scribbles's Blog

Well, I wrote over 100,000 words this year, submitted 40 articles, had publised 22 articles and successfully completed the nanowrimo.com writing contest with 50,000 words in 25 days. I tried a lot of new markets like flash fiction, commercial writing and journalism. I even tried cold calling . A wise man once said that a being was like a star in that to live they both must emanate. So, here is to out-flow and what ever it brings in 2011.
  If anyone wants a catalog of my stuff, or a newsletter, send an e-mail to positivegain@hotmail.com..
  Here is to a new year of prosperity and joy.

 Be an artist of your own life and slurge on it.

I notice the ice cream add about what 5 things are important in one's life. I have an odd point of view about these things and gave it some thought and here they are:

1. A game: Life is a game. It maybe cruel, you might not like the game you are playing but all the parts of the game are there. You have a goal, something you want to obtain. No different that a football player wanting to score. There are barriers that you must over-come. But remember, the game is much more fun than the award or accomplishment. The crowd will go home after the game and stop cheering. That's when you need to get into another game. It is what life is all about.

2. Awareness: Got to be able to see that tiger pit cover before you drop into it. It is hard sometimes to get others who are blind to see. And I am not particularly talking about faith, that is another perception.

3. Ability: Can't play any kind of interesting game if you don't climb the academic ladder to some degree. I am not a big fan of Earth's education process. Many a millionaire never went to college. Street smarts are not a class. But, unless you want to be the waterboy all your life and watch the bigger game being played, pick up something to read and learn about it.

4. Others: Though you could have a game between you, a ball and a wall, you are going to have to face the fact that you belong in a group by choice or not. Communicating leads to the discovery of finding someone with mutual likes and dislikes and to the appreciation of others.

5. A safe space: If your environment sucks, your so called friends are gang bangers or endorse a life of crime. Get the heck out of there. Even a water boy is better than watching the game from jail or the far end of a joint.  Find some place which is not harping, critical and supportive of pro-survival pursuits. 

  These are my essentials to life. Let the games really begin, and have fun.

   No body likes to hear that they are wrong. It is surely wrong to criticize others for the purpose to make them wrong. But, understand it is the intention behind the message which is often misunderstood.

  As a writer and author, criticism and counter-efforts are part and partial to the process in gaining publication. An author who is thin skinned will not last long in the writing business. I suspect the same is for politicians. The problem is complicated when we rear up in protest, point fingers at others when being told we are wrong is introduced to some of us.

  We have to be allowed to learn and find the correct answers to our lives by our own self-determinism.  You can't scream at a teenager and expect him to change his self-destructive ways.  Keeping the affinity high, agreement intact and staying in communication is the only way wrong behavior, choices and skill sets are ever eventually corrected.

   This is something I have finally come to grips with, and boy am I happy for it. Today I wrote a correction order to myself after I got my manuscript back from my proofreader. Not everything can be corrected. We still do not agree every time on what is the best adjective or adverb, but simple grammar, writing mechanics can and will be improved for the future.

  A golden age author once said: "The author writing a story estimates many, many efforts. If he is right, it is an interesting story and sells.  If he is wrong, it is not interesting story and it does not sell.” LRH

   After having been wrong for a decade, tomarrow I might sell a book.  The key thing about correcting the errors, the wrong headed thinking is that it creates such a bright and shiney future!  You can stop being stuck in the past, and start planning for tomarrow. It is a great feeling. 

As I close in on my goal of 1 million words written, I find myself nearly 1/2 way there at 499,239 words or approximately 1,998 pages. This includes both fictional stories and non-fiction articles over a 12 year period.  I decided to have a contest inwhich I will reward the winner a free copy of any of my books if they can guess what will be the 500,000th word.  Since I visit this site once a month, I will check back then to see if anyone guest the right word.

   My goal is part of a list of desired accomplishments in writing. You can see the entire list at my Writer's Write blog at http://positivepr.livejournal.com  .  If you wish to see my books, they are at my website at: www.eburg.com/~positivepr/ .

   In the meantime, keep them keys rattleing.

                                 

   Being asked the question, “Why do you write Science Fiction?” is like asking a man in the desert why he kept drinking.  Both I and that old codger in the scrublands would look at the person whom inquired with an odd twitch of our necks, causing our heads to bob like one of them plastic dogs in the back windshield of a sixty seven ford. It would ordinarily be followed by a spray of tobacco juice spat on the ground from a current mouthful of chew.
   Although I never smoked or chewed tobacco, I understand the symbolism.
   Old Louie Barnojarni, an immigrant from France, and a neighbor across the street where I grew up,  once told me a story of when he was a boy and observed the old men whom rocked in chairs along an eastern Atlantic boardwalk. They would spit and say, “It will never replace a horse.”  They said that in response to the first noisy and smelly gas driven car which came to town.
   Ok, so they were wrong about their spitting tirade in the later example, but you can see how knowledge and experience get tangled up with spitting.  That black piece of goo is like saying poetically, “gee let me count the ways,” metaphorically speaking. It is a complete communication. It was used very artfully by Clint Eastwood in the movie Josey Wales. 
     Having been asked enough similar questions, one inherently understand that you could never explain nor satisfy the query with either adequate prose or  include all the facets of the genre.
   When I was in the hospital, a nurse asked me why I wrote. I tried to answer her as simple as possible and at the end of my discourse she replied, “I don’t get it.” 
   Another nurse saw my catalog of books which I had written and she asked, “So how come you have not been on Ophra yet?”
   Do you understand why them old boys just spat!
   I could have given examples of “future thinkers” like Captain Nemo’s submarine or how often there is some science in Science Fiction, but, alas, I don’t think it would help. Writers of any genre or style in their initial stages of there efforts have been asked by well meaning relatives and friends , “You’re a writer huh. I read a book once. How much do you make anyways?”
   It is not a mystery why we crowd hotels during conventions and gobble up every precious piece of writing war story and successful fairy tale about how such and such has gotten a book published and now live in some ivory tower. 
   Next time you are asked such a question, just symbolically spit. It’s better that way. The hotel staff or your mother won’t make you clean it up.
 

