Liebster Nomination (Part 1): Ten Facts About Me

My new friend Axel Kussman nominated this blog for a Liebster Award yesterday.  The Liebsters are a kind of pay-it-forward blogging award meant to help others discover new, interesting, exciting corners of the blog-o-sphere.  Axel writes the blog Iron Rogue, which is mostly about his triathlon career, but the guy is also both a comics & pop-culture fan and a working engineer.  That makes him a decidedly kindred spirit.

What kind of guy takes up triathlon?

To find out, all you have to do is read Iron Rogue.  Axel is an active family guy with a successful career, great looking wife and kids, and a lot going on, both in and out of the world of sport.  This, I think, is a perfect example of why so many triathletes blog.  Because they have a lot going on, and they want to share all that joy with others.  Speaking personally, I've only just started reading Iron Rogue, and I already love it.

Tuesday Twitter Mad Science.

Inequality is the root of social evil.
— Pope Francis (@Pontifex) April 28, 2014

I'm not Catholic, but it's hard not to like the current Pope.   He at least comes across as a legitimate man of God.

With that said, it would interesting to see a little more detail on the definition of "social" evil.

Centurion Six Revisited

I updated the Sketch in My Notebook tab this morning to include the "Centurion Six" project, mostly so that newcomers to the blog can have some choices if they decide to try to dive into some of my crazy-assed short fiction.

I probably should've done this a while ago, but I was initially planning to include "Centurion Six" in the short story collection that has since become "War Stories from Wanderhaven", and with that in mind, I didn't want to make the story too easy to find on the blog.  I wanted to tease its existence, frustrate people with their inability to find all the pieces, and then entice them into buying my book when/if it ever comes out.  But "Wanderhaven" has become a whole different thing now, and if I ever do get around to putting out a print version of Dr. Necropolis/Centurion Six, it won't be for years.

Saturday News: Star Wars, a Training Update, and Other Stuff

Not a lot going on today, but there were a few things that caught my eye.

Lucasfilm Clarifies Future of STAR WARS Expanded Universe, Announces New Prose Novels (Newsrama)
They're going to shit-can it.  From Lucasfilm's press release:
"In order to give maximum creative freedom to the filmmakers and also preserve an element of surprise and discovery for the audience, Star Wars Episodes VII-IX will not tell the same story told in the post-Return of the Jedi Expanded Universe."

Five Things on a Friday: The "Cleaning out My Library" Edition

After we finished our walk on Sunday afternoon last weekend, Sally asked me if I had any books to donate to the local library's annual book sale/fund raiser.

"Do I?" I replied.  "Hell yes I do."

My boxes of books, now destined for Stratford Library.

But the best thing about this isn't just that I got a chance to get all into my own personal fung shui, nor is it that I'm helping the local library, though both of those are worthy results, of course.

No the best thing was that I found a bunch of stuff that I thought was lost.

Heading out of T-2

My friend Alisha just sent me this pic, taken during last year's Milford YMCA Y-Tri.  In the shot, I'm leaving Transition after the bike, heading out for a roughly 2.5-mile run.

Coincidentally enough, this year's Y-Tri is coming soon!  Why not sign up right now?

The race is a great early season tune-up or first-ever triathlon. It is:

---300 yard pool swim

---11 mile bike

---2.4 mile run

See?  No problem!

Come on out. Sally and I will both be there, and if you want, you can come over to the house for beer afterwards. And anyway, the Y could really, really use your support. 

Here's the sign-up link:

https://runsignup.com/Race/CT/Milford/WoodruffFamilyYTri

Questions?  Let me know!

Thanks.

Some Recent Pics

I put a bunch of these up on Facebook and Instagram, but I carefully prune both places of followers that I don't know personally, so you may not have seen them.  I took most down at Short Beach in Stratford on Easter afternoon. The selfie I took at 125th Street yesterday because I got bored while I was waiting for the train.

Well, what'd'ya think?  I should quit my day job and become a photographer, am I right?

Happy Easter and Go Army!

It's Easter morning, and my house is still pretty quiet.  I'm therefore doing my best to catch up on all things Army Football.

Sally and I are hoping to attend several games this year, including the Yale game (at Yale), the Air Force game, the UConn game at Yankee Stadium, and the last home game of the year, against my other (MBA) alma mater Fordham.

Last Night's Swim Workout

After eating, drinking, and basically sitting around all week in Albany, I got in the pool last night to try to burn off some of those calories.  The best thing about swimming is that it's a zero-impact sport, so while overtraining one day might make you sore, it won't actually injure you unless you do something really  stupid.

News Saturday (or what passes for it these days)

Ugh.  Truth is, there is a pathetic lack of interesting news today.

William Shatner on Star Trek’s Historic Interracial Kiss: “A Silly Fuss About Nothing” (Comic Book.Com)

Shatner was such a great Star Trek lead because he came across manly.  Nobody since has quite pulled that off.

Five Things on a Friday: The "New Kind of War" Edition

Greetings from Albany!

I'm up here for a class, and I've got about an hour.  Let's hope I can get Five Things down.

1.  It gets cold in Albany.
We had seventy-degree weather over the weekend and into Monday in the City, and it was still reasonably warm, if rainy, when I got into town.  But that all changed Tuesday night.

