It's Not Possible

I had this 3k word long post prepared about the coming destruction of society, and maybe humanity, but after reading it again I decided it needs another pass or two before I can let that one see the light of day. I go to some dark places there.

So, instead, I want to point out that I worked (wasted) my weekend trying to expand my horizons by entering the 3D art workplace.

Well, I don't want to chalk that up as a loss yet, but I did not have a good time. I got Poser 9 recently, thinking I could design and build 3D figures. I chose this program because it was relatively cheap and supposedly, great for beginners.

Sigh. I have no idea what I was doing, but I was not creating art, it was not user friendly, and in a lot of ways, extremely frustrating, not to mention, buggy, as it crashed many times, deleting my progress each time.

So I have nothing to show for all my work, nothing. If I knew it would have been like this I would have just gotten Blender or something, at least that one is free. But, I'll be trying it some more, which is why I'm not ready to call it a loss yet. A lot of my frustration is that they seem to be pushing me to use the prebuilt models, which doesn't feel very artistic to me.

Oh well.

I'm Right Here!

Just a quick note to everyone out there. I am on Goodreads. I like the site, and I've been there for a while now. But man, do I suck at making friends. So please, find me and friend me there. Unless you already have, in which case, thank you.

http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5124150.Rusty_Webb

Also, if you are a writer, or hope to be, I really do think the episode of the Simpsons that aired a few weeks ago is an absolute must see. Grumpy (who used to be a doctor - now a secret agent), made mention of it recently and I watched it. It really was great. Lisa is determined to write a novel and... oh, just watch it. I've went through the trouble to embed the thing so you don't even have to go looking for it. So take 25 minutes or so, relax and enjoy.

But don't wait too long to watch, I'm sure they'll disable it at some point in the future.

Insecure Writers, Christmas Edition

I hope we all know the routine by now. Alex J Cavanaugh started the Insecure Writers Support group a few months ago as a chance for all of us to vent our fears/frustrations about writing and to encourage one another. So, please go sign up, or, if you’re one of those writers that doesn’t struggle with confidence, then go and encourage all your fledgling brethren.

Last month, Nancy, who is a mental health expert in the real world, mentioned that the imposter syndrome plagues many people. But then I was thinking, does it still count when you have imposter syndrome but you've not had any success either?

A lot of this goes back to knowing your station in life. I spent many of my formative years living with relatives, grandparents, aunts and uncles, before my mother scrounged up the funds to put us in a sweet little trailer on a farm.

I’m not sure of the relationship we had with the farm owners, but we eventually wore out our welcome and had to move. We took that trailer and found a place that was nestled between lots of country, a few nice homes, and yet another farm. We plopped that trailer down on a very small plot of land that had been slivered off from the many acres of grasses and pasture and we lived there through all my middle school years.

Except for that nagging feeling like I didn’t belong. I always felt like I was that one kid, the one who was living in the wrong zip code. Others belonged and I did not. Never could shake that feeling - my whole life, just thinking that I didn’t belong, no matter where I was. I had to know my place.

I was well into adulthood before I realized that the problem might have just been with me. I’ve always enjoyed diagnosing myself as suffering from an assortment of behavioral disorders, and despite not knowing anything at all about disorders, and usually resorting to making up conditions to classify myself to fit in, I feel like I’m pretty dead on.

Example: did you know that I suffer from Conflictarian Rousal and Avoidance disorder? It’s where I find the situation with the highest drama, completely involving other people, and firmly insert myself into the middle of it, then do everything I can to not be involved.  

It’s a disorder, I have no control.

Anyway, you get the idea. Well, I have also diagnosed myself with the disorder I’ve named, “Social Aversion and Discordance Disorder," the acronym is S.A.D.D., which is cool, but also I’m sure had been taken by some drunk driving campaign, and I don’t want to confuse people, so I changed it to:

“Social and Hierarchal Aversion Temperament?” There, the name is less cool, but I like the acronym better.

