Scatterbrained Ramblings

Wow, it’s been way too long. I’m finally at the bar again, and I learned something new today: if you salt a napkin, it won’t stick to your beer mug. Neat!

The plans to have the smaller house built fell through: turns out I needed more equity, and it’s a minimum 17 months at my current rate of paying stuff off before I’d have enough to do it. I think I’ve decided to stick it out and get everything paid off like the original plan said. It’ll reduce my monthly payment and make it so I don’t have to pay PMI. We’ll see how I feel in 17 months…

The commission list is down to 4, and I’m looking forward to being done. I’m hoping to have them finished by the end of Sunday, but that’s a pretty tall order. If everything lines up right, though, it could happen.

Stuff at the property is about to get hectic. I’m gonna have to mow soon, and I need to spray for weeds. The trees I planted are all doing well, though, so that’s exciting! One of them has fruit on it…but it’s hard to tell what it is exactly.

Food’s here. Gotta go!

I’m going to forgo the whole April Fools’ thing…never been very good at those anyway. But I figured it’s been a while since I last posted, and I’m due.

Let’s see… My week off from commissions ends today, so I’ll have to get back into it hot and heavy tomorrow. I haven’t done nearly enough resting this week, though. I think I was up late every day except Friday and Saturday. I did, however, do a ton of sleeping yesterday, so whoo hoo! I plan to do some more today, too.

I took my truck in yesterday for an oil change, and they noted that I had no coolant. They dutifully filled it up, and we didn’t see anything leaking out, so I agreed to keep an eye on it. Well, I got back from Home Depot yesterday and saw a nice puddle of coolant actively leaking out of the truck. So, tomorrow morning bright and early, I’ve got to take the truck to the dealer and pray that I make it there before the engine overheats. As long as I’m there, I’m gonna go ahead and have them do the 100K and 150K-mile maintenance on it, too. Might as well get it done and over with.

The pasture is turning very green, which I really like. I’ve missed the greenery over the winter, and it’s coming in in force now. The herd can’t even keep up with it! I spent some time with them yesterday just sitting in the pasture and loving on them. I’ve missed that, but when I’ve been swamped with things to do, I feel like I never have time. I’m going to work on fixing my attitude where that’s concerned: I’m spending tons of money and time keeping this place up for them, so the least I should be able to do is enjoy their company. Heaven knows they’re usually more than willing to be loved on! Hee, hee. Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy when they scratch back. I got the brush out today and started brushing them out (usually I just use my hand, but with all the rain lately, they’ve got mud matted up in their hair that has been bugging me awhile). They definitely liked that, and I pulled clump after clump of hair out of the brush. The donkeys are getting used to me petting and brushing their legs now, which is great! They both even let me scratch itchy spots on their fetlocks, so we’re making huge progress over when I bought them. They’re all such loves, and I’m a lucky guy to have them.

As I mentioned, commissions should start back up in force tomorrow, but it will depend on what happens with the truck. I still have to get my minimum hours in at work, so if time allows, I’ll get started; otherwise, it may have to wait until Tuesday.

In any case, thanks to everybody for your support!

-Jack

I’ve been missing out.

Grasshoppers are really good!

Alcoholic mint.

Wow, the days are flying by this month! Seems I always think I’m a day behind. I’ve been snowed under with commissions and haven’t had a chance to post. I’m taking a break at the local bar and restaurant. Lookit the green beer!

Of course, yours truly forgot that it was St. Patty’s day. Between living in stories and a camper in the middle of nowhere, it’s easy to lose track of what day it is!

Anyway, before I forget, I’ve noticed a lot of traffic on the blog from Malaysia. I gotta ask: what are you guys so obsessed with? Not complaining, to be sure, but you’ve set records for most page views. Y’all did 60-something the other day; it was crazy!

What else…I finally fertilized today! Yay! Been waiting for a dry, calm enough day to do it for a good 2 months now. Got that done and got feeling the horse trailer re-tarped, so I’m feeling accomplished. Commission-wise, I revised one this morning and drafted one this afternoon. I’m hoping to at least start another one tonight after the bar, but we’ll see. I’m a sleepy drunk, so…

I gotta say, though, the commissions are going better than I ever would have dreamed. I’ve made over $3000, and it’s only March! I’m gonna have to start withholding from my paycheck for taxes here within another $500 or so… It’s not a problem I kind having, but I do wish I weren’t being taxed at 40%. That’s insane!

