From the Depths of the Unknown

Emerges an Indie Writer & Book Publisher

It's All Back On with It's All Over Now

It's hard to believe that it has been nearly two whole years since the last time I wrote anything on this blog.

A lot has happened in my life and in the world since the last time I did in November 2020 but one thing that has not happened is me publishing anything. In fact, it has now been over four years since the last time that I committed anything to print. I suppose that's why my last few blog posts (when I was still doing them) had more to do with what was happening in the world at the time. Or whatever random bullshit that spewed out of my mind and found a home on this site. Let's be honest that there has been a fair amount of that over years as well. I am not ashamed of it. In fact, the sheer amount of random bullshit is kind of a point of pride for me.

Lately, I will be honest, my efforts to keep up with these things have been pretty minimal. I even considered (for a very short time) taking an indefinite break from writing. Thankfully, that thought did not stay in my mind for very long. At least not while I have ideas, and I always have ideas. At least, I have so far. This is just the pace that works for me, I suppose. Rest assured, I am living my life thoroughly between in the silences.

I do hope to do more writing on this blog again, but we'll see what happens. I need to knock some cobwebs off -- even though I do plenty of writing for work. That is just not the same thing, though. Sometimes, I still work on short stories, poems, and songs -- everything just takes longer nowadays. I need to do this type of writing occasionally for my soul (if that's a thing), and blogging usually scratches that itch in just the right way if the others things don't or I need to feel inspired, because for some reason blogging about them usually inspires me to work on those other things more.

Also, because I do slowly-but-surely work on the above-mentioned things, I do sometimes have something new to announce -- even if it might seem like it has been a while since the last update. Maybe it has been a while. Okay, it has. Today I actually break my unintional period of silence to write about a couple of developments, publishing-wise.

First, I am still working on my short fiction collection, Xennial. Basically, there are ten stories, and one needs to be finished, then all five of the new ones need to be thoroughly edited and rewritten, then everything needs to be copyedited and proofread. To be honest, a big part of the delay is that these stories aren't particularly timely and I have been working on this collection for what seems like forever so I am kind of burnt out on it. It is pretty much just some 30-something navel-gazing about a time in his life in his twenties that has long since passed. I am definitely going to finish it and publish it, but I am not setting a firm date on it until I am more done with it. It will probably be 2023 or later before it finally goes out. So that will make it a 40-something navel-gazing about a time in his life in his twenties that has been even longer since it passed. That's fine. I have already been working on it for like 12 years, what is another 1-2?

Second, I am focused on publishing a different, albeit much shorter, four-story short fiction collection called It's All Over Now. A bit fatalistic, I know, but it's fitting. See the Gott Press Home Page for a bit longer of a description of it. I am pretty excited to release this collection, which I hope to do in time for the 2022 holiday shopping season. It will definitely take some work on my part. I have to really thoroughly edit and rewrite a couple of these, and then copyedit and proofread all of them, but it's much more doable by the end of 2022 than the other collection. Plus, these stories are a bit more timely. I also have to do all of the cover art and design work for it, but that's not too bad. That part of it is actually pretty fun. I just have to figure out how I want to go about it this time. That is harder, but I do have a few ideas already.

That's okay. I have time to figure that out, because I need to focus on actually finishing it first before I can really safely start that. I actually have a deadline to finish it though (more to come on this soon), so that motivates me to think about it and work on it, and gives me a justifiable reason to complete it other than I just enjoy doing it.

You wouldn't think that it makes a difference but sometimes it just does. Let's see how it goes. Hopefully, more to come soon.

Some Election Day Musings

It's nice to believe that a hero is going to step in and save us all from our collective suffering, but the reality is that hero doesn't exist. It's a myth we've created to help ease our suffering as we all go through the events of our lives--a fantasy, a lullaby.

For some reason, the increase in suffering only seems to magnify that belief in a benevolent savior out their just watching over the collective and keeping us safe from, ostensibly, each other, and maybe the occasional natural disaster--although, many of what we call those today are actually also man-made or at least made worse by man, like Fukushima or the earthquakes caused by fracking and mining, but that is neither here nor there if someone is just going to come along and make it right at some point when it gets bad enough.

Aside from the damage we do to our planet in the name of convenience and progress, most of the time the reasons for the things that actually cause our sufferings are a result of decisions we've made in our individual lives and because of actions we've taken or not taken. If you knowingly do something wrong and do it anyway, and then suffer the consequences of that, it is one thing, that is on you; however, it is entirely another thing when you do something you have been led to believe is the right thing but then have to find out the hard way that it is decidedly not. For a subset of people, that seems to happen more often than it does for others, so maybe some things that we see are universal truths just aren't. How much of what we know and believe is actually just conditioned into us by other seriously flawed individuals, and maybe our own gut instincts are just wrong because of this?

Maybe some people just continue to follow the same path and make the same mistakes repeatedly, likely just repeating the same patterns of mistakes our parents made, is because what we call our instincts about what is right and good in the world are actually just some persons' opinions that have been bred into us through some generational societal Pavlovian experiment, and the keepers of the experiment today are operating in bad faith. These opinions and behaviors are being forced onto us so we just go along with what works best for the benefactors of this experiment, these fascist power-hungry individuals who have such little faith in other human beings that they feel the need to make everyone else battle each other and suffer so they can stay at the top. The Trickle-Down theory is nothing more than a pyramid scheme.

However, I don't think it has to be that way. We don't have to keep falling for the con.

Our relationships with the world and to each other don't have to be so fraught with violence and just this generational cloud of negativity that hangs over and brings us all down and pits us against each other. Life doesn't have to be a competition, or maybe we can just reframe the competition aspect to what it truly is, us collectively struggling against the limitations of the natural world, the effects of what we've done to it that are now irreversible, and the universe at large.

While it's important to keep the things from the past that work well, an inherent part of the American experiment is that the idea can be altered to fit what the moment demands a necessity, and this ambiguity could either be its biggest strength or its worst weakness, but if the changes are made to truly ensure that society is protected--even from itself--that's when it's working at its best. Being adaptable when new evidence presents itself is one of the fundamental principles of the enlightenment and also just science, in general. The constitution was never meant to be a be-all-end-all. The evidence of that? The Bill of Rights. A built-in way to amend it.

Maybe we just need to start by being more adaptable, in general, as individuals, more amenable to change when new evidence presents itself. There is nothing wrong with admitting that you've been wrong about something, and changing yourself to improve your situation. That's how we grow. 

