I don’t mean to be difficult.  I don’t set out to be contrary.  I just can’t stand following the herd, mindlessly.  It feels lazy and unintelligent.

There are a number of subjects where people seem to give up critical thinking in favor of knee-jerk, reactionary parroting.  Let’s talk about a few of these things.

 

Windows 8

There is an amazing amount of mindless hate directed at Windows 8.  It’s true that it started off with some problems, but the level of animosity the operating system received was not in proportion to what it deserved.

“Where’s my Start button?!?  I can’t live without my Start Menu!”

Yes you can.  Seriously, how much time do you spend in your Start menu on Windows 7?  If you’re being completely honest, the answer is: very little, especially after you’ve had the system for a while.  What happens is that you install some applications and some games, and the classic Start menu becomes a zoo of folders, most of which you don’t care about.  And if you’re like me, you forego the Start menu in favor of pinning apps to the Quick Launch.

Even if you can’t live without the classic Start menu, guess what?  You can download an application which gives you a freaking Start menu.  With Update 1, you could boot directly to the Desktop, so Windows 8 can look exactly like Windows 7, if you really want it to.

Most of the hatred directed towards Windows 8 was because a lot of people react to change with fear and hatred.  Unfortunately, a bunch of people started spewing this fear and hatred all at the same time, and like a yawn, it was contagious.  Now, people troll posts with pithy, uneducated statements about the operating system reflexively, even though there have been substantial improvements made to it through simple updates.

 

Global Warming

This one is going to be a little bit weird, but here goes: I’m skeptical.

I’m not a stupid man.  I’m not saying that it isn’t happening, or that it isn’t caused by humans.

I’m just saying that public opinion suggests that everyone should be freaking out about it, all the time, and I think that is bullshit.

Here’s what we, the average people, should do about Global Warming:

1. Walk more and drive less
2. Turn stuff off if it doesn’t need to be on
3. Clean up after yourself
4. Vote your conscience
5. Don’t freak out

Realistically, what else can you do?  Buy an electric car?  That’s probably a good idea, as long as the manufacture of the batteries isn’t as bad for the environment as the emissions from your fossil burner.  Invest in solar and wind?  Sure, if that’s your thing.  Most people I know don’t have the means to invest in anything, but if you’ve got the funds and your conscience dictates it, then do it.

It doesn’t hurt to intelligently move away from fossil fuels.  Just don’t do it blindly.  Do some research.

And be skeptical.  I am not completely convinced that climate change is going on, or that humans have caused it.  Again, I’m not saying it isn’t going on, or that we’re not responsible.  I’m just saying that we’ve discovered that there is methane leaking from the bottom of the ocean.  I’m just saying that California is suffering from a drought, while Burning Man is getting rained out.  I’m just saying that we’re experiencing some of the strangest weather we’ve ever recorded, while at the same time being told that climate change has paused, and that the pause may last for another decade.

I’m saying that there is a LOT of noise, and while I will do what I can to do my part to make the world a better place, I’m not going to freak out.  It won’t do anyone any good, no matter how much the news wants to take a process that takes decades to fit into the 24 hour click cycle.

 

Obama

A lot of people seem to really want to hate on the president these days, and I don’t get it.

Maybe it’s because my memories of George W. Bush are still too vibrant in my mind.  I have legitimate reasons for disliking George W. Bush.  It’s one of those times in my life where it may have looked like I was going with the herd, but really, the herd’s opinion, educated or uneducated as it may have been, coincided with mine.

But here’s something you might not know… I didn’t like Bill Clinton, either!  I detested him, for the mockery that he made of the office he held.  I could not stand that he let his selfishness tarnish the presidency.  At the time, I couldn’t stand how he’d reduced the size of the military as well, being as I was in the Air Force at the time.  I had some reasons to hate Slick Willy.  Admittedly, I was much younger than, and my opinions were not founded entirely on rational thought or research.

I digress.  This section is supposed to be about President Obama.

I think he’s an intelligent and capable man that has been dealt a bad hand.  In addition to all of the pressures of being the first black president, he also had a horrendous economy to deal with, an adversarial congress to continuously fight, a Middle East in constant turmoil, and expectations squared on his shoulders set so high that they were impossible to achieve.  If he’d been born on Krypton, and was capable of walking on water as well as being able to turn water into wine, he might have been able to live up to the expectations.

