July 6th & 7th

Still going, though not at any breakneck speed.

July 6th.

The sixth of July is my brother's birthday (or it has been most years, not sure how Leap Years work), though I don't imagine we're close enough to wish each other a happy one anymore.  I saw him on the 4th, and gave him some cash for some comics from his childhood I sold.  That'll have to do.

It has been insanely hot the last few days.  I don't usually complain about the heat, because I like it and truly loathe the people who go on and on about it (it doesn't make it any cooler to hear you bitch, Auntie Gretchin), but that has helped give me the excuse not to write.  Heck, I can barely edit podcasts (though I spent Wednesday editing the next PTDNSIN, and the next day editing the Fake Sean song that follows it).

Here on my PC (that's Personal Computer, but it also means you're not supposed to use racial slurs or bigoted language around it), I've been putting the finishing touches on a project called "Journey Into Another Dimension Through A Portal Near a Truck Stop Restroom," a story I probably mentioned back in January of '16 when I started it.  I was quite enamored with that title through all of 2016 (even made a mock-up of a cover for it, which was an image about 80% covered with text) . . . but this year, I'm not so sure. 

I wracked my brains to come up with an alternate title, and decided on "Exotic Honeymoon," but it tells you much less than the original did.  And there's very little Punk Rock attitude with that title.  Anyway, I am at the end of that now, and after maybe one more day, I can put it behind me and start working on the other belated work.

I half-dread, half-look forward to it.

Words Written: 152
Total Words: 1165

July 7th.

Okay, today I actually got Some Writing done.*  It has been kinda pathetic, what I've accomplished so far, but it adds up, and it's more than I've been writing.  But today was the first day where I sat down and made myself do it, like I did in February, March, and April.  Unfortunately, it was all in my notebook, so I'll just have to type it again one day, and that won't count toward my writing goals.  Ah well, baby steps.

I took my notebook into a restaurant with me, wrote about three sentences before they called my name.  But then I forced myself to keep writing when I was done eating.  That's how it used to be, and how it needs to be again.  Basically, I wrote the opening of my YA nov--

Shudder.  I wrote the opening of my YA story.  Hopefully, that means there will be more.

Words Written: 560
Total Words: 1725

Rish "Writer" Outfield

*The capital letters tell you I mean business.

Celebrity D&D (Video Version)

In case you just can't get enough (all the things you do to me, and everything you said), here is the video version of "Celebrity Dungeons & Dragons," which should be exactly the same as the audio version. But is it?

July 4th & 5th

July 4th.

On Independence Day, I drove down to my childhood home to mow the weeds and so my mom could water the lawn.  My niece went along and I asked her if she wanted to check a little stream down the road for tadpoles ("pollywogs," we called them when I was a kid).  She did, so we drove over and looked around.  Didn't see a one, whereas the last time we'd been by there, my nephews caught at least a dozen.

What we did see, however, were these little green leopard frogs hanging out on the bank, which would jump and hide in the moss when they'd see us.  As you may know, I become an eight year old whenever I see frogs (I often criticize Big Anklevich for devouring a Family-Sized bag of M&Ms at one sitting or eating every donut in the box, but I have my revolting, unhealthy obsessions too, don’t I?), so of course we spent fifteen minutes trying to catch them (they weren't very fast, but were extraordinarily slippery, and quite a challenge to grab).

We got two, stuck 'em in a container, and brought them home, where my niece and I made a lid for their enclosure out of mosquito netting and Legos.  That may sound stupid, but it was a fun activity for my niece and me, and it seemed to work pretty well.  They haven't jumped away yet.

Then we had a family barbecue (I cooked the meat), gorged ourselves, and I believe I fell asleep.  There were fireworks, and then my cousin invited me to go over to his place, despite me being tired.  I drove over around ten pm, impressed by dozens of fireworks displays as I drove.  At his house, we've begun watching that show "Legends of Tomorrow," and I've gotta say, there hasn't been an episode yet where I haven't mentioned, "Just have Sara kill them and this will all be solved."

Despite all this, I don't think I got any writing done.  I got home, and forced myself to type a few before I went to bed.  So, an anemic day/week, as far as word count goes.