Our biggest mistake as a society was thinking of ourselves as the best. And because we're the best, everything we do is the best That is an arrogant way of looking at the world. We stopped striving for actual greatness because we stopped to pat ourselves on the back for too long. We decided that we were the chosen ones, and fuck the rest of the world. We were the direct recipients of all the light and glory, but we didn't take into account that when the sun was setting here it was rising somewhere else.

It's highly unlikely that anyone is going to come along and save the day; in fact, this is usually when someone much worse takes control and takes society down an even darker path because these types of people are good at convincing enough others that they are the savior they've all been waiting on. But hey, maybe there is a certain point where the lessons of the past need to be repeated to save future generations. The problem with that is there might not be any future generations if this thing gets bad enough. The doomsday clock has never been this close to midnight.

Rather than nuclear war, nowadays, the biggest threat: scientists are saying that we are at the beginning of a mass extinction event. It even has a name, Anthropocene, and it's called that because it's largely what we Anthropos are doing to the environment that is causing it. It doesn't have to be that way but it certainly can go that way and it's looking more and more like it will. 

Maybe entropy is the fundamental law of the universe. Maybe it's too late. Maybe no matter what we do at this point, it won't matter. 

It certainly won't if we take up that mentality. It's a flawed way of thinking about it. Maybe I was wrong when I said that heroes don't exist. Maybe instead we collectively are the heroes of our own stories. If anyone can affect a lasting and impactful change, it's us. We should be saying that it won't matter unless we do something now. What that is, I have no idea, but I think one step in the right direction is to elect more responsible leaders, and by responsible, I mean a sense of responsibility to society and not just to themselves. That is what should matter over any party affiliation.

If only we could collectively agree on that.

Fighting the Good Fight

The problem with protesting or "rioting," as it often gets labeled, is that no matter how just the cause, it almost always leads to violence, and fascists aren't known for fighting fairly. Just ask anyone who witnessed the events at Kent State or Jackson State in May 1970. My fear is that something similar, or worse, is going to happen next. I fully support the cause of the demonstrators, and I mean the real activists, not the right wing agitators.

Before I continue, I think it's important for me to say, no matter how obvious you think it might be: No one deserves to die like George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, or any of the countless others before them. No one. They were murdered.

That's why there is a lot of anger and resentment from their communities, and the countless others, and why it is completely justified. It's not like these men and women that keep getting shot, beaten, strangled, or whatever, by state-sanctioned "officers of the peace" want to be martyrs. I am sure they would have much preferred to keep on living their lives, but unfortunately, they did not get that choice.

The purpose of the police, and the military, and indeed the entire government at all levels, is to act on behalf of the people and protect the social contract, which guarantees the rights of all citizens, not just a select few billionaires. There shouldn't be varying levels of rights for you depending on who you are, how much money you have, or what you look like, but that is the way it seems to work.

It is my understanding that the Defund the Police movement intends to do just that, not to eliminate the police, but to transform the forces in all communities to perform this intended function of acting on behalf of the people and not to act as a standing army as they seem to be becoming with all of the military weapons and body armor and whatnot, to help the good officers weed out the bad ones, and to make sure the bad ones are held responsible for the bad things that they do. Police should be representative of the communities where they serve and should be protecting them and not putting them in more danger, but unfortunately, for some people, that is exactly what police do, and you have to wonder, if it's not their race, then what is it that connects them?

Further, how many more people have to die before real reform will actually happen? Everyone deserves the same rights, which according to the Declaration of Independence, are inalienable. Of course, at the time that was written, many of the founding fathers only included white, landowning men in that statement, but, you know... That's a detail that even the most well-intentioned among us often overlook.

When I see people complaining about the "rioters" especially poor white people (who have been victimized plenty throughout the centuries--just ask the Irish) I know, for most of them, it's because they are missing the point. Not that ignorance is really excusable anymore due to technology, but... A lot of the willfulness of their ignorance stems from the propaganda they have been force-fed for decades to distrust academic institutions, the humanities, and the news media. In order to truly change those who are able to be changed, we first need to unplug them all from the umbilical of this propaganda machine and dismantle it once piece at a time.

The people complaining about the protesters who aren't missing the point, those folks constantly speaking in dog whistles and coded language, who seek to keep stirring the pot and distracting everyone from what's really going on, those are the people who need to be revealed to the public, who need to be prevented from causing the harm they are wreaking on our society.

At least (at least among my peers and the people I'm connected with through social media) most agree that the killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor were wrong, so that gives me a little hope. Not much, but a little. That said, there is still a long, long way to go.

The problem with that is it might be too late.

A Dreamy, Breezy Post about Sunshine & Rainbows & Shit

Or, What I Do in My Basement is Wholesome so Fuck You

[Sorry, I don't Mean to Sound So Defensive, I Just have to Keep My Online Persona Consistent As to Not Draw Any Attention to the Fact that I Might be a Dynamic Human Being Capable of More than One Trance-like Emotional State]

There's not many better feelings than driving through the countryside on a sunny day, the brightness carefully suppressed from damaging my eyeballs by my Bob Dylan shades, stretches of trees and farmland flashing past on either side, the windows down, a cool almost moist breeze wrapping it's invisible scarves around me and through the cabin of my car, the sun-bleached asphalt unwinding ahead, with music blasting, me singing out at the top of my lungs--

That's one thing I need to do more, but I have nowhere really to go right now. Of course, I would also have to wait for a nice day. That might be a while, at the rate things are going. I mean, I could drive somewhere just to drive--just to leave the house. Get some fresh air.

There is something to be said about driving around on a gloomy day, too: the window cracked, the fresh drops filling my nostrils with their perfume, listening to the Allman Brothers Idlewild South, the slow slosh of the windshield wipers--back in my twenties I would have had a cigarette, the menthol and tobacco wafting with the rain scent creating a sort of intoxicating potpourri.

This weekend has been more like winter than early May, though, and the only thing fun about driving around in winter is driving at night when the snow is blowing, an X-Wing Pilot flying through hyperspace. "This is Red Leader..." As fun as that is, I am not in the mood.

That's Ohio for you, I suppose. Instead of going on a drive, I have barely left the basement. I have spent a long, seemingly endless amount of time down here, re-arranging my shit--getting my organ bench from the garage, sitting my trunk on it and using the combined structure as a table for my synth and my drum machine, and moving my guitars and drum set around to make it all work. This might actually be my favorite basement setup yet.

This space really works really well as a one-man recording operation (and maybe eventually for live-streaming) but it would only be conducive for a full band if it was like a three piece or four piece, max. Four piece might be stretching it, actually. It would definitely be loud and sweaty... Gross. No, I like the idea of doing a one-man band thing, and I like the idea of being a member of a band, but I wouldn't want that band to actually practice here after we gain more members than my brother and me.