Yes, I have S.H.A.T.

This will totally keep people from knowing I'm crazy!

What does that mean? Well, as I started to mention earlier, before I got sidetracked, is that I always feel like I have no business even trying to do the things I do. I feel guilty, yes, guilty for wanting to be a writer. Look, people around me in real life are generally supportive, if a bit confused about why I would choose to do something like this with my free time. But they don’t discourage me, the opposite really. So why do I feel this way, why do I feel bad about writing, about hoping to write even more?

I have no idea. Does it have something to do with my childhood? The more I think about it the more I think I would have felt this way no matter my upbringing. I mean, it sounds so lame that a farmer forcing my mother to move when I was a kid was that big a deal, I moved a couple of times a year up until I got to middle school. That wasn't that big a deal, and it sounds like a pretty lame excuse. No, I was just born this way. I’m insecure, yes, I have S.H.A.T., but I haven’t let that stop me for moving on anyway.

So, here’s to feeling like I can belong. Cheers.

My Last Sales Update

From time to time, I like to post my sales figures, just to let people know where I stand in regards to the relative success of my short story I’ve posted on various online ebook outlets. I think information should be free and freely available, shared and all that.

That’s kind of a guiding principal in my life, I tend to share stuff to people if they ask, and I like knowing stuff. Not necessarily anyone’s personal business, but things that are kept arbitrarily secret for no real reason bugs me some.

However, it was brought to my attention recently that publishing my sales figures could very well be a breach of the terms of service for those aforementioned ebook retailers, and they would be perfectly within their rights to pull my measly little short story and shut down my seller account.

Along with my desire to see information be free, I am somewhat pragmatic, and don’t have a burning desire to rail against the world for my terms of service agreement, which I did, after all, agree to. Not real sure I could expect to sway too many people to my way of thinking on this one, so I’m nipping this in the bud and caving to the draconian demands of my ebook selling overlords: No future sales numbers from me.

Also, on an unrelated note, I got an email from Amazon letting me know that my ebook will be available in Italy. I’m not saying that they opened up the whole country just for my little short story that has sold XX number of copies. But there is a bit of a spaghetti western vibe going on there, and I’d like to think they saw some potential and so decided to give it a go.

Harry Potter

I had an internet free weekend. It was weird. I didn't write anything, again, weird. The teenager waltzed in and asked if I wanted to watch the Harry Potter movies this weekend. So we sat around and watched them. It took most of Saturday and Sunday to get through them all, so I did pretty much nothing at all. It was quite nice, and I can see why so many people like doing it. It was pretty awesome.

I had a few thoughts. First, the movies are better than I thought. I know, everyone loved them. I never did. I always felt that with having already read the books, a newcomer would be lost trying to follow the rather involved plot that runs through the series. Especially later, when the books got thick and there was lots of information the viewer needed to understand what was happening.

Having read the books, not such a big deal for me, but still, I just like the books so much more, The movies are mere shadows compared to the novels.

But, I've pretty much seen them in theaters and never again. So watching them together was nice, as the teen doesn't want to hang around with me as much as he used to. That it's been several years since I read the books means that I don't have that chronology running around inside my head at the moment either. I figured, why not?

So, for the first time, I watching them as movies, and nothing else. And I liked them, well, I liked them except for the first two, which seemed a bit too, um, I don't know, kiddie, to me. They smiled too much, there were too many wacky hijinks. I found I didn't really like Dumbledore much then either.

But by the time we got to number three things turned awesome in a hurry. The series got darker, the threat of Whatshisname got serious. I did the wikipedia thing to see what was written about the direction and learned that Chris Columbus directed the first two, and intended to do all of them. He got burnt out and said he'll just produce. That saved this series, if they'd all been in the same style as the first two I don't think I could have stuck it out.

