Dec 11
If you’ve been dying to read my short story collection, Unsanctioned Experiments, but you just aren’t into the ebook thing, then it’s your lucky day.
It took me a year, but my book is finally available in paperback here! Who knew formatting a print book for the first time would be time-consuming? Thanks to everyone who helped. I couldn’t have done it alone.
So buy a bunch of ’em, and let me know what you think of it.
And Happy Holidays!
Dec 23
After literally years of scrawling away in stolen moments, and lots of effort spent learning how to format an ebook and get it ready for prime time, it is finally live.
My ebook of 6 short stories is available on Amazon here. Run out and get yourself a copy (or several)! And please leave me an honest review.
“In this collection of five short stories and a novella, Ben Credle explores misused science and dark motivations. Space garbagemen are forced to confront a deranged passenger in orbit, a middle-aged paper-pusher is thrust into the role of time-traveling assassin, and townspeople in 1890s Texas are stalked by an ancient predator with an appetite for blood. Across space and time, Unsanctioned Experiments introduces relatable characters who struggle against unexpected challenges.”
Right now it’s only available as an ebook, but in the next few weeks I should have the paperback version done, too.
Thanks so much to all my family, friends, editors and designers that have looked over endless early drafts of this stuff as it has slowly come to life: Kim, David, Matt, Will, Gwen, Kalen, Duffy, Cathy, Eddy, Cliff, Adrian, Lee, Joseph, Domi, and others I can’t even remember right now. I couldn’t have done it without yall!
Nov 23
So I took a break from this blog for a while (a while? three years?!?) to work more on fiction writing.
I actually spent that time writing short stories. Then I started getting some of them professionally edited. And my editor suggested I submit to the Writers of the Future Contest. It’s run by the estate of L. Ron Hubbard (yes, the Scientology guy, who started out as a science fiction writer, and no, Scientology has nothing to do with the contest). It’s apparently a pretty prestigious sci-fi contest, where, in addition to a cash prize, you get to go to LA for an award banquet, and do a workshop with a big-name author. And best of all, they accept longer submissions than most places, and my stories tend toward the longer side.
My first story didn’t win anything, but the next quarter I sent in an older story called Test Subjects, about a guy in Australia who runs a black market pharmaceutical testing lab, and gets injected with an experimental chemical weapon. That on got an Honorable Mention early this year, which comes with the fanciest certificate I have ever received.
So I will definitely be submitting more stories to the Writers of the Future Contest (you can submit every quarter). And in the meantime, I’ve collected several of the my best stories together, and am learning how to format them to into a book and self-publish it as an ebook. I’m just waiting for a cover now, and will hopefully have it up on Amazon by the end of 2019. So stay tuned for more details!
Feb 25
If you’re an aspiring writer like me, you’ve probably heard of Scrivener. If not, it’s the software tool used by lots of successful indie authors to both write their books, and to format them for e-publishing. If you listen to the Self Publishing Podcast, The Creative Penn Podcast, or the Rocking Self Publishing Podcast, all those guys (and girls) swear by Scrivener.
Credit: Ben Sutherland on flickr
The software is cheap to begin with ($45), but once a year they put it on sale for 50% off. If you’re interested,
head over to AppSumo and search for Scrivener, or follow this link (for the Mac version). The PC version is on sale too. The deal it good through next Wednesday, 3/2/16.
Scrivener is something I knew I’d need eventually, so I bought it yesterday, but haven’t installed it yet. I’ll be sure to follow- up here and let you know if it lives up to all the hype.
If you’re not ready to shell out $25 just yet, they apparently have a pretty cool free-trial program. It gives you full functionality for 30 days, and it only counts the days you actually use it.
If you check it out, let me know how it works out for you.
Jan 18
Like a lot of people, I joined in an office pool for the $1.5 billion Powerball jackpot last week.
Spoiler alert: we won $4.
And like a lot of people, during the days leading up to the drawing, I spent a few idle moments going on a mental spending spree with all my potential winnings. When I was younger, and being car guys, we’d talk about things like, “what are the first 10 cars you’d buy if you won the lottery?”, and what crazy places we’d live and houses we’d buy. Now that I’m older, and theoretically wiser, the fantasy runs down a slightly different path.
No matter how much money I won, I’m just not really going to be partying with supermodels in Monaco. I’ve got an awesome wife and two (often) wonderful kids. And realistically, the kids need to go to school, no matter what’s in my bank account. So if we’re keeping it real, Rich Me is still going to spend a lot of his time kicking it in one spot in the USA.
