Category Archives: Uncategorized

What to Write About Today…

Here’s a post being re-posted about a thing that I do, writing about why I write about writing the things that I write.

authormbeyer's avatarCatch a Falling Star

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I have to admit it.  I am pretty goofy.

Probably not Harpo Marx levels of goofy.

But close.

So, I have gone back and looked at what I  have been writing about during the course of my relentless three-year write-a-thon.  I am artist enough to recognize patterns.  At least, I can recognize the big and obvious ones.  Okay, I admit it, sometimes, while thinking, I am really only pretending to think.  That makes me kinda like Harpo, doesn’t it?

I reread one of what I think are my best works just now because somebody viewed it online for some reason I will never know.  The essay is Toccata and Fugue in D Minor written on March 23rd of 2017.  In that essay, I compare a super-condensed version of my life story to Johan Sebastian Bach’s masterwork, one that is represented in Disney’s masterwork Fantasia. My thesis was basically, “Living…

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Cover Creation

My goal, as I learn how to be a better self-published author, is to do all my own artwork.  This is one of the advantages I have over working with the other publishers I have published books with.  Page Publishing, to be fair, did use my artwork.  But they also controlled the cover design (since that was what I was paying for).

Planning to publish two more novels this winter, I am working ahead to create effective covers.  So let me show you how I fumbled together a cover today.

Here are the artwork elements that I started with;

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I then put the elements together with a photo-editing program.

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I then added the finishing touches with the paint program.

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I can probably be satisfied with this result.  But I am a fickle artsy-fartsy type who will probably fuss it all up well before I actually use it.

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Reading Twain for a Lifetime

As I continue to read old books, I wish to re-post this as a reminder of my opinion about the best Old-Book writer I know.

authormbeyer's avatarCatch a Falling Star

mark-twain

I wish to leave no doubt unturned like a stone that might have treasure hidden under it.  I love the works of Samuel L. Clemens, better known as Mark Twain.

I have read and studied his writing for a lifetime, starting with The Adventures of Tom Sawyerwhich I read for myself in the seventh grade, after seeing the musical movie Tom Sawyer starring Johnny Whittaker as Tom.  I caught a severe passion, more serious than a head-cold, for the wit and wisdom with which Twain crafted a story.  It took me a while to acquire and read more… but I most definitely did.  I took an American Literature course in college that featured Twain, and I read and analyzed The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.  I also bought a copy of Pudd’nhead Wilson which I would later devour in the same thoroughly literate and pretentious manner as I…

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Marching Into the Sunrise

sunnyface

Life isn’t exactly fair.  After working hard at being a teacher for 31 years, I was forced to retire by poor health.

I have diabetes.  And I was told recently by medical professionals that if I have a heart attack, I probably won’t be able to feel it coming on.  Not much hope for surviving it when it comes.

Retirement for me has been a matter of diminishing returns.  Reduced income gradually led to hospital bills I couldn’t pay and predatory banks with toothy credit card deals forcing me into bankruptcy.  Now I can’t afford to pay rising property taxes on a house that is falling apart from foundation problems and old age.  So, in the near future, we will lose the house.

But I am not ready to give up and die just yet.  I still have stories to tell.  There are still people who care about me.   I still have the ability to tell a joke or two and make people either smile a little or cringe a little.  I have already published six good novels filled with a bit of humor and a lot of life.

Let tomorrow come.  I am ready.  Time to face it like a good soldier, marching forward, weapons at the ready.  Even if the bright sun is in my old eyes.

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A Character Reference

Humble Admission

Millis

 

 

Millis

He was once an ordinary pet rabbit, transformed through an accident involving a time-traveler’s alien-created mechanical carrot.

He is a character in;

The Bicycle-Wheel Genius

 

 

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       Mike Murphy and Blueberry Bates (his girlfriend)  (She forced me to write that last thing, Mike.)

Mike is a member of the Murphy clan who resides in Murphy Mansion with many other Murphys.  Blueberry is the girl who chased him until she caught him and turned him into her boyfriend.

Seen in the novels;

The Bicycle Wheel Genius

Magical Miss Morgan

Catch a Falling Star  (only Mike is in that one)  (He forced me to write that, Blue)

Val in the Yard

Valerie Clarke

Valerie is a young Iowan farmgirl who lost her father far too soon.  She loves skateboards, 80’s music, and boys, especially boys who can sing.

She is a main character in;

Snow Babies

Sing Sad Songs

She is also an important character in;

The Bicycle-Wheel Genius

 

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Sherry Cobble

Sherry and her twin sister, Shelly, look almost exactly alike.  They are, with both of their parents, practicing nudists.  They love being nude at home on the farm, at the Sunshine Club in Clear Lake, and at school when they can get away with it (which is mostly a matter of girls’ locker rooms.)

