Pies are cool.

Update on music on my Xoom. I downloaded the MixZing player. This allowed me to select where my music folder is and only plays music from that folder. It also let’s me choose songs by album or artist, build playlists, all the things the other player did, but were having a problem with. I deleted all the stray music and the Google music player still doesn’t know where my music is and winamp wants to put up to 5 versions of each song in the master playlist. So my music problem, for the time being, has Ben corrected.

Mike Plested and I have started plotting Jack Kane II and it’s going great so far. Once we get this plotting done I’ll begin the edits on the first novel in earnest so we can get it ready for beta readers and submission.

Went to my favorite daughter’s volleyball practice earlier today. They looked good. They have practice again tomorrow. Even though they lost all their games yesterday they were all in good spirits. The coach had them doing some interesting drills and exercises. Some made them laugh as they were doing them so it was a good thing.

I normally do these posts in one sitting. Today has been an up and down day. I’ve managed to get about a paragraph out and I’m called off to do something else. Sometimes life is like that.

Our latest was off to get a rental car because sputtery truck won’t be ready until Tuesday. Now that we have the rental car, we’re off to Sees Candies to get a gift for someone. If it’s not one thing, it’s another.

Tomorrow I’ll be at an onsite training. I’ll post about that later. Once we get back from Sees, it’s writing time.

Until Tomorrow!

WOO WOO!

Why?

Went to bed a little late last night and got up at 4:30am so we could drive an hour North to go to my favorite daughter’s volleyball tournament. They lost all their games again, but overall their performance was far better and their attitudes were also much better as well. We stopped, at a big meal and everyone fell asleep on the drive home. Well, almost everyone. I managed to stay awake until I got home and then I took a nap.

Currently watching Fashion Police with the wife, my favorite daughter, and one of the kid’s friends. You either love or hate Joan Rivers and I have always loved her. There are few reality type shows that I watch, but her new show ( the name escapes me at the moment and I’m too tired to Google it) is also quite funny. The only other one that I really like is Gold Rush, but I’m getting into Storage Wars and Shipping Wars for different reasons. Shipping Wars is giving me some great ideas for V&A Shipping II.

Sputtery Truck should be ready on Tuesday. After talking with the gentleman who’ll be replacing the engine I’m feeling much more confident that it’ll be actually running on Tuesday. He’s seen my problem before with other vehicles with the same engine. I think it’ll be money well spent.

Tomorrow I’ll be assembling Lance Encounter and Don’t Use the Phone and putting those up on smashwords.com for free. Very excited to see what people think of both stories and the covers. Dan dan the Art Man did an incredible job with both. I’ve been abusing him a lot lately and he has far outperformed my expectations.

Speaking of tomorrow. I just woke up from a nap and I’m ready to go back to bed . We may end up playing some catch phrase first. We’ll see how it goes.

Until tomorrow!

Woo Woo!

Something I like to do to get a different perspective on a given room is to sit somewhere I don’t normally sit. Sure I usually sit on the couch or in the corner chair, but what if I sit on the patio chair and look in through the window? Things look quite different sitting on the outside looking in.

Or perhaps I’ll sit in each of the six dining room chairs in the morning. Which chairs give me the best view of the room. Which have the sun shining in my eyes. Which gives me the best view to look outside. How would a conversation flow with people sitting in the different chairs? Would one person be distracted by a picture or mirror behind the person they are talking to while that person is squinting from the sunlight shining just over the wall in the back yard?

Move yourself around and imagine your characters having their conversation. Perhaps you need some props on the table to visualize what your characters are seeing as they converse. Most people don’t just sit and stare at one another during a conversation. What are they doing in between sentences or while the other person is talking? These actions will allow you to cut down on the number of he said, she said and allow you to interject action to help move the conversation along.

What about other rooms in your house? Perhaps you have a low dresser that you lean against while you talk. Or would your character be more comfortable with his arms crossed leaning in the doorway or cross legged sitting on the edge of the bed. Sitting on the floor. Again, what do you see that might distract your character during a conversation? What might they pick up and look at as they conversation is flowing. Where are the windows? What do you smell in the room? Where would someone else sit?

Move yourself to the back yard if you have one. What plants are there? Are they still living? In desperate need of water or trimming? I’m not here to judge. Trust me I’ve got the brown Thumb of doom. But again take some time to look around to see where you have to sit or stand or what might be a conversation piece.

Next look and see how things are laid out on a given room or the backyard. How might your character arrange the room differently? How s the flow of the room and what looks out of place and what looks too organized? Where are the piles of stuff and what is in those piles. Would your character be embarrassed to have company or are they such a neat freak they’re following guests around picking up after them while smiling and holding a conversation?

Take some time to sit somewhere new. Perhaps you need to move a chair to get a look at a room from a different angle but take to get a fresh view on an old room. You may just surprise yourself.

Until next time

Woo woo,

I haven’t been sleeping well. I think it’s stress, but it’s hard to know for sure.

My major project at work has gone through testing. I’m now working on requirements for another project while the previous goes through User Acceptance Testing. The truck is about to get a new engine which means I’ll have a vehicle soon. It’s been tough without one. The money we’re spending will be difficult in the short term, but in the long term I think we’re making the right choice.

I was talking with my friend last night. It’s kind of funny. I’ve only ever bought two new cars. The first was when I was in the Navy. I got ripped off and didn’t fully understand that until after I had signed the contract. That one eventually died. The second the wife and I got when my favorite daughter was born. That one ran great, but we eventually needed something bigger and sold it to buy the Tahoe.

All in all I’ve had good luck with vehicles. It’s easy to allow a bad event such as what I’m going through now overshadow all the repair-free years. I haven’t had a car payment in a very long time so it’s not like I’ve been putting money into the vehicle(s) year after year other than standard maintenance. My hope is this repair will get me over the next year without anything else. As far as I know, I’ve done everything else that would cost a large sum of money.

Once I have the truck back I think I’ll sleep better knowing that when I need it, it’ll be there. I just need to relax. Yeah, that’s it. relax.

