LIBERTAD

Hay gente convencida de que las libertades individuales de los ciudadanos yankees empezaron a desaparecer como parte de una campaña del gobierno para luchar contra el terrorismo después de los atentados de Sept. del 2001. Yo creo que las libertades internas de EE.UU. -y por consiguiente las del resto del mundo- empezaron a desaparecer el día que George W. Bush asumió como presidente en su primer mandato (sin haber ganado las elecciones). En este humilde acto y fuera de todo chiste, empiezo a juntar firmas para mudar la Estatua de la Libertad de New York a algún otro país del mundo a designar. EE.UU. no es más un país del mundo que se merezca tener un monumento a la libertad. Por favor, si estás de acuerdo dejá tu nombre, nacionalidad y voto por el país que crees que debería recibir la Estatua en un "comment" a continuación. Vivir en un mundo mejor es posible. Hagámoslo realidad entre todos!

¿Simple o certificada?

"El desacuerdo es la mayor forma de patriotismo" Thomas Jefferson

(Si votaste por Bush, enlistate en el ejército ¡YA!) (Cuando Clinton mintió, nadie murió.)
(¿Hace falta traducirlo?) 
(Bush miente y los soldados mueren.) 

"MY NIGHT IN PARIS" Un fin de semana de novela.

Los pocos buenos elementos que quedan en la empresa para la que yo trabajaba, están concentrados en Rosario... Ahhh... Rosario... ...dándole los últimos toques a Showcase Rosario. Alfombra nueva? Entre ellos, el equipo del área de proyección al que yo pertenecía.

Los sospechosos de siempre me invitaron a pasar el fin de semana con ellos. -"Disculpame, pero entonces, por que llamaste al post "My Night in Paris" en vez de "My Night in Rosario"? Déjenme que les explique. El nunca mal intensionado Mark, (ver prontuario: Matutino Ruso Vol#2 No4 - Perfiles Psicológicos ), llevó la película homónima a la suite de Glenn para verla. Suite para Cuarteto en Re Mayor Opus #1. Suite para Cuarteto en Re Mayor Opus #2. Algunos de Uds. ya lo sabrán. Otros no. La realidad es que "My Night in Paris" es la película porno amateur que filmó el ex novio de Paris Hilton. (Risas). Sin proponérmelo, logré evitar (hasta los 28), un ritual común entre chicos de secundaria, que es ver películas porno en grupo. Realmente fue una experiencia bastante triste (si le restamos los comentarios hiper ingeniosos de mis amigos). Paris Hilton es una nena. No una mujer. Y eso hace que la película sea triste... hasta que Glenn comentó sobre la bronca del padre de la nena al haber visto la película en cuestión. Ahí se convirtió en algo literalmente invisible. La vida... de polizón! Couch sweet couch! ...buen díaaaaaaaaaaa... Las mañanas siguientes traen claridad a las noche anteriores. Esta mañana además trajo resaca. Despojos de guerra. Uno de los tres tachos de basura de la suite Rey Arturo. Los tres en iguales condiciones. "We´ll always have Rosario" tampoco suena tan glamouroso. Otro motivo para mantener el título como está. Un fin de semana de novela.

YO NO CREO EN LOS HORÓSCOPOS, PERO...

...por las dudas, los leo. Pocas veces me sentí tan identificado como con mi horóscopo del domingo pasado en la revista de La Nación. El Hombre de Géminis: Géminis es imprevisible. Lo que desea por la mañana, lo olvida por la noche. Voluble, fantasioso, brillante y divertido suele enamorar a todas, pero no se decide por ninguna. Independiente y muy inquieto en el amor -como en todos los aspectos de su vida-, le gusta resolver rápidamente: hacerse desear no funciona con él. La conversación y la imaginación son cartas de triunfo más poderosas. Niño eterno, Géminis es el que establece siempre las reglas de juego, y el que se encarga de concebirlas a su favor. Su punto débil: Aunque se empecine en demostrar lo contrario, sueña con el amor duradero. Pero su gran temor a perder libertad le impide -durante buena parte de su vida- concretarlo. Le tiene fobia a las personalidades posesivas y lo fascina la inteligencia. Claves para conquistarlo: Lo fundamental es no tratar de cortale las alas, porque en ese caso, Géminis huirá precipitadamente. Lo mejor es darle aire y, a la vez, la seguridad de que podrá volver al nido siempre. Por supuesto, no se trata de aceptar abandonos o infidelidades, sino de acompañarlo en su inmensa necesidad de actividades y amigos múltiples. También es un buen recurso mantener, eternamente, cierto misterio con él, ya que el curioso geminiano se aburre rápidamente de aquello que conoce de memoria; sorprenderlo siempre es esencial a fin de mantener su interés vivo. Para gustarle, hay que mantenerse muy informado, conversar largo y tendido y no tener miedo al debate. Sin moros en la costa. Una o dos discusiones menores. Y el resto, ternura y felicidad. Amor: "Somos el uno para el otro", exclamará Géminis con alegría, seguro de tener la pareja perfecta. Sin titubeos, ya que cualquier decisión que tome será pensando en el bien común y no sólo en su beneficio individual. Dinero: cursos, lecturas, conferencias y otras actividades que lo ayudarán a mantener su mente en forma. Cada nueva idea que tenga se convertirá en dinero. Crece su capital y el acierto en sus inversiones. Clave de la semana: respete sus propias necesidades en vez de atender sólo a los demás.

