Category: Blogs!

The Uphill Battle of Responsibilities (Old and New!)

Never let it be said that I will shirk my responsibilities, but I keep getting told to not forget my responsibilities to myself and my own well-being.

That well-being is best handled by letting myself have time to write, but the moment I sit down and think about it, there’s a moment of pure terror as I start to get overwhelmed by everything in my head.

Is there a hill I can run screaming towards?

…oof. I need a secretary, or a program that’ll function as one and whack me with a stick when I start to wander off.

It doesn’t help that more ideas keep cropping up and crowding my attention span, but that’s what you get when you pare down your writing/creative work to the minimum for several weeks. But I have a morning to get at least three or four things done.

That list doesn’t include checking in with players in my campaigns and setting up the next Side Arcs or finishing out Solo Arcs for other players. They’ve been so patient with me and I’m stupidly grateful.

So, what do I do when I am confronted with the Sticky Note Secretary?

Why, ponder a different and completely unnecessary project, of course! Specifically: taking the knowledge I’ve gained about lightsaber fighting (I’ve been teaching Basics and Shii-Cho with a few likeminded local nerds) and trying to put it into a new style that is based on my Kung Fu education.

Soon to be filled with notes that’ll never see the light of day!

Not that this will take over my free-time, but I will occasionally jot down notes after practice and having figured out a possible form.

Now, to use an hour for writing sprints before I feel guilty for using my time for myself!

Stay safe out there, folks. Take care of yourselves.

-JB Swift

Three Months Later…

I’ve finally had a quiet moment to remember that I have a website!

Holy hell, it’s been a whirlwind of a time over the last three months, folks.

I’ve been fired from the Post Office, enrolled in a Cybersecurity course, made Interim President of my local union, got my job back, and then I had to scramble to keep the new plates spinning along with all of my other ones.

I’ll be honest, folks. I’ve been exhausted for weeks, and I keep finding things to look into. Somehow, I still write, though it’s been sporadic (at least one paragraph a day) and it has to compete with both an upcoming newsletter for the local and some eight grievances a week (which are 25-30 pages each) and my own physical exhaustion from the day-job work.

I went from having absolutely nothing to do to having to plan out every half-hour on some days.

But I’m still here! I’ll have to set up a reminder to make a daily post (and pencil it into my calendar), but the practice and daily life-writing will do me good. At least the daily writing prompts have gotten more interesting!

Stay safe out there, folks.

-JB Swift

07/25/2024 Suddenly Busy, So… Vacation!

The past week has been a whirlwind.

After hearing that our union local’s president was stepping down, I called the other officers and told them I would take the job.

Two days after that announcement was made public, my postmaster called to say I had my job back.

Two people emailed me to say they wanted to join the Sidewinder Stories campaign, and one old player stepped up to say they wanted to contribute to Dungeon Mastering.

Online school has ramped up considerably and pulling my attention back to my desk to pore over my study guides.

In all of this, I carve out bits of time to write and make for 600 words in every 30-minute sprint.

So what to do when suddenly the world has gotten overwhelming?

A vacation! To Florida! In late July… during storm season…

I didn’t pick the dates.

Onward! There’ll be photos of the beach!

Stay safe out there, folks!

-JB Swift

07/07/2024 Day of Rest

Nearly three straight days of working on the property, practicing the recently-learned Kung Fu form (Tong Long Tao Dow, I think it’s spelled), drilling the Shii-Cho lightsaber routine, along with back-to-back camping sessions, player discussions, and writing sprints.

Photo by Cooper, the helpful golden retriever.

I need to remember that just because I’m not pulling 60-hour work weeks, I don’t need to push myself to my own limits every day. There’ll be another writing sprint later tonight, but I’m going to rest a while.

Stay safe out there, folks.

-JB Swift

07/05/2024 A Needed Break (With News!)

Needed to take a break from daily posts for a while, namely because life got busy for a while.

First and foremost, school is going to be starting next week, so I’ve had to make a few changes to my schedule and workplace. I’m now typing on a desktop for the first time in nearly twenty years!

Yes, it feels weird, but I’m liking it.

Secondly, you might have noticed that I’ve expanded a bit on the SWRPG page. Took to revamping the wiki-article section after a few self-education sessions on website design. Pretty soon, if they agree, I’ll also have some of my players contributing articles as they expand on their own home-brewed content.

Wiki (Swift’s SWRPG Games)

Thirdly, Bakka has returned! Where he’s been, I don’t know, but the full belly makes me suspicious that he’s been adopted in the subdivision behind the property, so I’m happy.

Boy’s gotten big! He’s survived!

