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Books and Blogs · 8 March 2025

Just because you have books out there, does not mean that anybody will buy them. Or maybe that is just me.

I have more than two dozen books out there on Amazon. And I would venture to guess that I have sold about that many books. Total. It is not discouraging or anything like that. It is just interesting. Well, I suppose not that interesting even. After all, I do not do that much promoting or anything like that. I can barely even tell people I have known forever that I have books out there. Okay. Maybe I tell them. But I just do not push myself on anybody.

I suppose that is the thing. In order to sell books, you need to tell people that you have books for them to buy. You need to be a self-promoter. Which is not me. I just do not know how to do it. It is not that I am humble or anything like that. (I try to be.) It is just that I do not know how to do the whole self-promotion thing.

“Hey, did you know that I wrote a book. Several, in fact.”
“That’s nice.”
“Wanna read one?”
“What’d you say?”

That actually sounds like a self-promotion conversation I would have. Even with myself. Still, if I am going to be a self-published author, I ought to at least do a little self-promotion.

I suppose that is what blogs are for. They are for writers to just get stuff out there. Show people that they have bodies of work. Or maybe that is just me. I suppose that I should promote my writing more with my blog. Maybe with posts like this one. (Hey! Did you know that I wrote some books?)

I also need to write and write and write because to not do so would be to deny the gift that God has given me. Even if nobody reads my stuff, I must write. Besides, writing is like breathing. Breathe in. Write. Breathe out. Write.

At any rate.

I had a nice thing happen at school the other day. The kids on the morning announcements promoted my book. Not my latest book, but perhaps one of my best books. (I am not sure since not that many people have read it.) The student held up the book (we have video announcements) and said that she was thankful (thankful Thursday) for talented staff who share their talents. Well, I may or may not be talented. That is for others to decide. All I do is write and publish. Others can decide whether what I have written is worth anything or not.

Well, I am not sure that I have said anything here. I may have just reiterated something I blogged about before. Which is that I am not much of a self-promoter. Or that I need to do a little promotion of my books on my blog. So here is my pitch.

I have lots of books out on Amazon. At least a couple people have reviewed a few of them. Maybe you should buy one too and give it a review. Ooh. Maybe that is an ad campaign.

“You should buy one too, and give it a review. You should buy one too, and give it a review.”

Nah. Too silly. And what does the “too” refer to.

Maybe it should be:

“You should buy one or two, and give them a review.”

Nah. That does not match the subject and object. One is plural and the other is singular. Ah well…

Well, I hope that I have not been too much of a self-promoter. But I do hope that you get a book or two of mine. And whether you like it or not, give it a review.

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Time Flies · 1 March 2025

Time flies. Whether or not you are having any fun.

It is not really an aha moment or anything like that, but time really does fly. When you are having fun. I know. The saying is supposed to give you a little perspective that when you are having fun, it seems that time is going so much faster than normal. Like you are in a time warp or something. One moment you are starting to do your fun thing. The next moment, it is time to be done. Bed time or suppertime or quitting time or something. You need to stop doing whatever fun thing it was that you were doing.

But even though it might seem like time drags when you are not doing something fun, it is really flying then too.

Think about it. No matter how much fun you are having doing anything, when you look at the clock, the second hand goes around at the same rate all the time. One… Second… At… A… Time… No matter what. That second hand keeps spinning and spinning and spinning. At the same rate. All the time. Just watch and see, if you do not believe me.

Of course, popular media would have you believe otherwise. I remember some movie or TV show where the clock ticked slower and slower and slower because the person watching was bored stiff. And it sure seems like time drags on when what you are doing is drudgery. But time marches ever onward. It flies.

I think that you get this perspective as you age. You realize that time is precious and that you should not waste it. Make every second count. Not that sitting and just looking at the sunset or watching your kids play or doing something relaxing is a waste of time. Quite the contrary, those moments are the ones that really matter. Often more than those times when you are supposedly being productive. When you are churning out the words for your next great novel. Or whatever your choice of productive time is. You do not need to fill every waking moment with something “productive” in the sense of work or even play. You can just be.

Maybe that is the key to slowing time down a little bit. I know. Not everybody wants to slow down time, but we do need to stop and smell the roses. We need to relax. We need to just be. Not always, but at times. Because we know that time does indeed fly. Faster than we ever imagined.

Yes. The saying is correct. Time does fly when you are having fun. But the deeper truth of the matter is that time just flies. Period.

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Do or Do Not · 22 February 2025

Do or do not. There is no…

We have all heard Yoda’s quote from The Empire Strikes Back. “Do or do not. There is no try.” It is a great motivational quote. I tell athletes this all the time. Actually, I tell them that “can’t” is a naughty word and it will cost them 25 pushups. But the notion that we are either going to do something or not do something is certainly a truism. We might try. And we get away with trying. But that does not cut it in reality. We either do or we do not. There really is no in between.

But Yoda’s quote is an interesting from a different perspective too. It is interesting from a logic perspective.

Now I know that logic and reason are not in vogue these days. You cannot tell somebody they are being illogical because feelings rule the day. We feel this or we feel that. So we do this or we do that because our feelings are what matter most. So to even have a notion that logic and reason might play any part in decision-making is ludicrous these days. Or so it seems. Even so, I want to tackle Yoda’s quote from a logical (albeit tongue in cheek) sort of way.

The “do or do not” part of the quote is a wonderful notion. Feeling-wise and logic-wise. After all, we feel that it is true. We can only have it one way or the other. We either do or do not. It feels right. It also makes logical sense. You can only have it one way or the other. Do or not do. The negation of do is do not, which is what Yoda says, and it is the logical way to say it. There are even symbols that show the logic, but I will not get into that here. The point is that a statement or its negation can be true but they cannot both be true. At least not at the same time in the same sense.

Now, I know what you are thinking. Something ought not make sense both emotionally and logically. (Either that or you were thinking about food. Or maybe that is just me.) But Yoda’s statement of doing or not doing makes sense in both ways. We feel it emotionally and we understand it logically. And there are probably other things that are right from both perspectives. Even if it might feel wrong. In fact, I would say that there are definitely many other things that are right both emotionally and logically.

But back to the rest of Yoda’s statement.

I never really thought of the logic of “There is no try.” But I should have. If there really is no try, then Yoda’s statement ought to read, “There is no…” After all, if there is no try, then not only could you not try, you could not say “try.” Try would not exist. Not in essence or principal or linguistically. No means no. Period. So if there is no try, there is no try. You cannot even say try.

I suppose it makes no difference in the long run whether there exists such a thing as try or not. We all try. We do. We may or may not succeed, but we do our best to get there. And maybe that is what Yoda was saying. Try is synonymous with not doing. We say we try when we do not really mean it. We say we try when we are just going through the motions. So perhaps Yoda was not saying that try does not exist, but that he expected Luke’s best effort. Of course, we know this is true. Just like when we say always and never in sentences. We use hyperbole to make a point. There are so few always and never statements that are true that we may as well say that we can never make never statements. Although there are always exceptions. (Neither of which makes sense from a logic perspective.)

Well, I hope that you do not feel you have wasted your time on this post on logic. And I hope you understand the notion that we really ought to do or do not. After all, there is no…