“Oh, so do you do all the drawings, too?”

When I tell them I couldn’t draw to save my life they end up looking a little disappointed.

Trust me, nobody is as disappointed as I am.

The thing is: My kids LOVE to draw.  Travis loves to draw Garfield, zombies, skeletons, and all kinds of abominations.  (this includes Garfield).  Jake draws little micro-sized pictures of pretty much everything.

Me: Jake, what’s this?  (I point to a tiny scribble on a PostIt Note)

Jake: It’s a light and a guy.

Me: Yes.

Anyway, tonight, we decided we were going to go without vids (video games) or TV tonight.  We would do something fun and (hopefully) creative.  As we were picking up Legos in Travis’ room, I had an idea.

“We should totally break out some pens and paper and make a comic strip or something,” I suggested.

“Yes,” Travis shouted.  ”Awesome!”

“Who should we use as a character?” I asked.

“Garfield,” was Travis’s quick reply.

Now, I’m not going to lie.  I haven’t found Garfield funny since I was like…8.  Lasagna, naps.  We get it, cat.  We get it.

Since I didn’t want Jon Davis coming after me for desecrating his beloved dog-abusing fat-cat, I suggested we go a different route.

“What if we make up our own characters,” I said.  ”We could use our imagination and come up with different guys to use.”

“Like who?”  Travis asked.

I hadn’t thought that far (naturally) and just blurted out: “How about Filthy the Skunk?”

“That’s horrible,” Travis said.

Suddenly, I had ideas for all sorts of characters.  We quickly retreated to the basement, broke out a bunch of UniBall Vision pens (best. pens. ever.) and some paper and got to work.  Travis set off to draw Garfield and Odie and I tried drawing a skunk.  It was horrible.  It ended up looking like a punk-rock rat-faced thing that I quickly scribbled out.  This wasn’t off to a good start.  As Jake began his micro-sized art pieces, I drew this little guy.

I mean, how hard could a pig be, right?  Started off with the snout, drew in some ears that looks a little more cat-like than I would’ve liked, added some dirt and scuff  from rooting around in filth and slop buckets.

The rest? Well, I don’t know what happened.

He looks like he got caught with his pants down.

It would appear that instead of hooves, he’s wearing some slippers.

His tail looks like it’s coming out of his side.

I don’t think pigs have nipples where people do.  Do they?  No.  I didn’t think so.

But this was the best I could do under the gun.  I figured I’d just draw a handful of little sketches and see if any of them stuck.  I’m not sure I like ol’ Paul all that much.  I mean, really, what kind of adventures is a filthy little pig going to go on?

Maybe he could fight the other pigs for control over the pail of slop?

Or he could befriend a spider and…never mind.

I think Paul is/was a lost cause.

After that, I decided I wanted something a little catchier and maybe more story-driven.  So, I drew a square and in no time, this little guy emerged.

I’m not convinced that it looks like he’s wearing a bunch of cardboard boxes.

At first sight, my kids were convinced he was a robot.

So, I ended up giving him a name so that you HAD to see the awful shapes on him as boxes.

Plus…Zach in the box.  Get it?  Get it?  Yeah, no one else was all that impressed with the idea, either.

But, as far as characters go, I though he was miles away from Paul the Pig or my failed attempt at Filthy the Skunk.

I mean, he could be a little kid who wants to be a superhero and just uses old boxes as battle armor.

People who’ve known me a long time will probably see this as a recycled version of a character from one of my old short stories.  Yes, yes.  I know.  He looks an awful lot like Cardboard Lad.

I think it’s safe to plagiarize myself, isn’t it?

The problem is, like most things I draw, I couldn’t leave it well enough alone.  I ended up trying to make it look more box-y and added the head flaps.

They totally don’t work.

Also, I suck at drawing hands.

Ah, well.  By this time, Travis was asking me how to spell GARFIELD and Jake was drawing a “spaceship rocket.”

Next up was this guy:

Okay, so who couldn’t love a sandwich as a character?

Don’t ask me what kind of sandwich Phil is.  I have no idea.

There might be some lettuce on him.

And an olive with a toothpick through it.  Don’t think I failed to see how dumb that is.

Usually those toothpicks are there to hold a sandwich together.  This one isn’t doing anything and I totally botched the olive.

Also: are those marshmallows there above his mouth?

After seeing my (to them) dumb drawings, Travis demanded justice.  ”You should draw a cat,” he said.  He showed me his Garfield and I thought maybe I should start taking requests.  I mean, I just drew an animated sandwich with no hope for comic strip fame, for cryin’ out loud.  So, here’s a cat:

Let’s just get it out of the way:  Nuggets didn’t turn out so hot.

He’s licking his chops while standing in a loaded litter box.

Gross.

Also, he’s holding a remote control.  You know, so he can change the channel while he’s taking care of business.

It’s hard to make fur look like fur.  Instead, Nuggets looks like he’s been rolling around with the Tootsie Rolls in his crap box.

I should point out that Nuggs is wearing the smallest pair of shorts known to man.

Do you sense that I don’t like to (or can’t) draw eyes?

I can’t.

I think Nuggets will forever stay in his litter box.  He just isn’t doing any thing for me.

Did I mention my kid’s obsession with skeletons and zombies?  It’s weird.  I don’t know where they got it from.  I’m guessing it’s from my wife, Laura.  She loves that crap.  So, in order to keep their interest, I decided I better break out the undead and with a quickness.

Yeah.  I totally screwed Saul up.

First of all, his head looks more like a light bulb than a skull.

The crack isn’t right, either.

Plus, instead of going with the traditional big ol’ eye sockets, I blew it and did my stand-by small ovals.

And I really should’ve named him Stumpy.  You know, since I forgot one of the bones in each of his arms.

I have to admit I do kind of dig his fingers.  Kind of.

But, overall I sort of think Saul stinks.

Jake saw him and decided that he was going to draw a skeleton, too.  After seeing his tiny, tiny little scribbles on the 84th PostIt Note he pulled out, I have to concede that his turned out much, much better.

I think it was at this point in the mad sketch-a-thon that I was running out of ideas and quickly losing the interest of my kids.  Laura was drawing Disney Characters and I had one last idea I needed to get out.  I wish I could say it was worth the wait and a true winner, but…

Well.

It wasn’t.  My last sketch of the night was the following:

Okay.  So, as soon as I started drawing the lid, I was thinking: This is going to totally seem like an Oscar the Grouch rip-off.

So, I decided that I wouldn’t put someone IN the can.  THE CAN would be the character!  Brilliant!

Eh…not so much.

His mouth is totally jacked.  At first he was doing a surprised face, but I changed my mind.

And ruined it.

I do like the flies and the dumpster juice around him.  Also, the stink lines.

So, that was it.  After ol’ Stinky the Can came out, we’d reach maximum drawing capacity.  I somehow don’t think any of the little guys I drew will make it into the Sunday Comics, but I’m okay with that.  I couldn’t imagine coming up with stuff like that day after day and actually drawing the dumb characters in different poses.

I think I’ll stick with the writing and let the more talented folks draw up the pictures, yo.

I know.  It’s been said a million times before a million better ways than I can say it: Raising kids is haaaaaaard.

It’s no secret to anyone who knows Laura and I that our two boys, Travis and Jake are very different in many ways.  Travis is (and likely always will be) a Mama’s Boy.  It happened at a young age and at age 6, it’s still the law of the land.  For fun times he goes to Dad, but when he needs to talk or to be comforted, he goes to Mom.  It’s been like this since he was a little tiny guy.

Jake on the other hand, is my right-hand man.  It’s like he knew there was a vacancy with me and he’s attached to the hip.  I come in the door and it’s ” Daddy!  Daddy!  Daddy!”  He even throws in some dance moves and jumps up and down.  It’s seriously the best.  Imagine coming home and someone is throwing you a ticker-tape parade.  Now imagine this is EVERYDAY.  Guess who’s not sick of that, yet?

This guy.

So, imagine my surprise when I blinked and I’ve suddenly got a kid (Travis, age 6) who is freshly graduated from Kindergarten.  Just like that.  Done.  We seriously dropped him off for the first time like a week or two ago, didn’t we?  Really?

Travis and the First Day of School

And it was a heckuva year for the little tyke, too.  He experienced all sorts of stuff in a short amount of time.  He met a girl who he swore he was destined to marry and was heartbroken when she ended up switching to a different AM offering of Kindergarten.  He made tons of friends, got invited to a bunch of birthday parties and went through a period where he hated school and wanted NOTHING to do with it anymore.

I knew the feeling way back when.

He learned quickly how to read even better than before and he was writing stories about cool things.  When it came to behaving in class, Travis HAD IT DOWN.  They had a system where if they were good kids, they got a green mark every day.  If they needed to be warned they got a yellow mark.  If you were a complete turd?  Red mark.

Travis ended up getting only ONE yellow mark for the entire year and greens every other day.  Can I tell you how devastated he was by the yellow mark?  It wrecked his whole week.  Even at the end of the year, he said, “Wow.  I got one yellow.”

Like his dad, he ignores all the good things and zeroes in on the one bad thing.  We both probably need to work on that.

But, to say we were (and are!) extremely proud of our kid is an understatement.

The thing is, he graduated and sadly (like millions of other kids in The US and A) he doesn’t get to hang out at home all summer.  He’s in a summer program that the school offers for working parents (like Laura and I).  He gets to do all kinds of fun stuff all year and hang with his friends, but it’s not the same.

So…there was a gap between when Kindergarten ended and the Summer Program started.  Those days?  Monday and Tuesday of this week.

Since Laura had to work, I took the days off to hang with the kid.  Now, I’d be lying if I said this is the first time that we’ve stayed home together and found something to do.  Nope.  There have been sick days, vacation days, and days where Laura had to travel for work.  It’s not like it’s a new thing to me, but somehow I wanted these last couple of days with Travis to be different.  I wanted my kid to see that we didn’t just have to stay home and watch 8,000 episodes of Spongebob Squarepants.

We could actually DO something.

So we did.

DAY 1

TEETH – Now the beginning of our Monday together was sort of a downer.  Travis had to get a cavity filled.  When I was a kid, getting my first cavity was a huge deal.  My parents devised a system where we’d get a gold star every time we brushed our teeth well.  It was a huge deal to get these stars on the makeshift calendar my mom drew up and posted on the bathroom door.  To me there was nothing worse than having a rotten hole in my teeth.  It wasn’t until I was about 12 or 13 that I ended up with my first cavity.

