Category Archives: Blog Post
Unorthodox Writing Tips 15: Know When to Say When
When I was in the Navy I hung out with a bunch of guys and we all liked to drink. Not just your casual drinking, mind you. Heavy drinking. Drinking to excess. Drinking until a fight broke out, someone passed out (usually me) or the police showed up to stop the party before the sun came up. There were many times I’d wake up back in my barracks with someone else laughing about my antics the night before.
There was this time with flaming shots where I light my face on fire, but that’s a story for another day.
Suffice to say I didn’t know when to stop. I’ve matured over the years, as a person is wont to do, and I’ve learned my limit. I normally stop at two or I don’t drink at all if I’m driving.
When I first discovered podcasting I dove in with both feet. I subscribed to all 100 podcasts and listened to every back episode I could get my hands on (in most cases this was 10 or 11). Yes, I was lucky enough to discover podcasts early on and I’ve seen it evolve and I drank deeply from that cup as well.
I got burned out and eventually I stopped listening all together several times but would still go back and get caught up from time to time. Now I have a set few that I listen to each and every week and I’ve pretty much cut out everything else. I’m still subscribed and have over 50 Gigs of podcasts I haven’t listened to, but some day I’ll clear those out and just keep what I feel I need.
Which podcasts do I listen to? I’m not going to name names here, but someday I’ll put up my play list. Most of what I listen to are writing podcasts and I don’t even listen to them for the writing advice, but for the conversation.
What does any of this have to do with your writing?
Easy. Learn to know when you’ve had enough.
I could talk to you all day about writing and even longer if you’d let me. I’d burn your ear off with standard advice, editing tips, dialogue dos and don’t, talking about other authors I’ve talked with about writing and story ideas until I turn blue in the face. But what does that get you?
In the end, nothing. It also doesn’t get me anything either. Talking about doing something is fun. It’s easy. It’s great to be social. It’s great to get out there and talk with people who have done what you really want to do. You know what’s hard? WRITING!
Writing is not easy. It requires a lot of hours of sitting by yourself and typing. If all you ever do is listen to other people talk about what they’ve done and this gives you a sense of accomplishment, great. There’s no better feeling than feeling like you’ve accomplished something and living vicariously through someone else can help you achieve that.
Want to know a secret? Getting to ‘The End’ yourself is a high you’ll never forget. Do you want to know something else? Knowing that someone is listening to you talk about writing is having the same sense of accomplishment is an even higher high. But the best high of all when it comes to writing; having someone you don’t know, have never had any contact with, and could have just as easily ignored you and your work send you an email, a tweet, a facebook post to say they read what you wrote, loved it, and wants more. I’m here to tell you there is nothing like that.
So I’m going to end here. What I want you to do is to decided when you’ve had enough input and start generating output. Put down those books on writing. Put down that newsletter. Stop that podcast and sit down at your keyboard wherever it makes you comfortable and start typing. When you reach ‘The End’ come and tell me how you feel. Don’t do things that are easy to get your sense of satisfaction, do the things that are hard and that sense of satisfaction will be tenfold.
Until Next Time!
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: A day filled with WOO WOO!
So my favorite daughter had another volleyball tournament this weekend. I’m the type of father that can’t sit down while watching and I think it’s harder on me than it is on the girls sometimes. I watch them play and each point for the other team just kills me and each point they get elates me. It’s an emotional roller coaster that wears me out.
Normally they play three other teams So it’s three games and done. Well, this time they had four other teams to play. I looked at this both ways. 1) it’s more games to lose and 2) it’s a better chance for them to win.
The first match they won the first game. It was tight, but they won. They lost he second game almost as close and then lost the tie breaker. The bright side was it was their first win! So much excitement. Well, by the parents anyway.
The second match almost went the same way except they lost the first game, won the second, they WON the tie breaker! They were 1 and 1. WOO WOO! Much excitement was had by all.
The third match was against the #1 seed in their group of five and it went as expected. they lost both games, but had a great showing and performed well.
The last match was against the bottom seed and the game went as expected. They won both games but they were a little closer than we would have liked.
So they ended the day 2 wins – 2 loses and played 2 tie breakers. They did great and I couldn’t be happier. It’s all coming together. By the end of the season the team will be a force to be reckoned with.
Writing. I’m getting on that as soon as this post is up. Mike Plested and I have continued plotting Jack Kane Book 2 (title coming soon). I’m cranking out words on My Teacher is a Zombie. Then it’s on to my secret project that I will announce as soon as I’m able. Finally I’ll be working on edits on Jack Kane Book 1 and Second Kance. It’s a busy month and I still need to get working on my audio for the Action Pack podcast and getting it all produced and ready to go.
So rather than blather on and on…
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: You’d Think there’d be more time in the day.
Last night was a late night and this morning an early morning. Looks like the same again today/tomorrow.
Today my favorite daughter wanted to get and go watch a wrestling tournament at the high school. The wife rook her and I prepared some filling for some mini pies. After going to three different stores to get the ingredients, that is. By the time I got the chorizo and sausage cooked, pie crusts cut, and cheese shredded it was time to head over to my sister-in-law’s house for my mother-in-law’s 75 birthday celebration.
