Tag Archives: blogging

January 28, 2014

I am on the Simpsons!

I don’t know if you (still) watch the Simpsons or have ever watched it, but it is my favourite TV show and I still watch it every week. In the most recent episode, all the nuclear plant employees get Google Glasses for Christmas (called Oogle Goggles in the show), which Mr. Burns uses to spy on them. One scene shows a whole screen of them, with names under each one and wouldn’t you know it, right next to H. Simpson was me, D. Stewart.

copyright Fox something or other, yada yada yada

And not only that, I was writing a story! It’s like they know everything about me.

see above for half-hearted copyright disclaimer.

My friend Mike thinks I should write an Angry Birds fan-fic now and maybe he’s right. Hmm… It’s definitely weird enough for me.

Also, in terms of a slightly more legitimate accomplishment, one of my stories, You Can Bait a Fool with Water was accepted to the Were-Traveler’s online magazine. Go check it and other spooky stories out here.

12 Comments | tags: blogging, David Stewart, fan fiction, the Simpsons, the Were-Traveler, writing | posted in Uncategorized

January 23, 2014

Let me introduce to some friends of mine

By David Stewart

Back before New Year’s, I did a blogging game, where I asked you to think of fictional characters and post them in the comments, starting with A, all the way to Z. We made it all the way to the end, eventually, thanks to one loyal fan, and I said that whoever got one for F, S, and Z would get featured in a future post. This one.

Winner 1: Miles Rost (Music and Fiction)

As the blog name suggests, Miles writes fiction, inspired by music. Each story has a corresponding song and he often uses some of the lyrics in the story.

Some highlights:

Demolition Man is a madcap piece about a group of military misfits.

Hazy Shade of Winter is just fun, with lots of energy in it.

Winner 2: Sharmishtha Basu (Window to my Soul, Wing of Dreams, among others)

Sharmishtha has been blogging a lot longer than me and has 12 blogs, dealing with stories, poems, social issues and interesting facts. If you don’t know about Sharmishtha’s work yet, go check it out.

Some highlights:

Honeytrap: A Novel: This, along with its sequel, Kingmaker, are a chilling look into the plight of young Indian women and the depravity of some people who exploit them.

The Other World: Sharmishtha writes compelling serial stories. This is her current one.

Other Friends:

Since I’m writing this post anyway, I thought I would mention a couple other blogs as well. One is Dysfunctional Literacy. If you have never read Dysfunctional Literacy, definitely go check it out. Author Jimmy Norman writes about funny, interesting posts about literature, books, words, etc. and has great continuing stories. His current one, The Literary Girlfriend is top-notch.

The other blog I wanted to mention is called Two Small Feet and its first post was yesterday. It is owned by a real-life friend of mine, Carmelita, a world traveler who just arrived in Bhutan to live there. Go follow her and read about her adventures and life in a remote, mysterious country.

13 Comments | tags: Bhutan, blogging, fiction, friends, India, literacy, music | posted in Uncategorized

December 28, 2013

Blogging Games – Fictional Characters Edition

By David Stewart

The nice thing about a blog is it’s your space to do with as you want. I mostly write fiction, but I don’t limit myself to that. And sometimes I like to do something random.

Like these guys.

So here’s a game for you. In the comments, write the name of a fictional character.

The first comment has to think of one starting with A, then B, and so on, all the

way to Z. If we get there, we win. You can comment as many times as you want,

but you can’t do two in a row. Them’s the rules. Also, I won’t do more than one, since this is for you all.

To make it more interesting, the magic letters are F, S, and Z. If you are the person to give a name for one of these (keep it in alphabetical order, of course), I’ll feature your blog or website in an upcoming post.

Ready, set, go!

35 Comments | tags: blogging, blogging game, Characters, fictional characters, games | posted in Uncategorized

December 24, 2013

3 Thoughts on the War on Christmas

By David Stewart

Merry Christmas from the Green-Walled Tower! I got the ladder out and put up lights around the ivy and put a bit of mistletoe somewhere, in case the missus wanders by. I’m sitting, looking out my window at the world all lit up with lights and I notice a small point of conflict.

Apparently there is a war on Christmas. For those of you who haven’t heard this term before, it is the conflict (mostly in North America) about saying Merry Christmas versus Happy Holidays, and using religious Christmas images in public places. I’m not here to debate the details of this or to say that there isn’t a war on Christmas. I’m here to say why it doesn’t matter one way or the other. I know that this is a very charged issue for a lot of people, but please here me out.

What does Christmas mean?

I’m sure you could get a million answers to this question, ranging from “absolutely nothing” to “buying a lot of expensive crap” to “spending time with family and friends” and “celebrating the birth of Jesus”. Sure, the birth of Jesus is the original meaning of Christmas, but all of these answers are valid. I’m not saying that all of them should or shouldn’t be the meaning of Christmas, but pragmatically, they are. Christmas is a lot of things to a lot of people.

