Tag Archives: writing

The blog days of August

The blogging world slows down in the summer. Some bloggers take a vacation. Some try to rediscover the real world. I, on the other hand, have just been slacking. It’s not my fault though. I blame society, because society is convenient to blame for everything, with its constant breakdowns. But mostly I blame this intellectually stifling season called summer.

It’s harder to get motivated to write in summer.

First of all, it tends to get hot and it’s harder to think when you’re hot. My best ideas leak out through my sweat glands in summer. Then, all I’m left with are horrible images of an old man perspiring. When the humidity hits, I start thinking again. I start thinking about the mechanics of breathing. I start thinking about how sweating like a pig is supposed to cool a body down. Lying science!

I can't do my work.

I can’t do my work.

The boys want to be outside, running around like maniacs who laugh in the face of the heat index, instead of staying cooped up in the house where I can easily hear and see the funny things they say and do. They become totally selfish and don’t care at all about their responsibility to give me good blog material.

Since between one and two of the children are too young to be outside, running around like unsupervised maniacs, I find myself always outside running around like a supervising maniac, preventing kids from changing neighborhoods like the wind. I can’t type while jogging, let alone at a full sprint. We might be outside until dark, which is practically tomorrow in summer.

As Captain Oates famously said, "I am just going outside and may be some time." It should be noted that Capt. Oates was never seen again, and it wasn't even hot weather.

As Captain Oates famously said, “I am just going outside and may be some time.” It should be noted that Capt. Oates was never seen again, and it wasn’t even hot weather.

Then they want to stay up late, because, hey, there’s no school in the morning and it’s still kind of light outside. This leaves me hardly any time at all for a muse-provoking scotch on the rocks, because, hey, there is work in the morning and it’s going to take me two hours to fall asleep in this heat. Kids tend to supply zero writing prompts when they are standing between you and a quiet nightcap.

This makes me grumpy. When you are hot, sticky, and grumpy, it is the perfect time to write – if you are due to fire off another angry letter to the electric company. When you are grumpy, you tend to lash out at people, which is just what the utilities need and expect. Unfortunately, utilities probably make up a minority of your blog audience. So you should probably just go to bed and stew in your own juices until you fall asleep, as figuratively as you can manage.

All of this not thinking and not writing leads to large gaps between blog posts. This is not the end of the world because your audience is outside playing and getting heat stroke too.  The real problem comes when you get frustrated and give up on the thinking altogether because you figure you can still do the  writing without it. That only ever leads to a third-rate blog post.

And I hope you enjoyed it.

One day in Berlin

I have a new favorite author. So far, he only writes short stories, but that’s fine with me, as he has already established himself as a favorite visual artist of mine. The kid is multi-talented.

Here is one of his latest literary offerings.

Berlin

Since the original may be difficult to see, I’ll type it out:

One day in Berlin there where [sic] nine people playing football. Then uncle Bob acsadentliy [sic] therw [sic] the ball at a ponty [sic] fence and the ball went pop! They went to a store but the footballs were all gone. Then they went home to look for a pump and patch but the stuff was lost. They where[sic] in bad luck. Then they went to Jakes house and they played catch. the end

In honor of discovering this new talent, I will now hold an impromptu book club meeting regarding this work. Let’s dig deeper into the text.

There’s a surprising amount of mystery surrounding this episode. For example, why is it set in Berlin? Well, actually, that’s not so much a mystery if you have followed this artist and seen the pickelhaube and Prussian flag requests in his Christmas letters to Santa, like I have. Berlin is the capital of Germany. That says it all.

Were they playing American football or European football (soccer)? We can’t be sure, but the fact that uncle Bob threw the ball indicates that, unless he was goalie or was throwing the ball in from out of bounds, it was likely American football. Also, the fact that he threw it at D-fence, or in German, Die-Fence, indicates he probably owned a cardboard cutout of a picket border which he took to NFL games.

Also, all the footballs being gone from the store lends evidence to it being an American football, as the German sporting goods shops would less likely be out of soccer balls.

Who misplaced the pump and patch? This is the question a father asks every time something goes flat. No one ever takes responsibility, and no one ever will.

Did Jake have another ball at his house, or did they make the best of things and play catch with the flat ball? I like to think Jake demonstrated admirable character development by showing his eight comrades that inflation is just a state of mind. The world thinks you can’t play catch with a popped ball. You can submit to that kind of limited thinking, or you can change the world. Way to go, Jake! You are a true football hero.

Sometimes the answer to great problems (global strife, world hunger, playing sports with an uninflated ball) are all about shifting the perceptions of the major players.

This is an uplifting story of human triumph. It shows that you can do anything your mind allows you, like playing with a popped ball, or even hyphenating and splitting single-syllable words onto multiple lines.

I think I’m going to be a fan of this guy for a long time.

 

Books: so much more appealing when they have covers

Occasionally I take a post off from Daddy Blogging in order to talk about blogging or writing in general. This usually happens when another blogger tags me for some type of event that’s going around the blogging community. Then, I put the kids to bed and talk about my blogging process or the writing life.

This is like that, but different. I’m taking off the Daddy Blogger hat, but not at the behest of other bloggers. I’m doing it on my own, in order to make some exciting announcements.

The thing about me and announcements is I’m not very good at them. They make me nervous. People will know my plans, so now I have to follow through on them. I’d rather finish my projects and then say, “See? That’s what I did.” But that doesn’t build any hype, and hype is part of marketing, and marketing is what you’re supposed to do at times like this. So I’m told by successful writers.

And I want to be successful.

So, announcements.

We have cover art!

