The Count of Monte Crisco, by Alexander Dumbass

Yep. I was watching The Shawshank Redemption again. This time on AMC with Story Notes. Couldn't really think of an entry title today, and kept hearing William Sadler say that line in my head, so, there you go.

Just made it back (okay, days and days ago) from the Montgomery County Book Festival, where I met lots of excellent authors and lots of excellent readers and bloggers and librarians. It was a solid 48 hours of fun. I love talking with other authors and hearing their stories. Yet, I always seem to take away two things from these encounters.

One: everyone else is way more plugged-in to the writing scene than I am, and I am a big, shambling, half-dead mamluk who only responds to very old news with awe and wonder and a wide open mouth. This doesn't bother me. I like hearing news this way. Agape. And two years later.

Two: I am a slow, dumb, lazy piece of crap. Allow me to explain this one. I continually talk to writers who have several manuscripts on submission, or several projects sold, or several projects in the works. We're talking, two, three, four, five, sometimes in entirely different genres, and they also have great day jobs and children and farms full of llamas that need shaving and milking.

Do you milk llamas? Anyway.

Some have several books coming out in the same year. With different publishers. Under different names. I...do not. I. Write. Slow. I can pull off two novels a year if I push it, and there's a 40% chance that one of those novels will suck. I don't fill in time with short stories, or journal articles or poetry. And I have no excuse for this. No farm full of llamas that need shaving and/or milking. I am just a slow, dumb, lazy piece of crap.

And I know, that there are other slow, dumb, lazy piece of craps out there, just like me. Though I hope they don't call themselves that. And when chatting with other, WAY more productive writers, it's easy to feel like we're not doing enough. But screw that. We write how we write. The only way we can. And honestly, being a slow, dumb, lazy piece of crap works pretty well for me. I don't know how to finish this paragraph...lazy craps unite? That doesn't seem right...

Anyway, as much as I enjoyed the festival, I'm glad to be back home, working on the novel. And diving into some of the great reads I picked up in Montgomery County. Did I mention I'm a slow, lazy piece of crap reader, too? But that's a story for another time.