R. Scott McCoy's Blog, page 5

Anesthesia is for Pussies

@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; My first mistake was going to my vasectomy alone. I'd scheduled it on a Friday when my family was out of town, and because I drove myself, I couldn't have general anesthesia.

The vasectomy wasn't a mistake. We'd wanted two children and we were blessed with two beautiful girls. We were done. Any other form of birth control was either a pain to deal with or had serious health risks for my wife. So I didn't give a lot of thought to the procedure, at least until I got to the clinic.

After all, my father had one. If he was to be believed, he had it done within minutes of laying eyes on me.

I was escorted into a room that had as it's centerpiece, a large stainless steel table that looked a lot like the tables they used to perform autopsies. A thin blanket was spread out on top of the table and there was a disposable paper sheet often seen in regular exam rooms. There was also a pillow, which I thought was very considerate. I was told to change into a standard ass hanging out the back hospital gown.

My general practitioner came in and once again assured me that this was a simple procedure and he had performed it several times. Then as he laid out his instrument of torture, he asked me if I wanted a mirror so that I could watch. The idea was intriguing, but I passed, and it was the only intelligent decision I made.

"You'll feel a small poke," he said, and I tried not to imagine scenes from prison movies. I felt the needle as it entered my scrotum and it didn't hurt that much, first on the left and then on the right. He waited a respectful time and the asked if I could feel anything. I couldn't, and he made two small incisions with a scalpel.

"Ok, now I'm going to deaden the tubes and surrounding area. This might hurt."

Most of you know, that doctors are full of shit. They do things that hurt and so are masters of understatements. If it's 'just a little prick', it's going to hurt. If he tells you it might hurt a little, it's time to grab the fucking table and bite your tongue so you don't scream or whimper like a little girl and shame your ancestors. I may have gurgled a little, because he assured me he was almost down when in fact he was only half done.

He gave the Novocain time to work and I was relieved. It was basically over. The Novocain had deadened my sac and I didn't even feel the blade that cut me, so I was over the worst right?

Wrong.

For some reason, it didn't take. I found that out when he secured a clamp onto my left vas deferens, which is the fancy name for the tube that carries a man's sperm from his testicles up to his Seminal vesicle as seen in the image below.

*Important note, my junk is bigger, especially the nuts.

My doctor noticed what he described as my 'discomfort'. Or perhaps he heard me when I said through gritted teeth, "MotherFUCKER!". Regardless, he noticed something was amiss and applied more anesthesia. It was no more effective than the earlier shots. He then asked if I wanted to quit and reschedule for a day when I could get general anesthesia.

I thought about it, and it sounded appealing. But I knew myself, and I knew that if I escaped his table, I would never come back. I heard my self tell him to go ahead. I was impressed with myself until I felt him cut the tube. It's a tough little tube and took about two very long seconds to get all the way through it. I felt the pain in my toes and in my scalp. My hands ached from gripping the table and I wished for one of those raw hide bites prisoners used to put in their mouths when they got whipped.

"I'm going to cauterize the ends so they can't grow back."

Here's an interesting fact. They use an electric device similar to a mini arc welder to cauterize human flesh. Simultaneously, I got to feel the burn as well as the electric jolt while smelling my own flesh burn. It was…a unique experience. I could feel myself getting a little shocky, but I kept breathing and trying to send my consciousness elsewhere. I got by telling myself it was almost over. I had done it, and it wasn't really that bad, right? Then my doctor said something that shook my confidence just a smidge.

"Ok, we're halfway there."

Repeat the same as above but this time I knew what was coming and what it would feel and smell like. Ten minutes later, he was giving me my instructions to take it easy. He'd apparently had men not take him seriously in the past, so he showed me a picture of a testicle swollen to five times it's size with blood because some macho man had decided he could play contact sports the day after his surgery. He clearly didn't know me.

I'd already cleared my weekend, and had nothing more rigorous planned than walking to the bathroom. In retrospect, that journey was a bit long. I should have brought a mini fridge and a blanket into a bathroom and nested.

Confession time. In the months and years that followed, I told a few men that my procedure was no big deal. I did it solo and drove myself home. Anesthesia is for pussies.

What can I say? I'm a bad man.

TGIF WTF?

It's that time again. What time you say? It's time for me to reveal a story from my past that will cause you to laugh or at least smile at my expense.