The expectations were so high, he was given a Nobel Prize before he had a chance to do anything.

Maybe it’s true that Obamacare is a mess.  I don’t actually know.  I haven’t tried to study it, so I don’t have an informed opinion on the merits or flaws of Obamacare.  I do know that millions of Americans are insured now that could not be insured before.  That seems like a good thing.

I also know that Obamacare is based on a plan that Romney put into place.  That makes me think that the people that raised the biggest stink about Obamacare did so because it was from Obama, rather than the merits or faults of the plan.

 

Final thoughts

Following popular opinion is the antithesis to scientific thought.  Following popular opinion is about giving up critical thinking for doing what everyone else is doing.  It’s laziness.  It’s immaturity.  It’s bowing to peer pressure.

The next time you find yourself falling in step with the public opinion, stop and give a thought to what you’re doing.  It’s only through thoughtfulness that we can stop being sheep and start doing amazing things.  Invention comes from thinking about a problem in a different way, and trying something that no one else has tried before.  Conversely, propagating inequality comes from following the majority, and doing what the everyone else is doing, no matter who it might hurt.

So please.  Be thoughtful and deliberate in your actions, and don’t just go with the herd.

I’ve been following the story surrounding Ferguson.  To sum it up, a white police officer shot and killed an unarmed black teenager.  The young man was shot 6 times, many of the wounds defensive, and two of those shots were to the head.  The one that killed him was through the top of the head.

Since the shooting, there have been outcries.  The police released a video of the young man robbing a convenience store just before the shooting took place.  There have been protests, both peaceful and violent.  The Missouri governor executed an emergency curfew.  Then the national guard was summoned and the curfew was lifted.  But there is still turmoil in the area, and President Obama seems reluctant to talk about the situation.

That’s a brief summary.  I know that I’ve left out a lot of the nuance, but my purpose with this post isn’t to rehash the news.  I want to talk about the actual cause, how this could have been avoided, and what can be done to unravel this situation.

First of all, I don’t think race is the primary cause.  I’m not saying that race isn’t an issue, or that Ferguson enjoys racial equality.  I’m saying that the primary cause was not racism.

The primary cause was power.

John Oliver sums it up very well.  He lays out all of the details of local police getting armed as the military are, but without the training.  What was it Einstein said?  “You cannot simultaneously prepare for and prevent war.”

But maybe the military arms weren’t the problem in the shooting.  The camo fatigues and assault rifles didn’t really seem to show up in Ferguson until after the shooting.  The escalation of force was a response to the people’s reaction to the shooting.

And that’s the problem.  Instead of offering sympathy to the family that lost a child, or looking for a way to keep this kind of thing from happening again, an effort was made to suppress the reaction.  Instead of taking responsibility for killing an unarmed kid, a video was released in attempt to villainize him.

The reaction of the police, and then the governor, was not one of reaching out to support and comfort the people that they are sworn to protect and serve.  It was more like the reaction of a parent scolding an unruly child.  That’s power, and the root of the problem.

Maybe race was a secondary issue in the shooting.  I don’t know.  It has certainly blown up to be a bigger issue after the fact.  I just finished reading a story that paints this whole situation as a race issue that President Obama, endowed with his darker skin, should be able to defuse.

I think this is just another reflection of the Stanford Prison Experiment.  When a group of people think they are in power over another group of people, the first group begins to dehumanize the second, both in speech and in action.  It doesn’t matter what their background is or what they look like.  It becomes about objectification and exercising power.

If the unrest in Ferguson is going to be unraveled, the power disparity is going to have to be dissolved.  To do this, the following will need to happen:

1. Call off the National Guard
2. Put away the military gear
3. Lift all curfews
4. Quit punishing the innocent
5. Publicly offer sympathy for the deceased

Maybe I’m naive, but I believe that if you treat a person as an adult, they will reciprocate by acting like one.

The ones “in power” have to make the first step.  It cannot and should not be to bring more weapons to bear.

Before I work on some fiction, I want to contribute a few of my own thoughts to the milieu following Robin Williams’ death.

Like so many others, I am saddened by his passing.  I never met him, but I have many memories involving him.  I wish that he hadn’t suffered such depression.  The world is darker without his light.

