Archive for the ‘Living and Life’ Category

Unlikely Advice (And Where I Got It From)

Posted: April 3, 2012 in Living and Life, short story, Writing
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Okay, so I’m watching Once Upon A Time on Hulu yesterday and one of the characters, August, who’s a writer, says that whenever he has writer’s block, he goes back and looks at what he did so that he can find “a nugget of inspiration” he may have left behind. Yeah, it sounds kinda funny to hear, but that’s what he said.

Anyway, I’m writing this new short story, and boy do I have such a case of writer’s block. I just can’t figure out how to make the story flow. I have the idea, I just can’t make the words come out. So I thought, “Hey, why not? I have to find something to help me get this out.” So I’m reading what I’ve already written, and then I think to myself, “You know, I don’t really like how my narrator is telling the story.” So I go along and change the style of narration and pretty soon the words start to flow again! Before  I know it I’ve got three-and-a-half pages written and a few more on their way.

Has this happened to anyone else? Have you heard advice from some weird place and just found out that the advice is legitimate? Please tell me, so I’ll feel less embarassed.

Winter Quarter Wrap-Up

Posted: March 20, 2012 in Living and Life, Novel, Progress Report, short story
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I know, that title sounds like something after a NCAA basketball game, but I’ve already used “update” twice in relation to winter quarter, and I don’t want to be redundant.

Now on to the news. Well, I had a slightly lower GPA this quarter, a 3.1, but I’ve got less classes next quarter and despite the reviews of some of them, they don’t seem too difficult or terrifying to me, so hopefully I’ll have a higher GPA than this quarter. I’ll even be taking a class on the search for extraterrestrial life and ways of going about it (yes, my school offers a class on that, you can take it to fulfill a science requirement). Although I don’t believe in alien visitations, I still think the class will be interesting to take. Though if we’re going by what our book teaches, it’ll mostly be what allows life on Earth and how we go about looking for that on other planets.

And as for writing, I’m still working on the final edit for Reborn City, but I hope to get some more of that done. I also wrote a new short story based on the Kony 2012 video I mentioned in my last post. I hope, after that story’s been edited, that a certain magazine I know might want to take it. Fingers crossed, right?

I’m looking forward to spring quarter. More flexible schedule, more time at work, what could go wrong? Wait, don’t answer that.

See ya next post, when it strikes my fancy to write one. Have a good spring break.

Kony 2012: I’m In

Posted: March 13, 2012 in Living and Life, Politics and Leadership, Social Activism
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I just saw the Kony 2012 video on YouTube. You know, it’s one thing to hear about kids being put into armies like that. It’s another thing entirely to be confronted by the evidence like that, all in your face, and want to do something about that. And you know, I do want to do something about that. Heck, I’m now writing for The Pulse, I start my first assignment this week, I’m all about the social activism now.

So, I’m in.

SPREAD THE WORD. TAKE HIM DOWN

Joseph Kony has kidnapped nearly 30,000 children and forced them to become soldiers and sex slaves for his private army, the LRA. He is wanted by the International Criminal Court, the Ugandan army, and human rights groups for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

 

I’ll do what I can to help spread the word and bring Kony to justice, because no child should be abducted from their parents and forced to be a soldier or slave, and no parent should have to suffer their child going through that. On April 20, 2012, I’ll even go out and do the Cover The Night, an event happening in nearly every major city where we put up posters, stickers, you name it, to spread the word. I don’t care if it’s the Jewish Sabbath, God would want me helping people.

Finally, I’d like you to check out the website and the video (I’ll be putting them down below at the bottom of this post). If you don’t like what you see, spread the word. You may be an individual, but when an individual is motivated to do something big, all they need is to find others who feel the same way, and they can change the world.

So let’s change the world together, and nab Kony by the end of the year.

Thank you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc

http://www.kony2012.com/

Winter Quarter Half-Time Report

Posted: February 7, 2012 in Living and Life, Progress Report, Uncategorized
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No, the title of this post is not a reference to the Super Bowl. You’ll probably be disappointed to know that I am not a fan of sports and only watched a small part of the Super Bowl just so I could be social with the other tenants of my building.

Anyway, to the point of the post: I just got out of the last of my midterms, so the quarter is officially halfway done. Another four weeks and I’ll be worrying about finals! Yippee! My tests were okay, I think I did especially well on my History exam. The English exam was difficult though because it involved a lot of poetry and as you probably realized, I’m mostly a fiction kind of guy. Anyway, I’ll keep working hard.

Oh, and speaking of fiction, I’m still giving Reborn City another edit, but what I’ve done so far is pretty good. I think that maybe after this edit I’ll be ready to find an agent. Let’s keep our fingers crossed and hope for the best, okay?

In the meantime, I’ll try and get some editing done after this post. Bye!

Winter Quarter 2012

Posted: January 12, 2012 in Living and Life, short story
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Well, I’m working hard. That’s pretty much it. I’m taking four classes and they’re not exactly the picture of easiness, especially my Linguistics course (that last one counts as my math requirement, believe it or not!). I’m also working two days out of the week, and also trying to have a life (which for me basically involves conversations with friends, reading a multitude of books, and watching different shows on TV. I don’t do the drinking-partying scene, though I’m sure I’d be popular there).

I’m also still working on that short story from last quarter/year. I’m still trying to work on whether to have an ambiguous or flesh out a real creepy one. If I do the former, then the story will be more literary than horror but will have plenty of choices of places to be published. If I do the latter, then I’ll have to make a rather violent ending and try and find a horror magazine that would go for this sort of story. Thankfully I’m working with a friend who’s been giving me excellent feedback. Perhaps I’ll be able to get this thing published with his help.

