Hot Christmas Toys? Maybe.

What do kids want for Christmas this year?

Why would I be thinking about buying Christmas toys right now in October?  Because now is when you want to start buying, people!  Don't be stupid and wait until the end of November when the stores are full of idiots and the shelves are emptying out quickly!  Get the things your kids want now and save yourself the hassel.

I guess the next questions would probably be how do I know what kind of toys your kids want?  *chuckle*  I think about the kinds of things I would want if I were still a kid.  (Let's not kid ourselves, I would still be running right to the video game aisle!  But there are still a few other neat things that might catch my fancy, too.)

So of course video games will be the hot items.  But do you really want your children sitting in front of a tv or computer screen playing video games all day?  Of course you don't and for the little kids, they need other things to play with.  Tonight I took a walk through a Toys R Us store to see what I could find.  Let's see what caught my fancy:

How about some garbage?  Would you like your little ones to be encouraged to play with garbage?  *chuckle*  I'm not even sure what the hell this stuff is, but here's a garbage truck that you can use with some garbage characters.

It comes with two trashy characters!  Now as an adult this might seem a bit nasty, but kids like what kids like.  And of course if you buy this, your kids will want extra characters to play with.

I thought $19.99 seemed like a bit much for the trash truck, but Amazon.com is selling it for $29.99.  Are these things somehow popular without anyone actually knowing about them?  *chuckle*  A great gift for little boys, but you'll end up stepping on the little things in the middle of the night when you're barefoot and trying to make your way to the bathroom.

They sound as bad as Legos, don't they?  And since we're on the topic of Legos, they're always really expensive!  The one Lego thing I found while walking around was this Lego Speed Train set.  I always loved trains and cars as a kid, and so if I were still small I know I would love one of these!  

It looks like you can put your expensive little Lego people inside the train!  I love it!  And it's $149.99 which is insane.  I like Legos, and I like trains, but I wouldn't pay that much for one of these.  If you've got the extra money to spend on your kids, you go right ahead.  But for those of us who might like to keep within a smaller budget, this is way too expensive.

Here's something that's a whole lot bigger than the Lego train set and I really have no idea what it really is.  It really looks fun, though!  And it's a bit cheaper at $119.99!  What little boy wouldn't love to wake up and find this under his Christmas tree?  It even looks cool to me as an adult! *chuckle*

How about something a bit sciencey?  A learning toy that could be a lot of fun?  I've always wanted a rock tumbler, and it looks like they still make them!

I'm sure this is loud and annoying.  It's something you can buy for a niece or nephew, or maybe a grandchild.  *chuckle*  Something for them to use when they aren't at your place.  Besides being loud, if your little one really likes this you may end up finding polished rocks all over your house.  At least they probably won't have pointy edges when you step on them at night on your way to the bathroom.

On to Barbie.  Barbie dolls are classics, right?  How about if we make them really, really small so you can step on them on the way to the bathroom at night?  Or maybe find them lodged in a couch cushion?

Trust me when I tell you these are small.  It's hard to tell from this picture, but they're the size of Lego figures.  Tiny.  Step on them on the way to the bathroom tiny.  *chuckle*  And what the hell is a little girl supposed to do with a tiny Barbie doll?  Why have a yacht party with all her tiny figure friends!

Perfect for bath time I guess, until one of the tiny figures ends up going down the drain.  Better get everything out of the tub before pulling the plug and letting the water out!

I wonder what happened to the regular Barbie dolls.  They're still around.  Here's a Barbie who's ready to get married!

I'm not sure who the male doll is.  The package says Barbie.  Is it supposed to be Ken?  Then why doesn't the package say Ken?  I'll call him Jed.  "Come and listen to a story 'bout a man named Jed, poor mountaineer barely kept his family fed.  then one day he was shootin' at some food, and up from the ground came a bubbling crude..."  Jed's rich now!  Time to marry a trophy wife named Barbie and get down!  *chuckle*  Yes, I have a very vivid imagination when it comes to dolls or figures.  Does Barbie's mother come with the marriage?  Barbie's a princess, right?  Maybe her mother is an evil queen?

Now that's my kind of action figure!  *chuckle*  Now how often do you find a Disney Evil Queen figure?  I almost bought this myself tonight, it was only $19.99.  To be honest though, I really wouldn't have anywhere to put it.  It's still neat, though!  If I were still a kid, I'd love one of these.  I would keep bringing her to my sister's Barbie Dream house.  I would just have her point and laugh.  "HA HA HA HA!  Would you like an apple?"  *chuckle*

Speaking of dolls for little girls, if you have a really young girl that you're buying for, you'd better find one of these.

