The good morning, good night thread

[marc_chagall]

Poll's up on the flash challenge for the next seven days.

And Ed, STAY AWAKE!!!!

[Ed]

Yah, sorry

[fnord33]

Hey, you remember that time that jerk ran an entire novel through the crit group? https://www.amazon.com/Birth-Exquisite-Falling-Turnip-Chakra/dp/0997709510/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1483606591&sr=1-2

[delboy]

Brilliant! Well done feller 

I used to thoroughly enjoy those chapters. In fact, I miss those crit sessions. I know everything has its time, but I've never since found a writers' group as fine as this one was back in the day.

I rather hoping to accelerate my writing again in the not too distant future, but I just need a few planets to align.... A close friend of mine told me, reasonably recently, not to wait too long for such alignments. When he gave me that advice he had no idea the remainder of his life would be measured in months. He died at just 53 years of age last November.  I figure it was good advice.

So, changes afoot if just a few more celestial bodies move in the right direction...

[Ed]

I was thinking about this place again today, and how I hadn't looked in for a while, and what a shame it was that the crit group had fizzled out. Truth is, it takes a fair bit of energy to keep it going, and it needs at least a few committed critters to make it work, which is hard to achieve and keep going week in week out. Personally, I'm swamped with work, to the extent I have pretty much given up on catching up with everything I need to do on a day to day basis.

I've certainly no time to write, and no time to crit. All I do in my down time is veg in front of the telly. I'm too knackered to do anything else.

Anyhoo, perhaps it's too late, but I was thinking maybe there was somebody here who would like to take over Doom and run it as their own? The hosting is paid up for a couple of years, as is the domain name, so it wouldn't cost anything, and if cost was an issue, I'd be happy to pay it up for say five years, and put up a few quid to run a competition to get some new blood into the forum again.

Any takers?

[elay2433]

Oh, man! That's awfully kind of you Ed.    I couldn't do it myself, but I'd love to see someone step up and kick it into gear the way you had it running  a few years back. I miss this place -- the crit-group in particular. Truth is though, even if it the group were running, I'd be lucky to participate once every two or three months. Can't keep up with my writing the way I used to (let alone the reading and thought that goes into a well done critique). Life is busy, and seems to just get busier.

Jerry

[marc_chagall]

Very generous offer, Ed, but like most of us, I simply don't have the time to take it on. Wish I did.

[Ed]

Hi Jerry and Delph -- yeah, I think things tend to have their time, and then life moves into another gear and things get left behind as we move on, for better or worse. The reason I first got into writing was because I was bored stiff at work all day, with no stimulation, didn't see hardly anybody, and writing gave me something to do and learn about, and get the grey matter turning over. It's really nice to have diverse group of friends to chat to online as well -- people I otherwise wouldn't have met or even known about. For the most part I've really enjoyed my time here, though it's been hard work at times, and we've had our challenges here and there.

I'll still keep popping in from time to time. May even rev it up again at some point in the future and get another comp going. I've been thinking about packing my job in. Work, these past few years, has been all encompassing, to the point where I have no life outside of it. I've been properly miserable and stressed like never before at times, to the extent I realise it's just not worth it. There are easier ways to make the same money. Just today another crisis happened, and now I'm going to have to drive to the site tomorrow -- a seven hour round trip, to deal with something that wasn't my fault, but could cost me dearly. I promised myself at Christmas I would give it six months, and if things weren't better I'd shut the business down. Roll on June

[delboy]

Hi Ed

I echo what the others have said - it's a generous offer, but time feels tighter than ever (for everyone) these days. Whatever happened to all this leisure time we were going to get when the computers took over.

It is a shame that CD has had (for the moment, at least) it's time. There was a period when the people, the crit group, the discussions, the support were just brilliant and helped me and my writing no end. I've searched in vain for a comparable writing forum out there, but there ain't one.

I'm still writing - just finished draft one of the latest western. It'll be going off to the publisher soon, so fingers crossed. But I'm a bit like you, work is all encompassing at the moment. As I edge towards retirement age I fully expected work to start to gentle tail off in terms of time / stress / travelling / expectations and so on. Let the young twenty and thirty year olds take the strain. But no, the pressure is accelerating. Maybe they have a course at CEO level on how to drive us all into early graves in order to ease the pension gap?

