M.X. Reo Kelly
  • Home
  • About
  • Contact
  • Published Works
  • Blog
  • Read

M. X. Kelly

The blog page where stuff gets blogged.

Home

Writing, Publishing, Editing and Life in 2022

12/30/2021

0 Comments

 
Picture
If there's one thing I've learned about making these goal lists, and I've been doing more than one per year (I just haven't blogged them), is that they're tough to do...mainly because I always end up spreading myself thin, like Bilbo Baggins (like a thin slice of butter spread over too much bread). I can't keep going at the pace I have been going. I end up wearing myself out and accomplishing very little in the way of personal gain. I work way too hard to make money, for a self-professed socialist. I do it in order to try and retire before I die...and I hope I can make it. 

There's some things I do for fun that I'm going to give up. Well, one thing, really. I've decided that if I ever have enough time to finish reading the submissions for the next two issues of The Were-Traveler, I'm going to stop publishing that. Now that my public media job has gone full time and I'm still editing part time and trying to write fiction (and do the heavy research that goes with writing fiction), and trying to self-publish my short story and poetry books... whew! There, you see? Time is of the essence, and I just don't have the time to read through a huge slush pile anymore. I wish I did. The magazine was getting good. Very good. But when I don't have the time to read the stories or respond to writers in a more timely fashion...that's not good. So, I'm putting the Traveler to bed. At least for the  time being. Later on, I may decide to publish a twice a year short poetry thing, but that's going to be waaaayyy down the line. 

So, I did succeed in fulfilling some of my 2021 goals. I've gotten myself out in nature, I've lost weight, and I've begun putting together some e-books of previously published and unpublished stories and poetry. What do I have planned for 2022? 

More of the same...and some other goals as well. 

Here's a list (flexible, I'm being very flexible with myself these days) of my goals and ambitions for the year of the Water Tiger:


  1. Continue my research reading for the novels that I will begin working on in 2023:
    1. So Lonesome I Could Cry
    2. Zen & the Art of Alien Diplomacy
    3. See the post titled: Reading Goals for 2022 
  2. Continue a little writing here on my back-burner novel (I'm almost done!):
    1. The Strange Blue Days of Dr. Fountainbrew
  3. Get the 2 e-books finished and up on Amazon for sale (Mamma needs to keep buying Apple stock on Stash!):
    1. Four & Twenty Blackbirds: Short Stories & Poems
    2. Little Paper Parasols: Haiku & Other Shortform Poetry
  4. Start prep work on the Florida-based short form poetry e-book:
    1. Tentative Title: Swamplillies: Haiku & Short Poetry on Florida Nature & Life 
  5. Begin prep for another e-book on my previously published and unpublished speculative fiction poetry. I don't have a title yet...well no...rather I have a couple of titles in mind but they don't really grab me
  6. Keep getting out in nature, hiking and seeing the wild critters that inspire me to write more haiku, senryu, tanka, and other short form poems. My coworkers gave me a state park pass for Christmas, so there are lots of state parks on my "To-Do and To-See" list for 2022:
    1. Cabin stay at Myakka River State Park...let's get squatchy... We are staying in the squatchiest cabin in the park. We better practice our whoops. 
    2. A weekend cabin stay at Fanning Springs State Park...a cool dip in the springs & a cabin with a screened, wrap-around porch! It's a long way for a weekend trip, but sometimes, with state park cabins you have to take what you can get. We will still have fun. Val may get to do some snorkeling. The park itself has a nature trail plus we will walk a little of the Nature Coast State Trail if we have time.
    3. A trip back to Oscar Scherer State Park (in the hope of walking the Blue Trail and seeing some endangered Florida Scrub Jays)
    4. New State Park visit goals include: Colt Creek State Park in the Green Swamp [UPDATE: DONE ON NEW YEARS EVE MORNING! Report soon on hiking blog], Charlotte Harbor Preserve State Park, and Fakahatchee Strand Preserve State Park (home of the endangered Florida Panther--not sure we'll get to that one this year, it's pretty far away) and Kissimmee Prairie Preserve State Park (need a tent for this one, as it is a dark sky paradise for astronomers and I want to see me some stars! So we'll need to camp out at this one. Sadly, they don't have cabins. I did registered to win an Airstream Interstate 24X. Sure would be nice to win that thing! Not sure we'll be able to do this one this year either).
    5. Other wild areas I'd like to see this year:
      1. Goethe State Forest
      2. Myakka State Forest
      3. Ocala National Forest
      4. Some more of the Withlacoochee State Forest (just because I love calling it the 'Coochee. Plus we've hiked some of it and not actually seen the river it is named for...and that is just so...so...wrong). Also, it's a really cool, hilly area that's not far from home.
        1. ​For the above State Forests: ..walk a trail for the Trailwalker program!
      5. Mosaic Peace River Park or another nature park along the Peace River (but probably not Peace River State Forest, as it is one of the few that doesn't have a restroom. I mean, WTF?)
        1. NOTE TO SELF: I need to write something about all the rivers I've seen in Florida. It will likely be a poem...or perhaps several. Who the hell knows, maybe an essay! Nah...most likely a linked haiku.
      6. Dead River Park 
        1. ​​Right next door to Hillsborough River State Park and part of it is on the Hills River. Would be cool to see this park as some squatchy happenings have happened there in the past. 
      7. John B. Sargeant Park 
        1. ​Also down Hwy. 301 from Hillsborough River State Park. Has a cool boardwalk trail (at least as far as I can tell from the pictures of it online). 
    6. I need to finish the last two issues of The Were-Traveler and put it to sleep for a bit, maybe forever. Sad, but I just don't have the time it takes to devote to a story magazine. I'm only one person. This is actually higher up on my to-do list. I really need to get it off my plate.
    7. I need to write a couple of new short pieces and get them submitted somewhere. I hope I am able to do that this year. 
    8. Take it easy...as much as possible. These last few years have been horrible for people, and I'm no exception. 
    9. Remember to breathe. And never stop dreaming.

