Musings from the Inkwell

Word counts for three fantasy series

2012-02-02T14:30:00.000-07:00

During my research on word count based definitions and labels, I ran across some interesting triva---well, interesting if you are looking into the subject of how long a book is. For instance, War and Peace weighs in at 561,304 words. Of course, many of us are not terribly familiar with how long War and Peace is (I have a Kindle version of it---largely unread), so prehaps looking at the word counts of three of the most popular fantasy series ever will help (ok, maybe just one fantasy series and two who-knows-whats).

Lord of the Rings

The Hobbit 95,022 words

Fellowship of the Ring 177,227 words

Two Towers 143,436 words

Return of the King 134,462 words

Harry Potter

Philosopher's (Sorcerer's) Stone 76,944 words

Chamber of Secrets 85,141 words

Prisoner of Azkaban 107,253 words

Goblet of Fire 190,637 words

Order of the Phoenix 257,045 words

Half-Blood Prince 168,923 words

Deathly Hallows 204,796 words

Twilight

Twilight 118,501

New Moon 132,807

Eclipse 147,930

Breaking Dawn 192,196

Is this my last semester?

2012-01-14T14:47:00.000-07:00

Starting this week, I may be entering my last semester of college. Well, my last semester as an undergrad (I still have an urge to apply to a few Master programs).

I didn't actually think it was going to happen. I did not get the monetary hold lifted from my account until yesterday. I don't want to think about the price that my wife is going to extract for loaning me the money to accomplish that goal.

Of course, some changes have been made in the program, something that I discovered while talking to the advisors earlier this week. I thought that I was working towards a double major; it turns out that I was wrong about that. In reality, I am working towards getting two Bachelor degrees instead (one in History and one in Literature). The reason for the change---I am just four credits away from hitting the credit threshold for acquiring two Bachelor degrees. I am not sure if two Bachelor degrees will look better on my resume than just one. I am also not sure if this makes me a historian and a literary critic---time will tell.

Now to actually make this my last semester, I do have to pass everything. I also need to kick my Honors Thesis proposal for Literature though the system, and get off the waitlist for one class (there is an online version, but I hate online classes). So for the generally curious, my semester consists of:

Senior Seminar in History (no clue what the subject is, but considering that Chris Agee is teaching it, I am betting on cities and urban development); World at War (1914-1945); Chinese Philosophy and Culture (Ancient Chinese---I got interested in the subject when I took the Ancient China history class a few semesters back; it is a religious studies class, but I have already taken three of them---all listed as Literature classes); and of course, my Honor Thesis in Literature (I presume that my proposal will go though---I plan on doing a reading of The Hobbit as a trickster tale).

Of course, I am presuming that my proposal will get though, and that I can get off the waitlist for the other class. I am also presuming that the advisors added up my numbers correctly, and was correct in thinking that I only needed one core course and one elective besides my speciality requirements.

It promises to be another interesting semester.

Dear Windows Update

2012-01-11T01:08:00.001-07:00

I would like to say a few words to the people in the Windows Update department...with a stick. Tonight's update took a half hour. Then when I restarted the computer, eight programs encountered problems and had to restart...including my anti-virus program. I ended having to restart after the restart...when it was all cut and done, this is an hour of my life I am not getting back. And to think I actually thought that I was going to get some writing done tonight. Windows Update...you suck.

How much can an occult writer make?

2012-01-05T16:08:00.003-07:00

One of my favorite quotes by Pat Zalewski, a Golden Dawn writer, is that he has never even made grocery money from writing books. Nevertheless, there are people who think that he is lying about this fact. As a writer, one who also does occult writing, I tend to believe that he is writing because he wants to share information and not because he is making a good living at it.

For those who do not believe this, consider the fact that Llewellyn Publications, who is perhaps the biggest dog on the occult publishing block, thinks that a mere five thousand copies sold is a successful occult book. And some occult books are lucky to sell a couple of hundred copies. Obviously occult writing is a niche market, and those of us who try our hand at writing Golden Dawn stuff are operating in a niche of a niche.

So how much does a successful writer makes writing an occult book?

[I have been informed that my figures are wrong---see end of post.]

Assuming a ten percent share (royalities) and a twenty dollar price tag and five thousand copies selling, the successful occult writer would make a mere ten thousand dollars for their time and effort. Presuming that they are a quick researcher and writer, they will have spent nine months researching and writing their book---and that is not counting for all the changes that the publisher is going to insist on; it is also not counting how much time and energy and cost that the author is going to have to sunk into personally advertising their book. Realistically, an occult writer can make more money per year flipping burgers in some dungy restaurant. That is right, I am saying that a successful occult writer is only going to make thirteen or fourteen thousand a year. No wonder so many of them sell magical dragon blood and love magic kits to make ends meet.

The moral of this story is that occult writers are not making money hand over foot; and if you want to make money as a writer, you are better off writing something else.

(The inspiration for this post was a blog post on Llewellyn was about the true cost of piracy of occult books. In other words, occult writers cannot afford their occult books being pirated.)

[And now the update---less than ten minutes and I have already been told that my figures are wrong. Thanks to my writing friends on Facebook for pointing out my mistake.]

Ok, I have been informed that it is actually the wholesale price and not the retail price that the percent is coming from. Therefore, it is not ten thousand for a sucessful book; rather it is five thousand. Furthermore, not all publishers give ten percent royality...which drops the figure to below five thousand for a successful occult book. That makes flipping burgers for a living look even better, doesn't it?

Labeling my nonfiction word counts

2012-01-03T00:30:00.000-07:00

In the interests of "truth in advertising" I have been trying to find descriptive terms based on word count for my non-fiction work. I figured that fiction has a loose set of terms based on word count, so one should exist for non-fiction. Well, so far I have not find a set of terms. In the lack of anything more definite, I have decided to use the following terms for the shorter pieces of non-fiction.

Short article: less than 500 words
Article: 500 to 2500 words
Long article: 2500 to 5000 words

As for the longer pieces, I still have no clue what to use. For instance, I cannot figure out at what word count a non-fiction piece properly becomes a book.

I do know some fuzzy facts, such as a standard 192-page paperbook contains from 40,000 to 50,000 words, and that book size in the print market was often determined by the nearest hundredth page marker, and print publishers were concerned with spine size (which is why you could not write a hundred page book in the print market).

I have thought about doing an estimated page count, but given the fact that word count per page on printed books vary (standard range is 200 to 350 words per page), I am not sure that will work for my ebooks either.

How many words are there in a newspaper column

2012-01-02T00:30:00.000-07:00

A piece of triva that I encountered while doing research on labels for various word counts:

A column inch in a typical newspaper is about 35 words, which makes the typical newpaper story of twnety inches equal to 700 words.

Labelling my fictional word counts

2012-01-01T00:30:00.000-07:00

There following are the labels/terms for the various ranges of word counts that I am going to be using for my fiction ebooks in the descriptions that I write up for my ebooks.

Micro-flash: up to 100 words
Flash fiction: 100 to 500 words
Short-short: 500 to 2,500 words
Short story: 2,500 to 7,500 words
Novelette: 7,500 to 17,500 words
Novella: 17,500 to 40,000 words
Novel: 40,000 to 110,000words
Epic: over 110,000 words

During my research, I also came across the term "drabble" which is for a fiction piece of exactly 100 words; I doubt that I would ever use it.

This past year and the year ahead

2011-12-26T17:22:00.000-07:00

Well, I do not know about you, but I am ready to show 2011 the way to the curb. Money-wise, it has been the worst year ever for me. My business has tanked in 2011, due to a drop in freelancing gigs, changes on the pageview sites, the Panda Farmer Google update set, and the general lack of money among my readers. Combine this with the fact that higher education funding has been cut to the max here in Colorado and I am so close to finishing my degree that I must finish it, and you end up with me being the poorest I have ever been...at least, as an adult (my childhood may have been worse---my father did go bankrupt once).

On the bright note, I did finally break down and start creating ebooks---both under this pen-name and some others (the stuff under the other pen-names I am not sure I want to be associated with me, but I really need the income). I am still working on formating issues.

Looking ahead to 2012, it looks like I will be doing some more ebooks. It also looks like I will finally graduate from the University of Colorado at Denver (I do have to talk to two advisors to make sure of that), not that it will matter all that much---I plan on applying to the literature and history Master programs. And I might be doing an Honors Thesis (it is not completely sure yet). And I am really hoping that I figure a way out of the giant debt trap that I am stuck in.

Happy New Year everyone!

May you never be ignorant; may you never be cold; may you never hunger; may you never thirst; may you always be thankful. So mote it be.

Statements that scream Run Away!

2011-12-07T21:13:00.001-07:00

Welcome to another round of me mocking my spam emails. Today, I recieved one with all my favorite "Run Away!" sentences in a single email---you know those sentences that indicate the very opposite of what the sentence says.

The email started off with the sentence: "THIS IS NOT A SALES, SOLICITATION OR SPAM." And yes, it was in all caps.

This sentence is soon followed with the statement, "My client's bank account with us has been frozen due to some diminutive investigation on my client." I am not sure what the word "diminutive" means, but I do understand what "investigation" means. I am sure that the is something dodgy going on here.

There are the usual statements of how rich the client is, and how they really need to transfer the funds into an account that only him and his client know of---aka my account. Then to prove their honesty, the email writer says that his client "is a very generous man with the fear of God in him." Obviously, this person does not know my theory about the religious being bigger crooks than the non-believers.

Then the email writer goes into the fact that the amount of money is so large that he intends to use four or five people to "conclude this transfer." How nice---you plan on ripping off several people. Furthermore he says, "For transparency I will fully outline the sharing pattern, we have agreed to give you a non-negotiable 10%, of the total money transferred and believe me, it is a lot of cash. Once the funds are in your account, we would then meet in a suitable place to discuss final disbursement according to the percentages indicated above." Hmmm, for some reason the more he claims honesty, the more I believe that he is a crook.

But here is the best sentence of them all---the one my father would have pointed out as the sure-fire giveaway that someone is trying to con you. "Honesty is the success of this business and trust is our watchword in this transaction." ROFL! Really?! Seriously?! C'mon, only a crook would say something like this.

Oh, just to point out something else fishy, when one wants to transfer funds that are being held up because of a legal investigation, and they say "I guarantee you that this transaction will be executed under a legitimate arrangement that will protect you from any breach of the law"---they are lying.

I would like to extend a big thanks to the email writer for providing me with something to blog about tonight. You are a credit to your profession---or is that demerit?

Nanowrimo results sort of

2011-12-06T20:17:00.001-07:00

This post is for those people who are curious about how much I managed to do in this year's National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). Basically, I gave up a couple of days into the month. Reason: I was swamped with homework. I am not sure how many words I wrote in November...provided that one is willing to count homework, it was at least twenty thousand words. I do plan on finishing the novel I started, but it is going to have to wait until the semester is over.

Back on Lulu

2011-11-23T13:22:00.001-07:00

I am back on Lulu. Last night, I learned that Lulu is having a short story contest (actually, it is flash fiction that they are asking for---just 600 words). So I decided to put together a short piece, starring Basil James, the spy-magician I created a couple of years ago during a Nanowrimo.

I honestly do not plan on selling a single copy (price floor is $1.49 currently on Lulu) considering that I set the price to $2.99. But then again, it was the contest entry that I was interested in---I could use a Barnes and Noble NOOK.

Anyways, just in case you are curious, the title of the flash piece is Magic and Bullets: A Basil James Incident.

Future is so bright I gotta wear shades

2011-11-22T20:24:00.000-07:00

Last night, I was trying to explain how writers make money through royalities to my wife. I might have had an easier time eplaining nuclear physics to her. In particular, I was trying to describe what I was doing on Smashwords, and why I suspected that in the long run I would hit the break-even point on some (if not all) of my writing there.

Midway through the conversation, I realized that my wife did not even understand the concept behind book advances. For the one person in the audience who has only been involved in the modern world of ebook publishing, an advance was something that publishers used to give to writers...it is still possible to get an advance today, provided that you are someone like Stephen King, who is guaranteed to sell copies even if one's writing bores the general public to tears and one's ideas are lifted from other writers.

My wife was not even aware that book advances had to be earned back before a writer got more money from the publishers, much like she did not realize that some writers took fifteen years to get their first book contract and that it can take three years to get your book onto store shelves.

(Gee, why do some of us decide that ebook through self-publication outlets are a better option---getting published by a Big Six legacy publishers sounds so quick and easy; you will be raking in the money before you die.)

Of course, I understand her concerns. She would like me to be making money (as getting a paycheck) tomorrow, rather than a quarter or three down the road. Again, for the newbie in the audience, even on a self-pub site like Smashwords, it can take awhile to get cut a check; it takes a calendar quarter for the distributors (iBookstore, Barnes & Noble, etc.) to send their sales figures to Smashwords, who in turn waits to pay you when the next quarter ends (plus thirty days)---nevertheless, it is still more timely than the print market was.

Anyways, I digress. The important part is that I can foresee making my time investment back (provided that the initial figures are a true indication of how well I am going to do). In fact, I may even make a nice little profit. That means that the future is a little brighter; I might have to invest in a new pair of sunglasses.

For those who are curious what I am doing on Smashwords, you can download a free copy of some my work. The rest of you can just sit here and watch the following video by Timbuk 3: The Future's So Bright.

Watching my ads

2011-11-19T14:45:00.001-07:00

I am not sure about other bloggers who use adsense, but there are days I just have to wonder how they are picking my ads. Looking over my Golden Dawn blog, I noticed that I had ads about buying gold, invisible dog/cat fences, American Girl mini-dolls, and Babies R Us. Only the ad about invisible pet fences make any sense to me---after all, I do talk about my cats a lot, besides posting more than my fair share of cute kitty pictures there.

