keep going

Most of the day today, I’ve been fighting off a brutal headache. (I feel like there’s a knife in my left eye . . . but I’ve been listening to Miles Davis do ‘Round About Midnight while I sit in an empty and otherwise quiet house. There are mighty thunderheads building above the San Gabriel mountains right now, sitting in a deep blue sky. It’s really beautiful.
Ferris is sitting on the floor behind me right now. It’s over 100 in my house (gotta love not having any air conditioning) so she’s panting loudly. About once a minute, her panting is interrupted by a little yelp, or a grunt, or some other noise to grab my attention.
When I turn around, she cocks her head to the side, and thumps her tail like crazy on the floor. She hasn’t moved in almost 15 mnutes. She’s just sitting there, giving up love for her master.
I wonder how long it’ll take for that to be quoted out of context?
I adore Ferris. She’s smart, obedient, friendly . . . but most of all, she’s just happy.
Typical conversation:
Me: Ferris?
Ferris: thump . . . thump . . . thump.
Me: What are you doing?
Ferris: thumpthumpthumpthump!
Me: Wanna go for a walk?
Ferris: thumpthumpthumpthumpthump!
She jumps up, runs circles around the room, races to the cabinet where I keep her leash, opens the cabinet with her nose, and drags the leash to me. And she never stops wagging her tail. This dog will eventually wag her tail right off her body, I’m sure.
In an effort to get my seratonin levels back up, and hopefully remove this anvil from my chest, I am doing my very best to focus on the postive things that I’ve encountered in the past few days. Here are a couple:

Yesterday, as I was driving past a local junior college, I observed, two glorious times, that the tube top is making a comeback.

I also discovered that my XM radio works while I’m in the car wash. My top-of-my-lungs singalong with Fred was uninterrupted yesterday, while heavy cloth fingers thumped heavily on my window.

I entertained myself in an interview.
One of those clouds I was talking about looked like a giant mushroom yesterday. A portabella mushroom, a few thousand feet across. (Sadly, I hate portabella mushrooms.)

School has started up again. This means I get to spend my days writing in blissful uninterrupted silence.

I gotta go. I’m going to Hollywood to give an interview to CBS for Up To The Minute. I guess I’m talking about blogging. Maybe I’ll wear The Shirt.
Winston Churchill said, “When you’re going through Hell, keep going.” It’s good advice.

Thank you.

The inbox is filled to overflowing with encouragement, support, a couple of really old interviews I gave when I was a 14 year-old dork, and some good advice.
I just wanted to take a moment and say thank you. It’s really cool that so many people . . . well . . . care.

stuff.

For the last month, (and most of summer, I think) this site has sucked. It has sucked hard. I can’t write for shit, and when I have written, it’s been . . . well, shit.
I’ve always made an effort to be honest on this site. Regardless of how embarrassed or humiliated, sad or elated I may be about things . . . I’ve always written honestly, and directly.
Here’s the deal. Honestly.
Without going into gory details, Paramount soundly and massively fucked me on TNG residuals this quarter. The result? The gap between anticipated and realized income is enormous and I’ve been struggling all summer long to close it.
The best way to close that gap, and provide for my family, I figured, was with book sales. To drive book sales, I’ve had to be in “publicity mode” for most of the summer. The simple truth is, I fucking hate publicity. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it. Because I hate it so much, I suck at it. It’s so hard for me to get on the phone and talk my self, my site, and my book up . . . but it’s really important. I have learned from other authors and publishers that the only time books sell is when their authors work really hard to promote them.
So that’s what I’ve been doing . . . and this site has suffered because of it. This site has basically become one never-ending chant of bullshit about my book, and the stuff I’ve been doing to promote it.
Quoth Homer Simpson, “BORING.”
Don’t get me wrong. I’m very proud of it, and readers keep telling me that they like it . . . but I’m tired of talking about it. I’m sick to death of being in “publicity mode.” It’s not that I’m ungrateful or anything. I want to be clear about that. The joy that’s come with the unexpected success was amazing . . . tempered, of course, by my massive fuck up of two days worth of orders, and the horrible delays that so many people had to endure because of it.
There’s other stuff going on too. Really bad stuff that I really can’t talk about right now . . . but it’s totally sucking the joy and laughter (and all of our money) right out of my life. Until it goes away, each day is a major struggle. I’ve also had my privacy severely violated recently, and it’s made me question whether I want to share any details about my life on this site at all.
So I know that this site has sucked. I know that there hasn’t been anything worth reading in a very long time . . . and I bet readers have moved on to other things. If you’re one of the few who have stuck around all summer, thank you.
Honestly: I’m really unhappy, scared, and frustrated right now.
I’ve just read this, and it seems like a big old whine-fest. That’s not my intention. I just want to explain some stuff. And since WWdN is just me, without any media filters . . . what you see is what you get.

It’s OFF. Again.

I’m sure there’s some humor in this, somewhere . . . but the BBC is OFF again.
I guess there’s some breaking news about the bali bombings, and that’s actually more important than Goth day and the Governor’s recall here in California.
Heh. I’m uh . . . really chagrined.
So no go.
Maybe I’ll actually have time to write a worthwhile weblog entry now. It’s long overdue.