I digress, but the point is, Travis couldn’t be more excited to go and get this taken care of.  I soon discovered why.

“Dad, whenever I go to my dentist doctor, they let me pick two prizes out of the box,” Travis declared on our way in.

“Well, please be happy if she tells you that you can only pick one,” I reminded him.

“She’ll let me pick two,” Travis assured me.

Once inside, he hopped up on the chair like a champ, slapped on the sunglasses they give him and was ready for action.

Bring on the drill!

He was all smiles during the ENTIRE thing.  I sat there  in a chair at his feet, watching and waiting for him like he was undergoing major surgery.  He told the dentist and the hygienist (is that what they’re called?) what our plans were for the day and didn’t flinch at all.  When they put the sealants on his teeth, his only remark was: “It tastes kind of sour.”

And wouldn’t you know it?  He DID get two prizes from the prize bucket.

LUNCH WITH GRANDMA

We decided to go see Kung Fu Panda 2 (in 3-D) out at Rosedale Mall.  I’m not going to lie.  I was definitely more excited about the movie than he was.  But we thought it would be cool to meet up with my mom for lunch beforehand.  I told him he could pick whatever he wanted for lunch and to no one’s surprise, he picked Noodles and Company.  Inside, he found his chopsticks and was happier than a pig in filth.  Since I’m not down with N&C, we got his goods to go and met my mom at the Chipotle (to no one’s surprise) and had a nice lunch outside.  My mom brought some shorts that I’d stained with corn-on-the-cob butter and (not sure how she does it) but the things were perfect.  Not a hint of greeeze on ‘em.  We talked, fed a little bird that decided to hang out by us, and got ready for the show.  When I reached down to try and get the sparrow to eat out of my hand, Travis reminded me: “Dad, those birds are full of germs.”

KUNG FU PANDA 2

If you’ve been following this blog, then you probably know my kid isn’t a big fan of throwing up.  (who is?)  But he LOVED the first KFP and I was sure he’d like the new one.  We were all excited when the previews came out months ago and we were jonesin’ to see it.  Then, when the extended preview came out, Travis changed his tune.  ”I don’t want to see it.  It looks awful,” he declared.  I was crushed.  There are few movies I was REALLY looking forward to and KFP2 was one of them.

Then it dawned on me.  There’s a scene in the preview where Po (the titular panda) says something about stairs being his old enemy.  Then he mentions in a cut-scene that he threw up two flights down and someone should go and clean it up.  That sealed it for Travis.  He doesn’t even like to HEAR about throwing up, let alone see it or, you know, throw up on his own.  I don’t know how I did it.  Maybe it was the allure of popcorn and his own soft drink that drew him in, but he agreed.  After buying the tickets and snacks, we headed to the theater.  Outside the door, I got this business:

“I changed my mind,” Travis said.  ”I’m not ready.”

“Seriously?  Travis, I just dropped a ton of dough on tickets and snacks.  I paid $4 for a bottle of water for myself for crying out loud.”

He stood there, adamant.  Only when I told him that I would make sure he wasn’t scared AND that he could cover his eyes and ears did he agree to come in.  We got in on time, and sure enough, he covered his ears and eyes at parts.  I was sure he was going to tell me he thought the movie sucked, but at the end, he gave it the thumbs up and declared it awesome.

I thought it was top-drawer, too.

MONSTER COOKIE

It’s no secret that I’m a sucker for cookies.  I can find the best cookie within a few mile radius of wherever I am and as it happened, when we got out of the movie, I was near a coffee shop that has my favorite.  MONSTER COOKIES.  I told Travis that even though I ‘m trying not to eat so much of that kind o’ crap, we should stop and get one.  We did.

Like his dad (me) he’s into kitschy kinds of dumb things, so we also scooped up a little plastic dragon for the road.  I’m pretty sure the ladies that run the counter at the coffee shop kind of hate me.  I never order coffee since I hate the taste/smell/thought of it and I’m the dude that comes in and orders a cookie and a large glass of Skim milk.

The thing weighs like 4 pounds. 4 POUNDS OF DELICIOUS.

Somewhere, that one famous guy in Columbia who picks the coffee beans is crying into his mustache.

While eating the mammoth cookies, Travis made an astute observation:

“If Jake knew we were having these cookies and he didn’t get one, he’d be pretty upset.”

I completely agreed.

“We need to make sure we don’t tell him, then,” I said.  ”Plus, a little guy like that wouldn’t know what to do with the sheer power of this sugary bad-boy.  It’s for the best that Jake doesn’t get his little hands on one of these.”

“Our secret,” Travis said.

After our fun-filled afternoon, I surveyed the weather whilst on our way home.  As you may or may not know, we live in Minnesota and the rumors are true.  The weather here can be awesome one day and god-awful the next.  It seemed like it was going to be nice pretty much the whole day, so I thought of a cool idea, not sure what my partner in crime would think of it.

BACKYARD CAMPING

Funny thing.  When Laura and I got married a little over 7 years ago, we must’ve thought we’d be doing a lot of camping.  On our wedding registry we asked for all kinds of camping gear.  Sleeping bags, cookware, a stupid radio/fan/lantern/alarm combo, and a tent.  Well, considering Travis was a honeymoon um, conception, that kind of thing never materialized.  We ended up with the gear all right, but never the time or the drive to camp, especially with little dudes.  At least…not yet.

When I proposed that we sleep out in the yard, Travis was ecstatic.  He had plans for what he was going to bring in there.  Toys, games, sleeping bags, pillows.  All the stuff you need to have a fun time out in the yard.  I also thought since we both had the next day off that we could stay up late and play video games and just hang out.

It was like he won the little kid lottery.

True to form, our lovely Minnesota weather decided to mess with us.  Trying to put the BRAND NEW (still in the unopened box) tent together was tricky.  The wind kicked the tarps and bags all over the yard and I wondered if it was going to rain.  It sure looked that way.  Travis didn’t care.  He got a hold of the mallet and was thrilled to be able to swing it around like a maniac.

Hammer Up!

The weather behaved and we stayed up until 11pm, playing Wii games and talking about how cool it was going to be to camp out in the tent.  At one point he even said:

“Dad, I can’t wait to sleep in that tent with you.”

I know it doesn’t sound like much, but considering how little I hear that kind of stuff from my oldest dude, it really hit home.  I think I was getting through to him and he was thinking that I’m an all right guy.  I let him pick where to put his air mattress and I put mine close-by, assuring him that if he got scared or anything I’d be right there.

That wasn’t a problem.  Travis fell asleep almost instantly and slept through the night with nary a peep.

I wasn’t so lucky.  I heard the neighbor’s sprinkler system go off at 3am.  I heard a bunch of dumb birds making noise and traffic.  Our neighborhood is quiet, but dang…when you’re sleeping in the yard, you can hear traffic from miles away.  Also?  My air mattress had a leak and I was sleeping on a half-deflated piece of rubber.  Great.

Travis was out, even after I was stirring around in the morning.

Out.

DAY 2

So you’re probably looking at these pictures of  Travis and saying: Dang…that kid is all kinds of shaggy.  He could use a…

HAIRCUT

Travis has this thing about his hair.  He doesn’t want to cut it until it completely covers his eyes.  I don’t know if he wants to look like Justin Bieber or what, but he’s AGAINST haircuts.  So, in true tradition, we decided the start out the day with something no-so-fun.  He wasn’t happy about it.  I promised him that we would only trim it a little to take some of the weight off.  I mean, seriously.  Look at that helmet of hair!  His hair grows thick and quick, just like mine.  Even so, he lets it grow over his ears and that DRIVES. ME. CRAZY.

A deal was struck.  We’d eat lunch at Subway, get his haircut…er, trimmed, and I’d let him pick what we do next.

On our way to Subway, was saw a dude with some seriously wigged-out hair walking across the parking lot.

“Check out that guy,” I said.  ”Don’t let your hair look like that.  Please.”

“He’s ridiculous,” Travis said.  ”That hair is just dumb.”

That’s my boy.

The haircut went smoothly, which was a relief to me.  The last haircut ended in tears as they “cut too much off” and “people at school are going to laugh at me.”  I reminded him (gently, ever so gently) that his hair, like mine, grows like a weed.  I swear, I get it cut and two weeks later it’s time again.

When the nasty haircut business was done, I asked the boy wonder what he wanted to do.  The night before, we listed out some potential ideas.  He picked…

CRYSTAL CAVE

When I was a kid, I heard about this place in Wisconsin.  It’s basically this massive underground cave that some boys in the late 1800′s discovered.  They hollowed it out and turned it into a tourist attraction.  I’ve ALWAYS wanted to go and for some reason or another, we never did.  Even driving past the signs on 94, I’d get a pang of nostalgia for the place I’d never been.

To say I was excited to go is putting it gently.

Ol’ Google maps promised that it was only 54 minutes away from our front door, but we made it in 35.  We listened to his favorite group (Gorillaz) on the way there and we were talking about how cool it was going to be.  It would be an adventure.  We’d get to go underground in the dark and see all kinds of awesome things.  I wasn’t sure if building it up was such a good idea (since I’d never been), but I didn’t care.  As long as the place didn’t pull a Wally World on us and end up closed, I figured we’d make the most of it.

Crystal Cave rocked.  (did you see what I did there?)

The Main Building. (worried at this point that the caves would suck)

New Haircut = New Adventures

It was kind of drippy in there.

This is about 7 stories underground. 7!

Stalactites & Stalagmites, yo.

"Dad, I wish we had a cave."

We had a blast down there and only saw one tiny little bat.  It was pretty cool.  Fully grown and the size of my thumb.

There was a point in the tour that we got where the guide told us that she was going to turn off all of the lights and I was sure that Travis was going to lose it.

Notoriously, he tends to get scared about stuff and I thought that after all of the things we did together, that would be how it would end…with him screaming bloody murder 7 stories down in a cave somewhere in Spring Valley, Wisconsin.

But nope.  Travis held my hand and told me he thought it was going to be scary.

“I’m going to be right here, dude.  Nothing is going to get you,” I said.

That was all he needed to hear.  The lights went out and we were cast in complete darkness.  I held my free hand as close to my face as I could and couldn’t see squat.  So so cool.

We got to walk around “Good Fortune Pillar” which is supposed to bring you a whole day of good luck if you walk around it once (and only once).  The guide showed us some phosphorus rocks that glowed in the dark.  We checked out some fossils, saw the underside of a mud puddle…you name it.

When we were all done, we climbed back out of the cave and into the Crystal Cave gift shop.

