Category Archives: Daily Update
Daily Update: Because I’m a writer
Yesterday I wrote. I wrote because I love to write. I wrote in little bursts here and there and knocked out a couple thousand words. I didn’t have much free time as my favorite niece and nephew were here and my favorite daughter took them to the pool. They had great fun.
The wife took the Millican’s youngest daughter shopping for ‘stuff’ that they assembled for her Quincera. They cleared the table (where I have my laptop) and went to work assembling. We ate pasta, I took my favorite niece and nephew home, and we just sat and talked with the Millicans for a few hours. We talked about our previous trip to Oregon and our upcoming trip to Oregon.
The Millican’s mom lives in Oregon so we will drive up there, stay with her for a week, and drive back. There will be a stop in San Francisco either on the way up or the way back. I forget which. The Millican’s youngest son plays lacrosse and he’ll be up there playing. We should be able to catch a game. Hopefully I can get some clam chowder on the bay again.
I’m attempting to get over 60,000 words ahead of schedule before we go. That’ll be tough, but I think I can manage it. I need to write a couple thousand words a day and I hit that yesterday. I need to hit it again today. Preferable surpass it. I know I’ll have a lot of little obstacles in the way. Currently I’m only 45,000 words ahead of schedule. This means I’m good for a vacation, but I’d like to be even further ahead of that schedule. I’ve let a commitment slide and I don’t like that feeling. I need to get caught up and hopefully ahead of schedule.
My writing partner, Mike Plested, has been on Holiday. We have a couple of projects going and once he’s back, I’m out. So it’ll be a few weeks before he and I are back on track with all we have going on. We had a good head of steam going (steampunk pun intended) before I went out to Palm Desert and we just didn’t get back on track before he went and ran away. Ah well, summers are like that.
Today, I think, will see more progress on my writing. Or so I hope. I’m a hopeful kind of person. I should have some free time this evening and hopefully more free time later in the week to knock out a large number of words. I’m nearly done with the next episode of Golden West and I will jump right into the following episode before I dip my head back into Of Gnomes and Dwarves. I’ll also take care of my recording of both those episodes so I’ll be one month ahead and will try not to slip again this year.
With Of Gnomes and Dwarves, I’m just getting to the middle of the book. For many people, this is the slog before the storm. For me, this is where things are all coming together and will suddenly be exploding in all different directions. I’ve got the group assembled, they’re about to join another group. The war is brewing. Oh yeah, I’m having fun with this one. I really can’t wait to get back into it.
I’m still giving serious consideration to self-publishing Of Gnomes and Dwarves. I really think I’ve got a solid story that will do well once out into the wild. I’m going to start, when I get back from Oregon, looking at where good places are to do a blog tour, where I can get a great cover for it, I’ll look at doing the internal layout. I’ll need chapter graphics. I really want to do this book right when I release it. I’ll post the details as I work them out.
There’s a lot to do and more duck pictures to download.
Until Next Time!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Sometimes there’s just a lot going on.
This weekend was a prime example of a lot of life happening all at one time.
Friday we went to a play. Art to Die For. Our friends the Farins were in the play. Well, Dad and his two daughters. They’ve done several performances at their church and this, in all the ones I’ve seen, was the funniest by far. The kids are getting really good and hit all their lines perfectly. One person in the play had several bit roles. He stole each scene he was in with a narcoleptic character, a sheik, a frenchman, and three or four other characters. There was audience participation, appetizers served by the cast (in characters) and, this time, no over the top religious theme. Being at a church they usually have a very religious theme/moral to the play. This one had a much lighter message.
Saturday we got up early, walked, got ready and went to Inflatable World. What? You’ve never been to Inflatable World? I’m sure it’s not just a local thing, but it’s a place here in San Diego where they have a number of inflatable slides/games. It’s $15 to get in and you can stay as long as you like and slide as many slides as you like. It was for, let me see if I can get this right, the wife’s niece’s fiance’s youngest son. I’m not sure how that makes him related to me, but he likes to be tossed in the air and swung around like a little monkey so that’s fine by me. Of course once you start to swing one kid in a circle a line forms and soon the kids thought I was one of the attractions. I swung kids until I saw one that I was pretty sure wasn’t part of the birthday party and decided it was a good time to stop.
