I Have Stories To Tell! Episode the 26th

Boy howdy and howdy to the girl who knows how to get it done, and welcome to the skewered literary world of G.B. Miller, Where it's hip to be square.

My friends, it's been a very brutal week at work, which in turn has put me in a pretty grim mood going into the weekend.

So today's post will be little shorter than normal.

Tomorrow is my birthday, in which I will be turning 54. Now if you couple that with the fact that I have daughter (18) graduating high school in three weeks, a son (26) getting married in September, and that my wedding anniversary (30) is coming up in two weeks,  I'm feeling mighty, mighty old.

The picture up above is a flashback to a simpler pleasure in life, like decorating a work cubicle with enough personal touches to make it feel like your siting in your den just stylin' and profilin', as opposed to sitting in an office performing mundane tasks to earn your paycheck.

Meh.

I leave you with a video of song by Alabama 3 that the majority of you might be familiar with. The lead singer of the band, Jake Black, passed away last week shortly after a concert. This song kind of matches my somewhat current dark state of mind (not depression, but seriously annoyed with inanities of work).

{c} 2019 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

I Have Stories To Tell! Episode the 25th

A Mustang convertible comes roaring out of the vast wasteland that is American Politics and immediately buries the brakes, thus launching itself into a miles long skid stain on the pavement of live, eventually fishtailing into a nasty dirt encrusted stop.

Out of the car steps forth a bad-ass chick, darker than her jet black hair and ready to beat the snot out of anyone who looks at her sideways. She performs a monster hair flip and says out loud the answer to the question that everyone is asking but is too afraid to ask.

"Welcome to the skewered literary world of G.B. Miller, whose sense of humor knows no bounds, and will literally lick my boots if I snap my fingers!"

Having spoken her piece, she casually gives the proper one finger salute, before sauntering away from the blog in a cloud of sulfuric smoke.

So the other day, my wonderful editor asked me to list 10 things that influenced my humor. They could be individuals, groups, novels, t.v. shows, etc. The reason as to why she asked this very interesting question, is that she wanted to get a better grip on just exactly where/how my humor came to be, which in turn would help her do a more thorough job of editing (among other things).

 I told her that was a very tough question to answer, since I don't think any one individual/group/t.v. show/novel really overtly influenced my humor. But I would try to answer it to the best of my ability. And this is what I gave her for an answer.

I do enjoy the warped humor that is Monty Python, although it has taken me quite a few decades to fully appreciate the subtleties of their type of humor.

I also enjoyed Steve Martin while growing up, as well as Robin Williams, for stand alone artists. I was/am very big into novelty songs/parodies, both as a teenager and an adult.
MAD Magazine had a very big influence on my type of humor, early 80's thru the late 90's.

Other than that, I don't really know who or what else had/has an/a influence on my humor. A good portion of my humor/dry wit/sarcasm is very observational (i.e. people, events, situations, places, conversations) and I'm not quite sure who had any influence on me when I was developing it.

I find humor in a lot of things, and I don't think I can pin it down to any one particular novel or t.v. show. I've enjoyed a lot of t.v. shows over the decades, from Dick Van Dyke to Carol Burnett (in reruns), Fraiser I found to be quite funny in its own special way, but I don't think any of them consciously influenced me in any way.

I can say that I'm a sucker for dry wit/humor, and I use humor as a good mechanism to get through the work day and beyond.

I also want to add here that I grew up on a steady diet of both Warner Bros cartoons and the politically incorrect shorts of The 3 Stooges and The Little Rascals.

My humor knows no boundaries, and it is about as politically incorrect as you can get w/o being offensive. As you can see by both the opening paragraphs as well as the picture, I have no problem in using provocative innuendo and dark humorous pictures to get my point across.

To quote a line from a well-worn/often seen episode from M.A.S.H. that I like: "This is me!"

And being true to myself is the only way that I know how to be. And I'm sure no one else who knows me would have it any other way.

{c} 2019 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

I Have Stories To Tell! Episode the 24th

Girl howdy and howdy to the boy who shakes his head in bewilderment at the type of outerwear his girl chose to drape herself in {YOU'RE WEARING THAT?!} and welcome to the skewered literary world of G.B. Miller, where being called wholesome is something that I often find to be very, very confusing.

This past work week has been a serious canine of the female persuasion, and as such, we've developed an abnormally low tolerance for TDS. Let me say one thing, and then will move on to something more meaty: People who suffer from TDS (and that includes the socialized media corporations), just give it up already. Hasn't the past with Bill Clinton taught you anything? If not, then be prepared to suffer devastating losses at the ballot box come 2020.

Now, the other day, with a few extra minutes to kill, I decided to watch a music video on YouTube, which is my current down time obsession for my phone when I'm at home (channel is a major inhaler of data usage). The song in question was Filter's Hey Man, Nice Shot. Being that this was YouTube, you can bet your personal paycheck that you can find almost anything video related.

This was no exception to the rule.

Searching my memory banks brought up the background story to the song, which was the on-air/live and in living color death of a politician falsely accused of a financial crime (the two people who peddled this lie later 'fessed up to it). And yes, you can find the entire uncensored video of this incident on YouTube.

I bring all of this up because I got to thinking about what I wanted to write about for today's post, and the first thing that popped into my head was rock songs that were based on real events. The song by Filter was one of them, although the connection wasn't made apparent until the band had to clarify that the song wasn't about the death of Kurt Cobaine.

So, in no order of particular importance beyond being my own personal preference, here is a very short list of songs that were based on real life tragedies.

