I’ve been offline more lately than is usual.  Well, I say offline but really I am still online, I’m just staying focused on the tasks at hand and not doing as much Twitter as people are accustomed to seeing from me.  That’s because I’ve been writing.

A lot.

The whole point of this stuff is [...]]]> /begin random thoughts

I’ve been offline more lately than is usual.  Well, I say offline but really I am still online, I’m just staying focused on the tasks at hand and not doing as much Twitter as people are accustomed to seeing from me.  That’s because I’ve been writing.

A lot.

The whole point of this stuff is to write, get published, sell some books so I hope you’ll forgive my absence and silences as the muse takes me, roughs me up a little, and ties me to a keyboard.

* * *

I tend to be a planner when I write, but not a traditional planner – at least, not so far.  I plan in my head.  Sometimes, I will take months if not years to think about something before I put a single word down.  Other times, I will think about something for a few hours, know what I want, where I want the story to go and then I sit down and write.  Not particularly the best way to do things, but there it is.

This past weekend, for example, I just had this idea hit and there was no way it was going to stay in my head for any length of time.  So I sat down Saturday morning and started typing.  By end of day Sunday, I had 9800 words down and Cord Cahill, space cowboy, had been born.

More on that later.  Promise.

* * *

I have turned the daily Functional Nerd News Roundups over to the extremely capable Scott Suehle aka @8bitdad (twitter.com/8bitdad or http://8bitdad.wordpress.com/).  I offered and Scott volunteered.

You rock, dude.

Why turn that over to someone else?  I admit, it was my baby.  I started it back a while ago to help drive some traffic to the Functional Nerds site.  But spotty accessibility at work (I put those together during lunch and the firewall sometimes blocks me/times out when I try to access the site) meant that the posts were becoming few and far between and when I get home from work, my priority is to churn out entertaining writing with an eye on publishing.

So, something had to give.

Luckily, Scott was there to pick up my slack and has been doing a great job.  Thank you!

* * *

One icebreaker is enough.  You don’t need to eat two at a time.  Seriously.  Stop it.

* * *

A lot of people get pocket dialed.  I don’t know of many who get baby dialed.  I get baby dialed, have for years.

Quinn has let both of his sons play with his cell phones and as such, I get baby dialed.

The other night, I got a call from him, answered it, and heard his youngest ‘la la la’ ing while Quinn, in the background, said things like, “Who’s a baby boy?  Who’s a baby boy?” or some such.

It was funny.  I should’ve recorded it…

* * *

My aunt and uncle sent me a stack of comic books out of the blue.

You hear those stories, ya know?  About how people move into a new house, head up into the attic, into the crawlspace or the basement, and come across a dusty box shoved into a corner or nook.  They dig the box out, blow the dust and dirt from it and wonder what sort of treasure they may have uncovered (or whose dead pet).

Upon opening the box, they find a mint condition 1st appearance of Superman, or a copy of Amazing Fantasy #16.  Suddenly, they are rich.  All because of the box of comics left behind by someone who is probably kicking themselves.

…these weren’t those comics.  These were some Captain America’s from the early 90’s.

Sigh.

/end random thoughts

~P

Make me famous:

THE RETURN OF THE PODCAST IS HERE!

Episode 9 of the All Things From My Brain Podcast is here.

In this weeks massive, DOUBLE SIZED, MAXI-PODCAST, I am joined by a special guest on his very first podcast [...]]]> I said I’d do it, I warned you – you didn’t listen, did you? Well, now it’s TOO LATE!

THE RETURN OF THE PODCAST IS HERE!

Episode 9 of the All Things From My Brain Podcast is here.

In this weeks massive, DOUBLE SIZED, MAXI-PODCAST, I am joined by a special guest on his very first podcast appearance as we discuss the iPad, about Apple, Google, Blizzard, Doctor Who, Dollhouse, Torchwood – and the fact that his youngest son may be stalking me via iPhone.

