Alex Bledsoe

The Siren (age 13), the mater familias and I went to the bookstore yesterday. When we got home and disembarked, the Siren asked, "Am I the only one in the family who can get out of the car without groaning?"

YES. Yes, you are.

Big thanks to @inkcapbooks.bsky.social for hosting SUMMERWEEN Thursday night, and extra thanks to the Siren for helping me read the opening passage of DANDELION. Lots of laughs and fun for everyone, especially the writers (me, Melissa F. Olson, Tyler Welch, and Christopher Micklos).

Yeah, I just noticed the very tips of one of the maples in our yard have started to turn. It's early, but dang, I'm ready for fall.

Hee. Have a character named "Baptista," and I just mistakenly typed it as "Batpisa." Now I have a new Renaissance Italian superhero, who fights evil while perpetually leaning 4 degrees off vertical.

"Epic speak," the way characters talk in old Hollywood period films like BEN-HUR, can sneak up on you. I just found that I'd written, "I know nothing of the gossip in Borgo San Sepulcro."

Ack. Changed to, "I don't know any gossip from Borgo San Sepulcro," which is how actual human beings talk.

In this first draft, it's tricky to remember that in the Renaissance, the trade of "artist" did not yet exist; there were painters, sculptors, tradesmen, etc., but no one claimed to be an "artist" as a career. Have to watch how I refer to my characters, and how they refer to each other.

YouTube video by Netflix Troll 2 | Official Teaser | Netflix

I really liked the first TROLL movie (still on Netflix, I'm sure) so I'm guardedly optimistic about the sequel.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=HF3N...

YouTube video by Attractions Magazine Star Wars Coke Collaboration Short Film Commercial

I love the new STAR WARS Coke commercial, but in its depiction of a theater full of hardcore fans all getting along and celebrating each other, it's as much a space fantasy as the movies. IMO.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Rh2...

The 1st season of the original PERRY MASON series had...wait for it...39 EPISODES. One producer, usually one writer. Now we have dozens of producers per show, a whole roomful of "writers," and we get 6, maybe 10 episodes a season if we're lucky?

Tell me again how this is a golden age of television.

We have a 100+ years old house, so cooling it when there’s a heat dome is a challenge. Which is why my daughter just yelled to my wife, “I can’t hear you, there are SO MANY FANS!”

Thank you, Elana! That is so kind of you. ❤️

Hee! ❤️

I'm not gay but I remember the 80s, and you're right.

I'm so sorry. I know this pain. Hugs upon hugs, brother.

My 13-yr-old asked me to come show her how to cut the cheese. When I stopped laughing (both at the question, and at the idea that she, of all people, would need me to show her how), it turned out she literally did need me to show her how to cut a slice from a block of cheddar.

I was just listening to a 1958 song by the Olympics, "Big Boy Pete," and it included the lyric, "before I tan your hide."

That takes me back...

...because those are some of the bravest people I’ve ever met. So if you need someone to accept you as you are, listen to your problems, try to give sensible advice if you ask for it, & tell you endless dad jokes, hit me up. And close the door, are you trying to air condition the whole street? (2/2)

I first made this offer during Pride Month in 2020, and it still stands:

I’m a big believer in family of choice. So if you need one, I’m offering to be your substitute dad; and even more particularly, I’m offering to be your substitute Southern dad, for any LGBTQIA+ people from down south...(1/2)

Next-to-Last of the Tiger Men and Mack's Last Rhino Amazon.com: Next-to-Last of the Tiger Men and Mack's Last Rhino eBook : Bledsoe, Alex: Kindle Store

Just a reminder that if you've got Kindle Unlimited, you can get two of my short stories featuring big-game hunters Linda Fontana and T.S. Bunch for free right now. Hemingway-esque by way of Peter Hathaway Capstick and, of course, me.
www.amazon.com/Next-Last-Ti...

Thanks so much, Ian! That's one of the best compliments a writer can get: that they helped another writer.

YouTube video by RogueBladesPresents 24 in 42 with Alex Bledsoe

Thanks to Jason M Waltz of Rogue Blades Entertainment for having me on his 24 in 42 podcast! It was blast talking shop with him.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=CV1L...

My daughter (age 13) and I are both working our way through S.E. Hinton's novels, and then watching the movies based on them. I haven't read them since...well, I was close to her age, but I have to say, Hinton is a buzzsaw of emotion and pacing that we could all learn from.

I put a map in one of my fantasy novels because, like you, it felt like I should, but I made it ludicrous. Ex. my hero has an idea while he's peeing behind a tree, so the map has a spot marked "Eddie's Pee Epiphany."

I wish this place (and all social media) had a function where you could just block "politics" in general, and not have to set up blocks for every permutation of names, parties, etc. I'm here for books, movies, writing, art, and science.

Mysteries of Scotland with Alex Bledsoe

I've had to sit on this for a while, but I can finally share it.

www.tracelesstours.com/tours/myster...

I'm specifically needing horse-related info from the early Italian Renaissance. Can you help?

I think there *is* a bun bedazzler, but it's meant for asses.

Good on you! I passed that in 2008, and now I've been sober longer than I was actually a drinker. It makes a huge chunk of our lives seem slightly unreal, doesn't it?

I've been burning a hole in Google today, filling in all the <NAME OF HORSE BREED> and <TYPE OF HAT> things I'd put down in the first draft. Making a file of all the answers, too, because I know I'll need to refer to it later. A smarter me would've done this at the start.

Yep.