Goal Post: Oops. Forgot a Full Title

Posted on May 7, 2022 by Charles Yallowitz

Feels like it was last Saturday yesterday.  It also feels like it was a lifetime ago, which probably isn’t a good sign.  This week was busy with work, parenting, and . . . I got nothing else.

I don’t really have a lot to say about the busy part of the week.  My son is doing Lego robotics after school nearly every day.  I’m occasionally proctoring afternoon tests, so we both get home late.  That means diving right into homework and dinner to get stuff done in time for bed.  No cartoons or video games when it’s a school/work day.  Even after he goes to bed or to his mom’s, I’m just drained.  I toss on more ‘Merlin’ episodes and watch until I pass out.  Had a feeling that I wasn’t going to be high energy this week, so I didn’t get my hopes up.

One fun thing that happened was something a bunch of schools do called ASL Idol.  My son didn’t perform, but it was suggested he go.  This is like American Idol, but the students do the songs through American Sign Language.  You hear it playing while they sign and perform.  It was really cool to watch.  Went from 6-8:30 on a school night, but my son enjoyed it enough that he’s considering trying out next year.  First, we have to make it through his first NYSSMA performance this Tuesday.  Fingers crossed on him doing good and us getting all homework done before it.

The other fun thing was last Monday when we had off for Eid.  It was a no video game day, so we put together a Lego set.  That wasn’t the big thing.  I got a set of ‘Diamond Art’ for my son to try.  These are stickers with numbers all over it.  You use a small rod-like thing to put plastic diamonds/bumps on the dots.  They correspond to the color of the diamond, so you color the picture in.  Just like paint-by-numbers.  I got a set of Pokemon Diamond Art and he made this:

He really enjoyed it, so I think we have a no hobby.

As far as writing goes,  I made the outline for Darwin & the Halfling Hunt and got a third of the way through Darwin & the Avenging Elf.  I might try to finish the second one tomorrow or at least get further into it.  The plan is still to start writing during Memorial Day weekend since it’s after all the chaos and a 3-day period.  Beyond that, I didn’t get anywhere with any other creative projects.

I figured out what to do for October posts too.  I chose 12 monsters and I’m going to do a MWF post on each one.  Thursdays will still be poems and I might push the old ‘Raven Series’ on Tuesdays.  That or I’ll try to find some creepy teasers from my books.  I can start working on that this week when I have time to breathe, but not much else.  Be nice to get most of the blogging year scheduled before I hit the summer.  Means I can really dive into writing again.  Really hoping I don’t get hit by unexpected bullshit and this whole plan fails.  I’d have faith, but the last year hasn’t gone in my favor.  Previous years didn’t do too well for me either.

This coming week isn’t going to be much different.  My son has NYSSMA, which is him performing a chorus solo for a judge.  He has tests and projects on top of the after-school club meetings.  So, we’re going to be juggling a lot of stuff.  I’ll probably walk into next weekend fairly tired, which will suck because of some scheduled events.  Might have to pull a few early nights during the week to avoid total exhaustion.  Why did people make me think adulthood would be fun while I was a kid?  Do most adults pretend it’s fun to make sure kids join in the misery?

Goals of the week:

  1. Work
  2. Parenting
  3. Finish Darwin & the Avenging Elf outline
  4. Puzzle time
  5. Finish watching ‘Merlin’
  6. Restart ‘Demon Slayer’ since new season is dubbed
  7. Hydrate
  8. Mother’s Day
  9. Sleep
Posted in Goal Posts | Tagged , , , , , | 11 Comments

The Enchanted Sword Shop: No Stabbing in the Store

Posted on May 6, 2022 by Charles Yallowitz

Final Fantasy Weapon Shop

Welcome to our little sword shop.  Every blade has been enchanted to do something different by type.  Why?  We get things in bulk and can’t afford have an in-house enchanter.  Not since most of them got eaten by trolls and the survivors decided to stay in their towers.  Anyway, take a look at our wares and don’t touch without permission.  If you feel the urge to test a weapon then please note that we have security to stop you.  His name is Paul and he gets a bonus for every punch he delivers.  Enjoy.

