A Review of my Blog...

I have always said that I am going to be a writer when I grow up, albeit the lack of comma usage.  These days it is getting stronger that I feel I need to act on it instead of just blabbering about it.  So, I sent a link of my blog to my friend's hubs who is a published print and online writer. He also has more of that goey stuff in between his ears that I was able to pick up some business principles from him, that's for another post. I do appreciate an objective review of my work, otherwise I will just be trudging ahead without any sense at all.  Anyway, expect a rewrite of the reviwed post :). This is what he had to say about my writing:

Thanks for sharing your blog with me. I like it; your thoughts are hard hitting, your prose bebop-like in its rhythm. I do have some suggestions, however, based on the posts I read:

1. Your writing is sometimes a little opaque; it’s hard to know what you’re talking about. Take your Sep 12, 2009 @ 2:02 AM post as an example. I think this is a story about your little brother’s infidelity, but I’m not completely sure. Because I am not anchored in some concrete details (for example, who are the “he” and “she” mentioned in the piece), the abstract thoughts (e.g., “how can rules be laid down and be disregarded, irreverently neglected to follow a darker life?”) lose some of their power. Concrete details make writing come alive. Your Feb 14, 2009 post about the Mexican cab driver is an example of a good mix of concrete details and abstract thoughts.


2. I think your desire to remain anonymous hampers you a bit. For example, in the Aug 24, 2009 post, you tell us about the new café in the ground floor of the building in which you work. However, we can’t try the café or even imagine it because you don’t give us the name. You say that this café is part of a chain, but we don’t know what chain. The omission actually weakens your point about chains taking over in hard economic times. Your Sep 12, 2009 post is another example. You friend was “a witness to a failed test. A test of ruined relationships, battered emotions, her faith in God is intact …”  I don’t know what you mean by “a failed test.” In reading your blog, I feel that I am being teased. Behind the innuendo and missing details, there is a thoughtful and eloquent writer who is all but hidden, afraid to give important details of the lives of herself or those around her.


3. Beware of mixing metaphors: in the same Sep 12, 2009 piece, you begin with “Life is so complex that past and present collide making the future blurry, filled with uncertainty.” “Blurry” implies the future is a picture, but “filled with uncertainty” implies the future is a container, or a room. It would be better to choose one image and stick with it, as in “the past and present collide, covering the future with the dust of uncertainty and clouding one’s vision of it.”

As a reader, I would be interested in seeing how you connect the events the we share in common (like items from the news) to your ideas about life. That gives me a connection with you that I don’t get otherwise.

Keep up the good work. Hope this helps.

Thank you, indeed.

High Tea..

 

Tea, not just the beverage can be referred to as a meal -- dinner in England or an afternoon snack in the US. High tea is a fancier manner of having an afternoon tea with petite fours, tea sandwiches, and all that fancy goodness.  When I was growing up, drinking tea was not really a part of our culture/family, tea was said to provide relief for upset stomach and is said to be good for the complexion.  My mom had these fancy tea cups that you can't hold the handle without your pinky poised up. 

So delicate that it seems more of a ritual than actually appeasing hunger.  Found these old pictures from a High Tea that I went to in Rockridge, can't even remember the place, you will notice that the pictures were not as rich as the newer pictures.  But going back to the high tea, it is actually a good social activity, it somehow forces one to be demure and gentle.

 The picture below was taken from the Palace Hotel in San Francisco, a birthday celebration.  The place is grand with ornate decors, but they don't seem to have high teas anymore.  The petite fours are soo good, I remember it was a pre fixe deal.  A certain amount for limitless tea and an assortment of pastries and tea sandwiches, yum. 

Looks like this tradition is dying, with the present way of life being so busy, there doesn't seem to have time for events like this. Before we forget how it is, I had to have my own version, as I have a little bit of a collection of different tea pots-mostly Asian inspired.  I got the tea sandwiches from Whole Foods--egg and cucumber. Not so great, it was dry, such that the crumbled eggs were not even bound together.  I did love setting this up, this was for someone at work, but I brought in my stuff. It is actually a fun activity.  You can even make your own tea sandwiches and pettite fours. Perfect in this stormy, wet weather.