Sherry and her twin are important characters in;

Superchicken

     Recipes for Gingerbread Children

     The Baby Werewolf

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     Orben Wallace, bicycle engineer

Orben came to Norwall after a tragic fire in his home and laboratory killed his family.  He switched from physics to bicycle engineering and opened a new lab where it is rumored that he also created sentient robots, time travel machines, supercomputers, and had relationships with aliens and time travelers.  Of course the only physical proof of anything are the bicycles he made.

He is a main character in; The Bicycle-Wheel Genius

He is also an important character in; Catch a Falling Star

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Anneliese Stein

Anneliese is a gingerbread cookie brought back to life through magical baking skills of her human mother, Grandma Gretel Stein.  She was also a human girl in the 1930’s and early 1940’s who also had, unfortunately, a Jewish father.  Okay, I know… I will explain better later.

She is an important character in;

Recipes for Gingerbread Children

 

This will have to be finished another day.  I have too many more characters to show you, and my Internet is giving out.

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How To Avoid Dropping Dead Like a Dunderhead

I have recently been revisiting my obsession with Mark Twain. So, inevitably I had to re-post this old post and pretend it is good. I even edited it so that it no longer claims that Twain died before he was born. (I sometimes get my 8’s and 9’s mixed up.)

authormbeyer's avatarCatch a Falling Star

Pony party

If it is inevitable that I will surely drop dead some day, and if it is likely that it will come sooner rather than later, then I hope to go out with a bit of style and leave something behind that speaks not only to my own children, but to anybody searching for truth and beauty, people of the future that I will never know who are living beyond the confines of my little life.  What makes me think that I can do it?  Well, I’m a writer… and Mark Twain did it… and I don’t have to be vain or loopy or maniacal or delusional to make the same thing happen.

On this day one-hundred-and-five years ago, April 21, 1910, Mark Twain left the world of the living.  He caught a ride on Halley’s Comet (It deposited him on Earth in 1835, appearing in the sky when he was…

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Mark Twain

authormbeyer's avatarCatch a Falling Star

Mark TwainMark Twain, real name Samuel Clemens, is my hero. He lived a long and difficult life, but he lived it with grace and humor… most of the time…well, some of the time. I would very much like to be just like him… ‘cept I ain’t dead yet and have no plans on that score… but I would like to also be like him in having something important to say that can be said to somebody who isn’t even born yet, a hundred years or more from now, the way that Mark Twain spoke to me.

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September 20, 2018 · 2:07 am

The Surrealist

authormbeyer's avatarCatch a Falling Star

Yes, I admit it.  I am a Surrealist.  I also hope that it is not too terrible a thing to be.  Because I truly think that everyone who was raised by television, and lived through the revolution where computers took over human life, is one too.

definition from Merriam-Webster;

Simple Definition of surrealism;

a 20th-century art form in which an artist or writer combines unrelated images or events in a very strange and dreamlike way

Full Definition of surrealism;

the principles, ideals, or practice of producing fantastic or incongruous imagery or effects in art, literature, film, or theater by means of unnatural or irrational juxtapositions and combinations

  • rooster riding
  • There is a certain satisfaction to be had in knowing for certain how to define oneself.  I learned about Surrealism in high school art class back in the early 70’s.  I saw and admired the works of Salvador Dali, Rene Magritte, and…

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Things You Probably Ought to Know about Mickey

I reblogged this because the world needs more warnings about the incredible dangers we face in the near future. And also because I thought it was funny.

authormbeyer's avatarCatch a Falling Star

As Mickey’s go, the one who is writing this is a moderately interesting example of the breed.  Still, there are things you probably ought to be made aware of.  A sort of precautionary thing…

First of all, this particular Mickey is an Iowegian.  That means he comes from Iowa, the State where the tall corn grows.  It is a prime reason why his jokes are corny and his ears have been popped (oh, and he does actually have two, unlike the picture Paffooney where only one is showing).  His fur is not actually purple.  If anything now, it is mostly silver-gray.  But the Paffooney is a magical portrait, and purple is the color of magic.  He has a goofy, and sometimes fatal grin.  You may not be able to prove that he has ever actually grinned someone to death, but it is likely he could always dig somebody up.

Another…

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Butts and Nolts

Old posts contain old ideas… but sometimes they are still a little bit funny.

authormbeyer's avatarCatch a Falling Star

“Don’t you actually mean nuts and bolts?” someone is surely going to say.  Oh, yes, I misspelled that little item on purpose.  This is another inane post about the writing process and trying to improve my “brand” with my blog.  It is something I have no earthly idea how it works or how to go about it.  So I often have to go back and think about the nuts and bolts of how you put this stuff together and try like heck to figure out what I am doing wrong.

Dumb Luck Doofy Fuddbugg here is an example of what a “Nolt” is.

So, the problem is, while the blog as a whole has been gaining momentum, my blog traffic is down for this month.  People are not viewing and reading my actual stuff and nonsense as much as they were in the other months besides February.  So I have to…

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