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it’s my blog and i’ll cry if i want to

[because i'm in one of those moods, here this is - but have fun with it!]

Blog Disclaimer
(also Social Media Disclaimer)

This is my own personal webspace that I buy (rent?) from Crovean Websolutions. Given that I pay for it with my own money, I reckon I’m free to write about whatever I want in this space as long as I don’t violate my host’s terms of service.

So I discussing my problems with panic disorder and ADD/ADHD. I discuss my writing and publishing adventures as well as the misadventures. I’m a fan/supporter of Apex Publications. I have a son with a kidney transplant; I discuss him often. I also have a son who’s a Marine; I tweet about him more often than I blog about him. #semperfi

Having said all that, most of my posts fall under the “daily” tag. Although sometimes many posts, or no posts as the case may be, fall under the “zombie apocalypse” tag. Yes, I have a tagcloud instead of a posts cloud. The larger, darker tags are the ones with the most posts. The smaller, paler tags are the ones with the fewest posts. You’ll notice a “family” tag. That’s one of those “taboo” topics I don’t go around much; my life is much saner that way, and I’d like to keep it that way, thankyouverymuch.

Please don’t come to my own personal webspace only to promote your books/movies/organizations/personal agenda/whatever. I consider such comments spam/annoying, and I will block your ip address. I do have the right to delete comments which I find offensive. I also have the right to block/ban the ip address of known trolls/problem people.

If you interact with me with the sole purpose of telling/informing me of everything I’m doing wrong, I’ll block you. If you interact with me and treat me like a complete idiot, I’ll block you. If I say you’ve strayed into territory I refuse to discuss on the internet, if I tell you to back off, and you don’t, I’ll block/ban your ip address.

If you’re afraid of Pagans, the eff word, or anything having to do with anything out here in the Really Real World, don’t follow me. Anywhere. Please. Don’t preach at/to me. It will serve only to piss me off – and end up with your ip being blocked.

If you like your life, your world, your universe, candy-dipped and covered in sprinkles, don’t follow me. If your posts are touchy-feely quotes or sugary sweet life is nothing but rainbows and unicorns unrealistic fluff every time, I’m not going to follow you. I’m a realist. I sugarcoat nothing for no one. I’m so totally not your target audience.

That all said, because this is my own personal webspace after all, if you don’t agree with what you’re reading here, why are you here?

Please don’t come to my own personal webspace only to promote your books/movies/organizations/personal agenda/whatever. I consider such comments spam/annoying, and I will block your ip address.

If you’ve posted four comments or fewer, your comments go into my spam queue. If your comment contains two links or more, it goes into my spam queue. I receive e-mail each time a comment is held for moderation.

In an effort to combat spamming and trolling I’ve turned comments off on all posts older than fourteen days (that’s two weeks).

As for the me who’s out and about on many social networks:

I auto-block those who are:
in any way abusive
won’t let go of an argument
a bot of any kind (spam or otherwise)
only going to send me automated DMs
only going to communicate with me via DMs

If you’re a marketer/coach/trainer of any kind, I’ll block you.

If you add me on any social network, I’m under no obligation whatsoever to follow you back. Following back, contrary to popular belief, isn’t a requirement of the social web.

If we’re in a group together or if you’re a writer, don’t expect me to accept your friend request based on that alone. If you’re friends with my friends, that doesn’t mean I am or want to be your friend. If we’re friends on another network, that doesn’t mean I want or need to be your friend on all of them.

Follow me because you find my tweets and/or blog posts interesting and because you would like to get to know me/my writing/my life better and engage in real conversation with a real human being. Follow me if you want to interact. I might follow you back if I’m not feeling “follow overwhelmed” – I do respond to honest mentions (that aren’t spam)!

I do read profiles (and often websites/blogs) before I follow anyone back. If your profile links back to the page I’m reading, provides no substantial information, or is locked from public view, I won’t follow you.

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review: a dark matter by peter straub

A Dark Matter, by Peter Straub
Publisher: Anchor; Reprint edition (February 22, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN: 1400096723
Paper: $7.99, 608pp, mass market paperback
Kindle: $7.99

I enjoyed this story, even though the storytelling got a bit tedious through repeated rehashes from various characters’ perspectives. But as that happens, more of the story unfolds. We learned more than we knew before. Each telling brings fresh insight to what happened to this group of people when they were teenagers.