We'll see. We really just even need to actually practice more than once or twice to really be considered a thing. I mean, what else have we got going on?

One thing as a musician that I strive to do, really as an artist, in general--because actually this is also kind of the essence of writing fiction--is take my audience to a specific time and place, and fusing these two disparate media together can help make it even more real, more present... And it has been a dream of mine to do for a long time.

I did kind of a proto-version of it with my novel, Escapes, creating a playlist on Spotify that covers music mentioned in or relating to the story. I am listening to that now, actually. It has a weird mixture of jazz, rock, punk, alternative, metal, and pop, as the story covers a lot of territory musically.

With my upcoming short story collection, Asshole Years, I would like to take that idea of combining music and reading to the next level. After I finish editing and proofreading it, the collection will go into production and I can set a firm release date. While that's taking place, I will start working on an accompanying soundtrack--think Pink Floyd but with a noise punk-alternative-new wave edge.

That's really why I got an analog synth. To add to the space rock-psychedelic ambient flavor of my sound. When I used to perform regularly, I would often get compared to Syd Barrett or Pink Floyd. I don't know if that's actually true, but that's what audience members (and totally different people) have told me after performances, on more than one occasion. Anyways, I plan to start composing the new, mostly instrumental songs for the collection soon, and I will include a download code or something with the book, and really lean into that.

And actually, to tie it all together with a neat little bow, driving around seemingly aimlessly is one theme that does carry through the collection, somewhat. I guess it's good that I'm in that frame of mind. Maybe I need to go on a road trip for the inspiration.

If the goddamn weather ever cooperates long enough.

30-Something Navel Gazing At My Navel-gaziest (And 13 Other Reasons Why Smooth is Better than Crunchy)

Sometimes, I feel compelled to write about politics, but then I question that urge, and ask myself if I really want to be another voice in the echo chamber. The problem with so many people feeling their opinions are valid just because they have them has kind of made holding any opinion seem absurd. But hey, you know where the US is ranked in education.

If I hold any particular political viewpoint--and it's sad that this is in fact looked at as a political viewpoint--it's that the humanities are important and provide something vital that you can't really get through facts and figures alone, unless you're truly looking at the macro. It's the humanities that help people to build empathy through the experiences of others, to get anyone to look at the macro in the first place.

It is more evident than ever that we need the humanities in our everyday lives, because not enough people are focusing on the bigger picture and how they affect it, and many seem to have a difficult time recognizing that we, as a collective of individuals, have become overly narcissistic and that it is seriously damaging our society. After all, if Donald Trump represents anything, it's narcissism more than anything else. I look around me, and look into myself, really deeply, and I come to the conclusion that too many people have stopped listening, myself too, to some extent, because they are focusing so hard on shouting out into the abyss, to the detriment of everything else in their lives. Listening, and really, actively paying attention to what's happening around you instead of hyper-focusing on what other people think about how you think about things is important and something that we often forget to do.

But maybe nuance really is dead, and we are really living in a post-nuance universe.

After all, it does seem like everything has to be a bold bright explosion of sensory overload navel gazing narcissistic masturbating pile of maggot infested horse shit, which let's be honest, is necessary to view in 4K, in order for people to pay attention. The maggots just don't seem real enough with less definition.

I am pretty sure this is what Ray Bradbury in the 50s, Kurt Vonnegut in the 60s, DEVO in the 70s, William Gibson in the 80s, Chuck Palahniuk in the 90s and Radiohead in the 2000s were all talking about in their own way, and I hope I am adding in my own small way to that conversation, because it's more relevant than ever.

As an aside, I recognize that those are just a few examples from a nearly infinite number that I could have chosen, and that there are probably many that I am even unaware of that might be better examples, but these are all ones that spoke to me in some way.

Anyways, as a Xennial, I grew up in the age when the public internet was in its infancy, before it was quite so universally accessible, and the speeds weren't really fast enough to do any significant computing, so it was easy to look out into the universe wearing major blinders, but not hard to avoid if you were open to finding things you weren't expecting. True, you had to be looking for something in order to find it, but you also had to be open to understanding it if what you found contradicted your viewpoint. That doesn't mean you had to change your viewpoint, but you had to at least question it. And you had to be looking. You didn't have to accept anything as a hard-fast rule, but the fundamental rule still remained the same. Look...

Fast-forward to today: the idea that this and others of the old rules also still apply, that you're not always right and it's a good thing to censor yourself sometimes, has gotten lost in the abyss--just look at the chatter on Facebook or Twitter on any typical day and you'll see what I mean. Of course, these rules are all interrelated.

By the way, the point of being anti-censorship and promoting freedom of speech isn't that censorship itself is wrong, it's more based on the enlightenment principle that censorship is only reasonable when it is self-governed, and you develop the ability to understand right and wrong from learning, and thus avoid making mistakes from understanding them through the experiences of others. Hence, it's okay and actually really important sometimes to withhold saying something if you're not really adding value to the conversation. True, sometimes the only value that something has is the contribution itself, but I suppose that's something you have to take the time for yourself to decide too, and that maybe, even if you decided to do something once and think something once, it does not mean that you can't change your mind when you get new information that changes your understanding of the thing.

Everyone just needs to take their fingers off the triggers and back down little, or a lot, even, and really stop and think about things, and start paying attention to what is really happening. Just because you have the ability to share your feelings instantly for the entire mega-verse to see, maybe a little filtering isn't a bad thing sometimes, or maybe even more often than not, it is a really good thing, and it's okay to think things through a little before reacting to something.

That's another thing the humanities can do, if you let them: they can help you develop a little emotional intelligence. Emotions are primal but trainable, if you take the time to question yourself a little and be willingly to admit that sometimes you have bad ideas and that it's good to learn from others, you will be better off. Can I just say here, yay multi-culturalism! And I am not sorry if that offends you because fuck you.

I know I can be guilty of being ignorant sometimes too, and it's safe to say that I have had plenty of bad ideas over the years, and many of them involved alcohol, but that's neither here nor there. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying that I am better or worse than anyone, but I am saying that I try to hold myself to higher standards than what my actual nature sometimes wants me to, and that's a good thing.

Also, it is not my intention to be lecturing anyone, but take what I am saying for what it is, nothing more, nothing less. Maybe you agree, maybe you don't, and I am open for a real, intellectual debate about it, but other than that. I am right and you are wrong, so, as they said it in The Midnight Gospel, put that butt plug in the asshole of your universe.

