Among a growing list of disturbing instances of recent hate speech, this week brought the revelation that Kirk Cameron of Growing Pains fame believes that homosexuality is “unnatural.” The actor had this to say to Piers Morgan on CNN.

“I think that it’s detrimental, and ultimately destructive to so many of the foundations of civilization.”

He also went on to explain that God defined marriage as one man and one woman in the Garden of Eden and that he wouldn’t be happy if one of his children came out to him as gay. Almost instantly he was excoriated on Twitter by a wide variety of (former) fans, comedians, and gay rights advocates, as well as the gay community itself. Many of the responses were witty and clever. Many of them were also just as ignorant and mean spirited as Cameron’s inciting remarks. The actor turned Christian advocate defended his stance on Fox & Friends as Biblical, stating he didn’t see the reason for such vitriol over his commonly held Christian belief.

For most of us this is just one more shot fired in an ugly Republican election cycle that has seen everything from Rick Santorum’s preacher advocating a Christian Theocracy in his hate-filled rant introducing the candidate to Rush Limbaugh viciously attacking Sandra Fluke for testifying in defense of woman’s reproductive rights before Congress.

Still I don’t quite understand the reason for the nasty backlash against people who express diverging views from our own, even the unsavory ones. You see, the older I get the less I feel the need to defend my truth to others. I don’t expect everyone to see things the way I do any more than I expect them to respond with civility or even reason for that matter. Put simply, your beliefs in no way diminish mine unless I allow them to, and in the end only I chose how to feel and react to what you say and do.

For example, Newt Gingrich doesn’t believe in equality for gays and lesbians. I disagree. He believes we should found a colony on the moon. I disagree with that as well. He cheated on his wife for six years then asked her for an open marriage after she was diagnosed with M.S. I strongly disagree with his choices and feel sorry for the suffering they have caused him and others. I don’t need to comment further on any of these things. I think they speak for themselves.

That isn’t to suggest that I believe we should stand by silently while others rights and dignities are stripped from them. Or that I believe in condoning irresponsible statements made by politicians, clergy members, and radical radio show hosts. Instead I think we can show our values by living them, putting our efforts towards creating the kind of world we want to live in rather than focusing our energies towards what we do not want and creating false enemies in the process. All beings have shown us incredible kindness in previous lifetimes, even if we cannot recall them at this present moment. Buddha tells us that they have all been our kind mothers in the past. All people have goodness and Budhha nature in them, and are capable of extraordinary acts of virtue and love – even war criminals like Kony and George W. Bush.

Being trapped in samsara means that all of us have held wrong views at some point in our lives. In fact many of us still do on a number of issues. We are all still learning and growing. If we were perfect enlightened beings already, none of us would be here. We’d be living in a pure land.

That’s why when someone expresses a hateful opinion in the name of their religion or a political party we should understand they are suffering from delusions, the same ones that plague us all. We should take the opportunity presented to us to view them with all the love and compassion at our disposal. Hatred and intolerance bring greater suffering to those who wield them than those against whom they are used as a weapon, heaping negative karma and unhappiness on them in this and countless future lives. At the same time, by patiently enduring the suffering of our own ripening karma we can use it to transform and purify both ourselves and our world.

As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once told us, “only love can conquer hate.”

If we are confident in our beliefs we have no reason to get upset when someone challenges them. Instead we should be grateful to have the chance to show our wisdom and compassion. Seen this way we owe these misguided souls a great debt of gratitude for without them we would have no way to perfect our spiritual practice. They are our kind teachers, helping us reach the fulfillment of this human life by attaining enlightenment for the benefit of others.

So this blogging experiment isn’t turning out how I thought it would so far. That’s okay. Part of what I hoped to us it for was to keep myself writing, and that hasn’t been a problem. Not at all.

Recently I set my sights on transforming my movie, HvZ, into a young adult zombie novel. Armed with the last copy of the shooting script (and the first) I set out to craft something that resembled a good read for teenagers. I’d already done some research by reading several zombie novels in the same category as what I hoped to create. Two drafts, a polish, and nearly seventy thousand words later I am done. The book goes to my new editor next week if all goes well, and then I begin the process of getting it on Amazon and Smashwords. It should be available by May online.

I’ve learned a lot about writing through this process and it’s inspired me to keep going. I have already planned several more projects and have set off on the next book, which is coming along nicely. Honestly I feel so much happier than I have in years. It’s like I am no longer waiting for something to happen to make my dreams come true but actively pursuing them on my own instead. My days are filled with sore fingers and smiles. My heart is filled with contentment. Once more the world is filled with wonder.