Needless to say a lot of sun and fun (and a couple of beers) will wear you out. We went back home and the wife and my favorite daughter started to watch TV for a little bit. They both fell asleep. I played a large, online (free) poker tournament. I think I mentioned this already so I won’t go into greater detail. In summary, I got 17th out of a field of 600 players. It felt good to get that far just because you have so many random players in a free tournament like that.
Sunday was a lazy day. My brain has been hurting, I’ve had trouble waking up, I have just have no energy at all. So I took some downtime. The wife and my favorite daughter went and did some shopping with the Millican’s wife and youngest daughter. Me? I watched the Big Drop for One Drop. This was a $1,000,000 buy in tournament. I wanted to compare what they cut out of the 7+ hours of video I had watched earlier in the week. The entire event was broadcast live so I saw the entire final table. It was great to see how some hands were played and I learned a lot. When you look at the condensed version they really cut out a lot of good hands. I’d like to see more final tables where you get to see every hand play out, but that’d be a lot of poker to watch.
I will be watching the 2012 WSOP (World Series of Poker) this year. I didn’t watch last year except for the final table of the main event. There are a lot of other events and I plan to record and watch them all. I love me some poker.
Sunday I also watched The Hunger Games. I’ll be writing a review for that. My initial reaction, if you didn’t read the book, there are a number of confusing part. Overall it gets a ‘meh’ from me. I’ll explain in greater detail.
Then the wife, my favorite daughter, and the Millican’s wife and youngest daughter got back to the Millicans house and I went over there. We talked, we ate, The Millican and I played a little online poker, and finally we came home. I should have taken more naps this weekend, but at least today my brain feels like it’s firing on all cylinders once again. I’m liking it. I hope it’ll hold up all week. It’s going to be yet another long week. I can just tell already.
Sputtery Truck update: So the last three times I’ve driven Sputtery Truck (with great trepidation) the gauges all stayed where they were supposed to. No dings, bings, dongs, gongs, chimes, or other indications of sputteritis. Hopefully it’ll stay that way. I’ll be getting the brakes checked out before our big trip up to Oregon. More on that later.
I’ve got a lot to do and not a lot of time to get it done.
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Running out of Gas
I’m sitting here trying to think of what to write for my daily update. Some days this is a piece of cake and snap, bang, done. It’s out there and I didn’t even need to think about it. Then there are days like yesterday and today where I have to think really hard about what I’m going to day and until I actually dig in, nothing comes out. It’s not really writer’s block in the fact that I can sit here and type words, but I’m just dipping into the bottom of the barrel and not finding anything worth posting about.
Oh, sure, I’ve got a lot to say, a lot of things on my mind. There’s a lot going on. It’s just a matter of trying to get everything together into coherent thought and onto the page. I can sit here for minutes looking at the screen, surfing youtube videos, listening to music, reading blog posts. I did a lot of that last night. Watched some poker videos. I watched the live (well, it was recorded) one drop event. The first half anyway. It’s over 7 hours of video showing how each hand plays out.
Then I get to thinking I miss poker. I played a couple play money tournaments last night. Wasn’t as much fun as I thought it was going to be, but after my win on Friday I keep thinking how much I miss poker.
And ComiCon is in town this week. It started last night. Several big names whose blogs I follow are in town. I won’t be getting to see them, but I’ll follow along virtually and see all that’s happening. Just to name a few, Brandon Sanderson, John Scalzi, Wil Wheaton, Mark Evanier, George R. R. Martin. There’s going to be a lot going on this year and I’ll be missing out.
It’s by choice though. We had a couple family vacations already planned and adding in comic con to the cost and time off just wasn’t in the budget. I’ve been to ComiCon several times and each time it’s only gotten bigger. Even though I live in San Diego I would have stayed at a hotel downtown to walk in rather than try to drive in each day. Perhaps next year, but this year it’s just not in the cards.
