Michael T. Miyoshi's Blog, page 12

Ready or Not

Another school year is about to start, and I am ready. Probably.

Some people love the start of a new school year. They come to it with great expectations. And if they are changing schools, they can create new personas. They can be different than they were before. Or they can be more their genuine selves. New is good. Or at least it can be.

Other people dread the start of a new school year. They do not know what is going to happen. They wonder what their classes will be like. They wond...

The End of an Era

I never thought I would do it, but I sold my truck. It is the end of the red Toyota pickup era.

I loved my truck. At least as much as you can love any inanimate object. It was the first vehicle that I bought for myself. I used it to go on my first date with my wife. It was my commuter for over twenty years. I never did teach my boys how to drive a stick shift in it, but it was a great truck.

Actually, it still is a great truck. It is just living in somebody else’s driveway now.

I was loa...

I Love Blogging But…

I love blogging, but lately I have been consumed with other projects that need to be done.

If you are a writer, you know that you need to write all the time. Every day. Or at least you need to have a habit of writing that you stick to. I tend to write in the mornings before I go to work and on Saturday mornings too. It is a good habit. One I have kept for many years. One that I am loathe to miss even when I am on vacation. Or sick. Although I will skip a day or two if I am too sick.

My ...

Beware QR Codes!

Beware QR codes! Rather beware QR code readers.

I am not much of a phone guy. At least not much of a smart phone guy. Which means that I do not have my whole life on my phone. Oh sure. I search the internet on my phone. I email and text people. I even use the phone to call people. But I do not have my whole life on my phone. At least I do not think so.

Since I am not that much of a phone guy, I had a problem with a QR code recently. Rather, I had a problem with my QR code reader. In ...

I’m Not an Expert Writer, but…

I’m no expert, but I seem to keep giving writing advice to people.

Just because I have published a weekly blog since 2007 and just because I have published over a dozen print books and over twenty digital books and just because I have written several screenplays, does not make me an expert on writing. After all, not many people have read much of anything I have written. Yes, it is true that I have a faithful following (of surely less readers than I can count on my fingers). (That is counting...

Vacation Bragging

I wonder if vacation bragging is really a thing.

We all know what vacation is. And we all know what bragging is. So vacation bragging must be when you tell everybody how great your vacation was hoping that they might get a little jealous of where you went or how long you went or just that you went. In reality, I am not sure that I really want to do any vacation bragging. After all, I do not want anybody getting jealous that I went someplace far away. But just saying that you went on a vaca...

Almost Paradise

Hawai’i is truly paradise. Well, almost.

If you have never been to Hawai’i, you might not agree, but it is close to paradise. It is just a little too hot and a little too humid. Or maybe a lot too humid. At least when we went. And if you happen to be lucky enough to go there during a tropical storm, a little too windy too.

Anyway.

Hawai’i is a pretty cool place. Cool in the sense of marvelous and wonderful and fantastic. Not in the sense of temperature. At least not in the middle of J...

Podcast Dreams

I have thought about having a podcast. You know. Another something of mine out there that people will not tune into.

I wrote about having serial blog posts on a past blog post. Tune in next time… It was a silly thought really. I mean writing a blog that has a continuing story line? Or thought line? I am happy when I just get any coherent thought out there. Much less one story that moves into another.

However, I think it would be plausible to have a podcast that does that. Maybe. At le...

Price Check

(#ad) click

I decided to change the prices on my books. All in one fell swoop.

I am all for doing research. The problem is that I often do the research after the fact. After I need to understand Christian apologetics. After I write a book about D.B. Cooper. After I price said book about D.B. Cooper. Actually, I did the research about D.B. Cooper long before I wrote it. I was almost obsessed with the Cooper hijacking. But then again, I was not even a teenager when it happened, and when I...

Word Choice or Choice Words

Choose your words wisely.

English is a funny language. English teachers talk about word choice. They say that word choice matters. If you choose one word, you sound funny. If you choose another word that means the same thing (a synonym), you sound serious. If you choose still another word (again a synonym), you sound like some computer who is trying to imitate you. (Oops. Sorry about that. I was just worrying that ChatGPT might replace me. Which is a completely different story. One I ...