Had another decent writing day yesterday. I was going to post weekly updates as to my progress. What I’ll do on my February 1st Daily Update is post my word count for January and show where I am and where I should be in relationship to my yearly goal. I’ll also break down fiction and blog posts. Obviously these daily blog posts have helped my word count. Next month I’m going to try and write far more fiction.

Well, the tow truck driver will  be here soon. I need to go get things packed up.

Until Tomorrow!

WOO WOO!

So I was hungry and old Father Hubbard went to the Cupboard and lo and behold the cupboard was bare. I did, however, find a frozen pumpkin pie in the freezer and it looked like something good to cook. I also found some noodles and some cheese and made some mac & cheese as well as a box of stove top stuffing.

*note: I did go to the store after the wife got home from work

So I cooked a mish-mash of different things. It was pretty cool having pumpkin pie even if it wasn’t fresh or all that good.I love me some pumpkin pie but we didn’t have whipped cream which I should have thought about getting when I went to the store. Perhaps later today.

So I wrote nearly 2000 words yesterday. I feel pretty good about that. I’m hoping for another 2000 word day again today. Tomorrow will be stressful as I need to drop off sputtery truck to get his guts replaced. Nervous about not only having to get it towed, but the process and the money. I’ll get over it.

Saturday my favorite daughter has another volleyball tournament but this one is in Temecula. That’s only an hour away so we won’t be sleeping over this time. That’s a good thing as Friday night they have practice from 7pm-9pm. I’d hate to drive up to LA after practice getting there super late and having to get up early to go to the tourney.

Speaking of my favorite daughter, I’ve been helping her at night practice her volleyball moves out in the parking lot. This hasn’t done good things for the pain in my lower legs. Although the pain is lessening during the day, when I have to chase after the ball it only takes about 30 minutes before I’m in pain and limping back into the house. Next week I’m going to start going up to the gym in the place where we’re renting and start working out again. I now know I cannot do any impact exercises until I strengthen my legs more and maybe not even then. <sigh>

So the picture I posted is of a small, pewter griffin. Yes, yes I know they’re mythical beasts. I bought this a long time ago and it always reminded me of my father. It reminds me of him because the logo for his company, Murdock Laboratory, is a griffin. It’s changed over the years and is more stylized now, but it’s still a griffin. I keep this little figure next to me when I write because it inspires me to write and it inspires me to think about the business of writing. My father always taught me you can never have too much on your plate when it comes to work. You’d rather have too much, than go hungry.

What does all this have to do with angry birds? Oh, wait. I didn’t mention angry birds yet. Anyway. I solved all the Angry Birds latest seasons levels in one sitting. I was sad, but I did. It got me to thinking of my dad in a weird sort of way. As I played the levels I thought they should build an angry birds level builder so people could make their own. I thought this would be so awesome. There would still be the official Angry Birds levels, but people who want to play more could find other people’s levels and those who want to join in the fun could build their own.

Awesome idea, right? Well, there was a game I love way back when called Lode Runner. The idea was to avoid the bad guys, collect the treasure, and a hidden ladder would appear that you’d need to take to the top. Simple 2D graphics. You could burn bricks (but not solid areas). There were hidden bricks that were really traps.

Anyway, the guys of Lode Runner built in a ‘build your own level’ area of the game. I solved all the Lode Runner levels in all versions of the game and played them over and over. I even got my dad addicted to the game. It was great fun. We’d have contests to see who could progress further in say 15 minutes. Things like that. When I discovered that I could build my own levels, it was game on! I’d build a level, my dad would solve it. I’d build a harder level. He’d solve it. I’d build a level with one solution. He’d solve it. I’d build a level with a trap, he’d get angry and say, “Hey! That’s not fair. Not traps on the next one.” I built somewhere around 70 levels and my dad solved them all.

It things like this that run through my head when I send those little birds screaming along to knock stuff over. It’s little things like the griffin that keep my dad in my memory. It’s inspiration like this that have me taking on as much as I can handle…and then asking for more.

Until Tomorrow!

WOO WOO!

However when I went to play a song, I noticed that winamp skipped a couple before it played a song. I didn’t think anything of it for the first couple of days until I opened the Music player and it wouldn’t play anything.

See, I like winamp, but the Music Player would allow me to select an album an play only that album in order. I wanted to listen to Pink Floyd – The Wall. For some reason winamp doesn’t think I should be able to do this without creating a playlist.

So I tried to figure out why the Google music player wasn’t playing, got really frustrated, and went back to winamp to play Weird Al – Hardware Store (love this song) and as I’m scrolling through the songs in winamp I noticed that there were three, four, and in some cases FIVE copies of each and every song. Huh?

I have (or had) all my music on the micro SD card. That’s the only place I’ve ever put songs. At some point all the songs got copied over onto the Xoom’s main memory. Ok, fine. That’d account for two, but all the rest? They were pretty much dead songs and I had no way to remove them except to navigate one by one in winamp and remove the offending songs. I uninstalled winamp and reinstalled it thinking that would cure the problem. Well, no. It didn’t

I installed MixZing. At first, yes, it also had the same issue. All songs were listed multiple times even after deleting the duplicate music folder. Color me confused, but MixZing has an awesome feature that allowed me to say “HERE’S MY MUSIC! RIGHT THERE! ONLY THERE!” and I selected only the SD card music folder and magically I have only one of each song again. Color me a happy boy.

I still need to play with it and discover if I can play an album instead of just shuffling the songs, but at this point I think it’s pretty cool. It also downloads and displays cover art which I also think is pretty cool. I’ll keep you updated if I ever figure out what happened. I think Winamp or Google Music created the duplicate folder and/or some bizarre playlist that goofed things up. I’ll have to look deeper into it, but for now I’m a happy music listener.

In other news, Mike Plested and I have begun the plotting of Jack Kane book 2 (title pending) and we had a conversation last night. We had each other laughing which is a good sign. Hopefully we can make others laugh as well. We’re currently doing our plotting in google docs and ‘tagging’ each other as we add a line/paragraph for a given scene and we’ll keep going back and forth until we have an outline. To help with continuity we’ll  be doing one chapter at a time and, again, play tag. It’ll be an interesting experience.

