Fish and Cherries Productions

With San Diego Comic Con only a day away, I thought I’d give something to all the aspiring creatives that follow me. Aside from all the costumes, celebrities, and previews, Comic Con is a place where people looking to break into the creative world can learn about the trade from professionals. In honor of all of the ones who taught me, I want to pass something down that I’ve put together.

So you want to be a writer. That’s good, admirable even. The creative bug should spread as far as possible. However, there are a few big obstacles in your way, namely that being self-regulated is one of the hardest things to do. It’s easy to work for someone else, but working for yourself is a-whole-nother beast to conquer. Now, I may not be an expert on the subject, but after a few years of working for myself as a writer, I feel like I’ve obtained some wisdom when it comes to being self-regulated. Here’s three tips on how to be your own good boss when writing creatively.

#1: Beware of JOM

JOM is a nasty fellow who hangs over the shoulder of every aspiring writer. Nobody knows him by name, but everyone’s met JOM. Perhaps even you non-writers have met JOM too. To be sure, let me call JOM by his/her true name:

JUST
ONE
MORE

Just one more webpage of random facts before I get back to work. Just one more level or quest in this really engrossing video game. Just one more chapter of the book or comic I just bought. But that’s the thing about JOM: he/she keeps coming back. That webpage may link to another, more intriguing one or the next chapter could be a resolution to a great cliffhanger. Suddenly, just one more has become several more and that deadline is looking tighter and tighter.

So to stave off JOM, you should take heed of the next piece of advice…

#2: Time Your Breaks (And Be Sure To Take Breaks)

The reason our minds wander to other things while we write is that, like any muscle, it gets tired after prolonged use. Imagine if you lifted 100 pounds for eight hours straight. The muscles in your arms would be completely destroyed! It is omni-important that your mind be allowed to rest, even if this is your future magnum opus.

That said, you should be mindful of how long your breaks are. Newton’s first law of motion says that a body at rest tends to stay at rest; the brain is no different. This isn’t helped by JOM constantly butting in to distract you. The best way to get around this is to set alarms for when your break is supposed to end, letting you know when to get back to work. Nothing quite jolts the senses like an alarm bell.

#3: Don’t Force It — It’s Okay To Take a Day

Sometimes the writing just doesn’t come. Maybe the muse isn’t talking to you or you’re dealing with some problems weighing on your mind. Whatever the reason, you just can’t seem to write.

And that’s perfectly fine.

If the stories aren’t coming, even after some exercises and walks, there’s nothing to be done. Creativity can’t be forced any more than water can be squeezed out of a rock. Sometimes the river’s just dry. There’s nothing wrong with that, though; sometimes ideas need to percolate in the back of your mind before inspiration strikes you for the next part of the project. Now deadlines can make this step complicated, but necessity is the mother of invention and there’s no bigger motivator for that than last minute panic.

There is most assuredly more to this than just these three steps, but the the very least they’ll be a great foundation to build your path to the literary world. Take your first steps. Learn your own valuable lessons to keep you on track. But most importantly of all, never stop imagining and creating.

That’s all for now. For all those going to Comic Con this weekend, have a great time and I hope to see you there.

I have somewhat of an inner confession. Not a sin or anything, just something that’s been weighing on me lately.

I don’t have a lot of fun with fighting games. I enjoy them to be sure, but there comes a point where I stop having fun because it… sets something off in me. Whenever one of these games is particularly relentless or cheap, I get very vivid sensations from being ganged up on, either verbally or physically, by strangers and friends alike. Most of the memories involve being told how awful I am or how hopeless it is to play against a friend who has had more time and dedication to it than I have. It’s a general feeling of helplessness that really gets under my skin.

Because there’s some truth to the matter. As a good portion of you know, I have Asperger’s Syndrome, which affects the processing power of the brain. Things that start in the brain take longer to come out and as such, my reflexes are a bit slower than my peers. Sure, there may be a second of a delay, but that’s all it takes for someone to overpower you in these games. It’s always bugged me in subtle ways, the knowledge that I’ll never be as good at these competitive games as my friends, like a splinter of sorrow in my brain. And yes, it affects me even when I’m alone.

This has been my confession for the evening. Have a good one.

I’d like to address a trend that I’m starting to find disturbing. I should probably have a whole article on it, but I’d rather get this out while it’s still fresh.

There’s been an announcement that Cartoon Network is rebooting the animated show Ben 10 and, judging from the promotional poster, it will have a minimalistic art style and focus on hyperactive, kid-pandering elements. Now I didn’t actually like this series, but I know it has a large and very devoted fan base and it is for them that I feel bad. Why? Because Cartoon Network has already come out with reboots for Teen Titans, The Powerpuff Girls, and Scooby-Doo, all of which had minimalistic art styles and focused on the hyperactive, kid-pandering elements. Oh yes, and all of them have been consistently bad.

Cartoon Network is going down a very troubling path, focusing on grabbing the attention of kids in the short term rather than keeping kids coming with quality stories. Variety is, of course, key… and that’s part of the problem. So many of these shows seem to be copies of each other. No, that’s not true, they’re actually all a copy of one show: Teen Titans Go! Despite the bad reviews, it’s pulling in very high ratings and has a huge audience to the point where Cartoon Network arrogantly advertises it as “your new favorite show.” What we’re seeing is a follow the leader mentality, putting out more of the same rather than different types of shows. While they still have gems that can legitimately engross kids with nuance like Adventure Time and Steven Universe, I’m worried that they’re going to get drowned out by this cavalcade of copycats. And I’m worried that the generation below us will suffer for it.

