I celebrate my birthday today, but I want to give two lucky people a present!
I am giving away two of these wonderful wooden bookmarks:
My friend Amber DeLouis of The Wandering Woodcraft (https://www.hippiegirlcollection.com/) made them for me. They make great gifts and are awesome bookmarks for all types of books.
It’s safe to say that I love mysteries. And that applies to reading them as well as writing them. In fact, my love of the genre, and the impetus for writing mystery novels stems from my love of reading mystery books.
A decade ago, I learned of the Big Book Series of books that were edited and curated by Otto Penzler, who is an editor of mystery fiction, and proprietor of The Mysterious Bookshop in New York City.
He published a book called the Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, combining one of my favorite genres with my favorite holiday.
It took me another two years to find it. Online ordering wasn’t as prevalent as it was today, and frankly, I was impatient. It was also backordered at the time I tried to order it, which was right after the Fourth of July.
I got my hands on it right after Thanksgiving in 2014 and immediately dove into it. The book contained stories by prominent authors, including Agatha Christie and Max Allan Collins.
It it a big tome as well, clocking in at 600+ pages. And the text is small, which means they pack about 40-50 page short story into a dozen pages. With that big a book, I knew that I wasn’t going to read it all in one Christmas season. I took three years to get halfway through the book.
When I moved in 2019, I took my big library (for my apartment, anyway) with me. Michelle already had a library, and she made room for me. I really appreciated that, given how many books I had.
As you can see, I have quite a lot of books. And I bought more as well.
Time passed, COVID happened, and I forgot I even had it. Until this summer, when I read about Otto Penzler online, and remembered I had the book (he doesn’t have a name that’s easy to forget).
Only problem was, I couldn’t find it. I ripped through the shelves looking for it (the above picture on the right is my shelf). I couldn’t find it. Did I lose it? Did it not make the move to my home? I had no idea.
I had given up on finding and forgot all about it as summer moved on and life kept moving.
Fast forward two weeks ago. We’re moving things around in the library and I dropped something on the floor and it partially moved under the bottom shelf (there’s about a foot of space under it). I laid down to pick it up and saw something else down there: The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries!
And as it had it, I was almost done with my latest book, which I finished this past Sunday. And with tomorrow commencing the Christmas season, I have a chance to read it!
I celebrate Christmas until the 12 days are done, which is January 4th, so I’ll have plenty of time to knock out the remaining half of the book. That is just as exciting as solving the Christmas Mystery.
Halloween is over and as the calendar is now in November, people all over social media are bragging about putting up their Christmas trees already. There was a Christmas commercial for a cell phone out before Halloween.
Hell, my local Lowe’s had their Christmas stuff out before October 1st.
I saw a few TikTok videos that went something like “Thanksgiviiiing? I’ll shut the tree off for one day, but as soon as the pumpkin pie is gone, that bitch is lighting back up!”
I know that to worship at the altar of money requires an offering of pushing Christmas well before Halloween, but I think that is too much.
Don’t get me wrong, I love Christmas just as much as the next Yuletide fan (I keep Christmas going until January 4, when it actually ends) but not at the expense of Turkey Day.
Granted, I have a closer connection to it than most, with my birthday around it, and a familial connection to the Mayflower, but after thinking on it I believe it comes down to something else that is very prevalent today, and it can be summed up, of course, in one of my favorite films.
In the middle of the greatest sequel ever made, Luke Skywalker lands on Dagobah and finds Yoda. As he’s trying to justify himself for Jedi training, Yoda lays this piece of wisdom down: “This one a long time have I watched. All his life has he looked away, to the future, to the horizon. Never his mind on where he was, hmm? What he was doing.”
To me, that perfectly encapsulates the holidays and, to a different extent, what our society is. Looking ahead to the next big thing: the next car, next phone, next house.
As I mature (in years, at least), I find myself being more in the moment than I have in the past. A lot of that stems from my partner, who makes me want to savor those moments as they happen, as well as my children, who are getting older and the moments I have on a regular basis will be fewer as a result.
In the past, I’d spend times worrying about future or past events instead of enjoying the occasion I was in. And looking back, I am bummed I wasn’t fully present.
So while the holidays are magical and should be celebrated to the fullest – to the end of the holiday, not in the middle of it – we shouldn’t look past Thanksgiving. It’s a time for family (birth or chosen), food, fun and celebrating our blessings. Why overlook that? Why not enjoy every extra moment you have with your loved ones?
Not to mention football, if that’s your thing.
Life goes by so fast, and it goes faster if one constantly looks ahead, never on his mind on where one is. Not only does it hinder your ability to be a Jedi Knight, but you miss out on good times in life.
Speaking of holidays and gifts, while I celebrate my birthday this month, I want to give you a gift! For the rest of this month, my books are only $11.26. You can get them here!
I cannot remember where my love of beer started. It was not the first adult beverage I was exposed to, but living 4 blocks from my town’s craft brewery cemented by love for the frosty beverage.
My appreciate and enjoyment of beer grew when I took a job in the beer business with the top US company that produces draught beer equipment. I was a sales rep that covered the territory of Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire and West Virginia. No, that isn’t a typo, they were all of similar market size, so they were all one territory (Fun fact: At one point, West Virginia had 16 Budweiser Distributors, 4 alone in Morgantown, home of WVU. They were one of the first institutions of higher learning to allow beer sales at college football games).