I’ve got to run. I’ll ramble more tomorrow.

Until Tomorrow!

WOO WOO!

I want to welcome all the new readers to the blog. I know you’re out there. I’ve seen the increase in traffic and thank you for the comments. I think you’re all awesome and I love each and every one of you. I mean, really, you’re great.

First issue that’s gone back and forth in my head is regarding sputtery truck. It’s pretty much dead at this point. Well, it’ll start, but only under duress. I’ve not turned it on for over a week and a half. The choice isn’t an easy one. Replace the head gasket and hope that nothing else has gone wrong that I’ll be replacing at a later time or replace the engine. Obviously one is more expensive than the other. After weighing all the options the wife and I decided that it’d be best to go ahead and spend the extra money to get a new engine. Head Gasket jobs cost around $1500. A good friend of mine found a person willing to do the entire engine job for $1900 (that includes the engine). With over 110,000 miles on the vehicle and overheating problems, it just seems like the best option at this time. It’ll hurt, but it’s needed.

The other thing I’ve been going back and forth with is getting back to walking. The pain in my lower legs has gone from annoying to excruciating. I’ve felt good one day, can’t walk down the stairs the next. It’s highly distracting. Suffice to say, I’ve not walked and the good thing is it’s bothering me not to walk. I know once this pain is gone (likely with the rain) I’ll be back out there, just slower. I’ve been doing weight workouts, but I know I need to do some cardio as well.

Writing has been going well. I’m still ahead of schedule with my word count for the year. That makes me happy. I should be ready to toss out the first short story in the Of Gnomes and Dwarves universe by the end of the week. I’m really excited about that. Dan Dan sent me the cover image. I’m SUPER excited about that, but you’ll have to wait a few more days before you get to see it. It’s awesome!

I keep listening to my music for the Action Pack podcast. I still love it. It’ll fit perfectly with the tone of the story.

Speaking of story, I’ve been going back and forth writing on To Fall From the Sky and Gold Rush (still a tentative title). I’m having a blast writing each.

Speaking of writing, tonight I meet with Mike Plested (and maybe Scott Roche) to talk Jack Kane (edits and sequel) and the Action Pack. Life is busy, exciting, and awesome! It takes a lot to get me down. I’ve been a little down, but watch out once I get this sputtery truck issue behind me.

Until tomorrow!

WOO WOO!

1) I have music for my piece of the Action Pack podcast. It’s not what I was looking for. It’s BETTER!

2) I have a cover going for Of Gnomes and Dwarves. It’s looking great! Freaking love it also

This means I really need to get my rear in gear and this week I need to have the first short ready to go for the end of this month. I’ll get on that tonight/tomorrow and start assembly so I’ll have everything ready to go for this weekend. The story will go up on Smashwords.com and be free for the frist 30 days where I’ll post it up on the kindle and nook for .99 and change the smashwords price to .99 as well. At the same time I’ll be releasing the second story up for free

That’s also the same time that the first Action Pack Podcast will drop. A whole lot of excitement going on around here. I LOVE it. All of this going on has me really excited. I mean, I mean, I mean…

Sputtery truck will go into the shop this week. After much deliberation and discussion the wife and I came to the conclusion that it’s better to fix it and hope for the best rather than drop back ten and punt (buy a new vehicle). It’ll cost. It’ll hurt. But in the long run will be better. Just means we’ll be eating top ramen for a couple of weeks.

My favorite daughter has another volleyball tournament this weekend (Saturday this time) and we’ll be heading back up to L.A. The night before it’s a late practice. 7pm-9pm so we’re torn over heading up late or driving up early. We still don’t have a time for when they’ll start play. My assumption is that it’ll be 8am like the last one, but I’ve been known to be wrong from time to time.

Even though I was up early today, I still feel better. I got a lot of rest over the weekend. The house is clean. I knocked out a few thousand words on To Fall From the Sky. This week is going to be a GREAT week. It’s only Monday and already great things are happening. I’m off to go make sure it stays awesome.

Until Tomorrow!

WOO WOO!

I had great plans for lots of writing mixed in with some laundry and cleaning. I got lots of cleaning and laundry done. I got a little bit of writing done. The odd thing, I clean better alone. I write better when the wife and my favorite daughter are around. I have a tendency to goof off, watch TV, and not do what I intend to do. Still I was about to write a few thousands words over the weekdn so I was proud of that.

I also intened to write this post this morning. Perhaps walk. It did rain much of the weekend which has two effects on me and my head. One is I get really stuffed up to the point of pain. Two is I get drowsy. Compiled with the stress of last week with getting up earlier than normal for work and Sputter truck becoming dying truck, I spelt almost 12 hours each night. I am SO refreshed and my brain is back on track.

I need to do some editing during the week on both Jack Kane, My Action Pack story, and my Of Gnomes and Dwarves story. I have a lot of projects all in the works and I need to make sure they all stay on track. Dan Absolonson said that he’ll have the cover art to me soon. That means I need to get the contents of the book compiled.

I’ve got a couple of stories out in the wild as well as a few books. All I can say is waiting really sucks. I know it’s part of the business and I need to keep pressing forward, but waiting to hear word about a story or book that’ out there is painful.

Speaking of painful. The pain in my shins is subsiding. Walking over the weekend, and by walking I mean around the house, hurt less and less. I’ll start wandering around the neighborhood again on Monday. I’ll slow my pace back down and work up slowly this time. I got a little excited about running that I did what I didn’t want to do and that’s hurt myself.

I also intend to blog on a more positive note. Yes, I’ve been down, but I don’t want to have this blog be depressing. So If I’ve gotten you down, sorry about that. Look for happier posts next week.

Until Tomorrow!

WOO WOO!

