Apartment Check

Thankfull the messy business of finding an apartment is now done and out of the way, mostly.  I've got a place secured at Princess Court, yes a frilly and quite gay sounding place that offers unicorn rides and flowery rose petal baths.  Actually it seems like a pretty good place, in the end the choice I had to make between the place on Main and the place at Princess Court came down to the school that Andy would be going to.  The last month's rent had been paid so now its just a matter of getting down to the office and getting the first month paid as well as getting the first year of checks in place.
I realized, in trying to get this place, that I'd not used my checks in a year so I still had the address previous to my current one on them.  The rent for this place was all paid using my ex-wife's bank account so my checks were never updated.  I've ordered replacement ones just so that I can move in a few weeks and then have to turn around and order more to another address.

In the last little while I've not felt as creative as I normally do and I'm not really sure why.  If I had to guess I think that part of me is gone into a hibernation mode or sorts until the messy 'real life' stuff is sorted out.  There is a lot of writing I want to do and I'm greatly looking forward to seeing what's going to happen with it once Andy and I are on our own.  I've also been planning on getting back into my Warhammer painting.  It's been just sitting for so long, I've not done a consistent amount of painting since the previous place where I had a painting desk setup in the basement.  It looks like there is going to be enough room to get a painting table setup so that I can get back into it and really work on pushing my creativity in new and different directions.

Birds in the morning annoy the crap out of me.  They just don't stop, I'm sitting here trying to wake up and they are going on like they have a whole social network to inform that there may or may not be a worm sitting under a pile of grass clippings in the yard on the corner.
Fuck you Bird.  Fuck you and your entire family...your entire lineage...and your entire species.

Peace,

ClX

Another Step

I've taken the next step in trying to get this blog more to my own liking and more to my vision of it, whatever that vision might be (some might not consider it a vision, more of a big mess on the wall).
Began working with Gimp to try and come up with a background that I like and I quickly realized that I've really let my Photomanipulation skills go.  It took my 10 minutes to figure out how to resize an image.  Granted Gimp is different than Photoshop, which I'm used to using from past experience...10 minutes though.  What a waste of a good portion of my day.  The interesting thing is I was going to use the work on my blog as a calming exercise, something to take my mind off the real world.

What's going on in the real world you ask?
Well I'll tell you....I would say.

Apartment hunting or apartment application handling.  I happened across a couple of decent places the other day.  One down on Main Street and one just a block from where I am now, both excellent places for my needs.  Problem is that I liked them both and for different reasons.  I had to take the night to sort it out and after sleeping on it (and by sleeping on it I actually mean not really sleeping at all but tossing around and then napping for half an hour) I decided on the one that's just down the street.  I felt it met more of my criteria than the one down on Main Street.
If it was free to make a decision and see the consequences of said decision without commiting myself I would have chosen the one on Main simply because size wise it was huge for a 1 bedroom, it was so big it was nearly a 2 bedroom.  The one I ended up taking is smaller, not by a huge amount but is in a very nice community oriented building which I think will be healthy for my little guy.

What else? Anything else?

Spots on cows are wrong, the world isn't just black and white...that means Michael Jackson is wrong too...but we everyone already knew that.

Peace,

ClX

Changes to the Blog

Doing some work on updating the look of the blog.  I've added some new 'I Follow' links on the side and updated a few that are lead to the dead space of the internet.
Internet dead space, not a friendly place to be that's where most of the unsavory pron (yes pron) sites are found, the ones with women trying to squirt 45 feet into a fat mexican man's mouth.  That's internet dead space.

Planning on doing some work on the layout of the blog too.  I've decided I only partially like the current layout.  I like the chinese characters in the background but at the same time I think that they are either too bright or too dominant for the look.  I don't mind the color so much but I would prefer to either tone it down or eliminate it all together.  I'm thinking that I'm going to have to dust off the 'ol Photoshop skillz and do some of my own work on this and stop using other people's templates.  I used to be pretty good in photoshop but in the last number of years I've let it go.  It also doesn't help that I dumped Photoshop in favor of Gimp, which is far less of a system hog but has its own learning curve.
So there may be some changes, drastic or not, but changes none the less.

