Blog Archives
Daily Update: Some actual updates
Shin Splints: The front of my legs still hurts after I exert myself doing activities such as helping out at volleyball, wandering around the grocery store, helping out at volleyball, walking to my truck too quickly (I park in the street away from the living quarters), helping out at volleyball, going up and down the stairs too many times, helping out at volleyball. The plus side is it only hurts for a short time afterwards and not into the day after like it had been. This is making me happy though I’m not ready to try out my ‘land legs’ any time soon. I still have yet to get up to the gym at our complex, but I intend to start going very soon. Hopefully this weekend.
Sputtery Truck: The check engine light is still on. The registration is due, but I don’t have to smog it this year. I know why the light is on and it’s nothing critical that cannot wait at this point. I’m happy that each time I go out I can start it up and it doesn’t look like Spy Hunter with a billowing cloud of smoke pouring out the back end. This was usually followed up with it overheating and that hasn’t happened either. I’ve kept an eye on the fluid levels and all looks good. It’s on the road to recovery.
Action Pack: Currently I have Mike Plested’s audio. I’m waiting on Scott Roche’s and I need to record my own. I’ll be recording the promo as soon as I get the audio from Mike. We have the cover art for the ebook edition of the stories that will be available at Flying Island Press. I’m waiting on my friend who shall be known as Mike Lafayette to produce music for me. He will be out after the 25th and assures me that I’ll have music before then. This will be just in time to drop the first episode on the 29th. Nothing like cutting it close, eh?
Writing: I’ve been going at it slower than I’d like, but I am catching up to my annual goal. At one point I was 5000 words behind. I’m now less than 3000 and gaining ground with every word I type. I’m having fun with both my research and my writing. If I wasn’t having fun, I’d be putting projects aside. It’s great to see my word counts going up.
Getting Caught up with Friends: I hadn’t spoken with Kimi Alexandre or Jack Mangan in some time. Sure we’ve exchanged emails, but it’s nice to get on skype and just chat with online friends that you don’t get face time with. Online chatting will keep you caught up with some goings on, but there’s nothing like hearing another person’s voice to get caught up on everything.
My Favorite Daughter: If you haven’t guessed, it’s been a lot of volleyball. I’ve been helping out at practices and it’s really great to see how the team is starting to really mesh and play as a unit as opposed to individuals. All I can say is my kid rocks 
but I may be biased.
Jack Kane: Edits are progressing on book 1 and plotting is progressing on book 2. Mike and I have been using Google Docs crazy and the more I use it, the more I like it. I’m sure there are a lot more features in there that we aren’t using, and as we find them, we’ll use them.
Scriviner: I’ve been using scriviner to edit Jack Kane. I’m really liking the interface and I can see now why so many writers rave about it. As soon as I’m able I’ll be buying a license for it and I’ll be moving all my works into the tools. I’ll also use any notes I put into scriviner up onto the wiki page I created and am currently not using. I do have every intention of getting everything up and in there.
MixZing: I’m still liking this music app on my tablet. I haven’t run into any issues and the ads only come up when I open the app and I can live with that. I have the widget on my homescreen and it works great for a shuffle and for playing entire albums. So far, no complaints other than the EQ will cause the tablet to lock up so I just don’t use it.
Work: Work is going GREAT! Frickin love my job. I’ve been doing a big mix of paperwork and documentation and a little bit of coding and I think this is what’s been slowing down my daily writing output, but the job does come first. It’s been a great start to the year with only a couple of unexpected bumps along the way, but nothing we can’t get past.
Sorry this is such a long post today.
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Things happen when you’re not looking
I now have two secret projects I cannot talk about yet. There is a lot going on behind the scenes that once I can talk about them, you’ll be just as excited as I am about them. Even though I won’t always post about everything I’m doing (or I’ll repeat myself from time to time) doesn’t mean new things aren’t happening.
Writing: Didn’t happen much last night. Okay, happened very little in fact. I intend to correct that tonight. My favorite daughter had volleyball practice last night so that ate into my writing time. I also spent some time with the wife because it was, after all, Valentine’s. The rest of my writing time was eaten up by discussing a certain project that will come to light in the near future.
Action Pack: Mike Plested has written up the promo. Now it’s just a matter of recording and producing it. All three of us will have parts and from the initial ideas we had, it’s going to be awesome. Heck, from what I’ve read from the other two stories, the entire Action Pack will be filled with awesome! I hope you’ll be there to join us. I’ve been bugging Dan Dan the Art Man and he assures me I’ll have my cover graphic tonight. I should have my page up over on the web site tomorrow.
