New Podcast

Check out my podcast, Vulture Droppings, on Anchor: https://anchor.fm/vulturewriterOn it we talk about, you guessed it, horror. Still rough around the edges, but I finally have my mic set up, all professional-like.So,

So,  I submitted a few stories to a contest of sorts. Every year,  Sustainable Fine Arts hosts a contest for writers who are parents.  I submitted last year as well. Pretty easy since I usually have something sitting around I can polish and send in. However... I'm not sure if my blood and guts and decapitations are usually what they are expecting.

One of the stories I sent in this year was tamer than usual.  More of a ghost story really. The Dark Corner is about a kid facing his fear of the dark.

I am working on building a group of readers of horror,  to which I will submit short stories and whatnot. Stay tuned. Don't forget about the podcast. 

Podcasting for Dipshits

Well, it's happened. I finally started to produce my own podcast. My wife and I decided we wanted to do one together, so in true fashion, I am starting my own.

Greasy Slimy Squirrel Guts is the tentative name. I will be talking about horror and writing. Pretty much what is on here. Hopefully, it won't feel like talking to myself for too long. I will talk about horror movies, stories and generally horrific things. Unlike this blog, it will be my sanctuary from the regular bullshit of life.

But that's what horror is: an escape. A catharsis.


Details to come.

Give it Up

Vulture Droppings


I have been taking stock in what I do as a writer. I am literally doing things the opposite of what I have been doing to see if that will move me ahead a little. Something as simple as, 'you need to work.'  'I don't want to' '...' 'Okay, I'll work.'  Or, instead of not writing, I write. I try to complicate things. I don't want to fail, but I have been making damn sure that if I do, I can point back to myself or something else I control so I can say, 'there...it's [xxx]'s fault.

You [whoever is reading] are going to be subject to a lot of shit as I sort through what I do and who I am as a writer. I am trying to post regularly.

I just have to out think my lazy.

Writing without my floaties

Vulture Droppings (brainnuggets)

I started my new schedule today. Which means that I started a schedule. Just like any addict, I have to remove myself from situations that encourage relapse. In this case, I am seriously addicted to procrastination. I just hope I put as much systematic effort into my schedule as I have into my procrastination. Writers are usually inspired to write by something or someone. Either it is an ideology, a work ethic, not to die (the premise of one of my stories)…or it is a fictional manifestation of that ideology or work ethic. It is whatever motivates them. I believe Stephen King’s is, according to his book On Writing, a fat guy in a tutu smoking big fat cigars.

Today, I didn't Google 'scheduling' or search for an app that helped me do it. I sat down, like I normally do, to a blank page. I woke up Mr. Logic and asked it, 'what do I want to do?' The reply was, 'I don't know...stuff.' I realized that my teenaged self fell asleep in the library again. So, I shuffled him off to bed and asked my question again. 'You want to write. More specifically, you want to order your day so you can write and not be distracted by all the other stuff you need to get done.'  

I made a list of general things I need to do: fiction, content, email (check, delete), learning, and social media. I decided to not slot times for them. No one's the boss of me, except for my wife. I hate having a schedule. It's too constricting...it's a tool of the man, man.

So, to stick it to the man, I decided that each day I am going to take the general things I need to do during the day and prioritize. Today, it is content; learning; fiction; social media; email. At the end of each day, I am going to look at all the things I did/didn't do and all the notes that I jotted down while getting the prioritized things done, and prioritize for the next day. Always stop and write down new ideas. Even if you are in the middle of writing something else. Have a pen and paper if you want to keep current and unformed ideas separate. I have a new document open so I just click, type and come back to my current work. This might or might not work for me.I have a sporadic mind, but I also tend to be ‘meh’ about things that I have otherwise deemed to be important. I have realized that I am not ‘meh’ about the work itself, just the idea of having to work to get what I want. I am still very much the ‘little rich boy’ growing up in a white suburban neighborhood. I have come really far away from that. I tend to gravitate to small, rural towns where the idea of a book might be to go really fast down a hill, or people wonder what the benefit of a library really is and can they not spend the money on (at the very least) maintaining a legal association to a library (touchy issue; I won’t get myself started).

