Blog 4/29 - 5/1

 4/29

Wow, I've come to the library five days in a row.  The people who work here must think I haven't got a life.  Pretty perceptive, the people here.

Comic artist Neal Adams died today at eighty.  He was an excellent Batman artist in the Seventies, worked on the X-men at the end of its run (when the art really got good), and was the artist on Green Arrow when it was revealed "My ward Speedy is a junkie!!!"  

He was very active at conventions, and I wish I had spoken to him more before he died (but he was before my time reading comics, and I was never much of a DC guy to begin with).  He was a co-creator of Ra's Al Ghul, Man-Bat, and was responsible for bringing the Joker and Two-Face into their modern, twisted versions (from the lighter, sillier Silver Age incarnations).

On the "Balms & Sears" front, I got to the part in the story I started writing in 2018 or '19 where a character says "faggot" and Alec's friend Chase (who is in the closet) tries to talk him out of using that word.  It's a difficult scene, because in my day, we used that word all the time, and the student that uses it doesn't mean it as hate speech, just as a casual angry word.  I'm not sure we live in a world where a character can say that and not seem villainous, you know?  And it makes me wonder if I'm a villain if I use it in my story, regardless of context.*

4/30

This marks six days in a row at the library.  But I don't know if today counts.  I was anxious to record a bit for a future podcast, so I took my microphone with me on the drive, and then I wanted to say more, so I just sat in the car with the windows closed for twenty minutes recording, despite the library closing in half an hour. 

When I finally came in, I had sweated through my shirt, which is pretty embarrassing.  But hey, maybe people just thought I didn't know how to work a drinking fountain.

The book now sits at 35,691 words.  But of course, only 34,000 of those are actual story.  To my horror, as I was typing this, I realized I had not emailed myself the work-in-progress.  I'd be logged out in two minutes (although they've screwed me twice before on that, logging me out before the timer reached zero).  I didn't do a great deal of writing today, but any loss is a pain, you know?

Gosh, I wish I were a better writer, and successful at it.  But it's something I love to do, so that's a huge point in its favor.

5/1

It's a new month, with a chance to start again, and get things done.  I wrote and/or exercised every day but one in April.  We'll see if I can do better in May.

May is a cool month.  Well, I'm a fan.

I mostly drove around, talking to Big Anklevich and podcasting today.  Guess all I can say about that is, Buh!

*Like that listener of my podcast that said I was basically a white supremacist for saying the n-word in somebody else's screenplay years ago.