Graeme

I've written a number of non-gay stories that are hosted here. Most of them are short stories (but, then, most of my stories are short stories), but I've got one longer series that's not gay themed -- Family Snippets -- and I'm still being asked to do more on that series. I see nothing wrong with a good story that doesn't have any gay characters (I've got enough books at home to prove it, too).

Thank you. I'll admit that that's one of my favourite chapters.

I had the same problem with my first novel. The second I was fine, but the later novels were also a challenge. For me, it was the desire to tie off loose ends. I eventually came to the conclusion that I don't need to tie them all off. It's good when I can, but I only really need to complete the main story arc and other things can be unresolved, because life's like that. Something that may work is to start at the end and work backwards. I've had problems where I knew the ending and knew where I was, but I couldn't get the join between the two to go smoothly. So what I did was to have the ending, and then keep writing scenes before that ending until I'd worked myself back to where I was in the story. Best of luck! PS: I almost never do much of an outline. I have a mental idea of where the story goes, but I only have minimal notes written down. The one exception was my second novel, but most of that was written while I was away on holidays using pad & pen. I wrote each chapter as a sequence of fine detailed events, and when I had access to my computer, I typed them up, putting in the extra bits to make it readable That's either just another technique, or it's the extreme in over-outlining, as I was effectively outlining the content of each scene in the story....

Print writers have a different mechanism to tell if people like their stories: sales. For stories published on the Internet for free, the only ways we have to tell if people like what we write is either feedback, or some sort of 'view/like' counter. The main problem I've found is that 'view' counters get distorted by the search engine bots that will read stories, but don't really appreciated them Narrowing views to only humans is a difficult job.... It gets back to what does an author want to get from publishing? Some want to be liked. Others want to be recognised (that is, for some people to recognise their talent without needing to be popular). Others simply get enjoyment from the creative process and want to share. We don't all want the same things. For me, I like the creative process (even if it's been frustrating me for the last few weeks) and I like feedback when I get it, but I don't need it. I don't crave it, and I'm simply happy if I think my readers are happy, without worrying about how many readers there actually are.

Ian Roberts says he has brain damage For those not familiar with Australian sports, Ian Roberts is a former rugby international player, who came out of the closet while still playing. He's still the highest profile Australian sportsman to have come out of the closet while still competing (though arguably Matt Mitcham, Olympic gold medalist diver, would've had a higher profile for a short period of time).

It may not be the story you were thinking of, but there's another real-life story from someone here at AD that's very similar: Aaron from The Mail Crew.

I remember the court case on Windows vs Lindows. The court in question (from memory) told Microsoft that by using a common word as their product name, they had significant restrictions on their trademark. Most of those phrases shouldn't stand up in a court of law as defendable trademarks. The one I couldn't believe was 'students with diabetes'. How the #%$@ did that get trademarked?!? The others are barely plausible, but even so I think a court would throw out a lot of them as being in common use before the trademark was applied for (eg. Fast-track MBA, first-year experience, and student life)

While the UK has had flooding rains, there are some people who celebrate when it rains.... Cheeky rain celebration too rude for Facebook WARNING: The above newspaper article includes a picture of a nude 22-year-old male. This photo may offend some readers. (that should get everyone clicking on it....)

I've never been a boy scout, and I've certainly never been a boy scout in America, so can someone confirm if the explanation given the article is valid? Is this really a long standing Boy Scout tradition?

I knew him moderately well while I was active at that site. The following information was all public domain at the site, so I don't believe I'm sharing any confidences. The major thing is he's a male-rape survivor (see the afterword to his short story You Are Not Alone). He was raped as a child by a family member. As a result, he suppressed his sexuality for many years. He worked in the Navy as a nuclear reactor technician (I think) and eventually married and had children (two girls, from memory). After reading some online stories, he had a breakdown as he realised that he was gay and had been suppressing the fact for a long time. The resurfacing of the rape memories occurred after that point, further complicating his life. He was one of two people who helped me when I came out to my wife, helping with advice on how to handle the situation since he'd been through it with his own wife. It was after that point that he separated from his wife. I think he lost his job, too, which was another factor in his slowdown in writing. I haven't heard from him for quite a few years.

Not everything is in the Wayback Machine. I know of a site (no longer around) where the owner set it up so it wouldn't be archived. The content at the site is now only with those who copied it while it was still around.

I'm a firm believer that the Internet can be one of the best things that can happen for someone with problems. I didn't accept myself as a gay man until I had access to the Internet. By being able to first observe, and then, when I was ready, participate in gay forums (all while keeping my identity private), I was able to build up enough confidence to come out in real life. I couldn't have done that without the Internet. I'm glad it's also being used to help other people with other problems.

I happen to know that year 7 at the school has 90 students. Admitedly, it's not a large school, but I don't think there are many schools in Australia that would come even close to the sizes you guys are talking about. The local secondary college is about twice the size, I think, with about 180 students in year 7. Extrapolate that out, and it's 720 students for years 9-12. And that's probably around average for the state.

The school my boys go to has around 800 students from K-12 -- that is, the complete range from primary school through to the completion of schooling and heading to college/university or employment. Somehow, I think that's a little smaller than the schools you're talking about

Interesting. I honestly don't know how active Facebook is at the school my boys go to so I don't know if something similar would work there. I suspect it'll be more challenging because the school is probably a lot smaller than the high schools being discussed in the article. Still, I think it's a good idea if enough students participate.