Did you know they have fudge there?  (they do)

We set Travis up with a bag of shiny rocks, flattened a penny with a design of Crystal Caves mashed onto it, and bought a little dinosaur for Jake (who was thrilled with it and named it ‘Oscar.”).  When it was time to go, I have to admit I was a little bummed out.  The next day I’d be back at work and Travis would start his summer program at school.  It went by waaaay too quick.

But those were my two days this week.  Traditionally Mondays are supposed to stink and (for me) Tuesdays aren’t much better.  Considering how quick they went and how much Travis and I bonded during these small, goofy adventures, I can’t think of a better Monday or Tuesday that I’ve had.  It made me come to realize that this kind of thing doesn’t need to be a special occasion.  He’s only going to be a little kid for a little while longer and while I’ll always be his dad, I know I’m going to look back on stuff like this and miss these days like crazy.

Life’s too short to let cool times with your favorite dudes slip away.

Seize ‘em up.  I know I plan to from now on.

Two TKTs.

Why, yes.  Yes, there is.

I’ve had quite the busy May since last you (might have) read my old time escapades about throwing rocks at cars and hot memories of the now demolished movie theater I once loved.  So, let’s just get this over with, shall we?

BOOKS

I finished up the two non-fiction picture books I was asked to do for Picture Window Books about a month ago.  One of them really kicked me in the dumper (total rewrite) and the other was fun, and dare I say it MUCH easier to hammer out.

Here’s the thing about that:  I ended up having to delve into topics I didn’t know much about: HISTORY.  More specifically, I was asked to write a book on life in Colonial America (yikes) and another on life aboard a Viking Explorer ship (sweet!).  The problem really was that I was never much of a history buff.  I couldn’t stand reading about dusty old dudes in wigs waving their feather pens around or even politics.

Ugh.  The mere mention of politics still makes the bile rise in my throat.

Seriously.  I’m actually amazed that they let me out of high school.  I should really still be there, crying over my 9,000th retake of some history test.

But…ancient history? (Egyptian, Mayan, Greeks, etc…) LOVED that stuff.  L-O-V-E.  Love it.

I probably should’ve listened to my parents when they said: You should really try and round yourself out a bit more.  You’re a smart guy.

I wasn’t having it.  In my head, I was going to graduate high school, go to college and there would be literary agents and publishers climbing over each other to sign me up to a multi-book deal.  What did I need history, science and (shudder) chemistry for?  I was going to write and that was ALL I was going to do, damn it.  I knew my destiny and it was behind a keyboard, staring into blank screens and making cool stuff happen with a couple taps on the keyboard.

Little did I know…

So, in a sense I was starting out from scratch.  I decided to do Colonial America first.  I checked out tons of books (emptied pretty much all of the Washington Country libraries on the topic) and flipped through pages.  I wanted to find something cool that I could latch onto.  So, I read about Jamestown and how gawd-awful it was for those peeps.

Hmm, I thought. That might be the way to go.

There was death, fighting, natives shooting arrows into people’s faces, fires, cannibalism!    I’d found my topic.  I wrote the thing from the point of view of a 10 year old, seeing the first settlement of America rise from the ashes (and corpses) of a tough land.  It was gross in parts, sad in others, and just plain crazy.

Seriously!  Who WOULDN’T want to read that stuff?

Kids.  That’s who.  3rd grade kids.  Probably not ready for that.  Not so much.

So, it was back to the drawing board.  I needed to scale it back, keep it more open, etc…  Looking back, I could see the error of my ways.  Lesson learned.  The new manuscript was much tamer and a bit more realistic look at what life was like for a kid growing up in a more established settlement.

How did the viking book go?  Wow.  Someone’s paying attention.  Thanks for that. I got virtual high-five from my editor (thanks, Jill!) and it’s off to the races.

Since then, I’ve been asked to write two more sports books from Stone Arch Books, the fiction division of the company.  Yes, please.

And for those that know me, many think I’m a sports-hatin’ hater.  Yes and no.  I absolutely detest watching professional sports on TV and still (to this day) don’t understand how people get so worked up over it and spend SO MUCH time watching game after game after game.  I do, however, like playing sports.  Big difference.  But it’s pretty much awesome-sauce deluxe to get behind the wheel of these Jake Maddox sports books (see MOUNTAIN BIKE HERO and WINDSURFING WINNER) and come up with a story from scratch.

When my fiction editor (hi Julie!) asked me which two of the four I wanted to write, I picked FOOTBALL and BASKETBALL.  The reason?  I knew there were already tons of books on these two uber-popular sports out there in the Jake Maddox series.  I kinda wanted the challenge to find an angle no one had thought of before.  And I was right.  Each sport had around 10 books already in the series and I looked through the plot lines of the older titles and figured out my stories.  Sent the synopses in and boom…accepted!

So that’s been keeping me busy.

Oh, remember that little zombie book I wrote a while back called GOODHALO?  The one that’s geared for the Young Adult set and is (planned) to be a trilogy?  Well, that’s coming out in eBook form hopefully in the next month.  My elite team (Wicked Webmaster J & Action-Artist/Barber N) are helping me develop cool stuff to promote the undead pants off of the thing.  A little while back I bought the GOODHALO domain name and wasn’t sure what to do with it.  Check it now: www.goodhalo.com.

Yep.  That’s going to be where all things GOODHALO-y are going to live.  There’ll be info about the book, some sketches of the main characters and (eventually) some other cool stuff.  Of course, it’ll also serve as the hub for BOOK II when it’s edited up and eventually GH 3. I guess it’s time!

FILM STUFF

Speaking of zombies, we’re FINALLY (finally!) in talks to start producing the long talked about zombie/sitcom/musical OH, ZOMBIE! My producer friend and I decided we wanted to try and go all out and develop a killer (literally!) pilot for the web and have a couple more all planned out in the pocket.  The concept is pretty slick and would really let us pull in the local acting talent we’ve got in Minneapolis and St. Paul.  Seriously.  If this goes as planned, just about every actor in town (who’s willing) will likely be in this thing.

And yes, I’m not telling you everything about it.  Suffice it to say, it might just be a lot of fun or a huge trainwreck.

Nah.  It’ll be fun.

So, we’re skipping the 48 Hour Film Project again (I think that thing is dying…) and focusing on making our own rules, pooling the resources from our talented and creative friends and hopefully rocking the socks and proverbial short-pants from your legs and buttocks.  That’s the plan, sirs and sirettes.

VIDEO GAMES

Okay.  This is where things get really cool.  As in ICELAND cool.

So, what’s the first thing you think of when you think of that crazy island over there to the east and north a bit.  Bjork?

ME TOO.

Well, as much as I wish I could say she and I are Xbox Live buddies…we’re not.  But some coolness happened regardless.  To tell the story, I gots to go back a bit in time.

(don’t worry, I’ll try and be brief)

Did I ever tell you that in high school, my friend and I ran as co-presidents of our senior class?  It hadn’t been done before and since neither of us wanted the job all to ourselves, we decided to split the Pres and VP duties among two people.  It was dumb, but I’ll be dashed if it didn’t pull in tons of votes.

Remember this kids: To get ahead in life, you gotta have a gimmick.

Sadly, this gimmick also came with a life-long chore: planning the high school reunions for as long as any of us are alive.

So, Matt (my co-pres) and I planned our 10 year reunion and it was a blast.  Crazy, insane times, but blast-worthy.  Oh, the stories I could tell…but won’t.

Anyway, since we’re now officially Old As Dirt, we’re looking down the barrel of our 20th Reunion.  Since Facebook is up and running, (and thus, destroying any pay-to-reconnect-with-high-school-friends websites in the process) trying to find most of the 64 people from my graduating class has been pretty simple.  I started tearing through the yearbooks, finding people, asking others where people might be, etc…  In the process, I reconnected with a friend from school named Deepa.

She and I were definitely different in how we handled high school.  She was (for my money) the smartest girl I knew, while  I was barely getting keeping my C- average.  We both ended up in a school play together (Antigone), and wrote some stuff with the school’s literary magazine.  Heck, I think she even critiqued the LEGEND OF JAKE HADE story I wrote way back when.  Looking back through the yearbooks, I just realized she actually got first place in the short story contest.  I got 2nd.

Yeah.  Deepa was good.

So, without embarrassing her (or me) too much more, I’ll move on.  I contacted her to let her know about the date we’d set for the (sure to be) glorious St. Anthony Village High School Reunion, Class of 1991.  It was then I found out a few things about Deepa.

1. She lives in Iceland.

2. She works (or so I thought at the time) for a video game company called MindGames.

We exchanged some messages through “The Book” and I off-handedly asked her what the story was with the company she works for.  I also said (since it’s long been a dream of mine) if they were ever looking for someone to do some writing for their games to let me know.  Months passed by.  I figured she was laughing from her throne of money at the piddly little writer who’s never even left the country.

(Does Hawaii count? Didn’t think so.)

And then…last week, I get a message from my fellow “Huskie.”

In it she apologized for not getting back to me and then asked if I’d be interested in helping them with a project.  The company she works (ahem…runs) designs games for the iPhone and iPad, but with a twist.  They have these futuristic headsets that (get this) read brain waves and that’s how you play these games.  They’re designed to help you relax and concentrate.  I’m not sure if I’m supposed to mention the company, but needless to say it’s pretty cool stuff.

Deepa asked if I could Skype with her and a couple people from her team the following morning at 7:00am.

CONFESSION TIME: I’ve never Skyped.

Excited as a Kingsley in a video game store, I agreed and set about trying to figure Skype out.  Luckily, I have a laptop with a camera and mic built in and it didn’t take me long to figure it out.  The next morning, while my kids were eating cold PopTarts (by choice!) I was down in the Nerdery, getting ready to see a friend I hadn’t seen in 20 years.  Also, a couple Icelanders.

Okay, I don’t know if YOU’VE ever Skyped before, but I gotta say: it’s ridiculously cool and strange.

One minute you’re minding your business on the internet, the next your computer’s ringing like a phone, you click something and there ARE PEOPLE LOOKING INTO YOUR HOUSE.

So there I was, talking to Deepa about cool things that they’re doing and watching a few people from the project with her looking into my office.  It was beyond cool.  I need to be vague from here on out, but they explained what they needed from me from a writing stand-point.  I sat there and nodded at the right places (I think) and pretended like I understood what they were looking for.

Truth be told, I was still thinking: I’m looking into another part of the world. This is so, so cool.

At some point, Deepa said: “Here’s the catch.  We need this story from you by 7:00am tomorrow morning.”