But gold? None of my readers have enourgh money to invest in gold. American Girl mini-dolls? I am not sure how any of my posts gets there---are we perhaps using the mini-dolls as poppets for voudoun? And Babies R Us---oh, that must be commentary by adsense about my latest rant post where I talk about the annoyance I felt about a post about proper employment for a Rosicrucian getting read as a criticism against someone else's Order and about my lack of belief in their promises of spiritual immortality (I have yet to figure how they are actually getting to that conclusion, especially about my beliefs about spiritual immortality, which bears no resembalance to what they are saying that I believe.)

Depression

2011-11-12T20:07:00.001-07:00

When cats get depressed.

Thanks to college, bad genes and upbringing, and not eating right, I have been rather depressed lately.

The stress of college and the joys of senior year has combined with a small student loan problem to create a perfect storm of depression. Of course, my genetics and childhood programming does not help. And I have gotten to the point that I am not even eating out of the vending machines...which would be good, except that I am generally not eating; even vending machine food is better than no food at all.

All this depression is having an effect on my school work, as well as my writing.

Thanks to the depression and my empty wallet, I have considered dropping out of college to increase the liklihood of getting a job. For some reason, employers do not want to consider anyone who is not available 24/7---especially in the only types of work that I am qualified for (restaurant and retail).

I need a piece of paper to be able to get a real job, but I need a real job to make sure that I survive long enourgh to get the piece of paper. It is a rather wicked little Catch-22 that I am stuck in. (By "real job" I mean one that does require me to drop out of school for minimum wage.)

And today on Facebook, I discovered a new twist. One of my Facebook friends (a writer of Tarot and Wiccan material) recently took a "day job" to help make ends meet---and now, she has people thinking that she is no longer an occultist or an author anymore.

Seriously?! I have never understood the idea that if you are an occult writer, or at least a real one, that you cannot have a day job. Given how small occult book sales are, one automatically needs a day job, or another type of writing gig, to support oneself. It is the reason that I occasionally write other type of stuff under another penname---I like to get paid occasionally.

Anyways, I am hoping that my depression lifts soon. That and the problem with my student loan is fixed. Otherwise, I am going to have to start cruising the LolCats sites to cheer myself up...and that is even worse for my schoolwork and writing than the depression is.

Thirty books all with the same cover

2011-11-09T21:08:00.002-07:00

Warning---in this post I am talking about a writer who writes erotica...well, that is the polite term for it.

So tonight, I decide to spend some time on Smashwords...because I had no desire to read my homework. While there I am checking out the various books that people are putting up. I had the adult filter off because I am curious about whether that is a viable money making choice.

(Feel free to blame my curiosity about possible money making options on the fact that part of my student loan has still not gone through yet, and the semester is about to wound down. And I thought some merchants paid out slow.)

While there, I noticed that one of the erotica writers (ok, let's be honest---it is pornography) has used the same cover for thirty of their books. The cover for Summer Suds, a sex romp that starts at a car wash is the same cover (with just the title changed) as Summer Camp Surprise, and the list goes on for twenty-eight more books. They do have a couple of other covers, including one that is used twice.

Nevertheless, I find myself wondering isn't there some rule of thumb that you want the covers of your book to be different from one another? Or does that just apply to actual physical books?

Now, I suspect that the only reason that this writer is even using a cover is that you must have a cover to get into the premium catalog (aka the rest of the distribution network). But seriously, are they so cheap that they are only willing to spend money on one "safe" cover? Looking at their regular website, I realized that they are willing to buy for the more racier, not approved by Apple style of covers (lots of naked flesh and sex acts if you are curious).

So are clothes really that expensive that more than one cover is out of their price range? Or does it really not matter if all your erotica titles have the same cover? And does this also apply to other types of ebooks?

Decided to modify my pricing system

2011-11-06T16:26:00.001-07:00

Based on comments made by my peers, I decided to modify my non-fiction ebook pricing system...a little bit.

*Listens to a couple of people running away because he called them "peers."*

I am now using an ebook pricing system based on the following factors:

How original was it? (The more I have to think, the more you have to pay.)
How focused was I while writing it? (Yes, you get to pay more if you want a focused book.)
How advanced is the information? (This is the information-value setting.)
Does it have a lot of diagrams and pictures? (Art supplies cost money; scanning and photo editing takes time.)
How long is it? (Based on word count.)

Note that this does not mean that all my ebooks are going to confirm to this system, but most will.

Based on this new system, Pizza Boxes on the Floor should be priced at $5.99; it would be $7.99 if it was not reprints and I would have been more focused while writing it. There are reasons why it is not priced based on this system---time will tell if those reasons were good reasons or not.

The latest ebook of mine, Five Reasons Why Magic Fails, is priced at $4.99 based on this pricing system.

Of course, having a pricing system opens up the door for critics to claim that all occult writers are only writing for the money. To that I reply, my cats would like to eat (and their food bill is huge, even when they are forced to eat the cheapest store brand). If it is wrong for my cats to eat, then don't pay my ebooks.

It is time to consider reference books

2011-11-03T23:43:00.000-06:00

Once again, it is time to mock my spam mail. This first gem of a sentence is supposely from Paypal:

A strange ip from a different location was recently login into your Paypal account and we have decided to limitate your account on our ongoing effort to protect your account and our relationship, we monitor your account for possible fraudulent activity.

Limitate? Is that actually a word? (Yes, I am too lazy to look for my dictionary.)

Here is another gem of a sentence from some crime commissioner:

Although he has being arrested and put to jail, now laid with Financial action task force custody in Paris de France.
Can we charge you with a crime for abusing our eyes with your murder of proper verb tenses? And I am not sure what the last part of the sentence is supposed to say, so I am guessing a charge of kidnapping sense of meaning is in order too.

Here is a gem from someone who needs a stylebook as well as a grammar lesson:

The agreement reached between the united state of America governments and Nigeria Government under Goodluck Ebere Jonathan,The President Federal republic of Nigeria agreed to release US$1.5M US dollars to you been part payment of your Inheritance / Contract Sum.

Once again, I would like to thank spammers, phishers, and cons for making my English sound so much better. Keep up the good work of abusing the English language for blood and profit.

I have read a bad blog about you

2011-11-02T11:54:00.001-06:00

The other day, I got a private message on Twitter stating that read:

I just read a really bad blog about you.

The message also included a shorted URL that rotated through a "session timed out" page before landing on what looks like the Twitter log-in page. I did not go any further. For one thing, the webaddress was not right, and I was already logged into Twitter on another tab.

I think that it is safe to presume that it is a phishing campaign.

But I will admit that it made me curious, so I googled myself "Morgaan Drake Eckstein." The only thing I saw bad in the first five pages was a couple of social networking profiles that show no activity.

I know that there is bad stuff written about me on the internet---after all, I blog about Golden Dawn and the occult. The number one pasttime of certain people in those fields is to badmouth anyone that looks like they might be an authority someday. In fact, I believe that this applies to all working writers.

My advice is to not really gave a duck's butt about bad blog posts about oneself, and just keep working. If nothing else, it will annoy the spammers and your critics.

National Novel Writing Month 2011

2011-10-31T22:23:00.002-06:00

So in a moment of insanity, I decided that I am going to attempt to do the National Novel Writing Month Goal of writing 50 thousand words while doing four literature classes. What I know about my novel so far is that it is humor, and the title is Then the Cat Threw Up. That is all I know. No plot, no plan, and several large papers to write for my classes. It should be a disaster.

Epic publishing fail

2011-10-30T22:15:00.002-06:00

Occasionally on the internet, one gets lucky and sees someone's mistake before they clean it up. Today's winner is from Smashwords. I am not sure what to point out as the biggest mistake---the cover or the price. Obviously, they uploaded the wrong cover, and I am positive that the price is also wrong.

But never fear, the person caught their mistake(s) and the ebook is no longer available to buy. I presume that they are fixing the problem as I write this.

And if the writer in question ever sees this, just remember that if you are lucky, someday you will be able to laugh at one of my mistakes.

Let's count the ways that this one is wrong.

Does peer pressure work?

2011-10-28T22:48:00.001-06:00

Today, I was reading the blog of another writer, and I noticed that they had a little note in the sidebar about the number of words that they have written in their current project. Which brings me to the question---does peer pressure work for any writer?

One of the suggestions that the Nanowrimo people suggest is telling people that you are working on a novel. The theory is that people will hound you to keep up your stream and complete the project in a timely manner. Who are these people who can make a writer get to work?

My friends are the last people who can motivate me to work. In fact, it is almost certain that my friends will cause me to slack off. And my beloved wife is no help either. I think it is mainly because she doesn't picture me as a writer.

(Honestly, can you picture me as a college professor? That is what my wife thinks I should be.)

I have never found peer pressure to be a good motivator for me. Maybe I am weird; perhaps there are writers who find that posting their process helps motivate them.

For myself, I have found that self-motivation is more important. Then again, I have OCD tendencies. A project gets under my skin, and I can't focus completely on anything else until I work it out of my system. Not even the threats of an editor matches the head of stream I can generate when my touch of insanity rears its head.

(I call it insanity not because I think that I am insane, but rather because of how other people [non-writers] react to me when I am in its grip.)

And if you are curious about my latest project---I have written a whole three words. C'mon peer pressure! Bring it on!

Am I as kind as my spam filter?

2011-10-24T20:59:00.000-06:00

Ok, I presume that the following method of writing is merely a way to try to fool my spam filter.

"I am prayerfully lett1ng all to you hop1ng that you w1ll respond pos1t1vely and wont betray my trust too."

I just recieved an entire email written this way. By the way, it did not fool my spam filter. Nice try, but no can do. And even if it did get past my spam filter, I would have deleted based on the writing style alone (not to mention the content).

Gee, I guess that I am meaner than my spam filter.

How much is a twitter account worth?

2011-10-22T18:36:00.000-06:00

Today, I stumbled across someone trying to sell their Twitter account for $300.

I was on Twitter, culling out some of the more useless people that I was following on Twitter. Mainly because I hit one of Twitter's limits on following people, so I was removing some of the people who never actually tweet.

Anyways, this person has 28,197 followers, and is following 29,768 people. They are listed on 126 lists. They have made 428 tweets, though their last tweet was on July 12th.

But is this Tweeter account worth three hundred dollars?

Beats me. I know that it is out of my price range at the moment. And it probably would be worthless to me; after all, I am dealing with a specialized market. The account was definitely not rigged for my market.

Yet, I still wonder if the account is worth three hundred dollars to someone who is less focused on a specific market than I am. Who knows. Nevertheless, I found it interesting---don't you?

Pricing ebooks

2011-10-21T17:23:00.001-06:00

I have been thinking a lot lately about how ebooks are priced. Mainly because I just started to get back into the writing game after a brief absence.

(Not that it is a serious venture back into the field, more like a sticking my toe into a pool of slime and wondering why I did so. For those who are curious about how serious I am taking it, just slip over to Smashwords and take a gander at my little test project, Pizza Boxes on the Floor.)

Honestly, looking around the internet, it looks like the Wild West when it comes to determining ebook prices.

The traditional publishers are still secretly trying to charge the same amount for an ebook as they are for a physical copy. Actually, the other day, I saw a history book that actually cost more for the ebook copy than a physical copy. I am guessing that some publishers believe that people will be willing to pay for convenience.

In my case, I am not willing to pay for convenience. Or rather I am not willing to have to pay for a ebook and then have to pay again for a hard copy with actual page numbers that I can cite in a college paper.

On the other side of the scale, there are the pirates who believe that no one should make a penny from any ebook. I am sorry, my cats would like to eat; therefore, I need to get paid something. And yes, if I am going to be pirated, than one of the pirate is going to have to pay a copy first.

So the question will arise about why I choose a 99 cent price for a 8860 word ebook, especially one that a reader will some time can find almost the entirety of for free on the internet already.

Well, I had three choices.

First option, the "reader names their own price"---there are two problems with this option. One, I know that a lot of readers would download the entire book and not read any more than the free preview that I am already offering; and two, there are outlets who would not carry the ebook if this option was choosen.

Second option, the "free ebook" option---I am sorry, my favorite charity is my cats, and they would like to eat. If I wanted to give stuff away, I would have choosen the first option; it would result in the same amount of income.

Third option, "pick a price that ends in 99 cents," better known as the iBookstore price force---iBookstore, if you are charging for a book, will automatically round the price to the nearest 99 cents. It is an iCommerce thing (I am sure that Apple is going to trademark that term soon enourgh).

So in the interests of greed, because we all know that occult writers only write books for the money, I went with the third option, and decided 99 cents was a good price for 8860 words.

Is 99 cents that much? Some people are going to say it is. But I do not think so. After all, that is how much a can of cat food is being sold for at Walgreens (and they label that a "great buy"). And my cats would like to occasionally eat.

First Smashwords test project up

2011-10-15T23:11:00.002-06:00

Now available on Smashwords.

Well, I finally managed to drive myself to complete a test project for Smashwords. It is a collection of the dozen articles I wrote in 2010 for the Hearthstone Community Church newsletter, which I titled Pizza Boxes on the Floor (after the floor diagram I used that year during the annual ritual that I conduct for Hearthstone and Bast Temple).

I still want to complete another test project in a different field for Smashwords. After all, writing about Wicca and Golden Dawn is not something that looks like it will be a big seller on Smashwords. Honestly, the test project was more about figuring out the horrors of the formatting process than it was about making a buck. In theory, the formatting of the next project will be quicker (yeah, right).

It was more important today that I edited the few pictures that I took yesterday of my wife's jewelry than it was for me to finish this test project. I am not sure when she is going to get the three new items up on the Etsy shop, Celtic Soul Jewelry and Pottery, but she is liable to sell them before I sell a single copy of my little ebook.