If you're interested, I started a blog page on my reok_weirdworldview site to blog about the nature trips and hikes we do. I need to give that site a bit more love, I've been neglecting it. 

That's it for 2022 plans, and I do believe that is enough. If I can accomplish half of it, I'll consider it a success. 

What are your plans for the new year? I hope you don't spread yourself as thin as I do.

Happy New Year! May the Year of the Water Tiger enrich us All!
Picture
Me inside hollow Cypress tree (I believe it's a Cypress) at Hillsborough River State Park.
0 Comments

Reading GOALS for 2022

12/29/2021

0 Comments

 
The book I'm currently reading is Where the Footprints End: High Strangeness and the Bigfoot Phenomenon, Volume I: Folklore. I will immediately follow that up with the second volume, which is called Where the Footprints End: High Strangeness and the Bigfoot Phenomenon, Volume II: Evidence. These two books are probably waaayyy more WOO than most Bigfooters like. Woo makes serious Sasquatch researchers nervous and fearful of not being taken scientifically seriously. However, one can't ignore that sometimes...with bigfoots, woo fucking happens. It just does. Other phenomena that gets put under the woo umbrella, no matter how many serious and professional, intellectual people have reported witnessing that stuff too. like UFOs and ghostly paranormal activity, is often associated with bigfoot sightings. And woo is going to work just fine for my novel. So be it. I have, for many years now, embraced all the woo. Experience has taught me that woo is a thing. I have not seen a bigfoot or other cryptid, but I've experienced some weird-ass and daunting stuff in my 56 years on this haunted planet of ours, and have talked to others who have as well. Enough to know...woo happens.  

I don't know whether there will be much woo in it, but I'm betting there might be, but I'm going to read the Bigfoot book of the Into the Fray podcast's host Shannon LeGro. I first saw Shannon on her TV show on Amazon Prime called "On the Trail of UFOs" and then later listening to the Into the Fray podcast and through the production group Small Town Monsters, whose Amazon and YouTube documentaries on cryptids like Momo (Missouri's Bigfoot) and the Minerva Monster (a Bigfoot that visited an Ohio family's property) and Mothman (those who know me well, know I love the Mothman cryptid stories even more than Bigfoot!) I've been consuming these stories like a kid consumes Halloween candy the day after trick or treating. Shannon's book is called Beyond the Fray: Bigfoot. I will read it next. 

Books by one of the all-time woo authorities on weird shit, John Keel, are on  my to read list: The Mothman Prophesies, Our Haunted Planet, and The Eighth Tower: On Ultraterrestrials and the Superspectrum. I'm not sure I'll be able to get to all of these, but for research purposes, I need to read the first and the third, at least. Why Mothman for a bigfoot book? He kind of figures into it somehow, but I don't know how just yet. I have a feel, way down deep in my little woo soul, that all cryptid creatures (if real) are somewhat connected. 

