The Old Man and the Tacos

I was going to begin this with a rant about the geriatric members of our society. But I do have respect for them. My parents are old. Hell…some people consider me old. I hope to be old one day. Because when or if I make it to the ripe age of old, I get to revert to toddlerisms. Toddlers get to say whatever they want. The only difference between a toddler and say…my dad, is the toddler gets reprimanded for saying something he shouldn’t. A toddler is developing his internal monologue—that function which keeps our thoughts separated from our words. My dad lost that ability back in 1982. Was he old then? No, he was younger than I am now.

While it’s true that he didn’t have a blog like I have to say things he shouldn’t say, his internal monologue was already in an advanced state of decay for someone who was only forty-two. So imagine it now, thirty-one years later. And this is where my adventure began—three decades after the time when he would mortify me by flirting with every person who had a higher level of estrogen than him while standing in line at the grocery store. Seriously, it was every person that likely had lady parts. And I say likely because there were times when I wasn’t quite sure of which gender he was speaking to. With that said, is it any wonder my mom divorced him? (Maybe I’ll get to my mom’s age rage during a later blog).

So my dad and I went to lunch at a chain eatery called Baja something or another. He arrived before me and, of course, he had to make me the brunt of his jokes with the worker there. Knowing from experience that I was walking into one of his ill-conceived shticks, I saw the young woman behind the counter looking at me and I knew right away what had taken place. I swore under my breath and made the slow walk to the counter. “He’s not ugly,” the young woman said to him, at which I forced a smile and tried to suppress the oncoming migraine.

The ordering process is where my dad transforms into a cantankerous curmudgeon. My dad has hearing aids. Add to that, my dad turns down the hearing aids while in public places to reduce the background noise or he forgets to change the batteries every time we meet for lunch. So when the young woman asked my dad whether he would like black or pinto beans, he snapped back with, “What? I don’t want pinto beans.” The young woman looked to me with an expression that said, “What happened to the jocular merry old guy that was just insulting your looks?”

I pointed to my ears in a very nonchalant gesture so as to avoid setting the old man along a path of future rants, hoping she would understand. He continued to grumpily order his food then switched back to joking-man when he told the cashier that I’m on his bill. I have no objections to letting the old man pay; I’m a starving artist/author and a free meal means I get to keep some of huge meager royalties I’ve made off of my debut novel RISE OF THE PENGUINS. That said, the cashier told him the total. At this point I cringed. He prattled off about the exorbitant cost of fourteen U.S. dollars and the cashier smiled and got a sinister glint in her eye. I thought nothing of it—I’ve been getting that look in my eye when dealing with my dad since 1972.

We sat down and engaged in conversation about his travels, my art and writing, and him telling me to get a real job. I didn’t bother telling him that writing is a real job and the conversation switched to him asking about my visit to the cardiologist or urologist. (OMG! I don’t use things like OMG when I write, but crap! Shouldn’t my dad be the one talking about his doctor appointments? Maybe I’m the old one).

During the conversation he asked me about my last prostate exam. As I previously mentioned, his hearing aids are less than reliable, so on the third attempt to tell him I’m yelling in a crowded restaurant the details of bending over the exam table with my pants down as the doctor stuck his finger in places usually designated as EXIT ONLY. The angry glares from the mother of two youngsters sitting at the next table made me decide to get up and get a refill of refreshing Coke Zero. 

As I walked back from the drink fountain, it happened. I dismissed it as a rumble caused by the digestion of tacos americano. I looked around the room and saw the cooks chatting happily with the cashier, I saw my dad merrily eating his Wahoo taco or whatever the hell he had ordered that came with black beans and I even saw the angry mom. Nothing seemed amiss. I sat down and the conversation resumed. I showed him pictures of my art on my phone, which he took from me to get a closer look, smearing pico de gallo across the screen. All the while my stomach was becoming more and more angry. I say angry and not upset because it was beginning to feel like I was pregnant with a baby warthog that was kicking my abdomen with its angry little warthog hooves.