Also, we don’t ever get the whole story. It doesn’t arrive in a blaze of glory or wound in a beautiful bow. A lot of questions go unanswered. We start with mystery and end with mystery. And this is fine. Speculating outcomes, intended and unintended, can be as refreshing and exciting as any brand new adventure. Each and every loose end, each and every question – all of that doesn’t need to be tied up or answered. Life isn’t boring. ‘Fully conclusive / fully inclusive’ fiction is boring.

Overall, I’d give this story 4.5 coffee cups out of 5 coffee cups. Well done, Mr Straub. Well done.

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quote of the day

But really so much more. Would love to see responses to this.

“I want you to tell me about every person you’ve ever been in love with. Tell me why you loved them, then tell me why they loved you. Tell me about a day in your life you didn’t think you’d live through. Tell me what the word “home” means to you and tell me in a way that I’ll know your mothers name just by the way you describe your bed room when you were eight. See, I wanna know the first time you felt the weight of hate and if that day still trembles beneath your bones.”

— Andrea Gibson

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mari’s so behind it’s … shameful, really

I know. I know. I said months ago (and then months before that) I was going to start blogging more regularly. We all see how well that turned out. Here’s the thing. There’s just not been that much going on, not anything that would make a blog post, anyway. I use Twitter now for the “this is what I’m doing right now” stuff – instead of using my blog for those one and two sentence updates I used to make throughout the day the first few years of my blog’s life. Also, I use check-ins at GetGlue for a lot of stuff, too. For example, I just checked-in to “pot pie” because that’s what I’ve got in the oven for our supper. I don’t want to let this blog go, though. It’s been part of my life since 2002, and there’s so much stored here (even if I did accidentally dump all the pictures a couple of years ago – whoops!). Yeah, I could archive it all on my hard drive, but that just doesn’t sound appealing.

So, here I sit. Trying to figure out where to start on catching up since … Christmas? New Year’s? My birthday? The funny part about all of this? Starting sometime in October, I created a tab in OneNote labeled “Blog Topics”. I have subtopics: brainstorming, love, memories, mental health, pagan, ‘women in fiction’, and writing. We won’t discuss the number of topics and ideas listed within each. I mean, I probably have enough material in there to work from for at least three months of intermittent blogging – like every third or fourth day kind of intermittent – especially with the memories stuffs. I probably should be shot for having all of these things and just sitting here and not doing one damned thing with them.

It’s a writing problem.

It’s a writer’s problem.

It’s so simple to create all these lists and jot down thoughts and ideas – and then just leave them and never once think about coming back to flesh them out. Especially with me. The whole ADHD (lately I’ve been joking and calling it ADDH – because CDO insists I keep everything orderly) thing makes me scattered. I have to keep telling myself over and over, “Focus on one thing at a time! One thing at a time! Easy now! Easy!” And that’s harder than it sounds. See, if something isn’t right in my face where I can’t see it or glance at it at least on occasion, I forget about it until I run into it again, be that a day or two or a decade or two later. This is the curse of having distractibility ADHD. (just look at this paragraph!)

Thing is, I don’t work at a desk; I work at our kitchen table. I’d have a garbage dump of a mess if I left everything out where I could see it all of the time – then I’d get cranky, irritable, and whiny because everything was a mess! What I end up with, then, is a pile of different notebooks containing this, that, and something else, pencils or ink pens clipped to each, and my cellphone stacked on top of that. I keep Outlook open all day because I need the reminder alarms, but I fail at keeping OneNote open all day – and that’s where my daily task list lives (but I tell myself I keep a duplicate in this one notebook …).

And see, I sat down here this morning with the intent of making one of those what I call “catchup posts”. I even pre-tagged it so I could look at the tags list and, with some hope and forethought, not leave anything out. But no. I’ve sat here doing everything but writing a blog post. I think I’m going to save the other half for tomorrow! If I don’t show back up tomorrow, just jab me and make me do it!

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