…

No, really. I’ve written a page of dialogue before and in my mind hours had gone by. When I’ve gone back and read what I’d written the conversation would have taken all of four or five minutes. Heck, Even when I did the podcast version of V&A Shipping I had to correct some timing issues. I had to figure out how long something took because it just didn’t feel correct after going back and reading it.

I have a stop watch. No, really. I have a stop watch. If my character is going to do something, cook dinner, get dressed, build a bomb, tie a knot, I need to know how long that task will take. Now I’ve never built a bomb, but understand the dilemma here. The time it takes your character or characters to accomplish a task needs to feel right. As I mentioned, that one page of dialogue was a short conversation, but in my mind I needed them to be in a different place after the conversation.What did I do?

The conversation took place while the characters were walking from one place to another. I needed a certain amount of time to pass while they walked and talked. This scene needed some fixing not only with the distance traveled, but with the flow of the conversation. What did I do? I took a walk and timed how long it would take at a casual pace to travel a certain distance. Even the walk, not enough time had passed in my story. I needed to figure out what would slow them down.

Okay, color me dumb here. The walk they took was in a heavily-congested, downtown area. Brilliant me I walked in a straight line. Taking a trip to downtown San Diego provided what I needed. I’ve walked with groups downtown before. There are a large number of things that will stop you as you walk. Window shopping, street vendors, street lights, cars, bikes, other pedestrians. Not only did all of these items add a little flavor to the scene I was trying to fix, it provided the length of time I was looking to introduce in the scene. It also helped to break up the dialogue so it wasn’t a long stream of talking.

This scene would have worked as-is, but but stopping myself and timing the event to make sure it had the right feel helped me flesh out a scene that, once I’d re-written it, worked so much better than the original.

Am I suggesting you get a stop watch and time every little thing you do? Well, not everything, but I do recommend you watch the clock when you’re doing something you would expect a character in your book to do. A minute can be much longer than you suspect and an hour much shorter than you know. Give it try. Maybe you’ll discover something more than just the amount of time something takes.

Until Next Time!

WOO WOO!

Sorry if I’ve dumped on you the past couple of days. It’s been a bad week. Yesterday I so wanted to take a nap and stay up late writing. Today I so wanted to get up early and start writing.

The best laid plans…

At any rate, the day is still young. I’m rested, refreshed, ready to rock and roll. I cranked out an episode of Unorthodox Writing Tips for Mike Plested to use on Get published. I had several okay ideas, and all fell flat and I deleted them all about half way through. When it comes to ideas, I can be like that. It either got to resonate with me, or it’s out. I threw out several because they were either weak, or sounded authoritative and mean.

I did say the say was still young, right? It is. As soon as I have dinner here in a few minutes I’ll be back into To Fall From the Sky. I had it end at a certain point, and having slept on it, I’ve decided that point was dumb and I’ll be deleting the last few hundred words or so until I get it back on track. I had a guy show up with a gun at the wrong moment and it was also the wrong guy. I need to put him in the right spot then it’ll have impact. Where I put it, it’s just confusing and really makes no sense. I think I was tired.

I hear the oven screaming my name telling me my food is ready. I better head down there before it burns. I’m excited. I have all night. WOO WOO!

Until Tomorrow!

DOUBLE WOO WOO!

Then came today. I just ran out of energy. I took a little nap thinking I’d wake up and have a little dinner, a shower, and jump into some writing. Well, I took my little nap now I’m more tired than I was before the nap. I’m thinking I’ll be down for the night and try again in the moring.

It’s been a long week. I wanted to do a longer post, but tired brain just isn’t up to it right now. I’ll do better tomorrow.

To go along with sputter truck, I have pain in my legs I had through I was past. It took a few days, but shin splints are what I have now. What I had experienced before wasn’t like this. that pain was muscle pain from not working my legs in some time. The pain I have now is deep intense pain in the bone. It hurts to go up and down the stairs and I need to take a break from my walking until this pain subsides. I’ll also stop jogging until I get my legs in better shape to handle the stress. This was a case of too fast too soon. This is a little frustrating as I was so excited about jogging. Everything else about it felt good and I enjoyed getting out there. But for now, it’s resting my lower legs until the pain subsides.

I do still have my free weights so I’ll be doing something about my overall fitness. I also plan on starting 100 push-up and 200 sit-ups once again. I know I can’t just sit still anymore and expect my body to be alright.

Plotting for the Jack Kane sequel has begun. My writing partner, Mike Plested, and I plotted not only one, but three subsequent novels to take place in the Jack Kane universe. We could probably plan out a dozen, so for now 3 and 4 are just notations whereas we began delving deeper into what book 2 will be about. I can tell you this, I think 2 will be even more fun than 1. Speaking of book 1, I have it assembled in Scriviner for Windows. Hopefully this makes editing easier.

Mike and I also net with Scott Roche so I could give the two of them a hard time about not having their Action Pack works ready for next month. Of course they still have a lot of time, I just feel the need to give them crap about not being further along. Artwork and music are being prepared. The website is live, but in dire need of modifications. Hopefully in the next week or two that will happen. Excitement levels are still high for all of us, so look for good things.

Speaking of good things, I’d better get back at it.

Until Tomorrow!

WOO WOO!

Life happens. People die, events happen, vehicles break down. This is just the way life goes.

Currently I’m looking at my truck. It struggles to turn over (usually doesn’t the first few times but then will) and once it does I get a gout of white smoke. I don’t mean a little bit, I mean HOLY SMOKE SCREEN BATMAN! white smoke. This is a bad thing. Very very bad thing.

There are two potential issues. One would be I have a blown head gasket. The other would be warped or cracked heads. I thought, yeah, okay, so it’s a gasket. How hard can that be to replace? So I got a hold of my friend who groaned and said “Maybe it’s time to trade in the truck” and laughed. I knew I was in trouble.

So I started looking online last night at how difficult it is to replace a head gasket. It looks like it’s a royal pain in the guzunkus. No, really. It’s not a one day type of job. It’s a two, three, eight day job. Though the cost isn’t that much, the amount of labor is horrific and complicated. Now I’m not afraid of a challenge, but I don’t think I’m up for this and my friend didn’t seem like  it was something we’d want to tackle in his front yard.

