New essay in the works

On top of my novel and on top of my literary journalism piece on melatonin, I have added another project to the works.

I watched my first Friday the 13th movie when I was five: Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives. Ever since, I've been a huge fan of the series. Everyone around me called the films worthless and trashy and even sexist. The acting is usually pretty bad too, but you know what? I watched them anyway, and I still enjoyed them to a great degree, and I still do today. I just finished watching the original Friday the 13th.

I'm going to make a bold statement in a new essay: these films are more than what they appear to be. Call them trashy. Call them worthless. But as a writer, I can examine a lot more there, and I firmly believe the makers of these films made them this way for a reason. I'm not going to be specific yet because I do not want my idea stolen, although this topic has been touched on by people before.

Additionally, I am desperately awaiting replies to magazines. Sometimes it just seems to take forever.

Melatonin

I believe I have found another side effect of the melatonin supplement: occasional dizziness. I've noted this since I began taking melatonin, but I never thought to link the two together until I woke up this morning with heavy dizziness, enough to make me wobble as I walked down the hallway. I experienced it earlier in the week, firstly on Thursday, but also the days following and now today.

I have elected to stop taking the supplement. Between bizarre dreams, which I experienced once more last night, and dizziness, I have enough material for a nonfiction piece on the drug.

Stephen Amidon

I have just recieved exciting news: Stephen Amidon, who has co-authored a new book with his brother called THE SUBLIME ENGINE: A Biography of the Human Heart, will be on CBS Sunday Morning tomorrow.

He helped me with my book when he came to WSU and I wish the Amidon brothers the upmost success. It will be released Monday, Valentine's Day of course. Go get it!

Sweet Dreams

I recently began taking melatonin on and off to battle insomnia. It works very well from me with only one side effect: increased dream activity.

I should note that I am on 2 other medications that have been known to increase dream activity in rare cases, but I have been on them since August. My usage of melatonin has only began recently as have my bizarre dreams.

Last night there were two dreams. Both horrified me while they were in progress, but when I woke up, I was able to laugh at one of them just a little, but definitely not the other.

First, the one I can laugh at. Has anyone ever played the video game MAXIMUM CARNAGE for the Sega Genesis or Super Nintendo? I was in this game, kind of. Carnage (for those you don't know he is a red villain from the Spider-Man comic books and more info about him can be found here). The story of "Maximum Carnage" in the comic book upon which the game is based takes place over fourteen issues. A war between Spider-Man and several allies (Venom, to name one) and Carnage and several allies (Shriek, Doppleganger). Somehow my dream brought me to the side of Spider-Man. I will spare the full details, but it was bizarre and terrifying while it lasted, but amusing once I woke up at 4:30ish in the morning and had to use the restroom. Then my mind unleashed the absolute horror.

I will say the dream ended in the brutal murder of my fiance by a knife-weilding pair of goons at a casino. The brutal vividness of it shocked me awake shortly before nine 9:00 AM. I was sweating, and my arms were jittery.

There were many dreams before these, occuring every night I took the melatonin supplement; I'm sure of it.

So this has inspired me. I was originally going to do a literary journalism peice on football helmets and concussions, but this is far more interesting to me now. I want to investigate the effects of melatonin supplements on the brain and find a cause for the dream activity.

I will take more tonight just to see if any more bizarre dreams occur.
Feel free to leave comments.

George Carlin

"Why is it that most of the people who are against abortion are people you wouldn't want to fuck in the first place?"

-George Carlin

Hello

My first entry: I'm here to update you on my doings around these parts. Firstly, I got engaged. Yes, to a beautiful little four-ten Native American with an attitude. Currently I am also 1 year away from getting my graduate degree, and I am also nearing the completion of my first novel. I would tell you what it's about, but I'd fear what a publisher would say about that, and I'm trying to attract them. That's one of my big 3 efforts I'm putting out right now. I'm also trying to get some shorter work published, mostly short stories, but also 3 poems and a hopefully humorous 500 word autobiography. The third major effort is an essay on football helmets and football related concussions.

I'm thinking I will have some sort of writing contest WHEN my novel comes out. That is a confident WHEN in capital letters, note. I love this book, and I love the characters. Not sure what exactly the contest will be yet, but keep coming back. I'm thinking I may give away a few autographed copies of the book.

I just got a job at the WSU library too. Working on the SOAR project, where professors and graduate students post their scholarly works so others around the campus and nation can access them for research. I was supposed to start today, but my boss had car trouble and emailed me not to come in. So I start tomorrow.

I will keep updating you on publications and rejections and maybe just some random thoughts about the happenings around the world. Please stay in touch.

And please follow me on twitter: DougABrowning
I will be updating a lot.