The 43

There's always this goal: Find more time to write, perhaps by watching less TV. And for the summer, that works well. Then late September comes, the new seasons kick in ... and I find myself in front of the television more than I should. I really like to think I don't watch that much TV. Right now, the only things I have DVR'd are "The Big Bang Theory," "How I Met Your Mother," "The Mentalist," "Modern Family,"The Amazing Race" and "The League." I'm hanging on to "How I Met Your Mother" just to get through this last season, and "The League" is a short season and will end in November. Unfortunately, all six are going at once, and it's a lot of extra hours during a time when I don't really have it. Beyond that, I had taken the first season of "The Wire" out of the library a couple weeks ago. It's really good, and I went to reserve the second season, thinking it would take s...

I'm coaching both Michael and Ben's soccer teams again this year. I was going to back out of Michael's team but was convinced by some of the parents to stay on. And honestly, coaching both teams isn't so bad. Administratively, it has been easier than last year -- we got enough kids on both teams and the parents have been quite supportive, so I'm not scrambling with rosters and emails. And really, it's two consecutive hours one day a week for practice, and two Saturday games I would attend even if I wasn't coaching. Michael's team is 0-1-3 so far, but we are playing far better than last year, and we have a lot of room for improvement. And, thankfully, we have enough players. We could easily be 3-1-0, but we the first game we started slow, the second we pooped out in the last minute and allowed the tying goal, and the fourth we had two defensive meltdowns, one of which included one of defenders trying to kick the ball and whiffing, allowing the other tea...

I have not updated this blog in a month. But I've been writing a lot. September was my busiest month of freelancing yet. Besides ghostwriting a crazy amount of blog posts for other websites, I was editing as well. Add in the fact that my hours at work were increased, and the last 30 days were crazy busy. Unfortunately, this is an excuse for me not to write for myself. September is always a tiring month; this was even more so. My priority was the contract work. I'm approaching October as if it's still a priority, but with a twist: I update this blog and undertake any other non-work writing first, then do the freelance stuff. I won't blow off the contract work, so if I write here first, I'll in theory still get the other writing done. The queue on the website where I get assigned jobs is empty. It's not going to stay that way for long, but for now, I'm happy for the break. Time to get rolling again.