Anyways, that was my work day today and yesterday. Fun, fun, fun.

I am proud of this bracelet photo---makes it almost look like I am a professional photographer.

Internal conflict

2011-10-14T18:30:00.000-06:00

The cover for Pizza Boxes on the Floor.

I spent some time working on the test project that I plan on putting up on Smashwords today.

I did this instead of taking more photos of my wife's jewelry for her Etsy shop, Celtic Soul Jewelry and Pottery.

The result?

Yes, that is right. I feel great guilt for actually spending time working on my own business.

It is something that I have fought for years, this alarming tendency to feel guilt whenever I put my own concerns and needs before those of other people.

I used to blame it on my upbringing, but that is unfair to my family. After all, it is not like I haven't had twenty years plus to learn to become a selfish b******. The fact that I have not overcame the problem is probably a good indication that it is actually something deep inside me that is broken, something that no amount of familial programming hardly affected at all.

I sometimes wonder if other writers feel this way.

Probably not. After all, most writers are much more sane than I am.

What I have been up to lately

2011-10-01T19:16:00.001-06:00

Halloween and kittens---what could be more fun?

My regular readers may or may not noticed that I have been ignoring this blog as well as my other blogs lately. The reason is that the semester is just kicking my a**. Remind me never to take four literature classes in the same semester ever again.

There is also the added bonus of monetary worries. Under normal conditions, I would attempt to make it up with quick and dirty writing...unfortunately, as I have already noted, this semester is a PITA.

I am no longer doing an astrology column for Campus Connection, the student newspaper of the Community College of Denver. I am not sure why I wasn't contacted for this semester; and after the difficulties of getting payment from them last semester, I am not sure that I even care. While it means that I have to make up for that bit of income loss, given the fact that this semester is a monster, it might have been a good thing in disguise.

Outside of the lack of money, time and energy, I am doing well. I may actually get a test-project up on Smashwords before the end of the year. I hope. Maybe not. Who knows? Time will tell.

Being honest, I will admit that the only thing I foresee accomplishing for sure is the 31 Days of Halloween Kitties that I am doing on my Golden Dawn blog. And that is just a bit of fun to lighten up the mood. Ironically, there may not be a single picture of any of my own cats in the set. You would think that given the number of cats I have that I would be able to get one of them to wear a hat; but no, I can't. They tell me that they are much better than the cats you see on the internet wearing silly hats. They may be right.

So anyways, if you don't see me updating this or the other blogs, presume that I am busy reading books and writing papers instead...because if I am not doing that, then I am busy trying to sell my blood for money.

Waving hi to South Korea

2011-09-25T00:17:00.002-06:00

Looking over my stats for this blog tonight, I discovered something interesting.

The biggest section of my audience for the month has been mostly from South Korea, a little over double the next biggest share of pageviews from the United States.

For the week, the traffic from South Korea has been almost double the traffic from the United States.

So far today, it has been neck and neck for the United States and South Korea.

For all time page views, the United States wins; but South Korea still is the second biggest share of my audience, representing a third as many views as from the United States.

And all this makes me wonder---What do the South Koreans find so interesting about my blog? Is it actual South Koreans, or just people living in South Korea?

Nevertheless, I would like to say a big hi to everyone in South Korea. Thanks for finding my blog.

Facebook is not going to charge you

2011-09-24T15:06:00.003-06:00

There is a bad meme, a Facebook Status Virus, making the rounds today. It is one of those copy and paste to your status things insisting that Facebook is about to start charging users for the service.

It is false, untrue, and completely wrong.

Facebook is not about to charge you for using the service.

Sure, they change your privacy settings back to their uber-preferred "everything is public" setting everytime you turn your back on them.

Sure, they change the layout everytime the wind shifts.

But they are not going to charge you for using the service.

You see, they are already making quite a bit off of you. They count up all your eyeballs, and tell their advertisers that they have a mighty X number of eyes available to look at advertisements everyday.

And then the advertisers hand them big bags of money.

Charging you to use Facebook would hurt their eyeball count, and the flow of those big bags of money that they love so much. They are not going to kill the golden goose by making it pay.

No, they are going to continue to mess up your settings, and changing the layout...that way, you keep noticing the ads. After all, it is ok to upset the golden goose as long as you don't kill it.

Business advice from Winning the email lottery

2011-09-24T14:55:00.003-06:00

I won the email freelotto lottery. Or so, I have been told...

...with about fifty emails.

Yes, it is a phishing campaign.

But it does remind me of some important internet business advice:

If you are going to use an automated email program, make sure that it does not send multiple emails to the same email address. And if you have multiple email mailing lists, figure out how to sync the lists.

Why?

Because if someone recieves the exact same email from a single or multiple senders, they are more likely to treat it as spam, even if their spam filters do not catch it.

And there you go, my winning prize in the email freelotto lottery, a crappy bit of internet business advice. Ain't you glad that I shared the winnings with you?

September 11th

2011-09-11T15:21:00.003-06:00

Image courtesy of Brian Nieman and adopted by the Library of Congress for their 9/11/01 exhibition.

Ten years ago, the Twin Towers fell in a terrorist attack.

And I suppose that I really should write something about it.

(Beyond the article about how 9/11 affected me that is still awaiting approval on one of the online writing sites---it could be weeks before it goes live at the pace that they are moving---but that was more about how the terror attack affected the business that I was working for at the time and affected my decision to go to college.)

But honestly, I was more deeply concerned about the Columbia school shooting (or any school shooting for that matter). School shootings affect me more emotionally than the events of September 11th ever have.

I guess it is because I have studied too many wars. Senseless deaths happen in all wars. Entire cities are destoryed periodically in the name of idealogies and terrority conquest.

There is also the little fact that I was born on the anniversary of the German invasion of Poland. I was raised hearing stories about the horrors of Nazi Germany and what happened in that conflict.

For me, outside of the reactions of people in the local community, the events that happened in New York City that day ten years ago are remote. Sure, I am reminded of it every time I have to go through a security checkpoint (most of which are laughable when you actually have been taught something about security measures); but beyond that for me, 9/11 was a bizzare act in a rather strange war, one that the United States started decades ago.

(Forgive me, I am a history major. I have seen enourgh to convince me that there are some real complaints to be lodged against the United States about our actions in the Middle East before 2001---I just wish that there were other ways to address the wrongs that the United States did without having to blow up and kill innocent people. And if you really want to hear about horrors, read up on the Crusades.)

It is the school shootings that cut me to the bone. I understand the envirnoment they happen in. And I understand how mentally ill someone must be to commit them. For me, school shootings are an act of terror---bombing buildings and civilians are just acts of war.

I am not saying that we should forget 9/11. It was a tragedy.

I am just saying that I did not have as strong of an emotional reaction as others had to it.

It makes me wonder if I have been writing about non-humans for too long.

What information do identity thieves want?

2011-09-09T12:37:00.002-06:00

Looking through my spam mail folder today, I found a perfect example to illustrate the type of information that identity thieves want to get from you, the type of information that allows someone to steal your identity.

The email is supposely from PayPal, citing a claim that the email address of my PayPal account has been changed causing my PayPal account to be temporary suspended, and that I need to give them certain information to restore my account.

The information that they, identity thieves---not PayPal, is asking for is:

My Full Name
My Address
My Mother's Maiden Name
My Date of Birth
My Social Security Number
One of my Credit or Debit Card Account Numbers, along with the issuing banks' name, the expiration date, the Card Security Code (CSC---the little number on the back that proves that you have the physical card), and my PIN (Personal Identification Number) for that card

By the way, some of this information, PayPal didn't even ask for when I opened my account. And if they did ask for it, I would be very alarmed---hint, never give anyone your PIN or Passwords that belongs to another account.

With this type of information, a identity thief can steal your identity, they can also instantly withdraw all your money from one of your accounts or use all the credit on one of your cards.

It is a scary world out there people, so be careful who you give this type of personal information to.

Mathematics of Expertise

2011-08-31T11:27:00.000-06:00

Today, I was reading a post over on FreelanceFolder on The Mathematics of Freelancing. Laura Spencer was talking about what I refer to as "critical mass equations"---those times when in order to make the happy buck, one has to send off a ton of stuff. Spencer was also talking about good bookkeeping practices---something that a lot of freelancers seem to ignore.

To the examples that she mentioned, I would also add "mathematics of expertise." This is how to figure out when it is cheaper to pick up the phone and call an expert in to do a job that you can do yourself.

It is something that I learned from my father. He was a big DIYer (do-it-yourself-er). But every once in awhile, he would pay someone else to do a task for him.

For the record, I am not a big DIYer. I am sort-of a kluntz. There is also the fact that I have no desire to know how to fix my own car---not that I own a car---but all men in my family are supposed to know how to fix one. There are a lot of things that I have no desire to learn how to fix.

For instance, one of my father-in-laws (my wife's biological father) believes that I should invest in some tools and do all the plumbing repairs that homeowners eventually need to do. In his mind, I should not be picking up the phone and calling in a plumber to do the job for me.

I disagree.

There is actually math involved in my reasoning for doing this.

When you add up all the time, it takes me to figure out what DIY book to read, the time it takes me to go to the hardware store, the time it takes me to screw up the first attempt to fix the problem, the time it takes me to figure out what the bloody hell I did wrong (sorry about swearing there), the second trip to the hardware store, plus the time to redo the job and hopefully finally get it right, when you add up all that time and grief, and compare it to the amount that I make as a freelancer, you discover something important.

I almost always lose more income than I saved by doing the job myself.

An actual expert not only can do the job quicker, and get it actually done right, than I; but they can do it for a cheaper price than the amount of income I would lose if I attempted to do the job myself.

For me, that is something inportant to know. After all, in my family, men are supposed to do all the repairs and never call in an expert to do it for them.

And as a freelancer, the logic extends to editing, advertising, etc.

Honestly, I would rather pay the experts to do their job while I focus on the area of my expertise. And that is why I will never be considered a "real man" by my father-in-law.

How taking photographs is like writing

2011-08-27T18:46:00.000-06:00

Ankh stamped offering bowl

Ankh stamped black and white offering bowl and chalice

Inside rim of ankh stamped black and white chalice

One of the things that I have noticed while taking photos for Celtic Soul Jewelry and Pottery is that photography reminds me a heck of a lot of writing.

You start off with a plan of what pictures you want to create.

You take a lot of shots.

Then you edit what you have done.

Sometimes you have done nothing more than waste your time. Other times, you discover that pieces look much better than you expected.

Outside of the equipment being different, writing is much the same---outlines, rough drafts, and editing. Sometimes it is bad writing; sometimes it is wonderful.

Maybe it is just me who feels this way. Maybe the two fields are nothing alike.

[The pictures used in this post are of pottery that is currently available at SpiritWays, 3301 E. Colfax, Denver Colorado.]

End of summer

2011-08-21T22:37:00.000-06:00

Handmade Robin Egg Blue Triple Spiral Star Pendant

Tomorrow is the first day of the semester, which means that today is the last day of my summer vacation. So what did I get accomplished this summer? Well, I took a lot of jewelry photos for my wife's business, Celtic Soul Jewelry and Pottery. And that is pretty much what I accomplished all summer.

I got very little writing done. I did set up a couple of new blogs---one for my wife (though I am going to be doing all the posting), another for a comic strip that I hope to get done...someday.

I made some progress on the two novels that I am currently working on, but not enourgh that I can slap a release date on either one of them. For the past month or so, I have been supposed to be working on a Smashwords test project (actually two of them)...but it keeps getting put on the backburner.

In fact, I would say that my own business had been on the backburner all summer. For some reason, I choose to place my wife's new business ahead of my own. I am sure that my friends will have their theories about why I did that---most of the theories will involve mental illness.

Speaking of mental illness, somehow I managed to avoid a really bad depression this summer despite the fact that I am no better off this summer than I had been during the previous summers. (Actually, I was probably worse off this summer---but I am afraid to look at the paperwork that would confirm that theory. I find that the lack of money in my bank accounts depressing.)

So tomorrow is the state of the Fall semester. I would promise myself to do better this coming term...but I have a whole table covered with books I have to read for my literature classes, so I am not going to be holding my breath on that front.

QoD Stephen King on Vampires

2011-08-11T14:55:00.002-06:00

"Here's what vampires shouldn't be: pallid detectives who drink Bloody Marys and only work at night; lovelorn southern gentlemen; anorexic teenage girls; boy-toys with big dewy eyes.

"What should they be?

"Killers, honey. Stone killers who never get enourgh of that tasty Type-A. Bad boys and girls. Hunters. In other words, Midnight America. Red, white and blue, accent on the red. Those vamps got hijacked by a lot of soft-focus romance."

---Stephen King, in the introduction of American Vampire (Scott Snyder {writer} and Rafael Albuquerque {artist}) comic book series collection.

Such a descriptive program name

2011-08-10T17:02:00.000-06:00

Sometimes, I wonder who comes up with the names for various computer programs. For instance, last night when I was updating the dino-computer (something I have to do because my wife knows nothing about updating any of the computers), I was looking though the list of Windows updates that were being installed.

There were the numerous security updates (which for some reason makes me question the overall security of Microsoft products), the Malicious Software Removal Tool update (a tool I have only used once and hope never to have to use ever again), and the Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 Junk Mail Filter update (I have never actually used Outlook ever---or at least, I don't think I have).

But the update that got my attention was Rollup for ActiveX Killbits for Windows (version does not matter---three computers, three different versions were updated by the time I was done).

What is Rollup? (It sounds like something that we used to do with the sidewalks in Brush Colorado...too harsh on a simple small town?)

What is ActiveX? (Is that better than ActiveW?)

