The SoapBoxers

Who Killed Breitbart?  His Heart.

It’s been a week since conservative leader Andrew Breitbart died.  At the time, I asked a friend of mine how long it would be before conspiracy theories started circulating about his death.  It took only a few days before people were saying that the Obama administration had Breitbart whacked.  While it’s fun to spin the theories, sometimes 43 year old men simply die.  My brother was only a bit older when he died due to heart issues.  It happens.

Now, if Rush Limbaugh and Bill O’Reilly both turn up dead in the next week, then I’ll agree that we should be taking a long hard look at this.  But until that happens, I’d suggest that Breitbart’s fans celebrate his life rather than trying to indict the president for murder.

The Billionaires Club

Mitt Romney picked up six wins on Super Tuesday, Rick Santorum picked up three, and Newt Gingrich won Georgia (the state he represented in congress).  It’s interesting to note that Santorum and Gingrich each have their own person billionaire funneling tons of money to them via SuperPACs.  This is completely legal.  However, the existence of the SuperPACs means that both can stay in the race even if they aren’t receiving decent fundraising support from anyone else.  In previous years, lack of funding likely would have pushed one of them out of the race by now, leaving the other to go head to head with Mitt Romney.  Head to head with Romney, either of them would have a chance.  But as it stands, they are splitting the non-Romney vote and are coming up short.  Romney can get a plurality in a three candidate race, but would likely have problems gaining a majority in a two candidate race.

Peyton Manning

After 14 years in Indianapolis, the Colts cut Peyton Manning.  The Colts are catching a lot of flak for this move, with many saying that they haven’t been loyal to the player who had built the franchise.

It’s true that Peyton Manning took over a team that sucked and turned it into a great team – largely due to the fact that he’s a stud quarterback.

But bear in mind that the Colts paid Peyton $26.4 million last year – when he didn’t play a down.  He was due to get a $28 million roster bonus if he wasn’t cut.  This isn’t some sort of pro-rated amount that would allow the Colts to wait around a month or two to see how Manning was doing – it was $28 million all at once.  If Manning didn’t play in 2012, this would have meant the Colts has paid $54.4 million for absolutely no on-field production.  Even if money wasn’t an issue, NFL teams are bound by a salary cap, and that sort of a cap hit would make it very hard to maintain a successful team.

If I were Irsay, I’d try to sign Manning to a one year deal with a low base salary and hefty incentives.  If he plays, he makes decent money.  If he doesn’t, then the cost is minimal.

Are the Colts right to go after Andrew Luck in the draft?  Certainly.  Even if Manning were to play this year, at some point soon he’ll be at the end of his career.  There’s no guarantee that the Colts will be able to get a player of Luck’s caliber in a later draft (in fact, it’s very unlikely, as a healthy Manning means a better team and a worse draft pick).  You need to take the bird in the hand.  I also tend to be a fan of having a young QB carry a clipboard for a year or two,  While a handful of recent QB have had success being thrown into the fire, historically, this has burned a lot of teams.

I love to read, but it often comes in fits and starts, generally dependent on how easily my kids go to bed (which directly affects the amount of free time I have).  I’ve been doing a bit more reading lately, and have purchased  fair number of books lately.  Here’s a quick rundown of a few.

I’ve been buying almost exclusively for my Kindle lately … great little device.
 

 

11/22/63 by Stephen King

I really enjoy King’s writing, but my favorite books of his are the ones he writes outside of the horror genre.  Perhaps my all-time favorite is Apt Pupil, although Shawshank Redemption is also quite good.  FYI: you can find both of these novellas in King collection Different Seasons.  Buy it.  Now.

In 11/22/63, the protagonist, Jake Epping (current day resident), receives a call from the owner of his favorite greasy spoon.  The guy has found a portal into the past.  He’s become too sick to take advantage of it, but wants Jake to go into the portal and save the life of John F. Kennedy.  I’m 20% of the way into this book and loving every page so far.  Really nothing supernatural about it, aside from the whole aspects of time travel (and I’m a sucker for a good time travel novel).  I’m beginning to have some thoughts about a few characters in the book and might have an idea about a sub-plot that might develop, but it’s far too early to tell if I’m right or wrong.
 

