Really… that whole ‘people think about sex every seven seconds’ was meant to be a bit of trivia, not a goal. J

The Opening Ceremonies are Friday night and I can watch them on my computer at work! Finally, I can watch something decent! Sound is going to be an issue because I will have to plug in headphones, but I am also going to record it here at home – I want watch it here, then come home and watch it with sound actively turned on. The sports themselves I don’t really need sound. I just need to set up recording times and bask in the warmth that is the Olympics. When I erased Battlestar: Galactica (with the understanding I would buy the series on DVD) my recorded space went from 60% to 40%. I knew that digital channels took up more space than analog, but wow – I didn’t think a whole series would take up 20% of the DVR’s memory. Lesson to be learned: analog is still king.

My novel lurches towards its ending. I have written one of the major scenes and I am now concentrating on the aftermath… which gave me a good idea for another series in that same world as it were, or that world in the future. I am sticking with my task however of getting this novel finished so I can move on to the next one. Thank God I have that commonbook – otherwise I would go mad with trying to remember everything. Of course, I still have the issue of writing things down when I have the time. This is why I am thankful for my work’s rather liberal policies about restroom usage – if I had to actually relieve myself as often as I make myself out to do… I should see a doctor.

Today is Wednesday. Halfway through the week, I keep telling myself. Today is going to top out (as far as temperatures go) at 104 degrees. Yikes! Did I also forget to mention that my car has no A/C? I know I should get it fixed, but it’s going to be about $200.00 dollars and I need that money to go towards an artist for the book. Maybe I will get the A/C fixed with the first set of royalties (after the celebratory dinner of course). Thankfully, the tires have been replaced (grumble) and I am not due for another oil change until I get paid again (further grumble). I’m starting to see the value of horses – and being as someone who had to muck their stables, that should be an indication of how much this car is killing me.

Well, that’s about it for now – there will be other things to comment on eventually, but I have to get Anya back to the pub to cure everyone eventually – the plot marches on as it were. Stay cool and have a mice day.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

I have this thing –when I dream, I try to analyze that dream either while I’m dreaming, or in the next dream I’m trying to analyze the previous dream. The last time something like this happened, it was in the very next dream where I am discussing the previous dream with a small beagle, who is asking me questions about what I felt the dream was about. All in all – it was an interesting peek into my inner workings, but I’m concerned about the beagle’s license to practice psychiatry here as opposed to Maymont Park. I should try to perform some lucid dreaming techniques when I get home at night.

I have three major scenes to finish in the novel: the apothecary, the advice, the duel – with a smaller scene to wrap everything up at the end. I’ve been doing a thousand words (or a little over) a day. Yesterday, I had to tear myself away from the computer to get ready for work – it was great! I love moments like that, when I’m in the zone as it were and everything just flows from my fingertips. It’s like catching fire in a jar, except that warm feeling is from a sense of accomplishment and not my skin burning off through the glass. You’ve probably had moments like that, dear reader. Aren’t they great?

Anyways – other than that, there is surprisingly little going on here of note. I found a gym near where I live where there is a pool where I can swim. I have to admit, I’ve been in a bit of a physical funk for two days. My legs hurt a little and it’s why I tend to just go home directly after work. Maybe I can say ‘fie to you, rat-kin’ and swim a couple of laps during the weekend. It’s not like I have to pick up hewn logs to build muscles anymore.

Oh! Speaking of lifting heavy objects! The Opening Ceremonies are this Friday! I am going to have to clear a lot of space off on my DVR – so I will have to sweep away Battlestar: Galactica to make room since I’ve seen that and I am going to buy the full DVD collection (I was going to buy it, anyways…). While I’m not going to get every hour of coverage (I wish I could) and when the Winter Olympics roll around, I should take those two weeks off. Oh – and the last little bit of Olympics until tomorrow, I swear – Wiggins is on track to be the first person to take the yellow jersey in the Tour de France and earn a gold medal in the games! He’s the first English Tour de France winner, so there’s a bit of pressure on him, but that’s what makes the games great – to see the end result of sacrifice, sweat and tears.

