Week in Review

This is something I am usually going to do on Saturday, to more or less replace A Thousand Days, because I epically failed on that front. Basically I write little interesting tidbits of random things that happened during the week, even if it is not particularly interesting. This week it starts Thursday the 6th and ends today, Wednesday the 12th.

Thursday-It's that time of year at JCP. A careful selection of all the worst and most obnoxious versions of Christmas songs are playing there. The few decent ones they accidentally let slip will soon be just as irritating through pure repetition. Also, apparently it is the time of year to play Mexican music? Seriously, every third song was in Spanish.

Friday-To think that Rear Window was considered scandalous in the day. Life was so different back then. Also, I finally got new Khakis and British pants during my hour long lunch since it was an eight hour shift.

Saturday-Things I have done since Wednesday, school, work, sleep, exercised, and watched Rear Window.

Sunday-Sweet blessed day off. I need to find the instructions to Hit the Deck card game. I have the game, not the instructions, and playing it like Uno is kind of lame.

Monday-Back to work, but I was just there. My family ate all the fish so I had fries for dinner, and pretty much all the salad.

Tuesday-Why was it so busy today? Seriously? Tuesday is never busy, but even into the afternoon I could not get away from the register. Oh, and apparently I eat too much salad at dinner. They have to add a whole extra head. Well excuse me for trying to have a balanced diet!

Wednesday-I am all up to speed. Not that I am using speed, because I don't take drugs, unless they are farm grown naturally and organic*.


*That was another joke, I don't actually take drugs. Well, like Aspirin and stuff, sometimes, but I even try to stay away from over-the-counter stuff because I feel like an excessive amount of medicine use can actually be detrimental to your body in the long run. I only take drugs when I need to.

Decisions

So November is here, which has meant NaNoWriMo to me for the past several years. Except, this year...yeah, I won't be doing it. I came to this decision on Sunday the 2ed. I know what you're thinking. "You gave up so soon?" "Only the second day and you decided it wasn't worth your time?" And any other questions you may have asked. Trust me, I wondered them too. But it wasn't on the 2ed that I first considered it. It wasn't like, on the 2ed, after a long time of wanting to do it, I changed my mind. I kept going back and forth and it was on the 2ed, as I was staring at the few thousand words I already had, that I realized this wasn't right for this year.

There are many reasons I decided this. The first being I just don't feel it this year. Again I know what you're thinking, "But you are supposed to write through those moments, otherwise you would rarely write!" That is exactly what I thought, which was why I was unsure until the second day of NaNoWriMo. It isn't just a case of "writer's block." Sometimes writing is hard work, but  I was experiencing that either. This was a complete disinterest from what I was doing. I have written a novel feeling this way before, and when all was said and done it wasn't worth it. I look back on that novel as a lesson and a mistake to not repeat. I love to write, and so I see no need to force it when I am not feeling it.

Second reason I am a quitter is because of time. Yep, time. Such an iconic excuse. But well, maybe November-when school is getting pretty intense, I am working over twice as much because of the holidays, and all the other business that comes with this time of year-is not the best time for me to try to write a novel. I know the whole point of the exercise is to make time, but I am not sure if I am but I feel busier this year, (maybe I am just lazier, I don't know) and I would like some time to just pause every once in a while and rest. The book is longer and more complex than the one last year, and I am  not sure I could keep up the pace, and I hate slowing down in the middle of a book. If I do, I have a hard time getting back into it. I am one of those people that get stressed with a super busy life, even if it is super busy with fun things.

The last, and probably the most important reason, the reason that made the other two relevant. I want to concentrate on editing my other books. Right now I want to work on my older novels to make the better for eventual publishing. This is something I am actually pretty excited about, and I am doing tons of research on self-publishing and the more traditional route. Usually I hate to edit, but right now I am actually enjoying the process of thinking how I can make my books better.  I would have to put my editing on hold while I wrote my novel. I feared that if a did that, I would have lost this editing momentum.

The other two reasons I could put aside, but the last one is what really demanded my attention, and it is definitely what tipped the scales for me. I think seeing Cycle actually availed for sale excited me, and I would like to see the others up there too, (even if no one ever bought them.) It made my hopes of someday being a recognized author more tangible to me.

