I woke up early because last night it seemed my country might be going to war, and even though I am not in the military, one should never take these things lightly.

 

After all, one aggrieved terrorist nutjob with a bomb (or car or box cutter) can do a lot of damage to a school full of kids or a crowd of tourists on a bridge, you know?

Retaliation is a thing.

Anyway, as I was pounding out my workout yesterday, stepping from the treadmill, Jenny sends me a Facebook message.

 

You guys know Jenny. She’s an amazing writer, a good friend with a great sense of humor, co-host of (the critically acclaimed – probably – but not very much watched) internet show Writers Off Task With Friends, valued critique partner, celebrity judge for the latest Word Weaver Writing Contest, presenter at the Florida Writer’s Conference in 2017, etc.

Note I said “a good friend with a great sense of humor.”

 

So yesterday she sends me a message

As you can see, in real time, I admit I have no idea who this person is, but since Jenny laughingly sent it to me, I assumed it was related to me.

What can I say, Jenny isn’t always on target with her humor.

“It’s not you. But I immediately thought of you. Which made it funny.

Or not, I guess.” – Jenny

Anyway, I go on about my business, and she catches up with me later – or tried, because as I noted I woke up early to see if we were at war. I also crashed early last night because we went shoe shopping for an 8 year old. (My poor wife. After 10 minutes she was dealing with two whiners. Shoe shopping for others is the WORST. Why didn’t you guys tell me?)

Meanwhile, this blogger dedicates a whole blog site to what Jenny thinks is attacks on ME.

I reblogged a few of them earlier.

Can you believe that? And they aren’t even well-written. Come on!

Now, I’ve heard that you aren’t supposed to give stalkers attention because they just go bananas with it. Like, if they can’t get positive attention from you, they will act up until they get negative attention from you.

But

“That picture I posted WAS ACTUALLY ABOUT DAN.” – Jenny, a few hours later

It’s safe to say we still don’t know, but

I’m not much for sitting back and taking shit.

• In fact, I once fought off 40,000 tweets from Blackfish after posting a picture of my then 2-year old daughter at Sea World smiling at a dolphin.

• I got into it with a hugely popular (but bullsh!t) writing contest that I exposed for the garbage that it was, and believe me, THOSE people weren’t backing down. (Until the head of the organization contacted me and then they backed the fuck down quick. They all went away, like snap! Gone.)

So can I deal with an unread, puny blogger with too much time on his/her hands? I think so. Today will be the most views that blog gets in its entire short, sordid history, and then it’ll fade away into the nothingness from which it came.

I love Bible thumpers who give Bible thumpers a bad name, don’t you?

As my good friend and Reverend Greg might say, turn the other cheek. (Yeah, one of my high school friends is a reverend, with a massive, totally impressive following.)

 

So as this humble blog gets ready to beat last year’s 60,000 views, let’s recap just what a piece of crap I am

• I mentor other writers. There’s actually a waiting list if you want to join my private critique group or have me edit your book. Many bestselling authors will not publish their book without me looking at it first.
• This blog got over 60,000 view in 2017 alone. Let’s just think about that for a while. Sixty thousand… 60k… A six followed by one, two, three, FOUR zeroes. (That’s a lot of people who aren’t complaining about me, isn’t it? So, ComplainerBlogger, are all of them wrong, or maybe just you? Hmm.)
• I work with school kids (grades 3-8) after school all year to help them gain a better understanding about writing. 18 grade school children will become published authors in a few weeks because of their love of writing. The teacher of one of my Young Authors told my wife that my involvement has really turned a few kids around to reading and writing when they were uninterested before. I helped that happen! What a monster I am.

• I regularly let unknown writers and bloggers do a guest post on this blog – because I’m a real @sshole

• I let new authors advertise on this blog to get word out about their book.
• I hold writing contests because a friend and valued critique partner (who is too humble to remember it was her, E6) said it’d be fun – and it was/is. We are finishing up our latest VERY SUCCESSFUL one right now – which makes me think the unhappy party in question might have something to do with that, but more on that later.
• So far, EACH 1st PLACE WINNER of my Word Weaver Writing Contest has gone on to publish their work, and so have a few others who got 2nd place or other recognition. That’s kind of a big deal. They found enough inspiration here to gain the confidence to move ahead and roll the dice on their writing, and so far they are batting .1000. Some GREAT authors have come to the world via these contests. How cool is that?
• I got a group of bestselling author friends together with some unknown and unpublished authors, and we put out a scary anthology last October that hit #1 in its category within 30 days of its release. That project helped a lot of people get published who might never have been otherwise. 
• 
• I keep cranking out books, three this year so far, including illustrated children’s books and a helpful writing guide (above, which I will send you for free if you contact me and ask for it and promise to leave a review on Amazon – free book? YOU MONSTER!!) Oh and my novels – the next novel is my best ever, and will totally blow your socks off. Check out the cover, below:
• 
• I regularly talk about, reblog and promote my author friends. If you follow this blog at all, you’ve seen Lucy and Anne Marie mentioned in the last 10 days, and a lot of others mentioned in the last 30 days. That’s what I do, help others.
• In fact, I help other so much I was recently asked to do a presentation with my books at Barnes & Noble to the Tampa Writers Alliance.
• And… I’m such a bad writer, I was asked to become a member of the Board of Directors of the Florida Writer’s Association.

All because I’m such a piece of sh!t.

So when Jenny sends me this message, I’m thinking I pissed somebody off and they are complaining on my blog.

