Crane by TerryL (CC BY 3.0)

I restarted kung fu this January. I’d quit when I got pregnant in 2002, and tried to return after, but lacked a definite edge. And I mean a mental/emotional edge, not just pregnancy weight, etc. So I took some time off. Suddenly I blinked and my baby was seven, ready to start kung fu herself, and I was 36 years old and a couch potato.

I am not overweight; I’m actually somewhat petite. But I’m not fit. I’m soft and tire easily. I’ve been wanting to get into shape simply to be healthier and so my clothes fit better. I did love kung fu, I loved the weapons and the forms, but I hated sparring and grappling. Sure, small people have many strengths to play to when they fight, but you really need to learn a lot of skill before you can tap into those strengths. I will say that I have had some really good sparring and grappling sessions in my time where I actually knew my strengths and played to them.

Well. Two. Two good sessions.

When I came back, I knew I would have a long hill ahead of me. I am not coming back as a white belt; I almost wish I was, so I could start at square one, unfit and ready to learn the basics. But I still have my training, and I’m remembering a lot of it. So I’m training with the green belts. It’s not easy.

I want to chronicle my path here, so I’m going to be honest with my training and include all the crappy weakness and insecurity inside me. Sorry for the look into the dark place.

Two weeks ago, we trained sparring. I hate sparring. And I hadn’t sparred in eight years. The blue belt I was with was fast, and hit hard – not hard enough to damage, but hard enough to let me know she was there. I began to get frustrated. And one downside of having a kid is I seem to cry a lot easier. So when I get angry or frustrated, I want to cry.

Panda Cry by Toronja Azul (CC BY 2.0)

Thirty fucking six years old, people.

So I’m sparring this woman and getting more and more frustrated. There’s no crying in kung fu, so I’m holding it back all i’m worth, and my throat starts to close up. So I’m dancing around, sparring, and suddenly can’t breathe. I was praying that my face was red because it always turns red when I work out, and not because I was about to break down. I was lucky class was called. It was horrifying and humiliating. (I couldn’t even cry in the car, cause I had the kiddo with me.)

So, one bad class, right? No big deal. Circumstances and weather had me miss the next couple of classes, and I went back last night, sure that the next class couldn’t be as bad.

Well. I didn’t cry. That was one thing good.

I learned that not only do you need to get in shape to begin fighting again, but when you train in martial arts (or any combative sport, I would wager) your body has to get used to being hit. And i don’t just mean fists- I mean contact with weapons, contact with the ground, etc. And that is not easy to get used to.

Last night we did rolls. I remembered the technique and went all the way down the room. When I got up, the room spun, but I kept going. Did about three treks down the room when I couldn’t get my balance and had to take a break. Humiliating. Tried to relearn backward rolls- hah. went down, over, back- and sideways. Fun. Two of those and I saw spots. Had to take another break. Then we did break falls.

In martial arts, you get thrown a lot, as your fellows need to learn how to throw people. You get to be the dummy. A lot. So they have to train you how to fall so you don’t break a wrist or get a concussion. The metaphor they use is comparing dropping a book on its corner vs. dropping a book flat. If you drop it on its corner, it’ll damage the book, but if the whole book absorbs the fall, it’ll be fine. So when you fall in kung fu, you try to fall flat and slap your arms as you hit. It’s a good technique to know, but hard to train yourself to just fall. Also hard to get your body to accept the frequent shocks of falling.

Then we did throws. Which is easier than break falls, honestly, because you don’t have to get through the mental block of making yourself fall; you don’t have a choice, you’re going down. Then again, if you don’t train well enough in break falls, throws will be really bad, really fast. I did OK being thrown, but wrenched my neck once. Stupid mistake. When it was my turn to throw, I struggled a bit and wasn’t too happy with my form. Most of the people in class are bigger than me, so my form has to be perfect if it’s going to work.  It was at this point I realized I’d been training for 75 minutes and I’d planned on being there only an hour, so I bowed out and came home.

I’ve been feeling lethargic at the end of the day lately, and made myself go last night. I realized when your choice sport is highly combative, you can’t really “warm up” and be on your A game if you’re feeling crappy. At least, I couldn’t. Sure, I could have done a slow, easy run if I was running, but you don’t know how you’re going to train in kung fu, and you need to be mentally sharp to get the techniques down and not get hurt. Halfway through the night I was just telling my body it was good for me and to shut up already and it would be over soon.

But sometimes I wish I could just check out with my mind and let my body get beaten up so it can harden, then come back when it’s ready so I can learn something. Right now I feel like a cat in a dryer, just being flung about, no style, no control. I know I need to train more, especially at home, and it’ll come back to me. But right now I’m feeling my age, and I’m feeling the 8 years away from training, and I’m feeling the lack of emotional and mental hardness that keeps me going when class gets bad. It’s frankly depressing.

Today my body is saying, “See what you did to me, all that hitting the ground and rolling around? See this bruise here? And this sore muscle? This is why we can’t have nice things!”

So I took a hot bath in Epsom salts, read a Runners World article about confidence in sports, and decided to get myself prepared for tomorrow’s class. Because I’m not quitting. That’s the one thing I’m holding onto. If I don’t quit, then I’ll get better. But it’s going to be a long hill to climb.

• Wayne Sutton, nationally known blogger at http://socialwayne.com and social media/community strategist for Twine Interactive,
• Jeff Cohen, a social media consultant and practitioner and one of the principles of SocialMediaB2B.com, one of the most active and useful sites for social media for business,
  
• Mur Lafferty, award-winning podcasting author, writer, blogger, and speaker, co-author of Tricks of the Podcasting Masters, host of I Should Be Writing, the Tor.com Story podcast, and several fiction podcasts,
  
• Brian McDonald, marketing director at Zencos, blogger at http://squarejawmedia.com and Social Media VP of the Triangle chapter of the American Marketing Association,
  
• Ryan Boyles, community manager at IBM, focused on connecting with customers and partners with social media and nurturing brand advocates with engagement inside and outside the company firewall,
  
• David B. Thomas (organizer), social media manager at SAS, responsible for directing SAS’ social media strategy and the practical aspects of integrating social media into the company’s operations globally.

Bidding begins at $1000 and all proceeds go to benefit Haiti quake survivors. Find out details here.

• 00:00:07 ISBW #140
• 00:00:38 GoTo Meeting Message
• 00:01:29 State of the Mur: wrapping up 2009 podcasting content, Jar of Awesome method for choosing among writing projects, editing.
• 00:04:33 Promo: Steve Saylor and Ringtone Feeder present The Caffeine Collection, a dynamic audiobook.
• 00:05:48 Possible ISBW community project: The Artist’s Way– let Mur know if you are interested in participating by commenting here or by email.
• 00:07:50 Today’s topic: the freedom and curse of being an amateur writer.
• 00:12:19 Promo: The Audio Market List–an online audio market resource for fiction writers.
• 00:13:48 Interview: James Enge, author of This Crooked Way. (He can also be found at his Livejournal or on Facebook.
• 00:28:59 Promo: Purgatory, a podcast novel by Tim Dodge.
  00:30:26 Interview: John Claude Bemis, author of the middle-grade novel The Nine Pound Hammer. (referenced book: Lev Grossman’s The Magicians.
• 00:49:55 Promo: V for Vertigo
• 00:50:32 Feedback: creating an author website or blog if you are unpublished or have only a very small number of credits; naming your characters — Charlie suggests using the names in the New Orleans Public Library’s listing of Criminal Court Defendants 1880-1918; word count; studying creative writing in college; running out of steam towards the end of a novel and how to tie it all together — check out Holly Lisle’s How To Revise Your Novel writing course; an in-depth listener review of Dramatica Pro; a listener has a friend who may be giving up on writing after an agency rejection; choosing which project to start (whichever you pick, write them all down first!); listener Chris follows Ray Bradbury’s advice and tries to write 1 Story a Week for 52 weeks “to get the junk out”; thoughts on books using only one P.O.V.; starting to write a story with characters and no plot yet; translating the behavior of publishing houses (anyone interested in a future podcast on agents?)

Thanks!

I’ll probably be some kind of scientist
Building inventions in my space lab in space
I’ll end world hunger I’ll make dolphins speak
Work through the daytime, spend my nights and weekends
Perfecting my warrior robot race
Building them one laser gun at a time
I will do my best to teach them
About life and what it’s worth
I just hope that I can keep them from destroying the Earth
“The Future Soon” by Jonathan Coulton

It is not my intention to start every new post with a JoCo quote, but there is no other way to start this one.