With Episode 9 I am dumping Podbean and everything is going to be hosted here on atfmb.com. If you’ve subscribed to the podcast via iTunes, that link is in the process of being changed and you’ll have to resubscribe – I’ll let you know as soon as that’s ready and available.

In the meantime, click below and stream to your hearts content or you can download via this link by right clicking and choosing ’save as’.

~P

[podcast]http://www.atfmb.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/AllThingsFromMyBrain009.mp3[/podcast]

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if i forget someone, I apologize. I’m trying!

Now, in [...]]]> My #FF recommendations are going to be different today. I’m going to take some time and tell you why you should follow these folks.  For prosperity sake, I’m going to put this post up so folks can come back and see it whenever they like.

if i forget someone, I apologize. I’m trying!

Now, in no particular order whatsoever, here we go:

#FF @TatteredCover A Denver institution, the Tattered Cover is a very famous, independent book store. Support em & your own local own shops.

#FF @sfsignal If there is anything at all going on in the #SciFi world, SFSignal, a group blog, will tell us about it. Great folks!

#FF @sliceofscifi One of the best & most entertaining podcasts that I listen to on a regular basis & a great extra source of #SciFi news.

#FF @DenverWestword This is not your parents news. If you want to know what’s happening in Denver (& more), this is the place to go.

#FF @TVWatchtower Just as @SFSignal gives us all news #SciFi, TVWatcher gives us all news #TV & does a fantastic job of it.

#FF @Agent_M Editor of Marvel.com. Writer, blogger, lover of tacos, tattoos, comics, video games, pop culture & cute stuff. -Entertaining-.

#FF @AirlockAlpha What can I say here? Entertaining, informative. A great source of #Scifi, genre, tv & movie news. A nerds nerd.

#FF @dances_w_vowels This is a Twitter bud. Follow him for entertaining tidbits throughout the day.

#FF @CliftonHill Another writer grunt in the trenches trying to get published – working on his Epic Fantasy Novel.

#FF @feliciaday Because she’s ~Felicia Day~ All your followers are belong to her. http://twitpic.com/11jvot

#FF @bearmccreary He’s the music behind Battestar. FRIGGIN BATTLESTAR!!

#FF @LisaPietsch Writer, veteran, wife, mother of two. Check out her works & you’ll be glad you did.

#FF @billamend He created FoxTrot people. FOXTROT!

#FF @doctorow Cory Doctorow is a scifi author, activist, journalist, blogger & the co-editor of Boing Boing. Well worth your attention.

#FF @miladysa Web Fiction Writer, author of serialized story Refuge of Delayed Souls.

#FF @bbcamerica For all things BBC TV on this side of the pond…

#FF @TheNewAuthor Aspiring author, great person, currently writing 2nd novel, a twitter bud.

#FF @aspiringmama Writer, blogger, momma. What more could you ask for? Also a twitter bud.

#FF @janoda Archaeologist, Avid Reader, Writer. A WFG member and a big fan of online published fiction.

#FF @authormancuso A sci-fantasy author and worldbuilder, creator of The Dark Wars & The Demon-God of Jubagh.

#FF @quillfeather Aspiring Children’s author who loves cheese, people, wine & dogs – just not necessarily in that order.

#FF @Writepop Writer of science fiction, humor, and other strange things – always amusing & a twitter bud.

#FF @io9 Group blog & news source for all things genre. Oh, and they’re from the future. Probably.

#FF @TheBigKlosowski Denver dude, professional photographer & DenverTweetup organizer. Love the beard.

#FF @JohnAnealio He writes & records songs about sci-fi & fantasy novels & movies, releases them on his website. cool dude/twitter bud.

#FF @trishthewriter YA novelist, SP romance writer for adults, freelance writer, happily married mother of 2 daughters & a very dear friend.