Well, first of all, I’ll let you complain about me on my blog. Most of you are nice enough not to do it, but when you have a legitimate gripe, I wanna know. For future reference, I prefer if you use the Contact Me button to air your grievances. It goes straight to my email, which I check a zillion times a day, and I take stuff on my blog seriously. The comments, those get posted at WordPress’ pace. The email is faster.

But that doesn’t mean I’m gonna lay down and eat shit, either, motherf^cker.

You have a complaint? I’m a willing listener.

You wanna go off for no legit reason about how your writing was good enough to win my writing contest after you admitted you didn’t really clean it up much and even you said it had some issues?

That’s on you.

See, in the years I’ve been doing this, I’ve had a few spammers and only 1 real complainer.

60,000 views last year, and one complainer.

ONE

This douche canoe thought his (I assume a he; with internet you really never know) but he wrote a good story for one of my contests. In the November 2017 contest, I got a decent story, but it had issues. Plot holes, and a leap of logic that didn’t make sense to me.  That happens. Some people think they have to cut their masterpiece down to 3k to get into the contest, and I think that’s what this guy did – leaving out stuff, but even by his own admission, it had issues.

So, I did what I do. I said it was good, I said it had issues, I told him what they were, and I offered suggestions to fix the story.

You did that? What a jerk!

Now, for those of you who’ve been through my critique process, these contests – and my many critique partners from around the globe – would have ceased working with me years ago if what I said in my critiques wasn’t supportive and helpful. Because it IS.

BUT IF YOU ARE JUST LOOKING FOR SOMEONE TO TELL YOU HOW GREAT YOU ARE… that’s a little different.

You might be great.

If the writing you sent isn’t great, I’ll tell you what I think you need to do to get it to be great.

If it’s great, I say so.

Those are some great books, and I’m happy to work with and talk up each of those authors’ stories. (And great books by of a lot of other people I’ve worked with or read.)

I’ve read several of Heather’s stories, and each is better than the last.

If you wrote garbage or stuff that – by your own admission – has major issues, I’m not telling you it’s brilliant if it’s not.

I’ll tell you how to fix your story, but if your reply is:

“It’s brilliant not for what it actually is on the page but what should have been there, and therefore…”

– huh?

Write the brilliance, baby. That’s the job.

– Dan Alatorre, who loves quoting himself on his blog

Okay, so later in the night, Jenny and another author friend decide maybe the blogger in question is actually nutso. Wouldn’t be the first time a writer went over the edge, but it’s probably best if their wrath for the world isn’t aimed at me, especially when they are giving implied death threats.

I still don’t know if this stuff is aimed at me, because it’s the act of a coward to throw stones anonymously. (Notice I use my real name on everything? Not a coward.)

Anyway, this nonsense got 30 minutes more of my time than it should have, so I’m gonna go turn on the news and sit on the couch and get ready for a fun day of two different birthday parties filled with 8 year olds that my kid has to go to. (I’m looking forward to both. Really. One is at a karate place. I wanna see about breaking a board with my bare hands like they do on the internet, and this may be my chance.)

• If you are writing blog posts about me, or dedicating your ENTIRE blog to me – good or bad, THANK YOU. (But seriously – rethink your life goals.)

• If you wanna report abusive content, click HERE to do that.

• If you wanna check out the borderline insane stuff this bozo is doing, click on over. I reblogged a few.

 

REMEMBER: a friend received a comment on her blog from me, followed by abusive comments by THIS blogger, causing the friend AND OTHERS to conclude the abuse is meant for me. That’s against the WordPress rules.

The nutjob shoulda stayed off Jenny’s blog, but nobody was reading theirs, and WP will see it all started right after I had to block the nutjob from mine.

Oops! Yeah, computer IP addresses and stuff are easy to trace when you’re the host network, dude. WP doesn’t need lawsuits.

Play nice in the sandbox, kids. Because:

1. Death threats, wishing a person gets killed in traffic, implied or otherwise – they aren’t funny. I don’t take it seriously, but I have a young daughter who reads stuff, and scaring kids is bullshit, Bible guy. Even your thick skull can get that message through. Be better than that.
2. We live in a world where people go bananas all the time. The FBI might come knocking on your door based on what other people think your hate filled messages say about you being the next psycho killer. Don’t be that guy. And for Pete’s sake, don’t hide behind comments on Jenny’s blog when nobody’s reading yours. That’s sad and pathetic. Talk reasonably to the source of your ill will, discuss rationally, and part friends or part ways amicably. Or just go away quietly, always an option. Maybe I read a different Bible than you did in my 12 years of Catholic schools, but let’s do a little Golden Rule here. If you were the guy who entered my contest and was disappointed, remember this, too:

3. I showed one of the judges the insane emails you wrote to me and even she said I should kick you out of the contest because you were a psycho. Now Jenny thinks so, too, and blocked you from her blog like I had to, and from my email after you wouldn’t stop with the nonsense. And now others will think you’re a psycho. IS IT ALL OF US, OR MAYBE IS IT YOU?

4. Don’t be a guy who posts insane rants on the internet.
5. Or at least be funny when you do.

YAWN

I’m still not sure ANY of this was about me, but I trust Jenny.

SHE says it was posted on her blog after a comment I made, and she concluded the comments were about me. So did others.

That’s good enough.

She subsequently felt the need to ask the person to stop commenting on her blog and probably blocked them.

They say they’re an author, but Amazon hasn’t heard of them:

 

All I know is, it’s time to make my beautiful daughter waffles (she no longer insists on eating the chocolate chip kind, thank god), hit Target for some presents, and then head to the birthday parties.

If there are no posts for a while, it’s because the karate board breaking didn’t go well and I broke my hand.