Backstory- We attend a Unitarian Universalist church. We don’t talk a lot about hell there, especially in regards to the kids’ religious education. The other day, the Pink Tornado made a comment about bad people going to hell, and Jim and I assumed she’d gotten it from her friends at school. So last night I asked her, “Where did you hear about hell?” She looked scared and I had to reassure her she wasn’t in trouble, but I was honestly just curious. Turns out she’d learned about the cartoony-type hell for bad people from TinTin books she’s been reading. I laughed and asked her if she had any questions about hell, and told her I didn’t believe it existed. She asked if I thought she’d go to heaven, and I said of course. She was worried about the things we get mad at her for (normal parent/kid interactions, not paying attention, slow on homework, etc), and I told her that if hell existed, it was for serious offenses like murder.

“Well,” she said. “I’m definitely not going to do anything like THAT when I grow up.” Then she paused. Then she frowned. And then she said, “My robots might get out of my control and cause some damage. But I’ll pay for that with my money.”

I nearly had a stroke trying not to burst out laughing. I did smile, and she glared at me. “There are going to be a lot more robots in the future, you know.” I nodded and said I know. Then she went to bed, secure in her future of perfecting her warrior robot race, hoping she can keep them from destroying the earth.

Me. Matt Wallace. Christmas. It gets weird. Not for kids.

• 00:00:07 ISBW #139
• 00:00:57 GoTo Meeting Message
• 00:01:32 Very Special Christmas Episode with Matt Wallace, recorded on the eve of Beethoven’s birthday (probably December 15^th, but according to that Wikipedia link, there’s some ambiguity). Recommended reading: Connie Willis’ short story collection Miracle. A Very Special Christmas Podcast: The Failed Cities Monologues, Hath a Darkness at Variant Frequencies. Watch at your own discretion: Santa is a D*** (NSFW!)

Now it’s late and you head downstairs
’Cause you just can’t sleep so you make some tea
And the doll disapprovingly asks
If you really need that much honey.
“Creepy Doll” by Jonathan Coulton

Since the new year I’ve been working out pretty regularly. I have EA Sports Active, I restarted kung fu (that’s a topic for another post!), and I got Wii Fit Plus for Christmas. So I’ve been mixing it up, doing something different each day.

EA Sports Active asks you what activities you’ve been doing, wanting to know that if you didn’t use the game, you at least did something, and they praise you for it. However, when you don’t do the Wii Fit every day, it starts to get uppity. The day after I’ve sweated in kung fu, and my muscles are rubber from drills we’ve done, the game disapprovingly says it noticed that I didn’t work out yesterday, and how I should work out every day.

And I’m thinking, “No, you passive aggressive fuck, I did not turn you on yesterday to PRETEND TO BE A PENGUIN AND CATCH FISH, I was actually running, jumping, holding a low horse stance till my thighs screamed, and doing forms over and over again.” But it’s just a program. So I try to move past those screens and get to the yoga and useful things.

When we got the Fit, the Pink Tornado was very excited and interested in it, so we made her a profile and she played around with it. She hasn’t picked it up since, deciding instead to play Pokemon or read or run around. Today, the Wii Fit asked me if i’d seen her around. I said yes. Then they asked me how she looked. Getting uncomfortable with this gossipy aspect of it, I looked to see if there was an opt out, but there were only four choices. Did she look: slimmer? heavier? Rounder? Or about the same?

I checked about the same. My daughter is 7 years old, healthy, active, and was slim before this controlling bastard entered our home. The game then registered surprise and said that MAYBE I WASN’T PAYING ATTENTION.

Then it said that if I get active with my pet, we can bond more.

I’m surprised it didn’t give me advice on my marriage.

Seriously, Wii Fit Plus programmers, I appreciate the need for encouragement, but I can do without the parenting and pet owner comments. Lay off.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/wilderdom/CC BY-SA 2.0

Happy New Year!

We are proud to have GoTo Meeting as a sponsor! Get a Free 30-Day Trial!

• 00:00:07 ISBW #138
• 00:00:39 GoTo Meeting Message
• 00:01:14 New Year’s Kick in the Pants: about failing to write/podcast because of fear. Recommended reading: author Matt Wallace
• 00:06:21 State of the Mur: rewriting Heaven, working on Underground, hosting the Tor.com fiction podcasts. Condolences for Tee Morris’s loss (ChipIn fundraising link below).
• 00:09:16 Promo Night Light Stories podcast
• 00:10:04 Advice we need to keep hearing. Fear, failure, experimenting, resolutions. DO NOT DESPAIR, and keep striving.

Detailed show notes provided by Carrie Kei Heim Binas

It’s like becoming fluent in a language. The truly bi- (or tri- or more) lingual understand that when you take a sentence and put it into another language, it’s not just a word for word translation. Bablefish can show you that much- you have to understand a culture, their idioms, how they speak, etc. It’s much more of an issue than testicles/tentacles (Better Off Dead).

Along the same lines, companies who are understanding that the Internet is a different medium are the ones who are succeeding, while the ones who demand a direct translation of their current product/message are not so much. When I did freelance web design I had a client who demanded, despite my constant explanations, that the website look just like their brochure. I tried to explain it was a different medium and was so much more versatile than a folded piece of paper. They wouldn’t hear it. So I made a website that looked just like their brochure, and they loved it. I was not terribly proud of it.

Our local paper just laid off 21 more employees. If you look at most newspapers, their websites are direct translations – to the point that they don’t even link relevant words in their articles, even when they mention web sites – of their newspapers. They’re taking a complex sentence in their own language and translating it, word for word, into Internet language. And it doesn’t work. Then they wonder why they are not making any money, why they’re dying. It’s not a secret that I write and podcast for Tor.com, so take that caveat, but I really do admire what they are doing. The Tor.com site is not a direct translation of the Tor catalog, with business and submission info. Instead it’s a destination for SFF news and discussion, for original storytelling in both text and comic form. Book reviews and podcasts, with long comment threads for further discussion. Baen also has an innovative way of using the web for their customers and prospective authors. These are new and innovative ways to translate your company in the new medium.

I can’t tell newspapers and other companies terrified of the web how to survive. I’m not a big picture innovative thinker. Anything new or special that I do is always on the myopic scope of me, “Hey, this sounds like a neat idea, I’ll try this.” But we’re seeing it happen in certain places. People are doing it. Don’t be afraid of translation, real translation, into a new medium. If you run your company through Bablefish, people will understand your words, but not your meaning.

• 00:00:07 J.C. Hutchins, author of 7th Son: Descent, presents ISBW
• 00:00:21 ISBW #137
• 00:00:50 GoTo Meeting Message
• 00:01:39 Congrats to all listeners who finished NaNoWriMo!!! State of the Mur: one project completed and sent to agent, working on short stories, blogging for Storytellers Unplugged (go read the December 6th post on FEAR), had book signing earlier in December.
• 00:04:19 Promo: Erin O’Briant’s podcast novel Glitter Girl
• 00:05:12 Today’s topic: Stop Thinking (confidence and self-motivation: see also Carrie Kei Heim Binas’ blog post, What would you do if you knew you could not fail?)
• 00:13:15 Promo: Friday Fables
• 00:14:16 Interview: Gail Carriger

• pseudonyms
• recommended reading: A Thousand Miles Up The Nile

• 00:38:43 Promo: J.C. Hutchins & the print debut of 7th Son: Descent – serialized novel at BoingBoing, audiobook, and other content also available online.
• 00:40:22 Feedback: developing characters based on real life; starting one’s first foray into fiction writing with a novel; Mur’s recording software; translating RPG concepts into fiction; looking for opinions on Dramatica Pro; NaNoWriMo experiences & keeping one’s writing a secret; listener Paul blogs about NaNoWriMo; advances (don’t quit your day job); iPhones and podcasting; feeling like a writer/like a success; feedback to WorldCon; planning characters for a novel; future answers for copyright questions!; Name That Color (risk of thesaurus-style word overload); “technical” writing in fiction and finding the right balance for level of detail; are writers’ groups worth joining?

And Happy Holidays to everyone.

Zuzu’s Bell

Lucifer despairs on the celebration of His birth.