#FF @jeremiahtolbert Writer, SF Geek, Freelance Web Designer, Photographer & all around cool cat with a hat. Mine’s cooler. & bigger.

#FF Other Amazing Twitter Buds: @spacedmuch @DraggonWolv @prav_us @FARfetched58 @Yinepuhotep @Torinir @1CreativeWolf @trishaleighKC

~P

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It’s kinda funny how things happen.  When I started playing World of Warcraft, a series of random meetings resulted in my meeting tons of new, creative and interesting people.  The same sort of thing happened when I joined Twitter a while ago.  One of those interesting people is John [...]]]>

Cover art by Ashley Quigg- http://www.ashleyquigg.com

It’s kinda funny how things happen.  When I started playing World of Warcraft, a series of random meetings resulted in my meeting tons of new, creative and interesting people.  The same sort of thing happened when I joined Twitter a while ago.  One of those interesting people is John Anealio.

In a music landscape filled with pretty kids made famous for the ability to dance while lyp syncing, I always enjoy finding an indie artist who can actually write a song complete with lyrics, a musical arrangement and, most importantly, they can play an instrument.  John is one of those (he actually plays all the instruments, I believe).

Everyone has to have a niche and John Anealio has found a most unique one; he writes music about science fiction and fantasy stories that he enjoys.

How’s that for original?!

Up until now, the only way to get John’s music was from his site, Sci Fi Songs, but as of December, John released a CD titled simply enough, Sci Fi Songs, with 11 of his best tunes to date (available as a physical CD or for DL at CD Baby).

With titles like ‘Cylon #6′, ‘Summer Glau’ (lyrics by John DeNardo over at SfSignal.com) and ‘The Millennium Falcon for Christmas’, Sci Fi Songs is a must have for any fan of the genre.  Kinda folksy at times, kinda poppy, I find the tunes very nice, very mellow.

Now, I only recommend music if I truly like it and I can honestly say that I like and enjoy John’s music.  As you may have garnered from the bit above, I can be a music snob.  Having said that, Sci Fi Songs is part of my iTunes library and is frequent in my playlists since I ripped it.  I can’t give any higher recommendation than that

John Anealio, Sci Fi Songs – check it out.

~P

Complete Track Listing:

1. The Return of Titus Quinn
2. Rachel Rosen
3. Leodora
4. Cylon #6
5. Summer Glau
6. Angels & Vampires
7. Lonesome October Night
8. Sarene
9. Merithyn’s Promise
10. The Millennium Falcon for Christmas
11. Grasping for the Wind

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There used to be more.  There still are alternatives out there, but I don’t use them for all sorts of reasons.

I was never a MySpace person.  The very first time I visited a MySpace page, it took [...]]]> When it comes to social media/networking, I think things have whittled down to two major players: Twitter and Facebook.

There used to be more.  There still are alternatives out there, but I don’t use them for all sorts of reasons.

I was never a MySpace person.  The very first time I visited a MySpace page, it took a while for everything on the page to load and then someone was screaming at me.  I realized it was supposed to be music – they had this little widget type thing on their page that played their favorite song, which happened to be someone screaming like a Yoko into a mic.  This put me off immediately.  For me, MySpace was all down hill from there.

I discovered Facebook just moments before discovering Twitter.  I liked Facebook.  I had that wonderful rush we all get when we first sign up with it and people we haven’t spoken to in forever suddenly find and friend us and the catching up begins.  It was fantastic.  Then, I started messing with Twitter.

Twitter was easy, much easier than Facebook.  In my mind, Facebook and MySpace had far too much in common.  Facebook was, in short, becoming complicated.  My use of the site waned.  Now, if you want to know anything at all about me, my day, what I’m doing, etc and so on – you have to look to Twitter, not Facebook, to find it.

Then, Facebook changed.  They made a conscious effort to provide updates in a more Twitter fashion.  I gave them a second look and really liked it.  I could go to Facebook and see all my friends updates in a single stream – it was fan-freaking-tastic!  I found myself warming to Facebook again.  I installed the iPhone app.  I added the Facebook column to my Tweetdeck.  Thing swere moving right along.

