Hey guys, here is the last episode of Goblin Market for the month. After being downtrodden by evil sickness, it took everything I had to get this one out. I am heading up north for two weeks, and then celebrating an early holiday when I get back to the States, but after that, I hope to get episode 16 out by the middle of the month.

This episode kicks off with the announcement of the winners from the Broken Hearts Club contest, and features promos for Angelo Bell’s Broken Hearts Club, Nobilis Erotica and Jake Bible’s Dead Mech. Special thanks to Angelo and Michael Bekemeyer for helping judge the competition.

As per usual, the intro music has been provided by Kevin MacLeod and incompetech.com, and the outtro music is provided by John Anealio.

Also, sorry about the two players. When I had all the issues with my site, I wound up having to switch from podpress to a new plugin, and I am still getting familiar with it. So far… It’s scary, and I do not love it.

Hope you all have a great couple of weeks.

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Last week while I was rooting around for promos to play on the next couple episodes of Goblin Market, I got a very interesting message from my Twitter pal, filmmakerAngelo Bell. Anyone who follows Mr. Bell on Twitter is privy to the knowledge that recently his film “Broken Hearts Club” was picked up by AMG-TV and began airing on October 26th. That right there is just awesome incarnate, so when Angelo messaged me about trading a promo spot on Goblin Market for a DVD of “Broken Hearts Club” that I could give away to my readers and listeners, the brain gears started to turn.

I asked him if there were any particular contest ideas he had in mind, and he said that since the “Broken Hearts Club” is all about relationships, we should somehow tie the contest itself into romantic relationship oriented stories.

We’ve all had them. Some of them good and some of them bad, and our experiences with those relationships molds and shapes us more than we could ever imagine. Think back to that first person you really thought you were in love with, and the first time you had your heart broken. That’s the stuff that lifelong memories are made of, whether positive or negative.

So, we’re gonna be giving this DVD away, and James Melzer was kind enough to sweeten the pot for you by donating a copy of his audiobook and a membership to the INVASION, but we’re not just gonna hand out these wonderful prizes. No, sir. We’re gonna make you work for it a little bit. How so? We want you to get to the writing. Now before you start to groan about how hard it is to juggle all your writing projects, especially in the wake of the NaNoWriMo season, relax. All I’m looking for is flash fiction. Your stories can be anywhere from 200 to 500 words. The length of this blog post. Three to four paragraphs. Enough space to cover some emotional groundwork.

The contest is going to run for two weeks. I will start accepting submissions today and close them on November 15th. I’m bringing two guest judges on board to help me read through, debate on and choose the three best stories of the lot. All stories will be numbered after reception and read blind by the judges to avoid any type of favoritism. I will announce the guest judges on the upcoming episode of Goblin Market during my intro, so be sure you tune in to find out who’s going to be judging the stories with me.

The absolute best story will win a copy of the “Broken Hearts Club” DVD, a copy of James Melzer’s TZC: ESCAPE audiobook and an insider’s membership to THE INVASION, and I will podcast their story for feature on a future installment of THIS WEEK IN AWESOME! Two runner’s up will also have their flash fiction stories recorded and podcasted for THIS WEEK IN AWESOME.

Email entries to: jennybeanses@gmail.com with BROKEN HEARTS in the subject header. No need to attach any files, just copy/paste your flash fiction story into the body of the email. That’s all you have to do. So get those entries in ASAP! Tell your friend about the contest too, because we’ve all had a broken heart at some point or another in our lives, so there is plenty of inspiration out there. Good luck everyone and check out the promo for the series for some inspiration if you will.

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Greetings everyone, and welcome back to the Goblin Market. I know it’s been two weeks since the last installment, and there have been some antsy fans anxiously anticipating the release of episode thirteen. I apologize for the delay, but as many of you know, I was up north in Toronto for nine days and did not have my equipment with me to record. I also had my website and server hacked into, which wiped out all of my media files. All of Goblin Market was wiped out, which means my iTunes and feed were empty. All of my poetry recordings and images, lost. Fortunately, I backed everything up on my flash sticks and hard drive, so it wasn’t lost for good, but having to reinstall and upload everything again will take weeks to do. I apologize for the inconvenience.

Which brings me to a major decision. I have uploaded the last five episodes of Goblin Market from eight through twelve. The first seven were incredibly poor quality, and I had been mentioning that I wanted to rerecord them, so that is what I’m going to do. Starting with episode seven, I will be rerecording and adding them back in one at a time. So they will be absent from the feed until they are rerecorded. That could be a bad move on my part for new fans looking to start the series, but the quality is so bad, that I’m considering this an opportunity to start over. I hope you understand, and that as you are recommending the story to your friends, you remember to note that it may be a few weeks before they can begin to DL the first episodes, so they might want to hold off.

