Monthly Archives: July 2008

Burning Questions of the Moment

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How come Oprah Winfrey is on the cover of every issue of her own darned magazine? I mean, even Martha Stewart gives it a rest.

Why does it have to be so bloody hot in Texas in the summer? And how long will summer last this year? How many more months of running the AC night and day will we have?

How come we were supposed to be moving beyond race with the nomination of the Fresh Prince from Chicago… and yet here we are again, having the same old discussion! But with the added frisson of being called a racist it we don’t vote for him. (Oh, yeah, and can we have a break from his entitlement-addled BAP of a spouse moaning about how hard it is to get along on a yearly salary of more than I will ever make in the next decade? Or two or three? Thanks.)

How deep are major media in the tank for Obama, actually? Deep enough to need a snorkel? A deep-sea divers’ suit and something to pump down oxygen to them?

How come anyone cares what celebrities think? About anything other than their next professional appearance, that is.

Who the hell cares about Paris Hilton? And why?

Which one of the dogs or cats threw up a strangely reddish patch of vomit, and please god, let the red color be from the reddish chunks of stuff in the dog food.

What’s Madonna’s new remaking of herself going to look like? Anything age-appropriate? She’s pushing 50, you know.

Will the price of gas go down? Would it be a little cheaper to run the car on milk? It’s at about the same price per gallon this week. How soon will the owners of all those big honkin’ SUV and pick-up trucks replace them with something smaller and fuel efficient. I remember the 70s, people – I remember this happing once before, and yes, I’d like to be able to see past the vehicle waiting next to me at a stoplight. Instead of looking at the step that allows them to climb into the cab of their big honkin’ SUV, which is at my eye level, thank you very much.

When those SUV’s and pick-ups get to expensive to run… will they wind up in the hands of people, who… I don’t know… live out in the country and really need a big, sturdy, 4WD vehicle with space to stuff a couple of Angus cows in the back?

How badly am I going to hate the part-time and regular job that I start next week at “Enormous National Call-Center Which Shall Remain Unnamed” by the next of six months? One year? Can I stick it out long enough for some of my books and on-spec writing jobs to pay off… so that I can turn in my employee badge of servitude and shake the corporate dust off my feet… again.

Stay tuned – we’ll know the answers to most of these in a couple of months. Or a year, tops. All but the one about Paris Hilton. That’s a mystery for the ages.

Baldilocks Gives a Helping Hand (and needs one, as well)

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Baldilocks has a new project underway. Seems that once upon a time (clear back in 2006), a certain senator of Kenyan descent made a promise to a Kenyan village. The village school needed help, and the Senator, while visiting there, promised that help would come – He would make it happen. Oddly enough, the village interpreted that as financial help, since the Senator was a wealthy man. They renamed their school in his honor: it’s now the Senator Obama Kogelo Secondary School.

But alas, the good Senator got distracted by life and political campaigns, and the Kenyan village got thrown under the bus (a very crowded place, the underside of that bus — but I digress).

Baldilocks also has a Kenyan father, who came to the States via the same program that brought the Senator’s father to the States. Baldilocks is not a fan of the Senator or his political/philosophical beliefs, but she does believe in helping those who need help, and in keeping promises. You can read more about it here and here.

She wants to help that Kenyan village with their school. But she can’t do it alone. As Sgt Mom and Timmer can attest, military retirement paychecks don’t exactly give one a lot of discretionary income. She needs knowledge and expertise about fund-raising, among other things.

What the Obama School needs:
• Water
• Sanitation
• Electricity
• Remodeling
• Security
• Maintenance
to bring water to the school by sinking a borehole and building a water tank, erect a perimeter fence, complete the science laboratory and add much needed new classrooms, additional latrines, and a school dining hall

For the things that are in constant demand–e.g. school supplies, wages for security guards, spare parts–I’d say that a two year funding is enough.

The school’s principal suggested a minimum of 8.2 million Kenyan shillings which is equal to roughly $129,220 at today’s rate. That shouldn’t be too tough.

So here’s what we have:

• Domain name: obamaschool.org
• Email address: obamaschool@gmail.com

What we need:

Someone to assist in setting up the website … And someone here in the states who knows about the logistics of these things.

If you can help Juliette help the school, regardless of what name it bears, please do.

