Football hangover...and a possible 'hair of the dog' solution.

I will say it here and publicly, yesterday's game between my beloved Seattle Seahawks and the hated 49ers was POORLY officiated. And I am still cringing at the injury to Bowman... However, the officials did not tip that last second touchdown attempt and cause the game ending interception...that was Richard Sherman, #25...and member of the LEGION OF BOOM...and Marshawn Lynch went into BEAST MODE to gash the Niner D for over a hundred yards rushing. 

And with that...my Seattle Seahawks are going to Super Bowl XLVIII against Peyton and the Broncos. You can bet that I will be on the edge of my seat on February 2nd. It is no doubt that I love my Hawks...but once the big game is over...what will I do?

ARENA FOOTBALL!!!

For years I have ignored the sport...so why would I give it a look now? Simple...Portland has a team. Enter the Portland Thunder. As season ticket holders, Denise and I will be in on the inaugural season...and I will be bringing my Seahawk fan mindset to support the new home team. 

Stay tuned.  And now, I have work to do as I bring a new Ava adventure to life before embarking on the 9th DEAD (which will be almost TWICE the length of the others!).

All star horror line up prepares to battle CANCER! How can you help?

And they even have their Cancer Awareness Ribbons!

I am proud to announce that the all-for-charity anthology is almost done. With a fantastic crew of talented authors who contributed their work completely free of charge (not even contributor copies, folks!) and a cover artist who donated his amazing work to bind them all together, This anthology promises to be something special.

To be clear, EVERY SINGLE PENNY generated by sales of this anthology will be donated in a quarterly check to the V Foundation for Cancer Research. MDP will send the check in the name of all the fine contributors basically until the end of time. 

It is with great pride that I present to you the table of contents:

Z Children                      Eli Constant

Of the Dead                    Alyn Day

Memories                        Heath Stallcup

Project Arizona              Gregory Carrico

Just Life                          T. Fox Dunham

Choices                           Claire Riley

Dying Days Mortality      Armand Rosamilia

Gift Wrapped Box            Catie Rhodes

Tunnel                              J. Thorn

One Lonely Night             Chantal Boudreau

Sweet Release                   Mark Tufo

Uncle                                Michael McFarland

The Legacy                       Julianne Snow

The Judas Contingent      Blaze McRob

My Name is Charles         TW Brown

Survival                            Rhonda Hopkins

Now, if you just can't wait, and you want to give the wonderful people of the V Foundation a little dough, then by all means, click on their link and give. If nothing else, go take a look at what they are doing. To quote Dick Vitale..."They're awesome, baby!"

I may have lost my mind.

Yep, it might actually be official. 

As many of you may know, I have started on my journey to be in this year's Spartan Race. This is not just the "normal" obstacle course laden 5K. The folks who run these take it pretty serious. To that end, I have started my own training program. The good people of the Spartan Race know that it is tough, so they offer to send you a WOD (workout of the day) as well as offer up a variety of 30 Day Challenges. (Currently it is a nice "easy" mile a day run.

Next month, I will be getting a chance to see just what I am facing and how far I have to go in order to be ready. I will be attending an official Spartan Race workout. "What is that?" you may be asking. Well...I just happen to have a little snippet of video to share:

So there it is. If you have been wondering just what it is that I have gotten myself in to...there you have it. Feel free to comment.

Is a "thank you" so difficult?

If all goes well, I hope to have some really cool stuff to say about our upcoming All-for-charity anthology later this week. However, today I wanted to talk about something that YOU, the writer types who are out there, can do to make a difference to the people who pay your bills. Yep, I am talking about the readers.

Now, I will absolutely not be the person to take credit for starting this, but I would like to be one of the individuals who perhaps starts a wee bit of a "politeness" movement. So, there is no disputing that we writers LOVE reading reviews that tell us how amazing our stuff is and that we are the greatest thing since sliced bread. That is a given.

Some of us even enjoy seeing what worked and what did not. We can divorce ourselves from the ego long enough to see a well-constructed review that points out a few chinks in our armor. After all, that is how we improve.

However, after you have checked your newest reviews and shared the good parts of the best ones with friends, family, and loved ones...I have a suggestion. Take your finger off that mouse and do not just click away to the nether worlds of Facebook and the like. How about this: hit the "comment" button and leave a little note of thanks. After all, they went through all the time and trouble of leaving you a review (which we all crave and want more of). How difficult is it to just leave a comment thanking the individual for taking the time to review your work? It's just a tiny moment of courtesy, but it could lead to fans who feel connected to you like never before. 

