Episode #307: One Exception To Total Silence

This was not my view looking out my back door this past Christmas was the brownest brown that you can have in mid 30 degree weather. But one can still dream, right?

As most of you have been able to pick up on throughout the years, I need to have near total silence in which to write effectively and efficiently. I say 'near' because of where my den is located (under the living room), so if I get at least 97%, I'm good. If it drops below that, I'm not so good and I have to find someplace else to write, or blog for that matter.

There was only one time that I had made an exception to rule, and that was strictly due to a plumbing issue that ultimately deposited nearly two inches of water into the basement early summer 2021. So naturally, I had to relocate my computer and printer up to the dining room for the rest of the year.

In addition to those two pieces of equipment being relocated, I was able to save four manuscripts from permanent destruction, so that I would have material to work on.*

*manuscript #1; manuscript #2; rewrite of previously published novella; and my fantasy series.

So here's where the exception comes into play. Dining room is on the 1st floor, with the kitchen directly behind me and the living room directly to my left. Because I do not play well with others when it comes to my writing, we whipped out the headphones, opened up the endless world that is YouTube and went exploring.

Now we didn't just choose any old music to serve as my temporary white noise, we needed music that was completely lyric free. Like the only words I want to hear is someone introducing a song. Because I had an early childhood exposure to classical music (thank you Carl Stalling), classical is what I went for first.

Any possible woodwind or string instrument related to classical, I found every conceivable type of music for. Once I had reached my tolerance level for a particular instrument or composer for that instrument, I moved on to another type of music or instrument, or even obscure stuff like Medieval choral music.

I eventually finished my classical feed bag and moved on to the type fantasy music that one would create for RPGs (aka role playing games), followed by metal bands that would create that kind of music, which was then followed by fantasy music of the ASMR variety (trust me on this one), We soon pivoted to Americana and Bluegrass instrumentals.

I eventually finished my instrumental journey by listening to a few movie soundtracks (e.g. spaghetti westerns), which worked out perfectly for me, as within days of finishing I had to vacate the dining room, as the basement was reasonably cleaned, pipes were fixed and everything was put back in decent order.

I calculated that I listened to nearly two hundred hours of instrumental music of a variety of types stretched across at least a half dozen genres. I came to that educated guess by assuming that, on average, I listened to two hours of music per day, seven days a week, for about five months.

Not since that fateful summer, now going on 4 1/2 years, not one note of classical music (although I do play snippets while running my evening errands) or any fantasy music has knocked at my chamber door. I know it sounds odd, but think of it as having to consume something out of medical necessity for months on end, then when the medical crisis ends, you never touch that item ever again.

There are a myriad of sacrifices that we make when we're in the writing groove, but this was the only time that I had written original material to music for my entire fifteen (and counting) year writing career. Every other time I've listened to music while transcribing, which is another story for another blog post.

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #306: Never Getting Into The Groove With Them Again

We can dream of a white Christmas, but realistically, it's not gonna happen here in Connecticut this year.

Over the years, I have lost a lot of respect and tolerance for various members of the creative community who choose to open their mouths and spew forth certain political viewpoints that IMO are not based in reality, or have revealed their true colors on how rotten of an individual they happen to be.

The problem I have is that they have a plethora of progressive platforms that are, in my learned opinion, quite out of touch with the forty odd states that are still grounded in reality, they honestly believe their opinions are righteous and no one can say otherwise.

While I have quite a few bones to pick with a myriad of individuals across an extremely wide spectrum of the creative community, I want to concentrate on the musical side of the aforementioned community, as they are the ones that I pay attention to the most.

This will be a short list, as it will only focus on artists who I have c.d.s of and used to play on a regular basis.

1} Rhiannon Giddens: this exceptionally talented musician, who was a Julliard trained opera singer, fits the usual mold of being an ultra progressive in the increasingly insular entertainment industry, and it got harder for me to reconcile her music with her political views. So about a year ago, it finally hit a point where she posted a political picture that was very sympathize to what all of the college crazies are protesting about. After that, her music simply disappeared from my audio world.

2} Rage Against The Machine: I used to listen to them with some regularity as their music, while overtly political, still resonated with me. That all changes when I found out they supported a cop killer in Pennsylvania, a man who is quite popular in the progressive academic world and Hollywood, and just like previously, I stopped listening to their music.

3} Bruce Springsteen: the older and richer he became, the more progressive and vitriolic his political views and open disdained for the people who actually got him to where his today. Basically, he became just another toady with no independent thought for the Democratic party to trot out as a mouthpiece for their increasingly unhinged views.

4} Hayley Williams: co-founder of the early 2000's alt-rock band Paramour. She's trying to still stay relevant after her fifteen minutes of fame by perpetually bashing those who do not possess her world view, which includes supporting men and women who cosplay each other (I have a very unpopular view on this topic which I will keep to myself). So yeah, I'm not gonna waste my time listening to someone who claims to be open-minded yet somehow wants to ban people like myself from attending her concerts.

And to round out this very short list are The Eagles. The Eagles are no longer a functioning band, but a major conglomo of annoyance with only one original member left. They are, courtesy of that one original member, the epitome of how a band should act when they want to stay irrelevant and undiscovered by a new generation of listeners. Every single anti-consumer act a business can inflict on others they have done with gusto.

Bottom line, due to the abysmal behavior of this remaining original band member, nobody listens to their music by choice. Not on Spotify, which allows you to rediscover the music of your parent's youth, and certainly not at home. I'm sure there's a good percentage of people who now regret purchasing product from this band (myself included), simply based on the abysmal behavior of this conglomo.

So my friends, I sincerely hope you have enjoyed this modest dive into music that I choose not to partake in, either at home or on the radio (commercial/college/internet). Do you have any artists that you choose to no longer listen to for various personal reasons?

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #305: Trying To Ignore The Trees For The Forest

Year two of faking it, because reality is just too darn expensive and messy.

I had a post already in the can that covers this very topic, but after realizing that four page handwritten blog post would total nearly 800 words on the computer screen, thus putting people into a zombie-like trance, I spun on my heel to write a shorter version. A reverse twist on the popular T.L.; D.R. by calling it T(oo).S(hort).; D(id). R(ead).

Due to circumstance completely within my control, I was struck with a drive-by female canine slapping of the incredibly obvious: I couldn't delay working on the all import draft #2 of my fantasy series "Sister v Sister" until late Spring 2026. I needed to push up the start date January 2026.

Why? It's simple if you boil it done to a bone broth: the self imposed deadline I gave to myself shortly after writing the proverbial The End, has mostly imploded, leaving remnants of good intentions gone sour.

Out of three tasks that I had assigned to myself for the majority of 2025:

1. Let the entire series marinate until next year, which I mostly did save for some front-to-back-to-front editing;
2. Publishing another book;
3. Birth a new novel.

The reality was a bit sobering. The first item was partially accomplished, as I started developing a serious case of 'what in the tarnation am I dong' when it came to item number three; item number two was accomplished earlier this year; item number three....