I can’t say for sure but I suspect that I will probably use the blog more in between projects, to express random thoughts or promote my new book or just keep my fingers moving. Once an idea gets its hooks in me I’m off and running, unable to let go until I have explored every possible inch of it. Trivial things like blogging, eating, and daily routines don’t stand a chance in the face of such alluring opposition.

So last week the interGoogles were rocked to their very foundations, not by 4Chan or 9gag or even the notoriously dangerous hive mind that is Reddit. Donavon Strain, a “famous blogger” stepped up (sans Guy Fawkes mask) to claim his victory via painstakingly researched empirical data, pinpointing the actual date of rapper Ice Cube’s “Good Day” as January 20, 1992. Quick side note – the phrase “famous blogger” sounds like an oxymoron to me. It’s like back when Tila Tequila was “Myspace Famous” which turned out really well for her and, well ultimately, for all of us. Last we saw of tiny Tila she was flashing Juggalo’s at a concert and appearing in a “sex tape” her own publicist more than likely gave Steve Hirsch like a bad case of herpes. Just an aside – try not to picture it. Almost immediately we were treated to a cynical retort from one lesser known but equally scholarly Mike B. of Lahatiel, who proves almost without a doubt that said day of goodness was actually November 30, 1988. You can read all about his thought provoking alternate theory in this handy Gawker link I selflessly provided (you’re welcome!)

I know we are all thinking it so I will just put it out there. Could this be the new future of academia? Let’s face it – America’s culture is overflowing with wildly popular success stories no one will shut up about featuring average guys that dropped out of college and still became super rich and famous “job creating” icons that all sane Americans living today worship and idolize like quarterbacks or serial killers – guys like Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs, and Bill Gates! Why according to what is probably an entirely made up and in no way accurate Wiki stub I found on billionaire college drop outs “the average net worth of billionaires who dropped out of college, $9.4 billion, is more than double that of billionaires with Ph.D.s, $3.2 billion.” Seriously, who spent their free time researching these statistics and posting them to Wikipedia? Geniuses, that’s who!

With all those extra bajillions just floating around out there waiting for some lucky uneducated sloth to roll out of bed at noon and grab out of thin air, what kind of exciting new topics will we have to introduce to keep kids interested in the mind expanding opportunities of higher education? Maybe it’s time we introduced some extreme sports into the mix, an element of danger, and one way or another some new fucking shit to major in that isn’t so boring. I mean who the hell wants to major in Shakespeare or Philosophy or Political Science anymore? The Tea Party has aptly proved you don’t have to have an education anymore to be in government. In fact, in their case it works against you. Bottom line is there’s just no pay off to studying crap you can easily access on the web, especially if it’s boring as hell. Take it from Einstein, who famously refused to memorize his own phone number because he said he could always look it up if he needed to, and that was like a million years ago – at least.

So, what I’m suggesting is that it’s time we took Strain’s advice and began unearthing the lyrics of our childhood and (finally) making sense out of them, with hard statistical data, you know, for the kids and shit. For example, does it really take two to make a things go right? I don’t know man but let’s find out. Somebody grab a graduated cylinder and start charting some figures and let’s get to the bottom of this as fast as we possibly can. I wanna rock right now, goddamnit! And stay away from me if you’re contagious because I’m a winner and no I’m not a loser. Yes, Rob Base was definitely onto something there. That much is clear.

One perfectly suitable subject for deeper academic scrutiny centers around Madonna’s unborn child in “Papa Don’t Preach” the title track from the True Blue album released in June of 1986. The song was supposedly written by Brian Elliot after listening to some North Hollywood High School girls talking in front of his studio during a smoke break – or so we are told. This leaves us with only two possible logical explanations (1) that somewhere out there is a 26 year old who has no idea they are the inspiration for Madonna’s controversial Pope banned pop 80′s hit or… (2) that Madonna lied about her baby, covered it up, and to this day has a 26 year old child she’s been hiding from the paps. Why else would she move to England, rename herself Madge, and attempt to be JK Rowling with her terrible kids books, other than to fuck up Guy Ritchie’s career for 8 WHOLE YEARS. I mean, come on, she says it all in the lyrics, that despite being in an awful mess, and she doesn’t mean maybe, she was going to keep that baby. What other options are there? I’m fairly certain being raised Catholic that she wouldn’t have dreamed of getting an abortion. I’d also like to know the exact location of La Isla Bonita. I’ve never been able to pinpoint it on Google Earth. It just keeps pointing me towards Belize.

