As an author, it should be no surprise that I enjoy reading. I think every writer should read, to learn what good writing looks like (but also to learn what bad writing looks like, because that gets published too). Primarily, however, my reading is a way I can escape the real world for a little while and explore new ones – that great what if? Thus my favorite genre is fantasy, so that is what I’m usually reading at any given moment. Lately I’ve also been trying to read some classic literature; not to sound impressive or even consider myself “cultured,” but mostly just to see what the big deal is with most of these books – why are they considered so good? I’ve been reading Sherlock Holmes recently. Interesting, but not too exciting.

I use Goodreads to keep track of what I want to read, but more importantly to track what I have read. I actually set a yearly goal of how many books I want to read a year. It’s embarrassing to say this, but my pathetic little number for this year is 15. And I’m behind.

2014 Reading Challenge

Rob has
read 10 books toward his goal of 15 books.

hide

10 of 15 (66%)

view books

I read very slowly. I don’t know if I’m just being careful, or thorough, but it annoys me, because I can’t read as fast as I’d like to. I’ve tried a form of speed reading, but I think it was a bit gimmicky, so it didn’t work. I was all excited when I read Stephen King’s On Writing, encouraging budding authors to read even if they read slowly, because he’s a slow reader too! How many books does he read a year? Around 80. OH SURE, STEVE, REALLY SLOW. More than a book a week, and I can barely get past the one a month pace. Sheesh.

But it’s not a race, just one of the many things I like to do, and keep doing it because it’s fun. So that Goodreads list just keeps getting bigger, growing faster than I can check them off. I guess there are worse problems to have.

my to-read shelf:

So that’s another thing I’d rather be doing now, reading more fiction.

Wait, aren’t I doing that right now? Well, yes, but not entirely the way I want to. This blog series is forcing me to write regularly again, and it’s something other than my novel, which is good for variety; but I’ve got a massive amount of ideas in my head and there is just not enough time to do them all. I keep a list, and hope that some day I will get to them all.

There’s the fantasy novel I’m working on, the second of a planned four book series (first one is for sale), and I’m nearing the middle of that story, which is hardest to write. (The beginnings and ends are the easier parts for me.) But I have other ideas for new novels, too, unrelated to my current series; and I have short story ideas, both related and unrelated to my current series; and I have multiple blog post ideas, and ideas for a newsletter (if people are interested in such a thing, drop me a comment here) … Yes, there are lots of things I could be writing. But as this 31 Things series proves, I like a lot of things. How often do you think writing, which is work, wins? I’ll tell you: rarely. It has to be a conscious, deliberate decision.

I have yet to decide if I am going to do National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) this year. It is a great motivator, and its largely responsible for how I wrote book 1. If I do, there are sacrifices for my family, since I am not as available to them; there are sacrifices to the 30 other things I like; there are sacrifices of my own sanity. But the reward is great: another novel. IF I do NaNoWriMo, I will need to decide if I keep going with book 2, or start something brand new. Honestly, I’m leaning towards new, just to maybe get another book out there for sale. We’ll see, as I have a couple weeks left to decide.

If I have any fans at all, and you happen to be reading this, what would you prefer I do? Sequel or new? Leave me a comment.

With the advent of the indie-publishing revolution, part of me wonders what life would be like if I wrote as a full time career. It is a very appealing proposition, but I would like to combine it with some other things too, as I will explore later in this series. Until then, writing is just something on the side, as I truly am A Writer with a Day Job.

So that’s another thing I’d rather be doing now, writing.

Today’s post will be somewhat short, because I don’t have a lot to say about sculpting; I’ve never really done it. Okay, there were those few ceramic projects I did in the 3rd, 4th and 5th grade (a fish, a hot dog, and a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, respectively), but they certainly don’t count. Someday I really want to take a sculpting class to get some basics down; I suppose online videos are fine, but it would be nice to ask questions, so I lean toward in-person teaching. There are two types of sculpting I’d like to try.