I’ll keep you posted on how this quarter and my writing goes. Wish me luck!

It’s 2012! Happy New Year!

Posted: January 1, 2012 in Living and Life
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Well, 2011 has come and gone. In my humble opinion, it’s been a pretty good year. Our economy has even improved a little. And now it’s 2012, I’d like to share my new year’s resolutions: one is to improve my writing and strive to get more short stories and possibly even a novel published. My second resolution is to make more friends and just to control my sometimes wild behavior.

Also, I’d like to say one thing: I don’t believe the world will end in 2012. Not by earthquake, fire, water, natural, supernatural, angelic, demonic, bacterial, viral, vampiric, or zombified means. However, God forbid that the world ends, I’m guessing by zombies, my sister Maya’s bad gas (LOL), or the wrong candidate getting the presidency. I’m not saying who on that last one, because I have no idea what my readers’ political leanings are. However, if you want to post who you think is the wrong candidate in a comment, I’d love to see what you say.

Happy New Year, and have a nice day.

Northeastern University

Posted: December 16, 2011 in Living and Life
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My sister (not the one having the bat mitzvah this weekend) has just recieved her first college acceptance! What’s more, it’s her dream school, and it looks like they’ve given her a merit scholarship to boot! Pretty amazing right there.

Now she’s in a daze, looking at the website, finding out the university has given her an email address already, seeing all that is possible. She reminds me of me when I was just getting accepted to colleges and everything was a strange and wild process full of wonder. I feel so proud of her! Congratulations, Adi, and I know wherever you end up going (though for your sake, I hope it’s Northeastern), you’ll do amazing.

This Coming Weekend (Dec. 16-18)

Posted: December 15, 2011 in Living and Life
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Well, life’s been good. I finished my first term at school (with a 3.76 GPA), I’m employed and able to make a little money, and the holidays are coming! Yay Hannukah! (What? Is there something wrong with yelling out the holiday you celebrate? Christians do it all the time)

Now, as for the true reason behind this post: I’ve got a huge weekend starting tomorrow. First, and taking up most of the weekend, is my younger sister’s bat mitzvah (coming-of-age ceremony in Judaism celebrated in the teen years, for all of you who don’t know a lot about Judaism). It’s a big thing and I’m even reading Torah in honor of it. After the Sabbath we’ll have a big party (it’s pretty much standard in America these days to hire a DJ and have a party after a bar/bat mitzvah), during which I’ll dance as I usually dance, which will lead my sisters (yes, that’s right, sisters) to beg me to stop, which I won’t do.

After the bat mitzvah, my dad’s family will be having an early Hannukah party, during which we’ll exchange gifts and I’ll get razzed because of the school I go to (most of my dad’s family went to U of M, darn Michigan fans!). After the party is over, I’ll be heading to campus to stay overnight. Why you ask? I’ll tell you: Tran-Siberian Orchestra! The bus route to the concert runs right through campus, so I’ll stay overnight after the concert. I’m looking forward to the concert, it’s supposed to have a killer laser-light show!

What happens after that, I don’t know. I may go to the gym, or I’ll go see Sherlock Holmes, or both! All I know is, I’ve got a busy weekend up ahead and I’m looking so forward to it! Shabbat Shalom and good luck, Maya! I know you’ll do amazing on Shabbas!

End of the Fall 2011 Quarter

Posted: December 7, 2011 in ideas, Living and Life
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This is the first of two posts I’ll post this evening. If you’re looking for the second one, then it’s probably above this one, so just scroll up.

So today I finished my last exam, which is something most of my fellow collegiates can say (“You’re already finished? Lucky!”). I feel that for my first exam week, I did very well. I’m very confident that I will get good grades on my exams and hopefully a high GPA. The day after tomorrow I’m heading to my dad’s place for vacation (it’s easier to commute to and from work from my dad’s place). I’m practicing for my sister’s bat mitzvah, and I’m going to see Trans-Siberian Orchestra in concert as well (that’s something I’m really looking forward to!).

Finally, I’m working on a new shorty story idea: although Ripple was rejected, the editor thought that one of the best parts of the story was that the story involved a really difficult choice. That got me thinking, and I realized that a lot of really good stories out there involve choices, really tough choices. So I’m running with that idea and doing some pretty obscure research (and I mean obscure. Like so obscure that I have to look for a specialist in England if I have any hope of looking for the info I need). Wish me luck, and happy winter vacation!

Ripple: Rejected

Posted: November 30, 2011 in Living and Life, short story
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Well, I hate to say it, but Ripple got rejected. However, they did give me some feedback that cheered me up a bit. First, the editor of the Grove, the magazine I submitted Ripple to, said it was amazing that I had written such a story when I basically taught myself how to write fiction (while my high school was a good one, it specialized more in essay-writing for college instead of fiction-writing, but with this economy and job market can you blame them?). The editor and his staff also agreed that the second draft was much better than the first draft, so that’s something positive. In the end, it all boiled down to the fact that they had a lot of submissions, a lot more than usual apparently, and some of the work was a bit better than mine (and probably came from upperclassmen). Well, hopefully the next short story I write, whenever the inspiration strikes me, will be good enough to publish somewhere. Wish me luck.

PS The quarter is almost over on campus, and I am so glad! Honestly, I loved my classes and I had a ton of fun, but I just want to relax before winter quarter starts and I start a whole new round of classes and a whole new crazy schedule. Just gotta get past exams, and how hard can they be?

You know what, don’t answer that last question. Just leave posts encouraging me to do well in school and in my writing.

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