Enough Rope by Lawrence Block

Enough Rope is an omnibus of short stories by mystery grandmaster Lawrence Block.  The wheels on the omnibus do indeed go round and round.  The stories include popular Block characters Bernie Rhodenbarr, Matt Scudder, Keller, Tanner, and Chip Harrison, as well as dozens of other stories.  It’s nearly 900 pages in hardcover.

I’ve actually talked about the book before.  Probably more than once.  Until recently, it held a fairly unique distinction of being one of just a handful of books that I owned in paperback and hardcover.

Now, it is the only book that I own in three formats.  I finally broke down and bought the Kindle edition.  Yeah, it’s that good.
 

 

What it Was by George Pelecanos

With several dozen (eh, probably as many as a hundred) books in my “yet to be read” queue, I buy a book from an author I had never heard of before.  I must have had a very good reason for doing that, right?

Well, yeah.  Lawrence Block told me to.  Here’s a pro tip: if you want me to buy your book, have Lawrence Block say something nice about it.

Also, the pre-order price was just 99 cents (and as of Feb 28, 2012, it’s at that price again).  I’ll gamble a dollar on an unfamiliar author.

Like 11/22/63, What it Was is also set in the past (1970s), but via the normal method (by having the author set in in that period) rather than time travel.
 

A Changed Man by Martin Kelly

Ok, I’ll be honest with you on this one. I didn’t actually buy this book.  I have a publisher’s copy, since I’m the publisher.  As the regular readers know, Martin is a longtime writer for this site.  A few years ago, he knocked out A Changed Man during the month long NaNoWriMo event.  He’s been refining it ever since.  Last week, he flipped me the Word file, and a few days later, it had been Kindleized.

The book is about how a man reclaims his life after being involved in a serious accident.  He was drunk and the other driver died.  I’m not very far in yet (Martin’s going head to head with 11/22/63, and Stephen King’s a tough draw in the “books Kosmo is reading” bracket), but I like what I’ve read so far.  I’m definitely wondering why the DA dropped the charges, though.  I’m sure there’s a reason, and look forward to finding the answer and exploring more about John Lickler’s life.
 

 

OK, now let’s turn the tables.  Which books have YOU bought lately  – and what are you currently reading?

Image via Wikipedia

Oh, joy.  Random odds and ends in today’s column 🙂

I’ve finished off  a free freelance jobs in the past couple of weeks.  I have a pretty decent backlog of articles and could keep pretty busy with the freelance work if my schedule allowed for it.  While The Soap Boxers makes a negligible amount of money, it’s nice to have freelance gigs where I get paid.  The cash is nice, but so is the underlying meaning – someone things my writing is good enough to pay me for it.

Johnny Goodman wrote an interesting article and submitted it to me.  You won’t be seeing it on The Soap Boxers, though.  I found a market for the article and brokered the sale for him.  It’s Johnny’s first professional sale, and he’s nearly as happy about it as I am.  I guess technically it makes me a literary agent.

The murder-suicide in Washington state saddened me greatly.  Unfortunately, we’ve had a couple of case of parents killing kids in Iowa City in the last few years.  As a parent, I find it extremely disturbing.  Personally, one of the strangest details about the whole incident is that he emailed family and friends about where his money was and how to get utilities shut off (I’m guessing the gas company is going to shut off gas supply to the raging inferno without being explicitly asked).  So he was able to think through all these insignificant details, but overlooked that whole “killing my kids is very bad” aspect?

