Under the Skin

Okay, we'll revert to the Celtic Culture lessons shortly, but as the only Russell with a blog, I feel I must make this announcement. Carol's mission extension was working, but then all of the sudden, it's not happening anymore. Carol is coming home next Friday from her mission. I'm sad that she didn't get the extension she wanted, but I'm also excited to see her.

I feel that people misunderstand Celtic cultures way too much. So, being a person fairly well-versed in Celtic culture (at least for an American), here I am to teach you about Celtic cultures. I'm going to break my pattern today, but here's the way I'm going to usually go: I'm going to arrange it by lingual development, because being someone who studies lingual development for fun...you know. And we're using the Insular/Continental Hypothesis. I don't like the P/Q Hypothesis. If you understand that, good for you. If not, it's not really important. So, we'll start with the Insular Celts, because they're more...stereotypically Celtic I guess. I'm going to start with the Goidelics, because they're my favorites. We should technically start with the Irish (their language came first), but I'm starting with the Manx (second in the Insular Celtic languages), because I want to start with someone obscure. Then we'll go to the Irish foll...

The question is becoming more real. As my first good piece of writing (at least my first good novel) is nearing completion, I'm beginning to consider publishing. I know, I know. How could I let my baby out into the world to be picked apart? The answer? I really don't know. I guess I've just finally realized that eventually this baby needs to grow up and be out in the world. I've submitted short stories to magazines. The many rejection letters posted on the wall remind of where those all went. I should become more involved in that again, I think. I've submitted freelancing. I've made a total of $.05! YES! But I tell you, eventually, they will get accepted as well, if I keep trying. My nonfiction skills have not developed enough yet I guess. To tell you the truth, the $.05 is because the source/freelance agency that I uses gives you a cent if you're in the top five choices. You don't get the actual cash promised to the writer unless they use...

All right guys. I'm having some trouble writing anymore today, which is what I LOVE to do on Sundays. Why am I having trouble continuing? Today it is not writer's block as it usually is. I know what I want to write. It's writing it that's the problem today. You see, there are three/four subjects (one is kind of a subset of the another), which all writer's will eventually need to face at least one of in every novel. What are they? 1) Law 2) Military protocol, organization, strategy, etc. 3) Medicine Subset 4) Mental Health I pride myself on being able to do the medicine thing. I usually know enough that I can navigate my way around the internet to find exactly what I'm looking for. Sometimes, I can do the mental health thing, though some subjects are harder (such as PTSD, which is what I'm facing in my writing right now). However, Military, I always have to revert to one of my three trusty sources. Their names are Sam, Caleb and Dad. Amongst th...