Then, they changed Facebook again.  Now we have not one stream, but three that I’ve counted so far – there’s probably others that I haven’t figured out yet.  Status Updates, News Feed & Live Stream.

With ‘Status Updates’, I would see some information from my friends.  You can click the image to see what I see when I first login to Facebook.  Now, people have told me that I can do this and I can do that to make things different, but so far – it’s all been crap.

When I login to Facebook, I see this page and on this page is updates that are hours old.  All the time.  For weeks, I thought that people simply weren’t updating Facebook anymore due to the lack of info and updates on this page.

To make matters worse, when I would update my own status, I didn’t see it on the Status Update page/feed.  And people were telling me that they weren’t seeing my updates anymore either and I realized that I was missing out on their updates, which weren’t showing up for me.  What the hell was going on?!

Enter: News Feed.

So, okay.  I click on ‘News Feed’ and I start going through this timeline and I can see stuff showing up from Yesterday.  YESTERDAY?

WTF?

Okay – so, on Status Updates, I see stuff 3 hours old.  On News Feed I see stuff from yesterday that didn’t show up on Status Updates for whatever reason.  What’s the difference between News Feed and Status Update?  I have absolutely no idea whatsoever.  When I go to MY page to update my status, it doesn’t say, “Update Status or News Feed?” so how does it decide where your update is going to go?  And why is there nothing newer than 3 hours ago?  Is everyone asleep?!  And why is MY stuff not showing up anywhere?!

…wait, there’s another button now – on News Feed, it says, ‘View Live Feed’ and has a number next to it.  Okay, let’s click that.

…

Okay, so, the answer is that Facebook is just stupid.  When I click on ‘Live Feed’, I now see ‘live’ stuff.  Stuff from a couple minutes ago – my own stuff, stuff that’s not showing up anywhere else (apparently).

Again, no rhyme or reason that I can see or that makes any sense whatsoever.

With this revelation, Facebook once again becomes absolutely useless to me.

The point is to be able to see what people are doing, leave comments, interact.  If you can’t find what people are doing because Facebook has randomly hidden it inside one of three timelines there is no longer any point to even trying.  It’s a waste of my time.

So I return to Twitter, where there is only ONE timeline.  Sorry Facebook, but you suck again.

~P

Make me famous:

Funny story: Had a bug fly into my car and land on my glasses once. Talk about freaking out! It was like it was crawling… ON MY EYE! about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck

as funny as the bug/glasses story is, I like to think about [...]]]> Sometimes, I amuse myself on Twitter too much.  Take today, for instance…

Funny story: Had a bug fly into my car and land on my glasses once. Talk about freaking out! It was like it was crawling… ON MY EYE!
about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck

as funny as the bug/glasses story is, I like to think about the other drivers on the road that day, watching as I freaked out, arms swinging
about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck

“Did you see that?! That boy is on -drugs-!” “Damned yankees!” I was in Tennessee, I believe. Hence the ‘yankees’.
about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck

Did anybody else publish their blog on Kindle? Did anyone else change their blog address, theme, look, feel & then forget all
about Kindle?
about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck

Kindle sent me an email: “DUDE! WTF?! Where’d your site go?!” Me: “Aw, dude – I frakked up. Sorry!” Kindle: “DUDE!” Me: “Dude, I know.”
about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck

…I don’t really say ‘dude’ often, so I don’t know where that comes from. So, dude, I’m sorry about all the ‘dudes’.
about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck

Oh, hey – Kindle – why don’t I publish the #Evermist blog with you as well, hmmmm? Whatcha think? http://www.atfmb.com/Evermist
about 1 hour ago from TweetDeck