And where and when did Tone Loc almost take home a tranny from in his song “Funky Cold Medina” because I am guessing he was at Peanuts on Santa Monica in Los Angeles thinking it was a different night. I’m not speaking from personal experience or anything but I’ve heard some of those “ladies” can be quite convincing, especially after a few cocktails. What was Tone’s friend thinking taking him there in the first place? If his “pal” had seen Ace Ventura Pet Detective he would know that Tone believes one “must be sure that your girl is pure” before getting down to business. Laces out!

Last but far from least I’d really like to know what exact day it was that “they” took away Whitney Houston’s dignity. If you’re like me you suffered greatly through one endless radio rendition after another of this “hit song” from the future drug addicted wife-slash-emotional hostage of Bobbie Brown. Perhaps it wasn’t so much taken away all at once as it was a gradual descent into the kind of madness that would have made Hunter S. Thompson just the tiniest bit proud. Is it fair to say that self-love is the greatest love of all after the tragic events we’ve seen over the last decade by narcissistic stock brokers and Ponzi schemers whose conscienceless acts of greed have undermined the entire world economy? And would someone who really loves themselves end up in a physically abusive marriage strung out on crack cocaine? I’ll leave it up to future Ivy League scholars to determine.

Thanks Donavon for bringing us one step closer to Idiocracy!

Starbucks announced the unthinkable today, that they would be bringing coffee to India, a land notoriously known to prefer tea as their addictive beverage of choice. That’s right, the soul crushing Seattle upstart turned unstoppable international corporation and local coffee shop assassin has gone all E. M. Forster on us. Allow us to break it down for you. That means the next guy to get your job after they close down the call center you moonlight in and ship those jobs overseas is going finally get that Venti Soy Latte he so desperately needs to make it through his 3rd full time job by Vishnu!

“Starbucks — the iconic American coffee house brand that helped make the beverage ‘cool’ worldwide, spurring imitators but also critics — will soon set up shops across India in association with the Tata Group. The joint venture will set up around 50 stores during this calendar year with the first one likely to open in the second half of the year.

Tata Starbucks Ltd., an equal joint venture, will own and operate Starbucks cafes which will be branded Starbucks Coffee ‘A Tata Alliance.’ The first retail stores will come up in Delhi and Mumbai.”

Call us crazy but “Starbucks Coffee ‘A Tata Alliance’” sounds more like a South American Super Heroine League of Strippers who derive their powers from Juan Valdez’s famed ripe cherry buds than a local hang out with free wifi.

Who knows? Perhaps a new scene of Beat poets will crop up. Or, maybe not. Our money is on a bunch of brooding unemployed Bollywood writers taking up every available electrical outlet and loudly talking about their next big masala to anyone who will listen. Oh and yeah, it’s the end of the world and all that anti-Capitalist stuff too, sure.

For the full scoop, visit – http://www.thehindu.com/business/Industry/article2845486.ece

By now chances are pretty good that you are aware that this year the world lost Steve Jobs, even if you are living in a cave. It’s pretty hard not to notice the near hysterical encomia being leveled at the golden tech God who brought us an overpriced version of the MP3 player, the portable laptop, and the smart phone – transforming many aspects of life as we know it in the modern world including film, television, and other media-based arts. I would say I am most grateful not for my iPod but for Jobs’ support of Pixar during its early days. I can’t imagine a world without Monsters Inc.

One of the more troubling assertions by those who are rushing to cement his legacy by transforming this obviously flawed and complex man into a saint of epic proportions is that many of his early designs were based off of his exposure to Buddhism, in particular Zen. The media would have us believe that Jobs was a devote Buddhist and that his faith drove his life and his business. There seems to be plenty of external evidence to suggest this narrative device is founded in truth. Jobs went to the far reaches of the mystical East after dropping out in search of truth we are told. He attended retreats over the years, and even chose a Master – who later married him and his wife in a traditional ceremony. Lama Surya Das, the American Buddhist, was more than happy to vouch for his old friend after his passing as well. It all seems legitimate enough. So why do I have an issue with all of this?

Well, to me the idea of a billionaire CEO Buddhist famous for his ill-temper, wildly inflated ego, idea stealing, and lack of charity seems an absurd Hollywood creation – probably because it is. Jobs was first and foremost a PR guy who knew how to control the spin, as the recent documentary on PBS about him suggested. It would seem he is still doing just that, controlling the spin, from beyond the grave… with a little help from his friends as the Beatles would say.

