What happened?

Things kind of fell apart for almost a year.  I relapsed into old habits/addictions and found myself dedicated to so many projects that I didn't know which way was up, sleep became secondary, family and friends were gently placed on the back burner and I dove headfirst into quicksand. I walked away from social media, I stopped writing altogether and ignored all the signs.

After the first of the year, the GetOffended gang reconvened and the decision was made to shut it down. I didn't go down without a fight. Angie, my longtime consigliere, locked me in a closet and pulled the plug. It was depressing. We were all heartbroken. I was lost.

I thought I had seen the worst of it, receding into the confines of my head, but I was wrong. After meeting with the accountant and making the official call to waive the white flag, I dove back into the quicksand.  A huge part of my life, that actually began in 1985, had come to an end.  My mortality was staring me in the face.  I was saying goodbye to what had defined me for the entirety of my adult life. GetOffended was my fortress of solitude. I'd met so many people, made so many friends and shared so many times with my cohorts because of GetOffended... I didn't know how to move on.

So I didn't.

I didn't know how to say goodbye.  I didn't want to.  I took all of the stock left over the site (thousands of t-shirts, stickers, catalogs, office materials, business cards, etc etc) and moved them to my home office. There were many suggestions on what to do with everything, but I wasn't having any of it. It's been six months and they are still stacked in there, reminding me of where I came from.  They'll probably be there ten years from now.

In the spring, I was pulled out of the quicksand. I dusted myself off and did my best to assume the role of human being.  I opened old projects and began to revise Harnessing the Spark before sending it off. The problem was, my heart wasn't in it and my head wasn't ready.  Lost in Infinity was thrust into my face.  The book had become my bane.  I had rushed it with intention of getting it off my chest and never looking back.  It was a stupid decision.  The only thing more prevalent than my naivety was my impatience.  For the last year I had stewed over its state of unrest and my inability to chalk it up for what it was.  It was time to focus on making it something I was proud of in hopes of freeing myself from the chains it wrapped around me.

I spent half the year reworking Lost in Infinity into Lost In Infinity: Deja Vu Redux. It was quietly released in October.  The rerelease is the same overall story and concept, retold the way I had originally envisioned it.  I completed the book without assistance, input or third-party editing.  I chose to remove the opportunity for manipulation in lieu of polished craftsmanship.  Despite the fact that the novel rests on my shoulders, I was at last able to move forward and walk away from the book feeling like it was an accomplishment rather than a means to an end.  I haven't decided whether I'll pursue marketing it or attempting to get it into the hands of readers. I'm satisfied at this point just knowing that it's out there.

I'm finally able to say goodbye to GetOffended without fear of losing my identity and my friends. Neigh, my family.  That's what we had become.  Those that made it happen, those that helped, those that supported us through the years... we became family.

Scavenger Hunt

My little sister turned 30 on Saturday.  For the last seven years she has been giving me increased shit over my foray into the realm of 'mature adulthood' so when it came time for her to flip her odometer into the life of a thirtysomething, it needed to be commemorated in style.  My 30th birthday was fantastic, marked by a surprise party at my favorite restaurant where my wife secretly brought together a huge group of friends, both past and present, to drink, eat and be merry, all to the sounds of one of my favorite bands, who she had persuaded to headline the shindig.  Not a huge band, one that I'd been working with for a few years through GetOffended, but a damn good band nonetheless who contained guys who quickly became some steadfast and lifelong friends.  I ended up so drunk I knocked over a table after consuming an ill-conceived "Irish CarBomb" using a pitcher of Guinness and a glass with more than 4 fingers of Bailey's and Jameson... all in all, it was a night I'll never forget.  I have my wife to thank for that.  My sister's party needed to be as memorable or more so.  Her husband pulled it off.  Well, he set the thing in motion and her brood of friends pulled it off.  The lack of inhibition or intelligence or both coupled with a complete disregard for law and order and all things considered 'normal' meant this party will always be remembered.  There are tattoos to prove it.