Brief Respite in the Writer’s Life Waltz

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Not a lot of time to spend on blogging on current affairs this week! I am stuck between the final edit of Adelsverein – Book 2 (The Civil War years), sending out review copies of Book 1, and polishing Book 3 (The cattle-ranching years) to a fine glossy sheen, and stuffing it full of local color and as many contemporary references and personalities as possible… oh, and doing the odd bit of marketing for “Truckee’s Trail”. One of the other IAG writers posted a tid-bit on the average sales of a POD or indy-published book; apparently the average number of copies sold is around 160-200 copies. I went back and looked at the various royalty statements for “Truckee”, tallied up a couple of other things – such as the copies that I sold through this website and from out of a box in the trunk of my car and came up with a grand total of 270-280 copies sold… possibly even more, since it takes four months for sales through bookstores, Amazon and Barnes & Noble to post. Those nice people at the Truckee Donner Historical Society just bought another box of twenty, so yay, me!

Once the final edits are done, and Books 2 and 3 uploaded… there’s not much more to be done until all three are released in December, except organize what I can in the way of exposure. The covers are all but designed, the promotional copy already done. I can even say that it’s being put out by an established (albeit small!) publisher – Strider Nolan Media. (Owner is another IAG writer and a fan of interesting western novels, having written one himself.”Shalom on the Range” – it’s hilarious, by the way; sort of Seinfeld on the Prairie.) I’ve been talking with some people in local bookstores, setting up signings – and the director of Fredericksburg’s Pioneer Museum bookstore is absolutely agog with excitement. The local historian who reviewed the manuscript for historical boo-boos found nothing more than some misspellings of German names, and he loves the story so much he is talking it up to all of his friends. Yes, it might very well work out that everyone in Gillespie County will buy a copy, just to see if I have mentioned their ancestors. The museum bookstore manager has ancestors on both sides that are mentioned, so he was quite tickled.

It will take months for the advanced reviews to be completed… so in the meantime, I am going back to work. I needed another two jobs to replace working for my computer genius friend, and the radio station. The royalty checks just are not consistently large enough, to permit me to stay at home. I applied to work part-time at a local call center, knowing full well that most people can only stick that sort of work for about six months, or a year, tops. Part-time, I can endure. The other job is with a local publishing company, whose owner was also a client of my late computer-genius friend. He had been after me for months, saying that I ought to get in touch with them, especially since the owner’s husband and partner had just died quite suddenly. Well, I finally did. The owner can’t pay anything much, until I bring in some big projects and clients for her… but there are two good parts to that: I can do most of the work from home, and she knows everyone in the San Antonio literary scene. Which means more local credibility for me… I might even get a review in the San Antonio Express News, in spite of their policy of turning up their nose at POD and indy books.

So that’s where it all stands at present – and grateful I am for all the people who have been truly helpful, sympathetic and supportive over the last two years, which have been quite a bit more rocky than they needed to be. Maybe I am just now beginning to see glimmerings of light at the end of the tunnel, not just the headlight of the train bearing down on me!

On Obama Not Goin’ to Landstuhl

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The latest right wing bruhaha is that Obama didn’t visit the wounded troops at Landstuhl and Ramstein while in Germany.  It didn’t bother me a bit.  It would be completely inappropriate for any candidate to visit any military installation and use it as a backdrop as part of their campaign.

BUT!  -the right cries-  Obama insists this isn’t a campaign trip.

Riggghhhhttt.

Here’s some news for you geniuses, if you see either Senator Obama or Senator McCain anytime in the next three months or so, they’re campaigning.   You know it, they know it, even my dog Max knows it and he doesn’t have a reputation as a particularly smart dog.

I think he’s given his opponent enough fodder without  tagging him with this one.

And seriously, do you really think the wounded troops appreciate ANYONE in politics coming to visit them when they’re on the mend?  Think about it, the hospital is going to change all the linen, even if it’s clean, they’re going to make you put on a fresh hospital gown.  The floors are all going to be mopped and buffed to a gleam causing that wonderful smell of simple green, amonia and wax, and no one’s going to be allowed NEAR the cafeteria until it’s clear the politico isn’t hungry.

Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog

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So back when the writer’s strike was going on, Joss Whedon and family put together a little three act thing called Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog available only on the web.  I’ve heard about it for awhile and with the i-Tunes “Season Pass” it was only four bucks.

How is it?  Well, if you liked Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s musical episode, “Once More with Feeling,” you’re going to love Dr. Horrible and crew.  Neil Patrick Harris as Dr. Horrible, Nathon Fillon as arch nemisis Captain Hammer, and the too cute for words Felicia Day as their mutual love interest.

It’s laugh out loud funny.