Buddha taught about impermanence and emptiness, true, but all of his teachings were also rooted in ultimate compassion for all living beings, or Bodhicitta. Those who practice this high realization are called Bodhisattva’s. So where is this Buddhist ideal of loving kindness in the works of Jobs? It’s as hard to find as the meaning of a Zen koan.

To me the idea of suggesting after his death that Steve Jobs had anything to do with Buddhism because he intermittently studied Zen in his life is like saying Hitler was a devote Catholic because his Nazi Youth once counted a future Pope among their loyal ranks. It just doesn’t hold water. His actions, and his life’s work, suggest otherwise, even if Lama Das claims Jobs found the branch of the 8 fold noble path relating to Right Livelihood.

It is said that a Bodhisattva will take upon themselves whatever is best and most useful to help other people with a supreme great heart. Some give up material goods and work with the poor while others will hold positions of wealth and power in order to use those resources to end the sufferings of countless beings. Born in terrible poverty, Kadampa master Geshe Langri Tangpa was extremely wealthy by the end of his life, despite literally giving away everything he received due to a vow he had made to his teacher, Geshe Potowa. He used his wealth to help spread the doctrine of Buddha and at the end of his life was able to build a monastery and support over two thousand monks and ease the suffering of many poor people. Jobs with his inordinate good fortune had attained enough material success that he could afford to offer the United States government a loan to prevent the country from defaulting by the time of his death. Imagine what great deeds of philanthropy he might have achieved had he chosen to put such resources to use for the good of this world, to repay the incredible kindness he was shown? Then he might truly have deserved this empty praise he is receiving.

Instead Jobs used his wealth and status in a manner inconsistent with the traditional tenants of altruism intrinsic within all branches of Buddhism (save perhaps Hinayana) exploiting other peoples ideas, talent, and hard work and using these to become insanely rich in the process. He was neither known as a kind man nor as a philanthropist in general. As his friend Lama Surya Das put it, Jobs “wasn’t especially generous, humble, or kind.”

There seems to be no more explanation than that as to Jobs’ schism with true Buddhist ideals, just armfuls of excuses from friends and media whores trying to justify his bad behavior with heady talk of his uncompromising genius and the heavy toll it took on him. One of his most ardent apologists is a Forbes columnist whose lackluster and thinly-veiled Objectivist argument for Jobs’ sorry lack of reciprocity for a world that gave him so very much reads like one of the terrible monologues so prevalent in ‘Atlas Shrugged’ – not that anyone would expect less from the leading voice of capitalist propaganda in the modern world.

In the end neither his monster ego nor his piles of money could prevent his early death. That must have been hard to swallow for a man who had spent so much energy trying to control his environment with what many would say was a great deal of success. His legacy, polished to a mirror shine, will continue to be championed by his cult-worthy legion of followers as well as the leering greed mongers who admire his ruthless tactics, perhaps more so than the man himself.

I suspect this obsession with Jobs, in part, comes from the same place that drives poor, working class folk to buy into the ‘pie-in-the-sky’ promises of trickster Republicans protecting their obscenely wealthy benefactors at the cost of the rest of us. It’s the same fascination with wealth and status that causes people to vote against their own interests over and over again, lashing out at the few good souls in Congress actually trying to help them. The idea is that they too will one day be rich and successful millionaires, so the elite like Steve Jobs must be protected at all costs, right down to his saintly post-death image. This type of thinking is as dangerous as it is delusional. It is wrong awareness and it leads to true suffering, plain and simple. This infatuation is undoubtedly behind the radically income inequality we are seeing now, the very same that has caused uprisings and protests around the globe. It’s what leads to tax breaks for billionaires, the sacred cows of Wall Street, the job creators, while the middle class gets crushed and those left in crippling poverty are stripped of all hope.

Great wealth is not achieved in a vacuum. It is a privilege to be used wisely, judiciously, for the good of others. Our culture has done its best to divorce us by the process of faulty and deluded reasoning, to make us think that we alone are responsible for our success and failure, and that once earned the wealth is ours to do with as we please. Buddhism teaches us about the interconnected nature of reality, the truth, which exposes capital for the lie that it is, the lie that helps perpetuate the suffering of countless living beings in this world.