Man, I can’t wait.

Well, off to complete another chapter.

Have a good day.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

I like yogurt, but I am not a spy. I just tried Greek Yogurt – and if I had to eat that on a daily basis – I too, would wreck the economy just to get the factories that make that stuff shut down. It is thick – like whipped cream, but a lot more dense, and it’s far more salty than regular yogurt. Even when it has honey flavoring, I can still taste the saltiness in it. Blech. Just… blech. Oh, well – on to other things in the day.

It is Monday and all the baggage about it remains. The dogs are back, so all is well as far as distractions go. I was oddly troubled by their lack of barking on Friday and now that they’re back, I wish they’d be a little quieter. “I don’t like the sound of those drums” shortly followed by “It’s quiet… too quiet”. Yeah – that’s my life here. Maybe this is just the Greek yogurt talking. I’m also waking up, still, so if nothing makes sense, then get some coffee and try to read this. Actually, that won’t help. I should get some coffee.

The novel continues along at its own pace and should be ready for major editing by beginning of September. Still looking for an artist for the cover of the first novel, so if you happen to know anyone, please direct them to this email address (keythsea@earthlink.net) and include in the subject: ‘cover artist’. I am willing to pay a small amount for the art and would be more than happy to discuss fees… but not right now, I need to focus on getting the book finished. I am so close to getting it done… I’m tempted to call in sick, but I can’t. I already did that last month just because I needed to have a day off. I’ll just have to put up with everything as best as I can until I can get to the point where I can leave the job and write full time. I know I’m putting the cart before the horse, but I need to get some other thing straightened out, like how I’m going to pay taxes when I go solo – should I get an LLC? It may be fairly optimistic of me to think down to a point where I’m going to need to have some sort of business license, but since I am taking on the duties of a publisher, I should look at the bigger picture. Besides, if I can incorporate in Nevada, it would be wrong of me to not go to the casino.

Back to reality – I didn’t get to go to see The Dark Night Rises. Maybe the next time I get paid, I’ll go see it. I had the writer’s meeting and by the time I got out, I was more than ready to come back home. I like the group, I like the interaction; but after hitting the Indian Buffet, I was ready to retreat home. I’m not the most social person on the weekends, I save up for the week. Speaking of which, I need to get back to the novel.

Have a good day.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

The first problem was that I could not make any sort of nifty links like this one. I managed to fix it and now I can add stuff when I can – like this. This may not seem like a lot, but honestly, when I get another novel finished, I want to be able to give you a direct link to it from here, rather than tell you look for it. I can now try to be more entertaining… or less boring, I suppose.

I managed to make it to my writers’ group meeting today. I am surrounded by very talented writers – I mean, these guys blow me clear out of the water. I could have printed up a part of another project, but wow – I feel like I’m a first grader holding up a piece of paper with my name and saying ‘see… I stayed within the lines!’ I know that this is part of the growing process, and I went through it with the Village, but with the Village, since it was online, I never had to read my work aloud. Dear God, I cannot stand the sound of my own voice, especially if I have to read something that requires voices (female voices, for example). One of the reasons why I love writing is that I don’t have to actively interact with people unless I want to do so. Holy cow – I seriously need to have my work evaluated, but going through the gauntlet of hearing myself drone on and on almost kills me.

I also got to eat at a Hindu buffet afterwards. It was… OK. I am not going to be going back voluntarily. I don’t mind that the food was spicy, and it wasn’t as spicy as I thought it would be compared to the stories I heard. I liked the rice pudding and there was a chicken dish that wasn’t too horribly spicy, but it did give me a better background on the food of the elves that eat in my novels, since I got the idea of their food from a Hindu woman I knew from my time back there. While the food was mildly spicy, the variety that was there was fairly sparse. Enough to give me an idea of what the elven pallet would consist of. The day wasn’t a complete wash. Next time, I might bring something to be read. I’ll just muddle through it.

I’m also fairly tired. I had to get up early to get ready for the trip. I can’t even remember if I changed out the laundry – well, I’ll check tomorrow morning.