Get your Frozen stuff now.  Trust me when I tell you that come December when everyone's looking for this stuff, it'll be gone.  It's popular now and that means it's more than likely going to be popular for Christmas.  By the way, never give a balloon to Elsa, she'll "Let it go".  If you get that joke, it's actually pretty hilarious!  *chuckle*  Don't pass this stuff up thinking you'll find it later, because you won't.  If the little girl in your life likes Frozen, grab this stuff up now.

What about boys, though?  Isn't there some neat, really hot popular stuff for them?  Besides video games I mean.  *chuckle*  Do you have a back yard?  Or somewhere where there's a bit of dirt that your little boy can go out and dig in?  He needs one of these then.

Don't go for cheap plastic crap, the best dirt toys are metal!  These did have plastic wheels, but most of the rest of the stuff was metal.  And metal lasts!  Hours of dirty fun with this stuff!  And to the grandmother I know who has been known to play in the mud with her grandson, I'm sure he would love this stuff!  *chuckle*

Here's a fight waiting to happen.  I think both English and American boys alike would like one of these, especially if you have a brother.

Now let me explain how these really work.  I have a little brother and we would have loved something like this.  You start playing and then someone gets angry and frustrated and pretty soon one kid ends up throwing the ball at the other one and they end up pounding on each other.  Then mom comes in and decides that because brothers can't get along, the toy has to be put up somewhere.  Now the brothers are upset because it was such a fun toy to begin with!  They still want to play and promise to be good!  Ten minutes later they're arguing again.  *chuckle*  But that's all part of being a brother.  Years and years later you always remember something like this as a favorite toy.  You'll both always remember what fun you had playing with it (fights and all!).

And yes, eventually you'll be stepping on the ball while you're trying to go to the bathroom late at night.

How about some "Minions"?  Everyone loves Minions, right?  Despicable Me was a great movie and I know Minions are a hot thing to watch on YouTube now.  This seems a bit expensive to me, though.

$26.99 for three small stuffed Minions?  Really?  REALLY?  Yeah, I'll pick some of these up right after I get the money for that $149.99 Lego train set.  They're really neat, but just seem a bit over priced to me. 

Last, but not least I have something that is actually for a video game.  It's sort of an accessory.  But I'm thinking this will be something that you won't be able to find soon.  People may be looking pretty hard to find one of these, so if you see one you might think about picking it up.

Yes, it's a Disney Infinity Elsa figure.  It goes with last year's Disney Infinity video game, but you can still use her for the new Disney Infinity 2.0.  This was the last one at the Best Buy nearby where I live.  They may get in more, they may not.  The new figures for the Disney Infinity 2.0 are everywhere, but it's getting harder and harder to find some of the figures for the older game.  A figure from the Incredibles called "Violet" went from $12.99 to $26.95 on amazon.  I haven't even seen a Violet figure in any store lately.  I think the same thing is going to happen to Elsa.  

It may happen, it may not.  But around December 20 when a coworker is saying they've been looking everywhere for a Disney Infinity Elsa figure, you can let him know that you have one that you'll be willing to part with it for $149.99.  That will be just enough for the Lego train set!  *chuckle*  (Yes, sometimes I'm a shark.)

Go out and walk around in a toy store yourself sometime.  Think back about the toys you used to have as a kid and check out some of the new stuff.  G.I. Joe has all but disappeared from most store shelves.  Sad, but true.  Take a look around, there are still plenty of fun toys beyond video games.

Robert Re-writes Irish history

The Middle Ages

What do you suppose happened during the middle ages?  We know a few historical facts, but we really don't know any specifics.  What were those people really doing back then?  I've come across a game called Crusader Kings II that lets you try and run royal families all across Europe during the middle ages.  There's not a whole lot of military strategy or things like that, the whole goal of the game seems to be to keep your family line around as long as you possible can.  In a way, this means you want to be the biggest sex fiend you can be and have as many children as you can.  This actually poses a few problems as your kids may end up fighting over who gets to be the next heir to whatever throne or title you have.  Maybe one of your kids may even try to kill you so they can take over.  And so here we go with my own "Game of Thrones" episode!

First off let me say that I started out trying to play as a historical figure in Italy and I got my butt kicked because there is still so much I don't know about this game.  And so I re-started as an Earl in Ireland.  To start off I will be playing as Earl Dunchad of Ormond.