Last year I did manage to go meet with a couple deadpanites (visit jackmangan.com if you’re wondering what that’s all about) and we had a great lunch, some wonderful conversations, and many jokes about my big truck. Yes, that would be Sputtery Truck as I call him nowadays.
So I’m going to keep today’s post shorter than usual. Oh, wait. Am I? Pfft.
See what I mean, it’s just a matter of sitting down and letting the fingers do the work. Speaking of work, my lunch break is over. I’d better get back at it.
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: M.M.O 7 Gaming Mouse
So you’ve been waiting to hear how I like my mouse, aren’t you? I’ve been using it for a while now and you’d like to know, as a programmer, what I think about this mouse. Here are my thoughts after using is and setting it up for a while.
I think I have a new right hand.
No, really. This mouse has a good number of buttons and they’re all accessible. A majority of them are for the thumb and the shift key on the ring finger doubles the number of thumb buttons. Have I programmed all possible combinations yet? No, I haven’t. I have programmed a lot of buttons right off the bat, then forgot some of the ones I programmed. That’s easy to do as I wasn’t using those buttons that often. Yes, I could be using the keyboard shortcuts for many of these commands, but it’s nice to have them all on my mouse.
A quick summary of what I’ve programmed so far.
I reversed the back and forward buttons (it’s just me)
Copy, paste, cut, select all (on the joystick)
Screen shot (on the joystick press)
Alt+tab on the flap button
Enter on the front thumb button, delete on the back thumb button.
Refresh (Ctrl+f5) on the scroll wheel click
Undo on thumb wheel up
Redo on thumbwheel down
With the shift key:
Shift+Enter on the front thumb button
Backspace on the back thumb button
Refresh CVS on the wheel click
Update CVS on the flap button
Commit CVS on the joystick press
That’s what I’ve got so far. I know I’m underutilizing the device but I’m always looking for more key combinations that I do on a regular basis and I’ll look at programming a button for that. For example I still need a CTRL+F (Find) as this is something that I use often, I just haven’t figure out which button to assign that to that’ll make the most sense.
From my experience so far, I don’t know how I lived without this mouse. Yes, I know it’s lazy to think about using a single mouse click to perform a two key combination, but I’m looking at it more that I can do these things faster with one hand than multiple fingers. I’ve had a blast setting it up, I’m having even more fun using it on a daily basis. It’s one of those things that once you get used to it, it’s really easy to use. Like any new device, it takes time learning how to use it, but once you’re used to it and no longer afraid to try something different with it, you wonder how you ever lived without it. I know I’ll be doing more and more with it as time goes on. There are so many possibilities I just need to do it one button at a time.
Now I also got a hold of the Razer Nostromo. I still haven’t fully programmed it. Well, that’s a lie. I programmed several buttons to do multiple things, but it’s not like the mouse where I use it all day every day. I’m still getting used to what it can do and to putting my hand over there instead of on the keyboard. 20 years of sitting at a computer it’s hard to get out of the habit of one hand on the mouse and one hand on the keyboard. Old habits die hard and it’ll take more time to get used to putting my left hand on the Nostromo. Again, with time I’ll get used to both devices. Then I’ll be dangerous. I’ll do a full run down of what I do with the Nostormo another day.
On the writing front, I’ve been hunting and pecking a little here and a little there. I hope to find a good block of time later today to get a nice chunk done. We’ll see how that goes and I’ll report back tomorrow.
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Really, Sputtery Truck? Really?
Today is a day in the office. That means I climb into Sputtery Truck and drive the 30 minutes into work. Yesterday I had Sputtery Truck looked at and I was quite happy it was going to be a minor repair. $200 total vs ~$1000. The issue was the Oil Pressure Sensor. That was replaced. The mechanic said all looked good. I thanked him. Payed him. Drove away.
DING!