Make sure you stay tuned at the end of this episode for promos for Steve Saylor’s The Caffeine Collection, a downloadable audio series which kicks off today. There is also a promo for Broken Sea Audio’s Zombie Cheerleader’s II, which sounds like it’s gonna be a real hoot! As per usual, the intro music has been provided by Kevin MacLeod and incompetech.com, and the outtro music is provided by John Anealio.

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Greetings everyone, welcome back to the Goblin Market. As I prepare this episode, Autumn is upon me in all her fiery splendor. The wind is howling outside, spiraling the leaves like a furious mother who’s lost her cool. It is a perfect day for the Goblin Market, and so I hope you’ll join me as we pass through the gates to see what Kothar and his minions have planned this week.

As you’ll hear in my intro, I am going up to Toronto to spend the week with James on Tuesday and won’t be back until Thursday the 22nd. I am going to try very hard this weekend to get episode thirteen recorded and edited so I can drop that for you either Wednesday evening from afar, or before I leave. No promises. I have to work this weekend and have a lot of family stuff going on right now, so I may not be able to do it. There will probably be no episode at all on the 21st. I hope you forgive me, and remember as you step away from the Goblin Market, that absence makes the heart grow fonder, and inspires the goblins to do more wicked for future episodes.

I also wanted to thank everyone again for their heartfelt warm wishes and congratulations upon the announcement of James and my engagement. Everyone has been so supportive and it’s really made me smile to know that love still has the power to draw communities together.

Be sure to check out the promos in this week’s episode. I’ve got Paul Elard Cooley’s Tattoo and Zack Daggy’s Dark World’s Project 31. As per usual, the intro music has been provided by Kevin MacLeod and incompetech.com, and the outtro music is provided by John Anealio.

P.S. The second player is not working, but the top player works just great. This episode is back in the feed and working most excellently. *tents fingers and laughs like a maniac*

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Greetings everyone, and welcome back to the Goblin Market. Thank you all for being so patient while I pieced this episode together after Horror Realm. Unfortunately, we came home with some sickness, so all of my energy these last few days went into getting this episode recorded and edited for you guys. To make matters more ridiculous, I’ve been having so many problems with Audacity lately, and I’m afraid to say that the quality of this episode is not up to par. I’m considering looking into another program, but in the meantime, I hope you’ll bear with me.

As always, I want to thank you guys for continually tuning in to my podcast. It makes me so happy when I get your feedback, so thank you all for that! You rock my world each and every week! Also, a big fat thank you that words alone cannot convey to my friend and blog-partner, Michele Bekemeyer for the generous donation she made this week to the Goblin Market. I was stunned speechless, which rarely happens. For those of you interested in making a donation, please note that 10% of all received donations go to the Crohns and Colitis Foundation of America.

Stay tuned at the end of this week’s episode for promos for Mur Lafferty’s I Should Be Writing and J. Daniel Sawyer’s Down From 10. As per usual, the intro music has been provided by Kevin MacLeod and incompetech.com, and the outtro music is provided by John Anealio.

Feel free to drop me questions or comments about this episode or Goblin Market in the comments form for this page, or you can email me directly at jennybeanses@gmail.com. Also, if you are subscribed to Goblin Market through iTunes, please take a moment to leave a comment feedback. Comments and positive feedback help draw more attention to a podcast, and I always love picking up new listeners!

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My bag has been mostly packed for about 30 hours now and truth be told, I’m ready to go. I didn’t want to leave you guys without any awesome this week, especially since I’m rushing off to the ‘Burgh for an entire weekend of nothing but Awesome. I plan to bring back plenty of awesome to share with you guys, from pictures and video content to the complete lowdown on how I squeed like a total fangirl before asking Jonathan Maberry to sign the copy of They Bite I intend to buy during Horror Realm. There are also going to be a handful of Permuted Press authors there, including that guy I’m so incredibly fond of, James Melzer. James will be giving away special edition Escape: A Zombie Chronicles Novel audiobooks with two bonus stories and a brand new introduction just for the audiobook.

And speaking of James, which you all know I am wont to do, let’s kick off This Week In Awesome with a picture…

This last Sunday, James traveled cross country and into Michigan to meet self-proclaimed FDO and NY Times best-selling author Scott Sigler. Sigler is currently touring The States to promote his novel, The Rookie, and since there were no scheduled stops in Canada on his tour, James, Laura and Jason Church and new media broadcaster Steve Saylor all headed out of Canada and into Michigan to represent. James did not release a new episode of UNLEASHED this week, but I hear he’s plotting to get some awesome interviews while we’re at Horror Realm. Here’s a picture of James, Laura and Steve. Be sure to browse through the Twitpic stream for more fun photos from the day’s events, and thank you to Jason Church for permission to use his awesome photos!

