Blair MacGregor's Blog, page 25

Five Fonts of Happiness

Mmm… Chinese food…

Ahem.

Five things that make me happy. Very well.

First, that mention of Chinese food does indeed make me happy. Mentioning Italian, Asian, Middle Eastern, American, Indian and European food makes me happy, too. I love food. I adore food. I don’t consider myself a foodie, or a great cook, or even a discerning eater. But taste and scent and texture—and sharing that experience with others—is a great joy. I remember the immense pleasure of eating fresh cilantro atop carne asada fo...

Update to the Update

In response to the post “Update to Interesting Timing” on May 31, Matthew Cavnar of Vook left a lengthy response on June 5. I was occupied with activities that didn’t involve a computer yesterday, so the comment wasn’t released from moderation right away.Vooksent both email and tweet in that time asking for the comment to be shown. Since it was such a matter of urgency, I thought I’d highlight it.

Look: Vook is most certainly talking to a different sort of writer than I am. As I mentioned in m...

Advice For the 16-Year-Old Blair

Choosing five things to tell my sixteen-year-old self is an odd exercise at the moment. I have a sixteen-year-old son, so I can’t help but conflate this with what I want to impart to him. Also, my late teen/early adult years have been much on my mind as I consider where I am in life now, and where I want to be in ten years.

So some of these are serious and some are more fun, but all are true.

Dear Sixteen-Year-Old Blair,

You are not, at this time, deciding the course of your life. Yes, I know ev...

Sometimes the Trite Is True

My characters are specifically barred from being subjects of this answer. If I let them have their way, they’d do nothing but blather on about how many horrible things I subject them to for the purpose of the story. That they’d be right is entirely beside the point.

I considered this question for a bit (and found it a little unsettling to realize I had numerous instances to compare and contrast), but concluded that the most accurate answer is also the one most expected, unto the point of clich...