So! Things are excellent. Smarmily, smarmily excellent, so please bear with me for a minute.
In the past 10 days I've somehow managed to drop +/- 5 pounds (like in the 4.5 to 5.5 range), which I didn't know was possible but absolutely has me on a great track to be the weight I want to be on Oct 1st, and the other weight that I'd like to be on Oct 31st. I didn't think it would be so easy. On the other hand, Ben and I agree that the first 2 pounds were probably straight pizza. (I had eaten a lot the day before.)
I have a series of excellent plans for Labor Day weekend which include, perhaps unfortunately, a lot of eating, including a bushel of crabs, but I'm trying to counter this with "It's a holiday weekend" and hopefully I'll avoid undoing all the good work I've done in the last 10 days.
Tomorrow I'm taking the girlfriend out for Special Dinner in Philadelphia. I made the reservation weeks ago. At some point assuming I have enough balls the plan is to tell her I love her. We've been dating 4.5 months at this point so I think it's a reasonable time. R/relationships said 3 months was even a reasonable time. Internally I thought, Really? It felt more like 6 months was reasonable. Whatever, I'm out of practice at saying this and meaning it.
Work is going fucking kick ass. To put it in perspective, all my work for the month is due by 9/15. I've turned in approx 85% of that work already and expect to get the rest in by the end of the week, all goes well.
I've been doing a really good job of being self-motivated and disciplined lately. I hope I can keep it up.
So I guess this is what happiness feels like, hmm?
I watched MURDER PARTY again this week. I love it. If you have Amazon, avail yourself of a free trial Shudder subscription and watch it. I'm going to write a review and post it on my horror blog sometime this week, too.
Things are positively just swimming.
- Really? It felt more like 6 months was reasonable. Whatever, I'm out of practice at saying this and meaning it.
Saying it makes it look like you're putting your cards on the table and why not?
Say it, be vulnerable, open, and woundable. Be confident, courageous, and better-to-have-loved-and-lost. Saying it or not saying it has more to do with expressing feelings in a verbal way, in the -- take-it-backable, it-all-depends-on-the-definition -- thing that language is.
Actually loving someone is the-day-in-day-out grind of respecting them, supporting them, feeling heard and understood and making an effort to hear and understand them.
If the behaviour seems to support the words, then maybe words have more than passing meaning.
- Is there a reasonable time for love or the declaration thereof? Love doesn't have a timetable
Love doesn't have a timetable, but timing is everything.
It helps to both be looking for the same things at the same times, preferably in the same places.
Awesome news all-around. Kicking ass and taking names. Hope the writing is still going well. The whole month long thing really helped kick start my daily writing routine. I'm also gonna have to agree with klein about the r/relationships deal. They are ill-equipped to give advice on the subject of their own sub-reddit.
My kid starts kindergarten tomorrow, I'm super excited for her.
She was in a small preschool with only one other girl. Most our friends have boys.
I suspect that she would really like to have more girl friends. I know she is ready for a larger social life.
Academics aren't looking like a problem, she can add and subtract and can do some basic multiplication and division. He reading is strong and she likes to make cards and write specific unique messages for the people she is going to give them to. Hell, she is reading this post over my shoulder out loud as I write it.
I hope she has fun tomorrow and thought the year.
First off - your kid is wicked awesome. Having met her in the real world... This I can say with some authority. And insert apples not falling far from trees comment here.
Regarding sponges... I couldn't agree more. I feel super fortunate to have a local charter school that follows a mostly Montessori methodology.
I spent an hour in a sensory deprivation tank last Friday.
It was useful in that I was able to determine that I'm much more dissociative than most people. For me, the utter lack of sensory stimuli wasn't profound, it was boring. I got the sense of "yes, it's interesting that I can open my eyes and see nothing, but I am revealing no deeper truths about myself." They advise you to count backwards from 100; I counted breaths backwards from 100 a good eight times with no fundamental change in my outlook or demeanor. I then decided that perhaps I do better with a little sensory stimulus so I started to sit up right about the time the timer clicked off.
I gained understanding as to why I prefer sensory inundation to sensory deprivation - my jam is the russian spas, because I love the steam room, I love the banya, I love the cold plunge, I love forcing myself into my body, rather than out of it. The fact that I'm deeper in my head than most people explains a lot, really, such as why I gain so little use from meditation, and why I so rarely act out of passion instead of logic.