Next up is the Creebobby.com Ninja Zombie Robot times table chart. I don’t even know where I got this thing, someone on Twitter posted it and I knew it was too awesome not to bookmark and share. In classic timetable format, you can now see robot times zombie, or zombie times Abraham Lincoln… 0_o Excellent!

My friend Kate Sherrod, who hosts the Kate of Mind podcast and Suppertime Sonnets, sent me this excellent Gawker link titled “Empire Strikes Barack”. What could possibly be more awesome than Barack Obama playing with a Star Wars lightsaber on the front lawn of the White House?

And now, for this week’s Superficial Gallery Awesome Post of the Week… In the spirit of going on a road trip with my best girlfriend this weekend: Why Girls’ Weekends Were Invented! Don’t forget, if you need a good laugh throughout the week, the Superficial Gallery has got one with your name on it!

Here’s another one I found on Twitter. Author Patty Jansen wrote a pretty humorous blog called the 90% rule about following the “rules” as a writer. She makes some great points and got a few laughs from me. As long as I’ve been writing, I’ve been a big fan of the old adage, “You shouldn’t break the rules until you know them like the back of your hand,” and Ms. Jansen goes above and beyond here with a self-imposed 90% rule. Even if you’re not a writer, check this out. It’s funny stuff.

The Laughing Vixen Lounge is giving away an AWESOME Halloween Goodie Bag! I love Halloween so much that I couldn’t leave this little gem of a contest out. The Goodie Bag contains nineteen awesome, spooktacularly themed Halloween goodies from vendors all over the net. If you love Halloween as much as I do, you will NOT want to miss this. Seriously. Go check it out and enter. Maybe if you tell them I sent you, it’ll increase my odds of winning .

I know this week’s awesome is a little on the short side, but I’m already on the road as this posts, so know that when I wrote it I was incredibly distracted by the awesomeness of the weekend I’m probably having as you read this. Before I do disappear for the next two days, however, I would like to share one last bit of awesome… Last week Seth Harwood invited me into the Hot Tub with him to sit down and talk about writing, podcasting and a whole host of other interesting tidbits. If you haven’t heard that interview yet, I do hope you’ll follow the link and have a listen: Hot Tub Cast. Thank you to Seth for having me on. I had a great time and my shoulder blades have never felt better!

And now, I’m off! I hope you all had an awesome week and that you tune in next week for another tribute to AWESOME! Don’t forget, if you happen to find something AWESOME on the net throughout the week, and you think it’s worth sharing I’d love to check it out and possibly even feature it in an upcoming THIS WEEK IN AWESOME. You can even hook me up with announcements about your own personal AWESOME! If I feature your recommendation I will note the source and link to your site. Send recommendations to me via email (jennybeanses@gmail.com) if you’ve got ‘em. Be sure to include the word AWESOME in your email’s subject so I don’t drop you into my spam folder by accident.

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Greetings everyone, and welcome back to the Goblin Market. Thank you all for tuning in this week, and for your continued support. This week’s episode is a turning point of sorts, as Meredith, Him and Sir Gwydion prepare to set out for the Darknjan Wald.

There is some neat stuff in the Goblin Market this week, including the fact that today is September 9th, 2009, and I am releasing episode 9. 9-9-9-9… Isn’t that cool? Of course, you know I planned it out that way… 0_o. Yes, yes I did. Anyway, that means episode 9 is my lucky episode. Close your eyes and make a wish while listening to episode 9. Just be careful what you wish for. You know how goblins can be.

Also, I did some tallying yesterday and discovered that Goblin Market has been downloaded just over 1500 times so far, and the number climbs to greater heights each week. That’s awesome, and I’m so proud. Thank you all for continuing to listen each week, and for telling your friends about my endeavor. I am hoping to find a few spare minutes this week to re-record episodes one through five so I can begin submitting to podiobooks.com, and reaching an even larger audience, so wish me luck.

In other Goblin Market news, I know this is a bit early, but there will be no episode of Goblin Market on Wednesday, September 23rd. We’ll be at Horror Realm the weekend before, and weekends are when I squeeze in the majority of my recording for the week. Fret not, my lovelies. Goblin Market will return, right on schedule Wednesday, September 30th.

Be sure to stay tuned at the end of Episode Nine for promos for Philippa Ballantine’s Weather Child and Michell Plested’s podcast for writers, “Getting Published”.

As per usual, the intro music has been provided by Kevin MacLeod and incompetech.com, and the outtro music is provided by John Anealio.

Comments and feedback are always welcome! You can email me directly at: jennybeanses@gmail.com or leave a note right here on the site. Also, if you are subscribed to Goblin Market through iTunes, please take a moment to leave a comment feedback. Comments and positive feedback help draw more attention to a podcast, and I always love picking up new listeners!

