I ventured forth to the Iron Springs Writers' retreat this weekend, with fabulous folk too many to name. But I will name jaylake , who ran a great critique group. His energy, humor and friendliness were all at top level and pretty amazing given the stuff the guy's dealing with. Also, he's still damn sexy. That hair...

And the other folks in my crit group--kehrli , criada , Sean Forbes, Laura (whose last name has reached escape velocity at the moment), Jack Bell, and our housemate Sarah Avery who, with her lovely husband Dan and cute-as-sin kid Gareth (named after one of the only consistently likeable knights in Le Morte D'Arthur) was a lot of fun to share a house with. They really buttered me up and gave me constructive criticism on a novel beginning that has been moldering aroudn my computer waiting to get kicked into high gear.

I'm afraid I wasn't much of a critiquer myself, though. I tried the best I could. I think that the stress of graduating and finishing what was a massive load of work for my on-campus job at the end of the year, plus the anxiety of trying to make it financially on what will soon be very much less money, made it just difficult for me to really analyze a story. (Also, it's making it difficult to construct a sentence. These are long.)

The best part for me, though, with the inner wannabe teacher, was doing the presentation on query letters and the Care and Feeding of Agents. People brought their queries, including Chelsea Campbell, who went all the way to book sale from a simple little query. Hark! It's a damn good query Chelsea has there, too.

We went way longer and people were way more into it than I thought they would be. Lots of people practiced pitching face-to-face, lots of people and lots of anal sex jokes. I'm still not sure how that came up. But it was quite cool, so much so that I would like to write them all down one of these days. Not the anal sex jokes, but the insights on breaking in that everyone came up with, and the way we analyzed the heck out of query letters and flap copy.

Also, there was a bald eagle. Pics to come.

Thanks for all the congrats (and one Yowza!) from everyone. I have a very nice letter on my fridge that says the judges thought my story "was very nice and spooky, like a good Night Gallery episode." Curiously enough, one of the aspects of the story they complimented me on was one that Chrissy came up with when she read the first draft, as an offhand suggestions. I'm a lucky man. All this and creativity, too.

I found a 20$ bill today while I was walking home from school. It was kind of weird. I noticed it, and I probably would have kept walking, but I stopped to point it out to the friend I was walking with.

She convinced me that I had found it through serendipity and I should take advantage of such a thing. But I felt weird. Like I should have reported it. I wonder if it was part of some kind of science experiment in altruism, or foot traffic, or something like that, because it had the number 38 written on it in blue pen.

Now, after having eaten the root beer float I bought with my serendipitous gains, I am worried that perhaps I had some good karma coming my way, and by picking up the 20$, I might have used it up. Like I had almost built up enough for a really good job at a community college, and now it's gone.

I'm sorry, 20$!!!

(PS--Considering how good that root beer float was, I'm not that sorry.)

"Dear Spencer Ellsworth

You won the 2009 PARSEC Short Story Contest. The check for $200 was
mailed this morning.

please send an electronic copy of your story, The Worm Dieth Not, and
Their Fire is Not Quenched..."

Etc.

Happy happy happy

Joy joy joy

It will be printed in the CONfluence program book in Pittsburgh later this year.

Western totally wants to squeeze every drop of coin they can from my moist, gooshy corpse. Corpse in the sense that I'm graduating.

Apparently to get all stocked up for graduation you have to pay 75$. Aaaaand then... just to actually do your thesis, like, have a copy bound for the library, which is apparently NOT an option, it's 150$.

I was saving money so I could survive AFTER I graduate, dorkheads.

One of the joys of marriage--I got to be right today, when I thought I wouldn't be.

Chrissy wanted to leave the house and take Adia to a little petting-zoo farm out in some podunk place called Ferndale. Can you even say Ferndale without talking like the guy from King of the HIll? No, you can't. "Furndul." See? I told her we should just go for a walk in Bellingham, even though I knew there was no way it would be as cool. Still, Chrissy bore with me and took Adia down Whatcom Creek. And there we saw some Canadian geese with eleven adorable little goslings, one of the typically spectacular blue herons, and a bit old freaking beaver.

Beavers! You don't know how cool this is, unless you were raised in Mojave Asshole, California, and the only water you ever saw was the California Aquaduct, and the only native wildlife rattlesnakes. The first time I read Redwall, I had to go to our encyclopedia (sad world without the internet) and look up what badgers and beavers and otters actually looked like. (This is actually how I was able to give Sän information on wolverines the other night. Wolverines, despite being the size of hound dogs, can take down a moose! Yeah. That's one mustaelid you must-a-not mess with.)