It's sad, especially as that's where I started writing, but I've only been back once or twice a year at most for some time. There were only a few key people keeping the forums going and when they moved on, the forums died Lugnutz tried his best, but I remember a couple of years ago (I think) when there was someone spamming the forum and there was no one around who remembered the admin control panel password to ban him. I still had my moderator privileges so I put him on an indefinite posting ban, but that was the best I could do.

You beat me to it! I just saw the NY Times article on the subject: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/27/us/Brewer-arizona-gay-service-bill.html?hp

Cole, I 100% agree. The point I was trying to make is that people who object to same-sex marriage should not be automatically assumed to be doing so for religious reasons. Education can be used to teach people that their fears and concerns about same-sex marriage are not warranted -- but I see too many times that accusations of religious bigotry are thrown at the opponents without any effort to determine if that is really the case. I've give one example of someone who opposes same-sex marriage who is not a religious bigot -- they're just ignorant. How do we fix ignorance? Through education, not inappropriate accusations.

I need to jump in here, because there seems to be a prevailing opinion that objection to gay marriage is only on religious grounds. That is definitely not true. My next door neighbour here in Australia is also against same-sex marriage, and he's definitely not religious (I don't think he's ever been to church for as long as I've known him). His objection is based on the belief that children should be raised by a mother and father, and marriage includes the right to adopt so same-sex marriage will means gay couples raising children. He feels that that is wrong. Now, his arguments are subject to refutation through scientific studies, but those studies can only come with time. At the moment, the studies that have been done all have flaws in them and are hence subject to dispute. Accusing him of being a religious bigot (or similar) is just going to alienate him. Education is what is needed, not abuse. Educating people that same-sex couples can successfully raise well-balanced kids is going to take time. I believe that is where our community should be concentrating its efforts, not complaining about religious extremists. Sorry, rant over. I just get annoyed when people seem to think that there's only one reason for people to object to same-sex marriage and ignore other legitimate (if incorrect) reasons.

Texas Gay Marriage Ban Latest to be Struck Down Though the decision is stayed to give the state a chance to appeal, as the Supreme Court indicated in it's Utah decision. As the article says, the Supreme Court is either going to have to make a decision on whether Same Sex Marriage is a constitutional right, or they'll have to leave decisions such as these in place, doing the same thing but on a piece-meal basis. I think they'll take one of these cases eventually, though they're obviously reluctant to do so. They won't have a choice.

Sometimes, I think what happens is that an author will have an idea, but isn't sure a multi-volume story will be successful. They'll write the first one as a standalone, and if it's successful, they'll write the sequels. I've seen numerous examples of this where there's a standalone first novel that becomes a series. In movies, Star Wars is a good example. The original was a standalone movie, but George Lucas had plans for more. If Star Wars hadn't been successful, it would have stopped at the original. As it us, we're now up to six movies.... In my case, I had originally intended to cover what's going to be in the sequel in the epilogue of the first novel, but as I was nearing completion, I realised that I had enough material to cover that it could warrant a novel if I expanded on a number of points, hence my question about how to deal with a sequel. In this case, yes, there are definite spoilers in the sequel, but I don't see how that can be avoided. In effect, I've got one story with two climaxes (I hope). The first climax ends the first novel and the second climax will hopefully end the second. They could be written as one large novel, I suppose, but It would be like Raymond Feist's original Magician novel. I bought it as a single novel, but I believe it's now largely sold in the USA as two novels for the two halves of the story, because it really does have two halves. In my case, the first novel comes to, I hope, a satisfactory conclusion (ie. you're not forced to read the next one because the ending of the first is unsatisfactory), but there's hopefully going to be a strong interest in known what comes next.

Possibly, but it's still interesting. It may be a coincidence (throw out enough items, some will be correct), but given that the current theory on how the solar system was formed is a lot newer than what's in Genesis chapter 1, I think it's intriguing.

A follow-up with what is probably spin from the council 'lifestyle chairman'. http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/councils-reception-cold-at-the-end-of-the-rainbow-flag-request-20140225-33fys.html She claims she questioned, not rejected, one aspect of the image, and that the organisers chose a different image to proceed with because "they needed to keep moving."

Thank you! That's along the lines of what I'm thinking. The opening scene between a couple of the main characters will be discussing what's about to happen, and putting it in the context of what's gone before. At least that's my current plan....

Back when I was a teenager and went to Sunday School, I was told to look at Genesis chapter 1 and read "day" as "period of time of unknown length". If you do, the order of creation listed pretty much agrees with current scientific theory. 1, The universe was created/came into existence 2. "Let there be light" -- the Sun formed and started emitting energy through nuclear fusion 3. The Earth formed, with seas and land (the order here isn't quite perfect -- the Bible has the water first, then the land, when the order is almost certainly the other way around) 4. Plants formed 5. The Sun and Moon appeared. This one is questionable, but the early Earth probably did have a large cloud covering, in which case this is the breaking of the clouds. 6. Animals appeared. That is, it was plants first, then animals. 7. Mankind appeared. Not perfect, but generally in agreement with modern scientific theory. Not bad for something that was written a few thousand years ago.