I Don't Need an Out

***I DON’T NEED AN OUT***

While it is true that there’s no age limit for success in the world of writing, some days it can feel like you’re running out of time. Maybe it’s been a while since your last session. Maybe real life got in the way of what you love the most. Maybe the burnout bug bit you a little too hard on the ass. Whatever the case may be, the longer you delay your project, the more pressure you feel to get it done. You don’t necessarily want an out. You’re trying desperately to find an in. And yet, procrastination takes over anyways. You’ve been locked out of heaven and you’re desperately banging on the gates to get back in. I’ve been there. You’ve been there. Anybody who’s ever picked up a pen or pounded on a keyboard has been there.

It wasn’t always this way, but I’m definitely a procrastinator whether I want to admit it or not. From third grade all the way to eighth, it used to be that I’d do my homework right when I got home from school and not a moment later. I turned in my assignments on time and got the good grades I wanted (mostly). And then starting in my freshman year of high school when the bullying was at its worst, I waited until nightfall to start my homework assignments. I purposefully delayed my work because I was afraid the PTSD would interrupt me and cause me to fuck up. While I eventually overcame the bullying and mental trauma, the habit of delaying my schoolwork stayed with me until I graduated from college in 2009. It could have been the onset of schizophrenia that kept the habit alive, but it follows me well into the prime of my writing career.

Whether I consciously or subconsciously do it, I keep looking for an out from my creative duties. I don’t want to look for an out. I don’t need to. I’d love to storm the gates of heaven and climb over the top. But some days, I can’t tell if I’m legitimately too exhausted to work or if I’m looking for an out. Maybe the reason I keep looking for an out is because I’m afraid of being interrupted by what the fuck goes on inside my head. While it’s a terrible idea to write while mentally slogged, I agree, it has gotten in the way of progress and as a result I feel awful about doing nothing for the rest of the day. Yes, lots of good writers procrastinate and proudly so, but this is a habit I don’t want. I’d love to quell my anxieties before knowing for sure if I’m tired, but it hasn’t happened yet and here we are.

When I get right down to it, there’s really nothing to be afraid of other than being afraid of shit. When I edit a long-term project, there’s nothing to fear because my beta readers and editors are friendly people who give wise critiques. When I write a short story or novel chapter, there’s nothing to fear because I’m getting in my practice and keeping my skills sharp, first draft or not. When I’m writing a review, again, not much to be afraid of because I’ve already rehearsed all of my talking points in my head and I’m ready to go well in advance. I don’t want to use the tired old phrase “it’s all in my head”, but there really is no reason for all of this fear. If I fuck up badly, so what? That’s the beauty of writing: you don’t have to get it right the first time, unlike a brain surgeon or a police officer.

Back in 2017, Texas rock band Nothing More released an album called “The Stories We Tell Ourselves” and it has many dialogue tracks in between their original songs. One of those dialogue tracks is from philosopher Alan Watts and he describes how the only way to master fear is to allow yourself to be afraid. When you’re constantly fighting fear, you’re only setting up a vicious cycle of being afraid of fear and being afraid of being afraid of fear. When you relax your defenses, you realize you’ve got nothing to defend and there’s no reason to fight in the first place.

I practiced Alan Watts’s mantra many times on the nights before I attended a rock concert. There was always the lingering fear of something bad happening at the show or transportation to and from the show being stressful as hell. I allowed myself to be afraid. I let the anxiety wash over me and it worked. I mastered my own fear. Can this method be applied to my writing? If I try hard enough, I suppose. The next time I feel anxious about being critiqued or whatnot, I’m just going to let it happen. Let the fear do its thing and then sort out the logic later. Will I stop procrastinating? Maybe not, but at least acknowledging my own fear will feel better for me in the long run than undeserved guilt.

I’m not saying that Alan Watts’s mantra or my own life experiences will work for everybody else. There is no one-size-fits-all solution when it comes to psychology because everybody is different and everybody has their own set of obstacles. My obstacles are schizophrenia, burnout, and the anxiety that comes with both of those things. Being aware of your own mind and your own circumstances will come a long way, though. Once you know what the problem is, you can relax long enough to find a solution that works for you and you alone.

Try it. If it doesn’t work, try something else. Stay curious and keep looking for answers. Don’t look so hard for answers that you add to your anxieties. We can do this. We can overcome procrastination together. Or if procrastination is what you naturally do and it doesn’t interrupt your work schedule, it may not be a problem to begin with. Like I said, no one-size-fits-all solution. I’m Garrison Kelly! Until next time, try to enjoy the daylight!

***BEAUTIFUL MONSTER***

After twenty days of wrestling with procrastination and self-doubt, chapters seven and eight have been revised. Chapter nine will have to be rewritten entirely to accommodate for Tarja Rikkinen’s suggested character changes. Instead of being a Mary-Sue who talks like a therapist and fights like a goddess, she’ll crack jokes at inappropriate times as a way to mask her own trauma and then feel internally guilty afterwards. Also, there’s got to be some reason why Shelly Atwood’s voice keeps appearing in her mind, right? After all, those two characters look similar to each other. Hmm….

***FACE BOOK POST OF THE DAY***

As much as I love Final Fantasy VII, they fucked up badly when they named one of Cloud Strife’s swords the Hard Edge. It’s a weapon that can be stolen from one of Shinra’s soldiers. But instead of saying that, my brother’s girlfriend at the time named Angela told me to, “Make them give you a Hard Edge”. I was only fifteen years old at the time, but I laughed like someone a fraction of my age when she said that. Those jokes just write themselves.

