Welcome to Pumpkin Overload

It's the dead center of October! The leaves are changing colors, everything smells wonderful, and no one can escape the excess number of products with the words "pumpkin spice" in sparkly orange font on the packaging.

I love it all!

Yes I am one of those pumpkin crazy nuts who loves all things pumpkin (well, within reason) and may or may not be sipping a fresh made pumpkin juice drink while writing this post (please see foodblog at the end of the month for details). Okay, I might have a slight problem.

And even I can see that things are getting way out of hand. Every company and their brother seems to come out with a new pumpkin flavored [insert product here] to their fall line up. All of the coffee places offer a pumpkin spice latte, pumpkin spice chocolates are in the candy aisle, and pumpkin spice candles are proudly displayed. Heck, I can even smell like my favorite combination of spices with different lotions, lip chaps, and even deodorant.

It's like the marketing industry has decided we must ooze the aroma of fresh baked pumpkin pie.

This over-hype doesn't stop me from loving it. I know it makes me "basic" (see Buzzfeed for details) and I don't care. Fall is my favorite time of year and I will celebrate it.

Some people might look down on me for my love of pumpkin. A few people tease me for buying that pumpkin spice bagel. I might even be seen as stereotyping myself for loving this pumpkin obsessed season.

I will own my love of pumpkin spice. I will shout it from the top of every Starbucks in New York City...all 361 (according to Quora 2017)! I will drink my pumpkin spice latte, while eating a pumpkin spice muffin, slathering on some pumpkin spice lotion, and walking down the street with a pumpkin hat on my head.

Because it's okay for me to love pumpkins.

Everyone has their one thing that they love to the point of die hard obsession and that's not necessarily a bad thing. Some people have their sports team, others won't hear anything against their favorite fandom, and a few are always first in line to buy the latest Apple tech. There's nothing wrong with loving something, even if people look down on you because you like it.

 So if you're someone who loves trying every microbrewery they come across, or has a passion for raising alpacas, or are a Dallas Stars fan (I've heard you guys exist) don't listen to the naysayers. Enjoy your passion and don't let anyone take it away from you.

Until next week.

If you enjoyed this post (or it really pissed you off) please like, share, and/or leave a comment. I love hearing from my readers and I hope you guys like hearing from me.

Welcome to Passion

Having a passion for something is a wonderful feeling. I personally have a few passions (most fall under the category of story telling) that I try to pursue whenever I get the chance. In some cases, I've even managed to combine passions, such as food and writing to become a food blog.

Cooking for me is fun and relaxing.

 Some people might have only one passion, while others may have a thousand different things that make them want to stand on a soap box and declare how awesome their passions are. Some people enjoy their passions as hobbies like building model airplanes, others turn them into a business.

I think feeling passion for what I am doing is very important. Otherwise, why would I be doing that thing? 

Okay, I'll make an exception to cleaning, since I need to get that done anyway. Then again, having a clean living space makes me feel good, so maybe I do find some sort of passion in cleaning.

I equate passion with strong positive emotions. Being passionate about something should make me feel good, right? That's why I work hard on my hobbies and job. They make me happy and I feel fulfilled.

Shameless plugs are shameless when they are one of my passions...

When I'm making plans for the future, my passions are usually high on the priority list of things that I want to do. I would love to write a novel and get it published, but I have to plan my time wisely to write, do research on the publishing industry, and mentally prepare myself for the massive amount of rejections that are very likely to happen before my dreams become a reality. Since I am a planner by nature, I need to factor all of that in while planning out what I'm going to do each week.

Other people might have a passion for nature. They might try to plan on living in an area with a lot of great hiking locations and outdoor adventure opportunities. People who love dogs might plan on having a place to live that can easily accommodate the fur baby. Someone who loves classic cars might go into mechanics so they can keep their favorites up and running smoothly.

Passions can change over time. I know when I was six, all I wanted to do was go into outer space. I might not have chosen to be an astronaut or astrophysicist, but instead my passion evolved to me enjoying writing science fiction stories (alright fine, it's mostly Transformers fanfiction, but I'm branching out).

Some people might not be able to pursue their passions at the moment or haven't figured out what they are passionate about. An author I recently saw at a speaking event, stated that he always knew he wanted to write a book that he could proudly display on a self. The only problem was he had no idea what that novel should be about. It took him a long time to finally follow up on his passion and today he has a hardcover copy of his book sitting on his shelf.

My passions drive me to keep working hard and enjoy what I am doing. It can be hard to do and might take a long time before a passion is fulfilled, but in the end I think it's all worth it. After all, no one pops out of the ground perfect at what they love. 