I had this discussion with the owner of the facility (an impeccable, million-dollar build; the sort of boutique floating facility you might find in Pasadena is exactly the sort of boutique floating facility it is) and he told me I'm the first person to tell him that in three and a half years. He offered me two more free sessions just to see if I'd change my tune because the research he's sponsoring with MRIs and shit indicate that an hour's worth of floatation is equivalent to 10,000 hours of meditation, whatever that means. So I'll probably go back just so I can put the last nails in the coffin but primarily what I learned is that spiritually, I am a bit of an outlier.
I crossed 1400 miles last night. Also I ran over a rat. roadkill is as roadkill does. I took four showers yesterday because I also took the metro into Hollywood for lunch, which meant walking a mile and a half. And I had an english muffin, and a sandwich and a bag of chips and a biscotti and some shepherd's pie and some salad and some watermelon and some ice cream and gained a pound and a half. The transit difference between "going to work" and "coming back from work" is an additional 10 minutes, which is all sitting at lights, all in Toluca Lake, all in 98 degree heat.
Supposedly the endocrine test results will be available next month.
The birth center has officially crossed over to the point where my vendors are getting impatient with me to finish so they can show off our projects.
I spent four hours day before yesterday ordering lights that I'd already ordered.
And I ate half of a round-trip ticket because we moved the schedule around. Things are so fucked up that I found myself googling what sort of penalties the airline can inflict on me for not using a ticket I purchased before I slapped myself.
On the plus side, the fare war means that rejiggering my schedule only cost me $200.
Yeah... the sensdep tanks are an interesting experience, but I guess they are mostly the "shock" that a lot of people need to actually take a deep look inside and just be fully with themselves. You and I have spent a lot of time there already, so the sensdep is relaxing, but not transformational.
Now, psilocybin, on the other hand... that gets me where I need to be, constructing fabulous architectures out of the air around me...
Ever since I was a teenager I would "depersonalize" and feel like I was outside of my body. Like I would stare at my legs and they would look small and separate from myself. Really it started before that but the leg thing started then. Apparently this was supposed to be scary but I guess that's only for people who are used to feeling in things. It got even stronger when I would smoke pot and lay on the floor feeling like I was floating above my body.
I guess it's why I enjoy sports that leave bruises, or something like pottery which requires a surprising amount of physical "with-itness". One form of meditation I find I like is called body scan meditation because it seems like the whole point is feeling in your body. I just do that and fall right asleep.
Uni is starting next week. New job started for real this week. Good news coming this Friday to a hubski near you!
I also started a new hobby:
Gliding! Which is much more intense and fun than it sounds. Those things can do some serious acrobatics. Hopefully I can get a good amount of flights before winter kicks in.
I'm gonna break ThatFanficGuy's brain, but flying gliders was one of my most favorite things ever!!
My Uncle flies them, and has taken me up flying many many times since I was a child. I quickly learned how to fly, and he'd just sit in back and enjoy the view while I - from about 12 years old, on - flew from release to landing all by myself!!
That is a transformative experience... being in the air, feeling the thermals, sensing the air... man, I miss it.
Man... You should start a series: #storiesfromgoobster. I'd follow that in an instant.
What you describe sounds like a fantastic experience, as well. I wanted to fly for as long as I remember myself, and I figured that the reason we enjoy sliding down a big hill on our butts is that it simulates (or provide some of the feelings as) the experience of flight.
Any way you can hook me up with a glider if we are to meet someday?
- Any way you can hook me up with a glider if we are to meet someday?
Sadly, no. Haven't gotten to fly in 20 years. The "airport" we used to fly out of got turned into condominiums, and I don't know anywhere within 100 miles where you could fly sailplanes any more.
And my Uncle - the actual, licensed pilot - lives on the East Coast... so I think my sailplane days are probably over.
The thing that shocked me the most about flying is turning.
We all think about turning in 2 dimensions... turn the wheel to the right, and your car turns right.
In an airplane (and especially in a sailplane), turning is falling to the side.
You move the stick to the right, the right wing slows down, and you basically fall over to the right, losing altitude quickly!
It's way more like skiing down a mountain, as opposed to driving... sure, you are turning and changing direction, but you are also losing altitude quickly.