My favorite daughter and I only stayed for a couple hours because I needed to get her to volleyball practice. I stayed and helped and after practice it was time to get packed and head to LA (Huntington Beach really) to stay over. Tomorrow morning she has another tournament. We just got to the hotel and are settled in.
I found a little free time to type up this post. The it’s off to bed. Get up early tomorrow morning, watch the girls play and then drive back home.
All in all it has been a great day. I know every day won’t be filled with sitting and writing and it’s days like this that fill my head with lots of great ideas for stories and characters.
Need to keep this one short.
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: It’s amazing. No, really.
It’s amazing how much time I waste in a given day. Over the past couple of days, yes, there have been circumstances that have prevented me from writing. Sadly some of them were my own brain. I need to stop doing that.
Here’s a brief musical interlude: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHLAtGBIvY4
Yes, this is what I end up doing. I’ll get something stuck in my head and I’ll need to go looking for it. A good friend and I used to sing this song way back in high school and we loved the strange looks others would give us as we sang it. Unless I’m mistaken, it was my father who introduced me to this song ages ago.
But I digress. I’ve got a lot going on inside my brain at the moment and it’s odd that the more that is going on, the more ideas I come up with. I have been given an opportunity to play in someone else’s sandbox and within minutes of getting the ‘nod’ I had three ideas. One is okay, the other two are tough to choose between. So I researched both for a few hours last night and I have a great direction on either story. Now I need to choose.
So if you thinking that I didn’t write a lick last night, you’re correct. I know to reach my yearly goal I only need to write about 1100 words a day. That’s it. That’s a drop in the bucket. Doing these daily blog posts are easy and it cuts the words I need to write drastically. I just keep allowing distractions to distract me.
If you’ve been playing along you know I have a number of projects I’m working on. I also have a few that need editing, not just writing. I need to get on them as those works are complete and just need some spit and polish to get ready. I haven’t been lacking in motivation to write/edit/read. I’ve been lacking in organization. I look at my yearly word count so far and I’m disappointed in that I know I can write much more than I have. I’ve got the ideas. I’ve got them plotted. I just need to sit and write and not let other things distract me.
I had a plan to start getting up early. But when I lay down at night, I’m not tired so I read. Next thing I know it’s 11:30 or midnight and there go my plans for getting up early. I think I need to take that time where I lay at night and start writing instead of reading. I know I need to read, but with the number of projects I’ve piled on myself, I need to do much more writing than I currently am.
Angry Birds be damned, I will write!
Sorry, needed to get three stars on that level.
But seriously. I sit down to write and I’m losing focus because I have too many directions to run in. So I’m picking one. I’m going to run with it that day, and then I’ll change directions. I’ve tried writing a little each day on each project and that’s not working. So I’m about to start focusing. Look out. High energy laser-like focus is on its way. Only good things can happen from here.
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Well this is a little different.
Normally a low pressure system will move into an area pulling along a storm front or a high pressure system will push a storm system in. Yesterday it rained and I had been clear as a bell. Today, well, let’s just say not so much. This is different in that I normally get hit before the storm, not after. It’s not nearly as bad as it could be, just slightly annoying. At least the pain in my head isn’t as bad as it normally is.
Waiting is still the worst thing in the world. I’ve gotten responses back from two people I’ve been waiting for and one is good news that I cannot announce yet (but will as soon as I’m able) and the other is just to let me know I’m not being ignored. I know both are extremely busy so I don’t mind waiting. Good things are worth waiting for. Just doesn’t mean I have to like waiting 😉
On the writing front, I had intended to write last night, but wound up running a few of the girls home from the non-practice last night. This took about 30 minutes less than the actual practice. The three girls all lived in different areas. There was a stop for ice cream and I spent some time with the wife watching a couple reality shows. After spending the day writing documentation, it was a nice diversion.
I have acquired the code to the workout room. I may head over there during my lunch. We’ll see how that goes. It’ll be nice to get back to the exercise routine. I do need to do something as walking/jogging had really cleared my head and helped me write faster. Of course so did not eating ice cream, but that’s a topic for a different day.
This weekend my favorite daughter has a tournament. Not sure where just yet. Details will be provided at a later time. Usually today or tomorrow. When we got to the ‘old’ gym last night (the girls hate the old gym) it was filled with tables and water leaks. This is why practice had been cancelled.
The ‘old’ gym? Not the one at my favorite daughter’s school Heaven’s no. They practice at a different school during the week and it has a ‘new’ gym and an ‘old’ gym. We’ve seen rats running under the stage on more than one occasion. It’s dirty, bordering on decrepit, and not a place the girls like to practice. But you need to make do, right?
Each day as I write these daily updates, I think about my mother or my father. Mom is still with us, and I have many great stories to tell about her. One involves her making a sailor blush. That was awesome. She is a colorful character and a great source of my inspiration. My father is also a great source of stories. He taught me all the Shaggy Dog stories that I know. He also provided me with a great business sense that I hope to use as I step into the world of publishing. I hope to share many stories about them in future posts.
