Author: Karel Kerezman

  • Great. Now what?

    Clearly, I need a new project.

    The comic ran for four years and succeeded, in that some people read it and were entertained for the duration of its run. I have considered and rejected the idea of picking that back up: I remember quite well how tired of making it I’d become, toward the end.

    Another writing project? Given the dull thud made by the arrival of the last one… probably not just yet. Le sigh.

    It’s been a while since I last put together a music appreciation project. And, in that time, I’ve learned enough about fair use guidelines to suspect that I’d never be able to assemble anything safe enough to post which would be even remotely entertaining. (Also: Please don’t go digging in this website’s archives. Ahem.) This depresses me because there are few things on this planet that I can geek out about more than my favorite bands and songs.

    Both of the photography projects that I’ve considered for the last few months will basically entail considerable equipment outlays. Time lapse is best done with a dedicated hunk of hardware, and stop motion demands a remote trigger and better lighting and a bigger workspace than I have available right now.

    Well, great. Now that I’ve eliminated every idea I could come up with so far, I’m back at square numero uno.

    I haven’t given up thinking about it, but wow oh wow am I doing poorly at thinking of ideas or what?

  • April, Twenty Fourteen

    Clearly, without setting some kind of arbitrary posting requirement for myself I’m willing to go an entire month without writing a single damned thing here.

    Whoops.

    It’s not that I’m wholly inactive, but I’m close to it. I could tell you about the saga of the dead fridge but it’s not really that interesting and I don’t think I could make it funny enough. I haven’t played any new games. My biggest accomplishment was finally getting through all fifteen books (so far) in CJ Cherryh’s “Foreigner” sequence. Are they good? Sure. I kept reading, didn’t I? But try as I might, I can’t come up with enough Serious Thoughts about the series to string together into their own post.

    My whole life’s like that now. Bits of this, pieces of that, mountains of same-old-same-old. And every time I think “Hey, I should write about that,” I realize that I don’t have anything to say.

    Mind you, this journal spent the first few years of its existence as the functional equivalent of Twitter, and now there’s Twitter. (Which I’m not as active on anymore, either.) So maybe I’m just struggling to find relevance in myself in addition to figuring out what I’m supposed to be doing online.

    Hmmm.

  • For Tea, Too

    Two things happened a couple weeks ago.

    One, I finished That Story Thing. On time, without missing a scheduled installment. That’s two projects I’ve completed (along with That Webcomic Thing) for which I maintained a reliable update schedule. I’m good for something, anyway: Keeping to a schedule. (Not necessarily “creating something worth taking the time to read,” apparently. C’est la vie.)

    Two, I clocked another year on this planet. We celebrated this momentous event via the receiving of books as presents from both romantic partners. Can’t complain, there. Mmmm, books.

    Other than that… not much going on, here. I’m in limbo, creative-wise. Got my taxes done. Bought some clothes and shoes. Been reading, of course. Playing old games like Age of Empires II and Titan Quest and such. You know. Puttering.

    Now I need to figure out what I’m doing next.

  • Good day. Sunshine.

    It may be chilly out there in late February but hey, sometimes we get quite the view…

    image

    Not bad. Not bad at all.

  • Laugh, Damn You

    I don’t bring much to the table. I accept this, most days. My looks, unremarkable. My storytelling, awkward. My strength, nil.

    Several times per day, however, I can make someone laugh. That skill is one of the things which keep me going. Over the years I’ve honed a talent for responding with a suitable (if possibly off-kilter) quip for a variety of straight lines and situations. I even have some talent at gauging the audience; there’s no point in wasting my time and jabbing their sensibilities dropping a Yakitate Japan “Kurawa-san” joke on someone who can’t stand anime, after all.

    And then came Twitter.

    On the one hand? One hundred forty characters is near-perfect bon mot length. If you can’t fit the joke into Twitter’s constraints, Twitter is the wrong medium for the joke. You can inject humor into any conversation to which you’re even merely a bystander. If you do well, you earn RTs and Faves and LOLs and such-forth. Validation, ho!

    On the other? Millions of folks chat on Twitter, a great many of whom fancy themselves quite the wit. It is so, so easy to wear out a joke by the time you’ve finished typing it. Sure, it’s funny to you, but the recipient may well get three dozen variations on the same punch line. In short: The obvious joke is, more and more often nowadays, the wrong joke. What works in your living room or around the water cooler may be withered and unwelcome, online.

    So I’ve been challenging myself lately to think outside the easy one-liners and programmed responses. This can only elevate the general quality of my comedy, on-line and off-line, am I right?

    Yes… as the late, great, George Carlin once said: “These are the thoughts that kept me out of the really good schools.”

  • Welcome To 2014

    So. Huh. Been a month or so, hasn’t it?

    It’s not like I’ve had much to write home about, as it were. You don’t want to hear about the nasty head cold this past week or so. The details of my love life aren’t generally for public consumption. My kids are off doing their own thing now. Things are crazy at work but I try not to write about work much here because man, I spend all day at work anyway, I sure don’t want to think about work during my downtime.

    Creatively, I’m still posting the story installments. Soon I’ll be forced to write the last few installments… which will be tricky given that I’m not 100% certain how I’m going to end the thing. Challenges!

    After that I’m going to do something more visual, either getting into time lapse, or stop motion animation, or perhaps just trying my hand at another AMV. Who knows?

    I’m not sure what that leaves me to write about. It’s not as if I go on adventures. (Maybe I should fix that…)