And in a sailplane - relying on thermals to gain altitude - this is a shocking and scary thing!
HELL YES. Enjoy that shit. I have some unforgettable memories of flying alongside hawks, catching thermals with other birds of prey... Oh man... Enjoy it, and stay safe with a hat, hydration, and sunscreen.
While I was in Civil Air Patrol (CAP) I got to spend time flying planes, but my favorite memories come from a buddy off mine inviting me to go to the local gliding spot. Only complaint, which is so outweighed by the sheer experience is the heat of the cockpit, but that might just be a Florida thing.
Sucks since I was phasing out my time in CAP and subsequently gliding that I never got to the level that I could do acrobatics.
Another possibly just Florida thing, but are you restricted in winter because of the snow? I ask since the last I remember, our local gliding club set their cross-country gliding distance in the winter - I think one of the reasons being the thermals had more condensed air, meaning more lift. Also, Florida is rather bi-polar when it comes to weather despite the name "Sunshine State" due to it's climate: lots of cumulus patterns to pick up altitude on. From what I gather, you're Scandinavian? Trying to sort out the system your'e working with.
If you look closely in the pic, the digital panel says 'Terlet Gld'. I'm Dutch and this gliding club almost always flies at Terlet Airfield (not to be confused with this, lol). Can't tell you much about the system except that flying is very weather-dependant. I had one run of just a few minutes because we couldn't find a single thermal. They stop flying when the ground starts to freeze overnight (around October-ish), as it pretty much kills the thermals for the rest of the day.
I'm looking forward to getting to control it myself for a while. Monday was more of a try-out. The heat was fine, it was like 70F outside so the little window provided more than enough fresh, cool air.
Ach. Memory recalled "Dane" rather than "Dutch". Apologies, I found it! Reads like it's been aroud for a bit. You must be in very good hands. Meant wind/weather system; made an oopsies on the short hand.
Mostly with reference to cllimate and wind patterns. It's been too long for me to remember the impact per se on thermals. While you're not supposed to glide in stormy weather, if there are stormy clouds nearby, it wasn't uncommon for us to swing by for a quick pick-me-up when we couldn't find other thermals. :)
Sounds like the heat was just a Florida thing after all!
This would be a bit much, but it was a before smart phones. And now that I think about it, taking video in flight would be a fun bit. May have to go back to it once I'm financially independent.
Very excited for you!!!
Not much is new. Next week is my last week of work thank fuck. Nothing new on the Fulbright front for now, made a post about orientation if you're interested in that.
Saw one of my very very very favorite artists on Saturday and got to sit on stage for the majority of the show :O this was only slightly soured by a fan who thought we were new buddies talking through the slow/quiet songs WHILE ON STAGE like who fucking does that?? so she was weird but it was all good because i got to introduce 2 friends to his music which is always a plus.
trying to brush up on Hebrew on duolingo which is going swimmingly (pretty easy language tbh, mostly relearning grammar and adding vocab) while also starting Albanian on Memrise, which is either not a great tool or it's a bad lesson. i just think it's weird the program says i've "learned" 70 something words but haven't strung a sentence together yet. the low level sentences on duolingo don't make a lot of sense but at least they give you a sense of how the language is structured.
since he's not on here much any more, i'm taking the liberty of sharing this picture of topher in california playing the banjo for a bunch of pigs because just look at it
i do on the reg. he took a media break and then never got it back in his rotation.
he says they ran right up to him when he started playing.
As is tradition, I am watching Oslo, August 31 today and feeling sad for fictional folks.
Meanwhile, in real life:
Love Life
(shrugs into oblivion)
...by which I mean I had to talk a girl that I had been seeing for a few months off of a bridge yesterday morning. And then we broke up. So there's that.
Unrelated: I am now back together with the ex who I have been moping about for the past few months, and I am extremely happy about that. We have had several long talks about re-establishing boundaries/ground rules etc., and things feel very good.
Music
Another successful Hubski music collaboration with TNG! Very happy with how this one turned out. (Fun fact: mostly recorded on the train ride back from seeing the bridge-girl mentioned above!)
Re: my music - I have an album cover!
Some small changes will likely happen to it before release, but there it is.
Recording starts tomorrow. 11 songs, 1 month to record. Lets fucking do it.