Here is the complete scavenger hunt rules and checklist as it was supplied to the party... trust me, nearly everything was completed and/or attempted by at least 2 of the groups.  There were multiple shaved mohawks, two tattoo'd asses, a neighborhood retention pond whose skinny-dipping cherry was popped (did I mention my sister is the neighborhood Homeowners Association President?), a bunch of very confused local patrons, guests at my parents' house who got to see a couple of ass tattoos and a raid on their liquor cabinet, one shaved leg that is going to grow back so disfigured its owner could play a walk-on role in the next "messin' with sasquatch" commercial and a dozen or so cell phones full of incriminating evidence.

Enjoy.  Happy Birthday, sis.

Scavenger Hunt Rules

- The scavenger hunt takes place in the boundaries of XXXXXXXXXXXX County Ohio.

- Scavenger hunt lasts between the hours of 6pm and 9pm. For every 5 minutes a team is late, 5 point deduction.

- Scavenger Hunt teams will be split into teams of 3,4,5… must fit a single car load.

- All team members must be present during the entirety of every checklist item.

- All check list things to complete are under a certain point range, the amount of actual points given for each completion will be determined by the judge after the competition based on creativity, style, team participation and the "holy shit" factor.

- The Judge reserves the right to award bonus points for an achieved checklist item that the team goes extremely above and beyond the minimum requirement.

- All accomplished challenges must be in video or photo form unless items are required

1-2 Point Checklist:

- All team members wear a paper hat from a restaurant

- An orange straw

- A receipt for 83¢ in gasoline

- Teammate standing in a dumpster

- Teammate in a ball pit

- 3 croutons from a grocery store

- 27 catsup packets

- Teammate by the local "Welcome to XXXXXX, Bend Over and Grab Your Ankles" pissed about city tax sign

- A random stranger's autograph

- Teammate pole dancing on a "Main Street" sign

- Entire team sharing a beverage simultaneously.

- Break a raw egg on a teammate's foot.

- A receipt for a glass of water

- Go through a drive-thru and order a "McGangBang"

- Teammate petting a stranger's dog

- Wearing a pair of sandals with socks on

- Fill out and turn in an application at Lowe's or Home Depot

- Teammate in front of a Corvette

- Entire team singing the "Wheels on the Bus" while driving

- 7 Blueberries

3-4 Point Checklist:

- Teammate doing something obscene with a banana

- Shave a male teammate's single leg

- Teammate pumping a random person's gas

- 2 or more teammates in a grocery cart in front of the beer section

- Eat 7 banana peppers from Papa John's

- Drink a full Guinness

- Dress up a fire hydrant

- Make a human chalk outline on a public street

- Go fishing in a public fountain

- Entire team sitting in an electronics section of a store watching a movie

- Arrange fruit in the shape of a face

- Teammate biting a corn procured from a farmer's cornfield

- Paint only the pinky finger of the entire team black

- Whole team crawling through a drive-thru

- Male teammate wearing heels in a public venue

- A piece of currency from the year 1983

- Play hide-n-seek in a clothing section

- Steal a single wiper blade from an opposing team's vehicle

- Make an "I am Cornholio" video

- Team member giving a statue a lapdance (must last more than 20 seconds)

- Locate an out of state license plate.

- Prank call a teammate's brother or sister

- Get the phone number from a random stranger under the age of 30

- 5 French Fries longer than 3"

5-7 Point Checklist:

- Teammate walking barefoot in a river

- A receipt for an eyebrow wax

- Change out the right front tire of your vehicle for a spare

- Prove that you drove more than 50 miles over the course of the night

- Teammate trying on an unbought article of clothing from the Adam & Eve adult store

- Teammate wearing a random stranger's shirt at a bar

- Have a random stranger buy you a drink

- Receive a citation from a police officer for having too much fun.