Yikes.  Now, I love a challenge, but I wasn’t sure what I was getting myself into.  Naturally, I said: “I’ll do it.”

Over the next few hours, I got a bunch of e-mails from Deepa, Katla and Ragnar (those cool Icelandic people (and Deepa’s plenty cool, too)).  They had the concept sort of figured out.  A character (vague) needs to do something that’s based around Icelandic folklore and this mystical place (really vague, forgive me).  They sent me photos of the area, some big, fancy Icelandic words (complete with cool tick-marks over some of the letters) etc.

Keep in mind that I was working during the day, so couldn’t do much of anything until I had a break.  Over my bowl of soup (lunch, y’all), I opened the 7-8 e-mails and attachments and looked at everything they sent me.

What was I going to do? I couldn’t help but think realistically about how I was going to make this happen…and in a short amount of time.

One of the things that you might not know about me is that I rarely, rarely let my author-ly ambitions and projects interfere with my time with my wife and kids.  There are some weekends where Laura (gotta love that woman) will take the little Troupe Chaps out of town so I can pound out a draft, but during the week, I’m with them until they hit the hay, then I retire to the office to do this kind of stuff.  That being said, I knew I’d have roughly 4 hours to write something, anything out of the pieces Deepa and her crew gave me.  The kids go to bed at 8pm (or so) and I usually start to fade around 12:30-ish.

I can do this, I thought.

Then, on the way home from work, the bomb hits.  Laura calls:

“Yeah, I need to get to the library.  The internet is down and I need to log into work.”

The worst part?  She was told our internet would be down for 24-48 hours.  Guess who needed to be able to send a story and synopsis off to Iceland before that?

THIS GUY.

So, I made plans to head to my brother and sister-in-law’s house in Hudson (a half hour away) to use their internet and crank away.  No problem, but it’s not my set-up and I’m REALLY feeling like it’s go-time and the pressure is mounting.  After catching up with my bro, sis-in-law and nieces, I’m all heads-down.  I copy and paste some of the elements they gave me, I start to shape a background for the main character.  I’m pounding away at the ol’ keyboard. I imagine what it’d be like in more mystical times (sorry, vague again) and before I know it, it’s almost 1am and I’m looking at almost 4 pages.  For laughs, I write up an outline to give them a more shortened version, too.

Done and done.  I do a quick read and tighten up what I can.  Zip…off it goes to Iceland.  I’m only hoping I didn’t blow it.

I get home around 1:30 and get to sleep around 2pm.

I’ll spare you the rest, but from what I’ve gathered from Deepa and the Icies, they dig it.  It’s got the right tone for their client and seems mostly doable for what they can create in terms of games.

We find out this weekend (I think) whether what we proposed and wrote up for the client is a go or not.  They liked the story so much (or so they say, bless their hearts!) that they even pitched the idea of having me write the story out as a full-length book for kids.  This place/client gets loads of visitors per year, so that might not be a bad thing… you know?  And the funny thing about it?  Since then we’ve sort of refined the synopsis and some of the story elements.  Each time I go through it, I’m digging it more and more.  I actually have started to figure out how I could expand this into (at least) a middle grade book of sorts.

Action, adventure, cool stuff.  Also, elves.

Today, I was chatting with Deepa through Gmail and we were talking about how very different our lives were in high school.  I was a kid who got picked on a lot at my old school and came to St. Anthony Middle School and was sort of popular for being the “new kid.” (remember, 64 in my graduating class?  yeah, anyone new is interesting) and Deepa had her own crazy path in school.  It then struck me that while academically we might not have had much in common, we did share one pretty cool thing (besides her kicking my butt in the literary contest).

We were both voted “Most Talented” in our Senior High School Yearbook.  (although, as class presidents, Matt and I changed the names of all the categories).  Observe:

Still a movie-making geek after all these years...

So, I don’t know.  There’s something kind of awesomely poetic about the whole thing.  A couple of dumb kids (okay, well… one dumb kid) from high school, parting ways after graduation and then meeting up again (through the magic of the interwebs) to work on something pretty dang cool.

So yes, faithful readers (wow…some of you made it this far???) it’s been a busy, busy May, but there’s exciting opportunities afoot and even more cool stuff coming up on the horizon.

I’m just glad to be part of it.

Your lovin’,

Kingsley

Join me, won’t you?

FLASHBACK: 23 YEARS AGO

So way back when I worked at the old Apache 6 Movie Theater (don’t look for it, like much of my memorable past, it’s been torn down to make way for something awful), I was an usher.  It was a prestigious gig.  I got to wear a dark Mann Theaters suit coat that never got laundered, I tore tickets in half, I swept up popcorn kernels off of the retro 1970′s carpet, and I got to bust little kids going that tried to sneak into R-Rated movies.

It was just shy of awesome.

At the time I had a girlfriend and like most high school romances, it was super serious and not to be tampered with.  In all honesty, I was with the one girl I had a crush on (and in typical TKT fashion) made absolutely no move to try and win her over.  How and why we ended up together is a story for another time.  But, let it be known that I was dating this (to me) dream girl and was pretty darn content with how things were going.  I was making minimum wage, I got to see free movies whenever I wanted and I was eating as much delicious movie theater popcorn as I could fit into my stupid gob.

As the folks at Miller would say: I was living the high life.

Then, a new girl started working at the theater.  She ended up being a concession stand gal, which is where you started when you entered the ranks of the old Apache 6.  I did my time there, ringing up orders without a cash register and doing all of the math (which I’m awful at) in my head.  I didn’t think much of the new girl.  Sure she was cute and whatever, but I was dating someone and it didn’t really matter.  Who cares, right?

This is the part of the story where I take you aside and tell you about me way back when.  Um, how do I put this nicely?  I was a complete idiot when it came to girls.  I couldn’t tell if one of them liked me on my own.  Naive as all get-out, you literally had to hit me over the head with a shovel to get the message across.  Plenty of friends and family along the way told me about girls at school and elsewhere who had a passing interest in me.  Almost every single time I was like: “Really?  How do you know?”

For some reason, I NEVER knew.  Call it low self esteem or just being plain ol’ daft, I just…didn’t…get it.  Ever.

My wife will tell you the same thing.  We met at work and apparently she was flirting with me months before we ever went out.  I never picked up on it.  This was a little over 8 years ago.

Yeah.  Some things never change, I guess.

Okay, back to the late 80′s…

So, as you might have put together by now…it turns out this new girl sort of-kind of liked me.  At least, that’s what I learned much, much too late.

I’ll be the first to admit: If I hadn’t been dating my high school girl friend, I wouldn’t have minded dating the Apache 6 New Girl (herein referred to as A6NG…catchy, isn’t it?)  She laughed at my dumb jokes, I laughed at hers, we talked about movies and stuff.  We made fun of customers and the people we worked with.  In my head?  We were becoming pretty good friends.  Since I knew there wasn’t a chance we’d ever be anything more, my 16 year old head didn’t consider other possibilities.  Even when she and I hung out together at her house to watch a movie one time…I didn’t think anything of it.

Until later.  We had, I guess as all guys and gals who aren’t on the same page, a TALK.  She talked about where she was with stuff and I felt like I was punched in the stomach.  It went something like this (I think?):

“I like you,” A6NG said.

“I like you, too.”

“Not like that.  I LIKE like you.”

“Oh,” I might’ve said.  “But I’ve got a girlfriend.”

“I know,” she said.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“Me too,” she said.

And that was sort of the end of it.  Things were weird at the old Apache 6 after that.  She didn’t really want to talk to me anymore and I felt guilty, but not sure why.  Wouldn’t I have felt worse if I’d done something horrible?  Broken the sacred bonds of teenage love?  I didn’t know what to do or what to say, so I sort of didn’t say anything.  Guess that wasn’t the right move either.

When I woke up one morning and went out to my car (a killer maroon 1974 Oldsmobile I affectionately named ‘The Missile’) I discovered that all 4 of the tires were slashed.

Crap.

When you’re a successful movie theater usher pulling down less-than mad cash ($3.85 an hour back then), buying 4 new tires is not a quick n’ easy purchase.  I was devastated.  Someone had it in for me and (in true TKT fashion) I couldn’t figure out who.  All I knew was that I wanted some justice.  My dad, who was a police captain at the time, asked me all of the cop-esqe questions:

Dad: Did you make someone mad?

Me: Me?  No!

Dad: Who has it in for you?

Me: I don’t think anyone does.  (I wasn’t dumb enough to think everyone LOVED me, but I didn’t think anyone hated me THAT bad, you know?)

Dad: Think of everyone you know.  School.  Work.  Everyone.

Me: That’s a lot of people.

Dad: Can you narrow ‘em down?

Me: No.

So that was that.  I didn’t think about any of the goings-on at Apache 6 or anything.  My mind was clouded with revenge and how when I found out who did it, I was going to break out the hammer of justice and crack it over their tire-slashin’ head.  Like the dark n’ twisted stories I used to write in my youth: I was looking for the payback.

So, I hatched a plan.  I decided that I was going to catch this person.  I ended up borrowing some money from my dad and replaced all the tires on the Missile that same day.  I knew that if the person who did this saw that my proud V8 beast was back on all fours again, he (or she!) would likely come back and try to slash the tires again.  I would catch them red-handed and a piping hot plate of justice would be served.

This was a plan that could not fail.

As luck would have it, my bedroom at my parents house had windows that faced the front yard and a side window that faced the driveway.  From my bed, nestled right next to the windows, I could peer through my mini-blinds and see the entire driveway and my awesome car…just waiting for someone to mess with it.  As the rest of my family went to sleep, I turned out my lights and stood (well, I was laying down) vigil by the window, watching the empty street.  We had a street lamp at the end of our driveway, so the entire front yard was nice and illuminated.

I checked out every car that came down 30th Avenue.  I was just waiting for the one that stopped or even so much as tapped the brakes as it went by.

Hours rolled past.  My mini blinds got a workout.  click! A car was coming! click! Nothing.

I sat up well beyond midnight.

You know how if you stare at something for long enough, you start seeing weird stuff?  This started to happen to me.  I don’t know if it was a combo of my dedication, stupidity, or fatigue, but I swear I was seeing Q*Berts and trolls and Abraham Lincoln dancing around on my front lawn.   This was dumb.  Whoever slashed my tires wasn’t coming back.  Why would they?  They’d delivered the message, even if I didn’t know what the message was.

I looked at the clock.  It was 3:30-ish AM.  It was time to pack it in.