Anyway, I’m gonna eat my salad, do laundry, and drink my beer. Happy St. Patrick’s Day, all!

Yay, bar time! It’s karaoke night, they’re giving away $2 fireballs, I’m about halfway through my 1L beer mug and have a couple of Jell-O shots on board…feels good.

A thought: in the infinite multiverse, there is a place where schnozberries are the only food.

Thoughts to ponder…

Okay, okay, I know, I keep promising I’m gonna get back on here, and then I keep not doing it. Commissions are crazy! I think I mentioned I got 3 new ones last Sunday. Well, I’m revising the last of those, and then those three will be done.

But…

The one who commissioned the third one also wants me to do ten more short stories, all between 2.5K and 5K words, so I’m going to have at least a week’s worth of work to do for that one.

Plus!

I’m sorely behind on my 50K-word commission. This coming week is going to be dedicated to finishing it. I hate having things hanging over my head, and this one has gone on for about a month already. I’m just…not as inspired on it as I have been on the others. It’s no excuse—I know—but I gotta get it done. I’ll feel so much better when it’s done and off my plate.

And then 10 commissions.

And there’s more….

One of my prior commissioners (I’ve done two commissions for him already) wants to do round 3 once my queue opens up a bit, and my very first commissioner has been hinting for weeks that he wants to do another one as soon as he gets a decent paycheck. (Priorities, people! Hehe.) So, after these ten, plus the 50K, I’ve got potentially two more, and the one whose commission I’m revising right now seems very pleased with my work (yay!), and while I never want to count my chickens before they hatch, I suspect that this particularly commissioner may bring even more work.

*pants*

So, I’m not dead, I’m just ridiculously busy. And it’s great! But I’m sorry I haven’t gotten some stories out for you guys. Geez, it feels like it’s been months since I posted anything story-wise on here. Oh, wait…it has… I’ll try to work it in sometime, but no promises…paying customers first and all, you know?

Oh! That reminds me, I recently added a link to my InkBunny account to the Books & Links page. Apparently I’m making a name for myself as “that author who will write anything, no matter how nasty it is.” It’s a…lukewarm feeling…kind of like my career. I mean, it’s good to be a jack-of-all-trades—it ensures that work will always be readily available—but on the other hand, I don’t want to only get commissioned to write nasty stories (happy stories are nice, too!), and I don’t want people to think that’s all I can write. (Most would probably never have read Shane and Colton or Human-Centaur Relations, so it’s a legitimate concern.)

But I digress…a lot. The nasty stories tend to go against FurAffinity’s Terms of Service, but InkBunny seems to have few compunctions against such things, and so I’ve been posting the things I can’t post on FA to IB instead. I’m also posting everything from FA to IB, too, so if you want to see what I’ve been working on, head over to my IB profile, but be warned: some of it is stuff that grosses me out to write, let alone to read.

I do have to admit, though, re-reading the stuff I’ve written that is gross and that does make me feel grossed out…kinda fills me with a sense of pride. Not because it’s gross, but because I was able to write something that made me feel something—especially a feeling as strong as revulsion! My day job is very logical and (nominally) unemotional. Being able to tap into emotions during story-writing is…kinda nice. 🙂

For those who have read my recent posts, this post must seem like I’m flying sky-high by comparison. And I am! I’m in a much better mood. The reason? I actually slept! For…months, now….geez, since before Christmas, I’ve been doing commissions feverishly. I think I’ve had one week without commissions in that time, and I’ve just been going and going. I’d go to bed late, tell myself I’d sleep in on the weekend, and then be up at 7:30 (I blame the herd, since they really want to be fed!). And then I’d be writing all day (when I wasn’t doing weekend chores) and wouldn’t take a nap, would be up late Saturday night, and it’d continue Sunday. I’d be exhausted Monday, but every week night, I had moar commissions to do, and so I wrote some more, sometimes staying up until 3:30…with an alarm at 7:30… So, yeah, this has gone on a long time.

