Official Description: The Umbrella Corporation’s deadly T-virus is spreading across the globe, transforming ordinary people into legions of zombies. Headed for extinction, the human race has just one hope: Alice (Milla Jovovich). She’s on a mission, fighting her way through cities and across continents, all inside Umbrella’s prime research facility. Old friends become new enemies as she battles to escape and discovers that everything that she believes may not even be true.

Unofficial Description: These movies keep going.  OR coming, I’m not certain which is which.  And I keep watching.  Are they a guilty pleasure?  Absolutely.  There’s no redeeming value here – it’s just a bunch of kick-ass, cinematic sequences strung together in an overly convoluted mess of a story that you still can’t look away from.  Well, you could.  Most people probably do, but where’s the fun in that?

I am a fan of anything that turns the normal genre and trope conventions on their head – so I will watch Alice run around saving all the big burly men from the zombies all day and night.

I will say this – of all the installments in the franchise so far, this one was the most confusing.  I think, in trying to give the viewer more story, they actually made it way too complicated.  All they have to do is wake Alice up somewhere, give her some guns and people to save and turn her loose.

This one won’t win any awards, but it’s still fun to watch when you want to turn off your brain and munch popcorn.

~P

If you ask me, and I know you didn’t but I’m gonna say it anyway, The End can be the hardest words to type.  I typed them just this week, capping a journey rewriting this book that began last year around May.  I’m talking about the Epic Fantasy.  175,000 words of fantasy goodness.  Yeah, that’s my opinion on it, but that’s all you get (for now).

Next is the hard part.  What do I do now?  I need to edit the last half of the book.  (I am so obsessive that I do a lot of editing as I’m writing.  Like, a lot.  Way more than is probably healthy.  Seriously.)  But at the same time, I’m at the point where I need to get away from this book for a minute or three.  But the agent wants it.  I have to edit it before the agent can see it.  But my brain wants to move on and write the next story.

That story will probably be the space opera.  I’ve wanted to give it some attention for quite some time now.  I have a polished three chapters and an outline for the rest.

Before I do that, though, I’ve been a little secretive about the title of the epic fantasy.  In the sidebar, it’s been just ‘epic fantasy’ rather than the actual title.  I don’t know why I do that, but I do.  Anyway, I’m gonna tell you the title now (and change it in the sidebar):

I’ll say more about this book as time goes on, but for now – you get the title and what little I’ve shared here and there on the ol’ blog.

Unable to think of a decent argument, he nodded. When she rose, he snatched her hand and held it. “Thank you.”

“For?” she asked.

He thought about this for a moment. “Everything.”

She gave him a very small smile that warmed his heart, before pulling her hand from his and walking away. Laying back down, he decided to close his eyes and get just a little more rest. Sleep came quickly.

I typed these words Friday night / Saturday morning and was very happy.  I’ve finally completed the final battle scene from the Epic Fantasy I’ve been working on, which is, in itself, a complete rewrite.  Saturday was spent doing all the things I have to do like grocery shopping, cleaning litterboxes (and the rest of the house), but I did sneak in some writing time on what will either be the final chapter/wrap up or epilogue – haven’t decided which yet.  I am a fan of the epilogue, though I know not everyone is.  I do want to tie up some loose ends.

I’m still coming in at 174,000 words.  The inevitability of having to cut a lot away is looming over me.  Right now, I can’t see where those words will come from.  Hopefully, when I can back away from it for a bit, everything will fall into focus.

In general writing news, I’ve felt disconnected and adrift.  Even taking the laptop to work, which gives me some small opportunity to write during my lunch, hasn’t been a total success.  Yes, I’ve managed to get some words on the page, but – how to explain this…?  A friend of mine used to get annoyed with me because I was working 60+ hours a week at the time, and whenever she’d ask me how I was, I’d say, “Tired.”  She got tired of my saying I was tired.  Well, I’m tired again.  The new job includes long hours and loads of stress.  When I am home, more than ever before, I find it really hard to put butt in chair and do the work.

I keep waiting for the balance to come.

~P

Official Description: Welcome to Rekall, the company that can turn your dreams into real memories. For a factory worker named Douglas Quaid (Colin Farrell), even though he’s got a beautiful wife (Kate Beckinsale) who he loves, the mind-trip sounds like the perfect vacation from his frustrating life – real memories of life as a super-spy might be just what he needs. But when the procedure goes horribly wrong, Quaid becomes a hunted man. Finding himself on the run from the police – controlled by Chancellor Cohaagen (Bryan Cranston), the leader of the free world – Quaid teams up with a rebel fighter (Jessica Biel) to find the head of the underground resistance (Bill Nighy) and stop Cohaagen. The line between fantasy and reality gets blurred and the fate of his world hangs in the balance as Quaid discovers his true identity, his true love, and his true fate.