So I’m currently looking for a shop that can replace the head(s) and gasket(s). I’m not 100% sure if it’s one head or two being that I have an 8 cylinder engine. I’ve looked at the costs online and it ranges from $700-$1500 which includes the cost of the parts.

After a great call with Mike Plested and Scott Roche on different projects I was on a high and hit a terrible low. I really don’t have money like that to throw into a repair and without doing the repair, I’m without a vehicle. I would drive it, but from what I can tell, coolant is seeping into the engine until it runs out of coolant to dump into the engine and then it runs hot. I’m guessing that the issue with it starting is due to coolant in the cylinder(s) gumming up the works and getting into the oil.

So today I’ll be calling and getting estimates. I’m not looking forward to the answers, but I’ll have to bite the bullet and take care of business.

Writing didn’t happen yesterday, but walking did. I’ll post more on that tomorrow. I don’t mean to be a downer today, but life does have a way of happening to you whether you want it to or not. I’ll be happier tomorrow. Promise

Until Tomorrow!

WOO WOO?

Persistence.

I had my fastest time on my circuit yesterday. I jogged more than I walked. It hurt a little, but overall it felt great to get out there. I can tell my fitness level is improving because I’m moving quicker. It’s easier to go up and down the stairs (the first few days of walking were torture). My legs don’t stay sore as long after walking either. Overall it’s making me happier.

So yesterday I wasn’t going to blog either. Again I’m glad I did. I had a ghost story that I shared from my Navy days it even though it’s a ‘told’ story, it was still fun to write it down. It made me remember a lot about those days in the Navy when I did security duty. I had a lot of “I wonder what happened to so-and-so” moments.

I’ll give you a behind the scenes to the ghost story. Even though I cannot tell you what passed over the Blazer, I can tell you this. There was a fire, and it was put out. Long after I’d left the base I found out that one of the people I worked with had been setting fires all over the base. Usually small fires. Even though he’d been accounted for, it was over radio. He’d left the base when it was his 6 hours off and had walked out into the field in question and set the fire. He was the shadow I saw running around the fire. He was lucky to put it out in time before we got there. After the incident he had to take a few days off due to illness that I later found out was smoke inhalation. He was eventually caught and court-marshaled when he burned down a building that contained many of the base’s shipping and receiving records.

So even though the whole incident still gives me the creeps, I do know most of what happened that night. He was able to get part of the fire out, the rest burned into on open area with no fuel to keep it going. I only know this because we did talk many years after. Once he got out of jail that is. But that’s a story for another day.

At any rate, I’m glad I wrote yesterday. Why? It was one of the busiest days on the blog. I had a lot of people stop by to read the story and that made me really happy. How happy? Happy enough that I got up off my duff, got a haircut and went for my walk. When I finished I had intend to write, but dinner appeared, I wanted a TV show, got interrupted many times, but finally got about 100o words cranked out.

Despite it all, I had a productive day. I hope to have a repeat performance this evening.

Until next time!

WOO WOO!

We did a little shopping yesterday, had some great food at the Cheesecake Factory. I’m a sucker for a good shepherd’s pie and they do make a good shepherd’s pie. I love me meat, potatoes, and veggies all rolled into one. Oh yes I do. I even have leftovers for this morning that I’ll have with an egg on top. Just sounds good. Of course we also had cheesecake to bring home (too full to heat it there.)

So last night we got home pretty early. I had intended to sit and write for a couple of hours. After cheering for my favorite daughter, driving, shopping, eating, eating some more, well, needless to say my brain just wasn’t about to get into gear. Didn’t matter what I did, creativity eluded me. It was one of those night’s I should have followed my own rules, but hey, life happens from time to time.

I will get writing done today. I will get work done today first which includes some training courses I need to take. But tonight words will fly! Or so I hope

Yesterday I mentioned I had some stories from the base I used to work on. I’ll have fun posting those. Here’s the first.

Rumors abounded that the base had 1) been built on old Native America territory and 2) multiple sightings had been made over the years the base had been in operation of ghosts, strange lights, odd fires, and unexplained events. There were many stories and I, being a skeptic, ignored them all and usually had fun playing pranks on people. This wasn’t a prank.

Fire on the base:

Working at the Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station I did the night shift. My schedule changed from time to time, but it was mostly from 6PM to 6AM with 6 hours on post and 6 hours off. Some nights it would be gate watch where I could sit and write or read being that I was rarely bothered. Mostly it was on patrol in a small Chevy truck. The supervisors had larger four wheel drive Chevy Blazers because the little trucks would get stuck from time to time on patrol and we had some areas that were inaccessible.

On one particular night on patrol I got a call. My supervisor was on his way to meet me. Someone had called in from outside the base that there was a fire in the middle of one of the fields. Being that it was in the middle of the field I couldn’t drive my little truck out there, I needed 4W drive.

He drove out and met me behind one of the bunkers. I stood up on the side where I could get a good view of the fire. It looked more like a large bonfire and sure enough, it was in the middle of the field where I couldn’t get to it. It could have been a trick of light or it could have been people, but I saw, and reported people around the fire.

It wasn’t uncommon for people to break onto the base. “I can neither confirm nor deny the presence of nuclear weapons at this facility.” That was standard mantra even though security guards were well aware of when nukes were on the base and somehow the public would find out as well and often lay across the entrances to the base in protest until the police arrived to escort them away for interfering with base operations.

Eventually my supervisor arrived in his Blazer with a few fire extinguishers. By this time we had reports from multiple people outside the base about this fire. We had alerted the police and fire departments that the fire was in an unused portion of the base, not easily accessible and currently posed no threat to personnel. There was no need for them to come and assist until we had assessed the size of the fire and if we’d be able to put it out on our own. Even so, the fire department had been called by civilians living across the street from the base and firetruck sat on the other side of the face much too far away to do anything about the fire.