Music That Kicks My Ass and Other Three, Four and Five-Letter Words

Today's blog post is brought to you by the schwa and 40 oz bottles of Miller High Life. I plan to spend the better part of today figuring out how to play the guitar solo in the Kingsman classic version of "Louie Louie" because to be quite frank, it's about goddamn time.

By the way. I also really love the original, the Richard Berry and the Pharaohs version, and the Toots and the Maytals version is also high up there. Joan Jett and the Blackhearts? Hell yes! That version slaps too, as the kids say. I wonder, did the Ramones ever cover it?

Unfortunately, it does not seem like The Ramones covered  "Louie Louie" (that I could find in a 30 second Google search) but, of course, if they did, it would probably kick ass!

Anyways, I am getting a bit off topic, or least on a different tangent about the same topic, and I do really want to talk about this guitar solo. As a self-proclaimed "Louie Louie" super fan and someone who's been playing guitar for roughly...25 years...Jesus...I feel a great amount of shame that I don't already know the entire Kingsmen version by heart. The rest of the song, of course, is a cake walk. I am determined this time around to get it, though. Give me a few years and I will get a bar band together that will play nothing but EVERY goddamn version of the song I can find.

This solo, when I have attempted to biff my way through it before, like what ends up happening most of the time that I attempt to learn someone else's song, I always end up jamming on my own thing. Call it a habit or call it a curse. I'll let you decide. I guess that's probably why my guitar playing has never gotten real complex. I have learned a bunch of catchy riffs but never the complete song unless it's just straight chords. I have also learned scales and chords and shit, but the best way to learn how to apply the theory is by learning to play songs...Naturally...And I have never really really done that on a serious level.

Giving up on learning it is not an option this time, though. And I am going back to other songs learn them in entirety, as well. I am hoping by the time this whole epidemic things is over, I will come out of it a better guitarist (and a better drummer too...but that is a whole different blog post).

It's taking a while to get to a point where I am ready to record, and that's okay, but I hope to start before the end of the year, and I think that timeline is totally reasonable at this point. I might tide myself over by getting out the old drum machine and throwing something fun together for old time's sake.

At least I don't need to work a whole lot on my bass playing to get into recording shape. That will more be a matter of coming up with the bass lines, and that I usually just improvise because that's what works well for me, I think.

Anyways, what it all comes down to is that I am going to use this time I am stuck inside to create something to listen to, hopefully. We'll see. I will certainly give it the old college try.

On that note, I have some jamming to accomplish. See all you crazy folks on the other side!

Rambling Nonsensical Post MCMXXXIII: Dead and Loving It Part Deux, Still Pretty Fucking Dead

Chapter One Section 3 Paragraphs 11-34

Might as well do another one. I mean, I'm on vacation, and I can't go anywhere, and I don't have a shortage of possible topics, so I suppose, let's do them shits.

I suppose there's probably one topic in particular that some folks would like to see addressed, but I hesitate for one reason and one reason alone. I just don't like eggnog.

Honestly, I am not sure how to talk about a topic that is already pretty well beat to death. Should I continue to take the more escapist route, though? Is that responsible of me? Do I need to be responsible? Can't I just play it safe, and do something unrelated but unquestionably still related, but more so as a subtext?

I mean, it's a subtext that no one can really escape at this point, anyways, so really, anything I write will somehow relate to it whether I want it to or not, even if the very nature of its relation is the unrelatedness of it... So I guess I might as well just discuss it.

It's amazing how something invisible to the eye can just change everyone's lives overnight, basically. It's no wonder that before science, people used to believe in magic. Hell, some people still do. It's amazing what ways the mind can twist itself to avoid the cold, hard naked truth, even if we're barreling our way towards a total systems collapse. Maybe.

I do hope everyone is staying as safe as possible given whatever circumstances they find themselves in. I do count myself as lucky. I mean, it's not really luck, because I did work hard to put myself here. Still, I did win the genetic lottery, to a large extent, being a cis-gender white male in the by-god greatest goddamn country anyone in the goddamn rest of the goddamn world has ever goddamn seen. Hoo-Rah!!!

However, when you're poor, if the virus doesn't kill you, then maybe poverty finally will. You finally run out of the means necessary to take care of yourself, or maybe your means doesn't necessarily fit the idea of what other people think it should, and then you get all persecuted and shit. But when you have no options, the only option is create your own options. Or die, I suppose.

Had this happened ten years ago, I would have been totally fucked financially immediately. Still, I did survive as a twenty-something with no college degrees or discernible skills during the 2008 recession in a big city with limited resources. However, that might to a large extent also go back to that thing that I mentioned a couple of paragraphs ago, and everything wasn't shut down then, either. It was just hard to find jobs outside of like fast food. Or "fast casual," as it so happened for me.

It was a weird time to be alive then too, but this is worse. Much weirder. Most people don't really even have the fast food option this time around. They're just stuck. Waiting to probably not die, but maybe die? The outcome of this we can't even begin to image yet, because we don't even know what next week is going to look like, at this point. That's the problem when you're trying to contain something that you don't fully understand. Sometimes it does stuff that seems like magic, that no one thought possible, but really it's just our ignorance of how it does the thing that is holding us back. I guess that's why it's important to get ahead of it--things could escalate very quickly.

Of course, it might not go that far or get too much worse than it is now. Hopefully not. I think as a society we have watched too many zombie and post-apocalyptic movies, but instead of preparing us for the possibility of a world-ending event, we have instead manifested it happening right before our eyes. I mean, the Spanish Flu didn't ring in the dawn of the end of humankind, and our understanding of viruses back then was much more remedial. I think, if anything, what's going to kill everyone this time around is not just straight ignorance, but something much worse: anti-intellectualism.

The powerful groups of obscenely wealthy people who control much of society can only shovel so much distrust of academia and learning, and the principles of enlightenment, for so long before the world around them just becomes a fucking Facebookcana American nightmare cesspool of sludge, while they hoard all of the resources and advancements for themselves. It might have finally bitten them in their asses, though. Not that they would admit that.

Oh hell, that last paragraph is going to get me put on some watchlists. I had better stop while I'm ahead. No need for any dissenters to rile up the masses. Don't want to get too crazy or they'll get all May 4, 1970 on us again. Tin Solders and Nitwits coming.

I'm just kidding **shrugs with a smirk and kicks the dirt**

Yay capitalism! **pumps fist in air**

Time for a new and more capitalism approved topic: Celebrity Worship!

I'm sad that Bill Withers died. I have had "Ain't No Sunshine" stuck in my head all day. Of course, he also wrote "Lean on Me," "Lovely Day" and "Just the Two of Us," and many more. What an amazing repertoire of songs--

No, this is not working. Damn. Sorry Bill. I do like your music, though. Might as well continue down the path that I have already created for myself... No reason to make any changes to the thing I can totally change, at this point, at a whim. It's really too bad. I guess whatever happens is just going to happen.