- 3 random store employees doing a Charlie's Angels-esque pose

- Entire team humming the Mission Impossible theme while sneaking through a department store

- Make a drink for a bartender at a bar

- A private address with a house number that says, "1983"

- Male teammate dropping pants to ankles while using a public urinal

- Give Ashley's dad a high-five and ask for a drink of water at their house

- Ride a bicycle with helmet and padding inside a department store

- Photo evidence of a teammate the farthest distance away from the party

- Entire team must recite the pledge of allegiance simultaneously inside of the Autozone on Main Street between 7:45pm and 8:00pm

- Teammates must fill pockets with bells and have a foot race through a department store

- At exactly 7pm, pull into the BP gas station on Main Street and the entire team must complete an imaginary NASCAR Pitstop

15-20 Point Checklist:

- Get a permanent tattoo of your name

- Bring a random stranger back to the party to drink after the conclusion of the scavenger hunt. Nobody in attendance can know who this person is.

- 2 or more teammates go skinny dipping in a public locale

- Best alcoholic beverage that any team can bring back for the Judge

- Shave a teammate's head into a 2-stripe mohawk.

I may never recover...

Whenever I close my eyes, I'll forever see this monstrosity. What could possibly possess my son's orthodontist to believe this stuffed animal could, in any way, be anything but frightening and life changing for a child?  I may never recover.

not that anyone's complaining...

someone actually let me write something on their blog...

...and I only mentioned one headless corpse and a colon full of action figures.

Read my guest post on focus at Frankie Blooding's blog 

and then check out her work at smblooding.com

-----------------
Finding Focus

The guidelines for this guest post were vague. I love vague. “Any topic is good as long as it’s writing/book related,” I was told. Someone with a brain that wanders freely such as mine needs direction, boundaries and discipline to maintain focus. I love vague, I have a strong aversion to boundaries and discipline was never my strong suit.

Two minutes into writing this post and I’m already miles away from any intended target.

According to an article I found on the internet, whose validity is questionable at best, the most effective way to maintain focus is a multi-step process which begins with adequate sleep and ends with making sure you are passionate and happy about the task you’re performing. Sprinkled in the middle were mini rewards for your hard work and dedication, finding the right music and isolation from distractions. After reading this article I clicked on a link in the footer attached to an x-ray image of an abdomen filled with what appeared to be die-cast Lord of the Rings characters. Two hours later I was buying a t-shirt from Think Geek with a schematic for the ‘Serenity’ Series 3 Firefly silkscreened on the front. Obviously I had read over the original article with uninspired vitality.

Read more...

Wise Bear Books review of 'Lost in Infinity' ... "a wonderful avant-garde achievement"

Review generated by Wise Bear Books

Lost in Infinity has moments of brilliance punctuated by sheer frustration. The book's lengthy summary does its best to simultaneously attract and deter all but serious readers. Clearly, this novel isn't for everyone as it's an exercise in patience, wading through the unconventional structure and repetitious literary progression. However, there's a method to Besecker's madness as the concept of déjà vu is a key theme and plot device.

Travis suffers from chronic insomnia, which brings the added bonus of a variety of other emotional and social debilitating behaviors and phobias including a fear of infinity, or apeiraphobia in psychiatric terms. We've all experienced occasional restless nights of sleep, and you might think you understand what it means to be an insomniac; but the severity and ultimate consequences of not being able to sleep for days, weeks, or even months until your body literally shuts down, is inconceivable.

Diagnosed at the age of seven, Travis has had to cope with his condition for nearly three decades. It's impossible not to feel tremendous compassion for this young boy who copes by sneaking 20-minute cat naps several times a day and then must endure the nightly terror of a shadow presence who only serves to ratchet up Travis's fear of vast nothingness.Travis's condition is exacerbated by his genius-level intellect, which causes him to question, protest and defy anyone he believes intellectually incompetent. There is a fine line between madness and brilliance, and Travis is a ticking time bomb.

