Although it in no way balances out any of the awful and inhumane things going on in the world currently*, I did receive a very welcome and unexpected piece of mail today: My first royalty check, for my Mahjong book which I wrote over a half-decade ago.

The check may have been small**, but it represents a book of mine finally “earning out” and bringing my cut of sales higher than the initial advance. In spite of having written over two dozen books at this point, this is the first time I’ve ever gotten a royalty check.

Over half of my books were ghostwriting for other people, so I have no royalties there. Another few of my books were self-published, so there was no advance to begin with. Most of my other books were for independent presses who did a limited run without massive distribution and the books didn’t stay in print for long, so it was hard for them to earn out. And my only other book for a massive publisher was a Work For Hire arrangement, so I didn’t have an ownership stake on which to receive royalties.

But here a mere six and a half years after writing a book, it has finally earned out. I’m not convinced this qualifies me to call myself a Successful Writer***, but between this and last year’s National Press Club award, I am willing to call myself “doing okay”, which is frankly pretty dang amazing in 2025.

In addition to receiving awards, I also give them out — my latest**** column offers some anti-societal technology awards to everything from the microwave to generative AI. I think no one will ever top Hayao Miyazaki’s description of AI art as “an insult to life itself”, but I figure I can at least add to the discourse while also sticking it to the microwave*****.

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* dear world: please stop being awful and inhumane

** envelope-sized, conveniently

*** no cap? yes caps!

**** not that late; still made deadline

***** and to think most people only ever stick things to the fridge

In spite of always being delighted to go for a walk with a friend, I have never been what you would call a “people person”*. Indeed, in the past half-decade I’ve become more of a hermit than ever, building up my own tiny bubble to be just the way I like it, as a refuge from the ever-more-distressing larger world.

But, sometimes needs must, and over the past few months I’ve found myself talking to more random people. At the farmer’s market while I’m picking up vegetables. Or at the National Press Club, where you can see my acceptance speech** (I’m at 2:12:24) for winning their 2024 Angele Gingras Humor Award.

And this general engagement with the world is probably a good thing. Perhaps it signals a slight lessening of despair, a willingness to cast my gaze beyond my bubble and look at the world again. Or at least, a willingness to stay up way too late last night with the Harris-Trump debate transcript and summarize the whole thing in the style of Edgar Allen Poe, in a very timely piece I am calling:

“The Raving”

It’s a beautiful day outside, so perhaps I will engage with the world even more, or at least engage with my lawnmower to briefly mow the front lawn. But I leave the side lawn wild, because it attracts the little animals that I love to look at out my desk window. As it turns out, that’s probably my favorite way of engaging with the world.

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* Technically, I can’t say whether YOU would call me a “people person”, but it would be only slightly less inaccurate than calling me a fashion template or a sports expert.

** This speech features a “Chekov’s gun” joke*** where the setup is on the mantlepiece and then is picked up halfway through, and I am gratified that the audience liked it.

*** Not to be confused with a joke about Chekov’s gun. “Captain, the audience is approaching, set phasers to Pun!”

I am proud to announce that I have won the National Press Club’s 2024 humor award*.

As I told my editor, I can’t think of a better way to celebrate my 20th year of writing “The Pun Also Rises”, which I’ve been doing for near-on half a lifetime at this point.

It has made for a pretty good weekend for me, a much-needed antidote to, y’know, the rest of the news, which seems like a cavalcade of bad that we can’t do much to change.**

Still a humor writer can’t just rest on his Laurel and Hardys, so I want to share my favorite column from last month, which is a Private Equity FAQ.

Of course, if you’d like to keep up with my latest columns and have links to each new column emailed to you along with my rambly blather — and who wouldn’t?**** — you can always sign up for my free email newsletter.

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* Technically the “Angele Gingras Humor Award”, but do you know who Angele Gingras is? I mean, you will if you read the Eagle writeup I linked, but it seems weird to open my post by naming someone you’ve never heard of. “Hello friends! Today reminds me of Edgar Winterbottom, which means it’s a very good day indeed.”