Rick Santorum picked up wins in Minnesota, Missouri, and Colorado.  Mitt Romney finished second in Missouri and Colorado, but third in Minnesota (Ron Paul was second).  Gingrich wasn’t on the ballot in Missouri and failed to hit 15% in the other states.  At the moment, it looks like Romney, Santorum, and Gingrich will all stick around for a while.  Santorum and Gingrich would be better off if one of them dropped out, and it would allow the “anyone but Romney” faction to consolidate behind one candidate instead of fracturing the vote.  I suppose Ron Paul is also taking votes from someone.

Scouts from the Baltimore Orioles have been banned from attending games in South Korea after signing a 17 year old who hadn’t yet begun his senior year of high school.  While Major League Baseball allows teams to sign foreign players (those not subject to the draft) at age 16.  However, the governing body of Korean baseball does not allow players to interact with professional teams until their last year of school (applicable to both high school and college players).

The band Alabama is touring once again, sans longtime drummer Mark Herndon (there was a lawsuit over some royalties).  I’m hoping to see some new music from the guys very soon, but will definitely miss Mark’s drumming.  I’m a huge fan of the group, owning more than 30 of their albums (including some very hard to find stuff).  I’ve been reacquainting myself with a lot of their work lately, and can’t help but enjoy some of the forgotten songs from their albums – such as Pete’s Music City, Pony Express, and Clear Across America Tonight.  None are signature hits for the group, but these songs – and dozens of other – are very enjoyable to listen to.  Hard to believe that some of these songs are 25-30 years old.

The Pony Express has a special place in the history of this country.  Care to guess how long it was in operation?  10 years?  5 years?  Nah – a mere 18 months.

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Keep Yo’ Mouth Shut!

The Super Bowl is over, and the only thing being talked about today is Tom Brady’s wife, Gisele, throwing fellow Patriot teams members under the bus.

There are a few different videos with audio (I am assuming they are taken on camera phones) of Gisele leaving her luxury box seats at the Super Bowl and waiting to get onto an elevator. In the background you can hear what to me sounds like an inebriated New York Giants fan yelling at her and bashing on the Patriots and her husband in particular.(wait, this is a news flash, an obnoxious Newww Yahkahhhh yelling at someone, no way this could possibly be happening!)

Gisele is heard firing back “You (have) to catch the ball when you’re supposed to catch the ball,” she takes a drink of bottled water. “My husband cannot [expletive] throw the ball and catch the ball at the same time. I can’t believe they dropped the ball so many times.”

Granted I think if someone was yelling at me about my spouse or my kid immediately following a sporting event, I would take it rather personal as well. I would likely not be very pleased about it and I would likely think pretty long and hard about firing back some verbal salvos of my own.

But….you are married to whom many claim to be the “greatest quarterback of all-time” You are a Super Model. You are constantly in the news, chased by paparazzi, and frankly, you know better.

This should make for some interesting locker room conversations between Brady, Wes Welker, Aaron Hernandez, and Deion Branch – – who it could be argued all did drop catchable passes late in the game.

I doubt this will go away quietly. Football season is over and the New York/New England Media has to have something sports related to talk about.

Greatest of All Time?

Last night, in the wake of another road loss at the hands of the Philadelphia 76ers, Kobe Bryant passes Shaquille O’Neal on the NBA career scoring list and now sits all alone in 5th place all-time with 28,601 points. He trails just Wilt Chamberlin, Michael Jordan, Karl Malone and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, although he sits nearly 10,000 points behind Jabbar at this point.

Kobe is 33 years old and had been able to achieve a lot of scoring success as he was drafted right out of high school by the Lakers. Last night on television, Earvin “Magic” Johnson proclaimed him the “Greatest Laker of All-Time” That is high praise coming from Johnson who many concede would be the current holder that title.

The fact is that Kobe will likely end up on top of the career scoring list, will have a fistful of NBA Championship rings, a myriad of All Star Game appearances and even an MVP title.

As with all sports some will argue he is the best ever, some naysayers will dispute that as a possibility.

If he stays healthy he is at least in the conversation of being considered the greatest player in the history of the NBA.