All or most of the names here should be pretty much historically accurate.  Or not, I really don't know that much about Irish history.  But my Earl starts out in this small province called Ormond.  I don't have any Dukes or Kings above me and am running my little province as an independent territory for the moment.  First things first, my Earl is 24 years old and single.  He needs a wife so he can start having kids.  But who to marry him off to?  

I find out that a "Princess Ximena" of a place called Navarra is single and arrange a marriage with her.  That will give my Earl a lot of prestige to marry a princess!  And here she is:

Ok, to be truthful that's not really who the Earl married.  That's actually Miss Xemena Navarrete.  She's a Miss Universe.  *chuckle*  The name is pretty close though, you have to admit!  Actually Princess Ximena probably looked more like this:

Now the first part of this is going to be a bit slow.  I thought things would heat up quickly, but they didn't.  My Earl had two sisters.  I married them off to kings.  Arranged marriages can be fun!  I married one sister named Sile off to the King of Scotland.  I figured this would be a good move to have family in the Scottish royal court.  That didn't work out for long as the king died shortly after the marriage and my sister wanted me to then marry her off to someone else.  This time no kings were available and I had to marry her off to some other Earl.  I married the other sister off the the king of Asturias, where ever that is.  I had no idea, but he was a king, so it seemed a good deal.

The Earl had one brother.  i married him off and he started having kids right away.  I'm married to the Ximena woman, but wasn't seeming to have kids!  How am I going to have an heir if I don't have any children!  Damn!  My brother began banging kids out immediately.  He has a son named Selbach.  then he has a son named Scoan.  What the hell?  He's popping out kids left and right and I'm still trying to have my first!  Finally though my wife gets pregnant!

I end up with a son, but don't want to go with the Irish name the computer wants to name the kid.  At least I think it was Irish?  I don't know.  Anyway, I name the kid Wally.  Now things began to go bad in Scotland and the new king doesn't like me much.  It's a good thing Scotland is a ways away from where I am.  Screw their new king!  *chuckle*  Wife gets pregnant again and has another son.  I name this one Elmo.

Now in my "court", my mother is the "Spymaster".  It's always nice to have family watching your back, and Mom is pretty good at intrigue!  Along comes this kid named "Brian" and he wants to take over Mom's job.  I tell him no and send him on his way.  My Earl finds himself wandering around a village and sees some drunks having a brawl.  He goes over to participate and wipes the floor with the drunks.  He's not too bad at defending himself!  Very nice!  He catches and beheads a spy.  We're doing ok, if living an pretty bland and mostly uneventful life.  Finally the Earl's mom dies at age 57.  She was old, infirm and insane by then and a new guy named "Bundachan" becomes the new spymaster.  I don't think he's as good as Mom was, but he'll have to do for now.

Ximena has another son and by now I'm a bit bored and name the kid Moose.  I don't seem to be taking these names very seriously, but on the good side, I have a few heirs for the Earl.  Ximena ends up pregnant, but not by me.  That whore was screwing around on the Earl!  How dare she!  And it was with the Earl's Chancellor, a guy named "Mael-Fathardaig"!  I had thought the Earl might do some screwing around, but not his wife!  What a horrid turn of events!  Her bastard daughter is named "Munia".  I'll have to figure out what to do with her when she gets older.

The Earl apparently can't keep his hands off of Ximena and promptly jumps back into bed with her again.  Shortly after that he dies at age 41.  Now his heir will take over the kingdom.

That's for another blog, though.  We'll check in on the reign of "Earl Wally Mac Dunchad of Omond" in another blog.  For now, stay bored.

Accrington Stanley

FIFA 15 at its best!

I didn’t grow up with soccer.  As an American I grew up watching baseball and American football and really never knew much about soccer. I never really learned much about the sport until I was up in the later years of my life.  But now that I’ve learned quite a bit, I love it!  I’m actually a bit sad that I can’t watch some of the lower league matches on tv!

What I can do though is play them out in a video game.  When I was a kid video game soccer looked like this:

Now what can I really learn from this?  Not much.  But that was years ago.  In the past couple of years I’ve been learning more and more about English football, transfers, player loans, and things like that.  Now I’m by no means an expert, but I think I could run a team with a reasonable amount of success.  I’m sure every sports fan thinks that though, don’t they?  Walk into any pub in England and I’m sure you can find a group of people who will tell you exactly why their favorite team isn’t run correctly.