I hope everyone keeps working on their passions. I certainly hope I do. 

Also Hufflepuffs are the best!

If you enjoyed this post (or it really pissed you off) please like, share, and/or leave a comment. I love hearing from my readers and I hope you guys like hearing from me. Until next week.

Welcome To Perseverance

Happy middle of August everyone! It's hot as all get out where I am, but that didn't stop one side of my family from coming out to our 84th Family Reunion. It was very hot, but we had around 30 people there. 84 years is a long time and we're hoping we make it to our 100th reunion.

Anything (be it an event, a business, or life expectancy, etc.) that lasts to 100 years is impressive. It requires dedication, hard work, a pinch of fun, and a lot of perseverance mixed with persistence (yep these are two different words with very similar meanings). I also think it's fun to think that so much has changed in that 100 years.

I have wanted to be a writer for a long time. I started a "family newspaper" when I was about 10 or 11 years old. There were three or so issues and I'm pretty sure one of my aunts has a copy somewhere in their house. I unfortunately didn't keep up with it (though thinking back that's probably a good thing). In high school, I took my school's journalism class and two creative writing classes. I also wrote my "first" novel around that time (it's in quotes because though there might be a paper version hiding somewhere out there, but for the most part it's lost to technology advancement).

I figure, if I keep at it long enough, I'll eventually polish up one of my other novels I'm working on, and send it out for publication (whether on an independent or traditional track is up in the air). For now, I keep working on my blogs (click here to see my second one that involves food - shameless plug, this is), my webcomic (see below - the title also shows up if you type it into Google), and experimenting with my writing style with fanfiction (sorry no links provided, but I'm working in the horror genre).

Mortimer's advice for marketing a webcomic...

I've made some progress since posting my first works. I have small followings (and a couple of fans who get annoyed when I disappear for a few months), but nothing major. I'm certainly no Anne Rice or Steven King (or that lady who wrote 50 Shades of Grey - seriously it was originally a Twilight Fanfiction). However my writing career is still more of a pass time hobby, then the driving force of my existence. It could change, but I have a lot more work to do before then.

This past week, I got to see Matthew Santoro at a book signing. He makes educational videos on YouTube, which are entertaining and great to listen to. The book is a "fun facts" type of book, with tons of weird and hilarious fact, much like his YouTube channel. Before he signed all of the books (over 100 people were at the event), he spoke to us for about an hour, allowing his fans to ask him questions. A lot of the questions he answered were about starting his YouTube Channel. He started uploading videos in 2011, but didn't start getting big until late 2013. There were many times he wanted to give up, but he kept on doing what he loved. He also said not to try to make it big with anything controversial. Not only will it fizzle and die out quickly, but you'll likely make a lot of enemies.

That is a great success story. His persistence and perseverance paid off and now he has turned his hobby into something that he loves. He's also not alone. On the website that I upload my webcomic to, there have been a few people who have made an announcement that they have been hired by one of the big comic book publishers. They now get to make comic for a living. The president of my current company is another good example.

Don't get me wrong, it does take some luck to turn a passion into a career. However, it also takes a lot of hard work, and perseverance. J. K. Rowling loves to talk about how many times the first Harry Potter book was rejected and look at how successful it has turned out (I bet all the people who rejected her initially have been kicking themselves ever since). Fred Astaire, one of Hollywood's biggest stars back in the day, was once told that he "couldn't act, couldn't sing, could dance a little." I guess he didn't take that criticism to heart.

I'm sure a lot of people want to be noticed right away (the media certainly seems to think so anyway). They want to go viral, they want to have a following, they want to matter to people. It just doesn't happen instantaneously. Most success stories talk about the first few years struggles and how many times the person or group almost quit. Then there are the failed stories that we never get to hear about (and it might have been for any number of reasons, not because they didn't work hard enough).

I write because it's what I love to do. Would I love to have 100 hits with each post or become a house hold name (well maybe not the latter - I like being in the shadows too much)? Yes, I'd love that kind of recognition. But I'm also happy when one person clicks on any of my work (sure it might be a spam bot, but it was a hit none the less and I will be excited about it).

I still need to balance my writing passion with my day job. I won't lie, I kind of like keeping the two separate right now.

But if you have a passion or a drive to do something, please keep at it! You never know what might happen. 

If you enjoyed this post (or it really pissed you off), please like, share, and/or leave a comment. I love hearing from my readers and I hope you guys like hearing from me.

Until next week.