  • Longsword– The classic, which comes with a basic strength enhancement.  Favorite for the elderly.
  • Rapier–  Fancy and fast with a layer of acid on the blade.  Please do not lick blade to intimidate.
  • Falchion–  Big blade that can be thrown and return like a boomerang.  No guarantee that you will catch the handle instead of the blade.
  • Claymore–  Two-hander is able to release a blast of wind.  Power of gale depends on strength of swing, so not recommended for small people.
  • Saber– Popular curved blade that is flexible like rubber.  Really not useful for parrying, slashing, and . . . We think this is really a toy.
  • Cutlass– Pirate sword!  Totally cursed to wander the sea alone, but still our most popular seller.  Can point to buried treasure.
  • Katana–  Japanese blade that can summon 6 other warriors.  They don’t help.  They just critique your style and give you pointers.
  • Scimitar– Another curved blade that can open portals if slashed a certain way.  No clue where the portals lead.
  • Gladius–  Straight blade that inflicts laughter when it pierces the skin.
  • Viking Sword– Straight blade that releases a bone-chilling howl whenever blocked
  • Shortsword– Small blade that can shrink anything it cuts
  • Hook Sword– Come in pairs and can be transformed into wings when put together and pressed to back.  It will feel like you have hooks in your shoulders until you revert them back to blades.
  • Machete– Lawn care.  It’s over in the garden department.
  • Basket-Hilt Sword– Fires colorful eggs from the hilt.  10% chance eggs are rotten and 1% chance that they will contain poison candy.
  • Flamberge– Flame-shaped blade with ice powers because the enchanter thinks he’s a comedian.  He’s not.
  • Gauntlet Sword– Metal gauntlet with a blade attached and the power to create thousands of bubbles with every swing.  You’d think this is fun at parties, but you would be very wrong.
  • Greatsword– Largest of our blades with the power to telepathically give the wielder compliments to maintain a healthy self-esteem.
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How to Use Prologues, Part 2, What A Prologue Is and Isn’t

Posted on May 6, 2022 by Charles Yallowitz

Hi SErs! It’s a day of Harmony here at Story Empire 🙂 Today, I’d like to talk about what a prologue is and is not. Here’s a link to the previous …

How to Use Prologues, Part 2, What A Prologue Is and Isn’t
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Poetry Day: Atrophied Imagination

Posted on May 5, 2022 by Charles Yallowitz

Carl Sagan Quote (Supposedly. Internet isn’t always honest.)

(Ouch.  This one hits pretty hard on the nose.  Apparently, I wrote this in 2011.)

Do you remember your power?

The childhood ability

To dream of the impossible

And bring it to life

Friends with no substance

Explanations beyond science

Reality was nothing more than clay

This power was the source of fun

And the push for our ambition

Defiance in the face of adults

Who swore it had no purpose

Because they had forgotten

That they once held the power too

As time went on many lost it

Like a muscle that is never used

Our power shriveled and weakened

Crippled by the horror of adulthood

Our friends of fiction vanish

Leaving behind a misty memory

That we call childhood foolishness

We have moved on to the ‘real’ world

Letting our great power die

No longer remembering its joy

Becoming the adults who stifled us

With their atrophied imagination

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7 Tips to Using Swords in Fantasy

Posted on May 4, 2022 by Charles Yallowitz

Samurai Champloo

Due to swords being so common in fantasy, many people think they’re very easy to use in battle.  At least in a fictional sense.  Swing, stab, parry, stab, slash, stabbity stab, and the cycle continues.  You can be very simplistic with your sword fights in those aren’t one of the highlights of the story.  If you want to put more meat on the action bones then you’ll have to consider more aspects of swordplay.