Anything else...there's a couple of stuffed cats making out in an empty breadbasket next to my desk, that's news worthy, and for some strange reason there is a Noma AA battery laying next to them. 

Why is any of this important?
I have no idea but it's how I think and that's what I'm working on trying to accomplish, making the blog more of how I think and less of a news/information format that it was taking on.

Viva la Revolution (no la Vida cause I don't wanna get sued by Joe Satriani)

Peace,

ClX

*note: I do want to apologize, yesterday I mentioned Jason Rothfuss as an example when it should actually be Patrick Rothfuss, that's my bad.  All sorryness for anyone that would have been offended, though sometimes testing a different name here and there isn't a bad thing, allows you to work on a different identity if you ever find you have to go on the lam from the law.*

Am I Being Honest

Alright, something I've been wondering to myself about just in the last 24 hours is if I'm honestly being myself in this blog.  At first it wasn't something I was questioning, I was just finding something to write about and then writing about it.  Then at work one of my co-workers, Andrew on the topic of fantasy writers (not the erotic fantasy that I know so many people are fans of, the sci-fi/fantasy genre...pervs) showed me two blogs, one by Brandon Sanderson (who has taken over the Wheel of Time series after the death of Robert Johnson) and Jason Rothfuss who wrote a book about wind (I forget the title, The Name of the Wind or something like that).  They don't write their blogs just to write in their blogs and say stuff they tend to honestly attempt to be themselves in their blogs.  This is what started me thinking that I might not be projecting that honesty that is myself in this blog, that I'm 'putting on a show for the cameras' in this case the camera would have to be the audience which would be you who is reading this, then that begs the question who is then the audience of you are the camera and for that I have no answer....a mess.

I think I'm going to have to ponder this question just a little bit more, depending on the conclusion I come to I think that there may be some changes to the way my blog is written, or at least the way it is composed.

As for the layout that I know I have mentioned a couple of times I'm now of the mind that I like it again, and that it fits my needs.  I'm sure tomorrow that will change some and that I'll be back to not liking it but that is tomorrow and for today I like it like I like Jamacian Patties for lunch (it's real food not some sick dog turd joke that I'm trying to make to be clever....jerks).

Peace,

ClX

Funny Things

There's a lot I keep intending to talk about here but each time I get ready to something else appears that seems more relevant at the time.  For example just the other day at work I came across a booklet talking about various fundraisers through the 2008/09 year, things like MS, AIDS and so on.  There was one that caught my by surprise, not because there was fund raising for it but because of the slogan they had for it.

Hemophilia Ontario
"Help Stop The Bleeding"

Now I understand what Hemophilia is, I understand the need to raise money for it, I understand the want to raise awareness for it but with a slogan 'Help Stop The Bleeding' that seems a little to 'jab you in the eye with a fork'.  I had to do a double take with it and then question it.  Why would you use something that is a fundamentally negative toward the people you are raising money for.
If it was one person who came up with the slogan for this they should be drug out in to the street and shot.  If it was a team of over paid people that came up with the slogan they should all be burned at the stake and their ashes doused with salt.

Of course maybe I'm the only one that has a problem with this, or even sees it this way.

Now that I'm off track what I was intending to say was that I was originally going to blog about the Hemophilia Ontario slogan (see above) but then there were issues at home and more specifically in the cupboards with mice so that was the new topic that was going to take precedence over Hemophilia for the blog, now something else that I feel even more strongly about has come up and that is the issue of creativity in school and in life.

The other night I got an email about genius in children and the lack of creativity in the school system that is hindering our childrens ability to be positive people as well as nurture genius type gifts.  I've only read a little on it and have yet to watch the video attached to the email and articles, which is the only thing stalling me at the moment from writing a full blog on the information.

Again I'm getting off track a little, in the end this was to be a blog about Creativity in the Education system by way of mice in my cupboard (make all the jokes you want about that one) by way of Hemophilia Ontario (again make more jokes, I know I would).  I think in the end its become very little of all three.

I'll try and sort all this out and post a proper enrty on a single topic soon enough.

