Random – Samuel Colbran

Becoming a Plot Snob.

The thing about becoming more experienced in writing is that you start to notice things in other books or media. Some authors can spot grammatical errors from a mile away or be very forward in pointing out spelling mistakes. I have been finding, that I am not a Grammar ‘Nazis’ but a Plot Snob.

Most of my life, I have been a roleplayer, either pen and paper or computer games and I love watching movies and exciting television programs. Lately, I started to see plot holes in the premise of said work, and when beta-reading, I can see a loose thread quite quickly. Which brings me to my next dilemma, how to ignore it.

When I realised that I was becoming this snob of plots, was when someone in my gaming group was pitching ideas for upcoming games. I can understand that it is just the foundation but wow they were all boring, and I could see the direction the ‘story’ would have gone. Of course, I said no, I am not interested, but I like hanging out with my mates.

My issue is that I start to think, how can I improve this story or can I tell it differently to make it enjoyable. I haven’t found too many writers that I have that opinion, some are not my cup of tea while others are marvellous. Seeing substantial plot holes in a television show, especially police or crime shows. I use to love watching these shows, but now they are just so by the formula.

So at beginning of the show, crime happens, police or investigators question people to the point that they might push their civil rights, but as long as they find the ‘bad’ guy, it is all good. Then some very obvious clue takes them to a bad guy, and then the interrogation happens. After a few threats/questions with no lawyer present, they confess to everything! Boring!

If you keep walking down that well-trodden road, you’ll find that people become bored. I’m not saying I am perfect, but due to this train of thought, I will always try to improve my storylines to make sure they are not formulaic.

What is happening?

It has been a while since I have written a blog. Some of it was due to the lack of motivation to write one, being distracted by either my writing or groups that I am a part of. Even typing this seems to be a little hollow and passing the buck. Just need to harden the truck up and do some blogs!

I have thought that Thursday will be my blog day, need to do something once a week. If I can’t do that, then why have a blog!

So what has been happening in the world of Samuel Colbran?

First off I now have a paperback of a superhero fantasy anthology which includes Kayla, Briana and Ciro with an addition of the first three chapters of the newly updated Lake Merrin! I have been ecstatic about this. Soon I will have a book in my hands with my name on it. It will be like book-crack for me!

This came about because I was invited to go to Oz Comic Con in Brisbane! Even a few of my author friends are going to have tables as well. They are Melissa H North and Karen Tyrell. It will be the first time I will have met Melissa, it going to be indeed fabulous!

There is one version on Amazon of FableLands: Interrogation, but you can buy off of me, a special edition of the book! Find out more at www.samuelcolbran.com.

My current working on a short story connected to the history of Favinonia (the country Lake Merrin is set in), called Rise of the Green. It delves into the rise of the fictional religion of Favinonia, in where the first saint rose, Saint Mela of the Green.

Saint Mela—the plague-ender; life-giver; and first saint—represents the Green Aspect. People who follow this aspect give thanks to the first saint for bringing the Trinity to Favinonia.

Discovering her story has been a highlight. It will be the first of three, under the title ‘The Trinity’ from the series Tales From Favinonia. There are about twenty stories to be written under this series name, some of the heroes of the past. A few of these stories will be about the political arena of Favinonia. This is mainly to expand the world of Amsul.

So that ends the first of, (fingers crossed) my Thursday blogs. See you next week!

Online Dating: Knight in Shining Armour or Just plain stupid?

Hello, my dear followers, Facebook likes, and Twitter followers. I am an online dater, sad isn’t it? Well, it is sad because I am so bad at it. I don’t have pictures of cars or jet skis. I don’t send a picture of my penis to a complete stranger, hoping that will impress her. I don’t want to be as the young people talk ‘Down to fornicate’ or DTF. I am a gentleman, who like to open doors for people, and making people feel comfortable and content.

I am the worst at ONLINE DATING!

I have been doing this journey for ten years. I have dated women, but each one had something broken. Not saying that every woman who uses this type of dating is broken, but I go out of my way to only date broken women.