And what is Killbits? (Is there a guy out there by the name of Bits who needs to be killed? Will Uma Thurman succeed? Do they have a kid?)

I am not sure what Killbits is, but I really like the sound of the program name. Don't mess with me; I am armed with Killbits.

Been taking photos for a long time

2011-08-08T16:29:00.000-06:00

A happy little cauldron of mint.

While digging though the photos on the computer today, looking for a photo for Celtic Soul Jewelry and Pottery, I realized that I have been taking pottery pictures off and on for six years now. Some of the older pictures I am still proud of (hey, I still think that they still look pretty good). For instance, this photo from September 2008. It is a picture of one of the cauldrons that my wife throws on the wife; the mint that I put in it is from my own herb garden (I think it was spearmint).

This is a cat, not a shark

2011-08-03T15:08:00.000-06:00

There are times I look around the internet and wonder if real live human beings ever double-check what their automated programs are doing. For instance, take the front page of Helium today.

What is wrong with this picture?

Everyday, Helium has a list of articles featured on their front page, and each article has a little picture above it. Now sometimes these pictures seem to have nothing to do with the articles that they are illustrating. Can you spot today's howler?

Did you spot the picture that seems to have nothing to do with the article it is associated with?

Seriously, a computer program has to be doing this, right? Or some employee with a strange sense of humor laughing to themselves. Because not a day goes by that I do not look at the list of articles and their associated pictures and wonder in what galaxy some of these choices make the slightest bit of sense.

Let me be clear.

This is a cat, not a shark.

The only thing that cats and sharks have in common is that they are animals. We can't even claim that they are both predators; one of my cats would strave to death if he had to catch his own dinner. And kitty is very unhappy when you toss them into the ocean...which may make dangerous to try to put them in it.

I guess that it is a good thing that the little search engine spiders cannot see pictures...because I think they would take points off your SEO score if they could.

Full disclosure: In the past, Morgan Drake Eckstein has written articles for Helium, and may do so again in the future if he can quit laughing long enourgh.

You are responsible for your own success

2011-08-01T01:01:00.001-06:00

There are times I do not understand how other people run their businesses. Saturday was one of those days. I probably should not be surprised by that fact.

Saturday, I was helping my wife at one of the local Denver craftshows.

Now, my day started off with a screaming migraine. So I will admit that after helping set up the booth, I sneaked off and took a nap (in the hot car---it was either do that or pass out in the back of the booth---I thought that the car would be a better business decision, at least appearance-wise). In my defense, I would like to state that it is my wife's business, and she was present---I was merely a glorified pack-mule (unpaid employee) the day of the show.

But when I came back, I helped. In other words, I sat in the booth and said hello to everyone that walked by the front of the booth. It is something that I learned to do when running a restaurant in a food court. The goal is to get them to look at your place of business.

My wife did her tour of the other booths. When she returned, I did my lap around the craftshow. In my case, I was fishing for information. Professional hazard, I am afraid; my true profession is generally nosy. Even when we have no vested interest at all in the subject of study.

In the case of several vendors, I was surprised that they were merely sitting in the back of their booths, and not saying hi to anyone. Often the state of the handmade craft product in question matched the care that the customer was greeted with.

The general impression I got was that several of the vendors were of the impression that it was not worth their effort. Call it a dissatisfaction with the venue. Now, I will admit that I would have liked to see more foot traffic. At the beginning of the show, I guessed that this was the first show. I was wrong. It was the second show...except that the first one had been forced into one of the buildings because of the weather---that sorta makes my guess right, doesn't it?

But to treat the few people that did walk though the craftshow in such a manner was...quite honestly, the business manager in me was appalled.

I was even more appalled at the end of the show. Now, I do not mean to easedrop...well, I am a writer and a comedic blogger...hey, it is not wrong to easedrop when it is part of the nature of your profession to easedrop. *sticks out tongue*

Several vendors were upset. Annoyed that enourgh advertising hadn't been done. Annoyed that we were competiting with another event (don't all craftshows happen the same day as other events?). Generally annoyed.

But here is the part where I do not understand their business plan. Turns out a couple of the complainers did not do any advertising of their own. Say what?!

I will admit that my own advertising of the event was not the world's best, but at least me and my wife made an effort. Flawed advertising still is better than no advertising at all. And the only person that you can be sure is going to advertise your business warmly is yourself.

But these people would rather place the blame solely on the event's organizer. I am sorry; but if you do not advertise your own business, you have to assume some of the blame for your failure.

Now, I am quite sure that these merchants would insist that I am wrong about this. After all, I am just a freelance writer, artist, photographer, and someone who spent ten years running a restaurant---I don't know anything about running their type of business. After all, writers have agents and publishing houses backing their moves---if only that was true even in the good old days. And artists and photographers are never good at running businesses---tell that to the professional photographer who is using the show to advertise her regular bread and butter work. And restaurant management does not translate into being able to sell crafts---hmmm, yeah, selling many little items to make the overhead for the day is nothing like what happens at the craftshows. (Did I miss any objectations to me having an opinion?)

I am sorry. Just because you paid a fee to be at a show does not mean that you are not responsible for your own advertising. If it is the typical show, a lot of the money collected is going towards renting the space that the show is taking place in. In fact, there may not be any money left over with the newer and cheaper craftshows.

The sad truth is that you are responsible for doing what is necessary to make your business successful. And when you have a bad business day, you must assume part of the blame...especially if you did nothing to get the attention of potential customers.

Do I write product descriptions?

2011-07-18T18:06:00.000-06:00

The other day, a friend of mine asked me if I was writing the product descriptions for my wife's items on Etsy (Celtic Soul Jewelry and Pottery). The short answer is No.

Why? Quite simply my wife tends to be a little obsessive-compulsive. And bossy. She tends to know what she wants the description to say; often the ideas for the description comes while she is making the piece.

So while I have done product descriptions in the past, and will do more in the future, odds are that I will not actually do any of hers.

Now, that is not to say I will not be looking at her descriptions and making suggestions. After all, I do SEO and keyword work---but ultimately, suggestions is the outer limit of my involvement on that front.

Can you tell I am married?

I love the detail on this picture.

Churning the annoyed

2011-07-17T15:45:00.000-06:00

Writing several different blogs, and keeping one eye on my future career, I read a certain amount of blogs from the problogging community (you know those people that are making a living by being bloggers). And one of the things occasionally kicked around those circles is that you are probably not doing a good job as a blogger if you are not making people upset.

Now, I like annoying people. I am good at it. Not as good as Scott Adams (Dilbert). But I am working on it.

Unfortunately, one of the communities I blog in is the Golden Dawn community. Due to the mud-slinging that surrounded a certain trademark lawsuit and the constant "my group is better than your group" bear-baiting, the community (or at least, some members of it) believe that we should not upset anyone. No flaming, no bear-baiting, and no telling people that they are headed in the wrong direction.

Last night, I was reminded of this as I wrote a series of short rants about some of the things I recently read on the corner of the internet Golden Dawn has rooted in. It was a post that promises to annoy everyone, except for the couple of people who tend to keep a low profile or generally don't give a shit (it is hard to target and annoy people like that).

When I got done writing the post, I thought about not publishing it. Then I said, "What the heck. This stuff needs to be said, and anyone who does not like it does not have to read my blog in the first place."

I had at least one person unsubscribe...it is hard to tell how many people left (there is a difference between visible and invisible subscribers)...one never really knows how many actual subscribers one has. Nevertheless, for me, it is a sign that I am still pushing the limits. The day when everyone agrees with me, well, I will probably be at a funeral...my own.

(Just to clarify, the Golden Dawn community is really small---one visible unsubscriber {they commented that they were unsubscribing} is a lot for that market. Of course, it will annoy someone that I call Golden Dawn a market...and a small market at that---see I can't help myself: my nature is to annoy.)

Did you met me before you married me? (Adult topic)

2011-07-11T15:09:00.000-06:00

Warning: If you are offended by adult subjects, do not read any further.

Occasionally, I have to look at my wife and ask her, "Did you met me before you married me?"

There are just times the question comes bubbling out of my mouth. You know those moments when your loved ones are surprised that you are doing something, and you really do not understand why they are surprised.

The latest time was yesterday while I was scanning this picture.

I am an artist and a man, so what?!

A picture that I drew. She thought I was looking at porn. No, I was not looking at porn; I was creating porn---there is a difference.

Of course, this led to the breakfast table discussion about how she would react if the only way I could make a living involved creating porn. I was being serious---I don't think that she believes that.

I have thought about this---a lot. What if the only way I can make a good enourgh living (aka big enourgh check to pay my half of the bills and student loans payments) was to be involved in the creation of porn? Not in front of the camera---no one wants to see me in my naked glory. But on the writing and art end of things---would I have a problem with this type of job?

Outside of the fact that various Golden Dawn members would want me to turn in my union card, I have no personal problem with this at all. Sure, there would be some who would say that I have became a bigger menace than Robert Zink (EOGD), but hey there are worse things I could do than being guilty of writing porn, and making porn cartoons and art.

And there is this thin line between porn and erotica---and reading some of the romance and urban fantasy novels which are on the market, I am not sure that I can tell the difference.

I have thought about this question for years. It first occurred to me in 1984. I brought one of those letter magazines that are supposely "written by amateurs and lovers of sex"---and looking though it, I realized that there was no way that these magazines were written by amateurs. Quite simply, the writing was too good to be written by average people. No, someone was being paid for writing these "letters" and they had to be professional writers.

It was the first time, I realized that someone had to be making a living as a writer. The thought never occurred to me before that there were people getting paid to write. It changed my world.

And yes, I am SO willing to write porn and do porn art if there is a check in it for me. I have cats to feed---my precious babies need lots of expensive cat food---hire me!!!

Lots of work for very little money

2011-07-07T16:51:00.000-06:00

Today, I was on myLot for a few minutes...goofing off mainly. As most of you know, myLot is a site where you are paid to participate (aka discuss things). The earnings are really low; but as a writer, I do find it handy for coming up with things to write about.

Anyway, I was looking at the discussions posted in the "making money" section when I came across this wonderful idea being trotted out for making very little money when wasting a whole lot of time. Try not to laugh too hard as I mock the posting (spelling and grammar corrected).

"Wonderful earning opportunity for those who have both Facebook and Paypal accounts. Announcing a new site paying members to 'Like' the content of its members. Get paid $.01 per like. Sign up today and recieve 5-12 new articles to like per day."

Minimum payout is ten dollars. And the site is charging people a dollar for fifty likes.

And for me, this site is just typical of online earning opportunities designed for those people who are incapable of doing basic math. Let's do some math, shall we?

With a payout threshold of ten dollars, and assuming the minimum number of expected new "like" requests per day, it would take someone two hundred days to reach the threshold. Furthermore, if it takes you two minutes a day to do the work, then you would earn ten dollars for six or seven hours of work dribbled out over the course of a year.

Sounds like a lot of bloody work for very little money. I think that I will stick to my writing instead.

But it is typical of most of the online income opportunities that you see. And the only people to really make money from them are the people who set them up. Look at this one---half of the money is earmarked for payment to the "likers." Yet, we all know that most of the people who sign up to do this work are not going to make payout; they will give up long before they reach threshold. This is a win for the organizers of the scam (I call them as I see them).

The customer who is paying for "likes" is also losing. In the short term, they are getting Facebook likes. But in the long term, these likes are going to be worthless, or less than worthless. People and search engines get wise to this type of tactic. And search engines punish companies and individuals who use them.

So the only winners, the only people who really benefit from the system, are the scam organizers (again, I am calling it like I see it).

I find that basic math like this reveals that most online income opportunities pay less than flipping burgers. Writing, photography and art---all pay better if you have some talent. Heck, they pay better even if you don't have talent (the announcement for this new income opportunity was just horrible).

As for the name of the opportunity, it is Rylcolike (that is how they spelled it---I have yet to be able to actually locate them on the internet---just curiosity really, I would never actually sign up for this type of work---after all, I can do basic math).

Kicking around layout changes

2011-07-05T19:27:00.000-06:00

Over the next few days, the regular readers of this blog may notice that I am experimenting changing the layout and description of the blog to bring it more in line with what I am currently doing. Perhaps using a picture or photo in the header.

For instance, the old description of this blog was:

The musings and gripes of Morgan Drake Eckstein as he goes about the business of being a freelance writer, full time college student, and Golden Dawn lodge officer.

And the new description is:

I am a scholar, writer, artist and photographer. That makes me a triple threat, right?---Morgan Drake Eckstein

This is not the first time, I changed something like this---the original name of this blog was Musings from the Pen, which I later changed to the current title, Musings from the Inkwell.

Experimenting with Book Covers

2011-07-03T19:00:00.000-06:00

Celtic Soul Pottery at a craftshow

This morning I was experimenting with turning photos into covers---or at least, experimenting with the ways I am thinking about doing them. This photo is not a book cover; it is actually a photo from some craft show or another that my wife did. But I still like it anyways.

Of course, I would love just to pay someone to do my book covers for me---it is the old busted wallet that gets in the way there. Then again, I am not above doing book covers for others---hey, I am a poor college student; most college students are willing to sell their professors to trolls for lunch money, given half the chance.

I am still considering doing a test project for Smashwords (actually three, but who is counting); and if one hopes to make their way into the Premimum Catalog, a cover they must have.

There are some migraines

2011-07-01T14:38:00.001-06:00

There are mornings that I start off with a can of coke, a trio of chocolate-covered coffee beans and a couple of ibuprofen. And no, it is not because I was busy gulping down rum and coke the night before either.

(My "in-person" friends know that I am not a big drinker---ar at least, not after the juke-box incident a decade-plus ago. I tend to order straight coke or cranberry juice when I do go to bars and restaurants.)