All and all – it’s been a good day.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

Hello, all – I woke up this morning with only one goal in mind: to get out of bed.

I try to keep my motivations really, really simple.

Now that I have accomplished that – I should be able to carry on with my day. It’s the beginning of the weekend for me, and my plans other than writing are fairly simple: TV and movies. I am going to go see The Dark Night Rises and bring back a review.

Wait. I just noticed something. The neighbor’s idiot dogs haven’t barked yet. I don’t see them walking around the fence. I think this day just got better. I’m not a dog hater. It’s just they bark at every little thing that comes near their yard, including me. They can see me when I sit down at my desk and start barking. I know they are used to me because their tails are wagging, so they don’t see me as a threat, just someone to bark at for hours on end. Wow. It’s really quiet. I can hear my music without having to keep jacking up the volume. I think I can really concentrate today!

OK – I am getting a little carried away. I’m sure that there is a good reason why Shemp* and Curly Joe* are not barking their heads off, but it’s odd and I’m hoping they are just inside to avoid the heat of the day. Let me get some caffeine to wake myself up a little more. There. Now, I am still in the home stretch for the novel and I should get it done fairly soon. Yeah – I know I keep talking about it because:

1. It keeps me motivated to finish it
   
2. This is only the second novel I have finished. It’s still a new experience for me.
   

After the novel is finished and while it’s being edited, I need to find a cover artist (any volunteers?), because while this novel is being written under a pseudonym – I want to put forth a really good first impression, something beyond grey ties and bland efforts. As far as the cover artist goes, I am willing to pay for the art. I will need to save up a lot of cash, I would assume… maybe above $500.00 (hey, that is a lot of money for me – that’s almost a full paycheck), but not too much. I’m still somewhat in the hole for my last effort. Expect several links to appear when I get everything done. Hopefully by then, I will have fixed this copy of Word so that I can put in hyperlinks. So – let me get cracking on the novel and with any luck, I will have it out there by year’s end and working on a second one (I/O Error) to be finished. My goal is to get a novel finished every season and in the wild at least twice a year.

In order to do that, I need to get off of here and into work.

I hope your day is as productive.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

* more than likely not their real names, but that’s what I call them

OK, I am a metal head. I freely admit that of my own will, and I will testify under oath that I am not a choosy metal head. I like Nu-Metal, Second Wave Of English Heavy Metal, Thrash Metal, Black Metal, Speed Metal, Death Metal, some Progressive Metal – but I love, love, love the Vitamin Series. What the Vitamin Series is a string quartet and a piano soloist (either or) that takes a band and adapts some of their music for either a string quartet or a piano. Yes, I know – Apocalyptica did that for a while – but the Vitamin Series also venture away from metal and cover different genres. I like listening to instrumental music when I write, and the Vitamin Series hasn’t yet disappointed me. Not really a shout-out, but a recommendation.

Anyways, I am about maybe three scenes away from the end of the book, which has become somewhat different than what I originally different than what I first imagined, but I hope it will be enough of a compelling ending to the story. That’s the one thing I am always not good at is how to end a story, because I can sometimes keep going in my head with what happens next to the characters. I think I’ve got a decent ending for this novel, but in my mind, I see the characters picking up where they left off at the end of the novel and getting into more trouble.

Gah – I’m tired. I think I’ll close up shop here today and retry this in the morning.

Sorry, all.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

I wake up at 8:30 AM and give myself a half hour to eat breakfast (today, more yummy sour cream pudding cake, which to me tastes an awful lot like the vanilla pudding cake) read some web comics and generally try to wake up. Well, it was a little harder than usual to get around to opening up this blog and put in the first entry. I’ll start typing, then I’ll think of something and go right to it rather than putting it aside and working on this blog. I wonder if it’s because I am still trying to adapt to this new work schedule and I am going to be far later than I was originally and getting 6 hours of sleep, or it’s because it’s 8:30 AM and I have had no caffeine since 10:00 PM the previous night. One of these I can solve right away (and will do so after this blog is finished), the other will require more time and effort on another front.