As I looked out again, I didn’t see anything.  I let the window blind snap itself back into place click! a final time and settled down on my pillow.  I didn’t so much as close my eyes when I heard a car slowly coming down the street.  Immediately, I sprang up and peered out.  There, slowing down in front of our neighbors house was a car.  The lights were off and someone was running across the lawn with something shiny tucked under their arm.

“Holy Hannah, they’re back,” I’m pretty sure I whispered.  Like that dude in the Night Before Christmas, I threw the blankets back and ran out of my room, through the kitchen, out the back door and hit the driveway in my bare feet like a savage.  I scooped up a handful of rocks from the basement window-well as I ran past it.  I saw the car pull in front of my house and spied the mysterious figure dash across our lawn.  I let the rocks fly.  Three of them flew out of my hands and with perfect aim, they whacked against the side of the car in the street.

Bam, bam, bam!

“Hey!”  Someone yelled.  “What do you think you’re doing?”

“You guys slashed my tires!” I shouted back.  I was standing in my shorts and a t-shirt, my mullet blowing in the early morning breeze.  By all rights I should’ve been freezing, but the adrenalin kept me nice n’ toasty.

“What’re you talking about?  Are you nuts?”

I looked at the guy coming out of his car, the I looked at the younger guy standing in my front yard. Holding…

A Sunday newspaper.

“Last night…” I stammered.  “Tires…”

“We’re trying to deliver your newspaper, you maniac!”  The guy looked at the side of his car where I’d peppered it up with some well-placed rock shots.

“Oh,” I said.

In moments my dad was outside and found out what had happened.  I explained how someone had slashed my tires and I was waiting up to see who it was (again…WHY would they show up the next night?), but I felt about 2 inches tall.  And dumb.  And even more naive than ever.  I apologized profusely and the newspaper dudes didn’t press charges or anything like that.  I realized that I might never know who slashed my tires and had discovered that couldn’t-fail plans usually did.  Badly.

It wasn’t until weeks later that my best friend totally figured it out.  While I’ve never been able to prove it and have since gotten over it, he thinks it was a dude that worked at the movie theater with me.  He was convinced that A6NG and the dude confided in each other and that since everyone knew I broke her heart (I did?) that he decided to do something nice for her and slash the bejesus out of the Missile’s tires.  That’d show me.

Here’s what’s crazy: I’m actually friends with A6NG again.  After years and years and marriages and kids and stuff, we’ve reconnected (through the magic of Facebook) and this time we truly are friends.  I’ve never asked if she sent out some goons (or a certain tattooed solo goon) to slash my tires, but I don’t think I need to anymore.

I mean what’s the point?  What am I going to go to his house and throw rocks at his car?  Nah.  I got it out of my system decades ago.

A Mulleted TKT & his Missile - Circa 1989

Things have been cooking in my part of the world, but I’ll be dashed if I don’t set aside some time to put something up on this musty ol’ blog.  It’s my duty.  I ain’t new to this.

WRITING NEWS (if this stuff bores you, skip on ahead yo)

I’ve been spending pretty much all of my free time at night behind the ol’ keyboard.  So much time in fact that I’ve worn it out.  I’m not even kidding.  The shift key sticks and it ends up putting words up there that I didn’t even type.  I mean…it couldn’t be my fault, right? (Right.)

In the world o’ writing, I’ve been plugging away on the two new Picture Window titles I’ve been contracted for.  A book about life in Colonial America and another on life on a Viking Ship.  Here’s what’s kind of funny about this:

In school, I didn’t care a lick about history.  We learned about old dudes signing boring documents and law and some battles and what-not and I honestly wasn’t even remotely interested.  Now…decades later, guess what?  I’ve got to write about this stuff.  I remember telling my parents (when I’d come home with a C- or even a D or two in history):

ME: “I don’t care about this history.  I’m going to be a writer when I grow up.  How is learning about history going to help me with that?  Besides I’m acing writing and English.”

PARENTS: “But you never know when you’re going to need this know this crap in the future.”

ME: “Ah.  I never will.”

(I had similar conversations for science and social study classes, too)

All I gotta say is this: History has a way of catching up with you.

So, I’ve been drowning myself in stories about Jamestown, Colonization, Vikings, Norse gods, etc…  It’s been fun, but LOADS of work.  I’ve been neglecting my other stuff, this blog, my critique partners (sorry Shelley and Brandon!) and all of my other endeavors.

The good news?  I’m close to getting these bad-boys done, so it’s only a matter of time.  In fact, I should have the 2nd (Vikings) done this week.  It’s always fun to finish ‘em up, but then there’s that weird part of me that’s like Dang, I wish I had something else to work on for those guys…

I’m always looking for more to do, contracted or otherwise.  But, I’m actually looking forward to a lull and this Spring might give me a chance to chip away at other writing-type stuff.

Remember that YA zombie series that I’ve been working on for years?  Remember how I couldn’t get an agent to snap it up to share it with the rest of the world?  (Probably not…only a couple people have actually read it!)  Well, I’m going to see if ol’ GOODHALO can get a new life as an eBook.  I’ve had piles of people tell me I should dip my toe in the water of eReaders, so I’m going to take a crack at it.

I’ve lined up uber artist Nathan Malvig to design the GOODHALO cover for me.  Check out his site to see some of this other work.  Scroll down far enough and you can see the drawing he did of my main character (Pious) a few years back.  The dude has talent coming out of his pores, y’all.  Plans to get the 2nd book in the series in fighting shape for release are in the works, too.  We’ll see how the first one does.

I’ve also go my other little underdog book: THE SHORT BUS JOURNAL waiting in the wings, too.  My hope is to get those two up and see if they can get any digital love.  I’ve got some awesome people in my corner helping to make this happen, so come spring…it’s on.  Expect to hear more about it when we get closer!  Special thanks to my gifted authorly friend Rhonda Stapleton for continuing to love this book when the literary big-shots wouldn’t touch it!

Outside of that, I’m planning on getting back in the saddle to finish the oft-delayed but still beloved LITTLE BROKEN WINGS.  Remember that one?  The one about my brother and I and the summer where he tried to save all those injured birds?  Yeah.  That one.

(FILM/MOVIE STUFF)

We (Soft Drink Productions) has yet to get a film project planned this year.  I want to with a sickness and and a quickness.  Something will get shot n’ cut before the year’s end.  Believe that.

The film fest that we entered RISE OF EL RETRETE has come and gone, but we didn’t bother to make one.  Schedules and stuff, man.  You know how it is.  Plus, we weren’t really too excited about shooting something in this god-forsaken winter.  But I think we’re all hungry for something new.  Heck, I know I am.

In other movie news…

It’s hard to see movies consistently when you’ve got kids, a lot of stuff to do in your spare time, and you know, a life.  So, a band of friends and I have formed a group called Friends of Cinema (FOC for short).  We get together (almost weekly) to see a late night flick during the week.  During the Oscar season, we tried to get out and see all of the nominated films.  (I only fell asleep for part of The King’s Speech, I swear)

We’re still going strong, seeing stuff on the cheap during the week.  The drawback?  When we’re done, it’s usually so late and so cold in the parking lot that we’re in a hurry to get into our vehicles and hit the road without talking about ‘em.

So…we’re in the planning stages of making FOC a tried and true movie review site and podcast of sorts.  My grand vision is to make it an all-encompassing site about movies, even old crap, stuff we’ve seen on Netflix, the works.  Not sure how it’ll shake out, but it’s another thing that might sponge up any remaining free time I’ve got left.  Who doesn’t like to sit still?

THIS GUY.

So that’s my big excuse for being absent.  I’ve been crazy busy.  It’s funny, I sort of bagged on this online comic strip that I love called Achewood.  The guy who created it used to put up new comics like 3-4 a week.  Lately, it’s been once a month.  I would log in and see that nothing has changed and say: Seriously, dude?  Nothing new?

Well, I’m not one to talk, apparently.  In his case, I think he’s just reached a creative drought with his characters and needs the time to explore new things.  It happens.  For me, it’s been trying to find to find the time.

So with a tip of my hat, I’m off to hang with the boys this afternoon.  Thanks for indulging me.  I’ll post something not so “hey lookit what I’m doing” next time!

Peas and carrots,

- TKT

As some people might have suspected, I’ve always wanted to be a writer.  Pretty much since forever…you know, if forever is 2nd grade.  Sure there were the occasional career changes I considered along the way (Archaeologist, FBI Agent, movie director, astronaut), but I knew in my heart of hearts that I was going to write in one way, shape or form.  And I’ve been doing it a long time.  I’m not saying I’ve always done it well, mind you.  In fact, there are days even now where I look at some of the stuff my fingertips have shot out of the keyboard and I’m like…Good god…what have I done?

It might surprise some people to know that I didn’t always write books for kids.  Oh, no.  I used to love writing twisted little short stories about monsters and evil things happening to good people.

There was RACING THE DARK about a guy who’s in a hurry to get home before the sun rises.  (Gee…wonder how THAT one ends?)  There  was also WILL WORK…FOR FOOD about a woman moving into her apartment who takes a homeless man’s offer to work.  The only problem?  HE’S THE FOOD.  I also wrote the first half of a vampire story called THE MALEVOLENT VOICE about a kid who mistakenly ‘un-stakes’ a vampire who’s been crippled beneath the soil for decades.  Oh…I almost forgotten about THE INHUMANE RAIN which was a story set in a post-apocalyptic future where ships are raining down acid bombs and slowly melting away a city.

Yeah.  Real kid friendly stuff, right?

But, back in high school, I had an English teacher named Mr. Studer who became my Obi Wan Kenobi, if you will.  He saw something in me that I guess I didn’t really see in myself.  Sure, I liked to write.  I wrote tons of stories but didn’t know what to do with them.  It was the classic: “I’m not good enough” and “No one will want to read my junk anyway” argument that I’d gotten REALLY good at.  But the problem was, I wanted to keep writing (and get credit for it at school) and I’d taken every writing class the school had to offer.  So, Mr. Studer offered me a chance to do independent study during my senior year, or what we liked to call: Creative Writing 2 & 3.

It was simple.   During the hour, I’d come into his room, crack open the notebook and write.  And so I did.

I’d show him my stuff and he’d tell me if it was any good or if my characters needed more depth or whatever.  I (under my breath) said he didn’t know what he was talking about, but found myself fixing them up anyway.  (turns out he did)

One day, during class, Mr. Studer threw down the gauntlet.

