Josh Gunderson's Blog, page 11

Fall Is a lot Better Anyway

I have to admit that this past summer has been WILDLY uneventful for me. Granted, a lot has been going on but really nothing worth sitting down and writing about. I’ve been working a lot and any down time has been spent sleeping, relaxing and generally trying to be human.

At the beginning of the year, Ashley-Michelle and I promised ourselves that we’d take little adventures once a month and we have failed miserably at that. Our schedules conflict and we’re both just exhausted about 95% of the time. With Halloween Horror Nights just around the corner, it’s very likely that we will continue to fail at our goal.

It is sounding like a big group of us will possibly be going on a cruise in November for her birthday. We shall see. I’m pumped to get back out on the seas and do nothing but drink and relax. If anything, I’m sure we’ll go again in January when things slow to a crawl for both of us. Maybe we’ll get to do both.

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My next adventure of sorts will be to head up to Boston next week for my brother’s wedding. I honestly don’t remember the last time that I saw him and I’ve never met his fiancé so this should all be very interesting. It’s also going to be the first time in about five years that all of my siblings have been together. So when the world ends this coming weekend you all know why.

I’m really excited because this means that I’ll get to see my nephew again and I have every intention of spending as much time with him as possible. I’m thrilled to be able to take him around the city, especially to the aquarium where I used to work. It’s also an excuse to be a massive tourist and possibly hit a duck tour and the children’s museum.

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Until then it’s just a lot of working and planning for what’s to come in the fall. I’ve got some fun stuff planned for Halloween Horror Nights this year. As everyone knows, I LIVE for this event so I’m excited that it’s finally rolled back around.

My Halloween decorations went up a couple weeks ago. Some would say August is too soon and those people are just plain evil. Considering I’ve already got Christmas and beyond on my brain for work, there’s no such thing as too soon for Halloween.

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If this year is anything like last, I’m sure I’ll have plenty to write about. I do know that this time of year is when I really start to fall off with blogging. It’s mostly because I’m spending so much time posting and whatnot on Instagram. It’s honestly a nightmare trying to juggle so many social networks at once, I really don’t know how people do it. I know that scheduling software exists but it’s hard to tell what’s going to play well that far into the future.

I guess I should ask, have any of you used social media scheduling? How has that worked out for you?

That’s my update for now, I promise I’ll try to be most interesting soon!

All the Things I Didn’t Buy on Amazon Prime Day

I guess this past week was an exciting time for everyone who isn’t me. The hot gossip around the water cooler was talk of all the Prime Day deals they snagged for themselves or as gifts for others. I, on the other hand, just hid in my office and tried to figure out what I was going to do for lunch.

Truth is, I actually cancelled my Prime membership after who knows how many years of having it. I actually haven’t ordered anything off Amazon in what feels like forever and so it felt pointless to drop $120 in one go when I’ve been trying so hard to do better with money.

In just a few more days I’ll receive the first round of royalties from “You’re Doing It Wrong” which is exciting. Royalties are sent directly to my savings account and here’s hoping they can actually stay there.

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I have never been a big fan of Prime Day anyway. I remember the first year when it was a laughable disaster. It got better with time but nothing worth getting excited about. It’s a lot like Black Friday. A sense of urgency is created to get people to spend money. At the end of the day, I’ll be just fine.

With Halloween Horror Nights just around the corner, that’s where my money plans on going because I’m an adult and I have priorities!

I guess that’s really all I’ve got right now. I thought I had more but I can’t think of anything else to say.

Did any of ya’ll grab something worthwhile on Prime Day?

Taking It All One Baby Step At a Time

If I had a dollar for every time I started and stopped this post there’s a good chance I would be out of any and all debt right now. Not for any real reason besides the fact that I have the attention span of a fruit fly at the best of times.

For anyone wondering why it took ten years for me to write a book, it’s mostly because between that first paragraph and me starting this one, twenty minutes elapsed because the TV is on. It’s not my fault Netflix just added the 5th season of Madam Secretary. I love this show.

If you haven’t seen it, it’s all on Netflix right now. Go watch it before season six starts. I’ll wait.