Moving
Also in one month: Chicago. Working as a waiter/taquito delivery man. Have a few shows in the works already, which is nice. All in all, very excited for the change.
guys gals guys gals I quit both radio stations I'm outie. I'm trying to shift from doing things for a sense of achievement and feather in my cap mentality, and to keep my mind occupied, to doing them for enjoyment. There's a few things I'm trying out, joined a volleyball league that starts in a month, thinking about a banned books reading group...things like that. It feels good.
Dunno if you saw my last post but I am also doing volleyball, not in a league or anything but with a group of buds.
It's fucking awesome, especially as you learn to jump better.
If you wanna get more hype about the sport you should totally (puts on weeb cap) watch Haikyuu!!
Even if you don't like anime shit, watch Haikyuu!!
Like seriously, look at this opening, tell me you don't want these guys you've never even seen before to win:
I recommend this show to anyone who wants to get into sports anime, or anime period, it's some good siht.
If you can justify it (i.e watch enough anime for it), via a crunchyroll membership.
Alternative, here: http://www.gogoanime.to/category/haikyuu!!
OK so, I'm really interested in getting into volleyball, but I can't see this as a viable undertaking without like, six friends getting all into one place at once. Minimum on the "six" part. Do you guys have any advice on that? Are you finding it possible to do with less? Because getting 6 of my friends to arrange their schedules all in tandem regularly at once....it's difficult. I can think of 4 I could get at once without too much trouble, but more than that....We're busy folx, mang.
The league I'm joining has "free agents" that get placed onto teams to make the six person team complete. That's what I did, and there are a lot of people that go down that road. Maybe there's something similar where you are.
I've seen a lot of .gif's of sports anime and haven't gotten into the genre yet. Though, I do know they can be wicked intense and phenomenally animated to make the action more interesting than real life - the point of most all action anime... cough. Anyways, thanks for this, would you have a couple others to recommend by any sort? Gotta gain a healthy repetoire. :D
In another strain of genre's and series I have yet to finish, Your Lie In April is an amazing music-centric anime. It's more so geared at the classical crowd which is why I was more able to pick up on Devac's piece's as a refresher, hehe. Still phenomenal. Highly recommended.
Possible Cumol? It's definitely a different sort, and you're probably tired from the suggestions or just getting a bigger list of anime's to watch. :P
Man I veered off-topic here.
I might look at it later, but I was never a fan of that romanticized view of musicians who almost literally pour their soul into their art. I know that such persons exist, but as someone who grew up surrounded by people that treat it just as a skill like any other… it's almost alien.
Here's a good example: I have played Megalovania from Undertale game soundtrack and it turned out to be nearly perfect despite being almost 150% the intended speed, played in one go and without notes. Was that some musicians rush? Not really, but it invoked a lot of frustrations at the fight where it got burned into my head from having it replayed over and over again when I was sitting at it, failing again and again against Sans. Here are the first five hours out of something close to thirteen hours worth of consecutive battles against him done by YouTuber Laura Kate.
If it wasn't for the explicit statement, I would have thought it came from the track itself. With regard to the storyline - for whatever it's worth - the main character is disenchanted from music due to the rigor with which their obsessive mother abused him over to perfect. To start, it's more of a story of overcoming PTSD to the tune of learning to appreciate music for what it is with a romantic aspect to it (the one who teaches him is a female musician his age). Whether you watch it or not is your call, but of course, I recommend it. :)
- I would have thought it came from the track itself.
- it's more of a story of overcoming PTSD to the tune of learning to appreciate music
Ach, sorry. I know that's an unfair stereotype, that anime will always devolve to unlocking your hidden powers of friendship to kill gods/become the best/catching them all, but after checking a few clips from it on YouTube I was left with a vastly different impression to what you wrote. If it has a reasonably priced OST I'm likely to buy it though.
Best Sports Anime:
Hajime No Ippo (Boxing)
Ping Pong the Animation
Kurko No Basket (Basketball)
That should last you a while.
Best Music Anime:
Nodame Cantabile
Sakamichi no Apollon
Beck
K-on (it's barely about the music but it issss cute as fuck so I'm throwing it in)
I've heard HIbeki Euphonium is good but besides K-On I try to ignore moe shit so YMMV
Interstellar 5555 (zing)
I'm so glad to be back at college.