“Mr. Troupe,” he said.  (He pretty much always called me “Mr. Troupe”, which made me think he was talking to my dad.  In fact, the only other name he called me was “Thomas” which NO ONE back then called me.  Now, it’s the name I prefer!) “I have a proposition for you.”

This wasn’t going to be good.  For years Mr. Studer was chasing me down, trying to get me to join the Speech team.  He’d already talked me into being in a bunch of the school plays, which I grew to love, but I never caught the ‘speech’ vibe.

“Okay,” I said, getting ready to bolt out the door if he tried to hand-cuff me to a speech meet.

“For your final in this class, I need you to submit a story to be published.”

A final?  In independent study, er…Creative Writing 3?  Seriously?

“I don’t know where I could send anything I wrote,” I said.  “Do I have to get published to pass?”

“No,” Mr. Studer said.  “But you do have to make it the best draft you can.  I want it to sparkle.”

I should take this time to point out that I was one of maybe a handful of kids in my class who liked Mr. Studer.  He didn’t joke around a lot, he took his job very seriously, and he didn’t take any garbage from anyone.  One day, I came into class wearing a Chicago Blackhawks hat.  Apparently, this was a no-no in Mr. Studer’s class.  I never got the memo.

“Mr. Troupe, please remove your hat.”

“How come?” I asked.  I looked around.  Sure enough, no one else was wearing a hat.

“Because that’s the rule.  We went over it in the syllabus during the first day of class.”

“I wasn’t here for that,” I said.  It was true.  I wasn’t.  “Why don’t we let it slide this time and I won’t wear one in here again.”

“I’m going to have to ask you one more time.”

“Mr. Studer,” I said.  “I can’t take off my hat.  I’ll have hat-head and I’ll look ridiculous.”  This was also true.  I was sporting a wicked Duran Duran-esqe mullet at the time.  And my hair was so thick and unruly, it would’ve been crazy.  I just couldn’t go out like that.  Not with girls in the class and my sharp-tongued friends around.

“Then I’ll have to ask you to go to the principal’s office and explain why you’re there.”

I sighed.  Mr. Studer wasn’t going to treat me any differently, even though I was the lead in a couple plays he directed and he saw the potential in me as a writer.  Rules were rules.

I stood up grabbed my stuff and headed for the door.  “All right,” I said.  “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

That was the kind of relationship we had.  It wasn’t a slap each other on the back, high-fivin’ mentor-like thing.  Not at all.  I respected his wishes, but I still wasn’t going to back down and look like a clown.  It was the dumb, stubborn and (I guess) vain part of me during my high school years.  Whatever.  I ended up hanging out with the principal and shooting the poop.

Anyway…back to the “Creative Writing 3″ final.  I didn’t know what I was going to write for my ‘new requirement.’  I looked at my notebook and it was filled with half-started, never-finished story ideas.  I’d write out 10 page outlines and by the time I was ready to write the dumb things, I’d get bored, feeling like I already wrote it.  I flipped another page and saw a picture I drew of a rocker-like guy standing in a grave yard.  He looked scared and beads of sweat were coming off of him.  A skeletal hand was popping out of a nearby grave.  The tombstone said JAKE HADE.  I thought the name Jake was cool (hence, it’s my youngest son’s name) and I liked the idea that someone could have a last name synonymous with hell.

And just like that, an idea was born.

I started writing THE LEGEND OF JAKE HADE right then and there.  I didn’t know how I wanted it to end, I just knew it would have a guy going out into a graveyard in the middle of the night to dig up a grave.  That was pretty much it.  As I wrote it, (longhand, before computers were everywhere) I started thinking about how I could incorporate some sort of legend…a local legend.

Well, I won’t bore you with the ins and outs of how I came up with the story, but after two more classes, I was done.  I had a decent-sized short story that ended the way I wanted it to.  I gave it to Mr. Studer, who looked it over and nodded.

“This isn’t bad,” he said.

“But is it good enough to submit?”  I asked.  I knew the answer, but asked anyway.

“Not yet it isn’t.”

And so I spent the next few weeks doing what (at the time) I couldn’t stand doing…at all.  REVISING.  I changed up the dialogue.  I added detail to just about everything the guy did.  I made the guy somewhat crazy, since I was going crazy myself.  I chiseled away extra garbage that didn’t need to be in there.  I saw the word count drop like a wet pair of pants.  After the dust settled, I looked at the story and re-read the dumb thing from beginning to end.

And I’ll be gosh-darned if Mr. Studer wasn’t right.  I was better.  Much better.  I had to remind myself that it still might not be Mr. Studer caliber better.

Turns out…it was.

By the time the next class rolled around, he’d found a literary magazine to submit it to.  It was called “Fresh Tracks” and it was a small little book that featured work from students in the Midwest.  I didn’t really care where it went to, as long as I was passing my writing class.  He dropped it in the mail and I pretty much forgot about it.

A month or two later, I came into class and saw a smiling Mr. Studer.  This was not a common occurrence.

“What did I do?” I asked immediately.  I put my hand on my head to make sure my backwards baseball hat hadn’t mysteriously ended up there.

He held out an envelope.  It was already slit open and the letter was still inside.

“You’re in Fresh Tracks,” he announced, taking the suspense away immediately.  I don’t know who was more excited.  I guess we both were.

I almost said: “You’re s#*@ing me.”  I read the letter.  It was true.  I was going to be in the Spring 1991 volume of “Fresh Tracks.”

It was kind of a big deal at our little school.  I ended up getting a plaque from the superintendent and had to go to a meeting full of St. Anthony Village big-shots to receive it.  When she asked (in front of the school board) what the book was about, I could feel my face heat up.

“Uh, it’s about a guy who digs up a grave to dispel a local legend,” I said, expecting shock and horror.  “It doesn’t end well for him.”

The school board laughed.

I had to admit, it felt like I had sort of ‘arrived.’  I’d gotten my first piece published and I thought: I could get used to this. Too bad it would be almost 2 decades before it happened again.

After what seemed like forever, I got my 5 copies of the magazine in the mail.  On the cover it had a picture of some animal’s tracks in the sand.  Huh.  I flipped it open and saw how many poems were in there.

Really?  This magazine wanted my book about grave-digging?  Sure there were a couple other short stories in there, but mine REALLY seemed to stick out like a sore thumb.

Anyway, below is the story, scanned in it’s entirety.  Imagine this amongst a sea of poems about snow, roses, trips to grandma’s house, and puppies.

(click on the first picture and then click it again to advance pages…you know, if you wanna read it)

Ah, the feel good story of the year, right?  (if the year was 1991).

Holy Hannah.  I just realized that this story is 20 years old this year!

He, like his younger brother Jake, had some major acid-reflux action going on.  You could look at one of them the wrong way and up would come a volcano of barf.  If you look through some of Travis’ early baby pictures, it’s rare to find one where he isn’t wearing a bib.  I’m looking forward to the day when he’s older, looking through pictures and we have this conversation:

Ancient TKT (me): Here’s one where you were playing with your childhood drum.

Young TKT (Travis): Wow.  I’m wearing a bib in this one, too.  Was I always eating or something?

ATKT: Nope.  That was for the barf.  You barfed a lot.

YTKT: Oh.

Jake is now about 6 months out of being reflux-y, but still, if the little guy so much as coughs, Travis covers his ears and runs.  Doesn’t matter what he’s doing.  He could be at the dinner table eating his 5th meal (in a row) of mac n’ cheese.

Cough, cough.  Shoom. He’s gone.

I think it’s good that we have the child-proof locks on the cars, because I’m pretty sure Travis would toss himself into the road to avoid an eruption of vomit from his younger brother.  We gently remind him that he’s just coughing and that Jake isn’t going to puke.  Still, it doesn’t seem to matter.

The dude is AGAINST barfing.

I know this sounds bizarre, but I’ve decided I need to make Travis more, how do I say this, comfortable (?) with the idea that people puke.  It’s a way of life.  After a barfy accident, I tried to comfort a distraught Travis.

Me: Travis.  Seriously.  It’s not a big deal.  Jake just threw up a little bit.  He’s fine now, look at him.  He’s smiling and laughing.

Travis: I just hate it.

Me: Well, no one likes to throw up, but you gotta just get to a point where you think: Hey, it’s gonna happen.  Might as well not worry about it.

Travis: I don’t think I can.

Me: (thinking I’m being clever) You know, when you get older, you’ll think throwing up is kind of funny.

Travis: What?

Me: Seriously.  You know, some people who write movies put scenes where people throw up in them.  A lot of people laugh because it’s so gross and ridiculous.

Travis: (near hysterics with tears flowing from his eyes) I want to find the guy that wrote that and punch him in the face!!!

So, yeah.  That didn’t work.

But, I’ve decided to tell him stories about when I was younger and had throwing up accidents.  I figure eventually I’ve got to get through to him and he’ll relax a little about spewing.  Right?  Right?

Collected here are some of those stories.  Stories About Barfing.

LEON’S SUPPER CLUB – 1979

I joined my mom on an errand run back when I was a sprightly 7 years old.  We went to the grocery store, to Zayre’s Shopper City and other assorted places.  As we were finishing up our trek through Columbia Heights and Fridley (which is where most of these places were located) she remembered that she needed to stop at a restaurant to pick up a gift certificate.  I don’t remember who is was for.  Give me a break, I was 7 stinking years old.  Regardless, I went into Leon’s with her and Mom waited in line to buy her certificate.  This, of course, was before the advent of gift CARDS.  As we were standing there, I remember looking into the supper club which was through a wide entry way and seeing tons of fancy people eating fancy foods.  For some reason, I just didn’t feel right and I told Mom I felt sick.  She said, “Oh, Tommy.  You’re fine.  We’ll just be a minute.”   I told her I was serious, and she said I should maybe wait outside and get some fresh air.

Thinking that would help, I did.

I stood outside and while the air did help a bit, I still felt like rotten garbage.  After a few minutes, my mom didn’t come out, so I decided I needed to tell her again that I was sick.  I walked in and my mom was at the front of the line, making her transaction.  When I walked in, I again saw all the people eating and, I suppose, if anyone at their table was looking, could see me.  I told Mom I was going to be sick and she said, “No, you’re not.”

Oh, yes I am (was).

I heaved and a fountain of puke came out of me.  It was like something out of a movie.  It matched the green, orange and yellow decor of the dump, but it was thick and liquid-y and splashed all over the fancy entry way carpet.  I have no idea if I set off a chain reaction in the restaurant proper, but there’s no doubt the people eating got a heckuva show.   My mom was mortified, I was feeling suddenly better and (I think?) we made a quick escape.  I do remember saying as we left: “I told you.”