It was the mid 80's, and I had just returned to Ft Dix, NJ from Explosive Ordnance Disposal School. I'd been able to get back to NJ to see my girlfriend (we'll call her Gigi), about once a month. It had been closer to six weeks since I'd seen her and I was very eager. What made my return even more special was the fact that it was my birthday. My 18th birthday had been spent doing 1,800 pushups at Basic training in Ft Leonard Wood, MO and my 19 hadn't been much better, spent alone, friendless and more importantly, girlfriendless. But number 20 had real potential. I had a girlfriend, and I was going to get me some. Heck, it was my birthday, so maybe I would get something…special.

I caught a ride with a friend back to Ft Dix. I got to my barracks, dumped my gear, showered and got ready for my birthday date. Gigi was going to pick me up and take me to TGI Friday's, her treat. Now that may not seem like a big deal for some of you, but you have to remember that it was the 80's, and I was making about $12,000 a year as a Specialist in the US Army. Also, eating out at restaurants was a fairly new experience for me, and any place that didn't have a drive through was classy in my book.

Gigi was on time for once and greeted me with a deep kiss. I wanted to throw her over my shoulder and carry her back into the barracks, but that type of activity was frowned upon, and besides, I was hungry. We got to the Friday's and she gave me balloons and a present. It was a good sized box, but light and I had it pegged as a shirt. I was right. It was a shirt. A shirt composed of the most interested combination of colors, but it did have sleeves and a collar so it had to be a shirt. I thought it was the ugliest damned thing I had ever seen, but I smiled and thanked her for the gift and tried to figure out a convincing story for how it would get ruined while we looked at the menus. Still, like a jingle that you just can't stop thinking about, I kept repeating in my mind a happy tune. I'm going to get some nookie, I'm going to get some nookie*.

*The actually word has been replaced with "nookie" to keep this story PG-13.

As I said, I was not rich and neither was Gigi, so when the waiter came I ordered a hamburger for my birthday meal. The waiter turned to my girlfriend, who promptly ordered the swordfish. Really? Swordfish? I wish I had ordered second. But what's the big deal right? I'm going to get some nookie, I'm going to get some nookie.

All the servers came over with my complimentary desert and sang me the happy birthday song. I could have done without that, but what the heck, it was my birthday. When the check came, Gigi said she didn't have any money. She must have spent it all on the shirt. Thankfully it was just after payday and I had stopped by the cash machine, because back then hardly anyone making less than $40K had a credit card. I only knew two enlisted soldiers that did. So cash was still king and thankfully, I had enough to cover our meal and would have been able to cover the steak I really wanted, had I known I was paying. But what the hell, I was back from training, I had a girlfriend and it was my birthday. I'm going to get some nookie, I'm going to get some nookie.

We walked out to her car and I watched her ass sway this way and that. I thought that there might not be time to go back to her place and maybe we should find a quiet place to park. I climbed in the passenger seat and watched her get in. My gaze traveled from her cleavage to her eyes and back to her cleavage. The shirt was forgotten as was the Swordfish, burger and my $50 bucks. The moment was drawing near and I was past ready. I had a fleeting moment of regret that I hadn't rubbed one out before the date, but back then 2-3 times was no problem for me, so I shrugged it off. Besides, I was always a giving lover and tonight was my birthday. I was halfway between her cleavage and eyes for the 4th time when she uttered these five words to me:

"I'm breaking up with you."

It took a few minutes of silence for the message to get into my brain, past my nookie chant. My reply was articulate as always.

"What?"

The ride back to my barracks was long and quiet. She had her reasons, though she didn't seem to be able to articulate them. For months I had ignored the allure of the women in class and the surrounding area because I had a girlfriend and you just don't do that sort of thing. I'd visited when I could, called regularly, but now that I was back, she'd broken up with me.

On my birthday.

Shit.

In retrospect, things did work out for the best. Gigi was not the girl for me. A couple of weeks later, my roommate saw the birthday shirt and liked it. I traded it for one of his that I liked. The first night I wore it, I caught the eye of an exotic dancer. It was white and glowed in the black light. The exotic dancer said it made me look innocent and thought she should corrupt me. I finally got the nookie I so badly needed, but that is a story for another time and another venue.

A day at the beach

Fair warning. I'm about to tell you a story but not one of fiction. Instead, I'm going to use this blog to capture some of the more colorful stories of my life.

I posted a new profile pic the other day on Facebook and then made a wall post describing the scene. I referred to it as a time in my life when I had the world by the ass on a downhill slide and didn't know it. I went on to say that the road to that place had been bumpy, but that it had only gotten better since.