So, in the cold hard light of post-Powerball reality, I thought back about my fantasies. I noticed I hadn’t spent much time thinking about buying some palatial home. I like the house we’ve got; but it might get some renovations. Would I quit my job? Hell yes. I don’t hate my job, but I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t need the money. Would I drive a fancier car? Most likely. But I just don’t see some Jay Leno-esque 50 car garage of exotic cars. That seems like more trouble than it’s worth. Would we go on awesome vacations when the kids were out of school? Heck yes we would, all over the world. But overall, what struck me most was how close this fantasy life was to my real life. It really made me happy to see how attainable this ideal life was.
We can realistically renovate our house already. Maybe the 4-car garage with secret doors and hidden passages is off the table. But a new kitchen and maybe a hot tub are not ridiculous.
Fancy cars? Well, I like the cars we have. If I had a Ferrari, what would be different? The thing that keeps me from driving any faster than I do is the traffic in front of me, and fear of speeding tickets. I’d be driving just about the same with 500 horsepower. And I don’t know what kind of guy can drive a Lamborghini to the store without looking like douchebag, but I don’t think it’s me. No big loss.
Travel? With a little planning and saving, seeing the world is not out of reach for most people. Yeah, we won’t be taking private jets everywhere. But Rick Steves is right: the less you spend on vacation, the more of the actual local culture you experience.
So the one big difference between Rich Me and Real Me is the day job. If you win $40 million, you don’t have to show up at work the next day. But even without a lottery win, it’s possible to reach financial independence, well before age 65. Mr. Money Mustache did it, and I know other people who’ve done it. Live below your means, invest well, work on your side-hustle. Man, I’m pretty amped up to make my life better!
So I didn’t win the lottery, but the money I spent helped motivate me down productive paths. Cool.
Dec 14
On Sunday we had a family outing to the Zoo in Atlanta. This was our kids’ first visit, and they and their grandparents had a great time. The weather was great, and we were very lucky that lots of the animals were active and visible in their exhibits. The gorillas were moving and clowning around, and the elephants and giraffes decided to stroll over toward us. The recently arrived and allegedly very shy clouded leopard decided to see if he could tightrope-walk around the near-edge of his enclosure, right past us as we were watching. It was a great day.
But the more remarkable aspect, from the benconceivable financial perspective, is that we went for free. Luckily my wife remembered the Zoo Atlanta Library Pass program. So Saturday afternoon we stopped by our local library, I watched a 25 minute-long video about the history of the zoo (which was actually pretty interesting), while the kids looked at books. And in exchange, we got 4 free passes to the Zoo. I think that ended up saving us $82!
So if you’re anywhere near a Georgia library, the Zoo Atlanta Library Pass program is totally worth your time. And you can do it once a year. Enjoy!
Nov 02
Meal Worm Stirfry
Back in September, we took the family to the Insectival at the Athens Botanical Gardens. If your kids like bugs (and ours do), it’s a fun event. There were lots of cool educational displays, crafts and a big butterfly release. This was all fairly standard fun kid stuff.
The thing I didn’t expect to see was a big cooking demonstration from Big Cricket Farms. This is a company that grows insects for use in food, and they were serving up several different example dishes. I’ve heard a few of the arguments that protein from insects is hugely more sustainable than say, eating cows (and you can read more about that on the Big Cricket website). And I know eating insects is fairly common in some other countries. In fact, when I heard Tim Ferriss talking about protein bars made with insects a few months earlier, I tried to get some free samples, but they quickly ran out. So I was a pretty willing and informed customer to try out the Big Cricket offerings.
The rest of my family was not so enthusiastic. My wife and son were not at all interested in trying it out. But I did talk my 3-year-old daughter into giving it a shot. It looked like food, and it smelled like food, but how did it go down?
First, I tried the Grasshopper Guacamole. If no one had told me there were grasshoppers in there, I probably wouldn’t have known. They were just about undetectable, and the overall taste was good. So far, so good.
Next up was the fudge. It looked like fudge, but with some little dark inclusions (mealworms? not sure). I liked it fine. The bugs didn’t taste bad, and had a crunchy texture like you might find from crystallized sugar in regular fudge. And since it was fudge, my daughter was ready to give it a go. Unlike me, she was not at all happy about the crunchy parts. She somehow managed to eat the fudge part, but spit out the bug part.
