No Free Time

I've noticed recently that due to having a teaching job involving three face-to-face classes, another teaching job online with a required 48 hour turnaround time for everything, being in a rock opera about the zombie apocalypse, doing music for Christian Challenge on campus, and trying to still spend time with important people, I don't really have much free time for writing. That should change slightly come November 4 or 5, when the online class is over, but for now it's what I have to deal with.

The point of mentioning all that is not simply to vent about it. I mention it because it's getting in the way of my writing. I have practically no time to dedicate to my own creative endeavors at the moment. In fact, right now I'm supposed to be grading homework for Basic Writing classes, but I can't bring myself to do it just yet.

Because of all of this, I have come up with a strategy. My plan is to build a story out of a single word. It seems a single word may be all I have time for at the moment. But if I have a word, I can create a sentence around that word, and from there (when I have a couple more minutes) a paragraph. I think it may eventually progress into a story, even, given enough motivation. I'm thinking of calling it a word-based story, which could be easily taken out of context, which I am fine with.

Do you have any suggestions on what word/words I should start with?

JF

Protesting

Recently, I've noticed a trend. It's a trend that's swept America before, and usually it means some form of change is coming. There have been more noticeable protests in the last little while (I realize they go on all the time, but there are some gaining wider recognition of late).

I think it may be that, over time, we grow uneasy in our complacency. Not everyone takes a stance in the protests, but we almost always find ourselves siding with one entity or the other (i.e. the protesters or the protested). I find it an interesting method of effecting change, or at least of attempting to.

While I find the protests themselves interesting and I'm still deciding where I stand on one of them (the two I have been seeing a lot on specifically are the 99% protests and the online protests of Columbus Day, the latter of which I already have a firm position about), I do not appreciate protesters being shown as violent/riotous simply because a pesky idiot-"journalist" wants a story and tries to incite violence himself to get it (http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/cutline/reporter-incites-occupy-d-c-riot-write-180750896.html).

As for Columbus Day, I have three questions: 

1. Why do we consider him to be a hero?

2. What did he do that actually benefited society?

3. Would we celebrate someone today who was responsible for the same things?

What are your thoughts on these ongoing protests, and what do you think the results will be with either of them?

For You and for Vince Gilligan

Dear Vince Gilligan,

Thanks for your recent work developing/producing Breaking Bad. I appreciate it. There was some extensive research that went into that show--either that, or you have some serious explaining to do. Regardless, I have come to appreciate the intensity of the show; there is tension even in the calmest moments. But every once in awhile, a moment of utter clarity occurs (often it is a humorous moment) wherein the viewer receives an unexpectedly well-delivered payoff for dealing with and being invested in the dramatic tension that is the core of the show.

Mysignaturehere


This is not meant to be a plug for the show, although it is something I would recommend, if you like good television; plus, the first three seasons are on Netflix instant. Rather, this is thanks to a producer for a quality product that inspires my own creativity. I have developed a number of plot and character ideas while watching the show. That isn't to say I'm taking his characters and trying to use them as my own--that's not the case at all. But I do see various elements in the characters' interactions that seem to speak to me as a writer, more than as a viewer. It's a nice effect.

For all of you: what is something (maybe something recent) that inspires you to do what you do?

JF

On Blogging

Someone (Caleb J. Ross--http://www.calebjross.com/) once (a couple weeks ago) told me that it's important for a writer to have an online presence--to have something worthwhile to say to the community at large, perhaps to fans or could-be fans in specific. In his (fairly successful, I might add) career as a writer so far, he said that he tries to post something of worth at least once every few days. Otherwise, he noted, the reading community might forget about him.

I'm not always the best at remembering to post things to this blog (I still have issues with the term 'blog'; there should be a better term for this), to keep people updated on things, but I've decided to make an effort. Not to say the effort will bring any real or lasting success. But my goal is to post something every few days, to ensure I am in the habit of writing something (even if it's not working toward novelization) more frequently than I have been. So, I suppose you'll have that to look forward to, if you look forward to that type of thing.