Listen, my intention isn’t to drag down the memory of Steve Jobs or to pretend he didn’t do anything good in this world during his brief time here. Far from it. He obviously contributed a great deal on certain levels to society and was rewarded handsomely for his abilities. Judging a person by their faith is a slippery path, especially when they cannot defend themselves. No need to tell me. I know it well enough. Rather than dismissing Jobs or his faith I’m simply trying to remind us all of the truth – that he was just a man – a deeply flawed man who was just the right combination of very smart and very lucky. Attaching the word ‘Buddhist’ does him and the rest of the world a disservice. Let us remember him as a bright flame who strove for greatness and glory, in the hopes we might forget how he took an extraordinary opportunity gifted to him to help the world, and instead helped himself.

For those who might be wondering (all 4 of you currently reading) I have been sick, which is why I haven’t made a great effort to update the blog. Yes illness has been the culprit behind my lack of follow through with daily updates, far more than the devastating impact of self-censorship, although I’ve consulted with my closest friend Mr. Fuss about the latter in great detail as well.

Shortly after moving to beautiful Palms my wife came down with a cold. It’s seasonal, no doubt about it, a true occupational hazard since she works with grade school kids. Given the cramped, submarine-like quarters we now inhabit it came as no surprise to me when a few days later I began to feel under the weather as well. My symptoms didn’t quite match hers but were close enough – lethargy, stuffed up sinuses, a dull headache behind the eyes that is still with me as I write this, cold sweats… you know the drill.

Accompanying this marvelous list of ailments was the telltale distemper and emotional fragility that have come to mark the beginning of sick daze with such recurring frequency that they now serve as a barometer to an impending bout of something nasty. The more implacable I become, the longer the cold is going to last. Yes in a lot of ways my mercurial mood swings have become my groundhog. Thank Buddha more poor wife Churro is so amazingly patient.

There is seldom a good time to catch a cold. The last productive weeks of the year top the list of worst times. Still I’ve been far sicker than this and survived. All things considered this wasn’t all that bad – just weird, and lingering. It has kept me from being able to focus as much as I would like though. Most of the time I just want to curl up under a warm blanket and sleep but when I do lay down, I’m restless. I’d have taken Nyquil but I can’t stand the thought of losing all those hours of the waking day to Sleep Berry punch, as I like to call it.

On Monday, when it had officially been a week since my cold symptoms started and I was still passing out from exhaustion, I was persuaded to go to the doctor. I filled out forms. I paid the co-pay. I read Men’s Journal while waiting for my Word with Friends partner to make their move. I held my breath while other patients coughed plague germs into the tiny room.

“Buddha, please don’t let me catch malaria or something worse from this waiting room” became a running mantra in my head.

At last they took me in to my own personal room. They checked my blood pressure, pumping up the restrictive armband until I thought for sure my veins would collapse. Temperature normal. Heart rate good. Light in the eyes trick, done. Weight check, yeah I know. Really? When was the last time you checked your scale again. I thought so. Shut up. What did I just mumble you ask? Never mind.

I sat down on the crinkly paper, feeling like a little kid, and tried to think up a word that would get me over 50 points, something sleek and hip, like FAQIRS laid out on a triple word score. My doctor, an amiable, good-natured sort, came in with a smile and set about his usual routine. He let me ramble on about what I thought my issues were, as gleaned from friends, television, Web MD, and raw specualtion, all while pleasantly nodding. He looked up my nose, in my ears, put the stethoscope to my chest and back, gazed down my throat, and clucked a few times. He pressed on my face, my chest, and my stomach, stopping short of putting his finger up my backside.

“So what is it?” I asked. “A cold? Allergies? Should I be worried?”

“None of the above.” He smiled. “A virus, that’s for sure. I don’t think there is anything to be worried about, but we’re going to do blood work to be certain.”

I fought off the cold sweats that were returning. A virus? What had I contracted now? Has the zombie virus which has dominated so much of my writing as of late somehow worked it’s way off the page and under my skin? Some days a writer’s imagination can be a curse as well as a blessing.

“I am fairly certain with sleep and Advil this will pass in a few days,” he said. “I just want to make sure. I will have the nurse come in and take blood. We’ll call you tomorrow with the results.”

He left, the nurse came in, and soon I had a needle in my arm. Two vials of blood later, I was on my way. No cookie. No orange juice. Nothing but the pinch of the bandage in the crook of my arm making me wonder how junkies do it. I couldn’t watch as she put the needle in. She teased me that I was holding my breath before she even got the syringe ready.