I wrapped up the conversation and meal and grabbed a mint on the way out hoping to pacify the pissed-off warthog. I waved to the cashier who was telling us about her gratitude for us eating at the Baja place and she gave my dad another of those smiles, a I know something that you don’t smile. I said my goodbyes and jumped into my Chrysler. (Chrysler? Really? Old person car). Seven miles to home and the pissed warthog in my gut was kicking with all fours. I briefly considered going back in the restaurant to use the restroom, but I remembered it was strategically located next to the soda fountain, probably to deter people from using it for the purposes I was considering. Seven miles to home that’s all…no problem, the freeway took up three of those miles.

As expected, the freeway traffic was easy at one in the afternoon, so driving at 75 miles per hour I made good time. I’d be home in no time. As I exited I had to stop for a red light. I made my turn and forty-three feet later I stopped for another red light. It was only a little irritating, but the warthog seemed to be napping so I mused about my dad, wondering how many servers or waiters/waitresses he had pissed off with his toddlerisms. This led me to the next thought—and this is more than a little gross, but it did cross my mind—I wondered how many ounces of spit he had ingested as acts of revenge by angry food servers over the years. The light turned green and I drove one hundred-twenty-three feet to the next red light. Sitting there, I recalled the knowing look the cashier gave my dad, then the flirtatious interaction between her and the cook. I was driving another eighty feet to the next red light when it occurred to me—what if the cook put something in the food of the spitty kind, intended for my dad but had put it in my tacos instead? This thought fully awakened the angry warthog and it began bucking with full force.

One red light after another, each strategically placed enough distance apart to where you can never actually reach the speed limit, hindered my progress and the warthog was vigorously twisting about in my stomach. Why the hell would a city put traffic signals every eighty feet? I considered stopping at a gas station, but I was driving through a part of town where if I used the public restroom, I was sure I would likely contract syphilitic cholera herpes from the toilet seat. I pressed on knowing that there was a stretch of road ahead with fewer lights and a higher speed limit.

After another red light, I reached the open stretch of road and put my foot down. It’s a little known fact that the act of speeding isn’t illegal if one has a case of the Bee-Gees (bubble-guts, sorry brothers Gibb).  Okay, maybe it’s not fact, but I was dearly hoping that was the case. As it turned out the idea of speeding was about to become a moot point. I got behind a mini-van which was straddling both lanes of the road. I tried to pass, but the driver swerved in my path. My anger roiled as did the warthog. I eventually found a break and passed the van via the bike-lane. I looked at the driver, intending to give him the salute, but all I saw behind the wheel was a poof of white hair resting atop of a wrinkly brow. I shook my head and sped forward only to have my path blocked again, this time by a sixty-foot long Continental. I didn’t even have to look to know it was another senior. I found a break when the car swerved into the bike-lane, nearly hitting the curb. But the break was short-lived. Ahead were two cars, a pristine Ford Ranger moving at negative eight miles per hour and a Cadillac Seville mimicking the mini-van's driving technique by swerving all over hell and back.

The warthog bucked hard and sweat began to drip down my face. Each and every car was driven by someone who was at least an octogenarian. I felt like I had entered a layer of hell where I was stuck in a perpetual Shriner’s parade. The only things missing were the ahooga horns and fezzes. Thoughts of digesting someone’s saliva filled my head as I raced through the parade. I finally broke free of the Shriner’s and made the dash for home. I took the turn into my neighborhood like it was turn four on the final lap at Daytona and screeched to a stop in the driveway. I duck walked through the house and to the bathroom where sweet white porcelain relief awaited me.

After giving birth to the warthog I left the bathroom and collapsed on the bed. I called my dad to check on him and he was fine with no issues whatsoever. Maybe the Baja cook didn’t give any extra toppings or maybe he did. If he did, well at least I took it for the old guy. I made a vow to order for my dad when I could and when he wasn’t looking. Not just to prevent future intestinal distress, but to save my dad the frustration of not being able to hear a conversation. It’s the least I can do for a free meal. I lied back, letting the anger of being stuck in the Shriner’s parade ooze from mind. And then I remembered…I used to be a Shriner too. OMG! I am old.

Justin Timberlake and the Realization of Self.

I have to say this: I’m mad. I mean livid, angry and incensed. Why you ask? Justin Timberlake. Okay, I don’t know Justin Timberlake and I’m sure he is a swell guy and all, but I recently purchased his latest release The 20/20 Experience which made me realize that I’m not cool.

