I have a few ideas. Just letting you know this isn’t a dead blog per se. Because you are reading it.
Author: Brian
Ballard Terminal Railroad_09.20.2017
Today I was biking on the Burke-Gilman trail and I got to see the Ballard Terminal Railroad’s Lil’ Beaver engine coming down the line! Being an old school railfan, I hopped off my bike and started snapping pictures and videos. I also got to meet James and Kat (sp?), who were running the Lil’ Beaver.
I will write up more of this exciting event, but in the meantime, I promised to put a link up to my article that ran in the Ballard News-Tribune almost 9 years ago. The BN-T has been folded into another paper, but they still are hosting this story for now. Hopefully they also have some of my other classic articles and 21st Century Viking essays still online!
One thing at a time, however. Without further ado, here’s Ballard Terminal Railroad Delivers Local Freight!
August 25, 2017
After months of inaction, I have started to write again. I can’t expect to train for and run a marathon if I run for a few days, then stop and not run for several months. This is my homepage when I open my browser. I usually don’t even look at it or guiltily click by it and pretend not to notice the Christmas 2016 post where I said I would finish it this year.
The fact is, when I write, I feel better. When I don’t, I feel like I have wasted a day.
So what’s it going to be? Are you a writer or not?
Christmas 2016
Hello dear reader,
I’m posting because I’m sick of seeing my dead blog stare me in the face each time I open my browser. I am spending Christmas this year in Colorado. Next Christmas I will have completed the novel I am working on and will have it available for sale.
When you write something on your blog, you are committing to doing something in front of the entire world. So here I am, committing to publishing a novel in the next 364 days!
Changes
I am embarking on an overhaul of this website. The goal is to make it about my writing (fiction and non-fiction) in general rather than strictly advertising my services as a freelance writer. I have a couple of stories that are in various stages of production, and there are a few Doctor Who-related blog posts that I have been meaning to write.
I have been watching “Trial of a Timelord” for the first time in 20 years and it has been a revelation. I have been meaning to do a 6th Doctor retrospective, so this is a great place to start.
I will share more about the fiction I am writing as well.
In the meantime, I wanted to put the blog back on the front page where it belongs.
Thanks,
-Brian
Ora et Labora
My article about Our Lady of the Rock Monastery, a community of Benedictine nuns was the cover story in the July/August 2015 print edition.
Here’s a link to the online version of the story- Ora et Labora: On Shaw Island, Benedictine nuns share lives of work, prayer and hospitality
When I first contacted Northwest Catholic about writing for them, I pitched this story idea. After writing a bunch of online articles for them, they decided to let me write the story.
I had came across the monastery a couple of years ago when searching for Benedictine communities in Washington state. They sounded really interesting, but I never really had a reason to go to Shaw Island. My wife, daughter and I went for an afternoon visit last summer as part of a vacation to the San Juan Islands and I returned earlier this year to get more background for my article. It is a beautiful, holy place. I was glad to hear that the Mothers liked my article and I hope to visit them again soon.
New Batch of Articles for Northwest Catholic
This week two new articles were posted on the recently updated Northwest Catholic website:
Organist honored for fifty years of liturgical music-making: A parish in Federal Way, WA celebrated the amazing milestone of their wonderful organist.
Evangelizing ‘green:’ Our Lady of Guadalupe parish adds solar panels: A parish in West Seattle is way ahead of the curve when it comes to saving energy- and money.
I now have a pretty decent group of articles for Northwest Catholic. Check out my Portfolio page for the complete list.
I have been having a great time writing these articles as well. The people who I have been interviewing are all committed Catholics who are out there in the world trying to make a difference. Hearing their stories is really inspiring and made me think long and hard about what I could be doing to help. Perhaps writing is my vocation…
NWCatholic.org: Brewing up help for the needy
I have started to write online articles for Northwest Catholic, the magazine of the Archdiocese of Seattle.
The first one is “Brewing up help for the needy,” which is about an interesting fundraiser held annually by the St. Vincent de Paul conference of St. Francis Xavier Mission in Toledo, WA.
Site Redesign Complete + Future Plans
Greetings and salutations! If you have been a regular reader of this blog or at least a regular visitor to this site, you may have noticed that it has been completely redesigned.
My main goals for the remodel were to:
1) Make the site about my writing, and
2) Pick a WordPress theme that was mobile-friendly. It’s pretty simple as far as whiz-bangery goes, but the focus of the site is the content not the graphics. There will be slight tweaks as I create more content, but I expect to keep this theme for a while.
As for this blog, I promise to post on a regular basis when I have an interesting idea for an article. Most of my blogging focus in the near term is going to be on the Infogration Consulting blog where I am going to expound upon and define the idea of “infogration.”
Let me know what you think of the redesign- thanks!
Last of the Projectionists: “The Wolf of Wall Street” is Not the End of 35mm Film
A few days ago, a story from the L.A. Times announced Paramount Pictures had become the first Hollywood movie studio to release a film in an all-digital format. No 35mm copies were produced. What is even more interesting was that the film- “The Wolf of Wall Street-” was directed by Martin Scorsese, one of the highest-profile proponents of film preservation. Has the “end of film” arrived? While it certainly looks grim for film, I believe that it will survive.
I am a film buff and a filmmaker. I have also been a film archivist and a projectionist during the last decade when 35mm was the main format for commercially releasing films in movie theatres.
The way films are going to be released, and the public is going to see them has completely changed in the last five years, and not always for the better. Sure you can see live events in movie theatres but the sound and picture quality are not the same as 35mm. I am certain that just as records nearly died but did not because there were aficionados who kept the format alive long enough for a new generation to discover it, so will film.
I will continue to write about the topic of the transition of 35mm to digital in movie theatres in this space. In particular, I will look for stories from the perspective of the projectionists and the theatres on the margins that may not be able to/don’t want to make the transition, the aesthetics of film and moviegoing, and why this matters in the 21st century.