I actually had one such person send me an email that expressed hope that it was me and not some member of my staff! Okay...stop laughing, it wasn't that funny. But seriously, as somebody who worked in radio, I discovered that it was not the glamorous life portrayed on WKRP in Cincinnati. The fact is, many of our readers do not differentiate between us and the likes of King and Koontz. We do what we do and think nothing of it because it is simply no big deal to us. We know all of our flaws and failures, but to the daily reader who found you by chance, you are an AUTHOR! Now, imagine some of the authors that you admire and picture what getting a "thank you" from one of them might feel like. Yeah...see what I mean?

Time to reveal a secret...and make a point.

So, in case you missed out, I made an announcement yesterday. In March (provided no unseen obstacles arise) I will begin a series of courses to become a certified copy editor. The course series is offered by UCSD (University of California in San Diego) and has some very nice write ups as I did my research to select the school I would be attending. 

So why now? Some of you may be asking. Well, I will put it like this: just because a person knows the basics of how to work on your car does not make him or her a mechanic. I have been editing for several years...and I can CALL myself an editor. However, no matter how I look at it, I am really just a guy who knows enough to get by. I want to be a professional, and that means that I need to have the education beyond my Associate's Degree and a few select courses in writing and basic English sentence structure. I am never happy with settling for "just good enough".

The indie scene is constantly under fire for shoddy material. There are hundreds of people out there who call themselves editors, and some of them are pretty good. However, just because I shimmy and shake while my music is playing...that does NOT make me a dancer. People have gotten comfortable with claiming things and giving themselves titles. Maybe that has something to do with how everybody gets a "participant" trophy these days. It has fallen out of fashion to say that somebody failed. The reality is that we all fail...perhaps daily. Somewhere along the line, it stopped being okay to say so. And Heaven forbid if we call somebody on being wrong. Well, then we are just being mean. Everything is sugar coated because we don't want to hurt another person's feelings. I got news for you, not everybody deserves a trophy. Being good at something takes work, you don't get to simply speak it into existence.

So, wish me luck.

A whole new pain.

I am no stranger to working out. I have burned through more than my fair share of workout partners (many half my age) because of the intensity of some of my favorite programs. With names like "911 Squat Routine" and "The full body 3 by 20 by 10", when I workout, I am not there to socialize or share stories. I am there to work out...PERIOD.

On January 1st I started the Spartan WOD (workout of the day) in preparation for the Spartan Run in August. Now I am a cold iron plate kind of guy. Toss 'em on the bar and let's get busy. I hate running. Those three words are such an understatement. And forget timing me...unless you bring a calendar or a sundial. Stop watches are stupid.

Each day, I get an email telling me what my workout will be. For instance, on Sunday...I opened this little nightmare:

Warm-up:
Dynamic warm-up – each movement x2 at 25 yards each:
High knee walk, high knee jog, butt kickers, lateral shuffle, straight leg march, skip, straight leg skip

Main Set:
Run/Jog/Walk 15 minutes

Perform 1 minute of each exercise, with 10 second rest between:

• push-ups
• crunches
• pull-ups
• plank
• squat jumps
• jump rope (fast)
• mountain climbers
• flutter kicks
• arm curls with sandbag
• 1-minute rest

Perform strength exercise sequence 1-3 times.

Run/Jog/Walk 15 minutes

Now let me just tell you that pull ups and I DO NOT jive. I made a pact with gravity a long time ago. I promised not to break its laws and it promised not to stop working and let me hurl off the face of the planet and end up in outer space. My "sets" consist of doing a couple, then having to just hang there like an overripe grape.

I am used to the first few days of a new routine causing muscles to hurt...but never in my life had I reached a point where picking up a glass of water caused my lats to fail and for my arm to shake like Michael J. Fox on a six pack of Red Bulls. (And before you get all wincy about that line, he tells even better jokes about his condition and is actually quite good in his new sitcom.)

Happy New Year, everybody. And how are your resolutions coming?

A new year starts with giving back a few things.

I hope that you all had a great and festive holiday season. I was fortunate to be able to take a few days and just unwind my brain. I realized that I had not taken a single day off since just after the July 4th holiday. Between writing and editing, I have been nose to the grindstone.

Well, vacation is over. My three top priorities are to get the new DEAD edited and out at the end of the month, edit Heath Stallcup's new Monster Squad novel (if you have not read them, I highly recommend this series...it is a blast!), and do final edits on an upcoming anthology that will have all proceeds going to The V Foundation (for cancer research) in a quarterly check in the name of all who contributed.

This is where my "calling out" will be, and I promise to keep it brief. I did have one friend who had some very personal and tragic events occur that made participation in this event impossible, but she actually took the time in all the chaos to let me know she just would not be able to send in a story. However, there were about a half dozen contributors who just vanished. No reply to follow up emails...basically...no common courtesy. I don't really care if you can't make it, the project will still be wonderful, but to lack common courtesy...well, like my grandfather always said, "BE careful about the asses you kick on the way up...you'll be kissing them on the way down."

Anyway, back to work...have a great day!