No, I do not suffer from hangovers. (Except for the kind that you get when you are doing a novel/book writing binge...also available in the handy ten-page research paper due tomorrow size.) Instead of playing for pleasure and good times, I get to pay for simply living---I suffer from migraines.

There are mornings when the sun slices though my brain like a chain saw through a pot roast. Things like weather changes can set my brain on fire. Moving vehicles are so much fun also.

And my best bets for dulling the pain is ibuprofen and cafferine. I have tried samples of several migraine medicines and they just make it worse. One of the side-effects of standard migraine medicine seem to be exorcism vomitting.

Someday, some scientist is going to find a cure for my migraines. And I am going to give them a big wet kiss with lots of tongue...even if they are a hairy man.

Best photo of the week is the Catnip Twins

2011-06-26T15:05:00.000-06:00

Instead of writing this summer, I have been spending a lot of time taking photos of jewelry (aka learning to take photos of jewelry) for Celtic Soul Jewelry and Pottery. But some of the best pictures that I have taken have nothing to do with jewelry, such as this one. The Catnip Twins (Georgie and Balteshazar) is the best picture that I have taken all week. It is the type of picture that I have seen at craft and art events, such as the Cherry Creek Art Walk, printed, framed and selling for big money. I am proud of it. I am also slightly amazed that the Catnip Twins cooperated with me; after all, they are cats who are constantly in motion. (For the curious, the plant you see at the bottom of the photo is a catnip plant.)

What would my father think

2011-06-19T00:25:00.000-06:00

Occasionally, I wonder what my father would think of my chosen profession. Then I shrug my shoulders and get back to work. Truth be told; it doesn't matter what my father would have thought about my profession.

My father actually learned that I wanted to be a writer before he died. He was one of the few relatives that I admitted the truth to. Even today, I avoid the subject with most of the relatives that I have contact with.

Now, he probably would not approve of how little progress I have made on my business over the years. Of course, he would also probably have a good idea about why I am moving so slowly. After all, he lost a business (it was an unhappy time).

He would also note that while I have been moving forward slowly, at least I have been moving forward. Like today, he would have given me credit for setting up a blog and a Facebook fanpage for my wife's jewelry and pottery business---Celtic Soul Jewelry and Pottery---before it was needed. He would be able to spot the fact that it was actually a hidden advertisement for my own stuff (it goes on the resume).

But I also know that he would be able to spot the worst part of that statement---that I am more capable and willing to work on (what is ultimately) someone else's business than my own. Of course, he would also remember why that is. And he would tell me that times change, and that I need to get back to work.

*sigh* There are days I miss my dad. And this was one of them.

I am a bad Twitter follower

2011-06-15T15:13:00.001-06:00

One of the things that you are told about Twitter by those "who know how to use it properly for business purposes" is that you are supposed to follow everyone that follows you on Twitter.

I am a bad Twitter user. I follow most, but not all, of my Twitter followers. This may be because I am more prone to looking for story and article ideas, along with a few mintutes of entertainment than trying to run a business from Twitter.

Instead of giving you a list of the type of people I follow, it would be easier to tell you who (what) I won't follow on Twitter---tweets in languages and characters that I do not understand (Chinese and Russian mainly), machine-driven spam tweeters, and people who are going to tell me (loudly) that my religion is wrong.

The one I can look at and see that it is in a language I do not speak or read. I do follow some French and Spanish tweeters (I was surprised to learn that I could read some tweets in Spanish). The other is based on fair guess---if you sending out articles links detailing Christmas gift ideas in July, I am guessing that you are actually a machine. The last is typically loud Christian Republicans who openly state that all Wiccans (Witches) and Democrats should be burnt at the stake---you can hardly miss spotting them as they try to set you on fire.

I will admit that I do have a few people that I follow who fall into these categories. For instance, I do follow a few tweeters who use robots to tweet, but occasionally they (the real human being) comes along and posts something that looks personal. But most robots I ignore. The other categories also have their special cases---entertain me and I will follow, no matter how dubious your personal habits or the related language difficulties are.

Now I will admit that I have some weird tweets coming up---I have an article up on Associated Content about listening to Christmas music in July. But the article is actually meant to be read in July (or December if you are into Christmas music).

Anyways, if you follow me on Twitter and I do not follow you in a 48 hour period---this is probably why---you are a Pagan burning and bashing Christian spamming robot.

As always if you have discovered an useful reason for following everyone, even people you do not understand, please feel free to leave a comment. Remember it may take me up to 48 hours to get back to the computer and approve comments, and that I send spam and flames directly to the round pixel file.

What would my guidance counselor say

2011-06-14T15:38:00.000-06:00

I sometimes wonder what my guidance counselor would say about my career choice today. Back in high school, my goal of becoming a writer was not encouraged. At least, not by anyone in a position of authority.

None of my career choices were thought highly of. I remember one day I told Thomas Wooley, one of my high school teachers, that I joined the army. His comment was at least honest---"Is the army out of targets?"

I am not sure what he would have thought of my goal of becoming a writer. Due to factors beyond my control, I was not a member of the yearbook or school paper groups. Wooley oversaw both of them.

If Wooley would have told me that I was wasting my time trying to be a writer, I might have believed him. But the subject never came up with him.

It did come up with the guidance counselor. They steered me towards the army. That worked out real well. Obviously, they thought that I was always going to be a mere cog in the machine.

(Depending upon the day of the week and the moon, my account of my worth as a potential member of the military varies. We will never know for sure---I left during boot camp when my father died in a truck accident.)

Today, I have two questions for my high school guidance counselor. Is aiming to be a writer such a bad choice in a world where there is three hundred applicants per job opening? And do you still have a job?

Let me show you my weiner

2011-06-13T20:14:00.000-06:00

No, it is not time to mock Representative Weiner, who is doing a good enourgh job of that on all his own this week. No, it is time once again to mock my spam, those junk emails that make me go Huh?! Today's winner was an email that said that I could see photographic proof that a certain male enhancement treatment actually worked. Ok, I suppose if I was in the market for such things, perhaps that would be something that I would be interested in. But...and it is a big but...I do not want to see the mutant member that was attached to the name of the sender...which just happened to be a woman's name. I am not reprinting the name, just in case it is a real woman, who decided to actually take this medicine and now has photographic proof of the size increase. Nor was I willing to click on the link to see the proof. The very thought of a enhancement treatment that effective scares me.

A lousy boss

2011-06-05T21:55:00.000-06:00

I have recently branched out into photography. My wife started making jewelry with handmade ceramic pieces, and started up a little Etsy shop called Celtic Soul Jewelry. As the dutiful husband, I have been taking photos of her work. But there are moments, I want to tell the micro-managing boss to take her own d*** photos. The worst of it was on Wednesday. I had taken a bunch of photos to replace the bad ones that were already up on Etsy (bad lighting and background). I handed her a flash-drive with the shots I had taken that day, and she promptly started to criticize what I had done. The really bad part was that she didn't understand what I had done. Recently I had to switch cameras (the old one died); the new one takes photos at about four times the pixel size of the previous cameras. I no longer take "close-ups"; with this camera, I have to take "reasonable distance" shots and then edit them to get my close-ups. Seriously, I have tried doing it her way, and all I get are blurry, unusable pictures. I had to do an emergency "I am a professional, trust me...no shut up...shut up...let me prove that I know what I am doing...just give me a bloody minute to prove that I know what I am doing!!!!" session. And what did I learn from all this---my wife makes a lousy boss. Good thing I love her because I would so quit this job otherwise.

A short mock of my spam

2011-05-30T13:41:00.002-06:00

Here is a pieceless piece of spam:

Hello
My name is Mis norna toure please i will like you get bark to me in My Email
Yours
Mis Norna

All blog comments recovered

2011-05-22T14:39:00.000-06:00

At this point in time, I have re-approved all the comments that were submitted during the time period that Blogger had to do the roll-back though. And that includes all my blogs. If your comments have not been approved, either I consider them spam (or Blogger does---I always forget to check the spam folder for comments) or they have been lost forever (and need to be resubmitted).

Will my audience be raptured

2011-05-20T15:54:00.000-06:00

One of the current concerns of writers is whether we will still have an audience for our writing after 6 PM on Saturday.

What?! You haven't thought about it? What do you mean that I am the only one that thought about this?

Egads! I guess that I am the only weird person that is writing in the whole entire world.

Anyway, I was thinking about this yesterday. What if my readership is part of the crowd that is raptured tomorrow?

Then I realized that my chosen market are probably the last people who would qualify for the rapture.

I am not sure if this should make me sad or not. On one hand, it is nice to know that my audience will still be around. On the other hand, it makes it sound like I am writing to a bunch of sinners and black magicians.

Oh...wait...I am, ain't I?

But it says a lot about the writing life that one's first thought about the rapture is concern about how it is going to affect your numbers (readers, pageviews, subscribers, potential income, actual income). Or maybe it just says that I spent too much time managing a business before becoming a writer.

And now, I can go back to worrying about the up-coming zombie horde.

Hmm Is Blogger Reading List Acting Up

2011-05-06T16:33:00.000-06:00

The last couple of days, Blogger Reading List has been saying that I am not currently following any blogs. Some of the blogs I follow show up in Google Reader, but not all of them.

Going over to The Real Blogger Status (not an official site of Blogger news), I have learned that this is not the first time that this type of problem has occurred.

So if you recently posted something and are surprised that I have not commented, odds are that I have not read it yet because of this particular bug.

Yep It is All My Fault

2011-05-01T23:38:00.000-06:00

On Friday, I had one of those days. You know the type of day that makes you wonder why someone would ever chose writing as a profession.

It was an administrative problem. The type of problem that a freelancer looks at and wonders if the department on the other end is trying to save money by ensuring that no one ever is able to collect a payment from them.

Yes, I was dealing with a payroll (human resources) department---one that insists that they do not have current paperwork for me, therefore they do not have to pay me by their rules because I missed a deadline for filing the correct paperwork. And yes, this department is connected with the government.

For the record, the information they had last year, and the year before, is still the current information. I still live in Denver Colorado, in the same house, I am still technically single according to the IRS (it is a common law marriage with a mortage, but my wife will not consider it official until I finish college and take her to the altar), etc. If they kept paperwork from previous years, then they have my current information.

To make matters worse, I have been stuck in the infinite loop (where each person sends me to another, and none of them is responsible for fixing the problem). And there is a small email problem (for legal reasons, they are required to communicate with me though an account that they set up---an account that was deleted), they keep sending emails to a dead account, despite my requests to send it to my primary email address.

But none of this is their fault. All the blame lays on my doorstep. And I have to shut up and accept it if I ever want to sell them another word.

I almost quit writing on Friday because of this (but my wife would not let me). Exactly why I didn't will be the subject of a future blog. In the meantime, consider this---have you ever seen a terrorist that wasn't upset at a political entity? Yes, I believe that it is red tape, governments, and power hungry and money grubbing politicans that create terrorists.

It is a small world

2011-04-27T20:43:00.001-06:00

Today, I gave my presentation in the Korean War/1950s class. We also had to create a two page handout for our classmates summing up our topic (mine was Robert Heinlein's novel Starship Troopers). In the interest of self-advertising, I chose to include my pen-name Morgan Drake inside of brackets enclosed by my legal first name and my last name Eckstein (which I actually use as part of my penname).

Turns out that one of my classmates (someone I have taken a couple of history classes with) is one of my online NaNoWriMo friends. It took her a couple of minutes to figure out where she seen the name Morgan Drake before---I tend to use it as my online handle everywhere---but she did make the connection.

After class, she properly introduced herself to me, and we talked a few minutes about the joys of attempting National Novel Writing Month while going to college. It is a really small world, isn't it? I wonder if she is on Facebook.

The State of Morgan Eckstein Economy 2011

2011-04-18T15:28:00.000-06:00

I did my taxes on Friday, as evidenced by the above picture of the line at the post office (imagine what the line is like today---Happy Tax Horror Day 2011). It was slightly depressing. When I accounted for the payment that I am still waiting for (small payroll department problem), the difference between 2010 and 2011 business revenue was a whole six dollars. Gee, my writing business is growing by leaps and bounds, isn't it? Add in the increased costs of daily living, my tuition and textbooks costs going up, and the cut in the amount of grants and scholarships I recieved (and it is going to be even worse this year), and my personal economic picture blows chunks. When I consider the number of businesses that are closing their doors, alongside my personal finances, I find myself wondering where is this mythical economic recovery is? It is sure not happening in my own backyard. Is there anyway that those people who actually seeing an economic recovery (I am talking about you rich-cat CEOs) could pay some more taxes? Probably not---but I can hope, can't I?

The hazards and difficulties of online experimentation

2011-04-11T20:05:00.000-06:00

One of the problems with online writing is that one occasionally has to experiement. One encounters a gap on one of the online writing sites, and one wonders why it is there. Is it because no one else sees it? Or no one looks for the information that you think should be there? Or is it too much work? Or not enourgh demand? Has someone tried it already and told everyone else it is not worth doing?

Depending upon my mood, I may or may not indulge my curious nature and write something to fit the hole. Of course, with online writing your definition of success tends to be eyeballs on the page. Often one finds themselves experimenting and wondering how long is a proper amount of time before one calls the experiment an utter failure.

It is a difficult call to make. Google takes time to index things. And if the subject is something that is only occasionally of interest, an experiment today that looks like a total bust can have a hot spot a year or two (or ten) down the line. For instance, this year I got a lot of hits on a state of union commentary I wrote when Bush was in office.

