Whew, talk about a major update.

The pieces that I have posted today belong to my first E-Book collection of poetry and photography, entitled 'Mana Theater'. This compilation was actually created in order to satisfy the 'Culminating Project' requirement for graduation here at Hanover High, a state-wide mandatory project that asks students to do a lot of research on a self-selected topic (one of extra-curricular nature), to write a series of papers concerning that topic, and then to expel tangible proof of learning in the form of a final product to be evaluated by a panel of teachers on the basis of the application, analysis, and synthesis of the information. As a result, projects tend to be very involved, from the hosting of sport-related athletic camps to programming a computer application to building a guitar from scratch (as I learned too late, however, the higher-ups tend to be very liberal concerning topic selection--I believe that somebody once baked a cake.)

My proposal was to play photographer and amass a number of photographs, and to write poetry inpired by or related to those pictures. The key to this proposal's acceptance, of course, was that I had never before taken a picture in my life, and thus, that is where that whole learning thing would come into play. Naturally, however, I waited until the last possible minute to begin the photography phase of the project (read: twenty-four hours prior to said presentation and evaluation.) As a result, I kindly request that you not let the crappiness of those photos taint your enjoyment of what I pumped all of my time and effort into--the written material. (Despite how terrible the photos are, however, I am actively searching for somebody out there who will be willing to host a small website for me so that I can allow people to download my actual final product for the Culminating Project, the formal .PDF E-Book version of the collection.)

As an aside: Yes, I won that bet with my brother. My picture was finally retired at hotornot.com after 463 votes with an average score of 9.9.

w00t.