I finally started noticing a problem this week at work, though. I was trying to write a report for a very boring test protocol and found it taking me all day. Normally I can churn that kind of stuff out in a couple of hours, tops. And I was making stupid mistakes—embarrassing stupid mistakes, like sending a revised version of a document to a customer, only to get feedback that I hadn’t caught all the errors the customer had pointed out. And with respect to my commissions, I found myself really getting sluggish on them and it taking me hours to do what I could usually do in minutes.

So, it was time for a day off. I took Thursday off, forced myself to stay in bed until 10:00, fed and loved on the herd, wrote a bit, went to the grocery store, and then went back to bed at 17:30. Slept until 23:30, checked on the herd, and went back to bed, slept until 7:30. In all, 21 glorious hours of sleep, and I feel so much better! So…word to the wise, don’t make the same mistake I did and let it get that far. Man, I was productive Friday morning! I ran out of things to do by 11:00, and my writing started happening really fast! So, yay! Rested and high-energy!

Also, I got to ride my neighbor’s tractor today. Mine is a little 28-HP tractor. It’s enough for moving tools back and forth, mowing the acreage, doing a little bit of box-blading here and there…but it’s kind of undersized for my property. It’s great—don’t get me wrong—it’s way better than not having one, but I got to ride around on a real tractor today (okay, okay, it was only about 50 HP, but still, almost twice as big as mine). But I’m really digressing again: long story short, my neighbor had back surgery and couldn’t put his hay out for his cattle and horses, so he asked me to do it and gave me a hay bale in exchange for the work. Yay! An online friend of mine is fond of saying, “make hay while there’s daylight” and is always delighted when I tell him about the stories I’m writing (and the money / “hay” that comes with them), so today I got to tell a pun: I (figuratively) made hay (wrote), (literally) moved hay (helped my neighbor), and (figuratively) saved hay (saved myself the money I would have paid my neighbor for a hay bale). Yay, puns!

I gotta go. I’m rambling (geez, almost 1200 words’ worth!), and I still want to finish revising this commission, go to the bar for karaoke night, and maybe poke at the 50K-word story a bit before bed.

Also, my back hurts! Yay! Oh, wait…

So, tonight was supposed to be the night where I played catch-up from having not slept much last night (or last week…). I got into bed and started watching BoJack Horseman (again) and was mostly just kinda winding down when I happened to check my FA account and saw that I had a message from one of my previous commissioners asking to do another one. Sweet! So I replied, waited around a little bit, and then he responded…along with two brand new commissioners. All three messages just showed up all at once! In a word, “Ack!”

So this is awesome! I now have three commissions lined up, plus my back-burner commission (that I swear I’m never going to finish), so in short, I have at least a week’s worth of commissions to do, and it’s still Sunday. So, wow! This is great! I’ll sleep when I’m dead!

In other news, I’ve started a demolition project on the trailer house that is technically mine (when I bought the property next door, I bought it as-is, and it came with more garbage than I hope to ever accumulate in my lifetime!). The deck/porch to the house has been looking rickety since I bought it, and the recent strong winds had started to take the sheet metal off it (that was a terrifying sound to hear!), so I threw a cinderblock up onto the roof to keep the sheet metal intact. Well, apparently the roof was so decrepit that the cinderblock was enough to cause the roof to start to slowly collapse…so I helped it with the tractor today. Got it down to where it can’t fall on anybody and dismantled and discarded as much as would fit in the dumpster. I’ll continue next weekend, after the dumpster’s emptied. Hopefully it’ll also be dry enough that I can finally put out fertilizer. The pasture’s beginning to green up (yay!), so I’m beginning to feel my spirits lifted. Nothing makes me sadder than brown, dormant grass, cold weather, and mud.

Anyway, I gotta go. Looks like one of my three commissioners replied, so I need to respond!

My life is a dichotomy.

Now, don’t worry, this isn’t gonna be one of those me-feeling-sorry-for-myself posts. It is, however, introspective, as my posts tend to be. Sorry, no sexiness here.

