Sunday, August 24, 2008

911 Writers Block Help

Dialing for Dialogue

Stuck? 911 Writers Block provides emergency settings, characters, dialogue, verbs, ways to "kill a character", and endings, such as:

"You drop the antique gold pocket watch into a storm drain. It has brought you nothing but pain."

Hmm, everything except plots -- except, I suppose, by implication.

You select your emergency help by pressing a button on a telephone keypad. Cute.

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Word of the Day: incunabulum

Word of the Day

incunabulum (n)

A book printed before the 16th century; artwork from an early period

"'It's a long story, Sergeant. A few months ago we had a rare book stolen from this room. A beautiful old Tier Buch -- a book of animals -- an incunabulum.'"
--Carey Magoon, I Smell the Devil

I attended an antiques fair last weekend in upstate New York. There were many old books there -- though not as old as incunabula. The aroma of musty, falling-apart books invokes the past like nothing else, I think. Nostalgia stinks?

Thursday, August 14, 2008

Stress Remedies

"We could learn a lot from crayons....

....Some are sharp, some are pretty and some are dull. Some have weird names, and all are different colors, but they all have to live in the same box."

More such wisdom can be found at Stress Remedies.

Monday, August 11, 2008

Ellis Island stairwell spiral

Spiral

Ellis Island stairwell

Ellis Island stairwell

Brain Dump

Brain Dump

Let me take you down to business is bad boy band together we can do it was the best of times change your life on Mars invaded China dishes break the silence is golden parachute opens the door frame up to you never know your own strength in numbers don't lie down to business. The rain falls under the bridge the gap between the two by two steps forward march madness. I have a question authority to order in the court disaster planning a vacation time is money is the root cause and effect a change in the weather report to me.

Wednesday, August 06, 2008

Color photos of the 1930s

Kodachrome!

Color photography, though rare, did exist in the 1930s, and these pics of Depression-era people and places make those times seem a lot more contemporary than the monochrome photos we usually see. And that's a little bit disconcerting, given the current economic climate.

Sunday, August 03, 2008

Haiku 1449

Haiku 1449

whispering light rain
juniper waving calmly
spittlebugs scatter