Wow, another decade is in the books. We’re on to the Twenties.
My feelings on the Teens are rather mixed. Societally, worldwide and nationally, I think 2010-2019 represent at best a series of missed opportunities and at worst some serious regressions. But for me personally? The decade was pretty damned good, for the most part. I got ahead professionally at The Day Job, and my writing career continued to advance, even if it took routes that I didn’t entirely expect when 2010 dawned. But this was the decade I got back to hard-core fiction writing after the emotional upheavals of the Aughts made writing deeply difficult.
In 2010 my attitude was, “I wonder if I can write that space opera book.” As 2019 exits, I’ve published three of the books in that series with the fourth coming right along for release in 2020. I’ve published the first book in another series, and I currently have four other novels drafted and awaiting my push into the world. I was a lonely blogger, and now I’m kind-of still that…but I’m also a writer for The Geekiverse, where I get to geek out about things of my choosing.
I launched my official author site as well, ForgottenStars.net. I haven’t been nearly as consistent as I should have been with that space, and even now I’m struggling to figure all that out. Hopefully in 2020 I’ll start to “get my shit together” a bit on that score. I’m trying to add some structure to my creative life, because I’m finding as I get older that the scattershot approach isn’t nearly as conducive to getting things done in a productive way as it was when I was younger.
As far as my “personal brand” goes, I guess it stayed pretty much the way it always was. Books, music, movies, food, drink, nature, occasional travel, and let’s not forget the bib overalls and the pies in the face! I probably have to admit that at this point I am a collector of bib overalls (when you set up eBay email alerts for specific things, it’s time to admit that you’re collecting them), and I continue to find delight in getting hit in the face with a pie.
Anyway, I’ve been photographically documenting my adventures for years, first on Flickr and then more recently on Instagram. Here is a small selection of the goings-on of the last decade. Lots of nature, and overalls, and dogs and cats, and pies! These are not presented particularly chronologically.
I also occasionally make videos and post them to YouTube. I’ve thought about “vlogging” in the past, but I’ve never really found the time or motivation to get into all that (though I don’t rule out appearing on other peoples’ shows and such). Mostly my videos are just forays into me getting hit with pies. Here are the ones I made in the 2010s (links only–I don’t want to take up a ton of space embedding them all):
How to Properly Dispose of Three Coconut Cream Pies
Anatomy of a Pieing
A Pie in the Face is a Wonderful Thing! (A compilation)
Smush or Splat?
The Porphyria Pie Challenge (pies self-administered)
Pi Day 2015 (pies self-administered)
How to play the Pieface Game if you don’t have the game (pies self-administered)
Pielexa: A new treatment for RBF! (repurposed footage)
The Evil Lurking Pie-wielding Cosplayer of Chestnut Ridge
Pi Day 2016
A retirement gift for my friend Joyce: She gets to pie me
Pi Day 2018 (a silent movie…I like the way this one turned out!)
Goodness, that’s a lot of pies in my face in the 2010s, especially when I consider that I didn’t even get pied in 2019. I suppose I could stop, but where’s the fun in that!
Anyway, those are my thoughts on the decade that’s just ending. Let’s bring on the new one. Even if my 2010s weren’t that bad, the world needs a better decade. Badly. And it’s in our hands to make it happen, folks. So let’s get it done!
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