I know, I’m slightly behind on my blogging and am very late wishing you a Happy New Year. By now your resolutions may have already failed, but don’t have FOMO, let me tell you about JOMO. Besides, while I’m very late for January, I’m only slightly late in wishing you a Happy Year of the Pig! It’s never too late for new beginnings.

Was just reading something online by a woman who sold her first book at age 59. So if you’re not yet 60, there’s every reason to believe that you have a wonderful exciting life ahead of you. And if you’re over 60, then it’s too late and you are doomed.

Kidding! In addition to the local poetry mics I attend, I occasionally still perform at events hosted by WordXWord, a wonderful organization. And one of my favorite poets who performs at those events is an octogenarian*, whose poetry I have enjoyed since he was a young septuagenarian. So what if it’s already February, or if you’re already old. It’s never too late to do something you find meaningful.**

*I think if you’re an octogenarian, you should always be able to show up and be considered in theme for 80’s parties.

**I mean, until you’re dead, at which point it definitely is too late. So I recommend trying to avoid death, and that way your options will remain open.

I saw on Twitter that people have been complaining about how terrible the year was for the past few decades, so in that sense perhaps 2018 is not special, but certainly it has been a year of big ups and downs for me.* While I may have preferred the previous few years, on balance life remains good, so like a proton microscope I am trying to focus on the positive.**

Writing is going well. I’m picking up freelance work a bit more regularly, as prospective clients can now read verified reviews from satisfied clients. I’ve written a number of columns I’m pleased with this year, which include my latest two columns, Dr. Manners on Holiday and I am especially proud of this Holiday Dating Guide. And I have the beginnings of two different books for which I would really like to find an agent and/or publisher, one a collection of my humor columns illustrated by an internationally-renowned artist, the other a book about boardgames.

Speaking of boardgames, I’ve continued enjoying them, most recently Great Western Trail which somehow really clicks with me. Lately I’ve been writing fewer in-depth boardgame reviews and saving my writing time for jobs that pay me. I still find time to do some short write-ups for videogames I beat like Shadowrun: HongKong. And a poetry open mic has resumed in my town, which is a nice thing that will hopefully inspire me to write more poetry.***

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*And frankly, I hate riding in elevators.

***Not counting what I’m posting here, in case I had not made it clear, it’s the real poems I’m needing, but thank you for reading, and have a fantastic new year.

I’ve been doing more ghostwriting lately, which is going quite well*. Everything from speeches and web copy to business articles and books, with the big downside that because it is ghostwriting, I can’t really share any of it with you. However, one of my recent clients was so happy with my work that she was willing to put my name on the children’s book I wrote for her as long as she maintained 100% ownership. So that’s a thing I can share.

Meanwhile I continue putting my name on my own columns, even when they’re about the power of someone else’s name.

In the boardgame world I got to play a few games of the new Endeavor: Age of Sail,** and have some mixed reactions to the various changes they made from the base game. But it’s undeniably pretty, and the overall game is still quite enjoyable. And in videogame land I’ve returned once again to Warframe with their latest Fortuna expansion and super-catchy theme song.

* In quality, although quantity could be higher. Maybe you would like to hire? Or if you know someone in need of writing, then… Hie ‘er! (over to me.) (Okay, that one was a stretch.)

** Not to be confused with the brewing entrepreneurship*** game Endeavor: Sage of Ale

*** or “entreprebrewership”. I’m addicted to mashing words together. I should join a supportmanteau group.

Hey, if you’re not a terrible person, you deserve a Bare Minimum Human Decency Award! And if you are a terrible person, my other recent column has terrible puns.

Had another local comedy show where I performed last week, but more exciting was traveling to see the hilarious Emo Philips live for the first time*. And he was ostensibly going to greet fans after the show, but there was a wait before he emerged from backstage, and the venue was full, and my partner wanted to go home, so we left. And it also left me thinking: Why do I care if I meet a celebrity who will never remember me? And why was I so excited months ago when Emo liked a joke I made in a comment?