Number three....involved at least four attempts spread out over three different stories, in which each attempt flamed out spectacular, spectacular. First I tried expanding on a short story, unsuccessfully I might add, on two separate occasions before giving up the ghost; 3rd attempt was dragging out a 1/2 to 1/3 completed novel that I had originally gave up the ghost because...GASP!...I literally lost the plot.

The fourth and final attempt drove me to my slushie pile, where I found the beginnings of two stories that were written sometime in the early 2010s. So I took a good look at them, saw they were fantasy stories, then sat down to write.

The first sticking point with them is that I had to remind myself that I was not writing a prequel for one my characters in my recently completed series. The other sticking point, which ultimately became victorious, was I started to really loathe what I had written, so as soon as I transcribed both chapters, it got pitched into my slushie box.

The one issue that all three of the stories had in common (besides fantasy) is that in order to them justice, they needed  the type of complex writing that I had to perform for my recently completed series (see this post for a deep dive that will hurt your head) that I was unwilling to devote one to three years of my life to.

The other issue that drove me to distraction and ultimately got me to focus on thee heavily packed forest and not the scorched earth in front of it, was the nagging cerebellum tap reminding me of the series that I had sitting in a giant milk crate next to my computer.

I did briefly silence that tap as I decided to finish up the multi-chapter synopsis before officially putting the series into hibernation. That involved writing up the last twenty-five chapters (and summarizing all the characters that appeared in the series) and it took me about a month of solid note taking, which was followed by a week of transcribing.

So for better or worse (the worse is not what you think), we have come to the decision to work on the second draft of my fantasy series. The scary thing, at least for me, is that the easiest part of this ginormous task was actually making the decision to do so. Because I had decided when I had first made the decision to create this series, I was going to a thorough job of acquiring everything that will be needed to properly write the 2nd (and others) draft.

As a former supervisor of mine would often state, it's never simple. But one way to make it simple, is to continue bringing everyone along on my journey to salvation by publication.

Have a fantastic week everyone!

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #304: My Den {1}-Getting Into The Groove

Sometimes, you just need to be anti-social in order to have a peaceful relaxing day in your neighborhood.

When I sit down to write, I need almost total silence in my surroundings. Doesn't matter where I am, indoors or out, I need to be as close to complete silence as humanly possible, which is saying as lot, because my den is directly below the living room, and the great outdoors, well, you got the occasional car, peoples and animals. So 96% is the best that I can shoot for.

When it comes to transcribing, that is a completely different topic all together. I need my proverbial white noise to help keep me focused, whether it's MLB (summer), podcasts or music. I know it's odd, but this works for me. Today's post will feature my favorite artists/collections that have become my go-to white noise when I'm transcribing.

Even though this is a top ten list, to quote a stale YouTube channel, it's just a list with no discernible difference between artists, only what I choose to pull out to help me concentrate. With the disclaimer out of the way, let's hit the ground jogging.

1} Any new stuff: I'm still heavily into buying used and the occasional new c.d., even though the new has become fewer as the months/years pass by. So whenever I'm ready to transcribe, I will often pick through my TBP pile to see if there's anything to pique my curiosity or fit my particular mood. I should note that I have quite the eclectic collection, so...yeah.

2} Schoolhouse Rock: Back when Schoolhouse Rock was going through its 90's renaissance, my brother picked up a 4 c.d. collection from Rhino Records (now out of print). It eventually came into my hands some many years ago, and it has become one my fave go-tos for transcribing music.

3} Children's music: I'm a fan of children's music from my younger days, when thought and time were given to create songs  that would last, so I have two c.d.s: one featuring Marlo Thomas & Friends and one by Carole King. Strangely enough, both c.d.s were created for t.v. specials back in the 70's and the 80's respectively.

4) Weird Al Yankovic: Been a fan of his music since the late 80's, when I had first heard his stuff on Dr Demento (formally a nationally syndicated radio show), and I got hooked. I have a few c.d.s of his and his stuff is so earworm inducing that even decades later, I can still remember chucks of melodies to dozens of his songs, both hits and non.

5} Samantha Fish: A really great blues guitarist and I first got into her via a FB friend who had posted a link to one of her videos. And as I'm want to do from time to time, I started acquiring her back catalog. I'm still a few current releases behind but I'm hoping to rectify that in 2026.

6a} & 6b} Sanmy Kershaw/Maddie & Tae: I rarely listen to 'country pop' and these two artists have become the exceptions. With the former, I found one of his c.d.s for sale at my local library, my curiosity was piqued and the rest they say, is history. As I'm want to do, I'm currently working my way through his back catalog. As for the latter, I first heard their hit 'Girl In A Country Song' on college radio. Curiosity properly piqued, I found the riotous video and immediately bought the c.d., and I'm also in the process of acquiring their current catalog.

7} Billy Joel: Like him or hate him, he has created some interesting music over the decades, so I have about six c.d.s that make it into my rotating playlist periodically.

8} Band Maid: An all female Japanese hard rock band that was brought to my attention via YouTube algorithms, which as of late is how I'm exposed to new music. Got hooked really bad and spent a pretty penny acquiring their back catalog and mostly present releases.

9} Train: Popular alt band from the late 90's through the early 00's. Acquired several of their c.d.s, with the latest being a live release from the later 2010's. Fantastic band even when nothing is charting, they're another of my go-tos.

10} Johnny Cash: About several years before he passed away in 2003, he teamed up with producer Rick Rubin and created a series of phenomenal c.d.s that were collectively called "The American Recordings, vol 1-6". This collection features original, classics and covers from well known artists and even duets. I highly recommend this particular music series (note, he won a Grammy for his version of 'Hurt').

I have a bonus recommendation that I would love to pass on to everyone: a cover band tthat is called Broken Peach.

They're a Spanish band who performs phenomenal cover-mashes. They tour mostly on the Spanish coast, have a multitude of releases on Spotify and came out with a c.d. of original material a couple of years ago. They came to my attention via YouTube's algorithms when one of their annual Halloween videos cropped up on my front page, "Tainted Love/Sweet Dreams Are Made of These", which in a span of four years has hit nearly 10 million views.

So my friends, I sincerely hope that you enjoyed my quirky top ten list of music I like to listen to while transcribing. I do want to add one option more to the list: everything else in my collection in case the top ten list doesn't do it for me at the given moment.

Happy Monday, and may no fourth be with you, just the magic number of three.

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #303: A Plethora Of Plots, But Only One Destination

Flashback photo from when even the animals were chill, circa early 2000's.

A comment that I had made earlier in the month on a blog post about secondary characters got me to thinking about how I was able to successfully pull off the mammoth complexity on what seemed to be on the surface, a basic plot: husband is kidnapped. Wife and ex-wife go play fetch.

Simple, direct, home-grown and has the hallmarks of a pedestrian story. But what if I told you that out of that basic premise, I managed to weave over one dozen plots that involved more than an equal number of characters, all of whom had one singular target in play: the husband.

