I set some big goals for myself in about May, so this is really a 5 month update, but six is a rounder number, so I’m going with that. This is also a call to arms, a way of saying I really need your help to make the next step in this process.
Over the summer, I’ve accomplished a good deal of my goals, and this is due in no small part to Kirin making plans to allow me to work alone in a way that I haven’t been able to in years. I’ve been writing myself out of a corner. Not being able to write has been a large burden on me, and is not healthy mentally. I now have a novel completed, and I’ve brought back Johnny No One. I have already started promoting these projects, and next month begin the podcasts to support them, and further build community. This is very important to the larger picture of my plans. I now have three websites up: www.mindofbryan.com, www.ihopeyourehappy.com and instructionslistsandnotes.com. I have put links down at the bottom of each article to allow peopel to Digg it, stumble on it and etc. Clicking those would certainly help quite a bit.
I have products on zazzle.com, and will soon have some at cafepress.com as well. I am the top ranked blog at weoped.com. In fact, my op-eds had a perfect rating for quite a while there. My bass scale book is finished and up at lulu.com awaiting promotion. My next music book is over a hundred pages already, and covers set-up of gear and construction of sound. It needs perhaps another 30 pages of writing and graphics. I could very easily follow this up with a video. My next novel already has over 100 pages written ( though this is 10% of the whole story). And to continue the Hidden, I already have 600 pages of other storylines mostly written out.
I have been working with Michael Kuhl on other projects, and we have made a good deal of progress. He has revamped mkuhl.com and comicgrail.com. Together, he and I are working on the database project, and three film scripts, with several other projects in the background.
I have three good solid stories finished. One has been accepted to a podcast, but I’d like to have some other things going so that I can use the following of this podcast to plug projects, and increase my exposure. I’ll be sending the next off to a print magazine this weekend. It is a longer story, and so is not suited to podcast. It is probably twice the desired length of a podcast. All in all, I have probably written over 150,000 finished words since May, which in a book would probably be 300 or more pages.
I think I’m standing on a precipice right now, the work has paid off, and all of the elements that I’ve been working towards are in place with the right timing. I have finished my novel, have a good deal of it recorded and ready for a podcast. I have a lot of social network in place via Facebook, Twitter, and the blogs that will allow me to generate a good following. If I can manage to get up into the podosphere in the likes of some of the other writers doing this, I could in a few months have 5,000 plus listeners. There are three other podcasts planned right now, and their audiences are not at all the same, which should generate a large amount of following.
Much of this social media work is laying the ground work for a new funding model for the database project. Many of you know about the database. The time for it is now. Michael and I have the hosting set up. We can get it up and start it off with a little help. Kirin, I need you to get me in touch with Dirk. No more talking about it, we just need to do it. We also need a web designer who can handle the database integration. I was hoping to have money for this, and I might be able to raise some, but somewhere in our network we may have people interested in being involved in this project. There really is no reason why we can’t have this up even though we have little funding and no promotion. I would rather bring in some ground floor people and get it going on hope than languish waiting for funding when we don’t even have the money to file the paperwork to become legal. I’m sure that we can look into the business structure and file the paperwork ourselves at minimal cost. The promotion will come on promos on podcasts, and other social media ventures, my own contacts, and other ideas that I am prepared to move on. I want to use the social media to seek more funding as well, but it is much easier to promote something that is already up.
Michael and I are spending too much of our lives in crappy jobs while circumstances seem stacked against us making it out of this position. For those of you who know Kirin and my situation, Michael and his wife have been in that same position for some time, and it only just resolved for them. We both work the same job. The work we do is physically demanding, mentally draining, and carries no stimulation for us. Our naysayers wonder what we’re still doing there, but only the people who live with us know how much these jobs and the other elements of our recent history take out of us. They consume us, burn us out, and eat all of our productive time that could be spent pursuing goals or other jobs.