More Writing: I’m going to try for a few days in a row of 2000 words of fiction. Why? I need to get caught up and/or ahead of my writing goal and I have a couple very hot projects that I need to get under way. I’ve been way too lax with my writing (in my own opinion) and even though I’ve been blogging daily, I haven’t been writing fiction daily. I need to correct that.
Jack Kane: Edits are under way and plotting of the second book are also under way. This is a fun story and the sequel is mapping out to also be a lot of fun to write. Jack, Betsy, Felonious and his minions, are all great characters and just easy to write. Mike Plested and I are having too much fun and I can’t wait until this falls into the hands of readers.
Distractions: I’ve been distracted by Ancient Aliens and not because I subscribe to their belief, but because I find their point of view fascinating. It doesn’t matter what you believe in, it’s easy to poke holes in any theory, faith, belief. I never try to argue with what another person believes because faith and belief are personal. I just like to observe and from that observation, a billion story ideas come bursting forth. *note, I used to argue with people’s faith but once someone says “I believe…” the argument is over because facts no longer play a part in the argument. #justsaying. I find it best to listen, insert comments, and avoid confrontation. It never ends pretty.
More Distractions: I’m not a big TV watcher. There are a few shows I love. Big Bang Theory, Two and a Half Men (not so much with the loss of Charlie), Gold Rush (what? You’re not watching this show?), Storage Wars, Shipping Wars, and that’s about it. I’m not big on any on going series and will usually pick up a show once it’s run its life. Like the aforementioned Ancient Aliens. I used to watch any Sci Fi shows on TV, but got frustrated with half a season or one open ended season and then nothing. So I stopped putting effort into anything else TV has to offer. For now, I’m directing that energy back into writing.
Speaking of writing.
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: I’m not Jake
To those that know me online, I’m J.R. Murdock. To those that know me in the real world, I’m Jay. I’m not Jake though I’ve been called James, Jim, Jake, John, Jason… Think of a name that starts with J and I’ve been called it.
Does it surprise me when people get my name confused? No. People get used to hearing a full name and when they get one letter, it’s easy to extrapolate and add on letters you think you heard that aren’t really there.
What’s funny is when someone is on a podcast talking about you and they start calling you someone else’s name, then asks you about it after the fact. It’s even funnier when you’re working on a colaborative effort with someone for a few weeks.
Yes, my good friend Scott Roche was on the Dead Robots Society podcast and… well, let’s just say I’m not Jake. He got a little confused and mixed me up with Jake Bible (a fellow author and worth your time to read). Hop on over to the DRS Podcast (not always work safe) and check it out. Scott had some great things to say and he’s doing 52 weeks of Indie where he’s giving away a book a week and one winner will ‘win them all’.
Got a lot of writing done yesterday. I’m not quite on track with my yearly writing goal, but I’m getting caught up. One of the things I forgot about when writing a lot is that I come up with more ideas than I can possibly write. I have another fun idea and should I find the time I’ll start getting it out there. I know I have a lot of projects, but this one could be fun to work in there.
Speaking of getting it out there. I’m slow. I know this. Kance Encounter is coming. My favorite daughter has practice again tonight and I’ll be working on that while I wait for her. Got edits back from Scott and Mike on my Action Pack Story now title Golden West. As soon as I have the cover art in my hot little hands from Dan Dan the Art Man I’ll get my page up over there. The podcast is coming together nicely and it’s interesting working on a collaborative effort in this manner. I’m not working alone on two of my multiple projects which is making keeping on track a little easier.
Speaking of making it easier…
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Still Provided Daily!
I’ve written daily for some time and I’ve continued to watch the number of subscribers to this blog drop. Am I annoying? Should I keep going? Should I stop questioning myself and just keep at it? Should I stop asking questions I don’t have the answer to? Are my dogs trying to communicate with me at a subconscious level I don’t yet understand?
I’ve read Scott Roche’s story for the Action Pack Podcast. I can’t wait to get the audio. It’s gonna be fun. I haven’t listened to Mike Plested’s audio yet, but I will be doing that tonight. At some point during the week I’ll be recording my audio. Then I’ll be bugging another friend of mine about the rest of the music so I can get the podcast assembled.
