You see, last Friday I was abruptly awoken at about 10:10. Not that the time mattered much — I was going to get up around then anyway. No, the problem was the incessant banging going on outside. Me thinking, ‘Is it really necessary to be making such a fucking noise?!‘ It was. As my mind started to clear up, my nostrils filled with a burnt smell. Smoke. Fire! So, getting dressed as fast as I could, I rushed to the door before the firefighters could knock it down. Outside stood two policemen telling me to get out. A fire had broken out in the house right next to my apartment. Okay. Fuck. Shoes, cap, scarf, jacket. Getting the fuck out of there. No tobacco or cigarettes or lighter or wallet. That decision came to haunt me when I stood outside, watching the column of smoke. I could kill for a cigarette.

So, long story short, I stood outside, freezing my butt off for two hours, watching the firefighters do their work. Hoping, praying to whatever deity might listen that my beloved MacBook and my signed first edition of Fight Club would not be damaged.

They survived. As far as I can tell, there were no damages to my property, although I haven’t gotten around to check everything yet. Still, none of my irreplacable belongings were damaged. The apartment itself needs a complete overhaul, something that might take at least a month’s work. And then there’s the waiting for works to begin.

So, if you’ve been wondering about the lack of updates, here’s your answer.

Breaking news: BBC has just announced who will succeed David Tennant and portray the 11th incarnation of The Doctor. And this must be a huge surprise for everyone that’s followed the rumour mill surrounding the casting. Young actor Matt Smith was today named as the next in a long line of immensely talented actors. At 26, Matt Smith is the youngest ever actor to be cast as The Doctor, three years younger than Peter Davison was when he first portrayed The Fifth Doctor.

Having already been named a face to watch by thisislondon.co.uk, Smith is one of the most promising young British actors today. Already making success with his stage work, he has figured in both film and television, perhaps most notably against former Who companion Billie Piper in The Secret Diary of a Call Girl.

With one of the most talented writers (Steven Moffat), and now one of the most talented actors, the fifth series of Doctor Who since its regeneration in 2005, this promises to be a very funny and exciting time to be a Who fan.

In preparation for the upcoming announcement, here’s my list of candidates for the next Doctor. (Note: This is just purely speculation and/or wishful thinking.) In no particular order:

Bill Nighy. An excellent actor with an established track-record. With the trend having been to cast increasingly younger actors as The Doctor, I wouldn’t be surprised if they’d go to the opposite end this time. Steven Moffat even admitted that he wanted to see an older, grandfatherly figure as The Doctor.

Brian Cox. Already a long list of American movies behind him. Always delivers solid believable characters. Might just happen to be a bit too established for a show such as Doctor Who.

Alan Rickman. Again, perhaps too big a name. But after one moody and one angry Doctor, I think it’s time for one sarcastic Doctor.

Richard E. Grant. Since Paul McGann played the eigth Doctor, I’m now hoping that they’ll complete the Withnail and I actor hijacking by casting this wonderful actor. Huge prescence and fantastic talent — would be a perfect Doctor, in my opinion.

Matthew Macfadyen. Caught my eye in his role as Tom Quinn in Spooks. Recently saw him in Pride and Prejudice, wich made me even more concvinced he’d make an excellent Doctor.

So, mere hours to go until the mystery is revealed. Until then, who are your favorite(s) for the role of the 11th Doctor?

So, it’s been all too long since my last update, even though I promised to post an essay on Steven Moffat. Oh well, at least I’ve got one hell of an excuse. No, actually I don’t have one. The draft for my essay has been lingering in blogging oblivion since I last updated. The annoying thing is, it’s looking promising. Still, I just can’t seem to get myself to finish the damn thing and click the Publish-button.

So, as an effort to finish it, I made myself a new year’s resolution for the first time since… well, forever. To hell with self-improvement style promises to quit smoking, excercise more or read all the classics I haven’t got around to. No, this resolution is a hell of a lot more simple: Less mucking about, more blogging!

