The Goon Factor

[Jon McDonald]

Gotta admit it.  I'm a first class goon.  As an author my publisher pleads with me to get out there and work the social media.  She advises me to go to the Yahoo groups and get in there and work them with sizzle and shine.  She wants me to blog - which I am doing right now,  don't ya see - she wants me on Facebook, Twitter and all the rest.  But I am totally helpless and clueless.  I have shunned these exercises like they were infected with a twelfth century plague.  We seem to be undated with a constant wash of personal agendas all screaming IN CAPITAL LETTERS demanding our dwindling attentions.  I really don't care about what you had for lunch or if you brushed your teeth or not.  And I am for damn sure no one cares what I do about these activities.  Am I crazy?  Am I alone thinking like this?  But...but...but I'm a reclusive writer.  All I want to do is work on my latest book or story.  How am I expected to do that if I have to be doing all this other stuff as well?

Sigh.  I should have been born a whole lot earlier, or at least started writing earlier.  I know, it's an age thing.  If I were twenty I would be all over it, but I'm 70 for chriz sake.  Leave me alone in my stupor and backwardness.  I can't be out there pushing myself like a used car salesman.  Give me a personal break.

So, I shall make this blog mercifully short and hopefully sweet.  I have had my little say.  So if  I disappear into the cyber void so be it.  For those of you who are adept at these activities I wish you well, and forgive this goon who continues to stumble along in the darkness.  But hey, I did learn to write on a computer.  That's gotta count for something.  Right?

[Susan Drury]

It does seem that social media is now the way to go for instant advertising so I don't blame publishers and agents for wanting their authors to participate, but it certainly does make the business of writing different. And so easy for these venues to hijack one's time. Not only in writing, but in reading and as you said, so much of it is silly stuff. And so many blogs contain silly information for the sake of getting something new written on the blog. I like the simplicity of your blog.