Low oil pressure after about five minutes driving off the lot. I picked up my favorite daughter from volleyball practice (she said she had an awesome practice YEAH!) and washed the Tahoe, and took Sputtery Truck back to the mechanic. We watched the truck idle and the pressure bob and weave (up, down, up, down). He said he’d had it connected to an external pressure meter and it read 16 PSI (standard) and never dipped even when the old pressure sensor read low.
So I was semi-confident that driving in today I wouldn’t explode in a brilliant flaming fireball much like the San Diego Fireworks this year (http://youtu.be/JuJHfkXEI-o if you haven’t seen it yet). I got in the truck, hit several stop lights, no low oil pressure. But then I hadn’t had low oil pressure before until it got up to temp.
Most of my drive is freeway so I didn’t have to slow down at any point. It was kinda nice driving in today. Lots of people must be on vacation. At any rate, when I got off the freeway I was fully expecting the pressure to DING! And drop then bounce back up. I kept my eye on the needle. I watched it like a hawk watching a mouse twitch in the grass. It moved slightly. It wiggled a little bit. It felt my intense stare. But didn’t go down.
Then I got to the next red light. And the next. And the next.
No Ding this morning. Color me confused. The engine was up to temp. The only difference was it was a slightly cooler morning. I’m not sure if that made enough of a difference, but we’ll find out when I go home later today. I’m hopeful that Sputtery Truck has been subdued into submission.
I got around 1000 words written yesterday. Being a crazy busy day there weren’t many hours to actually sit and write, but I found a small chunk of time and went for it. And I played a little NetHack. Died a few times, but upset that I couldn’t find the files so I could back up my character and decided to write instead.
We went to the Millicans’ house. It was the Millican’s father’s birthday. There was a fire extinguisher on hand and the room warmed considerably when the cake came out. It was a festive celebration and much food was had by all.
Happy Birthday, Pops!
I’m off to go get this day going in the right direction! I hope you’re off to do the same!
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Saga of the Sputtery Truck
Today is a good day. I took Sputtery Truck into the shop. I was prepared for the worst. I informed them about the truck’s history and waited. They called and said it wasn’t the Oil Pump (a costly repair) and that the oil pressure looked good holding steady at 16PSI just like it should. So it’s the Pressure Sensor that’s bad. A $100 repair. I went ahead and had them perform an engine flush just to make sure everything is clean inside before the installed the new pressure sensor. I’ll be on my way to pick up Sputtery Truck soon.
My favorite daughter is back to volleyball today. She’s just getting over a mouth issue (no, not mouthing off to the wife and I). She’s just starting to be able to eat again after having multiple cold sores and canker sores as well as a minor case of gingivitis. The poor thing couldn’t eat much of anything because it hurt so much to chew. We will be doing a lot of working out over the next few weeks up until tryouts. It’s going to be a busy, busy time.
Last night we took a little drive and did some shopping. We’re getting ready for the Millican’s youngest daughter’s quinceanera. We all need spiffy outfits. If you don’t know what a quinceanera is, it’s a party for a girl when she reaches 15. It’s the Mexican equivalent of a sweet 16. It will be held in Tijuana so the Wife and I have our passports all ready to go. That will be a load of fun.
During the trip my eye, which had been bothering me in the light all day, continued to get worse. I had changed my contact lens, but that didn’t help. It felt like someone had stuck their finger in my eye and refused to pull it back out. Needless to say it was distracting at best, and painfully distracting at worse. I took a nap while the Wife, My favorite daughter and her friend all shopped. When I woke up I thought it might be better. Well, I thought wrong.
It was, however, better after shopping was done and we went to BJs for lunch (late lunch early dinner?) I knew they made beer. What I didn’t know was that they made their own Root Beer, Blackberry Soda, Orange Cream Soda, and Cream Soda. Not only do they make their own, they do a fine job of it and after three glasses (free refills don’tchaknow) my eye felt better. So I’m saying here and now that Cream Soda is a miracle cure for a sore eye. Results may vary.