Until Next time….Stay classy Octagon, Alabama!
 

Today we sit on the precipice of one of the most hallowed days of the year – Groundhog Day.  It’s your day, Phil.  The world will be watching.

And you better do the right thing.  I know where you live.  Once you come out of your hole, you aren’t going back in.

How can I be so certain?  One word.

Quikrete.

Lots of Quikrete in your hole as soon as you take two steps outside.  You might as well enjoy the sunshine, because you can’t go home again, you little rat.  Not unless bust out the concrete with a jackhammer.

I want my spring, Phil, and I want it now.  If you dare to sic more winter on me, we’ll be having groundhog-ka-bobs for dinner tonight.

Super Bowl Media Day

An action packed week of sports as we are in the week leading up to the Super Bowl. The Giants and the Patriots are in Indianapolis where the main story still seems to be the future of Peyton Manning. Sadly this has overshadowed the Super Bowl in terms of media coverage. However, we are all in luck, today is Super Bowl Media day. Media day is the biggest train wreck of any media coverage in any sport at any venue. This might be pure marketing genius by the NFL as it is the closest thing to reality TV morphing with sports.

This year the NFL has handed out a little over 2000 press credentials as well as sold tickets to fans that want to come and watch the three ring circus.

In addition to what I would consider “legitimate” media from the networks, the sports channels, magazines etc., there will be folks there from late night talk shows, the entertainment industry, guys in dresses and people in costumes. You may even see a sasquatch or Batman.

I would say it is safe to surmise that the sportswriters and reporters resent the fact that this thing has turned more into an “event” than a true media setting.

Would love to see what the green jackets at Augusta would do if this happened at the Masters….

Super Bowl Wagering

No one expected the Giants to be here. Certainly not the Las Vegas sports books.

The Giants were as high as 250 to 1 on odds to win the Super Bowl this year after their four game slide. Even as they entered the playoffs they were still as high as 80 to 1 to win it all. There are a lot of casinos standing to lose a lot of money if the Giants win this game.

The other side of betting that is always interesting is the variety of proposition bets that take place for the Super Bowl. These are not wagers available on just any football game. You can bet on items such as who wins the coin toss, the first player to score, which team will score first, the number of catches, passing yards, penalties…..just about anything you can imagine.

There are also a bunch of wagers you would never imagine! The Color of Madonna’s hair at the halftime show, the length of the National Anthem sang by Kelly Clarkson, – even what color Gatorade the winning coach will be doused with. Vegas has way more action on these bets than they do on people just wagering on the game. The fun part is that ANYONE watching the game can place these bets and play along, there is really not much skill in most of these wagers and the luck factor is pretty high.

Ok, the Actual game itself

This game does not seem to be as hyped as in prior years. Maybe because the front running Packers were ousted early in the playoffs after going 15-1 during the regular season.
The New York Giants are arguably the hottest team right now, beating opponents who had a better regular season record in each of their three previous playoff games. The Patriots have quite possibly the worst statistical defense of a team to ever make the Super Bowl. They do however have 3 time winner in QB Tom Brady. The Giants have the hottest trio of young receivers in the league, a vaunted pass rush, and a solid running game, but a much worse record and are a big underdog.

The Patriots three losses this year came at the hands of teams with Top Tier Quarterbacks. They lost to the Steelers and Ben Roethlisberger, they lost earlier in the year to the Giants and Eli Manning, and they lost to the Bills and Ryan Fitzpatrick when he was on an early season heater (ok, ok…two of the Quarterbacks are elite) Not sure I like the Giants to win, but I do like them to keep it close.

Now pass the little smokies and chips and salsa. I am looking forward to a great game this weekend.

Until Next Time, Stay Classy Indianapolis!
 

As millions of students have already realized, Wikipedia is down today (January 18, 2012).  Did Wikipedia forget to pay their electric bill?