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Ok my most recently distraction was learning that the show HAS been renewed for a 6th season but it’s going to be shortened and it will be the final one. Now I’m sad. This is not how I saw today going at all. I also forgot that Hilary Clinton makes a cameo in the 5th season premiere.

Today is a roller coaster.

This year has been a roller coaster.

I’ve been quiet as of late mostly because I have been insanely busy. Out of the 20 days in the month of June, I worked 26 of them. Sometimes just at one job, but most days at both. On top of that, I have been plotting my next moves in life, working towards not just closing the chapter on one part of my life, but the whole book.

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I’ve found, in my life at least, every once and a while it feels like something is happening. I really don’t know how to explain it but it feels like something is coming. Maybe big things, maybe little things, but something. I feel re-energized and ready to take the world on.

Or maybe it’s just me coming out of depression. There’s also that.

I feel like I’ve been swimming in it so much these past couple years and it’s an ebb and flow of the feeling. Everyone one step forward leads to two steps back. Sometimes it’s more going backwards than forward. But these past few days, I’ve consistently felt good. Like good things are coming. Good things are happening. As a result, I’m excited and hopeful.

The trick is not to go to fast out the gate.

The past couple nights when I’ve gotten home and taken the time to relax, I’ve done a lot of thinking. One of the biggest things I’d like to do before this end of this year is really work to get myself back on track with so many of the goals that I have talked about for so long. I have been so excited about this, my temptation this morning was to spring out of bed and do it all!

But I didn’t.

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I know me well enough. I tend to get a bunch of ideas in my head all at once and get really excited and then explode all over the place. From there, I get tired and overwhelmed and overloaded and nothing truly gets accomplished. That’s my cycle and I fully recognize that. That’s a big part of why I didn’t push myself this morning.

I know that creating or, in this case, rebuilding healthy habits, takes a lot of time. It doesn’t happen in one day.

A big part of what I thought about it what I would like to be able to work towards over this next month. Here’s what I’m hoping to get going for myself:

Read for at least 30 minutes a day.
Write for at least 30 minutes a day.
Be active for at least 30 minutes a day.

These are the goals for July.

It seems small but given that I’ve been physically and mentally unable to accomplish any of these things lately, it’s a good place to start. This morning I was hoping to go work out but my body told me I needed sleep so I did that instead. Technically I’ve been writing for well over an hour mostly because I kept hating what I wrote for this post. So winning.

I also would like to find my bedroom floor at some point this month. I certainly will be making sure to work less. I finally feel like I’m in something of a place where I can take a breath and relax. I haven’t felt that way in some time but again… baby steps.

I am hoping to make sure I update a lot more than I have been lately. I know I’m going to end up falling short of my year goal of at least 100 posts. I mean, I say that now, a lot could happen in the next six months.

Time will tell.

Halloween Horror Nights 29: Let’s Get Totally Spooky

I have yet to make mention of Halloween Horror Nights once on this blog in 2019 and I feel like I deserve some kind of medal for that. Or not. I’m not sure how medals work.

This isn’t a Halloween Horror Nights blog though I’m sure sometimes it feels that way, especially since it’s the one thing I look forward to every year. This year especially since I have some big plans for how I plan to approach the event this year.

That sounds ominous.

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There have been several announcements made about the event in terms of houses, and we now know about four of the ten houses.

Not surprisingly, Stranger Things will be returning for a second year with the house featuring scenes from season 2 along with the yet-to-be-released season 3 which comes to Netflix on July 4th, well before the event begins.

Speaking of which- dates of the event. There is a lot of them. I’ll admit that I’m a bit pissed that Universal dropped the ball on beginning the event on Friday September 13th. Instead, the whole shindig will begin the week prior on September 6th and run through November 2nd. Given the popularity of the event last year this makes sense… but COME ON! Friday the 13th.

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Back to houses.

The remaining three known houses are original mazes. In April we learned of the return of the Nightingales, blood thirsty creatures as old as time. I’m not familiar with them as I didn’t attend HHN21 but I’m cautiously optimistic for the house which is going to be set in ancient Rome.

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Next up is Depths of Fear which I’m actually excited about. The original houses have outshined the IPs over the last couple years and this one sounds fun. Here’s the announcement from Universal that describes the house:

“The workers of a deep-sea mining company have found themselves in a dire situation. They’ve delved too deep and encountered a parasitic race of creatures that turn out to be deadly. Panic ensues as you find yourself encountering infected miners and acidic creatures. The pressure builds as the self-destruct sequence counts down to the inevitable implosion of the facility.