I've been thinking about that for the last few days and it is as true a thing as I can say about my life.

The time was 1991. The place was Monterey California. I was there to attend the Defense Language Institute at the Presidio to learn Russian. I had served a 6 year contract, 4 Active 2 Reserve and got out in April 1990, only to sign an 8 year contract in September 1991 as Desert Shield became Desert Storm. By the time I was in a unit, the war was over. March of 1991, I got orders to Monterey because I needed a new job, as my active duty job didn't exist in the Reserve.

But all of that is another story. This story is about friends. Next to me in the picture, is my roommate and all around awesome guy, Brian Nelson. I am embarrassed to say I can't remember the other guys name. Brian was known far and wide as "Bridude". He was and I'm sure still is a great person and a true friend.

It had taken a coupe of months to get the cash together to buy a wetsuit and board, but we had them. We had also just watched a special on sharks and learned the area from Monterey to San Francisco was called the "Blood Triangle" because of all the great white shark attacks. But were we nervous? Not that we would admit to each other. Soldiers are a different group. What we find funny does not always translate in the civilian world, and there is little a soldier enjoys more than busting his friend's balls. We did agree that there was nothing funny about a shark attack, and that this one area was off limits.

The day we picked sucked. It got cloudy and colder than normal, but worst of all were the lack of waves. Boogie boards don't require the same size wave to have a fun ride, but they do require a wave. We were out paddling around at Asilomar beach in water as calm as the lakes I grew up swimming on. I was in my grey and black O'Neal suite and Bridude was in what he thought was a green and back suit of the same manufacture. It turned out that when wet, it was actually yellow. Better yet, we'd learned on the shark special that the color was called "Yum, Yum Yellow".

We refused to leave until we caught at least one wave, so there we floated, our concern replaced with boredom, frustrated and cold. That is until I looked down into the calm crystal clear water and saw a shark of at least eight feet glide beneath me.

I remember trying to speak and failing. I distinctly remember thinking it was bullshit when I saw people on TV or in the movies struck dumb, incapable of speech and how ludicrous it was to happen to me. I kept trying until I managed to squeak out the following:

"It…It's a…It's a fucking shark. IT'S A FUCKING SHARK!!!!" Quickly followed up by, "Don't splash, it will go for you."

Unfortunately, what Bridude heard was, "He's going for you!"

My eyes we fixed on the thing under the water. It moved so fast, darting back and forth between Bridude and I as if it just couldn't decide which one of us would be more delicious.

Then I lost it as it darted directly beneath me. For those of you that have never seen one, a boogie board is less than half the length of a surfboard, and yet I managed to get every inch of my body on that board. If all I'd had were a Popsicle stick, my ass would have been high and dry.

I heard a voice, as if from far away. It sounded like Bridude, but that couldn't be, because he was just a few feet…I looked up and saw him standing on the beach, over a hundred yards away. I had no idea how he's managed it, but I had never wanted to be next to him more in my life.

I searched the water for the shark but couldn't find it. I tried to banish the image from jaws of it coming directly beneath me and without causing a splash, began to paddle toward shore. When I was about twenty feet out, I caught the smallest wave ever recorded and rolled up onto the beach.

We both agreed that while we could have gone back in, we'd achieved our goal of riding a wave and besides, it was getting late anyway.

In the year we were there, that was the only shark we ever saw. We got pretty good on the boogie boards and before I left, I managed to learn how to ride a surfboard.

We had many interesting adventures in Monterey, but those stories will have to wait for another time.

How my dad won the Coast Guard Medal

My latest novel, The White Face Bear, is semi autobiographical. The majority of it is of course fiction, but the main character is more like me than any other fictional character I've ever written. The prelude to the TWFB is a very accurate portrayal of one of the three bear hunts my dad went on (if you take out the mystical pieces of course). Finally, the journey Jeff Bennett takes to Kodiak, Alaska to spread his father's ashes mirrored my journey in 2008, two months after my father died.

The story that I couldn't tell in the book without an awkward data dump, is the story of how my father won the Coast Guard Medal while serving at Air Station Kodiak. The Coast Guard Medal is the highest award a Coasty can receive for acts of heroism in peacetime. It's a story worth telling, and I want to share it here.
It was a pretty standard November day on Kodiak, which meant no one had seen the sun in weeks and the usual misting rain was mixed with snow. It was early in the morning, and the temp was a wet 30 degrees.