Beyond the grief, I’ve been watching the news with both optimism and dread.  My news feed has delivered a number of articles to me regarding Robin Williams’ suicide, and I’ve been hoping that his death will be handled with simple sadness and respect.  The one thing that I’ve been afraid of is stumbling on a story where someone besmirches Mr. Williams’ for the method of his death.

There’s been a little bit of it.  Thanks, Fox News.  Stay classy.

For the most part, though, his death has been handled as a tragedy.  So far, there hasn’t been the blustering, holier-than-thou, accusatory vindictiveness that I half expected around a suicide.

In other words, the through-line hasn’t been, “He took his own life, hurting those that loved him.  What a selfish asshole.” Instead, it has been, “Robin Williams succumbed to his depression, an illness as difficult and dangerous as cancer.”

I’m pleased with the reaction to Robin Williams’ suicide.  I wish that it hadn’t happened, but if anything can be salvaged from this difficult event, it can be a greater perception surrounding depression.

Depression isn’t weakness.  It isn’t laziness, or something a person can just “shake off.” It’s an illness, every bit as serious as a broken leg or a viral infection.  Perhaps it’s worse, because it can be invisible and insidious.  Left untreated, it can be just as deadly as leukemia.

If we cannot erase his suicide and bring him back to life, then maybe we can learn from it.  Maybe we can be a little less hesitant to seek help for those in our life that are suffering from depression.  Maybe we can be a little bit more respectful of those that are facing such an illness, and treat the depression with the seriousness it deserves.

A dear friend approached me this week and asked me for a story.  It’s for GISHWHES, and if you haven’t heard of that, it’s okay.  I won’t judge you harshly, because I didn’t know about it until recently myself.  If you don’t want to click on the link, I’ll just say it’s a great big scavenger hunt for charity.

It seems pretty cool.  I guess Misha Collins started it, or runs it?  I have a lot of respect for Mr. Collins, just based on the stuff I’ve read about him.  I enjoy him on Supernatural, and I think the charity work he’s done is pretty fantastic.

Here is the item my friend was looking to me to complete:

Get a previously published Sci-Fi author to write an original story (140 words max) about Misha, the Queen of England and an Elopus: 59 POINTS.

Aside from not knowing what an Elopus was, I had another difficulty with this request: I don’t think I’m “previously published.”

I told my friend, but she said it probably wasn’t a problem.  She said that my blog was probably enough.

I don’t think my friend realizes how much it meant to me that she asked me for this.  Apparently, some other people became upset after they were asked.  I don’t begrudge them for this.  It isn’t always cool to ask someone to do their job for free.  And people do have busy lives.  I was busy myself, and couldn’t get to the story until tonight, even though it was only 140 words long.

Anyway, I’ve droned on enough.  Without further ado, here is what I sent her:

              The monstrosity raised its long nose and trumpeted an angry blast as it charged.  It rolled forward on six, suction cupped tentacles.  Its oily black eyes reflected the rough cave, as well as the man that stood defiantly before it: Misha Collins.

Misha met the creature’s charge with a crack from his staff.  Both man and beast were weary from their long battle, but the fight was nearly won.  Misha feinted, side-stepped, then swung.  The wood shattered.  The elopus dropped.  Pungent black ink puddled around the fallen creature.

“You did it!” cried Avy. “Let’s get the princess and go!”

“We’re not here to save a princess,” Misha said, his voice rough.  He walked to the cage the elopus had been protecting and ripped away the tarp covering it.  Inside was a woman of advanced age.

“We’re here for the Queen.”

 

On Facebook, I already posted about the kidney stone I experienced earlier, and I posted a couple of pictures of my hands when they they had wires in or on them.  There’s also a picture of me taken shortly after I’d been given pain medication.  I was feeling much better, but I was very, very sleepy.

I want to take a moment to jot down the details.  It’s not that I want anyone to go through my pain.  I wouldn’t wish the pain of a kidney stone on anyone.  However, there are details of the process that I think are interesting, and maybe some other people will think so as well.

Today’s kidney stone was either my 5th or my 6th.  It isn’t faulty memory that makes me uncertain on the exact number.  The 5th one was not confirmed by the hospital.  With the 5th one, I felt the pain coming on close to bed time.  I was well hydrated and I had access to Vicodin, so I took a pill and went to bed, hoping for the best.  When I woke up the next morning, I was fine.