Thanks again everyone for all of your support. Sharing this story with you is something I look forward to every week, so I’m glad you keep tuning in and going on this journey with me.

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I hope you’ve all been following Starla Huchton’s The Dreamer’s Thread since I recommended it a few weeks ago. The Dreamer’s Thread is a fully produced podcast novel with a full cast of characters stepping in to bring the story to life. Not that the story needs any extra breath into its already fully inflated lungs, mind you…

Anyway, I wanted to take a moment to let you guys know that my very first line appears in episode four, which Starla released last night. I am reading for the character Elsaar, who has only one line in this episode, but two full scenes later on in the story. You can find episode four, which features the voice talent of some amazing people-including Starla herself-right here

For a small taste of the story check out the latest promo, featuring Mory:

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Greetings all! Welcome back to the Goblin Market. I have to say, as much as I love Goblin Market and podcasting my episodes, I really didn’t want to end my vacation last Thursday. James and I had an awesome week, much of which was spent relaxing, but there comes a time in every vacation when you realize you have to get back to work simply so you can earn your next vacation.

Hopefully you will hear a vast improvement in the sound quality of this episode. I am now operating with new equipment (GO ME!) and though I am still learning daily about setting sound levels for the best quality, I am much happier with the quality of this episode than I have been with any of the others.

Before I get on with the episode, I wanted to thank the good folks over at Art By Tech Web Design for donating to Goblin Market. It was my very first donation, and much appreciated. 10% of all donations made to Goblin Market go to the Chron’s and Colitis Foundation of America (CCFA). So thanks again! I was both humbled and honored by your support!

The promo at the end of this week’s episode is for Starla Huchton’s The Dreamer’s Thread. As per usual, the intro music has been provided by Kevin MacLeod and incompetech.com, and the outtro music is provided by John Anealio.

Comments and feedback are always welcome! You can email me directly or leave comments here on the site. Also, if you are subscribed to Goblin Market through iTunes, please take a moment to leave a comment feedback. Comments and positive feedback help draw more attention to a podcast, and I always love picking up new listeners!

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Episode six of Goblin Market is here! This is the longest episode of Goblin Market yet, coming in just around 28 minutes. We get to know Him and Sir Gwydion a little better, and a few new characters as well. I hope you enjoy the episode. Feel free to leave comments or send me an email if you wish at jennybeanses@gmail.com.

Stay tuned at the end of this week’s episode for an awesome promo. James Durham’s FETIDUS, which I’ve been listening to while working. FETIDUS is an awesome audio drama! You guys will love it, I promise.

Music in this week’s intro is provided by Incompetech and Kevin MacLeod and the outtro music is “Merithyn’s Promise” by John Anealio.

Thank you all for tuning in and for your continued support. I hope you enjoy the episode.

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In which I introduce one of my all-time personal favorite characters, Him of the Green. I have always had an affinity with forest gods, and so he is modeled quite closely to the wild hunter ideal I cooked up in my head years and years ago. Humorous, witty, romantic, a little naive, yet incredibly strong.

This week I am featuring promos at the end of the episode for two of my very good friends. Michele Bekemeyer recently began podcasting her novel, Trapping a Duchess, and I have been anxiously awaiting the drop of episode three. It’s coming tomorrow, so I hear, and I can’t wait! Following the promo for Trapping a Duchess is the promo for Kate of Mind, the audio version of my friend Kate Sherrod’s Suppertime Sonnets. Both of these are excellent podcasts, so I hope you will stay tuned at the end of the episode, give a listen and then go check them out!

Music in this week’s intro is provided by Incompetech and Kevin MacLeod and the outtro music is “Merithyn’s Promise” by John Anealio.

Thank you all for tuning in. I really do appreciate the continued support. You are all awesome!

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So I learned a valuable lesson this week about posting more than one audio file at a time. While the promo James Melzer did for me was incredibly awesome, it completely trumped episode four of Goblin Market in the feeds, and I’ve been getting emails and messages since Wednesday asking if there is only a new promo this week, and not a new episode.

I apologize to everyone for the confusion and completely blame Kothar and his band of nasty goblins. Fret not, however, we the episode will prevail. I am going to delete the old post and add two new posts This one for the episode and a separate one for the promo. Thank you all for your patience and for the head’s up. And now, really without further ado, episode four of Goblin Market.

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Welcome back to the Goblin Market everyone. Thank you all for coming. Before I get on with the audio, I wanted to mention something I also brought up in my intro…

About my audio quality… I’ve gotten a lot of feedback on the quality of my audio. Thank you all for your suggestions and solutions. I really mean that. I know it’s no excuse, but I am working with substandard equipment right now and hope to be upgrading to a new mic in the next couple of weeks. I hope that the story and plot continue to draw you back and keep your interest and that you can find it in your hearts to forgive a poor girl for a little hiss… I’m working on it, I promise. Thank you again to everyone who’s made suggestions and helped with samples and software ideas. You are all awesome. I mean it. To have so many people who want to help out means a lot.