And so we come to the video game FIFA 15. This game gives you a chance to play with not only English football teams, but teams in leagues all over the world!  But of course I wanted to try playing in the English leagues.  My first choice for a team was Port Vale.  They earned promotion not long ago and moved up into “League 1” from “League 2”.  They have a bit of money, and it was fun trying to manage them for a few games, but I was curious about more.  I tried managing teams like the Tottingham Spurs and Manchester City.  Both have a lot of really good players (Both are also top teams in the Barkely’s Premiere Leage or BPL.  That’s the top English football league.) and money to spend on transferring in any players you might like to add to your squad, but this seemed a bit easy.

I wondered who was the bottom of the English leagues.  Who was the one team that was just struggling to survive.  I went into league two and found a small team called Accrington Stanley.  Feel free to click on the name and check out the real life team.  I figured I can take control of them in FIFA 15 and move them right to the top of the English leagues no problem at all.  I looked them up on YouTube and found a few really nice videos about them.  Their motto is “The team that wouldn’t die.”  I like that!  And so I started my career as Accrington Stanley manager.

First off, they don’t have much money.  And even if they did have a lot of money, they’re part of League 2 which means that even if I could afford to buy some big time players, they won’t want to play for a small time team like this.  Ouch. So I’ll have to start out with some young players.  No problem though, I figured I could find a few 17 or 18 year olds and pick them up cheaply.  Then you just develop these guys and end up with a good team, right?  Right…?

Again, Accrington Stanley doesn’t have much money which means I can’t afford to buy any players with tons of potential.  Damn.  Maybe if I transfer a few of the older Accrington players I can get more money to buy the younger players?  That didn’t work out either because poor Accrington doesn’t have very many players.  I need everyone I have just to keep them playing!  I manage to transfer in two guys before I run short on money.  They are CB Stephen Best who is 17 and LM Fionn Reilly who is 18.  All these guys are real life soccer players too, which makes things interesting.

I do have a few other youngsters on the team and will have to make due.  So I divided my small team into two team sheets.  One with a lot of the younger players on it, and one with most of my older players.  I figured I could rotate them as I played matches and keep everyone fresh and rested.  Before my first “friendly” match one of my 18 year old players named Luke Greaves asks to play even though he’s not listed as a first team starter.  I do have him starting on the younger team sheet, so I’ll just play that team in the friendly.

We play a small club called Latina for our friendly.  Luke runs out happily onto the pitch ready for his big start!  The game begins and Luke Greaves ends up with a torn hip floxor within a few minutes of play.  He's now out for a few weeks.  That's not good.  I was a bit short handed to begin with and now I have to wait for this player to heal!  This isn't a very good start.

If you’re interested, here’s a look at some real life Luke Greaves highlights!

The team must move on!  And so after two more friendly matches we moved into regular league play.  Now I’ll admit I’m playing this game on “Amateur” setting.  So it’s not horribly hard, but it’s not the easiest thing to score either.  I thought at first I would be able to just steamroll other teams with this setting and get my small team some instant success, but things didn’t work out that way exactly.  I won a couple matches and then ended up with a draw with another bad team called Portsmouth.  I didn’t like the look of a draw, but their goal keeper seemed like a wall!  None of my shots seemed able to make it past him!  We moved on to the J. Paint Trophy Cup.  I figured maybe I would try something new.  I had a 17 year old striker just sitting on the bench named Max Hazeldine.  Why not give Max his shot and see what he could do?  So I put him in for one of the J. Paint matches.  He scored the one and only goal and always seemed to have the ball!  I love Max now!  He moved right up to starter after that performance! (I now follow the real Max Hazeldine on Twitter.  I hope he has the same success in real life!)  My next J. Paint Trophy Cup match will be against Port Vale.  They are a league higher and I'll really have to work to score against them and move on!  Now we're finding a challenge!

And so here we are.  I may keep writing in my blog about what happens with this Accrington Stanley progress.  I'm having a lot of fun seeing what I can do with this team.  I may end up back at Tottenham or one of the other big teams eventually, but for now I like the little guys.  And I may have to keep an eye on the real life Accrington Stanley team.  Win or lose, they've found a new supporter!

The Evil Postmen

“Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.”

