2010 June | Drew Wagar

Archive for » June, 2010 «

Friends…

Jun 2010

No, not the US sitcom!

Some definitions for your delectation.

Friend. Noun. Value that is found in and often the result of a someone demonstrating the following on a consistent basis:

The tendency to desire what is best for the other

Sympathy and empathy

Honesty, perhaps in situations where it may be difficult for others to speak the truth, especially in terms of pointing out the perceived faults of one’s counterpart

Fair-weather friend. Noun.

A person who stops being a friend in times of difficulty.

I had cause to reflect on these definitions over the last couple of weeks.

I’ve always considered myself to have a few very close friends, as it takes me a long time to develop that level of trust. I do, however, have a wide circle of friends who I would not hesitate to help out or ‘look out for’ should the need arise. I would anticipate something similar by return, and this has been the case many times.

Beyond this is much wider circle of ‘people I know and would have a pleasant conversation with’, but I simply don’t know well enough to elevate to ‘friend’. Your definitions may vary a bit, but hopefully you have something similar.

I’ve never been one to shy away from a contrary view on the basis of it being unpopular. I will be pragmatic about such things, as there is no use in ‘winning the battle and losing the war’, but where I perceive a wrong or injustice I will attempt to right it.

So it came as something of a dismayed surprise to me to that some people I had on my mental list of ‘friends’ displayed none of the characteristics in my first definition above, and rapidly dropped into (and in one case below) the second definition when I expressed a strong opinion about the conduct of a local public service. This despite my having put myself out for them a number of times in the past.

If you’re a friend of mine you’ll stick with me. You may not agree with me 100%, and if you think I’m seriously off-base you’ll take me aside and tell me. Our friendship will be all the better for it. We’ll laugh, we’ll cry, we’ll puzzle through the tough times, we’ll wring our hands in despair, we’ll celebrate the successes. We’ll remain friends. I’ll invest time in those relationships.

If you’re not a friend of mine and you show you’re interested, have a thought beyond yourself, show some creativity, if you’re willing to come alongside, help, persevere, see the potential, praise others and work hard – you’ll find the same returned and more. You’re a friend I just haven’t got to know yet.

Otherwise you’ll get a polite smile, a friendly nod, perhaps even a snatch of conversation. That’s all a fair weather friend deserves.

Here’s to my friends. You know who you are, and I thank you for it.

Bookmark with

Category: Day to day 2 Comments

Meanwhile, a word about EBooks…

drew

Jun 2010

While I wait for the “Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook 2010″ to arrive, I had a quick play with Ebooks.

All my ‘free-to-air’ stories (the Oolite series) are available for download from this site in PDF format. This is a common format for many different types of computers, but it was brought to my attention that it’s not necessarily the best for some portable devices, particularly the small ones like the Kindle and the iPod / iPhone.

After a bit of research, I found that the ‘epub’ format, an open standard, which is supported by the most popular portable readers, seems to be the best bet.

I’ve therefore made an ‘epub’ version of ‘Status Quo’ available alongside the PDF version. If anyone out there would test it out for me I’d appreciate it – I don’t have a portable reader and I’m proud to say my phone does little other than ..er.. make calls!

Bookmark with

Category: Computing Leave a Comment

Revised Synopsis, based on feedback

drew

Jun 2010

Thanks to all (DaddyHoggy, Morag, my ‘lil sis and Michael) who provided feedback. I’m mindful that this blog should end up being a historical trail of how I attempted to get my book published, so rather than edit the original post, I’m putting up a second draft, so people can view how the text changed as a result of feedback. It’s now too long, so suggestions on trimming gratefully accepted! 3rd Draft?

After losing her job, Rebecca Turner has no option but to move back home to her parents. She joins them in a move to the village of Wealdbrook in Kent, where her father takes up a role as Assistant Pastor in a large fundamentalist church. Rebecca is a disillusioned Christian. She is plagued by frequent headaches she believes are caused by stress.

Benjamin Lawrence, a local resident in Wealdbrook, intends to build a science park nearby. He is wealthy as a result of licensing an advanced GPS algorithm. He lives with his sister, Phee, after the death of his wife and children in a car accident around four years previously.

