Gawker and the NY Post are both reporting the latest in Cougar news.  Women are not actually hunting down young men in huge numbers.  I know, all of you cougar-istas are surprised by this finding, and I’m sure your age-appropriate SO is sighing in relief, and yet, we consider to be surprised that all of humanity is not exactly alike.

Drudge is reporting that 25% of Americans believe Obama is a Muslim. I believe 20% of earthly residents believe that aliens (space, not the other kind that make Lou Dobb’s head explode) have actually landed on earth and walk amongst us.  73% of Americans are unable to believe this S&IT, which has gone on to become a best-seller, 73% of All Americans Unable to Believe this SH&T My Father Says.  And 89% of all Americans believe politicians are corrupt (I just made that one up, but I bet it’s true).

Also, in other news, both Wired and Newsweek are reporting that the Internet is dead, although NPR and BNET both say that the reports of the Internet death (by both Wired and Newsweek) have been greatly exaggerated.  I say that you are not actually reading this post on the Internet, instead it is being channeled through your computer via the Psychic Friends Network (which actually died in the 1980s, but nobody knew, because DUH!).

Also, the New York Times is reporting that John Lenin is still dead.

Fiction is not dead.  On the Internet, nothing will ever die.

I found this one on Jezebel.  Painfully obvious newspaper headlines.  And I should note that my DS has a t-shirt with Death: The Nations #1 Killer on it.  It always makes me snicker.

This week, the new Quentin Tarantino movie opened #1 at the box office, raking in $37.6M, which isn’t blockbuster numbers, but I was surprised. For those who haven’t read the storyline, here’s the synopsis:

“Inglourious Basterds” begins in German-occupied France, where Shosanna Dreyfus(Mélanie Laurent) witnesses the execution of her family at the hand of Nazi Colonel Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz). Shosanna narrowly escapes and flees to Paris, where she forges a new identity as the owner and operator of a cinema. Elsewhere in Europe, Lieutenant Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) organizes a group of Jewish soldiers to engage in targeted acts of retribution. Known to their enemy as “The Basterds,” Raine’s squad joins German actress and undercover agent Bridget Von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger) on a mission to take down the leaders of The Third Reich.

So, I’m thinking, is it:
a) World War II – Nazi evil, die suckah!
b) Brad Pitt
c) Quentin Tarantino
d) everything else sucked and people really wanted to see a movie

I really did love Pulp Fiction, but I’m thinking d) on this one. We watched Defiance a couple of weeks ago, and I’m sorry, but I’ll take Daniel Craig and Liev Schreiber over Brad Pitt any day. Feel free to debate and discuss the artistic merits of BP vs DC and LS.

And also watched Sum of All Fears a couple of days ago, and I realized how energy Liev Schreiber brings to a role. Absolutely nothing to do with anything, but I noted it.

New York mag has a fascinating article on focus v. distraction and how it’s affecting the brain.  There’s a lot of really cool insights in the article, which is sort of a hodge-podge of anecdotes (Malcolm Gladwellian style).  A few tidbits:

Only in the last ten years—thanks to neuroscientists and their functional MRIs—have we been able to watch the attending human brain in action, with its coordinated storms of neural firing, rapid blood surges, and oxygen flows. This has yielded all kinds of fascinating insights—for instance, that when forced to multitask, the overloaded brain shifts its processing from the hippocampus (responsible for memory) to the striatum (responsible for rote tasks), making it hard to learn a task or even recall what you’ve been doing once you’re done.

And this little bit:

The only time multitasking does work efficiently, Meyer says, is when multiple simple tasks operate on entirely separate channels—for example, folding laundry (a visual-manual task) while listening to a stock report (a verbal task). But real-world scenarios that fit those specifications are very rare.

I knew that!!!  Laundry days at the O’Reilly household are planned around TV watching nights.  The scenario plays out where Laundress O’Reilly dumps all clothes on the couch, in which laundry-drone O’Reilly members must actually fold in order to — get this, it’s the really strategic one — find a place to sit on the couch in order to watch TV.

