Where I am at the moment.

Well I made it back here today, though I’m feeling mighty tired; like some left over from the con.
An update on some of the things going one for me right now:

My writing project is going along nicely, more on that in a bit.

I’m planning out a line of cards for adoptees to sell in a cafepress store, it’s just so hard to find a card these days to send to a sister you’ve never met in person.

My message in a bottle project was started at the connecticon artist alley, for more on that you can check out http://groups.google.com/group/mess-n-bot . I’ve got a photo of the bottle before it left and I made photo copies of the contents to show off in case it gets lost on the way to its destination.

I’ve posted up some mazes on my minisite ( http://www.minisite.com/rovingjack ) for preview. They are meant to be rewards for those that donate to the write-a-thon. I just didn’t feel like restricting them with a password. So it’s sort of on the honor system right now.

I’ve got a trip to the crafts fair this weekend coming, and hope to take a paper making class, as well as talk to a lampwork glass maker and some wood workers about some ideas I have.

I’m going to make up some more of my hand painted maps for a portfolio and generic map folio for download off a site. Then use one to make up a flier to post in local gaming, comic stores for commission work. I hope that I can get enough together to pay for artist alley at next year’s connecticon. It looks like a good chance too, seeing some of the prices people charge for generating maps on their computers. I can charge less then that by 2/3 and offer a bit more customization and a different style then anything I see out there right now.

Then this weekend I have a repeat of my panel on alchemy from the con to offer to a local spiritual group in the book store near where I live. This is simply a trial to see if I might be able to take my con panels to a bigger audience and a new line to thinking about where I want to end up career wise. I used to dislike the very idea of speaking in public, now the idea of teaching and lecturing on certain topics as a way to make living sounds interesting enough to try.

As for the writing… Well I’ve had a few experiments so far. One of which is a horror story of sorts, as I look at it now it needs a rewrite badly, and I think I’m going to change it over from third person limited to first person. It wasn’t really supposed to be a horror story just a comment on a thought I had in story form. So using that as a model for how to venture into a new genre I think I’ll use the techniques again.

But the one I’m interested in tonight is the one I’m doing now. I was reading a bit and came across an idea. A writer was explaining the ways in which most authors use person and perspective in story and I realized something. There was mention of first person and third, and unsaid was the fact of present and past tense, and perverse mind that I have I immediately decided I needed to find a way to do a story in the future tense. But even more I needed to try to do something in the second person. Five minutes later I found a way that not only might satisfy that desire to experiment but also to let me venture into the area of romance writing. An area I was dreading, I’m not a fan of that type of writing, and it promises to be uncomfortable, but that is why I’m doing it.

As a writer I feel the need to test my boundaries in my writing style, to see where I can take myself, and to be able to say I tried and learned something from these areas I might not have otherwise explored.

So I am looking forward to that experiment and to see how the techniques might later be adapted to use in other formats.

Well I’m off again. Expect a post in the next day or two,
Until then, Take care of yourselves,
Roving Jack