Lucifer stinks with the feces of the hopeless, the wretched. Daily he bathes in the tears of the woebegone; he hopes to find the one moment where He Above overlooks, disregards, forgets. Then it will be Lucifer’s time.

His back twinges with memories of wings long gone. His wings shattered upon striking Earth Below, but his shoulders remember. Always.

But it is this night when the fiery sky opens. Unholy ichor sprays as white wings burst from Lucifer’s back and he looks up to hear the unexpected.

One silver bell.

(Copyright 2009, Mur Lafferty. Some Rights Reserved. BY-NC-ND)

Super special thanks to Rick Stringer of Variant Frequencies for the holiday card PDF!

Music- I am a huge fan of funny music, also called dementia (after the DJ Dr. Demento), and have been collecting the albums of people like Carla Ulbrich, Throwing Toasters, Devo Spice, and The Great Luke Ski. I was excited when Luke told me about the new MarsCon Dementia three disc album. From the website:

3 years ago we started the MarsCon Dementia Track Fund Raiser CDs, which is set up to raise money to cover the hotel room costs for those acts who are coming in from out of town, as a way to help take care of at least one of the two big costs involved for them to come out and rock the house.

Here’s what we have for this year:

• The Mars Con 2010 Dementia Track Fund Raiser: 3-CD set – $30.00 (An optional MP3 download of all tracks is included with purchase. Price includes shipping)
• The Mars Con 2010 Dementia Track Fund Raiser: MP3 Download Only – $20.00 (Contains all the tracks from the CD version. Length: just under 4 hours)
• We also still have CD & MP3 sets available from 2009, 2008, & 2007’s Fund Raisers.

Speaking of Carla Ulbrich, she recently sent me her new album, Live From Outer Space, which is flat out hysterical. The album as a whole is funny, but the two songs “Duet with a Klingon” and “If I Had The Copyright (on the word f#*%)” make the whole thing worth it.

Books have been coming out, as they seem to keep doing, and they always make fine presents. I can personally vouch for the awesomeness of the following authors:

Courtney Summers: Yeah, that’s right, I’m not only plugging a YA author, but a NON-GENRE author. I’m growing. I read Courtney’s Cracked Up To Be and couldn’t put it down. She writes protagonists that are mean on the surface with depths that are frightening to investigate, but you can’t not. These are not nice protags, and not nice stories, but they’re engrossing. Her new book, Some Girls Are, just came out. I haven’t read it, but if it’s as good as Cracked Up To Be, then you should buy it.

(Just realized that this won’t be out till early January. So buy Cracked Up To Be and then get this one next month)

(Speaking of books that are coming out right AFTER Christmas, when you’re returning the five copies of Dan Brown books your family bought you and you’re picking up Courtney’s book, I might recommend the mid-grade book Nanovor: Hacked! which is the project I busted my ass to write last June. It’s out in early January. A fun read. I’m just sayin.)

And if you’re going to get into some kick ass narrative nonfiction, you can’t go wrong with Wil Wheaton. While I don’t know him personally (crudpuppies), I am a fan of his blog and own his books. I love his unabashed voice as he tells his stories; Wil could make me more interested in the story of him getting a beer with a friend than half the fiction I’ve read.

I was going to plug 7th Son by JC Hutchins and Makers by Cory Doctorow, but Hutch one-upped me and put out a Holiday PDF featuring twelve amazing authors of both fiction and nonfiction. Download this freebie (direct link) and get a sample of 7th Son, Makers, and several other hot books.

Podcasts: And if you’re not looking to buy anything, then may I recommend some festive holiday podcasts? Matt Wallace and Variant Frequencies are podcasting Matt’s novella “Hath a Darkness” set in his brilliantly dark Failed Cities Monologues world in December. And I have the inside word that both the Tor.com podcast and Escape Pod will be running Christmas stories this year (I’m not saying by whom!), so be sure to download those next week. And Grant Baciocco is doing his yearly Advent Calendar video podcast, which is fun and family friendly.

I will be the host and producer for the upcoming official Tor.com story podcast! We’ll be taking the original fiction published at Tor.com (edited by Patrick Nielsen Hayden) and I’ll be cleaning up existing audio narration, narrating, or finding narration myself, plus adding news and discussion from the Tor.com website into the podcast. We’ll be featuring new content one week, and a story from the archives the next, so we’ll eventually work through all the stories on the site. Tor.com features some of the best short stories published today, and I’m honored to be able to bring those to podcast.

We launch this coming Tuesday. (I’ll have RSS links after it launches.)

I just read the fabulous essay (apparently I’m behind the times, as it was written in 2007) on Vonnegut’s Asshole about, well, Vonnegut’s asshole. In short, it tells how a ranging censoring teacher confiscated author Eric Spitznagel’s copy of Breakfast of Champions - mainly because of the drawing of the asshole – and how that made him read the book (when his father bought him his own copy) more carefully than ever to understand just what the teacher was afraid of.

I never had such a kind teacher to push me to read so carefully.

My hometown was small enough to have one grade school. My county was small enough to have one high school. My parents used to joke that the Democrat party was an underground movement in our area. I’m from the Bible Belt. My friends and my pediatrician thought I was going to hell because I didn’t go to church.

And yet I came up against no censorship in school. None. Not even D&D.

I can’t remember how old I was, but I do remember it was before I was in the advanced English classes in high school, but we had to do a book report. None of the books on the list turned me on, and I’d found The Picture of Dorian Gray and thought it sounded interesting. A guy’s picture absorbing all of his evil? AWESOME. Homosexuality an important subplot? Deliciously subversive. Not on the suggestion list? Possible objection! This story had so much promise to make life interesting. I pictured the headlines: YOUNG GIRL CHALLENGES CENSORSHIP — No! Better: THE COUNTRY CHEERS AS PATRIOT GIRL DEFENDS THE FIRST AMENDMENT.

I defiantly told my teacher that I was going to do my report on The Picture of Dorian Gray. She nodded and said fine.

Dammit.

I read it. I enjoyed it. And it held enough of the “weird contemporary shit” that I currently love to write that apparently it influenced my writing. Thanks, Oscar. But I did not have that moment of, “Holy shit, they’re really upset. These books must be powerful. This written word thing is a weapon.”

I’m a writer. Of course I know on an academic level that books are powerful. I can tell you the books that changed my life. But I don’t know on that visceral level, of having to fight and win – or steal – that opportunity to read. The most rebellious thing I did with books was in kindergarten: my school was so small that we had a blended K, 1, and 2 class. I read through the kindergarten reader, then, because I was bored, the first grade reader. When I got caught reading the second grade reader, wedged behind a bookshelf to hide, I got in trouble and wasn’t allowed to read ahead of my grade anymore.

Ah, the days when they really encouraged learning and ambition in school…

Look at it this way- one of the base lessons of any fiction is that conflict drives a story. When things are peaceful and calm, that makes for a boring story. When things are bad, when conflict happens, that’s when people decide change is needed, and they do great things.

I’m not saying deny kids books to protect their fragile little minds and delicate sensibilities. I’m saying deny them books to make them insanely curious and want to read, learn new ideas, and change the world. If we just give them the right to read anything they want, if they have the knowledge of the ages at their fingertips, there’s no way we can build revolutionary minds.

Maybe.

I Should Be Writing is also sponsored by Dr. Wicked’s Write or Die software!

• 00:00:07 ISBW #136
• 00:00:37 Sponsor message from GoTo Meeting
• 00:01:27 State of the Mur: novel edits are taking priority over NaNoWriMo.
• 00:03:40 Promo:Dr. Wicked’s Write or Die software
• 00:04:49 Main topic: For parents.  Priorities, being a writer, being a success, being a role model, and following your dream.
• 00:13:43 Promo: J. Daniel Sawyer and Book 2 of The Antithesis Progression: Free Will (and Other Compulsions)
• 00:14:55 Interview with J. Daniel Sawyer
• 00:30:13 Promo: The Metamor City Podcast
• 00:31:54 Interview with Chris Lester: visit him at ChrisLester.org or find him on Twitter
• 00:52:47 Promo: Digital Magic
• 00:53:45 Interview with Pip Ballantine

Detailed show notes provided by Carrie Kei Heim Binas

It’s been a hell of a ride. Thank you for your support. Special thanks to Dr. Phil Plait, The Bad Astronomer, for advice regarding some of the adventure in this episode.

