New updates

I guess it's clear, for anyone who stumbles on my edge of the world, that I haven't blogged much. That's changing, though. I've had a busy year. For the past ten months or so I was working overtime at my job which included almost every weekend. The time I had left over was enough for me to work on one of my hobbies, which was restoring a 1967 Mercury Park Lane convertible, or my novel, or some house chore that screamed at me to tend to.

Many things have changed in the last month.

The car is about 75% complete, but needs an engine rebuild. I had planned to work overtime to pay for it.

When I wasn't working on the car, I was writing my book. The book is finished now. Several beta readers have it, and I am actively querying literary agents right now.

A baby is on her way. I am expecting my first daughter in early March. I have had to prepare a bedroom in our house for the nursery. This room was formerly my room, my library, my little man-space. I had to move all my crap into the spare back bedroom which is half the size of my library and strip the wallpaper and prepare the walls for painting. My new library is under reorganization right now.

Meanwhile, I am unemployed. I was officially laid off from work on January 16. The wrecked economy is to blame for this one. There was a major work slow-down and more than half the workforce was let go. I hear that they're still letting full-time employees go. I was a contractor, and had been for two and a half years.

Now, with no paycheck, I'll have to rely on unemployment checks to subsidize my wife's paycheck. I have no health insurance on myself anymore, either. My wife has insurance, and will have it on the baby. But my own boo-boos will have to heal on their own without the aid of a doctor.

My job loss of course gives me the time I need to do the things I didn't have the time for before. This includes preparing my novel for submission. Done. Work in the house, being done. Work on the car? No, can't afford that luxury any longer. I'll be lucky if I can afford gas for the beast.

This also gives me the time to blog. Blogging can take a while for me to do. Before I had a choice: work on the car, work on my novel, or blog. I had to choose the novel because I wanted to finish it. Alas, now I have the time to blog and I have interesting topics to discuss in upcoming days.

I am also beginning work on a new project for Arcadia Publishing. This is a book about Beverly Hills Country Club in Southgate, Kentucky. Not the Supper Club that everyone remembers, most notably for the 1977 fire. No, this is the Beverly Hills of the 1950s, when this nightclub was the hottest club in town. Look for this book at the end of this year.

Upcoming topics: local radio versus satellite radio, annoying radio commercials, Cincinnati streetcars, and of course writing books. Vanity presses versus commercial publishing houses. Guess where I stand on that topic?