I almost forgot that I'm also currently reading Ghost Stories of St. Petersburg, Florida, by Tim Reeser. Speaking of the all-prevalent, dirty word WOO, my partner and I like to do some paranormal investigations sometimes, not strictly for fun, mind you, but to see what we feel. I'm particularly interesting in seeing how much I can feel from the other side of the veil since some of it lifted a lot for me after an encounter I had (and not a positive one) in a duplex I lived in here in Florida. So far, we've only visited the fort at Ft. DeSoto, reputed to be haunted by ghosts of soldiers and pirates. There was one bunker we felt a little uneasy in the day we went, but otherwise we didn't experience anything too ghostly there that day. 

Other research books on my list are more scientific. The Oregon Bigfoot Highway has witness accounts for sure, but also pictures of scat samples (they call it the Mother of All Turds, I shit you not...no pun intended), locations, and other interesting data. Jeff Meldrum is featured on many a bigfoot show and he is a scientist and University professor who believes in something called the relict hominid theory. That bigfoots are an undiscovered missing link to humans, if you will. Could be. Why not? Doesn't take away from their woo-ness. May even add something to it. His book, Sasquatch; Legend Meets Science,  is on my list. 

I have a few books on the Florida Skunk Ape and one on the Ohio Minerva Monster bigfoot account. I'd like to try and read the skunk ape one before our 4-day trip to Myakka River State Park this year (we recently saw our own MofATs there, but it was most likely a human who had to go to bad to get to the restrooms at the park...it was hella big though, enough for us to crack jokes about us finding squatch crap in the woods...lol). 

For fun and to get my fiction fix, I'd like to finish reading the latest Murderbot novel, Fugitive Telemetry. I'll be really absorbed in research and writing, but I need to get some reading-for-fun into my busy schedule in 2022. 

And I'm ordering from Amazon soon the second and third volumes of Junko's romcom manga Kiss Him, Not Me. I'm hoping I can fit those into my busy reading schedule this coming year. 
0 Comments

RESOLVED! 2 for 1/2! Plus Upgrades

1/2/2017

0 Comments

 
It feels good to be off to a great start writing in the new year. 

And so far, two of my resolutions are checked off.

First, I wanted to write more blog posts, and although I did not specify and make any certain plans known in my original resoultion post, secretly I made a challenge to myself to write (and publish) a piece for three consecutive days. Today's post is the third. 

I'm not sure I'll be able to continue writing daily posts once I start working both jobs again (and, Goddess help me, I'm considering trying to start freelancing in editing and proofreading as a third job). But the challenge I have set for myself is at least one per week. 

The other resolved resolution was writing more creative fiction and poetry. My grandmother always said that whatever you do on New Year's Day, you will do for the rest of the year. So I worked on and completed a poem from my Priority WIP poem list (more on that in another post). I also started, but didn't finish, a new poem and some future blog posts. 

Today, I will begin fulfilling another of my goals for the year. I will choose a book on writing and editng craft from the five I picked out from my collection of books on craft that I was either given or bought, but haven't yet read. Everyday, I plan to read a chapter or two from each of the five books. Today, I have chosen to read the first chapter of a book that has been on my shelf since shortly after I moved into my current apartment four years ago. Revision and Self-Editing is written by James Scott Bell and published by Writer's Digest Press. I think I got it for some ridiculously low price when I subscribed to Writer's Digest.

There are also some upgrades to my resolutions. I intend to seek out opportunities for beginning my editing and proofreading career. I hope to save enough money to be able to have my first paying issue of The Were-Travler (information, here). I am hoping to soon sign on to a monthly membership of the gym at the high-rise office building where my new office at the public media company will be located. I want to keep losing weight and feel better. I plan on a long long overdue visit at the dentist (as soon as I get some decent dental insurance) and do something about these awful broken and painful teeth of mine. 

That's it, folks. Just a few excited lines of success in the first week of the new year. I am hoping to receive some long awaited news about some poetry and fiction submissions made in the past. A nice acceptance email would be a great harbinger of 2017. I would blog about that, for sure. 

I hope your pursuits will all be successful as well. 

Peace--

​
Picture
0 Comments

J.K. Rowling: "The Fringe Benefits of Failure"

1/1/2017

0 Comments

 
A shorter clip of this was posted on Facebook earlier in the year, and it resonated with me. So I decided to watch the longer version of the YouTube clip of a commencement speech given by J.K. Rowling on the subject of the unexpected benefits of failure. 

The beginning of the New Year is typically the time we begin to re-evaluate the past year and make up our minds to better ourselves in the future. But we often have difficulty admitting defeat, even to ourselves, because in our modern society failure carries a negative connotation rather than a positive one. But perhpas it should be different. It's normal to feel some negativity and self-loathing after failing, but that should not last long. It should be soon followed by positive re-focusing of one's energies to strive to be better next time. Joanne nails these points in her own brilliant way. 

It's a little longer than the clip posted on Facebook, but well worth watching. The author of the famous Harry Potter series talks about the most valuable lesson she ever learned in one of the best commencement speeches I've ever heard. 

I've been meaning to post this talk of Joanne's for awhile now, but today it hits home more, so I'm finishing this post and sharing it with the world. Because sometimes you need silver linings when the rainbow fades to pale. 

​May we shoulder onward through our defeats and come out victorious in the end!
0 Comments

New Year's Ressies for 2017

12/31/2016

2 Comments

 
Picture
Happy End of 2016! Sayonara, you crap excuse of a year!  Here’s my plan for the coming year:
​
  1. I know I say this every damn year, but I really need to blog more. My last post was two months ago on October 3rd. That is unacceptable. I need to find things to say and freaking say them, on my web log. End of. This will be a priority. To blog weekly or every other week.
  2. Read more. I had a reading goal of 100 books on Goodreads in 2016 and I fell well short of that goal. I hang my head in sorrowful shame. There are a few books I am determined to read this coming year, books that will strengthen me as a writer/poet, editor, proofreader, and publisher. I want to read a chapter a day (or as much as I can daily) of each of the following books of the craft:
    1. The Editor’s Companion, by Steve Dunham
    2. The Subversive Copy Editor, by Carol Fisher Saller
    3. The Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers, by Christopher Vogler
    4. Revision and Self-Editing, by James Scott Bell
    5. poemcrazy, by Susan Goldsmith Wooldridge
      1. I will only schedule 5 craft-help books to read from daily, leaving the weekend free to pursue writing and reading fiction. I have some fiction reading goals as well: 
      2. Finish:
        1. Archivist Wasp, by Nicole Kornher-Stace, and;
        2. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
        3. Read the following fiction books:
          1. Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson
          2. Collected Stories, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
          3. Best American Fantasy, ed. by Ann & Jeff Vandermeer
          4. The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories, ed. by Ann & Jeff Vandermeer
  3. Live more, laugh more, worry less. Times will be difficult. We have an infantile idiot in charge of our country. We can protest, but we can also find joy in our every day experiences.
  4. I’m going to pursue freelance work with a passion, while I continue to work both of my other jobs.
  5. I’m going to write, write, write. I need to get some more fiction accomplished, so that I have something good to send grad schools.  
  6. Study for the GRE, take it, and pass the damn thing.
  7. Keep on breathing. Keep on, keepin’ on. Very important, this one. Because when we stop, we die.

My wishes for you for 2017:
  • May you find joy when you look for it. And here’s a bit of interesting news, if you dig thinking about the Chinese zodiac as I do. The Year of the Fire Monkey (2016) was pretty shitty. The Year of the Fire Rooster (2017) may not be that much better. In 2018, though, we begin a new element cycle, with the year of the Earth Dog, so things could start turning around then. I hope. I don’t believe in these things, really, but I love thinking about them. It’s the creative Wood Snake in me. ;)

This is it, really. Going to continue to pursue better health, but not listing that as a goal because I’m doing it already and I’m going to continue.


Heiwa! Peace!
2 Comments

A Flight Plan for Future Days: 2016

12/31/2015

0 Comments

 
Picture
​It wouldn’t be end-of-year blogging without some goal-setting. My Year 2015 Post was about looking behind at the year that was. This post is about looking forward to events as yet unfolded, and trying to orchestrate some good out of what may come. 

Last years goals were a mixture of health and success (academic, financial, and writing) related objectives. I began walking more. Even though I haven’t seen the results of all that walking in much weight loss, I will continue to try hard with my exercise. I also graduated Summa Cum Laude with my Bachelors Degree from the University of South Florida St. Petersburg, and that was an unexpected plus for the year. 

