The Writing Odyssey

My cell phone clutched in my hand, I looked unseeingly out of the skylight, which was covered by the gray icy fingers of rain.

"I am flabbergasted," I said when I reached my friend's answering machine. "I just read my brother's story and it is better than the story . . . you know, the one I asked you to read . . . the one that took two years of studying story forms to write. Call me back."

Gawd. This talent . . . this brother shook me to the core. I was the writer. I had experienced life. I had been a typesetter, a sailor, a technician, and a sales-clerk. All this life I had experienced so that I could write, feel the muse breathe down my neck and whisper in my ear. When I finally put pen to paper, I found that I must learn fiction. Fiction had a form. So I read the writing books. I could curse. "Nothing in fiction happens without a reason." But, life is not that way. Take this my brother, who is more talented than I.

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Is Life Really About Attitude?

Before my illness, I thought that life was about responsibility, education, and independence. Being diagnosed with a rare disease changed all that. I went from being active to needing a nap every day. I went from only taking an asprin once a month to taking prescription drugs every day (about 10-15 pills per day.)

So what saved me from dying four and a half years ago? Attitude.

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Scams and Scam Artists

I read a few years ago that most scams start in Las Vegas and then spread across the continental US. The reason these scams are developed in Las Vegas is that if you can scam a cynical Las Vegas resident who sees scams every day, then you can scam anyone.

Las Vegas has more than its share of scammers. One woman would stand on a street corner asking tourists for money. She looked obviously pregnant. Unfortunately she had been pregnant continuously for eight years (pregnancy prothesis). After nine months in one area, she would move to another area before the police were called.

Finish reading this article here.

P.S. I am preparing some new subjects for the writing essays and fiction. Thanks for waiting.