Latent Maturity

***LATENT MATURITY***

So…whenever a public figure fucks up beyond belief, it can usually be linked to how old they were at the time it happened. This is especially true when the perpetrator is a teenager and in some cases in their early twenties (not all cases, but some). The younger you are, the more forgivable you are in the eyes of the public. But what about fucking up badly in your later years? Suppose you do something horrible in your late twenties and apologize for it in your thirties or forties? Only then do you not have an easy way out of your predicament.

Whenever a teenager writes horrible fan fiction that accidentally glorifies monstrous behavior, they can be easily forgiven. But if that author was older and allegedly wiser, then the criticisms become harsher. An example of this is Anna Todd, the author of the One Direction romantic fan fiction After. The book got a lot of heat for lionizing abusive relationships, cheating, and overall deplorable behavior. Anna Todd wrote that book’s first draft when she was in her early twenties. Because she should have “known better” at that age, many of the attacks on After were lobbied against her as a person. Is this fair? Does she legitimately not know how the human experience works or is this some part of an evil conspiracy?

As many of you are painfully aware, I have my own experience with writing awful and tone deaf first drafts. Beautiful Monster, anyone? I didn’t figure this out on my own, but the first draft version of Tarja was manipulative as hell and incredibly nosy when it came to being therapeutic to Windham. Yes, you heard that right. Somebody else had to point this out to me. As a bonus to this juicy backstory, I just celebrated my thirty-third birthday when I completed this first draft. As someone with that much life experience, I should have known better than to make Tarja Rikkinen a super-creep. But that’s the thing: I DON’T have a wealth of life experience. I DON’T have a treasure trove of wisdom. In today’s world I’m thirty-four years old and I’m still taking too long to mature.

But when it comes to first drafts, authors should be given as much permission as possible to fuck up badly. First drafts are NEVER perfect when they’re barfed onto the page. Even well-established authors will tell you this. If you see a first draft of a novel and you want to point out mistakes, be forgiving and nonjudgmental. Every author deserves the benefit of the doubt. But the thing with Anna Todd’s book is, from what Book Tubers have said about it, it reads like it never made it past the first draft stage. It has so many typos, so many plot holes, and so many shitty characters. No sane editor would have allowed any of those mistakes to stand. And yet, here we are in 2020 and After not only is a published novel, but a fucking movie. By the way, I’m using the F-bomb as an adjective, but the movie could very well be about the act of fucking.

Here’s my stance on latent maturity. Fucking up badly is not exclusive to any age, whether you’re a teenager, an adult, or shit, let’s extend that to the elder years. My only concern is, did the offender grow as a result of this mistake? Did they change their ways? Did they learn the lessons they were supposed to learn? If the answer to these questions is yes, then that person should be forgiven, provided the crimes committed weren’t overly serious. Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein don’t deserve forgiveness. I rest my case.

So if I really do lack the necessary life experience to make rational decisions about my first draft, then why am I a writer? Isn’t wisdom a requirement for being successful in that industry? It is indeed. In fact, I have just enough wisdom to know that I need help crossing the street from time to time. I certainly don’t want to be offensive when I write first drafts, but it does happen and I need people to point this out to me without holding a blade to my throat.

I used to hate criticism so much that I’d reject all of it no matter how reasonable it was. Now that I’ve gained just a little bit of wisdom, I know that criticism is vital to my success as an author. I can’t have a career without it. Does it hurt sometimes? Absolutely. But does the criticism come from a place of love? Hell yeah it does. That’s something we as creative people owe each other: a place of love, forgiveness, and growth. If we’re being judged all the time for our worst mistakes, we’ll never get anything done. That’s not productive in the least.

Beautiful Monster is hardly the most offensive first draft novel I’ve written. In 2018, I wrote two others named Silent Warrior and Incelbordination, both of which are about school life. Because they are first drafts by their very nature and I don’t trust my wisdom one single bit, there are things going on in both of those novels that I don’t know could be offensive as fuck. Is Scott George from Silent Warrior a creep because of who he’s dating? Am I sending the wrong message by having his girlfriend heal him? Did I also create a bratty protagonist that nobody wants to cheer for?

What about Incelbordination? Is Oswald Crow a whiny bitch? Do I overplay the fact that he has dwarfism? Does he have any real dimension to him other than smoking pot, being short, and listening to heavy metal? Is having him pine for romantic love a sexist trope? It’ll be a while before I’m ready to have those two first drafts critiqued. I’ve got my hands full with Beautiful Monster and Emilio & Marigold. And goddamn, do those stories have some SERIOUS fucking problems!

To cap off what is already a very rambling blog entry, I just want to tell each and every one of my dearly beloveds out there to be kind to each other and don’t judge each other too harshly. Does Anna Todd deserve forgiveness? What about E.L. James? Or Stephanie Meyer? Is being naïve really an excuse or is the damage done too overwhelming? These are all reasonable debates that you can have among your friends and audience members. But when you have these debates…please be kind and if necessary, rewind. I’m Garrison Kelly! Until next time, try to enjoy the daylight!

***BEAUTIFUL MONSTER PROGRESS***

I’m certainly taking my sweet time with editing the shit out of my novel. It could be the creative burnout. It could be general tiredness. Or it could be that my slowness has been right all along and that I should take more time to think about how I’m going to fix these longstanding problems. As of this blog entry, I’m getting ready to edit chapter five, where the readers are first introduced to Tarja Rikkinen, the token female mercenary at Shadow Asylum. Or as Commander Rinehart calls her, the “diversity hire”. We know right away that she’s an excellent fighter, but being insanely violent doesn’t necessarily make for a likeable character. She needs something extra. But what will that extra nuance be? Her love for animals? Her penchant for cracking jokes at inappropriate times? Or maybe…Shelly Atwood will invade her thoughts and implore Tarja to…spill her secret! What secret is that? Well, if I told you all, it wouldn’t be a fucking secret! Stay tuned. Or as Lindsey Doe says on You Tube, stay curious!

***QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“Love is one of the most intense feelings felt by man; another is hate. Forcing yourself to feel indiscriminate love is very unnatural. If you try to love everyone you only lessen your feelings for those who deserve your love. Repressed hatred can lead to many physical and emotional ailments. By learning to release your hatred towards those who deserve it, you cleanse yourself of these malignant emotions and need not take your pent-up hatred out on your loved ones.”

-Anton LaVey-

Rolling the Dice

***ROLLING THE DICE***

Last night I had quite the wonderful conversation with one of the CEO’s of Hollow Hills, Aurora Styles. Round three of editing is rapidly approaching for Emilio and the Scratching Post, so the two of us agreed it would be a good time to talk about character profiles. I’m bold enough to admit that creating characters is something that I struggle with. Sometimes my characters are relatable and three-dimensional, other times they’re either despicable as hell (despite being heroes) or bland and boring. Aurora has been writing a long time and has character creation down to a science. That’s because she treats her TV and movie viewings as “study time”. She pinpoints flaws and traits in the TV characters she likes to watch and (either subconsciously or consciously) adds them to her own characters.

Unfortunately, I don’t put that much time and effort into my own character creation. I should. I know now I should. But up until this point, I’d been doing something I like to call “rolling the dice”. It’s actually called pantsing, which is the opposite of plotting. Everybody’s a hybrid of the two when it comes to writing, but for me personally, I would be a plotter for the events happening in the story and a pantser for character creation. My characters would be listed in my pre-writes as a name, a race, and an occupation. The main character of Beautiful Monster was listed as Windham Xavier, Elf Mercenary. His rapist was listed as Shelly Atwood, Human Seductress. With this incredibly limited information at my disposal, I would rely heavily on subconscious influences to flesh out these characters, much to their detriment.

Aurora said it best when she told me that the fiction we consume has the heaviest influence on our writing, whether subconsciously or consciously. This could not have been truer for Beautiful Monster, to use that example again. My biggest influences as a young writer included WWE, Pulp Fiction, Tales From the Hood, The Shield, Pink Floyd the Wall, and pretty much anything where the dialogue is snarky and vulgar. Well, those subconscious thoughts leaked into my characterizations of Windham and Shelly. They swore like no tomorrow. They got angry at little things, not unlike a WWE wrestler. The lengths that they would go to in being vulgar had no limits. The result? Having to completely rewrite the first draft from scratch. Windham and Shelly were hardly the only ones to act this way. Torger? You’re damn right. Tarja? Hell yeah. Orpheus Rinehart? Absolutely. There was no distinction between these characters’ dialogue. If I had quoted text with no names next to them, you’d never know who they were.

My critique sessions with Marie Krepps (the other CEO of Hollow Hills) led to a complete overhaul of my characters while my conversation with Aurora enforced and confirmed everything I should have learned. To use Beautiful Monster as an example again, Windham is soft-spoken and quiet-voiced even during moments of anger. Shelly is a lot more tempting and classy than she was in the first draft. Christian and Kody Savage don’t have any dialogue at all; they’re just a couple of drooling zombie rednecks.

For Emilio and the Scratching Post, the same thing is true: a complete overhaul of characters’ personalities. While I can’t divulge major plot points due to my confidentiality agreement with Hollow Hills, I am willing to give you some appetizers. In the first draft, Sweet Pea (Emilio’s master) was a little brat who disrespected her elders and got away with everything. Now, the newly christened Marigold is a lot more fearful of the villains in her life and that’s something she wants desperately to overcome. Antonia, Marigold’s grandmother, started off as a bland and boring screamer. Now, she’s still a villain, but her eerily calm demeanor makes her more believable. She’s creepy during her coldest moments and a joy to be around when she needs to lie to the public. In Antonia’s case, I stole her characterization from Abel, Trevor Noah’s abusive stepfather in his memoir “Born a Crime”. Yikes!

Of course, Emilio and the Scratching Post (which has the funny as hell acronym EatSP) has only entered round three of editing. There will be more changes. There will be more rounds. The macro and micro aspects will be fine-tuned. This will all be done before June 1^st, when Hollow Hills’s deadline for submissions comes to fruition. June 1^st is also two days before my 34^th birthday. Being a part of Hollow Hills’s anthologies will be the ultimate birthday gift for me. But before I can get to that milestone, I’ve got a lot of work to do…but not tonight. Tomorrow? Maybe. The next day? Could be. But not tonight. I’m physically drained after going for a long walk in the springtime heat. I need to be alert and alive if I’m going to make these macro edits to my manuscript. Until then, I’m Garrison Kelly! Even when you feel like dying, keep climbing the mountain! Or in this case, the scratching post to Uncle Thud’s catnip garden! There’s another thing that needs changing: Uncle Thud’s characterization. We’ll cross that bridge when a new day rises. For now, it’s about taking it easy.

***BEAUTIFUL MONSTER***

In between edits of EatSP, I’ve been writing chapters of Beautiful Monster and I’m currently on chapter twenty, where Queen Llewellyn Xavier is scheduled to make her first appearance in my story. The economic hardships have not been kind to her village. Her crops are covered in blight, her citizens are disappearing left and right, and she still hasn’t negotiated a trade deal with King Lars Stonewall. She’s ready to throw in the towel after so many failures…until a familiar face returns to her village with a traumatizing story to tell…

***LYRICS OF THE DAY***

“Summertime and the living’s easy. And Bradley’s on the microphone with Ras MG. All the people in the dance will agree that we’re well qualified to represent the LBC. Me and Louie run to the party. Dance to the rhythm, it gets harder. Me and my girl, we’ve got this relationship. I love her so bad, but she treats me like shit. On lockdown like a penitentiary. She spreads her loving all over, but when she gets home, there’s none left for me. Oh, take this veil from off my eyes. My burning sun will someday rise. So what am I going to be doing for a while? Said I’m going to play with myself. Show them how we come off the shelf. So what? Evil. I’ve come to tell you that she’s evil. Most definitely. Evil. Ornery, scandalous, and evil. Most definitely. The tension is getting hotter. I’d like to hold her head underwater.”