In brief:
- I helped run a radio program for freshmen, had a blast and made some friends
- My classes are all kickass (I'm taking one called "Who owns culture?" which is about the intersection of anthropology and IP law and it's awesome)
- I auditioned for and made the Chamber Singers
- I've started talking to people I don't know occasionally and it's pretty fucking liberating. I flirted with a cute girl in one of my classes and I might ask her out.
So that's fun. Gotta go do Greek homework and then I'm going to trivia with some radio peeps :)
I'm writing a short story right now. Literally right now, taking only a break to post on Pubski. It might take me the whole day, maybe the week. I think when I'm done with it though, I'll post it on Hubski. I don't have any better place to put it and I think it'd be a shame to put effort into something only to tuck it away.
At first I was gonna make it a fantasy setting, but then I figured I think while games like D&D and MorrowWind are fun to play, fantasies tend to be pretty silly. So then I was gonna make it a western setting, but I don't think I could do the genre any justice. Guys like Zane Grey and Louis L'Amour have pretty big boots that I don't think I could even try to fill. So, I'm gonna make it modern, but open ended if I ever want to visit the story again. Who knows? Maybe through some Twilight Zone events they'll find themselves in a fantasy or western setting.
It's about two travelers by the way, one mad at the other because he thinks God commanded him to burn their food. I dunno how it's gonna turn out. Reading is hard. Writing is harder.
Edit: Here it is.
You can always submit it to #scificlub when you're done.
I just got done. Eight pages on paper and my hand hurts real bad. I had fun writing it, but it's pretty silly and I don't think it's worth the time to edit. So I'm gonna go have dinner and type it up. I'll post it under the sci-fi club tag, even though it doesn't really feel science fictiony.
I left the ending open though. Maybe I'll do more with the two characters down the road. Maybe with a sci-fine twist, I can get them into a fantasy or western setting. I'm nervous though. The whole story is silly.
Where
Still in Vancouver. Sitting on Jericho Beach yesterday as my friends bounded in the surf. A man is sitting on a log nearby scribbling away in a notebook. Here's what happened:
---
He gets up and strides over to me. I see that he's about 60 years old, tall and thin. He says, "I solved it. I finally solved it!" He's intense and enthusiastic, talking to me, but I could just as well be another log on the beach.
---
"The 1970 World Cup," he says. "England vs. Germany. Quarter finals. England is ahead 2-0. There's 25 minutes left to play. England won four years earlier. I was 12 years old. They were going to win the 1970 too. Twenty minutes before the end of the game, Alf Ramsey, the manager, substituted Bobby Charlton, the team leader, for another player - Colin Bell. Bell was a great player, as good as anyone, but that didn't matter. Bell, a young guy, was not feared by the Germans. That's why the Germans won. When Charlton was benched, the Germans lost their fear."
---
Germany won 3-2 in overtime.
---
"I'm not English," the man said. "I'm Hungarian, but I'm a football man."
---
That really happened. Here's a guy visiting Vancouver, sitting on the beach, and the whole time - for 46 years actually - he's been turning over and over in his mind the defeat of England in the 1970 FIFA world cup.
Go figure.
_refugee_ this could get its own topic but since I apparently communicate with this site exclusively through Pubski I'll just throw it in here.
Alright, but is fanfiction worth it or not tho. And yes, before y'all type it up, I know I spent a sizable chunk of my sophomore year shitting out a 10,000+ story about a bunch of people online, but I also knew that it was garbage, and you knew it was garbage, and everyone knew that because it wasn't edited and really didn't have a plot of any sort and blahblahblah.
But if you are a person who considers themselves a "writer"^TM, does your perception of fanfiction change? Can you write "serious fanfiction," or is fanfiction by definition impossible to be taken seriously? Is every moment you spend writing in someone else's universe a waste of time because you should be crafting your own? Or is all writing good writing as long as you're writing because it's practice?
Granted besides referenced word vomit I've not written fanfiction since. Now I write word vomit of my own creation. The mediocrity is the same, but without the added sour aftertaste of "wtf Harry Potter wouldn't say that shit." Whether that's a win or not depends, I'm guessing.