Unless the stone itself gets to a certain size, negotiating a kidney stone is all about pain management.  There isn’t really any pain in “passing it,” in the sense most people think.  Once the stone reaches the bladder, I no longer feel it.  Maybe it’s different for women.  I can only speak from my own experience.

Today started off like any other day.  I woke up, went through my morning routine, gathered my equipment, and drove to work.  On the way, I stopped and picked up a dozen doughnuts as I do every Monday.  The hints of what was ahead of me didn’t start until just before I got to work.  At that point, I thought it was hunger, or bad gas.

I dropped off the doughnuts in the break room and made myself a breakfast drink.  I started going through my morning routine, hoping the minor discomfort would go away once I had something in my stomach.  I went to the bathroom and answered nature’s call, but the pressure continued to escalate.  That’s when I knew what was happening.

Again, I don’t want other people to experience the pain of a kidney stone.  I will, however, describe it in this paragraph, so skip on if you are prone to sympathy pains.  My kidney stone pain isn’t a stabbing pain, like a dagger in the belly.  It’s more like a crushing pain.  It’s pressure.  The first one was so much like severe gas that I thought that’s what it was for hours.  I kept trying to burp or fart or anything to make it stop, but it wouldn’t.  The pain from a Kidney stone is inescapable.  There is no position that offers release.  Pacing doesn’t help.  It’s a constant, relentless, crushing pressure that starts off slow and builds, until it consumes all thought.

There is a window of opportunity with kidney stones, where the pain hasn’t reached the point of causing nausea.  During that time, strong pain relievers, such as Hydrocodone (Vicodin) and Oxycodone (Percocet), are effective, and can help me get ahead of the pain and keep it manageable.  I left work in the hopes that I could get home during that window and self medicate.   I also left when I did because I knew that at a certain point, I wouldn’t be able to drive.

Luck was not on my side.  I hit all of the lights red, and each stop aggravated my condition.  I considered going straight to the hospital.  In retrospect, that would have been the smarter move.  I still hoped that I could self medicate and avoid the hospital.

Chris was home playing on his computer when I arrived, and he was worried as soon as he saw me.  It’s difficult for a boy to see his father in pain.  I tried to be strong.  I grabbed a Vicodin and swallowed it, and I had Chris call Melissa to let her know what was going on.

Fortunately, Melissa knew better than to take chances with this sort of thing.  She immediately left work.  Unfortunately, it’s about an hour between Melissa’s work and our home.  During that time, nausea settled in, and I lost the Vicodin, along with the breakfast drink.  I reached the point where the only thing that was going to help me was a shot from the hospital.

Being that this was not my first kidney stone, I knew exactly what I was in for.  I knew about the nausea and the severe, escalating discomfort.  I also knew what it was going to be like at the hospital, and all of the tests they were going to perform.  Knowing what was coming did not bring me any comfort.

When Melissa arrived, I was ready to leave.  Chris stayed home, and Melissa took me to Mercy San Juan, where I’d gone for my first kidney stone.  Navigating to the emergency room was more complicated than I remembered.  There appeared to be one lane, and in front of us, an SUV stopped to drop off a doctor.  Melissa and I were both in shock at this, because they were not fast about the drop-off, and they were blocking the only way to the emergency room.  I started swearing, but once we got moving again, I calmed down.

We parked and I walked in, leaning heavily on Melissa.  Inside, there was a line and a full waiting room.  I half expected that.  It was 10AM on a Monday morning.  I knew that unlike other times we’d gone to the emergency room, the place was going to be well staffed.  I was hoping we wouldn’t have to wait long, but I had my suspicions.

Once they took my name, I turned and threw up in the nearest garbage can.  There wasn’t anything left in my stomach.  As I straightened and wiped my mouth, I became conscious of how I looked.  I hadn’t bothered to button up my shirt when we left, and my pants were undone and a little bit baggy on me, from all the weight I’ve lost over the last few months.  My hair was messed, and I was pretty sure that I was pale and sorry looking.  I thought about all of the people in the waiting room, and how I would feel with someone looking the way I did, vomiting in the trash can.  I tried to straighten, compose myself, and take a seat.

