I'm starting my art history class tonight on the "History of Contemporary Art". It's an in depth look at art after 1940. You know, all the really, really modern stuff.

I took a class from this professor before and he's very good, so I'm looking forward to being in his class again.

He's an artist as well as an art historian, which I think makes his teaching so much better because he's creating art in his life as well as studying it. He's not some frustrated wanna be artist teaching art, because he's a failure as an artist. He's a professional artist, who has shows, teaches painting class as well as the history of art.

The best yoga class I ever took was from a professional ex-ballet dancer, who also still taught dance classes. The guy knew everything about the body and how it worked and about how not to injure yourself. The man has to use his body professionally outside of teaching yoga, and he was just so knowledgable. I mean, I think you would have to be, to teach and as well as dance professionally.

He wasn't like some part time yoga instructor. The guy used his body 5-7 days a week, and not just for a year or two but for most of his life. If you're getting paid to dance and teach dance, I would think you know a few things about the body and how to get it to work.

I saw the movie Winged Migration over the weekend. It's a documentary about birds migrating all over the world.

It was so beautiful, because it just showed birds doing their migration thing. I love birdies!

The movie took four years to film, and it made you wonder how the film makers got that close to the birds. At one point, all you see are the birds flying in their 'v' formation and the only sounds you hear are of their wings flapping. This movie would be great to see in an IMAX theatre, because the camera is so close to the birds you can see their feathers moving and I got a sense of how tiring it must be for the birds to fly such long distances. It was so unbelievable! Click on the site and watch the trailer, and you'll see what I mean.

The movie does make you think about how the changes in the weather and the degradation of the environment may be affecting the migration of the birdies.

My aunt and uncle had a memorial service for my grandmother at the catholic church they attend in Alameda. There were members of my family there that I don't see very often, which was nice.

I get there early, and my aunt tells me I missed Rich Gannon, the Oakland Raiders quarterback. Gannon attends their church with his wife regularly, and even hangs out to talk to the parishioners afterwards. What a scream! They say he's a really, really nice person. Gannon goes to church there when it's football season, but lives in some other state the rest of the time.

Her sister said Gannon's two kids attend some catholic school there. The San Francisco Bay Area is such a small world.

Afterwards, there was a barbeque at the priest's house, the rectory, which is right next to the church. Their priest seems like a really nice guy, and my aunt and uncle and their friends hang out with him and play cards (rummy) sometimes.

Father Fernando even gave me directions on how to get to my friend's house in Oakland, whom I was visiting afterwards. He drew a map and everything, which I thought was very sweet.

Some nun was also there that everyone knew, only she wasn't dressed in a nun outfit. I guess they don't have to do that anymore. She lives in her own house near the church.

The priest had a really nice house, and there was a Mercedes in the garage, which I'm assuming was his car. My aunt and uncle say their priest is really cool, and very open minded. I had a fun time, and it was nice to see family that I don't see very often.

I took a writing seminar today from this woman named Barbara Rose Booker. She was very good, and I got so much out of what she said.

Afterwards, I went to Starfreaks and wrote out 9 pages of outline and notes for my novel "Following in the Dark". I started it in 2001 with Nanowrimo, but then I couldn't finish it because I didn't know how to outline the novel. I think I learned that today.

I wrote a preliminary outline, and a structure which might be a little too complicated, but at least it's down on paper.

Most of my novel notes were trying to figure out what story to tell. Here's the new log line for my novel that I created in class today.

A religious woman with stigmata fantasies is trapped in a s&m relationship with her boyfried. She meets a mysterious itinerant preacher who holds the key to her freedom.

I think I'm trying to tell two stories. The first story is about an ex-catholic woman, who wanted to be a nun, wanted stigmata, some proof of God's love and existence. When none came, she gave up on God and years later finds herself in a physically abusive relationship with her current boyfriend.

Somehow in her mind, sex, religious pasion, and love all got fused together, making an s&m driven relationship not only normal but in a way very desirable. But lately the s&m stuff has become more violent, more dangerous, more risky.

I want to show the woman's descent into the dark side, like why would someone even want to be a sexual relationship where alot of pain was involved.

This is a subject that has always fascinated me, being very pain-phobic myself. I hate physical pain of any sort, but I know from experience, given the right circumstances, sometimes pain can be exciting, even incredibly desirable. I've always wanted to explore in a fictional character, when the line between pain and pleasure gets crossed to where it's the only thing that will satisfy a person.

But I also want to write about how you get out of that mode, that darkness, because I don't think being in a relationship where sexual pain is the only thing that satisfies you is all that healthy. I don't know. Maybe it is for some people, but for my fictional character, the s&m thing is not good.

So the second half of the book is how she gets out of the s&m relationship she's in. I wanted her to meet someone who shows her the light. I sort of thought I wanted her to meet Jesus, but I know that's hokey. I like it, but it's just a bit too much for people and really not that realistic.

So I think I want her to meet a mysterious itinerant preacher who untangles her thinking. But then I decided to add a Stephen King twist to my story, and make him supernatural in some way. And then I even decided I wanted a funky happy ending, and I mapped that out too.

My ending might be a little too neat and pat, but I think I can make it work.

So I'm writing out my notes about what I think about my new novel structure and this is what came out, "I don't think anyone is going to want to read this or publish it, but I don't care because I really like the story and want to finish it."

I think it's a wild story. I love the mysterious itinerant preacher, who may or not be Jesus in disguise. It's like the total religious fantasy I've had for years, meeting Jesus for real, and which later translated into wanting marrying someone jewish like Jesus, and which is currently wanting to marry a Jesus follower who helps me to further my relationship with God.

I also wrote to myself, "what if the only way I can sell this book is to have it be a bible banger type christian book?" That would freak me out, because I'm so not a bible banger, but if a christian publisher wants to publish it and pay me money, I'd take it.

But I'm also thinking, maybe this is the kind of book I write just to write, and never sell. This book is for me, just for my own pleasure and enjoyment, my story, no one else's, just to have, just because I like it and I don't care if everyone think it's horrid, it's mine, my creation, my fun crazy novel.