Diary of a Mad Editor

And Now a Moment of Silence . . .

. . . for writers who died in 2008:

George MacDonald Fraser
Stephen Marlowe
Janwillem van de Wetering
Robin Moore
Arthur C. Clarke
Alain Robbe-Grillet
Marmoud Darwish
William F. Buckley Jr.
Gregory McDonald
Andrew Britton
Chingiz Aitmatov
Alexandr Solzhenitsyn
Robert Aspirin
Thomas M. Disch
Tony Hillerman
Algis Budrys
Phyllis Whitney
Oakely Hall
James Crumley
David Foster Wallace
William Wharton
Michael Crichton
Studs Terkel
Barrington J. Bayley
Robert Jordan
Harold Pinter
Donald Westlake
Hillary Waugh

This is by no means a complete list — just the ones I could think of.

I Resolve to Resolve These Resolutions

Okay . . . New Year’s Day is over — back to the subject of New Year’s Resolutions. My own resolutions for 2009 consist mainly of resolutions I didn’t keep in 2008, plus one new one that wasn’t an issue for me in January 2008, but is in January of 2009.

Of the stuff that I didn’t achieve in 2008, the most pressing has to be updating/redesigning all my websites including this blog. In theory, I can build my own websites from scratch, but haven’t actually done so in almost 3 years. During that time, I’ve been either relying on pre-made templates or making do with an old design. In 2006, things started to get away from me. My health situtation dominated most of my time and concern throughout 2006 and 2007 so I just didn’t maintain any of my websites. And, in 2008, despite my best intentions, I was too broke, too lazy and too distracted to do much upkeep so, again, nothing got done. In 2009, I really want to change that. The problem with using pre-made templates designed by someone else is that they don’t really meet a publisher’s needs 100% because they aren’t specifically designed for you. I’m not saying that I’ll stop using templates altogether because I have a bunch of websites and I don’t have the time to redesign all of them from scratch, but a few of them need some tender loving care that only a complete and personal overhaul can solve. I can’t say I’m not intimidated by this. I don’t consider myself to be a great web designer. I’m completely self-taught. I’ve learned things through trial and error (mostly error) over the last decade and the thought of spending hours and hours working with source code when I’d rather be writing other things bugs the shit out of me. On the other hand, being as it would likely cost me between $1500-$2000 to hire someone to design just one website/blog (and with me being broke and in debt with an army of empty suits demanding their pound of flesh) my only option besides using templates is to do it myself. And really, it’s true, the only way to get things done the exact way you want them is to do it yourself.

The second big resolution is to submit more of my own writing to publishers. I submitted very little of my writing in 2008. This blog has taken up a lot of my time lately. It’s not that I haven’t written other things. I have. I just haven’t gone to much effort, once I’ve written them, to see that someone publishes them. There’s only so many hours in a day to write, write this blog, promote this blog, read stuff submitted to me by others, partake in the endless cycle of sleep/eat/shit/etc. — who has time to research markets and target submissions hither and yon? It’d be great if I could make submissions telepathically. That’d be a real time saver (although, I suspect, those same bastards who don’t accept email submissions probably wouldn’t be too keen on telepathy, ya think?).

The third big thing to address is my weight (no pun intended). A year ago, gaining weight was one of my New Year’s Resolutions for 2008. After cancer, treatments for cancer and going for so long without being able to eat solid food, I looked like a concentration camp survivor. Last year, I was, therefore, on a 3500 calorie a day, high protein diet. Unfortunately, once I got back to my normal wight in June 2008, I just couldn’t stop eating (and I don’t even want to tell you about all the crap I was eating during the holidays!). So, my resolution for 2009 is to lose weight. One of my Christmas gifts was a gym membership (a hint and a half for my fat ass, I guess) and I resolve to use it.

There you have it: my resolutions for 2008: 1) redesign websites 2) make more effort to get writing published 3) lost weight

Pretty simple and straight forward. No impossible superhuman multi-page list signed in blood this year. Just something plausible. My lazy, dumb ass’s fault if I don’t even manage one of these items.

Wrapping Up 2008: The 12 Best Posts of the Year

I certainly hope all you kiddies had a lovely holiday, and I wish you all a splendid New Year’s Day (really and truly. I’m being perfectly serious). Anyway, since the end of the year is a time of reflection and renewal, it’s as fitting time as any for our second annual recap of what was considered, based upon feedback from comments and emails, to be the best of this blogs posts during this past year:

OO Mary Sue, Whatever Are We Going to Do With You?

Short Stories Live Forever, It’s Only the Writers Who Die Slow, Agonizing Deaths

If It Ain’t Broke, Don’t Fix It or, Who the Hell is Shawn Bentley and Why Should We Give a Fuck?

He Must’ve Been Unconscious

Sometimes Talking to a Wannabe Poet Makes Me Feel Like a Dumb Polack

I Can Teach You to Write a Book in 24Hrs

5 Little Words That Guarantee Your Publishing Success

I don’t Know Nuthin’ ‘Bout No Writin’

I Can Teach You How to Write in 3 Little Words

He Must’ve Written His Story in Crayon

He Says He Was Only Joking, but I’m Thinking He’s Just a Joke

Revenge of the Troglodytes