I sat next to a tired looking, older black woman that was doing something with her hands.  I don’t remember if she was playing with her phone or doing some sort of needlework.  I struck up a conversation with her, trying to be polite, and she reciprocated.  It was very pleasant.  I don’t think she expected someone looking like me to be nice to her, and we had a nice talk.

They called my name much sooner than I expected.  They put me in a chair to take my blood.  It took the nurse a few minutes to get to it, and I kept curling over in the chair, resting my head on the arm supports.  When examined my arms, I sat as still as I could.  She had a hard time finding a vein, because I had been throwing up and was dehydrated.  I hadn’t really had an opportunity to get many fluids in me.  She wound up using a smaller needle and a surface vein, which hurt a little, but was nothing next to the pressure pain in my stomach.

I was taken to one of the tiny rooms in the area and given a gown to change into.  I stripped immediately, not even waiting for the curtain to be drawn.  Modesty is one of those concepts that is simply abandoned on the road I was traveling.  There is no time for it, and it doesn’t do anyone any good.  Melissa tied me up in the back, and a very nice orderly wheeled me away on the bed for a CT scan.

There’s not much to talk about with the scan.  I got onto the table and they slid me into the doughnut.  The sounds of heavy machinery surrounded me, and a recorded voice told me several times to hold my breath, then breathe.  The hardest part of the experience was staying still.  I managed just fine, though, because the procedure was very brief.

As they wheeled me back to my room, a very nice nurse offered me a blanket.  It was fresh from an oven, and they draped it over my exposed legs.  It was very nice.  I hadn’t realized how cold I felt.  It made me feel spoiled, and I thanked them for taking care of me.

Back in the room, I girded myself for the next obstacle: the urine sample.  Another nurse had left a cup in a bag with Melissa.  She handed me the bag, and I wobbled my way to the bathroom to do my best.

I knew that this was going to be a challenge.  I was dehydrated, and I’d peed while I was at work just a couple of hours before.  I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to give them a sample, and I was a little bit afraid that I wasn’t going to get pain medication until I gave them some urine.  I think the hope of getting pain medication was the right motivator, because I was able to squeeze out enough for them to test in short order.

Let’s get gross for a moment.  Since I’ve been doing my meal replacements, I’ve been a little bit fascinated with the color of my urine.  I was always told that if you’re well hydrated, it should be clear.  The thing is, I’ve been loading so many vitamins and minerals into my system lately that my pee is never clear anymore, no matter how much I’ve had to drink.  It’s a super bright, almost neon yellow.  I expected the sample to be this bright color, but it wasn’t.  It was brown.  I held it up and looked at it, and there were a few circles of red in it.  I thought, “So that’s what it looks like when there’s blood in your urine.” While I’m sure I’ve experienced this before, I’ve never really looked at it.  It was unsettling.

I went back to my room, offered up my sample, and prepared for the part I dreaded the most: the wait.  Like I said, this wasn’t my first rodeo.  I knew what each of the steps was going to be.  The hardest part of the whole process is waiting for the shot of pain reliever.  There is nothing to do but wait, and time slows down.  Crying doesn’t help.  Visualization and breathing exercises don’t seem to help.  There’s just time and pain, both in unmerciful quantities.

After an eternity, an angel in a nurse’s uniform appeared, and put something in my IV.  The stuff is called dilaudid, and it’s some derivative of morphine.  I’d been given it before, and I knew how effective it was.  After a few minutes, the pain began to subside, and I started getting sleepy.

The rest of the experience at the hospital was mostly me slipping in and out of consciousness.  The pain started to return after a little while, and I thought I was going to need another dose.  But then the pain receded again, and I knew that the worst was over.  I knew that the stone had made it to my bladder.

This was a smaller stone than others I’ve had.  This one was 4mm, where others had been 6 or 7mm.  As I said before, the pain from a kidney stone isn’t where it’s physically leaving the body.  It’s the passage from the kidney to the bladder, through the ureter.  The urethra is massive in comparison to the ureter.  Because of this, I’ve never actually seen one of the stones.  I’ve tried to strain my pee a few times, but it’s a disgusting process that hasn’t ever yielded results.

