Excuses, Excuses

Yet again I find myself apologizing for an extended absence, but this time I have good excuses, I swear!

Firstly, in a piece of toot-my-own-horn kind of news, I recently got a new job (unemployment, it turns out, while a great generator of free time, isn’t so great for the wallet). I officially started two weeks ago, and it’s been keeping me pretty busy, so I shall henceforth need to learn to budget my remaining free time a little better – an adjustment, to be sure, but as of today I’m resolving to make it happen.

Secondly, and much more interesting (especially from a visual perspective), I spent last week out west, visiting Seattle and driving down Coastal 101 with my girlfriend on our way to my friend’s awesome and unconventional wedding in a sea cave in Oregon. Yours truly provided some guitar accompaniment for the ceremony, and (tooting my own guitar horn), I dare say it was well received.

This was my first time to the west coast, my first time seeing the Pacific and, actually, my first time further west than Kansas (not counting Europe, which is, of course, much, much, much further west in a sense). The views from the drive and the wedding were incredible, and well worth sharing…

…even my artsy attempts (not bad for using my Droid).

Anyway, all of that is done now, and I finally intend to deliver on a few things I’ve been neglecting the last couple weeks, namely:

• The reinvention and continuation of my Civil War era story (formerly a collection of Five Sentence Fiction responses). Look for it this week.
• My glorious return to Friday Fictioneers. Friday, strangely enough.
• My equally-glorious and hopefully-not-too-semi-colon filled return to Five Sentence Fiction; the process is much easier with semi-colons though, so no guarantees; but, no, really I’ll try.

I’m also taking this opportunity to give my site a little overhaul (hopefully with some input from all y’all), to include more original writing prompts, a bit more photography, more substantial fiction and (if all goes to plan) new sections for travel writing and opinion.

Guest Bloggers Wanted (Inquire Within)

Here’s the thing, though: With those last two sections – travel writing and opinion – I’m actually going to be slowly recruiting people to guest blog. I can’t have as many adventures as I’d like (or opinions for that matter) so I’m going to try to enlist some help (yours, if you’re into it) – acting more as an editor for those sections. Get in touch with me if you’re interested in writing something (it’s an election year after all)!

Finally I’m toying with a visual redesign (though perhaps not too substantial). In short, there’s a lot in the pipeline and a lot to look forward to. Yuh-huh.