This means, no more hours wasted watching whatever comes up in the Related Videos sidebar on Youtube. No more reading random articles on Wikipedia. No more drinking coffee and surfing porn to extent that I think I’m watching video streams of naked bottoms, when I’m just watching a regular image of a naked bottom.

My thinking is, if I can take the time I’m wasting just consuming whatever pops up on the Internet, and put that time and effort into blogging regularly, chances are that I will eventually get the inspiration and spark I need to finish all those essays I’ve always wanted to publish on my blog.

Wish me luck!

And, as a request to you reader(s): What are your new year’s resolutions, and how do you plan on living up to them?

Has it really been nearly three months already? At this rate you can expect the next update around mid-January next year, I guess. In my previous update I mentioned something about a major overhaul. It’s not here quite yet, but work is finally underway. The first step will be to tweak the theme. At the moment it’s really not utilizing the real estate of most monitors, and this is something I want to adress. Also, I will integrate Gravatar into the comments.

And, sometime during this week, I’ll publish an article on one of my favorite writers — Steven Moffat. I’ve even got plans to see Blink for the 628th time tonight; I’ll never tire of watching that episode.

Later that day, the lookout screamed that there were two pirate vessels sending two boarding parties towards their ship. The crew was nervous, but the Captain, calm as ever, bellowed, “Bring me my red shirt!” And once again the battle was on!

The Captain and his crew fought off the boarding parties, though this time more casualties occurred. Weary from the battles, the men sat around on deck that night recounting the day’s events when an ensign looked at the Captain and asked, “Sir, why did you call for your red shirt before the battle?” The Captain, giving the ensign a look that only a captain can give, explained, “If I am wounded in battle, the red shirt does not show the blood, so you men will continue to fight unafraid.” The men sat in silence. They were amazed at the courage of such a man.

As dawn came the next morning, the lookout screamed that there were pirate ships, 10 of them, all with boarding parties on their way. The men became silent and looked to the Captain, their leader, for his usual command.

The Captain, calm as ever, bellowed, ‘Bring me my brown pants!!!’

Expect a major update and overhaul sometime before World War Three in the coming week(s).

Chuck Palahniuk’s excellent essays on writing are back, after an all too long hiatus. In his January essay, he closes by saying: “And welcome to 2008, if you do nothing else in January — please — make a list of the goals you’ll accomplish in the next 12 months. Then, share those goals with as many people as possible. Please, expect more from yourself than you think will be possible. Use this year to become someone bigger, smarter, happier than you ever imagined.” Which I intend to.

It’s been almost three whole months since my last update, and to be frank, I think some of the reason behind this is that I’m reluctant to expect too much from myself. So, I figure, what better way to deal with that fear than to replace it with an even greater fear? To replace my fear of demanding more from myself and not accomplishing my goals, with the fear of public humiliation?

The first step, then, is to make public my goals for this year. If I’ve failed to accomplish a single one of them by the end of December, do feel free to rub it in my face. I actually encourage you to do so.

So, without further ado, commence utter shame and humiliation:

1: Finish a short-story I have only gotten round to writing a few opening paragraphs on, never mind writing down a whole plot outline. The story deals thematically with euthanasia, a theme that I think I’ve been putting off to deal with due to my mother’s boyfriend being terminally ill with cancer, and then eventually passed away last fall. I’ve been, perhaps, overly conscious about the fact that it will be emotionally exhausting to work on that particular subject. So, it’s about time I exorcized some demons.

2: Finish a short-story that is on paper only a paragraph long, but has been fully outlined in my head for over half a year. A small community of survivalists have been living inside a complex of underground nuclear fallout shelters for years. Not having proper protection against radiation, none have ventured outside, so as far as they know they’re what’s left of life on earth. At the outset of this story, people are getting murdered for no apparent reason, and someone is vandalizing all the equipment that makes for the underground life support. So it’s a choice between staying underground and fight an unknown enemy, risking extinction in the process, or fleeing outside and more than likely get everyone killed by radiation.