I’m home, now.  I’m physically comfortable, and I’m emotionally buoyed up, because everyone has been so nice to me.  Melissa was there for me the entire time, and cared for me.  This is the other side of the experience that no one talks about.  Relief from severe pain brings clarity and peace.  I feel loved and happy, and thankful to be alive.  When people talk about kidney stones, they focus on how much it hurts.  No one ever stops to talk about this part, where all of life’s little dramas and obstacles have been stripped away, and all that’s left is what is important: peace and love.

I know that what I’m feeling right now is momentary.  When I wake up in the morning, I’ll get back into the grind, and pick up all of the burdens that I didn’t have to carry today.  That’s why I wanted to write about this experience now, while all of the details are still fresh.

I don’t wish the pain of a kidney stone on anyone.  But, I do hope that everyone feels as cared for and loved as I felt after the pain was over.

Let’s talk about fear, courage, and unexpected competence.  This can apply to just about anything, but in my life, it applies to writing, programming, and being a homeowner.

A couple of weeks ago, I started a project I’d put off for too long: retiling my shower.  The previous “tile” was actually some sort of particle board made to look like tile, and it was water damaged and warped.  It was scary, and I’d procrastinated fixing it because I thought it was going to be really expensive, or really difficult.  After worrying about it for years, I got up one morning, put on my worker boots, and went to work.

I’d done my homework.  I’d watched several hours worth of videos that covered the subject material.  When I went to Home Depot for the parts, I asked the people working there about specifics.  The cloud of uncertainty dissipated as I was armed with enough information to get the job done.

What I had going for me was resolve, which you can use in place of confidence.  With confidence, you can face a task without worry, knowing that you’re going to get through to the other side.  With resolve, you still have the worry.  You just know that you’re going to do it anyway, even if it means royally screwing up.

While talking to one of the guys at Home Depot about refinishing the shower pan, he started to say something and then stopped and asked, “How handy are you?”

I said, “I don’t know.  Kinda handy?”

Later on, that question kept coming back to me as I worked on the project.  What does it mean to be handy?  Is there an objective measure for the level of someone’s handiness?  How handy was I?

I pushed on.  I cut out old parts of the wall and replaced it with new material.  I sealed the walls, tiled them, and grouted.  I scoured the shower pan and refinished it with a white epoxy material.  I acquired masonry bits and drilled holes in the porcelain tiles, so that I could put up the shower doors.  Today, I installed the shower head and controls, and everything looks pretty good and works.

Job finished!  Yay!

So, I guess I’m pretty handy.  I thought about it some more, and looked back at all of the other projects I’ve done around the house.  I’ve replaced faucets, installed appliances, replaced ceiling fans, run network and speaker cables… I’ve done a ton of stuff in this house.  I’ve plumbed.  I’ve carpentered.  I guess I am handy!

Looking back at it, the hardest part wasn’t the work itself.  Don’t get me wrong… there were aspects of this project which were extremely difficult.  None of the physical labor compared to the mental anguish I put myself through, trying to figure out if I could do it.  I had to tackle self-doubt and fear just to get to the point where I was picking up tools.

It didn’t matter how much work I’d done around the house before this project.  I kept asking myself the question, “What if I fail?” I couldn’t move on until I either answered that question, or decided that it didn’t matter.

Now let’s look at my writing.

The same kind of fear, and the same kind of question comes up. “What if I fail?”

Just like with the shower project, I have to push past that.  Sometimes, I’m able to gather up my resolve and push on.  Other times, I get deflected and wander off to do something else.

The hard part isn’t the actual writing.  Once I start going, I have a great time.

It doesn’t matter how much writing I’ve done in the past.  It doesn’t matter how many stories I’ve already written.  The one that’s important is the one that’s in front of me.  Even if it doesn’t come out perfect, I have to pick up my tools and start crafting, and let fear be damned.

After the last several days of physical labor, where I’ve literally been tearing down walls and rebuilding them, I expected editing my story to feel like difficult labor.  It wasn’t.  Tiling and grouting my bathroom walls have left my hands bruised and cut, and I expected that retooling my story would leave similar damage on my psyche.  Instead, it was like meeting up with an old friend and catching up on the past.  Instead of feeling drained and beaten, I felt invigorated and hopeful.

This isn’t to say that I’m going to drop everything else I was doing and finish editing my novel.  My original plan was to finish the first draft of my epic fantasy before going back to do the next draft of my urban fantasy.  That’s still my plan, but I needed to take a detour in preparation for Convolution.