Con quién te identificás más?
	No creo en horóscopos y no los leo.
	No creo en horóscopos, pero sí los leo.
	Creo en horóscopos, pero no los leo.
	Creo en horóscopos y sí los leo.
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SOLO PARA ESCRITORES (y bilingues)

1. EXPERT SERIES: The Myth of Sacred Writing Time by Stephen Berger I would like to address a problem that many writers contend with every day. It's a problem that can delay a project's completion by a few days, or it can stop work dead in its tracks, leaving it permanently unfinished. It can hinder a single project's momentum, or it can lay waste to an entire writing career. And the most amazing aspect of the problem is that most writers don't consider it a problem at all. What I consider a plague on the entire creative process is something many writers would consider an ideal, a work ethic, something to struggle to achieve. If you're thoroughly confused now, allow me to elaborate. I am talking about the Myth of Sacred Writing Time. Most of us spend time studying and struggling to master certain aspects of the craft of writing, such as story, plot, character arc, dialog, archetypes, hero's journey, you know the drill. These subjects are noble and necessary if you hope to be a competent purveyor of the craft. They are what I call 'external' skills. The great mistake many writers make, however, is stopping once they feel they've learned said skill-set. Now this is not to say that good writers don't attempt to hone their skills by writing, or that they're not open to learning whatever they can about the above, external subjects. The tools that are so often neglected are 'internal.' By 'internal,' I mean mastery of the 'inner self' -- a writer's individual habits, her beliefs about her own writing, her relationship to her own creative process. All of the above may sound like New Age gobbledygook but, as I'll demonstrate, these principles have vast practical application. The one application I'll focus on here concerns the time (or the number of pages) you set each day for yourself as a writing goal. Even if you don't have a set page/time quota and your method is just to sit and write, you'll still find great value in the techniques I'll discuss. So, back to External Knowledge. Typically, you take courses, read books and find an idea for a story. You are now armed with the tools you need to create an amazing piece of work. All you have to do is go off and write, right? So, do you? Are you writing consistently, every day? Is your output a steady, dependable stream of pages, or is it more like water sputtering from some old plumbing -- occasionally gushing, but most of the time trickling or even backing up in a stagnant sludge? If you're more familiar with the gush/trickle syndrome, then you might be a victim of the 'Myth of Sacred Writing Time.' What is the aforementioned myth? It's the belief that in order to seriously pursue your writing it's necessary to carve out an IDEAL time, place and set of circumstances in which to write. Now on one level, this makes perfect sense. If my goal were to master the art of chair-making, I'd certainly be wise to find a workshop and set aside time each day to build either a specific number of chairs or spend a specific amount of time building the chairs. This appears so obvious it almost seems beyond question. Yet, the act of writing brings with it some special circumstances. To illustrate, see if the following scenario sounds familiar: You're starting a new project; you want to get it out and not lose any momentum. You start out strong; either writing several pages a day, or for a set amount of time, say a couple of hours. You vow to keep it up, cranking out the same number of pages or spending the same hours writing every single day. You won't let ANYTHING stop you... ... Until something does. Inevitably some other work or some out-of- town guests or the kids or SOMETHING gets in your writing way one day. No problem, you vow to yourself, you'll make up for it tomorrow, DOUBLING your output or hours. And you do...until something else interrupts you. Before you know it, you're in the hole for an impossible quota of pages/hours, you've lost critical momentum and, to top it off, you feel guilty that your Sacred Writing Time keeps getting trampled. The net effect of all this is exactly what you wanted to avoid: a loss of momentum. You're stopped dead in the middle of your project, you can't even start to get back to your writing time and you feel like a failure. The insidious problem that Sacred Writing Time causes is the feeling that if you can't do it CORRECTLY (that is, get in at least a good portion of your pages/hours) every day, you end up not doing it at all. While intuitive and