Write when you least expect it, and an ode to Macs

Any writer knows that the craft isn't about perfection. We'd all be bored to death if we knew exactly how to transcribe what we wanted to share, and which techniques readers respond to most. While flattery is enjoyable for the occasional ego boost, the goal isn't to receive the most compliments. It's to improve--to discover. And sometimes, in the heat of raw emotion, you'd be surprised what you can crank out.

After my, erm, incident of getting a less than raving peer review at Problem Child magazine, I decided to take my anger out on my keyboard (perhaps we've identified one of my computer problems) and spew out a scathing poem about boxed in peer editors. Actually, I titled them canabilistic peer editors, but that's beside the point. I wasn't trying to be witty, or produce beautiful, legato lines. I was mad. I was telling my computer screen exactly how I saw the world. Line breaks just sort of happened, imagery flew from my fingers. And the second I hit "submit"--that's when reality set in. All I wanted to do was cower in a corner and get a time turner or something. I feigned sickness and told Maria I'd have to skip out on that meeting. The time that it took the club to review all their submission was the longest hour of my life. Yet the second Maria walked in, I, expecting awkward condolences and "better luck next time"s, asked how much they hated on the poem.
"They loved it."
I thought maybe I was mishearing things in my delusions.
"Say what?" Perhaps it was loathed. How is it loathe and love can sound so similar?
"Yeah, they thought it had really good imagery."
Apparently references to Miley Cyrus and floating pink clouds are good imagery. Hey, I'll take it. Sometimes, when you're just trying to rant, your words can flow a lot better than when you're trying to be the next Hemingway.

So that was surprising incident numero uno. Yet that same week, when I was storming Best Buy in hopes I could finally break my jinx with technology (so far so good), I got to talking with someone who, at first, was interested in why I was willing to shell out a bajillion and a half dollars for a Mac. While I'm not a fan of being a farther broke college student, I figure it's a fine investment in actually having a computer than works, and somehow that led to my being interested in pursuing screenwriting and this guy being a producer. Huh. Connections. Right in the middle of a Best Buy--the least writerly place I know. So not to give away any project plans this guy has, but after half an hour of meeting, and we're shooting off scene ideas. Here I am, someone who can't say a coherent sentence to a discussion class, who's networking with super cool Hollywood people. Okay, perhaps that's a stretch, but it's weird how writing can pop up in the strangest of circumstances.

As for an update on the computer deal--HOLY BAJEESUS ONCE YOU GO MAC YOU NEVER GO BACK. Seriously, I may not get any homework done, but I have never been so amused when toying with iMovie and garageband in my life. So what if my movies consist of a bunch of old high school photos and sound effects of crickets chirping? I'm damn proud of my creation. I'm sure PCs have their strengths and whatnot, but whenever I had to download something, I would click on the "download button" and then my computer would yell at me. It would say that I hadn't completed step two. So I'm clicking my little heart out searching for step two, coaxing it with chocolate and shiny things. "Come here, little step two," I would say, "come out, come out wherever you are!" And would it come out? No, it would just hide away with all its little computer-y friends, heckling at the technologically incompetent. This computer here (let's call it Alphonso) has a nice little bulleted list of all the steps, where everything is, and you don't need to have a bout of hide 'n seek just to get your flash player going. It's a beautiful, beautiful world.

Just don't smash a chocolate orange on your computer, because then this happens:

Namaste.

I has a twin! Oh, the wonders of technology ^_^