Blogs

  • A Phantom for My Opera?

    Some days when I doubt myself and my abilities to write I think of employing a ghost writer. But in a bit of a different setup. I will write the first draft and then the potential ghost writer can refine it to a readable/enjoyable state. I love storytelling, and I love the creative process. But my produce just isn't up to par most of the time. Training is like trying to teach an old dog new tricks. I read, I watch, I practice... I learn? Yeah, sometimes I do learn. But I will continue to try my best. So no, I will not employ a phantom for my space opera. I will be the author of my own...
  • The Desperate Search for a New Idea...

    I think I have it... Not a truly different idea in that it's completely unheard of on any level.. But I had quit story-telling for a while because I couldn't think of something genuinely new and interesting. Different in terms of style, structure, and idea. As a fiction writer...I tend to want to [I]create [/I]something. To flex my imagination rather than offering stylistic renditions of the same types of stories. Only problem is...I think I will never complete it in time. I know...cryptic. Useless...but this is more a time-stamp for myself. Maybe, in time, someone will look back on...
  1. Guess what, America....

    The internet is not America.

    It's not.

    It's the World.

    Welcome to it. I know you've been insulated from it for a goodly while, but it's time you got reacquainted.

    Please leave your giant, gossamer-thin comfort bubble in the receptacle to your left before entering. Notions of political correctness go in the bin to your right.

    Please know that viewpoints will be other than your own.

    Please know that you will encounter socio-personal interactions different from the ones you have been...
  2. One in a million.

    There are only a few people that are going to help you when you are in need without expecting something in return. The ones that are unrelated to you or that are not close friends of yours, even fewer. You can count them on the fingers of only a hand and these people are a true blessing. Noble and sincere. Polite, gentle souls. Theofilos Vandoros was one of these few people that crossed my path. We met one warm spring night at the small cafe/bar of a self-managed hangout through a friend and...
  3. What They Forget

    They don’t talk about the listlessness.

    It’s been around two years since I “got out” of the Marine Corps, and the itch to go back lingers day in and out. But that ship sailed with the breaking of my legs.

    I’m a bit of a cripple of sorts (not wheel chair crippled, bless those poor bastards’ souls), though I probably will never run again. I’ll always have a limp in my right leg. No one escapes a broken patella, which the doctor describes when reading your CT scan as “kibbles and bits,”...
  4. Do you want to write your story? Or someone elses?

    I've made my share of mistakes, and they probably are legion. But you know what I've never done? I never told someone elses story. I'm telling mine.

    What are you doing? Are you also writing your own story? I don't mean a memoir necessarily, but the story you bit into with joy, consternation and despair?
    Lightbulbs going off all over your brain when some scene that's been giving you headaches suddenly made sense?
    Hours and hours of arranging tiles on a storyboard to get just the...
  5. Grief

    This is the first time I have been on here in months.
    My work went back to being insanely busy and once again I was wrapped up in it, unable to think of anything else.

    My job was the most important thing to me until my dad unexpectedly died.
    Now I don't think about work, I dont really think about anything anymore.
    I just think about him.
    I'm not good at this and he would be.
    When the cards and the flowers stop, when the texts and the calls stop, its just you thinking about a voice you will...
  6. Well, it’s certainly been a minute.

    Why did I step down as admin? If you care to read on, I’ll get you up to speed:

    The aftermath of Hurricane Maria quietly morphed into the first passes of eldercare on my part. Maria aged all of us in ways that none of us can deny, but for my parents who were already well into the senior zone, the mark Maria left was game-changing, and I’m the only one around to provide for their care.

    And Puerto Rico’s recent inclusion into the Very Seismically Active Club™ has been a new flavor of crazy...
  7. I published my first book

    Today is awesome for me because my first book, SciFi Doodad, got approved and placed on Amazon. I've got a lot of work to do, and more books to write, but for now I'm just riding the high of actually following my passion and hobby.

    The first of many books.
  8. Minding One's Manners

    This is something I've had kicking around in my head for a while, but was spurred onto the page in partial response to @Foxxx's Thoughts Stirred by Stripclubs

    Ah, the gentlemen’s clubs. In my younger days, I spent… well, no. If I was still doing it, it would be far too much time, but there’s a time to every purpose under heaven, and your late teens/early twenties are the perfect...
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  9. Update on the Missing Forums/Posts

    Last Wednesday (4/27) the Community Interaction category of the forum disappeared. I know many of you have been wondering what happened, what is currently going on, and when it will be back. This post is to explain the situation - and does so in detail - so as to be transparent about the problem, since it's still unresolved. It may get somewhat technical. If you want the short explanation, jump to the end. I would have made an announcement sooner, but I had to gather information and I had...
  10. Good Job

    Yesterday was my last day at work. A few days from a ten-year span. I did other things during, but this was the one I could count on to pay the bills.

    I realized "It's been a pleasure" and "thank you" frustratingly does not seem to be enough. There's something else I should say, but the words won't come. Oh well, done and done. I'm driving home, windows down. I stop for a walker-bound lady to cross (I'm turning right, light green). Person behind me honks. No big deal: he just can't see the...
  11. Tales from the insane box of quarntine.

    What's new in the land of OZ and padded walls?

    Started working on a custom LP guitar build. Though I am having a bit of a challenge sorting out how to not screw up the acrylic glaze part. Hopefully with some careful thought and creative ingenuity it will go alright, given I haven't ever played with acrylic resin before. Should be fun, and luckily I won't glue my feet to the floor in the process.
    :supergrin:

    Writing wise I've taken a break from my main WIP at 23k, and it's complicated 8th...
  12. Tired

    There's an informal sniper motto that goes:

    "Don't bother running, you'll only die tired."

    I often apply that to the folks who bolt out of the one train I take, hoping against hope to make the two-minute distance fit the one-minute connection time.

    But today...today today today.... the train I was going for, when I was at about the halfway point, decided to be just ever so slightly late.

    So I ran. I fucking ran. Through the second rush-hour crowd, through the connecting station, down the...
  13. Acceptance II

    It takes a lot of effort sometimes to remember the good moments when you've lost someone really close. Sometimes the grief is more than a wave. It's a vacuum and you can't feel anything but the pressure of that loss, the pressure of the absence of the person you loved. They can't make jokes about how innocent you were. They can't send you twenty-five YouTube videos of their favorite metal songs for you to wake up to. They can't stay up until all hours of the night just because they love the...
  14. The Funeral of My Youth

    Inspired by a recent comment in Random Thoughts.

    When I was a senior in high school, one of my classmates died. Not through any of the usual teenage shenanigans, not through a random bit of ionizing radiation twisting his DNA.

    It took a week to find the spot where the flight path had made its abrupt intersection with local geography.

    His father wasn't certified to fly on instruments alone.

    But when the funeral came... Ever been to a high school funeral? I wore black jeans, a...
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  15. Forgot my mask

    I went to get some pizza today and pick up my Mom's medication from the pharmacy. I've been cooperative with these rules on wearing masks but today I just forgot it. I was nearly at the pharmacy when I remembered and figured it would be okay to just go in without the mask this once. Well, I was right. The pharmacist behind the counter's mask didn't even squirm or squiggle. She didn't miss a beat and greeted me with a warm welcome: "Last name?" Well, some things never change, I guess.

    But I...
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