January Sweeps - Day 342

So, I spoke to Big Anklevich today.  He told me he felt it was time to run our fabled "Final Episode" of the Dunesteef Audio Fiction Magazine, which we recorded around 2010.  The reason is financial more than emotional, as he is the one who pays for the hosting and domain name, and despite our recent Christmas productivity, the donations he receives aren't going to cover what he'll pay in 2021 (he even had to pay extra in December since we ran five episodes on the feed, exceeding our bandwidth).

We would still podcast together, from time to time, appearing on one another's solo shows, and maybe return to That Gets My Goat (one of my New Year's Resolutions is to put out the lost episode from 2019 we did with Marshal), but he would no longer have to pay to maintain Dunesteef.com, and LibSyn, which hosts the shows.  I told him to mention this to his fans before he goes forward with it, but I didn't try to talk him out of it.  

When the two of us went our separate ways in June of 2017, him moving to Houston and me staying in a puddle of my own filth, we vowed to stay in touch, and we have done so, texting every day and speaking twice a week.  But the topical podcast has never recovered, and the short story podcast was already on life support.  We now only do the show on special occasions, and another of my resolutions for the year is to get together with him to do one of our stories on video (a trial run I did last year with my story "Rest Stop"), and he told me, Why not have that be our final story on the show?

Time will tell what we decide on that front.

In other news, I hit the library again the way you'd hit your local pub, and had a much easier time writing, even though it was right before closing.  I'm back working on "Only Have Eyes," and I'm going to have to figure out how much of it can be left unresolved at the end, as I had three subplots going in it--Mason's romance, Natalie's brush with a new, terrifying spirit, and Meeshelle's suspicions about her boss.  It seems natural to combine the Natalie and Meeshelle plot at the end, but I don't know how one goes about getting rid of a particularly nasty spirit in a place that is as haunted as Noble Oaks is.  Can you bring in a preacher or Mormon missionary and have them cast that specific ghost out of the building, or would it send the other, less malevolent ones packing too?  I guess I'll have to ask Marshal about i--

Wait, ghosts aren't real, are they?  I can have whatever I want happen.  Hmmm.  That should make things easier, but it doesn't.  Anyway, I guess I'll just focus on Mason and Rowan and cross the other bridge when/if I get there.

Push-ups Today: 50
Push-ups In January: 683

Sit-ups Today: 100
Sit-ups In January: 903

I closed out the evening with my sit-ups, a few warm-up push-ups, and my run around the neighborhood, but as I was jogging, I remembered the story I had been planning to record the last two nights (I think it's called "Bad Trip," but I don't much like that title), so I cut it short a block early, turning to go back home the street before I normally turn (which I don't tend to use because, if I've gone all that way--.80 of a mile, why not just go to the next block?), and ran east . . . until I reached an entire street with no streetlights, or any houses with their porchlights on.  

It was surprisingly dark, since there was no moon out and the major street I usually run on has streetlights on both sides of the road.  It was good and spooky, like the little farm town where I grew up, and I have to admit that I slowed way down, afraid that I might slip on some unseen ice, or just trip over a crack in the asphalt.  And as I was passing a fence, a dog started barking ferociously on the other side of it, scaring me quite excellently.  It made me think I should be writing horror stories instead of Romance, Christmas tales, Westerns, and contagion tales set on a space colony.

When I got home, I once again wanted to just press Pause on the world so I could get my editing done, record a story, finish my blog from the day before, and write up my New Year's Resolution list, so I could record an episode about it, which would necessitate deleting files off my recorder, which I couldn't do until I'd edited them and knew they were fine, which I can't do because I have no time (not to mention the two library books that sit beside my bed, unread, every night, which I probably won't crack until it's time to take them back a month from now).

I chose to sit down and record "Bad Trip," since I could use it for a future episode . . . and it just wasn't very good.  I disappointed myself, because the premise was so amusing, and I couldn't wait to share it on the podcast, offending my listeners with five full minutes of dick talk.  There was only one line that made me laugh (so I had to do it over) in a story that was meant to be darkly hilarious.

So, I won't be doing an episode about "Bad Trip" (which I retitled "Afield Trip," and then changed it back).  But I will put it in my fifth audio collection, and maybe Big will have something nice to say about it.

Words Today: 374
Words In January: 4097