The food was great. The service was excellent. I’d been there a couple of times and I still haven’t tried the beer. If the Cream Soda is any indication of their quality of beverages, I’ll be trying a sampler the next time I walk through their doors. I’m in the mood for some good beer just like I’m in the mood for some good poker.
Speaking of poker, I used to be a little into poker. Ok, a lot into poker. I had stopped writing for a spell (a year?) while I played online poker as much as humanly possible. I made some money, but never anything significant. It was more for entertainment. During that time and leading up to that time was heavily into watching poker as well. I also read books about poker, watched training videos, you name it, I was obsessed with poker. I got to know a lot of the players from watching them on TV so when I see their name in the news I would read about them.
Lately I’ve been reading about the WSOP (World Series of Poker). There are a lot of events and I’ve been trying not to read too much about them. I want to see the hands played out on TV, but it’s so hard to avoid any news. I’ve subscribed to multiple poker news feeds so it’s difficult to avoid reading an article when I see a top player’s name in the news feed. I will try to keep from getting too deeply involved. I’ve already got my DVR set up to record the 2012 WSOP. I can’t wait. 🙂
My eye feels better, Sputtery Truck is going to be in better shape for less than I thought, I won a poker tournament Friday, This is starting out to be a great week. Now I need to go find some more pictures of ducks (I want to have an ample supply before I start) and I need to write up some more writing prompts (I also want to have a good supply before I start). Those will be coming daily. Be on the lookout. I also intend to get some more writing done today. Yesterday wound up being a shopping day. We’ll see how it goes.
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Nethack and MUDs
I don’t know why, but I have an affinity for text based games. I played ZORK when it first came out. I played MUDs over a 1200 baud modem. I had a great time doing so. This was how I was introduced to computers was through games and the best games were all text based. When you found a game with great graphics for a PC it was usually a text based adventure with splash graphics.
Yes, I grew up in the primitive age of computers.
So I was having a hankering for playing a game the other day and this might shock you, but I don’t own a gaming console or a gaming PC (something I will remedy one of these days). So my PC will heat up if I play a graphics intensive game and without a console…well, you get the point.
So that leads me back to text based adventures. Now Nethack isn’t really a text based game, but it doesn’t have any graphics either. It’s run in the computers CMD window and everything is drawn with text characters. If you’re lucky enough you can have color as well. Each letter or symbol represents something different. For example a blue E is a water elemental, but a blue e is a floating eye. A red E is a fire elemental. A D (depending on the color) is a dragon (color determines what type).
The game is a D&D style game where you ‘roll’ up a character by picking what you are (race, class, sex, alignment) and this determines a number of factors about your character. You’re dropped into a dungeon on level 1 and you need to get to the bottom of the dungeon, collect a special token, and get back to the top of the dungeon. There is also a special quest depending on your characters class and alignment.
What does this mean? It means there are dozens of levels in the dungeon. There are multiple different quests. There are endless possibilities.
The game is based on the original Rogue game developed in 1980 and evolved into NetHack in the late 80s (1987?). It’ gone through a lot of changes over the years and some people have even developed graphical versions of the game. And yes, there is an app for that. So I downloaded the app. I’m still getting used to it. I’ve died multiple times. When I played the PC version it was easy to stop playing, copy your character file, and restart. This would give you a backup save point. When you die in nethack, that’s it. It’s over. You don’t start where you left off. That means it’s quite frustrating if you’ve spent a number of hours playing and suddenly you die through some accident (accidents happen in the dungeon) and all your progress is gone. Poof. Just like that. Over.
These are the kinds of games I grew up with as a kid. There were no endless lives. You died, you started over and learned to be more careful. You didn’t float back in a bubble and magically continue your game. Oh heck no. You also didn’t follow the same path everyone else followed. You didn’t just solve a level and move on. Nethack develops levels as you go and draws them randomly ever time. That means you never know what you’re going to get or where it’ll be at. Only a few levels are static like the quests and the lower levels, but for the most part you’re looking at a random dungeon.
