6/24 & 6/25

6/24

While at the cabin, I opened a dozen or so of my "Hatchling" files and raised the volume.  Today I uploaded ten of them, and every one passed their QC on the first try.  Amazing (or "amazeballs" as my cousin like saying).  The entire audiobook is now at 2 hours and 3 minutes.

I went to the library today, and worked way too little on the washing machine story.  But I take solace in the thought that, if George R.R. Martin wrote as much on his "Winds of Winter" book as I do on mine (whether "Balms & Sears" only, or everything), I'd have finished it years ago.*

Writing or Exercise: Both

6/25

I watched "Columbo" last night instead of doing anything productive.  I had intended to record another chapter (or two) of "But Now I'm Found," but I chose the quick and easy path, as Vader did.  Sorry.

I did get all the "Hatchling" files up on Audible (one was the wrong bandwidth and one was a smidge too quiet).  All I have to do is click the Approve For Sale button, and it's out of my hands forever, thank Buddha.

It occurred to me a day or two ago that one of my goals for 2022 was to put out an Outcast episode for my story "Caller ID," which is the one where the kid gets a call from his adult self every year on the same day.  I had figured to publish it on my birthday, so I could remember to put out another installment every year at the same time . . . but I've done nothing on it in 2022, and now there's only two weeks left.  I really need to get on that in the next week, so I can edit the story one Wednesday and the episode the next.  It's totally doable, if I but try.

As I was heading into the library, I saw a stranger waving right outside the door.  He seemed to be wearing a winter sweater for some reason.  Since he was a stranger, I didn't think he was waving at me, but when I got to the door, it became clear that he had been waving at me, and that he was a homeless guy who wanted a handout.  I told him "Sorry" and went inside.  I thought about him, though, wearing a cardigan in nearly ninety degree heat, and I felt bad for him.  Less than an hour later, when they kicked everybody out, I told myself I'd give the guy a dollar if he was still there, since I was just going to spend it on soda anyway.**

I wrote for about twenty minutes (maybe twenty-five) on "The Washer Whispers."***  It's a fun story.  I've decided the main character is my age, but a grandfather, so I don't know if he qualifies as a Geriatric Protagonist or not. 

You know where this is going, obviously, but yes, when I left the library and looked for the sweatered homeless man . . . he was already dead. 

Writing or Exercise: Both

*I know I talk about this almost endlessly, but I don't understand how he could have had a dozen chapters finished in 2016 (and eleven of those are the ones he released to the public), and still not have it done.  He said he wrote "hundreds of pages" of it during 2020 alone, and yet here we are with no book.  At this point, it wouldn't surprise me to hear that the real George Martin died a decade ago, and there are conspirators keeping it a secret.

**Both Marshal and Big have recently given up soda, so that gives them ridiculously-elevated moral high ground, but I'm here to tell you that soda is up there as one of the great things you can spend your money on, and if I spend a single day of the rest of my life without a soda to drink, then that's a day that's surely wasted.

***I might have to change that.  Marshal Latham mentioned the other day that he thinks "Newfound Fame" should've been titled "The Curse of the Brown Depths," and he may be right.  All I know is I've never thought "Newfound Fame" was a perfect title, even though I like thestory quite a bit (support me on Patreon, and the final episode is already available there).