-Sublime singing “Doin’ Time”-

2019

My intentions for the brand new year

Have never been so crystalline clear

Drop a hundred pounds as I walk this town

While listening to favorite heavy metal sounds

Publish a new book full of action and drama

Edit that bitch down to the very last comma

Find a girl who loves me for my soul

Who’ll pull me out of my blackest hole

Read more books and clear my shelves

I’ll review them all, but read for yourselves

Learn how to drive some clunky machinery

Eat less junk food and eat more greenery

See Tarja Turunen perform at a show

Even if the destination is one I don’t know

Buy a T-shirt that says Ego Kills Talent

Vote for justice on the November ballot

Glide my fingers across the piano again

Play some funky music that never ends

Be the best kitty father I can possibly be

Emilio the snuggle buddy sleeping with me

Write more often while being wide awake

Write every day if that’s what it takes

If these dreams and goals sound unrealistic

You’re obviously part of this division

You might as well stand right in my path

Can’t guarantee your safety in the aftermath

You say I can’t do it, I tell you to screw it

You’ve got too much attitude; lose it

This year is mine to grab by the horns

This life is mine, it shall never be torn

The Chicken Shit Scale

***THE CHICKEN SHIT SCALE***

Just to clarify, no, this journal topic has nothing to do with the last topic, which was about cowardly villains. It’s about a certain idiom we’ve all heard at least one point in our lives: “Making chicken salad out of chicken shit”. In other words, it’s a blunt way of saying that you’re going to make the best out of a bad situation. Sometimes you can make a delicious salad, other times you’ve still got a big heaping plate of chicken shit.

I know this because back in 2006, I tried to make chicken salad out of chicken shit with a movie script previously called Pumping Filter. It was drenched with violence and slurs that made absolutely no sense in that context, so I took the script to a woman named Heather for evaluation. Despite the fact that we couldn’t see eye to eye on a lot of things and our professional relationship was a complete failure, Pumping Filter, now called Snakes in a Cage, was slightly better because of her critiques. Unfortunately, the newly christened Snakes in a Cage has been deleted from my archives because in the end it was still a heaping pile of chicken shit. A lot of my past creative writing projects have met this fate and perhaps the silver lining in all of this is that they are learning experiences I will have forever.

Today in 2017, I face the chicken shit dilemma once again. As many of you know, I’m currently shooting towards finishing three different anthologies for publication: American Darkness 2 (contemporary drama), Poison Tongue Tales 2 (sci-fi, fantasy, and horror), and the newly christened Lunatic Justice (dark poetry and heavy metal songs). I also have three first draft novels that I finished a long time ago that need to be looked at: Filter Feeder (environmental fantasy), Watch You Burn (psychological fantasy), and Demon Axe (musical fantasy).

When I eventually put the finishing touches on the anthologies, that will be when I present my beautiful beta reader Marie Krepps with choices as to what she wants to work on. I’m not saying I’m incapable of making my own decisions or that my love of surprises has spiraled out of control. I’m saying that some of these first drafts are better than others (despite the fact that all first drafts by their very nature suck ass). The question I need to ask myself is, which ones are easier to fix and which ones will completely drain me?

In an effort to answer this question, I came up with something called The Chicken Shit Scale, where I rank my first drafts on a scale of one to six, where one is the worst rough draft (and therefore needs a LOT of work) and six is the best (easy breezy lemon squeezy). Is it better to make chicken salad out of chicken shit or is it better to make more diamonds out of…well…diamonds! Sorry, that last analogy sucked, which doesn’t help my case for making the most out of a bad situation. Anyways, here are my rankings for my first drafts:

1. Filter Feeder
2. Watch You Burn
3. Demon Axe
4. Poison Tongue Tales 2
5. American Darkness 2
6. Lunatic Justice

I want you to notice that I’ve grouped the novels, short story anthologies, and the singular poetry collection separately. In my experience, short stories and poetry are easier to correct than a full-fledged novel since there aren’t as many variables to deal with. I put Filter Feeder on the bottom of the list because…well…have you seen it lately? It was written a long time ago, so naturally the more recent ones, Watch You Burn and Demon Axe, are going to overwhelmingly outrank it. American Darkness 2 outranks Poison Tongue Tales 2 because I feel like with the latter I’m writing the same story over and over again with different characters are different circumstances. It’s the same ass beating on repeat, which is pretty much what WWE is, but I watch that weekly anyways. Lunatic Justice ranks the highest because people seem to love my poetry anyways, as noted by the grades reviewers have given my previous poetry books Confessions of a Schizophrenic Savage and Necrograph (I swear I’m not trying to stroke myself…maybe).

When the last three items on the list are complete, then that would be a good time to recruit Marie’s services so that I can have a singular focus in my creative work (editing). I know she’s been pretty busy lately and money isn’t coming easy for her, so that’s why I’m treading lightly with this one. To be honest, I’ll pay her whatever she wants because it’ll be worth it in the end. I trust her judgment no matter what the project is. Plus, she’s got a wicked sense of humor. Regarding the “magic wand” joke in the Poison Tongue Tales story Streetwalker, she said, “I’d rather get raped than listen to another one of [Ryan Brock’s] stupid jokes.” She’s brutally honest, but she’s right on the money with that one. Did I mention I trust her completely?

