The one where I’m Super Excited!

YES! It’s true! Despite the various woes of life and the dreariness of job-searching in this little town, I really am Super Excited!

 

What’s got me in such a great mood, you may ask. Is it the fact that I’ve got Random Ramblings back to regular updates after some serious slacking off from mid-December until yesterday? Maaaaybe. Is it because I have my payday this Friday and get my income tax the following week, which means I’ll be able to buy the plane ticket for my trip? Maaaaybe.

 

But what is REALLY causing my Good Mood and general Super Excited-ness is… WRITING! I’ve been looking at submissions guidelines for comic book companies, and came away from it surprisingly hopeful! This got me brainstorming ideas, and I’m happy to say that I’ve started outlining one of them.

 

As per most of the companies’ submissions guidelines, I’ll be outlining the entirety of the story, which will probably mean going with a miniseries instead of an ongoing. Completely cool with me, since limited series have a much higher chance of a company risking money that they would waste if they had to cancel an ongoing due to shitty sales.

 

I’ve also got a semi-local friend who might be doing the art for my project, provided she’s interested in what I come up with! If everything goes according to my very loose time-table, I should have a submission ready to be sent off by summer – late summer, if things deviate from the plan.

 

Hope you will keep following along! If everything works out, I’ll spoil little bits here, like whatever the final title ends up being and such. Maybe even some art here and there! Wouldn’t that be cool?

GAAAAH!

Ever been in a situation where money is a liiiittle tighter than you’d like?

 

. . .

 

Fuck, who am I kidding? The state that this country is in, the majority of us are struggling to pay bills. For me though, the struggle just got a wee bit harder. As in going from “paying bills and almost able to start saving again” to “FUCK! My boss cut me down to 12 hours this week!”.

 

Yeah, that’s my oh-so-wonderful work schedule for this week – two days, from 4pm to 10pm. What’s really sad about it is that I’m hoping it’s that high next week, and that my boss doesn’t decide to schedule me for only one day, or no days at all.

 

So I’m in the process of trying to find a new job. I’m hopeful about the application I put in with the bank I go through, and they seemed surprised that I called the day after applying. I’m hoping that’s a good thing, as I plan on calling every other day until I get an answer, one way or the other. I’m also going to file for unemployment, as they’ll (hopefully) help cover what I’m not getting, hours-wise. And my next day off (Thursday) will see me stopping by both of the employment offices in the area, to try my damnedest to get a different job.

 

. . .

 

I’m trying to be hopeful, though. Everything will work itself out in the end, which I’m reminding myself of whenever I start to stress out about money. Best case scenario, I get a new job that pays similarly to my current job, and don’t have to cancel my trip this April. Worst case scenario, I become homeless. In the event of that happening, I’ll have to work on a skill, like that “golden-voiced homeless guy” that’s been in the news.

 

OH YEAH! I’m also working on a novel. Or starting to. I’m in the “idea” phase, and intend to start outlining by the end of the first week of February. As the plan stands, the first few chapters should be finished by the end of February at the latest. I would try and work faster, but I’m also attempting to work out ideas for pitches to comic book publishers, and find work In Real Life until that works itself out. So, there’s that.

 

I’ll try and post more!

Kal-El-mas Eve 2010

Another year, another Christmas Eve family get-together. All the insanity that I’ve grown used to over the years, despite one of my aunts making an attempt to keep us all organized and to keep the chaos to a minimum. 

Aunt D: “Okay, now everyone calm down, and let’s all be patient.”

J (sister): [Laughs]

Me: “You do realize that we’re crazy every year, right?”

Aunt D: “Yes, but this time, 95% of us are adults.”

That didn’t work out as well as she expected. She didn’t make that much of an effort, either. Things started off sort of orderly with everyone in the room getting a gift from the same person, and all of us opening them one by one, and then proceeded to devolve into chaos. People started talking over each other, and weren’t waiting until everyone got gifts to open the one they’d just been handed – so, business as usual at my Grandma’s house on Christmas Eve.

 

Despite not getting what I was looking forward to (and had been led to expect), I still had a good time appreciating my family’s insanity, and being thankful for the gifts that I did get. And as far as I’m concerned, I had a pretty good haul this year: a DVD player (which I’ll be letting my mother use, so I can take my PS2 back from her), an amazingly comfortable robe (or is it ‘housecoat’ when it’s a ‘man-robe’), pajama pants, black slippers, a box of five different kinds of hot sauces from boring jalapeño to a yummy habanero (which I’ve gotten three years in a row now, and enjoy), a nice button-down shirt, and a gorgeous wolf-themed knife.

 

The wolf knife is one that I’ll have to put up a picture of, when I can get one. The aunt that bought it never asks most of us what we want for Christmas, but as far as I’m concerned, always buys some of the coolest shit. A couple years ago, it was a collection of small wolf sculptures of varying colors, with tribal designs on them. Last year, it was a wool wolf blanket.

 

This year, the knife she got has a handle made to look kind of like bone, with a metal-etched wolf set into the center of the handle, and a wolves-in-the-snow scene painted on the blade in a great-looking set of metallic paints. It’s probably the coolest thing I’ve gotten from her, ever since she found out that I really love wolves and eagles. Before that, she used to get just random cool stuff, and a package of socks. I kind of wish that she still got socks, because they’re always disappearing. And they’re not nearly as pleasant to replace when it’s your own money paying for them.