Nope, nothing like that.  Wikipedia and other big (and small) sites are participating in a blackout to protest SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act).  When the calendar flips to Thursday, Wikipedia will once again be live.

The intent of SOPA, sponsored by Texas congressman Lamar Smith, is to aid law enforcement agencies in their fight against intellectual property violations.  That sounds like a great thing, right?

The problem is that the government could shut down sites that are allegedly violating intellectual property laws without significant due  process.  SOPA would make also make a rights holder who falsely accused a site liable for damages.  However, under SOPA, it’s quite likely that rights holders would try to press the issue and attempt to force law enforcement agencies to grant them protection that exceeds what they are actually legally entitled to.  I think this because there already a lot of example of rights holders trying to expand the reach of their protections (no, I’m not talking about illegal downloads).

What SOPA would essentially do is turn the internet into a “shoot first and ask questions later” landscape.  Sites that operate without the boundaries of the law could get shut down while an investigation take place.  Whole sites could be taken down even if there were only a single case of copyright infringement – even if the site’s owner did not approve of then infringing content.  If a visitor to this site were to leave a long comment that they stole, lock, stock, and barrel, from someone else, I wouldn’t necessarily know this.  I could honestly believe that they had themselves written the content.

I do believe that intellectual property rights should be protected.  However, I also believe that due process should be allowed to run its course and that law enforcement doesn’t rush to judgment simply because a rights holder says that a site violates intellectual property laws.  There should be a balance between intellectual property rights and the first amendment.

I’ve had an interest in writing since my elemenetary school days.  This is how my life as a writer has evolved throughout the years.

The Early Years

I was selected to attend a Young Writer’s Conference in sixth grade.  The conference was geared to 4th through 6th grades, and since I wasn’t selected in 4th or 5th grade, I assume that the writing bug must have hit me in sixth grade.

From day one, I wanted to be a fiction writer.  My earliest report cards contain comments about me drifting off into my own world at times.  The job of a fiction writer is simply to drift off in those dream worlds and write down what happens.  I’ve always been pretty proficient at non-fiction, but have never found it as interesting as fiction.

Most of my earliest stories were about sports.  This makes sense, since I was a huge sports fan (some things never change).  My teacher told me that she’d select me for the writer’s conference (a day away from school!) if I proved that I could write a decent non-sports story.  I wrote a story about Bigfoot.

I don’t remember there being much emphasis on creative writing in my junior high and high school years, so I didn’t write a lot, although I did read hundreds of books during these years.  The one story I do remember writing is “The Case of The State Vs. Santa Claus”, where the head elf goes on trial for vehicular manslaughter in the death of Grandma.

College

Reading textbooks during my college years tempered my enthusiasm for reading and writing.  Since I pursued a minor in English as well as degrees in business disiplines, I generally had quite a bit of reading on my plate.  When I wrote, it was usually discussing topics such as the mental state of Hamlet. 

When I did write, I made an effort to have some fun.  One of my freshman composition papers discussed basebal’sl anti-trust exemption.

I wrote a handful of stories during this time frame, but I don’t have copies of many of them any more.

Post-college

For several years after college, I basically stopped writing altogether.  Every couple of years, I’d get to itch to write, hammer out a couple of stories, and go into hiberation again.

Eventually, I fell into a group of friends who did dinner and a movie once per week.  At some point, I became the organizer of events, and began inject a bit of flair into them.  This is a dinner invitation from a few years back.  Bob Inferapels stars as “pudgy man with a limp”.

You reach tentatively toward the door.  It creeks as you open it.  Once inside, you are treated to the pungent aroma of the roasted, rotted, flesh of small mammals.  In the back, you see the milk maids turning cow and goat milk into fetid cheese.  A gardner whistles a drinking song while violently slicing vegetables into tiny chunks.  The serving wench balances eight mugs of ale on her tray.  An angry chef shouts orders above the fray, but nobody appears to be listening.
 