I also want to thank John Anealio, who offered the use of his original music for Goblin Market. John writes awesome songs based on science fiction/fantasy films, books and more. Please go and check out his work. It’s awesome. Sci Fi Songs. The song used during the outtro of episode three is called “Merithyn’s Promise.” Thank you, John!

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I will tell you the truth… I am a giver. Whenever possible, I do what I can to give people what they ask for, and quite a few people DMd me and sent me messages that they would like to hear a sneak peek of episode three of Goblin Market. Because I try to record early, and this episode has been sitting in my special Goblin Market folder since Saturday afternoon, I thought, sure, why not.

It’s not a very long clip, and there is no introduction or outro at all, just a four and a hlf minute snippet of the story. I hope you enjoy it, and that you tell your friends about it. I also hope to see you Wednesday when the full episode debuts around 7:30 PM EST.

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I made the mistake of joking before I went out into the hot tub for a soak that I was visiting the Goblin Market hot tub and would probably have to pay something monumental for the soak. As soon as I got in and turned on my favorite jets, I leaned back, looked up at the sky and had inspiration for a poem.

Silhouette

Silhouette
black ink tattoo
on the shoulder of the sky
moonstone rising
in a bed of
serious clouds
trimmed in white gold.
Beyond cricket song
leaves rustle
and the firefly ballet
goes on and on.
This humble moment,
worth more than jewels
and etched forever
in the stone of memory.

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Welcome back to the Goblin Market everyone. I’m so excited to see everyone lined up outside the gates this week for episode two. Thank you so much for coming.

The kickoff for the debut of my very first podiobook was a huge success. Episode one saw over 150 downloads on the first night alone, which to me was a massive win! Thank you!

I have gotten a lot of positive feedback about episode one and some interesting opportunities as a result. Stay tuned over the next couple of days for some neat stuff coming down the pipeline. In the meantime, I am enjoying hearing from everyone so please don’t hesitate to contact me. To find out how, visit the contact page.

Endless gratitude and appreciation for all of your support and encouragement!

Jenny

P.S. HUGE congratulations to my friend James Melzer, who made the biggest announcement of his career to date over on his website. GO THERE! Congratulate him and buy him a beer. He deserves it. Congratulations, James. You rock!

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Before you listen, I want you all to know how much I appreciate all of your support and encouragement as I have embarked on the podcast storyteller journey. It means a great deal to hear your praise and feedback, so thank you.

I hope you enjoy episode two of Black Velveteen, and if you liked this story, please consider checking out my podcast novel, Goblin Market

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and also for you. If you’ve been tuning into my blog, many of you already know that my friend Travis King created a website a couple weeks ago called The Black Velveteen Campaign in attempt to spread the word and try to get my short story, Black Velveteen nominated for a Nebula Award.

I really wanted to say thank you to Travis, and so I thought I would podcast the story for him and for everyone else in two parts on this fine American Independence day weekend. In truth, that is also another reason I thought it might be fun to podcast the story. Sharing my work through my website these last few months has been a very liberating thing, and kicking off the podcast for Goblin Market was truly amazing. I wanted to celebrate, and give back something else. Episode two of Black Velveteen will drop sometime tomorrow evening.

If you are a member of SFWA, and would like to help in our endeavor to get my story nominated for a Nebula Award, please check out the link in the sidebar for the Black Velveteen Campaign.

I did not include a PDF version of this story, as you can click on the Online Writing page at the top and follow a link straight to the online publication at eMuse. Hope you enjoy the story.

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Greetings from the Goblin Market, esteemed friends. Thank you so much for all of your support. I am beyond excited to finally be able to share this sneak peek at the story with you, and I hope you enjoy it.

Please ignore the instructions in the introduction asking you not to share the preview. Originally this little sneak peek was previewed by a select group of contest winners, family and loved ones. With the Goblin Market preparing to open its gates tomorrow night, I thought I’d release the preview to everyone, in hopes that it gets you all excited about what’s to come.

Thank you for your interest in my first ever podcast novel endeavor. I hope you enjoy the sneak peek and that you’ll return tomorrow night to check out the whole chapter. Now, without further ado, here is a seven inside listen to Goblin Market, episode one:

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It’s been awhile since I had a moment to record an audio poem to share, so tonight I thought I’d share a brutal little piece inspired by a walk I took recently during a thunderstorm. The mind roams free quite often, especially while I’m walking. I tend to have about 75% of my best ideas while I’m walking because I disengage from my mind and just free think. This poem is actually about a battle with the writer self… interpret as you will.

flash and flicker
follow me down the road
and my shirt is so wet
it’s a part of me now
closer than the skin
and stuck, stuck, stuck,
but I wouldn’t dare try
to pry it off or away…
I’d never want to tear
the skin or let the elements
inside to wash away
all of the important words
I’ve put together, but never
found the courage to say.
They’re only words, and really
I shouldn’t have to say them-
should never fear you’ll break them
down into about a million
other things never meant to be
heard. “It’s only rain,” you say,
and in the distance…flash and flicker
it’s like lights out and I’m
left standing alone in the dark
just listening and waiting.