Rebecca attends the new church, becoming a ‘born again’ Christian within weeks. She is warmly accepted by a new circle of friends. Radicalised as a result, she becomes an activist on behalf of the church and aggressively ensures the derailment of Benjamin’s plans, believing them to be anti-Christian.

After being confronted by the local Anglican minister, Julia FitzPatrick, Rebecca discovers that the material she was given about the science park by the Pastor was misleading. Rebecca swallows her pride and, despite being intimidated by Phee, apologises to Benjamin unreservedly. Benjamin eventually accepts her apology. Rebecca’s uncertainty with her church leads her to meet Thomas Wilson, a less fundamentalist member. Thomas notes her headaches and suggests she visits a Doctor.

Rebecca and Benjamin tentatively build a fractious relationship, debating the relative merits of science and religion. Rebecca begins to question her church and faith as a result. Benjamin ponders the emptiness in his own life.

Rebecca helps Julia with some difficulties at the Anglican church, and begins to value her own abilities.

Benjamin asks Rebecca to accompany him to a conference in San Francisco. Rebecca declines, fearing the reaction of her parents and her church, but her work colleagues encourage her to go and she relents when she discovers that Phee is Benjamin’s sister. Thomas also backs her decision. Phee tells Benjamin he is making a mistake in becoming involved with Rebecca.

The Pastor of the church is financially indebted to a property developer, who is funding the church on the agreement that the church blocks certain planning proposals. Rebecca and her father are unaware of this. Thomas and Rebecca are singled out to be excluded from the church as troublemakers.

As Rebecca vocalises her concerns about the church she is ostracised by her Christian friends. She rows with her father over accompanying Benjamin. Benjamin discovers that Rebecca’s headaches have been ongoing since childhood and persuades her to visit a Doctor. She is sent for an MRI scan.

Rebecca and Benjamin travel to San Francisco. After being accused of being a ‘gold-digger’ by a local socialite, Rebecca discovers that Benjamin is far wealthier than she suspected. As the frustrations between them come to a head they are able to finally be honest about their feelings for each other.

During the return trip Rebecca has a crisis of confidence in her Christian faith. On attending her church she is accused of sexual immorality and excluded from membership. In outrage she denies her faith too. She drives away, furious.

The MRI scan reveals that Rebecca’s headaches are caused by an undiagnosed brain aneurysm. This ruptures, causing her to crash her car. Severely injured, she is rushed to hospital by air ambulance. Benjamin abandons a crucial meeting to get to her, ruining his chance to build the science park.

With Rebecca near death, Benjamin resorts to prayer after being confronted by Julia. Rebecca recovers and they reach a balance in their spiritual beliefs. Rebecca takes on the challenge of making the science park a reality, and succeeds, despite not fully recovering from the accident. Rebecca makes her peace with Phee.

Rebecca begins to reconcile with her father. He apologises, revealing he is now dealing with the dire financial situation at the church. Rebecca and Benjamin make plans for their wedding.

Bookmark with

Category: Torn One Comment

Synopsis

drew

Jun 2010

Well, here’s the long awaited synopsis! I’d really appreciate some feedback on this. It’s about the right length, 512 words.

Rebecca Turner loses her job in a small business and joins her parents in a move to the village of Wealdbrook in Kent. Her father takes up a role as assistant pastor in a large fundamentalist church. Rebecca is a disillusioned Christian. She is plagued by frequent headaches.

Rebecca joins the church, becoming a ‘born again’ Christian within weeks. Radicalised as a result, she becomes an activist on behalf of the church ensuring the derailment of Benjamin’s plans, believing them to be anti-Christian.

The material Rebecca was given about the science park by her church was false. On discovering this, Rebecca swallows her pride and apologises unreservedly. Benjamin eventually accepts her apology. Rebecca’s uncertainty with her church leads her to meet Thomas Wilson, a less fundamentalist member of the church. Thomas notes her headaches and suggests she visits a Doctor.

Rebecca and Benjamin build a tentative relationship and debate the relative merits of science and religion. Rebecca begins to question her faith. Benjamin ponders the emptiness in his own life.