An example, a girl I dated for a while had a wild weekend with an ex and got knocked up, and this fabulous ‘man’ gave her 1500 dollars to have an abortion. Sweet guy. Now she told me 6 hours before my first mathematics exam at university, still I made an overall mark of 82% because I am a smart gentleman. Now you would think, that was it, no more cheating woman? No, you are so wrong! Not only did I emotionally support her, but I was also willing to put my name on the birth certificate, so her bastard child had a father.

Knight in shining armour! I am an idiot.

Another story, I dated a girl for a while, and we went well. But, I was supporting my sister and niece because the dad was a drop kick. She broke up with me because I care for my family. Now a year later, she started to date someone, like 5 seconds after the breakup and she invited me to a party, and after everyone had gone to bed, we went for a walk. During this stroll, she said she loved me! She was still with this guy, and he was at her home asleep. That is all kinds of fucked up! Story not over yet. She asked me if they broke up, would I give her another chance? Being the genius dumbarse, I said yes. To cut a long story short, they ended 4 years later, and I asked her out because I promised I would. And she freaked and started dating this guy’s best friend. Would you think she was happy, hell no! She told me again she made a mistake and she loves me.

Moral of the story, don’t be dumb

Time and time again, I fall for a girl and for some reason they freak out when we start to become serious. So I gave up. Haven’t dated for nearly a year, had more important things to do with me. Being a carer for my Mum and writing my first book. As you could tell I am a sucker for punishment, so I re-activated my dating account. I have no bites. Still, I know I pick up another broken woman, be that guy she needs and once she picks herself up, bye bye Sam.

When the chips are down, rant!

This isn’t a rant, I am amusing myself. I have had a really F’up love life. I mean really. Won’t go into my last one, because I think it was the worst and I had a girl cheat on me, and I was going to be the Daddy for her child. Wow.

So I thought of a new way to amuse myself ask a series of ridiculous questions on my profile. These are my top ten ‘never to get laid’ questions.

IF you want to talk to me, answer one of these questions.

1. x²+4x+4=0, solve x.
2. Next Prime Number after 19?
3. where does this quote come from “Isn’t it easier to forgive than to hate?”
4. Name of Raymond E Feist 15th book in chronological Reading order?
5. What is your favourite comic book movie?
6. What is the difference between Fae and a Fairy?
7. Why is Anne Rice’s Vampyrs better than Stephenie Meyer’s Vampires?
8. What is the atomic weight of Au?
9. If a train is moving at the speed of light and you throw a ball, is the ball moving faster than the speed of light?
10. Do you think these questions are a waste of your time?

Talk to me if you answered no to number 10.

I like to see if I can pick women up with these? If I do, I am going to laugh my arse off!

What defines a writer?

As I approach the release of Lake Merrin, I have to ask ‘Am I going about the right way to becoming a professional writer?’ This question is stupid and pointless as everyone’s path is different and there is no rule (to my knowledge) that this how things are done.

Exposing myself to the community of writers has been one of the most incredible experiences I have ever had, but this can be a double edge sword as I see them doing things that frankly seems to be a It’s not a waste of time, just not my path. Again I have to ask, what defines a writer?

Is it being published, writing blogs or entering writing competitions? Being active online on social media, telling everyone how fantastic you are? Or being part of a writers group that meets monthly? Could it be quietly by yourself creating and imagining new worlds and stories?

I think all of these define a writer, a creative. There are no labels but why do I feel that somehow I am cheating the system. I have never entered a competition or done articles. I haven’t tried to go down the traditional path of an author, finding an agent, submitting to a publisher. Does this make me less than other who have?

I believe in helping people have the guts to take that first step into a scary but fulfilling life of writing. Seeing people become as passionate in the creative medium and just trying. I don’t want a million dollars, I don’t want a fancy house or car. The only thing that I really want is that my book to be read, by one or many.

As I sit here and try and think of how to finish this blog, this reminds me how much I love writing. In the end, we define who we are, not society, not our peers, not friends or family. If you write, then you are a writer. Simple as that.

The question from the movie, Arrival.