So what will it be? Will I make chicken salad out of chicken shit or will I…uh…uh…make golden earrings out of gold? (What the fuck was that?) We’ve got ears, say cheers!

***CREATIVE WORK***

Besides this journal, I haven’t done any creative work today, so nothing has changed since the Cowardly Villains blog. I might as well put on my “Please Don’t Make Me Do Stuff” T-shirt, because that’s how I feel today.

***MUSIC JOKE OF THE DAY***

Q: What does the lead singer of In This Moment say every time she does a commercial for underwear?

A: Even in these Hanes you can’t Jockey.

***POST-SCIRPT***

If you can make chicken salad out of that chicken shit joke, by all means, go for it. Hehe!

Poison Tongue Tales

***POISON TONGUE TALES***

The last time I published a book was in February of this year and it was a collection of dark poetry called Necrograph. I think I’m about due to publish another book. The next one on the assembly line will be Poison Tongue Tales, a collection of short stories from the science fiction, fantasy, and horror varieties. It’s currently going through another round of editing from my overly awesome beta reader Marie Krepps. I specifically told her to look for places where I can show instead of tell and she’s done a phenomenal job of pinpointing those areas for me. What can I say? She does a lot for me and I try to repay her as much as possible.

So far she has given me notes on 17 out of all 50 stories in the collection. If you want to be alphabetical about it, it starts with Acid O’clock and ends with Gates of Hell. Ordinarily, I could polish 17 stories standing on my fucking head. I could do all 50 stories while doing the splits over an alligator swamp. I could do Poison Tongue Tales and American Darkness while sitting on a bed of thumb tacks. If all of these obscene analogies aren’t getting to you, what I’m trying to say is that editing a short story isn’t that hard to do. It’s not like editing a novel, like Occupy Wrestling, where I had to constantly change plot mechanics on my way to the final chapter. These 50 stories are all standalone in nature and only add up to three single-spaced 11 X 8 pages per story.

That’s why it pains me to say that I haven’t edited a single solitary story since Marie Krepps did her most recent round of critiques. No Acid O’clock, no nothing. Not yet. My reason for this has nothing to do with real life obligations or even mental exhaustion. It has everything to do with fear. That’s right. Something as simple and irrational as fear has stopped me from getting started on making these changes to Poison Tongue Tales. If I had to take a guess as to what this fear is over, I’d say it’s a fear of having a huge task in front of me. These new changes are going to radically transform the way each story looks, but it’s still the same kind of labor as before, so what’s all the fuss about?

I have no reason to fear critique as much as I used to. In my younger years, I had an over-inflated ego that would burst at the smallest suggestions. Now that I’ve surrounded myself with people who give a damn and are with me for the long haul, my sensitivity to critique has gone down quite a bit. I might even say that I’m immune to it now. So again, what’s all the fuss about? If I actually enjoy listening to Marie and her advice (because she’s hilarious and thoughtful at the same time), where’s all this fear coming from?

For far too long, Poison Tongue Tales has been considered a backburner project, meaning the WSS, Demon Axe, and everything else took precedence over it, even the Dark Fantasy Warriors, for shit’s sake. I have all the time and energy in the world to complete this simple task of editing the shit out of these 17 stories that Marie has compiled for me. If you want to talk about energy, I somehow found the energy to read 30-40 pages of my Carl Hiaasen book per day. The last time I showed that much dedication to a book was when I read “The Absolute True Diary of a Part-Time Indian” by Sherman Alexie (I hope the movie adaptation will be good). If I have the energy to blitz through a Carl Hiaasen novel, I should have the same energy to blitz through Poison Tongue Tales. The energy is there, but so is the trepidation. What the fuck, brain?

I know that an unexplained fear seems like small potatoes to you, my readers. Hell, you’ll probably want to flood my Face Book page with R. Lee Ermey memes after reading something like this. But I assure you, I can get over this fear in due time. I have four books to show for my worked up courage, why not have five? And then after Poison Tongue Tales, I have five different ideas for what I’ll send Marie next:

• Filter Feeder (environmental urban fantasy)
• Watch You Burn (psychological urban fantasy)
• Demon Axe (unfinished heavy metal urban fantasy)
• American Darkness 2: Black State (unfinished collection of modern day drama short stories)
• Poison Tongue Tales 2: Warrior Spirit (unfinished collection of science fiction, fantasy, and horror stories)

On a side note, Marie once told me that I use the word “warrior” a lot in my stories. She even joked that if my characters took a huge dump in the middle of the road, they would be called “shit warriors”. Not only did I laugh my ass off at that remark, but it’s also one step closer to me actually editing Poison Tongue Tales and not letting some bullshit fear get to me. If it’s finally time for me to “cowboy up”, then I’m shooting from the hip. Adios, amigos! Thanks for reading!

***DARK FANTASY WARRIORS***

As you guys can see, Sonya Demonic is now posted online. I showed my drawing of her to my mom and she said that Sonya looked strikingly like my ex-girlfriend Brianna. I can’t say she’s wrong. Hehe! What’s next you ask? How about Ronis Wakizashi from my most recent WSS entry “Fire and Fury”? Sounds about right. I’ve always wanted to draw a half-Japanese redneck sheriff with a big ass shotgun and fuzzy beard. Actually, this might be more daunting than editing Poison Tongue Tales. Wish me luck!

***LYRICS OF THE DAY***

“This is the point from which I could never return and if I back down now then forever I burn. This is the point from which I could never retreat, ‘cause if I turn back now there can never be peace. This is the point from which I will die or succeed. Living the struggle, I know I'm alive when I bleed. From now on it can never be the same as before, ‘cause the place I'm from doesn't exist anymore.”