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One of the things I LOVE about Twitter is that I have met literally dozens of amazing people who put themselves out there on the net each and every day with amazing new ideas, stories and projects. There is always something cool and exciting going on on Twitter, and recently I was drawn into a cool new contest called the The Great Evil Laugh Contest.

The Great Evil Laugh Contest, sponsored by my twitterpal, FETIDUS author James Durham, is offering immortality and an awesome iPod touch to the contributor with the most evil laugh. The evil laughs will be judged by a host of amazing new-media authors: J.C. Hutchins, Matthew Wayne Selznick, Seth Harwood and Corey Graham.

Where else can you win something as cool as a FETIDUS pre-loaded iPod Touch and immortality just for getting your evil laugh on? I have already entered, and can assure you that my evil knows no bounds. The competition, from what I’ve gathered, is gonna be pretty stiff, but don’t let that scare you. What you should be afraid of is the impending deadline… which is tomorrow, June 21st. GET LAUGHING PEOPLE!

For full details on how you can get your last minute laugh into the The Great Evil Laugh Contest, click the link. Go on, you know you want to. muahahhahahahaha, muahahahahahaha, muahahahahahahaha *choke… sputter…cough*

On top of this really cool audio promo for the contest:

I totally stole the YouTube video from the FETIDUS site for you to watch:

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So, today I went and I did it. I’ve been tooling around with recording this short story since just before the move, but I hadn’t had much time to try and integrate music, an intro and an outro. So, not happy with the original version of the story, I deleted it before the move and decided I’d start fresh once I was relatively settled in.

Needless to say, it is now Thursday and I have not had much time to myself to do anything fun this entire week. I had work at both jobs, writing, family responsibilities and of course, the aftermath of the move. So, today after I took the squeenager shopping for some summer digs, I came home with every intention of taking a nap. The nap never came. I laid in bed for about half an hour listening to a friend’s podcast project before I decided I had to get up and do something. ANYTHING!

The madness began there.

Of course, because I was bent on recording, and I was silly enough not to put up signs and announce that I was going to be recording, I endured a few interruptions and even some banging on the pipes and the walls in the room behind mine. Then I got a phone call, an urgent call to dinner and by the time I actually had the bulk of the recording done, I was definitely feeling frazzled. I couldn’t figure out how to align the god forsaken tracks. Fortunately, I have a very patient mentor who is always happy to help me out. Thanks guy! You rock.

Finally, I got it all lined up, got the audio and music recorded. It’s my very first attempt at something of this capacity. I know it’s not perfect and I’ve got a long way to go until I am cool like the big kids, but I’m proud of it. I also know that with practice and time, I will get better, and I can’t wait to get started on my next audio project.

So, now, without further ado, here is Clarissa’s Game. Stay tuned at the end for another interesting tidbit about a project I recently participated in with my Twitter Friend, Aaron Mystery, aka @Suckermouth.

Now, about my project with Aaron Mystery. A couple weeks back, he had popped on over to my blog and had a listen to some of my audio poem. Afterward, he emailed me a nice compliment and asked if I might be interested in combining efforts on one of his animated projects. He has a huge following over on his YouTube Channel, and when he mentioned there would be zombies involved, you know I couldn’t resist. So, I did some voice over work for him earlier this week and he is just now getting the animation put together as he has time. He revealed a tiny sneak peek today on his blog, which you can check out here: Chamber of the Zombies, Day 1. I hope you’ll pop on over and take a look, and please leave him a comment. This is going to be pretty cool, and I am honored to have been a part of it.

Clarissa’s Game by Jennifer Hudock is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Based on a work at jenniferhudock.com.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://jenniferhudock.com.

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Yesterday morning, I woke up in my new apartment still clutching the base of the flag I had stuck in this new world I’ve claimed for me own. I shall call this world, Anew.

After a strenuous weekend of heavy lifting, body bruising and literally running around like a chicken with my head cut off, I am relatively settled into my new place with only a handful of boxes left to unpack. There are still big things to move into storage when the time comes, but for now, I can settle into my new situation and strategize how to tackle that stuff later.