I went to #Staples & bought a bunch of stuff for a project. At checkout, they had to verify my CC, which took twenty minutes. PAIN IN THE-
12 minutes ago from TweetDeck

I probably won’t shop #Staples anymore. If I can’t walk in, pick up the crap I want & check out fast, it annoys me. I am, after all, male.
11 minutes ago from TweetDeck

Men don’t wander in stores – have you noticed? We know what we want, we buy it & go. It’s only the shiny things that distract us…
10 minutes ago from TweetDeck

“Hmmm. I have $24 in my bank account. Enough to purchase this Mt Dew. But I also want this 99″ Plasma they have in the aisle. What to do..?”
9 minutes ago from TweetDeck

“Excuse me, sir? Are you going to be purchasing that 99″ Plasma?” “I was thinking about it.” “It has bluetooth.” “SOLD!”
9 minutes ago from TweetDeck

Bluetooth isn’t even a real word. They made it up cuz it sounds shiny, appealing to the nerd gene dormant in most, dominant in others…
7 minutes ago from TweetDeck

*secret underground lab* “We need a new buzzword. something to sucker them into buying this crap.” “How about.. *looks at keyboard* U-S-B?”
6 minutes ago from TweetDeck

TV Announcer:”Introducing the new standard – USB!” Nerd 1:”Holy crap – I need to get some of that.” Nerd 2:”I think I just wet my pants…”
4 minutes ago from TweetDeck

doesn’t plasma come from blood anyway? Who wants a tv full of blood – that’s gross! Still, it is 99″…
2 minutes ago from TweetDeck

…I’ll shut up now.
2 minutes ago from TweetDeck

~P

Make me famous:

Spam n. a disruptive, esp. commercial message posted on a [...]]]> It doesn’t matter if you have ten friends or a million on Twitter, I guarantee you, some of the people on that list are spammers.  Actually, there’s probably a good portion of them who are spammers.  I know you know who and what I’m talking about.

Spam n. a disruptive, esp. commercial message posted on a computer network or sent as e-mail.

Example: How many people on this list of my followers are real and how many are spambots?

Answer: Who the hell knows?!  I think 2 are real.  Keep in mind, this is a very small sampling and my followers list is cluttered with this kind of stuff.  I got an email today telling me that Carol Smith (belovedmuscle) was following me.  Um… Okay…

In the twitterverse, there are 3 kinds of spammers that I have encountered.  The first is the ‘increase your followers’ spambot that (I think) actual people (I think) have to sign up for (I think) which then puts out tons of crap messages on their account  like this:

I hate those more than I hate the others because they fill up my damned Tweetdeck column and burn through my API calls!

Next are the ones who start following me and then start spamming me with @replies which fills up my damned Mentions column on Tweetdeck.  ARGH!

Lastly, there are the spammers who may not even be intending to be classified as spammers.  These are the people who tweet and retweet the same things over and over again all day long.  Not like the above screen shot, oh no – see, they tweet something in the morning; it could be a link to their blog or an article that they found – it could be something interesting.  Wonderful!  That’s a legitimate use of Twitter!  I applaud you and your efforts to drive traffic to your site!

…but then they send the same tweet again an hour later.  Exactly the same.  Not even the link is different.  The exact same tweet, just an hour later.  WTF, right?  Maybe it’s a mistake?  maybe they aren’t aware that they’re doing that?  …but then they do it again an hour after than, and then again in another hour, and another, all freaking day long, using up my API calls and annoying the hell out of me.

That, my friends, is a spammer – someone who is sending a disruptive, esp. commercial message over and over again.

And that is the challenge Twitter faces moving forward – stopping the spammers and spambots from cluttering everything up with this crap every day. And they need to get a handle on this quick!  It’s only getting worse and people won’t stick around if it continues this way.