The first is a recent interest, thanks to watching the Syfy show Face Off, in sculpting facial masks or prosthetics. When I watch these artists lay clay on a face model, then make a mold, then pour in the latex or polyfoam, and eventually paint and apply it to a model, I enjoy all of it, but it’s the sculpting that impresses me the most. I watch them, and I think, “I could do that.” Maybe I really can’t, but I won’t know until I try.

via http://www.afxstudios.com/masks/

The other type of sculpting I want to try is the hard one: stone sculpting. (I’ve wanted to try this long before I ever played Dwarf Fortress, so no, it’s not because my dwarves know how to sculpt stone.) There is something really interesting about taking a stone and carving it up into a shape that could potentially last thousands of years.

via http://www.donalddavis.com/

But, as I said, I’ve never done any of it yet. I just want to. That’s all I can say.

So that’s another thing I’d rather be doing now, sculpting.

Time for some more geek pastimes. When I say board games, I’m not talking about Scrabble or Monopoly, although those can be fun at times. When I play a board game, I like (surprise surprise) complex strategy and innovative gameplay. Lately I have a soft spot for European-style Economic strategy games, like the ones in the gallery below. These types of games require you to plan, be either directly or passively affected by opponent choices, and to change strategy; the good games offer multiple paths to victory so that you can change strategy. I really don’t mind long game sessions lasting hours, as long what’s happening isn’t mundane (this is where Monopoly fails: round and round and round until you’re bankrupt? No thank you).

Agricola

Axis and Allies

Carcassonne

The Settlers of Catan

Forbidden Island

Puerto Rico

There are two problems with my board game choices: First, they tend to be expensive; thus I have to know they are really good before I plunk down the money for them, and that limits me. Second (and most important), it’s hard to find other players to play with. Because of the complexity of the games, most of my family members are not interested. (“Games are supposed to be fun, Rob, not work.”) To me, this kind of work is fun, so this just means I haven’t found enough people like me to play regularly. (I say regularly, because there are a number of people I know who will play with me, but if we manage a game twice a year, we’re lucky.)

My lovely wife will play almost any game with me and enjoy it, but we both agree it’s much more fun to play with multiple people. I’ve got half a dozen games in my collection, and I’ve discovered that there is a “complexity continuum” that I use to help decide what we should play whenever new people come over. From easiest (and usually most fun for all) to hardest (only fun for me), they are:

1. Forbidden Island
2. Carcassonne
3. Settlers of Catan
4. Puerto Rico
5. Agricola
6. Axis & Allies

For the record, I haven’t played Axis & Allies in over a decade.

There are a lot of games out there that I would like to play, but I’m smart enough to realize I shouldn’t buy a game that will never get played. I’m thinking my best bet is to create new players: my kids. That’s not the only reason I had them, just one of many. 🙂

So that’s another thing I’d rather be doing now, playing board games.

Along the same lines as yesterday’s Bonsai post, here’s another brief hobby I tried that involved making big things little, and that take a lot of time to get a final result: model shipbuilding. Maybe it was all those years of playing with legos, but for some reason I really like to admire miniaturized things, whether they be models of houses, trains, armies, landscapes, whatever. Maybe it makes me think I’m a big powerful giant or something, I don’t really know. But I consider it art on some level.

With model ships, there’s a unique quality that is different from other miniaturization projects. It’s not just getting the outside to look right, it’s all the parts on through to the inside, too. I tried plastic model cars as a kid, and although I learned a little bit of cars’ components, the ones I attempted were not that educational. The pieces went together so that when you lifted the hood or opened the doors, they looked like a car inside, but you didn’t learn how an engine was built. This isn’t the same with model ships. It seems that a good model ship is designed to be a such a replica of the original that by the end you will know all about every single part of ship. A lot of times you even cover up very detailed things that you’ll probably never see again – but you know it’s there. That’s fascinating to me. Theoretically, I could build a real boat someday just by working on one of these kits.

Ok, that’s probably stretching things a bit. And as someone who’s barely been on a boat, it’s surprising that I even enjoy this. It’s probably the complicated nature of the endeavor, along with the creative aspect, along with the solitary aspect. Once again, I like the idea of it, but the reality of it is beyond my reach right now. Mainly, it’s cost; a good kit starts at $150 minimum. Time is not on my side either because I have other things in my life more important to me, like my family and my writing. Finally, I don’t really have a good work area to keep the work in progress protected in between sessions. But, as I’ve said before and will say again, I hope to someday give this a try again.

The dream ship

So that’s another thing I’d rather be doing now, building model ships.