Just like Mom used to make.
NaNoWriMo 2008 Winner
Me! Suprisingly, despite all of my other projects and obligations this month, I managed to make it to the 50,000 word threshhold in the National Novel Writers Month competition. So far, less than 10,000 of the 117,000 entrants have crossed the finish line.
I would like to take this moment to thank the Academy, my family, my mom, my pastor, Carolina Men’s Basketball Team, Coach Williams, the entire Steelers organization…
I came across this link via Twitter. Apparently, a man tried to pay his utility bill with a drawing of a spider. What’s the weirdest payment arrangement you ever tried to make?
What would it be like if the Matrix ran on Windows? That was the question asked by a few college students who put together this video. Personally I hate all the porn and spam on MySpace, but this link was sent to me and the video warranted inclusion on the blog given my stance that Windoze is the worst piece of crap in the computing world. Enjoy!
A few nights ago, I was doing some calculations on my current writing schedule as it pertained to the National Novel Writers Month competition. At the time, I had written about 8900 words. I started doing some math, which is something that computer-geeks like me do all of the time.
I figured I had to write approximately 2100 words per day six days a week in order to get to the targeted 50,000. Wow, that is a lot more than the 1667 words per day I was targeting at the beginning of the competition.
My writing was going well; I was having no problem actually churning out a few pages when I sat down. But, I was getting to the point where the story in my head was getting more difficult to connect to where I was in the book. I had written nine chapters thus far, and was only scratching the surface.
So I decided to spend a night plotting out the rest of my book rather than actually writing a complete chapter.
I started at chapter 10, and wrote a little blurb about what I wanted that chapter to be about. I put it in brackets ([]) so I would not get confused later. When I finished that blurb, which was nothing more than a paragraph summarizing what I wanted to tell about next, I inserted a page break and did the same for chapter 11.
Fifty-nine chapters later, and I had the pleasure of writing, “The End.” Of course, what I really have right now is just a skeleton, but I think it is a GOOD skeleton. By thinking through each chapter one by one, I was able to direct the story towards what I had originally conceived, but without the pressure of making all the little details interesting. I now have a blueprint for success in the competition.
Sure, the book may still suck. But it will be 50,000 words of suck, which is really the point, now isn’t it?
Long story longer: I sat down today and wrote chapters 10 and 11 in one sitting. It took me about an hour and fifteen minutes, and I churned out more than 2100 words. The other night when I did my planning added over 2000 words of summary text, so I was already at 10,900 before the day began. I am now sitting at 13,175, and couldn’t feel more confident that I was going to get it done.
Wish me luck! I may post some of my glorious prose at some point when I feel the need to be held in an entirely new, if not unflattering, light in my circle of influence. Thankfully, no one I know actually reads this blog, so I might be safe sharing my secrets with you.
So yesterday, we had a historic vote in terms of the race of the president selected and also in voter turnout. In this information age, it appears easier to motivate young people, who don’t typically participate as frequently by percentage in elections, to vote.
Here is one video I came across on a blog for a development company in Austria. No doubt the professionally made You Tube video was in wide circulation in the days leading up to the election. No matter which side you were on, this video is genius.
Ok, so for once, the inspiration from my title is a little more cryptic than a line from an 80’s song. And no, I am not getting ready to flog you over the head with some nostalgic piece about Mork and Mindy. Although, that would be oddly entertaining to me. Don’t ask me why - I really don’t know.
Saturday begins the annual official National Novel Writers Month competition, or NaNoWriMo for short. Participants are tasked with writing a 50,000 word novel in 30 days. That breaks down to about 1,667 words per day. No one in their right mind would participate in this competition - especially if they have anything else they need to do with their life. Good thing I am not in my right mind, or I might really be stressing about having signed up!
So I finally got one of my old, old, OLD websites back online. It has been fun and oddly disturbing looking at the stuff I was doing a decade ago. I was a weird dude! Some would say I still am. But that’s their problem.
The first installation of “That Dude Had Issues” is a personal site I did in 1998. For those of you not in the know (which would be most normal people), 1998 was the 30th anniversary of Monty Python. This particular site was inspired by, and contains a lot of content about, those fine British chaps.
Poke around and enjoy. Try not to read too much into some of the comments or content - I was in a different place back then. Thank God.
I will be putting up a page shortly with links to several of my really old sites that I have, for lack of better judgment, resurrected from my old blue-and-white G3. Until then, I will update this post with anything mildly interesting.
Have fun!
Ok, so I have created a monster. My wife saw my shiny new blog yesterday and said, “can you make me one of those?” Sure honey.
She came up with a domain name, we registered it and had it pointed to my server in minutes. Using Fantastico, I deployed a brand new WP blog for her, and within 15 minutes, her blog was live. Of course, she spent the rest of the day looking for a snazzy theme, so no posts were made.
That, despite pleas from attention-starved children, has changed.
Sunday was my daughter’s turn to go to the football game with me. I only have two tickets, and there are five of us. So I rotate the extra ticket (mine is non-negotiable) around to the others in my fam. Before Haley and I bolted for the stadium, Carrie turns to me and says, “Ok, so how do I post?”
I showed her all about how to post, how to manage categories and links, and how to do all of the little things bloggers have to do. Then I showed her how to load themes, and her eyes promptly glazed over. Note to self - adding themes and plugins is MY job, not hers. Got it.
The game was great, and many hours later, Haley and I returned home. I asked Carrie if she had made a post yet. The answer was, “a few.” A few? My big ol’ butt! She wrote seven posts and three pages! And this is with a cold. I can’t imagine how much she will write when she feels WELL!
I was going to leave it alone, let her have her fun, and be happy that she now has a hobby that doesn’t involve educating our kids or cleaning the house. But she did something unexpected - she wrote a song. About me. It is a parody, of course, and I deserve nothing else, but I really like it! It is hilarious, and sadly, very true.
Check it out if you have the time. But you have been warned: her blog is quite entertaining, especially if you homeschool or are a parent. Read at your own risk!
I don’t know why I did this - must have had a little bit of time on my hands. But I just did a Google search for “chris beck.” Only without the quotes or anything (so don’t bust on me all of you search gurus out there). And guess what? I actually appear on the front page of the results. The only problem is, it is through my page on Working With Rails. Still, I was happy to see that a direct reference to me appeared in the first 10 listings. Because let’s face it; if you ain’t on the first page of Google results, you ain’t shooby dooby. At least that’s what my SEO friends say…
See! There I am, near the bottom, but still page 1
While there are many “falls” I could write about, this one is actually the title of a little video I shot of my daughter back in 2000. Now before you click away and say, “jeez, will these blogging guys ever stop force-feeding us their home movies,” I encourage you to check it out. I actually submitted it to America’s Funniest Home Videos tonight, so you may as well get a look before we are all big time and don’t have the time to share with you any more.
Without further a-do…
The non-technical, somewhat silly and perhaps slightly off-beat blog of Chris Beck. Those of you who know me will know this is not a stretch. 
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