As Promised

Hey Gang!

I know I've been teasing another sliver of the, "The Plunge" for awhile now, but haven't gotten around to doing it. This morning as I've been editing before the standard 6-hour weekend trip to buy things for our house, I thought I'd follow through. So without further adieu, please enjoy a small piece of two-years of hard work.

American Engagements

There hasn’t been a bigger scam perpetrated on modern society than the prevailing thought that engagement rings are a time-honored tradition, and that all men MUST buy their woman a diamond that stretches the boundary of reason and reality. Blame really belongs to every person who has raised their little girl to be a princess that would one day be carried off on a white stallion by an Armani-clad, Mercedez prince. Combine that with ‘gotta have it society,’ and you’ve got a woman expecting a diamond engagement ring that costs months of salary.
Every man who has to save every scrap of pocket change for months to buy his bride-to-be something that meets her approval can thank De Beers and their masterful job of duping the civilized world into obligatory engagement ring purchases. In the late 1910s, diamond sales were down thanks to the discovery of African mines that caused diamond prices to freefall. De Beers created a marketing campaign, and the now vomit-inducing slogan, “A Diamond is Forever,” and changed engagements into materialistic, cookie cutter occasions no longer reserved for the exclusively wealthy. Every holiday season our senses are bombarded with jewelry advertising, creating the formulaic equation that love equals gold and jewels.
“If you love her, you’ll buy her diamonds,” suggest commercials and magazine ads.
Marketing wizards at DeBeers enlisted movie stars as spokespeople who brandished diamond rings, and when coupled with that catchy slogan, men were bamboozled into buying diamonds for women for all sorts of occasions. Men all got hit in the wallets, because mass media and social pressure told their women that their man wasn’t a real man unless he bought big, nice diamonds. So much for being there through thick and thin, providing a shoulder to cry on and be a shelter from the storm; because if you really loved her you’d go into mountainous debt to buy her a diamond ring. And if there’s one thing that I’ve learned, is that conventional wisdom says love doesn’t mean anything without the bling.
Women get ridiculous rings and men get a pat on the back or the envy of other women who want their men to buy them similar or better jewelry than their friend has. And if you’re a dude that gets outdone by a friend on a diamond, then I feel sorry for you. You’re perpetually behind the 8-ball, because ‘his was bigger.’ As if we didn’t have to live THAT one down often enough.
The whole process just sucks, and I mean sucks. So let me get this straight, I’m a good guy because I bought out a huge diamond ring, which required me to sell a kidney and half of my liver for the down payment? Really? Perhaps it would be easier for me to swallow if women received engagement rings and men in return got engagement big-screen televisions, or engagement beer mini-refrigerators. Then we’re talking about a win-win for everyone, with equality to be had for all! Well, as long as women have to blow two months’ salary, too. Otherwise it wouldn’t be equal, right?

Amazing Happens

Sometimes life throws you small snippets of what's possible. And it's when you don't expect it, too. After week upon week of crap, there are rays of sunshine that peak through the clouds.

Tom Watson, a 59-year-old golfer, almost did the unthinkable. He almost won the British Open. Age is just a number, and it's never too late. It's never, never too late. Of course he fell short in playoff holes, perhaps a victim of old age and tired legs. He'd won the tournament before, but that was twenty years before. It was almost a miracle. It was a ray of sunshine, at least for me.

This weekend my wife and I went to see the Terra Cotta Warrior exhibit at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. Though it was short, it was truly amazing. The long, tenuous work on a megalomaniac's desire to live forever uncovered for a world to see. I don't recommend you pay full-price, though. It was really that short.

Last week was really, really long, and I don't feel like I got to rest-up for the week to come. Thank God for caffeine and its mystical charm of raised blood pressure and alertness.

So get this, I've started on the third rewrite of 'The Plunge', and I got through 40 pages today and didn't focus on it too much. That's really good news, because I think I'm going to be done with it fairly quickly. From there it goes to edit, then back to me for the final revision. We are really, really close to having a finished product. God only knows if it'll ever get published. That's my dream, though. And if not, I have a certain zombie novel and two other ideas I'm pretty high on!

This Tuesday marks the release of "The Watchmen" and "Coraline" on Blu-Ray. I'll be picking both up to watch this coming weekend. This Friday my wife and I are going to see "The Phantom of the Opera." I've never seen any iteration of the show, so I'm looking forward to it. Oh, and I bought a Michael Jackson CD. Please make fun of me. I deserve it, especially after my last blog entry.