And I think the answer is love. For the first two decades** of my life, I viewed love largely as a spiderweb of one-way arrows, because I had a crush on a girl at my highschool who had no interest in me, but was very interested in my friend, who in turn had no interest in her but wanted some other guy, etc. Mutual affection was the elusive grand and glorious prize.

Years later, a number of us are fortunate enough to have mutual affection. But less common is a mutual admiration of craft. If you ask people who they love the most, you’ll likely find a lot of reciprocal listings. But ask people who they think is the most brilliant comedian or the best writer, and if you’re not asking celebrities or a professional cabal, you’re likely to find mostly one-way arrows. People scoff and pooh-pooh mutual admiration societies****, but to me, this has always been the great allure of celebrity: The idea that the people you think are great might think you are great also.

* I mean, he was living before, but previously I only got to enjoy his work via a screen.

** aka the worst two decades***

*** aka the thirst two decades, aka the cursed two decades, aka rhymes burst through decades help i like rhyming too much

**** “You are a handsome bear, would you like some hunny?” “Why yes thank you, and your crop-top red shirt is lovely.”

This week is our annual Alphabetic Boardgaming Challenge, so I’ve been playing a lot of games ranging from A to Z.* 11 years in, I realize not for the first time what a glorious and yet simple thing it is to spend time doing what you enjoy, with people whose company you enjoy. Sure, for a writer that often means sitting alone and writing about how I hate throwing things out, but that’s valuable too.

This Friday I’m doing a benefit comedy show to raise money for the local teen center, where I’ll be giving a dramatic reading of a few of my columns in addition to doing some stand-up. This is a rarity for me, and promises to be a good time.** So if you’re local and have no Friday plans, come enjoy yourself for a good cause!***

*Or technically A to X so far — Yspahan and Zepter von Zavandor** still to come tomorrow.

***Although as I’ve tried to explain above, enjoying yourself is a good cause too.

After a bit of a lull, I am doing some stand-up comedy at shows again! Last week I got to open for Luke Mones at the Colonial in Pittsfield, and two weeks from now I’ll be doing a fundraiser for the ROOTS Teen Center in North Adams. That show isn’t just stand-up, so I may also be doing some readings in addition to my stand-up sets. I’m strongly considering reading my two most recent columns, both of which were fun concept pieces:

Read this one out loud!

Daily Horrorscope

We’re up to the third summer now after some cold weather last week, but I have it on good authority that this is the last week or two of summer, before what promises to be a very cold and unpleasant winter. It’s really a shame you can’t just bank heat from summer and send it to February.

Been a month with some big ups and downs. I figure my blog isn’t the place for complaining*, but it is the place to mention that I’ve been doing some ghostwriting**. I can’t, uh, actually point you to any of it because, y’know, ghostwriting. But maybe in a year or two I’ll have my name in tiny print on someone else’s book. Meanwhile, I can at least point you to my most recent column advising you on ways to beat the heat.

Although it dealt no decisive heat blows***, this past week I attended another poetry open mic, which I hadn’t done in a while. There is something inherently satisfying about live performance that all the writing in the world never quite captures: the pleasure of being on stage and getting that immediate positive audience feedback that lets you know, yes, someone appreciates what you’re saying. Just a couple weeks until WordXWord Festival, and even if my own role this year is fairly minimal, it’s still the best poetry event in the Berkshires (and is FREE!), so I encourage everyone who can attend to do so.

* Facebook is the place for complaining!

** Boo! and Yay!

*** “Decisive Heat Blows” is my Flaming Lips cover band.

Sometimes it’s hard to write a blogpost in the current political situation without feeling like a civil war letter.* But I’m trying not to do that, so I’m going to try to find good things. Massachusetts continues to be a forward-thinking state, which is why I have suggested that Massachusetts needs a new motto. On the boardgame front, I finally got to try Altiplano, sequel to Orleans, and already a game I want to play again. I also wrote a column to give you a brief explanation of Mahjong, using helpful devices such as Batman punching things.