It takes years for Travis's concerned parents to understand the severity of their son’s condition, but eventually he connects with Katherine, a psychiatrist who manages to bear up fairly well under Travis's constant challenging behavior. Each chapter begins with a small glimpse into their sessions together. Katherine has given Travis a red spiral notebook for journaling, which she reviews at the beginning of each of their sessions. The problem—Travis is neither cooperative nor forthcoming in their exploratory work together.

Travis's highly-gifted intellect eventually propels him into a variety of creative career fields with reasonable success. He is married and father to two boys who seem to have elements of his own condition. It's important to note that while other characters exist in this book, they are mostly referential in nature, as the spotlight is always squarely on Travis and his delicate psyche.

As an adult, he seems to have managed his condition quite well. At 30, his life begins to spiral out of control into a tornado of depression and self-destructive behavior. Travis is on the verge of a psychotic break, which is a crucial element to revealing the story's ending.

In general, the novel reads like a memoir until you get 90% through—that's when the plot twists kick in, leaving no doubt about the fictional fusion with the author's reality. The debatable creation of the book's content made for lively discussion amongst our collaborative review team. How much of the content is autobiographical? Could or does this really happen to genius-level insomniacs? We can't offer any definitive answers, but you can be sure this story is truly thought provoking.

Lost in Infinity has a lot of good things working for it. The story is unique and evokes a broad range of emotions and lasting reactions from readers. It's easy to get invested in Travis's dilemma and hard to forget the psychological impact of the story.

You'll want to help fix this poor kid's circumstances, but Lost in Infinity is not that kind of novel. Readers will be pushed to confront many of their own black fantasies in the context of the novel's circular time looping quality.

Stylistically, Lost in Infinity is a wonderful avant-garde achievement. Although plot and time lines may shift in confusing and unexpected ways, the abrupt nature of the structure is merely echoing the conflict within Travis. The real triumph of this book is that readers will actually share in the frustration of fictional Travis as Besecker's writing immerses readers into this fascinating yet uncomfortable story.

The all-important title and cover are outstanding. The front cover concept is based on Travis's red spiral journaling notebook with terrified drawings of his shadowy tormentor. Too often, book covers don't reflect the essence of the author's story, but Besecker's cover and title work in perfect partnership with book's plot as well as its summary.

The book has a Stephen King-esque feel about it. Like King, Besecker is clearly a lover of psychological terror. The only thing missing from this book is some blood and gore and then you'd have a full blown horror novel.

Our only minor dissatisfaction comes from the story's ending, or lack thereof, as it seemed contrary to the course and direction of the first 90% of the book. The final twist abruptly moves the story out of its sweet spot, the concept of infinite nothingness, into an explanation that felt a little forced and random. We get what the author was going for or maybe we were just waiting and hoping for a good old slasher scene, but the conclusion didn't resonate with us as much as we'd hoped. That said, the final twist didn't dislodge our overall praise for this innovative literary work. And we love that the author wisely fictionalized his personal struggles rather than trying to write a memoir and have readers call into question so many of the surreal details of being a chronic insomniac.

Lost in Infinity has moments of brilliance punctuated by sheer frustration. The book's lengthy summary does its best to simultaneously attract and deter all but serious readers. Clearly, this novel isn't for everyone as it's an exercise in patience, wading through the unconventional structure and repetitious literary progression. However, there's a method to Besecker's madness as the concept of déjà vu is a key theme and plot device . . . Oops, there's that circular time loop we were talking about . . . in truth the book's summary says it best, "This book is not for everyone." But if you’re a fan of psychological dramas laced with elements of terror in the vein of Stephen King, Ray Bradbury, Clive Barker, and Kurt Vonnegut, then Lost in Infinity is a must-read for you.

'Lost in Infinity' announced as a 2013 Digital Book Awards Finalist

'Lost in Infinity' was named a Wise Bear Digital Book Awards 2013 Finalist. The final award decisions will be announced in the next couple of weeks.