Granted, the most plot lines that I managed to write for a given novel/novella was three (my recent novella has three plot lines), and I certainly didn't plan on having to deal with so many plot lines within a given story. But after the dust had officially settled in 2025, I have to say that I am very pleased to say that pulling off such a mammoth complexity as this was a worthy feather in my cap (and a headache for a future post) that I would like to share with everyone.

~~~~~~

1} For starters, we have the original plot line that begat nearly one dozen other plot lines: husband is kidnapped and his wife and his ex play fetch. From here, we have our second plot: ex-wife is connected physically/mentally/spiritually with her ex, and now that connection is broken. So she wants to retrieve him in order to restore that connection and become healthy once again.

2} Our third plot line is as follows: the wife has a betrayal by those who she thought were family (non-blood) and that betrayal revolves around her husband.

3} Our fourth plot line that revolves around this husband involves the mercenary who was hired to perform the kidnapping, with the person who hired her being plot four point five, because both plot lines are tied at the hip.

4} Our fifth plot line plus the additional half, involves a powerful person from the ex-wife's past. He wants to help her achieve her goal, but knows he can't directly help her, but can indirectly. The additional part of this plot involves two others whose main objective is to help retrieve the husband so that they may achieve their goal of freedom.

Presently at this juncture, we have five main plot lines along with two sub-plot lines, all of which center around the husband. Let us now continue.

5} Our sixth plot line revolves around the half plot point from number four, as this person was the actual catalyst for the original plot point. Do not fear though, as this plot point has an additional plot point that involves a recently added member of her retinue.

6} Out of the next three plot points, two of them indirectly involve the husband, while the third involves catalyst from point four and point six and the added member of point six. Our seventh plot point involves the wife who indirectly caused the death of her sentient; our eighth plot point involves the ex-wife from point two, who kills the close family member from point four, with the half plot point involving the reincarnation of that particular member. our ninth plot point involves the added member from point six who takes a traitor in their midst.

7} Our tenth and final plot point involves two people who were caught on a camping trip and turned into edibles. However, they were given the opportunity to earn their lives back by performing a task for the mercenary, and if you'd guessed it was something to deal with the husband, you would be correct. The half plot point is that one of them becomes an involuntary host to a sentient who has a week to prove their worthiness or else.

In conclusion: out of ten official plot points, we have one sub plot point doubling as a full plot point, three sub plot points and one plot point that has no ties to the husband whatsoever. Fifteen plot/sub-plot points spread among eighteen characters, with only one plot point not connected to the husband in any way, shape or form.

I don't know about you, but I personally find it impressive that I had fourteen plot/sub-plot points tied to one person and managed to properly resolve every single one that was tied to the husband to everyone's satisfaction. Even though I don't think this is something that I'll be able to repeat anytime soon, I genuinely believe this has made me grow quite a bit as a writer, because it's showed me that with a little patience, I can handle up to triple the previous amount of plot points that revolve around one person.

I think I have a better understanding of what it takes to create a complex book series, especially one based in the fantasy genre, and why it can take multiple years to finish the series.

Here's to a happy Monday and stress free first week of the official Christmas shopping season.

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #302: When Music Clashed With Reality, It Made You Think

What advertising was like back in the mid 2010s: cartoonish and cringeworthy.

Back during my younger years (that would cover 1980 thru 1999), I used to hear all kinds of songs that were based (sometimes loosely, sometimes not) on real events. Those songs would always make you think and sometimes search out the event in question that piqued your curiosity.

For example, my earliest memory of a good song based on a real event was Ohio by CSNY (listened to it a lot on oldies radio). Unless you've been living under a rock or in a non-Western country, the song was about a shooting that took place during a protest of the Vietnam War at Kent State University.

As I grew older and expanded my musical horizons to include non-commercial  radio stations, I would often hear other songs based on real events that received a lot of notoriety upon release.

The punk band The Dead Kennedys performed a cover of I Fought The Law but reworked the lyrics to have it based on the shooting of Harvey Milk and George Moscone by Dan White (he of the Twinkie Insanity plea). I heard this one on college radio because no same commercial radio programmer would in fact, add it to the playlist.

A few years after the previous song listed, the Boomtown Rats (Bob Geldof's original band) wrote a song based on a school shooting in California called I Don't Like Mondays, which was the reason the shooter gave for shooting up the school. Now that song still gets fossilized on the classic rock/alternative radio stations. Song itself has quite the orchestral feel to it, which is perfectly suited for the lyrics.

Fast forward almost two decades, and now you have a solid major label debut from one of those flavor of the month 90's alternative bands that had one banger of a release then got forgotten about. Seven Mary Three released an exceptionally dark c.d. that produced two radio friendly hits: Cumbersome, and Water's Edge. Water's Edge, according to the band, was based on a real life event that took place in Chicago. It seems that a young woman was being chased by two drug dealers and they boxed her in on a bridge. Frantic, she took her only route available for her to escape: jumping off the bridge into the water below, where she ultimately drowned.

Staying in the same time frame, R.E.M. created the song What's The Frequency, Kenneth, which was based on an incident involving CBS news personality Dan Rather, when he was attacked by a mentally ill man who kept repeating that phrase throughout the attack (note, he wasn't caught until almost a decade later).

Drift back to 1991, you have the song Tears In Heaven that Eric Clapton wrote as a tribute to his young son who tragically passed away after falling out of an apartment balcony.

These few rock songs are the only ones that stick out to me, if only because the majority of songs like this are done in other genres, like Bluegrass, Americana & Folk, which can pack a more powerful punch and leave a far reaching lasting impression.

Are there any songs that you know of that are based (loosely or completely) on real life events?

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #301: Back In Ye Olden Days When Comedy Was Memorable

A blast from the very distant past: sidewalk art via the road, circa 2010's, as performed during the annual Waterfall Festival. It's funny how images can conjour up a tenuous connection to a random song, in this case, The Spirit of Radio.

As most of you know, I am quite ambivalent to most forms of audio that originated during my teenage years which are currently being fossilized on an hourly basis on commercial radio.* There are however, a few exceptions, of which one is comedy. I grew up/came of age in what I consider to be the 2nd golden age of comedy (late 70's through the 80's) and is where I often retreat to when I want to listen to good comedy.

*the stuff being fossilized today I remember listening to when it was actually fresh.

I actually have quite a bit of comedy in my record collection that ranges from old time (Lily Tomlin), to really old time (Victor Borge), from crass druggie (Cheech & Chong) to the strangely topical (Vaughan Meader and Rich Little), to name just a few. But I rarely venture beyond that 2nd golden age of comedy, simply because the majority of today's doesn't really do anything for me (I will admit to watching some Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence in their collective prime though).

However, amongst the baker's dozen or so of comedy records that I own, there are three that I do cherish from my favorite comedian-turned-to-very-competent-actor, Steve Martin.