Finishing watching the movie, Arrival; again makes me think about the over-arcing theme of the film. I just have to say that I do love the movie, for a science fiction to a great story. The visuals were spectacular, and the music was on point. That isn’t why I am writing this blog; a particular question was asked.

In the movie, a question proposed, and I am paraphrasing. ‘If you comprehend your life from beginning to end, would you change anything?’ Reflecting on this, I do not have a complete answer for you, as I don’t know my whole life. All I can do is to answer to the best of my ability.

First is the understanding of time; time itself does not have a care for seconds, minutes or even millennia. Time is just that; time. There is no direct expression of it, we, humans impose our meaning on to the concept of time. My view of time is like a river delta, with many forks and outlets. All connected to a vast river rushing to this multitude of streams. Contradicting with the previous statement, as time, being linear, I can understand the confusion.

Take your position and move to any point of the river delta and you have a river flowing from behind into a countless amount of forks and outlets, meaning that the standing of the past does not impact the possible and probable futures. In a following blog, I will be going over this idea.

Understanding the cause of the river in its complexity and all the twist and turns of the possible futures. Comprehending this would be a mammoth task. Again the question, if you knew this would you choose the same path? Any indirect or direct decisions would impact the flow of the time river.

I am of two minds about this; I do have certain things in my past that I could live without? On the other hand, I do have important people in my life that open certain paths? My abuse, mental, emotional, physical and sexual at the hands of many different people from my toddlerhood to teenage years. I would be happy to give this up…

But are events, even horrific things like this could I one hundred percent say if I had the power to change it, I would or wouldn’t do it? I have to say, no. Every event has shaped me into me. All the happy times or sad times, the times I just wanted to dance or curl up into a ball. How can I honestly say, I would change it and hope that it would give me a better future, present or past?

I can not, with a clear answer but if I could, how would that impact the people I care about around me. My friends, family, people I have met recently and ones that I will destine to meet? Changing my past would not just effect me but every single person I have ever interacted with. Some of these would be insignificant while others would be like shattering of worlds. How can I be the judge of that? I am no ‘God’, I am just a human.

3-3×6+2= BODMAS and other problems.

Social media has these particular questions that pop up on my feed now and again. This is not my first draft, the previous one was a lot more insulting, but after a good night sleep, I thought I give it another go.

The first one I would like to tackle is the title of the piece.

Now looking at this, most will think ‘Hey it is like reading goes left to right’ or they will pick up their phone and plug it into the calculator. This is when I refer you to what you should have learned in Primary School. Yes, Primary School.

BODMAS, this is how you solve this problem. B is for a bracket, O for operation, D is division, M for multiplication, A is addition and finally S for subtraction.

Let us look a look at the problem, where to start. No B or O but there is an M, hmm. So the first thing to tackle is 3×6, I think most of you can work this out.

Now the problem is 3-18+2, what is the next letter do we deal with. Now A or S can be in any order but let us keep to BODMAS, so addition, means that the ‘3’ and the ‘2’ should be added together. Now the problem is simply 5-18=-13, there done.

The next one I like to go over is simple algebra, sometimes I have heard that people complain about this topic are incredible. But it is a bit off point. So the above picture is the usual problem, some have different graphics, but the answer is the same.

Now I have to put into algebraic terms.

Let W be Horse

Let Y be Horseshoe

and Z be Boot.

So now the problem looks like

W+W+W=30

W+Y+Y+Y+Y=18

Y+Y-Z-Z=2

Z+WxY=??

This is very easy to solve, 3W’s = 30, so 30 divided 3 equals 10. Substitute that into the next equation, 10+4Y=18. This takes a little more effort.

Take 10 from both sides

10-10+4Y=18-10

So you have

4Y=8

Divide 4 on both sides and Y = 2. Now the last one and then the final problem!

2Y-2Z=2; sub in Y=2

4-2Z=2; subtract 4 from each side

-2Z=-2; divide by-2

Z=1

By this time, you can see how to figure out the last one, so Z =1. We then substitute into the final equation and using BODMAS again, we have 1+10×2=21, that’s that!