I always try to be a peacemaker and I try to see both sides of every issue. As a Christian, I understand people getting upset that Jesus, not only the reason for the holiday in the first place, but also our Savior, gets a back seat to Santa Claus a lot of times. However, for those of you who think that there is a war on Christmas, I have three thoughts.

1. The original Christmas story is unchanged

I just went and watched the second Hobbit movie a couple days ago. And while I didn’t like everything about it, it was a pretty good movie. However, even if they had really butchered it, the book The Hobbit would have remained unchanged. That is how I view Christmas. Rudolph and Santa cannot erase the Christmas story. Christmas has survived the introduction of Christmas trees, holly, and mistletoe, as well as numerous other traditions that have nothing to do with the original Christmas. Even if the word Christmas is eventually effaced from public usage and people use the term Annual Gift Exchange Day or Santamas, it still won’t affect the original meaning of Christmas, which brings me to the second point.

2. What matters most is how you personally celebrate Christmas

In Korea, Christians in Korea go to church most of the day and then go help poor people. This makes me a bit embarrassed since although I’m a Christian, I don’t go to church on Christmas (that’s for Christmas Eve). Christmas for me is a time for family. I wouldn’t want Koreans judging me for not going to church and so I should not judge others if they want to say Happy Holidays or read The Night Before Christmas instead of Luke 2. Honestly, I think it’s pretty impressive that non-Christians talk and sing about Jesus as much as they do around Christmas time.

3. Let’s have a little peace, shall we?

“Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” (Luke 2:14)

“If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.” (Romans 12:18)

“For God is not a God of disorder but of peace.” (1 Corinthians 14:33)

Merry Christmas, everyone. I hope you have a great day.

15 Comments | tags: Bible, blogging, Christmas, Jesus, Korea, Merry Christmas, Santa Claus, War on Christmas | posted in Uncategorized

November 27, 2013

5200 Words – Friday Fictioneers

By David Stewart

Today is my 52nd straight week of doing the Friday Fictioneers, ever since Amy from the Bumble Files suggested I give it a try. I’m very glad I did. One year of stories and pictures (each one exactly 100 words, since I’m obsessive that way) is an accomplishment but more important are all the people I have met and the relationships that I have made in the Friday Fictioneers community. And so, I have decided to dedicate this story to that idea. (I toyed with the idea of mentioning people by name, but 100 words is not at all enough room to mention everyone and I didn’t want to leave anyone out.)

5200 Words

Hundreds streamed through the cafe, but Gloria chose one soul a week to get to know, then wrote 100 words about them.

Soon leather jacket—table 4 became Mike, grabbing a breather from the crying new angel at home. Lunch special—table 8 was Miles, heading off to adventure in Australia. Smiling eyes turned into Carmelita, stopping in to get her usual whenever she was in town. After one year, the notebook in Gloria’s desk held 5200 words of real lives.

Then one day:

Where’s Gloria?

Collapsed suddenly.

Stable condition.

The number of kind words that awaited her were countless.

59 Comments | tags: blogging, diner, fiction, flash fiction, Friday Fictioneers, illness, relationships, waitress | posted in Friday Fictioneers

November 11, 2013

I’m bored: Come on, give me a challenge

By David Stewart

Okay, so I’m not really bored. In fact, I’m insanely busy. But that’s life.

I’ve decided to do another Open Prompts story this Friday. I haven’t done one in over a year, so for those of you who don’t know what that is, let me explain.

I take five story elements that you suggest (one per commenter, please) and write a story around them. Examples are:

– the title

– the genre (fantasy, mystery, horror, etc.)

– the tone (dark, humorous , serious, absurd, etc.)

– a character’s name or other details about them

– plot elements (e.g. a silver dagger, a rainstorm, identical twins, etc.)

– the length (something between 50 and 1500 words)

– anything else you feel like.

Nothing sexual, overly graphic, obscene, etc, but I’ll take the first five suggestions I get in the comments. Feel free to make them as random as you want. Come back on Friday to see what I make of it all. As always, you are free to write your own story around the same set of story elements. Please do, because that would be awesome.

15 Comments | tags: blogging, Open Prompts, writing | posted in Uncategorized

November 9, 2013

Nanowrimo? More like Pernofinmo…

By David Stewart

Ah, Nanowrimo. There is always the annual debate among amateur writers: to Nano or not to Nano? Some love the idea and some are against it for various reasons.

Personally, I like Nano. I like the energy and even the deadlines that push you to get things done whether you feel like it or not. I’ve done Nano eight years in a row and won seven of them…until this year. This year I’m not doing it and it’s your fault.

Okay, so it’s obviously not your fault. It’s my fault or at least the fault of this blog. My usual modus operandi for novel writing has been to write a novel in November and then spend the next year (and more) editing it. However, since I started this blog, I have done much less novel editing and consequently, I have two novels from past Nanowrimos that are fifty thousand words long, but are still unfinished stories. As much as I would love to do Nano again this year, I don’t need another unfinished rough draft sitting on my hard drive. What I need is to finish the ones I have.

