The Fooling Around Before the Storm

After returning to The Undisclosed Location from the soul sucking hole of hell that I call a job, I had dinner, and . . . relaxed.  It was time to fool around, not do anything writing related.  Because I know what’s coming:  work, then the drive home, then dinner, and relaxing.  By the time I get on the computer, it’ll probably be about 8 PM local time, and I can finally dig into the journey that will be Harper Voyager.

I figure I’ll have my package together and polished by Saturday afternoon, so as soon as I feel comfortable that it’s ready to go, it goes.  I’ll update my Author’s Page on Facebook, then play the waiting game.  I figure, at best, I won’t hear anything until after the first of the year.  Before that probably won’t be good news.  But after the first of the year . . . yeah. I can see that happening.

Since I was resting last night, I caught up on some news, and contacted a couple of old friends that I hadn’t seen for a few weeks, because editing takes up a lot of your free time.  I listened to music, which is no different than another night, because without music, I’m only half there at the computer, and my mind needs something to help churn the waters of my imagination.  (Notice I didn’t say “chum”, because I don’t believe I have sharks in my mind.  Not yet.)

I also caught up on a few game supplements   Even though I rarely game these days, I have a ton of games on my external drive.  And there are probably a dozen supplements and core rule books that I haven’t read through.  Again, writing takes away from your free time, particularly when writing isn’t you main source of income.

I didn’t do a very in-depth read of the books; it was more like, skim, skim, skim . . . oh, there’s something interesting.  It’s a routine I’m used to, because you stop and get the stuff that jumps out at you.  I can spend three or four days going over a book this way–especially if it’s one of the books for Eclipse Phase, which have great writing, incredible amounts of information, a lot of wit, and comedy you can’t find anywhere else.  (Read about Momo von Satan and the Chewy Gristle Commentary Hour, and tell me if you don’t laugh.)

One of the games I went through last night, though . . . I need to dig into it a little more.  The author and developer gave some rather particular reasons for developing the game, and the more I thought about it, the more a review of the game seemed necessary.  And when that review comes, you’ll see it here.  It’s been a long time since I’ve written a game review:  it should be interested.

But that’s for later . . . this weekend comes the real work.  Package, edit, upload, click, hope:  such is the mantra of today’s writer.  Oh, don’t forget wait, which hasn’t changed for writers for, well, a long time.

Everyone wants to buy the next masterpiece, but they certainly take their time that your book is it.

I can wait, though.  I can wait.

Sourcing the Kinetic Vector

A note first thing:  this is post 481, so if you do the math, it seems that in something like two-and-a-half weeks, I’ll be hitting post five hundred.  That means what, exactly?  Well, we’ll see.  I’ve usually posted something important at different levels of posting awesomeness, and I’m fairly certain I’ll do something at post five hundred.

Maybe I’ll give something away–like my soul!  Any takers?

I’ve been up for a while.  As I write this, it’s 10:30, and that makes it four hours since I crawled out of bed.  The mood when I got up?  Not good.  I need to return to The Undisclosed Location today, and I’m feeling like I have a weight on my shoulders I can’t lose.  There is not one ounce of enthusiasm for returning–not one.

That’s kept me a little down, and what do I do when I’m down?  That’s right:  I read.  Mostly, I’ve been reading about space weapons.

Now, why would I do that?  For some reason I find comfort in the numbers, the math behind why things go boom.  It might also have something to do with my dream last night, which found me in a real-life version of Breaking Bad, and I was in Mexico buying machineguns and meth cooking supplies for Mr. Heisenberg.  Really, it doesn’t get any more messed up than that, particularly when I was shooting some punk on the street with an MP-5 because he was giving me shit about something.

It seems pretty logical, then, that I started looking at information about things like nukes in space, and kinetic kill weapons, and missiles, and just about anything else that has to do with blowing things up and space, and how I might apply that information to a story, any story.

For some reason, working the information around in my mind, and seeing how I could work it into a story, has made me feel better.  Call me strange, call me unusual, but research gets me going some times.  I think it’s because my mind is working, thinking, acting, and I’m not sitting here like a lump mumbling, “Damn, I’m bored.  I wish I had something to do.”

Someone told me earlier this morning that I need a hobby.  I did have a hobby:  it was gaming.  But I don’t do a lot of that these days–I don’t do it period, actually.  Gaming seems to have passed me by these days, only because I don’t have a group to work with anymore, and the ones that are out there would rather sing and dance like happy elves.

Did all this research lead to anything?  No, not actually.  As much as I might have wanted to come up with another idea, I didn’t get one.  Not that I needed it, because I’ve got ideas galore right now, and another would have only taken up more room on the hard drive.

But one never knows where it might lead.  It’s there in my head, and it’s waiting for something to happen.

It’s only a matter of time before it crawls out of a hole and begins dancing about.