sit and think about the land around me, and how I connected myself with it.
At the time, it was a great way to not get my head swapped at, but as I've grown older, I've come to accept that I'm incredibly attracted to the earth.
However, I am new to this whole realm of thinking. It frightens me some and I'm still really confused. I know it might seem like a really loaded question, but is there a site that could help me or at least explain wiccan traditions to me. I've searched and found a lot of protestant propaganda, but nothing of any real use. I understand that this religion may not even be the one I'm searching for, I'd just like to know if it would work with my system of beliefs and feelings.
- Mood: contemplative
- Location:Kitchen
- Mood: cheerful
- Music:Korpiklaani
- Location:apartment
- Mood:sedate
- Music:the fan in the background
I'm speaking to professional artists and designers. If that's not you, skip this and listen to Leif Garrett.
Okay. Earlier today, I said:
It's years out of date, so I've been considering either closing or updating the WWdN Cafepress store. I can't design for shit, though, and even if I could, I don't have time to do it.
Rather than just close it down, I thought I'd pose a question here: I'm sure there are lots of good designers and creative people who read my blog, so if I had a contest to design things like shirts and stickers and stuff, would anyone be interested in participating?
The winner would get a signed Happiest Days hardback and credit + links to the winner's website, blog, store, whatever.
Response is mostly positive, but some designers were offended by my suggestion to do this thing as a contest. After reading their comments, I totally understand why, especially after reading the links to No Spec that they shared with me. I didn't think about it until after I read those comments, but I get the feeling that contest is a loaded term in the design community, and though I spoke to this in a comment on my earlier post, I want to be really clear about my thinking, so I'm posting much of that reply in this entry, so RSS readers who don't read or post comments can see it (I've also edited and expanded upon it a bit):
I'd never write something for free, unless I was getting some other form of compensation. One of the main reasons I stopped doing live sketch comedy shows was the poor investment:return ratio on time and money. There was a time when it was totally worth it to me to get nothing more than the joy of a performance out of the whole thing, but over time, something in me changed. It wasn't adequate compensation anymore, so I stopped doing it.
People ask me to contribute to various blogs all the time, just because it would be neat; I always decline, because I write here, and for other places that pay me for my time and energy. But if I got a chance to do something like be an unpaid boingboing editor for a week, I'd do that in a heartbeat, for obvious reasons. This is why I thought I'd offer publicity and a signed book as compensation.
I didn't even consider that it would offend, but thinking about it now, I totally respect that some (most?) designers would feel disrespected or demeaned by my idea, and I totally support and understand those designers who choose not to submit designs to me. You absolutely deserve to get paid for your time and effort, and if what I'm offering as compensation isn't worth it to you, I completely understand.
See, if I had the money to pay someone for the work, I'd do that, but since the store isn't a real big part of my business model (selling books is) I don't have any budget to spend on it. To be clear: if this sort of thing offends you, please accept my apology; it's not my intention to diminish you or your profession.
Contest is the wrong term, I guess. Maybe if I said that I'd be willing to trade credit, links, promotion, and an autographed book, it would be less offensive?
I want to be really, really, pedantically clear here: I totally respect the training and experience that goes into being a successful artist and designer. It was never my intention to demean anyone's work or experience, take advantage of anyone, or exploit anyone.
So, let's try this again, in a different way: I'm considering revamping the WWdN store (the alternative being just closing it down) but I don't have the time or skill to do anything worthwhile with it on my own. I can't afford to pay hundreds of dollars or more to commission designs. So here's my idea: if you'd like to submit something to me, kind of like what Jonathan Coulton did recently, I'll trade you exposure and publicity, as well as an autographed hardback of The Happiest Days of Our Lives.
Comments are closed on this post, but can be left on my post from earlier today, where there's already an interesting conversation happening.
- Location:TDN
- Mood: chipper
Bought lots of books in the Paraty Festival bookshop today -- and saw many beautiful Brazilian editions of my stuff I hadn't seen before.
My favourite article read on the plane, incidentally, was the wonderful The Magic Olympics -- with tricks explained! by Alex Stone, in Harpers, which you can read online at: http://harpers.org/archive/2008/07/00820
Hi Neil,You wrote a lovely story, told by Abel (I believe) about crows sitting in judgment on their storytellers. Somewhere along the way, this story became fact in my head. I was wondering if there is any truth to the myth, or if it's just myth. Maybe you could pass the question on to the Birdchick?Thanks!MRM
The description of corvids sitting around one of their number, cawing back and forth, and then sometimes killing it and sometimes flying off is something I've run into in old bird literature (and more recently as well -- since Sandman 40 came out I've read an eyewitness account of it in the Smithsonian Magazine). As to why it happens, I don't think you'll find any bird people who claim to know.
I should mention that the collective noun for rooks is not a parliament (which is actually the collective noun for owls) or it wasn't until I wrote Sandman 40, anyway. Mostly it's a building or a clamour of rooks. Sometimes it's a storytelling of rooks, which sounds like something I might have made up anyway...
Does Neil have an official myspace page? If so what is the adress?
No, I don't. There's an unofficial one, or more than one out there. I keep meaning to set up official myspaces and facebooks, but really tend to feel that keeping this place under control is more than enough for one author, and it never happens.
Hi Neil--Not really a question for you, just comment. You mentioned Tom Stoppard in your blog today. They say you should never meet your heroes, but they never say how cool it is when some of your heroes meet each other and get along so well. You seem to get along well with just about everyone. What just makes me smile is that so many of them are heroes of mine (Dave McKean, Roger Zelazny, Tom Stoppard, Philip Pullman,... ).Good luck growing up to be Mr. Stoppard. You seem well on your way.Have fun!
Geoff
Actually, you should never meet your heroes if you want to keep them as heroes. They may wind up as friends or as disappointments or as pleasant surprises, but once you know them they immediately stop being heroes. (I've turned down several opportunities to meet Stephen Sondheim socially, because he's practically all I've got left. Even David Bowie, who I've never even met, has managed to transmute in my head most of the way from DAVID BOWIE ZOMG!!1!* to my friend Duncan's dad.)
But then, I'm not sure about heroes at the best of times. I wrote about it at http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2004/10/wh
and still feel pretty much the same way now.
The most remarkable thing about Tom Stoppard (leaving aside the whole him-being-a-genius thing) is he's twenty years older than me, and he has my hair!
This gives me hope.
.......
*correct !!1! punctuation assistance here by Maddy.
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- davidsfoley : Meme/ first post [+1]
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officialgaiman : With still a million things to say... [+0] - davidsfoley : Daily Snapshot [+0]
- davidsfoley : Website updated! [+0]
- moronqueen : FINALLY getting to this thing. [+0]
- solitarywiccans :: xstillxframex : "Hearing Voices" [+4]
- solitarywiccans :: elfies : Jokes [+8]
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- solitarywiccans :: linkwolf : Pendants and incense burners [+13]
- wilwheaton : the pretty white ships that i've been dreaming of [+3]
- solitarywiccans :: jennyraven : Decisions, decisions..... [+14]
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