“Mouthbrooders”

As you venture further into the depths, you’ll encounter the creatures known only as the “Mouthbrooders.” Picture being trapped in a claustrophobic mining installation underwater with a countless number of these slithering monsters. Your worst nightmares will come to life as these fiends spew flesh-eating acidic eggs at human hosts, and you witness miners being driven mad by the infection.”

So yeah, I’m on board.

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The last announcement house that has been announced is “Universal Monsters” which had been a house in Hollywood last year and apparently did well enough for Orlando to give it a shot (and probably do it better—sorry, ya’ll know how I feel about Hollywood’s event…)

I’m looking forward to this house as I am a fan of the Universal Classics and I’m excited to see them come to life.

So that’s my quick update for those who, for some inexplicable reason, come to me for HHN updates. I’m going to be posting more on the subject soon since some interesting rumors have been swirling my way and I’m too excited not to chat about them!

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My Plate Is Full But I’ll Go Ahead and Take Seconds

Summer has arrived in Orlando and, as a result, everyone is amping up hiring to deal with the impending flood of tourists. My place of employment is no exception and therefore I’ve been doing a lot of training as of late. It’s sometimes fun and sometimes stressful but it’s life.

It’s also exhausting. I’m working two jobs right now and most days I’m running from one to the other. On top of that, I’m working on promoting “You’re Doing It Wrong”, keeping my blog updated (which I’m not doing so great on… sorry), working on my next book, and sometimes sleeping.

During one of the many days when I was working both jobs and running all over the place, one of my trainees asked, “Do you ever have a moment to stop?”

Answer?

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I don’t know what that is to be honest.

I’m reminded of when I was in college where I was just constantly on the go.  I was working full-time, taking on a full-time course load, working in the theatre department and was on the executive board for several groups on campus- and sometimes I would sleep in the in between time. Actually, I was notorious for sleeping either in my car or sometimes in my office on campus. It was exhausting but I loved every second of it.

I guess the only real difference now is that I’m getting paid for it? For the most part? I think I’m winning.

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According to an article I stupidly just decided to read, I have a busyness addiction, and I’m using being crazy busy as an excuse to ignore bigger problems in my life…

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This is why I don’t google things, I don’t want to know the truth. I’m the baby in Baby’s Day Out, I just want to be blissfully unaware. Thanks.

This whole post has already gone off the rails of what I was planning to talk about. Because I’m me. I don’t know why I’m surprised by this.

Anyway- with all this stuff I’ve got going on you’d think I’d like to settle down and get some rest and you’d probably be right. Even at this moment, I’d really like to just take a nap. But I want to take over the world, and that’s going to take priority.

So there’s looking at what’s coming next. For the longest time many people have been trying to push me towards the world of podcasting. I’m not sure why but the whole idea didn’t really seem all that appealing to me an as a result I’ve sort of shunned the whole idea. Lately, though, the word has been thrown around again and I’ve decided to look into it.

I actually blame Chelsea Handler for this. I really enjoy her and I’ve missed seeing her on a regular show. I was hoping to see her on tour when she came to this area around my birthday but it wasn’t in the cards for me financially so I skipped. I did, however, decide to start listening to her limited series podcast.

Once people found out I was listening to a podcast they started throwing other my way that they thought I would enjoy. Why not?

As I listened to more and more, I couldn’t help but think, “hey, I could do this.”

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So here we are. I’ve been chatting with Ashley-Michelle about the idea of co-hosting a podcast and she’s totally on board. Matter of fact we chatted about it today over lunch and I’m super excited about the whole thing.

I’m not really look at it as yet another thing on my plate but an opportunity to expand my creative horizons. It’s another form of storytelling and a great way to start playing with ideas for everything especially as I’m working on my next books. What stories are fun to tell and even what new stories could be created.

So I guess this is serving as my little announcement that very soon you can not only read my nonsense, but you’ll be able to listen to me babble on about stuff as well!

It’s really a win for everyone. You’re welcome world.