I am quite sure that no one was actually looking for that one; I am positive that they were looking for information about the most recent one that Obama did---one that I did not watch because I got no return from the Bush state of union address. *sigh*

Of course, the reason for the extra hits was the fact that the site that I had it on was being managed by a different company and now had a much wider audience share. Which is another thing that makes experimenting and writing stuff that fits into missing gaps so d*** difficult to decide when it is a success or not.

At the moment, I am kicking around all these questions merely because I am experimenting with trying to figure out why such a hole exists on one of the online pageview sites. The set of articles I am writing are on a special type of astrology (the "born on this day" variety). Based on the first couple of days' results, I would have to consider the experiment a complete bust.

Now, I can't give up the experiment yet. One, I have been writing online long enourgh to know that it is a strange market. Two, I really need to have some stuff like this in my portifolio if I ever want to work with a business or publication that does this type of articles. I figured that I need a sample of thirty days to prove that I can do this type of work.

It would actually be easier to do this type of writing for someone other than a pageview site. After all, most publications who do the daily horoscope routine require a smaller number of words per day. I figure I am having to do four to six times the words that I would have to do for a regular client. Plus my initial math, and yes I had to do math to prepare for wiriting of the set, can be reused---I never have to do the math ever again.

Nevertheless, based on the short term, it feels like I am wasting my time. Only time and Google will tell if that is really true or not.

QoD Selling books about enlightenment

2011-04-07T23:10:00.000-06:00

Anyone who sells books about being 'enlightened' should first try that themselves, preferably with some kind of flame thrower aimed at their heads.
----David Shaw (someone on Facebook)

Thanks Jim Logan

2011-03-26T14:53:00.000-06:00

Ok, I am going to say something polite about Helium---hey, it could happen!

In the recent discussion about the new publishing rights policy, Jim Logan realized that the only way to keep up on the posts was to answer each person's questions and concerns directly in their own post (by using the edit function). And I would like to thank him for that---it made finding the answer to my concern quick and easy. It also made it easier to find his responses to other people's questions (some of which I was interested in).

(My concerns were about piracy and teaser paragraphs.)

Thank you Jim Logan for your prompt attention to my concerns. Even when I am upset with Helium, you prove to be professional. Thanks.

Helium response to the last Google update

2011-03-22T17:01:00.000-06:00

In the last Google update, the search engine perimeters were changed to punish duplicate content. It was meant to down-rank the pages which were just reprinting what other people wrote. Unfortunately, I immediately realized that it was going to penalize everyone (if your work is pirated, then it too is a duplicate---even if it was the original). I also realized that this was going to mean a big change in the online writing envirnoment.

And today, I saw my first indication that what that change in the online writing envirnoment was going to look exactly the way I thought it would.

Helium, as of March 24th, is now going to take exclusive online rights for one year on all new articles submitted. As always when Helium does a change, there are mixed reactions.

In my case, the reaction was "Well, thanks to Helium making me spend any time I have to write [for them] in maintaining my rating star, and tying any incentive earnings to having a writing star which I do not have, so lots of rewrites [leapfrogs] would be needed...it was going to be a long time before I ever write a new article for the site, and now it is going to be even longer."

Sure, one can submit an article to a ebook and/or print publication...oh wait, most of them have a web process. And there lays the rub. Welcome to the new ugly online writing envirnoment.

Thanks to Google, everyone is going to move towards requiring that all content submitted is exclusive. Soon, we will never be able to reprint any piece of work. Everything that we publish will have to be original content.

But we still going to be penaltized for writing duplicate material because of people who copy other people's material. The front page (the latest seven entries) of one of my other blogs is being posted elsewhere on the web...and I have not been able to do a damn thing about it.

And other thing, I like to occasionally use a paragraph from an article to advertise it...opps, I guess I can't do that anymore either. Welcome to the wasteland...hope that you didn't plan on doing this type of writing for a living.

QoD Elbert Hubbard on self-promotion

2011-03-07T19:44:00.000-07:00

Everyone should advertise while they are alive. The man who does not advertise is a dead one, whether he knows it or not. Life is too short for you to hide yourself away mantled in your own modesty.
---Elbert Hubbard

Helium is upgrading to four point oh no

2011-02-18T13:54:00.002-07:00

Warning: the following is a rant!

Just tried to check my rating stars over on Helium, something that I do everyday. And couldn't.

Helium is upgrading to their 4.0 version (as they are calling it).

I managed to see some of the changes before the site went back into upgrade limbo (5:30 to 6:30 EST)---hmmm, counting on my fingers that announcement does not seem to match the current time.

One of the changes is that they moved the stats for the rating stars. Basically, they have hid it at the bottom of a page (I was in the process of looking for it when the limbo came back). The official answer is that no one wants to be greeted by their low rating numbers first thing on arrival.

Hey, that is the only reason I log into Helium is to check my rating stats. And I won't do that even if I wasn't earning something from a couple of articles to justify the time spent rating every month.

Yes, I will admit that I have more or less quit writing for Helium. I just don't have the time to continously leapfrog articles that are drowning in the ratings because I wrote a general article and everyone else is shouting about the injustices of the world. It is sad to say, but political and religious rants outperform reasoned and neutral articles in the rating process.

One of the biggest changes is that they are going to start adding the date that the articles were created and last updated. On one hand, it is very much needed---I have complained about the lack of dates on articles before (is this recent? or something written three years ago?). On the other hand, I wonder how old (as in written and not updated recently) articles are going to be affected earnings wise.

Unfortunately, I can imagine people just leapfrogging articles (without actually changing a single word or punctuation mark) merely to get a more recent update date listed. I have a feeling that some of my articles have tanked simply because other people continously leapfrog their articles until they found the right set of raters and the article goes higher in the ratings. Let's just give them one more reason to hit leapfrog without making any actual changes, shall we?!

Yes, it is a form of paranoia that I suffer from.

Helium also has introduced a "Needs Improvement" page---a page that shows you the fifteen articles that your rating is the lowest on. For me, this is an useless improvement. All fifteen that are showed are articles that I will never actually leapfrog.

There is a reason I don't leapfrog certain articles and never will. Either they are in the "got a whole penny from the article in its entire existence" or the article is very, very outdated. For instance, "Predicting the outcome of the war in Iraq" is something terribly outdated. And I am not going to leapfrog any of the poetry or fiction I published there---it is not worth my time and energy to do so.

In fact, with the style of writing I do, I am better off spending the same amount of time that it would take to rewrite an article and leapfroging it to write completely brand new article and publish it somewhere else. Sad, but true. While there are good things to be said about this new upgrade (I like the tweet button on every page), the biggest changes are just going to annoy me.

Heaven forbid that my top two earners quit making money on Helium---because I am so out of there when that day comes. Or at least, I will be if I am having one of "those days."

If you want to actually read something that I wrote on Helium, here is a link to an article about Why Count and Length are Important for Helium Articles. Provided of course, that the site is not currently in update limbo.

Quote of the day: Writing and the Sports illustrated Swimsuit issue

2011-02-05T16:31:00.000-07:00

A writing assignment for the swimsuit issue is a dream come true for the Sports Illustrated staffer. He grabs an exotic dateline and the guarantee that no one will read anything he comes up with.
---Bryan Curtis

Comments about modern students from an actual English teacher

2011-01-30T20:07:00.003-07:00

see more Failbook

Form letter junk mail

2011-01-25T12:55:00.000-07:00

A new rash of form letter junk emails have hit my spam box.

All of them have the subject line: Re. (fill in the blank)

And the text says:

Ahahahaha looks like we share the same opinion (fill in the blank).

Check my profile at:

Some dating site referral link
See what else we have in common ;)

You just have to laugh at the laziness of the people who send out this spam. Does the company send their spammers a form letter to fill out? I am thinking yes because the only difference between the letters is (fill in the blank) and the sender (and the referral number, of course). C'mon spammers, create your own letter if you are going to spam me; your job is to entertain me, not make me think that I am watching TV reruns.

Revising my class schedule

2011-01-23T14:21:00.000-07:00

Checking my transfer sheet, I realized that one of the required classes I need did not transfer with the right course number. So I had to drop the Critical Essay class.

Faced with the choice of dropping the Korean War class and taking the missing class (Introduction to Literature which has to be taken at UCD), or taking the missing class another semester and enrolling in another class instead to keep me at the twelve credits, I chose to punt and take Immigration and Ethnicity in American History instead.

I actually thought about signing up for this class in the first place, but decided to try to take two English classes this semester instead. Haha---the joke is on me. At least, I have only missed one class (a whole three hour of lectures), so hopefully I should be able to catch up.

Classes I am taking this semester

2011-01-21T15:08:00.000-07:00

This week was the first week of classes for the Spring 2011 semester at the University of Colorado at Denver. This semester I am taking my standard allotment of four classes (12 credits).

I finally got into the Critical Writing Essay class. It is one of the classes that I have to pass in order to get my degree. This class involves a lot of writing and developing the ability to actually wax on about the meaning and structure of a piece of writing.

I am also taking 1950s: Korean War, Cold War and US Transformation. Personal interest---it actually fills no slots other than an elective. Have to do an small research project---I am thinking something to do with the pulps (either men's magazines or science fiction).

My other history class this semester is Urban Development in the US; it is a class focusing on how cities developed and some of the social changes that resulted from having big cities in the United States. Again, personal interest (though I am hoping to convince an advisor to count it towards my US history requirement). I am hoping to get some background for the urban fantasies that I find myself writing.

My last class is Medieval Women---Whores and Saints. I am taking this class because (1) it fulfills a requirement, and (2) it is being taught by my favorite professor (ironically the professor that I hated the most at the beginning of last semester). Based on last night's class, it is going to be a major learning experience.

So there are my excuses for not getting a lot of writing or occult work done over the next few months. But on the bright note, I am getting closer to graduation (not that it means much to someone who plans on flipping directly into the Masters program).

Critical Writing Panic Attack

2011-01-19T20:42:00.000-07:00

As I noted in a previous post, my wife was hoping that the start of the semester would even out my bad mood. No such luck. Today, I had a small panic attack (and am still on edge) in the Critical Writing class.

Definitely not the way that I wanted to start that class. But I do understand why it happened.

Critical Writing is one of the classes that I have to take in order to graduate (provided that I want to finish up the Literature major---or even a minor in Lit). I knew that the class was going to be hard. But the more the professor talked about what we needed to do to pass, the more I wondered what a high school dropout like myself was doing there.

I am not sure that I can get across that bar at all. Oh well, even if I crash and burn---hopefully---I will pick up the skills I need to survive my senior seminar in the fall. And yes, I am so stubborn that I would rather flunk the class than drop it. Here is to the book and 600 words (good words) that I have to finish before the next class.

Clarification of my job skills

2011-01-19T19:16:00.000-07:00

Just a quick note to make something clear: When I say that I am not qualified for anything outside of flipping burgers or supervising people flipping burgers, I am actually saying that I don't have a piece of paper that says that I am quailified for anything else (aka the lambskin that the university gives you saying that you have an education and are programmed to jump though administrative hoops while sitting still). It does not matter what type of skills, management or otherwise I have, without that piece of paper, it is like having none. Of course, that is like saying that because I have not gotten published by a big publisher that I have no skills as a writer.

Where would we be if we did not have our gatekeepers keeping the riff-raff out?

Foul mood continues

2011-01-17T21:31:00.000-07:00

Well, my foul mood has continued. Blame it on my brain rotting. Or something.

My wife is hoping that the start of the new semester improves my mood. I am not so sure that it will. One of the things that is driving me batty is the little voice that says that I should drop out of college and head back to working in restaurants.

(As if there are any jobs to be had in restaurants, even if one is available 24/7. And outside of restaurant work, I am only qualified [or not] to do freelance writing.)

It is the little voice that says I should be doing more to get us out of our little budget problem that is driving me nuts. My childhood training kicks in, and that makes me grumpy. Which is turn, drives my wife nuts.

Taking care of business

2011-01-15T20:57:00.000-07:00

Did some minor business updating today (profiles, account information, etc.).

The most important update was probably the fact that I decided to swap around my "real" name and my "alternate" name on Facebook.

When I signed up on Facebook, it was to keep touch with a couple of friends that I made when attending college. That is why I signed up---college. So I used my real, legal birthname, the one that my college friends would know me by. It is also the name that people who went to High School with me would know me by.

What I did not realize was that more of my Facebook friends would end up being game players (most of my networking involves game-playing) or people who had knew me by my pen-name (who probably never heard my birthname before encountering it on Facebook) than people I was going to college with.

As my regular readers know my pen-name became the name that I introduce myself by because one of my family members did not want my activities being associated with them. There is a moment in one of the Harry Potter books where Uncle Vernon wants Harry to claim to be attending St. Brutus's Secure Center for Incurably Criminal Boys because they do not wish to admit that there is a wizard in the family. I understood that scene; I have been there.

The goose has flown on that particular ploy a few years ago. Someone I went to High School with connected the dots between me and my pen-name. And given the size of the town I went to High School in, well...if one person in the town knows---everyone knows.

Today, someone noted that they still could not get used to my real name, and I decided that enough was enough---so I decided to swap the names around. Besides I had it rigged already that you could find me by either name.

The second most important update today (maybe) was the fact that I enabled adsense for my Bukisa account. Bukisa had decided to abandon their Bukisa Index (mainly due to fraudant traffic), and pay out though Google Adsense or Chitika Ads instead (taking a forty percent cut off the top). I already have an Adsense account, so I went with it. Not that I have much up on Bukisa, just three test articles (someday I will get around to fleshing out that section of my writing portifolio).

Doing stuff like this is not why I became a writer, but it is neccessary stuff to do.

Mocking the spam 2

2011-01-11T16:23:00.000-07:00

I presume that any email written this badly must be coming from a spammer or phisher.