It Could Be Worse...

You could be in Albany with me. It was 22-degrees this morning.

This Morning's Swim Workout

I'm in Albany this week. That's important to you because it means that I'm not doing swim practice with my Tri Club this week; I had to go this morning early before driving Upstate. 

For what it's worth, I don't think I swim particularly well in the mornings.  I compensated this particular morning by doing my main set pull. 

Warm Up:

-- 5 x 100 free @ 1:30 (easy)

-- 200 kick (fly)

Main Set:

-- 10 x 100 pull @ 1:25 (lazy aerobic pace)

-- 50 easy

-- 2 x 50 fly @ :55 (mid-tempo)

-- 50 Warm Down

Sunday Morning News

I know, I know.  I'm supposed to be on hiatus.  But there were a few things that caught my eye this morning.

Xenophobic Chill Descends on Moscow (NYT)
'From the mo­ment that Rus­sia’s in­va­sion and an­nex­ation of Crimea cast a new, bit­ter chill over re­la­tions with the West, a sin­is­ter jingo­istic vibe has per­vad­ed this un­set­tled cap­i­tal — stirred up by state-con­trolled tele­vi­sion and Mr. Putin him­self.

“Some West­ern politi­cians are al­ready threat­en­ing us not just with sanc­tions but al­so the prospect of in­creas­ing­ly se­ri­ous prob­lems on the do­mes­tic front,” the pres­i­dent said in his speech an­nounc­ing plans to ab­sorb Crimea in­to the Russ­ian Fed­er­a­tion. “I would like to know what they have in mind ex­act­ly: ac­tion by a fifth col­umn, this dis­parate bunch of ‘na­tion­al trai­tors,’ or are they hop­ing to put us in a wors­en­ing so­cial and eco­nom­ic sit­u­a­tion so as to pro­voke pub­lic dis­con­tent?”'

Five Things on a Friday: Mid-Hiatus Update

The last couple of weeks have been a real roller coaster ride.  Amazing highs, crappy lows...  That's life.  It's a contact sport, and sometimes I feel like I ought to wear a helmet.

When I left off last week, it was on a decided down-note.  A few of my regular readers dropped some pretty nice thoughts in the comments, and I wanted you guys to know that I appreciated it.  A really terrific weekend followed last week's tough couple of days, and this past week has been rejuvenating as well for a variety of reasons.  Life will always have its ups and downs, and that's okay.  Things have been great this week in particular, so more than anything, this update is about letting you guys know what's going on--and saying thank you for your well wishes.

Hiatus

This has been a monumentally shitty week for a variety of reasons, none of which do I feel like sharing.  I gave it some thought and decided that my first, best response is just to throw myself into my book, finish it, and then consider my next move.  That doesn't have a lot to do with you, of course, but the fact is that I just don't have time for you right now, and that's just the way it's got to be.

So.  I'm putting the blog on hiatus at least until I finish my book and maybe forever.  I don't know.  Let me finish the draft and see how I feel.

In any event, please don't take this the wrong way.  I just need to focus on other stuff right now, and that stuff doesn't include blogging.

I'm leaving you a couple of things to read in the meantime.  The first is the script to a 5-episode webcomic that I wrote with my friend Steve about some of the side-characters (villains) that appeared in a few of the later episodes of Awesome Storm Justice 41.  In fact, if you want to read something, start there.  I wrote a good 1/3 of that, and it's probably about as commercially approachable as my work ever gets.  But ASJ-41 is not what I'm leaving you.  I'm leaving you The Freelancers, the unproduced sequel to ASJ-41, and...

Well, here's betting you won't read it, but if you do, I'd love to hear what you think.

Link to The Freelancers script (via Google Docs).

If you make it all the way through The Freelancers, then you can read my first novel if you really, really want to.  It's called The Ballad of Lu-Tze, and it's about Modor and Belle from "The Tower of Al-Kafiri".  Kind of a historical fantasy, set in a Tolkeinesque version of 15th century China.

The Ballad of Lu-Tze (also via Google Docs).

If you make it through both of those, let me know, and I'll send you a Certificate of Completion or something.  You'll definitely have earned it.

***

Thanks for stopping by.  I'll be around, so if you have a question, drop it in the comments, and I'll try to get back to you.

See you later.

Very brief update

It's been a couple of days.  Sorry if you've missed me.

I got sick on Friday night and pretty much collapsed in place.  Slept through 'til Saturday, pulled myself together long enough to make it to Founder's Day Saturday night, and then slept most of the day again Sunday.  And that was the day that Sally got sick.

Anyway, Founder's Day was fun, but now I'm back at work, and life keeps on keeping on.

***

I came here today intent on sharing that sample out of "The Crown of Pluto" that I mentioned last week, but after going through it, I don't think there's any way to put it out there without redacting it beyond recognition.  Sorry about that.  "Pluto" is the third part of a trilogy of short stories--about half of my book, overall--and it's just not an independent piece.  So, bottom line, even the introductory parts of the bit I was going to share would spoil significant stuff that happens in "The Priest of Loki", and I don't want that to happen.

Sorry about that.

Anybody got anything for me?