I only rarely participate in Twitter’s Follow Friday. For the non-twitter users, you post on Friday your favorite people to follow, spreading the word around. It’s flattering and nice, but honestly I don’t see my follow numbers spike on a Friday, so I’m not sure how effective it is. For the hell of it, last Follow Friday I looked at the #ff hashtag to see what strangers were saying. I was astonished to see several people say “please follow me.” For one thing, only people who a) follow them, and b) look at the Follow Friday hashtag will see their plea. For another thing, they give you no incentive to do so. Do they really want me to follow them out of pity?

The way you get people to follow you is to a) follow people and b) write tweets worthy of others’ interest. That’s about it.

I recently went through my list of followers and added a bunch that looked legit, for the hell of it, just to see how the conversation would change. I was surprised to realize that most of my new followers were “Social Media Experts” who tweeted only about social media and were utterly sterile and vapid. (Yeah, I know several people who’ve been complaining about social media douchebags, but I didn’t really grok what they were talking about till now.)

It hit home again. You don’t need to tell people you’re an expert. Do expert-level work. You don’t need to SAY you are king. You’re just king. You don’t SAY “follow me on Twitter!” You make content worth following. This applies everywhere: twitter, blogging, writing, movies: anywhere there are experts.

Beware the person who says they’re king. If they’re known more for their boasting than for what they’re boasting about, don’t listen to them. If they have to remind you how awesome they are, instead of showing you constantly with their content and their actions, then walk away. Look to the people who are doing, not talking. That’s where you’ll find the kings.

• 00:00:07 ISBW #135
• 00:00:39 GoTo Meeting Message
• 00:01:27 Happy NaNoWriMo!  Special episode: three interviews, no feedback.  Mur is still editing as well as NaNo-ing, and trying to pace herself to avoid early November burnout.  You are invited to be Mur’s NaNoWriMo buddy, but it make take her some time to return the favor.  [You are also invited to be my writing buddy!  I’m not as popular as Mur, so I’ll probably be able to “friend” you back a little faster.  –Carrie.]
• 00:03:58 Promo: P.G. Holyfield and Tabitha Grace Smith of Angel Between the Lines write short stories for each other’s podcasts.  On Nov. 16, 2009, download P.G.’s Exit Strategy at Stories from Wolfram & Hart, and on Nov. 18, 2009, at 9:30 EST, visit Stickam.com to view the live video recording of Tabz’s story for Tales of Children, Love’s Sacrificial Song.
• 00:06:06 Interview with author Nathan Lowell of the Solar Clipper series – 6 books written in 2 ½ years.
• 00:24:01 Promo: J.C. Hutchins & the print debut of 7th Son Descent – serialized novel, audiobook, and other content also available online.
• 00:25:40 Interview: David Niall Wilson author of Vintage Soul – novel originated as a 2005 NaNoWriMo project.  Register to read this year’s NaNoWriMo read-along book, The Heart of a Dragon , and be David’s NaNoWriMo buddy
• 00:38:38 Promo: Jon Armstrong and Underland Press present Jeff Vandermeer’s Finch listen to an interview with the author at If You’re Just Joining Us
• 00:39:48 Interview: Chris Baty, creator of NaNoWriMo (don’t forget to check out the NaNo Video podcasts).

Show notes provided by Carrie Kei Heim Binas.

• 00:00:07 ISBW #134
• 00:00:38 GoTo Meeting Message
• 00:01:26 State of the Mur update: giving a talk at BlogWorld re: podiobooks, and working on edits for “Project Underground”
• 00:05:26 Promo: J.C. Hutchins & the print debut of 7th Son Descent – serialized novel (at BoingBoing), audiobook (at podiobooks.com), and other content (at JCHutchins.net) also available online.
• 00:07:04 Main topic: “That’s just words”? The importance of language.
• 00:15:09 Promo: Tuning in to SciFi TV
• 00:16:27 Interview: Devo Spice (aka Tom Rockwell) Recommended sites: The FuMP (Funny Music Project), Dr. Demento, The Real UHF, and Working Indie Musician
• 00:34:48 Promo: A. P. Stephens & The White Shadow Saga
• 00:35:49 Feedback: Neil Gaiman writes a book via Twitter; Is it worthwhile to invest in 3rd-party editing before shopping a novel?; Advice on writing from the perspective of a character who slowly goes insane; New website — Lit Drift ; Possibly useful organizing software — Writer’s Café; 100 Questions for Character Development – Geocities closed down, so we were unable to use the link originally sent to us, but Carrie found another similar list here.

Show notes provided by Carrie Kei Heim Binas.

This is the thing about podcasting-or any self-publishing, because podcasting your fiction is simply free self-publishing in audio format-if you do the work and don’t tell people you’ve done the work, and that the work is worth their time, no one will pay attention. So no matter if your insecurities loom large, and your ego is a forgotten raisin under the fridge of your psyche, you have to be able to market your work.

And to do that, you have to believe in it. When you believe in something, you can make others believe in it too.

This summer, my friend JC Hutchins came out with a podcast where he discussed how “disbelief is the enemy.” He and I talked about this some, and it seems to be one of those totally true things that you don’t think about till it’s said aloud. When you do this thing, this content creation, and then the self-marketing, you have to believe in it – every aspect.

I always wondered why the NPR pledge drives work. My local NPR phone number is drilled into my head (1-800-962-9862) because of their pledge drives. It drives me mad. I can’t stand it. And yet, I give. I give because I know these people pushing it believe in NPR, and I do too. And I realized our marketing is the same; we believe in our work, and we have to do the NPR thing to make a splash, to make people remember us (1-800-962-9862), but those true fans that we have believe too, and they tolerate us. Because they know we’re our own best cheerleaders, because they know we believe in our work, and because they believe too.

When I did my marketing on twitter and my blog last year at Playing For Keeps’ launch to hit as high as I could on Amazon, I was terrified I’d turn people off. And I’m sure I did. In fact, I know I did. But the little raisin ego tried to understand that I can’t please all people, and that if I get ten fans behind me, supporting me, it’s worth losing the one who got sick of me promoting. Because if I don’t believe in my stuff, and tell you that I believe in it, no one else will.

So it was with interest that I watched JC’s marketing efforts of his new book, 7th Son: Descent, which came out two days ago. He tweeted and he blogged and he encouraged others to play too, pretending to have their twitter or facebook or blogs hacked by one of his characters. He started the day with the caveat that if someone wants to unfollow him to avoid the deluge, then he wouldn’t take it personally. He believed in this book. And he had fans who believed in the book. And goddamn did they deliver. To sum up (from JC’s site):

• 188 overall, up from 209 at 11:55 pm (we started yesterday at 3,711)
• 31 in Science Fiction/Fantasy (up from 34)
• 11 in Science Fiction (up from 12)
• 3 in Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > High Tech
• 55 in Mystery & Thrillers (holding steady)
• 36 in Mystery & Thrillers > Thrillers (holding steady)
• 14 in Hot New Releases (Sci-Fi/Fantasy) (up from 16)
• 3 in Hot New Releases (Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction) (up from 4)
• 39 in Hot New Releases (Mystery/Thrillers) (holding steady)
• 26 in Hot New Releases (Mystery/Thrillers > Thrillers) (holding steady)
• 6 in Movers and Shakers (down from 5)

Note: Since some books in the Amazon charts are free Kindle titles, I’ve adjusted the list below to reflect what positions we “earned.” When these free titles are removed…

• 20 in Science Fiction/Fantasy — 11 free titles were removed
• 5 in Science Fiction — 6 free titles were removed
• 1 in Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > High Tech — 2 free titles were removed
  
• 50 in Mystery & Thrillers — 5 free titles were removed
• 2 in Hot New Releases (Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction) — 1 free title was removed
• 38 in Hot New Releases (Mystery/Thrillers) — 1 free title was removed

I watched with glee as my good friend who wrote a damn fine book finally saw some print success after years of building his podcast and his audience, and it really made me think about the concept of belief. This is not snake oil sales, cult-building bullshit “belief.” This is not seeing who you can fool, who you can scam. This is honestly believing in your work, and honestly telling people about it. And that they should believe too.

He believed in 7th Son because it was a good book. And he made us believe. So if you don’t believe yet, check out the PDF below. It’s free, and it’s the first 10 chapters of the book. And if you believe, pass it around, and pick up a copy yourself.