  1. Most moves in a swordfight are designed to create an opening.  Unless the opponent is severely outmatched or unaware of the danger, a full on slash or stab will probably get blocked.  This means you need to consider feints (fake attacks), parrying (blocking), and various other moves that are designed to disrupt an opponent’s defense.  The actual strikes where blood is drawn will be fewer, especially any that cause major damage.
  2. Injuries that don’t kill will force a swordsman to adjust.  They can’t keep moving at their original speed if they have wounds.  The pain slows them down immediately and, if things progress, the blood loss causes weakness.  This is why you have to remember injuries and dole them out sparingly unless you have a reason why the characters can keep going at top speed while wounded.  Location is important here too because the sword arm being slashed will have a greater impact than the non-sword arm.
  3. The style of fighting must match the physical skills of the combatant.  It’s not a one style fits all.  A fast character will be better suited to use quick strikes and dodging instead of heavy blows and parrying.  They would be building up speed and trying to throw their opponent off-balance.  In contrast, strong characters will try to overpower with strong blows and minimal footwork.  They’d be more likely to act as a wall and not try to out maneuver an enemy.
  4. Swords need maintenance just like any other piece of gear.  If you have a character who doesn’t take care of their blades then you have to consider that they will break in a battle.  Those nicks and scratches make for a subpar blade as well as any spots where it could be too dull to cut skin.  All you need to fix this is a few scenes where the swordsman is talking while sharpening or mending their weapons.  Can even it do it once and people will assume it’s always being done.
  5. Speaking of footwork, you don’t have to make it flashy.  There doesn’t need to be flips and spins, which would normally get you stabbed at the point where you aren’t looking at your opponent.  These are fun since it’s a fantasy setting, but we go back to the moves having to fit the character.  For example, Luke Callindor is a dual-wielding swordsman who uses speed and agility to create openings.  Him flipping around makes sense as well as him getting hit a lot.  Delvin Cunningham is a traditional sword and shield warrior, so he’s not going to be in the air every often.  It’s more parrying and countering with him, which is why he gets hit less than Luke.
  6. It’s not always the pointy end going into the other man.  Sometimes it’s the sharp part going through the other man.  Slashing is a thing, especially against someone with thin or no armor.  Even against an armored opponent, a slash has force and can knock that person to the side enough to create an opening.  So, a slash isn’t always done when there’s a clear shot.
  7. It really isn’t that easy to chop a head off.  In fact, it requires the opponent to be unable to strike back.  Think of swinging a baseball bat, but you’re aiming at something higher and meatier than a baseball.  You have to get through bone too and it’s usually not from the back like an executioner with an axe.  You’re typically come from the side or the front with no gravity to help either.  So, this is a move that should be unleashed carefully . . . or not because it is flashy.
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Happy Paranormal Day! (Enjoy Fang-Filled, 8 Book Series for $2.99/Volume)

Posted on May 3, 2022 by Charles Yallowitz

Spend this supernatural day with a band of vampires who want nothing more than to live and have fun!
War of Nytefall!

Cover Art by Alison Hunt

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Did You Know There Are Swords in Fantasy?

Posted on May 2, 2022 by Charles Yallowitz

FF9 Sword Fight

So, did you know swords are common in fantasy?  I know, totally surprising.  You’d think it has something to do with most fantasy stories taking place in a pre-firearm age.  So, swords would be the most logic weapon to have in your story.  Guess it also has to do with tradition and the weapon being a trope that transcends cliché.

Funny thing is that you can even find swords in a story that takes place in our world or futuristic ones.  They might be used by a secondary character or be altered to fit the setting such as those laser slashing thingies made popular by that movie series.  Really shows that even when bullets and lasers are flying, authors just can’t resist writing a slashing or stabbing scene.  Why is that?

