In Which I Get My "Rant and Ramble" On....

Leave me be.

Yes, you! You can't be here. You're not allowed.

Oh, wait... you're not aloud. Sorry, I get those mixed up a lot.

You can be here. Just be quiet, mmkay?

Shhh! You'll wake the baby!

I bet you're wondering why I've been silent myself of late, eh? It certainly isn't to avoid waking the (fictional) baby. I'm sure you keep popping your head in here, checking to see if I'm blabbering anew about acting again, right? And all you see is that same old (admittedly awesome) photo of the lion couple, right?

Well, todayve is your lucky dave! Dave the Weird is here to entertain you!

That's me, by the way, up top, in that amazing Milky Way/Beach photo.

Or at least, it should be. That's how I feel of late. Drifting, spinning, feeling alive and very small, at the same time. As with most facets of life in general (and my life in particular), I cycle through things. I could rattle off a list (familiar to many of you long-timers, no doubt) of things and hobbies and interests that I've been fully into 100%, for long stretches of time... and then one day, I wake up and I'm simply done. I cycle through things, like some sort of grand series of cosmic mood swings or something.

Right now in my life, I'm all in 100% in acting and screenwriting. According to this pattern, one day (hopefully not for a good, long while), I'll just wake up and be done. One day 100%, full-throttle, the next day, 0%. And on to something else.

But that's not the cycle I meant to talk about -- the one that refers to the Milky Way/Little Man photo at the top of the post.

On a smaller scale, I cycle through feelings... in other words, I'm a normal human bean... I feel confident, alive, full of creative energy, vim and vinegar, ready to conquer the world. And then The Shift occurs, and I feel spent, small, adrift, confused, insecure... Sometimes I dwell there for a while... sometimes it's a quick visit. Not sure how long this latest visit will last, but I'm feeling solid ground under my feet at the moment, so that's a good sign...

Yes, I get a lot of my photos from 9GAG... I wish they wouldn't tag them with their URL on the side like that... it detracts... sometimes I don't mind popping them into Photoshop and "cloning" the tags out again, but I'm feeling lazy at this moment, so I'll leave it... funny, a few minutes ago, I wasn't too lazy to remove it from the top photo... see? Mini-Shifts occur in me too! How cool!

Took part in my second BTI-related interview a couple of days ago. It was a radio interview, with a few select members of the BTI cast, for a program called Kryton Radio (Event Horizon). It is the "Most Popular Sci-Fi Station on the Planet", and they're big fans of what we've done so far in BTI. Here, hop over real quick and take a peek at their website... Krypton Radio...

There, I put their banner and everything! Click it! It's like magic!

Anyway, yeah, it's kind of a big deal. So we'll be on their radio program this weekend (9/19-9/20), and then at various random times throughout the week, and then it will go up onto iTunes and their website archive the following weekend. It was a lot of fun. I'll post a link when it becomes available.

If you do listen to it, picture me calling in from my Man Cave, sitting in my Favorite Chair in my gym clothes, smelling suspiciously like a potent armpit, having rushed home post-workout to hop onto Skype. Due to some miscommunication somewhere, I had no idea the interview was scheduled for that night, and had planned other things accordingly, lol...

But it all worked out in the end, and we saved the world from destruction.

OK, fine, but we did do a cool interview.

So BTI is moving ahead full steam. Jeff and I are still wrestling the mammoth script into submission. We hope to start filming before the holidays begin in earnest, which should make trying to produce this year's Christmas play at church more interesting (read: frantic)! Man, I need to get on that, and soonish!

Also, working on Momentum (web series), with Alpha Male Rob Dey (lol). The steampunk project has been bumped to the back burner. I'm meeting with Cinema Viva at the end of September to discuss future projects. And my film-maker friend Ryan E. also has things in the works that I hope to participate in. So lots of things going on! Plus, I've written a short film (15 pages) about a gambler in Vegas, and a 5 page monologue about a company CEO being forced to resign.

The steampunk project.... hmm... OK, rant time.... you know, one of the hardest lessons I've learned as a burgeoning screenwriter is patience, and the fact that people are not like me.... I can list 8 people I've given the steampunk script to, to read. Of those that I sent it to (most many weeks ago), only two have returned any feedback at all, indicating that they even read the thing -- and one of those two is the person that commissioned the script to begin with!

That drives me crazy. It's a 36 page script, and I love it. Yet I want to grow, as a writer, always. It would take a person maybe 15 minutes to read it, tops. Then maybe another 15 minutes tops to write out some quick thoughts into an email, or call me with what they liked/disliked, and suggestions on improving it.

A half-hour of someone's time! Is that too much to ask?! Am I worth a half-hour of someone's time? Especially someone that told me they'd like/love to read it?! I'm sure other writers among you can relate - it's like any art form. You pour yourself into something, creatively, and it means a lot to you. And you'd LOVE it if someone would take a small amount of time, look at it, and give you his/her impressions/thoughts. Man, it would mean the world to me! But, nope, not everyone is like me.... I drop everything, and read stuff straight away... don't tell me people are "too busy".... they just don't want to, that's all. It must be like homework. Don't tell me you'd love to read it and then fail to deliver, dangit!

Whatever. Rant is done. It bugs me, but there's far worse problems to have, obviously. Hardly worth the time/energy spent typing it out... and, frankly, it makes me seem rather petty.

And I know whining is not what you came here for!

You came here for fart jokes, right?

And for edgy theological humor, right?

And for cat photos, right?

There, that should keep everyone happy for a while. Too bad I don't have any edgy cat fart theology pieces to post....

Other Odds and Ends:

• My car is over mileage on my lease, and I still have half-a-year to go. Ouch. That's gonna add up...
• I found a stash of old CD's that I haven't listened to in years. It's like finding buried treasure. Hello, Sinead O'Connor! Hello Switchfoot!
• Recently watched the movie Nebraska. Bruce Dern was fantastic, and the rest of the cast wast solid. But it was a boring film, no mistake. Worth watching, though.
• Currently devouring Prince of Fools by author Mark Lawrence. He is truly a terrific author - definitely in my Top 5 Favorite Authors. The man can write. And he updates his Twitter more than anyone else I follow. He's an addict.
• Speaking of addiction, I'm still spending a shockingly-embarrassing amount of time building things in Minecraft. I tell myself, "It beats running around town, drinking and getting into fights!" Of course, I'd never do that to begin with, lol, so it's a limp justification.

And with that, I am done.

Adios for now,

Dave the Comma Addict