You look down at the parchment once more.  Could this den of inequity be the right place?  Have you been lured into this location by a highwayman with larceny in his heart?
 
You peer around the corner.  Ah, you see the tall man in spectacles.  And there, leaning against the wall, is the pudgy man with the limp.  They are listening intently to their feudal lord.  As you enter the room, the trio quickly looks up … they are aware that their plans are now in great danger.

Beginning Anew

In 2008, I received encouragement from a friend to launch a blog.  Blogs were completely foreign to me at this point.  I was aware of the concept, but hadn’t paid attention to how prevalent they had become.  It seemed like a great way to get immediate feedback on my writing.  One thing that I had always disliked about the writing process was inability to get quality feedback.

I jumped in head first and began writing as many as seven articles per week, on topics as diverse as politics, sports, and personal finance.  A few months later, I began featuring a short story every week.  Fiction Friday is on hiatus for a while so that I can focus on some other fiction projects, but it allow me to work on my writing technique.

Eventually, The Soap Boxers grew beyond a simple excercise to work on my writing technique and became the site you see today.

The Professional

In 2011, I was approached and asked if I would consider doing some freelance writing.  I had never really considered it, but decided to give it a shot.  I’d be doing the work for someone I considered to be a friend, so I was confident that it would be a good working relationship.

When the first payment hit my account, it was official – I was a professional.  I wasn’t getting rich from my writing yet, but I was getting paid – and that’s the first step. 

Helping Others

I’ve had a lot of help in recent years.  People that I have never met in person – but have come to know as friends – have donated thousands of dollars of expertise.

I’m trying to pay this forward.  In addition to trying to trying to launch a few of my own projects this year, I am assisting a few other writers in their efforts to launch eBooks.  At the moment, I’m volunteered to help at least four other writers get their books into print (well, ePrint, anyway).  For the writers, this will be a completely turnkey operation.  They had over a Word document and a cover image to me, and a few days later, their book will appear on Amazon.
 

Marilyn vos Savant has the highest reported IQ in the world and writes a weekly column where she answers questions from the great unwashed. Often time, the questions are simple enough that a person with average intelligence could answer them. Sometimes, though, she does bobble one and give an obviously wrong answer. (I guess your editor can’t question your work if you’re the smartest person in the world.)

Let’s take a look at this recent question.

I manage a drug-testing program for an organization with 400 employees. Every three months, a random-number generator selects 100 names for testing. Afterward, these names go back into the selection pool. Obviously, the probability of an employee being chosen in one quarter is 25 percent. But what’s the likelihood of being chosen over the course of a year?
Jerry Haskins, Vicksburg, Miss.
 
Marilyn responds:
The probability remains 25 percent, despite the repeated testing. One might think that as the number of tests grows, the likelihood of being chosen increases, but as long as the size of the pool remains the same, so does the probability. Goes against your intuition, doesn’t it?

Yes, it certainly does go against my intuition.  There’s a great reason for this – the answer is wrong.

Is the answer counter-intuitive?

Before we actually analyze in any detail, ask yourself if this makes sense.  Do you really think a person has a 25% chance of being chosen over the course of a year, regardless of the number of tests?  So if the company tests 1 time per year or 700 times per year (arrival, lunch break, and right before you leave every day) John Q. Public on the assembly line has a 25% chance of being picked at any time during the course of a year?

Give Marilyn a point for correctly suggesting that her answer is counter-intuitive.

Walk through the 4 tests

OK, let’s walk through the selections in each of the quarters.

• Quarter 1: Of the 400 employees, 100 are selected and 300 are not.  At this point, we’ve broken the single group of employees into two sub-groups – those who have been selected and those who have not.
• Quarter 2:  100 of the 400 employees are selected again.  If the sampling is truly random, 25% of each sub-group will be selected.  This means that 25% of the 100 employees (25) who were selected in the 1st quarter will be selected again, and 25% of the 300 employees (75) who were not selected in the 1st quarter will be selected.  The “selected at least once” sub-group now grows to 175 while the “never selected” subgroup shrinks to 225.  From this point on, we’ll focus on the “never selected” group.
• Quarter 3:  The “never selected” group drops to 169.
• Quarter 4:  The “never selected” group drops to 127.

