Author: Shane

Another day older, and deeper in debt

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So, it’s my birthday.

I had a rough plan of talking about how my birthday always makes me feel like posting a “year in review” post even though I really didn’t have anything important to say, but then I sat down and read last year’s birthday post and I already said all of that, except funnier.

So.

Not much to say. Good year. Well documented.

This is a weird thing to say, but maybe I do feel more grown up? Part of it is that I’ve noticed that the way I think about things has definitely changed. Definitely more into the long view, definitely feel like I understand the previous generation a bit more. Better understand what it means to be a parent, and how having kids changes how you approach life. Another part of it is that this is the first year in a while that I feel like I can see flaws in myself that I need to work on. The flaws were always there, but I can see them now. That’s growing up, right?

It also took me 35 years to figure out that boots and a hood are awesome and amazing things in the winter.

What can I say, I’m a slow learner.

Writing, Year 6

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For the past 5 years I have been writing these posts on my “writing anniversary” of March 1st. Everybody runs them in December or January, so I liked being different. However, all of my tracking software tracks these things by calendar year, and it’s a bit of a pain teasing everything out, so I’m giving in.

It helps that this has been far and away my most successful year, even with only counting 10 months.

This year:

Stories Written: 5
Number of [Submission-Ready] Words: 14,000
Number of Story Submissions: 104
Number of Rejections: 94
Number of Acceptances: 8
Postage Costs: $3.85
Revenue: $578*

*$3 not actually paid yet

Total:

Stories Written: 31
Number of [Submission-Ready] Words: 118,600
Number of Story Submissions: 372
Number of Rejections: 354
Number of Acceptances: 12
Postage Costs: $124.68
Revenue: $850.70

Oh my goodness, where to even begin.

I thought I had finally cracked 100 rejections in a year, and I certainly will in a full 12 months, but only technically 94 since March. However, twice as many acceptances this year as I’ve had all time, and correspondingly twice as much money this year as I’ve had all time. (Side note, 4 of those acceptances will be published in 2015).

But the numbers don’t tell the full story.

I’ve had stories translated into Galician and Polish. I attended my first con and did my first reading. I had a story performed as a play, and a story hung in an art gallery. I had a story selected for a Year’s Best anthology (still squeeing).

It’s been quite a year.

On a smaller note, a few things that felt pretty good as well: I sold a second story to a single publisher for the first time (whoops, haven’t even announced that one yet, as it just happened on the 31st – watch this space!), I sold a very long story for a big chunk o’ change, and I also sold the trifecta of horror, fantasy, and science fiction this year. All of these things feel so good because they’re just excellent validation. Each one helps to combat my imposter syndrome in some small way. When my brain says, “You can only write short,” or “you can only write SF,” or “nobody thinks that’s funny”, or “when this publisher comes to their senses and realizes you are a worthless puddle of goo, you will never sell another story to them,” I can point to that and say, “Nuh uh, brain! Nuh uh! Lookit that right there! I’m not a worthless puddle of goo! I am a puddle of goo that is WORTH something!”

I am a puddle of goo that is worth something.

Carving that on my tombstone.

And then literally turning into a worthless puddle of goo.

The $25 car repair

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What is it about cars? From used car salesmen, to shady repair shops, they just seem to attract unsavory characters. I have a couple of horror stories (some even documented on this blog), and I’m sure you do too. Quite frankly, the negative experiences FAR, FAR out-weigh the positive experiences.

So when I do get a positive experience, I am more than happy to crow about it.

Turns out I had just such an experience with Aspen Auto Body. Remember that enormous scratch I put down the side of my car the other day? They fixed it. For TWENTY FIVE BUCKS.

I had some vague notions of buying the paint and trying to touch it up myself. The paint was about $10, and from what I read online people were saying like $700 for a shop to fix something like that (apparently they just replace the whole panel these days rather than repair them, and this was across both doors). So it seemed like I had little to lose. However, the car has to be warm for the paint to take which was a bit of a problem (I don’t have a garage), and after watching a few tutorials on youtube, I was worried it was going to be a bit more painstaking than I was willing to spend. Most recommend dabbing the paint on with a toothpick. Did I mention this was an enormous scratch?

Worse, while I dithered around trying to make a decision, it started to rust (in about a week…yay Chicago winter!). So now I would need to sand it, etc.

I decided to get an estimate, just to make see where I was at. Fortunately, I don’t have a “usual” body shop, so Aspen was referred to me. It was very close by work, tucked away on a little access road where you would never find it. I ran it over for an estimate.

“If there’s a cheap way to fix it and an expensive way, I’d go for the cheap way,” I ventured.
“Oh, in that case, we could just touch it up,” he said. “Maybe $30?”
“Thirty?” I repeated in disbelief, thinking maybe I’d misheard. “Thirty dollars?”

I honestly thought he’d laugh at me and say, “Thirty THOUSAND you idiot.” Repair shops around here usually charge something like $90 an hour. I can’t even get an estimate for $30. I’m lucky to get a haircut for $30.

The place was very low key, but by god if they didn’t fix it for $25. I paid cash. And it looks great! You can see the paint if you get close, but from a distance it’s pretty unnoticable. It’s *certainly* a lot better than I would have done, and the paint itself was $10, so they only charged me $15 in labor. $15!

Fast, cheap, and high quality to boot. Best $15 I ever spent.

Happening Now: Cat Vomit

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I’m sitting at the computer, casually browsing facebook, when I hear the cat getting ready to hork. I look over and she’s hunched over the rug, not more than a foot from the hardwood floor.

Now, in case you don’t have a cat, cleaning up cat vomit (something you, unfortunately, do a lot of) is about 7.432 billion times easier on hardwood than rug. Not having to clean up cat vomit would be the best, but second best would be cat vomit on the hardwood.

I leapt into action grabbing the cat and desperately flinging her vomit-side out.

Too late.

I got her mid-spew, resulting in a 3 foot cat-vomit arc across the living room. So it turns out there is something worse than cat puke on the rug: cat puke on a wide arc of the rug, followed by cat puke on a wide arc of the hardwood.

On the other hand, my life’s not so rough: nobody has ever squeezed me mid-puke and spun me around like some kind of crazy-merry-go-round-vomit-squirt-gun-bagpipe.

So, there’s that.

Quote Monday understands the language

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::Watching a Santa-Tracker App on Christmas Eve::
Sara: “How do you think it knows where Santa is?”
Evie: “Because it’s a smart phone.”

Me: “We’ll take a selfie.”
Evie: “Yeah!”
Sara: “Do you know what a selfie is?”
Evie: “Yeah.”
Sara: “It’s hard to be 7 and not know what a selfie is.”
Ollie: “It’s when you take a picture!”
Sara: “It’s hard to be 4 and not know what a selfie is.”

Me: “I don’t remember the dad’s name, but the dogs are Jabberwocky, Primrose, and Bean.”

Look, if more people named their kids “Jabberwocky”, maybe I could remember people’s names too.