ADF & BBBE Carnivore | Tripping Out of the Blocks | Journey to One-derland | Week 46 Roundup

 We ended up last week and began this week with our trip to see the solar eclipse as it passed through Texas. During that particular road trip, I indulged a little too much. It left me in a pretty bad place to start the week. Could I fix it? Was it possible to turn things around before the week came to an end and I'd gained weight again? Watch and see whether I pulled it off or not.

A Macabre Shipment

Yesterday, a package came for me in the mail. I saw the light on our Alexa, and asked it what my notifications were.

"A shipment has arrived, including Blood of Elves."

I couldn't help but laugh. That made it sound like a much more ghoulish shipment than it actually was. It might be a lot neater if it really was something like that. I might be a much more interesting person in that case. Instead, it was referring to this:

Yup, I listened to the audiobooks of those books back in 2023, and I've been meaning to amass the books on my shelves. Now I've managed to get most of them. Just one more left, Season of Storms...the post-finale prequel book.

Maybe I ought to do that on my blog as well. I talk about all the new toys I get in my collection, but I suspect there are more book nerds that see my blog than toy nerds. Maybe I ought to start talking about the books on my shelves too. There's way more of them than there is toys, I think. What do you think? Should I try it? We can discuss the books if you'd like...

Volume Two Now Available!

Okay, after last month's frenzied publish fest for all my short stories, the time has now arrived to get the collections of those stories out. Phase one of that process is the publishing the eBook version of A Battalion of Ideas: The Short Fiction Collection, Volume Two. 

I put it together over the last little while and just published it yesterday afternoon. You can find it on Amazon and get seventeen of my stories for the price of...well, not one. It's about what it something like two of them would cost on their own.

Next up will be to make the paperback and hardcover versions. Lastly, I'll get the audiobook done. Some of the stories are already recorded for the audiobook, but only about five or six. That's a pretty low percentage of seventeen, so I've got plenty of work to do on that. Of course, the audiobook version of this book will have to wait until I've finished the audiobook version of Kingdom of Flies and Fireflies: The Short Fiction Collection, Volume One. Shouldn't be that bad. I only have to record the audio for "Kingdom of Flies" to finish up that one. So, things are rolling along.

So, if you are interested, pick up a copy of A Battalion of Ideas: The Short Fiction Collection, Volume Two. Also, when you read it, give the book a review or at least a rating. It doesn't take much, but it makes a big difference on how visible my books are to people. Unreviewed and unrated books might as well not exist on Amazon.

Oh, and I have one more question. When I came up with the idea for the title of the collection, it was a play on the story "The Battle of the Ideas," which we did on the Dunesteef years ago. That story was about a writer whose story ideas had grown tired of being trapped inside his head, and threatened to kill their creator in an attempt to escape and land in some other creator's head that would actually write the stories. So, there's nothing about a battalion of space marines marching down a road in a futuristic city that pertains to that story, nor is there anything like that in any other story in the collection. 

So, my question is, do I need to change my cover or is it okay? The cover refers to the title, and not to any particular story in the book. Is it misleading? Might people buy the book expecting sci-fi space warrior stories and grow angry when they don't get them? I'm just curious what y'all's opinion of that is.

I Know It's Not The Right Time...

...but I missed my chance to get this published when the time was right back in November. It was my goal to get my first audiobook published back then, but I effed around for too long and found out that it just wasn't possible. I've straightened up since then, and managed to get all the stories for Christmas Creatures: A Twisted Christmas Story Collection recorded and edited, and I got an email from ACX the other day to tell me that the audiobook is now available on Audible, which is Amazon. 

This is the square version of the cover, because it's audio, and that means...a CD? A record album?

It's exciting for me. I've published my first audiobook ever, now. Surprising to consider, since I made my name (what little name I have) doing an audio podcast. I probably should have had audiobooks up ages ago, but it's better late than never, I guess.

So, if you are one of those who wanted the book, but only wanted it if it was in audio...and there was at least one person who specifically requested that...then you can pick it up now...or you can wait until November when the time is right, I'd definitely understand if you did that.

A Scarlett Letter

Algar Van Cluth suggested that I should wait until clearance for the Vintage Scarlett from the GI Joe Classified line. I had to ignore that advice, because I'd already pre-ordered the figure. 

Maybe I still could have, but truthfully, I didn't want to. This is the Scarlett figure that I've wanted ever since they announced this six-inch line. This figure is the third version of Scarlett that I've bought. When the line first began, I bought every figure they offered, including the updated-for-modern-audiences version of Scarlett.