TOO MUCH CHOCOLATE

It was one of those rare times when our family went to church.  It must’ve been a funeral or a holiday or something, but afterward we headed to a local restaurant called Chester’s.  This place was THE BOMB.  I was probably 9 years old, but don’t quote me on that (since I just did).  The thing I liked about ol’ Chester’s was that they had killer chocolate chip pancakes.  I ordered some along with some chocolate milk.  Chester’s also had a bakery section and after eating ALL THAT CHOCOLATE, we each got to pick out a donut to bring home and eat in the car.  I chose a chocolate donut with chocolate frosting.  I don’t think I need to tell you how the rest of this story went, but I’m going to anyway.  By the time we got home, I made a beeline for the bathroom, spraying brown sludge from my chocolate-y mouth.  The thing about me (when I was younger) and barfing?  I wasn’t neat about it.  Every surface of the bathroom at my parent’s house was covered in brown, barf-tastic bile.  The walls, the tub, the sink, and some in the toilet.

My mom was a little squeamish about cleaning it up and began to get the dry-heaves, so my poor dad was tasked with cleaning it up.  One whiff of the mess and he decided to break out an old cop trick they used at grisly murder/we-found-a-dead-body scenes: he took some Vicks Vap-o-Rub and squashed some around his nose.  He cleaned the bathroom without trouble, working up a good sweat.  The problem was, he worked up SUCH a sweat that when he was done and came out of the bathroom, the Vicks had melted, making it look like he had thick snot running out of both of his nostrils.  My mom saw this and came close to puking all over the hallway.  Ahhh…good times.

I’M 21!

I know I jumped ahead in time, but I didn’t want to recall EVERY time I coughed up some lung butter as a kid.  But I remember the incredibly magical night I turned 21.  Turning 21 in October meant that none of my friends from school were 21 yet.  So, I ended up hitting the town with my friend Dan who was a big dude with a solid fake ID (his brother’s).  We went to the now defunct place called Mississippi Live in Minneapolis, which was a bar that had a bunch of other themed bars inside it.  I’d never been there (obviously) so I thought this was the way to go!  I was excited and as we walked up to the entrance, a big, bald bouncer checked our IDs.

“I’m 21 today,” I said proudly.  I didn’t know how corny that likely sounded at the time, but I was pretty proud of this fact nugget.

He nodded and told us to have a good night.  We assured him that we would and together, Dan and I entered a land of liquor.

Cut to 5 hours later.

I’m what you might call ‘blotto.’  I’ve had 3 of everything and 2 of everything else.  I’m woozy on my feet and I don’t remember much of what had happened since showing the bald guy my ID.  Somehow, I do remember this:

As we were approaching the exit, the same bald guy was there, waving people off.  He saw us and called out to us: “Hey, have a good night.”

At that point, I got down on all fours and coated the tile floor with about 40 gallons of booze-y barf.  I think I grunted and made noise, too.  I probably sounded like a dying cow.  Felt like one, too.

Then, I got up on my feet, waved to the guy and said: “Hey, YOU have a good night, too!”

Yeah, I know.  Probably not my classiest moment, but it happened and there’s no taking it back.

(Oh, and for the record, I don’t tell this one to Travis.  Might wait until he’s 18 or, you know, 21.)

And finally, I told this one to both Travis & Jake because it involves their uncle Brad, my brother in law.

TOO LATE BRO

A few years before there was a Travis Kingsley Troupe in the world, Laura and I would rent a cabin with her family up north for a week.  It was pretty nice.  We’d sit around, drive around in a boat, drink a few fermented beverages and just kick back, Minnesota-style.  Her younger brother Brad was there, too and that boy DID IT UP.  For the whole week he drank beer like it was water and really…why not?  He was of age, he wasn’t driving anywhere and that’s just what happens sometimes.

Well, like all good things, the week at the cabin had to come to an end.  Brad woke up that last morning and informed everyone he wasn’t feeling so hot.  Of course, he was to ride back to the cities with us.  We had carpooled up there together and he left his car at my parent’s house, which was a central meeting point.  On the way home, he was groaning and telling us how awful he felt.  I remember this conversation happening:

BRAD: Ugh.  I don’t feel so good, Bro.

ME: Well, no kidding.  Did you even eat anything this morning?

BRAD: No, I felt too crappy to eat.

ME: You should probably eat something.

So, we stopped at a grocery store called Zup’s (best. beef jerky. ever.) and picked up some stuff to eat in the car.  Brad decided that some Kellogg’s Strawberry Cereal Bars sounded the most appealing.  I got some beef jerky because, seriously?  It’s the best ever.  We drove on with Laura and I in the front and Brad in the back so he could spread out and lay down to recover.  He tore open a couple of the bars and began to eat.  I figured we were going to be okay, because about ten minutes passed.

Then he burped.

It was one of those deep from the gut and caught-in-the-throat burps.

Uh-oh.

BRAD: Oh, man.  I think I’m going to be sick.

ME: You want me to pull over?

BRAD: Too late, Bro!

Brad quickly rolled down the window and stuck his head out.  He barfed and made a sound like there was a demon living in his stomach.  He grunted and groaned and another round came up, this one as loud and creepy as the first one.  Laura and I couldn’t help it.  We were laughing like there was no tomorrow.

BRAD: Quit laughing, you jerks.  I’m sick.

LAURA: You sound like a Komodo dragon!

BRAD: (heaving) Blararagaragargh….

We didn’t stop, we just kept going.  I remember looking in the rear-view mirror and seeing pink-tinged spray blasting outside of my (then) brand new Xterra.  Even though I knew my truck was getting coated, it was the funniest thing ever.  Which, I reminded Travis (having only told him about Brad barfing, not why he was barfing) means that puking isn’t that big of a deal.

You throw up.  You feel better.  End of story.

The funny thing?  I think these stories are sort of working.  Every once in a while, I hear Travis shout: “Too late, bro!” and both he and Jake make the puke demon sounds that Brad made that fine summer day.

Maybe there’s hope for the kid yet.

Holy Hannah, people.  It totally makes sense now.

And here’s the thing I never like to admit: THEY WERE RIGHT.

Right now I’m sitting on the edge of first day of the year 2011.  When I look into the bowels of my website and blog, I can see that a month has passed by since I wrote some stuff on the interwebs.  A month?  That’s nothing and certainly not too uncommon for a shabby blogger like myself.  But, as I was doing some home repair (details later), I realized a whole year had been pulled out from beneath my feet.  A YEAR?

Okay, okay.  The home repair, because I know you’re DYING to know what kind of handy-man I am.

All right, remember how I did the biggest loser thing with a couple other firefighting chaps back at my fire station?  Well, a few weeks ago last year, I was getting ready for the inevitable beginning of our competition.  We were going to weigh in after the first of the year.  I decided that I was going to ‘fatten myself up’ to pull a big weight and then just lose it like it was going out of style.  I did that, eating just about anything I wanted as often as I wanted.  I ended up weighing in at about 216 pounds.  Pretty porky for a dude who’s only 5’9″.  Don’t bother looking at a BMI thingy.  I was a pudge.

Well, after the holidays last year, we decided to take down the lights we had on this upper shelf-like thingy in our kitchen.  It looks pretty sweet.  All this fake garland with lights woven into it.  It made you just want to cry and sing Christmas carols.  It was that awesome.  Since I’m not afraid of heights, I got up on the counter using a kitchen chair.  I handed the garland stuff down to Laura, getting a little misty in the process (no, not really) and soon the work was done.  As I prepared myself to come down off of the kitchen counter, I stepped down onto the kitchen chair and, well…I stepped right THROUGH the kitchen chair’s seat.

It was like I did a karate chop, but not really.

I powered through the chair and it must’ve looked like something from a really bad sitcom.  My tubby self stood there like a deer in headlights.  One leg outside the chair, the other, still through what remained of the dumb thing.  If that wasn’t a ‘dude you’re fat’ wake-up call, I don’t know what is.

Anyway, this story isn’t about my Biggest Loser competition (and victory!) it’s to show how quick time goes by.

So guess when I fixed that chair?  2 days ago.  For a whole year, we went ghetto and used a mismatched folding chair to accommodate our family of four at the dinner table.  As I was cutting the dumb piece of wood in the garage, it dawned on me.  One year.  Just like that.  Gone.

It’s not like I just sat around and let the year fly by without something to show for it.  Heck no.  But still, being the way I am, I feel like I used about 34% of the year with doing awesome things.  The other 66%?  (For the record, I had to double check my math.  That works out to 100%, right?)  I sort of took it easy.  I let days and weeks go by without writing something.  It actually got to the point where it was HARD to sit down and work on something at all.  It’s like it had become foreign to me in some way.

How did I let that happen?

But that’s not to say I didn’t write stuff.  I wrote plenty, y’all.  Just very little of my own projects.  I think all told, I kicked out 5 books for Picture Windows and 5 for Stone Arch.  Not too shabby.  I also worked on another short film with my Soft Drink Productions crew.  The sad thing?  We’re just NOW putting the final touches on the DVD of it.  Sorry to all the people who worked on it with us who were waiting for one.  I swear it’s not my fault.

But anyway, this is the year stuff happens.  I think I’ve said it before, but I’m not messing around anymore.  Look at my face.  You see how it’s all serious and stuff?  That means I’m not messing around.  I’m going to wear this keyboard out this year.  When the keys crack and splinter from the awesome I’m channeling through my fingertips, I’ll unplug it from the computer, toss it over my shoulder like an empty can of some delicious soft drink and crack open a new one.  It’s that kind of intensity I need to re-acquaint myself with.

Self?  Meet motivation.  Motivation, meet self.  Let’s rock.

The other thing, too, is how I need to put myself out there.  Sure, I’m disappointed that ANNA 2.0 and even GOODHALO for that matter, didn’t exactly make any agents clap and do a back-flip into a dumpster.  Maybe it wasn’t their time and who knows, maybe it never will be, but it’s not like I ran into a corner with my corner team, let them squirt water into my mouth and press that cold metal thing against my beat-up face only to have them throw in the towel.  Nah.  I’m not like that.  I think I just got all swept up working on my contracted books and using the little breaks I had between them to recharge my batteries instead of writing more, submitting stuff to agents and letting the chips fall where they should.  I still want to write stuff for my peeps at Stone Arch and Picture Window Books, but I need to wedge my own projects in there too.

