Poop: It's Everywhere

Guess what I just finished doing with my kids?

Anyhow, my weekend thing. Got off the pot today and started wrapping up the first draft of the Dead Bait story, starting the edits after a bit more in the way of grocery shopping. In the same not, Cate Gardner has received her first acceptance of 2009, much later than I expected. Seriously, Cate is a pro in a dabbler's world. This woman needs an agent and a contract just so I can say "Oh, yeah, I know her on the internet!". Great writer, and a friendly person. Congrats Cate!

Outside of that, not much going on at Casa Del Tabler. We had company over last night, and agreed to do a weekly potluck rotating between three houses. On the bright side, we may be moving again from a rental home to one we own. My sister is moving out to the country with her husband, and if she does they're offering to sell us their Ranch Home at the price they paid for it about 7-8 years ago. It was a foreclosure home at that point, and has a lot of work that was done to remodel it since, so getting it at that low of a price is a steal for us. We'll see how it pans out.

Finished a few short-shorts this month, and I realized that since I've become a father of babies again my horror mind tends to go towards the evils and fears of child-rearings, from zombie stillbirth to demonic, cannibalistic infants, down to the fear that something out of our power can hurt a child (think my fear of snakes...I hate snakes, yet have this worry one will somehow crawl through our heating vents and end up in the crib). "Trolling Nature's Bounty", my Dead Bait story, is a nice break from that, and injects a little dark humor in.

Now, my end of the year submission wrap-up:

"No Deductible" at Weird Tales
"Tribe of Harry" at Annalemma
"Parable of Judas" at St. Anne's Review
"Ain't Gonna Dig No More" at Abyss & Apex

A few more that came back, getting sent back out today.

No, to drive for diapers and Happy Meals!

Peace,
J.C. Tabler

Blood On Bluegrass

I finally broke the writer's block, and it isn't on a story. Not exactly.

I'm working on a story about a true suicide that happened here in Kentucky, at least they thought it was a suicide, and it may have actually been. I want to play it close to the vest right now, but it has homosexuality, a love triangle, felonies, embezzlement, a coverup...all the makings of sensational psuedo-news.

EDIT:

I realized I should post some more.

Alright, so here goes. Work has picked up, and as a result I have four 1/4 finished stories sitting on my hard drive. It isn't about substance right now, just getting the starts down on paper. If I can muscle through that, and get a flow going, I can always go back to rewrite the beginning.

In other news, the whole family got sick last week, babies and all. This meant my 7-day vacation from work for writing purposes turned into 7 days of sniffling and sneezing, turning into a couple of days handlingt he babies myself as my poor wife passed out and had to be hospitalized. She's alright now, but with her condition (MS), both her M.D. and I are in agreement that she has to take better care of herself.

As for the stories...well...

"Norton Is Watching" has been rebirthed, and "The Parting Glass" has come into development stages for the basic idea, clocking in at 958 words for an intro and atmosphere. "Deep Dark Hellhole" is starting to bud into the real meat of a short, short piece, and I've started outlining the NANOWRIMO idea.

I swear I'm going to try and finish that this year.

As for everything else...well, I have no excuse. See, I know I can write, and I know I do a decent enough job, but I'm seeing a serious lacking quality to my recent work. Chalk it up to stress, time constraints, family...whatever. It's no real excuse. I've got to get my feet under me, in a literary sense. I started out this year piss and vinegar and went strong up until July. After that...well. We only have to look back at my blog to see what happened.

So here's the plan...get one story finished prior to NANOWRIMO. Complete a draft of a novel, even if it does turn out to be as rancid as my son's last diaper, during November. Do two more stories in December. Rest for half of January, then kick my big rear back into gear. Luckily, I now have three days off a week, working 4 days a week, 10 hours a day. My wife and I have agreed the extra day is a no-kids, no-distractions writing day, 8 hours from rising to resting in front of the P.C., 4,000 words a day. That...well, honestly shouldn't be a problem for me. My normal daily limit for 2-3 hours is 1,000 words, and that's counting distractions.

I'm counting on you fine folks, then, to harass me every Wednesday on whether I've finished my work or not. Beat him, harangue me, cajole me. Hell, get my phone number and call me incessantly to ask if I'm at the computer.

As for the project above...right now it's research and trying to secure interviews. I have to get the family, coworkers, cops, and journalists to talk to me, secure 15 year old case files, get audit reports, find friends/witnesses willing to talk to me, and secure a photographer. I also have to turn my coal room into a kid-proof lair where I can tack up crime scene photos in all their gory details. It isn't horror, but damned if what I have (just in two interviews and news clippings) doesn't lead me to believe there's a story there.

For now, though, I have to help train a class of new hires tomorrow, so off to bed I go.