Episode 15, at which Kate explains her revelation. They return to The Sheridan.

Let’s say a guy sees a pretty woman. He thinks, “I sure would like to fuck her.” This is not a conscious thought that keeps marital status, societal rules, or the other person’s preference in mind. It’s the lizard brain – fight, flight, or fuck. Women do it too. People see someone and our first subconscious thought is, “Can I fuck it?” (pretty much determining gender, depending on your sexuality.) Second is, “would I want to?” (OK, I think science has proved the first one, not sure about the second.)

However, society has told us that there are ways we can deal with this. There’s, “I would like to fuck you.” Or, “Nice tits.” Or, “You look nice today.” As our culture has evolved, the last comment has turned out to be the one that gets the best reactions and least violence.

Then the movie American Pie came along, which chronicled four young men and their desires to fuck before graduation. It was an interesting movie, actually pretty well told, but it got most of its attention for having unbelievably crass humor. The boy fucking the pie, or later having his first horrific sexual experience that ended in two premature ejaculations end up online. But perhaps the most prevailing pop culture stamp to come out of American Pie is the term MILF.

Mom. I’d. Like. to. Fuck.

It’s there in the title, the return to the lizard brain, the base, crass answer to the second question – “I can fuck it and I’d want to.” MILF is now used most often to essentially tell Hollywood women, “You’re still pretty after having a baby, don’t worry.” But I think people forget what it actually means. It means, “I want to fuck this person.” Literally. No hinting about it.

See, complimenting is fine. Hinting is fine. Even amusing (such as saying, “You’re a lucky man/woman,” usually really means, “I want to fuck your spouse”). But MILF just says it outright.

What’s weird is in today’s culture, it’s considered, oh, a bit rude to go up to most strangers and say, “I’d like to fuck you.” Hell, it’s considered rude to go up to your friends and say, “Gee I’d like to fuck you,” unless you are looking to take your relationship to another level. (And even then, one might want something a bit more eloquent.)  So why is the term MILF just fine, and in some people’s minds, considered a compliment?

There is a reason we don’t walk into a restaurant and grunt, “WANT FOOD.” The same reason we don’t usually react with considerably physical violence when angry, or run screaming from something that gives us a momentary fright. We’ve evolved: When hungry, we are civilized and communicate with more words and fewer demands. When angry we try to calm down and deal with a tense situation with logic or at least angry words instead of violence. And when scared we let our logical minds calculate the odds we will actually be harmed. Sure, we may fail. But whenever someone is screaming and demanding in a restaurant, or reacts to anger with violence, or freaks out at a small fright, we look down on them, sometimes even considering them animalistic in giving into their id responses.

I’m seeing MILF as being a return to the lizard brain, something akin to saying, “WANT FUCK WO-MAN.” I find it really creepy when someone flat out says they want to fuck me. People believe MILF to mean, “A pretty mom.” A compliment. But that’s not what it means. The F is right there. It stands for fuck. And when you say it just in general, it’s funny. When you say it directly to someone, thinking “MILF” cushions the fact you are saying you want to stick your dick in them, it’s not so funny. Pretty fucking creepy, actually.

Remember that. If your lizard brain tells you that someone is fuckable, perhaps it may be best to just tell them they look nice.

I began to panic. I know enough about this stuff to be able to figure out what’s wrong, and maybe even figure out how to fix it, if only I could find the door through which I needed to go in order to fix it. I began to get enraged. The back of my neck was hot, I was panicked, I felt distinctly clock tower-y, and close to biting the head off of anyone nearby. Luckily my husband was out with friends and our daughter was in bed.

I tried to look at myself logically. Why was I so angry? This clearly wasn’t a logical response, and certainly wasn’t helping me at all. And then I remembered that the feeling reminded me of something.

I have a very slight travel phobia. The concept of heading somewhere new on my own is scary (small town girl syndrome). The concept of heading somewhere I don’t speak the language is terrifying. We honeymooned in Spain because a friend’s parents owned a villa and a week there was our wedding present, and I suppose turning down a free stay on the Mediterranean is MADNESS, but I had a bit of anxiety there. But the anger I was feeling tonight was similar to the travel panic I feel. And that’s when I realized…

My extent of Wordpress knowledge is like being dropped into France with only high school French at my disposal. I know enough to get by. I perhaps know enough to get myself in trouble (J’accuse!). But I don’t know enough to get myself out of trouble. Everything looks familiar but I have no idea what to do with it. That’s why I get so angry and anxious. Because I think I SHOULD be able to fix it. I used to be a webmaster, for Thor’s sake.

I turned off all chat, afraid I would lash out and be the first to succeed in killing someone over the Internets. But I forgot to turn off gchat. Dave Slusher - one of the podcasters who was instrumental to me getting started – hunted me down there and offered help. He patiently and kindly helped me pinpoint my problems, and we fixed the feeds. I found my translator. Thank you, Dave.

It all comes back to high school French.

Je m’appelle Mur.

[EDIT- bonus to whoever gets my ridiculous French references.]

• 00:00:07 ISBW #133
• 00:00:38 GoTo Meeting Message http://www.gotomeeting.com/podcast
• 00:01:12 State of the Mur update: final season of Heaven (War) is finished! Upcoming projects:
  • “Project Underground”
  • NaNoWriMo – other WriMos are welcome to visit the MightyMur profile page (Mur is happy and flattered that so many people want to be her NaNo “writing buddies”… but it may take time for her to “friend” you back. Please be patient!)
  • List of helpful iPhone/iTouch writing-themed apps for future blog post
  • Mailing books to winners of the writing prompt contest
• 00:04:38 Promo: Jennifer Hudock’s Goblin Market
• 00:05:43 Main topic: Cautionary tales for novice writers, including advice re: NaNoWriMo & podcasting novels. Balancing “you’re allowed to suck” with “is it ready to put out there?”
• 00:13:45 Promo: The Scotchcast
• 00:15:03 Interview: Lou Anders of Pyr Books and Pablo Defendini of Tor.com at DragonCon
  • Short fiction website mentioned during interview: SF Signal
  • How to submit to Tor.com?
  • Email short fiction to Patrick Nielsen Hayden at pnh at panix.com
  • Email comics to tordotcomics at gmail.com or pablo.defendini at tor.com
• 00:50:52 Promo: Well Told Tales
• 00:51:48 Feedback & Announcements: Event! December 10, 2009 (Thursday) from 7pm-8:30pm reading/singing/performances with Jeff VanderMeer and Natania Barron at Chapel Hill Comics. Mur will also be at BlogWorld in two weeks to talk about podiobooks. Feedback: Who is the antagonist in the typical romance novel? Update from listener Tom, re: balancing multiple projects. Writers’ conferences. Writing contests. Who does the podcast intro music? Beatnik Turtle! More thoughts on use of language originating with the specifics of the real universe in the context of a fictional and other-worldly novel.

Show notes provided by Carrie Kei Heim Binas.

(See the subtle sexism there? That was irony. Keep up.)

But the word that troubles me lately is “addictive.” I was browsing the iTunes App Store for productivity apps for my iPod Touch (instead of writing- more irony here), and found myself casually browsing the new games. In discovering how many of the apps proudly call themselves “addictive,” I realized the word now means “so very cool.”

I’m not saying they’re wrong. I had two addictive apps on my ipod, Virtual Villagers 2 and Civilization, and wasted many an hour on them. “I’ll stop at 5:30. Oh. It’s 5:35. Ok, then I’ll stop at 5:45…” and so on. Recently I set new goals for the fall that include upping my writing output by a great deal, both in fiction and in freelance. Some of these freelance assignments include book reviews, which means I actually need to put down the shiny screens and pick up a book (unless, of course, I get the book on kindle or ipod, but I digress)-which I should be doing anyway because writers read, dammit. Note that none of the above include “play Virtual Villagers till your people gain level 2 engineering and you can build a dam.”

While it was tough to ignore the constant pull of these games, it was pretty easy to delete them from the ipod. Now the iPod is mostly a music player with some “grown up” apps on it – as well as some games for the Pink Tornado (she loves Pocket God, especially with the addition of zombies). So when I look at games in the app store, I steer away from “addictive.”

