Shai August's Blog, page 2

binged: february 2022

I started off watching what everyone else was watching at the beginning of February - The Tinder Swindler and Sweet Magnolias, Season 2. I had been waiting for Sweet Magnolias forever, and I wasn’t disappointed.

Netflix

Love is Blind Japan

Love is Blind, Season 2

Inventing Anna

Major Dad, Season 1

Ali Wong: Don Wong

Fishbowl Wives

Major Dad, Season 2

Young Wallander: Killer’s Shadow

Space Force, Season 1

Amazon

Reacher, Season 1

Murdertown, Season 1

Book of Love

Pretty Hard Cases

The Mystery of Agatha Christie with David Suchet

Revenge of the Middle-Aged Woman

Dominique Witten: Stop Me When I'm Lying!
Marina Franklin: Single Black Female

Finding Your Roots

Winter Wedding
When I'm 64

Wycliffe
Accident Man
The Wheel of Time - Season 1 season finale

The Bodyguard (1992) - whole blog post coming…

Peacock

Bel Air

HBOMax

The Gilded Age

Another NaNoFail

My therapist and I have talked about my perfectionist tendencies, but it still hadn't modified my behavior.

And I thought I was doing better with my constant agonizing over things but then I signed up to do NaNoWriMo knowing that I'm working two jobs, had to travel to attend two training classes (in person), my left hip is killing me, and my asthma/bronchitis situation is flaring up almost daily.

For the few who have never heard of it, NaNoWriMo is the acronym for National Novel Writing Month, and my nemesis for the last fifteen years.

I've failed more times than I've won.

Some way some how, November will always become my least productive writing month even when I've prepped all of October.

Each year I promise myself that I will win NaNoWriMo, it's becoming a running joke in my head.

I've tried reverse NaNoWriMo intending to complete huge word counts early before tapering off.

I've picked rewards, some huge, many big, and a bunch of little. Next year I going to do something drastic, I'm going to take the whole month off.

It'll be a chance for me to destress and be productive. I think maybe I don't have perfectionist tendencies but I tend to load more things on my plate than I can handle.

Old Shai could sign herself up for twenty things and get twenty five things done.

With November coming to a close in less than seven days, there is no way humanly possible for me to write the forty thousand words I’m short of getting a win.

Proof of Life

I've been MIA since before August and I apologize. Ida (the Hurricane) made life difficult in more ways than one.

No electric.
No air conditioning.
No internet.

No brain function thus killing my writing MOJO.

I haven't been home to New Orleans since late August/early September and I desperately miss my own bed.

Luckily writing is a business that isn't location dependent, and I'm still far from my Hoffice. It isn't even dependent on electricity as writers of old can attest. Millions of books have been transcribed from hand written notes, which is why the damage of my power cord shouldn't have stopped my productivity.

Alas, y'all know me and no power cord means the words just stopped flowing.

If you're in the Rare and Unknown Facebook group, you followed the saga of my power cord delivery from Amazon. If you Aren't in the group, why? Click the link, answer the questions and join now.

Just to recap quickly, I ordered the same cord three times, one was undeliverable, one was delayed for three days, and another arrived right on time (at the same time the delayed on arrived).

I posted a proof of life photo on Facebook, and got the weirdest message in my dms. “Wow, your so pretty. I didn’t know!” This was from a reader who had previously sent me messages too.

It threw me for a loop, cause I stick my face out all the time, or so I thought.

Confession time!

I truly loathe taking pictures. My face shows whatever emotion is foremost, and half my inner thoughts. And recently my left eye started twitching and I look like Mad Eye Moody.

I can’t school it to look neutral.

I don’t understand angles or posing.

My eyes look like they’re closed if I smile too hard. If I want to make it look like my eyes are open then I can’t smile wide. There is no middle ground here. NONE.

via GIPHY

I can’t win for losing. One out of every one hundred pictures I take looks okay. One out of thousand is exceptional.

There are people who take pictures all day, every day. I ain’t one of them. Maybe it’s the Virgo in me, but I don’t understand the need either, I know what I look like.

Do you take a quick pic every day? Are you practicing angles and poses? How do you school your face?

What Is That Feeling...?

You know the feeling that you’ve done something - like return an email or a text message, but when you go to find it, it’s still in your draft folder? Or you’ve taken the chicken out of the freezer, but its still there? Or you’ve done one of a thousand things that you do in a day, but it remains stubbornly undone?

That is how my life has been revolving lately.

I will swear on a stack of bibles, the immortal souls of all my dead ancestors, or worse that I had not only done the task or errand but done it well.

Then when I’m forced by time or circumstance to find said email or package of chicken, it isn’t done or it’s done poorly or still in the freezer. It’ll have a million typos or I drifted off halfway through a thought…sort of like this sentence.

AND to make matters worse sometimes, I’ll have vivid recollections of doing the thing.