Anyway, I wanted to share.  Wired had an article on the future of reading in this month’s issue (I’m not sure there’s a link to this, the website seems to link to last month’s issue, not the current) , and they also had an interview with Guillermo del Toro on moviemaking, and the common link on both with the desire to make the creation/experience of movies and books more of a collective experience.  This makes a lot of sense to me because when a person *owns* something, the emotional response is higher than if they have no ownership investment in the process.  I remember a writer friend talking about Diana Gabaldon posting pieces of what would become Outlander on the web and get comments and criticism.  I sometimes wonder how much that little piece of the process affected the outcome of Outlander.

I’m not sure how a collective book could be written or reviewed.  As a writer, I know what paths work best for a story, which paths I’m most invested in, and I’m not sure if Readers Group chose Plot Pathway B as the route to proceed along, that I would care as much about *my story*.

Anyway, I’m mulling it over, and if anybody has any ideas about how the collective could work, I’d love to discuss.  I think it will be some sort of the future, but I’m not sure how to get there…

So, there’s a lot of developing things developing.  Looks like Washington is going to throw a diamond-studded, 14K gold lifeline to the auto companies.  Might I say that I am not optimistic about the long-term prospects for GM, or even Chrysler?  I’m thinking the Big 3 should be the Big 2, or maybe even The Big 1.

I’ve been doing the holiday things, the school-concert things, the exercise things, the writing things, and the sleeping and eating things.  I think I want to take Ritalin.  There was an article in Nature (which I haven’t read yet, but I will) where a team of scientists advocated the use of brain-enhancing drugs for healthy people, simply as a performance improver.  I’d had long thoughts about this because I think we are getting to the point to where genetic tinkering will start to prevail, and will of course, be expensive, so that achievement gap that we have now is going to grow by supersized-DNA leaps and bounds.  Imagine that a parent can pay $40,000 and have a kid who is ten IQ points smarter, or pay $100,000 and get Angelina Jolie’s mouth.  It’s Logan’s Run, but we’re advocating it.  (Does anybody remember Logan’s Run?  I really liked the movie).   Anyway, I’m not sure if we will get to legalized brain-enhancers or not, but the world is moving that way.

And in writing news, there’s not a lot to say, still writing my New Year’s Eve book.  I’m thinking of calling it Midnight Resolutions, and I hope HQ lets me keep it.  I just got the title for my August book, Hot Under Pressure.  My working title was the Mile High Club, but apparently that’s not Blazey enough.  Actually, I do like Hot Under Pressure, and it works on many levels, and it’s not Sex, Straight Up, so I’m happy. ☺

In other publishing news, there is a fund-raising auction for Blaze author Jo Leigh.  I’m donating a critique of three chaps and synop, or else a phone call brainstorming session, and if I may toot my own horn here, (and I’m not a big horn-tooter, which should give you an idea of how big this is), I am both an excellent critiquer, and an excellent brainstormer.   So, for those of you writers that are reading this, it’s for a great cause, and right now, it’s at the super-low bargain price of $10.52.  But WAIT, there’s MORE! If you bid now, I’ll throw in an extra hour FREE, that’s right, an extra hour of world-famous Kathleen O’Reilly hand-holding, character-shaping, idea-molding, plot-snipping for FREE!  But you must bid now.  Little Ebay elves are standing by to place your order.

I now return to our regularly scheduled writing day.

Today’s post is a collecion of miscellanea… without a consistent theme, because it’s gloomy and rainy and Friday, and I’m suffering from post-election malaise.