Last time I took off the Daddy Blogger hat, I mentioned that I’m working on publishing a new book. It seems like I’ve been working on publishing this book forever. One of the delays was finding the right artist to do the cover. I finally found her. Her name is Jessica O’Brien. She did this awesome artwork.

 

ice4

 

I just have to get the final proofing done and we’ll finally have a book. Cross your fingers.

And when will this final proofing be done? Ha! You actually expect a man with my dread of announcements to give a date? Don’t worry; I’ll make an announcement.

I’m working on a new blog.

As part of this book rollout, I’ve replaced my author website with a new WordPress blog. My static website was a completely amateurish endeavor, built by me, a completely amateurish web designer. In moving to WordPress I hope to do more with less (time and money). That savings should allow me to maintain two blogs at once. We’ll see about that, won’t we?

At the other blog, I will be writing about writing. If that’s the sort of thing that excites you, you probably have issues, so you should go here www.scottnagele.com and click “follow” right away.

This blog will remain.

I’m proud of this blog. It’s not the most widely read blog, but I think it has its entertaining moments. (Click the Index of Posts tab at the top to see everywhere it’s been.) But when you are trying to publish a book, write another one, transition a website, work a full-time job, and raise three boys, time can get tight. (Note to the homeowners association: this has nothing to do with why my lawn is eight inches high; it rains every time I try to mow, so tell it to the weatherman.)

I cut down to posting once per week here over the summer. Maybe once my obsession with this new book eases, I’ll be able to post more. I hope so, because Daddy Blogging is the most fun writing I do.

P.S. My apologies to those who read the title and thought this would be a fun post about toddlers tearing the covers off books.

Going on tour by sitting in the same spot

I’m doing something a little different this time.

Fellow blogger, Naptimethoughts, has invited me to join something called the Writing Process Blog Tour. This “tour” involves me sitting in a chair and answering four questions about how I write. Then, I ask two other bloggers to do the same thing. In the end, I think some psychologist will come along and coin a new phrase for the mental disease that makes people want to blog, if narcissism isn’t enough to cover it.

sweet music

I banish Ethel to the porch, fire up my favorite pipe, and tap it out like sweet music. (Image: Harris & Ewing)

It’s always an honor to be asked to participate in a harebrained scheme by another blogger, especially one who is witty and writes things you enjoy reading. Keep up the good work, Naptimethoughts.

But why would I discuss writing on a blog about parents and children? Out of ideas? Filler?

Well maybe. But this is also a blog about writing. If you haven’t noticed it, that’s good. If you don’t think about how the words got on the computer screen, it means I’ve done something right.

Now that we’ve established the motive, let’s move on to the crime. Here is the info you probably (and rightfully) never cared about.

  • What am I working on now?

For starters, I am always working on this blog – trying to transport fragile, funny episodes from my memory to your computer screen without busting them into a million un-funny pieces with inadequate writing.

Beyond that, I am hoping to publish a new novel this year. This one is titled, A Housefly in Autumn. It’s a Young Adult book, or at least I think it is. I’ve never published YA before, so I’m a little anxious about it. Right now I’m trying to arrange for cover art, formatting, and all the other things that go into making a manuscript into a book.

I am also writing the first draft of another book. This one is also in a new genre for me, so I’m not going to say much, because it could turn out to be total crap, in which case you will hear no more about it.

  • How does my work differ from others in the genre?

There are lots of entertaining parenting blogs out there. If there is one way in which my blog is different from them, I’d have to say it’s that I don’t use the F-word as much. It turns out parents like to swear a lot when they talk about their kids. Go figure!

My fiction is different mostly because I like to write across genres. I do humor and drama, contemporary and historical. I even have a novel manuscript squirreled away that borders on science fiction.

a smile throug a tear

Humor and drama; historical, contemporary, and futuristic – all in one book. Variety is just one of the reasons I love short stories. (And that’s my self-promotion for the day!)

More about this.↑

  • Why do I write what I do?

I don’t know why I write at all. Writing is hard. It makes me tired and I’d rather be playing games. As far as what I write, I write what seems like a good story in my head, whether it’s a true story or something I just dreamed up. Sometimes it is still a good story when it gets to paper, sometimes not.

I most enjoy reading humor and history, so that probably influences the things I choose to write about and the way I approach the process. I like reading classics too. I wish that meant that I write classics.

feeling classical

Sometimes, when I’m feeling classical, I just slip on my writing tights and let go.

  • How does my writing process work?

I’m not sure it does work. I try to set a little time aside most days for fiction. Blog posts I fit in whenever I can. With three boys under six, time can be tight.

They say you find time for the things that are your priorities. I find time for my family and a few paragraphs here and there. This explains why my lawn looks like hell and I’ve always had a day job instead of a career in something.

Little by little, I finish manuscripts, and then I spend a long time figuring out what to do with them. Some of them I put away for later. Once in a while, I publish one. If I ever find the talent, time, and money for effective marketing, you might hear about one of them.

Until then, there’s always this blog. And it’s free!

handoff

Then I simply hand the manuscript over to my agent, and the rest takes care of itself.

Now it’s time to recruit some partners in crime.

For that I turn to Pieter at Ah dad. Pieter writes funny commentary about many topics, but when he writes about his family, there is a heartfelt quality about his blogging that emanates right through the computer screen to you. Plus, he’s in the Southern Hemisphere, and if I understand geography, that means he does everything upside down.

Also, Jon, from South of the Strait. A lot a bloggers talk humor at you, but Jon writes humor. His wit doesn’t gang tackle you. It’s a storyteller’s wit, thoroughly mixed in, not bunched up around the exclamation points. I like that.

Gentlemen, I leave it to you. If you want in on this boondoggle, just answer these four questions and pass the buck to two more victims honorees.