Category Archives: Random Toy Box

Posts on the general topic of family.

Hay still smells good, but Daddy’s done with cows

For some strange reason, it smelled like a haymow on the second floor of my building yesterday. It’s not the kind of space that should smell like hay. Maybe somebody was just wearing an extra dose of Barnyard by Calvin Klein. Whatever the reason, it sent my mind reeling back to the 1970s.

The images in my memory were not ones of attempting to lug hay bales as big as myself, or of scratching up my arms on the rough edges of cut hay. They weren’t of getting blisters in the joints of my destined-for-office-work fingers from the friction of baler twine. They weren’t of trying to balance on a moving wagon while keeping out of the way of bigger kids who could actually heft the bales up onto the stack.

My memories were of building forts with bales in the mow; of playing hide and seek and tunneling between the stacks; of the hay smelling fun, not being the odor of sweat and hard work.

haymow diplomacy

Ah, those good old days! Making forts, hiding out, and negotiating international treaties in the wonderland of the haymow. It was good to be a kid. (Image: Ridson Tillery – US Farm Security Administration)

My wife once asked me if I regretted my children not having that kind of upbringing. I said no.

They’ll have much more opportunity in their suburban childhoods than I had in my rural one. They will have schools with more resources, and a wider variety of people with which to interact. They will miss out on some particular brands of fun, but they’ll miss much of that fun merely because it’s not the ‘70s anymore. Even in the country, it’s 2015, with 2015 rules and regulations.

A farm life would be good to teach them the value of hard work. It might teach them that you can smell bad and still walk tall, as long as you smell bad for a good reason, and only when necessary. It could teach them humility, as it did me when my job was to hold cows’ tails. Cows’ tails can get to be very – let’s call it grimy – and having to hold them tight can make a young dandy have to swallow a good portion of his pride.

All the cows are doin it

Even with a friend along to help talk to the cow into it, I still don’t want to do any more milking. (Image: John Vachon – US Farm Security Administration)

There can be many character benefits to a farm life, but I don’t want it for my boys. The selfish truth of the matter is I don’t want it for me, because if they lived on a farm, I’d have to live there too, and I don’t want to. I don’t want to start work at 4 a.m. and knock off after dark. I don’t want to carry blisters on my still perfect-office-worker fingers all through haying season. I don’t want to coerce milk from an animal who doesn’t feel like giving it up, or even one who does. I don’t want my livelihood held hostage by the weather or a far-away commodities market. And I never want to have to grab hold of another cow’s stinky, sticky, wet tail again.

I’ve decided the second floor of my building smelled more like a silo. Silos were always dark and damp inside. I never had any fun in a silo.

Our usual boyhood shenanigans are interrupted for this important announcement

It seems like it’s taken forever, but it’s finally here. I can now hold in my hand a copy of A Housefly in Autumn that doesn’t have the word PROOF stamped in bold letters across the last page. This is the real deal. The book is live.

Now all I have to do is sell it. There should be a richer reward for writing, editing, formatting, and generally coordinating the production of a novel than the big prize of having to persuade people to buy it. I mean, yeah, there’s the sense of accomplishment, but writers are dreamers. They have big, glorious dreams about their work. Rarely does the dream culminate with nobody buying the book. The reality may end that way, but not the dream.

So let’s not worry about reality for a minute; let’s focus on the dream. The dream is that all kinds of people, from all over, get behind the book and spread the word to other people I could never reach on my own.

If you are inclined to help with this dream, I am grateful for any assistance. Whether it be through social media, word of mouth, or smoke signals, I’ll take it. I need all the help I can get spreading the word.

My baby can read!

Big Man is first in line to get his copy.

Here is some information about the book.

Title: A Housefly in Autumn

Genre: Young Adult and up. I’ve tried to create something that both young adults and adults could enjoy while attempting to do some things that are different from the current trends in YA fiction. Time will tell if different is a good thing in this instance.

Synopsis: At 17, Anders Christiansen was a young man overflowing with potential. All his teachers believed he was destined to blossom into a leading man of letters, enjoying a life of rich rewards.

That was before the accident.

Now, Anders’s great talent lies fallow. He can’t produce the complex ideas he once did. His thoughts are slow and his words simple. The world holds little promise for him anymore.

Struggling to build a meaningful life out of the wreckage of his dreams, Anders learns the value of simple treasures. Loyalty, devotion, and even sacrifice hold rewards of their own to renew hope after tragedy. Love can cause hurt, but he who gives love when he hurts the most will reap a joy outweighing the pain.

Anders gives meaning to his life in the way he spends it. He will face grave danger to spare those he loves, and though his gifts be diminished, he will share them freely with even the humblest of children. Though never sought, Anders’s reward is immense and enduring, showing the millions of reasons to go on sharing even the simplest of gifts.

Purchase Links:

Paperback

Amazon (U.S.A.)

http://www.amazon.com/Housefly-Autumn-Scott-Nagele/dp/1502492954/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1434470691&sr=1-1&keywords=scott+nagele

Barnes & Noble

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-housefly-in-autumn-scott-nagele/1122120147?ean=9781502492951

Kindle

http://www.amazon.com/Housefly-Autumn-Scott-Nagele-ebook/dp/B00ZPQ05AO/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=8-1&qid=1435071078

I haven’t told you how good the book is because you should never trust the author to tell you about the quality of his product. You can trust that I’ve poured years of hard work into this book. Whether that’s enough is for the reading public to decide. Thank you for helping me reach them.