Le sigh...

The real reason the concept of staying home is hard for some is not sheer ignorance or arrogance, but it is because for them, there is little else to do but sit around all miserable like, hyperventilating and obsessing over their own mortality. Trust me, that's no fun.

That's why it's good and cathartic to use your imagination to make some kind of art, and pour those feelings into something that might actually, eventually, help others feel better too. Don't go out, get inward.

Or at least, you know, entertain and distract yourself for a little bit. Make yourself feel better.

And on that note, here's some Don Hertzfeldt to maybe inspire you or at least cheer you up while you wait this mothefucker out:

Three Out of Four Dentists Recommend This Blog Post (But for Totally Non-Dental Reasons)

You had to wonder how long into "sheltering in place" it would take before I finally wrote a blog post. It's been... 17 days. That's not too bad, considering I haven't written one in nearly 11 months. At least not one that I've published.

That's definitely a thing. I have written plenty of blog posts over the years that I haven't published. Some of them were pretty good too, like the Scott Weiland tribute I started on the day of his death and then never finished. Maybe I should finish and publish that one even though it's been like 4-5 years since he died. Nothing that I wrote then doesn't still hold true.

Now is as good of a time as any, I suppose, for a new blog post. I mean, I am on a mini vacation from work for five whole days! It was supposed to be for a wedding, but, well, you know... Anyways, it's now a well-needed break for some rest and relaxation.

I am listening to the new Pearl Jam album, Gigaton. It's not super catchy, but it is kinda catchy. Not that that's bad. In fact, I am really enjoying it. The right amount of catchiness, I suppose. It's not one of those albums with knock them out of the park singles, necessarily. It more of a whole piece, and content-wise it is definitely appropriate for the moment. What amazes me, as someone who's been in bands, that the members of Pearl Jam, who have played together consistently for such a long time now, still get along well enough to make pretty solidly good music together. This is probably their best album in a long time, too.

For me, creatively, things are also looking up. Not only am I playing music again, but I am also finishing my next book, the semi-autobiographical short fiction collection, Asshole Years. It actually started as a re-edit of my first book, the now out-of-print Tales from the Fringes, but from it I only kept four stories and totally re-wrote and re-edited them, so it didn't really seem fair to call it a new edition.

For the record, the stories in Asshole Years that came from Tales from the Fringes are "Tin Cup" (formerly "The Other Side of Cool"), "Greasy," "Maturity" (formerly "A Hipster Confession"), and "The Opossums" (formerly "The Backwoods Event").

Another two of the stories in Asshole Years have also already been published, but elsewhere: "Freshmen" as an e-book single, "The Day the Music Died," on Smashwords, and "Truck Shop," which was originally published in Literally Literary on Medium.com. 

Finally, there is one new story, "Dropout," which is about 25% of the entire collection and one that I am pretty proud of.

Originally there was supposed to be three more new ones but I decided to pull those and put them into their own separate set of longer short stories (probably 10-15K words each), tentatively titled Fucking. That probably won't last as the title, so I guess technically it's more of a working title.

All of the seven stories in Asshole Years have origins in stories that I wrote for classes as a student at Kent State when I finally came back and finished my bachelor's degree in 2010-2011 after a long hiatus. You could say that I was in a kind of nostalgic head space at the time--plus, in most of the workshops I took, we were encouraged to write in realism, and I really adapted well to it (I think). The plan is to release the collection over the summer. I am still working on a specific date, as I am still editing it, but I am upping my game quite a bit this time and publishing through IngramSpark with my indie imprint, Gott Press. This increases my expenses, but I don't mind putting more money into it to come up with a better product and also break away from using CreateSpace, which is owned by Amazon.

Music-wise, I have a couple of projects going on: one that I started with my brother, and one that I am pursuing on my own.

The first one, which we are still in a large way sorting out the details of, will hopefully eventually turn into a full-band situation. We're not exactly sure of the genre, but there's definitely some areas where we overlap musically and so we plan to just lean in those directions.

The latter has been sort of my ongoing, off-and-on-again solo act/one-man-band-acoustic-punk-folk-psychedelic-noise thing that I have been doing since roughly 2003, when I first learned that one of my favorite things on the planet to do is to write and record albums completely on my own. If you're not familiar with this project, I have on Soundcloud my two most recent recordings, Survival Pilot (2013) and Daydream Death Rattle (2009). I highly encourage you to check out the self-titled one, at least, as those songs still hold up pretty well.

I am even contemplating doing some gigging again, eventually, as I have grown at least a little as a singer and a musician since the last time I performed for an audience. Actually, between 2007 and 2009, I used to perform somewhat regularly, but I stopped to focus more on writing, and I haven't performed as a musician since.

We'll see. I might take advantage of the opportunity and start out by putting stuff online or doing a "live from the basement" sort of thing, I don't know. I think my position at work, having to manage people, has helped me overcome a little my stage fright.

In summary (as I read on more than one student paper during my tenure as an adjunct college professor), I guess that means I am surviving being forced to stay home. I don't really mind it, to be honest. I am definitely a home body, so to speak. After all, it's hard to work on projects when you're not home, or, you know, dead.

Until next time, I suppose (there I go again), ta ta!

Standing in Mr. Vonnegut's Shadow

The longer it stretches between posts, the more it seems like a chore. Even though, when it comes down to it, it's really not. However, even if some posts are strung out between long stretches, I would just be shitting the bed in a major way if I gave it up after nine years. That's how you know I plan to keep this blog indefinitely for some time. It's pride related.

Actually, I've been blogging much longer, but nine years is how long I've maintained this particular website in some form, which existed even before I bought this domain name. When I first started it, I kept it up as just a plain-old Blogger website called Out in the Fringes. The original intent for this particular domain was to ramble about whatever was at the top of my head and also to publish my original fiction.

Since then, I have figured out better ways to publish my fiction and poetry, but on this website, I have spent all of these years honing my randomness, and it's as sharp as a bent thumb-tack against your ass through two layers of pants: you'll still feel it but it's more of a minor annoyance. Overall, I like to think of myself as a cross between Hunter S. Thompson and the more meta side of Kurt Vonnegut, with maybe a splash of F. Scott Fitzgerald, but I'm probably in reality just a poor man's Chuck Palahniuk from the Midwest, but way less cool.