I don’t have kids yet, but that’s what makes me care more because right now, I’m dreading what kind of world I will be bringing them into.

Oh my… looks like I’ve got some big accomplishments to announce…

Let’s start with the first one: my mom and I were interviewed on a Bay Area public access show called Life on the Autism Spectrum hosted by AASCEND (Autism Asperger’s Spectrum Coalition for Education, Networking, and Development). If you don’t already know, I was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome from a very young age and have spent a long time coping with it. Believe it or not, Asperger’s has been a huge boon in my creative work and going on the show allowed me to talk about it, as well as The Fire Truck Who Got Lost and the Fish and Cherries website. Follow the link here and see the interview in all its glory.

And more exciting news — I just came out with my first published book review. The website SFBook published a review I wrote on a book called The Complete Double Dead by Chuck Wendig. This marks the first time that a piece I’ve written has been published by a third party before it showed up on Fish and Cherries. Check out the review here and read about what happens when a vampire wakes up after the zombie apocalypse.

That’s all from my end. I’m going to go off and watch the trailer from the new Psychonauts game. My body is ready…

Today’s On My Mind is being postponed for a later day. There’s something big coming in the week and I want it to be included in this week’s update.

Wow.

I mean wow.

$6,176 raised for The Fire Truck Who Got Lost.

That is over triple the goal and I don’t know how to really express my gratitude. Thank you to everyone who helped make this happen. Bringing Barnabus the fire truck to life has been a real journey and you have definitely helped it move along. It’s hard for me to believe that my first official book is going to be published to the world. I’m excited, Amber the artist is excited, our families are excited, and you can bet that Barnabus and company are excited.

Hope you all had a great Memorial Day weekend. The holiday was the reason I didn’t post a Snippet yesterday, but I’m going to make it up next week, possibly even give you a Classic Snippet tomorrow. For now, it’s back to the grindstone for all of us.

It’s amazing how easy it is to get jaded and forget how great things can be.

As you guys may have noticed, I’ve had a bit of a bad run with the cimenas lately. Watching both God’s Not Dead movies two weeks back-to-back was an absolutely brutal experience that left me drained and practically dead inside. Granted, I’d seen some good movies in the weeks prior, but coming off the heels of Batman v. Superman, which stripped two icons of every bit of morality and likability just for a slugfest, tainted the memories quite a bit.

But then I saw Captain America: Civil War and suddenly, it was like I’d seen the sun for the first time. Emotions other than disgust and disappointment fired off within me as I was finally able to love something again without having to justify or make excuses. It was a great feeling, to say the least.

Funnily enough, something just like that happened last night. In my downtime, I went to reading the New 52 Batman crossover event named Death of the Family, which my friend had leant me. I made it to the middle of chapter three before I had to put the book down, unable to bear the unpleasantness, choppy writing, and defamation of characters that I loved. But immediately after, I picked up my then unread copy of Grant Morrison’s Wonder Woman: Earth One: Volume One and my disgust melted away as I read a reimagining of a character with some actual effort and imagination behind it. That book reminded me of why I used to love DC and what they originally stood for: larger than life heroes that stand as gods we aspire to be like.

So if you’re ever feeling beaten down or disgusted with the world around you, keep pushing forward. Another shining moment could be just around the corner.

Happy Cinco de Mayo, everyone! Allow me to give you another reason to drink.

Yes, here it is, the long awaited review of God’s Not Dead 2. I wanted to get this one right and I think I succeeded, but I leave that entirely up to you. Let’s get ready to have our faith in God and humanity challenged once again.

God’s Not Dead 2

And if you really wanted an On My Mind for yesterday, here’s what’s on my mind: the Indiegogo campaign for my children’s book! Keep it coming, folks, we’re almost at our first stretch goal!

The anticipated review of God’s Not Dead 2… will be delayed due to complications. Rest assured, it will arrive within the week. Expect glorious and righteous rage.

What’s on my mind this week? Ohhhhhhhhhh… a LOT!

First of the two big announcements. My Zootopia Reel Snippet got republished on Culture Sonar! That’s right, my signal is spreading wider and I owe it to all of you (though my dad gets special mention for reaching out). Click here, read it again, and give these folks some traffic.

Next… drum roll please… I’ve taken to Indiegogo to help fund a children’s book that I wrote! And it made its goal in two days!

Let me back up and explain. For the past year, my friend and I have been collaborating on a children’s book called The Fire Truck Who Got Lost. I wrote the story and my friend did the artwork. We finally got it to a good place and we’re ready to work on production and distribution. Since both of us are kinda broke, though, we decided to take to crowdfunding — the modern American way of business.

We set a modest goal of $2000 — just enough to get layout done and print a few copies — but lo and behold, we got so much support that we made it on the second day of our 45-day campaign. We were positively gobstruck, but now we’re coming back swinging with a stretch goal. We’re hoping that donors will help us get past $4,000 so we can donate some copies to children’s libraries or possibly the kid’s section of my hometown’s local fire truck museum.

If you have some free time, please follow this link to the Indiegogo page. It would be really great if my fans could donate even a little bit so we can spread this book farther and farther. If you can’t donate, that’s okay. You can play a part by sending it around to friends and families, particularly those that have toddlers, and get the word out.

This has been a really big couple of weeks. Everything’s coming up Colin! Here’s hoping for even more good news.