AND it should also serve as a red flag to me that I’m moving too fast, multitasking too much, or something…but I’ve never been good at slowing down or taking a hint.

This feeling has to have a name, right? It’s not quite déjà vu, but I don’t know how else to describe it.

What I Binged This Month... Super Duper Late March & April Edition

I didn’t do much in March besides watch an inordinate amount of television, taking a break from the daily grind of writing, and even a brief break from work.

March

Nadiya Bakes: Season 1 - Netflix - I love Nadiya and have since her debut on Great British Bake Off with those expressive eyebrows. Every thing she does I watch.

Deep Water: Season 1: "Episode 1" - Netflix - Yeap, I only watched the first episode. Fell asleep on it, and didn’t go back.

DC's Legends of Tomorrow: Season 2 - Netflix -

Quantico: Season 2 - Netflix

DC's Legends of Tomorrow: Season 3 - Netflix

Murder Among the Mormons: Limited Series: "Episode 1" - Netflix

The Flash: Season 1 - Netflix

Nightflyers: Season 1 - Netflix

Manhunt: Deadly Games: Season 1 - Netflix

Manhunt: Unabomber - Netflix

Criminal: UK: Season 1 - Netflix

Marriage or Mortgage: Season 1 - Netflix

Pine Gap: Season 1 - Netflix

DC's Legends of Tomorrow: Season 4 - Netflix

Country Comfort: Season 1, Episodes 1-3 - Netflix

The Five: Season 1: "Episode 1" - Netflix

April

Unabomber - In His Own Words: Season 1 - Netflix

Young Wallander: Season 1 - Netflix

Bad Trip - Netflix

Evil Genius: the True Story of America's Most Diabolical Bank Heist: Season 1 - Netflix

Thunder Force - Netflix

This Is a Robbery: The World's Biggest Art Heist: Limited Series - Netflix

Paranoid: Season 1 - Netflix

Ibiza: Love Drunk - Netflix

Dad Stop Embarrassing Me!: Season 1 - Netflix

Shadow and Bone: Season 1 - Netflix

Style

My cooking style mirrors my writing style.

Follow me on a journey as I try to explain.

I’ve been trying to eat healthier, so my fridge often looks like a produce section threw up. If I’m slacking or more like backtracking on the healthier eating then of course my fridge looks like the dumpster outside of the produce department.

I’m trying to be a good steward of all these vegetables I’ve purchased because I’m cheap so I’m chopping radishes tops off and slicing them to be tossed into my “daily” lunch salad.

While I’m slicing I think maybe I should pickle some of these. Then I turn to the bag of red onions (because pickled red onions are divine). Then my mind strays to all of the vegetables in the fridge and I start to wonder… Can I pickle carrots? Squash? And I start re-examining all the veggies I have with the question, ‘Can I pickle that?’

This cascading train wreck of thoughts is also a mirror of my writing. Can I write about alpha women? Can I write about matriarchal alpha women who aren’t damsels in distress and definitely aren’t wasting their lives pining for a man? Can I write alpha men who don’t run from smart alpha women, but instead run to them? Can I take magic and infuse shifters? Can I take shifters and infuse shifters? Can I take that world and add African mythology? Greek mythology? Chinese mythology? Norse mythology?

The question I’ve been asking myself in one of my many moments of self reflection is ‘How much is too much?”

I’ve been working on the full outline of the last books in The Shifter Bachelor series, and trying to stitch up all the different plotlines and spreading them on the table of my mind I realized it might be too much for one person.

In the future, I don’t think I’ll attempt to write something this epic again.

Who am I lying too? I don’t think I’ll attempt something this big and sprawling for awhile, because I can see myself saying never and my grandmother’s spirit right behind me saying “never is a mighty long time…” Which is basically country-shorthand for “that’s what your mouth says now, but we’ll see what your ass does later and remind you of this moment…”

Books that Influenced Shai - March

In my Sophia Petrillo voice Picture it. Louisiana 1997.

Mercedes Lackey’s Oathbound appeared in my mailbox as part of some book club’s mailing. I looked it over with some skepticism but greedy reader that I am started in on it. Two hours later, I was pissed that I had to put it down to do actual work.

I rushed through what needed to be done so I could get back to this book, and I finished it that evening. Oathbound, Oathbreakers, and Oathblood opened up a new category of female sword and sorcery fantasy and I would never be the same.

I would clear the shelves at my local library of Lackey books until I’d read them all.

2021 The Veil Only Stories

Hey,

I promised you Veil Only stories and here is the line up! Some are current matching with the ongoing timeline of the Rare & the Unknown, some travel back in time and gives you a glimpse of the backstory of your favorite characters.

Traveling back, you’ll go on adventures with:

First, Romeo & The Oracle following the adventures of a young Romeo who meets The Oracle for the first time.

