More Quick Hits

From time to time, lets say once a week, I'm going to do some 'quick hits' on topics I have on my mind. So there.

1. Baby Names. For the love of god, stop with the silly names. First rule is DO NOT name your child after a city, state, or country. In fact, keep away from geographic terms altogether and we'll all be happier. Naming your child something like "Dylan" or "Hunter" is just a try for attention. Stop it. Australia has a law where you can't name your child something stupid like "Apple." Let's all take a cue from those wacky Southern Hemisphereians. Viva la Australia!

2. Metro Rail in LA. I'm a fan. Easy, pretty quick and I've take it to a few places where I probably wouldn't go due to the traffic problem we have here. For a person who did not grow up with effective public transportation as a feature of life, I've become a big fan.

3. The WPA. I say bring back the WPA. I'm no far right wacko, but would it kill the unemployed to do a little work for my money? Let's build some dams, pave some roads, clean some beaches, dig some ditches and anything else that needs to be done. At some point in our recent history we lost our "pride in working" gene. There are people who CAN work that just sit home and get a check. Perhaps not a majority, but enough. Why not use that as labor to do something that might be menial, if we find them unfit for real work, such as picking up trash on the side of the road or at the beach? Could even limit it to 24 hrs a week so that it's not too harsh on those collecting. Easy. And maybe it helps people have pride in themselves and not their ability to watch TMZ.

4. I'm writing a play. Not a huge topic, to be sure. But a while ago, lets say a year, I actually thought to myself, "I should have written a book by now." Not sure why I thought that. Not sure why anyone else would expect me to have written a book by now. Lord knows I don't have, and never have had I'm happy to add, the stick-to it-ivness to complete something as long as a book. I suppose at some point I should have an idea that could hold together long enough to be a book.

True, I DID write a 75 page "History of Baseball in San Antonio" which, if expanded could be a book-ish kind of creature. But, alas, it is not.
But "the play's the thing", as someone more famous than I once wrote.
I used to write quite a bit. Not exactly prolific, but quite a lot of nonsense came from this tiny brain. I then went into a long period of not writing, during which ideas came, but nothing stuck.
I wrote the "History of Baseball in San Antonio" which I thought was brilliant, funny, and clever. It was received with a combination of silence and indifference. Somewhat unnerving. That's the kind of thing that can, and did, make me not want to do ANY writing.

But underneath it all was a small idea about a play. I then started seeing a few plays and was inspired by the writing and found myself coming up with some funny alternative dialog for them. Why not? I asked myself. And so, slowly and with caution, I've been collecting scenes and conversations and personalities of my characters. The pressure was minimal until I started telling people what I was doing. Now the pressure is on. Which is kind of exciting.
I haven't had to write since college, when deadlines helped me focus and work. Let's hope this will work now. (I now will wait for the flood of goodwill. . . .waiting . . . .waiting. . . WAITING .. . fuck)