Blog – Page 43 – Robert Raymond’s Blogtorium

April 13, 2013

Showlog – Deland – 4/13/2013

What can we say? When we opened the truck, we found one of the racks had shifted – scenery damage! Then there were the arguments while setting up, and a member storming out. Then, when we did get everything together (it took two hours – people were coming in the door), the layout didn’t come up until after lunch. What a terrible start. Forgive me – I know it’s no longer April 1st, but I had to do that for the benefit of the committee member who is bobbing about on a gulf cruse while we all did the show. […]

April 14, 2013

The Scarlet Pimpernel (Guest Review)

On my first day as a rocket scientist at Nasa, they jammed me into a pod with a fireball of a secretary, a wiry blonde with a winning smile and a very sharp personality. After she marked her turf (and scared me silly), it came out that we were both writers. Lynn Perry and I have been friends ever since. So here is her take on Baroness Emmuska Orczy’s classic. I am a reader….my bulging book shelves, decades old library card and financially abused Kindle account reflect my love of books. Most recently, I reached into history and re-read The […]

April 18, 2013

Passion (DOG EAR)

I was in a funk about writing. Just re-upped the site for five years and found myself wondering what the point of all this writing is. There was even a cartoon I saw HERE that said it all for me. Yes, it made me sad, but it’s oh-so-true. And then tonight, my wife and I went to Arby’s. JB was over at the table and I was standing at the counter. The counter-guy had gone off to dump our curly fries into the vat and I was just standing there, thinking my what’s the point of writing thoughts. And that’s […]

April 19, 2013

5K

Under a tent, wearing a purple running shirt, with skyscrapers against the setting sun and everyone chatting and helicopters beating about and like, what the hell am I doing here? And how did I get myself into running a 5K? That’s a long story (thought I still hate Sam for talking me into this). It’s the corporate 5K run in downtown Orlando, a massive event. FedEx had a tent and I’m on the people committee, so here I am. You may have seen, in prior weeks, my miserable attempts to train up for this (and how I kept pulling muscles […]

April 21, 2013

A Clash of Kings (Review)

It’s easy to hate House Lannister. After all, they murdered the rightful King. They throw kids off roofs. They behead main characters. They are mercenary and cunning and bad to the bone. And now Queen Cersei has planted her slightly bastardinous (if not incestuously-created) son Joffrey on the throne. Judging from the number of self-crowned kings that spring up (four, at least, not counting Daenerys lurking off in the east with her three dragons), I’m not alone in hating them. Oh, we have battles galore, small skirmishes, sieges, and expeditions beyond the northern wall. We’ve got politics. We’ve got intrigue. […]

April 21, 2013

New Computer

I‘ve read all sorts of books about piracy, and the one part of it that really makes me NOT want to be a pirate (outside of dangling in a cage at the end of Execution Dock, slowly rotting until the gulls are picking the eyeballs out of my sun bleached corpse) is careening. See, while you yo-ho your way around the Caribbean, your bottom gets foul (we’re talking your ship’s hull) with long strands of weed. This could prove very disadvantageous if the Spanish Navy (not the English – can we put THAT movie misconception to rest now?) attempt pursuit. […]

April 24, 2013

OpsLog – LM&O – 4/24/2013

I‘m driving home in that easy-smiley way I am once club ops are done and we (as a group) hammered it out of the park. Running west on the 408 in the right lane, just passing Dean Road. To might right, there is an on/off ramp, a short little interchange with two cars coming into merge onto the expressway. I should move over but a glance in the rearview shows a guy overtaking on the left lane. I frown – he’s just in the wrong place for me. Touch of the brake to give the two mergers room in front […]

April 25, 2013

This I vow! (DOG EAR)

I can’t believe this. After all the blogs about pushing yourself out there, of facing the adversity of the publishing field, I suddenly awoke to the fact (as a drunk wakes in a gutter and sees what he’s become) that I’ve been putting off submitting my agent packets. First it was a train show. Then the new computer arrived. And I’ve been cross-loading my files and playing glass-smooth Spelunky. And also weeding the yard, running a 5K race, finishing a “Thrones” book, all sorts of things. It turns out that the best thing you can do for yourself is to […]

April 28, 2013

The Night Circus (Guest Review)

Another Dad-review. If you were wondering where I got my voracious appetite for books, now you know. Why he has forsaken beloved paper for that glowing screen of electrons, I can’t say. Imagine, if you will, one day the field is empty, the next the circus is there. A cluster of black and white striped tents surrounded by a tall iron fence. You go to the main entrance where a sign states simply “Gate opens at Nightfall, closes at Dawn.” Over the entrance in Baroque letters is “Le Cirque des Reves. You wait impatiently for sundown when the gate opens […]

April 28, 2013

Tandem

JB and I have been talking about tandems a lot. We used to own one years ago, a weird thing called a “Love Bike” (I think they are also called “Buddy Bikes”). The problem is that you sit pretty close, and the captain in the back has his knees out around the posterior of the stoker. Trust me – a couple of miles like this and you feel like you’re grinding flour with your hips. Oh man, do you. So we’ve been looking at tandems and don’t want to just buy again and find out it was a mistake. The […]