Killian's Blog/Website/Whatever

When I first saw this promo shot for Sherlock , all I could think was: Oh, Stephen. Doctor and Companion? I suppose, like any director, he has a very definite aesthetic. Too bad he had to turn it to my favorite literary duo. Shouldn't he be focusing his creative efforts on Doctor Who? We all know what happens when a prolific creative mind gets stretched too thin: they might as well start working for Marvel.* But, hey, I won't kick it just yet. Now that it's online for free (thank you, Masterpiece Theater! Remind me to give to Public Broadcasting this year), I might as well give it a whirl. However, I will stipulate that the second Sherlock uses modern technology as a crutch, I will turn it off. Yes, yes, we all love the internet, but Holmes was frickin rad because he basically had the internet in his brain . Also, the guy who plays him looks funny. I like to have crushes on Holmes**--I do not have a crush on this guy. A bit petty of me, perhaps, to base some of my in...

Something I found pretty fascinating about ye olde Icelanders (and viking culture, even more generally) is the level to which they elevate their poets. If a great strong man goes viking*, and then his heart is broken by a sexy lady, it is totally ok for him to go home, cry it out, and write poems about it. In fact, if he wants to retire from the whole fighting business to write/recite poetry full time, he is not discouraged. Though I suppose that's to be expected from a group of people whose epic god, Odin, is the god of poetry and killing people. Also, he looks like Gandalf. Odin is   Keyser Söze  **** I have recently spent almost 200 pages getting acquainted with my first Icelandic Saga: "Egil's Saga." It begins with the story of Egil's grandfather, Kveldulf, who is a shape-shifter (*cough*OdinReference*cough*). Kveldulf (whose name means Night Wolf...because he's a werewolf ) has two sons, Thorolf and Grim. Grim is nicknamed Skallagrim, because he'...

I seem to have developed a Coldergy. Unsure of whether I have Seasonal Sneezes or Cautious Congestion, I have spent the past few days sounding like Homestar Runner and fretting about school/work/THE FUTURE in a slight-but-ultimately-distracting fog. Despite this, I was able to write a checklist of every assignment from this Monday up until Veterans Day*; write two papers; read four online articles; fill out a silly form; and even read an adapted fairytale (this one was for pleasure). And that's just the homework! Also, perk to being Under the Weather: Daniel makes me nummy lentil soup. Sadly, I do not foresee myself recovering quickly. For one thing, I don't sleep very much. Last week was my first without nightmares in over a month, but that may have been because, up until this weekend, the Czuba Family Zoo was keeping me up all night. I have grown accustomed to sleeping with the dryer running and a pillow over my head. Second, people keep adding stress to my bucket. My str...

Today, I was feeling a bit unmotivated. The walls in the apartment were (note: ARE) too white, the sky outside was too grey, etc. It was just sort of a bunk day. And though I have, since my point of creative departure this morning, changed my story,* I spent most of my afternoon doodling. Which is code for making Pok é mon versions of myself and Daniel after seeing this . So, behold! Me as a Pok é mon: My attacks aim true Yeah, those are guns on its back And Daniel, as not so much a Pok é mon as "li'l danil: astronaut": Those are tea-shooting cannons on that third one As I said, I also got some actual work done today. Well, I think I did. There is no really good Instruction Manual for Doing Writing the Right Way, so I may be on the right track, or I may be stumbling around a dark room, hitting the garbage disposal instead of the light switch. Only time will tell! PS The closest you will ever get to an Instruction Manual for Doing Writing the Right Way is...

Up until about three days ago, I was about seventy-five pages deep into a novel I had been working on for three and a half years. Sure, that doesn't seem like a whole lot, but I've cut huge chunks out, re-written it time and time again, and was finally picking up some steam on it. And I loved some of the later parts. The beginning, though, drove me absolutely batty (as most things I wrote at age nineteen are wont to do), and there was just no fixing it. At first, I was going to try re-writing the first paragraph blindly and go from there. But that led to me realizing that I want to scrap huge plot points that I think are dumb. That left me with starting over completely. Which is what I have done. Don't worry, I archived the old stuff. I'm not getting rid of it. But the usable bits are pretty insignificant. Fortunately, in the span of two days, I smashed out about 1,300 words, and they are more to my liking. But now I'm hitting that What's Next? wall. The chara...

I think I may increasingly be a fan of Federal Government (Sorry, T-Jeff). This may sound odd, because I have never been a fan of The Man, and federal government is about as Man-ful as it gets. However, I love organization and, though I'm sure it's drowning in its own bureaucratic nonsense, I imagine the consistency offered by it (at its most ideal, mind you) would make jobs like the one I currently have MUCH easier. Before the days of the internet, I would probably be a Power to the States girl. But the internet has proven to me that the Texas Medical Board has it way more together than the Oregon Medical Board, and this is disheartening. There goes my state pride. But if EVERY state had to meet certain searchable board requirements, I would be The Happiest. Because I am researching on medical boards across the country all day long, and it is a headache and a half to try to find a license for an emergency transportation organization in about 46/50 states. (this is Thoma...

Somehow, I forgot to re-cap my full TA experience. So here it is. (I'll try to keep it short and sweet) The class was only four weeks long (as summer classes are occasionally wont to be), so right about the time people were starting to get all warmed up to the idea of Magic Realism*, the term went kaput. Their presentations went amazingly well, though, and I don't know how the papers turned out (those weren't my responsibility to grade, Thank Heavens) but I would guess they were, at least, chock full o' heart. Grading was an extremely humbling experience. It simultaneously enlightened me (some of my students truly blew my mind with their input) and depleted my faith in humanity (out of twenty students, only two got A's, and I was being generous. Those two deserved it, definitely, but the people who didn't get there have absolutely no excuse. They never asked for help or extensions). I tried the best I could to give them the benefit of the doubt, but some r...