It was a great epiphany for me. For years I have languished in the self-confidence that I am, in fact, super cool. I mean I have pretty good sized action figure collection, I have written a book titled RISE OF THE PENGUINS, I can paint pictures that are poignant, I know the alphabet and I can use the alphabet to assemble various words in a somewhat structured manner in order to communicate. All really cool stuff. So you may be asking yourself, if all of that is true, then why did JT make you feel uncool? Well here’s why: As I was cruising home in my 2007 Chrysler Sebring that has well over 100,000 miles and that I’m still making payments on, (don’t be jealous), I listened to The 20/20 Experience by the aforementioned Justin Timberlake. His voice was smooth; the beats had me feeling it to the point where I was awkwardly bobbing my head and then I couldn’t help myself but to start singing along to the bonus track Body Count.

Let me tell you a little more about myself. I’m forty-five, somewhat pasty white despite some Hispanic heritage in my bloodline and I have the singing voice of a Galapagos Tortoise in heat. The reason I know I have the signing voice of Galapagos Tortoise is because on a recent visit to the local zoo I had, thanks to my teen-age daughter, a Cher Lloyd song stuck in my head and I quietly sung I Want You Back. Within minutes the tortoises broke free from their pens and stampeded toward me, all with hope of having a ‘go’ at the creature singing with the mellifluous voice of their kind and announcing that it was time to procreate. I fled the lust-filled tortoises posthaste, narrowly avoiding their amorous advances.

As I was saying, I was happily driving and singing along with JT, (it didn’t matter that I didn’t know the words, with pipes like mine I can make the words up), and then a strange thing happened—I discovered  I couldn’t match his notes. To say the least, I was shocked. I’ve always been able to match the subtle crooning of KISS and other artists. You should hear me sing Calling Dr. Love by KISS. I guarantee it will leave you with your heart all a flutter. Something had to be amiss. I tried again and by comparison to Mister Timberlake I emitted something that sounded akin to a belch after eating one too many kielbasa. This wouldn’t do, so I changed tracks to Suit and Tie. This song made me remember his performance on the Grammys. At that point I also remembered that not only am I forty-five, but I have bad knees and that I have the rhythm and dancing ability of an Aardvark with arthritis and palsy. 

Handsome JT-ish guy-Crayon on paper-2013

Arthritic Aardvark in Suit and Tie-Crayon on paper-2013

I continued to listen to the music, despite the fact that I two had consecutive gut punches to my self-esteem. In my frustration, I switched lanes to go around a Roadway truck whose driver wrongly guessed that the speed limit was 30 MPH when in fact it was 50 MPH. (I mention the name Roadway so the company will know that their drivers lack the capability of reading road signs or adhering to traffic laws). As I’m passing, the driver of said truck decides that he wants to be in my lane and promptly merges over. I narrowly escaped a grisly death by slamming on the brakes, laying on the horn and extending a single finger to let the driver know that he was number one. 

*(The single finger reaction is essential to survival while avoiding tons of impending steel doom)

When I stopped at the next red light, I took a deep breath and looked in the rearview mirror to adjust my bifocals. How did this guy not see my beige four-door sedan? It was then that I fully understood the forces at play. I was no longer in the realm of cool—that shady oasis that protects those who dwell there from the harsh light of reality. The Gods of Suave had attempted to smite me. I can’t dance like JT, I can’t sing like JT, I’m not as good-looking as JT and if he collected action figures, his collection would be bigger and better than mine. I thought man, I need to go home and watch a Dove commercial.

But when I got home my dogs were jumping and barking, happy to see me. And then my wife came home from work and she hugged me and was glad to be home and by my side. She looked at my latest painting and loved it. And then Justin Timberlake being so much cooler than me no longer mattered—he’s just a guy who worked hard and used his talents and is really cool. So now I listen to The 20/20 Experience and no longer feel uncool. It reminds me to keep on working hard and maybe I’ll get to where I want to be. Who knows, maybe JT wishes he could write a book about a penguin uprising?

On Writing Stuff Part 4 (Reality, Distractions and Delays)

Welcome to part 4 in my 11,789 part series on writing. Today we have a special treat. I will be doing a Q&A with Lance Dilly. Dilly is the author of the wildly successful children’s novel Don’t Stab the Cat with That Icicle and the heart-warming bestselling collection of adult paranormal poetry Raindrops on Tears.