Then I need to write a piece for Dan Dan the Art Man (I haven’t forgotten about that). I also need to write my piece for my secret project. My Teacher is a Zombie is coming along nicely. Had fun writing last night’s scene and the next scenes will be loads of fun to do. I also need to get working on Second Kance. I need to do edits, I need to write. I need to get off my duff, don’t I?
Yes, yes I do. I wrote a couple thousand words last night. I’ll be doing another couple thousand tonight. I should be able to get myself back on track with my overall writing goal for the year and for this month. I just need to keep hitting keys on the keyboard in the right order and I’ll get there. It’s a magical feeling seeing some of my writing projects take shape.
Tonight my favorite daughter has a voluntary practice. I’ll go and I’ll write in the truck during the first half and go in for the second half. When I’m actually sitting and writing I can get out over 1000 words an hour. It’s just a matter of sitting and actually typing out the words.
I just realized that I hadn’t put out an Unorthodox Writing Tips. I’ll get that out tonight as well. I guess with so much writing to actually get done, I should get on some of it, eh?
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Getting the wind knocked out of your sails.
So I’ve been a writing fool the past couple of days. I’ve been watching my word count go up quickly and it was making me very happy. I keep everything in a spread sheet with formulas and totals for days/weeks/months/etc. I’ve got a graph to show how the work is going daily and all that. Looking at the report makes me happy because I can see where my word count is going.
Then I noticed an error. Thankfully I found it only 10 days into February. It kinda took me back when I found it and it made me sad for a moment, but i quickly got over it.
According to my word count I was about 3000-4000 words ahead of schedule for my annual word count goal. Well, this mistake was adding February’s word counts to January’s word counts and padded my numbers. A lot. After fixing the formula my word count dropped by 10,000 words (thereabout). That was quite a goal, but I’m only a couple thousand behind now and I can write to get caught up. I don’t have the padding I did, but I have a lot of words I need to write so getting caught up won’t be as difficult as it could be. It just means I need to write a little extra each day and actually get back to writing daily without fail.
Okay, got that out of my system.
Kance Encounter was suppose to be released at the end of January. Sorry it’s late. I will be putting it out soon and I’m already working on the sequel. Both will be coming out this month so keep an eye out for them. I just got the edits back (email failed me and it had gotten lost the first time). Now that I have those I’ll be going through Kance Encounter and getting it out as soon as possible.
The Action Pack Podcast is on track. I should be getting audio from Mike Plested and Scott Roche over the weekend. I’ll be recording and bugging my friend for the musical parts once again. We’re hoping to get a promo ready (Mike is writing that up) and I’ll be writing up the intro to the actual podcast. Since we all have these HUGE egos, we decided not to pick which will go first and instead we’ll rotate which story goes first and we’ll also rotate introductory duties. Next week should see some updates to the Action Pack Podcast website. Keep an eye out for that.
I’ve gotten a writing assignment. Research has been accomplished. I will be getting my rear in gear and knocking out some words. Once I can announce more about this work, I shall. Stay Tuned.
Speaking of writing, I’ve got much work to do before I can start putting words down. So…
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: I was annoyed, but now I’m happy
I spent too much time last night trying to figure out why I couldn’t play music like I should be able to. I use my Xoom tablet for almost everything and I had Winamp installed and the latest Xoom update made the generic music player become the Google Music player. Ok, that’s fine.
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!
Daily Update: Yeah, I’ve been whiny the past couple of days.
I’m kind of over that at the moment. The whining I mean. Posting on this blog is a way to clear my head. Get the cobwebs out. Get my motor running. Get my fingers typing. Get my brain in the writing mode. To get all that bad stuff put aside and just get words flowing.
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!
Daily Update: Plowing through.
With the news of having a blown head gasket on sputtering truck and the expense of having to get it repaired coupled with the amount of money I’ve already put into the truck just to keep it going was a one-two I wasn’t prepared for. I let it get the better of me, but I let go long enough last night to knock out about 1500 words. It was difficult with everything gnawing away on my brain, but I wrote. I feel good about what I did write and I’m thinking I need to make some modifications. Not quite sure just yet.
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!
Daily Update: I actually ran!
No, really. I walked up the hill, then ran on the flat and downhill parts. Okay, okay. I walked up the hill and started a light jog, but I was still moving much faster than walking. I didn’t think I was going to start, but as I walked, I just had this urge to start going faster than a brisk walking pace.
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!
Daily Update: Good Things are in the Works
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!