~~~~~~~~

Pictured to your immediate left is one of those albums, which in today's world the front cover featured would probably get you into trouble for being the "T" phobic word.

Like most adults who grew up in the seventies, my initial exposure to Steve Martin was through his novelty song "King Tut" (also had my first exposure to censorship on vinyl with the B side called "Excuse Me"). This novelty song of his piqued my curiosity enough to search out his comedy albums, of which three: the one pictured to your left, "A Wild And Crazy Guy" and "Let's Get Small", are part of my collection.

I felt his humor really connected with me on a personal level and some of his bits, like the aforementioned "King Tut" and "The Cruel Shoes" became absolute comedy classics. The man was an absolute legend as a comedian and I personally believe he was way ahead of his time with his comedy.

I for one, was truly sad when he stepped away from being a comedian and moved in other forms of entertainment, like acting (the majority of his movies were commercial/critical successes) and music (he dipped into bluegrass with his banjo playing, and became quite the solid entertainer in that endeavor). In general though, his comedy is still, some 40+ years later, my go-to humor of choice whenever I want to have a chuckle or two.

He was my introduction to the type of comedy that you really don't see much of these days: clean with the occasional swear word thrown in. In my later adult years, I came to appreciate his comedy as well-written sketches that actually relied on talent with the English language as opposed to 50 ways to use the "F" bomb in grammar. I think subconsciously, I wanted to emulate that with my writing: playing around with the English language just enough to make my stories interesting without an over reliance on select adjectives (trust me, creating a kneecap insult that replaces a swear word/multiple swear words is not the easiest thing to do).

He will always be a comedic legend in my book. A legend that people often strive to emulate but haven't yet completely succeeded in doing so.

So I leave you with this question: who is your favorite comedian, past or present, that has influenced you in a particular way?

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #300: My Bookcase {3}-Curiously Odd Non-Fiction

Flashback Monday of sorts: just to give everyone an idea on how long I've been blogging, this is a pic of my daughter that I had used in my photo blog back in the late 2000's. She is now 24 1/2 and a university freshman pursuing a dual PhD/Masters (already has a BA) in neuroscience; the two stores in the background filed for bankruptcy earlier this year and were (mostly) liquidated.

As I've mentioned previously, non-fiction is my preferred genre to read. It started with the Guinness Book of World Records, but quickly spidered off into other sub-genres under that umbrella, including one of my perennial faves: true crime.

Now I know that sounds weird, but true crime really became my go-to non-fiction genre for most of my adult life. Whenever I had a problem in finding something to read, I could always depend on true crime coming through for me.