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: The Morning After
This was supposed to be published on the 6th. Looks like it got saved as a draft. Oops.
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Yesterday was SuperBowl Sunday. It’s almost a national holiday. Every year my wife’s family gathers at my father-in-law’s house. He makes some incredible carnitas (the best I’ve ever had) and everyone brings along something to go with it and/or a dessert. It’s a feast fit for a king and I eat as much as I possibly can. Sometimes (like yesterday) I eat too much and need to go to sleep as soon as we get back home.
I didn’t care for either team that made the Superbowl. Say what you like, I have my reasons. Eli Manning turned down the Chargers after being drafted. That never sat well with fans. Belachick got caught cheating and a proper investigation was never performed. So I really didn’t care who won and this gave me no emotional stake in the game.
I usually love the commercials presented during the Superbowl so normally I won’t get up for the commercials. After the first few sets of commercials I was also disappointed and would get up and snack during the commercials.
Then there’s the half time show. Where do I begin. If you like Madonna, I’m sorry please skip the next paragraph.
Madonna is the worst performer of all time. Sure there was a big production around her, but she didn’t not sing one word. She didn’t dance. She barely moved. I know she’s getting old, but this is the Superbowl. People should have higher standards. When you’re singing is clear as a bell and people are waving pompoms in your face and all I can hear is your voice you want me to believe that you’re singing? The only reason I can think that Madonna was selected is that she has a new album and is going on tour. And she expects her fans to pay $300 and up to see her perform. Really? I don’t think so. She’s a has-been that never should have been. That’s my opinion and I’m sticking to it! Sorry, I was really upset during the half time show and I needed to vent. I personally feel that people who don’t actually sing their songs should be banned from performing.
Sputtery Truck ran like a champ yesterday. Thank you to all who inquired about its present condition. The next couple of days will be telling. I made several errands and drove quite a bit yesterday. The new engine is awesome, it’s just a waiting game to see if I need to replace an O2 sensor or a catalytic convertor. I’m hoping for neither, but we’ll see.
Writing didn’t happen yesterday. With a number of errands to do pre-game and eating more than any 5 normal men (plus 2 helpings of dessert) my brain was just not in gear to write. I’ve written an UWT about this. Even though no writing happened, yesterday was an awesome day. I love spending time with my wife’s family. My tummy today would disagree, but it was some great food. For me, it’s never really about the game, but spending time with friends and family.
How was your Superbowl Sunday? Did you watch the game? Do you avoid the game at all costs? Was it just another day? If you’re outside the states, do you even care?
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Check Engine
So the Check Engine light came on this morning. At least I’m confident that it’s not related to the engine, but the exhaust. I’ve got it narrowed down to one or two parts and they don’t affect the performance of the truck. Started right up this morning and I was on my way into the office. Today is a good day.
It’s supposed to rain today. I’ve been diligent about taking my sinus medicine. Normally I’d be shut down right about now. Happily, I’m not. I’m clear headed and ready to rock and roll. It’s been a long time since I’ve made it through a rainy day without suffering.
As a kid, I used to love rainy days. Growing up in Minnesota it wasn’t uncommon to have a warm rain on a hot summer day. My brother and I would get into our shorts and run and play outside. After a good heavy downpour we’d end up with our tonka toys plowing through every available mud puddle. By the end of the day we’d be covered head to toe in mud. My mom would make us stand by the back door while she hosed us off before allowing us to go inside and take a shower or bath.
As an adult, I learned to dread the rain. Typically I’d get a headache a day or two before a storm and my sinuses would all but shut me down. I could easily go through a couple boxes of tissue in a day and would use the cheaper method of a roll of toilet paper. The day before it would rain would usually be the worst. The low pressure system bring the rain would be doing its best to kill me and my head threatened to explode. It’s a pain I wouldn’t wish on anyone. I’d almost rather get hit in the head with a bat. At least the pain would subside quicker.
To say I was surprised when the wife told me “It’s supposed to rain tomorrow” would be an understatement. I didn’t feel anything and even as I write this I only feel the slightest pressure. I’ll not be forgetting my meds any time soon I can tell you that.
Yesterday was a good writing day. I accumulated nearly 2000 words. I didn’t get stuck, but after dinner I couldn’t focus as well on my writing so I decided to play around with the blog a little bit. I found new word counters. Now you can keep better track of where I’m at and so can I. It’s great having a visual display of where I am in a story. Heck, where I’m at with multiple stories. I just need to start making those percentages go up quicker.
Speaking of quicker, I’ve got some paperwork to get done. I already know what I want to write during my lunch. It’s raining, I can’t go walk.
Speaking of walking, I’ve got the code to my complexes workout room. I hope to get back on the horse soon. I will post my numbers as I do.
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Astel E-Book giveaway winner announced
Scott Roche announced the winner for the Astel:Chosen giveaway. Read more here…
http://scottroche.com/thoughts/2012/02/06/shira-ebook-giveaway
J.R. Murdock 