Am I Going to Have to Fight That Lady

Well ya’ll it has been quite the month. I keep starting up posts and getting, like, a paragraph in and then getting distracted by things like life and work and less than exciting things like that.

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I had a sort of day off today in that I only had to work a few hours this morning before changing gears and heading to Disney Springs for a photoshoot. The theme of the shoot was “boy Josh sure looks tired.” It ended up being a low-key affair as we got to the location and realized that the Springs weren’t the best location for what we were hoping to accomplish.

Which was fine because it was still a fun afternoon and it was nice to get outside for a bit even though it felt like we were walking on the surface of the sun.

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To add insult to injury, I made a poor selection when it came to getting dressed for the shoot. I put on my favorite pair of shorts, knowing that they had a hole in them. It wasn’t a big deal because it was easy to cover up with a shirt. Because they were jeans, I figured they’d stand up to the shoot and the hole wouldn’t be a problem.

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By time I got to location, I had made the hole slightly bigger. It was fine. Totally fine. My shirt would cover it.

Except every time I sat down and moved wrong, which was a lot, I made the hole a lot worse.

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I was posed so as to avoid showing the ever growing hole on my right side. My boxers were definetly starting to make an unexpected appearance. Thankfully, they were Lion King so it was at least fitting to the environment.

We wrapped up with as few wardrobe malfunctions as possible and carried on with life. We have another shoot coming up on International Drive so I guess it means that it is time for me to buy new shorts.

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Funny enough I ended up at Target but mostly because I needed cat food. I had already returned home twice today without it and I figured if I repeated that a third time, they cats would just up and eat me. I wasn’t willing to take that risk.

I spent a great deal of time awkwardly walking around the store attempting to hide the very sizable hole running down the back of my shorts. Well, not really the back. It’s hard to explain. Basically, it was a hole between the back pocket and the front right pocket. That area.

I got some looks.

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Things got very interesting as I was trying to leave Target.

I made it out of the story no problem but when I got to my car, there was a cart behind it being unloaded into the car next to mine by two older women. We made full-on eye contact and smiled and I dumped my purchases into my car and got into it.

I assumed they would put two and two together and move their cart so I could pull out.

Nothing.

I turned the car on hoping they’d get the hint.

Nothing.

I put the car in reverse and, using my back-up cam, moved until I was about to hit the cart and stopped.

Nothing.

No reaction what-so-ever.

So I put the car back in park and sat there debating my next move. They were taking their dear sweet time unloading and didn’t seemed bothered that I wanted to leave. After another minute, I lightly tapped my horn to get their attention.

Nothing.

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After another minute, I stepped out of the car and very kindly asked if they could move their cart as I was trying to leave.

“CAN YOU JUST WAIT A MINUTE?!” One of them screamed at me.

Game on lady. Game on.

I’ve been up since 6am. I’m very hot. My ass is hanging out of my pants.

“I’m sorry, I’m just trying to get my car out, if you could please just move your cart a bit for me, I don’t want to hit it.”

“YOU NEED TO WAIT YOUR DAMN TURN”

I don’t know what that meant. I don’t know what that meant at all.

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So I got back into my car, put it in reverse and took my foot off the break. I had already been close to the cart so I slowly bumped into it almost immediately. They ladies were well out of the way so the cart was my only real victim.

The light tap was enough to let my foes know that my crazy was going to out-crazy their crazy and they finally pulled the cart out of the way, making sure to flip me off in the process. I just smiled and waved.

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The Rise and Fall of the 800-Year Old Swamp Witch

It’s Sunday, already? How the ever-loving hell did that happen? This time last week I was freaking out about my book being born into the world and now it has happened! If you haven’t picked up a copy yet, you probably should. You can do that by clicking here. It’s okay, I’ll wait.

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Things were a bit bumpy on release day as the paperback edition ran into an odd delay upon release but we got there. Friends and my fans (all three of them) were ready to rock and get their copy ordered. I really wish that I had the money to throw behind an advertising campaign for the book but alas, I don’t. But the word of mouth from friends and others has been amazing and the reviews of the book have been really positive. Here’s a couple!

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So, when you’re done ready your copy, but sure to share your thoughts with friends and your book club and then leave a review!