1} The Dead Kennedy's cover of I Fought The Law. In a nutshell, they re-worked the lyrics and turned the song into diatribe about the Twinkie Defense used in the murder trial of Dan White, who shot and killed Harvey Milk and George Moscone.

2} The Boomtown Rats, I Don't Like Mondays. This song was based on a California schoolyard shooting in the late 70's. The shooter, who was a teenager, when asked why she shot up the school (killing two and injuring 8), said, "I don't like Mondays".

3} Seven Mary Three, The Water's Edge. This song was based on an event in Chicago, in which a woman was being verbally and physically assaulted by two men on a bridge. It was witnessed by dozens of onlookers who didn't get involved. The woman ultimately jumped from the bridge to escape her attackers and drowned.

I don't mean to gross or horrify anyone with this particular very short and very dark list of songs, but I do want to point out that all creative people can find inspiration in all sorts of news, whether it's very good or downright deplorable. And more often than not, it's the item based on deplorable events that will be remember years/decades after its been created.

{c} 2019 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

I Have Stories To Tell! Episode the 23rd

Boy howdy and howdy to one and all, no matter where you may be on the aggression scale, and welcome to the skewered literary world of G.B. Miller, who just absolutely loves working in all kinds of titles of strange movies that he's enjoyed over the years into his posts {click on the link for a nifty example}.

Did you ever have one of those weeks where you just didn't feel doing any blogging? Unable to come up with a concrete topic to even blog about? Currently feeling like that there couch potato cat staring out at you?

Well then, you came to the right place, because my week was exactly like that preceding paragraph.

Basically, the mantra for me that week was....If I tried to fail and succeeded, which have I done?

But, this is my blog and I must churn out fresh weekly content, no mater what kind yummy Swiss cheese my brain currently is. So, here goes nothing.

I've come to the realization that I miss having my muse involved with my blogging. Way back in the halcyon days of my 1st blog, Cedar's Mountain, I had some truly fascinating conversations play out in a very public fashion with my muse. My muse is mostly an extension of the composite characters that I create for my stories. Should you get the opportunity to read any of my stories, you will swiftly see that there's an undercurrent of Walter Mitty running through the plot lines.

Long story short, I love strong women and Walter Mitty-esque men for my stories, which in turn became great quality cannon fodder for my blog posts of yesteryear. So I'm thinking about working the hot mess of an entity that is my muse back into my blog posts. Because you can never get enough of poking fun at yourself.

On the other hand, this can be an excellent way to showcase a previously unseen side of my writing persona. Not too many people know what makes me fully tick as a writer. Sure, they've seen small bits, tiny pieces and minute parts from time to time {most recently, my thoughtful series on religion showed a previously hidden part of what makes me as writer}, but reintroducing my muse back to my blogging life would be a fantastic, and quite possibly scary, way to peel away another hidden layer of my persona to show the world.

My muse doesn't have a name, but is usually identified with the proper pronoun of She. Kind of like Daniel Craig's character from the movie Layer Cake, in where he's never actually identified by name in the movie or in the closing credits.

As I've previously stated, I miss having my muse being involved with my blogging, and I look forward to working her back into my blogging life. Because you just know, the world indeed does around her, and I'm just along for the ride.

But man, that dog collar has got to go, 'cause I'm no-one's chattel. Except when my muse is involved....

{c} 2019 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

I Have Stories To Tell! Episode IWSG the 4th

IWSG

Girl howdy and welcome to the skewered literary world of G.B. Miller, where no good deed goes unpunished and bad deeds are rewarded handsomely.

Besides today being May Day, it's also the 1st Wednesday of the month, and you know what that means (no, not this). YES! It's time for our monthly coffee klatch. aka the IWSG, where writers from all the blogsphere get completely wired out on caffeine and talk a mile a half-minute on all things writing related.

For the past few months, my head has been emptier than a person suffering from TDS (if you're from the states, you know who I'm talking about). This time though, I think I got a writing related topic that we all have gone through, or are currently going through, at one time or another.

Waiting.

In between bouts of writing, we've all suffered from the dreaded waiting malady. Whether it's waiting for you story to come back from your beta readers, waiting to hear back from your graphic designer (if you use one), waiting to hear if your manuscript has jumped through all the necessary hoops in order for you to hit the "publish" button, or even just waiting around for your muse to show its pretty little face, we faced it with every possible combination of emotion.

For me, it's been an especially tough process to go through. For those who know me, I am legendary for blowing my top when it comes to waiting longer than 3 commercial breaks for any entertainment medium. It has taken me many, many years decades to learn the value of patience. This newfound skill has been put to the severest test that I know, when I decided to pursue this side hustle of being a writer.

Let me tell you, it's incredibly tough not to develop the reputation of being a twit when it comes to writing. We've all heard (or experienced) the horror stories of writers behaving extremely bad, and that was the one thing that I did not want to happen to me. I value my hard earned rep as a person who knows how play nice with all the various peoples that I deal with on a daily basis, so the last thing I want to do is ruin that by acting like a twit when it comes to writing.

Presently, the 2nd book of my trilogy, The Friendship Has Continued, is with my editor of choice, being sliced/diced/julienned/dissected. She has constructed a very good time line for the project (9 weeks) and has been very solid in all aspects of it. However, the waiting aspect, while 100% necessary, is really testing my resolve not to act like a twit. I refrain from sending e-mails or nagging on socialized media (we share the same groups and writer friends), simply because I know my book isn't the only thing on her plate and I completely respect that.

So I bide my time, practice my writing skills by blogging and fry out my brain while watching YouTube. All the while waiting for the squeaky wheel to move on to the next stop on the editing journey. Because after all, when you write, waiting is the one part of the journey that separates the adults from the toddlers.

{c} 2019 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved