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Showing posts with the label blogging

Writing about Writing, Vol 9

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     Today’s theme: Don’t Overthink it. As simple a concept as this may seem to be, it is DIFFICULT in a creative process that is constant to actually do.  The work done toward constant improvement is more in constant practice and willing acceptance of what comes back.  But that is a concept we have already dabbled in, so no need to repeat ourselves.      This is more about trusting yourself and your instincts.  You sat down to write, let that bitch fly!  What I mean by this is that your first gut feeling is usually the best.  Back over the summer, while I was in and out of vacation and away from both my home AND work computers, I was in a pinch to get things up and I kind of felt my work suffered some for it.  I would never let anyone know this shit as it is happening, but as I sit and type this, I see EXACTLY why that was. I was too obsessed with things like word count and a multitude of other shit that really didn’t matter that I neglected my time-honored approach of “

Writing About Writing Vol 8

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     “Stick and Move.” Every day I have been near a desktop computer for about the last 16 months, I make a point of opening my blog dashboard and looking around.  I make sure of the traffic numbers, I look at comments that might have found themselves in the Moderation Queue, I look back over previous posts and make small changes I may have missed on the way through the first time. Most importantly, I open my drafts queue.  In it there is usually one to three posts I am actively working on, one I am purposely never posting and FIVE I can best describe as a “false start.”      My archive goes like this: 2009 – 204 posts.  I was new and excited. 2010 – 178 posts.  I was still into what I was doing but busy in the real world. 2011 – 110 posts.  Ava showed up in July and my time was strained. 2012 – 35 posts I was slowly being dragged somewhere I wound up not liking. 2013 – 8 posts…  see above, I was actually there now. 2014 – Took a whole YEAR off and apparently started

Pause and Eject--... No, Reset!

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     Aside from what is already in the queue scheduled, I am done with my postings for the year.      It has been a great year full of laughs, wonderful food, fun stories, funny raps from the so-called president and various other things.  The exercise of writing has been cathartic to me.  2018 will promise to bring more of the same.      This isn’t to say I won’t be WRITING during this last two weeks, just that I won’t be posting what I write until January. I’m tired, but I am tired from being tired, I am far from tired of writing.      My queue consists of Thursday and Sunday postings.  Tuesday and Wednesdays require last-days writing and a different process than I am willing to take time away from my family to leg out these holidays for right now.      See y’all January 1 st !

Writing About Writing Vol 3

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     Now that I have my muse, motivation and most importantly the support I need to do this, I am BEATING on my craft. At home, I have someone I can bounce my ideas off of and instead of being met with indifference to even wanting to do it, I get feedback. Sometimes it is “ehh...  I don’t know if I like that,” or "you're moving to quick to close the story out" or even just “you’re moving too fast, chill and perhaps let me read before you publish” when I make rookie mistakes that I normally don't but even those are better than turning and walking away.  What is most important is that I am being engaged in what I love to do. It also motivates me to CONSTANTLY perfect my creative process.  I have often spoken about seeding scribes with ideas that I will use later.  Another thing I do is conceptualize and repeat things to myself until I can get back to a computer to type them out. Support for my craft: the love of my life knows I have short term memory issu

Welcome to CallmePhlip.com... Some houskeeping

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     It was brought to my attention Wednesday and again yesterday that a couple of things that I thought were pretty obvious were not so much so… With that, I will spend a few words this morning explaining them. 1 – I believe in continuity and make a point of supporting it with tags and links back to prior posts or to whatever outside element will clarify a statement.   Links will look like this  and will be set to open in a new tab/window so you don't lose your spot in a post. Tags can be found under every post: [Note: tags will be both topical and comical, so don’t be alarmed] 2 – Only those who KNOW know what and what not to accept as bare-assed truth, with the exception of food posts.  Remember that I have a jacked up sense of humor and sometimes laugh at real shit and we’re all good.  When you want to come at my neck for supporting R. Kelly   (<-- almost="" got="" i="" killed="" me="" one="

Special Coverage... True Story©: The Process

True Story©, The process…                 I have been asked – well, once – just where in the hell I come up with my story-a-week presentation. It is REALLY quite funny, actually. Well first thing's first, it was never actually supposed to become a "thing," so much as me being silly in a FB post back in September, which grew to "Phlip, you should do this every week!" which grew to "Phlip you need a blog," which became "wait, I have a blog!"  and voila, I was out of retirement. Now that we have established how this became a thing, back to business... I generally go about my every day just looking at the world as only I can see it and wait for SOMETHING that happens that I can wrap a story around.  Then it becomes a multi-part process. 1 – Wait for something interesting, funny, bombastic or otherwise outstanding to happen.  It doesn’t even have to happen to ME, it just has to happen for me to see or hear.  This is where being

Where has he been?