Peace,

ClX

Happenings

Aside from realizing I really need to make a point of sitting down and doing a blog entry when I have an idea there's something that I'm really feeling a little off about.  That's apartment hunting.  I'm in the process of looking for a place, 1 bedroom, for me and my son (5).  Based on my income I can comfortable afford something in the range of 500-700, preferably inclusive cause it just makes life easier.
Today I took a look at 2 places, both were well below the value that they were being listed as.
One place listed as $625 was a 2nd floor apartment...no big deal.  The problem is that the stairs going up to the second floor were collapsing, on top of that I'm almost positive that the tenants that were in there before were addicted to Meth, probably not cookers but users no doubt.  There were broken windows very dirty cupboards.  There was a man in painting and he nearly got stuck in the bathroom which was so small that if you stepped inside and took a breath you'd get stuck between the sink and toilet.  Not worth the price at all.
The second place I took a look at was slightly larger, maybe, but as far as a 1 bedroom it was an exaggeration, it was more like a segregated bachelor apartment.  There was a kitchen, off the kitchen was the bathroom and a single bedroom which would have to double as a living room so as it stands that was it, not much else.  The location was far better than the previous one but as far as price goes it wasn't $650 inclusive.
There was one place that I've been looking, or trying to look into.  It's several doors down from where I am now.  I talked to the guy on the phone and it sounds very reasonable.  $690 inclusive, is a large (according to him) with a parking space (should I ever get a car) it's close to my work, my little guy would be able to go the same school that he's already at.  It has all the makings of an excellent place, on top of that the people that own it have a son a year older than my guy so he would have a playmate.  Problem is that I talked to him the other day and left my number, he assured me that once his wife got home that he would call and setup a time for me to view the place.  That was on Tuesday, today is Thursday.  I called this morning and left a message on their machine with my name and number and asked them to give me a call back to setup a time, still no response.  I am very interested in this place but I'm a little pissed that I'm getting nowhere with the people that own it.
I'm wondering if they are stalling because they are waiting for someone specific to come along and ask for it, holding it for someone they already know.
I hope that's not the case and that they are just too busy to take a moment to call, or that there are currently tenants that haven't given any time frame for when the place can be shown.
In the mean time I'm going to have to keep looking in other areas.

I should really also consider looking for another template for this blog, I'm starting to dislike this one more and more.

Peace,

ClX

An Early Start

Woke up at 2:30 this morning, not really able to sleep but not feeling really tired at all.  I decided it might be best to get up and do something seeing as I wasn't going back to sleep at all.
What better time to blog than super early in the morning.
I was considering what to actually write about.  There are some topics I intend to cover, just at the moment it doesn't feel right to go into them.  It's not that they are heavy or shocking topics I just don't feel that right now is the best time to go trekking through them.
I do want to cover the topic of writing as in story writing or book writing.
I consider myself, to some degree, a writer.  I enjoy writing stories and I tend to think I'm fairly good at it.  At some point I'd like to become a professional writer, if that is still possible.
What I'm rapidly discovering though is that very few people, at least these days, are professional writers alone.  It seems that many have 'day jobs' with writer being the secondary or supplemental income for them.  There tends to be very few 'pro writers' out there these days and I have an idea that some of this is due to lack of government funding, lack of agencies/places that help support new or struggling writers and also the economy.
I think the first two are fairly straight forward in their names alone, the Canadian Government though it likes to show people it supports the arts tends to be (at least currently) having tight coffers when it comes to arts spending.  At the same time with the lack of federal/provincial funding there are few if any places that help get young or struggling writers published, it is very much up to the writer to do that on their own, now thanks to the internet that makes sending writing submissions easy as pie but still there is a lack of concrete knowledge and support in getting that confidence up for the young writer.
The big one to me is the economy, it is not viable at all for a writer to 'just be a writer' they have to have something to support themselves and use the writing as a supplemental way of making a living.  That has it's up and its down side.  Up being that the writer has a steady source of income, down being that having a primary focus other than writing takes time away from the writers actual task of writing and if there was more time to devote to writing then the writer, with the proper support, might be able to make a 'pro' go at it and become the 'Next Big Thing' in the writing world.

There tends to be a lot of snags along the way in becoming a writer and I'm sure this is a topic that I'll be coming back to in the not to far off future, if only to deepen my own thoughts on the subject.  I think this blog can be looked at as a starter to an ongoing topic, something that will be re-visited again.

Peace,

ClX