First up, the election is over. On November 5th, I woke up, immediately jumped to www.realclearpolitics.com, and realized that I had nothing I wanted to read. There were no more polls; oh, yes, there was commentary on why Obama won, why McCain lost, but it’s like post-football-game commentary after the game is over. We know how it turned out, so is all that necessary? Apparently not for me. I did get teary eyed at 11pm on election night, but what was interesting is that it was the sight of Jesse Jackson crying that did me in. It’s not that I’m a huge Jesse Jackson fan, but looking into his face and seeing the peace in his eyes, I finally got what a huge turning point this was for this country, especially the African-American community. I started tearing up then, because I realize I didn’t know how this country was going to change because of Obama, but I knew that somewhere over the last ten years it already had, and it made me happy.
The next bit of thought: are racial jokes the new black? I read an article yesterday on whether the Daily Show could survive an Obama presidency, and last night, we watched John Stewart, and I noticed the plethora of black jokes, and I found them a little funnier than I would have on November 3rd, but it still made me uncomfortable. There’s been a lot of discussion about how commedians can make fun of Obama, race being one, and I do enjoy a good dead baby joke which are pretty much the worst in terms of jokes that no one should find humorous, but I’m not sure I’m ready for racial jokes. This will be interesting to see if this trend continues, and if continues, or if goes the way of new Coke.

Publishing news is not good, although Harlequin did buck the trend and have a nice quarter, and it *seems* that Harlequin authors might perhaps be pleased this royalty period, but my Tyvek has not come, so I can’t say “Woohoo!”, or “Meh” with any authority right now.

Last night, I finished Lisa Kleypas’ Blue-Eyed Devil, and thought it was awesome. I had read Sugar Daddy about a month ago, and enjoyed it, but contrary to popular opinion, I loved Blue-Eyed Devil more I have no idea why, perhaps because it started with the hero, and ended with the hero, with a little heroine-thinking-she-was-in-love-with-someone-else in between, though not as much as Sugar Daddy. I’m a recent Lisa Kleypas fan, having only really glommed her historicals in the past year, and I was nervous about her foray into contemporary, the way Stephen King has, where he takes the beloved friend in the middle of the book, and then they get bitten/turned/converted into something bad, and you see them standing there, and you know they are now a bad person, but you can’t forget the past, and you want to like them. So, needless to say, I was nervous about trying the contemporaries, but I downloaded the first sample from Sugar Daddy and read it, and when I got to the end of the chapter, I immediately bought it and continued reading, not stopping until I got to the end. I think what Ms. Kleypas gets right, IMHO, is that she infuses the page with a ton of emotion, and it doesn’t get draggy or feel like its TMI. Anyway, if, like me, you have been nervous of the LK contemporaries, I give it the Kathleen O’Reilly seal of approval.

I think that’s all for now. Have a nice Friday, and a good weekend, and I’ll be back.

There’s a piece in the NY Times about whether or not the F-Word should be allowed on television.  Apparently, Fox Television is in favor of the fornicationally-flavored locution while the FCC says not just no, but effing-no.   What intrigued me most was that the word’s sexual connotations seemed to be the thrust of the problem, not the fact that it was a curse word.  

My only comment, WTF?  We can show copulation on network television, we can imply copulation on network television, we can make bawdy jokes about copulation on network television, but God forbid, that we call it by its name.  Apparently if the word is non-sexualized, then it’s freaking fine.  Sigh.

I will be fair and fussy here and say that I don’t enjoy hearing the f-word overused in casual conversation, and I don’t like when it runs fast and loose through writing or movies.  It’s usage is much more powerful in the one-off, and eventually, for me, like the dialog tag, ’said,’ it gets blocked out.  BUT if a character is given to phonetic freedom, like Tony Soprano, it should be used as necessary.  

I suspect that the Supreme Court will recognize that the use of the word has gone far beyond its sexualized meaning, but I don’t know.  A lot of the justices are part of the older generation where words were very carefully chosen for their precise meaning.  I miss those days, not because we couldn’t say fuck, but because there is something to be said for having a cornucopia of words at the tip of one’s tongue.  Writing and speaking — they both suffer for it. 