Second, A Coven Gathering: Freemans & McNamaras . What can I say all the single Freemans and all the single McNamaras get together four decades ago and where a certain badass witch’s parents meet for the first time.

Third, {Redacted}.

Fourth, {Redacted}.

Matching up with the current timeline will be The Rappers and The Librarian (reverse harem), and {Redacted}.

Membership to The Veil is at the $25 Beta or $50 Alpha monthly levels, and can be purchased in the Store by August.

What I Binged This Month... February Edition

Foodwise

I ate too much king cake, but I’ve been doing my own personal Eat the Pantry challenge. I overspend on groceries because on the days I’m tired (both mentally and physically), I go straight for the convenience foods; ignoring the more substantial ingredients that need more than a few minutes to prepare. There are bags of beans, and other pantry staples and I promised myself to see how long I could go without ordering groceries or going in the grocery store.

My crockpot has gotten a good workout this month.

The goal was to go all of February without buying new, but fresh fruit, cereal, and milk got me. I even finished off a box of oatmeal (which I loathe by the way) by adding all the aforementioned fruit to it alongside walnuts and brown sugar. My friend posted this Pan Seared Oatmeal that I reluctantly tried, and found that it was more tolerable than regular oatmeal but the prep is rather intensive.

I almost broke down and ordered more than once (when I ran out of pork rinds) and Scrubbing Bubbles, but I had at least a dozen other kinds of cleaners from vinegar to bleach to blue stuff and two kinds of concentrate. So I worked with what I had on hand, and dreamed of Doritos.

Distractions

I’ve been trying to break my addiction to Merge Dragons, and I couldn’t get past this Challenge level for two months. I’ve been playing Sodoku online, next I’ll be knitting cat sweaters and doing the crossword puzzle in pen.

Television

Blown Away - Season 2 on Netflix

Red Rock - Season 1 on Prime. Two words - too short. Two more words - bent cop. Ok, more words. Each episode runs maybe twenty minutes, so you see why I think it’s too short. This show presents as one of those feuding family versus feuding family dramas, but it’s more family versus family versus police or “Garda” and is complex and complicated. It’s Irish, so the accents get thick, and the theme music is horrid! BUT BUT BUT, there are like eighty episodes in the first season. This show had me yelling at the computer or the television PISSED at Garda Sharon Cleere for a thousand little reasons.

Star Trek Enterprise - Season 4 - Netflix - This is a rollover from January, and I finished the last few episodes.

One single episode of Season 3 of Cobra Kai, once I saw the black character, Aisha was gone so was I. - Netflix

Tiffany Haddish Presents: They Ready - Season 2 - I loved the first iteration, featuring one of my fave comedienne Aida Rodriguez (who I’ve been following since Last Comic Standing) and of course went back for the second. Y’all Miss Barbara! I howled, and I believe that Erin Jackson and I are cosmic twins - she doesn’t like to be hugged

Star Trek: The Next Generation - Season 1 - Well half of season 1. I know I said I would do a full rewatch in chronological order, but as much as I’m a Trekkie to the bone - I hate Williams Shatner. The mood has to strike me to get my needed Spock and Uhura fix to watch. Is there any Spock and Uhura fanfic?

Finding ‘Ohana - Y’all a modern day Goonies with an even more touching family drama and Hawaiian mysticism. It was fantastic, and your girl teared up. And I’m now in love with Brad Kalilimoku. (Don’t google, the pictures on the internet do not do him justice. Get that man a proper photographer!)

Release Day! The After Market, Volume 4

Originally, The After Market series was going to be a standalone story within the World of the Rare and Unknown, but my mind wouldn’t stop wondering back over to my shifter fight club. So I ran with it, fleshing out this part of the R & U that is a little darker, and a lot grittier than the rest of the series.

Volume One was set in Houston. Volume Two and the continuation was set in Los Angeles. And Volume Four is set on the mythical island of Atlantis.

I’ve been excited about introducing Atlantis since I first started building and writing this world.

I hope you enjoy your trip to Atlantis, and your return visit to The After Market.

The aquatic Atlantis After Market only happens once a year. It is the major social event of the aquatic community like a combined Mardi Gras, the Super Bowl and Kentucky Derby.

So popular in fact is the happenings of the AM, that the couples united as a results of the battles spawn a series of side betting on the outcomes of the relationships for over a year and a day.

Thea Theriault's music career had just taken its death knell with her record company followed quickly by her boyfriend slash manager dropping her in the middle of her tour. She finds herself stranded on the island of Atlantis without a dime to her name and no way off the tropical prison.

Trenton Baptiste's time has run out. The jaws of the arranged marriage he has avoided for years have closed around him with the finality of a prison cell. A formal announcement has taken place, engraved invitations have been sent out, the date has been set for two weeks away, even his bachelor party has being planned to coincide with the main event of the year.

Will these two strangers find a solution to both their problems, or will their trips to the After Market keep them trapped forever?

Available Now