** Unless you have enough money to bribe*** a Supreme Court Judge to change it.

*** Sorry, I meant to “gratuity” a Supreme Court Judge.

**** Most people, technically. But that just means if you do subscribe, I’ll like you better than I like most people.

One pretty much has to be wary these days given the state of the world; unease is pretty much the baseline existence. Even amidst pleasantness, I can be out enjoying some unseasonably warm weather, and then stop to think “Why is the weather unseasonably warm?”*

And yes, a lot of the constant wariness is political, but everything is political these days, from what you eat and drink, to what you read, to certainly my two most recent columns, whether I’m writing about Black History Month or the increasingly distressing killing spree of Johnny Murderface.

These remain the proverbial** “Interesting Times”, and certainly anyone following the news regularly is already exhausted and doesn’t need me to recite*** a litany of ways in which things are bad. I am attempting to stay afloat and find the good, which for me has largely been good food and video games. My mother reminds me that her method of finding the good is to do good, but she has always been a kinder person than I am.

Not that I never do good — indeed, I always hope that my columns might infinitesimally bend some people’s thoughts towards a better world — but I’m much more cognizant of the old airplane maxim****, “In case of high pressure, put your own mask on first”*****, and the global forecast continues to call for ceaseless high pressure for the foreseeable future.

But I’ve got Shepard’s Pie and a Gamepass subscription, so tonight I’m doing okay, and perhaps later this week I should try to do something pro-social.

* Insert your own meme picture of a goose chasing me while asking this.

** Is a curse a proverb? I can’t really call it curseal Interesting Times. I only wish they were cursory.

*** Unless I was doing it in rhyme or something. Maybe in April.

**** “Surely you can’t be serious!”

***** People’s refusal to put on their own mask on at all is another reason things seem high pressure

I no longer have a sense of time.

For years I haven’t known what day it is, aided by the fact that as a freelance writer my work is largely unrelated to the day of the week*. But I think the pandemic really kicked that into overdrive, and that combined with the natural acceleration of time due to aging**, means that I often not only don’t know what year it is, but certainly don’t know how long ago things were.

This is not an uncommon experience; many people my age feel like the 90s were just one or two decades ago, and can simultaneously feel that 2015 was so long ago that it feels like a whole other lifetime.

Regardless, one of the things about getting to this age is that many things actually were 20 years ago, as I mentioned about starting my relationship 20 years ago last month, and as I now reflect that 20 years ago this month marked the release of my first published**** book. It was, of course, a great pleasure and thrill for me to finally feel like I had a book out in the real world, published by a company (Barnes&Noble) people had even heard of, no less.

But also, the book was a collection of weird groups and the intro was all about how weird isn’t bad, you just have to find your people. The good news is, finding your people has become a lot easier these days, thanks to the Internet and whatnot*****. The bad news is, an increasingly-large swath of the country seems to believe that not only is being different bad, but that it needs to be attacked/destroyed/outlawed/erased to the point where even learning that other people exist and lead different lives and have their own joys and struggles is now controversial.

This is a damn shame, and is also largely opposed to what I’ve come to realize is my primary moral principle: “People are people.”****** Not terribly complex, but surprisingly unpopular. Still, if you’re going to live by a moral code, you could do worse. Of course, there are those who hold themselves above other people, like some kind of superman, and that reminds me that my latest column is a little Superman parody that is my favorite thing I’ve written in a while:

The Adventures of GovernMan

I know, that bird joke in the opening is ridiculous. But what can I say; bad puns are my kryptonite.

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* Notwithstanding my column deadline, natch.

** I have often thought that our experience of time accelerates at a steady rate as we age, and that there must be some analog to the calculable acceleration of gravity (9.8 meters per second, per second) to account for how time seems faster every year. Maybe years go by 9.8% faster every year? I don’t know, I’m no Einstein.***

*** Although on occasion people have remarked upon the similarity of our hairstyles.

**** Technically I think I wrote my first book in 3rd grade for a Young Authors contest, I believe it was about dinosaurs and preceded the book of birthday poems I also wrote in elementary school as a project. But I certainly wouldn’t call either published.

***** The glorious powers of whatnot are truly unmatched.

****** Consider it a condensed paraphrase of a Terry Pratchett quote I can’t seem to find about how most problems start when someone decides a certain group of people are lesser and shouldn’t really be treated like people with full rights.

