Musings from the basement...

Re-Watching the Sopranos – Season 5

July 1, 2013 0 Comments

I put my Sopranos series on hold for a while simply because I got busy, but with the recent death of James Gandolfini, it seems appropriate to pick up where I left off. So here are my thoughts on revisiting The Sopranos season 5 many years later. As always, this is written assuming you have watched the season, so SPOILERS ALERTS apply. At the time I first watched this, I felt this was one of the stronger seasons. I still think so. In a way it’s more fragmented than previous seasons, with many short arcs rather than several large arcs (though those are present, too). The mafia side of the drama is compelling despite the main conflict being marital, i.e. Tony and Carmella’s split, which is the big story…
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Television

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Guess I’m supposed to be blogging about stuff

June 28, 2013 1 Comment

Blogs are like great weights affixed to your neck, or rather, like a 200-pound sets of car keys. You don’t want to carry the damn things around, but the car won’t start without them. It’s been a while since I’ve blogged here. Probably should have stayed current. Should have been updating all along. Could have talked about this project or that, or merely talked about James Gandolfini passing away and why Bruce Springsteen is probably better than I give him credit for and why the Akira manga is crazy good. Yet the truth is, I’d rather be working on new projects than talking about them. The other truth is, even though it’s seen as your authorial duty to plug your upcoming books or whatever else…
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Random Musings, Rants, Writing

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Sandy from the Jersey Shore island perspective

January 14, 2013 0 Comments

I’ve already mentioned that I am writing about Hurricane Sandy from my perspective. Swell, I suppose, but more important than that is trying to tell the story of other people who lived through the storm. My Sandy story, after all, is pretty tame compared to what many went through. And it really is. Yes, the Hurricane Sandy videos I posted seem kinda neat if you didn’t live through it, but that’s all they were. Kinda neat. Prior to the videos the water was two feet HIGHER. It sounds kind of nuts, and yes, the night of the storm was WILD, but we still survived. We lived. We moved on. But what do you do when you CAN’T simply move on? What do you do when…
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Works by Eric, Writing

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25 Things You Should Know About Plot

January 7, 2013 0 Comments

Chuck Wendig brings us an excellent blog post called 25 Things You Should Know About Plot. It’s about … well, I bet you’ve already figured that part out. Here’s an excerpt: Let Characters Do They Heavy Lifting Characters will tell you your plot. Even better: let them run and they’ll goddamn give it to you on a platter. Certainly plot can happen from an external locus of control — but you’re not charting the extinction of the dinosaurs or the lifecycle of the slow loris. Plot is like Soylent Green: it’s made of people. Characters say things, do things, and that creates plot. It really can be that simple. Authentic plot comes from internal emotions, not external mechanics. The whole post is full of great…
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Writing

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Hurricane Sandy: How We Saw It

January 3, 2013 0 Comments

When I was asked to engage in some first person journalism about being at the Jersey Shore for Hurricane Sandy, I was both excited to do it and a little hesitant. Excited because, like everyone at the Shore who experienced the storm firsthand, I wanted to share my experience with others. After all, that’s what you DO when it comes to life-altering experienced. You talk about them (even if just with a few videos). But hesitant because, unlike so many people in my area, including friends and family, my family and I came through okay. Oh, we lost some cars and have had our home life  turned a little upside down, but we still have a home to go home to. So I hesitated. But…
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Works by Eric, Writing

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