You know what we need? A hurricane!

I'm not talking about Hurricane Ike-level destruction, more of a really strong tropical storm and maybe, just maybe a category one hurricane. Why you ask? Well, when there's a storm brewing in the Gulf of Mexico, the city of Houston shuts down for a few days. Plus it's straight drought-land around here. If we could get three days of no work and ten inches of rain, it'd be dreamy. I think we all can agree that work sucks. It sucks hard. A paid, rain-drenched vacation is better than no vacation at all.

I'm approximately 20 minutes away from watching the premiere of the new season of HBO's 'Entourage.' I remember in 2004 when my buddy and I got hooked on the series. It came on after Ali G. (Borat and Bruno) I became enamored with the show, and a daydreamed about living the sort of high-flying Hollywood lifestyle that a movie star and his posse lives. The closest I got was owning a Corvette that I couldn't afford. Nevertheless, I'm looking forward to the new season, which begins in just a few minutes!

Today I couldn't help but become ensnared by one of the dozens of Michael Jackson specials that have riddled the television landscape for the past week. You know, I actually sat down and thought about the King of Pop and his legacy on our culture. Beyond the shadow of the doubt, he's one of the greatest performers of all time. His musical trail leaves a path of genius, but let's not get crazy. His death is not the low point of anyone's existence. Let's keep it in perspective. It's sad he's gone, but he's been irrelevant in America for a decade unless he's on CNN for a molestation trial. Rest in Peace, Michael. Now let's move on.

In my race to finish writing books and attempts keep up with my seemingly endless string of hobbies, it's come to my attention that I don't sleep anymore. On a good night, I get six hours. On a typical night, I get five or less. After dozing off at the keyboard at work and finally getting physically ill, I've decided to go to bed in a timely fashion, eat well and get back to a regular exercise routine. By doing these things I hope to be ultimately more productive. I'm bringing the old me back. Except that, you know, I'm not giving up beer. No way, not ever.

And there's good news. The second rewrite of 'The Plunge' is now complete! Tomorrow begins work on my third rewrite before I turn it over to my editor and complete the final draft. So, I'm shooting for a September completion date to have the final copy. Then it's on to 'Waterglade.' Speaking of my zombie-thriller, I read over a few chapters the other night. I'm getting a good feeling about it. But then again, we all know how that goes.

Have a great week. Until next time....

The Curious Case of Lemony Snickets

The July 4th holiday came, and the July 4th holiday went. Now it's time to put on my finely-creased twill dress pants and make the two hour round trip to walk amongst the rest of the living dead.

I finally caught-up on sleep for the first time in three weeks. I've been going hard at work, and it's left me sick with some sort of head congestion or something. My wife and I had a fine time with her family over the weekend. Now we're back home and hunkering down for yet another week in the fray.

I swear to God there's a show called, "Say Yes to the Dress," which chronicles the adventures of brides-to-be as they try to pick out a wedding dress. That saga hits a bit too close to home for me.

Did anyone know that we're about two months away from the kickoff of the NFL season? It's not long until it's beer and chicken wings every Sunday for 12 hours while my wife helps me keep track of my fantasy team.

Anyone notice that unemployment is at 9.5 percent?

My writing is well...it's on going. It hasn't stopped, really, but it's become harder than Tom Sizemore (might have used that joke in the blog, can't remember) to find the energy at the end of the day. Someone has mentioned using Vista's voice recognition software, which eases the process somewhat. Now it's all about finding the time to make that happen. I'm feeling okay about getting the first rough draft cranked out pretty quick. As I predicted, I've now begun to think that the whole book sucks and needs to be dumped in the trash. I know I've always said that no matter what I'd publish it, but if I'm not going to get published for airing out all of my dirty wedding laundry, then I don't know if I'll ever let anyone read it...ever. I'm just in one of those moods where I hate everything. It's sure to change any minute.

I finally saw the David Fincher (Fight Club, Seven) directed 'Curious Case of Benjamin Button.' I bought it three weeks ago and my wife and I sat down to watch it this afternoon. I must it was a stirring and artistic portrait of a 'curious' situation. One thing I took away from it was, that it is truly never too late to do something; it's never too late to start. I'm happy I saw that movie today. Thoughts like that help me get up every day. Well there's that thought and the Floyd Mayweather fight coming up.

Until next time...