Lance, thank you for being here.

Call me Mister Dilly.

(Interviewer chortles).

Why is that so amusing, Steven?

I’m sorry, Mr. Dilly… The name sounds like a euphemism. I think of Jim Morrison being arrested in 1969 for introducing Mr. Dilly to the audience in Miami.

Well now that Mister Dilly is gone, I have some space to take up. *note to self—work on interviewing skills. I was going to ask him about what it took to write his books, so instead, I’ll talk about how I wrote my first novel RISE OF THE PENGUINS. 

Let’s take a trip back to 2005 when my teenage daughter was chatting with her friends on World of Warcraft. I jumped in her conversation and typed a few words about penguins. I recalled a short story I had written years before, and I soon began writing out the idea. Because I had never really had much time on the computer and I didn't know that Microsoft Works© was a really shitty, crappy bad word processor thing, I failed to save after every paragraph other word and, of course, I lost the first twenty pages to my book. 
 

Works doesn't.

But I was young and ignorant. Okay I wasn’t really that young. So with me thinking this writing stuff was easy, I pressed on and bought a stack of spiral-bound notebooks and I wrote. I wrote every day, every spare minute I had until, and I’m serious about this next part, I developed carpal tunnel syndrome. Actually the injury was caused by some poorly designed equipment at my job, but it was quite painful, and my writing slowed to a crawl. So two surgeries and eight weeks of physical therapy later I could finally write again.

I spent the spring of 2006 blasting through notebooks. (I wrote the entire novel by hand, not on the computer after my Works experience). I was doing well. I was working a lot of mid-night shifts, which was fine by me because that gave me undisturbed time to write while on my breaks; I had gotten myself in the best shape I had been in since my high-school football days and then the next thing you know, at 38 years old, I found myself getting two coronary stents because two of my arteries were 99% blocked. The doctor said I probably would have died had I not got the appointment when I did. The thing about life-changing events and the whole almost dying thing is it can sometimes cause you to lose your focus. Well wouldn’t you know it, 2007 rolled in and I was still sitting on a book that was 5/8 finished. After another surgery and recovery that year, I got to it and finished the book!

I spent the remainder of ’07 converting the hand written text to digital, editing all along the way. So by the end of that year I had a completed novel and absolutely no idea what to do next. I decided I needed an editor. I found a friend of the family with the credentials, and he spent the next year and a half editing 70% of the book. In the meantime, I had lost my job (actually forced to resign because I sued the company for my injuries caused by their faulty machines. I can’t mention the name of the evil multi-national glass corporation that made my last year working for them a living hell for legal reasons).

2008 came along, my book was still with the editor, I found a new job and then my heart decided to make it’s presence known again. No big deal that time, I had only one artery that was 80% blocked. I got my partially edited book back in 2009. I decided I had to just put it out there and submit it and see what happens. I was rejected. Okay. I brushed it off and found a new editor. Wouldn’t you know it, on January 11th, 2010, I suffered a major heart-attack. Three months later, my second editor passed away of the same thing that almost got me. My doc said no more stress and no more heavy work. So that meant I spent the rest of 2010 headed for a divorce and I went back to school. All the while, there sat my lonely little book.

I joined a writers group, got a Facebook account, met some old friends, one of whom is an author and really showed me a few dozen things (Actually more than a few dozen, and I credit him with more than he probably knows). I met another old friend who encouraged me to get to the living part of life. When she became my wife in 2012, she pushed me past the very real fear of publishing my book. (More on fear in the future). And in spite of all of those little or major roadblocks life put in the way, my book is available for sale to the good people of the world. 

So there it is. The condensed history of a novel and getting past the things that life throws at you and getting your work done. So whether that next heart-attack comes this year or next year or in twenty years and if don’t get lucky again, I can say I have a book in print (and on Kindle and Nook). Yeah it’s not a NY Times best-seller (yet) and there might be a few things in the book I would change now, but the fact is I did it and I’m currently writing another novel in the RISE OF THE PENGUINS Saga.

Well I hope this brief bio gives one or two of my seven or eight readers an insight to the author and maybe even inspire one of you to keep on pushing through whatever life throws at you, because there is a light at the end of the tunnel (Dang it…another tired cliché). Until next time, when I'll talk about my adventures in the Congo and finding Mokele-mbembe, keep on reading (hopefully about my penguins). Feel free to add a comment or talk about what you have (had) to overcome to get where you need to be.

