I can’t believe it’s May already.

I can’t believe it’s already Wednesday this week. I blink and another day is gone.

I have another book to write, two more short stories to write, and I’m developing one webcomic and planning another. I’m practicing to make Ikkyu (first degree brown belt) in karate and am trying to pump up my home workouts in general. And oh yeah, there’s that family I like to hang out with.

I feel like a shark: I can’t stop moving. If I stop, nothing gets done and everything’s behind me.

The song of the day:

The Wife will be taking the rugrats out of town, leaving me with an empty house. I’ve got a poker game Friday night, karate Saturday morning, and then I write. If I get bothered at home, I will pack up the laptop, jump on the bike, and ride out to somewhere quiet. If my phone keeps ringing, I’ll simply “forget” it somewhere.

Because I really, really need to get some writing work done this weekend.

I received a flurry of emails last week from a publisher I’m working with, and things are moving along. It’s nothing I can announce yet, but I can tell you that if things pan out, both my comic and my prose fans will be pleased. I’ve only today caught up with all of that email, and I’m on to artist searches.

(That said, if you’re a sequential artist or know one, feel free to point me to a gallery.)

It’s going to take some hustle. Again, nothing solid yet, but I can tell you I have no intention of wandering Wizard World Chicago aimlessly next year. I want to be planted behind a table or booth and shoving product into folks’ hands. There’s a good chance that will happen.

Assuming I can cease to exist long enough to make it happen.

Despite falling behind on my 52 Weeks Flickr group contributions, I now have an entire year’s worth of self portraits in my 52 Weeks set. Sure, I’ve got 8 more to post, but time-wise there’s a year in there and it’s neat looking back and seeing if things have changed at all.

For example, there was my beardless phase, which I recently abandoned:

Not to mention the time I busted my head in Pennsylvania:

Yeah, good times.

I can also play the then-and-now game. The following picture was taken in March, shortly after I joined the Academy of Okinawan Karate:

Compare it to the picture I took just last night:

Higher rank, better gi, looking a little leaner… not too shabby.

A year goes by quick, but as we’re experiencing it, we don’t always see the big changes. I’m glad I participated. It’s kind of a pain to remember to take the pics and keep on top of dumping the pics to the computer and then uploading them to Flickr, but I’m tempted to do it again this year.

I really don’t know how the 365 Days folks do it, though. I’d almost have to cop out and use cell phone pics to post directly to Flickr. I’m sure my cellular provider would love me for that…

I had one today today.

The daylight savings change was like a switch for many things. One week it’s cool but not cold, and the sun’s still up into the evening. Then the time changed and the Wife and I are busting out the kids’ winter jackets and talking about sealing up all the windows. The sun’s gone shortly after 5pm.

I haven’t been cold walking to work, but yesterday the winds kicked up and cut right through my zip-up hoodie. I broke down and got out my own winter jacket. Halfway to work today, I zipped it up, and was blown away by how much extra room I had. Last year, if I zipped up the jacket it fit snug across my belly. It wasn’t tight like the year before, but it was right there.

Today I was able to grab a big handful of the front and tighten it up. I may not have been swimming in the jacket, but I had inches to spare.

Now that’s progress. The BMI calculations say I’ve got a ways to go, but even if I was convinced BMI was in any way definitive (I don’t think it accounts for muscle), I wouldn’t let it bring me down.

In the fitness routine, my weight’s been stable for a month or so. Suddenly I’m seeing a drop again, and I finally lost another five pounds to meet last month’s goal (missed it by a day). It’s gone the same way since May: I’d shed a few pounds, then float, then lose a few more pounds, then float again. In the long run that’s a good thing, because it appears the slow weight loss — the stuff you work for — tends to stay off more than a diet that you start and stop when you feel like it.

Money definitely has its ups and downs. I’d be getting ready to tighten my belt when a contract or check shows up. I just did a small job for a friend and have a royalty check showing up any time, but then I got the news about the insurance rate increase at work.

Speaking of, the same goes on at work. I got caught up from a few straggling tasks from the start of the school year and had some time to work on some projects, then a teacher discovered some major crisis. I resolve that, skate a bit, and learn about a state database issue that has a deadline in two days.

Last but not least is the writing. I’ll go a month or so with no real news, then hear from an editor. For example, this weekend a mock cover for the German edition of Deadliest of the Species showed up in the inbox. I’ll tap away on To Rise from the Ashes one weekend, then not touch it for a while. I’ve got several other things I should be working on, too, but I’m letting To Rise gum up the works.

I’m starting to realize I have a real problem with time management.

On the face of it, it doesn’t appear weight loss or income could have anything to do with time management. But when applied to the fitness routine, or the amount of writing-related work I actually finish and turn into money, proper time management can have a huge impact. Keeping a better workout routine (between karate classes, that is) could make the weight loss more consistent. Finishing To Rise and a few other projects could set up some additional work and bring in some moolah. And that, in turn, would make it a lot easier to stomach the insurance increase, if not provide a little more stability to the monthly account balance.

So what do I do about it?

Accountability – I need a way to track my writing and make sure I’m doing it. It’s been working fairly well for the fitness with the Weight Tracker the last eleven freakin’ months. One would think it would have dawned on me to apply something similar to the writing. Dumbass.

Motivation – I’ll start with the important question: do I want to be a writer, or do I want to have written? The bibliography says the former. Should I think about the money? Wow. I can’t believe I typed that with a straight face. No, this one’s a bit trickier. I need to get some more stuff out there. And to do that I need to write more. See the problem? I could try to convince myself I’m doing it for the love, but then I’d be full of shit. In fact, anyone who says they write for themselves is full of shit. Writers need to be read. Period.

Distraction – Distractions abound. I need to cut out several of them, and stop overscheduling myself. In fact, I think I’ll talk to the wife right now about keeping next weekend wide open. With Thanksgiving and Christmas coming up, I better take advantage of free weekends while I can.

And now that I figured all that out, maybe it’s time to shut the hell up and actually do something about it.