There you go, that’s an inscription on the James Farley Post Office in New York City.  Are these words more than just scribbles carved into a wall?  They certainly should be!  But they aren’t much more than that.  The mail doesn’t always get through now a days.  Some postal workers are lazy, stupid, and slow.  Some don’t even care if you get your mail.  Some just throw your mail away instead of delivering it.  Am I kidding about that?  LET’S GO TO THE VIDEO TAPE:

So now there will be people who won’t get their birthday card from Grandma.  Bills won’t be delivered and neither will things like voter registration cards.  Did you get a package from your Aunt May?  TOUGH!  But maybe your package didn’t end up in the dumpster, maybe it ended up in a ravine after this guy got a hold of it:

But not all postal workers are like this, right?  I mean yes some are fat and lazy and will drive the postal truck across your carefully manicured lawn, but...wait a minute, they'll drive on your lawn?  What the hell?

This chick not only drove up on the lawn, she isn't even wearing a postal uniform!  And even better, she just tossed the packages onto the porch.  I guess if they broke that's just too bad, isn't it?  Bought a really beautiful one of a kind sculpture from a local gallery and had it sent via US mail to your house?  If it arrived broken that's too bad!  Now pretend to ignore the torn up part of your lawn where the postal truck did doughnuts!

Not all postmen drive on your lawn with a postal vehicle.  Some actually use their own vehicles to sling the mail out.  Yes, I said sling, as in throw.  Did you order some nice new computer stuff from Amazon?  Amazon is really good at sending your orders right out!  And then the stuff gets delivered by people like this:

Isn't that lovely?  And from the news report it sounds like the post office didn't even care!  They said they would "investigate".  Isn't seeing this video enough?  Do you really have to investigate something you just saw with your own eyes?  There are supposedly laws against tampering with the US mail, but they apparently don't include postal workers.  

This just happens in American though, right?  Or maybe not.  Let's take a look at the Royal Post in jolly old England!  Here comes the red truck now!

That's for my English friends who sometimes don't get all their post.  It might be in the bushes somewhere, or maybe off in a creek.  People are people no matter where you live, and I guess lazy postal workers are the same the world over too.  Sad, very sad.

Now don't think this is about all of the people at the post office.  There are some really dedicated postal people out there and the idiots in these videos are hopefully the exceptions.  I know there are plenty of people in the post office who believe in that thing that says "Through rain and sleet and..." whatever.  I don't even know the whole thing and refuse to scroll back up to the top of this blog to copy and paste it here.  

Time to give Madison Sevier a Vegas Adventure!

Interview with Author Madison Sevier

Now to have a bit of fun I’ve decided to not only interview Madison, but to also Answer my own questions and reply to anything she says in her answers.  And here we go!

Hi Madison and welcome to your Vegas Adventure interview!  Firstly, I’d like to thank you for agreeing to do this, I really appreciate your time.  And secondly, relax and enjoy yourself with these questions.  Have a good time!  And let’s begin!

How did you get started in writing?  And have you taken any college courses or classes to help you with your craft? 

 Thanks so much, Robert.

I began writing when I was around eight years old. I'd been reading (sneaking my aunt's books) V.C. Andrews and Stephen King since first grade. I'd also "worked" with my aunt at our local library. So, when my grandfather found out about my love for books, he gave me a powder-blue typewriter for Christmas—Right then, I knew I'd write books someday.

As for courses or classes, no. Not yet. I've been fairly busy homeschooling my daughter and once you add in all of my other "duties" plus writing and everything that goes along with it, that doesn't leave much time for anything else. However, I do plan on it.

I’ve been writing since I was a kid.  My favorite class in high school was Creative Writing.  There is so much of my older writing that just disappeared and that’s kind of sad.  I think that’s because I started writing stories and things back when there were typewriters.  If you wanted to keep something you needed to keep a hard copy of it and I was never really organized enough to keep track of a bunch of papers.  It’s so much easier now in the digital age to just save writing as a file.  Other than high school I’ve never taken any writing classes either.  I’ve been encouraged to do that, but I’m one of those egotistical people who thinks he doesn’t need writing classes.  *chuckle*

Can you write without coffee?  What would you write if I kept you away from coffee for a week?  How about if I told you no coffee before you’ve written 10,000 words?  (*chuckle*  Yes, I have a mean streak sometimes.)

No way. I'd end up writing a horror book or a murder. No, you wouldn't be the victim **wink, wink** Oh, if I had to work for my coffee, I'd write 10,000 words in no time. :)

I personally don’t drink coffee.  I’ve never liked it.  I’ll be happy to make coffee for you if you’re pushy, but all kinds of things will make it into the coffee filter.  *snicker*  Yes, I love to make coffee, I’m just not much for drinking it. 