I will try to make it worth the time it takes to read. Feel free to give feedback--especially questions. Questions, I've noticed, tend toward forcing conversation. And, another thing I've noticed, sometimes it takes a bit of force for me, personally, to become invested in a conversation. Sometimes I need to be asked something, or I will stop paying attention. Anyone else do that?

Hectic

Well now, son. What do you think you're doing here? I don't even have a son. Not that I'm disowning you. You simply don't exist...I suppose you have a point--if you don't exist, who am I talking to? I suppose I'm talking to Ben Wiebeck. Not to you, imaginary son. Ben, you're unofficially adopted, even though you already have parents. To make it official, I'll have to discuss it with Juliet (some legality issues about a non-joint parent filing joint tax returns). Back into it, I guess...

Well now, Ben. That is, Ben and the others who actually read this. Here's the recentness:

I have started working at that online university. It takes up a lot of time, on top of that other lot of time taken up by Emporia State teaching and grading. Most of my time has been claimed by this stuff. I like free time, but I don't seem to have any left. Bah, well. I've always needed to force myself into productivity, so this will have to suffice for the time being.

I'm currently listening to Lowry's free-to-listen-to album Emporia. Thanks, Timothy. It's helping as I grade all these papers on the computer. Oh, I'm also currently grading all these papers on the computer for that online university. All these papers. Lots of all these papers.

Recently, as often occurs, I've been mostly in one of the following moods:

• Wanting a recording studio and related accoutrements; I'm developing a lot of song ideas, but I need to have some way to record and mix tracks for it to work right. (I'd also need a bit more free time.)
• Wanting to write a screenplay--actually working on this one currently (more time would definitely help here).
• Feeling like I should be working on my novel(s). Feel free to reference Family Guy here. This one's not happening much of late, but I have been finding good inspiration in a number of places--most recently, from Caleb J. Ross (a Kansas City based writer who went to ESU...uh, Timothy, get in touch with this guy, for the following reasons: his stuff is more literary, but it's good, he seems very open to getting to know other writers, he's a bit obsessed with SEO and having an online presence as a writer, I think you'd get along well, and once Denis Johnson almost drank his pee).
• Wanting to travel. Anywhere. And sleep in while I'm wherever I end up. Sometimes getting up early, because sunrises; but usually sleeping in.

Probably some other stuff could go in that list as well, but I do need to get back to grading, so I can get some semblance of a few hours' sleep before I have to go teach the face-to-face classes I teach on Fridays.

Oh, also, hi Juliet. Hi Adam. (I felt I should say hello to my more avid readers/commenters, so there you go; there aren't many of you, at least not yet...if there were a great many more, I wouldn't be able to recall everyone's name. So, good job getting in on the name-y action.)

What's going on for you people of late?

jdf

Fall, Teaching, Not Teaching, and the Zombie Apocalypse

Last I heard from me (since this blog is how I correspond with myself), I was getting ready to teach at that online university place, work for that staffing firm, and my bike had just recently been fixed.

Well, I finished the training program for said online university, they told me I had a class to teach, then there was no enrollment in the class. So, I ended up not teaching there--at least not yet. I've been assured I'm at the top of the list for whenever a class does open up (one with students in it this time).

My bike started making a funky popping noise, so I took it back in and the people at the bike shop said they weren't sure what was wrong with it. They could figure it out though, if I gave them a few days (admittedly, they were a bit swamped). I only took it back home with me that day because otherwise I would have had to walk all the way home in the 110+ degree heat. So I set it aside for awhile, and then my car broke (the bushings wore out on one side; but at the time, I wasn't sure that's what it was). So I rode my bike once after getting it safely home--on that ride, the popping noise suddenly got quite loud and, before I could stop, the rear quick release skewer snapped and half of it shot into the street. So, the bike was no longer functional. It's currently back in the bike shop.

As for the car, I was able to--with the help and expertise of my father-in-law, Mike Johnson--replace the bushing for about $3 and an hour and a half's work. Last year, a mechanic charged me close to $400 to do the same thing, and they put the wrong size bushings on. I didn't know it at the time. But, negative plug for their business anyhow: do not go to Williams Automotive in Emporia. It would appear they're swindlers, of sorts.