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To keep my mind off the madness of release day, Ashley-Michelle and I went to my favorite breakfast place at Disney followed by a trip to Magic Kingdom. I haven’t been to Disney in forever so it was loads of fun to hang out. We were caught in a Florida Monsoon, naturally, which kept us under cover for a while but then the weather let up and we got to enjoy the day.

Out first stop was to Pirates of the Caribbean since I hadn’t been on it since they changed The Red Head into a pirate. I don’t get why people were so cranky about it, I enjoyed the changes.  I did miss the mermaid skeletons in one of the first scenes, but other than that, I enjoy the ride.

After the Festival of Fantasy Parade, Kevin joined us for some shenanigans and we went to meet some princesses. It was a lot of fun because the princesses were on board with our shenanigans and there was a lot of laughing on all parts.

We also went to see Mickey and Minnie and I have no words to describe the nonsense that went on during our meet and greet. There was A LOT of laughter. These photos best show some of the moments. The first being Mickey’s take to the camera as I was flirting with Minnie.

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Next was when Mickey doubled over with laughter as we all lost minds. After Mickey got jealous of my flirting with Minnie, I offered up Ashley-Michelle as a consolation prize. He started to take me up but changed his mind and ran back to Minnie. I asked Ashley-Michelle how that felt and she replied, “TYPICAL” which caused everyone in the room to just die.

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And then we all died.

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Next up came a trip to the Haunted Mansion. I really love this ride so I was excited that we had fast passes for it. We got right in and I was pumped to visit the happy haunts. As we got to the ride vehicles, Ashley-Michelle asked how we wanted to split up. Not thinking it through, I decided that three grown-ass adults would definitely fit in the doom buggy.

Spoiler alert: we didn’t.

With all three of us wedged into the buggy, we were in for an uncomfortable but hilarious ride.

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All said and done, release date was a success and I didn’t has as many freak outs as I had anticipated.

And I got to see Donald Duck.

So life was good.

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I’m Not Freaking Out, You’re Freaking Out

Okay. Hi.

I totally promise I’m not dead, though sometimes it totally feels like it.

The past couple weeks have been a whirlwind and it’s so hard to be able to keep on top of everything that needs to be done. I honestly don’t know how so-called “social media moguls” keep up with it all. Trying to maintain a presence on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and my blog has been nothing short of exhausting.

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The biggest thing has, obviously, been getting my book ready for publication. The final deadline for my manuscript submission was this past Friday. I pretty much worked right up until the deadline in an effort to make everything perfect. Once the deadline hit, I was locked out from editing.

Sounds harsh but honestly they are saving me from myself. I would have spent every waking hour right up until publication altering things. This has been my baby for the last ten years so I’m very paranoid about the final product. I’m sure there’s still a mistake here and there but no one is perfect.

I’ll likely still alter things as I find weird mistakes. That’s the perk of the e-book anyway. Anything I change will go straight to anyone who has purchased it. As for the print book… just consider it a limited edition!

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Outside of working feverishly on getting my book ready for its Tuesday birth, so much has been going on in my work life. I’m not going to go into detail at the moment because there are still some moving pieces in play. I’ll surely get an update to the world at some point.

For now, I’m trying to keep myself calm about the release of “You’re Doing It Wrong.” I’m so damn scared and excited and just feeling all of the emotions. I’m trying really hard not to think about it since it’s in the universe’s hands now. It’s not stopping me. That perpetual pit of nerves and despair is going to live inside of me for a while.

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I do have a plan to somewhat distract myself on Tuesday. Ashley-Michelle, Kevin and I are going to breakfast at one of my favorite restaurants on Disney Property followed by spending some time at the Magic Kingdom. I’ll be able to look at sales and whatnot but only on my phone. I’m sure I’ll do a few posts here and there to get the word out but I’m going to try and not think too much about how freaked out I am.

My birthday is the following day on the 15th and I don’t have a clue what the plan is. We had a plan at some point but who knows. I just want to enjoy the day. Birthdays have just become another day for me so it’s hard to get too crazy about it.

We’ll see.

That’s all from me for now!

Superheroes? In New York? Give Me A Break!

I’ll start this off by saying, that there are absolutely zero spoilers in the post because I have no intention of actually talking about the movie. Because I’m not a jerk. Like some people.