It’s also Joss Whedon.  If you don’t know what that means, well, let’s just say you may not love the ending.

This Political Season

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Okay, look.  I’m still out of work, so before, during and after I’m done surfing around the net and looking at the paper for opportunities, I catch a good portion of the news.  I watch an hour or so of Foxnews (SWOOSH) and then an hour or so of CNN (now with some James Earl Jones soundalike doing their “Black in America” promos) and if I remember what channel it’s on, I’ll catch the BBC just to see what the Brits are saying about us.  I got into that habit when we were in Germany.  It can be very…educational and it makes me feel better about being American instead of some elitist wanker.

I gotta tell ya that I’m getting scared here.  The two men running for office are freaking idiots!

Every time you turn around Obama is either making shit up as he goes along, or he’s spouting stuff that’s so ridiculous my mouth literally drops open like I’m one of my Father’s relatives who moved to Southern Missouri because it made them feel smarter.  When I listen to him I feel dumber than I did before he started.  I mean he sounds better than most politicos, but when he’s done talking I’m just thinking, “What?!  That made absolutely NO sense.”  No…I can’t give you specifics, it happens EVERY time.  And he’s starting to make John effing Kerry sound absolutely decisive.

And McCain?  I haven’t seen that dynamic a speaker since Bob Dole ran against Clinton.  And that insipid grin he gets when he’s “scoring points” on Obama?  I’m sorry but it’s just plain creepy.  I’m waiting for the 1930s monster movie music to come up.  And seriously, the clip of him cruising around with Bush I in the golf cart?  Dude…the age thing isn’t helping your case and nothing says, “I’m too old to be President.” like a golf cart…unless it’s one of those scooters from Walmart with the basket in front.

Obama, stop making shit up.  Here’s an idea, when you don’t know what you’re talking about, shut the hell up.

McCain.  Stop pointing out what’s wrong with Obama, you’re sounding even MORE like a democrat when you do that.

Both of you, start talking about what you’re going to DO about the economy, gas prices, and the four years you’re presumably going to be President.

Well, here’s a first (and a lesson learned)

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So I get an email from a former classmate today. That, in itself, is not unusual. This classmate periodically forwards emails to me, thinking that I agree with political viewpoint and will enjoy them. She’s usually fairly correct in that assumption. Unfortunately, she also seems to be one of those people who automatically assume that anything she reads on the internet or that gets forwarded to her from a friend is incontrovertibly true.

On that, we disagree. I’m a big fan of Snopes.com, and a firm believer in checking the flotsam and jetsam of my inbox before sending it on to others. And it irritates me that others don’t do the same.

Usually, I can simply ignore the bazillion forwarded items, but sometimes I just get an itch to do a public service and let folks know that no matter how much they want it to be true, Barack Obama is not the child of the anti-christ (or the devil himself), and the little boy in the UK is not still on his deathbed and trying to set a guinness world record for number of greeting cards received (if, indeed, he ever was). When this itch strikes, it’s usually not enough for me to simply reply to the individual who forwarded the email to me and her 5000 closest friends.

Not this time. Maybe it’s because I had a bad day at work today, or maybe it’s exhaustion, or the summer heat/humidity affecting my brain, but this time, I chose to “reply all” and let the entire recipient list of that email know that snopes calls it false.

Oh, maybe I should describe today’s email in more detail? Sure. Continue reading →

I’m Tired

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Just because…

I’m tired of Yahoo f**king up.

I’m tired of never getting any answer to the mailings and emails that I send about my books.

I’m tired of being treated like crap because I’m a writer and there are another ten-thousand of writers just like me (only most of them are F**king worse!) on the next bus. And that most of them seem to be better connected than me.

I’m tired that most of the ones that I am connected to, appear to to blow me off like an embarrassingly incontinent relative.

I’m tired of being stalled on payment on work that I have done.

I’m tired of having to work like a dog just to get a one-hundredth of the interest awarded to crappy, mediocre writers, just because they’re the flave of the moment. Or they have well-connected friends and fans.

I’m tired of looking at things that I should like to buy, but can’t because I can’t afford them. Oh and I am really, really tired of jugging bills. (please don’t construe this as a bleg, I am just venting.)

I’m tired of non-essential stuff but non-the less non-functioning stuff around my house that I can’t afford to fix. Like, giving the animals the vet care that they deserve.

I am really tired of Pajamas Media – my reason for sticking with them is…

Oh, yeah – I am really tired of Old, Traditional, Established Media. That’s what my reason is. Otherwise, I can’t see that I am really getting anywhere with the PJ Media association, anyway.