Words Written: 114 
Total Words: 854

July 5th.

So, on the fifth I went to the library for the first time in, I dunno, fifty days.  I know that's where I get the most work done (besides the family cabin, where there's no internet, television, or even cellphone service), so I ought to go there more often, but it's hard to make myself do it.  I've even driven to the library, pulled in to the parking lot, then said, "Nahh, I think I'll go throw dirt-clods at red-headed children" instead.  That's on me.

Last Saturday, I went over, meaning to start the new month out right, but the bastards close early on Saturdays.  Who does that?*  That's on them.

Well, on the fifth, I finally manned up (or womanned up, if that's tougher) and went up to the Quiet Floor (where you just ignore the cellphones, despite all the signs that say to silence them).  I had intended to stay only an hour, but ended up being there nearly two. 

While not technically writing according to my July definition, I was typing up my novella "A Mark on the Sky" from my notebook.  I've now gotten it about two-thirds of the way typed, and when it's done . . . jeez, I dunno.  It'll probably sit on my hard drive, impotent and mute, while my beard gets whiter and whiter.  We'll see if I can break my usual cycle on that one.  As Aerosmith once told me, "Girl, you got to change your crazy ways.  You hear me?"

Despite the time spent in the library, I can't count that as writing, except what little writing I did do.  I'll do better next time.  Seriously, dude-looks-like-a-lady.

Words Written: 159 (which is crazy, but that's what it said)

Total Words: 1013

Rish Outfield, Writer (so far)

*It may be that all libraries do that.  But I don't have to like it.

July 2nd & 3rd

So, I was a little bit worried about how this month of July would go, with me pledging to write every single day, but almost missing the first day of the month.

And the second.  On July 2nd, which was my childhood friend Dennis's birthday (still is, I would assume) and always had significance to me, I had just as much motivation to write as the day before.  Namely, none.

I have a work-in-progress I've been puttering around with since the end of April or so.  I write on it a couple of days a week, and rarely very long.  It should really be a screenplay, I'm aware of the fact, and hence, there's very little incentive to work on something like that.  But at the end of the night, instead of working on that, I decided to jot down a paragraph or two on a story I wrote in 2016.  January of 2016.

And that was literally it: a paragraph or two.

So, here's my barely-not-failing-numbers for today:

Words Written: 191
Total Words: 476

July 3rd

The next day, however, I got an email from my pal Cameron, saying he was finally going to stand up to his father and/or kick the crap out of a Ferrari.  Oh wait, wrong pal.  This one emailed to let me know that he would be my surrogate writing coach, and would be happy to not only urge me on, but take the writing-everyday-for-a-month challenge alongside me. 

He also told me that he was my boyfriend now, Nancy.

Tonight, I went for a lengthy bike ride, rather than writing.  There were (are) tons of fireworks going off, so I used that as an excuse to pedal around for three-plus miles (although I guess you could use exercise as an excuse as well).  Sometimes I thought about where my life is going--never a good idea--and sometimes I thought about writing.

I did some work, sent some emails, and wrote just a tiny bit on (the end of) that story I mentioned from more than a year ago.  And by Thursday or so, it'll be time to start on something else.

I mentioned that idea I had for a YA novel in my last post*, and I really think I might have something with it.  But I am intimidated by the thought of trying to write a novel (we've been over this before, right?), and I just find that task too daunting.  I know, though, that if I just wrote a couple of hundred words every day . . . I could do it.  By December.

But I could still do it.  Guess I should increase my word count, huh?

Words Written: 264
Total Words: 740

Rish Outfield, Word Counter

*And also mentioned the nigh-unto-unbearable YA book I was slogging through, which I actually finished yesterday.  And the sad thing is, even though it amassed about thirty-one strikes during the ballgame, the book ended on a pretty strong note, so much so that I wondered how something like that happens--whether the author was building toward this final chapter the whole time, or had a theory (like mine about horror films) that the ending is the most important part and ended up working hardest on it, or whether it was editor-mandated.
And then, the author finished the book by bashing the Harry Potter series so shamelessly that I wish I had a time machine to use to go back to one of those times I was tempted to throw the book against a wall and give in to my inclination.  Let me know if you've got a DeLorean handy.

