Just wanted to wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving. Drive safe, and enjoy the bloated fun as you stuff yourselves!

I broke 40,000 words this morning. I should write in the morning more often. I’m sharper and it’s easier to bang on the keys. Coffee doesn’t hurt either. ;)

So there’s only 10,000 words to go. Should be no problem. I may get to it before the 30th too. We’ll see.

I’ll be enjoying the usual Thanksgiving hybrid dinner. A mixture of white food (the usual mashed potatoes, green beans, etc.) along with some Mexican treats like tamales. There are so many reasons to love my wife Jennifer’s family, but as far as my stomach is concerned tamales is at the top of the list!

As for my stories, I’ll leave you with a little treat courtesy of my pictorial research. I’ve assembled a picture grid collage of some of the reference images I’ve collected that are inspiration for my futuristic settings of the quantum universe. Copyrights their respective owners and all that of course. Enjoy.

It’s getting close to the end of National Novel Writing Month! I’m at 36,803 words with seven days left. I’m confident I can make the 50,000 as long as I don’t slack too much in the next seven days.

I’ve had to curb the urge to play games all night though. Xmas season is always bad (read: good) for gamers because there are dozens of great new games out and no time to play them all.

I’ve got Black & White 2 started, and I revisited Silent Storm recently. Special Forces addon for Battlfield 2 just came out, and it’s very tasty. I’m curious to jump into The Movies and see about trying to make a little movie out of my NaNoWriMo novel.

Oh yeah, and the XBOX 360 came out. I won’t be buying one anytime soon but it just goes to show that it’s a painful time to be a gamer!

I’ve also fallen behind in my reading.

So December will be a welcomed break from the writing to catch up on some things while I let my story ferment.

What does all the gaming have to do with writing? I’ve mentioned in the past that I draw a lot of story inspiration from both reading, playing, and watching movies. Creativity is all about synthesis and synthesis is all about input.

When I’ve found myself stuck during the month while working on my novel, my first urge is to crack open a book or fire up a game. I’ve been bleeding myself dry of ideas and the only way to get more is to indulge a little.

My reward for finishing the contest will be immersing myself in fodder for more creativity. Here’s looking forward to December!

Reknowned copywriter Bob Bly asks if blogs are self-indulgent drivel. Yessiree Bob. I believe that they are. One step further, that’s exactly what I like about them.

It’s no different than the Opinion Editorial in your newspaper, or an arrogant talk show host. I’ve heard people lament the decline of letter-writing as a pasttime and preserver of historical commentary and perspective.

Not many people write letters anymore, but that’s OK. I’m perfectly content for them to be replaced by blogging. I think as long as there is a medium that keeps people writing and satisfies their urge to write, then the medium be damned. Is that self-indulgent? Sure. No more so than the aforementioned allowances of our culture.

The thing that cracks me up is that every time something new comes along, people moan about how things are ‘going downhill’ or ‘not the way they used to be’ or some other silly meaningless sentiment. The only thing that never changes is that things are always changing. I won’t pretend that earlier, more ‘classic’ eras didn’t have their own fair share of drivel. It may not have been as open, widespread, and participatory as blogging, but drivel is drivel is drivel, isn’t it?

And if it’s drivel, so what? I happen to enjoy pulp novels, which got their name from the low quality paper they were written on but also became synonymous with the quality of the writing as well.

So I’m not reading Shakespeare or Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath, or Ernest Hemmingway. So freakin’ what! Maybe I enjoy pulpy stuff like Philip K. Dick because it doesn’t take itself so serious?

And perhaps, just maybe, that’s exactly what I enjoy about reading blogs?

They don’t take themselves seriously. They are also a pure 100% direct line to buzz. Want to know what’s making the rounds? What are people talking about? Read a blog. It’s a direct feed into our culture moment by moment as it happens.

I never used to like it, but I’m starting to understand why they have play-by-play commentary in sports. Why?

Because the game would be awfully quiet and boring without a narrator. What do blogs provide me? Any kind of narrator I want for just about any kind of game.

Blogs are self-indulgent drivel and to that I say, blog on!