Unofficial Description: I DVR’d this.  Oy.

Ok – some positives.  It looked great.  Special FX?  Really well done.  Other than that?  It never hooked me.  It felt light on substance, like a story half-told.  I think it suffered from reboot-itus in that it was trying to rehash the same plots but put a new spin on it.  The problems come from that spin.  Pull a thread loose and everything unravels.  They didn’t do enough build up, make us care about the characters before jumping into the mind-fuck aspects and the revolution.

~P

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Due to POPULAR DEMAND, May’s free eBook giveaway is now available for purchase via Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble! A lot of people downloaded Cahill’s Homecoming and then started telling other people, prompting them to head out to Amazon looking for it, so I had to scramble to get the book out there where folks could buy it.  I’ve uploaded it to Amazon and B&N and since it’s a novella, I’m selling it for $2.99.

Description:

After fifteen years in space, Cord Cahill is coming home. His parents passed long ago, his younger brother is off defending border worlds from the expanding Republic, and his sister, whom he left behind, is dead. How she died, he doesn’t know. But she left him a video message predicting her own death, and he wants to know what would drive her to do such a thing. His home has changed, but so has Cord, who now wears the gray cloak and hat of a Sentinel. They mark him for what he is; a gun for hire. But this isn’t about Cord, it’s about family, about Katie; how she lived, and ultimately, how she died.

Check it out at Amazon or Barnes and Noble, tell your friends, write a review.

~P

RANDOM THOUGHTS!

OMG!

/begin random thoughts

….have you ever seen someone who looks perfectly healthy park their car, which has a handicap icon on it somewhere (license plate/mirror), in the handicap spot and then walk into where ever it is without any issues whatsoever?  This always makes me pause.  I really want to go up to them and ask them what, exactly, their handicap is.  Would that be rude?  Wrong?  Maybe they have a spouse or dependent who legitimately deserves that spot…

* * *

Running through the grocery store shouting, “OH MY GOD THE GROUND BEEF ISN’T COW!  IT ISN’T COOOOWWWWWWW” would probably be a bad idea.

* * *

Fries or onion rings – CHOOSE NOW!

* * *

wooo-ooo that smell! Can’t you smell that smell?

* * *

I always find it curious when teenagers gain superpowers and an instant sense of duty and honor.  Specifically, boys.  I think girls could totally gain an instant sense of duty and honor, but boys… um… no…

Comic book teenage boy:

“You can turn yourself invisible?!”

“Yes, and I will use my power TO DEFEND THE WEAK AND INNOCENT!”

Real teenage boy:

“You can turn yourself invisible?!”

“Yes, and I will use my power to STEAL BEER AND SNEAK INTO THE GIRLS LOCKER ROOM!”

* * *

More rain?  Seriously, nature?  Seriously?

* * *

I had to walk out in the freezing rain to get the license plate number off my car to give to the security desk at work because, apparently, they want that now.  Yay…

* * *

So far, I have used my new BluRay player exclusively to watch shit streaming from Netflix…

* * *

Just when it got cold again, my furnace stopped heating things… d’oh…

* * *

Shadow the Cat is driving me crazy lately.  He is unhappy with my current job/schedule.

* * *

Nothing unreal exists.

/ert

~P

Well.  I finally did it.  I installed the update for Scrivener.  This brings me up to the 2.4.1 version and should fix some bugs – I’m just not certain that I was aware of the bugs.  Either way, I’ve done the update and I have to say, so far, so good.

Here’s the full list of what this update does / fixes:

Scrivener 2.4.1 Change List

Scrivener 2.4.1 is a bug-fix release that addresses some minor issues with 2.4. It should also help resolve the eSellerate registration and activation issues that some users have been experiencing.