Dick was an Aviation Electrician's Mate, 2nd class. His job was to keep all the birds working. Many times over the years, he discussed the difference between the brown shoes, or Airdales as he called them, and the black shoe Coasties that scuttled around on their boats like crabs. Air Station Kodiak - Rescue had a few fixed wing craft in 1967, but most of what they had was helicopters. Specifically, the Sikorsky HH-52A Sea Guard. By today's standards, it looks odd, and one wonders if it can even get its big ass up in the sky, but in 1967, it was the shit.
He was a fair pilot that could drive anything with wings or rotors, but he mostly flew test flights of the aircraft he fixed and not as pilot in charge during actual rescues. One of the best helicopter drivers was Dick's best friend and hunting partner, Grant. When a call came in about a couple of men that had been lost in the mountains for three days, Grant was driving. The crew complement was three, in this case it was Grant and a corpsman, so Dick decided to go along as the third to help search and to work the winch.

Searching for hunters, or in this case poachers, up in the mountains was rigorous work that rarely yielded a positive result. The sad fact was that in those days they had to rely on nothing but their eyes, and there was a whole lot of ground to cover. The odds of them finding anything was minimal, but Dick's eyes were better than most and he would rather ride on a call than sit back at base.

Up they went, on the hunt as they had many times before and began their search with the most likely hunting grounds for mountain goat. Dick and Grant had hunted everything worth shooting in Alaska and knew where many of the best spots were. The Sea Guard cruised at 85 miles per hour and had a maximum range of 474 miles. Up they went and the search began. After a few hours, they had to refuel, and then out again for another look. By that time, a storm had moved in and the winds were picking up. Grant took her in as close to the peaks as he could and Dick searched for a flash of color, or a straight line that had no business being in nature.

They were low on fuel and had run out of places to look. The two men were surely lost. Their bodies might turn up in the summer, or they may never be found. Maybe they weren't missing at all, maybe they had just got tired of the dreary weather and their dreary wives and decided to head for the mainland. Dick knew people who felt that way, his wife being at the top of the list. For him, though life was what happened while you were waiting for the next hunting season to open, and there was no better place on God's little green earth than Alaska for that.

Grant banked the beast toward home when Dick saw a flash of color. He blinked, rubbed at his eyes and looked back where he'd seen the flash. Nothing, just more snow, now beginning to swirl in the storms gust, and then he saw it. This time he called out for Grant to bring her around for a closer look. Grant nodded, as he saw it too and both men assessed the situation. It wasn't good. They were almost bingo fuel, and if they went back for more, it would be two more hours and past dark before they got back. The two figures looked frozen in place, as hard as the rock and ice that seemed to encase them. It was doubtful at this altitude and temperature that either was alive, but if there was even a chance, they couldn't delay two hours.

The men had somehow shimmied their way along a ledge no more than two feet wide that suddenly ended. The cliff face rose up eighty feet to another ledge that was cut back into the mountain a mere fifty feet. The wind was gusting toward the mountain, which meant Grant would have to hold the chopper in a steady hover, with his blades a few feet above and next to a mountain, with 60 mile per hour gusts buffeting them from behind, while the corpsman lowered the basket eighty feet to a two foot ledge below.

Grant smiled and moved the Sikorsky into position. He was one of the best to ever hold a stick and he knew it. Dick went back to work the winch that would lower the corpsman. The man made no move toward the door, his eyes frantic. Grant ordered the corpsman in the basket, but the man refused. Dick lost his temper and yelled at the man and when he refused to move, threatened to chuck him out of the helicopter.
Time was running out and Dick grabbed the corpsman, shook him and told him he would go down but that the corpsman had to work the winch. He responded, like a condemned man after hearing the governor's call. Dick went down into the storm on a wire basket held by a cable that looked too damned thin to hold one man, let alone two. He hated heights. In a plane or helicopter, he felt in control and gloried at the feeling of riding the wind. It was a lot different swinging underneath one and bouncing against ice covered rock.

He got level with the outcropping and got a close look at the two men. Both of their eyes were closed and they looked dead. The wind eased up for a second and Dick stepped across to the ledge. Both men were literally frozen in place and he had to pry the first one lose, frustrated at the lack of leverage the iced surface allowed. He managed to get the first body loose and somehow, bend him enough to fit into the basket. He strapped the poacher in place and as he signaled for the basket to be raised, the man's eyes popped open. The shock of finding one alive, turned into hope and as the basket rose into the storm, he started working the second man free. The corpsman lowered the winch, and Dick repeated the process, though the second man didn't show the signs of life the first had.