- I know I spent a sizable chunk of my sophomore year shitting out a 10,000+ story about a bunch of people online, but I also knew that it was garbage, and you knew it was garbage, and everyone knew that because it wasn't edited and really didn't have a plot of any sort and blahblahblah.
Did you get the Rider-Waite deck? I was just explaining to someone how the 22 cards of the major arcana depict the allegorical journey of a human in a Jungian sense. I love that interpretation. I can send you the book where I pulled that out of. I just saw it on www.abebooks.com for $1.22 + shipping. Are you at that Smokey address in Aurora?
It's on it's way to Smoky.
Estimated Delivery Date: September 26, 2016
Title: The Tarot
Author: Alfred Douglas, David Sheridan
Quantity: 1
I decided to go for "very good condition" - Mine has the spine broken and pages falling out. Sewed up periodically by shoemaker's elves. Although who knows where anything is anymore, given my sudden eviction from the island. Still, it's amazing how long one can journey with only carry-on.
Book Description: The Tarot This book is in very good condition and will be shipped within 24 hours of ordering. The cover may have some limited signs of wear but the pages are clean, intact and the spine remains undamaged. This book has clearly been well maintained and looked after thus far. Money back guarantee if you are not satisfied.
Book Price: US$ 3.78 Shipping Price: US$ 1.64
I've got a friend who is a seriously successful fanfic author, and we have had this exact conversation. And it is circular.
You cannot (by definition) make money writing fanfic. So it is ultimately pointless.
Becoming a better writer is only done by writing.
Writing fanfic is writing.
Return to 1: repeat.
There is no "right" answer, of course. But it is an important question to ask yourself from time to time. "Am I spending my time on the right things?"
The right things are, reading, writing, and creating. Sometimes you will be doing 80% of one thing (writing) and only 20% of another (reading). You can't sustain that, so you need to make sure to measure yourself, ask "Am I doing the right thing right now?", and then do The Right Thing, whatever it is.
I've got Discworld fanfic I have written. It really is a great story about Nobby Nobbs accidentally becoming a legitimate businessman. But... what do I do with it?
Good questions to ask yourself. Just don't stop asking these kinds of questions, and you will be healthy.
Hm. Maybe...?
But... I'm almost 48 years old. I can't ever "retire" in the normal sense.
So my only option is to find work that I love to do, and do that until I keel over.
At this point in my life, the "point" (as you put it) is to develop a career that allows me to make money doing something I love. So, in my case, you could say that the point is whether the thing I like to do generates money or not...
I understand your point, but I think you are missing mine.
a) I do make my living from writing.
b) I enjoy my work.
These two things are not a happy accident. They are the result of concerted focus on a specific goal to make money by doing something I love.
At first, I wanted to say, "You are very lucky," because while I love to write, I have come to feel that a career in writing is out of my personal reach. However, I am certain that you have managed to make this happen for you out of skill, perseverance, practice, all on top of some undeniable, but unquantifiable, element of "right place, right time" which might be classified as "luck." (As you yourself say above this.)
I'm glad that you have managed to make it work for you, and of course, a little envious. I'd love to hear what kind of writing exactly you do and how you make it pay (article writing? magazine editing? freelancing? fiction books? kindle books? a little bit of everything? do you write only on spec? how long have you been writing/publishing? etc), because I am passionate about and interested in writing. I am greatly interested. But - with that in mind - I am pretty sure such a career is beyond me, and my kind of writing.
I said what I said because as an amateur, I have to enjoy writing in order to push at even what little success I've achieved - and I have had to push hard, and I've burnt out a few times along the way. So to me it's important to do things because you love them, not because you achieve success at them. Because if I was doing it for material success I should just stop right now.
I don't know, I feel like I'm talking about a circle in very thin slices and maybe, it all sounds the same to anybody else.
- I said what I said because as an amateur...
I totally got that, and that is exactly why I responded in the way I did. I was an amateur once, too. What I saw in your phrasing was a base assumption that it was silly to think that you could ever do what you loved and make money at it, and I wanted to be a counterpoint to that way of thinking.
Anyway, the way I did it was through Marketing. I learned how to market things, how to do marketing writing, etc. You get $20 for this article. And then $50 for that one. And then do a package of three on the same topic for $75. Etc.
After a while, someone will like your work. Then they will send you more work. And they will ask you to write other things. "Hey, I know you normally write blog articles for us, but do you think you could do ______?"
