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One of the blogs in the blogroll here is Pumping Your Muse Prompts and it is a collection of photos and simple writing assignments.  I recommend it to those of you who are interested in writing more and exercising your imagination while you do it.

For example this morning I chose to do an exercise about a parked car and was asked to focus on emotion, smell and sound. In keeping with my present dark mood I set the scene before dawn in a rundown city area.  And here is what happened!

He sank down in the seat of his Chevrolet and waited for the morning light. He had spent most of the night in the bar up the street and only left because he felt uncomfortably close to an altercation with the stranger in the corner booth. Why had the man approached him as he was leaving? What did he want?

His car was strewn with empty Budweiser bottles and the smell of spilled beer and cigarettes mixed with the sharp odor of gasoline. The car wouldn’t start. He had flooded the feeble carburetor.

And suddenly his mind was flooded with fear as he saw the door of the bar swing open and the man burst through it and head down the sidewalk in his direction. The street was silent except for the sound of his purposeful walk.

“I need some help” he thought. But there was no one near and the hulking shadow under the street light continued in his direction.

“I am lost” he whispered to himself and he once again checked all the locks on the doors. But the sudden loud report of glass cracking into hundreds of tiny islands desperately hanging together came a second later.

“I should get out of the car” he said and suddenly rage filled him like a spark that threatened to turn the interior of the fume filled vehicle into a ball of flame.

He reached across his body with his violently shaking hand and released the lock. And with his left hand he pulled up on the handle. His feet hit the pavement and his weary frame suddenly weary no more stood up to meet his assailant.

He picked up the rock embedded in his windshield and thought about heaving it in the direction from which it had arrived. But a rock is a feeble weapon when pitted against a rather large handgun.

And this he could see as it was raised in his direction.

“What have I done?” he thought as light began to color the lonely street of this old and often violent city. “Why did I come here ?” and the answer came not in words but in the flash of the gun and a loud sound that somehow was all mixed up with a brief moment of pain as the street, his car and the shadowy figure now just a few feet away all exploded.

And suddenly he was looking down on a man lying in the street next to a green 1975 Chevrolet while another man turned and ran down the sidewalk.

He turned and looked in a window across the street because he heard a baby crying. And he suddenly knew that the small child was hungry and afraid and wanted his mother. Because he dreamed of ghosts in the night.

The child’s dream was disturbed as the light crept through the tattered shade of his bedroom window and he wanted to be held by his mother who was just coming out of the bar across the street.

She screamed as she saw the body of her friend lying on the pavement over a dark stream moving towards the gutter and the parked Chevrolet.

And slowly lights began to come on up and down the street as residents held their heads and turned their weary bodies towards a familiar sound and the beginning of another day.

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You can start something like this and really not know where it is going for awhile. Just put yourself in the scene as an invisible  bystander or one of the characters.   Imagine somehow you dropped out of the sky and there is this unfortunate man sitting in his car.   What is he thinking?  What is going to happen?

I probably took this exercise somewhat far afield but no one is going to grade this thing.  We are not in school anymore.  Please let us not bring our teachers home with us!

The boxing analogy was working pretty well as American Idol had it’s biggest night of the year. This is what it’s all about and why we have been patiently listening to “pitchy” notes and half baked versions of songs we have always loved. And things were going well until the introductions when David Cook announced that it wasn’t a competition for him. He was going to have “fun”.

If losing is fun I guess he must have had a great time last night. In any case he started with I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Lookin For. And it was a solid if predictable performance. His second song was something written for the program called Dream Big. And I am sure the writers and their families were excited about his performance of it.

And his final performance was The World I Know. This was his choice and his voice was in great shape but he should have sung Billy jean again. Perhaps he would not have had enough “fun” performing the same song twice.

If he was competing he would have done it. He would have stirred the soul of the audience by singing it even better than he sang it the first time. Perhaps that would have solved the problem of singing the same song twice.

Because there is always room for improvement on this show. But he didn’t and so he lost his best chance to win the competition. And I’m not sure he even had much fun because he cried after finishing his last performance. Why did he cry? Possibly because he threw the fight. It must hurt terribly to not show everybody what you can really do.

Archy on the other hand came out to win. He wants to win. You can tell. He sang Don’t Let The sun Go Down On Me for his first number. And the nerves were evident but then he picked it up a notch and really got into it. He goes somewhere when he sings. We just hope he will keep his eyes open so that he doesn’t fall off the stage.

For his second song he did something called In This Moment. Once again we had a song created for the event and he pretty much did the same thing that he did for the first number. Except the nerves were gone. Same genre, same emotions. And the same little girls screaming at him from the front of the stage.

And for his third song David once again sang Imagine. And while he was singing I was imagining him challenging himself in the way David Cook did earlier. David C noted that he had never performed his third song before.

But Archie did a nice job. He is totally committed to that song and he can claim the prize for being the very best vocalist of the evening. It was absolutely beautiful.

But I was vaguely disappointed by the whole thing. I would have liked either of them to sing something like Billy Jean. I would have liked to see a star born right there on the stage. And I don’t think it’s ever going to happen on this show. Because a real genius is not going to give it up. He or she might tease us a little bit during the season with flashes of brilliance but then will clam up during the finale and avoid the trap.

Archy wins tonight. He will be happy. David Cook will be happy to go off and explore on his own. But he still has to deal with the tour and singing the same songs every night. Bummer. He better have his pirate joke working really well.

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David Cook

Brilliant

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Billy Jean

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Update: So David Cook is the new American Idol! And the show tonight was inspirational in a way that last night’s show was not. I am happy that America got it right in spite of the fact that Mr. Cook played a little hide and seek last night. He certainly had Simon fooled. Apologies all around!