This job is not without its merit for us. It keeps us in a good position to pursue the database, it provides the right network to implement it, but we need to be able to exploit it, and in order to exploit it, we need the site functioning in at least it’s most basic design. With an email, we could have an ad go to 10,000 people in the company. That, along with all of the podcast network would be a nice beginning to advertising our project and getting it widely used.
The situation with Kirin has just significantly changed. We know Kirin needs one more surgery to get her hip back into health. The insurance company just used its trump card, and sent us to a schill who said she was fine, and didn’t need the surgery after a five minute examination. This ended the rehab phase of the case, and we are now into the endgame of it all. This has its benefits, in that Kirin can now seek work and it will not affect the case. We’re going to have to find a way to get that surgery. We are considering options for the future in terms of this case, but our lawyer tells us we should see money in February. I’m not holding my breath. I’m still looking to my projects and my future.
To this end, Kirin is looking at jobs, though the market is hardly friendly right now, and she is still disabled, but is also taking another look at her steel business. You can all email her to find out more about that.
Something came up this week in terms of a new job that is very interesting, and I am pursuing it. I’ll keep all of you posted, but can’t say what it is yet.
In terms of fundraising for the database, I am now looking to make a share price $10, and so investing is in anybody’s range. The business plan is mostly ready for public consumption. I figure if I can get 100 people to invest $100, that’s ten grand. That’s probably available in our network right now, but with 5,000-10,000 followers of the book and podcasts, I might be able to get 1,000 of them to invest. That’s money enough. This is what I’ve been working towards all this time. I feel like all the pieces are in the right place for checkmate in three moves, so to speak.
In terms of writing, I really need comments from first readers, I need people to look into their networks and find the other authors, agents, publishers, and people with fandom connections to communicate with. When Instructionslistsandnotes.com is up, I’ll need promotion and material to kick it off. I have about 10,000 words to write and maybe a little drafting before I can set this book in stone and move on to the big one. 10,000 words, with the right prep can be a weekend, so it isn’t far off. Then I get to the big book. I have writing projects scheduled through the end of the year, then doubled up for the back half of winter, and spring. I can’t really describe all of these right now, but some are books, and some are network building exercises. They are fun and exciting. I promise I will give details when strategically I am able. Michael and I have a few film scripts in the works, and I’ve got a very good idea on how to market these scripts. Some of the connections come through my uncle, some through social media.
Chuck and Bryan, I am very anxious to get playing again. I needed this time to turn things around, but I’m not giving up on music. I have the mic pre we need to record drums properly, I have some projects clear from my head, it is a lot less crowded now.
For my friends and family, you know this has been a hard time for us. I’ve been making myself scarce so that I could pursue these goals, and I think the effort has been successful. I also can’t tell you how much I’ve been hurting. I’ve pushed well beyond my limits for the past few years while simply grinning and bearing it, but that time is over. My family doesn’t understand where we are, and has a hard time listening to our explanation of the situation, because they aren’t in the meetings with Kirin’s lawyers, they don’t know what is going on with my projects, and don’t look at anything we do objectively anymore. There’s a lot of stress on those relationships, and at times they have been downright abusive. It hasn’t helped me, hasn’t helped my overall mood at all. It has fed my drive, and helped me get to this point, but has been an overall detriment to health and happiness. It’s time to make forward progress in life and everything else. I’m pretty dug in, I’ve reached my last fall back point, I make my stand here, and I’m sure there’s a lot of other clichés I can throw out along this line. The way things have gone for the last few years have been harder on me than I let on, and I’m tired of feeling this way.
I’m asking for a little support, and a little effort to bring all of this together. This can take the form of telling friends about the blogs, giving reviews on itunes and other forums when they are up, and promoting other projects so that I can develop a following, or provide the other bits of support I’m looking for in terms of the database. It could be financial investment in getting it going, or helping find the missing skills we need to make it feasible. Or it could be just a few kind words. Those have been in short supply of late.
Recent Comments