My supervisor and I drove around the bunker, slowly due to there being no road and the field being filled with large dips and rises and tall grasses. The entire time we kept in contact with the main base keeping them appraised of the situation.

Now this is where things got weird. We stopped to try and determine where we were in the field with relation to the fire. The grass was tall and driving through it difficult. I had opened my door and stood looking over the top of the Blazer. I heard something that sounded much like an earthquake. Living in Southern California you hear many before you feel them. I told my supervisor that I thought an earthquake was coming, but the sound changed. He turned out the lights to help us get a better bearing on the fire. I could smell smoke. I could see the glow. I could hear the nearing rumble.

I can neither confirm no deny that a horse jumped over the hood of the Blazer as I stood there. I can neither confirm no deny that the horse had a rider that looked very much like a Native America brandishing a spear.

What I can confirm is this. 1) The glow of the fire disappeared. 2) The rumble stopped. 3) The fire department called our base to congratulate us on putting the fire out. Both my supervisor and I were given letters of accommodation by the captain of the base for our diligence in handling the situation.

In the dark of the field, we emptied the fire extinguishers and our bladders. In the dark of the field we both confirmed and denied what we saw. In the dark of that field, my skepticism found it first true challenge with something I could not explain.

I had the watch for the rest of the night and I had the heebie-jeebies for the rest of that watch. As the sun started to come up, I made my way back to the fence-line on the edge of the field. I stood on top of my truck and I saw the scorched area where the fire had burned. No other vehicles had been in the area as all vehicles were accounted for as well as all personnel during the situation. The firetruck would have been at least two hundred yards away. I couldn’t make out any path or tracks through the field that led to the scorched area. I never spoke of that fire again.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Believe what you want, I know what I experienced. I’ll have more for you in the coming days.

Until Tomorrow!

WOO WOO!

Enough about that. I could go on and on, but I won’t. It was a learning experience for the girls and they still had a great time. Our next one is in two weeks and we’ll be better prepared.

I was going to write a blog post on the road, but we got up early and got moving quickly. There was much discussion between the parents in between matches. Basically there was little time to do anything so I didn’t post until now. Suffice to say, today was a day off from walking. It’s far too cold right now and I’m already pooped. Yesterday was almost a day off from writing, but I did manage to get a blog post out as well as an Unorthodox Writing Tips. Tonight we’re back home and I’ll be sitting down and writing soon.

I have many things in the works. I feel good about all that I have going on. As things happen I’ll make sure you know about them as quickly as they happen. At the end of this month both my home life and my writing life will be going full speed ahead and I’m excited to see if happen. I need to spend as much time sitting and writing as I can. I need to increase my word output dramatically. A thousand a day just won’t cut it. I was happy when I noticed that I was a little ahead, but I’d like to be much further ahead. Look for numbers to start jumping.

Speaking of writing, I think that’s enough for now. Tomorrow I’ll have a story about the Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station where I did a couple years of security duty while in the Navy. Obviously I can’t tell anything about the people or operations of the base, but I have some interesting anecdotes as well as a couple of ghost stories. Being that we drove by the weapons station on our way to and from the volleyball tournament, all these memories came rushing back. I had fun sharing them with the wife and my favorite daughter.

I’m off to go make words happen

Until Next Time!

WOO WOO!

I’m a curious person. I like to try new things and I’ve never shied away from trying something different. Earlier in the week I needed to take my favorite daughter to 7-11 to get a snack (old mother Hubbard went to the cupboard and the cupboard was bare).

In the same little strip mall is a sweet shop, Pistachios. For us this has been an ongoing joke. I want to say they’ve been setting the place up for a few months now and we’re trying to figure out when they’ll open the place. We put our  faces up against the glass and peeked inside. There were some lights on the left side of the store wall that look like they will hold signage and a nice look counter behind which are some shelves with a few bags of pistachios and a couple boxes of candy. That’s about it. It looks bare, but I’m hopeful it’ll be filled with good things to be had by all.

Walking from Pistachios to 7-11 is the Rancho Market and Bakery. Now I’ve only been in the area for a few months and I’ve seen it dozens of times. I kept telling myself I needed to actually go inside and look around. I figured, why not teach my favorite daughter not to be afraid of going into a new place. I diverted my steps and went inside.

“Papi? Where are you going?”

Let me interject here. I have a tendency to walk astray just to confuse my favorite daughter. It’s funny most of the time and sometimes I do what I did on this day. I didn’t say anything, I just entered the store.

Inside standing next to the fresh fruit was a group of men. They could have been Greek, the could have been Arabic, I didn’t know. They just had that swarthy complexion that I’ve always associated with the Mediterranean. Now I was even more interested. Sure the Market and Bakery was located in Rancho San Diego and I expected it to be run by Mexicans, so I was a little surprised.

Inside I found a great selection of fresh cheeses I hadn’t seen before and a large number of dairy products. Even a great selection of salamis and meats. I still had no idea of the nationality of the products displayed. I didn’t talk to anyone until I reached the dessert section. I’m a BIG fan of desserts. Each looked amazing. I had to ask.

“What type of desserts are these?”

“Baklava”

Ok, I’ve seen baklava before. He wasn’t going to get away with that simple of an answer.

“This doesn’t look like Greek baklava.”

“This is middle-eastern baklava. In Lebanon we have over 150 varieties of baklava.”

Okay, now I was really in new territory. My favorite daughter kept picking out ones to buy, the man gave me a 5 minute lesson about baklava, and $8 we were out of the store. I went back the next day and bought $5 more. I know I’ll be going back again and I’ll be trying more than just the baklava.

What did I learn? I learned  lot more than just what kinds of baklava are available. It’s something I’ve know and try to put to practice.

1) Don’t be afraid to walk into a store and talk to the proprietor

2) Don’t be afraid to try something new be it food, a book, a new sport, anything.

3) Be opened minded with the experience.

4) Seek out opportunity, don’t just run into them by accident.

