My Goals for June 2008

May is finally done. Since I no longer have writer's block to deal with, I think I can actually achieve my goals for June. These are:

1. Rewrite the Spanner script. This is a Script Frenzy thing, using the old month (June) as the "EdMo". The deadline is June 30. In addition to the script rewrite, I'll do the accompanying page layouts.
2. Finish the second draft of Bad Company. This is when I'll start fitting the old scenes and plotlines from the first draft back into the rewritten story alongside the new ones.
3. Complete my self-instruction course on how to draw the human figure, then begin drawing my character designs.
4. Learn how to play the guitar, learn at least a little about how to play the piano (or keyboard), and learn to read music better. This is for the "50 Songs in 90 Days" thing I'm doing in lieu of FAWM.
5. Start relearning French, German, or both.

I should have a better chance at pulling this off now that I'm able to write again. The script rewrite should be the easy part.

A Simple Conflict to Complicate: Dragonites vs. Enders

I was reading a book on the Book of Revelation (also known as the Apocalypse of John), called A History of the End of the World, by Jonathan Kirsch. He shows that the last book of the Christian Bible is a rage-fuelled mind bomb so potent that it has all but dominated Western culture at least since Emperor Theodosius turned the Roman Empire into Christendom by decree in 391. But the most important point I'm drawing from it in this entry is the extreme dualism the Apocalypse embodies. From at least the middle of Black Science all the way to the end of Spanner, America is torn apart by an apocalyptic duel between two factions determined to put an end to American democracy and replace it with an apocalyptic theocracy: the Gnostic fundamentalist Dragonites, the ultra-elitist conspiracy of self-described supermen who want to reimpose the old totalitarian caste system based on a cult of blood; and the Christian fundamentalist Enders, that group of militant cults determined to put an end to the world by force. Actually, the Enders don't have to be Christian; the Islamists and the Jewish Messianists are also Enders. Both factions see the world in ultra-stark black-and-white, either-or, with-us-or-against-us terms. If you're not for one faction, they believe, you are by definition part of the other. This is a "Gordian knot" that desperately needs to be cut before it destroys the world. In my dialectical worldview, there must be a third force dedicated to disrupting both forces. This force I call the Spoiler. But the Spoiler's disruptions are useless unless (s)he fights alongside, and for the sake of, the common enemy of both Dragonites and Enders: the people.