The reason why I’m slightly concerned about is, as I pointed out in my last entry, I am so close to being finished with the novel. In 12 to 18 days I should be finished and close to the 60K word count I imposed on myself. When it takes more effort than usual to get around to something, that means I’m getting fatigued about this and want to move on to something else, which is something I normally do (Isaac Asimov did it and he pumped out a couple of books in his time), but to quit this novel and move on to another thing is bad. Especially when I am this close to finishing the second novel of my fledgling career, I shouldn’t give up now. So, I just need to remember the advice I got from Ms. Tan and just smile and fake it until it’s over, and then have a cookie for my efforts (the cookie wasn’t her idea).

This Friday, The Dark Knight Rises hits theaters and I am going to wait until Saturday to see it. After I’ve seen it, I will come back here and give a full review for everyone. There is only one more summer film I am heavily anticipating (Total Recall), and only because it’s based off of the work of Philip K. Dick – who is an author that I recommend highly for the depth of the concepts he brings up in his work… which Hollywood runs to for their films. He is also a greatly influential author to me with his contemplations on the nature of memory, identity and just how shaky the concept of reality can be at certain points. Go look for him, either in book or on the big screen: Blade Runner, The Adjustment Bureau, A Scanner Darkly, and Minority Report are some that are taken directly from his works, but you can see his influence everywhere.

Well, time for me to get back to it.

Have a good day!

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

I am about 12-18 days away from finishing the first draft of my novel. I cannot begin to tell you how excited I am to have typed that sentence. Of course, after the rough draft is completed, then I have to begin the revisions. That task isn’t going to take that long because I already have some idea of needs to be revised (one character needs to have dialogue fleshed out, another needs to have some scenes added in) and that might tip me over the 60K limit I set up for myself. Not a problem for me, since I also intend on carving out 6K words of the manuscript before I send it to the editor for the final hammering (thank you Stephen King for the guideline: Your manuscript – 10% = success). If everything works out, this novel should be hitting everything by November. I am getting ready to find an artist to work on the cover and I have a feeling this is going to be somewhat… pricey, but hey – I need to take this more seriously than the last book (still available on Amazon!), even if it’s being written under a pseudonym. I still can’t believe that this is going to get finished soon. After it’s finished and sent to the editor (thank you, masked editor!), I am going to jump onto I/O Error and get that finished. After that… who knows? I’ve got tons of ideas and thanks to Amazon and Smashwords; I can get them out there. With any luck, I can get away from my job and work on a career – a career that I am very late coming to, but a career nonetheless.

On to other things: the Olympics! Next week are the beginning of the Opening Ceremonies. I’m bummed that I am going to miss them, but they and the rest of the Olympics are going to be faithfully recorded. I should clear out some space in the DVR… but all I have are series that I will have to either watch all the way through in one sitting or delete them. Some are not going to be a problem to delete, but others… well… I could just by the DVDs (the series in question: Fringe, Battlestar: Galactica, The Mentalist – all told, these series are taking it over half of my DVR space), which I was going to do anyway. Well, let’s just see what happens with the DVR for the time being.

Well, I am going to try to cut this entry a little short. I’ve been lollygagging off screen by going to the Internet and reading a few web comics and looking up some things (curse you, TV Tropes!). So, I will say good day and wish you luck on your endeavors. I’ve got characters to torment and not a whole lot of time to do it in. Oh, look – I went over my 500 word goal.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