Anyway, it seems that Whatcom Creek is actually as cool as a petting zoo.

My writing group is trying to teach me to write short stuff. In that vein, the Great Beast, the 225k novel I finished in January, is nearing its first rewrite. My goal has been to cut it to 175k. At the moment, I've gone through about five-sevenths of the books' segments and I have 142,275.

The problem is, I have 51, 928 left to go through and cut down by about half. I hold out hope--there was a lot of stuff toward the end I marked for serious surgery. But seriously, I've taken three or four chapters at a time and replaced them with one. I've chopped out entire subplots. And I even, sniff, cut some sex. This thing should be under 175k by the time I'm done. It has to be...

I haven't posted in a while, mostly because I really didn't have a lot to post about. Still in school. Still writing.

I just wanted to say that I am in the greatest writing group ever. I will love my writing group in Utah and Fairwoods forever, but I've never been in a writing group before where the people involved were so enthusiastic. Everyone submits like crazy, writes like crazy (especially ) and generally buoys each other up. Plus, they put up with my constant 12,000 word short stories.

Also want to say that Chrissy has been awesome lately, as I stress about rewriting the novel, going to school and holding down two jobs. I couldn't have a more supportive partner who plays Mommy and does design and art on the side.

Since the beginning of 2009, I've been much more satisfied with and excited about my writing than I was in 2008, which was, all in all, a depressing and frustrating year. Chrissy and I went deep into debt that is now slowly vanishing from the help of our tax return and my new job. I switched medications dozens of times and fell into serious depression, while trying to agent and be a student.

This year I've so far met my writing goal of writing a short story every month. I finished The Great Beast, my 225k novel Godskin, and have been successful thus far in cutting it. I'm about halfway through and at around 80k, so if I can keep cutting the rest of the book should get down to 160k, and then it will go to the readers, who will no doubt tell me to cut more. I've also quit snacking, lost a little weight, and been running every day. Things are generally looking up, though my attempts to get a real job are still not going anywhere (turns out I have a real mess of a resume, and I'm cleaning it up).

The Journal of Educational Controversy, where I work, has a new issue up. Lots of good stuff about the roles of poverty and education.

And when you read it, tell me if you find any errors, since I get paid to copyedit the thing.

When we were first married, I explained to Chrissy that sometimes, though I didn't want to be rude, I would have to ask her to go away when I'm writing. "It's hard to maintain concentration," I explained.

Somehow from that she got, "Please try to break my concentration."

Today she walked in while I was writing and shoved her half-eaten banana in my face, then ran out of the room squealing, "I have no impulse control!"

Increasing use of acronyms makes it harder to say things like, "What the F***?" when one's first instinct is to say "Dubbuyew tee eff?" but "Dubbuyew tee eff" is too hard to say, so one is left with "What the F***?"

This problem will be solved by the addition of "ugga" or "ogga" to acronyms. "Wugga tuh Fugga?" or, instead of the classic OMG, "Ogga muh Gogga!" No need to say "Ell oh ell." Just say "Lugga og lugga!"

"Ugga" will soon become its own slang for "something cool to the ultimate," ex: "Ceiling cat is tuh ugga squared."

BONUS: Math teachers will get smart and start calling their class "Pie." They will blame it on confusion with the greek numeral. Math enrollment rates will soar, and the same for obesity.

For those still interested in the long-struggling novel, it got more of a break thatn I wanted it to get over the holidays, but I'm now chugging along. Well, not really chugging, but trying to get through some of the last few chapters before the climax without taking too big of an infodump. "Look, it was the one-armed Ssestrucian all along!" In the next week, I swear, since I've got other writing projects bearing down on me at the same time.

In other news, I've been telling people recently about the absolute worst sex I've ever read, which was, naturally, in a Conan book written by Robert Jordan. In this scene, Conan saves a girl from being raped, and then decides that he's going to have sex with her, whether she wants to or not.


"You spoke of a reward." He stepped out of his breechclout. "Since I doubt a word of thanks will ever crack your teeth, I'm collecting my own reward."

"So you're nothing but a ravisher of women after all," she said bitterly.

"That was close to an uncivil word, wench. And no revishment. All you need to do is say 'stop' and you'll leave this place chaste as a virgin for all of me."