At the end of the year, 127 of the 400 employees (31.75%) have completely avoided the testing, while 273 (68.25%) have been selected at least once.  1 or 2 people would have been selected all four times.

Show me the math

As is often the case with probability, the easiest way to attack this is to computer the odds of the opposite circumstance and subtract this from 100%.  The odds of being selected one of more times would involve computing the odds of being selected once, twice, three times, or four times and then adding the results.

Alternately, we can easily calculated the odds of never being selected, and just subtract this from 100% to arrive at the likelihood of being selected at least once.

The odds of avoiding testing in any quarter is 75%.  Thus, we simple raise .75 to the power of 4 (.75^⁴) to arrive at the odds of never being selected for testing – .3164, or 31.64%.  Thus the odds of being selected at least once is 68.36%.  This differs slightly from the result above because the 68.25% involved some rounding (since we must use whole people and not fractions).

The moral of the story?

Don’t place too much trust (or dis-trust) in the messenger.  Pay attention to the actual message.

2011 has been a very good year.  Hyrax Publications (the parent company of The Soap Boxers) turned a profit, as did the Soap Boxers division.  Not a large profit (the hourly rate would be absurdly low), but definitely black ink instead of red.  The number of visitors also hit an all-time high.  What lies ahead for 2012?

• The 2012 election will get a lot of coverage in The Political Observers column of The Soap Boxers.  I’ll definitely have something special in place for Election Night coverage, although details have not been ironed out.  There will be more than 40 scheduled political articles between now and election day, but you can be sure we’ll sneak in a dozen or so extra articles – and I’m sure the number of comments will increase.
• We’ll also provide ample coverage of the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, as well the the US Olympic trials.  I’m also very interested in the insights of Olympic fans outside the US, as well as expanding our US-based team.  If you’re interested in becoming part of the Olympic coverage team, send me an email at kosmo@ObservingCasually.com.  We’ll also have an Olympic Fantasy league, where you pick a team and get points for medals your athletes win.
• If the world ends on December 21, 2012, we’ll be sure to provide coverage.  I’ll likely write and “end of the world” article and schedule it to run on the 22nd.  If the world doesn’t end, I’ll just delete the article.  If the world DOES end, the article will run (assuming that Dreamhost‘s servers survive to apocalypse).  “Winning!”
• I’ll continue to do some freelance writing on personal finance topics at The Digerati Life, and you may see my name pop up on other sites from time to time.
• I anticipate launching at least one Kindle novella in 2012.  Hopefully this number will be closer to six.  I have plans for a series of novellas that follow the exploits of a certain character.  I’d love to get two of these launched by mid-year.  As always, you’ll be able to find all my works on my Amazon author page.  (Hey, guess what?  My books will be FREE tomorrow and Sunday.  Merry Christmas!)
• I’ll also be working with some of the site’s other authors to aid them in launching their own Kindle books.  Tentative plans include a poetry book, a fiction book, and a lighthearted travel book.  The books will be published under the Hyrax Publications imprint.
• Will we add any new writers in 2012?  Probably.  I have no plans to add any writers at the moment, but I’m sure I’ll want to tinker with things a bit at some point in the year.  I always do.  The most likely additions would be writers from other countries, as I would love to add news and analysis that doesn’t have a distintcly American angle.

What are you – the readers – looking for in 2012?  As a non-niche site, we can definitely tailor the content of the site to reflect what you want.

If the money from your Christmas bonus is burning a hole in your pocket and you want to contribute to the financial success of The Soap Boxers, you can always  PayPal a few bucks to us (email address for contributions is payments@hyraxpublications.com).  Or you can simply continue to read for free.