A Most Excellent Acquisition

As I mentioned earlier, I am trying to get published in Shimmer Magazine’s, The Pirate Issue. I have what I think is a pretty good idea for a story and have been taking a few notes. In the meantime, I have been on wikipedia (I know it’s not totally accurate, but I need a crash course not an education) researching piracy. This led me to Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson. Embarrassingly, I have never read this classic, so I decided to check it out on Project Gutenberg. After reading a few pages at lunch, I was hooked.

In a perfect world, I would be able to download the book to my PDA or Sony Reader and read it without having to be sitting in front of my computer. Unfortunately, I have neither of these devices. So, I was going to have to buy a hard copy of the book. I immediately hopped on Amazon to see how much a copy of Treasure Island would set me back. The cheapest copy (not used) was something like $3.99. Since I didn’t want to wait for the book to ship in the mail, I went out to the local bookstore, hoping to find this edition.

Perusing the fiction books, I saw they had only one copy of Treasure Island, and it was $5.99. Again, this was pretty cheap for a book, but I have such trouble spending money on myself, especially this close to Christmas. Reluctantly, I decided to buy the book anyhow, figuring I would have paid the extra money for shipping anyhow. I handed the book to the cashier and she rang it up and said “$2.62”. “Sweet,” I thought to myself. The book was 50% off, but hadn’t been marked.

So, to summarize, I picked up one of the real classics, Treasure Island for less money than the average comic book costs these days. Now, I just have to plow through the boo, hoping to get some inspiration. Maybe some of the talent will rub off on me.

It Was Just a Dream, Though

Thanks to everyone who read this blog yesterday and left a comment.  We broke my personal record for most blog views in a single day! Since it was so successful, I plan on continuing “What If Monday” next week.

Before going to sleep last night I was able to do a little work on my current, and hopefully soon to be finished, Christmas short story/flash fiction. I’m trying to finish this story as soon as possible so I can work on my entry for Shimmer Magazine’s, The Pirate Issue . I was pretty happy with the results and rewarded myself by reading The Westing Game (to try to get to sleep as others have suggested). Well, after reading a few pages I was able to calm myself down from my burst of creativity and soon I was asleep. Not long after, I had the strangest dream.

Normally, I never remember my dreams. If I do remember them, I usually only remember the premise and the emotions of the dream, and not many details. So, as I relate this dream to you, don’t hold it against me that I don’t remember what I was wearing or anything like that. Also, stick with me here because this is writing related.

Anyhow, in my dream I had finished my entry for Shimmer Magazine and was pretty proud of it. So proud, in fact, that I actually believed I had a shot at publication. My hopes were soon dashed when I received a rejection letter from the magazine. The part that angered me the most was the reason the gave for the rejection: I use the word “though”too much! Amazingly, in my dream I actually convinced myself that I do in fact use the word “though” too much. Even as I type this, I’m thinking to myself that I must avoid saying “though”.

Anyhow, I hope to complete my current work-in-progress and move on to the Shimmer Magazine entry. I am currently looking for short stories about Pirates to get myself in the mood to write that type of story. I will make sure not to use the word “though”, though.