Benjamin asks Rebecca to accompany him to a conference in San Francisco. Rebecca declines, fearing the reaction of her parents and her church, but her work colleagues encourage her to go and she relents. Thomas also backs her decision.

The pastor of the church is financially indebted to a property developer, who is funding the church in exchange for the church blocking certain planning proposals. The pastor arranged for Benjamin’s plans to be thwarted.

As Rebecca’s suspicions grow she is ostracised by her church. She rows with her father over accompanying Benjamin. Benjamin discovers that Rebecca’s headaches have been ongoing since childhood and persuades her to visit a Doctor. She is sent for an MRI scan.

Rebecca and Benjamin travel to San Francisco. Rebecca discovers that Benjamin is far wealthier than she suspected. As the frustrations between them come to a head they are able to finally be honest about their feelings for each other.

During the return trip Rebecca has a crisis of confidence in her Christian faith. On attending her church she is accused of sexual immorality and excluded from membership. In outrage she denies her faith too. She drives away, furious.

Rebecca’s headaches are caused by an undiagnosed brain aneurysm. This ruptures, causing her to crash her car. Severely injured, she is rushed to hospital by air ambulance. Benjamin abandons a crucial meeting to get to her, ruining his chance to build the science park.

With Rebecca near death, Benjamin resorts to prayer. Rebecca recovers and they reach a balance in their spiritual beliefs. Rebecca takes on the challenge of making the science park a reality, and succeeds.

Rebecca begins to reconcile with her father. He apologises, revealing he is now dealing with the dire financial situation at the church. Rebecca and Benjamin become engaged.

Bookmark with

Category: Torn 4 Comments

Not sure what’s more difficult!

drew

Jun 2010

Writing a book is hard work. You’ve got to have an idea, a plot, some characters, story arcs and so on. You need to do research, finding out the nitty gritty details. You need to have determination in order to cross the finishing line, sticking it out to get all those words onto a page, or atleast into a word processor.

Job done?

Nope.

It takes almost as long to do all the proof-reading. Infact, it probably does take as long, specially if you tend to dump ideas in a hurry and out of sequence like me. You then go back to start chopping and changing things and find a whole bunch of corrections you need to make.

Still. I think I’ve done that. Job done?

Nope.

Now I’m trying to write a covering letter and a synopsis. Covering letter is pretty straight forward, though I had to condense my book into a couple of sentences, which was a bit of a toughy. Here it is though… what do you think?

A romance, set against the background of Kent village in turmoil over new building development. The book attempts to deal with themes of depression, loss of faith, disillusionment and the conflict between religion and science in an accessible, moving and ultimately positive manner.

Probably still too long… sigh!

The synopsis is much, much harder though! I’ve got to write a, max 500 word, summary of my book. This I’m finding tough. Trying to pack some of what I consider to be the interesting parts of my book into this sort of size is really very difficult indeed. I’m having to be brutal. (My initial summary was looking to be about 500 words per chapter, and I’ve got 24 to do!)

Once I’ve got something, I’ll post it up and you can tell me what you think of it!

Bookmark with

Category: Torn Leave a Comment

Virtual Reality

drew

Jun 2010

There are a lot of uncomfortable stories associated with meeting people in real life, particularly after you’ve formed a long standing impression of them over the internet. We’ve all heard of the underwhelming impressions of meeting potential partners from dating agencies, and the horrors of internet pedophiles ‘grooming’ their victims from the innocuous one-sided mirror of a web browser.

It was thus a pleasant surprise for me to meet a fellow writer, blogger (is that a word?) and ‘80s Space Combat Simulator Fan‘ and find that he was quite as erudite and charming in the real world as he is in the virtual one.

A fortuituous turn of events allowed us both to meet up in London this afternoon after a number of years of exchanging comments on internet bulletin boards. We had time to share a pint and chat about writing, space games and old computers. We clearly had much in common and could probably have chatted for hours, but our conversation was cut short by the inevitable passage of time. We both had trains to catch, so half an hour was all we had.

Despite this we covered a fair bit of ground, and hopefully laid the foundations for future meetings. I’m really fortunate to have meet a lot of people both in person and across the internet and it’s great to put a face to a userid and an avatar. I never cease to be fascinated by what other people do and what they’re interested in.