Peace,
J.C. Tabler

One Slice or Two?

Well, in forty minutes tonight I wrote a flash piece, edited it in an hour, did a re-write over the next hour, and sent it out to Neon Magazine

There are several reasons I'm like "Geoffrey's Pizza", 835 words. First, and foremost, it made my wife cry. No joke. Honest to God tears over the ending of this story. I had guests tonight and let them read it, and not one of them looked happy afterwards, which tells me it punches in just the right place.

The second, and selfish, reason is that it is the first piece I've both began and finished since the birth of my children. I was starting to worry there were no good ideas left in my head what with all the work around the house and at the office, not to mention the recent pressure. So I have a new goal, now. A story a week. Not a finished, complete product, but something. Be it good or bad, short or long, one finished first draft of something every week. Length is not an issue. Taste is not an issue. Just something to keep me in practice until the kids sleep through the night and the house settles down.

The last time I stopped writing regularly, I ended up spending three years repairing the paddlewheel on a 100 year old steamboat.

So, back to it. Tomorrow I start trying to find my story for that week, and by next Saturday I resolve to have the first draft finished.

In the meantime, let's see what happens with my pizza order, eh?

On a different note, we took the babies and Sophie to the market today grocery shopping. There were nuns there. I have decided nothing I can ever write is scarier than a nun cooing over the baby strapped to your chest. I was squirming the whole time, expecting rulers to flash through the air and smakc my palms.

Plus, it's just a little uncomfortable to have a Bride of Christ looking at your personal Product of Lust.

Speaking of uncomfortable, this song kickstarted another story idea. It's a song about lynching, extremely haunting.



Peace,
J.C. Tabler

Here ya go!

Hi. We've hijacked Daddy's blog. We were getting tired of the Alien references about facehuggers and chestbursters, so we've beat him up. To be honest, it wasn't much of a challenge. He's put on quite a bit of weight since Mommy got pregnant, and gets winded very easily. We've got him tied up in the basement right now. Don't worry, we'll feed him...maybe.

Now, bow before your new overlords:

Meet Maggie (Left) and Henry (Right)

Let's cover August.

Well, I am loathe to admit this, but I only finished a single complete work of fiction during the month of August. I had finished several things during July, got them sent out and such, but August was mostly work and pregnancy. So, as a result, only one piece of writing got finished. That was:

"Ain't Gonna Dig No More" - Submitted to Potter's Field 3

Outside of that, I started on several things only to have them fall by the wayside throughout the month, among them being:

"One Lump or Two, Balgaraog the Eviscerator" - a possible Dead Jesters story. This was started, and about halfway through set aside because I wasn't certain of the story's thread or where it was going. I had Balgarog, the demon from Hell forced to have a tea party with a little girl whose bed he slept under, down pat. As for the plot, the girl, her family...not so much past the first couple scenes. I'm working on this one still, and someday hope to read over what I have and churn out a definite story, but for now it's on hold.

"Mitchell Hill Road" - A calling from the world of Harvest Hill. I've started it, and have decided in a few hours of writing that it will be much longer than the simple one-shot I wanted to do as a work-up for my own amusement. This'll be on hold for definite development until I get the anthology in my hands and see what history has already been developed for the town outside of my own story. It may be a possible submission to some future anthology or project set in that tiny Tennessee town.

"The Coal Room" - Not really on hold, just having a few false starts. Everytime I found the thread, my wife (still pregnant then) needed something done, and by the time I was finished the story would have fled. The basics are still there, just waiting for me to sit down and type the story.

"Rex Storm, Large Vermin Exterminator" - A longtime project finally began, that saw a good amount of work on the outline for it over the month. Between this one and the babies, I have a decent excuse not to get many short stories done over August.

September will hopefully see a lot more work being done, both on "Rex Storm" (which may end up being that 'someday' novel I keep talking about, depending on how the outlines tickle my fancy) and on the short story scene. Now that the kids are here, believe it or not, I'll have a little more time to write because I'm going to be up half the night anyhow. Might as well make some use of those midnight hours. Plus, I tend to be prolific when I'm stressed out.

Well, back to the children, then back to the grindstone. By the way, remember to read Catherine Gardner's new story over at Allegory. It is, very simply, another wonderful piece from this talented writer.

Peace,
J.C. Tabler

Now introducing....

As of 5:58 and 5:59 (17:58 and 17:59 for you limey readers ;) ) On August 28, 2008, we can now introduce...

Margaret Beatrice Tabler - 19 inches, 5 lbs 9 ozs

and

Henry Billingsley Tabler - 20 inches, 6 lbs 1/2 oz

Now, to get some sleep and get back up to the hospital with the new big sister.

Peace,
Daddy J.C.