I really enjoyed your story Banged in the Bayou and you’ve told me that you’re doing more work on that.  I read a comment on Facebook saying “You'll be happy to know that Rosie is on the road again.   Searching...  Can't wait to see what she finds next”  So will we maybe be seeing more Monster Sex stories with Rosie Peaks?

Thank you so much! Yes, Rosie will be appearing again. Honestly, Banged In The Bayou began as a joke between another great friend and myself. Never in a million years did I think anyone would actually like the story. I have grown to love Rosie's character and she may appear shallow on the outside  (I wrote her that way), but she will show more of her personality and strengths in her next story. There are so many monsters in the world and she's been trying to find one that satisfies her like Nessiana did.

One of my books started out with a bit of joking around.  I came up with the idea for Terminating Vegas while working a security dispatch position with a good friend of mine.  It started out with that good ol’ question, “So, what would you do if you won the lottery?”  *chuckle*

Bad reviews always bother authors, me included.  But would bad reviews matter to you at all if you were selling a couple of thousand kindle copies a month?

Honestly, yes that would still bother me. However, I wouldn't let it stop me from writing. I know that not everyone will love what I write and some people will hate it. That's okay. We all have different tastes. As long as the reviews aren't cruel (I had one once), I'm fine with constructive criticism.

My book Frigate November has 35 reviews on Amazon.com right now.  Most of them I don’t bother to read.  I get a lot of people complaining that the book isn’t “realistic”.  It wasn’t written to be realistic, it was written to be entertaining.  The book still sells more copies each month than all my other books put together.  Obviously not enough copies to pay my rent, but still it puts a few dollars in my pocket.  I recently edited and rewrote quite a bit of the story.  The rewrite added around 100 pages to the paperback version.  *chuckle*  It remains to be seen if changing a few things will help with the sales and reviews.  If the reviews change, I probably still won’t read them.

 Let’s say you just made ten thousand dollars in book royalties this month.  Not including bills (we all have to pay those), what would you go out and spend the money on just for fun? 

 

Oh, I wish. LOL! Let's see. I'd definitely head down to the Smokies with my family. There's something magical there that I can never put into words. So, I'd spend a good chunk of it for that trip. Maybe I'd stay for a month. Maybe use the money for a down payment on a house there. I'm not big on blowing money, so I'd put it to good use.

I know...booooring :)

Women always seem to be like that, thinking about a new house or a trip somewhere.  I think ten thousand dollars would pay for a nice trip to Orlando, Florida for me.  I’ve also promised a friend that if one of my books ever took off and made me major bucks I would treat her to a trip to Walt Disney World in Florida.  So that’s where the first bit of my huge royalty check would go.  *chuckle*  The rest would probably be spent on video games, computer stuff, and maybe a nicer car.

Let’s move on from Monster Sex and talk about your book Wicked By Nature.  I haven’t read this one, but it seems you have a flair for the supernatural.  Is this your preferred genre, or do you ever expand your writing to other things such as comedy, straight romance, historical, or things like that?

I definitely have a love of the supernatural/paranormal. I combined it with my love of RomCom and a bit of the erotic to get Wicked By Nature where it is today. (Currently being re-edited and re-covered) and will be available for purchase again by October—I hope.

I'd say my favorite genre would be RomCom. I tend to put real-life, comical things into my stories. I like snark and wit in my romance, so I try to bring those to my characters. Luckily, they cooperate. I also love cozy mysteries and I have one saved in my files (that I'm supposed to finish). I've never written historical or western, but up until a short while ago, I'd never written monsterotica either. So, who knows. Maybe someday.

I think most of my books have comedic parts in them.  All except for Kiss the Darkness.  Not too much humor in that story.  Lots of emotion there, though.

 Most writers have things they’ve written long ago that they never share.  My secret thing is an old Western story.  It was written on a typewriter back in the mid 80’s.  Do you have any hidden writing that you’ll probably never let anyone see? 

Honestly, no. But that's very cool and I think you should publish it!

I've thought about it. But I worry that if I wrote something secret, it would one day find it's way into the world. So, I keep those secret things to myself.

My western won’t see the light of day.  At least I won’t be the person showing it to anyone.  On the frightening side, a girl I knew back in my military days still has a copy and has told me she rereads it every so often!  GAH!

I did a “Bob’s Books” episode for your book Banged in the Bayou and you really enjoyed it!  So how shy are you?  If I could ever arrange it (I’m learning more every day!) would you ever consider a live video interview?