I know what they’re meaning by it: play this and it will be so much fun you won’t want to stop! But to me, “addictive” means not just a time-suck, but also demanding brain space when you’re not playing. I still do this with World of Warcraft, and I quit that months ago. It means ignoring more meaningful things – and I’m not saying games bad, I mean it’s more meaningful for me to play a game on the PS3 with Jim or our daughter than be holed up with my iPod urging the Germans to attack America, as New Orleans is right down the road from Hamburg. It means ignoring my family. And, as my dear friend Chris Miller pointed out to me, it also means vapid, shallow, and empty calories if not downright dangerous – people get addicted to cocaine and WoW and alcohol, not aspirin and Connie Willis books and milk. (Specifically Chris said “optional and frivolous” – but it reminded me of meaningless, empty calories that we love so much, and then I got reminded of the harmful products, etc, etc.)

I’ve been an addict before- cigarettes and gaming. And I’m all too aware of the feeling of brief euphoria followed by a somewhat hollow feeling and planning the next time you get that feeling. That shit ain’t healthy.

So I know my $.99 (or more) is but a drop in the bucket, but if you list your app as “addictive,” I’m going to think twice before downloading. I want to have fun, but not at the expense of more important things. I have books to read, words to write, a family to go enjoy the fall weather with, and pumpkin bread to make.

Mmmm. Pumpkin bread…

I am generally in good health. I should exercise more, but I’m healthy; my depression has been regulated quite well with medication with no horrible side effects, I don’t have a problem with weight, and there are no real issues I’m aware of. In fact, I’m hoping to lose a couple of pounds (shut up – I’ve gained a little since finally losing all the baby weight two years ago I don’t want to have to buy new clothes again).

Red Blood Cell by Andrew Mason

As I’ve said before, I have hereditary hemochromatosis. (WordPress wants that word to be “monochromatic.” Just thought you should know.) Essentially my body doesn’t digest iron right, so it gets stored in my organs. This causes problems later in life, depending on how much iron is stored. Problems like liver failure, cancer, and heart disease, for instance. It’s terminal; eventually all that iron will kill you in some way or another. But it’s not really that scary, cause a) they caught it early in me (my mother has it, as it’s hereditary) and b) it’s treatable. They treat it with good old fashioned bloodletting. I’ve been treated for this condition for 11 or so years, I think. I’ve had good times of low iron when I need treatment every six months and times where they have to take a three pints over two months (for instance, Jan 2, Feb 2 and March 2). The phlebotomies always wear me out, usually putting me on the couch for the rest of the day.

In fact, this “couple of extra pounds” weight thing is what made last Thursday so puzzling. A little while ago, I dropped down to 114 pounds. I even went to see the doc, as I wasn’t doing anything to encourage this weight loss. He said as long as I maintained the weight and didn’t have any other symptoms, I should be fine. My health wasn’t bad. I felt great. I even had phlebotomies with no trouble. But now I’m at 127 pounds and last Thursday I had the phlebotomy from hell.

It had been a while since my last bleeding. I’m thinking maybe three months, but it could have been six. I lose track of these things. Usually I take someone with me just in case I am too tired afterward, but the last time I went, I risked it, and I was fine. So I pushed it again this time. See, I know the condition is real and this is a necessary treatment, but since people give blood* all the time and continue to go on with their days, I feel weird asking someone to drive me.

The nurse was pleasant and the treatment was as pain-free as she could have made it. Now, I never know how long it takes me to bleed. That time period just doesn’t log itself in my mind. Is 30 min okay and 20 min too fast? I don’t know. I did wonder if it was too fast, but I didn’t start to feel anything till she was nearly done. Near the end, I felt woozy and put my feet up.

It was this odd moment, with a needle in my arm and my blood pumping into a bag, that my daughter’s school called to tell me she was sick. It was close to 3:00pm, she was supposed to stay after school for a program, but I said just put her on the bus. I figured I could make it home by 4:30 to meet her.

Once the phlebotomy was done, I started to feel really bad. I broke out in sweats, got nauseated, and lost all energy. The chair did full recline with feet elevation, so we did that for a while. The nurse brought me ginger ale. Maybe 15 min passed, then I felt the oh-so-convenient need to pee. I asked the nurse if I could stumble toward the bathroom and she said sure. She walked me there, and aside from an initial headrush, I felt fine, if very tired. I went in alone and did my bidness. While on the toilet, I realized sitting back down was not keeping the wooziness from coming back full force, and I started breaking out in sweats again.

It was pure societal shame that got me off that toilet, to the sink to wash my hands, and got that toilet flushed. There was a “help” pull cord at the toilet but I was not going to be the woman who had to pull the goddamn toilet help cord for getting a pint of blood taken. The river started to rush in my ears and I started to get those blooming black flowers in my vision. Even though I was standing and properly put back together again, I still didn’t want my face to meet that bathroom floor. I slowly made my way to the door, out the door, and to a chair by the bathroom. I sat down, thrilled at my triumph (by “thrilled” I mean “white faced and losing hearing due to the blood rushing in my ears”). I could faint now! I was not in a bathroom! I could wait for help to come, and it did!

A nurse walked by, put her hand on my arm, and said, “Are you all right?”

“Oh, no,” I said, shaking my head and focusing on a particularly interesting air molecule.

I’m sure the poor woman didn’t know what was wrong with me or why I was there, as I get treatment at a cancer center. It used to be “hematology and oncology” and it’s where my hematologist works, but now it’s just called Cancer Center. This nurse; I’ll call her “Savior,” found my nurse and together they got me back to my pretty recliner. Oh so pretty.

“Maybe we should take your blood pressure,” she said. Huh. Maybe. She did and it registered 70/40. Well. That wasn’t good. I received another can of ginger ale.

Well at this point I realized I was not going to be able to drive myself home. I was communicating with Jim via chat on my phone and he very sweetly offered to come and get me, but, again, how lame is it for him to have to say, “I have to leave work to get my wife because she had a pint of blood drawn?” Nope. He was going to be one of the last people I was going to ask for help. I figured I’d start with people I knew were home during the day. Hey! My mom lives relatively close! I’ll call her.

Whoops. Apparently I scared her to death. She has had her share of bad bloodlettings and demanded to know why I had gone there alone, why the nurse wasn’t giving me fluids at this point, etc. She was right, of course, they shouldn’t have let me just lie there like a dried out husk, but this had never happened to me before, so I had no idea. Also, her … strong encouragements to demand that they give me fluids were not really working considering at this point my mental capacity was congratulating itself on being able to figure out how to call her and not much else.

My nurse got off shift while I was on the phone. “You drink that ginger ale or we’re going to have to give you fluids!” she said before she left. She said it like threatening a kid. “You eat all your veggies or you’re going to get a spanking!” I blinked at her. I’m not four, and fluids are not a punishment. Course, it took approximately six minutes for this thought to work its way past my lips, and by then she was gone. The nurse assigned to me didn’t really pay much attention to me, so I lay there for another ten to twenty minuts. I wasn’t really sure about the passage of time at this point.

My stepdad came in; Mom had called him to come and get me. So instead of getting my husband out of work, I got my stepdad out of work. Great.

The new nurse came by and checked my blood pressure again, and at this point my stepdad started asking questions about why I wasn’t getting fluids. She said they just don’t do that, they wait to see if the patient is recovering over some time, then they ask the doc. She took my blood pressure again, frowned, and said, “I’ll go ask the doctor.”

So I got my phlebotomy at 2:00. By 3:00 I was in bad shape. By 4:00 I was told I’d be there around another hour. I sighed and told Jim he had to leave work early anyway to go get our sick kiddo at the bus stop. The nurse with the fluids came. I got stuck again. I learned at this point that saline is not kept in a happy 98.6 degree F warmer, and so got rather chilled during this. But hey, my head stopped swimming! I felt better! When we were done, I stood up and my blood pressure was 120/90 – much closer to my norm. My wonderful stepdad drove me home, and I fell into bed around 5:30.

Poor Jim. Our kiddo was miserable with what we’d find out on Friday was an ear infection, and his wife, while no longer about to faint, was still in bad shape. Dad was in town so he went out and bought us Chinese for dinner while Jim had to go to the school for a mandatory meeting regarding a program the Pink Tornado is going into. Dad helped put the kiddo to bed. It was a busy night for them; I just wandered around like a zombie.