He lowered himself onto her, and thoug she beat at his shoulders with her fists and filled the air with vile curses the word 'stop' never once passed her lips, and soon her cries changed their nature, for she was a woman full fledged, and he knew something of women.


So, basically, it's rape, but she liked it. Okay. If you can find worse sex in a novel, I'd really like to see it.

Top Ten Myths About the Iraq War 2008

My shock-o-meter is especially knocked over by the information about a genuine ethnic cleansing of Baghdad Sunnis.

I haven't been reading Ultimatum, but this pretty much sums up the situation around it.

Haven't done this in a while. And the world will know, that I drank some Coke, did some time on the stairclimber--not a joke.

12/19/08

Words: None FERRRRRK. First day in weeks I haven't written any.

Time writing: Ha.

Candy yesterday: 2 mini haagen-daaz coffee almond bars, which are the BEST THING EVER. And some hot chocolate. Oh, and some other chocolate. A bar of it. Yeah, yesterday sucked as far as my candy resolution went.

Exercise yesterday: Walked about three miles in snow.

I got a B+ in my graphic novel class. Me. Captain Graphic Novel of the Good Ship Graphic Novel.

Academia. Gotta love... no, wait, I hate it.

Guess I should have talked more about the arthrological deconstruction of the gutter space.

I'm not joking. That last sentence was totally f*cking serious.

In other news, Obama, What the Hell Were You Thinking?

This is the political equivalent of Spider-Man: One More Day. Emphasis on the selling your soul to the devil part.

rrrg. After the fun of sledding with csinman , I got home and this became a slightly frustrating day. On the not-frustrating part: Sän is so very 2008 that he had to take a video with his handy camera as he sledded down a massive slope. He ended up falling out of the sled, proving the old adage that those who are constantly filming themselves will inevitably look like asses on their camera. (Or get caught in sexual congress with an underage girl. Hey, I don't make up these adages.)

Also, I met a kid named Riley who decided we would be best friends. Immediately. "Spencer! Go down this slope! This is the best one!" Our friendship ended abruptly when he wiped out after I pushed him down a slope. He wouldn't even say goodbye to me.

(Sledded sounds like it should be an irregular verbe. Slid? Slood? Slud?)



bzzt... hmm... novel bitching mode ON!

Okay. So I made the goal to finish my novel by Monday for the Codex novel contest. Due to a lot of the madness involved around finals, around Friday I realized I wouldn't finish it in time. So I set a new goal. Friday. Tomorrow. This gave me time, I thought, to write some chapters I had originally cut for length. Three thousand words a day would do it, I thought, and I've got few responsibilities other than finishing up some work stuff and thinking about a WotF story. Oh, and showering Chrissy with gifts.

I am not going to finish it tomorrow.

So, as I said, I decided to add back in some stuff I thought I would have to cut, last-minute, for the Codex novel contest. I seem to have forgotten that I had no idea how this stuff was going to end. I have a choice between:

a) cutting it again in order to keep the characters in status quo for the end of the novel

b) totally screwing the characters over like I'd love to, ruining their lives and drenching them in blood without worrying about how to get them back into place for the end

or

c) wrapping it up without asking too many questions, therefore kind if making the whole thing boringer than it should have been.

I like B. Perhaps if I kill, rape and murder, God will find a way. When God closes a door, he opens a window, and when he closes a stomach wound, an axe is more likely to split your skull open.

(novel bitching mode OFF!)

No joke, there is a big huge debate going on over the possibility that Obama might use a Zune.

Hilary's sitting up till midnight saying, "Damn it! If only I'd known, I could have DESTROYED him!"

Even more entertaining, there is a flame war going on in the comments based on these two posts. The first, I'm fairly certain, is a joke. The second... is just funny.
Comment by Michael Capelli - December 4, 2008 at 2:23 pm "

"Michael Capelli, Comment by Know your Logic! - December 4, 2008 at 3:22 pm"

Last, The Final Word on the subject.

The lesson went pretty well. In retrospect, though, I should have just shown this.

Okay.

1) Putting Church lessons on the internet so I can check Penny Arcade when I get bored of preparing them--not so much the best idea ever. "God wants us to follow him so we can sprinkle our ashes over the organic produce at Ballard Market."

2) I am teaching today the lesson on how we can become gods. I didn't know that one was still in gospel essentials. But it's right there: "we will become gods." Oooookay. How do you gently break that one?