Yes. Yes, I can! Because writing is writing. It's all stories. There is a goal to be achieved at the end of the article, and there are facts that need to be presented in a coherent order to tell a good story, and you need to not stab your eyes out with a fork when you write it, so you throw in some artistry in the sentence and story structure, and... $500.
Then you get offered a $10k, 6-week contract, working on a product launch for a high tech company that needs you in their office, 8 hours a day, developing "content" for their web site, marketing sheets, booth materials, etc. You have just made HALF your annual income in 6 weeks.
Anyway. Now I write sales proposals for a tech-ish company. Some organization needs to buy a product that does X, and they put all the details into a thing called an "RFP", and send it out to potential providers. I read it. I figure out if we can do it. I research their company, their use case, our products, what we can do, what we can't do... and then I write a 50-100 page document that tells the story of how amazing these products are and why the customer wants to buy ours.
That work hits a lot of my "loves": technology, research, writing, storytelling, etc.
Then for fun, I have a bunch of freelance work I do in the evenings. Writing articles, customer case studies, blog posts, editing other people's work, etc.
Small things - transcripts, article editing, etc - I get $100 a piece for. I have one client that can send me 4 of these in a week, and they each take me about an hour to do. Sometimes I can do four of them in an hour.
Larger Case Studies I get $500 each for. Two or three a month. These can take 1-5 hours each.
My day job pays me very well. (Actual amount redacted because it felt weird to write such a big number.)
I have two books in the works, one fanfic story, a TV series, and two other screenplays I work on to keep my creative juices flowing and to scratch the creative writing itch.
So yeah. I get paid to write, and make a good living at it. It took me 10 years of concerted effort to make it happen, but I did it.
The whole reason I go into all of this is because I don't want you to sell your dreams short. There are lots of people like me. But we don't talk about it in public. We just say, "I'm a writer." It feels weird to talk openly about this... there's kind of this unwritten rule that we writers don't really talk about the money end of things. But. Now ya have it.
I would say most of it is awful but it's such a weird, prolonged experiment in collaborative storytelling that it borders on sublime human creative achievement. I'm exaggerating a little but I'm massively interested in a world where there's a canon explanation for Stan Lee forgetting the Hulk's name one time. There is absolutely nothing else like the DC and Marvel universes in all of fiction.
The transition is actually at the My Little Pony/Watchmen crossover.
Just kidding, that's not real.
Just fuckin' kidding about kidding, it's totally real.
So here's the thing, I've never written fan fiction, but some of it I've enjoyed the hell out of (HPMOR).
I think sometimes it is very freeing and worthwhile to spew out garbage. Sometimes you find out when you look at it later it really isn't all as garbage as you thought it was, and that maybe like 25% of it is good enough you'd want to keep it and rework it. I am absolutely a defender and supporter and participator in garbage writing. I call it "vomiting on the page."
Sorry I missed the pub, I was too busy making poor decisions. I picked up a 'Captain Save-A-Ho' costume several years ago and like to pull it on every now and then when I feel masochistic. Lucifer was the most beautiful of all the angels, right?
Chicago in a little less than two weeks. I have a several page word document full of suggestions for improving clinical research that I need to format into something meaningful. I'm not going to be presenting in any official capacity, just sitting in on a few committees and a Q&A panel, but I'd like to have something concrete to give to the group that might one day fund my research. I have suggestions/concerns split up by 'Patient Comments/Concerns' 'Clinical Staff Comments/Concerns' and then my own breakdown of the problems with the current modes/methods of clinical research and how they could be improved without dramatic changes in budgeting. At the moment, I think I'm going to leave both the patient and clinical staff lists as they are, and do a write up to summarize each one.
Kayaking and coffee girl has ghosted me. I thought we had a nice time, at the end of the day we talked about getting dinner the following week and just... radio silence. Such is life in post-grad dating, evidently. At this point I think I'd prefer having a drink dumped in my hair, that's at least an act of passion rather than apathy. Bill Burr has a bit tangentially related to this, how when you're single for too long the little voice in your head that says 'Don't say that!' flips and starts saying 'Say it! Why not?! See what happens!'