To make things work, I also have in my notes things that work and don't work. If something I know is distracting keeps distracting me, I write it down. I don't worry about solutions. They are just notes for later. 

Joining an online bible study

Atheist AF: So, I am now in the habit of collecting religious publications. You know, those little publications that demonstrate what happens to the righteous and the wicked? I also have three bibles now (and like a naughty, baby-eating atheist, I even stole one...from a little free library, but, you know...)

At first, I was not sure why I wanted to collect what people normally throw away.
Now...I know.
I think I've found my calling.

via GIPHY

Just kidding. But I have been trying to find a reason to write. I'm going to join a bible study.

My intention is not to ridicule, not to argue. My intention is to follow a natural progression of thought. To learn.

That being said, I do have a sense of humor. Should be interesting.

Nauseated Logic (Brain Droppings)

We all struggle with our own problems. Some are lucky and their problems are tangible. They can easily execute a solution. Others aren't lucky. Their problems are their own minds. For one reason or another they have been told that they are no good, other by those who are supposed to care for them or themselves.

One of my problems is that I second guess myself. If I don't want to talk to someone I need to talk to, I won't  because I'm most likely wrong. Tell someone why I don't want to do something, I either end up giving in and going or I don't and I spend at least the next hour convincing myself I made the right decision. So when I think I have things figured out, nailed down, ironed out and it changes,

I realize I don't need other people's approval to have an opinion. I know I don't need to be afraid of the majority of confrontations I could possibly encounter standing up for myself. But there's something else about me: I love being the victim. I want something I can point to and say, "See, that's why I failed." Not doing something, not trying, not talking to someone is the easiest way to say that to myself. If I choose not to do something, then I can say to myself it was because 'I chose' not to. 

And I know that sounds like bullshit. Certainly smells like it, I know that. But the next line in that logic is that I say, 'See, I can't be trusted.' I sometimes say, jokingly, 'set the bar low so they are surprised when you do something really well.' I don't want to be expected to do something because I don't want to be blamed when it all goes to shit. 

The problem with this, aside from the headache these mental acrobatics pound through my head, it has set a limit on my creativity. I have convinced myself that I suck as a writer and no one wants to hear what I say. Subsequently, I don't give myself the amount of practice I need to grow as a writer. 

Look at me now

He hit the wall and his body went limp. His skin and clothes snagged on the porous and jagged red brick as he slowly slid to the ground. Scraping and tearing sounds harmonized together, voicing its pleasure in his pain. 

Just after hitting the cement, he tried to rise. He rolled off his left side and hit the wall, this time at a much lower velocity. This knocked his 200 pounds over on its back and he rolled onto his side and fell onto his front. Noticing the cool pavement on his cheek, he took that pleasure away from himself and pushed up with both palms planted firmly on the ground. He lost his balance twice, once from his head swooning. The very wall that had aided in his self immolation helped him up, getting a scrape across his palm for good measure. 

The security light at the top corner of the building clicked on, highlighting his efforts.

He stood as a drunk stands taking a break from his sojourn home: One arm propped out, a palm supporting his swaying body on the wall, head bowed. The blood ran down the front of his face and dripped off his nose. It flowed from his head. The skin on his bald head burned and tingled from scrapes and lacerations. 

The security light clicked off.

"Don't turn off the light...One more time coach," he slurred, "I swear, do good papa. oranges in the can until Sunday. " 

The irony was that he could not drink anymore. Every time he drank, he drank to a stupor.  The memories were clearer when he was drunk. The real life monsters morphed into unspeakable beings of darkness and pain.

He took a deep breath and, waking up the security light, shuffled past the end of the cracked pavement onto the sparsely grassed dirt of the playground, fifty feet from the wall. He turned and face the building.

He swiveled his head, and jumped up and down, shaking out his hands and arms. 

"Watch this, you...ahhhrgh"

He sprinted as fast as he could and slammed into the wall, his head taking the brunt of the force. 

