State of the Author: A Bit Frazzled

I may have mentioned this a few times, but I have a bad habit of giving myself too much to do. This has been one of those episodes. The daily tale has been taking more time, mostly because I've felt like I had to write bigger and longer stories.

Why? Because I've had to take breaks to chill down my dumb painful ankle. Which takes twenty minutes.

I have attempted to enhance my focus capacity, but... writing more takes longer and then I take more breaks for the ankle and -yeah. Vicious cycle. The dubious plus side is that my readers get longer stories to entertain themselves with.

Alongside the ankle treatments and the daily tale, I've been making story videos where I read my most popular tales with B-roll to look at for those who want something to stare at while I'm doing my voice work.

I don't know if it's doing anything for my audience count. I've noticed that I get more followers on Bluesky after I post a video, and I'm choosing to take that win. However, making videos eats more of my time and energy.

Which has been running low.

Again, the core cause is the dingdang ankle. I don't go to parkrun so I don't get social/face/touch time with Beloved or Adorable. Which means that I'm more prone to depression than what passes for normal.

Couple that with a charming new addition to the Rona family nicknamed "Razor Throat" and I'm battling that and anxiety. Being in the high-risk group is even less fun when your loved ones won't listen to you about getting any possible jabs. So much fun (/sarcasm).

Weirdly, I am sleeping well, this week. Which means less time windows to write A Devil's Tale, which means that the latest chapter is being... difficult. My "audience facing" work takes precedent and, when that's out of the way, I don't have a lot of energy left. If I was still waking up at one in the morning, I'd have written a lot more.

It's a sad thing to wish that I still had insomnia. I have to keep reminding myself to be kind to me as I go on. I'm working on getting my stuff out there to a wider audience. If I can make my compulsion pay the bills, it'll all be worth it. I have another agent to chase, and I even have all the things ready to send their way. When they open up.

I think... if I can't sell them there, I'll surrender and get ready to publish on Draft2Digital. It's been far too long in limbo. I need to get things moving and I'm sick of being in the doldrums. I'm sick of little to no feedback.

Good News/Bad News: I did find some advertising advice but I'm certain it's gone stale. Plus the first point in the listicle is basically, "work to your budget". My budget is zero dollars, my good bean. How's a socially incompetent weirdo meant to work with that? And there's recommendations to use "social media" sites that have since become... unwelcoming... to queer voices like mine.

Sigh.

I'll keep on trying things. Maybe something will eventually work.

It's just that 'eventually' feels like an eternity away right now.

I'm making more effort so that I can have more time of ease later. A little is better than nothing. A lot would be better than that, but... I don't have that. Gotta take what I can get.

When it comes to that much effort? I'd rather be playing Minecraft.

Maybe tomorrow.