Dear Account Owner

This is email from Windows Live Hotmail and we are sending it to you account user for your safety. Due to the anonymous registration of our account which is causing congestion to our service so we are shutting down some account and your account was among those to be deleted,so the purpose of this email is for you to verify that you are the owner of this account and you are still using it by filling the information below after clicking on the reply button:
* Username: ---------------------------

* Password: ---------------------------
* Date of Birth: -----------------------
* Country Or Territory: ----------
After following the instructions in the sheet, your account will not be interrupted and will continue as normal. Thanks for your attention to this request. We apologize for any inconveniences.

Bestsellers on the day of my birth

2011-01-10T14:29:00.000-07:00

Over on BibiOZ.com (The Booksearch Wizard), they have a page where you can type in your birthday (use the calendar tool, it is easier to make sure that you get the right results) and the system spits out a list of the bestsellers on the day (week) of your birth (unless you were born before 1950, then you just get the bestsellers for the year).

(The link is on the topbar, far right---I could not get a clean link to the direct page.)

The fiction bestsellers for the week of my birth (ending September 5th 1965) were:

1: The Source (James Michener)
2: Up the Down Staircase (Bel Kaufman)
3: The Green Berets (Robin Moore)
4: Hotel (Arthur Hailey)
5: The Looking Glass War (John Le Carre)
6: The Man With the Golden Gun (Ian Fleming)
7: Night of Camp David (Fletcher Knebel)
8: Don't Stop the Carnival (Herman Wouk)
9: The Ambassador (Morris West)
10: The Rabbi (Noah Gordon)

The non-fiction bestsellers for the week of my birth (ending September 5th 1965) were:

1: The Making of the President 1964 (Theodore H. White)
2: Intern (Doctor X)
3: Is Paris Burning? (Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre)
4: Markings (Dag Hammarskjold)
5: Games People Play (Eric Berne)
6: The Oxford History of the American People (Samuel Eliot Morison)
7: Journey of a Soul (Pope John XXIII)
8: A Gift of Prophecy (Ruth Montgomery)
9: Queen Victoria: Born to Succeed (Elizabeth Longford)
10: Sixpence in Her Shoe (Phyllis McGinley)

How many of these books have I read? None.

I have read a couple of pages each from The Man With the Golden Gun, Games People Play, and Is Paris Burning?

I imagine that someone out there will find this sad; I hope that they have read more of the bestsellers of their birth week than I have.

How to use your physical book

2011-01-06T13:50:00.003-07:00

Hehe, tech support for books.

Changing Resolutions

2011-01-01T19:53:00.000-07:00

One of the things that I have noticed over the last few years is my changing attitude towards making New Year's resolutions. At one time, I used to make New Year's resolutions, and I would never keep them. Today, I no longer make New Year's resolutions (except when required to).

(This year, CCD Campus Connection, the college newspaper that I write the astrology column for, gathered a set of resolutions and matching pictures from all the staff. My resolution? To clean up a certain table before the end of the year.)

I think that the reason I quit doing resolutions was that I was making impossible choices. "This year, I am going to write a novel." "This year, I am going to make a greater effort to get published." "This year, I am going to make a greater effort to actually make money."

Those were the days that I used to do the annual New Year (Spring) writing campaign. You know, one of those frenzies of activities that make you think that you are busy and making progress, but in reality you never really accomplish anything.

Nowadays, my writing campaigns occur 365 days a year. Oh, there are times of increased activity, such as my school breaks. But the times of increased activity merely correspond to those times that I have extra time to work at my craft.

At some point, I became one of those writers who is always working.

A small reminder of this is one of my latest projects: a set of coloring pages based on the Splendor Solis illustrations. There is no definite self-imposed deadline on the project. And I have posted one of the rough Splendor Solis coloring pages on my Golden Dawn blog. Hopefully, I get it done by the end of the year, and figure out a viable way to profit from the project.

Ok, it might be a resolution to finish it by the end of the year...but I am not under any delusion that it will make this my big break-out year. I guess that I am older and wiser...well, older. I have discovered that as long as I am slowly increasing my stock of material, the urge to make resolutions is not going to rear its ugly head. And that makes me much happier than I was when I was making resolutions.

Happy New Year

2011-01-01T01:34:00.000-07:00

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Denver Zoo 2011 Free Days

2010-12-23T16:07:00.002-07:00

Ok, this is not writing related (unless I decide to spend a day at the zoo instead of writing), but I am posting it anyways because I like animals.

Denver Zoo 2011 Free Zoo Days

January 8 (Saturday)
January 24 (Monday)
February 6 (Sunday)
February 19 (Saturday)
October 12 (Wednesday)
October 20 (Thursday)
November 6 (Sunday)
November 12 (Saturday)

Writing Christmas articles

2010-12-19T02:09:00.000-07:00

One of the markers I use to gauge how mentally healthy I am at any given time is the stuff that I am writing. As all writers know, your writing is an indication of your mental state; some writers even use writing to change their current mental state. It is like a giant feedback loop. Your mood affects your writing; your writing affects your mood.

Last week, while I was supposed to be studying for finals, I had a couple of evenings where my brain absolutely refused to do any more schoolwork. I find myself cruising the internet, looking for distraction. While on Facebook one night, a friend of a friend joked about giving someone a lump of coal for Christmas. I seconded the notion, then found myself wondering how much a lump of coal actually would cost. So I googled it.

What I discovered was that a lot of companies were selling lump of coal themed products. Looking at the date, I decided that it was way too late in the season to write a Christmas shopping article. Ha! The idea and one other just stuck in my head.

Today, I broke down and wrote the artiicles. The shopping piece might do me some good next Christmas season. I never actually have time to write Christmas articles during the time that internet writers are uploading them; a pesty thing called the University of Colorado at Denver gets in the way and takes up most (if not all) of my writing time during the height of that season. As a result, I have no Christmas test articles out there---I know a lot of writers have a big stock of Christmas articles online, but I have no idea how many pageviews they are getting. Are Christmas articles (or any holiday articles) worth the time and effort necessary to write them? I don't know. I need to find out. So I now have a test Christmas shopping article up on Associated Content---oh wait, it is now the Yahoo Contributer Network.

The other piece I wrote was simply to get it out of my head. It was a short semi-fictional piece about my mother playing Christmas music in July. My mom playing Christmas music in July is not the fictional part. That is some god's honest truth; she actually plays Christmas music in July. Don't ask why---I never figured it out. I have also never figured out why I get the urge to play Christmas music in July either.

This is not the first semi-fictional piece I have done about my family. The first one I did was actually done for an Introduction to Fictional Writing class I took at the Community College of Denver. It was a piece about the time I fell down the stairs at school and said a few choice words. The assignment was to fictionize a real memory; in my case, it was already partially fictionized (because my memories of it consisted of my father telling me the story). I never published that piece; maybe someday I will (mainly because I like the story).

The first semi-fictional family piece I actually published to the web (first on Helium, then on AC) was a piece about recieving a fruitcake for Christmas. (Lump of coal---fruitcake---there seems to be a pattern there.) It is definitely fiction. For one thing, I actually like fruitcake. The second thing is...well, I took liberties with how I depicted one of my relatives. It is still one of my favorite pieces.

Unfortunately, short fiction does not generate a lot of pageviews. There is also the little fact that it involves my family...it is semi-fiction; there is a grain of truth in there somewhere. It is that last part that promises always to get me into trouble. Comedy about one's family is not the way to go if you want peaceful familial relationships. It is time like this (when I have written pieces that I like, but know other people will be upset by) that I find myself wondering if other writers and entertainers also have this problem.

Oh well, odds are (if I am being honest) that none of my family will ever read the stories in the first place. Which is even more depressing than them being upset with me. But I suspect that is true of half the writers in the world. I have this theory that as a writer you have a fifty/fifty chance of your family loving everything you write or absolutely hating everything you write. The universe is balanced---I just got the pillar of severity section in this particular regard.

Nevertheless, for some reason (well beyond my ability to reason it out) I had the urge to write a semi-fictionized piece about my family around the holiday season---again. I think I see a pattern forming here.

Happy holidays!

Motivation malfunction

2010-12-13T21:19:00.000-07:00

The last few days, I have noticed a definite lack of motivation on my part. Or at least, a lack of motivation geared towards what I was supposed to be doing---studying for finals and working on last minute papers.

But what I found interesting is the fact that I would catch myself researching articles to write. I guess it has been awhile since I wrote anything and my mind is itching to go. We will see how long and strong the motivation to write is in a few days when I will actually have time to practice my trade.

For those who are curious, one final is done, two to go, and one I don't have to take (taking the final adds nothing to the grade I already have---I already have an A).

Mocking the spam

2010-11-24T12:42:00.000-07:00

Once again, it is time to mock the emails that I get in my spam (junk) mail.

Today's winner had the subject line: Hareyak.

And the text of the email: ungeduldig friseriez flagellantismens svpikb iuyjxl zprlwn

One of these words was hyperlinked; I did not click the link. Heck, I am not sure what any of these words even mean, though I am fairly sure that they are just semi-random letters.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

Writing in public

2010-11-23T00:54:00.000-07:00

One of my writing friends the other day posted on her Facebook status that she was in a Starbucks and that people were actually writing in Starbucks. (Ok, I call her my friend, but she may inform me otherwise by the time I am done with this post.) I think that she was witnessing "poseurs" (or "posers" if you prefer that spelling): those mysterious creatures that claim to be writers, pretend to be writers, but have never actually sold a single piece of writing.

One of the big things about being a poseur is that you must write in public---it somehow increases your writing cred if you write in public.

At this point, I must admit that I have been guilty of writing in public. (*waves hi at his soon-not-to-be friend*)

Heck, on Friday night I wrote at two public locations. The first place was a small pizza shop on Colfax (Famous Pizza); it did nothing for my writing cred---there were just the two employees there. The second place was at the First Unitarian Church; again, no gain for my cred---people just thought I was sitting in the corner being anti-social. Honest, I wasn't being anti-social: I was just tempting to finish an article that I am hoping to offload on someone for a bit of cash.

Of course, that last bit is why I would have to hand in my Poseur Union card (provided that I still had one---I lost mine the day I sold my first piece of writing). No poseur would dream of stooping down to the level that they work on pieces just to unload them for small green pieces of paper (exchangable for all debts public and private). There is no cred to be gained actually working as a writer. It is ok to be misunderstood; it is not ok to be a hack.

I have done a lot of writing in public. At one point, I was doing two hours a day four days a week of writing in public. Ok, I was standing behind the counter in a food court downtown, pretending to wait for customers (after two o'clock, we saw very little traffic)---nevertheless, it was writing in public. Interestingly enough, most people thought that I was actually a college student.

Before that job, another restaurant job---more writing in public. I actually wrote the very first piece that I sold between making hamburgers. And before that writing in the high school cafeteria, again public writing, but that is a whole different story about why I was guilty of writing in public at that point (oldest of eight kids---do I need to tell you why I was writing in public rather than at home?).

So there you have it. I have done a lot of writing in public. But alas, I have absolutely no writing cred---at least among the poseurs. The sad part is I would rather have a great big bag of cash instead.

Oh wait, it is not my writing friend that I am going to lose; it is any and all poseurs reading this blog that are going to wave goodbye to me. That is not going to be good for my writing cred, is it?

Kitteh Zen meditashun

2010-11-16T19:14:00.002-07:00

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NaNoWriMo 2011

2010-10-30T13:09:00.000-06:00

So am I going to be doing NaNoWriMo 2011? Yes and no.

Yes, I am going to do it because why should I break my losing streak now? For the record, I have never succeeded in writing 50,000 words in the space of thirty days. At least, not on a single project. If you are willing to count the number of words that I have devoted to term papers during November the past few years, then I am scoring about fifty percent.

No, because I have three more postion papers, two book reviews, two research papers, and probably a lot of stuff I am forgetting here. In addtition to that amount of writing, I have to do the reading and research to support that amount of writing.

No. Do I look insane?

Yes, because I keep having scenes pop in my head. Damn it Harmik get back in the cab! I am trying to do homework here.

So am I doing NaNoWriMo 2011? Maybe. Depends on who wins in the cage match between Harmik and my college professors.

(For those of you who are curious, Harmik is a six feet tall troll who drives a cab in one of the stories that I am working on...he tends to be a little loud.)

You are only as good as your last editor

2010-10-19T19:13:00.000-06:00

Today, I was reminded about one of the harsh truths of a writer's life: You are only as good as your last editor.

The reminder came in the form of looking at the published copy of something that I sold, and realizing that the title used was wrong. The title was from the month before, and now what I wrote for this month makes no sense at all.

I know how the problem happened. A form is being used for this particular publication, and they simply swap one article for another as they put the publication together. This month, they simply forgot to change the title along with the article.

Heck, I have made the same type of mistake myself on occasion. The only sad part (besides confusing readers) is that this publication is in hard copy form, so the mistake exists in a couple thousand copies. Fortunately, it has a short shelf life, and next month all the current copies will have been recycled.

Another reminder of this fact of life today came in the form of my midterm for Latin America Colonial history. What I turned in was in dire need of editing; then again, most of my homework tends to be in need of editing. It is what happens when you write something just hours before it is due, and turn it in (email it) to the professor just minutes after you are done writing it.

I will admit that I have trouble editing myself. Tense problems, mainly. Point of view problems, secondly.

The only way that I can effectively edit myself is to allow something to sit long enourgh to forget what I wrote, so that I can see what I actually wrote instead of what I think that I wrote. Needless to say, this is not always an option.

If there is any doubt that one needs to be aware of this type of stuff, I would like to mention something I saw on the way home. I passed a vacant lot, and noticed that it had two "for sale" signs up. Both from the same real estate agent. One sign had the phone number 303-xxx-4816; the other sign 303-xxx-8416. I suspect that this person is also self-editing. I also suspect that they do not know why they do not get half of their phone calls either.

