It’s been suggested by a dear friend that I should stop yammering on in endless blogs and begin introducing you to my actual writing. After I let said friend out of a textbook sleeper-hold, I revived her with smelling salts and demanded to know what the fuck she meant by that?

H:  Well your blogs are very cute, AJ, but … it’s not “real writing”.

That’s right, she went there: the double-whammy of cute and “not real writing”, peppered with audible air quotes. DREAD! HORROR! BIG OWIES! I blinked rapidly, wondering how many people could place me here today if it became a crime scene.

AJ *slow-spreading smile*: Hey, H? C’mere for a sec.

H: Holy shit, what moron gave you the garden claw?

AJ: I’m “weeding”. Ya, hear them air quotes? Suck real bad, don’t they?

But she was right, so I let her live to read for me another day. Miss H is entirely irreplaceable, in that her sometimes-stinging support drives me to do my best. Blogging is writing, but it isn’t what I do. I wouldn’t call myself a “blogger”. I am a “writer”. Blogging is not what I endeavour to master, nor is it what I spend most of my time working on.

Sooooo, once a month or so, I’ll pop up an excerpt of my current WIP (work in progress), or a short story, or poetry (ha! OK I tried to say that with a straight face, but you won’t see anything remotely poetic comin’ from these grey cells, no sir), or a wee flash fiction … starting today, with the horror short BOTTOMS UP. I hope you enjoy. Comments/criticism always welcome, and probably I won’t hit you with a shovel if your words cockslap me in the soul  (warning: fingers may or may not be crossed behind my back).