Progress is good

… by which I mean that progress is a good thing as well as that I’m making good progress. In this particular case, on the planned novel. I had another 2000+ word day, perhaps even a new personal high at around 2200 words, which felt both unexpected and pretty good, given the usual slow down … Read more

Lego remains awesome, but…

There’s a time in a parent’s life–I’m making a sweeping assumption here based on my own experience, but I’d bet money it’s accurate–that in raising their child(ren), they encounter not only toys that are particularly cool (with thoughts of, Man, I wish they had stuff this cool when I was a kid), but also revisit … Read more

My novel’s first draft is crap, and that’s okay

As I mentioned in my last post, the first draft of my first novel is going well. Meaning, as far as progression of the word count. As for the quality?That’s a whole other thing. I rewrote the opening three times, trying three different approaches with it, and it still feels weak. The inciting incident–a young … Read more

A new personal best and solid other thing

I hit a couple of notable benchmarks today. This isn’t to be confused with hitting the magic number I mentioned recently. That’s a whole other thing. And not a good one.Don’t confuse personal bests and personal worsts, people. It can’t end well. No, this time the first benchmark, albeit the less significant of the two … Read more

What I read this month

With a wife who’s a teacher and a grade-school kid, it was a little crazy in the ol’ Jespersen household this month, so I didn’t get as much read as I would’ve hoped. Then again, there’s a solid argument to be made that I never do. Here’s the low-down on how September went: ReadOpen Borders: … Read more

Stop motion is cool

As I’d written about back in earlier days of isolation, I’m trying out making some stop motion videos. It’s been a while since I took a crack at another one, in part because I wasn’t able to come up with more than a handful of ideas lo these many months, and in part because I … Read more

How to feel old fast

My nine-year-old daughter has had some interest in coding for the last couple of years. Now bear in mind, at that age, “coding” is pretty much using a program that lets the user drag and drop pre-set commands into a stacked order for, say, a basic (real or virtual) robot to execute:Forward 1 spaceForward 1 … Read more