Rish Outcast 76: Miss Fortune

A year or two ago, I entered an audio drama in the "Masters of the Macabre" contest, the entry that would, sadly, be my last.  I wrote about it here.  It was brought to my attention that that episode was no longer available, but luckily, I still had the original production.

Featuring the voices of Renee Chambliss and my niece, "Miss Fortune" is a short piece written with awfully narrow specifications.  The location had to be a Festival, the monster it featured had to be Raw Head, and a specific tarot card had to appear (namely, The Hermit).

Enjoy?

I recorded this episode after a particularly heavy snowstorm, and was going to save it until next winter, but listeners (well, ostensibly they were listeners) told me to go ahead and post it.  After all, it's winter in the Southern Hemisphere.



Of course, you can always download the episode directly by Right-Clicking This Link.

And come support my Patreon.  Only the cool kids are doing it.

July 1st . . . already?

So, earlier in the year, I made monthly goals and then reported on those goals, mostly writing-related.  It was actually pretty effective in getting me off my doughy behind and making me do things when I didn't really want to do them.  It didn't hurt that I had a friend who was working on his own (public) goals, and I could encourage myself by encouraging him.

Then, things changed.  I got a big audio assignment (and a nasty, smaller one), and decided to curtail my writing activities in favor of those.  May and June would be dedicated to finishing those obligations, and I told myself that then, in July, I would be a writer again.

And as Big said on several occasions this year, a writer is someone who . . . writes . . . every . . . day.

But today is July 1st, the start of a new month, the opportunity to be that thing again that does that thing again.  And I really don't want to.

I took my notebook to lunch with me, as I did during my prodigious writing days this past winter, and instead of toiling on my work in progress, I jotted down a couple of ideas for an abandoned short story from a year or two ago that I thought about turning into a novel.*

Now, the day is close to done, and I haven't done any more writing (not the kind where I can count up the words and boast about them, which was what I told myself I'd do every day in July).  In fact, I was tempted to watch television--a vice I almost never engage in--until the whole night was gone.

What's wrong with me?  Besides, the obvious, I mean.  When Big was here, he and I would delight in railing against that long-standing notion that doing something for x days in a row would make it an unbreakable habit, because we both discovered that that particular lie did not apply to writing.  But at least we had each other to complain to.

Now, though, I'm on my own, and I couldn't even manage to write one day in a row??  That's awfully pathetic, even by my own standards.

What should I do?  Publish this abortion of a blog post, then open Word and force myself to write a few words, so that I can say tomorrow, "Well, I wrote yesterday.  The least I can do is do it again."?

Shit, maybe I will.

Rish Outfield, Writer?

P.S.  Well, it isn't much, but I did write for a few minutes, and it wasn't nearly as painful as it could've been.  So, here we are:

Words Today: 285
Total Words: 285

*I am nearly finished reading a Young Adult novel by an esteemed, acclaimed, and prolific writer, and I'm absolutely hating it.  Time after time, I'd angrily tell the ether, "Okay, that's Strike Two.  One more strike and this sucker gets tossed across the room."  But I'd keep going, due to a martyr complex or something.  Because even though I loathe the book, I'm fully aware that its author is a better writer than I am.  If he is capable of such middling, cringe-worthy, sub-ordinary work . . . holy San Salieri, what does that make of my own writing?  Of me, who would rather clean a fishtank than put pen to paper?

My "My First Story" Essay on Emerian Rich's Website

A few weeks back, Emerian Rich, who runs the Horror Addicts podcast and webpage, which ran, I believe, five of my stories, asked for people's testimonials on their first story, which she would run weekly on her website.

I was happy for the chance to guest on this blog, since Emerian has always been very nice to me.  It was only after I had accepted that I discovered what we were supposed to be blogging about.  And the first novel I wrote was less than two years ago, only published last summer*, and there have been none since then.  What could I possibly talk about, then?

But in re-reading her invitation, I discovered it was "My First Story," rather than "My First Novel," which makes me wonder why I even included the above paragraph.

Well, why include anything, if you're going to have that attitude about it?  Come on, focus on the positive for once.