I’ve always subscribed to the view that I’ll trust people until I have a reason not to, and as such have a number of rewarding friendships with people I’d never have known if I’d adopted a more cautious outlook. I hope this marks the start of another one. Great to meet you, John!

Bookmark with

Category: Day to day 3 Comments

Football, not a ‘beautiful’ game…

drew

Jun 2010

I’ve always disliked football.

I can probably trace this back to standing in the cold (and rain and uphill against the wind) at school always being the last, or usually second to last next to the fat kid, being picked for teams. I don’t know quite why this was because I was quite good at sport at school, being second in cross-country running and a bit of a demon at badminton. Clearly this was a bit limp-wristed and not good enough for the gods of football.

When I was picked for the teams I was always relegated (Is that the right word? Do I care?) to ‘defence’, which was obviously the ‘Hades’ of football. All the self elected elite got to play in far off and exotic positions like ‘Left field’ or ‘Centre Forward’ which meant they actually got near the ball on occasion.

‘Defence’ was a position of inferiority characterised by standing around in the cold and mud waiting for the brief periods of panic when the ball did come in your direction, swiftly followed by the opposing team’s top players charging at you; blame and recrimination marched closely behind as the ball passed the goalee, a chap who (in my view) was the only one who had an even worse job than us.

It was cold, wet, miserable and utterly boring. Football clearly never wanted me and the feeling was mutual.

I discovered in history lessons that football originated as a game played by yobs kicking an inflated pigs bladder between villages with scant regard for property or chattels in between. Apparently few rules were applied and the ‘game’ usually ended in a brawl. Not much changed there then.

Later I read in biology that sports, particularly team sports, are the result of mankind being denied a more natural way of ‘marking their territory’. Tribal associations played out in a game, rather than direct conflict. I’d kind of hoped we’d matured beyond base instinct, but clearly many of us haven’t. Still, it beats peeing up lamp-posts I suppose.

Football was inexorably liked with delinquent behaviour in my mind, and I’ve seen little to break me away from this early observation. The English are particularly bad in this respect. The reputation for post match violence and pre-match intimidation is shameful.

I don’t know if I’m the only person in the whole of Europe who hasn’t got the slightest interest in this overhyped and pointless game, but it seems like it. Work stops, traffic stops, people get stupidly drunk and all the decent pubs are ruined for the duration.

It’s not that we’re even particularly good at it. We last won in 1966. Colour hadn’t been invented, and people walked too quickly in films. Some group of singers called the Beatles were popular. Today we’re far better at motor-racing, yet we don’t get this unseemly obsession about that. We pay these footballers utterly outrageous sums of money for this so-called ’skill’. Big question then, what do they actually do that makes them worth their inflated pig-bladder salaries?

I also dislike how I am obliged to pay ‘homage’ to it, accord it ‘respect’ or be branded a social outcast when I answer the question ‘So, who do you support?’ in the singular negative. Been there before; small hermit’s cave for me.

Worse than this though are the stupid flags people are sticking on their cars. I bet they are popular with bikers as they are ripped off at highspeed on the motorway. I saw one car with its wing mirrors painted with an England flag, enough is enough!

I was accused last time round of being ‘unpatriotic’ for not following it and hoping that England would be knocked out early. Given that I’m British, but not English, the comment somewhat irrelevant anyway, but I resented it nonetheless.

And what has football got to do with Patriotism anyway?

I endured listening to our ghastly entry in the Eurovision song contest, how much more patriotic can I be?

Roll on July 12th!

Bookmark with

Category: Day to day 2 Comments

Social Networking

drew

Jun 2010

I’ve been continuing the update of my website and it’s now got social networking functionality added.

At the bottom of each article you now have the option to easily bookmark anything I post with your favourite social networking site. (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, etc.)

Just click the icon, type away and it should appear on your own page using the wonders of Web 2.0!

Give it a try!

p.s. Also experimenting with a Gallery (see button at top)and lightbox functionality. If you click on the thumbnail below, it should jump out with a full version of the image. Neat, eh?