You know who you are.

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So, on the off chance that you’ve been living under a rock the last few days, it has been pop culture overload. I’m not usually one that gets hyped up about most things POP but it would turn out that everything I do actually enjoy decided to all happen at once. Starting with Avengers: Endgame

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I was fully expecting to not have the time to see it until sometime after the weekend but it would turn out the universe was in the mood to let me have some fun. I was working on Thursday night and, despite a few bumps in the road, I was able to escape a lot earlier than I had anticipated. For shits and giggles, I decided to check out showtimes for Endgame expecting to find seats but horrible spots (front and center).

Sure enough, that’s what I found as I started with the 11:30pm showings and started working forward in the 15 minute intervals. Then something weird happen when I got to the 12:15 showing… it was wide open. I mean, there were a handful of occupied seats but for the most part the theatre was empty.

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“Screw it,” I thought. I didn’t work until the evening on Friday so I had plenty of time to catch up on sleep following the 3+ hour journey to the end of this amazing saga. I snagged a ticket, securing my favorite place to sit when seeing a movie (back row, center). I had plenty of seats around me so I messaged friends to let them know they had the option of joining me.

No big deal either way. I actually enjoy going to the movies alone. I think I’ve mentioned this before. It’s usually a better experience for everyone. I’m very fidgety and I feel like that gets annoying and that would be especially so during a three hour film. I’m fairly certain I changed sitting positions roughly twenty million times in the first hour alone.

I’m especially fidgety when I’m tired and this was the case as we got closer to the start time.

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Now, I’m not really one to hit up an opening night movie. I typically enjoy catching a weekday matinee to limit the number of people I have to be around in the theatre- the less potential talking and people on their phones the better. I’m fairly certain the last time I saw a movie opening night was Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

Other big movies I have waited. Even Infinity War I saw about a week after it came out. Things were spoiled for me, but I waited.

It was actually the fear of spoilers that kept me from waiting and got my butt in that seat at such a late hour.

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All was going well as the countdown to the trailers beginning right up until it wasn’t.

It started with two small children entering the theatre. Followed by two more. THEN TWO MORE. There was a family entering the threatre- all the parents and a total of six children all under the age of 10. That’s being nice I’m fairly certain they were closer to the six and seven age range.

Did I mention it’s now past midnight on a school night?

Naturally there were just a couple rows down and to my right. I’m not a naturally violent person but I was having a lot of emotions during them trying to figure out how to best arrange themselves in their seats.

“Where should the kids sit?” one dad asked.

“AT HOME” I might in my head, and also outside my head, and a little loud.

THEN another couple walked in PUSHING A STROLLER WITH A BABY IN IT.

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The trailers began and the kids were rowdy. I was willing to forgive it. Frankly, until the Marvel Logo hit the screen, I was fine but after that everyone needed to shut the hell up and let me enjoy my movie.

They didn’t, but the dream was there.

The kids ended up being far more antsy than me and were chatting and asking questions the ENTIRE movie from the moment the first scene started. The parents shushing them turned out to be far louder than the actual talking.

Naturally as the movie progressed the baby woke up and started crying. Rather than fully exiting the theatre, the mom decided to simply stand in the hallway leading into the theatre WHICH HELPED NOTHING AT ALL.

And for some reason there was a dog in the theatre that would bark occasionally.

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All said and done, I was glad to have experienced the film. Despite the children and the dog, it was a lot of fun being in the theatre with a bunch of fans who were just as, if not more excited than I was about the experience.

I’ll certainly go and see it again but I’m glad I was able to see it before anything got ruined because with the internet today, it was likely going to happen. The only other option would have been a social media blackout which a lot of my friends are doing until they have time to see it.

That all said, I hope everyone’s viewing of the movie went better than mine and you were able to go into it spoiler free!

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We’re In The Endgame Now

Ya’ll.

I am beyond thrilled to say that we are less than a month away from my book “You’re Doing It Wrong” coming out. For anyone REALLY keeping track, that magical day is just 24 days away! You probably have it marked on your calendar already but if not go ahead and circle May 14th on there as the big day.

Actually, even better, you should probably just go ahead and head over to Amazon and pre-order it. Right now. You can click here and do it.