On Writing Stuff Part 36

Welcome to part 36 in my 11,789 part series on writing. In our previous adventure I told you how to make 8 million dollars on your very first independently published book like I did off of my first novel RISE OF THE PENGUINS. Just remember to follow those FIVE very important steps I told you about in parts 33 through 35 of the On Writing Stuff series on this blog. And if you haven’t subscribed, I would suggest that you do, if for no other reason than to appease my vanity. You can also subscribe to the RISE OF THE PENGUINS newsletter on riseofthepenguins.net for news on the second part in the ROTP saga titled THE ROYAL CREED. Due out late 2013/early 2014.

So now that we are all fabulously wealthy and wading around in piles of cash from our novels—hold on, my blog writing is being interrupted by the voice in my head—

What’s that you say? I’m not wealthy? I didn’t make that much money? Really…I only made that much? I can’t afford to breathe on that much money. But what about parts 33 through 35? It was all a dream? But what about the moose antlers, ballet slippers and grape seed oil? Oh. Was she mad? Well that's the last time I take ZQuil with muscle relaxers.

Okay, let’s get back to maximizing our time spent on writing. Time zombies. I was asked why not time vampires? Well it’s been done and because of popular culture, I kinda hate vampires right now. So I chose the next scary monster that is headed to the point of becoming trite: Zombies. Zombies used to terrify me, but now, not so much. I’m gonna say, that while I am happy for the achievement attained by certain television shows, and I love seeing creative people being rewarded with success, I’m at the point where I really don’t care about The Governor or Rick. Zombies are everywhere now; the movies are currently in process of butchering Max Brooks’ World War Z and I even see zombies in car commercials. It's like we live in the movie The Sixth Sense and we are all Cole Sear and we see nothing but dead people. The next thing you know somebody is going to write a zombie love story. What’s that? They have? Well at least the zombies didn’t turn into My Little Pony glitter sparkle fun time zombies.

[BTP] The next biggest time zombie…or better yet, because it can be such a huge time waster, I'll call it Time Cthulhu, is social media. For example: I just did a Google search to make sure I had spelled Cthulhu correctly because spell check was yelling at me with a squiggly red underline. I proved to myself that I was indeed correct, but during the search I got distracted by a message on Facebook and spent twenty minutes doing other stuff when I should have been writing this blog. While social media is a necessary evil (Warning: tired cliché just used) it is also, for me anyways, the biggest Time Cthulhu I have to deal with. While I may post a picture or an update on my RISE OF THE PENGUINS Facebook page every few days, I will also check to see what’s up with my family, fellow writers, my friends (a lot of whom are fellow writers and people I have met on Facebook and I am happy to call genuine friends), and, from time to time I also numb my mind by playing just one game of Bejeweled Blitz. Well one game turns into 28 and before you know it 45 minutes have been devoured by the Time Cthulhu. Add Twitter, Goodreads, Tumbler, Instagram and other things to that equation and you can easily sacrifice 2 or 3 hours to the Cthulhu.

For those of you who don’t know what a Cthulhu is, I’ve created this amazing rendering of a Cthulhu: 

Cthulhu Rising-Crayon on paper-2013

The most difficult part about the Time Cthulhu, (A.K.A social media), is that you need it. You need it to help promote your book and to meet people in our profession, especially if you are an indie publisher like I am. But you have to learn to tame the Cthulhu. (If you are wondering why I keep using Cthulhu when I can easily use another word, it’s because I say the name every time I write it, and it’s fun to say. How many times a day or week or year does someone actually get to say Cthulhu? Say it with me. Cthulhu, Cthulhu, Cthulhu. Fun huh? Though I think we just summoned the Cthulhu from the depths). By taming the Cthulhu, I mean try to allow yourself only one part of the day to use social media. And by part I mean, restrict yourself to an hour or less. There is nothing that you have to do on Facebook or Tumbler that can’t be done in less than an hour. Whether it be six/10 minute intervals or two/30 minute sessions or whatever works, just do it and spend that extra time writing your stories. Nobody is going to write your story for you, especially not Cthulhu.

Join me next time when we discuss how to make 8 million dollars off of your first indie book.