Now, this story is actually one I’ve been really looking forward to work on, so why have I been putting it off? Again, I think it’s sufficient to point to my fear of failure, of not accomplishing anything. Then flip off that fear and say: “Fuck you, I am going to do something worthwhile with my life!”

3: Finalize the first draft of a novella that’s been in fictional purgatory for over a year. Again, most of the plot is already clear to me, but I think I might have written myself into some kind of dead-end. At least it seems that way. Every time I take a look at what I’ve read, that last sentence just. Stops. In theme with the actual themes of the story, it’s time I took a giant leap of faith, and followed the somewhat anarchic theory that in order to build anew, one must first make rubble. Rubble in this sense, meaning to not be afraid to delete some paragraphs in order to unblock that particular dead-end.

4: Finalize a first draft of a novel-length text I started working on last month. The inspiration came from reading about the murder of Sylvia Likens back in 1965. What intrigued me was how so many children did nothing to help the poor girl; some even participated in torturing her. All with the encouragement and blessing of the mother in the house Sylvia Likens and her younger sister lived. Why didn’t anyone tell the authorities, their parents, or simply be the voice of reason and tell the other children that what they did was wrong?

So, I want to explore this further. One of the main characters in this story is a man who in his childhood participated in torturing and killing a young girl, and through him maybe I can get some answers. Or at least get some kind of understanding of the brutality of it all.

Being my most recent project, the inspiration for this story is still very much alive. So putting this public, I hope that this serves as a motivation to keep working. Working to finish this story and the three I’ve mentioned before.

5: Make an effort to get something published. Okay, I know that actually getting fiction published is not entirely in my hands. I am aware that — unless I finance it myself, which I can’t afford — book publishers and magazines have the final say in what they choose to put money into. But what I can do is to work towards making my stories as well-written as I can. To find themes that not only are interesting to me, but other people will find interesting to read. And last, to actually mail some manuscripts. Worst case scenario, I’ll share the faith of so many others, getting a rejection letter. And again, I think it’s that fear of failure that’s been keeping me back. But (at least at the time of writing this) I’m determined to not let that stop me. To use a rejection letter as a motivation to be a better writer. To refine the themes, to make for more interesting reading, to try and accomplish my goals.

So, there it is. Five goals for this year. Five very specific and clear goals. And looking back on them, I see that they are all very much possible to achieve. They are not affected by some external influence, and so very much in my own hands. The only thing that will hinder me from achieving those five goals is me. And only me. This isn’t reaching for the stars. This is reaching for an apple that, if I only make the effort to stretch to my full length, is well within my reach.

So here’s to a productive year!

What are your goals?

(Picture obviously extremely unrelated. But any excuse to put up pictures of cute kittens is good enough for me.)

Just wanted to take some time out to wish you all the best. May your Christmas be abundant with fatty food, lots of beverages, and presents galore!

How will you spend your Christmas eve?

I will be spending the evening with my dad —

eating, eating, eating, enjoying a few beers, eating some more, and unwrapping presents. Then falling asleep infront of the TV, before dragging my stuffed stomach to bed.

So, again, I wish you all a merry, merry, very very oh so merry Christmas.

PS: I am aware that the Christmas celebration won’t be starting until tomorrow morning for many parts of the world. But since I live in Norway, where it’s only yesterday we abandoned clay huts, invented the paper clip, got colour television, discarded bank cheques, and discovered the wonders of fire, we are actually sufficiently technologically retarded enough to think it’s a brilliant idea to celebrate Christmas today. Yes, we do. Now, where did I leave my ice tablet?

Just wanted to make a quick note to you readers about the comments system.

If you click register (under Meta in the right menu), your contact information will be saved, for making comments. Also, I only have to approve your first comment, so in the future your comments will be up immidately after posting. (No more waiting for an admin to moderate.)

I also have a few ideas for further use (and a few extras) for registered readers. These might include forum access, community workshops, and even contributing articles and posts to the site. Keep your eyes peeled!