An old dog’s new trick: asking for help

I’m not good at asking for help. I’m much more comfortable helping than being helped. I don’t know why; it’s probably some kind of pride thing. Or stubbornness. Who knows?

This self-publishing biz has taught me there are some things you can’t do alone. Writing is a fine thing to do alone, but writing sometimes leads to publishing, and publishing beats the hell out of introverts.

You don’t have to ask for help if you can afford to pay for it, but I can’t do that either. Take that, foolish pride!

I’ve had to learn to ask. I’m still learning. It’s a long lesson.

So this is me, practicing asking for help.

If you’ve been following this or my other blog, you may know I’ve been preparing a new book for publication. It’s taken a long time, but I’m finally on the cusp of having the project pulled together. My wife is planning a small release party for me on June 25. (This happens to be the anniversary date of Custer’s Last Stand, but I was never into omens, and it was a pretty good day for Crazy Horse.)

Over the past couple years, I’ve asked and received valuable help from beta readers, editors, and a talented artist named Jessica O’Brien who provided the amazing cover art.

Jessica's wonderful cover art.

Jessica’s wonderful cover art.

Now, I need more help, lots more. Perhaps even your help, if you are willing.

Besides visitors to my blogs, and a sprinkling of people on Facebook, few others know about this book. Once the book is released, this has to change. I need people to help spread the word. So, to any who are willing, I humbly ask that you use whatever social media you are comfortable with to help. Whether it be a link on a blog, a Facebook post, a Tweet, whatever you’d like to do will help.

I will announce the official release. (You bet I will!) I will then welcome your assistance. You don’t even have to tell me how you’re helping spread the word, although it would allow me to thank you if you did.

Helping does not mean you have to buy or read the book. I’m just looking to let people know the book exists so they can make their own decisions about their interest in it. If you want to read the book and share your impressions of it, that would be fantastic, but just pointing a few people toward the book to see for themselves is also very helpful. Whatever you are willing and able to do is appreciated. And if you’d rather just wish me luck, I’ll take that too.

Some info about the book.

Title: A Housefly in Autumn

Genre: Is Young Adultish a genre? I’ve tried to write a story that would appeal to Young Adults as well as General Fiction readers. In doing so, I have incurred the risk of missing both audiences, but what is life without risk? (Just ask Custer.)

Blurb: A Housefly in Autumn is intended for Young Adults and up. A historical novel, set in 19th century Europe, it follows the life of a young man whose dreams have crumbled down around him. In an act of heroism, he sacrifices his own promising future to save the life of another. Now he must decide whether to cling to the unlikely hope of regaining his old life, or aim his efforts toward making the most of the life fate has dealt him. Though it is difficult to let go of the rewards that life once promised, perhaps the greatest rewards are the ones earned by building new hope from the bits and pieces of wrecked dreams.

More description can be found here. I will post purchase links when they are available.

A big Thank You in advance to all willing to help.

 

 

Always play safe in Thunderdome

The boys’ uncle sent them a trampoline for Christmas. Memorial Day weekend is the perfect time to build outdoor toys. The weather is finally warm enough to play outside; enough months have passed since Christmas to make it seem like a brand new gift; and parents have an extra day to recover from the trauma of assembly.

This trifecta of perfect timing was marred only by my being sick. I had just your garden variety virus, but my throbbing head and weak limbs did not feel like trampoline-building.

This did not stop my wife for a moment. If I couldn’t do it, she would. I begged her to hold off, but she was a woman with a plan, and that plan involved happily bouncing children. All I had to do was bring up the box from the basement.

Rather than stand in the way of a mother’s goals, I did as asked. Then, I entertained Big Man in the sun room as Mommy and the older boys exited to the back yard.

She did a good job building, but a trampoline, with all its required tautness, presents a struggle for any individual builder. By the time two female neighbors had come to check on her, I realized I had to abandon this being sick business.

I’m sure the neighbors saw me moping around in the back room. I’m also sure my wife explained my infirm state to them. But I’ve read enough mommy blogs to know that when a wife tells her friends her husband is sick, she rolls her eyes. I also know the friends take any husband’s illness as code for, “He’s faking so he doesn’t have do any man work.”

I took Big Man out to help Mommy. With two adults working, we finished the job without much trouble. The worst part was keeping track of the two pages of instructions among the 20 pages of safety guidelines. On the plus side, that was 20 pages of booklet we could ignore.

Don't do this at home

If this picture were in the instruction booklet, it would have a giant, red X over it.

I did notice one headline in the safety area. It was accompanied by picture of two stick figures bumping heads, complete with pain lines radiating from the skulls. It was a funny picture, accompanied by a ridiculous admonition: “Only one person should be on the trampoline.” The entire family had a good laugh over this one. Why didn’t they just tell us to take it apart and put it back in the basement? One person at a time? How could that be fun?

Yes, they were likely to bump heads, and yes, that might hurt for a minute, but hadn’t I just risen from my deathbed to make this fun possible?

They went two and three at a time. They crashed into each other in all kinds of hilarious ways, and they all got over it. Because it was fun. Because sometimes fun comes with bumps and bruises. Because we’re not the kind to make trampoline memories; we make Thunderdome memories.

I got next

The next challenger is ready. Just imagine how awesome it will be once we get the chain saws and pikes hung from the sides.