But anyway, it's all history now. So, I've provided for you, my favorites, in order:

The Prisoner of Azkaban
Deathly Hallows Pt I
The Order of the Phoenix
The Half-Blood Prince
Deathly Hallows Pt II*
The Goblet of Fire
The Chamber of Secrets
The Sorcerer's/Philosophers's Stone

Happy Monday, for those of you that think Monday can be good.

*Confession, I didn't watch PtII this weekend. I was going to, but I didn't. I'll watch it thing week. I'm basing my enjoyment of that one on my movie going experience, and since I've already explained that I liked them much more this weekend, my opinion might change about that one.

News, Notes, and Nubbins

I had a great time with Ciara Night's blog hop yesterday. Many of the authors found their books. Please stop by her blog and find out how others did.

First Item: That's right. I won the crap out of Nano this year. I think that makes it lucky number 7 for me. I'd have to go back and look to be sure, but I think that's right.

It was the most difficult year to date for me. I chucked my outline a few paragraphs in and that made it tough. I managed to squeak into that glorious winner's circle by churning out many thousands of words in the final days. Take a look at the nifty nano word count stats below to glean what wisdom you can from my ordeal. As you can see I was behind the pace almost from the very beginning. Well, really I guess I fell off the wagon at around day 5. I nearly quit around day 20, but I decided that even if I didn't make it, I wasn't going to go out a quitter. So I plugged away and during the last week I think I hit a stride of sorts. I'm not quite halfway through the story and am definitely taking a few days to do other things before I start writing again.

Item 2: Dr Grumpy himself has decided to get into the whole blogfest thing. Not by merely participating of course, but by hosting one, he's giving out prizes and everything. Please stop by, say hello, and sign up. Let's see, I don't think he has an official linky thing up.So comment HERE and I'm sure you'll be counted as in the running.

That's real money that will be changing hands there folks, real money.

In case you're curious, and can't be bothered to check the link above, the blogfest is dedicated to Christmas. Wait, scratch that, Dr. Grumpy has a vendetta against that word. It's a blogfest dedicated to the holidays, specifically, the twelve things you most hate about the season.

I know, how can I possibly narrow it down to only twelve. Just kidding. It gives us all permission to vent a little about some of the more annoying aspects of the holiday season.

The Nubbins: Yes, just one last thing. I've put off a lot of stuff over the past month, and will be feverishly working on some of the things I've put off doing over the next few weeks. So everyone, if you're waiting on me to do something that I've promised I was going to do. I'll be getting my butt in gear in December.

Did I Notice Your Book?

The lovely Ciara Night graciously asked me if I'd like to be a part of her 'Did I Notice Your Book' blogfest today, and I couldn't say yes fast enough.

To put it plainly. I'm tasked with putting a book I've noticed recently up on my blog, and seeing if the author notices my post. Sounds like tons of fun. It's also a grand experiment in how memes can spread. Ciara has been doing this for a while now, and a surprisingly high percentage of authors eventually find their books, even without knowing anything about the blog post before the day begins.

The blogfest is highlighting authors from several genres, please visit Ciara's blog today to see how well this experiment plays out.

My genre? Science Fiction.


My choice, well, it was tough. I had something in mind right from the beginning, then thought better of it and chose another book from another author, then changed my mind again and again. In the end I went through about 5 or 6 books before I settled on one.

So, without further adieu:

Neanderthal Swan Song, by Rick Novy

From the blurb:
The world of anthropology would have been excited when a perfectly preserved Neanderthal body is discovered in the Greenlandic permafrost, if authorities would allow the details out. When an American anthropologist involved in the excavation is denied access to the body, she uses an illicit tissue sample as source material to carry the Neanderthal’s clone to term herself.

Meet Ike Mudge, twenty-first-century Neanderthal man. Self-educated and raised in a laboratory thirty-thousand years out of his time, he is alone in a world of billions. Will it drive him insane, or will he make a final contribution for his kind–a Neanderthal Swan Song?


For what it's worth, this book sounds amazing to me. So, Rick, if you're out there, please drop me a line in the comments below and let me know that you found your book profiled here today, and how you discovered it.