Fast forward a few decades. Having exhausted most of what I have chosen to read about in true crime, I moved on to other topics under the queasy literary umbrella that is death that happened to strike my fancy. One of the odder topics that had struck my fancy was how people passed away performing/pursuing certain outdoor activities (aka The Darwin Awards), of which one, visiting a national park, is the subject of this post.

~~~~~~~

I had first heard about this particular book while I was watching a documentary about North America a few years ago, so I decided to check it out. As the subtitle suggests, it contains all kinds of Darwin Awards activity (along with some that were decidedly not Darwin Awards eligible) that has happened since Yellowstone was first opened back in 1872.

The one thing that stood out to me was not the fact they had records of untimely deaths dating back to 1872, nor the fact that the book was written by (at the time of publication) a member of the NPS, but the fact that this book is an updated second edition, circa 2014, with the first edition being published in 1995.

It kind of boggles the mind that a second (and apparently final) edition had to be produced in order to bring this darker side of Yellowstone to completion (as of 2014).

Not to weird anyone out any further than they already are by reading this post, but I found this book to be quite the engaging read. While some of the events are distasteful to read, Lee managed to weave in the history of Yellowstone quite effectively throughout his narrative. Essentially, you're not just reading a book about smart people doing stupid things, or nature doing stupid things to smart people (with tragic results), but you're also reading a thoroughly researched history of Yellowstone too.

If your secret guilty pleasure is reading stories about people who nominate themselves for a Darwin Award, this book is for you. It's well written, highly enjoyable tome that treats the profoundly stupid, the simply careless and the those who were in the wrong place at the wrong time with equal gravitas, thus letting the reader judge for themselves the merit of each and every story.

I sincerely hope that this latest installment of my personal bookcase has met or exceeded your expectations this week.

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #299: The Music Of Our Youth Influences The Music Of Our Today

I was feeling just a tad zany today, thus the main protagonist from one of the very few (like you can count the amount on one hand) live action movies that I've chosen to pay money and watch as an adult. This was an actual gift I had bought for my wife while we were dating.

The music that I grew up with as a child has had a moderate influence on what I have decided to listen to today as a "mature" adult (I'm 60, so you can take that "mature" descriptor with a grain of Himalayan sea salt), although it took me quite few decades to realize that.

Back in the 70's, I grew up listening to what my parents listened to: my mother enjoyed 50's rock/doo-wop and I think some 60's & early 70's pop; while my father enjoyed 60's folk and 70's/early 80's country.

As the 70's morphed into the 80's my music tastes didn't really change much nor did they follow what my schoolmates liked (e.g. the classic rock/new wave bands that were originally fresh and popular in the late 70's/early 80's). For all intents and purposes, they basically stagnated, and stayed that way until the mid 90's when I was introduced to the wonders of college radio.

College radio allowed me the ability to not only reconcile the music of my youth with music of the present that was still under the same genre umbrella (e.g. folk and classic country), but also allowed me to explore other genres that I had given short shrift to previously.

I want to focus a little bit on the aforementioned genres that I grew up on and hopefully show how they've influenced what I listen to today.

1} The folk music that I'd grown up listening to boiled down to three groups: the heavily commercialized/influential Peter, Paul and Mary; the commercially successful trio that had four members The Kingston Trio (If you can find it on c.d. check out their live recording from Lake Tahoe (called "Once Upon A Time") when they were at their height of popularity; and the commercially successful/influential Australian quartet The Seekers (the original incarnation from the mid 60's).

These three groups gave me my first real exposure to acoustic music. Prior to them, the only other  real exposure I had to acoustic music was via Hee-Haw and The Waltons. It took me forever and a day to appreciate the power that acoustic music could bring to a given song. To be honest, early folk music allowed me to appreciate the lyrics of a given song, especially if it was a topical song. An appreciation that still sticks with me some 45 years later (never really liked the MTV show "Unplugged" because it sounded too artificial/too forced when artists tried to turn their well known hits into acoustic songs w/o putting in the necessary work to make them fit the format).

Over the decades, that early appreciation of acoustic music made me take a second look at other related genres like the singer-songwriter, classical guitar and even a deeper look into the folk music genre (but bypassing today's folk/pop trend that seems to be all the rage these days.

2} The country music that I had listened to growing up would be considered "classic country" by today's metrics: Kenny Rogers, Marty Robbins, The Statler Brothers and ye olden stars from The Grand Old Opry to name just few. I also grew up listening to just a smattering of Johnny Cash, as my father really wasn't in to him.

If you fast forward to the early 2000's, I started hearing more Johnny Cash on college radio, which really intrigued me. Turns out he had a renaissance of sorts where he was starting to cover popular rock and pop songs, (all courtesy of producer Rick Rubin), as well as performing duets with some as well. During that fertile time period, he released six c.d.'s on Lost Highway Records, of which the first five are really good, and I highly recommend checking those out.

Just like that early appreciation of acoustic music changed my outlook, so did listening to classic country. In addition to rediscovering Johnny Cash, listening to college radio allowed me to explore other genres under the country umbrella like Americana, bluegrass and alt country. What it did not do was modify my very dime outlook on country-pop, but I managed to dip my toes in a small wading pool wave by selectively exploring certain artists in the country-pop genre that I could actually listen to w/o being turned off.

In general, what I had listened to growing up has come full circle. While I now listen to the same kind of music that both of my children listen to (shock I know), I will also search out and listen to the music of my youth, because sometimes listening to the music of past often makes you appreciate the music of the present. Especially the stuff that doesn't quite make it to commercial radio in its currently decaying format.

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #298: A Smattering Of Ideas & A Plethora Of Verbiage

As the title of the blog post suggests, we have a smattering of ideas to play with. Why? Because our tired brain (allergies that morphed into a good old fashioned chest cold) couldn't quite come up with one solid idea in which to latch upon. A plethora of verbiage? Well...duh. I are a writer, are I not? Writers are known for pumping out all forms of grammar onto the digital page in the vain hopes that they will magically reassemble into semi-coherant sentences.

Caught this little birdie tripping across the hood of my car the other day.

So I thought that since I have multiple ideas for blog posts, today's post will lightly touch up on those ideas, which in turn, we hope, become a meaty post. So to quote John Cleese, let us begin at the beginning.

#1: I decided to start another novel. 

I'm pretty sure everyone is saying, "well, duh. that's what writers are supposed to do." And you would be correct in every sense of the word. However, at this particular juncture, I was/am quite happy churning out short stories, as I was taking a much needed break from novel writing (I had just finished my five volume fantasy series earlier this year, and I don't intend to seriously start diving into it until about this time next year). 

But one of the short stories I had written started calling out to me. Like, "I want to be a novel!" So I said, "why not?" And because I absolutely love a challenge, the story in question fits more like a chapter of a novel than an actual beginning of a novel. So the challenge for me has been to build a novel that comfortably surrounds that story, plus a few actual plot lines to make it gel. Oh and, need to rewrite the story to make it fit a particular time period. Oh and, decide how much fantasy it needs to be infused with. Fun, fun, fun!

#2: I joined another writer's group.

I did quite a bit of searching on Facebook this past summer for another writer's group (to refresh: I got suspended/blackballed/gaslighted from my previous writer's group for posting a link to a blog post that I had previously cleared with one of the admins), which required me to really study/parse out the group rules for each potential group. Suffice to say, there were a few who had rules that in good conscience I could not follow, so they were dropped from consideration.

The one that I did join had rules that I could comfortably live with, and I was able to get clarification on a few of the rules posted. I also found out that every single post made in the group had to be approved by the creator of the group (group has a five to six digit membership).

One of the curious aspects of this group was its complete loathing of anything associated with AI writing. Posting AI covers were verboten (except for show and tell when people were trying to explain a vision for a cover) as well as AI created snippets. Overall this group has been an eye-opener for me, with all the good information/writing tips that I've been able to acquire from other successful writers. I think this one is going to help me in the long run.

3#: My bookcase.

I have a warped sense of humor. I grew up in the 70's & 80's, where humor was raw, offensive and no one had zero f's to give if other people where offended. So naturally I would be on the lookout for books and audio that would cater to my particular taste in humor (e.g. Steve Martin & Cheech and Chong for audio, say Bloom County for the written word).

I found this fascinating book at my local B & N some 15 years ago, because bad humor has always been my thing. James Napoli is a well known writer, comedy performer and filmmaker who has eight other books in the same warped humor vein as this one.

Sarcasm is great to listen to, and even funnier to read about, and this book covers general sarcasm from Alpha to Zed. The cool thing about this book, is that the sarcasm for the topics involved still rings true 15 years later.

Examples: 

Canada-free healthcare, low crime, birthplace of William Shatner. two out three ain't bad.

Dress-something that does not, I said not, make you look fat.

Health-a type of insurance plan that covers everything but the rare condition you managed to come down with.

Haircut-something a man would notice his girlfriend had gotten only if she came home bald.

If you like the kind of humor that was popular in the 2010's, he can be found on Amazon, which seems to be still active and in print.

And that, is that, although that is not this, nor is this that or the other thing. Either way, was this trip really necessary and I don't think I'll be making that left turn at Albuquerque again anytime soon. I think my best bet would be to run to the hills, or yell, "Run Lola Run!"

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #297: The Family Bookcase {3}

Before we get into the meaty part of the blog post, a little rant is in order. To refresh, back in the day, I had Yahoo! as my main e-mail provider. That didn't last very long as I eventually moved over to Hotmail and Gmail as my two main e-mail providers, leaving Yahoo! to collect all kinds of junk mail (this turned out to be a smart move as Yahoo! was hacked some 12 years ago, in what turned out to be the largest data breech in history).

Anywho, I'm getting very disappointed with the quality and the amount of spam that I have been receiving at my Yahoo! addys. I feel so neglected and unwanted because I no longer have any decent micro fiction stories to read any more.

Now, the meaty part.

I have two more book choices I want to pontificate on, with one of them actually being my wife's. She's the epitome of a non-reader as she averages about one book read every seven years, shorter if something piques her curiosity. Maybe. Anyways, she was prompted to buy this book because she got hooked into the original version of the BBC series that was shown on PBS back in the day.

Now personally, I'm not quite sure how I found my way to the James Herriot book series. I distinctly remember reading the entire massive four book hardcover series (which after doing a bit of research for this post, was a compilation of his other books) that I had borrowed from my public library. I also remember listening to the books on tape versions that were read by the lead actor of the BBC series Christopher Timothy, so I'm guessing I made it to the book series that way. And of course, I watched the BBC series on PBS back in the 80's and 90's.

For the uninitiated, James Herriot was the pen name of English vet James White (who had good biography written by his son some several years after his death) and his adventures working as both a big animal and little animal vet in Yorkshire, England.

If you enjoy animal stories, as well as stories about the veterinary trade and life living in rural England, I highly recommend this wonderful author, his book series and the original version of the BBC series that ran in the 80's/90's (I can't speak of the reboot, as I did not have the opportunity to watch it), because if a writer can get my very non-book reading wife interested in reading, imagine what they can do for a member of your family.

~~~~~

With this particular book, the back story is usually the same as how other books are acquired in this house: I have no idea. 

