My attention span has been about this –><– long lately. Between the brain-melting summer heat, a full plate of day-job craziness, and massing forces for a final assault on my current manuscript, I’m tapped. My bedside table is piled high with novels that bristle with bookmarks, but I’m having trouble making through a story arc […]
This morning was a lot like the previous few up on Mount Tabor; slate-gray, damp, with a hint of chill in the air. It might be nearing spring on the calendar, but winter seems determined to get at least one more jab in before hitting the mat. So I’m up on the mountain, doing what […]
My apologies for not writing in such a long time. November was consumed by NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). Then came the holidays, hard on its heels. And as if that wasn’t distraction enough, we were hit with Snowpocalypse 2008™, the mother of all snowstorms. It was a mother, too; blanketed Portland in sixteen inches […]
It’s almost that time again. November 1 marks the start of the tenth annual National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo for the hip). Every year, increasingly large numbers of literary speed-freaks set their keyboards ablaze by writing a 50,000-word novel in thirty days. The whole NaNo notion stands normal writing convention on its ear, with sheer […]
It’s been a tough summer. For a whole bunch of reasons, the passage of the last few months has left me feeling tense and strung out, with a knot of gristle lodged in my chest that just wouldn’t let go. I wrote a while back about white space and the need for it, and this […]
Ever feel like you’re the only one who isn’t in on the cosmic joke? I take a walk every morning in one of the handy patches of urban wilderness nearby. Usually, it’s a peaceful reprieve from the daily insanity; a way to reconnect with my thoughts and watch the squirrels, get my blood coursing, and […]
I was tapping away at my novel with my office windows open when the first explosion rocked the house. After untangling myself from the ceiling fan, I rushed into the street, certain I’d find a smoking crater where a neighbor’s house once stood. The street looked the same as always; no shower of falling wood, […]
Another foot in a shoe has washed up on the Canadian coast. This is all you need to know about today. Instead, let me tell you about what I did on my summer vacation.
My wife knocked me awake around 11:30 last night, wearing a worried frown and fleeing the room. Of all the pleasant ways to be awakened, this is pretty damned low on the list. The living room walls were pulsing with red and blue light as I stumbled into the front of the house in my […]
Maybe it’s just Monday morning talking, but I feel like delving into dark territory. Did you ever daydream about where you’ll be and what you’ll do when it all falls apart? Call it what you will; global economic collapse, Armageddon, the big one, they’re all faces of the same nameless beast that lives in our […]