I’ve discovered a number of things over the weekend. For example:

1. Dogs do not like to move.
2. Bones are incredibly resilient, my calcium must not be so bad as all that.
3. Bruises are pretty cool battle scars (come on, man, I’m internally bleeding, but still alive.)
4. A big change can both inspire and drive a person to do amazing things.
5. I am in desperate need of a new office chair.
6. A person is only as free as:
a. she allows herself to be
b. her situation allows her to be

Of course there were dozens of little revelations, but the above few were the most pressing. Which, in reflection seems a little odd. There were no incredible revelations. While I definitely woke up in awe of the steps I have taken to grab my situation by the horns and show it who was boss, for the most part there is just this incredible sense of calm coupled with a drive to embrace the woman I have always been, but felt too suppressed to embody on a regular basis.

I won’t lie. There were moments last week that I began to doubt my sanity and my decision. Was I really ready to run out into the world and take charge of my life? What if I wasn’t strong enough (HA!)… what if I wasn’t able (yeah right)…what if my sense of self-amazingness was just the result of an overblown ego and I really wasn’t all that amazing (pfft…)… Well, the funny thing about that is in the face of doubt I listened. I opened myself up to the universe and listened to what it had to say. And that very same day, I sold my short story to a publisher. To me, that was a total, “Hello, this is the universe calling, I have a message for Jenny…” moment.

I answered the call. And I’m going to keep answering the phone whenever the universe calls. Because that’s what you have to do. Otherwise you spend what little time you have here in your body/life doubting your purpose, your reason, your drive… yourself, which seems a silly thing to do now that I’m on the steps of this new life looking back at what I’ve left behind.

Over the next week I will be unveiling some awesome details about the plans I have. I hope to have the promised short story podcasted before the end of this week. I also start working on a new novel tomorrow, and can’t wait to get writing, as it’s going to be awesome. I am working on edits on my fantasy/adventure novel that I hope to begin podcasting this summer. Stay tuned for details. I’m very excited, and it is literally one of my proudest works. I absolutely cannot wait to share it with you.

And now, I leave you with a reflective poem I wrote just two days before I started moving. It’s called “Cancer.” I think it encompasses how I felt about the stagnation in my life rather well.

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It’s human nature to sit back in your chair, or even just in your moment and sigh the words, “There are just not enough hours in the day.” Life can seem like a tight squeeze, especially if you are prone to running wild through your days, working one or two jobs on top of trying to make a creative dent in the universe. This has happened to me more times than I would like to admit. The day job gets me down, my errands overrun my time, and the hours I set aside for writing balance almost as well as a nearly finished Jenga game at the end of a long day. Some nights, the pieces and plots I plan to toy with fall down on top of me and suffocate me, and other nights, I push them away altogether, too tired to play along.

As I have been packing up my life and moving into a new space, the exhaustion of every day towers over me, but I know it’s only temporary. Despite the struggles to find enough time to think straight, I have managed to write several poems, several thousand words on various works in progress and I’ve even finished a scant few. I’ve had work accepted for publication, and I’ve been secretly plotting world domination behind closed doors. More details on that endeavor to come down the line I hope in the next couple of weeks.

The thing is, no matter how many “hours” we have our day, those hours are what we make them. If you find yourself feeling too tired at the end of the day to squeeze in the things that really matter, rearrange your schedule if you can. Write on the subway, pen a poem during your lunch hour, if you have a long commute alone, carry a microcassette recorder and talk out your ideas–hell, you could even write a whole book this way, and then transcribe it when you’re done.

And if you aren’t able to rearrange your time as easily, think about how you are selling yourself short when you deny the exercise of your creative endeavors. Yes, you’re tired, but it only takes about an hour to crack out 1000 words. Stay up later, or get up an hour earlier. Make more time to cater to that which really matters to you, and in the end, those things will make you more time. And I’m not just talking about money and security, but all the success gurus say it again and again: “Do what you love and the money will follow.” Dedicate yourself to the life you deserve.

This doesn’t just apply to creative endeavors, either. Apply it to anything. If you want to run marathons, make time to run. If you want to start a business, set aside time to devote to it. For me personally, this means more time writing, more time creating and sharing my work with the world.

That said, just like yesterday, today is a big, important day. It is the first day of the rest of my awesometacular life and I’m going to do everything I can to make it the best one ever. So, what about you? What have you done today to make your life your own?

“Steps” an original poem by Jennifer Hudock

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Wouldn’t it be nice if everything in life were a guarantee. If we never had questions or moments of doubt? If there was no such thing as uncertainty? Unfortunately, there is. Even with guidance, we stand against doubt and uncertainty all the time and brave the future. Some are weak, cowering in the wake of the unknown, fretting and fearing what may come. What if it is painful? What if it kills me? What if I fail?

Others draw their Hatori Hanzo sword and walk like Samurai fearlessly into the unknown with every intention of killing Bill. They do not fret about the unknown. They do not worry about pain, death or failure. They simply exist in conjunction with those things. They are very real possibilities, and in many cases inevitable, but you have to be a warrior no matter what.