Sister Mary would find him in the early parts of dawn. Seeing him out of the corner of her eye, she thought it was the drunk that sometimes fell asleep on the grounds, so she did not notice his bloody face or his caved-in head until she looked up from her keys and locked her gaze with his dead eyes. 

Ink

Walk into the wall.

Walk into the wall

Walk into the wall

Fall down the hole
Wrap my arms around nothing

Stab myself in the back
I fall deeper in the black
My eyes bulge to see
Burst from the effort

I sleep.

Why Tom sucks #1 (KONSFW)*

*Kind of not suitable for work

Own it. Put it out there. If I share with you why I think I am awful, then maybe it will help me stop being a bitch and become more sociable...not that I want to be, but, well...

1. Tom sucks because he takes two hour shits.  This is somewhat of a confession and it might severely cut back on the time in the 'office', but I camp out in the bathroom. I'm doing it right now. Sometimes I do it to avoid people, but mostly, I do my business and get caught up in what I am working on and then I can't feel my body below my waist.


May your day suck as much as mine.




For those of you who don't know me, I like to laugh at myself. I just never put it out there like this. Like most of my conversations, most of it is truthful, some is embellished and very little is made up. What it's meant to do is make you laugh. I was going to call it, 'why no one likes me', but I started to cry. You can't get more pathetic than crying while on the toilet. Basically, take what you see with a couple grains of salt.

Eni[me] (or, self-sarcasm)

For the first time in awhile, I actively distracted myself from writing. Normally, I don't write for lack of time, or I simply can't get up. I still want to write in those instances, I just don't. What I don't do is essentially say, 'you need to write," and then immediately say I don't want to, either by actually saying it or doing something els ine.

Today, I chose not to write. Granted, I needed to do what I did instead, but I chose to do it instead of writing. 

I'm not particularly worried about it. Hell, I shod be happy I didn't harrumph through my day; I mad a decision. 

YAY, me.

What do you call sarcasm against yourself?

Motivational (at least for me, anyway)

I wish I could capture my sense of humor. The problem is, I have a problem remembering rants and quirky connections later, mainly because they are never logical.

"Why not channel it? Free up you mind and go there?"

I'll tell you why: I squander. Most of the time it is not a conscious choice. I squander my time. I don't set limits on myself because when I set limits on myself, I never recognize the limits. "You're not the boss of me!" I yell at myself and I end up on the computer or my phone until I end up late for something or too tired to get up and go to bed.

When I want to read, I don't . When I want to write, I don't. Like I said, that's not all the time, but it happens enough that I wonder why, if I want to do something, why can't I follow Mr. Labouff's advice and

Sorry, but...he's so enthusiastic! It makes me want to strive to not be like him. Creatively, I have to say, I do envy him.  He puts the crazy out there.

Anyway, I guess you call it self-defeatism, engineering pity...I think I wrote about it before. I do something to sabotage myself so when I fail, I can have the caveat of trying. If I succeed by accident, whoops....yay!

Carcass

 

Can't think
Swollen head
No room for thought

Emotion to expression
Broken

Words chop
Splatter
Then trickle

Run down and
Dry on my
Chin like

So much
Blood from my
Brain, the
Dying, useless

carcass

Bloody Treat

The skin comes off, first in small pieces, then in whole sections. Using a finger from only one hand he picks at the wet skin and has problems grabbing it. He finally manages to pinch the flesh, but puts ever more gingerly. Slow and steady he pulls from the wrist to the crook of the elbow. This piece is wider, so he grabs the steak knife and says gently. He rolls the skin off the arm and throws it over his shoulder. The skin hasn’t been hitting the ground. His dog is very happy. 

George makes a note of this. He still doesn’t have full control over him yet, but at least he is feeding him. He’d rather have bigger pieces, like the ones the man served himself at dinner. But He thinks it might take great effort, a puppet or not, to cut your own skin off. 

The skin slips out from under George’s paw and it slaps into his muzzle. He shakes his head and the meat drops to the floor. He quickly snatches it up and chews and swallows. 