I guess I could write this whole blogpost in rhyme,
But conceivably that would take up too much time,
Unless I just type straight away and don’t edit,
Okay I guess I’ll do just as I said it.
I’m writing a poem every day (this won’t count)
By the end of the month 30 is the amount
Of new poems I’ll produce, which to make very clear
Is more than I produce in the rest of the year.
Although most of these new poems don’t rhyme and don’t meter,
Thus making them less cool for your average reader
Expecting a poem to sound like Dr. Seuss,
(Even though my poem senses have gotten more loose
Over time, while my jeans have only gotten tighter.
Just kidding, I’m sweats only now. I’m a writer!)

And anyway, even my brand newest column
Is in rhyme this month (though it is a bit solemn)
It’s an important topic, and though it’s not fun,
It’s a fact that we all need to face: It’s The Guns.
You may be rhymed out after reading this blog,
Which I guess is my fault. That’s an “oops” from me, dog.
But it’s only one month every year that it happens,
And hey, it could be worse, at least I’m not rappin’
Although if I did it would have better flow,
Since I no longer rap Seuss (I did long ago),
And then speaking of my raps, I’m once again sharin’ the
Multi-award-winning Hamilton parody
That I co-wrote with Sam Hammersley and
Thom Mesrobian, honestly it’s pretty grand,
So as musicals go, a political one,
I can recommend this, and it’s called Simpleton!

Otherwise, things continue on here much the same,
Eating tasty food, Genshin Impact is the game,
And I’m writing freelance for the clients that pay
(So if your friends need great writing, send them my way)
That’s about all that needs to be said in this post,
So I bid you good day, and some cheese on your toast.

My winter vacation ended, and so I’ve been back to work writing speeches, children’s books, and whatever else clients hire me to write. I like being on vacation and playing games. But it turns out, I also like writing things for clients, especially these past few years.

Since I’m still being more covid-cautious than your average bear* and not doing performances at packed little indoor comedy/poetry shows, I’ve been missing the stage time. I did do a couple Zoom comedy shows the other year, but the demand for that has all but vanished, so I was feeling a severe deficit of I come up with something clever to say to an audience, and then I get positive feedback.

Conveniently, speechwriting ends up fitting that need for me to some degree. Sure, having a client give me positive feedback instead of an entire audience isn’t quite the same**, but it does fulfill much of the same craving, and I find that being paid more helps bridge the gap, as it so often does.

Still, I’ve certainly had clients who hire me and say, “Make this funnier,” and then come back after my first draft to say, “Okay, less funny than that, actually.” Which is one of those revision requests I can’t help but smile at. But it’s also why in spite of enjoying ghostwriting for clients, I also quite enjoy writing things like my column where I can be silly about serious topics like Antisocial Media and how Vince Is Gonna Get You.

And then of course there’s my newsletter, where I am not only unreasonably silly, but also have so many asides and arcane references that it would be unsuitable for a mainstream newspaper. But it’s free and so am I****, and I find that all in all having the page as a stage works out okay for me. Especially since I don’t have to wear pants.

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*Which says a lot, really, since most bears already spend all their social time outdoors and avoid people. And hibernating is a great response to almost any virus.

**Although I do always love hearing reports of success like “it brought the house down!”***

***This was a great review for a wedding speech I wrote last year, but would be a bad review for an architect. Context!

****I was going to say this is a difference between free as in speech and free as in beer, but I’m more often free for tacos.

Technically, hail to everyone in my area at the moment, because that’s the weather we have. Snow, sleet, and slurry. But also, food is amazing and I continue to enjoy eating well. We* recently made tachin, a Persian rice dish I’d never tried. It was quite tasty, and hooray. Hooray for people who cook, specifically. Especially people who cook for me.

What I’ve been cooking up is more columns, and honestly I’m pretty pleased with the columns I’ve put out this month. If you have questions about AI art or ChatGPT, I’ve got answers. Please enjoy

An AI FAQ (with Professor McSeth).

And if you’ve been despairing over Florida and how they’re preventing kids from learning about history, I have appropriately written a children’s poem about it:

Green Eggs and History

Other than that, I’m still enjoying my winter vacation. I’ve just finished book 14 of Robin Hobb’s massive 16-part fantasy series which I’ve been reading. And videogame-wise I finally started Dead Cells and Dragon Age: Inquisition, so I’ve been playing those alongside Genshin Impact. I may not go out and spend a lot of money on things**, but I think my insatiable appetite for food and media still means I’m keeping the spirit of American consumerism*** alive.

And I’m also alive! A fine start to the year. Hope yours is going well as well.

