or whatever.THE MODERN HIDALGO: Entry_065.
Written: Thursday. November 21, 2019.
I’ve been writing these journal entries in the morning. Sort of an experiment I’m trying to do. Trying to mix things up, to see if something works; if it changes things as to the discipline of being able to put out an entry as often as I did before.
I used to allot six days of journal writing per week. Now that I have “The Omnivault”, I only have a five-day slot for the journal entries. Tomorrow is supposedly the day of the week where I work on another chapter of “The Omnivault”. The last chapter I did, it wasn’t that good. It felt like a filler episode, or something like that. It felt mundane, felt like nothing really happened that much in the story. But I guess it’s the little moments that make the story, and not the action-scenes, the expositions, the monologues, or whatever.
I don’t really have anything to say yet for today, since it hasn’t really started yet. I guess that’s what’s gonna happen when you write a journal entry in the morning. I dunno. I haven’t thought this through.
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Yesterday…I did nothing. Or I ended up doing nothing. I was supposed to go to school today to pay off some tuition debt that we haven’t paid yet. But I fell asleep for like 2 and a half hours in the afternoon. So there’s that. The day was lost. I was gonna go out still, in order to go to Fishermall. Cause the people at the Market Market branch of Chapters & Pages told us that there was still a branch in Fishermall, only that it moved places. So I was planning to go there and check it out, but my mom told me to just go tomorrow, after we’ve settled paying the tuition situation.
So yeah, stayed at home. I tried spending my time editing this 1-minute video of a sort of fast-cut of the first “Iron-Man” movie. Ended up trashing that idea, cause I failed to squish the movie into a minute. It was a trial-and-error thing. I tried, failed, wouldn’t try to attempt that again for quite a while.
Or maybe just do a different approach to it. I tried jamming the whole movie into one minute…of course it’s not gonna work. I guess I need to focus on one key element of the movie.
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What else…I changed a few things on my Youtube channel. I changed my profile icon. Changed the cover photo. Changed some thumbnails.
My dad asked for my help in changing the look of his channel. So I complied with helping him change stuff on his channel, since if I didn’t, he’d just ask me again at a later time, until I finally pull through. So, end the stress as early as possible, as they say.
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Still been reading 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea by Jules Verne. It really reads like the Moby Dick novel. I’m finding it hard to enjoy this kind of story. But I got the book for 39 pesos. What am I gonna lose?
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So it’s night time right now. I took a pause on this journal entry for a bit in order for the day to ensue.
I was able to go to Fishermall awhile ago. And now, I’ve got two new books to add to my collection. I also dug myself a hole, since the two books that I bought were both Conan novels.
If you’re a frequent reader of this journal, then you should know that once I start something (mainly if we’re talking about books here), like buying a book from a franchise, then the domino effect starts from there.
I am bound to look for the other Conan books out there, that are hiding from me in every second-hand bookstore in Metro Manila.
This isn’t even something I set out to do today, but I guess there’s no fate but what we make. I feel like, at some point, this was bound to happen. Cause I’ve recently finished buying all of the Wheel of Time books, which took a year or so in order to finish. And Robert Jordan, the writer of Wheel of Time, wrote some Conan books back in the day. So that’s cool. That’s some trivia for you youngsters out there.
What am I saying? I’m only 21.
Anyway, going back to Conan. I don’t see a lot of Conan books out there. Not even comic books. I did find a Conan pocket book like a month ago, but it was a “choose your own adventure” type of story, so I put it down. Maybe I’ll stumble upon it in the future. Who knows?
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You know, I’ve been doing this a lot lately. Going to second-hand bookstores, hoping to find good old books to read. And if you’re planning on doing that, here are some things I’d recommend that you keep in mind:
- Don’t go to the same bookstore within the same week — they don’t change up the arrangements that often, so you’d just end up browsing through the same books.
- Never buy a book from an author, if his/her books take up at least half or even the whole square of a bookshelf — authors like Robert Ludlum, Dean Koontz, James Patterson, Terry Goodkind, etc. are in every second-hand bookstore. That in itself should mean something to readers. Their books are probably hard to read, not your cup of tea, or just plain boring and wont give you anything in return.
- If you’re planning to buy a second-hand book, think about how it will benefit you — Will the book improve your writing skills? Are the ideas within the story worth examining? Those kinds of questions. Be a smart reader. Don’t be like me. I’ve bought a lot of books that were a waste of time.
- Try reading a whole chapter from the books that you want to buy — sometimes, people just read what’s in the back of the cover. Don’t do that. I do that sometimes, and I end up regretting the decision of buying the book. If you found an interesting looking book, open it up, and start reading it. If it reads easily (meaning, if the writing style is easy to read), then that’s a good book. If you’re opening your phone’s dictionary app whilst reading that book, then you’re gonna have a bad time. Most second-hand books have an old-style of writing. Which means, authors from the past tended to use more smart sounding words. This isn’t really a bad thing, it’s just that it tends to get annoying, especially if you’re planning to just buy second-hand books all your life.
Those are my thoughts for the day.
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