This weekend I was kind of down with low energy. Took a nap each day, which helped. Interestingly enough, even though I had low energy, I still managed to gt a ton of stuff done that had been weighing on me (check the feed this past weekend – and Tor.com this week – to see what I mean). I don’t know if my low energy this weekend was remnants from Thursday, but it sucked anyway.

Mom wanted to know if I was leaving the cancer centers for another that will take better care of me. I said I’d give them another chance; I’ll tell them what happened this time, and if they don’t take the necessary measures next time, I’m walking. I love my hematologist, but I see her maybe once every six months- and often I see her assistant instead. I see the nurses much more often. And if they can’t take care of me, then why the hell am I there?

So if you’re still reading, that was my Thursday. I was touched by my husband’s, mom’s, stepdad’s, and Dad’s understanding and helping with the situation, and the friends who offered the following day to help me retrieve my car from Raleigh. I know I shouldn’t be amazed that people would help me out when I need it, but still, some part of me is going, “Sheesh, it was just a pint of blood, what’s WRONG with you?”

But I guess a blood pressure of 70/40 was wrong with me. Oh well. I’ll take it seriously next time.

* I know it’s going to come up in the comments of whether I can donate this iron-rich blood I’m pouring down the drain. And trust me – I have tried. Many, many times. My red blood cell levels are never what the donation people want them to be, or my weight is too low, or some places don’t want to do treatment phlebotomies (dunno why, maybe it’s not altruistic enough), and after this episode I definitely want to be around nurses and doctors. There’s nothing wrong with my blood, but I can’t donate it. Sorry.

Did I mention it’s free?

(intro, chapters 1,2 and …) Chapter 3- Ideas are EASY. Work is HARD (Direct PDF download — Direct PRC download)

• 00:00:07 ISBW #132
• 00:00:38 GoTo Meeting Message
• 00:01:12 Mur tackles ISBW administrative activities
• 00:02:49 Mur names her new assistant, Carrie Kei Heim Binas — check out Carrie’s writing blog at Heim Binas Fiction
• 00:03:37 State of the Mur update: finishing recording War, edits from agent on Heaven, more work on “Project Underground”, and then NaNoWriMo in November (if all goes according to plan) to write Playing for Keeps 2: No Takebacks
• 00:04:44 Upcoming NaNoWriMo focused interviews! Possibly Chris Baty [update since recording- INTERVIEW CONFIRMED!], definitely David Niall Wilson, and Nathan Lowell
• 00:06:05 Promo: The Kingdom Crisis Anthology
• 00:07:05 FEEDBACK: July emails: Is printing a single copy of a book “publishing”?  What is a good synopsis? (Suggested reading: Mastering the Dreaded Synopsis, Writing the Novel Synopsis, Writing a Synopsis (with lots of links from a romance writer.)  How do I protect my short stories? Is it legal to mention famous people in books?  How do I best present my children’s picture book for publication?  (Suggested reading: Editorial Anonymous, the blog of a children’s book editor.) Line-by-line editing vs. “big picture” editing. Polite ways to withdraw a short story from consideration. New beta software for managing timelines: Aeon Timeline.  How do you manage your various writing obligations (freelance vs. fiction)? Is it proper to use italics and exclamation marks in manuscript submissions?
• 00:19:24 FEEDBACK, continued: August emails:  How does an author refer to objects or situations with culture-specific names if writing a fantasy or SciFi story based in a world that has no knowledge of these cultures? Using children and plants to show the passage of time. What is a story bible? Letting authors know the value of their blurbs for other books. How should I handle my disobedient characters? How can I balance my screenplay writing with my novel writing? ISBW’s News from Poughkeepsie inspires listener Jason Ramboz to create the Fifty First Lines project – free ideas to take and use (under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license). Recommended podcast: Writing Challenges. How do I tell a story without explaining everything?  How do you outline short stories?  When should you apply for a copyright? Applying for contests instead of submitting to a magazine. How do I get a job writing for RPGs/writing for money?
• 00:35:03 FEEDBACK, continued: September emails: How do I get access to the ISBW archive episodes that aren’t currently on iTunes (Download them HERE.) How do I handle too many ideas for too many different kinds of writing? Concerns about needing to write more on a daily basis/how can I look at my output and be proud of it? Advice on alternate media/releasing books in podcast form, etc. Cory Doctorow calls for YA writers to donate digital books to a class for blind students.  Should I rearrange and edit the first parts of my draft novel now, or finish writing first? Writing franchise fiction (or not). Starship Sofa is launching its first anthology complete with free ebook.
• 00:47:28 Promo: Into the Blender
• 00:48:44 Contest winners announced (thank you to the 19 people who submitted writing prompts!)

Show notes provided by Carrie Kei Heim Binas.

Additionally, Carrie weighs in with some good synopsis advice:

My personal listener feedback on how to write a good synopsis — I’ve read that a synopsis is the place where you can “tell, don’t show.”  After all, there’s not enough space to show, but if (for example) a major plot point happens because a character gets really angry at another character, you can just say “this makes the hero very angry, and an epic battle ensues” without going into much detail.  However, I think that the best synopses are ones where the tone of the synopsis matches the tone of the manuscript.  An epic tale should have some hints of grandeur in the synopsis, but a lighthearted tale can have a hint of humor in it, etc.  My own main character is a bit irreverent, and the story is told with a rather “confidential” tone, so in my 6-page synopsis, I found room to drop 2 or 3 quotes of the MC’s language straight from the text of my novel, so that the reader could “hear” her voice more effectively.

As many of us tend to do, I went to Twitter to blow off steam, posting essentially the paragraph above, but in 140 characters. I watched some TV and went to bed. This morning, this was in my TweetDeck:

Oh cool, I thought. Spreadshirt customer service is paying attention. Neato. Good job Spreadshirt. While I tried to think of a way to form my frustration into a customer-service-answerable question, I looked up Ms. @jeggers, figuring “Spreadshirt customer representative.” Not quite.

Well. CEO and “customer advocate” – the second was very true.

So I’m still trying to figure out how to form my “AUGH! Too much! Too little!” issue into a problem with real solutions, but I know when I do have a question, I’m pretty sure this woman on twitter, who I followed and immediately followed me back, will be there to help me or point me in the direction of someone who can.

This kind of service seems common sense. Run a search for your company’s name (and/or select keywords like “custom shirts” probably) on Twitter, reply to people who have something to say about your product. Through casual mentions on Twitter, I’ve been contacted by Brad Sucks and by someone from SyFy who wanted to know what I’d found misspelled in one of their commercials (“sneak peak” – one of my greatest pet peeves). Some companies have blog comments they never look at, forums they never look at, and others go out of their way to find out where people are talking about them, and get involved with the discussion.

Yesterday I was having a discussion with a friend about a future project. Some of his ideas felt innovative, but also on a level of such basic common sense I wondered why no one else was doing them. (Including me!) Then I realized that one of the first things you can do to make yourself stand out – in business, or writing, or marketing, or whatever – is figure out what basic, common sense things aren’t being done. Forget thinking outside the box- there are plenty ideas in the box that are just being ignored.

• 00:00:07: ISBW #131
• 00:00:38: GoTo Meeting Message
• 00:01:12: State of the Mur roundup (vacation, DragonCon, writing)
• 00:02:43: Plan for the fall: War, “project underground”, and NaNoWriMo
• 00:03:58: Announcement!  Upcoming interview with David Niall Wilson
• 00:06:32: Promo: The Dreamer’s Thread
• 00:07:47: WorldCon interview with Hugo nominee Jay Lake
• 00:26:52: Promo: Lost Gods
• 00:28:10: WorldCon interview with Campbell award nominee Felix Gilman
• 00:39:07:  Gilman references The Warriors, a 1979 cult action/thriller based on the 1965 novel of the same name by Sol Yurick.  The book and movie are modern retellings of Xenophon’s Anabasis.
• 00:48:03: Promo: Jennifer Hudock’s Goblin Market
• 00:49:08: WorldCon impromptu Round Table chat with James Patrick Kelly and John Kessel
• 00:53:26: Pat Cadigan joins the round table
• 01:05:12: Recommended reading: Tom Reamy’s San Diego Lightfoot Sue and Other Stories (1979) and Blind Voices (1978)

Show notes provided by Carrie Kei Heim Binas.

I’m afraid.

I talk in this podcast about whether we should give children’s books content ratings like video games and movies.