I don’t know about you, but I want to be a warrior, and the only way to do that is to battle against uncertainty with ferocity. To get out there every single day and Kill that bastard Bill, who would take away everything you want and know inside that you deserve just to see you squirm like a worm under his thumb.

And so, I hope you’ll join me today in pummeling uncertainty. Take into hand that which you deserve and be amazing. Because you are amazing. I know it, you know it, and soon the world will know it too.

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For the last three days, I have been walking around singing songs from NIN’s Pretty Hate Machine. It blows my mind that the cd is almost 18 years old, and that it has literally been a part of my life on so many levels. Funny, the things we carry with us all through life.

I bring this up, not only because I’ve been walking around randomly shouting out the words, “I am justified… I am purified… I am sanctified… inside you…” for the last three days, but because I remember distinctly, how influential Pretty Hate Machine was on my poetry as a teenager. I actually came across a notebook full of teen angst poetry while I was packing, only to discover some hilarious angsty poetry from 1993… which incidentally was a very good year. I will not be posting any, at least not anytime soon. The notebook I speak of has been packed away and carried off to the new apartment. Maybe in a few weeks, I’ll dig some out and we’ll all have a good giggle. I will leave you with a little audio for a poem I wrote called “Burn Scar.”

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While I was in college, I took every English Literature course I could get my hands on. Not because I was an English major, that was obvious, but because I would have taken nothing but English Literature courses in college if they hadn’t insisted that mathematics, science and that other stuff were equally important in the course of a well-rounded education.

Of all the Literature courses I took, there was one that I never quite got over… it was in my next to last semester, and while the professor was brilliant and well-respected, the subject matter bored the crud out of me. It was a combined course on the works of Virginia Woolf and T.S. Eliot, both of whom I’d admired before taking this course, but now they bore me to tears if I even think about either of them too long.

A couple of months ago, I was actually thinking about Virginia Woolf, and her feminine liberation work, how “A Room of Her Own” is almost as popular among feminist literature as the “Vagina Monolugues,” and being the least feminist person I know, the following poem came out:

Pocket Full of Rocks

Sometimes I wonder
what did Leonard think
when he went looking
for Virginia…
pockets filled with rocks
mouth heavy with sand
unstable beauty
trapped like a woman
with a room all her own.
She had to pay for it
out of her own pcoket
because the days of
patronage have long gone.
Besides, no great sister to Bill
was she, no hidden
talent. Just a girl
with a room of her own
who paid with her
life for the key.

Virginia Woolf’s suicidal tendencies have always fascinated me. Combined with the twisted stories we had to endure about T.S. Eliot’s insane wife’s uterine issues, I literally felt that both women were crude examples of strength. I actually found myself wondering how Woolf later became such a strong advocate for the feminist movement, especially considering that she spent most of her life trying to kill herself.

Completely random and unrelated to anything actually going on in my life, but I was thinking about Virgina Woolf this afternoon while packing up some books, and thought she and the poem I wrote about her might make for an interesting blog post.

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Birthdays come and go, sometimes so quickly that as we lean in to blow out the candles on this year’s cake, we feel as though the moment blended into last year’s wish. Maybe we even wished the same thing this year as we did last, and we are still waiting for it to come true.

This year, I did not have cake or candles, not that I’m complaining. The people who care about and love me made sure that I felt extra special today, and took time out to let me know how much I meant to them. Who needs wishes when you have such wonders? But just in case, I lit a match tonight, closed my eyes and made my wish before blowing it out. It’s my birthday. Why not?

In reflection, I have accomplished more this year than I imagined for myself. I spent the entire year working as a freelance writer. I managed to complete and send out a few short stories. I put a lot of hard work and time into eMuse, and devoted as much time as I could to helping the people I love and believe in get closer to their own dreams. I took my life into my own hands this year, and realized my own worth. None of it has been easy. In fact, quite a bit of what I’ve done in the last year has been a challenge, but all of it made me stronger.

Thank you to all of my wonderful friends, family and loved ones who reached out today to let me know how much I mean to you. I am truly blessed to have such amazing people in my life, and I mean it when I say I love and appreciate every single one of you more than you could ever know.

On that note, I’m going to go crawl into bed and get a good night’s sleep, so I can start my first full day in the next year of my life. The tarot cards tell me it’s gonna be a good one. I can’t wait.

Before I go to bed, here is another original audio poem. I have been loving audacity, and hope to expand my audio horizons. I hope you enjoy the poem.

Exhale

Wrapped in the silence of this moment
and the darkness like a blanket
draws me near
unseeing, still I close my eyes
and listen for the sound of you
whispering, “There is nothing to fear.”
Breath against skin, I draw in
ragged gasps, startled by the touch
of my own hair caressing my cheek
when you exhale.

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