For a while, I aspired to write more stream-of-consciousness, especially after reading Ulysses and Mrs. Dalloway, but I am far, far from that skill-wise so it's better that I stick with what I've already established. I do feel like reading these stream-of-consciousness texts has at least colored my writing in an interesting way, even if I don't dive into the deep ends of the style like I originally wanted.

On the less rigidly academic end of the spectrum of my influences, a friend from grad school introduced to me Harlan Ellison through "Repent, Harlequin! Said the Ticktockman." I was of course, familiar with him a little even though I didn't know it because of the original series Star Trek episode he wrote, "The City on the Edge of Forever," but "Repent, Harlequin! Said the Ticktockman" inspired me to buy the collection where it appeared, Paingod and Other Delusions, which I am nearly done reading. I definitely need to read more science fiction like this, which I would say exists in a similar universe as Vonnegut, but also Ray Bradbury, George Orwell and Phillip K. Dick, which all have also inspired me in some way.

This split between more "literary" and more "pop art" in my influences definitely explains why I don't stick to one genre or another or really even consider that when I go to write a story. The ideas just come and I just write them. There's no real grand plan, at least not to my knowledge. My styles are slowly merging, though.

That doesn't say as much about my current short story collection, Asshole Years, due out some time in 2019, as it does my next baby, Xennial, due out Election Day 2020. I am really excited for both, but Xennial will have all brand new stories, and they are all more in the style where I'm heading that the styles where I've been.

Speaking of which, I have been thinking about it recently, and I might eventually release the rest of the stories from my first collection, Tales from the Fringes--the ones that didn't end up in Asshole Years. A lot of what's left originally appeared in this blog. Not all did, but many of them, if not most, did. It has been almost exactly a year since I published something. My most recent book, my second poetry collection, Idiot Parade, came out on May 12th of last year. If I wanted to publish these remaining stories as a collection, I wouldn't really have to do much. It is, of course, possible that I have already planned for this and a completed manuscript already exists lol

Hmmm, maybe I'll consider it. I would be tempted to rename it, though. I don't know. It's definitely not my main priority right now. That is in getting Asshole Years finished. We'll see what happens, I guess.

Everything You've Always Wanted to Know about Me

And More...

Given the generally positive reactions to my recent dipping of my toe into writing science fiction, my flash fiction chapbook, Dispatches from the Information Age, it's probably not a surprise to anyone that I also want to continue writing more in this vein, and indeed, that's why, until recently, I have gotten away from the more "realism" style in which I also write.

However, since deciding to split my short story collection, Xennial, into two collections, Xennial, and Asshole Years, I've come to the conclusion that both sides of my writing personality can coexist, just maybe not in the same collection--at least not this time. Since Asshole Years is what I'm focusing on first since it's much further along, for now, you'll probably hear me talk it about it and the stories it contains more than you'll hear me talk about what now comprises Xennial, but that's not too say that Xennial is on the back-burner, necessarily, I just won't be working on it as much. Once I get Asshole Years to the editing stage, it will be easier to work on both projects simultaneously.

I like to think my writing now is some cross between realism, dark humor, modernism and science fiction/satire that comes out as a kind of science-fiction-leaning Flannery O'Connor. This is more evident in Xennial, and in Asshole Years, it doesn't all come out at once, and certainly the collection as a whole strays mostly in the territory of realism and modernism, there is still a glimmer of the dark humor and science fiction that I also like. A very brief glimmer, but still a glimmer. That being said, Asshole Years is definitely firmly entrenched in a universe very closely based and very similar to our own.

These stories aren't true stories in that they actually happened, but they are stories about my life through fictional events that in some ways mirror my actual experiences. Call it truthiness. It's not an autobiography but the characters are truthful. That's what makes it fiction.

One idea I have toyed around with for Asshole Years to keep the ball rolling towards a 2019 publication and to get back to Xennial is to set a number of pages, say 200, and stick to it, no matter what. My plan is to smoothly and as naturally as possible get as close to whatever goal I set and then to fill the remaining pages with splashes of visual art. That would make it easier for me to do the design at the same time. Hell, I will likely finish it before I ever finish the three new stories, which is what mostly stands in my way of completing this thing. If I cut it close on the writing and editing to whatever deadline I set, the design will be done, or nearly done, and I can mainly just focus on finishing up.

Needless to say, while I am excited about Asshole Years, I am even more excited to get back to Xennial, which I aim to publish in 2020 on or about as close to election day as possible. Since it is more in the style that I aspire to write, I am going to just pull out all of the stops and get Asshole Years done so I can get back to it. I have spent the past eight years or so on most of these stories so it's about god damn time I get them in print the way that I want them to exist for forever--or, at least, that's what I tell myself will happen in order to be able to let them go.

Given then, that spirit of making progress, I have decided upon a cover, which I am happy to share here. Thank you to those on my Instagram stories who voted between the three cover designs. It was a hard choice but ultimately, I thought the design below was the best one to represent this set of stories.

 

Hopefully my desire to stay busy on this project will also mean good things for those who read this blog since I like to come here to think out loud and hone my ideas. I can't say at this point whether reality will truly reflect this desire, but I am hopeful...

So until next time, fare thee well, my friends!

Vacationing in the Snowpacalpse

Or, Midnight Confessions: Where did our life go... Right?

By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6940995

Vacation by the Go-Go's has become the unofficial anthem this weekend around casa de Gott.

We have at least a foot of snow and more is starting to come down, but the cold didn't seem too bad to me when I went outside to shovel. Then again, there is a difference between a city cold and a country cold, and Akron is definitely somewhere in between.

Sarah and I originally took Monday and Tuesday off to go on a long weekend trip, but because of the weather, of course, that didn't pan out. To be honest, we're making the best of it, and I am kinda glad it turned out this way. It has given me time to reflect, a little. Here we are, in our little bubble, living life, struggling at times, feeling successful at times, but getting through it and feeling stronger together. It is much nicer to have someone to hold hands with through the roller-coaster.

After the Go-Go's, The Grass Roots seems the next place to go as I choose the soundtrack to our hibernation. It popped up the other night when we had friends over and I was picking out just random records that I hadn't listened to in a while, and everyone seemed to enjoy it a lot, and I am especially super-jazzed about rediscovering it because it has on it one of my hands down all-time favorite songs, "Midnight Confessions."

Speaking of The Grass Roots, this seems like an excellent opportunity to sneak in a Creed Bratton meme:

via GIPHY

Other than this blog post, I have also committed time this weekend towards working on my short story collection(s) and what might be the beginning of a new music project.

