Stages, and Libivox.org

I seem to go thru stages where I am writing and writing, but I am not reading much. Then I flip and I almost stop writing and I read everything I can get my hands on. Then things balance out and I read and write about the same.

Currently I am in the read everything stage. It dawned on me today that is what has been going on the last several weeks.

Currently I am reading “Antarktos Rising” by Jeremy Robinson. It is pretty interesting with a unique premise.

Just finished “Killer Gorgeous” by Jane Holleman. A quick read putting me in mind of the old detective noir with an updated timeframe. Through the whole book never managed to pin down the supposed location of the book. I think Houston Texas may have very briefly been mentioned, but that was all.

I have been listening to several of Robert E. Howard’s Connan series. Hour of the Dragon, A Witch Shall Be Born, and others are available thru both Librivox and the new Nook Audiobooks app. Listening to the Connan stories I am still in awe of Howard’s writing. His books read like movies with the perfect balance of action, details, and allowing the reader to be fully enveloped in the story.

Cheers, james

P.s. Check out http://www.libivox.org and Robert E. Howard’s Connan series. The nook audiobook app is wicked cool too.

Where do you go?

Where do you go?
When I need you so?
Feelings of alone,
Easily banished if you were by my side.
In a moment of doubt, drowning in despair.
I see your smile, and know you never went anywhere.
Only petty fears caused my tears.

Pen Tech (cool new toys)

I recently heard about a new weapon in the “writer’s arsenal”, called a smart pen or digipen. This hi-tech gadget is a pen, audio and video recorder. You write and record what is going as you write and then you can transfer the stuff you wrote on the paper to your computer, along with the audio recording. Some of the pens that do the recording use the pen or use another device like a tablet or smartphone. Only draw back is the all in one pens are expensive and have special ink cartridges and paper. Some slightly less expensive pens have a reciever that handles the recording, but no special ink or paper. Livescribe and Wacom seem to be the manufacturers I kept stumbling over. Another is a complete system named Iris. There was another decently priced one but I couldn’t find an active seller for it. It is called a Logipen? for about $50 dollars. The others are $100 bucks and up.

Maybe I am just a wee bit kooky, but this sounds so cool. I am still learning about these things, but how cool useful would this have been in class? Since I am a vocal creative person, the audio recording would be awesome. Allowing me to catch those fragments of thought that didn’t merrit writing, but still be available later instead of forever lost to best guessed memory. The real pay off is my prefrace for hand writing then typing and editing. It would allow me the ability to write faster without the aggravation of typing, since I would download the pages and go from there.

I mentioned it to my boss and she thought it was a interesting idea, because of the notes and stuff I write. I think my post has turned from a  “lookee what I found” to a self targeted sales pitch. Hmmm, not sure that is good. These pens are still evolving, but I don’t think they will replace my much loved dollar store pens. Anyway just a little food for thought in pen-evolution.