… because I have no idea what to write. I didn’t get much sleep last night (got two hours, had to get up and use the bathroom, wash, rinse, repeat). So, I’m feeling kinda bleary eyed right now and there is nothing new to report, unless you’re a North Korea watcher. There’s some interesting things going on there… above the starvation, work camps and Vice Magazine dropping by every now and then to say ‘hi’. Apparently, the newly crowned Great Leader has dismissed his military advisor who was originally appointed by Kim Jong Il. The official line is due to ‘illness’: either the military advisor called in and said “I’m feeling sick, I don’t think I’m going to make it in today, boss” or Kim Jong Un called him and said “I’m sick of seeing you. We’re going to pack your desk for you, swing by to pick it up” is unknown. My opinion? When you take over a leadership position, you need to make sure you have people you can trust on your side… especially when you have one of the largest standing armies in the world. More than likely, he was dismissed once Un had made sure he had the loyalty of the armed forces on his side and any holdovers from the old regime would be keeping from making the changes he knows needs to be made to make North Korea a major player in the area. Another hint that things are going to change for the better in the Hermit Kingdom? Fashion. The New Leader was seen applauding a show where the talent was wearing conservative short skirts – something that we here in the decadent West wouldn’t bat an eye over. A lot of analysts are putting this together and saying that there is a new form of ‘glasnost’ coming. Those of my generation will remember what happened after the last time we saw ‘glasnost’. Yes – we were forced to watch a whole bunch of Soviet-U.S. buddy films.

Be prepared for another addition to the Iron Eagle franchise. That’s all I’m saying. I’m no North Korean expert. All the Korean I know is ‘yes’ and ‘hello’. I’ve only read one book about the area and I’ve watched about maybe six or seven documentaries about North Korea itself. I am just comparing the North Korea of today to the Soviet Union of twenty years ago.

So – anything else interesting? No? OK. Well, to let you know that another one of the greatly anticipated Summer Films is coming out this Friday: The Dark Night Rises. I am going to see this on Saturday just because of my schedule, and there is a Writer’s Group Meeting on that day as well, so I’ll be out already. I haven’t been there in a few months, I wonder if anyone is going to recognize me? I’m not going to have anything done for them to read, but I should try to ‘network’ at least.

Well, I’m feeling warmed up enough now.

Off to work.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy

But today, I’ll have toast. It’s the weekend, so I can eat things that I normally can’t eat due to the constraints of time. Toast and jelly is one of those simple pleasures. Today is also Saturday, so I schedule it like this: do the blog for about 30 minutes or 500 words, write the novel for 3 hours and break for a couple of hours to watch a movie (today’s movie: Anonymous) and have lunch, them go back to the novel for another three hours and then call it a day by watching more TV or maybe play a game while I cook dinner. Saturday is going to be a lazy yet productive day for me… if I can pull myself away from Facebook. It is Saturday. So it’s the Bob and Tom Show on the player and more toast for me.

OK – this is going to be a slow day and I don’t mind. Listening to Bob and Tom and they played the intro to a song that I hadn’t heard in years, so I went out and looked it up and bought it. Yeah – completely focused on the blog today. It’s Saturday. Yaaa – Saturday… and either someone dropped a pallet of safes out on the road in front of me, or we’re going to get another thunderstorm. Not really complaining, since my grass is still UPS brown. Hopefully, where you are at, you’re not going through the heat of the summer… or the famous Southern Humidity.

Now that I am gently caffeinated, maybe I can become a little more coherent. Nope. Apparently, even caffeine is taking it easy on Saturday. It’s now noon, and I started this at 10:30 AM – so we’re not the bundle of productive energy I am Monday through Friday. The power has gone out here. Thankfully, I’m writing this on my laptop and the battery is now realizing that to it – it’s Monday morning 8:30 AM. Wow… it’s coming down hard now. If I was standing outside, I couldn’t see any further than fifty yards clearly and I would be very cold because I am only in shorts and a t-shirt. It is Saturday after all. So, I’m going to stay inside and wait for the storm to go over before turning anything back on. Watching this rain coming down reminds me of something – it never rains in the novel. Maybe that should be noted somewhere. Well, let’s ask the question: does the knowledge of the lack of rain propel the story in some direction? Well, the villain of the story is called Everthirst, but there is no reason to bring up the lack of rain right now. Maybe that can be a point for a sequel, if there is any call for it. Sure, I have it planned out in my head, but if no one wants to read it, then I’ll just let it sit in my head. It’s cozy there.

Well, I should go on ahead and try to get a little more productive than I have been now. I hope your weekend is calming.

Sincerely,

Seething Apathy