There are a few others out there, but I think I have taken up enough of your time. Maths is used every day, and having social media using these mind twisters shows the need to understand even the basic concepts of mathematics. As in the end, you don’t want to look stupid in front of your Facebook or Twitter friends, do you?

Documentary ’13’ and My Discussion with my Mother.

It is strange that I want to write something about a documentary about the thirteen amendment of the USA constitution. Watching this doco, made me realise the mentality of today’s politics and everyday people, and how it is related to Australia. Being not only of Australian Aboriginal descent, but I am also, English, Scottish and Irish. I don’t see myself as Aboriginal or Caucasian, but an Australian who is proud of all the bloodlines of my family history.

I meant to watch this documentary when it came out but it was only today that I thought why the heck not. It goes back to the Civil War in America and how that lead to the loophole of criminals as slaves. With this part of the amendment, it shows the evolution of the mentality of people of colour. Then looking at how Aboriginals were treated at the same time.

My people fought a war against their invaders, Black Wars of Tasmania which went for twenty-seven years. Six hundred Tasmanian Aborigines lost their life defending their homes, but that could be in the thousands as there was no accurate census of the population at that time. Once eradicated, the survivors moved to Flinders Island in the Bass Strait. More live were lost here, due to the horrible conditions of their forced ‘settlement’. And this doesn’t even stop here, brutality since the First Fleet came here, still shocks me to my core.

Am I proud what happened during these years, and the fact that my family was born from this situation. No, but blaming the past doesn’t help the future. My mum doesn’t see herself as Aboriginal but as an Australian, unlike the rest of her siblings. My mother raised in an Aboriginal community and her white father; my grandfather saw himself as a ‘black fella’ as he was married to one.

Our discussion of this re-imagining of the same ideology of all ethnic people are criminals, and how Australians today view ‘boat people’. My mother recounts her mother, an Aboriginal who brought two Vietnamese children into her home as they were fleeing the outcome of the Vietnam War. She didn’t see them as outsiders, but Family and treated them as such. There are no two buts about it. I too have this idealism when it comes to my friends, once you achieve a certain point I see you as Family, not just friend. As Family doesn’t need a blood relation is about the care and acceptance of that person. My Family is HUGE, blood relations and adopted, all are Family to me.

We need to break out of this hatred of differences, of the past, of assuming stereotypes of people. On Facebook, I had an acquaintance who was a friend to one of my Family. He put up about his belief of ‘boat people’ should be deported, harsher things should happen and that forcing multiculturalism upon us. That if you are not one of us, being white, then go home and that this should be a land for just Australians. Does he just mean white Australians? I was about to turn to him and say “If you think that, you go home as you are not indigenous to Australia. As you are a descendant of a ‘Boat Person’.” As he is a white guy, isn’t he forcing multiculturalism on Aborigines? This is our land, not his but I guess that is different.

In the end, it, like the Michael Jackson song says ‘Black or White’, it doesn’t matter if you are black or white, you are human, and you deserve respect and the right to be heard. Even racist people have the right to be heard because they show us the past. From this, we can learn from our mistakes and, together, forge a new future of a united human race.

A Family…

History of Rants Part Two

Here is part two of my rant history on Facebook. Looking back on this rant about ranting, I can see I was trying to find an outlet but just didn’t know what. I do know now, and the possibilities are endless.

5th of February 2014

It seems it has circle has turned again, and the rant shall begin! What is a rant? A rant by definition is “speak or shout at length in an angry, impassioned way”, which originated from the Dutch word ranten from the late 16th century. There are five words in German, which mean to rant, four in Spanish and only two in French. Does this make the English language is more efficient than the Germans or does it meant that our rants are just more annoying!?
The word rant was used more in the 1800’s but dropped off in use during the 1900’s. But now it is back on the rise, does this mean that we have become rantier due to the influx of social media or have we more on to becoming more dignified? I wiL lt U 2 Dcide dat 4 urself. i hOp U hav a gr8 dA & fEl d rant!