George licks his paws and the sides of his snout for the remaining morsels and realizes that the man is not cutting anymore. The sounds he hears coming from the man are no longer from the cutting. These sounds were different.  From the back of the couch, he sees the man shaking, then the sounds became louder, not unlike his howls when he gets hurt by the man or when the man leaves him outside to long in the snow. 

George’s tail wags, barks and trots to the front of the couch. He barked and growled at the man. He picked up the knife in his mouth and put it on the man’s lap. He barked his deep bark and bared his teeth. The man's eyes met George's and the crying immediately ceased. He nodded, fighting back tears.

The man whimpered. He picked up the knife and went to work on the underside of his arm. 

Discussed Anger (Brain Droppings)

I realized something today.  I mentioned in a previous post that as a child and adolescent, my family never discussed politics and that I must have fallen far from the tree. I think about politics and the state of the world a lot. The internet and social media have made it possible fo me to deliver my opinion to others. I have been called passionate and have entered into my fair share of flame wars.

I know now that this desire to tell people what I think, to debate when it is better left alone, when most people would move along, is related to my upbringing.

Last night, I had dinner with my father. On the tip of my brain was the election, but given past habits, I did not bring it up. Before last night, I had decided to not let who they voted for affect how I feel about my family. But, it still pisses me off. It disgusts me when I see decisions certain politicians have made or plan to make that will have detrimental effects on my family and I think, 'How could they.' For example, I thought that today after my wife talked about unions and the effects current negotiations could have on our family. I thought, 'Why dad?'

I think the reason I am passionate about politics and eagerly enter into the fray is not so much an effect of our family not talking about it--not directly, way--as it is that I know I can't talk about it out of respect, but it still pisses me off, and this anger is injected into my discussions with other people.

Grave efforts

Struggling to reach normal
                      be the perfect father
                                 compassionate husband


with no definition.
Climbing with no direction
I grip for the level above,
when all I do is dig deeper

Up is down.
Life the grave.




                                                                        Buy Me.

      Also by the author, available for purchase:

Bound away.

The thoughts leave,
they escape.

Gone until I see them
later

Faded and worn, vague
representations

I call to them, coo words
similar


But they cock their heads and
bound away.



                                                                        Buy Me.

          Also by the author, available for purchase:

To be heard.

Hands slap my face
Futile revival of a
Sluggish mind

Catching up to a
Speeding cart
Carrying life away

Blind, fingerless
slapping, poking
the keyboard words


once they leave my
mind, they dissipate
into the air, gone

Ideas held back, run
and batter into my
skull, and scream

To be heard

                                                                        Buy Me.

          Also by the author, available for purchase

Journal: Writer, Where Art Thou?

I've lost all desire to write. I write this, but outside the quick spurts, I don't feel compelled to write. Three months ago, I was collaborating with my friend on a book; I barely give a shit when I lost the drive the book was on.

I found the will after a long dry spell before. It will happen again.

internal

At odds, at odds, odds
I make myself pay every day

No good, no good, good
Deplorable, I become loving

So shallow, so shallow. Shallow.
I dig to the surface, breathe

I dig, I dig, dig
Daily, I dig out of the hole

I fight, I fight. Fight.
Pity vs. Confidence, no winner.

Shameless self-promotion...just add the shame

I was cleaning out my file cabinet and came across a stack of paper and partially filled notebooks. Filling the papers were a crap ton of poems. A handful were from when I was still in high school, but a good portion was from college and post-college. I struggled to interpret a lot of it. There were quite a few that dug into my heart and threatened to push it out through my chest. Love lost(sometimes on purpose or through my own stupidity).  Many of the mistakes I made are there, most of their lessons not learned until much later.

I want to share this with others. Two links. Two books. There is a fiction series by the same name. Mine's the poetry.

Enjoy.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MSGZHZW/ref=sr_1_22?ie=UTF8&qid=1478228719&sr=8-22&keywords=zombie+bait 

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B01M3YZAXO/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1478469790&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40&keywords=zombie+bait+2&dpPl=1&dpID=51grjB6eIiL&ref=plSrch