noble in concept, Sacred Writing Time is almost impossible to maintain. The solution? Lose it. Don't have Sacred Writing Time. Instead, choose a new model. Write JUST A LITTLE BIT, but do it every day. Even if your writing quotient is MINIMAL (and I mean minimal, as you'll see below), it will still get done. Think about it. There are numerous things you do throughout your day that seem to get done, day after day, and yet you don't even think about them. You don't have to set aside Sacred Shower Time or Sacred Reading-the-Paper time. They're just habits. Similarly, if you write AS LITTLE AS 1/3 OF A PAGE A DAY (or even JUST A LINE OR TWO), your writing will become internalized, a habit, and soon it will become something you do without having to even think about it. Now at first blush, this may offend the sensibilities of serious writers. It's like saying that practicing your craft is on a par with taking a shower or watching TV. If this is your reaction, I would ask you to consider if adhering to your own Sacred Writing Time has paid dividends for you. If not (or if you feel you could improve your writing output in any way), I'd ask you to put aside your prejudices and try something that truly works. The method I've developed is called Momentum Writing, and it works like this: For the next 21 days (researchers have determined that it's necessary to perform a new action for 21 consecutive days before it can be internalized as a habit), write A FEW LINES, no more. This isn't as easy as it sounds, but it's essential (often when I give this exercise in a workshop, overachievers think they've done extra- well by writing a whole page.) Again, WRITE ONLY A FEW LINES, three or four at most. Then, for the NEXT 21 days, write only 1/3 page. Continue this way, adding 1/3 page of writing to your quota each 21- day cycle, until you're writing two pages a day. Once that two-page limit has been reached, you will be able to write two pages a day automatically, habitually and, most significantly, without your Sacred Writing Time. Once you've achieved the two-page level of Momentum Writing, there are other benefits. On many days, you'll be writing three, four, five, seven, ten pages at a sitting, and it won't feel like work, it will just be what you do -- a habit, automatic. You'll be able to write in the spaces of your day, or when you have a free moment; the tiny places in which you would never attempt to achieve Sacred Writing Time. And even if you only write 1/3 page a day and no more, you'll still have over a hundred pages of text at the end of a year. But what about those days when even two pages are impossible (and there will be those days)? On those impossible days, simply write JUST A LITTLE, a line or two, as in the early part of your Momentum Writing training. This will preserve your momentum and, when circumstances permit, you'll be able to go back to your two-page-a- day habit effortlessly. It's essential to think of two-pages-a-day not as a quota, rather, two pages will be what you automatically do. You won't be keeping track, only stopping after two pages have been reached. Instead, you'll just notice that you seem to average two pages a day. But if you do come up short, it's not a problem. As long as you write SOMETHING, ANY AMOUNT AT ALL, you're maintaining momentum. Finally, lest you think that banishing Sacred Writing Time lowers the respect you have for your craft, remember this: the only way to become a better writer is to write, and Momentum Writing allows you to do just that, consistently. The fact that you haven't sanctified a place in your life for it should be of little concern. You're doing what all successful writers do -- adopting habits that work. Ultimately The Work, and working, is what it's all about. * * * * * Publicado originalmente en el e-zine de The Writer´s Store.

CASTING

Hoy estaba pensando quién me interpretaría a mí si alguna vez hicieran una película sobre mi vida. Después de un cuidadoso analísis, admito que mi primera opción sería Ewan McGregor. Claro que por lo agitado de su vida, muy probablemente no tendría tiempo para interpretarme. Mi segunda opción (desilusión por problemas de scheduling aparte) es: Wes Bentley de Belleza Americana. Ruego que este morocho acepte, de lo contrario, los candidatos que van a quedar, me van a hacer desear que la película sea un homenaje post-mortem. Seguramente el productor va a presionar a Adam Goldberg como opción, por más que yo no quiera saber nada. Pero, al final, voy a terminar aceptando cuando él me amenace con contratar a Hervé Villechaize.

Vos qué pensas? Quién haría un buen Andrés Briano?
	Ewan McGregor
	Wes Bentley
	Adam Goldberg
	Hervé Villechaize
	NS/NC
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