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Started Running Finally
Not Much in Distance, But a Start… Like every book or story, you have to start with a first line, a first word. Today, finally, I figured out how to motivate myself enough on the running to get the goals I want done. And interestingly enough, it is a twisted gambling structure that helped me get started. Now, for the folks who love to toss money away in casinos, yet feel they are winning, there are gambling systems. A Martingale is one. (Really silly.) Another is a simple Positive Progressive Betting System. All that one does is give some structure to betting and make a gambler feel lucky at times…
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Great Writer’s Meeting Tonight
23 Professional Writers Talking Business… Once every six weeks or so we have a gathering up at the WMG Publishing offices of the professional writers in the Pacific Northwest that can make it. 3 hours of nothing but business. You get 23 pros in the room like that, all focused, and it is great fun. Topics ranged all over the map tonight, from a fantastic reader survey to Hollywood to Book Pricing to Ads, and on and on. I took notes. Lots of notes. Thanks everyone, for a fantastic and learning evening. —————- JUNE ONLINE WORKSHOPS… All have openings at the moment. Information at www.wmgpublishingworkshops.com Any questions at all, feel free…
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Too Much Other Stuff
Yup, We All Have Them… Meetings and then I spent a couple of hours up at WMG working on collectable stuff. We (meaning me and Josh, the North store manager among other jobs) are madly working to dig out a massive collection I bought about four years ago and haven’t done anything with. But at the WMG stores and offices and warehouses, to dig out one thing, it takes moving around a ton of other stuff. But almost there. The collection? Well, for libraries, they used to bind newspapers to make them easier to store and handle. The Oregonian, the main Portland paper, was bound in large black books, each paper…
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Open Driveway and Other Distractions
It Was a Saturday… Got off to a slow start because our wonderful neighbor came to help me get rid of a big metal post that was partially blocking our driveway. All gone now, but the work got me off to a very late start. I ended up recording half of the first advanced business lecture and worked on workshop stuff up at WMG, then went out for a walk. But on the way back it looked like it was going to rain, so I ran the last quarter mile. A start. Then to the grocery store and home to cook dinner after a short nap. Then read some fun short…
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Movie and Dinner
Fun Day… Started off with WMG meetings, then Kris and I headed into the valley to catch a movie. Guardians of the Galaxy. Great fun. Great heart. Then a nice dinner and drive home. We got back around midnight and we went to watch news and some television. So I didn’t make it this computer until after 2 a.m. I answered some e-mails, then did some Strength Workshop assignments. Then I took a break and sat and started a novella Kris had just finished in her Diving Universe. I only intended on reading a little of it, then going to read some short stories for the May short story challenge.…
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TICKING CLOCKS
Offers That Will Vanish Shortly… A summary of offers that are vanishing shortly as we head into the summer months. Details below on each… 1… Write Stuff Bundle… one day left. (update: finished and deleted from this post) 2… Lecture Subscriptions…. Just a week or so left. 3… Strengths Workshops… Just a few weeks left. 4… Novel and Short Story Challenges… June 1st. —————— NEW SPECIAL LECTURE SERIES STARTED I will record six new lectures in May and through June. One new lecture per week in this special series will be added. Each lecture will consist of between 9 and 15 videos. These are Advanced, Advanced lectures, taking up where the…
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No Writing Tonight
Just a Crazy Busy Day… It was a Monday. Errands from the moment I left the house until after five. Then workshop stuff at WMG, then home to do e-mail, take a nap, cook dinner, and then back on workshop assignments. Today and tomorrow has April workshops ending and May workshops starting assignments. Crazy amounts of stuff, plus doing some reading on the Strengths workshop and on the short story challenge. (Yes, still taking sign-ups on the Strength workshops.) Plus Kris gave me a brand new novella I wanted to get reading. Yeah, I have a tough life, reading stories. But alas, someone has to do it. (grin) But no writing…
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A Very Diverse Sunday
I Did Just About Everything Today… One of those days that I worked on just about everything. Started off the day with a writer’s meeting at WMG. Fun discussions. Then Kris and I went for a walk to get some milage in (I didn’t hit five, but got to four miles again). Then I stayed at WMG to work on workshop recordings and the new lecture series stuff coming. Then home to take a nap and cook dinner. After that I managed all my e-mail and workshop assignments before heading to my writing computer. I got two sessions on the novel of just at 1,900 words. Then back to this…
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Fun Auction Tonight
Saturday Night Fun… Missed my five miles today, got four, because I wanted to rest my legs. And had fun at the auction. Every month here in town (on the first Saturday of the month for the past 35 years) there is an auction. More social for me since I seldom miss one, but also there are no minimums and trust me, antiques do not sell out here on the coast. A person could make a living buying antiques worth thousands for $50 here and hauling them to California. But tonight in the hour I was there I managed to get an entire box of silver. Mirrors, combs with silver…
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Thirty-One Years Ago Today
I Met Kris 31 Years Ago Today… I had just left the Nebula Awards ceremony in Berkley and was visiting my father for a day or so in Arizona before heading to Taos, New Mexico for a week-long writer’s conference. 12 writers hand-picked by Algis Budry were invited. The workshop was free but on short notice we had to get there on our own, pay our own room, and so on. The instructors were Grand Master’s Fred Pohl and Jack Williamson, plus Gene Wolfe and Algis Budrys. Four of them, twelve newer professional writers. I would have sold anything to make it. So before I left my father’s house (far before…