So I’m not doing Nanowrimo this year. Instead, I’m doing Pernofinmo (Personal Novel Finishing Month) and honestly, it’s a lot harder. For one thing, there’s more editing and retooling of things, which is much slower than just pedal-to-the-metal rough draft writing. Plus, the story I am working on has remained unfinished for two years for a reason. The main theme of the novel is that the main characters (and the whole world for that matter) are struggling with a intractable situation with no easy answers. The problem is, that I don’t have any easy answers either and I have spend tons of hours over the last two years trying to figure out how to end it plausibly. I’ve been making progress, but it’s still slow. I don’t know if I’ll actually finish the story in November, but I’ll try. I still have 21 left.

I get the feeling this guy doesn’t like Nanowrimo

Do you do Nanowrimo? Why or why not? I’m just curious.

13 Comments | tags: blogging, Nano, nanowrimo, National Novel Writing Month, novel, outside the tower, writing | posted in Uncategorized

September 21, 2013

The Green-Walled Church

By David Stewart

I was wandering around Daegu today and came across this church. If the Green-Walled Tower ever had a church attached to it, I’m sure it would look like this. (Plus, if I ever start a theological blog, I’ll have a good image for it. 🙂 )

7 Comments | tags: blogging, church, Daegu, green-walled tower, Korea | posted in Korea

September 9, 2013

Minecrack – The Confessions of a Recent Addict

By David Stewart

When my good friend Mike finally got me into Minecraft, I went into it like someone who decides to take up recreational heroin. Of course, that was also the reason why I resisted buying it for so long: I knew it was insanely addictive. And now that I have it, it is exactly as addictive as I had expected, although in a good way (unlike heroin, in case someone thought this was a convoluted endorsement of hard drugs). Now, I find that anytime I have trouble writing or am just feeling too tired, the lure of the game beckons me. However, despite the slight loss in productivity, I still don’t feel that lingering feeling of regret when I finish playing, like that sour feeling you get when you eat an entire bag of gummy bears in one sitting (hypothetically). Here’s why:

Here is how I imagine the real Green-Walled Tower.

1. It’s Totally Creative: drool… This is the kind of program I have been looking for for a long time. This is the reason that I want to have a room full of Legos someday. A very long time ago, I had a Lego computer program that was similar, except nowhere near as powerful. After one house, the landscape started disappearing as the computer ran out of memory. But now, I can create almost anything that comes into my mind. And believe me, I can come up with some pretty freaky stuff. The only sticking point is time, since I like things big and you still have to place every block individually. Currently I’m working on a setting from the first novel I ever wrote. It’s a pool, surrounded by five temples, on top of a fortified hill, in a huge city in a deep cleft of a valley. After about an hour or so, I’m almost finished the pool.

2. It’s Open-Ended: I’m using both the creative mode to make the aforementioned pool/city, but also playing in survival mode, where you have to find food and not get killed by monsters. It is way better than most games because you can manipulate everything . Currently, I’m at the bottom of an abandoned mineshaft with monsters all around. In a normal game, I’d have to fight my way out to get back to my house and recharge. Not in Minecraft. There, I can block off a shelter, dig it out bigger, make a crafting table and make more weapons and armor, even smelt ore into metals, all while I’m stuck at the bottom of a mine. I can make my own staircases or ladders, dig straight in any directions or basically do anything I want.

The upper room, where the creative magic happens.

I realize I’m late in the game (as usual with technology; I just got a smart phone a few months ago) and that over half the world has already played Minecraft. But to those few out there who haven’t played it, I would just say that it’s awesomely creative and awesomely addictive. I’m still exploring what I can do, but I would like to make stories and set them in a Minecraft world that I create, recording the whole thing on video. So we’ll see. You never know what will come out of the Green-Walled Tower.

11 Comments | tags: addiction, blogging, creativity, games, gaming, Minecraft, outside the tower, The Green-Walled Tower, world-building, writing | posted in Uncategorized

June 22, 2013

Baker’s Dozen preview

By David Stewart

A man named Forrest goes to work one day, worried about his small problems in his insulated world. Then a mysterious message appears on his computer screen, telling him to get out of the building. He does, just as it explodes. He is quickly thrust into a maelstrom of chaos, warring factions and uncertain allegiances. Everything seems to be centered around a medallion that his father gave him before he died. They say it has hidden power and powerful, shadowy forces will stop at nothing to get it.

This is the premise of a collaborative story with 13 chapters that has been ongoing for a couple months, run by my friend Joe Owens. Next week, on Tuesday or Wednesday, my installment of the story will be posted, which will be the 12th and second last chapter.

If you are interested in reading the ones that come before, here is the link to them. It starts with the most current chapter, Chapter 11, but the links to the earlier ones are there too.