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New Year and the Holiday…
Wrapped Up In The New Year… As we bump into December of this year, I am really focused on ramping up my writing for the new year. Just doing all kinds of plans and ideas and possible challenges that will really get me going. Plus making some changes in my office and possible schedule. Enjoying the process a lot, actually. Not at all stressed on it or time pressured. I think that might be because I have two really good ideas, both would be challenging and fun and actually crazy to even attempt. So now just trying to think of other things along those same lines. You know, like trying…
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Getting Ready for January 1st…
Spending Time Getting Ready… Almost December 1st and I am doing a ton of focusing and planning for January 1st. And doing a ton of getting ready. As I said, I am loading my old traditional published books and stories into boxes to take to storage. Finding a ton of stuff I had forgotten about. For example, I knew I had been in a few Twilight Zone anthologies, but turns out Carol invited me into three of them. And wow did I achieve my goal of wanting to be a “paperback” writer. I’m filling box after box with paperbacks that I either wrote or have my story in them. Mass…
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Fun Day!
US Thanksgiving Holiday… We had intended to head out a 6:30 am to a park to the north of Las Vegas for a charity 5k run that started at 8 am. Intended was the operative word, but due to events the day before with business and other stuff, Kris and I both managed to stumble to be round 2 am. (I was a little later.) So the towel was tossed and we got extra sleep. Then I cooked (with a ton of help from Kris) a turkey dinner and we were were joined by four great friends and we had a blast. Kris had baked a bunch of fantastic pumpkin…
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Knowing How Lucky You Are…
I Know For a Fact I Am Stunningly Lucky… Just to be alive and well. My old-time friends all say that all the time and I can’t argue with them. I have been lucky to have friends for thirty, forty, and fifty years that I treasure and they are there when something happens and I hope I am there for them in return. I have been stunningly lucky to have been with Kris the last 38 years. I was lucky to be a free-style professional skier, a PGA Professional, get a masters degree in architecture, and do three years of law school. I was lucky enough to write a lot…
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Cleaning Up!
My Traditional Publishing Brag Shelves… It is all getting boxed up and hauled to storage. Nine shelves filling about 12 filing boxes full of books and magazines that I published stuff in during my traditional publishing days. Sadly over the years, I didn’t keep it up very well, and would take a book out of it for one reason or another and not replace it or get the book back in the right spot. And unlike Kris’s brag shelves where she kept everything in perfect order and also has one copy of all editions. Her brag shelves fill an entire room and her office. We have another brag shelf downstairs…
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Life Rolls…
That Means “Life Events”… And so many different kinds of Life Rolls and different sizes and events. Health issues, family issues, money, job issues, publishing issues, and so on and so on. Major life events can stop you cold, like me falling last fall and smashing up my shoulder and being in a brace for a month after surgery and then nine months of PT. (Quarterback of the Las Vegas Raiders just had that happen to him on Sunday, same injury.) You just never know what kind of life event will hit and what size and shape. Today, (Monday), Kris and I both had pretty busy days planned with writing…
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Length of a Brand/Trademark
I Was Surprised… I was working on an issue of Pulphouse Fiction Magazine tonight and mentioned in the introduction that Kris and I started Pulphouse in 1987 and it has been going along one way or another, making money as a brand and a business name for 37 years this coming year. And we have plans to expand the brand even more very shortly. I find it interesting that the older I get, the bigger the numbers get with different things I have been doing. My best friend and I have been close for sixty years this year. I sold my first short stories 50 years ago. And the Pulphouse…
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Thinking of the Start of the New Year…
New Year Is Not Far Off.. Today I got up late (since I stay up until 5 am), watched far too much college football including that crazy ending to the Arizona/BYU game, then headed out to the store(s) to get all the stuff Kris needs to make her fantastic pumpkin pies and a turkey and all the extra stuff as well. Actually fun. And then watched more television and didn’t get into my office until after midnight. And most of the time since getting in here I have been working on and thinking about the start of the new year and what I am going to do to really ramp…
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A Few Great Questions Today…
First A Question on Priorities… The question boiled down to this… “What is more important? Writing, Learning, Reading, Publishing?” Great question, and I honestly had to stop and stare at it for a moment because in the publishing world of 2024, all of those are important. There needs to be a balance of feeding them all regularly. But writers tend to get into trouble over time when they drop one or two. “I don’t have time to study another author’s book or to take a class or worse yet, I don’t need it right now.” So learning gets left out and the writer goes stale and dull in time. “I…
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I Have Been Lucky…
Yes, Even With Everything Going On… I consider myself amazingly lucky that somehow I have been able to continue in this profession of fiction writing now for fifty years. I mark that fifty from selling my first short story. For going on thirty-nine of those years, I have been super lucky to have Kristine Kathryn Rusch as my partner. We met when we had both sold a few short stories and just kept on going through all the ups and downs. There have been some amazing ups I can tell you, but also some stunning downs. We just keep on going, enjoying the storytelling and the publishing and our friends…