I think it can come down to a few reasons:

  1. Action scenes in books can be drawn out more and possess more moves when you have melee weapons.  Range weapons are all about aiming and hitting first, so they can typically be rather slow.  At least if you’re going for realism.  People also assume a bullet kills or severely cripples a person, so you can’t have the characters take multiple shots.  Not parrying either.  All of this can be done with swords and other melee weapons because it’s close range.
  2. There’s an odd flashiness that fantasy readers still find interesting when it comes to swords.  The whirling blade that they picture in their mind can really set a scene and show the full speed of the action.  Characters tend to do flourishes and acrobatics in sword fights as well.  It’s almost like a violent ballet.
  3. Scenes where a character is dying from being stabbed are fun to write in a macabre sort of way.  Since they’re close to each other, a conversation can be had as long as they can still talk.  Beheading clearly stops this.  You also get more of a tussle as the injured can scramble out of desperation and become more erratic in the fight.  This is because we expect them to be functional as long as the head is attached and the heart has not been pierced.  There’s an extension of life that goes along with the weapon.
  4. I remember reading once that people are more scared of getting stabbed than getting shot.  Part of it is that we think a bullet will hit us and we die instantly.  That or it will go through then we can get patched up.  Swords and knives have a greater sense of invasiveness for some reason.  They’re seen as a slow demise and they stay in there to cause more damage with every movement.  Another part could be that those people think of how you shouldn’t take a knife out or you’ll bleed to death, which isn’t a bullet warning.

Those are all my guesses though.  So, take them with a grain of salt.  Swords are a staple of fantasy and I’m sure they always will be.  People have written fantasy stories without swords, which is fine.  There’s no rule against that.  Yet, I’ve met many readers who feel like something is missing without one character wielding a medieval weapon at some point.  There really is something to the genre when it comes to swords, which is another reason why it’s hard to go into depth.  They’re like guns being in a Western or kissing being in a Romance.  You can skip those things if you want, but people kind of expect them to be there.

So . . . Do you like swords?

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Know your audience

Posted on May 2, 2022 by Charles Yallowitz

Hi Gang! Craig with you once more with something to consider. There’s an old bit of advice about making presentations, or producing an article, that …

Know your audience
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Take Your Time Because We’ve Got Sloths Here

Posted on May 1, 2022 by Charles Yallowitz

I do find these animals fascinating.  They’re so slow that they have microbiomes living in their fur.  Their metabolism is so slow that they take days to digest food other animals can breakdown in hours.  They stay in the trees and only come down once a week to go the bathroom.

Sloths are pretty cool when you look beyond them simply being slow.

Sloths fall into two categories, which are two-toed sloths (2 species) and three-toed sloths (4 species).  The pygmy three-toed sloth is considered critically endangered and the maned sloth is considered vulnerable.  There biggest threats are:

  • Deforestation, which destroys their environment.  Sloths live in thick canopies where they can hide from predators.  On the ground, they’re too slow to escape snakes and jaguars.  If they are on branches, but are exposed than large birds of prey can snag them.
  • Poaching because . . . humans suck.

For more information, CLICK HERE!  Now the pictures starting with the three-toed sloths

Brown-Throated Sloth (Most Common)

Pale-Throated Three-Toed Sloth (Commonly mistaken for Brown-Throated Sloth)

Maned Three-Toed Sloth (Vulnerable)

Pygmy Three-Toed Sloth (Critically Endangered)

Now for the two-toed:

Linnaeus’s Two-Toed Sloth

Hoffman’s Two-Toed Sloth

Can’t have an animal post without some cute videos:

A note on this last one.  I picked it because there are a lot of videos where people help sloths cross the street.  Many end with the sloth ‘waving a thank you’.  I wondered about this and found an answer in the comments of this video.  Raising its arm is a defensive posture.  Sloths are just so slow that it resembles a wave when it’s really their version of putting up their dukes.

Posted in Animal Posts | Tagged , , , , , | 31 Comments

Goal Post: This Week Didn’t Go as Planned

Posted on April 30, 2022 by Charles Yallowitz

I don’t even want to see what I had planned for weekly goals.  Partially because I can’t fix that post, which is very narrow.  This is apparently what happens when I use the blocks or whatever WordPress forced upon us.  I apologize for the ugliness and wish I could find a way to fix it, but there’s no point now.  A week has past . . . passed?

