I started my internship with The Perseus Books Group last Wednesday, the 13th. Right now I’m working with Google Adwords. I didn’t have much practical experience with Adwords prior, so I’ve been learning a lot as I go.
The most exciting project we’re working to promote right now is the Cathy’s Book application for iPod Touch and iPhone. I’m intensely interested in developing storytelling technology, so I flipped my top when I found out I would be helping to promote something this cutting edge. For those of you not immersed in the world of alternate reality gaming, the Cathy franchise comes from the brains of Sean Stewart and Jordan Weisman of I Love Bees fame. In short, these men are Olympic deities of the alternate reality gaming world. Fans of Bungie‘s Halo series, take note.
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January 8, 2010 – 4:00 pm
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I’ve arrived. Spent last night in a hostel in Brooklyn. Sleeping in a comfy bed was really great; I got no sleep in my red eye flight from SeaTac.
Let’s get the obvious out of the way: everything is huge; everything is open late, so it’s really accommodating for night owls like me; the subways are confusing, but I think I’m starting to get the hang of them.
For my first day in the city, I ate breakfast at a little joint around the corner. Then I did the tourist thing and explored Times Square, Rockefeller Plaza, Grand Central Station. Today my mission was to find a comfortable, quiet, quirky, writing-friendly coffee shop like the ones I frequented back in Bellingham. I’m happy to say I found one. I’m writing this post in the Flying Saucer Cafe, where the baristas are friendly and the atmosphere is peaceful and inviting. I’m a huge fan of the cut-out comics pasted on the supports. Plus Ziggy Stardust is playing right now, so I’m pretty sure I found my new home away from home.
Now to find a bite to eat and then off to Central Park.
December 3, 2009 – 1:34 am
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My brand new Acer laptop decided to have screen problems. Specifically, the back-lighting unit was faulty, so the screen is blacker than coal. Luckily it’s still under warranty. But it’ll be a couple weeks before I get it back in working condition. Considering all the terrible customer “support” I went through to get that far, plus the fact that I just got the laptop last month after my old one—also an Acer—decided to die of the same malady, I am just a little upset.
All this means I’ll be on a temporary blogging hiatus, probably until I’m settled in to my new home in New York City. City of Tides will be back in early January, and it will be so good. We’ve got fresh content cooking, a new focus I’m extremely excited about, and a couple surprises. Until then, everyone have a great holiday season and a happy winter solstice!
I love writing. It sustains me. But no matter how satisfying writing is, Internet access practically guarantees distraction. Oh sure, I could choose not to connect. But Google and Wikipedia are just too useful for grabbing those quick bits of information. But then “I’ll just check my email,” “I’ll just retweet this,” or “I wonder if Nedroid updated yet.” One thing leads to another, and oh wow look, I’ve lost four hours and I seem to have opened thirty Wikipedia tabs on Marvel super heroes. Great.
If only there were a minimalistic text editor for Windows that could keep me focused, but retained the features that are actually important to my productivity.
I’d like to introduce you to WriteMonkey. It’s a scaled-down text editor that runs in full screen mode so you can concentrate on your writing. It’s like a little home office for your operating system. Read More »
Thanks to my existentialist leanings, I tend to define myself by what I do. Figuring out who I will be in this world means figuring out the actions I wish to take. So who do I choose to be?
It struck me today that I am not interested in being a traditional novelist. I feel like I’ve been struggling with this for years, trying to be something I don’t want to be just because I decided somewhere along the way that novel writing is a more legitimate profession than writing alternative forms of fiction. Read More »