I will probably play a little each day. I don’t think I’ll get sucked in like I did long, long ago. It’s fun to see what’s similar in the app version, but I’m used to playing with a keyboard. It’s taking some getting used to.
Other than that, I wrote a bunch yesterday. I knocked out another 2500 words. I hope to do the same today. We’ll see how it goes. I have some honey dos and some shopping to take care of. I need to take Sputtery Truck to the shop tomorrow. I have pictures of ducks to download. Busy Busy Busy.
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Sputtery Truck and Poker
I wrote just over 2500 words yesterday. That felt great! It was nice to get back on track with writing once more. Only a little bit was fiction, but I intend to write a lot more fiction today. More fiction than you can shake a stick at. Well, I don’t know why you’d be shaking a stick at fiction, but it makes for an interesting mental picture. No?
I will attempt to perform the same feat today and write around 2500 words. I’ve fallen behind, but I can get back up. I just need to sit and write. I had intended to watch a movie and then write. I managed to fall asleep for a couple of hours. Last week took a lot out of me mentally, physically, and emotionally. I feel refreshed now and a-writing I will go.
The movie I watched earlier was the 1958 sci-fi movie Terror from the year 5000! I won’t call it a classic. I’m not even sure it should be called sci-fi. The plot was weak, the characters motivated by things other than the science, and other than a little time travel speculation, wasn’t very thrilling. I’m glad it was just over an hour. I don’t think I could have watched much more of it.
Yesterday the Millican and I had decided to go to the casino to play some poker. Skip ahead a bit if you’re not that much into poker. I’m about to get poker geeky here.
<poker>
This was a bounty tournament. $40 buy in ($6 fee) and $10 bounties. A bounty is the money you collect for knocking someone out. I got half a bounty. Not too thrilling, but some of the hands were. Here are the big hands. I had Jh8h against five other people. Two people were all in and I was in the big blind and it wasn’t much more to call so I stayed in. Pot odds and all that. Flop came Js 10c Jc. Another person shoved all in, a second shoved all in. I tanked. I had to think about this. One person was already all in. I had the other two covered. I figured, why not. 3 bounties would be awesome. The first all in had 10 10. Another had KQ. Another had AA. And me with my J8. Turn came an A and the river a blank. I got beat by everyone else in the hand and went from 12K down to 1200. That hand really hurt. I got AA the next hand and shoved with one caller (the big blind) and doubled up. The next hand I picked up AQs and figured, why not? I shoved again. I got called by the following hands. KQ, KQ, KJ, K9. Yes, 4 callers. I was golden. The board came all low cards and I quadrupled up. I lost a limp bet, I picked up KK and picked up someone’s raise when I shoved. I made it to the final table with around 21K in chips.
There were no spectacular hands on the final table. I picked up AA again and shoved from the button. The small blind grumbled and folder. The Big Blind called with JJ. It was a nice double up that helped me get down to three players left. We chopped and each of us took $331. The big stack wanted to chop rather than take a bad beat which I was good with as well as the short stack who had been almost crippled during the play. The two I made it to the end with were at my table the entire time and we talked, smack talked, and generally had a good time. We each showed some hands just to have a good laugh and show a bluff here and a great hand there. It was the most fun I’d had playing poker in some time and not just because I made a little money at it. I was relaxed and on my game. I read players well, I made great calls, and I want to go back and do it again soon.
</poker>
Tonight I’m going to do some writing. The Action Pack is taking a month off due to many vacations by all the writers involved. I’ll write up a post for that soon. We will return on the 1st with more stories. I want to get ahead a couple of episodes so I’ll be taking a short break from Of Gnomes and Dwarves and work on Golden West for a few days. I’ll be happy to get back to working on Of Gnomes and Dwarves. Maus and Willie are waiting for me. Slick probably is too, but he’s a problem child.