I’d be lying if I didn’t say I checked my phone all day yesterday to see if they had called. By last night when I hadn’t heard anything a little part of me was concerned. Was that a good or a bad sign? Maybe they found something and were double checking it before telling me I had indeed contracted HerpaGonaSyphlAids and needed to come in to get more tests. Was there something so evil hiding in my system that they didn’t even have a name for it?

I put it out of my mind and carried on with the business of working while sick and trying to focus on writing when your head feels like it’s wrapped in pain inducing cotton balls. Who manufactures such terrible engines of suffering? Surely not SC Johnson, the family company? I was well into my morning work routine when the call came in. I pressed pause on my Skrillex live set and answered.

“This is Dr. Rand’s office calling about your blood work,” the woman informed me.

“Yes?” I said, sounding like an overly eager tourist waiting to visit the wreckage of a natural disaster site.

“Everything looks normal.” She sounded so nonchalant as she informed me. I wondered if that takes practice, you know, in nursing school. Still I appreciate her being straight to the point. People use the term LOL all the time, to such a degree that it has practically lost all meaning, but that’s what happened next. For the first time I can recall in a long time I literally laughed out loud, giddy with relief.

“Your liver is working a little too hard but that is just because you are overweight. You will want to go on a diet after the holidays.”

I thanked her and went back to the business of living, safe in the knowledge that although I still am not one hundred percent back to health, I will be soon. I’ve lived a wild life, far too wild to go into on a public blog. Yes, there is that censorship I was worried about. The path of excess has lead me to an upscale neighborhood of self-reliance and hard earned common sense, trickled down the hill from the palace of wisdom. The views not bad and I’m allowed to visit the palatial grounds whenever I feel like making the heady climb. Most days I don’t. Given my circumstances, and my behavior, I could easily have contracted a number of unpleasant, and in some cases incurable, diseases when I was younger. I am grateful I have not, for both mine and my wife’s sake. It is a wonderful feeling and I am grateful beyond words for my good fortune.

It’s also a nice feeling to know that I will be able to tell anyone who gives me a hard time about my appearance that I am on doctors orders not to beginning curtailing my intake until after the seasonal goodies are long in the rear view mirror. Until then I am getting my fair share of pumpkin pie slices, gingerbread, and egg nog.

For now I think I will start with a nap followed by a game of online Scrabble.

So, after nearly five years, it was time to do something useful with this site. In that time I have fallen in love with Word Press and thought it was the best thing for the site really. A lot of people talk about using their blog to ensure that they write every day, but I’ve been doing that for so long now that it really isn’t an issue.  While the quality of what comes out may be questioned, the creative soup always flows. If you know me then you know I don’t understand or believe in writer’s block. If I ever get stuck on one piece of writing I either push through or switch to something else and come back when the spark hits again. Aspiring writers make a note  of that. It’s great advice. Always be writing in your head. For me that habit became ingrained when I used to blog for Gawker on their unruly and unforgiving CMS.  I’ve actually been working exclusively in Word Press now for the entirety of this year.

With the tiniest bit of scrounging around I found this amazing theme you see now, installed it in about five seconds, and viola… a new site, a new day. So, now what?

Well, I guess that depends on my mood. I’d like to use this blog to talk about the writing projects I am working on – maybe keep myself inspired to keep cranking out pages. So there is that. But the truth is when I am writing new material I don’t tend to share much of it until it is “read ready” – if you know what I mean. I will have to see how that goes. I noticed a few other writers I like will share pages on their blog before they are done. I admire that, but I am not entirely sold on the idea of emulating their example. Certainly I can use the blog to speak in greater detail about how my movie ‘Humans Versus Zombies” is coming along. I think I will save that for a post of it’s own in the next few days.

In addition I will more than likely use the site to talk about my thoughts and feelings on a wide variety of topics that impact my life – from topical news to my Buddhist studies to observations on life, yearnings, dreams, travels, and maybe even what new deliciousness my wife and I ate this week at some food truck or hip L.A. eatery.

Blogs are scary. I’m not gonna lie. It’s why when I created one on Blogger (a few years back) I ended up going back and deleting all the posts. It’s strange to have all my thoughts and ideas floating out there for anyone to read, exciting in many regards and equally terrifying in others. Having people that know you combing through what you wrote about whatever hot button issue you were passionate at the time before any of us had the facts can be a great lesson in humility – a painful one too. I haven’t always liked what I had to say later on, and that has kept me from repeating the mistake. Let’s hope that isn’t the case moving forward.

May this blog be a safe place for me to pour out the most trivial musings my heart dreams up as well as the deepest parts of my soul for many years to come. Thanks for reading,

Devan Sagliani