-Immortal Technique rapping “The Point of No Return”-

Laziness

***LAZINESS***

I’ve beaten this dead horse so many times that it’s nothing more than shredded flesh and bone powder. I wouldn’t blame any of my readers if they suddenly got tired of hearing about it. But if I don’t write about the topic of laziness for the hundredth time, I feel like this will be a missed opportunity. There seems to be an updated version of this song and dance every time I write about it. So here it goes.

As of today, I don’t have a whole lot going on in my life. I haven’t lifted heavy furniture or done any strenuous chores around the house for weeks now. I still don’t have a high demand for book sales. I wanted to apply for a job with What Culture, but I didn’t think I could make the cut since I’m not as knowledgeable about pop culture as the admins. I’ve been on the job application sending circuit in the past and not one boss said yes to me. The WSS and my Deviant Art page have both been slowly declining in activity since old friends are falling off the face of the earth.

So I guess it stands to reason that I have all of this time in the world to work on my creative output and boost my self-employed career as an author. I can keep putting out chapters of novels, short stories, and heavy metal lyrics in hopes that one day, just one day someone will see them and help spread my message like a virus. That’s pretty much what being an indie author is all about: hoping that the right people will see you and want to invest their time and money in you. It’s like fishing in the sense that the right lure will catch the biggest and tastiest fish.

But here’s the thing. Yes, I do have lots of free time on my hands now that my schedule is clearing up quickly. However, most of my free time has been replaced with zombie walking. In other words, I pace around the house, lay in bed, or surf the internet hoping that my motivation will come back to me. The motivation has always been there, but every time it’s time to read, write, or edit, there’s this sensation in my brain that keeps me down. It’s a combination of sensitivity and numbness (for lack of a better description) and it robs me of the energy and willpower to get any creative work done.

I thought this problem was long behind me. I’m using my CPAP every night, I’m eating less and losing weight because of it, I haven’t had a schizophrenic attack in forever, and life is comfortable in this cozy town of Port Orchard. So where exactly is this mysterious brain sensation coming from? Self-doubt? Possible depression? Dare I say, the gray weather? The outside world’s influence? Aging?

That last item is important because when I was in my teens and 20’s, I used to get shit done on a regular basis. When I worked on a novel, I wrote a chapter a day with the longest paragraphs. When I had a college assignment, I worked relentlessly on it until it was done and turned in on time. When I had my volunteer jobs here and there, I worked my ass off and made my supervisors happier than the Pillsbury Doughboy being frisked by the TSA.

So what changed? How did I go from writing a chapter or short story per day to barely getting anything in at all? Am I really feeling like an old man at 31 years old? Is my obesity really that much of an influence? Keep in mind that in my teens and 20’s, I was skinnier and drank a lot of caffeinated energy drinks. I’ve since shot back up to 300 lbs. and I can’t drink Red Bulls anymore because they make my heart race. Maybe there’s also something about not having a routine schedule that makes me sluggish. Maybe I have to have work in order to do work.

I don’t claim to have all of the answers to my own dilemma, but I’d like at least some idea of what’s going on. I’ve read articles on procrastination and boredom and they’ve suggested that irregular sleep cycles, lack of exercise, and too much caffeine were among the reasons for that. Those seem like easy problems to rectify, but you have to remember that sleeping late, eating fast food, and drinking caffeine are all addictive behaviors. It’s just another way for my own brain to fuck with me. Thanks, brain.

Laying around and walking like a zombie might seem like paradise to someone with an overworked schedule. But make no mistake about it: there’s nothing glorious about feeling sluggish. There’s nothing normal about not being able to do what you love because of a technicality in your own fucked up mind. I repeat: a technicality, with many loose explanations, but no concrete answers. I see people brag about how hard they work and it hurts that I can’t put in as much firepower as them, all because…of a technicality in my goddamn brain. It’s a technicality that seldom existed in my younger years and little has changed now that I’m a 31-year-old.

If I could put out creative project after creative project 24/7 for the rest of my life, trust me, I would. I love writing. I love reading. I love editing. I even love my drawings and photography even though they’re not my main products. Common sense dictates that doing these things more often than I do would increase my happiness and fulfill my hardworking nature. So why am I not doing them? Because of a technicality, that’s why.

By this time in the blog entry, the dead horse is beyond necromancy. Not even Papa Shango’s silly magic from 1992 WWE television will be enough to animate this horse’s dead body. It used to be that every time I talk about this subject, the next day would result in a cornucopia of creativity. Maybe that’s what will happen tomorrow, maybe not. I don’t know anymore. It’d be nice to have some solid answers, but who do I look like, Dick Tracy?

***WRESTLING QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“Go ahead, Miz, go do what you do best! Whatever it is, it sure as hell isn’t wrestling!”

-Daniel Bryan-

Distractions From Eating

***DISTRACTIONS FROM EATING***

I have my creative work to thank for a lot of things in my life whether it’s easing schizophrenic symptoms, getting my voice out there, or just having some good old fashioned imaginative fun. Now I have another thing I can thank my art for: distracting me from overeating. As many of you know, I’ve struggled with my weight for a good portion of my adult life. I’ve tried the Atkins Diet and was successful with it, but only temporarily. My main problem was that I was always bored and overeating was my favorite source of fun. It didn’t matter if it was McDonald’s, candy bars, soda, or pizza; if I was bored and junk food was available to me, I would wolf it down and feel like shit afterwards.