 Yes, you did and I truly did enjoy it. Thank you again!

I'm fairly shy at first. I'm okay behind the computer, but in real life, I'm very quiet until I get to know you. Just like RAGT14 this year. I didn't know many people, but once I warmed up, I was talking to the point that I lost my voice. LOL

I'd definitely be open to a live video interview. Just let me know :)

I’ve asked another author or two, but they always waffle out somehow.  They’re either using a pen name and don’t want to reveal their real face, or they aren’t sure how it would work, they’re busy, or some other excuse.  Two authors I did actually get on video were Missy Martine and Mary Quast.  I had met them at a Reader/Writer event hosted by author Lori Foster.  I asked if they would mind talking a bit about their books while I filmed them and I could then post the video on YouTube.  Both were happy for the promotion and let me take video of them.  Mary’s video has had 138 views so far and Missy’s video currently has 56 views.  This is from three years ago and I’m sure video interviews would be much more popular now.  The world has become so much more digital now.  I’ll definitely get with you about trying a video interview!

Have you ever held a book signing for one of your books?  You know, one of those things where you sit at a table and no one looks at your books.  But the bitch at the next table has everyone over there all looking at her stupid books about some summer/fall romance crap that’s just a bunch of stupid fluff!  Your book is so much better but none of the air heads in the room seem to care!  All they want is to look at the bitch’s book!  Why won’t they come over here!  If they would just read my stuff, I know they would like it!  I hate sitting here all by myself!  It’s so damned hot in here! 

 I actually had a signing at RAGT14. I was completely surprised and shocked because no one had told me it I would be doing it. It was quite embarrassing, but I did my best. I honestly wasn't upset by how many people were visiting other authors. I knew who they were all mostly there to see and not many people had ever heard of me. However, I won't lie. I did sit there smiling while dreaming I'd be one of those lucky authors someday. But no one would have ever guessed the many other things that were going through my mind that day.

 Uh…sorry, I got a bit carried away there.  *chuckle*  That hasn’t ever happened to me.  Has it happened to you?

We all get carried away sometimes :)

Yes, that actually was my attempt at humor.  In a way it stems from a bit of truth.  Three years ago when I went to the Lori Foster event I met quite a few other authors and it was nice…I guess.  I did make a few friends there.  And I always get asked each year if I’m going back to the next Lori Foster event.  Sadly I have to say no.  To me it was just 300 babbling women in one room all trying to talk about their books at the same time. 

 What is the longest thing you’ve written so far?  My longest would be a novel called Frigate November.  Originally it was around 120,000 words long.  I recently edited it and rewrote a few parts and now it’s 124,392 words.  So have you considered writing something that long?

Wicked By Nature was around 70,000 and with edits/revisions, it should be longer. I've often considered writing much longer stories. Up until a few weeks ago, I felt boxed in with deadlines and such, so my writing went into a tailspin. Now, I have ideas running rampant and driving me insane. Hopefully, I'll get my cozy mystery finished soon and then, I'll have a longer story to tell.

Authors always laugh and joke about putting people they don’t like in their books and then killing them off.  Have you ever based any characters in your writing on anyone you know, good or bad?  You don’t have to name any names. 

 Would someone as sweet and innocent as lil ol' me do that? 

Remember that phrase "Two can keep a secret"?

Of course I have. One particular I killed a few times—just to be sure.

It's excellent and cheap therapy. Wouldn't you agree?

Thank you so much for having me over, Robert! This has been so much fun. Hopefully, you'll stop by my place soon and I can ask you the tough questions.

I can be honest in saying I’ve never done that.  You won’t make it into one of my books as a character unless I like you at least a little bit.  I killed off a couple people in my book Las Vegas Investigator and I’m sure people will try and guess who those characters represent, but in reality they were just characters not based on anyone. 

Well thank you again Madison for participating in one of my screwball interviews!  It was a pleasure having you and hopefully we actually can hook up for a video interview soon.  (I do have a few evil plans for this.  *chuckle*)

YouTube and You

YouTube and You

Have you ever thought about a career in film making?  I think most people have.  It would be so great to work at the dream factory called Hollywood, wouldn't it?  Well with today's technology you don't have to move to Hollywood to make it big in film making.  Or should I say video making?  But really what's the difference between a video and a film?  The length, maybe?  Let's forget the semantics and jump right into YouTube!