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*the culinarily skilled part of we, which isn’t me

**unless health insurance counts as a thing, in which case, I spend way too much money on things

***now I’m imagining a reverse A Christmas Carol, with a friendly and socially conscious main character haunted by spirits of capitalism****

****admittedly, all socially conscious people are probably haunted by the spirit of capitalism to some degree

With Bolsonaro now having been defeated at the polls in Brazil – if not yet on the ground where his troops blocked roads in attempts to prevent people from voting – it’s nice to have a tiny bit of hope that fascism can still be pushed out. I guess we’ll see if that holds true for the US midterm elections, which I encourage all of my US readers to vote in, presuming you are pro-democracy and anti-fascism. (If you are pro-fascism and anti-democracy, voting isn’t really part of your ideal worldview anyway.)

My latest column, Troubled People, reminds you why you might want to vote. It also rhymes, which admittedly was totally unnecessary, but what is life about if not having fun by going beyond what is necessary? I guess that’s what Halloween is about*, in a way.

I started playing Fallout 4, which takes place in Boston, so it’s a little strange to be roaming around in Massachusetts amidst the aftermath of a nuclear war, and then glancing nervously at the latest international news. Still, with the ABC now long gone, and Covid still very much not gone, my recreation has returned from mostly boardgames to mostly videogames.

I would like to write for more videogames in the future; I’ve had a few gigs putting together ads for games, or in some cases even doing a bit of plot or quest descriptions for some small indie games, and would love to do more game writing. Still, nothing’s more appropriate for Halloween than Ghost writing, and I’m still doing plenty of that. One day I should probably make this site more professional so people can more easily hire me for it, but in the words of St. Augustine, not yet.

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* Also free candy, but admittedly the allure of free candy diminishes rapidly once you’re old enough that you can just buy candy whenever you like. Not that I don’t appreciate free candy conceptually – indeed, I’m known as someone who happily partakes of free snacks at all functions – but the effort of taking an hour knocking on doors for a sack of candy that’s probably only 25% candy you were actually excited about means that you’re just working a very labor-intensive** job for a low wage.

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** The most labor-intensive job is obstetrician.

The more they stay the same. For example, I have updated* my website to the newest version of WordPress, with a whole new interface to make it easier to deal with the thousands of spam comments that continue to pour in (which is why comments are still off; feel free to email me). And it should now be easier to post. Technically. By which I mean technically, and also technically.

Ah, English.

But the primary obstacle to my posting is always my attention span and sense of time, and neither were terribly good to begin with, and the past few years have done neither any favors. Amidst my paid freelancing for clients, it’s harder for me to motivate myself to write things no one is paying me for that I’m also not sure anyone is reading. I have been writing my biweekly email newsletter, which I’m sure at least a few people are reading, because no comment spambots are subscribed to my list. Yet.**

So if you’d like to get fortnightly updates with my latest columns and my even laterest ramblings (this issue: Blisters! Gilligan’s Island! The Apocalypse! Tweety Bird!), please follow the complicated instructions below:

Meanwhile, I’ll share some of my favorite recent columns with you here. If you like Edgar Allen Poe, or poetry, or wonder if his friends ever called him Edgar Allen Poetry, you might appreciate my parody of his poem “The Bells”, but about birds, which I have imaginatively titled “The Birds“. Also, if you’ve been following the news lately, I’m so sorry. I’ve also been following the news, which has been even worse than I imagined, which is impressive given the capabilities of my imagination. I could tell you more about how that all ties together if you’d like to hear about Imaginary Friends.

Life is short; have some sushi.***

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*by which I mean, I have hired someone competent at these things to update my website, because apparently skill at words does not translate to skills at WordPress.

**You could be the first! Act now! No money down! Additional terms and conditions may apply. You might well ask why I am advertising to spambots. Well, turnabout is fair play.

***Admittedly this probably shortens it more for the fish. But actually this footnote is to note that the one tangible improvement in this updated wordpress is that I can now move my footnotes down the page without having to enter a few lines with a single period on them.****

****That’s a footnote I wrote before loading the preview screen, which turns out to be completely incorrect*****, because all my carriage returns didn’t prevent the footnotes from being right up next to the text. So much for modern technology. I’m keeping my carriages. One day I’ll have a whole carriage house. That’ll show ’em.

*****Well, not completely incorrect; sushi still does shorten life for fish.