I was contacted a week or so ago and asked if I wanted to participate in another Writer’s Workshop.  It was a fantastic experience, so I replied that I did.  I then had some back and forth with the coordinator as to what story I should send.  Her first suggestion was that I send the updated story from last year.  I would rather workshop the first few thousand words of my novel.  She suggested I send both and do two workshops, and I simply couldn’t argue.

Before I could send her anything, however, I needed to make sure it was “ready.” I know on some level that I will always have doubts about whether or not my writing is ready to send off or not.  This isn’t a case of doubt or fear, though.  I just wanted to do a quick check before letting my work go.

And now I’m here, excited about my novel again.  I really didn’t expect to enjoy editing it.  Have I ever enjoyed editing something?

I might have a name for my urban fantasy, thanks to Melissa.  I can’t keep calling it “the Mel Walker story” because it’s my hope that it will be the first of many.  I’m leaning towards calling it The Repossessed Ghost.

Every convention I’ve been to, I’ve walked away with a variety of delicious tidbits, like chocolate chips in a cookie.  Sometimes information is repeated over and over in a weekend, such as “treat your writing like your job and show up to work.” Other tips or tricks I hear once, and they float in my thoughts for weeks to come.

I’m reminded of one of those bits of information every time I sit down to work on my epic fantasy.  It is this: you might not have the skill yet to tackle some story ideas, and you’ll need to come back to it later when you have more skill.

The epic fantasy that I’ve been working on is one that has perplexed and stumped me for nearly two years.  It was the story that I attempted when I failed my first NaNoWriMo.  I struggled with the story for most of the year last year.  I put it on a long pause last November, in order to start the Mel Walker story, and tried picking it up again in February.

I’m still struggling with it.

There are a few reasons that this story is harder than others.  For example, I’ve plotted out more of it than I usually do.  I’ve spoiled the story for myself.  There is still more for me to discover, but not as much as there was with the Mel Walker story.

Another challenge with the story is the premise itself.  I’m dealing with a troupe of characters that are awoken from being imprisoned in stone, and they have no memory of how they got there.  This amnesia is pivotal to the main plot of the story, but it raises the difficulty of writing the story substantially.

On top of these challenges, I’m working hard at improving the overall quality of my prose.  I feel like I’m juggling flaming chainsaws.

On the bright side, I’m a better writer than I was when I first started the story.  The rewrite has produced a much stronger start to the book, and I am much happier with it than I was.

I think I just need to take a deep breath, hold my nose, and jump in.  I’m typing this into Scrivener, not chiseling the words into marble.  I suppose I am setting my words in stone, if you consider the silicon in electronic media, but that’s getting technical.  The point is, I can easily change whatever I write, so why not just allow myself to make some mistakes?

The problem is that I might be trying to work on a story I’m not ready to write, and it might be a better use of my time to simply put A Clean Slate away and work on something easier.  I don’t want to do that, but it might be the smarter thing to do.

One year ago today, I made my first blog post.  It was a pretty big step.  I’d deliberated over setting up a blog for more than 10 years, mostly because I thought that I wanted to write blog software.  I wanted to do everything myself, and I wanted to do it the hard way.  There’s a lesson to be learned in that, I think.

So as I sit in my hot garage, procrastinating over my epic fantasy, let’s take a moment to look at the journey so far.

A year ago today, I set myself the lofty goal of writing a little bit every day.  I fell a bit short on that goal, but I did keep writing.  I kept to a schedule for most of a year, going out at least once every week to a Starbucks.

I attended conventions, taking notes and posting them to my blog, so that all of my viewers could learn what I have learned.

I installed some plug-ins so that I could keep track of how many people came to read my words.  To all three or four of you, you have my heartfelt thanks for showing up.

I rose and I fell.  I was diligent, and I was slothful.  I procrastinated, and I pushed myself.  The year was definitely full of ups and downs.

There were two challenges that I rose up and faced valiantly.  In October, I succeeded in 31 blog posts in 31 days.  That led into November, where I managed to get 50,000 words completed late in the evening of the last day.  My first successful NaNoWriMo.

I tried a self-imposed challenge in March, which fell flat.  I attended writer’s groups, where I was both wonderful and terrible.

Fiction was created in good ways.  Drama was generated in bad ways.

