A Very Brief Post

Hi Folks, A very brief post today. First, I wish you a happy Christmas Eve, a Merry Christmas, a happy and prosperous New Year, and an overall happy holiday season. I also invite you to check out my Journal for today. Anytime today, please visit This Link. I’ll be updating the post until around 3 p.m. To make it more valuable to writers and the curious, from this day forward the Journal will contain an introduction … Read more

Setting Goals — 2016 Is Almost Here

Hey Folks, If you’re a human being with dreams and aspirations, this is a great time to be thinking about what you want to attain or achieve in 2016. If you’re a writer, that means thinking about goals. At the minimum I recommend setting a daily writing goal, one that automatically resets at the beginning of each time period. If your goal is to write 1000 words per day and you meet or exceed it, great. … Read more

A Revised Baker’s Dozen: Thirteen Traits of a Professional Writer

Hi Folks, I’m sending this out a little early because, darn it, it’s the Christmas season and I wanna give you a few presents. I’ll slip in an appropriate post on the 21st just to keep the routine of every ten days going. That’s when this one would have gone if I’d left it to its own devices. First, Merry Christmas. If you don’t celebrate Christmas, I hope you have an enjoyable holiday season. Also, I … Read more

The Journal, Tuesday, 12/15

Hi Folks, Back on track for writing during my quiet time. In fact, during the wake-up, I wrote an article, basically, to rebuff a HuffPo article in which the author got pretty much everything wrong. As my response was not really long, I’m including it in this post. For reference, the full Huffington Post article is here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/janet-tavakoli/apple-taxes-authors-patie_b_8711882.html I hate it when such obviously slanted stuff is offered (and bought, unfortunately, by many writers) as fact. … Read more

The Journal, Monday, 12/14

Hi Folks, Well, on the second day of my new system of writing during my quiet time, I messed it up. (grin) On the up side, I limited my waking up time to about ten minutes. On the down side, I spent the next two and a half hours on admin stuff, prepping The Scent of Acacias for layout for print. Sigh. I forgot I hadn’t done that yet. I already have folks wanting boxed sets … Read more

The Journal, Sunday, 12/13

Hi Folks, Today is the first day of me going back to writing earlier instead of allowing my quiet time to be taken up with other nonsense. I’m allowing myself a half-hour to an hour and a half administrative time. During that time I’ll check and respond to emails, update my Fiction spreadsheet and tend to other administrative matters. I’ll also take care of the kitten and come here to begin the Journal entry for the … Read more

The Journal, Saturday, 12/12

Hi Folks, This was mostly a non-writing day. I wasn’t really planning it to be a day off, but that’s how it turned out. So about 2:30 p.m., I called it. Suffice it to say I really need to start getting two to three hours of writing done while the world is quiet in the early morning hours. Then no matter what happens the rest of the day, at least I got something done. The Day … Read more

The Journal, Friday, 12/11

Hi Folks, Still under the weather a bit today but definitely on the mend. It feels good knowing by this time tomorrow I ought’a be back to my normal level of unhealthinessicity. (grin) The Day Rolled out a little before 3 this morning. Sometime overnight my subconscious set up an alarm reminding me to get the “boxed set” of the Wes Crowley novels out for that one guy who might want it for Christmas. (grin) So … Read more

Finding the Right Web Browser

Hi Folks, Right up front, let me say if you have a browser you like, one that works for you, then you might want to just skip this post. I’m not putting this up here as a source of argument, but only to help those who might have found themselves in the same situation. There are a lot of browsers out there that are NOT Internet Explorer (or the upcoming Edge) or Google Chrome or Firefox … Read more

The Journal, Thursday, 12/10

Hi Folks, Okay, I had a bit of a rough night last night, but the lag isn’t too bad. So my goal for today is to write two separate short stories. If I can do that, I should shoot straight past my daily publishable-words writing goal. This is my way of jumpstarting myself back into writing after finishing the novel. Helps me avoid the post-writeum depression. I’ve mentioned before that I don’t celebrate finishing a novel. … Read more