October 4, 2008
 

Department of Social
& health Services
          

 To whom it may concern
    
     I received  your letter of  9/29/08 which again denies me any help with my medical bills and further denies me any help until after 11/08.  Personally, I can not understand DHS’s policies compared to the reality of life . Dose DHS really believe that  having  over 2,000 dollars is  “too much” resources with the prices of today’s medical costs?  I sent you a partial of my medical bills which exceeded $70,000.00.  I sent you a copy of my pass book which had “CANCELED PASSBOOK” sticker on it.  Cancelled means there is no account. No account means there is no money. I showed you I paid out  over $16,000.00 dollars  which drained  my account  until I had less than $2,000.00 dollars . It took me 12 years to save that money and you know I do not have a house, or a car  to mortgage or sell. You have been informed that my foot has been amputated which has caused me to have no further income since July.
    I have already been denied disability by  Social Security  for what ever reason they gave.  I was not asking for money or food stamps, only an opportunity to reimburse medical facilities located in the “State of Washington” for the work they have done.
   I thought coping with having my foot being amputated and the long road to recovery was hard enough. Most assuredly  you can not identify with how difficult it is to live day after day with not being able to walk or do  the simple things like taking out the garbage, mowing a lawn or getting the groceries for my 88 year old mother.  Maybe you have not felt the humiliation or degradation of having to ask others to do the chores you once did. Chores which were done in exchange for a roof over my head and food at the table. But, that is nothing compared with the financial ruin which resulted from this ordeal. To know that even with the future restoration of walking with a prosthesis that all your future plans and activities requiring  a buck must be canceled. That your life is on hold until further notice. It is the inability to pay for my existing and future medical care that is the most stressful.  I have never wanted to ask anything from my local. State or Federal government.  Self reliance has always been the key stone of my beliefs. It appears to me now,  that my mistake was either  having too much money in the bank to get help or earning too little income over  of my lifetime to handle such a medical crisis.  Unfortunately, either mistake it is, can not be remedied now. The proverbial Catch 22.  
 
 Sincerely,

Flustrated tax payer

 

Writing & Editing Credits:

Member of the qualifications department of Bridge Publications 1994 to 1995 in Los Angeles, CA.

Freelance articles for Daily Record Newspaper in Ellensburg, WA. 2002 to 2003


Freelance Writer for Genweekly.com magazine with over 37 articles from 2003 to present.

Freelance Writer for 5+ articles with the Kittitas County Genealogical Society newsletter 2004 to present, Ellensburg, WA.

Contributing Writer and Member of the Editing committee for the Owen Family Association newsletter , 2007 to present.

Writer & Editor of Alkali Flats Gazette 1-10th issue; (365+ circulation)
Positive Spin Newsletter 1-6th issue.

Membership of:

Willamette Writers association, Pacific Northwest Writer's accoiation, Ellensburg Pictures words writing club

Published Author:

Science fiction novels published; "The Corridor" 1999, "The T'na Chronicles" 2004, The Prophesy of Arden 2005
Chapbooks Published: "The IOD's" 2003(Also published on "Bewildering Stories", "The Throne Cult" 2004, "The Time merchant" 2005, "The Sudoku Code" 2006, "The GPS Murders" 2007, "The Adventures of Captain Adam Smith" series. 2006 to present.
Genealogy Books: "I don't know you from Adam" Vols. I & II 2003, The Owen Family 2nd Edition 2003.

Conventions I attend:
Radcon (February) Pasco, WA.
Norwestcon (April) SeaTac, WA.

You can purchase the above books at PGE Publishing website at:  www.eburg.com/~positivepr/

 

 

 In the course of human endeavors, one must confront his own mental, physical and spirtual short comings. Somethimes the sure is far scarier than the problem. But the loving and nurturing nurses and doctors at UWMC in Seattle, WA. aided me greatly in what turned out to be an important chapter in my own life's memior (aptly entitled: "The Memoir of a Minion").  In July of 2008 I had the front portion of my foot amputated which had a cancerous tumor. If this was not hard enough, I also battled an auto-immune disorder called Pemphigus and at the same time, I was informed that I proved positive for type II diabetes. 

    For the outcome; You can see the rest of the story at http://blog.myspace.com/67504807

Scribbles

 Obviously there are ultimate truths which politcians do not have a clue about. For example, "if what you think is the problem, does not resolve the problem, then that was not the problem."

   The debate over the two main parties seem to try to win the support from stereotyped groups and then hold their collective breath over what polls say.  The Democrats proport to be the crusader of the poor and middle class while chastizing the republicans for supporting big business and rich people.  How long has these two groups been bantering the same old dividing lines in the sand? Decades?

   People are either capable or not capable, there is an ability issue which never has been equated into the mix. We are fore-shadowed by 1.) our environment and the amount of nurturing vs supression in it. 2.) Our education which may or may not be from institutions and 3.) Our view points which can be on a scale of fixed-ness on past events and subjects which influence how we see things in the present.

    Combined these elements and you have individuals which can or can not reach for new experiences, strive to improve conditions or make rational and ethical decistions about their own life.  Part of the fixed-ness includes willingness to communicate, exsist, create and own situations about self and others. It takes confront, and instead of confronting the elements which underlie such problems of society, politicians point fingers at each other and create nonmenclature that mean nothing and handles nothing. 

  That's my thought about the political scene today.