No means no, and you can’t make people love you. Really.

Everyone feels it. But we have to press on.

Also, it’s hot.

Short. Unedited. Free.

Kate, Daniel and crew enter Leviathan city, find Barris and Ishmael, and prepare to meet the queen.

My DragonCon schedule:

Title: The Life And Times Of Podcast Novels
Time: Fri 02:30 pm Location: 204 – Hilton (Length: 1)
Description: How the podcast novel has evolved over the past five years, and the continued benefits of podcasting to promote your writing.

Title: Podcasting Tips for Working Writers
Time: Sat 02:30 pm Location: 204 – Hilton (Length: 1)
Description: A discussion with authors and podcasters who have turned the art of the podcast novel, into a formula for publishing success

Title: The 2009 Parsec Awards
Time: Sat 07:00 pm Location: Regency V – Hyatt (Length: 2.5)
Description: The Parsec Award is given for excellence Sci-Fi & Fantasy Original Content, and Speculative Fiction within the new frontiers of Portable Media.

Title: I Should Be Writing with Mur Lafferty
Time: Sun 04:00 pm Location: 204 – Hilton (Length: 1)
Moderator / MC for panel
Description: Join the award winning author and podcaster, Mur Lafferty and special guests.

Hope to see you there!

In which Barris meets a new friend and Kate, Daniel, and crew hit the water and formulate a clever plan that cannot fail.

Also, if you are interested in buying prints from War, check out our new art page!

It’s short, it’s unedited, it’s attempting to be daily, and it’s free.

Yes. If you want something done, ask a busy person. Welcome to ISBW Lite- It’s attempting to be daily, it’s small, it’s experimental, it’s unedited. But hey, it’s free.

Today I give an introduction to ISBW, for any new listeners we may have.

Neil Gaiman - photo by .guilty

I’m starting to wonder if I should just take August off from podcasting. It seems to be the month I have the most trouble getting content out. But no more! This week you will be DELUGED with content! Starting with the (one week late) anniversary episode of I Should Be Writing, featuring an interview with one of my favorite writers, Neil Gaiman!

Abbreviated show notes:

• It’s 4 years since I started ISBW. And boy have I learned a lot. And a lot more to go. I’m also writing a ton, hence being behind on podcasting. Also, if you use iTunes, can you give some review love to ISBW?
• Promo: World Wide Weird Podcast
• Meta thoughts on writing, accomplishment, media, etc. I take questions from Twitter.
• Promo: The Dreamer’s Thread
• 35:50 Neil Gaiman interview from WorldCon (And The Graveyard Book did win the Hugo! Congrats, Neil!)
• Promo: Inner Demons novel
• Contest! You send me writing prompts, I send you books! All writing prompts are ownership of me, the books you win are ownership of you.

NOTE- This podcast is explicit. I told Neil I’d bleep the bad word, but dangit, the quote is too good and I left it in. There’s one swear word in this interview. It’s quick, and Neil is soft spoken so people not listening carefully (like your kids) will likely miss it. But to quote A Christmas Story, it’s THE dirty word, the “f dash dash dash” word, so I’m marking this one explicit. Neil Gaiman and Matt Wallace – too explicit for I Should Be Writing. Aw yeah.

Honestly, too, i worry about con reports getting too long, mattering mostly to the author, and to a lesser extent, the people they know who went to the con who look for mentions of themselves. But let’s just hush the fretting and get on with it.

In short, WorldCon was the best con I’ve ever attended. Hands down. It feels weird to say that, as I went solo, roomed solo, and ate several meals solo. But I found the downtime quite nice, and I didn’t have to feel guilty when I had my usual dreadful waking-at-7am con curse. But the con was vastly different than the others I’ve been to. It was my first truly literary con – sure, they had some podcasting and new media and blogging panels, but it was a literary con all the way through.

Things I discovered-

• I don’t know a damn thing about fandom. Or at least, I didn’t. I was sitting with Charlie Jane and Annalee from io9, taking advantage of the only free wifi around, when a woman came up to us and said, with an air of announcing royalty, that David Kyle of First Fandom wanted to email his wife and wondered if he could use one of our computers. We shrugged and said sure. The woman looked at us as if we were ignorant. “Do you know who David Kyle is?”

“Uh, no…”

“Do you know what First Fandom is?”

We looked at each other, suddenly aware that we were in the midst of a massive faux pas, but no idea what to say beyond the truth. “Uh, no.”

She sighed explained that First Fandom was the group consisting of people who had gone to the first WorldCon, 67 years ago. David Kyle was one of the remaining members, and he “was the one in the red blazer.” (I tried to remember seeing someone in a blazer, couldn’t recall.)

Having initiated the grubby n00bs, the woman went off to get Mr. Kyle. It took her a while, and Charlie Jane and Annalee had to move on, so I hung out until the very old man approached the table. He said very nice things, working to wrangle gmail, and had me sign the notebook he carries around with him. He was joined by two other men, one of whom decided to show me his fanzine, and explained to me how to read it (it’s less patronizing than it sounds. I’ll have a post about fanzines in the future.) I sat there for an hour and learned about fanzines, heard stories about Worldcons gone by, including stories about H**lan E**ison and other familiar names. I finally had to beg off due to needing lunch and went and had dim sum at my hotel. But they gave me a lot to think about.

• The SF community is quite welcoming. I was gratified to be remembered (and hugged- squee!) by Tobias Buckell and Neil Gaiman, and upon meeting John Scalzi, was thrilled to hear he had read Playing For Keeps. Jay Lake and Shannon Page were excellent to talk to and interview. I met Pat Cadigan who was an inspiration from the moment I met her. I spent a lot of time with Lee Harris from Angry Robot, and Pablo Defendini from Tor.com, who was always welcoming online, and even moreso in person. I had dinner with Pablo after my experience with fandom and we discussed how it seems to have evolved. I also got to sit with Pablo at the Hugos (was utterly thrilled that Cheyenne Wright was the colorist for the Hugo-winning graphic novel, Girl Genius.) Afterward, Pablo, Annalee, Charlie Jane and I served as the entourage for Hugo nominees Lou Anders of Pyr Books and John Pacacio to the Hugo afterparty, where I spent quality time with John Kessel, met Nancy Kress, got to gush over Connie Willis again, and countless others.
• The comment about “the future” from Viable Paradise was true. Near the end of VPX, 2006, we were told that the time would come that we would run into our instructors again at some con or another. They would naturally welcome us, but they would ask us what we were working on. And if we couldn’t answer, they’d politely go about their business. They were there to teach us how to be pro writers, and if we weren’t going to work on what they taught us, then they couldn’t treat us like peers at cons. I spent quality time with former instructors Cory Doctorow, James Patrick Kelly, got a brief hug from Jim MacDonald, and got to say hi to Debra Doyle and Teresa Nielsen Hayden.

There are many other things to mention- running into Barbara, my roommate from VPX, Rock Band at the Tor.com party, and the countless interviews I did for I Should Be Writing and Tor.com (My Tor content is here.) I did have a horrible panel that suffered from too many panelists and not enough audience, but that was one down part of the whole con. I was astonished at how welcome I felt, was lucky to have such nice folks like Lee and Pablo to let me hang out with them, and was utterly overwhelmed with awesome.

I know I’ve forgotten things. (And I know I suck for not adding a bunch of links to people. But you’re a big girl/boy, you can Google.) Sorry about that. But it really was the best con ever.

Former instructor and bestselling author Cory Doctorow. And me.

The writing has been challenging to say the least. I made myself stretch beyond the humorous and weird/speculative/fantastic realm and just told a dark, bloody, sexy story with nothing more magical than mental illness and teen angst. I hope I pulled it off.

The final installment went live this morning. I tweaked the site to read less like a blog and more streamlined for narrative flow, so if you haven’t checked it out yet, I’d love it if you would take a look. Because of the visual element, we have decided not to release via audio podcast, but we’re definitely not against a print release.

I’ve never collaborated like this, but JR is such a brilliant and enthusiastic partner it was nigh-effortless working with her. I’d love to work with her again.

Note that I said this project includes dark. bloody, and sexy images. Where there aren’t ropey intestines or bared boobies and genitals, many of the images are not kid-safe, and depending on your job, there are at least two that may not be work safe.

Her Side, by Mur Lafferty and JR Blackwell

I'm prepared.