Neck needling at the end of the month. I'm going to a party on a lake this weekend. Lots of boats, lots of alcohol, and I'm fairly certain I'm going to struggle to get out of my head. I know that this group of people is friendly, but they aren't the type of people I'd call my 'tribe' or 'troop.' We'll all get nice and drunk and say pleasant things and then not see each other for another few years.
Man I am the definition of a party pooper.
Edit*
Just got genetic testings results back on a pair of little kids, both are perfectly healthy and have no chance of developing disease.
First off, before the crowd rushes in, quick shameless plug:
Did you know that Hubski has it's very own photoshop battles?
One is underway right now which ends tomorrow. It's all for shits and giggles, and you're more than welcome to submit (quality, clear) photos for fellow Hubskiers to play around on the battlefield.
Ideally, we'll get enough interest to get those threads of changes among artists. :D There is no need for photo shop itself as the tool if you want to get in on the action as per resident awesomeness executive community coordinator jadedog:
Secondly, another round of whatever y'all are having CUZ IM 21 now! Woot woot. Planning a #dayinthelife for the bday. It wasn't anything terribly out of the ordinary, but been wanting to contribute for a while and figured I only turn 21 once, plus no one's done a birthday yet... I mean, aside from TNG's kid, but that's a different sort of birthday, yo.
Was feeling kind of stuck and unproductive the past couple of weeks. The not having any school/work is kind new to me and I was both busy all the time doing things a bit all over the place while not being productive and disciplined like I would like to.
Went volunteering to this real cool place with my friend today (havn't been there in more than a year) and it kinda got me out of my head for a bit which was nice. I was stuck on a loop of "what should I do with my life", "how do I want to make monies" and "who am I" which was getting kind of tiring. Feeling better, gonna commit to going there weekly now. It's mostly chopping vegetables which almost feels like meditation when you got 100 peppers.
Speaking of meditation, I was thinking about going on that 10 days Silent Meditation retreat thing but feeling unsure about it. Anyone ever done that? I'm not quite sure what I'd like to get out of it but at least I figured after 10 days I'd know if Meditation is my thing or not once and for all. Or maybe I'm a special kind of masochist that wants to test if I can shut up for 10 days. Or I'm secretly hoping for an epiphany? I don't know. Adulting is confusing.
Transition period.
Chopping vegetables IS meditating. Leave the 10-day retreat for after you have that high-powered corporate job and haven't taken a vacation in 5 years.
An analogy: Work two 24-hour days straight, in a suit, in high-powered business environment, powered by nothing more than coffee and cold takeout food. Super high-pressure. Stress. Aggravation. Irritation. GRRR! Then, leave the office, find a swimming pool, and jump in while still wearing your suit and heels and with your iPhone in your pocket.
BAM! That is meditation. When you have been running too fast, too far, and not eating well, and stressing out, and all that... meditation will help you find your center, and get you balanced again.
Meditation is not very useful when you are chill.
And right now, as you spend time considering your future, trying to figure out what to do next, etc, you are already inside your own head and heart, and you are very present and connected with yourself.
All meditation can do for you at that point is provide some marginal gains. Maybe chill you out a little further. Or whatever. It isn't the shaking-the-snow-globe kind of reset that a 10-day retreat is supposed to be.
Sounds to me like you are in the perfect place right now... receptors open... eyes wide... looking at the world... seeking the patterns that will vibe with who you are...
Keep it up. You are on the right track. Just remember that the right answers don't tend to be the easy ones.
:) you're right, great advice! Like always.
The meditation thing is just something I want to do at some point for sure and it felt like an easy one to check off the bucket list since I have plenty of time. Probably won't do much good tho. Most people I talked to that said it changed their lives said something about being anxious or kinda depressed before going which I'm not (yet).
I'll chop some veggies in the meantime.
I can't belive I'm brewing kombucha, eating oatmeal, friends with some mushroom eating weirdoes and thinking about meditation. My teenage self would cringe. Am I gonna be a hippie or something in 10 years!?
I'm dual enrolling in some classes at a community college this year. Today was the first day of those, and it went pretty well. Still losing weight, too. Feels good.
So I decided to put off school until March and go out west to work plus get my need to travel out of the way before I'm stuck somewhere. I applied for a job less than an hour ago and already heard back. It's a two month contract so I probably won't take the risk although I might ask if they'll need help in other areas after that. Decisions decisions.
Either way I'm feeling good about my choice.