Thursday, May 20, 2010

Go Read It!

Neil Gaiman (hi, Neil!) writes about Ray Bradbury.

Not much for me to add so I'll just say that Ray's stories — and a couple of in-person encounters when I was a teen — had a lot to do with me sticking with my plans to write for a living. You would not believe how nice and encouraging he was to me back then.

• Posted at 7:02 PM · LINK

Just The Other Day...

The reason posting was sparse here for a while recently was that I had to get three half-hours of The Garfield Show done in about six days — four for the writing, two for the voice-recording. The recording sessions were Monday and Tuesday.

Tuesday's session was attended by two up-and-coming voice actors who took the class that I taught last month at Voice One up in San Francisco. One of them, a gifted lady named Cia Court, wrote up the experience for her blog.

If Cia and her friend Chuck had come to Monday's session, they would have seen/heard (along with our regulars) Laraine Newman and Jason Marsden recording. Laraine has been on the show several times now and she keeps reminding me why I always thought she was the best actor/actress in the original cast of Saturday Night Live.

Jason, who voices Nermal and many other recurring characters on the show, wasn't in on Tuesday because I gave him the day off...and for good reason. Some of you may remember a fascinating video I linked to here...a video Jason made of his son Clark, who was born way prematurely, on February 17, at the weight of one pound, ten ounces. On Monday afternoon, shortly after our recording session, Jason and his wife Christy were finally able to take Clark home from the hospital. The kid now weighs a hefty six pounds. We are quite happy about this.

• Posted at 12:10 PM · LINK

Recommended Reading

Remember the Chandra Levy case? Let me refresh your memory. A young woman disappeared. It came out that she'd been having an affair with the otherwise-married Congressman Gary Condit. Much of the press (and the nation) suddenly decided that Condit must have arranged to have her killed and the main proof seemed to be that he was reportedly evasive and unhelpful in the police investigation. It eventually came out that someone else had killed her but Congressman Condit's reputation was destroyed, above and beyond the shame that might have befallen a married public official who was caught sleeping around.

Suzanne Smalley was one of the reporters who contributed to the widespread idea that Condit was obviously guilty and had tried to impede the police. Turns out he wasn't guilty and didn't try to impede the police but, hey, it was a good story for a while, right? She looks back at the case.

• Posted at 9:12 AM · LINK

Recommended Reading

Another Fred Kaplan piece. This one's about how modern technology is changing the way people kill each other.

• Posted at 2:11 AM · LINK

Today's Video Link

A couple of times on this here blog, I've raved about a close-up magician named Johnny Ace Palmer...and I even snuck his name into the Spirit comic book back when I was doing the dialogue for it. Well, Johnny did a smidgen on his amazing act last night on David Letterman's show. Here's the segment. See what I mean?

• Posted at 1:27 AM · LINK

Software Suggestion Needed

Years ago, I did my accounting on Quicken. I wasn't wild about it, mostly because it had way too many bells 'n' whistles. I needed something that would...

1. Download my checking account data and credit card activity...
2. Allow me to easily assign categories to each item...
3. Allow me to print out annual reports of each expenditure grouped (and totalled) by each category...

...and that's all. I don't need to track investments or compute interest on a mortgage or budget how much I'll spend on tuna fish over the next fiscal year or manage a pension plan or track the exchange rate of the Norwegian Kroner or anything of the sort. All that stuff gets in the way.

The then-current Quicken (this was long ago) just did too many things for me. When I got an offer to buy Microsoft Money for a pittance, I decided to switch...and it was a little better. It still did way too much I didn't need and seemed unduly clunky for the functions I did need but I liked it more than Quicken...and they were, at the time, about the only two options.

Over the last decade or so, Microsoft Money has added features. I believe the last version can cook an omelet and backwash your Water-Pik. But it's still terribly awkward for what I need...and I'm obviously not the only person unhappy with it. Microsoft has discontinued the program.

So I'm looking around for software that can do the 1-2-3 functions above. I fear Quicken has only gotten more complicated. The other ones I've looked at sure seem to be. I found a program called AceMoney that seemed to be what I wanted but after fiddling with the trial version, I discovered it wouldn't download from some banks — mine, among them — and didn't have a format for the kind of report I wanted, nor will it let you design your own. I also tried GnuCash and Household Accounting and didn't like 'em.

Anyone out there got a suggestion?

• Posted at 1:14 AM · LINK