Hello from the Balkan Arctic

What's cooking, homeslices. 

Someone quite rightly pointed out recently that I haven't written to you lot since November. So I thought I'd give you the word on the latest happy-haps. 

What's new? Well, Sofia looks not unlike the arctic at the moment. Now, I should say that we don't get too much snow in the south of England, where I grew up. Almost none actually, and when we do it's the kind of snow they'd give away free with a shit magazine. So when snow came to Sofia, my first Bulgarian winter, I was more excited than Hitler at a Crap Moustache Convention. Three days of it, however, and the novelty had worn off. It's been over a week now. Weather, you are so silly. Stop this nonsense. 

Anyway. To finish editing the novel, I thought I'd take a trip out of the city to the old capital, Veliko Tarnovo. I mostly spent the time wearing skimpy shorts and working on my suntan. I've attached a picture of the sun-fest for your enjoyment. The novel is indeed almost done. Just a bit of last-minute polishing and it'll be out. I initially said it would be finished by December. Egg on my face for that, but I hope you don't begrudge me for wanting to put the best stuff out that I can. I can't just reel it in for tidy-ups if it turns out to be crap, not once it's out there. Safe to say I'm rather excited though. It's quite different to the last book. It goes without saying I'll be sending it out for free to you lot. 

A bit of backstory about the book actually, if you're remotely interested: 

I started writing it when I was around 23. It was going to be a short story about two gods taking a holiday in the English countryside. The thing developed out of control and I thought I'd take a stab at turning it into a novel. This turned out to be a bad idea as the final result was total and utter shit: sprawling, half-baked, verbose rubbish. I left it for a bit, did other stuff. Several years later I found myself at a less-than-enjoyable point in my life, and living alone in the middle of the English countryside, miles from, well, anything. So I thought I'd give rewriting the thing a go. It took about 6 months, usually getting home from work, having a few drinks, having a few more drinks, and screaming at the keyboard. Again, I got some of the way through, but inevitably gave up. Finally, a year or so later, YouTube got considerably bigger on me than I was expecting. And I knew just the novel to fix up. It was the final push I needed to polish it, really. And boy did it need polishing.

So that's the higgledy-piggledy story behind it. A work in progress for about 4 years. The last 5 months have been a fairly gruelling period of writing, rewriting, yelling at inanimate objects, and trying to resist launching the laptop out of the window. But it's finally, almost done. Only tidying up left now. And that feels, if I may say so, pretty fucking good. I hope you enjoy it nevertheless. I might have a little celebration in a bar somewhere in Sofia, if some of you are interested.

Besides that, I've been taking further steps into VR, and am considering grabbing an HTC Vive when I next jaunt back to the UK. If any of you who are already using VR would like to have a chat and give me a heads-up on how you've found it already, that'd be very welcome. This stuff is still new to me, and I usually take around 3-4 decades to adapt to new technology. 

I also thought I'd mention a YouTuber I've been watching recently who deserves far more attention than they're getting. He's  a compatriot of mine, who I suggest we bully into making more videos. The channel is called Ten Minute History, and this is my favourite  of his stuff. I particularly like it when famous heads of state run through fields of flowers. 

The new video script is done, and I'll get work on it shortly. All I'll give away is that it's hopefully going to be another musical number, and largely based around what happens when you eat too much drugs. Or, what happened once when I did anyway.

Final item. I've needed a Kindle for the longest time, for proofreading the new book. In Veliko Tarnovo (the city I was just in, as above), I found a shop selling them. This was a gift from Yahweh himself, as I can't find any in Sofia. Three days of downloading books left, right, and fucking centre, and I couldn't wait to get the thing back to Sofia. And of course I left it on the bus on the ride home. When I make little self-deprecating remarks at what a moron I am, it isn't a zany psychological display. It's just owning up to the fact that I am, unfortunately, a fucking moron. 

Anyway, I hope your lives are considerably more organised and less snowy. 

All the best,

Ex.