Do I think baklava will make it into my writing? Probably not. But one thing I’ve heard over and over with writing advice, write what you know. If you limit yourself a little box you’ll only ever be able to write about that same little box. The more you allow yourself to experience the more flavor you’ll add to your writing. Get out there. Try somewhere new. You’ll thank yourself one day.

Until next time!

WOO WOO!

Don’t get me wrong. I know what I’m doing for my body and my brain is the right thing. As far as I know this will get easier. It’s been a very long time since I pushed my body and my brain at the same time and both really need the work out.

Last time I decided to exercise I wasn’t writing and I really wasn’t pushing myself. Last time I went on a writing binge (at the end of last year) I wasn’t exerxising. Now I’m pushing myself n both areas at the same time. I’ve been working out nearly every day and writing every day.

I’m not complaining. Perhaps I need to look at what I’m putting in my body as well. Let’s think about this for a minute. Last night I had two hot dogs, so e left over macaroni and cheese and one beer. Hmmm. I don’t drink often. I enjoy a beer when I have one. Perhaps I’m just overreacting to this one slow wake up. Perhaps. I’ll let you know.

Speaking of writing, I finished my story for the Mad Scientist Handbook Anthology and got that sent off. Felt good to complete another piece. Felt even better sending it off. It’s been a very long time since I’ve actually completed works and sent them off.

On the walking front, I continued the walk/jog on my circuit. I shaved off another minute. My legs are stiff and sore, but in a good way. I’m still stretching them several times per day and this does help. Not sure I’ll get my walk in today. It’s tme to clean the house, pack, book the hotel and head off to LA.

We’re heading to Lakewood California (not the nicest of neighborhoods but not awful either) for my favorite daughter’s first travel team volleyball tournament. Kind of excited as I’ve seen how well they’re doing in practice. They should do really well.

Speaking of Lakewood. It’s next door to Long Beach. I used to li e in Long Beach. But that’s a story for another time.

Until tomorrow

Woo Woo!

A few days ago when I started walking I mentioned that I recognized a pain usually labeled “No pain, no gain” and a pain that said “SOMETHING IS WRONG”. Today I suffer from the former.The past two days I jogged a little during my run and greatly increased the pace at which I complete my nearly three mile circuit. I also said I run on my toes, not heel-toe as many people do. So yesterday I was a little stiff in the calf muscles, today I’m a lot stiff. I have been stretching and will continue stretching.

On the plus side, the shin splints I suffered from seem to have mostly been alleviated. That makes Jay a very happy boy. The only pain I get in my shins is during the walking portion of my walk if I extend my stride too much and I know continued walking will eventually make that pain subside as well.

Do I feel fit yet? Heavens no. Not really even close. Even though I’m jogging, I’m not running. It’ll take time to get there. How much weight have I lost? No idea. I honestly don’t even have a starting point. My goal is to get into better shape. Not lose weight. One will follow the other naturally. I’m not going to stress if I’m a pound or two overweight. I will stress if I stop working out.

Good habits are difficult to form and easy to break. Bad habits are easy to form and difficult to break.

My favorite daughter didn’t have practice last night. I had intended to write a lot. That didn’t happen. I did find time from 9-9:30 to crank out 800 words for a story (written in interview form) for the Mad Scientist Handbook Anthology. I also did a little editing on Kance Encounter, the short story I’ll be releasing at the end of this month.

On the Action Pack news front: I’ve procured a friend to do some music for each segment in the podcast. I’ll have to find some transition music/sounds for each scene transition inside of one of the works. Just thinking out loud here. You can ignore me if you like.

On the workplace front: Today I hit 15 years with AT&T. Although I’ve had some complaints over the years I have to say that the choices I’ve made in my career have helped me a lot and made for a fulfilling time. I started out as a member of the CWA (Union) and quickly moved on to management. I am NOT a supervisor, but instead I am an independent contributor. For those that don’t know me, I develop internal web applications for AT&T. I freakin love my job.

Speaking of loving my job, time I got at it.

Until Tomorrow.

WOO WOO!

A funny thing happened.

Now let me explain something. As I’ve been saying, shin splints have haunted me and my walking. It has for years. I was working out on an elliptical which was nice because it was non-impact training. The new shoes and a shorter stride have helped alleviate the pain of shin splints. But when I run I don’t run heel-toe, heel-toe. My cross-country/track coach in high school had us run on our toes.

So I’ve been told that I look a little funny when I run. I’ve also been told I have Barney Rubble legs (short and stumpy). But hey, when I start jogging, I’m running on my toes and not heel-toe so the pain in my shins is lessened greatly. This was almost as awesome as doing 12 minute miles yesterday. Down from 17 minute miles just a couple of weeks ago.

I’ll be jogging/walking/jogging/walking from now on. I’m going to try and extend my jogging periods and shorten my walking periods. When I can get below 10 minute miles, I’ll reverse my direction. Wait, what? See, currently I go up one big hill, then a LONG, slow downhill. Once I get into better shape I’ll do the LONG uphill with a short, steep downhill. Just to mix things up. There are even different routes I can take that’ll provide more hills, again, just to mix things up.

On the writing front:

I mentioned the Action Pack yesterday. Well I also spoke with Dan Dan the Art Man and he had already agreed to do my cover for my Action Pack story. I’ve now convinced him through my magical ways to do the cover art for both Mike Plested and Scott Roche as well as providing us with a banner and logo for the Action Pack! I mean, how cool is that? Dan is filled with awesome and every time I see him produce something I’m amazed. Dan, if you’re reading this, we promise not to abuse you. Too much.

Yesterday My Favorite Daughter had a late volleyball practice (her first tournament is Sunday). It went until 9PM. Didn’t get into a sitting position until 10PM to start writing and banged out exactly 800 words. It’s always strange to end on a specific number. No practice for her tonight or tomorrow so I should be able to bang out a couple thousand a day. I hope. I’m really enjoying the direction To Fall From the Sky is taking. I had something bad happen to the protagonist, and I used the antagonist’s POV to explain what had gone wrong. I’m not even a third of the way through and I can already see where this is going. I’m going to have a blast once I get into the final parts of this book. Heck, I’m having fun now just thinking about it.