Also, I don't work for the staffing firm. I was offered a position teaching at Emporia State again, so I took that. It's pretty good work, none too very strenuous (especially without having to write papers or do homework of my own). So, I am employed, at least for the time being.

Finally, this show thing that I'm in, Slaughterhouse Opera--a rock opera of the zombie apocalypse--has been having some significant success in its opening run. This Tuesday, we're playing at the recordBar in KC (show at 11:00 p.m. if you're interested)--our third show in August. We will be taking a brief sabbatical after this show, so if you want to see it soon, Tuesday's your best bet. For more details, click where it says For more details. I'm not sure if the show date is listed on there at present, but it will be this Tuesday (i.e. tomorrow). $7 cover. Dress like a zombie, get a free kazoo.

Anywho, that's what's been up in this bit o' the globe. Hope you enjoyed the update, and hope to see you Tuesday. Except my mom--she's babysitting my awesome nephew, so she won't be there. But my dad will be there. And who among you hasn't wondered what my dad is like (and where I get it from)?

Onward...

Several things are happening right now.

1. I've successfully published some articles on Helium and Yahoo's Associated Content--the latter is a far superior system that offers significantly higher pay for articles, as well as better exposure.

2. I've successfully borrowed some money. It should be enough to make it far enough into July that I'll be making my own money again (probably doing factory work for that staffing firm I keep referencing).

3. I have officially begun the ten-day training program for teaching at the online university. That has a very promising potential for being lucrative and relatively painless. I'm excited to get into it; it's unique how student-centric everything is. By the by, it's a for-profit university, which is interesting; but it is accredited.

4. We (meaning myself, Juliet, and some other people related to Juliet) are heading to Florida tonight-into-tomorrow. It will be a long drive (around 24 hours, if I did the made-up math in my head correctly).

5. For the foreseeable future, I have local-within-Emporia transportation; i.e. my bike is fixed. Except I rode it to Wal-Mart yesterday to buy a new back tire and on the way home the back tire went flat. So, I now have to get a new tube for it. But other than that, hooray for my bike working again.

6. Jorge (my 'neighbor'--is it a neighbor if technically he lives in the other side of the same house? Duplexes are confusing for linguists) has apparently read this blog. I had no idea he knew about it. You should check out his blog, especially if you like Siberian Huskies. You can find it somewhere around here.

So, that's that, update-wise, I suppose. What are all of you up to?

Waiting and Trying to Survive Unemployment Without Unemployment Benefits

I still haven't started the (unpaid) training for the online university. That all starts on Monday. I still can't work for the staffing firm until I come back from Florida. So, I'm down to pretty much having no money in the bank. I may not be able to pay July rent on time (fortunately our landlord is awesome about these things), bills are still coming up due, and all around it's just a bit frustrating. I am still hopeful, though, because not being hopeful would just be, well, depressing.

I have officially applied for food stamps, and the very kind people at SRS seemed to rush to the rescue. I now have a Vision card and can purchase food with that, until I start making money again. I have asked some family and friends to borrow money, and am still waiting for a response on some of those. Currently, it looks like we'll be broke until around mid-August, which is when Juliet gets her loans for the semester and when I (should) start getting paid for my online teaching job.

In the meantime, I've been working on writing for content websites like Helium and Associated Content, and started bidding on writing and editing projects on Elance. No luck on the latter, but for the others I've written a total of (I think) seven articles and have made, so far, about $2.09. All but four cents of that came from Yahoo! paying me up front for this article. The four cents came from residual revenue from people going to the articles and/or clicking on ads on the pages the articles are on. Speaking of ads, I decided to reinstate AdSense onto this blog, simply in order to increase the meager earning potential I currently have. Anyway, if I write enough articles over time, my residual income of about a penny a day should increase gradually. Eventually, I should be able to pull in a decent secondary income from writing articles. But that won't happen immediately. But it will be nice to have a little bit of money coming in. Even if it's only a couple dollars here and there.

Edit: while I was typing the above, I discovered the I received $2.00 for this article on Helium. So, the total is $4.09, which reminds me of the Beach Boys. But since I don't want that stuck in my head, I'll say it reminds me of the Spin Doctors.