That how it’s gonna work, 2011.  You hear me?

Oh, and agents?  I’m throwing my hat (well, manuscripts) back into the ring.  You’re going to see some new stuff that might make your undergarments spontaneously explode, destroying your pants in the process.  Sorry about that, but you know, you’ve been warned.  I’m getting back out there, y’all.

But overall, 2010 has been a transitional year for me, I think.  Big stuff happened, some good, some bad.

- Travis started kindergarten.
- Jake learned how to say “Are you kidding me?”
- Laura dressed up like a hot witch for Halloween.
- I rediscovered how delicious Orange Crush can be.

Need I go on? These things don’t just happen overnight.

I guess what I’m saying is this: Don’t take time for granted.  It does fly by and before you know it, you’re 38, your hair is a little grayer and you’re a little less hilarious than you thought you were.  I’m not saying this from experience, I’m just saying.

But really.  Another year.

Every time I sit on that fixed chair, I’m going to think about that.  Seriously.

Have a rip-roaring 2011, everyone.  Let’s make it a good one.

I’ve been lazy.  I can’t even say it’s anything like writer’s block, it’ s more like “Eh…Block.”  It’s been a strange and hectic fall and I’m REALLY trying to find my way back into being the productive son-of-a-so-and-so I’m usually known for.

QUESTION: Do you ever get to a point where you’ve got sooo much to do that you sort of sit back and think: You know, I don’t even know where to start. Do you ever get that?  I get that at work and I get it while I’m sitting in the Nerdery trying to plan and devise my next move.  It’s one part overwhelming and 82 parts frightening.  Now, don’t get me wrong…I’m able to take care of my author-ly obligations.  You know, the stuff I’m contracted for.  In fact, I’ve turned in my last 2 (of 3) books in a little early.  I think I’ll be done with the 3rd one well before it’s due in January.

That’s just how I do it, yo.

But that’s the thing.  I’m sort of spending some of my time working on the stuff I’ve been hired for and using the rest of the time (which I’ve sort of had a decent amount of) kind of…taking a break.  Oh, and playing Rock Band 2.  Lots and lots of Rock Band 2.  I don’t know what happened over the last week, but I can’t seem to put that stupid guitar down.  And get this:  I actually went out and designed what the rest of my band should look like.  Satch is our lead singer, Old Bill plays Bass and Shasta’s on drums.  We’re called The Chaps.  It’s kind of sad and pathetic, really.

But dang, it’s fun.

UPDATE: I just found out there’s a band (in the real world) called The Chaps.  It’s not pretty.

And don’t get me started on this dumb ol’ blog I’m barely keeping together.  I thought changing the name of it (anyone notice that by the way?) would give me a good kick in the seeds to keep it going.  I happened to look at the last post…October 7th!  What?  It’s like I skipped November completely.  Actually, I DID skip November completely.  That’s just what happens, I guess.

Anyway, I’m clawing my way out of this over-extended ‘break’ I’ve been taking.  I actually critiqued a few chapters of my pal’s YA novel-in-progress (and it’s finger lickin’ good, y’all), and I’ve been really locking down some of the details of the new MG series I want to pitch to the world o’ publishing.  I’ve got 4 books pretty much mapped out in my head, it’s just a matter of gettin’ it down and seeing how it all comes out.

Outside of that?  It sounds like we’re FINALLY going to get our last film RISE OF EL RETRETE color-corrected and DVD-ized for the world to see.  With any luck, it’ll be on the interwebsticles before the end of the year.  The oh-so-hilarious thing?  My producer friend is talking about gearing up for our next short film.  We’re going to be smarter about this one and not shoot it 4 nights during a work week and getting 3 hours of sleep before rushing off to our normal joe-jobs.

Consider that one to grow on.

Oh, and I’m thinking I want to learn how to play an instrument starting next year.  Namely a bass guitar.  I bought my almost 6-year old (Travis) a drum set for Christmas and I think it’s going to be fun to learn how to play and have our own goofy little rhythm section.  Also, I think it would be fun to (sometime in this lifetime) write and record an entire album.  Nothing fancy, mind you, just 10-12 songs that I’ve had some creative input in.  Mostly lyrics and what-not, since I can’t read music to save the world from destruction.

Remember that part in Goonies where Andy had to play the skeleton piano or they were all going to fall into that pit and die?  Yeah.  The Goonies would’ve been worm-food if left in my incapable hands.

There’s been other stuff going on, too.  My littlest guy is sleeping in his big-boy bed.  I go in to check on him every night (his room is right across the hall from my office “The Nerdery”) and it’s a comedy show every time.  Once he was sleeping underneath his old crib as his bed was LOADED with books.  Seriously.  He had like 40 plus books stacked on his toddler bed.  Another time he was on the queen size bed in there, a book opened up over his chest.

My oldest son is in Kindergarten and sorta liking it.  He’s telling me about his new girlfriend and how he’s definitely going to marry her.  I’ve seen her when I’ve gone to pick Travis up and the kid has got MOVES.  He doesn’t leave any doubt in this poor girl’s mind that he’s interested in her.  The bonus?  She seems to like him, too.  You know, as much as 5 year olds can. When asked what his favorite part of the day is, he’ll tell you: “Lunch.”  When asked why, his response is simple:  “You get to eat.”

Oh, did I mention that we got a new car?  Probably not.  I probably also didn’t mention that before the thing even had 1,000 miles on it, it got dinged whilst parked in a lot at work.  The jerk-face who did it didn’t even bother to leave a note.  A $500 deductible later and it’s going to be as good as new.  Good times, good times.

So yes.  This post has been all over the place and random and kind of well… dumb.  Consider it my “I’m getting back on track” post or like a portal to greater things.  The momentum is there, I can literally feel it building.  I just need to harness it, guide it in and show it who’s boss.

Because I’m the boss.  (Me. I am.)

Joe and I were pretty much inseparable.  Every weekend, I would either sleep out at his house or he’d sleep at mine.  More often than not, we ended up at Joe’s house, though.  His parents always made the best popcorn and we got to stay up as late as we wanted, watching movies we definitely weren’t ready for.  I remember seeing my first Friday the 13th movie late at night with Joe and his older sister (who I had a little bit of a crush on) and screaming like a little girl.

For a good year after that, I was pretty sure I could hear breathing coming from my closet at home.  If I squinted hard enough toward the dark corner of my bedroom, I could almost see a tall, silent weirdo in a goalie mask, machete at the ready.  Chhhhh-chhh-chhh-haaaa-haaaaa-haaaaaaaa….

Joe and I were into all the stuff kids growing up in the late 70′s, early 80′s were into.  Star Wars toys were a no brainer and getting new ‘guys’ and vehicles was pretty much all we talked about.  We would ride our dirt bikes through the alleys, making Speeder Bike noises and ramming each other off of our rides and into the wall.  Joe was always the Biker Scout, which left me as Luke (in Endor gear).

From time to time, I’d get to go to Joe’s cabin with him and his family.  I always, always wanted our family to get a cabin, but it just never happened.  We had to settle for visiting the cabins of friends when we were lucky enough to get invited.  One of the big things we liked to do was explore woods, trails, just about anything.  We’d find sticks and hack n’ slash our way through the rough stuff, imagining there were treasures to be found and ninjas to fight.  It didn’t matter that we didn’t find much.  There was a certain feeling of victory coming back out of the woods and into civilization.

And, you know, getting yelled at for having muddy pants n’ shoes.

We didn’t limit our woods exploring to just Joe’s cabin, either.  Growing up, there was a small lake near our town’s movie theater, called Hart Lake.  It was more of a pond, really, but at the time it seemed like a lake.  We convinced my parents to let us ride our bikes out there (across a few busy roads) so we could explore.  They weren’t crazy about the idea, but we somehow won out.  Our mission was simple and the same as ever:

Find treasure.

That time, we did.

As we trekked through the brambles and wet leaves, we came across a big ol’ black garbage bag.  It was tied up and stuck underneath a bush.  I poked it with my stick and tore a hole in the plastic.  A woman’s face peeked back out at me.  My eyes widened and Joe and I knew INSTANTLY what we’d found.

We dropped to our knees and tore open the bag.  Inside were literally hundreds of Playboys and Penthouse magazines.  The face that stared back at us was Miss January, 1980 (I think).  I’d like to say we just looked at the covers and left them where they were, but we didn’t.  We couldn’t.

We were boys.

“Do you realize what we’ve found?”  I asked Joe.  “This is pretty much the greatest find of all time!”

“Yeah,” he said.  “How do we get these home?”

I lifted the bag and the rest of the magazines slopped out onto the muddy ground.  There was no way we could lift them all and no way we could get them home on our bikes.

“We’ll come back with a car,” I suggested, flipping through the damp and yellowed pages.  “I’ll see if my dad will drive over here with the station wagon.”

Joe just shook his head.  “I don’t think so,” he said. “He’ll ask what we’re loading in the car.”

He was right.  Dad wouldn’t go for that.  Besides, he’d probably want to keep them for himself.

“What if we take one home at a time?”  I looked at the treasure trove of nudity lying around us.  “It’d be easy to sneak them back if there weren’t so many of them.”

We probably stood there for a good hour, contemplating how we could transport our treasures back to civilization.  After a while, we decided we’d have to leave the magazines where they were.  For now.  After another quick peek (or two), we wrapped up the goods and tucked them back under the bush where we’d found them.  I won’t lie and pretend I forgot all about them.  I even considered taking my brother’s wagon all the way back to Hart Lake to load up the product.  I thought it through a bit more and realized that if someone stopped me on the street or (heaven forbid) a police officer decided to stop me (you know, because they always stop suspicious 8 year olds pulling wagons), I’d have to fess up.

“Sorry, Officer.  Just trying to get these Playboys home.”

About a week later, Joe and I happened to venture back to Hart Lake.  No reason, really.  You know, just exploring.  Our hearts were broken when we discovered our naked treasures were gone.  Not even a muddy centerfold remained.

“We’ve been robbed,” I’m sure I said.  I might have even cried a little.

Cut to almost 30 years later.  When I drive through Nordeast Minneapolis, I sometimes pass by Hart Lake.  The movie theater that was once nearby (and was the site of my first job) has been torn down and replaced with condos.  Even the little shack in the parking lot where you could drop off your camera film for developing is long gone.  The whole area is almost unrecognizable.

Even so, I can’t look at that little ring of trees along the edge of the lake (pond) and NOT think about our adventures there and what might’ve been the coolest treasure Joe and I had ever unearthed.