The short story collection(s) I'm referring to is(are) what used to be called Xennial. I've got this crazy idea to split them because it wasn't really working for me to have the stories I'm writing now paired with stories I wrote ten years ago. Or even 8 years ago. The stories I'm writing now are different. I've grown, I think, as a writer, or at least developed my style, or, rather, a style that works for me. So those new 18 stories are what is currently titled Xennial. Most of these need a lot of work to finish so I realistically think it will be 2020 before it comes out, but that's okay, it will be a good book to publish on a major election year.

Don't worry though, I haven't given up hope about publishing something in 2019. The other 15 stories that were originally going to be included in Xennial with those 18 will be paired down to the best nine, and will be published, probably next, under the new title Asshole Years. These are all of my realistic fiction stories, most of which I wrote for different fiction classes at Kent State University. Here's what it will contain:

1. Eargasm (based on a blog post)
2. Dropout (new story based off of my old story, "The Other Side of Cool," originally published in Tales from the Fringes)
3. Truck Shop (published in Literally, Literary on Medium)
4. The Day the Music Died (published on Smashwords as a single)
5. Greasy (updated, originally published in Tales from the Fringes)
6. The Opossums (updated, originally published in Tales from the Fringes)
7. Highly Evolved (new)
8. A Hipster Confession (updated, originally published in Tales from the Fringes)
9. The Joint (new)

I don't have any cover art but that will be forthcoming, probably after I finish this blog post. The three new stories need finished but they are all pretty far along so this one I feel confident that I will be able to publish this year. It will probably be around 200 pages.

The music project will be under my Survival Pilot moniker, and will be at least one song, but I have at least two drum parts so there might be more. I don't know if I will finish it over this long weekend, but that is my goal. I am thinking about doing a free Soundcloud EP for record store day, or something, just for shits and giggles.

As you can see, I am never bored. Hopefully, you all are staying safe, warm, and entertained like we are here in Highland Square. And if you haven't heard "Midnight Confessions" in a while. Maybe you should give it a listen. You won't regret it.

Procrastination Paradise

Greetings, fellow humans of 2018. It’s been quite the year, eh? I know it has for me. It started off strong—my Akron Soul Train Residency came and went (and went extremely well) during the first quarter of the year, and then my inspiration to write kind of fizzled after that, with maybe a few short bursts here and there. Maybe I just used it all up and needed to refuel—I don't know.

I’m not even really sure where I’m going with this blog post, to be honest. Not that that’s ever stopped me before. No, I’m going to do like I do and just sort of wing it. See where it goes. Put fingers to keys, words to screen, and hopefully, after the dust settles, what I write will make some semblance of sense. Maybe even have some coherence.

We'll see, I suppose, but I wouldn't get my hopes up too much.

Black Sabbath's Paranoid is spinning on my record player, because I needed some “Electric Funeral” in my life. This was recorded before they spent more money on cocaine than on the music. It should at least be a 50/50 split. I don’t know. Cocaine has never really been for me, and I feel like, at 36, I’m too old to start that shit now. It would just be sad, at this point. Too mid-life crisis-y for my taste.

In my experience, it’s better to use drugs to help find inspiration, rather than relying on them for inspiration. It’s a subtle difference, but an important one. It’s best this way, when they're more of a tool than a crutch. I’m finding that meditation works really well for that, too. It’s also much healthier. I’m no spring chicken anymore, so I have to think about that shit. I’ve already started falling apart enough—I don’t need it to get any worse.

Finding inspiration can definitely be tricky. It might not always be, but sometimes it is. Even if I know what I'm going to write about, even if I’ve already brainstormed it and outlined it and all that business, actually sitting down and punching it out is the hard part.

Of course, it doesn’t help that I am something of a first-rate procrastinator. Even in grad school, even during my short but busy journalist days, I have always been one to wait until as close to the deadline as humanly possible to complete an assignment. It usually always worked out for me, which is probably why I have kept doing it all these years. The results speak for themselves, anyways. Well, it has gotten me this far.

Every writing advice column/blog/magazine is loaded with the sorts of advice that the aspiring writers who subscribe to them will follow and have varying degrees of success with in the real world. I used to subscribe to that advice, too, writing so many words a day or for so long a day, or whatever it happens to be this week, but to be honest, I think the best advice I have ever gotten is to just find what works and stick with it, no matter what the experts say.

The key is to just keep, keeping on, even if that means only sitting down every once and while, when the inspiration actually does strike, and getting out what I am able to get out during that time. I just keep doing it, no matter what. Eventually, something will click and I’ll finish what I set out to finish. It might not turn out how I originally thought it would, but that’s okay. It’s almost always for the better, that way.

So maybe I’m doing more guitar-playing than writing right now, but that’s okay. I will come back around to the writing again. See? I’m doing it now. That’s all the proof I need. It might not be the thing I need to focus on writing, but it's something. That, the short story collection, might be far from done, but if I continue pushing myself, continue story by story, page by page, word by freaking word, no matter how long it actually does take, I will get it done, and it will turn out exactly like it's supposed to turn out.

Maybe the trick for me is motivating myself through sitting down and writing a blog post first, because I feel pretty super-jazzed about writing right now. Hmmm, maybe there's something to that. I'm not sure, but I'm just going to go with it, because at least it's working now, and that's all I really need.

Next Title: Coming 2019!

Xennial is Gabe Gott’s definitive collection of short stories, which was written between 2008 and 2018. The set is divided into three sections: 1. Pop, 2. Auto, and 3. Rejects. Pop is a set of brand new science fiction and dark humor stories. Auto contains the autobiographical stories that Gabe wrote during his final year and a half of studying English at Kent State (between 2010 and 2011). Rejects contains some of the first stories Gabe wrote and published on his blog between 2008 and 2011.

Birth of a Salesman

My minds eye is always looking towards the future, towards the next project, towards how the projects I am working on now will shape that future and how I can better reach my goals and still retain my humanity.

I think that's why I usually end up jumping from one project to the next, and indeed, I have come far as a writer and a publisher, but maybe I am being too hasty when I just move on to the next thing. Maybe I actually need to stick with a project after I have completed the creative side of things and really dig down and try to get people interested in it.

That being said, I've never wanted to be a salesman so there is a balance that I have to maintain, but there is not reason why I can't take some time to put my book out there and get people reading it. I see no reason why I can't treat what I do like local musicians treat their music and build an audience.

That's one of the benefits of living somewhere like Akron. There's plenty of opportunities for me to do readings and vend my wares on people at events where people come to purchase such wares. There's a market for what I do and potential readers all around me. I just have to present what I've got to them and hope that it strikes their fancy.

While I am definitely planning and preparing for my next move, I am not in a hurry to dive down and pour all my focus in the next pot. I am pretty proud of how Idiot Parade turned out, and I can't wait to get it out there. It's worth spending more time on and building an audience around.