Say whatever you will about my skill level with drawing pictures or my frequency of cat pictures, but alongside my writing, reading, and editing, they’ve been welcome distractions from overeating. And whenever I posted a piece of art to my social media accounts, I would scroll through my pictures and admire my handiwork, not because I’m an arrogant jerk, but because I don’t have to think about eating. Even when I’m watching What Culture’s WWE videos or Last Week Tonight with John Oliver episodes on You Tube, I’m doing something other than stuffing my face. Living in a boring place like Port Orchard, it’s easy to give into your food-related vices since there are restaurants, grocery stores, and convenience stores pretty much everywhere you go.

Ever since I’ve been occupying my mind in even the smallest ways, I’ve been eating less frequently and looking better in the mirror as a result. If I ever did get bored enough to eat, I’d usually drink a bottle of distilled water instead and piss away the pounds. I drank a lot of water and ate minimally while I was in Hawaii and have already noticed changes in my body. When I first flew from Seattle to Kauai, I would need a seatbelt extender. When I returned home to Sea-Tac, the airplane seatbelts fit perfectly fine. I’ve also noticed that I’m getting full off of less food and I’m not huffing and puffing when I return home from my walks.

Obviously, I’m still a heavy guy and there are times where I occasionally grab a bag of Mickey D’s or a Pizza Hut pizza. I am by no means a weight loss guru or a super athlete. However, I’m not the only one who says that overeating can be triggered by moments of extreme boredom. Scientific studies, gym teachers, food documentaries, I’ve heard them all echo these sentiments. While I understand that what works for one person won’t necessarily work for the other, I can say with confidence that little distractions are helping me lose weight. It may be a slow process and I may have miles to go, but the thing about losing weight is that you feel the effects right away. Your mood improves, you have more energy, and you look at yourself in the mirror with less judgment.

But of course, there are days when I don’t feel like working on creative endeavors. Today was one of those days. My guess is that I’m still in recovery mode from these past few days of housework and remodeling and that’s why my brain doesn’t want to cooperate with me. Hell, I had to go to the chiropractor yesterday after lifting a whole bunch of heavy furniture. I had a shelf break because it carried a shit ton of CD’s. Dale wasn’t happy about that since he’s in no way a musical person. He doesn’t understand the beauty of David Draiman’s golden voice or Dimebag Darrell Abbot’s shredding guitars. All that aside, I was definitely in need of some recuperation. I’m a fragile introvert after all.

Even with all of this mental exhaustion working against me, I managed to only eat two meals and I got full after both of them. They weren’t even big meals, at least not compared to what I ate before. My afternoon snack consisted of three plums. My first official meal was at 5:00 at night and it was a baked potato with no toppings, a portion of spam, and a banana. At 8:45, I ordered a sandwich and breadsticks from Domino’s Pizza, both of which aren’t even close to being as fattening as a full pizza. I have no plans to end the night with more food.

I may have to spend some more time in recovery mode tomorrow and the next few days because that’s when my family and I are going to paint my bedroom walls light blue. We might do one or two walls one day and do the rest of it over the course of Monday and Tuesday. I won’t have to do a whole lot to disconnected my electronics since they’re all hooked up to a power strip. We’re not going to move out my furniture for the painting process; we’re just going to scoot it over a few feet. God, I love my wooden floors! I would have never been able to scoot things over on a dust-collecting carpet.

I hope all of my readers are doing okay considering what a wild and crazy October it has been. Halloween is coming up soon and for any metal heads who live near the Tacoma Dome, Five Finger Death Punch and Shinedown are going to perform there on November 5^th with Sixx AM and As Lions opening for them. November is also National Novel Writing Month. Last year I completed the first drafts of my Poison Tongue Tales stories. This year I’m going to storm through all 17 remaining chapters of Demon Axe. I’m also going to use some of those days to compete in the WSS contests like I normally do.

We’ve got ears, say cheers!

***DARK FANTASY WARRIORS***

One of the best things about being in recovery mode is that I still have enough mental energy to pump out a drawing or two. Although to be honest, I’ve gotten a little bit rusty with my latest effort, a picture of Detective Shawn Henry from Demon Axe. I’ll do better next time when the time comes to draw Edge Spider, the drug dealing gangster from the Poison Tongue Tales 2 cyberpunk story The Audiomancer. One of the pieces of advice I constantly receive from Angie at the WSS is to write about villains who are sane-minded since they’re scarier than the wild and crazy ones. I hope I achieved that with Edge Spider.

***VIDEOGAME DIALOGUE OF THE DAY***

MIKE HAGGAR: Hello? Mayor Haggar here.

DAMNED: Hehehe! Mr. Haggar, I’m so pleased to make your acquaintance. I believe you know who I am. Don’t hang up! We have an important business proposition for you: your daughter for your cooperation. Plus, we’ll throw in a monthly bonus to your salary.

MIKE HAGGAR: What?! What’s happened to Jessica?! Who is this?!

DAMNED: Not so fast, Mike. Turn on your TV.

MIKE HAGGAR: You son of a…what have you done with her?!

DAMNED: Nothing yet, but we’d enjoy the opportunity. Listen to reason, man. Why make your job difficult? Just let us do as we please like the mayor before you did! Agh-hahahahaha!!

-Final Fight-

Adapting to Change

***ADAPTING TO CHANGE***

We live in an era where everything we do has the potential for artistic merit. In the past, I’ve covered topics like reusing abandoned buildings, home improvement, and building Magic: the Gathering decks, all of which qualify as being creative projects if done in an innovative way. I’d like to add something else to this list, an underrated form of creativity that often gets taken for granted: adapting to change. As long as we live our lives, life will give us all the change we need. Whether it’s good change or bad change, the only way we can seek to improve ourselves is by rising from the ashes every time.

