raveller.com

Despite appearances
I've actually progressed on novel writing and picture taking and all sorts of things. Just not on this site. I'm planning on killing some frills off the cable bill which may help me concentrate on the Orange Juice. If you know what I mean. If you do, tell me, I'm at a complete loss as to what that means.

Anyway, it's gonna be Fall in a month, and that means a couple of things: the heat wave may be passing, and it's football season. So I'm planning on getting outside a little more and watching a little more football. And maybe, just maybe, we'll learn something.

I have no idea what.

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The Photo Album has been updated.
While this may anger some, it may enrich others. Take a look at photos ranging from 2005 to 2003. Photos from 2002 and 2001 may be forthcoming. I give no guarantee.

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I awoke from a dream...
the other morning about Ravel's travels in the wilderness. It was really only a black and white pen drawing of his encounters with mutated children with Giant heads. It has prompted me to consider creating the Ravel Saga in comic form. Not that I'd not considered it before. I had. But dreams move me more than logic in the realm of art. As they should.

Also I read Stephen King's last (7th) novel in his Gunslinger/Dark Tower series. While much of it is over-indulgent King B.S. as was the Song of Susannah (book 6), the constant berating he gives himself as a lazy author put a spur in my spirit to get restarted on Ravel when the Year of the Monkey is over.

Or not...
Here's another rough snippet from the first novel:

A Touch Wild
“Ravel, I must give you a gift,” the Elil with him said, “It will help you through the night. Your Sign was made at the time of the Bleeding to help the Lost. It has tools to protect and help. I must unlock one of these. It will not be pleasant though.”

The demons were getting closer. “Anything would be good. Do what you must.”

There was no hesitation. A pain shot through his eyes and he screamed. “It will be easier next time, and painless the next. The Others unlock for the Lost. It is ... an advantage.”

The landscape was on fire. Where night had covered the hills, it was now bright red and textured. After a moment the fire died down, but it was day in the midst of the night, color was absent and everything was shades of silver except the stars. The stars were blue and red and yellow and green and orange, distinct and brilliant. He could see other things he had not seen before: dark smoke massing in the air all around him that could only be the demons, and a dim band of changing color circled his waist.
Ravel did not question this gift. He could see his path and the demons. He could see an escape. The demons had homed in on his screech and were in pursuit. He could hear their hungry rasps as each veered toward him.

There was play their voices. He recognized now the difference between the chase on the ridge and this hunt. They had been toying with a fresh piece of game then, hungry yet not strong enough to take the prize. They knew how to wait a little while it seemed and now the wait was over.

Here was the prey in the open. Here was the hunt. Ravel began to run. The earth was vibrant before him, silver boulders and shrub brush all around him. The demons glided after him in whirling smoke patterns.

He ducked down into a ditch as a black shape whipped overhead, unable to change course. It seemed to grow clearer as forced itself around. Others came pouring after him as he scrambled to his feet in the other direction. A quick dodge to his left sent four shapes streaming past his ear, pulling up a quarter mile away.

Ravel continued at a trot. The first one he dodged was finally getting turned around. A reddish haze marked the form's heading as it focused in on him and another change of direction left the demon reeling past again.

As he cut back and forth across the terrain, Ravel prayed his new sight and knowledge of the demons movement would preserve his strength across the miles ahead.

Fuck it
I'm starting it. The air of disinterest is over. I've been writing a novel. It's the reason behind the name raveller.com. I was the raveller because of Ravel. Ravel was because I thought of him. There were at least 3 sources for the character when I started. Now that I know more, there are more. But he remains the same. This is the story of Ravel. A man who has passed into manhood without knowing. A man who makes the decisions of a man thinking they are inconsequential, yet striving to make everything right around him. A man who knows nothing of the cycle he is breaking and the change he is creating in the world around. A man who doesn't know that one random element that has been introduced into his life will be the one to destroy his way of being and his society's. And this is how it begins. For now.

Not tonight

The party was nearly over when Glori left. She had said her say and more. The lamplight cast warm glows around the remaining huddled groups and Torm didn't notice as she slipped out the latticework door. This was good since Torm always overplayed the host.

Starlight was all that illuminated her path. Night lamps had run out of fuel hours ago and the moon wasn't due for a few days. The rock and clay buildings were easily navigable though, square-built and practical with wide-lanes in between, more than enough for even the traffic they would see in the morning. She was past the point of drunkenness where she had to consciously walk upright into that place where she automatically followed the path home.

What had he been thinking? To just stand over there and glare when he would be gone tomorrow. Best friends since childhood. To not even say anything and then try to slip out into the night. Into the wilderness.

Into the wilderness.

He always said what on his mind. Whether it was crude or eloquent or some twisted combination of the two, he always said what was on his mind. How utterly unlike him. How could he?

She could see his mark clearly despite her other trouble focusing. The ornate mass of threads interlaced like stylized ball of yarn almost gave the impression they were moving. She could hear his quick "Not tonight" when he ducked out the door as she tried to intercept him.

"Not tonight." If not tonight, then what other night? He would be gone tomorrow. He would be gone into the wilderness.

Everyone else were just "maybes". But he had that look since they had returned from the last retreat. His quick wit had given way to surliness and he seemed to spend every day working from sun-up to sundown. He never had any time to go swim in the river with the rest of them. Even Josiah went with them sometimes, but never him anymore.

Maybe she should have chased after him but then that would have made a scene. Not at all like her kissing on young Rolf and then slapping him for his audacity. Not at like her wishing Tanai a nice time in the desert. Not like a half a dozen ill-timed statements she wished she could have back with her two broken glasses on the Torm's glaze-work floor. Her sobriety had certainly gone downhill after he left.

Staring at her surroundings she realized she was home. She fumbled at the latch and let herself in careful not to wake her parents and crept down the hall. Kicking-off her shoes, she crawled into bed.

"Into the wilderness" kept repeating through her head.

While lazing around seems like an alright thing to do, others might find that reading Internet funnies is a worthwhile occupation of time. By all means, head over to monkeyproject.com. The complete lack of new Opinions may be a direct result of the sheer amount of work going into producing what are probably empheral wastes of internet space. For new folks the old Opinions may still hold some humor value though. Don't expect any new Downloads either, even if the existing ones are impressive. The only thing that's really been updated here recently is the Links page that has been stripped bare of exciting link graphics and the like and is in no particular order. So that's that.

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As the site that basically does nothing but sit here and attempt to ignore what goes on around it, raveller.com finds it depressing even to think about updates to monkeyproject.com or The Half Closed Eye. But they insist I tell you about them anyway. Like I'm their little messenger boy or something. How demeaning can you get?

Fairly demeaning in my opinion. Bah.

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If you think I have anything important to say here today you are gravely mistaken. raveller.com is annoyed by your incessant querying after updates, more so by your lack of technical knowledge (if applicable). If this seems like an elitist attitude, so be it.

If you want a website that panders to nonsense and trite humor, you might as well visit monkeyproject.com.

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It's now the Year of the Monkey and raveller.com continues its downward slope into starkness and mundane despair. Good for it. It is meant to be utilitarian and grey. Other places are meant to be cheerful and uplifting. Quizzical and nonsensical.

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raveller.com has now moved into the blog world. This may make it easier for me to post about current events without worrying about site maintenance too much. Perhaps this means the site will be updated with pertinent information sooner.

Also raveller.com is no longer The Half Closed Eye, this site has been moved to halfclosedeye.com.

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