Oh right, Mahjong. Did I mention that my new book about Mahjong was published this week?

The Little Book of Mahjong

It’s my first hardcover book, so if you only buy one of my books to prop up a table, be sure it’s this one!

*Frankly, it Burns.

“A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read.”
–Mark Twain

Had a friend over for lunch earlier this week, and we were discussing creative work and motivation. I said for me, there are only three reasons I do something:

1) I enjoy doing it.

2) I am being paid for it.

3) I want to have done it.

Obviously, it’s relatively easy to motivate yourself to do things in the first category. Sometimes there’s a startup inertia to overcome (see: making plans to actually interact with my friends face to face), but generally if you know you like something, it’s not hard to get yourself to do it. When it comes to writing, I’m actually surprisingly good at the second category. If I’m being paid for something, I am fairly motivated to set down and write it. I find this slightly more difficult with larger projects (such as my upcoming Little Book of Mahjong), but still if someone is paying me to write something, I’m pretty good at motivating myself to sit down and do so.

That third category, however, is what I often refer to as a “Mark Twain Classic”. I realized this week that sometimes blogging for me falls into this category, which is why I only end up doing it once a month or so. More (de)pressingly, into this category also falls any ambitious creative project of large scope for which I am not being paid. Small projects often stay fun long enough to also be in the first category. But big projects like books or albums or games*, if the fun is gone and the money shows no signs of appearing, the only remaining motivation is that Mark Twain Classic.**

But things don’t have to be restricted to one category. My humor column happily fulfills all three: I enjoy writing it, I get paid to do so, and I’m happy that the completed columns exist. Heck, I even hope you’re happy they exist, and might enjoy reading about how my family has a tradition of saying the wrong thing despite the Best of Intentions, or how people underestimate the Importance of Inspiration. Come to think of it, probably the best thing we can do is life is try to find outlets which fulfill all three categories at once.

But often that won’t be available, and so we do what I do, which is enjoy the first category as much as possible, plan to work on the second category as available, and tell myself that next month when the paid project is done, I’ll get around to that big personal project.

* Or in my case, a book about games and a game that would include a full album.

** And that’s why it took me a decade to write From God To Verse.

April, as you can read about in my recent column, was National Poetry Month. As per usual, I participated in the 30/30 Challenge through WordxWord and wrote a poem a day. I’ve even thrown one of my daily poems at the end of this blogpost. But of course, poetry isn’t the only thing in April. There’s also taxes, which hopefully you’ve filed by now, but would probably have enjoyed more if you could use my Updated Tax Regulations for 2020.

On the gaming front I’m more than halfway through Mass Effect Andromeda, but between graphic novels and writing poems, didn’t get tons of videogaming in for April. Still plenty of boardgaming though, and I have up a review of Pandemic: Season 2. Also got in a game of Age of Empires III, one of my all-time favorite worker placement games.

Anyway, here’s Wonderwall a poem:

“Tyranny of Manners”

Machines still have some learning to do
In spite of numerous advances over the past few decades
Algorithms that scan and filter text on the Internet
Are much less good at detecting what you are saying
Than detecting how you are saying it
And many of the people running big websites on the Internet
Are no better than machines
Which is why you can get away with saying
“Pardon me, I believe it evident
That your race and/or religion
Is genetically, intellectually, physically, and morally inferior
And members thereof should be expelled or exterminated
Or at the very least denied the rights my race/religion receives”
But if you reply
(As one naturally might)
with
“Get the fuck out of here with that bullshit”
Then your account may be warned and/or suspended
While the person to whom you are replying receives no such admonition
Which goes to prove
In spite of numerous advances over the past few decades
People still have some learning to do