Like the fact that you can read my little blogpost at this link, if you feel up to it.

Rish Outfield, Blogger

*And read by, what, six people . . . two of which have since taken their lives?

Rish Outcast 75: Goodnight Moviehouse

There really ought to be a comma in there.

So, this is something I recorded really recently when the local neighborhood movie theater closed down.  It was among the shortest episodes I've ever produced . . . so I decided to write a little something for after the show.  Padding, if you will.

Hey, you wanna download the episode directly?  Simply Right-Click on THIS LINK.

I Perform "Single Parent" on Cast of Wonders

Happy Father's Day, you male mothers!

In honor of the holiday, I got to narrate an odd little story over at the "Cast of Wonders" podcast.  It's called "Single Parent," by Sarah Gailey, and it tells the familiar tale of a dad checking his kid's closet for monsters . . . and finding one.

"Cast of Wonders" touts itself as The YA Fiction podcast*, and once again, this term vexes me.  In this case, there's no one in the story that even remotely would count as a young adult (ie, teenager), as the three characters are in their thirties, a six year old, and a grandmother.  Plus, there's the dreaded eff-word in the first five seconds of the story, which my reading has taught me would caused a YA reader to spontaneously combust.

But my gut is telling me that YA is whatever the person selling it says it is, much like when I ran a Horror Film review website and constantly had to do battle with the definition of "Horror."  Which films would we review on our site and which ones wouldn't we?  Why would PSYCHO count but not REAR WINDOW?  Why did JURASSIC PARK, TERMINATOR, and KING KONG count, but not WESTWORLD, CYBORG, and MIGHTY JOE YOUNG?  Ultimately, the decision was made that "Horror" was whatever the hell I said it was, and if other people disagreed, well, eff 'em.

So, apparently "Single Parent" is YA, and if I disagree, eff me.

It is Horror, though.

The story is certainly interesting (as the man's wife used to be the one to dispose of pesky spiders and/or closet monsters, and now he has to figure out how to do it himself), and it's neat they had a Father's Day story planned enough in advance to get it out for the day.

Anyway, check it out if ye like, at THIS LINK.  At the very least, it's got a fairly good narrator.**

*Oh, and these guys are now part of the Escape Artists network of shows.  I must have missed when that happened.

**Oh, and Fake Sean gets a bit of a shout-out in this episode too . . . so there's that.

The Podcast That Dares 18: Celebrity D&D

Rish presents his most elaborate sketch yet, an episode of nobody's favorite reality/game show, "Celebrity Dungeons & Dragons."  With, of course, your host, Fake Sean Connery!

 
Thanks to Gino Moretto for his input (and the logo), and let's hope this goes over well.


If you wanna download this bad boy, just Right-Click HERE.

Unreliable Narrator

Not much here.  I just wanted to be able to use "unreliable narrator" and pretend I'm clever.  This is a segment of me falling asleep while narrating.

I was going to post this more than a year ago, when I was editing an E.C. Tubb audiobook and discovered the condition of my recording, but I forgot about it and threw away the outtakes when I got to that part.*

But here we are in 2017, and I've found another section in Abbie's new book that will do almost as well (in the Tubb book, I went on for much, much longer, but I've discovered the audio tends to be unusable no matter how many times I wake up and reline in that condition).  This may or may not be entertaining, it's difficult to say.



Even though I'm not quite done with my narration (I probably have a dozen or so more chapters, then I'll start on retakes), Abbie has begun to publish the audiobook in installments over on her Patreon page.  You can probably (possibly?) check it out HERE.

In the meantime, I will try to stay awake.

Riszzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

*Which is a shame because it was much more pathetic that this clip is.  In that one, I forced myself to carry on, despite my condition, until there would be twenty seconds or so in between lines where I had closed my eyes and only resumed when my head dipped and that woke me up.  Now I'm wise enough to just quit and say, "Well, there's no use continuing now if I'm just gonna have to record it again anyway."  It's like when you're falling asleep while driving, despite the radio and the window and slapping yourself.  Nowadays, I just pull the car over at the next rest stop or clear spot, and take a nap for half an hour or so, rather than risk actually zonking out right before a turn or cliff.