Brother Beldar's Digital Devival

"Today I did something strange.
I started to write.
There can be no purpose in this.
Still, I am writing."
(Neil Gaiman, from "Signal to Noise")

LJ IDOL PARTICIPANT
See therealljidol for details.
Season Three: January-June 2007, 19 weeks, finished in 11th place.
Season Four: November 2007-February 2008, 14 weeks, finished in 58th place (out of over 150 contestants).
Season Five: September-December 2008 (195 contestants, withdrew on Week 14 with 80 contestants left)
Contributor to book "Idol Musings" (three entries)
Season Six: Observer, occasional "home game" player and Week 19 Gatekeeper
Season Seven: Home Gamer, entered in Second Chance Idol, promoted out of SCI Week 3 to join the main LJ Idol in Week 12 (with approximately 100 contestants left), finished in Week 24 in the top 33.
Contributor to book "Idol Meanderings" (three entries)
Season Eight: Competed using the beldarzfixon account. October 2011-July 2012, 34 weeks, finished 14th out of hundreds of participants.
LJ Idol: Exhibit A: Started January 2013 in limited-entry "mini-season" (using beldarzfixon account). Eliminated end of Week 9, finishing in 17th place.
Season Nine: Competed again with beldarzfixon account, 23 weeks, March-October 2014.
Season Ten: Entered in Second-Chance Idol, and participated in main competition (with beldarzfixon), 2017

Note to newcomers: Feel free to look around, most posts are public. If you friend me it's highly likely I'll friend you back. If I friended you first, I found you or your journal interesting, that's all. You don't have to friend me back, but are less likely to be dropped if you do (If you do want me to drop you, just let me know).
At this point my filters are geographic. Most friends get most posts, but if you wish to be included in my Arkansas or Indiana filters, tell me.

For my "day job" -- I'm in the same career field as Clark Kent and Peter Parker: I worked at a newspaper. Though a member of the "evil media" I have a more noble outlook on it, reflected in this quote I found:

"I record history every day. Everything I do... it's all part of history, no matter how small or how large."
-- Richard Drew, Associated Press photographer

On the other hand...

"Don't tell Mom I'm a journalist, she thinks I'm a piano-player at a whorehouse."
-- Button I had made once, inspired by that quote from a fellow journo

For a more complete picture of the day-to-day life of Beldar, you could also friend my significant other, the lovely the_dark_snack, an interesting character in her own right. Note this is completely optional, as Snack has a strong personality and is not for everyone.

My other online haunts:
I often check and post to Facebook (account is "jbelden").
I also have a Facebook "fan" page for my work as writer and journalist, but I'm more active with my blog Plays With John & Wendy (its Facebook page) which mainly hosts the Indy-area live theatre reviews by me and the_dark_snack.
I'm @indybeldar on Twitter, but I often go days or weeks between tweets.
I'm also "Indybeldar" on Ello.
I never go to the MySpace page anymore.
My cancer survivor's blog has been on indefinite hiatus; I'll update this when I start posting there again.

From 2001 to 2006, I was a contributor to murnkay's e-zine TwoHeadedCat.com, which has since been taken down for good due to software issues. I also wrote for a while for The Footnote(.net), but that site is also gone. I've got copies of all my writings for those sites, and am planning on publishing or reposting them sometime in the near future (which knowing me, could be years). Watch for updates.

Meanwhile, back on LJ, I have a place for fiction, poetry, and such at beldarzfixon. Feel free to consider adding. It is also where I have been keeping my LJ Idol entries.

(There is also a secret "therapy journal" with which I keep a very limited restricted friendslist.)


"Unless you are made of stone, this thing called LJ changes you."
-- popfiend

This journal participates in Drama Free Thursdays.

“Before I open my mouth, I ask myself three things: Does this need to be said? Does this need to be said by me? Does this need to be said by me now?”
-- Craig Ferguson

"A writer's job is to tell the truth"
-- Andy Rooney

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

WE ARE ALL SURVIVORS

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

"I don't want to survive, I want to LIVE!"
-- Captain of the Axiom, "Wall-E"

"Embrace the mystery of all you can be."
-- Michael W. Smith

"You were sick, but now you are well again.
And there's work to be done!"
-- Kilgore Trout

"There's something you don't see every day,
Unless, of course, you're us."
-- Xander, "Buffy the Vampire Slayer"

lest we forget:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

"You can't make up anything anymore. The world itself is a satire. All you're doing is recording it."
-- Art Buchwald

"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we.
They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people,
and neither do we."
-- George W. Bush

"Oh, goody. My dog found the chainsaw."
-- Lilo

Comfort the disturbed -- Disturb the comfortable

"Don't ask me what I think of you,
I might not give the answer that you want me to."
-- Fleetwood Mac, "Oh Well"

"Welcome to the collapse of civilization. Have a beer."
-- Goats

"I drank what?"
-- Socrates

"Humans are a self-thinning herd."
-- Lucky Lemur

"Your brain is not your friend."
-- Phil van Hest

"Don't try this at home, kids,
Go to your neighbor's house and try it!"
-- Krembo, Blue Monkey Sideshow

"There ain't no law that says how high you got to let your freak flag fly."
-- Quincy Tinkle

"You gotta floop to be rev, and ya gotta be rev to floop!"
-- Doozer saying

"I am here to kick ass and chew bubblegum,
and I am all out of bubblegum."
-- Rowdy Roddy Piper, "They Live"

"Get crazy with the cheez whiz!"
-- Beck

"What if evil attacks, and my mouth is full of tangy apricot filling?"
-- Mark Harvey Levine, "Cabfare for the Common Man: Superhero"

"Kids should meddle, dogs are sweet, life is groovy, and if something scares you, you should confront it."
-- Hank Stuever, Washington Post, on the appeal of "Scooby Doo"

"If it is to be
It is up to me"
-- Chumbawamba

But the fruit of the Spirit is
LOVE, JOY, PEACE, LONGSUFFERING, GENTLENESS, GOODNESS, FAITH, MEEKNESS, TEMPERANCE:
Against such there is no law.
-- Galatians 5:22-23

rEALITY iS wHAT yOU mAKE iT
-- Title of my column at Footnote.net

There are no contradictions.
When you find one, check your premises.
You will find that one of them is wrong.
-- Ayn Rand, from "Atlas Shrugged"

"Somewhere between anticipation and nostalgia we should have been happy."
-- Too Much Coffee Man

Pilate answered, What I have written I have written.
-- John 19:22

And those who came at first to scoff, remained behind to pray...
-- Alan Parsons Project, "Ammonia Avenue"

"You lived what anybody gets... You got a lifetime."
-- Death, from Sandman: "The People Who Remember Atlantis...," by Neil Gaiman

Influences (aside from the small still voice of a higher power): Dad, B.M. Bower, Robert Heinlein, Stephen King, Alan Moore, Bill Hicks, Dave Barry, Neil Peart, Jim Beam.