Back to Work

So it is back to work for me next week. It has been nine long weeks since I last set foot in the pharmacy. I am both anxious to get back and dreading it. Going back should be a good feeling, but with all that is going on there right now, it will be like jumping back into the middle of a firefight.

But I need to go back, even if the headaches aren't gone. Being a Manager of People is sometimes a dreadfully thankless job, but it can also be extremely important. I don't pretend to be the best leader on the planet, but I like to think I do a pretty good job. But working with egos and emotional baggage can be a lot more stressful than just throwing together widgets. Or writing.

So back I go. Back into the fire and the frenzy. The good news is the book is nearly complete. I see three more chapters and an epilogue and then its time to go back to the beginning and revise, revise, revise.

Let's hope I have the energy to finish those last chapters once I return to my Real Job.

What its about (for real this time)

So, at least one of my blog readers (Hi Mom!) commented that I didn't really give you all a good idea of what my book was about in this post.

Muahahahaha! That means I am doing it right! You are supposed to be curious! You are supposed to be intrigued! What does the venerable Aspiring Author have up his sleeve?

Eh. Who am I kidding? IF/WHEN this thing gets published, it will likely be years from now, so below the jump, I will give you a little more detail...

Work Stoppage

You shall pet me and love me and worship me before you are allowed to begin Chapter 32! So sayeth Mystic Kitty!

Concussion Junction, What's your Function?

It has been eight long weeks of headaches for me, thanks to someone doing their best Metta World Peace impression to my noggin in a hockey game. Later this morning, I will finally go to the neurologist who (I hope) can shed some light on 'why'. I don't hold any expectations regarding 'how long' or finding 'this magic pill', as I am fully aware that the only consistent thing with concussions is their inconsistency in how long it takes to recover.

What I do hope happens is that I get sent for tests to rule out anything ugly, like a cracked bone in my neck, or, heaven forbid, a tumor. I honestly don't think those are issues, but until I get some scans/tests to confirm that, I can't squash those mental bugs that occasionally pop up when I am hurting the worst.

UPDATE: Crap. I am out of work for another month until I get an MRI and switch over my meds. The meds I have been on are apparently great in the short term, but terrible in the long term because they cause rebound headaches after a while. Loving Wife and I just looked at each other on the way home and shook our heads. We're pharmacists. We should have known that. Just goes to show it is very difficult to "treat yourself" when you are a medical professional.

Another Chapter done

Hard to believe, but Chapter 31 is now complete. It was probably one of the fastest chapters I have written. As I mentioned in a previous post about Chapter 30, writing the ending is actually easier in many ways. Unlike the middle of the book, where the characters can go off in innumerable ways (and often do!), the end provides a funnel effect where many things must happen in order to complete the story.

The only hard part? Making sure that a) things don't happen too quickly, b) that it isn't so predictable that the reader doesn't even bother to read the last twenty pages, and c) you don't forget anything!

A very successful literary agent commented that in the larger framework of any story, the protagonist must undergo a series of ups and downs. No one likes a hero who wins every fight or a villian who has no sympathetic characteristics. Why? Because its BORING and no one wants to read boring.

So, I just finished beating the crap out of my protagonist in Chapter 31 and damn was it fun. But I have to knock him down so that when he gets back up, it will be that much more satisfying.

I just never expected to find so much joy in putting him through the wringer. :)

A lesson on genre

So, what is my book about.? I have been getting many questions about that. Okay, no, I haven't, because no one really reads this blog yet. But I am going to tell you anyway! (Because when I become Published Author, you're gonna want to know what the hell was going on 'way back when')

First, a lesson on genre.

If you surf the net long enough at 2am, you eventually come across a lot of websites that feature naked women definitions of the various kinds of genres into which books are generally classified and stratified. Genre is different from category. You can get a decent accounting of the type of categories, by looking at amazon.com. Getting a decent account of genre is a little more difficult.

House Hunting sucks

Looked at eight houses today that were for rent in the area we like and in the price range we want. FIVE of them already had deals in place. Two turned out to be serial rentals  (read: trashy!).

Only one was decent. It will probably be gone tomorrow.

I seriously hope rentals are turning over quickly.

Milestone!

Tonight, I finished chapter 30 in my book. Since I plan on 34-36 chapters (depending on how naturally the final plot points come together), I am on the home stretch.

In fact, Chapter 31 starts the denouement.

Time to move! Wait, what?

Well this is a fine how-do-you-do. Earlier this week, I sent an email to our landlord to see if the terms of our lease would be changing. The response?

"We're selling the house. Get the heck out!"

I may have added that last part. The truth is, while it throws summer plans into complete turmoil, we need more room. With Ian growing almost as fast as the sunflowers in the back yard and Loving Wife and I trading elbows to the gut while sharing an office, more room will be welcome. We are definitely looking this as glass half full. It will also potentially allow me to get a little closer to work.

Our only issue? School. Ian is just going into middle school, and he is still a year away from potentially going to OCHSA. Decisions, decisions. Anyway, time to start saving boxes and donating clothes.

Oh...and there will definitely be pizza and beer to anyone willing to answer a call from us come moving weekend!

Weeeener!

Anyone who knows me understands that I am a huge LA Kings fan.

Thus, you can surmise that I am deleriously happy that the Kings won the Stanley Cup. What you don't know is that I am not some fairweather fan. I enjoy baseball, like football and will even watch most of a soccer match on occasion. But hockey, especially Kings hockey, can literally affect my health. If the Kings lose a couple games in a row, my heartburn kicks up to flame thrower levels and I am pretty sure my blood pressure goes up twenty points. When they win, I swear I lose weight and become more attractive to my wife.

So, being the kick-ass Kings fan that I am, and true believer, I put a bet down on the Kings to win the Stanley Cup, two hours before the game. The first game of the playoffs. I will soon be off to collect my 18-1 winnings.

That definitely makes me feel like giddy.

Being a Writer vs Being an Author

Being a writer is easy. You sit down in front of your computer and pound away to put the letters together to make words, you put the words together to make sentences and the sentences together to hopefully convey a coherent thought.

I am already a writer.

But I am not an Author. Being an Author is much harder than being a writer. Being an Author means writing in a way that other people like it so much, they want to pay to read to it. I have no doubt that I am in for a goodly number of rejections, a healthy dose of skepticism and sackful of "I told you so" from one corner of the universe or another.

But the cool thing about being an Author? You have to be a writer first and it doesn't matter how many rejections I get, how much skepticism is sent my way or how many people tell me "I told you so", they can't stop me from writing.

So I will keep doing that. And hope that by suffering through the hardships, I come out ready to be an Author instead of just a writer.

...And so it begins

With these words, I become a blogger. Weird to think about. Blogs are what I read, not what I write. But here I am, putting myself out there, throwing words at the web and seeing what gets stuck.

I can't count how many blogs that I have been to where I lurk and lurk and lurk and never comment or participate. While it is not in my nature to be overly careful, it is in my nature to be spontaneous. Thus, instead of becoming a commentor or forum troll, I just ran out and put up my own blog.

There is a reason, of course. Nothing is done without thoughtful consideration. Well, that's not true, I do a lot without any thought whatsoever, but in this case, I am hoping this becomes the home of the DavHalt the Published Author. Perhaps a few years from now, I will look at this post and tell my future self that I was a genius for starting it now.

Or not.

This could be just another leaf blown into the gutter of the information superhighway, crinkling, crackling and decaying in the detritus of life.

Or maybe its the first post of a dude who finally got his book published. Only time will tell.

Either way, since no one else is likely to do so, I welcome myself to my new blog. I wonder how long before someone else stumbles across it...