And to be brutally honest, I have no idea how this book caught my eye, beyond the cover catching my attention. There wasn't much of a back cover blurb beyond a few blurbs by three well known publishers of the day (1982), and I don't believe that I had developed my book choosing routine yet.

Curious fact about this book, the copy that you see is actually part of the second run of the mass-market version, and the third version (as of 1982) overall. I did a bit of research for this book as well, just to satisfy my curiosity and the first author listed was/is quite prolific and well known in the sci-fi genre.

Looking back on this novel, which is set in a futuristic version of  California (that we desperately wish was still around) that suffered through the upheavals of a global war, the use of RPG's (for the uninitiated, role playing games, e.g. Magic the Gathering or D&D) as the main setting for a very interesting murder mystery was something I don't believe I read previously.

I didn't do too much of a dive for this post beyond checking for the catalyst of this story, the murder itself (which is actually quite ingenious for its time and I've only seen used one before in a Keanu Reeves/Dan Aykroyd movie), as I wanted to make sure that I wasn't misremembering a key part of this book. The book itself is quite yellowed with age, so I didn't want to risk losing pages from opening the book too wide.

I found this book to be interesting enough for me to consume quickly (how quickly I cannot say, other than there was a very long stretch of time where I consumed books in the same manner that frat boys would consume beer in a week). I don't remember what my opinion of the book was back then either, but it did manage to stick in memory just enough over the decades that some 35+ years later I'm able to write about with a good deal of clarity.

What I can say with confidence was that I truly enjoyed this book, especially one that clocked in over 400 pages. I'm quite particular when it comes to reading sci-fi and the various sub-genres that fall under that umbrella, where I lean more towards stand-alones than series. I do like series, but when they go on for far too long (Robert Jordan soured me on fantasy series in more ways than you can possibly imagine) is where I have a tendency to say "no mas".

With that being said, I hope you enjoy this latest chapter of my family bookcase. I highly recommend both books, as well as both authors, as they seem to have enough of a back catalog to keep you occupied for quite a while.

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #296: It's Grammering Time!

Family decided to do something a little different this year by actually putting up decorations in a spot that is high visibility.

In blogging news, it seems the bots finally filled their USB stick and went home to download a terra-byte of collected data for who knows what, as my page views are back to normal for the first time in two months.

So with the bots hightailing it out of the blog world, hopefully never to return for another decade or two, it leaves me with a tiny bit of a quandary: do I continue down the new path that I had to involuntarily chart, or do I casually add an old element or two back into the mix?

It is a tough decision, because on one hand, I made a commitment that I shouldn't back out from; but on the other hand, I made a commitment that I shouldn't back out from.

The above question is a little rhetorical, since I do plan on dipping my toes into the proverbial mud puddle to see what kind of response I will get, if any. Wish me luck.

I finally, unequivocally, with a solid degree of certainty, put my five volume fantasy series "Sister v Sister" on the last train to Clarksville, where only a pedi-cab will meet them at the station and take them on a journey for self-reflection for the next several months. I had decided, mostly because I was in a funk with my latest attempt at writing a novella (no real writer's block, just the conundrum of how to use a short story as a starting point for a novella), to finish writing out my bullet point chapter synopses for my fantasy series. Having left off at chapter 96, it took me about 1 1/2 months to create the remaining 24 chapters (totaled about 75 pages).

Naturally this left me with a plethora of time on my gnarly little hands. And you know a writer with time on their hands and a jumbled mess of brain cells desperately wanting to focus on something worthwhile, no matter how shallow or tenuous it may be. I eventually focused on writing a blog post, and since I had quite a bit of time on my hands, I wrote it out with pen & paper.

The topic of this initial post was something I had been mulling about for quite some time: the unrealistic portrayal of gay characters in novels. Now this is probably a hot button topic for those who've done at least three times the amount of reading that I've done in a quarter in one month, but this was something I really wanted to elaborate on and explain my thought process on portraying at least 20% of my characters as gay/lesbian/bi realistically as humanly possible, based on the societal norms of today and yesterday.

This post ultimately turned into something that I haven't really attempted since my high school days (that's more than 40 years ago for those of you keeping track), an essay, which in this particular instance, was an essay totaling over 7k words. Now considering the amount of aggravation that I was going through with the bots, combined with the hypersensitive faux triggering in today's culture, I made a conscious decision to not post the end result to this blog, but to create a section containing essays in another short story collection that I've been working on for the past several months.

I know there are a certain subset of people who like to take offense when people write about situations that they've never had personal experience with, and it's these people that my essay is geared towards. In general, I explained my rationale for writing what I personally believe are realistic scenarios that the gay community would sometimes face, either passive aggressively, all purpose aggression, or in some instances, with acceptance and empathy.

Believe it or not, I don't mind explaining my rationale behind why I write what I write to other people, as it forces me to step outside of my comfort zone (I'm a weird anomaly, in that I'm an introvert in the real world, but quite extroverted in the digital world). It's definitely not easy stepping out of one's comfort zone, especially when you're half introvert/half extrovert, but it's something that I'm incrementally working on.

I do have other ideas for essays, some of which pertain to other aspects of my writing life, that I have no doubt I will enjoy expounding on. Because, as well all know, a busy writer is a happy writer, no matter what he/she has chosen for a topic/format to write about/write in.

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #295: My Bookcase {2}: Time Life Books

Back in the 1970's through the early 90's, Time-Life book series were, more often than not, the pinnacle of craftsmanship. The type of craftsmanship that you don't usually see, unless you're participating in a Kickstarter project where one of the pledge levels features a leather bound book cover, Gilded pages and other fine material that goes into a limited edition book, which is capped off with an exquisitely detailed/thoroughly research story of non-fiction or fiction.

I had first come across one of these series called "The Old West" when I was a middle school student (that's circa '76/'77), and of course what got me interested was the cool photos of dead people (saw a pic of scalped soldier, which is still seared in my memory banks 50+ years later). But what stood out to me to begin with was the leather cover/binding, because to a kid anything out of the ordinary was a must touch/see.

Fast forward to now, or rather, the early 90's. The early 90's version of me was dropping serious money on Time-Life music cassettes (yes, I know, I know), when I decided to pay attention to one of the inserts about their many book series. I'm a US Civil War buff, so two of the book series stood out to me: one was a repro series of Civil War memoirs (ultimately 32 volumes) called "Collectors Library of The Civil War", while the other was one of those leather bound US Civil War series called "US Civil War" (yes, not very original), which totaled 28 volumes.

I also have a very short series on True Crime (9 volumes), but the two mentioned above are the ones I'm most proud of, and they will be the focus of today's post. I would like to note that these three book series were my biggest outlay of funds for book purchasing, and in fact, the total outlay, conservatively speaking $1,400 in 1980's dollars, has not yet been matched by my 30+ years worth of book purchases since.

So without further ado, two brief synopses of my favorite Time-Life book series.

