Wow, I haven't posted much here lately, have I? I guess that's because I'm busy, but it's also because I hate to talk about myself. (Kind of defeats the purpose of blogging, doesn't it?)

Anyway, with the year half-over, I'm starting to think about where I want to take my writing in the second half of Oh-Eight. Along those lines, here are some goals I have for the next few months:

• I'd like to find one more regular environmental journalism client. My two current gigs each have a tight editorial focus, which is great, but there's so much more exciting work being done outside of those two topics that I'd love to write about.
  


• I'd also like one more regular marketing client. I do a ton of PR, but I'd enjoy the variety of writing more web content or ad campaigns.


• More print work. Right now, 90% of my bylined work is appearing online. I'd like to see a few more articles in print magazines toward the end of the year. (On the other hand, this means storing contributor's copies, and I'm trying to whittle down the amount of stuff I have clogging up the old homestead, so maybe this isn't the best idea...)
  


• More fiction!!!! I need to start devoting a few hours a week to personal, creative work. I have promised several new stories to people, but I just haven't been able to get to them. I need to stop procrastinating and start writing.
  


• I'd really enjoy writing about comics at some point this year. Reviews, features, interviews, something like that. Or hell, maybe actually writing an actual comics script or two.
  


• Speaking of which, I need to get back to my cartooning. I had a few productive months early in the year, but I haven't picked up a pen or pencil since April. Even my sketchbook is gathering dust. Gotta break out of that block.

There. That oughta keep me busy.

So, what are your current goals?

Here's a milestone I didn't see coming -- I just added the 500th Extinction Blog story over at Plenty Magazine's web site.

A little over half of those stories are archives from the days when I was publishing the blog myself, but I have written 238 new stories since moving to Plenty last June.

Writing Extinction Blog is often challenging, always rewarding, and frequently depressing, but it remains the assignment I am most passionate about. I wish there was no need for it to exist at all, but I'll keep writing it for another 5,000 entries if I have to.

I interviewed Robert J. Sawyer, Douglas Preston, Lincoln Child, Mike Resnick, Paul Barnett and Lawrence Watt-Evans for an article in this month's issue of Today's Engineer magazine. It's now available online here. I hope you'll check it out!

As we approach a snowed-in weekend (one foot and counting!), I thought I'd take a moment to reflect on a pretty good week:

• I actually wrote an entirely new short story on Tuesday, something I haven't done in months. Yay me!
• I have also started a new story collaboration with one of my old partners in crime. It feels good to have the old creative juices flowing again.
• I launched my webcomic on Monday -- and it's already getting pretty decent readership. More yay!
• Speaking of which, I went through my cartoon archives and found enough finished gags to keep it going for four to six weeks already, which gives me time to finish some new drawings without too much stress.
• Unfortunately, I can't find some good drawings that I know I should have around here somewhere. They're probably still packed in a box after last year's move, which makes me want to tear the entire house apart until I find them. But even the thought of doing that makes me tired, so I think I'll just draw new cartoons instead.
• Getting my cartoons ready for the webcomic has taught me a lot about computer graphics, which has been both fun and frustrating.
• I'm very happy with this week's Extinction Blog entries, which covered some really interesting topics. (Now if I could just get people to start commenting more on the blog...)
• Man, I wrote a lot of press releases this week!
• Just as I was afraid a start-up I did some marketing work for had already gone under already -- without paying me -- a check arrived. One more yay!
• I started brainstorming six articles that are due next Friday, and they're going to be really fun to write. (I'll start the actual wordsmithing on Monday.)
• Rural life means no at-home mail delivery, and heavy snow since Wednesday means no driving to the post office. Man, I'm itching for some mail, but I might have to wait to pick it up until Monday. No fair!
• I won $200 in the Lions Club's annual raffle on Super Bowl Sunday -- but I donated it back to the club. I hope I don't need that money later this month!
• I'm having a lot of fun helping to start up a new Interact Club for the local Rotary. It's intended to teach high-school age kids how to do good in their community and internationally by raising funds and running charitable projects. We're just in the organizational phase now, and will start up for real in September. I think we'll be able to do some good and I'm looking forward to working with the kids.
• And now I'm hungry for lunch!

How was your week?

Last night, I saw something that chilled me to the bones: a commercial for Fox's new reality show, "Anchorwoman," which follows a buxom, blond bikini model as she becomes the newest news anchor at a Texas TV station. How sad and horrifying to see yet another example of how far American TV news has fallen.