David did show flashes of genius during the season. And maybe he DID want to win. He certainly seemed very happy after he found out about it. Maybe he simply didn’t want to see Archie disappointed. This is one very intelligent, talented and caring person.

And maybe American Idol has learned a little bit about letting these young people go out and explore their talents in ways that make sense to them. The well documented dust up between the first winner, Kelly Clarkson, and Clive Davis may have led to some discussions in that regard. And allowing Fantasia to do her thing last week certainly gives credence to this notion.

All I know for sure is that I am very happy David C won. Archie is a nice kid and he has a bright future but he is not ready for New York, New York. He needs to finish high school in a way that Jordin Sparks did not. And speaking of Ms. Sparks it certainly was wonderful to see her back after the doctor imposed hiatus. She looks and sounds great. And so does Carrie Underwood.

The show has been over for about ninety minutes and here is what it says in Wikipedia about all of this.

The program seeks to discover the best singer in the country through a series of nationwide auditions. The outcomes of the later stages of this competition are determined by public voting by phone. The format features three judges who give critiques of the contestants’ performances in order to facilitate the voting: record producer Randy Jackson; pop singer and choreographer Paula Abdul; and music executive Simon Cowell. The show is hosted by former children’s game show emcee and television personality Ryan Seacrest; comedian Brian Dunkleman cohosted with Seacrest in season one. The American Idol band is led by Rickey Minor. The show usually airs on Tuesday and Wednesday nights in the US and Thursday and Friday nights in the UK (two days after the US airing). In its seven seasons, its winners have been Kelly Clarkson, Ruben Studdard, Fantasia Barrino, Carrie Underwood, Taylor Hicks, Jordin Sparks and David Cook. Hicks was the oldest winner at 29, Sparks the youngest at just 17.

Congratulations David Cook. It didn’t take someone long to add your name. And congratulations American Idol on a great show. You are showcasing our young people and their talent in a very positive way.

And the final shot of the show could not have been any better if it was scripted. David Cook’s brother looking into the camera a proud and happy guy forgetting for a moment his fight with cancer.

“That’s my brother!”

Perfect.

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Beth and I had not been to the botanical gardens here in Richmond this spring so we went there this afternoon for a few hours. The weather is just about perfect today. It is warm and there is a very nice cooling breeze. The humidity is very low and our little corner of the world seems to be at peace.

Having this time together with her in such a beautiful spot is my idea of heaven on earth. And so we wandered down the paths while we smelled the wonderful smells and viewed the colorful plants.

Here is one of the photos I took as we went inside where they grow many of the flowers needing protection. They had the doors open today because it was so nice outside.

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While you are destroying your mind watching the worthless, brain-rotting drivel on TV, we on the Internet are exchanging, freely and openly, the most uninhibited, intimate and, yes, shocking details about our config.sys settings. ~Dave Barry

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There are really not enough simple explanations happening in cyberspace for someone who wants to blog but has no background that would be helpful in this regard.

In other words “I’M AN IDIOT !!” (and this is why “Idiots guides” proliferate).

Perhaps it would be helpful if I broke down some of the knowledge I have gained in this area. Because it is easy for me to explain things in simple language and not leave out any important little details. I need those details too!

THIS is what sinks ships. Those tiny little bits of information that are just so OBVIOUS to the knowledgeable may sometimes be left out. And that can leave us floating on a raft. Lost, lost, lost and waving good-bye to our new love as he sinks out of sight. Sorry Leonardo but you should have climbed up there with your true love. Being a gentleman will only get you so far.

But perhaps you were too tired after your adventure in the car.

So here is how I installed NextGen Gallery into my Wordpress blog from the word GO!

First we are going to upload some files.

I have a couple of tools for doing this. And the first one will allow us to bring the second one on board. So let’s begin with the first one. It is called Total Commander 7.03

Here is a download location

http://www.totalcmd.net/plugring/totalcmd.html

Follow the directions and open the software package.

This is shareware and in order to use it you have to play a little game. It will give you a number and you will have to click on the same number in order to get in. It’s very simple. It’s a confidence booster really.

Each time you want to use this program all you have to do is hit Control-F and it will spring into action.

A window opens. It says Connect to ftp server on top. And on the right is a button to click that says Connect. But before you can connect you have to set up a New Connection. New Connection is the second box.

So click on New connection. This brings up another window called FTP:connection details. We only need to worry about a few of the boxes here (repeat this exercise for each of your blogs).

The first box is entitled Session. Put the name of your blog in here.

The second box is entitled Host Name (Port). Put ftp.davidnotes.com in there. LOL. Actually you need to put the name of Your Domain in there. Sometimes it is written ftp.yourdomain.com but I used to find that to be slightly confusing. If you do too then we are maybe from the same planet.

The next box should have Anonymous login etc in it already.

Next is User name. Do you know your user name? Do you have as many of these per chance as I do? Well this one is the one you use to get into your Cpanel. It’s the one that came with your domain. If you didn’t write it down I can’t help you. Try looking in your admin panel/settings/writing. Look down there under Post via e-mail. There is a Login Name. That could be it! Or you may need to email your hosting company and have them help you.

And then we have the inevitable Password. You have many of these floating around too no doubt. This one is also associated with your cpanel. Same deal as the username. It could be down there with the Login Name.

In any case it pays to write things down.

But even more important than this it pays to write them all down in the same small notebook and then.. . . . .

DON’T LOSE THE NOTEBOOK! Always know where it is so you can find it at a moment’s notice.

And that concludes our first lesson boys and girls. We will move on in a day or two. But we don’t want to overtax ourselves with this stuff. It’s “Keep It Simple Sweetheart” all the way! And for now. . .

As Paul Harvey used to say

Bye Bye!