The basket went up for the second time, and Grant eased the helicopter away from the overhang as it rose to prevent it from slamming against the rock like it had the first time. Dick was watching the progress when the chunk of ice he was standing on broke loose. He fell and later couldn't remember what happened. Grant was watching and saw Dick's hand lashed out and catch something solid. The momentum of his body swung him up and back onto the thin ledge a few feet down. Adrenaline screamed through his veins and he had to force himself to take long deep breaths to steady himself. After a few minutes, he spared a glance down and saw one of the poacher's rifles, frozen in place, its barrel hanging out less than a foot over the edge.
Then the basket was there and he was riding it back to safety. Once inside, Grant wasted no time heading back to base. Dick didn't want to look at the fuel gauge, but he did. The needle was pegged with five miles left to go and he remembered the expression, 'running on oxygen and imagination'. He hoped their imaginations would hold out. Grant brought it in with his usual light touch, as if he had just been out on a leisurely check ride on a sunny summer day. He'd called ahead to the hospital, and the medical team was waiting with two gurneys.

Dick still had an urge to strangle the shit out of the corpsman, but the man had worked hard on the two victims the whole way back and was clearly capable as a medical practitioner. Dick focused on the checklist for the post flight operations instead. Once they were done, they set foot back on the ground. Grant stopped gripped his shoulder, smiled and nodded. It was enough.

Both of the poachers lived, though each lost a few pieces and parts to frostbite. Dick and Grant got more drunk than usual and life went on. A few months later, word came down that Dick had been awarded the Coast Guard Medal for his part. That was as good a reason as any to get drunk that day, but this time they decided to take a little trip to the base commander's house. It seems the old man was having a party and forgot to invite the hero and his driver, so Dick and Grant decided to crash it.

Wind from the rotors raised holy hell on the picnic, and it was no surprise to the men that the commander refused to put steaks beer in the basket. Neither man was written up, but neither did they reenlist.

Science and Religion

Not Science vs. Religion.

I read a resent post on FB that sparked a debate between atheists and theists. There was a lot of fantastic and respectful debate. I was genuinely impressed that it didn't turn into a flame war, though there were a few digs on both sides. It was pointed out that people of faith could come across and smug and condescending. I have noticed that some of the atheists came across as arrogant and condescending. Both attitudes are disrespectful, so let's take the question of people's intelligence and mental state out of the debate. Too often, when people hold opposing views, I see both sides attempt to degrade or dehumanize each other, as if someone that disagrees with them must be faulty in some way. This is a fallacy and cheapens the accuser. One issue we face today is the complete lack of respect between people that possess opposing views. It doesn't matter if it's politics or religion, too often people classify their opponents as being stupid or backward or extreme.

One position that was discussed was that debate over the issue is useless. I agree that if a person that believes, either in a specific dogma, or just believes in the existence of a soul, debates with someone that doesn't there won't likely be any resolution. That doesn't mean the exchange shouldn't occur. I don't agree with blind faith in anything. I think people should examine their beliefs and dis beliefs and justify, at least to themselves the reasons for them. Even the act of asking the question means that we are open to other possibilities. Being open to a possibility is not a weakness of character. Only a fool assumes they know everything or has all the right answers. Each person need only look to their past to find example of when they were proven wrong and learned from the process. Why do some adults assume that at some point being wrong is no longer possible? For that matter, that a conflicting opinion must be wrong.

I love science. I understand some of it, but even if I had the abilities to understand all disciplines, I would never have the time to verify or test all hypotheses. I trust in the scientific process and the community as a whole to verify and validate findings, but I am also skeptical, because occasionally, this trust is betrayed. Because of the scientific process, hoaxes and bad science are uncovered eventually, but blind trust of science as the answer without even a basic understanding of the scientific process, is simply replacing the faith of one deity with the faith another, by deifying extremely intelligent scientists. It is certainly dangerous to assume that even a group of scientists are right when they insist on the validity of a given theory, yet there is a lot of pressure to create legislation based on theories that have not been given the time to be challenged and validated using the very scientific process they claim supports their position.

I do believe that there is more going on that a simple cycle of life and death. I believe that there is some purpose and some part of us that continues to exist after our meat suite dies. I don't go to church because I have never found a dogma I can believe in. Religion is humanities attempt to explain what they can't understand. There are and have been a large number of religions and variations of religious systems created by mankind. They can't all be right. There can't be hundreds of true creation stories. I think what some people mean when they say "I'm spiritual, but not religious" is that they don't follow a specific dogma. I don't feel a need for ritual. I don't feel the need to find others that share my beliefs, but I also don't begrudge or demean those that do.

