I remember sitting in the small supposed dining room in my grandmother’s house on Lay Lake in Alabama sometime in high school. It was a two story home shaped like two octagons glued together. From the living room, you walked through the long and narrow kitchen to the dining room. In it was not a dining room table as one might imagine, but a large desk where my grandmother would handle her affairs. She had turned it into a quaint little office. Grandma had a word processor sitting against the wall, the kind that came in a case and you could carry around with you – portable. I remember you slid the thing out of the case like a sleeve and I believe it had a flip up screen. I don’t … Read entire article »

I’m having a bit of a hard time with this month’s short. Part of me wants to scrap it and part of me wants to finish it. My time budgeted for other things has run over and I’m sacrificing writing time to get them done. Yesterday when I was working on the short, I looked in my folder and found that it is number twelve. Why is twelve so important? When I started doing the shorts, I set a goal for myself to compile every twelve of them into a book and publish it for sale here on the site. So technically I’ve reached that goal. I think I’m going to take a break after this story. Making myself sit down and write a story every month is turning into a job … Read entire article »

A couple of months ago I inherited a computer from my mother that sat unused in her garage for some time. I had helped her upgrade some time last year and there it sat, unloved and unused in the cold, dark garage. I had wondered if it would work and decided to bring it home after my last visit. My original plan for it was to set it up as a file server, intending to get all of my work files off of my laptop and onto it so I can access them remotely from anywhere on my property with the laptop.  After all, what would happen if my laptop ever got stolen or lost? Sure I had a backup but still, I don’t want some of the stuff on … Read entire article »

I swear, I change my mind more often than a woman. Instead of making you all wait for this month’s short story, I’m going to make you really wait. I’ve decided that instead of posting a story for this month – don’t worry, I’m still going to write it – I’m going to nip it in the bud and do something else. This being story number twelve, and seeing as you have already (hopefully!) read the other eleven, I’m going to leave you in suspense. I’m in the process of compiling the previous eleven into a book. For the twelfth, I’m going to write and write and see how far I can take it. I don’t know how long it will be, but I can assure you it will be a lot … Read entire article »

Recently I filled out an application – I guess one would call it more a questionnaire than an application, really – to contribute to an as of yet unnamed online magazine. For those of you who know that this very morning I submitted a query to Write Anything to become a regular columnist, no, it wasn’t Write Anything. First on the list was my name and the pseudonym I would like to be published as. I found this one amusing as it was one, the very first question and two, I have a long history of using aliases. I have anonymous e-mail addresses and even regular mail correspondence where I use the names Jim Beam and Jack Daniels. I’ve often wondered if anyone has ever looked at the names and what … Read entire article »

I opened Piratas last night and began working again, only to find that after a day full of inspiration and a notebook filled with more plot points to plug in, my writer’s block hadn’t fully subsided. The first chapter of the story is completely done and I’m well into the second. Keep in mind though, that there are only five; six if you include the epilogue. I ended up writing the Epilogue – made it short and sweet, less than a page – and formatting my pages with headers and footers with my name, the title, and the page numbers. OpenOffice gave me trouble on Seven Days of Terror with the formatting so I’m curious to see what’s going to happen with this one. At least with this one I’m starting … Read entire article »

Man, oh man. I’ve spent every afternoon, and a little bit of every morning, since last Monday or so learning how to use WordPress. As is the case with just about everything I do, I jumped in with both feet before seeing how deep the pool was. Being that this kind of thing appeals greatly to me, I didn’t have all that much trouble with it; mostly just trial and error fixes on my part. I just got tired of Blogger. Period. End of story. While it’s a great platform for the beginning blogger, those of us that don’t want to pay for hosting our own blogs, and the not so tech savvy among us. I feel into the first of the three, just toying around with blogging as something to … Read entire article »

Yesterday I mailed off my contract to eMergent Publishing for a little project I’ve been working on, collaborating with other authors from around the world. Being the first writing contract I’ve ever signed, I copied it before I put it in the envelope and I plan on framing it and hanging it on my office wall, along with the framed $5 bill I received from my first book sale. An old high school acquaintance contacted me and brought up the prospect of one of my short stories – I pointed him to my Fiction Friday stories – possibly being made into a short film. That would honestly be a dream come true. Not only for the fact that something I wrote made it to the screen, but the fact that someone … Read entire article »

Last night I attended my first creative writing workshop – It was the first creative writing instruction I’ve ever had – hosted by the college I attend (the first one they’ve ever hosted), featuring Cynthia Gregory. Cynthia is a prize-winning author and creative workshop leader. Her poetry, fiction, and nonfiction creative prose have appeared in many literary and commercial magazines, anthologies and other publications. And – she’s a teacher at my college so hopefully one day I’ll be in one of her classes. We played a lot of word association games, the first one being naming “zombie” words. These are words that, like zombies in a movie, serve no real purpose other than to take up space to make the finished product look good. “Zombie” words, when looked up … Read entire article »

I checked my school e-mail today and much to my surprise, I found an announcement about a creative writing workshop being held by the school next Tuesday. It should prove to be beneficial, for there are always things to learn and attending the workshop will better help me to hone my craft. I can’t wait. A full report will come shortly after. … Read entire article »