Changes:

• Fixed bug whereby file references with spaces in the file path could not be opened from Scrivener’s references pane.
• Fixed bug whereby there could be a typing lag in scaled footnotes in the inspector.
• Improved buffer area around editor split-divider when double-clicking to make editors same width or height.
• Fixed bug whereby clicking the “Move…” toolbar items repeatedly and quickly could cause an exception to be thrown.
• Fixed bug whereby replacements didn’t work in e-book NCX titles.
• “Project Properties” is now the first pane in Meta-Data Settings.
• Fixed bug whereby Compile presets panel resizing would not resize the presets tab view.
• Moved “Show Titles in Scrivenings” to the Format > Options menu.
• Updated certain non-Retina toolbar items to match those used on Retina displays.
• Forward references are now supported in autonumbering, using e.g. <$n#keyword:tag> to refer to numbers generated using <$n:keyword:tag>.
• Fixed bug whereby exception could be thrown when typing in old script formats.
• Scrivener no longer throws up internal error alerts by default. The error alert feature was introduced in 2.4, but there are too many harmless errors that get thrown by plugins or OS X itself which can trigger an alert message. It can be turned back on via a new “Show internal error alerts” preference, but should only be turned on if you encounter strange problems in Scrivener.
• Fixed bug whereby footnote markers would not have a space after them in exported RTF files if the text was not left-aligned.

As I said, so far, so good.  I’ll let you know if anything comes up.

~P

Official Description: Senior Charley Brewster (Anton Yelchin) finally has it all. He’s running with the cool kids and dating the hottest girl in high school (Imogen Poots). But all hell breaks loose when charming Jerry Dandridge (Colin Farrell) moves in next door. Charley thinks there’s something odd about him, although no one – including his mom (Toni Collette) – seems to notice. But after too many of his classmates vanish under bizarre circumstances, Charley comes to an unmistakable conclusion: Jerry is a vampire preying on his neighborhood! Get set to sink your teeth into this thrilling, modern-day re-vamp of the wickedly entertaining horror classic. Featuring a star-studded cast and crawling with bonus, Fright Night will captivate you from the very first bite!

Unofficial Description: This movie lacked the…charm? of the original.  McLuvin was terrible.  You could tell that Collin Farrell was having some fun with his part, as was David Tennant, but it was a poor copy of a cult-favorite that I remember quite fondly.

The cameo from the guy who played the original vampire was amusing.

~P

I mentioned recently that I have some new tv/dvr equipment.  What I think I failed to mention is that the new equipment, unlike my old TiVo, doesn’t support Netflix – which sucks.  I have come to miss Netflix immensely, even with all the stuff I have the ability to record now.

For example, I’ve really wanted to watch the new Netflix shows like Hemlock Grove.  Also, The Killing, season 2.  So with that in mind, I’ve been trying to figure out the best way to get Netflix back on the big tv.

My first thought was to use my XBOX 360, but when I did a little research and discovered I would have to subscribe to XBOX Gold Live – that nixed it for me.  Why would I want to pay for two services?  That’s just stupid.  And I already hate XBOX Live/online bullshit, so I am not going to give Microsoft any money for it.

That left me with getting another device.  Choices included: a Roku player, Apple TV, or a new DVD or BluRay player.  I’ve been using my XBOX for DVD watching ever since my DVD player died last year (or the year before?).  I’ve resisted the impulse to get a BluRay player for years now.  First, because I had a DVD player that worked just fine, and later, since I had the XBOX.  Would having Netflix back be worth getting a BluRay?

Apparently, the answer is yes.

I checked my bank account, didn’t cringe (for a change), and made a trip to BestBuy.  My criteria?  I wanted the least expensive player I could get that also supported Netflix.  A very helpful gent (a plus for BestBuy, where they usually bug the shit out of me), walked me over and said, “This one or that one?”  I eyed the two players with a $10 difference between them and asked, “Which is better?”

“This one has a better processor, so it’ll be faster, more responsive.”

“Sold.”  It helped that it was a Sony, and I’ve had Sony players before and liked them.

I brought it home and did a little rewiring of tv stuff, which I’d been planning to do for a while.  A long while.  I’d bought new surge protectors that were sitting around collecting dust, so I pulled everything out, cleaned and dusted behind the tv shelf, rearranged some things and hooked up the new BluRay.  I hard wired it to the router, which I’ve also done with the DVR.  The process to getting Netflix up and running included a trip to a Sony website, but once that was done, it was smooth sailing.

I have to say that I prefer the TiVo interface for Netflix, but the BluRay player caches quickly, never seems to pixelate or freeze, and looks absolutely freaking crisp and clear – and I’ve got it set to HD, 1080p.

NETFLIX IS BACK, BABY!

~P

More accurately, I ran out of time…

…should that be ‘too lazy’…?

~P