And in a Sudden Turn of Events

For those who labored through that last post, I appreciate your efforts. I also have some good news. I have been hired (pending successful orientation/training) for the online teaching job. I start a ten-day online training program on 13 June, which means that I will be at least a bit busy with that through half of the time I will be in Florida. I don't know how intense the training is, but I am looking forward to it, despite its conflicting with that whole vacation thing.

Once I complete training, I will get to start teaching online 8-week classes. It seems like a good plan to me. Especially considering I can do it all from home.

The one thing I am very curious about: I will be an independent contractor working online for an online university that happens to be based in Kansas City, MO--will I be required to pay the local tax? It would make sense either way. But I would prefer to avoid it, since (as an independent contractor) I will be required to pay the full rate for Social Security and Medicare taxes.

Note: I have a job that starts in mid-June (although I am not certain whether the training is paid). But for the moment, I am still a bit frustrated, because it still seems to me that I am unemployed; plus, I don't know how many classes will be available for me to teach anyway. So, I don't know how much I will be making once I start that job. So, it's nice to know that I will have some sort of income in the near future. But still: uncertainty blows. Werner Heisenberg told me so.

Scouring Emporia for Employment

I am currently in possession of one Master's degree, and no job.

I began searching for employment a few months before graduating, rather than waiting until afterward. Here is a small snippet of the past explaining why (skip the rest of this paragraph if you don't want to listen to me rant about past employment): Last time I graduated from college (B.A.), I began the search for a job after I had graduated. I ended up working for Sprint through a temp agency, then getting hired by Sprint directly. I worked there for a grand total of six months before I quit. Why did I quit? Because they were stupid. We did the work of twenty-seven (I did count, yes) of their thirty-something customer service call center departments, except all via email rather than by phone. I was fine with this--completely fine. I liked it quite a bit, in fact. Then someone decided we should have to answer phones in addition to providing all these services via email. So, we needed to do the work of 27 departments (for which they already had entire call centers) both by email and by phone, and still keep up with the hourly email quota. If you know me, you know that I really am not a fan of talking to people on the phone (even people I like), so dropping the task of answering phones (and talking to people I mostly didn't like) on top of the already heavy workload was too much for me. I was good at my job there, when it was only emails. In fact, the reason I originally applied for the job was simple, and was in the job advertisement: no answering phones. The reason I had applied for the job had been removed by (I was told) higher-ups completely ignorant of the day-to-day operations of the company. I left despite my supervisor asking me flat-out how much of a raise I would require to keep working there, because that is how much I do not like answering phones. The biggest problem with this plan was that I didn't have any other potential employment lined up, and since a bachelor's degree is no longer anything but a glorified high school diploma, I had some trouble finding employment.

For a while afterward, I tried to work on my writing, while looking for a regular job sort of as a pastime. It took about five and a half months before I found employment again--this time as a proofreader, which I liked for quite awhile; but eight hours a day of proofreading, over time, becomes mostly just straining on the eyes and the mind. It was after working there for two years that I decided to pursue my M.A. degree and hopefully find some time during my coursework to develop some of my own writing (eventually, I would like to be able to earn a living through my writing alone).

So, for the last two years, I have been working on my M.A. in English. I have officially graduated with the degree; I just haven't received the diploma in the mail yet. I have also spent the last two years teaching Composition classes. So, I have the experience and education to (potentially) get a job teaching at a community college or teaching lower-level classes at a university. But I have also learned that grading is the biggest time-killer a teacher faces, and I have to be extremely organized with my time if I want to write and teach.

So, I suppose, back to what I was saying at the beginning of all this:

I have been looking for employment for the past few months, seemingly to no avail. I have had several good leads (one of which I feel I may be over-relying on just a bit), but nothing is really set apart from working with another temp agency--which I really don't want to do. I am hoping to get a job as an instructor for an online university (a specific one), but I don't know exactly how I am doing in the seemingly very formal-and-informal-at-the-same-time application process. I have applied for a management position at a video store, but I'm not expecting to get that job. To potentially work again for ESU, I need to "throw my CV in the pool," as one instructor put it. I plan to do that sometime this week. I even applied at Aldi, but they didn't call me back. Maybe I'm "overqualified" with my fancy degree and whatall, or maybe they just thought I looked stupid; I may never know. But apart from those things, there do not seem to be any real employment opportunities available in the city of Emporia that would have the earning potential to pay for both rent and food.