Now, Sunday is where things started to go sideways.  I woke up feeling terrible to the point where I took a home Covid test.  Came back negative, but I wanted to be sure.  I went to a clinic to get a rapid and that was negative.  The problem is that the fatigue, coughing, and chills hit so quickly that the doctor wanted to be very sure.  So, I had to take a PCR test, which meant I had to stay home from work for 3 days until the results came back.  Those were negative, by the way.  The culprit ended up being:

  • Common cold
  • Severe pollen allergies (Thanks, DC)
  • Exhaustion (Thanks again, DC)

Before anyone congratulates me on getting 3 more days of spring break, I wasn’t happy about this.  Didn’t even try to work on the Darwin & the Halfling Hunt outline because of my mood.  I did feel out of it for Monday and half of Tuesday, but I knew I just wanted to be back at work.  Sure, I was there when the guy came to replace my car’s windshield, which cracked right before the trip.  I made progress on ‘Pirate Warriors 3’ and the latest jigsaw puzzle.  Yet, I really wanted to be back at work.  I missed being in that Testing Center.

This isn’t to say I did absolutely nothing.  All of the September posts are now written and scheduled except for Tuesday.  I don’t want to do more Darwin & the Fate Bracelet teasers like July and August.  The national holiday thing didn’t do anything.  I’m thinking of doing teasers for Do I Need to Use a Dragon? (Fantasy Writing Tips) for at least that month.  That’s going to be tough because it’ll be chunks of essays unless I stick to the openers of a few.  Only need 4 of them, so this might be where I go since I can’t think of anything else.

Another issue is going to be what I can do to keep myself occupied.  It looks like I won’t get to any real writing until Memorial Day weekend.  This weekend is slated for doing the outlines for the 2 books I want to write this summer.  The next weekend that my son is with his mom has some family events, so I won’t feel comfortable writing during that time, especially since we’re hitting the big testing period.  So, what to do?

I was thinking of starting in on the October posts, but that would be the ‘Monster Maker’ and other yearly things.  Not sure I’m going to bother since my audience is incredibly small, so I might not be able to cover that.  I was thinking of a way to revive the ‘Raven’ stories since there were 4 of them and October has 4 weeks.  Each one had 30-31 sections though, so it isn’t like I can cram 4-5 into each day.  That would be overkill.  Guess an option would be to see if I can get enough for ‘Monster Maker’ and maybe make a poll for Windemere monsters.  Though, I remember polls sucking now.  Then, I can use one day to touch on each ‘Raven’ story.

I could also start working on November and leave October alone.  Really depends on what people think, but I’m not getting a lot of traffic these days.  So, I might have to just flip a coin on things.  Not that I have any blog topics for November either.

We have Monday off for Eid, so I’ll be doing non-tech stuff with my son.  Lego sets and maybe some drawing.  We both need to tone down our video game time.  Work should be exciting and fun, which leads to a relaxing weekend.  Can’t remember exactly what the weekday events are, but each week of May has at least one.  This is where a lot of projects come to fruition.  Another reason I’m not going to be tackling any major challenges until Memorial Day weekend.

By the way, the last time I did any real writing was August.  I haven’t written a new story since then.  I’ve edited, outlined, and tinkered, but it’ll be 9 months of no writing by the time I take on another project.  This is why I want to try to write 2 over the summer when I have more free time.

Goals of the week:

  1. Outline the next two Darwin books.
  2. Keep working on the LOTR puzzle
  3. Try this Blackened whiskey made by Metallica
  4. Watch more ‘Assassination Classroom’.
  5. Work, parenting, sleeping, and hydrating as usual.
  6. Legos!
  7. Start planning either October or November posts . . . Maybe I shouldn’t try for anything special this October in the first place?  Just ‘Monster Maker’?
  8. Oh yeah!  Set up the Tuesday posts for September.  Can’t forget that.
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