I still harbour hopes that when I do finally give it all up I will find time to write properly again (rather than taking a year to pen a short western) and have a go at some gothic rock'roll romances, which of course is the finest genre going. So, as I said at the start - I hope this place can become great again, but I'll too have to decline the kind offer of taking it on board.

Take it easy with your won workload, too. It really isn't worth. This year I've used up far too many days leave attending funerals.

Regards
Derek

[Geoff_N]

Just poking my head around the door to see if anyone is in the room.

An update then. My historical fantasy, Xaghra's Revenge, is to be released on July 24th, the anniversary of the real event. Pirate corsairs abducted everybody on Gozo and their spirits cry out for revenge.
I have short stories out this year. A mix of SF and fantasy. I still lead a crit group for the BSFA and I have to produce a short story every two months - harder than it seems. My writing speed has slowed lately.

I'm off to a writers' retreat in Greece again in September but half the time there will be cycling.

Many of us that used to inhabit Cafe Doom here, see each other in other forums or on facebook. If you aren't a pal on fb or twitter then please friend / follow so we can remain in touch. If you want to. On fb I am at http://www.facebook.com/geoffnelder and on twitter @twitter.

Hope you are all well.

[Ed]

Yeah, it's funny, isn't it? I thought I was busy ten years ago, but that's nothing compared to how it is now. Maybe it's just our perception changing as we get older, though -- could be that we are less able to cope with multiple simultaneous challenges the older we get?

I've just hit the big five-oh, which made me stop and think a bit. Take stock, and all that. I'm starting to find that bits of me are wearing out after years of heavy lifting and wielding tools. Apparently my flexor tendons are shot and I've got carpal tunnel syndrome. When I play squash my wrist aches for three or four days after. Oh God, I've just realised I'm turning into one of those old people who talk constantly about their ailments. Next thing you know I'll be talking about my bowel movements.... 

[elay2433]

Happy 50th, Ed. Take care of yourself. You'll need your wrists in decent shape for when you hit the keyboard again. Brainstorming any story ideas?

[Russell]

Happy 50th.  Oh that takes me back.

Today was my last day with the employer I'd been with for 12 years.  They did a restructure that was designed to let everyone keep their job  (at lower pay) but it meant redundancy was on offer.  I was lucky enough that I could put it tax-free straight into my pension (the equivalent of roughly 5 years contributions), and not be in too much of a hurry to find new income. I'm 58 and a good bit, and whilst I've not started talking about bowl movements, I have been thinking about how close I am to be being able to get by without having to work - or rather having to work full time in something stressful. 

Some form of retirement !!?  It creeps up on you (this age thing).

[Ed]

Thanks for the birthday wishes, you two.

Brainstorming, nope -- that's part of the problem. My brain needs a certain amount of downtime for creative ideas to formulate, and those 'what if?' thoughts just aren't happening with how busy I am. I would still like to pursue writing in the future as a pass time, though. Maybe in a year or two I'll be in a better position to actually do it. Have you got anything fermenting in your synapses, Jerry?

Russel -- sounds like interesting times. Funnily enough, I've been thinking more about when I can afford to retire without dropping my standard of living too much. My accountant told me last week that I have to put a ton on money into my pension if I'm to avoid paying massive amounts of tax. It's put me in a bit of a quandary, because that was the money I was planning to put into property development. I've recently got cold feet about investing in property with the uncertainty and economic upheaval that is likely to accompany the next few years of Brexit, but at the same time I don't like the thought of locking my money into a pension, albeit a SIPP, for at least the next five years, but then again it's better than handing it to the govt as tax I'll never get back. Why's everything so damned complicated?

So, are you going to get yourself a part time job, or are you looking for another full time job, Russell? I know a few people who went from positions with a lot of responsibility in one field of work to ones with none in a completely different field. They found it a refreshing change.

[elay2433]

Brainstorming, nope -- that's part of the problem. My brain needs a certain amount of downtime for creative ideas to formulate, and those 'what if?' thoughts just aren't happening with how busy I am. I would still like to pursue writing in the future as a pass time, though. Maybe in a year or two I'll be in a better position to actually do it.

I know what you mean, Ed. I hope things slow down enough for you so that you can get back to it. I'm brainstorming still, but I don't often get much farther than that. I'm attempting a reset of my daily schedule now, trying to get up early enough to get my butt back in the chair. Problem for me is discipline. I've gone as long as about 5-6 months without missing more than a few days at a time, accomplishing about one (too long) short story per month. But sooner or later I always seem to get derailed. I'll get the hang of it one of these days.