~P

Make me famous:

In the eighth episode of the All Things From My Brain podcast, I talk about the petition to make the Kindle open and non-DRM, DRM in general with books, music, movies and dvds, how ESPN, the NFL and the Marine Corps have all banned Twitter and Facebook, TiVo’s new [...]]]> Episode #8: All Things from My Brain

In the eighth episode of the All Things From My Brain podcast, I talk about the petition to make the Kindle open and non-DRM, DRM in general with books, music, movies and dvds, how ESPN, the NFL and the Marine Corps have all banned Twitter and Facebook, TiVo’s new web video support, the FlyCast App from the App Store, TomTom on iPhone, Sam Raimi’s (fictitious) World of Warcraft movie production Diary from Wired, chargebacks via PaymentOne causing Warcraft accounts to be suspended, G.I. Joe; The Rise of Cobra. 73 ways to become a better writer and my own writing and blogging this week on All Things From My Brain.

[podcast]http://www.atfmb.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/AllThingsFromMyBrain008.mp3[/podcast]

Make me famous:

It was a damned fined question.

I am not a published author but I’ve probably read just about everything I can on writing simply because this is what I want to do.  The above message is [...]]]> I was asked just today on Twitter how I manage my time.  This was in response to my saying:

It was a damned fined question.

I am not a published author but I’ve probably read just about everything I can on writing simply because this is what I want to do.  The above message is accurate.  Everything I’ve read on the subject boils down to one simple concept: if you want to be a writer then you need to write.  Write even if it’s crap because you have to practice if you want to get better at it.  What is it Stephen Kind said?  He wrote 200 books before one was published?  Writing to write.

But how do you manage to write or fit it into your busy schedule?

For me, it’s a commitment that I’ve made to myself.  I know that every night, no matter how I feel, no matter what’s going on or the day that I’ve had, I am going to sit down and I am going to write for at least one hour.  Sometimes in that hour I write the worst crap I’ve ever seen and sometimes, I hit it right on the mark and I don’t want to stop.  If I have the energy, I won’t stop.

I also blog to keep the creative juices flowing.  Hence this site.

I will be the first to admit that there are tons of things to distract me from writing including but not limited to:

• TV
• Movies
• Xbox
• World of Warcraft
• Reading
• Life

I guess it all comes down to balance.  Everyone has to find their own balance and I don’t think any book written on the subject can do it for you because we’re each unique.  What I’m doing, right now, works for me – right now.  It may change in a month or a year and I’ll have to find that new balance to make it all work for me.

~P

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BTW, went to Tokyo Joe’s for lunch and, while they do have good food, it’s not worth waiting 30 minutes for. Not when you’re in a hurry. about 24 hours ago from TweetDeck

I said nothing more about it.  What’s [...]]]> Yesterday, on my Twitter feed, I mentioned that I’d been to Tokyo Joe’s for lunch.  Here’s the Tweet:

BTW, went to Tokyo Joe’s for lunch and, while they do have good food, it’s not worth waiting 30 minutes for. Not when you’re in a hurry.
about 24 hours ago from TweetDeck

I said nothing more about it.  What’s cool is this from this morning:

@atfmb Wow Patrick… please tell what happened and where you waited so long.?
tokyojoes, Tue 21 Apr 11:17 via Mobile Tweete

Instant (or near enough) customer service inquiry.  Pretty nifty.

I replied back with the details and haven’t heard anything since.  We’ll see what happens.  But this level of interaction is what makes Twitter so darn cool.  I’m sure Tokyo Joe’s checks out what’s being said about them and contacts folks who have bad experiences to see what can be done to fix the situation, and probably contacts folks with positive experiences as well to help spread around the joy.

That kind interaction is incredible.  It made me feel better immediately because A) it was a surprise to hear from them and B) I felt like someone there cared, which is important when it comes to customer service.  If they come back with something more, that’s just icing on the cake – they’ve already helped simply by caring enough to contact me.  I mean, it wasn’t as if I was complaining on their website, calling or sending them nasty emails – I just made a comment in a Tweet.

How cool is that?

~P

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