So where do we go from here? Well…here is everything I hope to accomplish in the coming year. 
  1. Get some more hours at either job whenever I can. I need the money for taking the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) and applying to graduate programs.
  2. Pass the GRE (get brushed up on the maths and nail this thing in one go!)
  3. Apply to the 5-6 graduate programs I’m interested in.
  4. Blog more. It’s not that I didn’t blog much in 2015. I did a helluva lot of blogging last semester for my Senior Portfolio class. So I have some posts to steal from there to make up for lost time. But I also need to blog fresh good stuff on here. 
  5. Read more. I read 126 books in 2015. My goal was 75. I would like to set a goal higher than 126 for 2016 and blow that one sky high as well. 
  6. Get the few completed short stories I have sitting around edited and in decent shape for submitting to magazines. 
  7. GET PUBLISHED BIG TIME IN 2016! That means a decently paying market. 
  8. Write more. Now that I’m not writing for academia anymore, I would like to start making sweet words with my muse again. We have missed one another. 
  9. Keep walking. Try to finally invest in a stationery bike or look at getting a membership at the City Gym I pass by every day. I need to get really in shape if I expect to be cruising big-ass campuses like Florida State or Iowa or USF Tampa. 
  10. Keep breathing. That's very important. 

That’s it, really. I’m sure there are other things I need to do, but I’ll deal with all that stuff as we roll along. 

As for you all, I hope you manage to slay your 2016 Resolutions List like the bosses you are. 

Peace and Joy and Love. 
0 Comments

2015: Turn and face the strange changes.

12/31/2014

2 Comments

 
Picture
Happy New Year, friends. 

Going to make this brief. This the new website embracing a new persona. I'm still working on it so don't trip over any power cords and please wear your safety helmets at all times. Pardon the dust and din. Creating a new persona is messy and loud. But I feel at this point, it's time to make a little noise. 

I don't have a whole lot of goals for this year. But the ones I do have embrace the changes I've ended this past year on. Nothing less than a complete remake of self, starting with a semi-psuedonym. I was going to go all out and call myself something completely different. I have in the past. I have a secret male pseudonym who is responsible for all of my darkest stuff. Not secret anymore. Coming out of that pseudonym closet and going to embrace another, less private one. Sort of. Same first initial and same last name. Only change it to the middle initial. A is not a cool initial. M.A. Kelly is not a cool pen name. X is cool. X marks the spot where the hidden treasure is buried. X is radical and visionary. X stands for Brand New Me. 

That's that for the name enhancement. 

Now for these 2015 goal thingys. The list is short and sweet. 

In 2015, I will endeavor to:

  1. Keep breathing and living. Important when you start getting up there in years. I need to get healthier. Will make changes toward this goal, no matter how painful and uncomfortable. 
  2. Write, write, write. Need to get more writing in (other than academic writing) for the year. 
  3. FINISH the stories I started late in 2014. They came from excellent ideas and have the potential to be some of the best stuff I've ever written, but I need to get on with them and bring them CLOSURE! That means writing "END" after the last word drops. Capped and centered. Ready to edit and send flying into slush piles all over the World Wide Webby.
  4. Find a way to make more money. 2014 is the most unprosperous year I've had in awhile. Don't want a sequel of that. 
  5. Find a way to make it up to all those friends who helped me get through the shitstorm that was 2014. 

And that's it really. 

I hope all of your dreams and aspirations come true in 2015, and I hope you hold strong and stay committed to your own resolutions. 

Change is a good thing. 
2 Comments

    Archives

    January 2022
    December 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    December 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    February 2019
    September 2018
    January 2018
    January 2017
    December 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    March 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    March 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014

    Author

    Here's where I update readers on what I'm doing…blah blah blah...

    Categories

    All
    Accolades
    Accomplishments
    Advice
    A Few Of My Favorite Things
    Anime
    A Weird Reader Review
    Best Web
    Book Review
    Books
    Cool Apps
    Cool Tools
    Cool Writing Apps
    Craft
    E-book
    Editing
    Failure
    Fantasy
    Favorites
    Free Reads
    Getting Published
    Goals
    Manga
    #NaNoWriMo
    New Year
    Old Year
    Poem
    Poetry
    Post It Note Poetry
    Reading
    Rejection
    Research
    Resolutions
    School
    #ShoStoWriMo
    Stuff About Me
    Success
    Survival
    Video
    Works In Progress
    Writing

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
Photos used under Creative Commons from mpclemens, alexandrabilham, Karamellzucker, david.taquin, Hayzphotos, mugwumpian