So, as I wait to hear back from these places, I look up potential online employment--editing copy, writing articles, filling out surveys--pretty much anything for a couple dollars here and there. I think I may get the online teaching position that would pay well enough. But as a part-time realist, I also know that I may not get it. I am currently unemployed and not eligible to collect unemployment, and savings go a lot quicker than I had expected them to. It's a bit frustrating, but there's currently absolutely nothing I can do about it. Except maybe work out a deal on paying rent late, talk to the student loan people who are expecting me to start payments up again in June, take random odd jobs (which are just as rare around here as regular jobs), work as a fill-in employee for the aforementioned staffing firm, try to find more online jobs, and I don't know what else.

So that's where I am at the moment: waiting and hoping and frustrated and gradually going broke.

The most interesting thing I have learned in all of this: it is nearly impossible to do research on available jobs in a smaller city/town. The information is neither available in the single local paper nor online. It's more of a go-door-to-door-and-see-who's-currently-hiring type of situation.

Finishing Grad School

I finish graduate school with my master's degree this semester. There is still much to be done at this point (a large chunk of that before this Friday). I need to scrounge up all my materials for the thesis (again); revise, rewrite, and alter a number of things; and get it all turned in to the graduate offices sometime this week.

After that, it's smooth hovercrafting. Truly, it's mostly a bunch of grading, a couple minor assignments, and looking to the future.

Speaking of the future, I've been wondering what I'll do once I finally am done with ESU. I do not believe I will pursue a second bachelor's and rack up a bunch more debt, although I did consider it for awhile there. Instead, I will try my best to get some form of employment that works for our current situation (and preferably one that pays well). By "our current situation," I mean the one wherein we may need to pick up and leave Emporia come spring or next fall. Mobile employment is definitely optimal, and since I am not yet published (by a major publisher that pays me, I mean), I have been looking into some other means of work for the time being.

I have, of course, been looking into a lot of freelance work. So, there's that. I am technically currently employed by two content writing/editing firms--Purecontent based in the UK and WriterAccess based in the US. The latter I just finished applying to/was accepted for today. The former I have not heard from since they told me on Monday that they were going to start sending me work. Maybe there's no work to be had at the moment, but we shall see.

I have also been considering a position as an outside contractor/adjunct professor at a certain online university. The pay would be reasonable, I can do all the work online, and I actually have several connections with people who already work in the department there. So that seems perhaps more promising.

I am also considering starting my own website that would charge for editing/proofreading. It would be targeted primarily toward fiction writers. I think that might be a slightly better way to go. I am not entirely certain of that, though. We will see, I suppose.

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You may be wondering why I haven't posted in so long. But most of you know the time-consuming beast that is higher education. And many of you also know how difficult it is to keep up with a blog whilst also attempting to write your own fiction, keep up with school/work, and generally have a life at the same time. So, those are my reasons for the lack of updates on my life.

For those of you who have not kept up with anything and perhaps have no contact with me save via this blog, here are some general updates since last time:

2009

Summer:

Juliet and I moved to an apartment in Emporia.

We both got extremely bad sunburns over the summer. She worked part time at a school.

Fall:

We started school in the fall: BS in Health/PE for Juliet; MA in English: Creative Writing for me.

I worked as a Graduate Teaching Assistant (still do, for the next three weeks or so).

2010

Spring:

I continued working as a GTA (see above; it's not a video game). School, school, school.

Summer:

We went (for class credit) to London, and it was awesome.

We took classes. My major one was a Creative Writing Pedagogy course. It was intense.

Fall:

More school. I started work on my thesis material.

2011

Spring:

School. Juliet has been writing lesson plans like mad and learning to teach by teaching--it's the only way, in my opinion, to know whether you can actually do it. I think she would agree with me on that. As for me, I have written and now defended my creative thesis, the major requirement for obtaining the MA degree (more about that at the very outset of this post--no need to reread the whole thing though).

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What about you? What have you been up to?