Something that was quite prevalent in the late 19th century, were memoirs written of wartime experiences, either directly (e.g. soldier, spy, military officer) or indirectly (e.g civilian on the home front or part of the rear command), so the book series "The Collector's Library of the Civil War" features diverse topics such as: 

The Citizen Soldier (both sides relied heavily on the military draft/volunteers);

Army life in a Black regiment (self-explanatory);

The capitol of the Confederacy, Richmond VA;

The book pictured on your right.

All of which were written by the actual participants to the topics in question. These are the kind of books that good historians thrive upon, as they can give one a more in-depth look at a particular event in history, which in this case is the US Civil War. This conflict affected a wide swath of people on so many levels that only by reading the various memoirs of those who participated can one truly appreciate the magnitude of this monumental conflict. 

I do want to note that I haven't read any of those books. These books are so well crafted that even 35+ years later, I'm still afraid to crack any of them open beyond a couple of inches for fear of somehow damaging them with my bad hands. But as many are want to say, one can never say never.

~~~~

This particular series is one that I've actually read all 27 volumes of (28th volume is the master index) from cover to cover back in the early 90's. 

It covers the entire US Civil War, from the events leading up to the Civil War (1st volume is called "Brother vs Brother"), and everything connected with the war itself: the various military campaigns in the various theaters of the war, such as the one picture to the right, which features the Rebels counter offensive in two different battles; the life of a typical soldier, the extensive involvement of civilians, and of course, the surrender and assassination. 

The articles/essays are expertly written with not a smidgen of bias to be found (which is a novel concept in today's journalism); are easily digestible/understandable to the average person who only has a smattering to zero knowledge about the Civil War; and are written in such a way that when you're done, they'll make want to search out more books on whatever topic that has piqued your curiosity.

Time-Life Books, when they were around (sold in 2003, and ended business in 2024), created a quality product that was basically sold directly as a subscription and is still highly desirable today. As an example, the Old West series I had mentioned at the beginning, I found for sale on Etsy for about $230. If you can find any of their book series, and they produced quite a lot in their many decades of existence, I highly recommend purchasing them, as they both a fascinating read and a research culture encyclopedia.

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #294: My Bookcase {1}

This is my personal bookcase, which has a little bit of everything: knick-knacks, books, music and down below out of view, various used computers (out of date Chromebooks, Win XP and Win 7).

The book collections that stand out the most, are from Time-Life Books, two on the US Civil War. One set contains 31 (of 32) volumes of leather bound reprinted memoirs; while the other set is a leather bound original set covering all aspects of the war. Total dollar value, in 1980's dollars, is in the neighborhood of $1300 +/- (each volume had a price range of $17.99 to $21.99; the other is a true crime set of about nine books that came out in the early 90's, with a dollar value of $220 +/-.

What we'll be concentrating on in today's post is music, specifically boxed vinyl record collections.

Back in the 1970's/1980's, boxed vinyl record collections were all the rage. Whether 45s or LP's, they were always a great addition to one's personal collection. For me, I have almost one dozen in total decided between 45s and LPs. The boxed sets of 45's include artists like The Carpenters and Little Richard, while the LP's included artists like Bob Dylan, Jethro Tull and Dr. Demento (I know, not an artist, but he came out with a 7 record sampling of novelty songs from the 40's through the 80's).

My favorites though, were some boxed sets from Reader's Digest. Back in the day, Reader's Digest branched out from their condensed books and started releasing record collections. I managed to acquire about five or six from my late grandfather's modest music collection, and oddly enough, they were from artists that I had grown up listening to. One such artist was a well known country singer Marty Robbins.

I was introduced to Marty Robbins as wee lad via my late father, who would often play an album on the stereo while he was grading tests/exams. Like most kids, I did not like or appreciate the music of my parents at that age. But as I got older, I learned to appreciate the music that my parents, especially my father, had exposed me to. In fact, I have come full circle with musical tastes, as I more often than not, will pivot to those genres (and sub-genres) for my listening pleasures.

Like most boxed sets that are programmed a certain way, so too were the Reader Digest box sets. 

With this particular box set, it was programmed as follows: record one features a greatest hits compilation; record two has songs from Hawaii and country classics; record three has sad love songs and ballads; record four features songs about women (remember these are from the 60's and 70's) and more love songs; and record five features story songs (story songs were a major thing back in the day) and even more love songs.

I believe this is probably the basic programming outline for any artist that comes out with a box set these days: start off with the greatest hits, then slowly work their way through their vast catalog for different themes (emotion, personal faves, deeper dives, etc).

In general, while I do appreciate the box set collections that come out, as it can be a great way to sample a favorite artist's back catalog if you don't want to go the other route (aka buying each individual release of a fave artist), I will often balk at the excessive price tag that seems to be attached to those box sets these days, even if they're mainly on c.d.'s instead of vinyl (which, IMO, is turning into a major grift/cash grab these days).

Whether you enjoy compilations or not, a box set from a given artist is often a fantastic way to sample an artist's back catalog without spending an escalating amount of money in acquiring every single release of that artist.

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #293: The Family Bookcase: {2}

Before we get into the meat of the post, a word from our sponsor, the US Constitution, in regards to our perpetual flavor of the year: the 1st amendment.

SCOTUS has ruled, repeatedly I might add, that while you do have the right to unfiltered, unfettered and uncensored free speech, your right to that unfiltered, unfettered and uncensored free speech comes to a screeching halt like putting a car into 'park' while driving 65 down the highway the second you cross the threshold to your place of employment. Because at that point, they have the authority to regulate what you can and cannot say on their time; and as an added bonus, they can regulate what you can say on your own free time, because reputational damage is a very real thing.

And now back to our previously scheduled blog post.

The book pictured above, One Good Deed by Dave Rosi, is a mystery of some renown, that is currently out of print. The publisher of this particular book, Hard Shell Word Factory, was in business from the early 1990's thru the early 2000's, and they were an early embracer of digital technology, as you were able to purchase downloads and floppy disks (the 3 1/4 inch version) of their published books.

This particular book stood out to me due to the simple fact that I was looking for a decent book of fiction that I could take my sweet time in reading. My reading is often cyclical in nature, in that I have long periods of wanting to read a plethora of books in the shortest time period possible. Those long periods are intermingled with equally long periods of wanting to move at the speed of slow with my reading, which is not conducive with borrowing books from the public library (even though my public library has basically eliminated fines in favor of perpetually renewing a checked out book until the patron decides to return it).

So among the many dozens of books of fiction, this particular book jumped out at me. The cover art was eye catching and the back cover blurb intrigued me as well (low level drug dealer, hurricane, lost stash of drugs, murder of what is now derisively called a 'White Liberal Savior', etc.), with the actual hook being: "the decision he makes will measure how much his life can be changed by one good deed".

The book itself is but 364p in length, which, in my opinion, tells me it can be a solid enough read that should any draggy parts be encountered, the rest of the story will pick up the slack. So far, with about 70+ pages read, I have not encountered any draggy parts.

I like fiction, but just like I'm finicky with the type of non-fiction that I read, I'm also finicky with the type of fiction that I like to read. This book seems to fit my offbeat criteria for what I feel comfortable in reading for fiction.