I guess Hasbro didn't believe that modern collectors would like a Scarlett that wore the same old tan bathing suit-looking outfit that she wore back in the eighties, so they gussied her up with a bunch of extra colors and highlights and a goofy new face and hair color.

I tried a few things to make Scarlett more like the one I'd loved as a kid, and considered a full-on custom version. I'd seen some really good repaints of the figure, but I suspected that, like the Baroness that I built for myself, as soon as I finished the custom repaint, they'd announce their own classic version of Scarlett that I could have gotten without putting in all the effort and still coming up with something that was only "pretty good."

So, even though I gad the origninal release and the movie release of Scarlett...

I waited, and lo and behold, they announced that classic vintage look Scarlett. Now she's hitting stores, and I've got her in my grubby little mitts.

I have to say that I absolutely love the figures. It's exactly what I always wanted. It comes with a literal crap ton of accessories, including two different pony tails, so you can give her a more action-packed hairstyle if you'd like.

When you compare it to the old Scarlett that I had, which I'd enhanced by giving it the head from my Black Widow to make it closer to the character I wanted it to be, it towers above.

Although that might have been poor phrasing, because in the picture the old one looks a lot taller. I think they're basically the same size as far as that goes, though. The new one looks shorter because she's crouching a lot more.

Now, I can give Black Widow her long hair back. I've been using the short-haired-version on that shelf for a while, but I definitely prefer the long hair.

And Scarlett can join her compadres on the Joe shelf.

With Scarlett and Gung Ho made vintage, the only non-vintage looking guy there is Duke. He's still got the stupid golden shin guards and futuristic gun in his hand. The vintage Duke was released in the same wave as Scarlett. I didn't pre-order it, but I saw it in the store the other day, and I'm sorely tempted to buy it. I have a sneaking suspicion that I will very likely be able to get it at clearance in a few months, but will I have the fortitude to wait? Probably not, to be honest. I'm sure I'll have a post about adding him to the bunch in just a week or two. See you then.

Among The Wildflowers

I've done a few posts over the years about the wildflowers here in Texas.

Between February and May or June, they're everywhere, and they are often very impressive. They sprout up in any patch of open ground available to them, and line the freeways everywhere, even in dingy urban areas. They're a ray of sunshine in the deep darkness like that sometimes.

However, in all this time, I've never seen much of the state flower, the blue bonnet. I guess it must be Houston's climate. It must not be quite right for the spread of blue bonnets. Sometimes, you'll see a few of them here and there, but mostly its other flowers...yellow ones, pink ones, white ones, etc.

There's a trend here in Texas where people take their kids to a field festooned in blue bonnets and take pictures of them. I've seen the results, and the pictures are pretty great. I've even seen some blog posts about where the best place in Houston is to find enough blue bonnets to get a good picture.

It seemed weird to me that it was so hard to find them if they were such a big deal that the state of Texas decided to name them the state flower. Usually, that is reserved for something so prolific that it is a integral thread in the fabric of the society. You can't go anywhere without finding those flowers.

Well, this weekend, when we headed to the hill country to witness the eclipse, I discovered, at last, why blue bonnets are the state flower. As we drove away from Houston, the freeway was lined with yellow flowers, and orange flowers, and pink flowers, but here and there, we started to see some blue flowers. I even saw a large patch of them on the side of the road near Huntsville, and someone had pulled over on the freeway and set their kid in the middle of them for a picture.

Then we started getting more and more blue bonnets. Eventually, the blue bonnets completely took over. You might see some other flowers here and there, but the fields, the meadows, and the sides of the roads were covered with thick, shoulder to shoulder blue bonnets.

I wasn't about to stop on the side of the freeway for a picture like the lady did in Huntsville, but I smiled as I looked at the scenery through the whole drive. I hoped that our destination would have blue bonnets to see, and my hope was rewarded. They were everywhere, choking the fields and growing right up to the very edge of each campsite. Have you ever seen blue bonnets? Well, let me disgorge on you a bunch of my favorite shots that I took while there.

ADF & BBBE Carnivore | Triumphing Over Backsliding | Journey to One-derland | Week 45 Roundup

For two weeks in a row, I went in the wrong direction, but then for the last two weeks I have made a specific push to stick 100% to my plan and eat what I should without any of the processed stuff or the extra stuff. I have also made sure to stick to my fasts even if it was really tough. How did it go? Watch today's episode and see!