Matthew Dicks's Blog, page 672

Can I survive on even less sleep?

Tell me if this makes sense.

I'm thinking about cutting down on my sleep.  Here's my rationale. 

I go to sleep sometime between 11:30 and midnight every night. 

I wake up sometime between 5:00 and 5:30 every morning.  Sometimes a little earlier.  

This routine does not vary regardless of vacation schedules and weekends.  I never use my Saturdays to "catch up on my sleep."

This means that I average about five hours of sleep a night.

But I am almost never tired when I go to bed, and I...

Merriam Websters Top 10 Commonly Confused Words

My most frequently confused word did not make the list.  I don't know be happy or sad about this.

For me, it's peek and peak.

Even with the see and peek pneumonic (both have a double-e and both relate to vision), I still have to pause and consider the distinction whenever I use either word. 

I can also never remember how to spell calendar.  

So I understand when a writer confuses words.

But the one word pair that makes the list that should never be confused is its and it's, because...

Dead peoples jerseys

A couple years ago, my friend's daughter, Katie, played on a softball team that was sponsored by Bailey Funeral Home.

I think this is fabulous.  Kids running the bases while advertising a funeral home on their backs.  Do the proprietors of the funeral home think that this type of advertising is effective?

"Hey, I heard that your aunt died.  Have you checked out Bailey Funeral Home? They seem very community oriented.  Good with men in scoring position, too."

But at least Katie's team knew...

be an unbeatable person and avenge my death.

I write a daily blog to my daughter, who is nineteen months old, entitled GreetingsLittleOne.com.  I've written every day since we learned that my wife was pregnant and have not missed a day. 

Sometimes the post is merely a collection of photographs and videos from the day.  Other times it's an account of the day's proceedings.  Occasionally I dispense fatherly advice or share stories about our family or our childhoods.   

Coming from a family with less than two dozen photographs from my...

Give kids a reason to write

I was on an escalator in the MOMA, and I heard a mother ask her son, "What was your favorite exhibit?"

The boy hemmed and hawed and ultimately failed to answer the question. 

I wanted to explain to the mother that a better question would have been, "What exhibit did you hate the most?"

This would have most certainly generated a response. 

A fundamental truth about human beings, and especially about kids, is that they are more likely to remember the things that they despise rather than...

CAPS LOCK

What is the point of the goddamn Caps Lock button?  And why must it be as almost as large as the Shift key.  And why did the morons who designed this keyboard put the damn button beside the letter A, making it a button that I am constantly striking by mistake.

Who the hell even uses Caps Lock?

Why is it so big?

Why not put it beside the letter Z?

Or somewhere above the row of numbers?

And why not shrink the thing to a reasonable size?

If I had my way, I'd force the designer of my...

No place like home

As summer vacation draws to a close and my school year begins, I can't help but think that I am returning home after a summer abroad.  After a dozen years of teaching, my school has begun to feel a little like home.  It has become a fixture of my life, and during my years spent teaching, I have worked among people who have become some of my closest and dearest friends.

I have taught children who return to my classroom on a weekly basis to apprise their former teacher about their adventures...

Skookum!

Elysha rarely calls me by name. Like most couples, we have developed a series of pet names and nicknames for one another. Skookum, a word that means the best (and ironically also means monster) is our most commonly-used moniker but honey, sweetie, and the like make their way into the lexicon as well.

This left me wondering:

Do couples fall into these patterns early on in their relationships in order to avoid accidentally referring to their current lover by the name of a previous beau or...

Did they use straws?

Did you know that skateboard parks began with southern California skateboarders in the 1970's known as Z-Boys, who would trespass into neighbor's backyards, empty the pool, and use it as a half pipe and concrete ramp?

The 1970's were such an odd time in America.

Is it time for product placement in fiction?

A month after SOMETHING MISSING hit the store shelves, I began receiving the occasional but persistent email from readers asking and sometimes accusing me of having made product placement deals in the writing of my book.  It would seem that my frequent use of specific brand names in the book had struck a nerve and caused them to wonder why an author would choose to be so specific. 

Clearly, they had not yet read Stieg Larsson.

I answered those emails with the assurance that my attention...