S. Evan Townsend's Blog, page 48

Friendship

Time once again for the 52-week blogging challenge. Today's prompt is: "Friendship."

Being an introvert, I tend to have one good friend a few other friends, but mostly just that one good friend. This was the pattern as I grew up.

When I got married, my one good friend was my wife.

Right now my one good friend is a fellow writer in Canada and we communicate mostly via text. She's a Jeopardy fiend (has tried out for the show) so we often talk about the losers on the show.

I have friends that I met in Toastmasters and friends who are in my writing group. But those aren't close friends. At least not as close as my close friend.

How many friends do you have, and how many are close. Let me know in the comments below.

Three Weeks

Three weeks until the return of Husky Football. Woof!

I Am at SpoCon in Spokane

Today I am at SpoCon in Spokane, Washington. I will be there through Sunday.

The con is at the Doubletree Hotel. Here's the address:

322 North Spokane Falls Court
Spokane, Washington

This is my first time at SpoCon as a visiting Pro. So I'm hoping to have a good time there. Follow this link for my panel and reading schedule.

I hope to see you there!

Connect

Back to the 52-week blogging challenge. Today's prompt is simply "Connect."

I had to think about that for a while. What do they mean by "connect"?
With the internet I've connected to a lot of people I would never have met otherwise. I have Facebook friends all over the country and some in the U.K. and Canada. I was thinking about this, and I don't have any FB friends in the Southern Hemisphere (even though I've been to the Southern Hemisphere but I've never been to the U.K.). A lot of those distant friends I met through my publisher, World Castle Publishing. Others I met through writing forums, Twitter, and other social media.
My wife a long time ago somehow got involved in a ListServ (remember those) of women all over the world. At Christmas they exchange gifts. It has moved from email to Facebook, I understand.
I've connected to people through being in Toastmasters. Those are all local, Eastern Washington folks (although one moved to Mexico).
In today's world it's easy to connect with a lot of people. And I love learning about other cultures such as that of the U.K. and even Canada has a different culture than the U.S.
Who do you connect to and how? Let me know through the comments below.

Four Weeks

Four weeks until Husky Football is back. #PurpleReign

Football has Changed

1990s Husky QuarterbackThe other day I was watching Pac-12 Network and they were showing a University of Washington Huskies (Go Dawgs) game from the early 1990s. And I noticed something: in the past 30 or so years, football has changed.

In the 1990s the shoulder pads were huge compared to today. I don't know if that's because they can get as much protection with smaller pads today, or it was decided so much protection wasn't needed. I suspect the former. And I think the small pads have changed how the game is played. In the early 1990s, the game was more brute force. Today there seems to be more finesse as players can dodge and scramble to get out of tackles, not just barrel into each other.
Huskies' Current Quarterback
And I prefer today's football. Yes, there is still the rough and tumble part of it. But the quickness and skill of a running back able to dodge tackles and speed down the field is much more entertaining to watch. I love watching Jake Browning (the Huskies' current quarterback) run and throw and connect with his wide receivers moving with near ballet-like grace. Or see Myles Gaskin find a hole in the defensive line and scramble through it.

So the game has evolved, and I think for the better. Can't wait for the Huskies' first game on September 1st against Auburn. Just 29 days away!

Weekends

Back to the 52-week blogging challenge. This week's prompt is "Weekends." Which reminds me of an old commercial tag line: "Weekends were made for Michelob."

As a freelance writer and author, my weekends are not much different from every other day. I do try to take some time off. And if there's college football (i.e., the University of Washington Huskies) on Saturday, I definitely watch that. (College football starts September 1st, so just under a month away!) And I often watch Seahawks football, but I'm more of a fair-weather fan than the die-hard fan I am of Husky football (I was a fan even 10 years ago when the Huskies went 0-12).

But sometimes my weekends are very busy such as if I have a freelance deadline coming up and I need to get my stories done. I try to schedule my work so I do most of it Monday through Friday, but sometimes that doesn't work. People don't want to talk to you until the weekend so that's when you do the interview and write the story. Or, if I'm working on a fiction novel, sometimes I get a lot of writing done on weekends because I don't have anything else going on.

Lately I've been playing Dungeons and Dragons on the weekends with my son and some friends of his and mine. It's a good way to kill half a day.

Back when I was doing the Speculative Fiction Cantina, I would set up the next show on Sunday mornings. Now I spend Sunday mornings do what I want, unless I have work to do.

What are your weekends like? Let me know in the comment below.

The Past

T
ime once again for the 52 week blogging challenge. Today's prompt is "The Past."

There's a line the The Princess Bride (the book, and maybe the movie) where Buttercup tries to tell Wesley all the bad things she's done (like get engaged to the Prince), and Wesley says "The past has a way of being the past" (I'm paraphrasing because I don't remember the exact line, but I think that's pretty close).

And I try to live by that philosophy. Sometimes it's tough, the past comes back to haunt you. Past hurts, past screw ups, past embarrassments.

If we're going to remember the past, we should remember the good things. But we don't, not always. There are some people who, it seems, dwell on the bad parts of the past. And there are those who blithely move on from their past as if they weren't responsible for any of it.

We shouldn't forget the past. But we shouldn't linger on it, either. And what happened in the past cannot be changed. So look to the future.

How do you feel about the past. Let me know in the comments below!

Love

Back to the 52-week blogging challenge. The next prompt is simply "love."

Love is weird. It's something I don't think science can readily explain. Is it only imprinting like a duck for its mother? That can explain the love among families. But what about meeting a stranger, "falling in love," and deciding to spend the rest of your life with them (although that's getting rarer these days).

A lot of people I think make the mistake of confusing desire with love. "You give me great orgasms, so I must love you." They don't consciously think that. But that's what their brain is doing. So they get married and then when the sex gets boring (as it will) they "fall out of love" and divorces happen. You can only hope that happens before any kids come along because divorce is bad for kids. Very bad.

This is why I'm an advocate for no premarital sex. If you love someone without mind-blowing orgasms, then chances are you actually love them. I know that makes me old-fashioned and out of step with the times, but I don't really care.

But I still don't understand love between two strangers. What causes it? Hormones? Pheromones? You spend enough time with someone and they are a decent person, you'll fall in love? I don't know. I don't know if anyone knows.

What do you think love is? Let me know in the comments below.

On the Inside

Back to the 52-week blogging challenge. The next prompt is once again "A favorite book/music/movie." Which I have pretty much covered before.

So we'll go to the next one which is "On the inside." There's no further information about what that means.

On the inside, I'm all red and squishy.

On the inside, I'm shy and full of anxiety.

On the inside, I'm creative and funny.

On the inside, I'm a procrastinator.

On the inside, I'm me.

What are you on the inside? Let me know in the comments below.