I did it! I really fucking did it! Yesterday, on day 200 of my morning journal, I finally published a book. It may not be a great book, and it may not be perfect, and it may be a lot of things, but the damn thing is finally published. It’s really fucking published. I banished the demons from the day before, that had me paralyzed with the thought of actually putting the book out there, and I really put the thing out there. I even setup a blog normanchristof.com for my author pen name … thanks dad, and I setup a mailing list with it using mailchimp.com. I think, setting up the blog and mailing list first, may have helped get me over the hump. But, the big fucking deal is, that now I have a book published … sure, at the moment nobody knows about it, but the damn thing is published, and that’s so fucking far beyond cool, I don’t even know where to start. I think, I’ll just start, by feeling really really good about it. There is, even an authors page setup for it as well. I explain the pen name in it, and put my own picture on it, so it’s pretty clear right from the start who I am, but it’s so god damn cool, that I’ve finally taken it this far. It’s so many little hurdles, that have now been cleared, and I feel like, I really have a platform to clear the way for me now to just do some writing. I know that it’s all just a butt load of little things, but I truly don’t care. The fact, that I’ve really got this thing setup is a huge weight off my shoulders. Just going through the admin stuff last week, where I had to call the IRS, and get an EIN number so that Amazon doesn’t tax me was a big relief. It’s so cool, that I am where I am now. I now, I should have done this ages ago, with a silly little book that doesn’t matter much, but what the hell … none of them really matter all that much. They’re all just exercises in mental masturbation anyways aren’t they? Isn’t that all they are? And, I do like the idea of having the blog, which could be another avenue for me to do some writing, kind of like the morning journal I do here. If I could write something in that everyday, that would be sort of cool. Maybe, after I do my journal writing. Sort of like a release from the writing ritual of the day. I know, I would be feeling pretty positive about things at that point everyday. It could, be like a reward, being able to blog after finishing my 5K words for the day. It could be the start of a new ritual. That would be interesting to start. I could write about the writing, or about what I learned, or what I struggled with, or just try and work things out about the story. Without of course, giving too much away about the story. But, if your going to do some writing, and you ARE going to do some serious writing in the near future, then why not leverage some of those feelings and experiences into a tool for communicating with the outside world, and readership. Let’s really do this writing thing. Think about the journal leveraging content, kind of like in the book “Your first 1000 copies” is talking about, where you leverage content from your creative experience to make contact with your readership. And, if you really like the writing, then put it out there. Put the words out there, and let others know about the creative process, and what it’s all about. Connect with your potential readers. I do have to think about this a bit more. Think, about how you write for your blog vs how you write for your morning journals. I do write for my morning journals still, and I think I still need that, but to have the blog you know could really be something different, and something way cooler, because your actually reaching out to more people when you do it. This could be something quite interesting. Just imagine a year from now, where you could be, if you kept writing for the morning journal, and your novels, and your blog … every day. Something … just something on all three platforms everyday. Something meaningful … where would you be then? Huh? Where would you be?

TIGERBLOOD: uh huh! DAILYMOOD: good and pissed all in the same day LOCATION: at the boat in Bayfield WORDSWRITTEN: none PUSHUPS: 2:15 plank TODO: go paddle boarding, write to the blog? TV: documentary on ancient Chinese invenetions BOOK: Your First 1000 Copies GAME: 2048 EXERCISE: none WEIGHT: 170 BREAKFAST: bacon & eggs & tomato LUNCH: big ass salad DINNER: pork tenderloin, brussel sprouts SNACKS: grapes ALCOHOL: none BEDTIME: 1:45 AWAKE: 7:30