~~~~~~

One final advert, this time sponsored by me: I now have print copies of my latest book, To Live Is To Die Young, available on Amazon KDP, as well through me. The copies available through me are roughly 40% off the list price (plus CT sales tax) and I cover the S&H. Details can be had at my book blog, Books By G.B. Miller.

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #292: I'm Popular In A Bad Way

I needed something relaxing to look at while I'm writing this particular post, because the topic of choice is something that I thought I would never have to deal with in my blogging life, but here we is.

I was comparing my weekly Statcounter reports with the amount of page views that this blog and my book blog had been getting for the past month or so (as well as my other dormant blogs) and the math wasn't mathing.

Example: last week I was averaging a daily page view for this blog of 4.9 and the book blog of about 1 per day. Yet looking at the view count for my last blog post was sitting at 196 views, while my book blog post was sitting at an aggregate total of 561. 

I ruminated on this troubling statistic and I eventually came to the sadly plausible explanation for the sudden uptick in page views was that all of my blogs are being scrapped/pilfered for content. Obviously I'm none-too-pleased about this depressing development.

I spent a solid week ruminating on what I was going to do about my blogging going forward, and the few ideas that I had come up with, weren't really feasible for me. The first idea that crossed my mind was simply writing a short blog post on my Facebook author's page then link to here on the blog. While I did change the settings for the page so that you don't have to be a member of Meta to view it, but I have not figured out how to paste the link to a FB post elsewhere, and would inconvenient to everyone if I said on a blog post, "hey, look for my FB post dated xx/xx/xxxx to read the blog post."

The second idea was to create a newsletter that people could subscribe to in order to read my blog posts. But that was problematic on sooooo many levels that I sent that idea to the bottom of the Mariana Trench.

So having discarded those ideas, I'm still left with the quandary of what to do about my blogging going forward. While I don't plan on giving up on my blogging (been doing it now for the better part of seventeen years), I do plan on making a bunch of changes going forward.

I plan on tweaking what I actually blog about. Instead of ruminating on whatever happens to strike my fancy, I plan on narrowing my scope to simply the following four items.

1} My family bookcase: I have a huge eclectic bookcase to share with everyone. Archival memory is always a good thing to have, especially when it comes to books, and trust me, my memory is quite encyclopedic when a given situation calls for it.

2} My personal bookcase: mine is about the same size in totality, as it kitty corners, and is chock full of all kinds of interesting things to explore and opine about.

3} My vast music collection, which is located in that kitty corner and my den

4} My writing: which is the original topic that all of my blogs were predicated on. I will still opine about that, but will try to tighten it up to make it not so specific, unless I'm promoting one of my books.

In regards to my other blogs, I started the process of shutting down 99% of three remaining blogs that people could actually peruse: Cedar's Mountain; Father Nature's Corner and It's Always Saturday In Suburbia (my adult blog). I say 99%, as I turned all but one post into draft mode, eliminated the page tabs and any out-of-date advertising on them. My short story blog has already been completely deactivated using the same method, going on now for at least five years. Because of this, any links that you may come across directing you to the first two blogs will be broken and unusable. My picture blog will stay open for those to peruse at their leisure.

So my friends, this post is probably not what you're expecting to read, but it's the one that needed to be made, albeit quite reluctantly. Next week we will be back to our semi-abnormal self covering one of the aforementioned topics.

Have a fantastic start to your week.

{c} 2025 by G.B. Miller. All Rights Reserved

Episode #291: The Family Bookcase: {1}

In my basement we have two monstrosities that pass for bookcases: the family bookcase that basically stretches some ten feet across a side wall, and mine that stretches some four feet down the side wall in front of my den. Starting with this post, we'll be doing a skewered exploration on the contents of the family bookcase, and alternate a few about my bookcase.

Our family bookcase contains about 60 years worth of books collected in a few different ways: directly purchased from bookstores, acquired on the dirt cheap (aka free) from various people who were bringing/purging their collections. 

Just to give you a basic idea of what kind of books/reading material taking up space, we have the following: old mystery/sci-fi magazines; religious materials, encyclopedias, fiction, pop culture and different types of non-fiction that one would find in schools/universities. Like I said, this is just a sampling.

Wherever I walk by the bookcase, I'm always on the lookout for a particular missing repro book from the late 19th century, specifically, memoirs from the US Civil War (I bought some 35 years ago, two different Time-Life book series that totaled almost 65 volumes, each one costing, on average, $14.99 (not counting S&H) in 1980's money). When I was creating my own personal bookcase, I discovered I was missing one volume from the memoir series, thus the need for perpetually searching the bookcase.

Because of the type of books we have stashed in a bookcase that will never be read, there are titles/topics that often jump out at me, simply because of how strange the topic is. For our first example, we have this:

To be honest, I do not recall how this particular book made it to our family bookcase, but since my brother is a bit of a mild hoarder, I'm thinking it came to us courtesy of him.

Now, I know absolutely zero about cricket and I'm 100% positive that no one in the house knows anything about cricket. I think I tried watching it once or twice, but when you don't know anything about a sport that is popular everywhere except the US, you kind of say to yourself, "No." and move on.

This is but one of about two dozen sports oriented books housed within that large bookcase, which run the gamut of encyclopedias, memoirs, histories and compilations, covering mostly baseball, with a few football and one emphasizing World Cup soccer....and one that's a short history of Bundesligia, which is German soccer (fun fact: our local PBS affiliate used to host a weekly German soccer game called "Soccer Made In Germany", which my dad used to watch every Sunday.

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I have five of these highly informative baseball encyclopedias. This particular baseball encyclopedia was around from the 1970's through 2009, was a baseball junkie's wet dream. It had everything a junkie would want: a detailed synopsis of every season (both AL & NL) as well as the final standings; with a statistical breakdown of each team's total player stats; it also included a breakdown of each world series (and divisional playoffs); divided the entirety of baseball (1876 thru 2009) by periods/eras; lifetime stats were also divided by the same periods/eras; and even included the two years that the Federal League was around (1914 & 1915), fun fact: Wrigley Field initially belonged to the Chicago Whales, the Federal League ball-club before they disappeared with the Federal League did. Overall this was a fantastic detailed history about Major League Baseball.

This baseball encyclopedia was the catalyst for me getting into the minutiae of baseball for a number of years, and everything else that I've managed to come across I compare to this encyclopedia, and I found those...wanting.

This was and remains to this day, my absolute favorite encyclopedia of my absolute favorite sport (I became a NY Mets fan since I got cable t.v. in the late 70's), and it still has an influence on me as a person and as a writer to this day.

As the title of this post states, this is the 1st part of what I hope to make a reoccurring feature on this blog: a sampling of books that were read maybe once or twice, then became a part of a very eclectic collection of books that me, myself and I would ever read, as I seem to be the only hardcore reader in my household.

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