Month: December 2007

My Day, Crud Edition

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I didn’t throw up until 1:30PM, so that was good. Things were actually quite nice until the afternoon, in fact. I had a meeting, drank some coffee, ate some lunch; it was pretty nice. Then, for some odd reason, I began violently throwing up. It was truly a vomit fest, and just as gross as it sounds. With chunks. (And later without…)

Anyway, after school, we had to retake our Christmas photo, because in the last sitting, yours truly towered over the family like a middle aged totem pole. It looked silly. So, back to the scenic spot for our photo. It turned out nice, and if I hadn’t told you, you’d never know I’d thrown up shortly before the photo was taken:

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After a dozen takes, we ended up with that charming shot you see above. Standing up that 12th time, however, proved to be more than I could handle, and I took a lovely little ride down the riverbank. I managed to catch myself before a full fledged swim was required, but it sure didn’t make my day any better. You’ll notice the snowy scenery? Yeah, that’s real. Real cold.

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How was your day?

Messing With My Theme

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If it seems dark in here, it’s just me fiddling with the site. I am trying a new theme. I might keep it, and I might not. In fact, I might delete this post, and you’ll never know. 🙂

Today’s Funny IM

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I was speaking to a programmer friend over IM today:

Him: Hey, I’ve been learning Python

Me: Cool, the hisses are the hard part. Pythons are pretty forgiving with grammar, but Rattlers get TICKED if you mess up their tonal dialect…

Yep, I’m still a geek. I gotta love that he played right along though.

Joy

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Joy is getting an email from your 8 year old that simply says, “Daddy, I love you!!!!!!!!!”

Merry Christmas

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Here’s a 1:45 snippet of the culmination of 2 months worth of preparation. My wife was the director of the children’s Christmas musical at our church this year, and tonight was the performance. We’re not sure what we’re going to do with ourselves now that there won’t be 3 practices a week, with 3 times that this past week. 🙂

Our youngest daughter, Lizzie, has her very first solo ever at about the 34 second mark. She’s 6 years old, and we are so proud. In fact, all 3 of our kids had solos (not just because my wife was the director!), and they all did wonderful. Lizzie gets the spotlight on Daddy’s blog, however, because it’s her first.

I’m so happy the musical is over! That’s not to say it wasn’t wonderful, but to get back to the regular amount of holiday stress will be quite a relief. 🙂

Why I Haven’t Written A Book

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awesome.pngI have no good excuse. It’s probably the fear of failure. Maybe it’s intimidation on tackling such a huge project. Maybe it’s a combination of several things. The funny thing is, I usually do well when I’m given a deadline. I recently took a magazine article assignment, and had a deadline of a week later. I pretty much met my deadline. (The Devil’s in the details, but it’s not really exciting)

So sure, maybe one day I’ll have a book assignment, and I’ll have to write it. John Scalzi has a deadline this month to finish his current book. I have to admit, I’m a little jealous. Yeah, I could easily “assign” myself a deadline, but really, I’m smart enough that I can’t quite fool myself that way. My recent failure at the NaNoWriMo is just another example. Oh well, I’m not terribly old yet. Hopefully one of these days I’ll get around to doing what I claim I want to do for a living. 🙂 I just need to quit writing blog entries explaining away my lack of novel, and write one!

Oh, and that picture on the fake book is freaky. I’m just sayin.

The Whole World Doesn’t Love Me

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It’s rather weird to be in the public eye. Granted, the “public” eyes I’m in are rather small, but when a few thousand people intake something you’ve created, there’s bound to be someone that doesn’t like you. It’s a little weird to be disliked by someone you’ve never met, or talked to, or talked about, etc.

Don’t get me wrong, lots of people dislike me. I’ve been called names that would make sailors blush (and there are a couple Navy folks that read my blog, yes, you’d blush). Those people, however, have reasons to hate me. I may not agree with their reasoning, but at least they have something to claim I’ve done to them.

It gets wacky when people randomly email you, or comment on youtube, or attempt to make you look dumb in public somewhere. Even that I can handle to an extent. The thing that I find interesting is when people assume that if someone has managed to get published somewhere, that those people must be arrogant, rich, self-absorbed ignoramuses. Because in order to get someone to pay you for your creation, you must have cut corners somewhere. All geniuses are undiscovered, and must die poor and alone, right? How dare I risk embarrassment and ask a publisher to accept my creation as professional quality. I must be really arrogant to think my stuff is better than those that aren’t published.

Guess what? I DON’T! Crimeny, I’m more insecure about the things I do than anyone I know. (My suspicion is that everyone feels that way, whether they admit it or not) If you don’t like what I do, then don’t read/watch/listen to it. If you’re a publisher, just don’t buy it. (Unsurprisingly, I’ve never gotten a, “You suck” response from a publisher, they generally have better things to do)

Oh, and if you don’t like this blog post, feel free to email me about how much I suck. I have a special place for those emails, snuggled up next to the male enhancement offers I get. :o)