 

So, how was everyone’s Christmas this year? Or if your family hasn’t had their Christmas get-together yet, what are you expecting? Any funny things that usually happen? Or any gifts that you’re reeeeally looking forward to? Let’s hear it!

 

And lastly, merry Kal-El-mas.

Wow, it’s been a while

November 6th was the last post here?

 

I guess that wouldn’t be a long time to some, but with the whole (usually) “daily update” thing over at Random Ramblings, a month and a half – almost – feels like a really long time. I suppose I should update you on how things are going in the life of Barlow, eh?

 

• MOVING – I don’t remember if I mentioned this in the last post, since I’d’ve just found out about it a day or two prior, but my mother (who I’ve been supporting for a while) and I had to move out of the house that we were in and into a new place. The new place is a lot smaller, and it’s a bit of a pain in the ass to pack a five-bedroom, two-story house into a one-story, two-bedroom house.
  
• NEW HOUSE – The new place may be small, but its got a lot of potential, which is why we chose to move into it. When we first looked at it, it looked like hell, and the neighbor has since informed us that the people who lived there were heavily into drugs. Since then, we’ve done a LOT of cleaning, and it’s looking a lot better. I planned to take pictures before we moved stuff in, but that ended up being impossible. When we’re fully set-up in there, I’ll snap some pictures for you folks.
  
• BEARD – The beard abides.
  
• RANDOM RAMBLINGS – There is a cool article over on the main site today, from one of my writers, Em. She’s got a cool (albeit not-recently-updated) blog of her own, and wrote a good article about all the bullshit with Wikileaks and Julian Assange that’s been going on, and if you checked this today, then her article’s right there on the front of the page.
  
• FITNESS – So my plan at the beginning of this year was something of an EPICFAIL. Sort of, anyway. If I remember right, I didn’t limit myself to having it in place this year, and I have finally started to work towards it. I’ve been eating healthier (salad almost every day for lunch, smaller portions, and healthier breakfasts and lunches), and plan to start a modified version of the Couch To 5K program at the beginning of January (to keep it even).
  
• WORK – As always, there are issues at work. I’m getting by, though, and continuing to do the best that I can. I don’t mind most of the people that I work with, but I am looking around for other work. I’ve got a possibility on the horizon, with a bank, so that’s cool. I’ve also got hope of being a paid blogger, possibly as soon as the first half of next year. In the last month, my AdSense totals have jumped from 90 cents to a little over $9, which means I’m (almost) 10% of the way to getting a $100 check from AdSense. It’s not much, but once you start getting paid for writing, the confidence inspired from it will help generate a forward momentum to the point where I will be earning a living with my writing.

 

That’s really all that I can think of for now, I suppose. You guys are always welcome to ask anything you want, though!

It’s a nostalgia type of day

 

Fellow 90’s kids, do you recognize why that wrapper would’ve been as good as gold to any of us, back in the day? If you don’t, be ashaaaaaamed.

 

Tootsie Roll Pops were what I was SO EXCITED about when I was a little kid, even though I didn’t like very many of the flavors. Because if you saw that star-shooting Native American, YOU COULD GET ONE FOR FREE! All you had to do was take the rare, prized wrapper to a store and BAM! Free Tootsie Roll Pop!

 

I saw one of these at work, when a guest asked me to throw away their kid’s wrapper. It made me chuckle, so I looked up pictures on Google Images and found that one somewhere, don’t remember where.

 

The last few days have been really nostalgia-filled anyway. I’ve seen people talking online about all sorts of shows that I used to watch way back when, like Are You Afraid of the Dark? and Secret World of Alex Mack, and the SNICK line-up. Oh, and the always unforgettable Legends of the Hidden Temple. Not to mention a recent crack-fic idea I had for Green Lantern to be mixed with Captain Planet…

30 Days Of Truth: Hate

So yesterday was the first day of my not-too-sane idea to do NaNoWriMo, 30 Days Of Truth and more, all in one month. Yesterday's was SUPPOSED to be "Something you hate about yourself", but I just remembered, so that's why you're getting the first Day Of Truth now.


What is something I hate about myself? I'll take this opportunity to say 'forgetfulness'. I have a really bad habit, and always have had it, of forgetting things or getting really off-topic, really bad.


When I was a kid and later, a teen, I would be asked by my grandparents to get something from another room. I'd agree, walk out of the room, pause and realize that I'd forgotten. Those were, I'd wager, largely due to not paying that much attention, but it's always been a pain, to have memory issues.


It's only recently that I've started remembering REALLY early things, mostly brought to mind by external stimuli like a family member asking if I remember things. But there are things later than that, that I only know happened because someone else swears it's how it happened, and it seems likely.


That one is how things are with my closest and longest-term friend, a guy named Tony. I've known him longer than I remember, and with his account of how we met, details put that at almost 20 years ago, when I was 4 or 5. But if he's wrong, I have noooo clue.


Anyone else have memory issues? Or, hell, want to share something that you hate about yourself?
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