I have a couple of glasses of chablis in me. And tomorrow, or the day after, I will have to go into a couple of employment offices and make a pretense of being all about them and tending to their coporate needs, just so that I will have enough to fund the last bits of the Adelsverin Trilogy. Like mailing copies of same to reviewers – three-quarters of which will take the copy of Book One and never do a damn thing with it. Except take it down to the local second-hand book outlet and get a couple of dollars for it.

Pardon me while I swallow the vomit in my throat.

The gift that keeps on giving……..

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Pocket Taser Stun Gun, a great gift for the wife.

A guy who purchased
his lovely wife a pocket Taser for their anniversary submitted this:

Last weekend I saw something at Larry’s Pistol & Pawn Shop that
sparked my interest. The occasion was our 15th anniversary and I was
looking for a little something extra for my wife, Julie. What I came
across was a 100,000-volt, pocket/purse-sized taser.The effects of the
taser were supposed to be short lived, with no long-term adverse
affect on your assailant, allowing her adequate time to retreat to
safety.

WAY TOO COOL! To make a long story short, I bought the device and
brought it home. I loaded two AAA batteries in the darn thing and
pushed the button. Nothing!

I was disappointed. I learned, however, that if I pushed the button
AND pressed it against a metal surface at the same time; I’ d get the
blue arc of electricity darting back and forth between the prongs.
AWESOME!!! Incidentally, I have yet to explain to Julie what that burn
spot is on the face of her microwave.

Okay, so I was home alone with this new toy, thinking to myself that
it couldn’t be all that bad with only two triple-A batteries, right?

There I sat in my recliner, my cat Gracie looking on intently
(trusting little soul) while I was reading the directions and thinking
that I really needed to try this thing out on a flesh and blood moving
target.

I must admit I thought about zapping Gracie (for a fraction of a
second) and thought better of it. She is such a sweet cat. But, if I
was going to give this thing to my wife to protect herself against a
mugger, I did want some assurance that it would work as advertised. Is
that wrong?

So,there I sat in a pair of shorts and a tank top with my reading
glasses perched delicately on the bridge of my nose, directions in one
hand, and taser in another.

The directions said that a one-second burst would shock and disorient
your assailant; a two-second burst was supposed to cause muscle spasms
and a major loss of bodily control; a three-second burst would
purportedly make your assailant flop on the ground like a fish out of
water. Any burst longer than three seconds would be wasting the
batteries. All the while I’m looking at this little device measuring
about 5′ long, less than 3/4′ in circumference; pretty cute, really,
and (loaded with two itsy bitsy triple-A batteries)thinking to
myself, ‘no possible way!’

What happened next is almost beyond description, but I’ll do my best!
I’m sitting there alone, Gracie looking on with her head cocked to one
side as to say, ‘don’t do it, dip shit,’reasoning that a one second
burst from such a tiny little ole thing couldn’t hurt all that bad. I
decided to give myself a one second burst just for heck of it. I
touched the prongs to my naked thigh, pushed the button, and… HOLY
MOTHER OF GOD…WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION…WHAT THE HELL!!!

I’m pretty sure Jessie Ventura ran in through the side door, picked me
up in the recliner, then body slammed us both on the carpet, over and
over and over again. I vaguely recall waking up on my side in the
fetal position, with tears in my eyes, body soaking wet, both nipples
on fire, testicles nowhere to be found, with my left arm tucked under
my body in the oddest position, and tingling in my legs!

The cat was making meowing sounds I had never heard before, clinging
to a picture frame hanging above the fireplace, obviously in an attempt
to avoid getting slammed by my body flopping all over the living room.

Note: If you ever feel compelled to ‘mug’ yourself with a taser, one
note of caution: there is no such thing as a one second burst when you
zap yourself!

You will not let go of that thing until it is dislodged from your hand
by a violent thrashing about on the floor. A three second burst would
be considered conservative!

SON-OF-A-BITCH!!! THAT HURT LIKE HELL!!!

A minute or so later (I can’t be sure,as time was a relative thing at
that point), I collected my wits (what little I had left), sat up and
surveyed the landscape. My bent reading glasses were on the mantel of
the fireplace. The recliner was upside down and about 8 feet or so
from where it originally was.

