Posts Categorized: Writings

Life is what happens to you while you are busy making other plans

It has been two and one half years since I last I last wrote here. I had just published my first book, The Riddle of Riddles, both on Kindle and in paperback, and I had vague plans for my next project when life suddenly got in the way. As John Lennon reminds us in his song Beautiful Boy, “Life is what happens to you while you are busy making other plans.” Ain’t that the truth. A cascade of events that included a replacement, a renovation, and a relocation (joint,  kitchen, Dunedin, FL.) occupied my time, and that of my wife… Read more »

Piracy is never romantic, Jack Sparrow be damned

Piracy, banditry, or any other self-serving tag line you want to apply to thieves in the act of burglarizing intellectual property (IP) is never romantic, or audacious, or heroic, Jack Sparrow with his bandanna, earrings and self-effacing grin be damned. Recently, Julie Andresen started a discussion on Google+ entitled “What are your thoughts on content piracy?” She got over thirty comments with opinions varying from “piracy is great,” to one advocating a personally administered penalty of “trans-anal evisceration.” Most of the heat came from a handful of the respondents, who purported to be listening but obviously were not hearing one another…. Read more »

Motorcycles and rain do not go together

Motorcycles and rain do not go together. Unlike the comfort of a cage (car) in which you can employ your windshield wipers, turn on the defroster, turn up the radio, and stay dry and comfy, none of that is possible on a motorcycle in the rain. Even with the best foul weather gear you are going to get wet. If you are not wearing a full-face helmet and gauntlet gloves each individual rain drop feels like a bee sting on the face and the back of your hands. The rain will find ways to whip around your helmet and down… Read more »

Three grubby bikers discussing forgiveness

Three grubby bikers wound up discussing forgiveness, of all things, after getting delayed by a rainstorm in upstate NY. Their original intent was to gas up, grab some chow, and continue their journey from Fort Ticonderoga up to Au Sable Chasm, but a violent rain storm changed all that. Discussing forgiveness was not even on their radar. They were concerned with how long it was going to take for the front to pass through. When it became apparent from a smart phone weather app that it was probably going to be a lengthy wait (six hours as it turned out),… Read more »

Motorcycle joys mature with age and experience

Motorcycle joys mature with age and experience. Even though I was a fully grown adult when I start riding motorcycles I still had some growing up to do when it came to acting sensibly. I had been interested in riding for years but no one I knew rode a motorcycle until the winter I got a job as a bartender down in Charlotte Amalie, St Thomas. My brother, Brian, was teaching school down there, riding his motorcycle to and from work. That was all the impetus I needed. My time had arrived. At the age of 30, I purchased a… Read more »

Take back roads whenever possible

Take back roads whenever possible. I just got back from a five day, 1000 mile long motorcycle  trip with my two brothers through a bit of New York State’s Adirondack Mountains. Wherever possible we took back roads. As mentioned in the first blog (The Journey is the Destination) on this website, both of my brothers enjoy motorcycling. Each of us took up the hobby at different times, and has had differing experiences, but because of our common interest we ride together whenever possible. Our usual outings are to visit tri-state markers – just because they’re there – and because their… Read more »

Blog and/or Website

Having been brow-beaten by my massive ego (see previous post) into building a blog and/or website, my next step was to determine whether or not I needed just a blog, or just a website, or both. It turns out that the correct answer, for me, was both, and, much to my happy surprise, I discovered that a website can also function as a blog. Eureka! I was so green early on that I did not even know the difference between a blog and a website. This is what I learned. The term blog is a portmanteau for web and log,… Read more »

My massive ego website

My massive ego, being what he is, demanded that I satisfy his lust for fame by creating a website.  Being shy myself, and not knowing anything about websites, I was reluctant to give in to his unyielding demands.  In fact, I ignored his demands for years, but as time passed he became more and more insistent.  Finally, he would not let me sleep.  My eyes would pop open in the middle of the night, and there he would be, sitting on my chest, staring down at me until I got up. I’ll call him Mot.  That’s French for word and… Read more »

Research, research and more research

Publishing a book? Get ready to immerse yourself in research, research and more research. Unless you are already in the industry, once you decide to become an indie-publisher, the learning curve gets steep, very steep. Prior to the days of print-on-demand (POD), if a writer could not get read by a publishing house, he/she could not get published. And yeah, rejection sucks. Sure, there were the Vanity publishers out there, vultures only too anxious to strip whatever cash we had from the bare bones of our bank accounts, leaving us with a garage or basement full of books that we… Read more »

Rejection sucks

If you’re a writer you’ve been rejected. It comes with the territory. That does not mean that you have to like it, accept it or chalk it up as some kind of (choke) learning experience. Rejection sucks, whether it is your manuscript or a date to the senior prom. It sucks. As writers we can “accept” rejection as a fact of life without “accepting” rejection as screwing down the lids of our coffins. We accept that some ivory-tower-snob, who has never written anything other than a rejection letter, just doesn’t get it, doesn’t understand the art of writing. We don’t… Read more »