            Wow, looks like a ghost town around these parts, huh? I saw the tumbleweed and heard the eerie music too, not to mention it seems that Blogger has changed things quite a bit in the dashboard as well. I haven’t left the two of you and my intentions have not been to let you down. but… I’ve been BUSY!!! One full-time job (the one that pays my mortgage) One semi-part time job (beer doesn’t pay for itself) Got married back in June A 1 year-old (a SECOND full-time in itself) Working on TWO books at the same damned time (tired of sitting on my dream) Sometimes posting on two other higher-profile sites; rippdemup.com and thetonygrands.com We won’t even MENTION Tumblr (well, not again after that) Yeah, suffice it to say that my hands have been VERY full of late, to the tune of an average of less than a post per month this year. Unfortunately, other than what I have mentioned above, nothing of particular interest has happened to me this year.  Beyond

(**) Phlip -- 30 for 30

Double star bonus coverage this time, legendary people weren't supposed to die in the middle of my month, dammit. Sometime in the middle of March, I decided that in April I would set about the task of posting EVERY day for a solid month, just to see if I could pull it off. I'd have my go-to moves, what with talking sports and music, cooking a time or two if it comes to that and there is always crossing my fingers and hoping some shit pops off in the news. I used the birthday of a favorite musician of mine as well as my disdain for a purely American (and wholly fucking BORING) sport, as I have time and again. Anyway... Taking a cue, or just lifting the name from what has become one of my favorite documentary series of the past several years -- like since Ken Burns' Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson -- I went on a tear of 30 for 30; to get at least one post up every day for the 30 days of April. Simply put, I made great use of my drafts a

1 year later...

02/11/2009, I largely abandoned my MySpace blog in favor of this one. I can access Google from work, while I can't access MySpace, and that is enough reason right there... I know I am a few days over as it relates to the "annual" side of this, but one should probably look at the fact that I had REGISTERED this blog in December 08, but not bothered to touch it for a couple months after even that fact, so don't judge me. It's been a crazy year, I don't post as much as some people I read, I am not as well-known as some people I regularly shoot the shit with, but I have had a consistently enjoyable experience so far. I will not join the exodus to Wordpress that seems to be going down as of late, what with the clipping of the blogger-hosted blogs that feature music. No, I do not know what I will do to steal get music now, lord knows I don't want to pay for the shitty shit that has been coming out for the last couple years. I do thank the both of you for contin

Wayback -- putting it back in storage

As the two of you well know, I incorporated a post from May and wrote a series of drops this week reporting live from my personal favorite era in hip hop, 1990-1999... I was discussing with The Katie last night whether or not I would continue this into the decade in which we currently live for 4ish more months here and talked myself out of it with "am I really qualified to call it 'wayback' if I am still in the decade I am discussing?" and with that, the idea was put to bed... When I got home, I finished writing the 1994 post, which completed the decade for me, as follows posted in order of POST date, not chronological year, so don't be confrused that they're out of order: 1998 1996 1997 1999 Pause for explanation 1991 1993 1990 1995 1992 and 1994 And there you have it, 10 years summing up hip hop's GOLDEN age. The 70's were infancy, and I was not born until all but 6 months of the decade were passed. The 80's were the formative years, where the su

"Wayback" explained

Apparently, through a few comments and direct comments, my "Wayback" series of blogs have been a decent hit with both of my readers... I make no specific claims to remember all that I am naming off the top of my head, but I DO remember why they matter to me and speak to such in my commentary. We can thank Google, Amazon and Wikipedia for reminding me of the albums, and further we can thank my parents for their situation, which drove me to my love of music, specifically hip hop. At the end of it all, the hip hop I listened to and grew to like spoke to situations I was in, had been in, would come to be in (now that I look back) or had seen others through. It was something that was for me. We never had much coming up, but through cutting yards for extra cash starting at like age 11 or 12, and working on W9 (read: legal) jobs promptly from age 16, I have built a collection WELL in excess of 800 CD's, most of them hip hop... What is contained in my computer is even bigger, wha