So, there’s been a lot of doom and gloom and depression time talk and it’s not fun.  Hugs to all who feel sad, and just remember, it could be worse.  You could live in Iceland, population 310,000.  The country has three big banks, of which two are now apparently under government control.  The Guardian has this article, which includes this quote:

Nonetheless, most Icelanders – Gudnarson included – seem confident their country will weather the storm. “I’ve been working since I was 18,” he said, “and this would be the third time the banks and the government between them have managed to make my work worthless. We always come back. Iceland has strong fundamentals. We’re not going to fall into the North Sea.”

Now, Gudnarson is 45, so he’s been working for 27 years, and he’s saying this is the third time the government has made his work worthless.  Three times? Honestly?  You know, I’m pretty patient, but after two times, I think I’d move.

After reading this, I have to say, I feel better about my government (and yes, Congress, I’m looking at you) now.  Sure, they’re a bunch of good-for-nothings, that can’t even bail out the country right, and like to debate about stupid, meaningless things except when it’s time for re-election. But have they made my work worthless three times?  No.  Only once.  Some (in Iceland) might even say that Congress is doing “great.”

Oh, heck.  I was trying to undepress myself this morning (the market futures are not helping).  I have failed.

I think I will go off and torture my characters and make them move to Iceland.

And if anyone out there reading this is from Iceland, I’m sorry.  Come to the states, where yes, we screw up too, but not so bad.

The New York Post has this fascinating article on the fall of the alpha male.  The author has a new book out, The Score: How the Quest for Sex Has Shaped Modern Man, and I’m tempted to pick up a copy, based on the premise of the article alone.  

According to the article:

Stanford neuroscientist and primate expert Robert Sapolsky says he doubts humans have true alpha males because our society is structured in a much more complicated way than, say, dogs. We tend to belong to multiple social circles, so the guy who empties the trash for a big corporation might be a star DJ at night or dominate the company softball team.

Hallelujah and pass the donuts…  Have you ever watched men in groups?  Do you see the same guy take the lead in the car racing discussion, in the political discussion, in the stock market discussion, in the football discussion?  No.  Because no man rules all.  Now, if you’re writing a prison book, okay, there might be alphas there, because that’s a pretty simplistic system.  But the world is not so simple.  

The author talks about the side-blotched lizards, where the largest males fight each other for female affections, but the smaller, yellow-striped lizards are largely ignored by the other males — but not by the females.  While the bigger lizards are fighting, the smaller lizards are, you guessed it..  having sex with the ladies.  I love the term a British biologist uses to describe their social hierarchical position: Sneaky f—ers, which the author shortens and sanitizes to “sneakers.”

As a reader, it’s interesting to me to see the stereotypical alpha male in a situation where he’s not the alpha.  How does he respond?  And what’s even more fascinating to me is seeing the non-alpha male in a situation where he is the alpha….  I know readers and writers want to stick people into one box or another, but the human mind is much more complicated than that.  We all have capabilities and talents that take us in different directions and that is true of everyone. 

As a writer, I like to show the hero in the place where he rules, because there always is one, for everyone.  It could be a military base, a squad room, a baseball field, a courtroom, a bar, an airplane, or a pet clinic.  Every character has their place where they reign supreme, and I like to write it, I like to read it.   

One of the rather interesting points of the article is this one:

Human males are unique in their flexibility – able to use combinations of all the above strategies. Fathering, sneaking, beautiful displays – all this makes the old alpha males look not only obnoxious but boring. Where have all the cowboys gone? While they were out herding cattle, the skinny-jean wearing emo rocker took his woman.

hehehehe….

Yeah, I knew that.

Father’s Day.  Free yogurt.  Participating TCBY.  Although, it was hotter and more humid than hell could ever be in New York yesterday, so this would have been great….

I’ve been, uh, actually working, so posts have been limited.  Thank you for understanding.