Writers have to adapt to change on a regular basis, especially if they’re working one-on-one with an editor. An editor’s job is simple: read an author’s manuscript and point out what things worked, what things didn’t, and what could be done to improve the things that didn’t. It is not an editor’s job, however, to make these changes for you. Yes, you have a better idea of what to change, but it’s ultimately up to you to decide how you will change those things. Even if an editor gives you a solution at your request, you, the author, are ultimately the one who says “yes” or “no” to that decision. When a writer has successfully adapted to the changes his manuscript is presented with, he will have a stronger product. He may have to edit several more times after that, but every time the literature will become stronger.

Episodic television shows have to adapt to change all the time. A screenwriter can produce weeks, months, or even seasons of television far in advance. But if an actor leaves the show, budgets become constrained, or the ratings aren’t high enough, adapting to change becomes more important than ever and all of that advance television has to be rewritten and reedited to accommodate those changes.

The original version of NCIS (Washington DC) has gone through several lineup changes during its current thirteen year run. In 2005, Sasha Alexander (Special Agent Caitlin Todd) left the show for unknown reasons, so her character was sniped by an Israeli terrorist named Ari. Ever since then, the audience was treated to Ziva David, a socially awkward, yet badass Probationary Agent. In 2013, Cote de Pablo (Ziva’s actor) left the show also for unknown reasons, so her character went back to Israel due to crippling guilt. She was replaced by socially awkward NSA analyst turned NCIS Special Agent Ellie Bishop. Don’t worry, because Emily Wickersham (Ellie’s actor) isn’t going anywhere for the time being. Michael Weatherly (Tony DiNozzo) on the other hand is leaving at the end of this current season. So many changes, so little time.

The WWE has to adapt to changes all the time, so that will keep the creative writers busy for a long, long time. In 2015, there were a shit ton of injuries that prevented certain wrestlers from competing. Seth Rollins tweaked his knee and had to give up the WWE World Heavyweight Championship, which is currently being held by his former Shield mate Roman Reigns. Daniel Bryan suffered a concussion and had to give up the Intercontinental Championship, which was won by Ryback in an Elimination Chamber match, won by Kevin Owens at Night of Champions, and won by Dean Ambrose at Tables, Ladders, and Chairs. Then Tyson Kidd, Cesaro, John Cena, and Sting started getting injured. The Divas division wasn’t safe either since Paige had concussion issues, Sasha Banks injured her knee, Nikki Bella snapped her neck, and Rosa Mendes became a mother for the first time in her life. Choosing wrestlers to take these injured workers’ places is a critical decision that must be made on the fly. Entire storylines have to be rewritten all over again to accommodate these new wrestlers.

Just like with every journal, I’m going to use my own life as an example as well. My life is for the most part pretty routine, humble, and satisfying. Major changes in my life are rare, but when they do happen, they usually come in the form of a schizophrenic attack. Offensive images and sounds will invade my mind to where I “flinch” away from them to minimize the pain. But as I flinch from them, I’m also flinching from other aspects of my life that I derive pleasure from, the most important one being heavy metal music. How do I adapt to a schizophrenic attack? Listening to more new age music is my most common method. I’ve written a shit ton of heavy metal song lyrics during schizophrenic episodes and they were well received by the public. But just recently, I’ve had to learn how to confront my schizophrenic demons. I had to play the images and sounds in my head so many times without flinching until the fear of them is conquered and dead. I’m no longer afraid of my own mental demons because I looked them in the eye and said, “Fuck you, I’m not moving!” The gatekeepers to my happiness have gone home…but for how long?

Change can come in many forms: a new city to live in, the death of a loved one, the loss of a job, a physical injury, and many others that are easy to relate to. Learning how to live a normal life in the face of these changes is what will make you strong enough to never regret those changes happening. Change is inevitable, but strength is forever. No amount of change will make life impossibly hard to live. You simply learn to work around those issues and face the next challenge with a warrior’s spirit. Any piece of art can be created from the remains of destruction. The main character from Pink Floyd the Wall smashed up his hotel room and turned the broken furniture into a collage. It’s an insane way to think about it, but then again, insanity and creativity have strong ties to each other. We’ve got ears, say cheers!


***DARK FANTASY WARRIORS***

The next warrior to be drawn will be a villainess named Domino Gunn. If you’ve been following my art career in 2007, you would have seen her in a movie script called World of Darkness, where she was a lingerie-wearing dark paladin whose weapon of choice was a ball in chain. In today’s world, she’s a villainess in the Poison Tongue Tales short story “Stone Cold”. She tries to seduce the vengeful barbarian Brutus Warpath, but gets her throat ripped out instead. A lovely fate for a lovely lady.


***MOVIE DIALOGUE OF THE DAY***

DANTE: You know what the real tragedy of all of this is? I’m not even supposed to be here today!

RANDAL: Oh, fuck you! Fuck you, pal! Jesus, there you go again trying to pass the buck like I’m the source of all your fucking misery! Who closed the store to play hockey?! Who closed the store to go to a funeral?! Who tried to win back his ex-girlfriend without even discussing how he felt with his present one?! You want to blame somebody for all of this?! Blame yourself! “I’m not even supposed to be here today!” You sound like an asshole! Jesus, nobody twisted your arm to be here! You came here on your own volition! You like to think the weight of the world is on your shoulders like, “This place would fall apart if Dante wasn’t here!” You overcompensate for having what’s basically a monkey’s job! You push fucking buttons! Anybody can waltz in here and do what we do! You make it sound so much more epic, so much more important than it really is! Christ, you work in a convenience store, Dante! And badly, I might add! I work in a shitty video store, badly as well! You know, that guy Jay has it right! He has no illusions about what he does for a living! Us, we like to think we’re so much more important than the people who come in here to buy a newspaper or, God forbid, cigarettes! We look down on those people like we’re so advanced! Well, if we’re so fucking advanced, why are we working here?!

-Clerks-