New

In this humbum life that I call my own, very little new stuff happens. Every once in a while, a few insignificant and meaningless changes crop up, and this post is concerned with those changes.

First of all, my new hair. Well, technically it is the same old hair that I had before, I didn't grow a new crop of new hair, (thought I guess it might all be new hair I've grown since the last picture of myself I have posted...) but rather my hair is now cut differently. I present to you the hair cut that I have been told makes me look younger, older, edgier, and more sophisticated.

I spent like seven minutes making it so the pictures would be side by side.

New term of college. As a finish up a term of college where I was nearly driven insane by Math101, (because it was ridiculously easy but I had to take it because everyone has to take it.) (This is weird, everything I write now is highlighted. It doesn't show up like that in the actual post, but it is doing it to me in the writing stage.) For the first time since I started college I am actually taking more than one class per term that deals with actual accounting.

New season of Korra. Book 4: Balance. I am both excited and a little said. Also somewhat confused. At the present time I am on a search for way there was a year between each Korra season, but the 4th one comes only three months after the end of the 3rd one. (The irony here is that there is only a few months time between each season  in the show's time, but three years pass between season 3 and 4.)

 

 

And last but not least there is coming a new NaNoWriMo. A vaguely Victorian/steampunk theme this year. As soon as they clear them from last year and put all this year's stuff up I will bet hitting the forums in my free time and working on my novel's outline this month.

Very Exciting News

The first of today's very exciting news concerns my family. My sister Megan had a successful delivery of Elizabeth Faith Hafle on Thursday of last week. (Yea, I know, it's been like, a full week. Don't judge. It may take me a while but I get there.)

 

(I stole this picture from Megan off of Facebook. I hope you don't mind. If you do send my a very bitter and judging message.)

 

Second order of exciting news. My book Cycle is now available for sale. You can purchase it at Amazon, or the CreateSpace e-store at this ULR https://www.createspace.com/4626634. If you get it off of Amazon you'll get to it more easily if you search for it under my name, (author name) Alex Quillian, than under Cycle. There are a lot of books out there that have the word "Cycle" in the title. (As cool as the amazon page is, get them at the direct URL if you could. Totally selfish request. I get higher royalties that way.)

 

 

See, it's all official. You can even look inside of it.

 

Third, last, but not least. Dave's Killer Bread is here, in Tennessee! All the way from Oregon I have missed your delightful, rich, wheaty taste. I have longed, and longed for bread this tasty ever since moving down here. They don't really believe in wheat bread down here. Even the wheat bread was white.

 

 

Failures

I have to important failures to discuss today. My first being, my failure to A Thousand Days. Starting in June, I just sort of stopped. I fell out of the habit, and well, never started it up again. A part of me is really upset for doing this, I was over half way done, after all.



Well, for any of you still following, my life is the same, pretty much. My oldest sister is having another baby, my second oldest sister got a new car because her old on kept breaking, and I am in a different semester of school. Same job, same basic interests. Same lame social life. I have accounts on a couple different social media sights, but due to the fact I never do anything I never post. In essence I am living the same monotonous unchanging life that makes for a rather lack luster lif

e on the internet. Maybe I should join Tumblr. Oddly it seems it is those kinds of people who become popular there.

 

On to other failures and potentially exciting news, I am attempting to make it so my book Cycle can be purchased. I am following the steps with CreateSpace, and it mat be available for purchase within the next couple weeks. It might already be available if not for one small thing.

 

The cover was monstrous.

 

When I was done with all of the steps and such, I sent in this picture to be the cover.

 

 

And this is what I got. More or less.





 

So I have reworked the cover to be lighter. I also chose a different picture that would not be as prone to being made dark and dusky I figured I would give it one more go. I don't have the money to keep ordering $7 dollar proofs indefinitely. It mat not seem like much, but this is the third proof. If I like this third cover, I will publish it through as many channels as CreateSpace offers, and maybe look into getting stalls for events, and junk like that. More as it comes up, which it probably won't.

 

Also check out this cool T.A.R.D.I.S. thumb drive I got.