I’ll be posting more updates tomorrow and keep you apprised of what is happening with the Action Pack. We’re currently shooting for the first episode to drop at the end of February, so keep your eyes peeled. Oh, and I also have my first short getting itself ready for release at the end of this month. Dan Dan the Art Man is also doing the cover for that. It’s going to be amazing!

I’m rambling, aren’t I? Ok. Get out of here. I’ve got words to write.

Until Tomorrow

WOO WOO!

I’m a fan of dessert. My motto: Life is short, eat dessert first.

So when I took my daughter to 7-11 the other day, I looked up at the Rancho Bakery and Deli next door and decided to walk in. Why? Hey, I’m curious. It’s what I do. I see a new place, I need to go see what’s inside.

Side note: There is a sweet shop next door to the bakery (Pistachio Sweets) that hasn’t opened yet. It’s been months and it’s driving me nuts.

Back to the story. So I dragged my daughter into the bakery. They had fresh produce, some great looking cheeses (I also love cheese) and lots of dairy goods and meats. Then there was the baklava section. Now, I’ve seen baklava before. I’ve eaten it many times. I really like it. This didn’t look like baklava.

I introduced myself to the store owner.

He gave me a sample.

Oh! I mean. Oh! Yes Yes OH GOD YES!

So I bought a small container to take home. I wanted to buy a lot more, but I also didn’t want it to go bad. Apparently the bakery is a middle-eastern bakery. He explained to me the history of baklava and that in the middle-east there are over 150 different kinds of baklava. The display they had there had a couple dozen (I’ll take a picture of that when I go back.) It all looked great!

We got three different varieties. All of them were delicious. It was only $5 so I know I’ll be going back. I’ll also be posting the experience as an Unorthodox Writing Tip this weekend with more details.

On the walking front. Took the day off yesterday. Will resume today. The Kid (she wants me to start calling her My Favorite Daughter) has Volleyball practice tonight. I’ll be cheering her and her team on. WOO!

On the writing front. I got a lot written yesterday. Currently I have my short story completed for the end of this month. I have my story ready for the Action Pack (I’ll explain about that in a moment). Although it’s going up slowly, the yearly word count meter is creeping up. I’ve written over 15000 words so far this month. I’ll be writing a lot more. 2012 is shaping up to be great year. I’m so excited.

So the Action Pack. Last night Scott Roche, Mike Plested, and I all sat down to discuss the jokingly named Action Pack Podcast. The name was thrown out based on an 80s TV show. Our concept: 3 stories in one podcast. Each month will bring a piece of each story continuing on throughout the year and concluding a storyline at the end of the year. That would be one season and if all goes well, we’d do a second season.

We talked about artwork, music, content, the blog, the url. The Action Pack Podcast grew on us quickly and we’ll be getting a blog out there soon. It’s going to be a lot of fun and I hope you’ll join us. I’ll be posting more on this as time goes by leading up to the release of the first episode. Like I said, I’m pretty excited.

I need to go make use of that excitement.

Until Tomorrow!

WOO WOO!

Working from home has given me something more, though. It’s given me the ability to be a self-starter. When I work from home, I sleep in a little later. I usually wake up before my alarm goes off and get ready to start my day. I usually have my laptop already on so I can just sit down and go.

This has really helped me with my writing. I can just sit down and go. There are some days I need to do a little more, like get myself off the internet. There are even days when I just don’t feel in the mood to write or something is distracting me. These days will happen and I’m learning to work through them. Sure I can make up an excuse like, I only need to write 1000-1500 words a day to make my yearly goal and I can get caught up tomorrow. No, I won’t. If I slack off I won’t hit the goals I’ve set out for myself.

The same goes for my physical fitness goal for this year. I didn’t set a weight resolution or an exercise resolution. What I did was set a goal to reduce my body mass and get myself into better physical condition. I’m not gauging success of this goal on pounds lost or distance traveled during my walks. I’m basing this goal on the size of my stomach and the amount of fat I can feel on my body. Being in better physical condition is more important to me than the number of pounds I see on a scale.

Speaking of fitness, I walked again yesterday. I was able to do the circuit I’m walking in just over 40 minutes. This is a success. The pain in front of my legs is still a dull ache that comes and goes and I’m starting to get a weird, I guess I’d call it a weak feeling in my right knee. I was aware of the problem and my doctor had told me that I need to exercise to get the pain in my knees to go away. So I’m working through that.

Well, as I said, I’m in the office. there’s work to do.

Until tomorrow

WOO WOO!

The roots of this story go all the way back to 1985/1986 when I played Dungeons and Dragons and these characters come to life. Actual writing didn’t begin until 1988 and, as I’ve chronicled before, didn’t get completed until 1998. The book suffered from many false starts and too many re-writes. I plan to do another re-write and this time I will be completely redoing the series as I’ve learned so much about writing.

On the walking front, I managed a good time yesterday with the new shoes. Shin splints are still happening, but are getting easier to deal with. I still want to go much faster, but still when I start to get moving a little faster than my legs want, the pain comes back. It’s more of a dull ache instead of a sharp stabbing pain so slowing down with a smaller stride still helps. I know it’ll take a few weeks before I can really move on my walk and if things go right, I’ll be able to start running in a few months. Oddly I’m looking forward to it.

I got my daughter’s video edited for her. The kid wrote the script and decided what needed to be shot. I just added the music and pieced it together. That took up a lot of my writing time over the weekend and I’ll be attacking this week with renewed vigor and a need to get caught up or even ahead of where I feel my writing should be at. I’ll post the video once I get approval from the kid and the parents of the others in the video.

Speaking of video, I learned a lot (well, enough to be dangerous) about video recording and editing. If I get bored I may start posting some video updates in place of blog posts. I had fun editing them and had a thought of recording Unorthodox Writing Tips as videos. Interested? Sound like fun? Leave me a comment. Let me know. I’ll see what I can do.

Time to get at it.

Until tomorrow

WOO WOO!