I have my own YouTube channel.  I can upload just about anything I want onto it and people all over the world can watch the videos I put up.  There are restrictions and you can't just post anything.  It is possible to get banned and have your channel removed.  My friend Chinstrap has had his channel removed.  You can't be a bad boy (or girl) and be putting up copyrighted stuff such as videos using copyrighted music!  Don't be posting a video of yourself dancing to Lady Gaga's latest hit and expect the video to stay up.  You don't own the music so you can't use it!  What a lot of people may not realize though, is that YouTube has a huge selection of music that you can download and use in your videos for free!  Just do a bit of research!  And don't post really offensive things.  The world doesn't need to see people getting their heads chopped off in an execution, or women being roasted over an open flame.  You may want to see that stuff, but it's offensive and will get you banned.  Don't post stuff like that.

Now the big question is how do you get people to watch your videos?  Uploading them to YouTube just isn't enough to get views.  Once you have an established channel you might be able to just upload stuff and people will watch it, but that takes time and effort.  So what kind of videos will people watch?  Who the hell knows?  For instance I uploaded this video and it has 7 views.  So only 7 people watched it.

Is it a bad video?  Hell no, I think it's pretty good!  But apparently no one was interested in my reading a bit from one of my own books.  What is interesting then?  How about chicken?  Is chicken interesting?  Take a look at this video:

As of right now while I'm typing this blog the video has 705 views.  People want to know how I cook chicken in a microwave.  *chuckle*  So should I make cooking videos?  I don't want to do that mostly because I can't really cook that well.  That's why I cook chicken in a microwave!  But it comes out well and so I thought I would share that secret with people.  

How about video games?  They're pretty popular right now.  There are some guys who play video games and do commentary while they play.  The videos are called "Let's plays", or "Walkthrus".  Some of these commentators have millions of subscribers.  Yes, I said millions.  Take the guy named Theradbrad for example, he has over three million subscribers.  Here is one of his videos:

Brad is so popular that I guess once in a while a smart game developer will send him their game and allow him to play it and put up a video before the game is even released.  I say they're smart because having him play your game will get the game a lot of buzz and promotion.  Brad is good at what he does and believe me, what he does is not easy!  I've tried it a few times and haven't had the same level of success.  But then I don't stick with it.  One way to find success on YouTube is to keep a steady stream of videos uploading.  So to compare, here's a video I made of the same game.  My video only has 6 views.  But then I don't keep adding videos and finish the game.  

Believe it or not, there is more to this than just pointing a camera at your tv and recording the game.  You need specific equipment to record game footage.  I think I paid around $200 for the small thing I have.  It connects the game to my laptop computer and I can record the game footage with commentary if I want and then save it as a digital file.  Now these game walkthrus might not be easy to get views on, but sports games are a bit easier.  They take a LOT of editing, though!  Football is fun, but you need to cut out all the stuff in between the plays in order to make the video short enough.  Long videos are really nice, but they take forever to upload!  Shorter is better.  So here's me editing some football:

I really was going to keep up with this series, but my Playstation 3 died after a couple of videos and I wasn't able to make any more for a while.  Months and months had passed before I was able to make video game videos again and when I finally could, I had lost the saves I needed.  That sucked.  But this thing has 75 views right now!  So people love to watch football and see how you play!  I know I like watching it!

So let's get back to making videos.  What does it take to get a YouTube video channel?  Just sign up.  That's about it.  It's all part of Google.  Now YouTube can be more than just something to show videos to the world.  There's so much to it.  I don't even know half of what you can do with this stuff!  There are people who make "daily vlogs".  I follow two of these people.  One is in Orlando, Florida and is called TheTimTracker and the other one I follow is in England and is called WanderingDaz.  These husband and wife teams do videos every day about what they're doing, what's going on in their lives, or just whatever they're thinking about.  They upload videos every day!  I honestly think they're fun to watch.  For a while they barely had any views, but eventually after they had stuck with it, people found their channels.  And now they get more and more subscribers.  That's a lot of work to upload a video every day!  I love and respect what those people do!  

So even if you don't want to make videos yourself, check out YouTube.  It's a fun thing.  You can find anything at all you want.  There are literally videos on just about anything you want to search for!  Such as this:

This video is insanely funny!  Learning about a habanero pepper the hard way is always fun!  You can search how to build a computer, or how to change out a sink!  How to train your dog, or funny golf videos.  You can type in the name of any video game at all and find things!  YouTube is fun!  So help support a YouTuber today.  You don't need to give them any money or anything like that, just watch videos and then leave a comment, or click the thumbs up icon to leave a "like".