Last up was the meal worm stir fry. After the fudge, my daughter was not interested in trying this. And judging from the people around us, she was far from alone. As you can see in the picture, the bugs are very visible in this one, and that visual alone was too much for a lot of people. But it was sort of a mind over matter thing. I convinced myself it was going to be ok, and it was. Crunchy, flavorful, not bad at all.
Here it is, a little over a month later, and my daughter and I survived with no ill effects. I’m not exactly seeking out restaurants that serve bugs. But the next time somebody’s trying to pitch insects as alternative protein, I’ll definitely give it another shot.
Oct 12
DIY slime made from glue and starch
A while ago, I was watching the kids on a rainy Saturday. There were so many fun things we wanted to do outside, but there we were, stuck indoors. Fortunately, the kids had found videos on how to make slime a few weeks before. This seemed like the perfect time to try some out.
The most common recipes I saw online involved glue and Borax. Now, I’ve researched a little more since then, and Borax is probably safe. But at the time, knowing only that we used Borax for cleaning laundry, I wasn’t crazy about using it in something that might end up (accidentally or on purpose) in my kid’s mouth.
Apparently I was not a alone, because there are plenty of online slime recipes that specify ‘without Borax.’ So we decided on this one: glue and liquid laundry starch, and (optionally) food coloring.
For the glue, we used Elmer’s Glue-All, the normal school glue you’re used to. It’s non-toxic and cleans up easily with water. The white kind works fine, but since we were at the store anyway, I picked up some of the new clear kind, thinking it might result in some cool translucent-looking slime.
We also picked up liquid laundry starch. Most of the spray starch at the grocery store was aerosol, but we did find one brand in a pump-spray bottle. I don’t know if aerosol would have worked or not, but the pump-spray bottle gives you the option to unscrew the top and pour out as much as you need.
Before we started, I cut open a few plastic grocery bags to use as a waterproof disposable play-surface. This was probably overkill, as the slime didn’t turn out to be that big of a mess, and it cleaned up pretty easily. Then we mixed some glue and starch in a roughly 1-to-1 ratio (about half a bottle of glue) in a stainless mixing bowl. We added a dash of water (I’m not sure what the water did, and if it was necessary, but it was in the video we watched) and 2 drops of blue food coloring. With a lot more food coloring, you can probably get to an opaque Nickelodeon-style slime. Since our goal was a more Ghostbusters-like translucent spooky slime, the less food coloring, the better. You might be able to mix it up with a spoon, but the point of slime is to feel the sliminess, so get your hands in there and mix with your fingers. In a minute or two, it will begin feeling solid, but still stretchy and malleable.
Ours turned out great on the first try: goopy, gross looking, but not too sticky. It’s easy to try adding a little more glue or a little more starch to see how that changes the feel. We made it into shapes, stretched it, and tried to bounce it. It was good fun for a while, but after 20 minutes we realized there isn’t a whole lot more to do with slime. The good news is it stores great in a ziplock bag. So if the kids want to mess with it later (which they did), we’ve got it already mixed up. If the slime is a little too sticky, a quick spritz of spray starch will fix it.
Overall, it was lots of fun to make, but not really a long-lasting activity. If there was something else fun we should have done with it, let me know in the comments.
Jul 08
I had heard of speed reading, just like you have. I’ve seen people making crazy claims about how fast they could get through a book, and I always thought of it as a bit of a parlor trick, like hypnosis. Yes, I believe it exists, but so what? I guess, more exactly, I was suspicious of it, in a too-good-to-be-true sort of way. The people I saw bragging about speed reading seemed a little scammy, and were often trying to push some paid course. My underlying assumption was that I was already reading as fast as I could comprehend the words, and that if I was inputting them any faster, I would not be comprehending them.
Ajax von Kaiserpenguin vis flickr
But recently, I was listening to a Tim Ferriss podcast, and he mentioned that the way he was able to read as many books as he does is by speed reading, and that it was easily and quickly learnable. And better yet, he wasn’t trying to sell anything. He has a bunch of tips, for free, on his website. Then I glanced at huge pile of reading on my desk that I was just never finding time to get through. So, with nothing to lose, I headed over to this post on his Four Hour Workweek site, and got started.
Tim’s basic point is that the bottleneck of reading is not your brain comprehending the words, but the eye movements you use to get the words to your brain. Specifically, if you learn to move your eyes more quickly across each line, your brain will keep up. And, if you scan only the ‘inner’ words of each line, your peripheral vision will still pick up the words on the ends of the lines.