Fourth (!), we got a call from a friend with a unique problem: a male golden retriever nearly two years old needing a home. My family, from the in-laws to my wife and children, to even my parents, said that I needed to take him, that it’d be good for me, and that after the last year and the pummeling it’s taken, my soul would heal a bit.

So, meet Cooper (Buddy), folks!

Like looking at both of my old boys at once.

We’re getting used to each other and taking all the time in the world to help him acclimatize, letting the other dogs around him slowly, and getting him through as much training as possible.

Writing-wise, I had a hiccup of point-of-views for the past week, but after a few false starts I’ve gotten over the hurdle and dived into the Big Friggin’ Middle of the Interstellar Tall Tales rewrite. It’s now nearly 25K words long and will be getting into the real fun of that story. Stampeding asteroids, a chase from ‘the law’, and making a tall tale prove his legend by taking on a challenge that’s supposed to be, by every count of relativistic physics, impossible.

Published or not, this has damn fun to write.

I’ve been swamped with house projects as the family realized that I’m home almost every day, now. So much so that they wonder why it takes forever to get any of the projects done, up until I explain how much work needs to be done to get something to a manageable level and how it was put off by my working 60 hours a week at the Post Office.

Reading-wise, I’ve gone to one of the classics and picked “Ender’s Game” up again. I’ll give a review on it after a while, though it’s a debate if I’ll look at other books in the series. “Speaker for the Dead” was the only other book I had read, so I’ll have to look through the “Used” section for the next novel.

With the day coming to an end, I’ll try to get one more writing sprint done before a player discussion session this evening. Stay safe out there. folks.

-JB Swift

06/24/2024 Assessment for IT Education

I passed!

Some of the information I’ve learned just as a hobby actually stayed in this withered cortex! Classes begin in July!

Intimidating but also exciting.

Now I have to update all of my old school information.

It’s been 20 years. I’ll have to retake the ACT. Ho’boy.

Stay safe out there, folks. Life’s about to be very busy, but this time it won’t just be “I’m delivering the mail”.

-JB Swift

06/23/2024 The Day of Yards

8 hours. 4 acres. One riding mower with a slippery belt.

How am I this exhausted? I’ve spent years walking dozens of miles in heat like this, but all day on a riding mower wore me out.

And I forgot sun screen, and I haven’t been out in the environment in a while. My arms are burned, again.

But my father was correct: damn but it feels good to see all of that acreage cleaned up.

The ditch out there is going to be an absolute nightmare. Ugh.

Stay safe out there, folks.

Seriously. The snakes are out in force this summer.

-JB Swift

06/21/2024 Saber Training

I went to a double class for Kung Fu training to get extra practice and help teach a few of the younger students. During the downtime between classes, one of the students asked Sifu what he knew about ‘lightsaber combat’.

“I’m learning about those forms, but I think we have someone here who can host a seminar on the subject.”

He then turned to face me, the question obvious in his expression.

Now, he’s not wrong. I’ve read a lot about the various forms of lightsaber combat, and I’ve even practiced forms developed from fight choreographers.

But can I teach?

…well, I can’t say I don’t want to try.

Guess I have something else to look into, on top of the other things I’m looking into, now that I have the time and chance to do so.

Stay safe out there, folks. Lots are happening!

-JB Swift

06/20/2024 Appplications and the BFM

I’ve sent off the application for LSU’s Cyber Bootcamp!

After over a decade of looking at news articles, learning bits and pieces of the trade to satisfy curiosity, I’ve finally taken the step towards learning cybersecurity professionally and moving to the next stage in life.

Yes, that is terrifying. And exciting?

Who knows, maybe this old dog can learn a new trick. Dad Law requires me to use the bad joke, and I make no apologies.

While I wait for the assessment (which took an hour to complete and reminded me that I’m not in the 90’s anymore; I was writing the math problems out on notecards when I remembered that I had a calculator), I’m going to wrestle with a different problem: the BMF for the “William the Pecostian” story.

I wasn’t expecting this rewrite to grow into a real novel, but I’m here and now I have this struggle to deal with. There are at least two more dramatic scenes before the story’s climax, but where I am currently could call for either a downtime scene with the protagonists, or a short cutaway to the antagonists to heighten the tension. In other words, I’ve reached the Big ‘Furry’ Middle.

The kids have been reading these over my shoulder; I’m moderating my language while they’re in the room.

I’m not sure yet which choice will be the better one, and I might write out both to compare them. That means I’m also fighting off the procrastination that’s tempting me to look at other things, even if they’re things I want to work on.

I’ll be calling out for beta readers to look it over. In the meantime, there’s a Kung Fu class for the evening and a long chat with Sifu over something he wants me to look into.

Stay safe out there, folks.

-JB Swift