I'm a little late posting my season's greetings. I'm hoping that whatever winter holiday you celebrate, it is a joyous occasion, and that if you don't celebrate a winter holiday, you have a joyful winter season anyway. I certainly am. Sitting out beside my fire in Quartzsite, AZ and enjoying a PDR 1878 Capa Oscura cigar to cap off the day.
And here is some other good news. I've received all 47 chapters of Double Take Book 1 back from my fine editors, Pixel the Cat and Old Rotorhead. Without them, my works would not be as clean as they are and I thank them loudly. Having all the chapters in hand and having finished formatting them this morning, I've scheduled the first two chapters to post here on SOL on January 11. From then on, the chapters will post every three days, concluding Memorial Day weekend. If all continues to go well, by the time this one finishes, I'll have Book 2 ready to post without an interruption. Here's the blurb:
Life was good. It just wasn't long enough. Eighty-year-old Jacob Hopkins is dying and wishes to return to his fourteen-year-old body. He has no burning desire to change the world. He just isn't ready to die. And someone has decided that's okay. But Jacob is in for a major surprise. His new life is within a new reality. Things just aren't exactly the way he remembered.
There will be a new story from Wayzgoose in the New Year, as well, but I'll let my alter ego tell about that in his New Year's Day post.
My daughter visited for six days over Solstice and we spent our holiday exploring Cabeza Prieta Wilderness. If you look that up on a map, you'll see that you can't get there from here. After watching the 15-minute required video about all the ways you can die in the Wilderness, we were granted back-country passes to cross the Barry M. Goldwater Military Range to get to the Wildlife Preserve and spent the day 4-wheeling in my very scratched up truck.
If you'd like to read more of the story and see some pictures of the adventure, you can find them on my First Exit blog at http://firstexit0.blogspot.com/2018/12/into-wilderness.html. Not satisfied with trying to kill me in my truck, my daughter led me on a hike two days later to a mountain canyon where the only native California Palms in Arizona grow. And after the hike, we had to take pictures from about half or three-quarters of a mile away.
All told, we had a great time and she did not succeed in receiving her meagre inheritance.
In a few days, my friend Mark will be joining me here in Quartzsite and January 23 will find us in Las Vegas for the AVN Adult Entertainment Expo. I'll open a private section on my website to post pictures from the Expo for your prurient entertainment. Mark and his girlfriend will be two of the six friends that accompany me as my entourage to the show. Maybe this will be the year I find a distributor for my books in the adult industry. Or maybe I'll land a deal to write a movie script. I'm sure I can come up with some dialog that is better than "Uh. Uhh! Harder! Faster!"
Aside from that, I'll be showing (and hopefully selling) my books during January at the Readers' Oasis Bookstore in Quartzsite, famous for its "naked owner". Yes, this guy runs around the store and outdoor area wearing nothing but a cock sock. Seems like the right market for my books!
So, that's the news from my winter haven in Southern Arizona. Happy Jollydaze!