Sputtery Truck is being annoying once again. I took him to a ship today, but they won’t be able to look at him until Monday. I’ll be dropping him off early Monday Morning and hopefully it’s not bad news. I’m losing oil pressure and it could be either engine sludge (I just dropped a new engine in there so I hope it’s not that) or it could be the oil pump. I doubt it’s anything cracked inside the engine because I don’t lose pressure when the engine is revving (only lose it when idling) and I’m not losing any oil at all. I’m hopeful that a flush or a new oil pump will take care of it.
Speaking of getting it taken care of, I need to get some writing done. And some pictures of ducks to download.
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Back on Track
Today will see me back on track. I was going to write last night, but two things prevented me. Well, three really. One was my favorite daughter. Two was my favorite nephew. Three was Spiderman.
Yes, that web-head prevented me from writing last night. The kids were in the house all day watching TV and playing video games. I figured I’d gt them out of the house for a little bit. So I ran my errand that truly put a slice of my life behind me and took those two to the movies. The wife wasn’t in the mood for Spiderman so it was the kids and I. At least until I sent a text to the Millican and he joined us. I will be doing a review on the movie soon. Just as I’ll be doing reviews on the books I’ve read lately.
But like the title says, back on track. I’ll be spending as much time as I can getting back on track. Although I’ve been doing daily writing with my blog posts, I haven’t been writing fiction daily. Vacation did that for me. I’m still way far ahead of my annual goal so I’m not worried yet. I do need to get further ahead before my next vacation hits at the end of this month. After that work will be ramping up and I’ll have another major project to work on so I need to take advantage of a light work day where (at the end) my brain will be clear and I’ll be ready to rock and roll.
As I’ve said before I haven’t stopped plotting and planning in my brain. This will help so when I actually sit and do my daily writing it’ll go that much faster. I’ve already had entire conversations with the characters in my head, seen where they’re going. I know what they’re going to do. I don’t have any surprises in store at this point. At least not for me. That’s the joy of plotting even if it’s only in my head. I’m frustrated that I haven’t written as much as I would have liked, but still, I’ve made progress.
There are a lot of words ahead of me before I hit my annual goal and they’re not going to write themselves. So…
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
Daily Update: Freedom! Sweet Freedom!
Yesterday was more of a celebration of freedom yesterday for me. As I have mentioned (and been very vague about) I have a been dealing with a personal matter that has no w been resolved. I’m quite happy about this. It’s a burden off my mind and a lot of stress that will now go away.
Now I will be able to deal with Sputtery Truck which seems to have a failing oil pump. If it’s not one thing, it’s another. That’s kinda how life works, right?
Even so, I can still get back to writing as much as I possibly can. I’ve allowed things to back up through vacation and personal issues and now that those are past me, it’s time to press on. The good thing about the vacation; I was able to get some reading done. That helped prime the pump for wanting to get back into writing and gave me some ideas and directions for the stories I’m working on. I have many reviews that I need to write up, but those will have to wait for the time being. I do want to do them while the stories are still fresh in my mind. I’d hate to let my thoughts slip from my mind.
Speaking of my mind… wait, what was I thinking about? Ducks? Writing? Reading? Hmmm.. I’ll figure it out sooner or later.
Last night here in San Diego we had fireworks. Sadly 5 minutes before 9PM (when the fire works were to start) a whole bunch of brilliant flames shot up from the bay. It was amazing and brilliant and really cool to watch. Then at 9PM the fireworks started and somehow there was no finale. The radio station that sponsored the fireworks this year announced their apology that the finale was set off prior to the actual start of the fireworks. I’m hoping someone recorded then and will edit them to they way they’re supposed to be.
We watched them from my father-in-law’s house. No, he does live on the bay, but he re-did his patio cover and put a deck on top of it. So from up there the entire family gathered and we could see all the firework locations at one time. Some were a little further away and not as brilliant, but it was still amazing to watch. Instead of trying to fight traffic to a certain location, I think this will become our 4th of July tradition. We were able to watch baseball, talk, eat, drink, and relax before the show so it was really nice.
For now I need to get some work done, run an errand later today, and then it’s all about the writing. And Ducks!
Until Tomorrow!
WOO WOO!
J.R. Murdock 