My triceps, right thigh and both nipples were still twitching. My face
felt like it had been shot up with Novocain, and my bottom lip
weighed 88 lbs. I had no control over the drooling. Apparently, I shit
myself, but was too numb to know for sure,and my sense of smell was
gone. I saw a faint smoke cloud above my head which I believe came
from my hair. I’m still looking for my nuts, and I’m offering a
significant reward for their safe return!!

P.S. My wife loved the gift, and now regularly threatens me with it!

‘If you think education is difficult, try being stupid.’

Child Labor

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I know its old, but still funny

Here’s a truly heartwarming story about the bond formed between a little 5-year-old girl and some construction workers that will make you believe that we all can make a difference when we give a child the gift of our time.

A young family moved into a house, next to a vacant lot. One day, a construction crew began to build a house on the empty lot. The young family’s 5-year-old daughter naturally took an interest in the goings-on and spent much of each day observing the workers.

Eventually the construction crew, all of them ‘gems-in-the-rough,’ more or less, adopted her as a kind of project mascot. They chatted with her during coffee and lunch breaks and gave her little jobs to do here and there to make her feel important. At the end of the first week, they even presented her with a pay envelope containing ten dollars. The little girl took this home to her mother who suggested that she take her ten dollars ‘pay’ she’d received to the bank the next day to start a savings account.

When the girl and her mom got to the bank, the teller was equally impressed and asked the little girl how she had come by her very own pay check at such a young age. The little girl proudly replied,

“I worked last week with a real construction crew building the new house next door to us.”

“Oh my goodness gracious,’ said the teller, “and will you be working on the house again this week, too?’

The little girl replied, “I will, if those @**holes at Home Depot ever deliver the f***in’ sheet rock.”

Looking at the Past

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I belong to a Yahoo discussion groups for fans of Westerns, and one of the curious things is how very passionate some of the members are about their favorite authors, and western series, some of which are well known, like Elmer Kelton and some quite obscure like Amelia Bean, who wrote about the Fancher party, of the Mountain Meadows Massacre fame. Old western movies are also mad faves, everything from the acknowledged classics like “Stagecoach” and the original “3:10 to Yuma” to obscure B-movie features and movies made for television that have since sank like a stone. Generally the older stuff is held in higher regard. Oddly enough, many of the members of the group are English – at least to judge from the frequent laments about how little there is in the way of ‘Westerania” to pick through on the other side of the pond.

Like it or not, this is how we begin to visualize the past, through books and movies, first seeing these things, as if through the prism of how a writer, movie producer or TV director visualized them. The trouble with this is that the farther we are in time from the events pictured, the more of the milieu of the time that such things were created seeps in around the edges. Look at a movie like “Gone With The Wind” – it practically screams the date of it’s premiere. But as hard as the various creators might have tried to banish every scrap of inauthenticity in trivial things such as women’s hair-styles, interior decoration or weaponry – contemporary sensibilities and habits of thought are even harder to root out. Movies like “The Patriot” and “Dances With Wolves” took especial pains to superficially and physically appear authentic – but then fell apart when it came to things like the likelihood of a village of escaped slaves being out in the open, and a Union officer in the 186os going over to the wall, metaphorically speaking, to join the Sioux Indians. But never mind – it’s a story. Like “Gone With the Wind” we can overlook anachronisms and accept gaps in logic in service to a riveting and entertaining story. Well, sometimes – depending on how much of a fuss-budget we are for strict authenticity. If something that feels to us like authentic sensibility is present, though – who wants to quibble about details?

But this gets harder to do with a great many more recent movies, and not just Westerns. Something went out of our movies when many producers and directors began to think more about a ‘message’ and a movie as a personal statement of belief… not strictly as something that a great many people would plunk down the price of admission in exchange for being entertained for a couple of hours. The old studio system turned them out assembly-line fashion, good, bad, indifferent and superb, A-list, B-list, genre, serials, bios, epics, musicals and all. As one of my former bosses was fond of saying – it’s a numbers game. The more there is of any one thing, be it sales calls or movies, the better the odds that more of it will pay off… or be really, really good. The old studios diversified their releases. If a movie bombed… well, there were three or four more in the chute, so who cared but the accountants and maybe not even them, very much. Some of them which bombed, or did indifferent business at the time of release later made a better showing, farther on down the track. And some of those are beloved by website discussion groups, so here I am circling around to my main point… which was that there were Western movies made after the 1960s (to pick a date at random) but few of them seem to attract much of the same degree fanatic devotion.

Why? I wondered if the reason might have something to do with the fact that watching this show a couple of years ago on PBS left something of a sour taste in my mouth.

(To be continued)