"So, we can become gods."

"So there's more than one god?"

"Um... basically, yeah."

"The Bible say there's only one god."

"Maybe God will give us each our own universe to play in, so that God is only the God of this universe. Maybe there are lots of universes."

"Universes?"

"Yeah, like maybe in one universe I ride a steel-toed fork to triumphatic victory over the Blarney People."

"...."

Thanks for the pity love, Rebecca and Ben.

My newest comics review column is up.

I got a lot more comments on my blog when I was an agent.

christian guitar hero.

I'm curious who buys that game and why they wouldn't buy regular Guitar Hero. So there's like, Christians who want to listen to rocking Christian tunes but not worldly music as opposed to the Christians for whom all rocking out is sin, who this game is obviously not for. I wonder how the guys who stand in Red Square with "Jesus is gonna getcha!" signs feel about it when they're not busy making fun of guys with long hair.

This is Dead Week, the week before finals. Since the Codex novel contest ends on December 15th and my final papers are due the 8th and the 12th, I've got a lot of reasons to procrastinate and not a lot of time to do it. Don't you hate that?

Is all it will take to read my very short story "How to Tell It" on Flashquake.

http://www.flashquake.org/nonfiction/how-to-tell.html

Oh, and when you're done, read my friend and fellow Codexian Elle's story in the same issue:

http://www.flashquake.org/vol8iss2/editorial/part-42.html

Whenever Adia watches Elmo (her favorite thing in the world, as you might have guessed) she kneels up like she's about to pounce, resting forward on her hands with her butt in the air above her knees. At first I thought she was pooping, and I kept wondering "Why does Elmo always make her crap?" But nope, no poo.

It took me a long time, but I figure now she must be holding herself ready for the revolution. "Elmo says now is not the time, babies, but soon... soon Elmo will destroy the oppressor daddy and you can eat all the smashed peas you want off the floor!"

People are always asking me, "What's that lump on your head?" When I refuse to answer, sometimes they ask, "Why aren't you doing NaNoWriMo?" (National Novel Writing Month, in which you pound out fifty thousand words or about two hundred pages in one month.)

Ten reasons.

10. November 15th is the start of seal-hunting season. Novels are all well and good, but a man needs blubber.

9. My "world's best writer" coffee mug just broke and now I'm useless.

8. I tried to tune my Mormon brain-sucking powers to pick up my fellow writers' talent, but instead I got President Obama's secret deal to sell Alaska to Iran.

7. I write 50,000 words every day. What's the point of slowing down?

6. I'm lying in the doorway letting ants crawl over me.

5. November isn't just NaNoWriMo, kids. It's also Aviation History Month, Peanut Butter Lovers Month, and Epilepsy Awareness Month. Once you're through celebrating all that, who has time to write a novel?

4. I'm a talentless hack and everything I write is shite and oh god I need a drink...

3. The novel is dead. Actually, wait... War and Peace just jumped up, crawled off my bookshelf and got something to drink, so never mind.

2. Busy eating yams. Yams yams yams yams.

And the number one reason is:

1. My computer has internet.

I am so ashamed I am near tears.

Members of my own church mostly supported Prop 8 in California, which passed by a five percent margin. I fought against it as much as I could from Washington, mostly by arguing with my friends. We're all still friends, and I feel confident that human decency will win in the end and we will realize that a gay marriage is just another commitment between two people who love each other, hardware irrelevant.

At least, I thought human decency would win.

Then I read this article about how much money members of my Church of modest means were donating to the Yes on 8 campaign. These are not people who can spare the money. They contributed it because they believed it was the honest, best use of their money. How could they be so misled? Forget Prop 8 for a moment.

How much could 50,000 or 35,000 dollars do for a poor high school? For a homeless shelter? For the Lower Ninth Ward? For Amnesty International? How many immunizations and blankets is that in Darfur? What if they donated that to the Church's own Perpetual Education Fund, which provides tuition for people in poor countries? That is a full college education in Washington--never mind Mexico.

I am so ashamed of these people who call themselves Christians. They are Pharisees; unable to love their neighbor because their gaze is drawn inward at their own pet causes.

Adia is just learning to talk, and we are just learning to recognize things in her string of babbles. Last night, Chrissy was hunched over doing something and Adia was clinging to her, whining. I picked Adia up and she shouted "Not Dada! Mama!"

She gave me a kiss this morning. I think I'm out of the doghouse now.