I don't understand why people from both sides of this argument feel that the views must be apposing. I'm not talking about faith in a religious system, I'm talking about the possibility that there is something more that the death of the body. That there may be a purpose for our sentience, and that beyond sentience, we are more than the sum of our organic parts.

I am not a believer in or supporter of the new efforts around "Intelligent Design", because it feels like a cheat or a way to try to prove what can't be proved with pseudo science and half truths. Having members of a particular religion attempt to use science to prove the literal truth of their scripture (e.g. the earth is only 7,000 years old), is just as absurd as scientists trying to use the scientific method to disprove the existence of a soul (a non dogma specific constant among most religions).

In the 1600's, the scientific community was split into two camps with regards to the nature of light. One camp believed that light was a wave. The other camp believed that light was a particle. Both groups had evidence to support their claim and both believed the opposing camp was wrong. I wasn't there, but I'm guessing some unkind things were said by both sides. The problem with both positions was that the evidence each of them was using was proof only for their position, but did nothing to disprove the opposing view. Each side assumed the two theories were mutually exclusive. Because Newton was the one that proposed the particle theory and he had some horsepower, most scientists jumped on his bandwagon. For almost two hundred years, only idiots thought that light was a wave. Then in the early 1800's, some smarty pants created a test that proved light did in fact have the properties of a wave. Take that you stinking Newtonians! They must have been stupid to think light was a particle. That is until 1905, when a real smarty pants name Einstein, discovered what most of you reading this now know, that light is in fact both a wave and a particle. Three hundred years from when the first theories were put forth as scientific fact, we finally had the answer that it was both.

I'm only 44 and don't think that if I devoted the rest of my life to the study of this issue that I would be any closer to understanding it if I live to be a hundred. I'm also not sure where we are on the time-line from the origin of scientific process to the point where we will have all the answers. Certainly, there is a finite point sometime in the future where we will run out of scientific questions, assuming a sustainable technological society with no expiration date. If we were at that point we could look back at the primitives living at the beginning of the twenty first century with sympathy bordering on contempt. It's possible that the universal duality of wave and particle that exists in matter as it does in light may be as blueprint for the seeming duality we now perceive between science and spirit. I don't have the answer, I have my answer and currently I'm content with it. I'm also open to hearing new views so I can consider them. Until the question is answered definitely one way or the other, I hope both sides can strive for acceptance of each others beliefs without resorting to smug or arrogant condescension.

News and updates on the writing front.

First, I had my short story "Garbage Man" accepted in the reprint anthology, Northern Lights: 20 MinnSpec Tales by Sam Dot Publishing. It's a collection of stories from the Minnesota Speculative Fiction Writers group. It is currently available now from Genre Mall.

A new story of mine, "Field Test", is part of the anthology Unspeakable: A New Breed of Terror from Blood Bound Books. It's currently available on Amazon.

Liquid Imagination is also doing a reprint anthology in conjunction with Cho...

One Minute Weird Tales - Best Dressed

It took a while, but my One-Minute Weird Tales video is up on their website! Very cool feeling to see a 100-word story turned into a multi media video. Enjoy!

What is a Jackpine Savage?

The Jack Pine (Pinus banksiana) is a North American pine with its native range in Canada east of the Rocky Mountains from Northwest Territories to Nova Scotia, and the northeast of the United States from Minnesota to Maine.

Savage: n.
1. A person regarded as primitive or uncivilized.
2. A person regarded as brutal, fierce, or vicious.

Put them together and you get the picture. Do not confuse this species with the southern "Redneck", there is a vast difference. The only similarity I am aware of is...

Guest Blog 8: R. Scott McCoy With "Going To Print"

Louise Bohmer is a highly talented writer and editor. I was honored to be her guest blogger for April. Please check out the post.

Guest Blog 8: R. Scott McCoy With "Going To Print"

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Time and Energy

I just put up my most recent post for Stygian Publications about the upcoming Necrotic Tissue, issue #10 and noticed that I haven't put out a personal post since November. I check and rechecked that date because I didn't believe so much time has passed. I started the personal blog to talk about my writing. Even if no one ever read it, I've always found that writing about an issue has helped me think about it and work through it. Sometimes I will have the edge of a thought about a topic and wo...