{ 31 } I Suck at Life

Two posts? In the same month? How is this even a thing?

Well, I'll tell you: I had way, WAY too much fun last night hanging out with people I've known forever, people I've met once, and people I've never met before. I mean, Wednesdays are usually fun in general, but every once in awhile, a Wednesday comes along that is super fun. Last night was one of those Wednesdays.

But I'm here to tell you about how awesome I am at having fun. No, I'm here to tell you how much I suck at life.

Since last night was so much fun (did I mention that?), I am a complete pile of uselessness today. I decided to at least pretend to be productive by doing something that requires very little movement. Hence, a new blog post. Aren't you lucky?

I actually went back and re-read every post on here, something I don't usually do. It depresses me how little progress I've made on my writing since I started this blog almost 7 years ago. Sheesh.

I promised to win 2009, have something published before 2010, and at least finish one damn writing project I started. None of those things happened. That makes me sad.

Let me tell you about my writing process. This is how the vast majority of my projects get started. I'll be driving down the road or trying to fall asleep or doing some other mindless task when, all of a sudden, BOOM! I'll get an amazing sentence in my head. I'll stop what I'm doing, jot down the sentence, and go back to my original activity (yes, it does get a little scary in the car). Then when I have real, actual time, I'll spin that one little sentence in to 10,000 or more words. This is how SSIBWO got started. This is how my YA book got started. It's not how HOS got started; that began with an image in my head, but same concept.

Do you how frustrating it is to have to wait for your brain to go all lolly-gaga before you can write? Not to mention if I don't have any paper. That actually happened the other night. I got the sentence, came up with character names and subplots, somehow managed to write the whole book in my head, even decided who was going to play whom in the movie adaptation, and I neglected to write anything down because I'm an idiot. Within the span of 30 minutes, I couldn't even remember the main character's name. Good work.

But here's the thing: if I could just remember that one damn sentence, I'm sure I would get the whole thing back. But I can't remember it. I know it was a semi-common phrase that would make my main character sound like a hippie if you added the word "man" to the end. Not helpful.

I do, however, have a plan.

As I have mentioned, I've been reading books like a crazy person, two to three at a time. I'm weird, I know. Anyway, most of the books have been amazing, but one I read was meh. It had an okay plot, but it lacked any distinct style or voice. I could have been written by a robot. For all I know, it was. No, I will not tell you who actually wrote it, because I don't feel that she's a bad writer, just an uninspired one. As we all know, there's only one writer I dislike enough to talk shit about (hint: she's the only one that has her own tag on the right).

Anyway, I decided to do what any writer would do when faced with the same situation: rewrite the book. Hack move? You betcha! Do I care? No. No I do not.

I'm not going to promise you I'll finish it, because we all know how shitty I am at keeping writing promises. But just know it's a thing I'm doing. I might not ever mention it again or I might actually complete it. That would be weird.

Until next time!

{ 30 } Updating Stuff

Not very exciting, I know.

Other than changing the background, the only other real change is the "tag cloud." See it over there on the right? Now you can view all post on a topic.

The one I think you'll like the most is "SHORT/LONG/OTHERWISE": clicking that will show you all the posts in which I've actually written something, rather than just blabbing away about whatever is going on in my tortured artist's soul.

Coming soon, I plan to add the full text of the article I wrote awhile back for Rooster magazine. I just have to find the damn thing. This is a constant problem for me.

As of late, I've been reading way too much. Like, uncomfortable levels of reading. Like, reading so much, it's a good thing I don't have friends because they might feel I've chosen books over them. And I'm not talking audio books either; since the beginning of the year, I've read six full books and I'm in the middle of two more. That's more than most people read in a year. And I've done it in under six weeks, on top of working full time, and, you know, living. Sheesh.

Also, as I pondered doing awhile back, I'm going to make audio recordings of all the stories and whatnot that are here. It's going to be a process, but it might be fun to read aloud the stuff I've written. Or maybe it will be just another laborious task that I start, which I hadn't, and never finish. Time will tell.

Finally, as I teased over on my Geeks Who Drink blog (the one I'm contractually obligated to write every week, recapping my misadventures in quizzing over at the Trail Head Tavern), I'm starting a new project. Another one. 'Cause, you know, I don't have enough partially finished projects to work on. So, keep an eye out for that.

I'm going to try and stop being so creatively lazy. No promises.