Well, for the moment you can pre-order the Kindle Edition of the book. If you’re like me and just really love having a physical copy, the paperback edition can be ordered on May 14th and it’ll be shipped to you ASAP!

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I will say that pre-ordering does help the book in the sales rankings on Amazon and helps put it in front of more people so if you are an e-book person, pre-order helps me a whole lot!

Just throwing that out there.

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That being said, as I’m racing towards the finish line for the book, there’s a lot to still be done and I’ll be the first to admit that I’m super stress out about it in all the right ways. If there is a correct way to be stressed out?

I mean, anyone who knows me knows that I’m just always stressed out. I’m a lot like the Hulk in that fashion. A tired-looking, whiskey-addled Hulk. The Incredible Drunk.

That’s not the only reason I’m referencing the Marvel Cinematic Universe in the title of my post. It’s also because I have been working on this book for the past ten years, the idea for writing it first being planted in my head around the same time that Iron Man was hitting the theatres.

It’s honestly crazy to think about just how long it’s been since I first started working on this. The person I was then versus the person I have become now. How I realize that I needed this time to really be able to create something that I am deeply proud of.

With any luck, perhaps the book will sell just as insanely as opening night tickets to Endgame.

A boy can dream.

What was more exciting was this past Sunday when I received my “proof” copy of the book.

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I did an unveiling post on my Instagram story where the world got to see it the same time as me and I will be honest that I cried. After all this time, being able to hold my baby in my hands, it was an overwhelming feeling.

This was also right before I was able to sit down and watch the premiere of season 8 for Game of Thrones so there was just a lot of emotion happening all at once.

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Once the shock wore off, it was time to get to work. Will a physical copy in hand I was able to take a critical look at my work and start to make some changes. There is still some editing to be done and I’ve found myself wanting to add a few things here and there and delete some others.

It may seem crazy to still be tweaking things this close to release but my goal is, obviously, to make this the best that it can be. Being the perfectionist that I am, I’ll probably never be fully satisfied and I’ll likely worry about EVERYTHING forever. But right now, I’m very happy with what I have created and I’m really excited for what’s to come.

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That being said, I’ve already started working on some new things. There is a lot that didn’t make the final cut for “You’re Doing It Wrong” especially as the book evolved over the years, but that doesn’t mean I abandoned them. There are some fun stories that I still want to be able to share and put out there and I will. One such chapter ended up on my blog as I felt it didn’t quite fit the bill for this first book. You’ll recall this post “Never Again; or, the Soundtrack to Your Breakup” which I had written but ultimately decided it didn’t really fit in to what the book had evolved to.

In the end, these piece made for a better blog post than a book chapter so it lives here on my blog and I’m totally cool with that. But there are others! And those are morphing into my next project. Note above when I said “this first book.”

Yeah, I guess I’ll say it now- I’m already working on the follow-up to “You’re Doing It Wrong.” While I have a general sense of where this next project is heading, I’m sure it will also take on a life of its own. The goal is to make sure that what I’m producing it worth reading.

In preparing and writing “You’re Doing It Wrong” I spent a lot of time reading other memoirs. Some I loved, others I hated. I made note of what I hated about some of them and made sure not to repeat those mistakes. This is what helped the book evolve and take shape. This is part of why I’m glad it took as long as it did to write. If I had written and released what I originally intended all those years ago, I doubt I would be as proud of this final product as I am.

The same goes for this next book. I don’t want to ever put something out there for the sake of getting it out there. I want to forever be proud of the work that I’m doing.

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That all said, I apologize for being quite absent these past couple weeks and I feel the same will happen between now and May 14th. There is just so much to focus on and be worried about that I feel like I have nothing interesting to write about blog-wise.

That’s a lie.

There’s plenty on my mind but I’m so focused on these next 24 days that it’s hard to think of anything else, much less try and sit and write. Even this post took longer than normal and I even trashed the first draft to leave for later but then got so annoyed that I couldn’t sleep until I revised it. I planned on being asleep by now—(note this is posting at 9:30am but I’m writing it at now 1:30 am. The original draft I wrote at 11:00pm. I’m doing great).

That said, I’m scheduling this to post and going to bed. It’ll be live once my alarm goes off.

Someday I’ll sleep.