When I was a kid, I used to live two lives: the public “good kid” life, straight-A student, teacher’s pet, would chew you out for swearing; and the private “dirty kid” life, messing around with pretty much any of my friends who were game. It used to bother me terribly, and through growing up, confronting things, and making life decisions, I finally managed to unify myself into “just me,” and it was great!

Then I started getting dissatisfied with “just me”: I wanted to be more laid-back, more adventurous, more spontaneous, and definitely much less worried about things. So I created Jack, and he became the persona I used when role-playing and interacting with people online. He’s the reason my pseudonym to this day is still “Jack Doe.”

But as time went on, Jack and I merged towards each other. The psychologists that research furries said that on average, people who deliberately create alter-egos like fursonas can only keep them separate about 7 years or less before they merge with the person’s “real” personality. (Note that this is different from people with Multiple Personality Disorder, where those personalities are not purposely invented like a fursona is but rather arise from some form of brain imbalance.) Well, things were no different for me: I don’t know if I made it the full 7 years or not, but I became more like Jack, and (more so) Jack became more like me. I lightened up a bit, worried a little bit less, and Jack became much more responsible and much less carefree. I was, once again, “just me,” although I still used a different name for furry/online versus non-furry/in-person interactions.

And now we’re in the present. I have noticed that several of my coworkers (believe it or not, I’m an engineer by trade) are far more inventive than I am and are far less likely to shut an idea down before it starts. Talking to them, I’m shocked at the words coming out of my mouth, saying that such-and-such won’t work. The words are shocking because when I write, everything is possible, and I delight in having no true boundaries, save for the edges of the current page, which are easily remedied by adding another one. I wrote a story about a guy whose dick started growing and growing and growing until it was the size of the universe. It kept growing still, and then it broke the universe, and he found himself talking to an alternate version of himself who had also broken the bounds of his universe, and the two of them began frotting there somewhere in the multiverse together. I mean, talk about no boundaries! Check reality at the door, please!

So how is it that the same person who wrote about a universe-breaking penis is then skeptical about a design just because there are a few issues with the very first concept? This troubles me, and I am resolving right now to quit it! I want my engineering self to be as open-minded and creative as my writing self. That is where I will find that great idea that will make me millions so that I never have to go to work again and can spend all my time writing, loving on the herd, and tinkering on neat things in my lab.

But enough about that. Today was a good day; it occurred to me that getting a shower a week at the truck stop was costing me $48 a month, and if I were to join a gym, I could get all the showers I want (within reason) for less than that. So I did today: I joined a gym, and while I was there, I had my first workout in…geez…years. It was great! I was sore today, which means the next few days should be very interesting (in the masochistic “Ow, it hurts so good!” way), but it’s good that I’m finally able to get back in the swing of that. I’ve needed to for a long time now.

Also, I’ve been dark this week. The reason is: commissions! OMGsh, I’ve had a lot going on. I started this week out with one background commission I’ve been slowly chipping at. It’s 50K and going painfully slowly. I’m just suffering from lack of inspiration on it, but I am still chugging on it. 11K down, 39K to go, and I’m inching closer and closer to the juicy part. That was Sunday. Monday I chipped away on the 50K story. Tuesday I had two commissions come in and did them both in a single night, finally going to bed Wednesday morning around 3:00 AM. Wednesday evening, I revised one of them with feedback from the client. Thursday morning, I revised the other one before work. Thursday night, I revised one I’d submitted on Saturday and got feedback Thursday morning. Friday, I chipped away at the 50K story. Then today (well, yesterday now), I got another commission and just finished it about an hour ago. Tomorrow, I’ll either do revisions (if I get feedback) or continue chipping at the 50K. It’s been a great week for commissions, and I kinda hope this kind of thing will continue. It’s really rewarding to have quick turnaround like this. I might hold off on long stories after this 50K is finished. It just kinda sits there in the back of my mind, eating at me. Maybe I need to outline it a bit more to at least give myself a paved road to travel. We’ll see. Anyway, just wanted to share, ’cause that’s pretty awesome!