19th of April 2014

About end of my birthday, I guess a rant is in order. To all who message me on the one particular time of the year. The only time of the year most people would go out of their way and say “happy birthday”. Well done, I feel the love all the way over here! For all those who haven’t, well have a nice day and may all your Karma come your way as you deserve it. But I haven’t ranted about rants. O to rant, such sweet ramblings! Only if rants can go forever and, we would feel justified to the moment! But like all rants no-one care or even likes, but we do it to feel better about oneself but in the end, we are people on their phone/tablet/laptop/desktop who have no life

Merry Easter!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

26th of August 2014

Once again the feeling of ranting has pressed upon my weary mind. As in times past, I have to take a point in ranting about ranting and this too will be in the spirit of the past, present, and future. What I love about my pure ranting is, in fact, it does not explain what is going thru my mind at the moment, nor need to go on about my comings and goings.

What I also love about an unbiased rant, is the freedom from said reader to interpreted how they wish it. It is never to clearly pointed out what this rambling is about; only to allow me to for fill the need to describe a need for it, as always it is just a rant.

But again as I feel the need for this jabbering, blubbering, gibberish, wordy excuse for a rant has come to an end. As always your rants or ramblings are neither to the point or need for explanation, as it is only for the author.

Ode to Rant: A History of Rants.

Looking back over the years I had written a few rants about ranting I do have some others, but they are more severe, well not as fun. Each of these rants did help me to find my way through some difficult times. The last one on this blog, I think was my first indication I was meant for better things, but it still took another three years for me to realise the path. Ode to rant!

17th of January 2012

What does Sam Like, Sam Like ranting! The rant, a favourite thing of the average person on Facebook. Ode to the rant, such sweet rambling. Only if I could go on such random rant about rants. How can I describe such a nice lovely fixture of words?
But like all rants, this one must end as the ranter is at a loss for words. May all your rants be random and enlightening, be at peace and laugh once in a while, and think of others.

But not too much

15th of July 2012

It’s been a while since I have ranted for the sake of ranting! How can I put this new but continue rant into words? Shall I be formal? Ode to rant, how sweet methinks twas to be frank and straight wilt thee. Could only word perchance be the gift of thine has on this ball of earth? Maybe mine shrift that I am judicious, but shall I then come roundly to thee have acquaintance with my desires as this is mine rant. But enough of this ungodly language let’s be simple and direct.

RANT IS GOOD, ME AM ‘APPPY

9th of December 2012

Good morning to all my friends out there, again I have come to a new rant. Thrice before I have ranted about ranting, I have enjoyed these rants but now wish to make one that has been inspired by a book.

The two books I have just read of recent, are The Name of the Wind and Wise Man’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss. I will not go too much into the storyline as it would ruin the book for anyone to read. The main character is a man named Kvothe (pronounced as Quothe). I will not describe him; I will not talk about his history or his happenstance in the book. Most of this are how he has affected my thinking, this, of course, is due to the excellent writing style of Mr Rothfuss.

Some of you might know of me as a cook/chef at Montezuma or some as a student at QUT. Some knew at school, some thru even Facebook. Family and friends, some very dear to my heart, even if we have little or no contact. Knowledge and understanding are my bread and butter, my need to understand all walks of life. Sometimes this is just in passing, others I throw my life and soul into existence! Gaming, cooking, and math are three of examples. Two of them are significant failures; one is an over-indulgence. But again I digress. My curiosity has gotten me in trouble many of times. My of the need to know, this is what truly drive my soul! Knowledge, no woman (or man) touch could overcome this. Even words can not encompass my real feelings. People say that I am smart, intelligent and some think of me as slow, stupid, even mentally retarded. Very few have seen every facade of my personality. Most will as always under or overestimate my abilities. The more I write on this, even I do not quite understand myself. Kvothe and the author are my new inspiration; I need to return to the path which I have zig-zag for most of my life. I need to finish what I have started! I wouldn’t like to push as this would irritate me and cause grief for both parties. Most people who might pick up this book series, will not come to the epiphany I have, some will not quite understand the character ( this is apparent with some reviews). I am 33 years old; life is supposed to begin at 30. I guess I didn’t get the email. My life has remained trapped in amber.

Again lets my life’s journey begin