This post is mostly written in generalities, for various reasons.  In less general terms, what do I have to show for this last year of writing?

I finished the first draft of an Urban Fantasy novel.  In terms of writing, this is my biggest accomplishment.  A long time ago, I’d written a novel, but it was before I knew how hard it could be.  It was before I’d developed a good sense of taste, and while I was still young enough to know everything.  It was before I’d created a demonic, mean-spirited inner editor.  Somehow, in the month of November, I managed to get over myself enough to sit down, shut up, and write.  And it was glorious.

I’ve grown as a writer.  I can see many of the mistakes I was making a year ago, and I know how to correct most of them.

I haven’t given up.  There have been times where I’ve considered it.  It would be easier to just work during the day, play games at night, and accept my life as it is.  I have a good, comfortable life.  There’s nothing wrong with it.  I just know that if I stopped writing, I wouldn’t be happy.

My journey as a writer over the last year has been pretty good.  Let’s make this next year even better.

At the top of this site is a Convention Notes section.  Within this section are all of the conventions I’ve attended, starting with Renovation, and going right through to Westercon 67.  Some of the notes are better than others.

There were four “panels” I attended at Westercon that I did not include in the notes.  They were:

1. Choose your Own Apocalypse

The panelists were:

• Carter Reid
• James Wymore
• Bradley Voytek
• Robert Defendi

It was more of a game than a panel.  James Wymore moderated and directed it, while Carter Reid represented the zombies, Brad Voytek represented trans-humans, and Robert Defendi represented aliens.  They took turns describing how the world would be different under their rule.  The audience occasionally asked questions, and changed positions in the room in order to vote for which apocalypse sounded the most appealing.

It wasn’t particularly educational, but it was fun.  Melissa and I had some laughs.

2. Regency Dancing

Panelists:

• John Hertz
• Mary Robinette Kowal

This was very educational, but there was no way I could take notes.  We were taught quite a bit about the Regency, in terms of how the nobility thought, how they moved, and how they probably thought.  We were also taught to dance.  As I said in a previous post, it was a great deal of fun, and well outside our comfort zone.  I’m glad Melissa and I participated.

3. Tag Team Jeopardy and The Avenue of Awesomeness

In my opinion, this was one of the weaker events.  There were too many writers involved to be named.  They were mostly in the back of the room at tables, meeting fans and signing books.  Four at a time would be called up to the stage, where they would be asked trivia questions.  Some questions were collected from audience members, and if those questions stumped the panelists, the person that submitted the question received some a free book.  Every 15 to 20 minutes, a new set of writers or artists would be called up.

One of the problems with the event was the lack of structure.  The guests called up were called up at random, where they probably should have been selected beforehand and given forewarning, so that they could be more comfortable on stage.  The means by which the questions were selected was inconsistent.  The way the audience questions were handled was inconsistent.  Believe it or not, a little bit of applied structure and consistency breeds familiarity and comfort.  The way the trivia portion was executed, the only person that seemed particularly relaxed was the one asking the questions.

Another problem was the sound.  The people on the stage often couldn’t hear the questions, even though everyone was using microphones, and the person asking the questions was only about 15 feet away.  From where I sat in the audience, I could hear everything clearly.  The guests on stage were not so fortunate, which made the experience uncomfortable.

4. Dresden Files LARP Playtest

Run by: Erin Ruston

Melissa did not join me for this event.  Instead, she wound up having drinks with some of our friends.

I was nervous about going to this, because of the LARP part.  I love the Dresden Files, and I love role playing games.  I’ve done musicals, and I’m relatively comfortable speaking in front of people.  I even participated in LARPs, about 20 years ago.  Even still, I was nervous.  This was another event where I was stepping out of my comfort zone.

It turned out that it was really light on the Live Action part.  Unfortunately, it was also light on the Role Playing part.

About ten of us showed up, and I did my best.  I donned a British accent, gave my pregenerated character a name, and tried to get into it.

It went okay, but it wasn’t a satisfying experience.  I’m pretty sure I would have had a better time getting drinks with Melissa, Michael, and Jim.

 

With that said, I think I have now completely documented my entire experience at Westercon 67.  Overall, it was a great experience, well worth the price of travel and admission.

I’m really looking forward to Convolution, now.