In other words, expect to see my shining face around town this summer.

Launch of Gott Press Website

Yesterday, I officially launched the website of my brand new publishing company, Gott Press (click the image below to follow link to GottPress.com). Starting a publishing company is something that I have wanted to do for a few years now, and thanks to Akron Soul Soul Train, I have been able to do it.

Eventually, I would like to publish others' works, but right now, until I can get this thing off the ground, I will be focused on publishing my own books. At least for this next book, I will still be distributing through Createspace, but that is also eventually going to change, as well.

Right now, you can say that I am in a transitional phase. I am still doing most everything myself, but for future works, I am going to outsource things like editing and cover design to people who specialize in those things so I can create more professional products and focus more on the writing and the promotion of the works. At least for most stuff anyways. Pet projects I will still do it all myself. For example, I don't feel like I need to outsource editing for my poetry, but my novels, it make sense to hire an editor.

Now that I have the framework setup, I can focus on getting this first book, Idiot Parade, finished and ready to be released. To be honest, I don't have too much left to do to get it ready as it has come together pretty easily and naturally, and I don't want to overthink it too much. I might cut a few of the weakest poems out of it just so I have a tighter, stronger set of poems. Other than that, there's not much left to do. I will be ordering a proof this week.

Thanks again everyone for all of the support! It definitely makes this easier and more exciting for me. Maybe eventually I will make a living doing this, but for now, I am happy with where I am with everything. I feel like I am making real progress, at any rate.

I hope everyone likes Idiot Parade. I guess I will find out on May 12.

Going Ape (For You)

Greetings from Gott Press Headquarters here in sunny Highland Square, Akron's hipsterest (and hippest) neighborhood -- home of PorchRokr, Annabell's Punk Night, and the Zub's girl.

Today is March 31st, or as I look to think of it, April Fools Eve. It's also the last day of my Akron Soul Train Fellowship. It went by extremely quickly, and I attribute that to the fact that it was extremely fucking fun and I enjoyed pretty much every moment of it. I would call it a success, at any rate. Here are my final numbers, as far as creative output, if you're curious:

Free Verse Poems: 18

Blackout Poems: 16

total: 34

That's right, I averaged more than a poem a day, which definitely meets the goal that I set for myself before I started. I have also designed the cover of the chapbook, and I have a solid draft of the interior. I am still working through selecting and editing the poems that I will include in the chapbook, but I hope to order a proof this week -- if everything goes according to plan.

There's a few people who I need to thank, for without whom this would not only not have been a success, but it wouldn't have happened at all.

First, I have to thank my wife, partner in crime, and muse, Sarah, who held me to my word and made me finish that application at 8 p.m. the night that it was due. I love you!

I would like to also thank the 2017-2018 Fellowship Selection Committee and everyone at Akron Soul Train, particularly Natalie Grieshammer, who went above and beyond in her role to make this a great experience. She made things possible that would have been impossible without her help. I would also like to thank Amy Mothersbaugh, Nancy Brennan, Danielle Thompson, and Arnold Tunstall, who have all been extremely supportive and helpful.

Finally, thank you Adam Searl, JT Barnett, Mila Susnjar, Toni Billick, Sheepy, Roxy & Marc, The Dreemers, Sage Lewis, Elly Dallas, Rubber City Prints, Chris Miller/The Akronist, Yoly Miller, everyone who came to my Happening, everyone who came to my Blackout Poetry workshop, Compass Coffee, and everyone who has supported me over the years. I could go on and on here, and my apologies to anyone who deserves credit who I may have forgotten, but I can't thank you all enough!

Be sure to mark your calendars for May 12, from 6-8 p.m. for my Idiot Parade book release party so you can see for yourself the end result of all of this hard work (and maybe buy a copy ;-)).

Major Announcement, Complete with Fanfare

Hola mis amigos y amigas! Que tal? Es Sabado y estoy escribiendo un "blog post" para ustedes!

For those of you who don't speak Spanish: Hi friends! What's up? It's Saturday, and I'm writing a blog post for you!

And that's all for today's Espanol para Gringos, 101, brought to you by Sabado Gigante (RIP) and Medalla Light.

I'm in a good mood this morning for a few reasons. For one, I didn't have any obligations so I was able to sleep in past 9. Not to mention, it's shaping up to be a beautiful day weather-wise. However, the main reason I am just bubbling over with enthusiasm before noon on a Saturday is that I am ready to reveal the cover of my Akron Soul Train chapbook.

Drumroll, please. Spotlight ready... Curtains! Fanfare!

(front cover)

(back cover)

There you go. Hopefully not too underwhelming, or overwhelming. Hopefully just the right amount of whelming.

Yes, Idiot Parade is the title, and I want to ensure the PC Police that I don't mean that in a negative way. It's in reference to a line of one of the poems contained inside, "Expectations."

It will be approximately 50-60 pages of all free-verse and blackout poetry. My original intention was to also include flash fiction in it, but I instead plan on releasing another chapbook/short collection this summer that is exclusively fiction.

Anyways, this is also the first official publication of Gott Press, my own imprint. It seemed time to create more of a separation between myself and Createspace, and this was a great opportunity to do so with some of the stipend I received for being an Akron Soul Train Fellow. It is important to me to have complete creative and artistic independence so I can say what I want to say in the manner I want to say it, and this will ensure that I will continue to be able to do so. I have wanted to do this for a while, and I am excited about the future and the many books I plan on releasing on this label. More to come on this!

If you have been following my journey as an Akron Soul Train Fellow, you probably recognize the cover as a picture of the art that was created during my Happening at my Fellowship Kickoff party. I really liked how it turned out and it seemed like an appropriate use of this piece. The back cover, you might be able to tell, is the same picture, cropped slightly differently, and heavily edited with the photo editing software of my Samsung Galaxy S9.

Idiot Parade will be released on May 12 with a party here in Akron (more info TBA soon). I will be reading from it, as well as a few from my first poetry collection, Live Organ Transplants, and maybe some of my flash fiction, as well. There will also be live music and booze, and copies for sale. Stay tuned for more information!

I have one more official week left of my Fellowship. It has gone fast and I have thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it. That being said, I have plenty of work to do before May 12th, so that is only the official end. Really, it's a beginning, too. All my hard work and struggling the past 15 or so years is really starting to pay off, and I am excited about what the future holds.

Now it's time to go out and enjoy this beautiful sunshine. It's a good day for a drive through the country, and I am feeling especially inspired to create more art. Hopefully, you take advantage of this gorgeous day, too!