Semester so far

2010-10-15T14:00:00.000-06:00

This semester so far has been kicking me in the behind. Therefore, I have gotten very little writing done, outside of the three astrology columns that I have written for Campus Connections and the required essays for my classes.

(The first astrology column of the semester I finally got around uploading to Associated Content today if anyone is interested in reading it---about how the sun signs start the semester. I don't think that it will get many page views, but I am after the google-love and AC cloat.)

I think that the Faulkner class is kicking me the hardest. The other day, I was so tired that I looked at the schedule to see what novel I was supposed to be reading next---and somehow, I still ended up reading the wrong book. *groan* The bright spot? I wasn't the only student to do this. I guess that I am not the only person that is having their rear kicked this semester.

I do plan on getting back to writing sometime in the future; I am just not sure if it will happen before the semester is over.

For your kind attention

2010-10-08T23:53:00.000-06:00

Once again, Morgan has the urge to mock his junk email.

I was going to ignore this junk email, a standard please consider relocating a large sum of money into your country story, clear up to the point where I got to this line:

Without a (heir) hence the money is floating and if I do not remit this money out urgently it will be forfeited for nothing and the big guns at the herms of administration at the bank will share this fund amongst themselves as it has been done if no trace of heir to such fund is found.

Huh? Why is "heir" in brackets? And how about a comma? Or perhaps a period or two? And is "herms" supposed to be "helm"?

Now, I will admit that I like the idea of "floating" money, though I imagine that it is not how I picture it. Heck, if I could float money the way I am picturing it, I would have a career in Vegas.
And if you think this person just accidently made those mistakes, consider "the France citizen" which is a term that they used in another sentence (a perfectly fine sentence outside of this term). I understand all French citizens consider themselves to be France, but I think that this might be carrying it a little far.

Hey spammer, thanks for your kind attention and giving me some sentences to mock.

Would I recommend freelance writing as a business

2010-10-07T17:30:00.000-06:00

I am a freelance writer. Would I recommend this type of business to someone else? Probably not. A lot of people do not realize how much work writing is. It takes more than just stringing sentences together, and/or repacking information. While you can get paid to write, it takes time and energy to find clients and the pay is notorious low (I think that writers are still being paid as if it was the 1950's). Of course, nowdays you are also operating in a global market---can you low bid someone in India? Probably not. As far as business income goes, the bum begging on the corner probably makes more than you do.

I haz awesome ninja skills

2010-10-06T22:13:00.002-06:00

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Put up links to the fanpages

2010-09-18T19:08:00.000-06:00

Today, I put up the links to both my own Morgan Drake Eckstein fanpage and the Bast Temple (Golden Dawn, Denver Colorado) fanpage on a page of the Bast Temple website. While there is probably not a large audience for my work (after all I am a niche writer), I still wanted to get the links up.

The reason I am going with fanpages is multi-fold.

The first and most important reason is that silly 5000 friend limit on Facebook. After seeing a couple of writers on Facebook dealing with this limit and having to set up fanpages for themselves, I decided that I would just sidestep the problem and set up my fanpages early.

The second reason as I have noted before here and elsewhere is that I play a lot of games on Facebook. I am quite sure (ok I know for a fact) that some people are annoyed by this aspect of my life.

The third reason is that I am getting better at shameless self-promotion. Or at least, I think that I am getting better at it.

The fourth reason is that it is harder for your account to get removed from Facebook for spamming people if the offending page is an actual fanpage. (Long story involving dirty Golden Dawn Order politics...of course, I have no idea why the one party wasn't using a fanpage in the first place.)

Fifth and final reason, occasionally my personal life erupts on my personal Facebook wall and I would like to keep some of it locked in the closet.

I also put up a link page on each of my blogs for my writer's fanpage, and one on my Golden Dawn blog for the lodge's fanpage (different audiences, different levels of interest in the fanpages I figured).

Qod Stephanie Reisner on the importance of copyrights

2010-09-04T13:16:00.000-06:00

As an author it frustrates me that people should think I should spend thousands of hours on a manuscript and then give it away freely to whoever wants it. Because I can live on air and my love for writing. lol! I say all challengers of [Intellectual Property and Copyrights] ...should put in 40 hours a week for 52 weeks producing reading material for the general masses (see how easy it is) and then just hand it away for free. It will never happen. I'm betting a lot of them wouldn't be so against IP if they actually had any or made a living as an artist. For some of us - that's what we do to survive and we do it well.

----Stephanie Connolly Reisner

Writing astrology columns

2010-08-19T15:04:00.000-06:00

As many of my regular readers know, for the last couple of years I have been writing an astrology column for the student newspaper of the Community College of Denver (CCD): Campus Connection. And today, I am starting my fourth semester of being a professional astrological writer (using the olympic definition of professional---if you ever got paid [even once] for the work, then you are a professional).

When I first accepted a position on the newspaper staff, the astrology column was not even a glimmer in my eye. I was in a literature class with Sarah Stover; and when she got the job of editor-in-chief, she remembered that I mentioned that I occasionally did some freelance writing. I agreed to work for the newspaper, then discovered the very next week that I needed to do a last minute transfer to the University of Colorado at Denver if I did not want to lose a whole semester worth of credits (I was just short of a single class, a science class, for my Associate degree when I transferred). Sarah did not care that I was going to a different school; as long as I was taking classes at Auraria campus, I was still qualified to work for Campus Connection.

It was not until October that the thought of an astrology column arose. I was doing a piece on Wicca and witches---which is how Sarah realized that I knew a lot about the esoteric traditions---when the thought occurred to her that I might be capable of writing an astrology column. Every writer meeting after that, she would mention how she loved astrology columns (hint, hint). I basically ignored the hints because of a slight difficulty that the format of the student newspaper presented.

Campus Connection comes out every three weeks (five issues a semester). This means that doing a predictive column was close to impossible. The very first semester I was there, I discovered a two year-old issue on one of the stands---an issue long forgotten by everyone. This caused me to have to figure otu a way to write an astrology column that was as fresh (useful) on the last day that the issue was on the stands as it was the first day.

It took me three months to figure out the solution. In fact, I figured out the solution the very last week of winter break. I cobbled it up and sent it in. The first column was about How Your Sun Sign Might Affect Your Study Habits. It got published, and the rest as they say is history.

The original format of the astrology column included an introduction which discussed some aspect of astrology and introduced the theme of the month. Based on the feedback from readers I talked to, the introduction section was abandoned when the next editor-in-chief started (it was part of the changes needed to keep the column in the paper---his opinion of the column was not exactly favorable---ironically, all the changes were ones that I wanted because of my feedback research). There was also some artistic changes done last year (including the removal of the background artwork).

But despite the changes in format, the way I write the column has been stayed the same. A month before writing any particular column, I have an idea. A couple of days before the column is due, I abandon the original theme and start working on a completely different theme. The revised idea for the column tends to be something I dreamed up while in the shower. Coming up with the idea is probably the hardest part of the process (in terms of how long it takes me to come up with a viable idea).

Then I start with the easiest signs for that idea and work my way towards the harder ones. The easiest signs to write about are those that I have a real life model for (often I am joking about how a certain Virgo and Gemini react). Then I progress to the harder ones...for the ones that I am unsure about I open up one of the many astrology books that I own (most often Rex Bills' The Rulership Book). Due to the nature of the column, I end up writing bits of it whenever I have a few mintutes to spare (lightrail, standing around waiting on my wife, etc.).

And a few months after the issue is off the stands, I reprint the columns on the internet. The astrology column does not do well on the internet for various reasons, but I do like to have them available online for my non-college friends to read. (The last four columns I wrote have yet to be posted to the internet which says what type of summer I had this year.) So here is to another year of writing astrology columns. May you enjoy and learn as much about astrology as I do while writing them.

Qod Leon Uris on Discipline

2010-08-17T00:57:00.000-06:00

"In order to be a good writer, you've got to be a bad boss. Self-discipline and stamina are the two major arms in a writer's arsenal."

---Leon Uris

Washing away writers block

2010-08-14T15:11:00.000-06:00

One cannot leaf though a writer's magazine or writing book without running across tips to overcome or prevent writer's block. I always presume that the tips are meant for amateurs; none of the professional writers I know believe in writer's block.

Nevertheless, I do keep track of what other people do to break blocks when they occur. The other day on Facebook, it was knitting and spinning around in circles.

Personally, when I am not sure what to write for the next paragraph, I resort to washing the block away: loading the dishwasher, the washing machine, sorting though the mess in my office, and taking showers.

Of course, I am not sure if anyone understood this the other day at the writer's meeting for the student newspaper. I got some strange looks when I said that a lot of my writing occurred in the shower. I wonder how they would have felt about knitting or spinning in a circle.

Ask me a question---what can I do to become a good writer?

2010-08-10T21:52:00.000-06:00

Question: What can I do to become a good writer?

Answer: I think that the number one quality that any writer needs to develop is the ability to be a self-starter. Too many would-be writers spend time looking for the perfect niche, or the perfect mix of keywords, or the perfect site to write for. In the meantime, they are accomplishing no actual writing, and their skill as a writer is not improving at all. Their income is also suffering. The only way to become a good writer is by writing, and the only way you can accomplish that is by learning to self-start.

Living in a Fishbowl IV

2010-08-03T15:45:00.000-06:00

This last month or so, I learned another problem with living in a fishbowl. It turns out that the glass goes both ways; not only can everyone see what you are up to, but quite often you can see what other people are doing and saying also.

I discovered this on Facebook. As some of my readers know, the last relative still talking to me, one of my sisters, decided to throw a fit because I decided that plans made months in advance (plans which involve other people's schedules and feelings) were more important than her plans announced at what I felt was the last minute. There was the additional fact that they said some harsh words in my direction the previous year---basically, it boiled down to the fact that they felt my entire life was a waste of time.

I tried to come to an understanding with them, but got tired of being told that I did not measure up and that I was not allowed to have hurt feelings over how they were treating me ("That is just the way I am"). As my friends know, I do not respond well to anger, threats and blackmail. And if I can't tell you the truth, I quit talking to you.

Even more serious was I tried to take certain things private (emails) only to have them explode in public on my Facebook wall. I am still not sure what that was supposed to accomplish. Maybe they thought that I cared about my reputation...I know that they care about theirs (a habit that mom drilled into us kids).

Of course, the cherry on top was that they decided that they could not work around my schedule and started to make snide comments on their Facebook status updates. An example: "There are two types of people in the world: those who always have time for friends and family and those who do not." Ok, maybe I am paranoid; maybe that was not aimed at me. And if it was, well, the plans I had scheduled months in advance involved friends and my nine-year old god-daughter (who acts like she is related to me)---my crime was not having time for friends and family; it was that I refused to give my sister a higher priority after learning what she thought of my life and that I was required to change while she was allowed to continue being a PITA.

The snide comments went on for days. Now, she was not holding a gun to my head forcing me to read this stuff, nor was I forcing her to read my status updates (I generally went about my life as normal [sort-of]; I did get less writing done than normal).

Then when she got done with her vacation, she went on Facebook bragging about how wonderful her family was (including my abusive mother). I treated these updates the same way as the others, I ignored them (aka did not take the bait, did not respond).

So what did I learn from all this? Well, all public figures get to see what other people think of them. Besides Facebook updates from frenemies (you have to love that term), we also get to see unfavorable opinions about ourselves in the comment sections of articles, on forum postings, and (if you write books) in the review section of Amazon.

Of course, I do not have to read about other people's opinions of me. I can ignore other people's reviews of my work, and comments they make about me. It is easy to ignore one's bad reputation when your very own family set out to destory it before one's public career even started.

And in this case, I do not have to read someone's snide comments disguised as status updates. Why? Because they chose to defriend me yesterday. I guess I am no longer talking to any of my relatives (unless the relatives on my father's side of the family decide to talk to me now---can they be any worse?).

Three random observations

2010-08-02T15:05:00.000-06:00

Here are three random observations for today (random because they came out of my head):

1: There are sure a lot of ads for ballon helium on the writing site Helium. I guess that the spiders that control ad generation believe that people looking for gas to fill party ballons will end up on that site merely because of its name. Then again, I have noticed that often the little ad spiders have no idea what type of ads to put on my pages either. And it is not just Google Adsense either---all spider driven ad systems seem to have this issue. So it goes.

2: There are times when it takes me forever to figure out how to do something, especially things that I have been putting off. Today, I decided to put the "share buttons" on all my blogs here on Blogger. I had installed it on my most popular blog, Gleamings From the Dawn---a blog about Golden Dawn and the mystery traditions, the first day that it was an option. I decided that I would do it another day for the other three blogs I have here. I failed to note where the option was hidden...hence I spent a half hour today looking for the widget that does this. (It is under Design/Blog Posts if you are looking for it yourself.) If I would have done it the day that the option became available, it would have taken me five minutes to do it. *sigh* Good news, all my blogs now have share buttons under the individual posts.

3: The economy probably still sucks eggs on rocks, especially the job market. When I was in the restaurant business, I used to judge how the economy was going by the sales numbers and the behavior of my customers. This habit has carried over into my current profession, being a writer. I watch the articles I have on the pageview sites as a "witch's ball" (the big glass fishing floats that Wiccans use to scry with); as the concerns of my readers go up and down, so too do my articles go up and down with the trend. The fact that my articles about unemployment have shown no signs of cooling off makes me firmly believe that any rosy numbers I hear from the government are being cooked to a fine mash (these articles did not go hot until the job market tanked, so it is not that they are always good pageview generators).

So there you go. Three random observations. Now I really should go work on my latest project---one that I have been putting off for a month.