I followed his instructions very closely. I started by figuring out my baseline reading speed, and then did his 20 minutes of exercises, and measured my speed after that. I did add 2 new wrinkles of my own, just out of curiosity. I tried with both a non-fiction book I am reading for work (The Toyota Way), and a fiction book I was reading for pleasure, to see if there was a difference. I also checked my speed again a week later to see if the results ‘stuck.’ Here’s what I found:
BASELINE SPEED:
Non-Fiction: 216 wpm
Fiction: 192 wpm
AFTER TRAINING:
Non-fiction: 300 wpm (a 39% increase)
Fiction: 288 wpm (a 50% increase)
ONE WEEK LATER:
Non-Fiction: 373 wpm (72% increase over baseline)
Fiction: 262 wpm (36% increase over baseline)
It seriously took less than 30 minutes to learn. And, I didn’t have a good way to objectively test this, but I didn’t seem to lose any comprehension. When I went back to count the words I had read, I didn’t see anything I had missed understanding during my speed reading. It is worth noting that Tim’s claims in his article, and his video, that you’ll read 300% faster. I didn’t see anything like that level of results. But I saw a solid, noticeable increase. Maybe if I did the exercises a few more times, I’d see a bigger increase. At this point I don’t know.
So yes, speed reading is for real. In round numbers, I can read 50% faster than before, if I choose to. The downside is, doing it feels like work to me. So, for things that I am reading for pleasure, I don’t consciously do it, because that misses the point of leisure reading. I stop and smell the roses, going only slightly faster than my old, slow pace. I go back and re-read phrases to see how the author played with the words. I dilly-dally. But, for things I need to plow through, like work-related books and trade journals, I now use Tim’s techniques, and it saves me some time. If you’re interested, give it a try yourself and let me know if you get the same (or better) results.
Jun 02
A few weeks ago, I was listening to the Rocking Self Publishing Podcast Episode #15 interview with self-published
Credit: Ben Sutherland on flickr
author Kevin Leigh. Leigh talked about trying to find time to write while constrained with both a day job and a long commute, which certainly hit home for me. One trick he mentioned was a way to get his phone to read what he had written aloud, so he could spend his commute time checking his writing for errors. This seemed like a pretty cool trick, but the app he used (Voice Dream) cost $9.99. So obviously, not being made of money, I googled around to find a more cost effective solution. What I found is a free trick to get Siri to read text documents. There is an awesome detailed write up on reddit here, but I’ll give you the short version:
1. Go into Settings:General:Accessibility. At the bottom, set Accessability Shortcut to VoiceOver. Now when you triple-click the home button, Siri will go into read-aloud mode.
2. Next, open the ebook (or any other text document) you want to hear. Triple-click the home button, and Siri will say “VoiceOver on.” Now, with 2 fingers, swipe downward on the page and Siri will begin reading, and will continue on to following pages until you triple tap the home button again. A single tap on the screen will pause the reading.
That’s about it. This works for ebooks, and any other long text document you want to hear. There are some more detailed instructions in the linked article to fine tune the process if you find you like it. For example, you might want to slow Siri’s voice down. Or you might want to lock the screen in portrait mode, because the reading will stop if the screen switches orientations.
But you may not like it at all, which is the reason for the “mediocre” in the tagline above. I love me some Siri for directions and dictating texts. But you’ll quickly realize how wide the gulf is between automated text recognition and an actual professional audiobook narrator. The downsides, which can be annoying:
1. Siri is not an actor. Obviously, all the characters are going to sound the same, and be devoid of emotion.
2. Siri does not acknowledge pauses, or chapter breaks, or endings. She just plows right through without even taking a breath.
3. Siri doesn’t do heteronyms. This was the most surprising to me. I just never gave much thought to how many words in English are spelled alike, but are pronounced differently, based on context. ‘Live’ (as in ‘Live from New York’ vs. ‘live free or die’), and ‘wind’ (‘the wind in your sails’ vs. ‘how did we wind up here?) are two that Siri is pretty much guaranteed to get wrong every time.
Overall, VoiceOver is a pretty cool trick, with some notable drawbacks. For me, if it is something I already have as an ebook (free or cheap), or something I’ve written, I’m willing to put up with Siri’s little idiosyncrasies. If it is a long book that I’m really looking forward to, I think I’ll spring for the (sometimes pricey) audiobook. Narrators need to get paid too!
Give it a try and let me know if you agree.