Part of my duties were to arrange for draught beer 101 sessions in my territories for 1-2 weeks per year. I would visit my customers and one of my training staff colleagues would put on a class. In turn, I got to sample a lot of great beer. Not only did I love beer, but a lot of the offerings in New England are not available in PA (some of that is due to our VERY backward liquor laws, but that’s another blog post).
About three years in, I learned about Bissell Brothers Brewing. On my next trip to Maine, I met one of their top employees, Seth Vigue, at their first brewery, which was in a strip mall-style industrial park just outside of Portland, Maine. We helped them with draught issues, some parts orders and they sent down staff to attend our three day intensive draught school at our office.
I made my next trip to Maine about seven years ago and they had moved into a new facility in Thompson’s Point, an entertainment venue just outside the city of Portland. And in the midst of a tour of the facility, I learned two awesome things: first, they are fans of Tottenham Hotspur F.C. (English Football Team).
The exterior of the brewery at Thompson’s Point
Bissell Bros Tasting Room – courtesy Landry French Construction
Second, I was introduced to their flagship beer: The Substance.
I took one sip, and after tasting well over one hundred different beer, I fell in love.
This amazing beverage has hazy golden color with a thin white head. The aroma is balanced between tropical fruit with some wheat or oats in the mix I think() that makes for a smooth mouthfeel and softens the landing on the palate overall.
The biggest shock to me is that this is considered an IPA. And I do not like IPAs. Unlike a lot of beers, which have a citrus or wheat type taste – at least the ones I like – IPAs tend to be bitter. The more hops they have, the more bitter the taste.
It is a great beer and I get it every time I am in Maine, which is the only place I could get it, as they only distribute in their home state.
Fast forward to 2019, and I left that company for my current situation. I am very happy I made the move for many reasons, and it turned out the timing was great – they revamped the company and eliminated my positions two weeks after I left.
That means that it’s been almost five years since I last had The Substance.
Cut to August. Michelle and I earned a trip to Boston for our work in 2022, and we went. Our friends live near Portland and we made arrangements to visit them over the weekend after our Boston trip.
We had a sweet Chevy Malibu rental car in Boston and drove almost two hours to our friends’ home in Saco. We had a great time eating pizza from their home wood-fired pizza oven and playing board games. And we made plans to go to Bissell Brothers Saturday for lunch.
The area around Thompson’s point changed a little bit – they had a children’s theater and some of the building occupants changed. This included Bissell Brothers, who took the adjoining building and made another tasting room.
And, for the first time in five long years, I enjoyed two pints of The Substance. It was just as good and smooth as I remembered. It was such a great experience having my favorite beer again. And I was determined not to wait another five years.
I wouldn’t.
To that end, Michelle and I had discussed cancelling our flight home from Portland and driving back. That morning, we confirmed that we would drive home, making stops along the way.
This also allowed me to transport The Substance back home. Two cases, to be exact. Our friends allowed me to borrow two cooler bags and ice packs to keep it cold.
And I got another welcome surprise – Bissell Bros is expanding, and they have it in Philly and just outside DC!
So when the two cases I have are gone, I won’t have to wait another five years to drink it again.
But for now, I am enjoying my favorite beer in my home, and am thankful for the great memories I made during the trip.
The most common question I’ve been asked lately is “How do you have time to write?”
I’m not as prolific as I’d like to be, as I have a full-time job with a lot of responsibility, plus I am a dad as well (though my kids are older), so I can sympathize with writers who have to raise kids, do household chores and other things that command as much attention as writing.
There are those out there that will share ‘hard truths’ about what you need to do in order to write, but I’m not going to share that, because I find it negative.
I will say I don’t have any crazy secret, no alchemy that I perform to get my writing done (though alchemy is cool). I don’t write every day, and on some days that I am able write, it’s devoted to newsletters, marketing copy and my blog. I also write screenplays, which is a totally different animal altogether and requires a different skill set.
But I think my secret is simple, but not easy, and I truly believe that everyone can do it.
What is it?
I commit to 250 words a day.
Why 250?
A printed page of a book is roughly 250 words. I forget where I heard that, and while it doesn’t apply to every book out there, it’s a standard I’ve aimed for and used as a guide since I began writing. I know (on days when I write), that I can write 250 words.
A page a day.
I can hit that goal. And extrapolating that out, if you write 1 page a day for a year, you have a 365-page book.
Like I said, simple. I won’t claim it’s easy because it’s not and I will add three caveats to that.
First of all, I don’t edit as a I go (which I know a lot of authors do). There is time to edit later. You need words to edit, so getting them on the page is paramount.
Second, I am not a discovery writer. I have (some of semblance of) an outline I work with for every book. I don’t necessarily know every story beat, but I always know my ending, a fully formed scene often near the beginning of the story, and the midpoint. I have those for every story I write, in any medium.
The final caveat is I am referring to writing the book itself. Coming up with the plot, characters and my outline is not a hard-and-fast process. Some days, these things flow out of me like water out of a ruptured dam, and others, I may only get a two-sentence paragraph. I don’t feel – unless you’re on deadline – that you can rush and force this.
So that’s it. Commit to a page a day. It may take awhile at first, but the more you do it, the faster it will go. And I tend to get more than a page done during most of my writing sessions. But I commit to a page.
For my fellow writers: what do you think about this? Can you commit to this simple goal? I’d love to hear your thoughts below!
