A Load of BS

  They say a picture is worth a thousand words. To quote a dearly departed songwriter, if you could read my mind, what a tale my thoughts could tell.  The catch is I don't remember some of the finer details, nor do I want to.  The photo you see above here was the last picture taken from what would become my last author signing event. I learned from my friends and colleagues to leave a piece of your work behind as a way to thank the hotel staff for their hospitality.  I didn't know it at the time, but maybe this was a case of foreshadowing. I always loved using that tool in my stories. I'm a lifelong pro wrestling fan. When I found this photo yesterday, the first thought that popped into my head was that of a veteran grappler ceremoniously taking off his boots and leaving them in the ring. This is a time-honored tradition and a clear sign that he has just competed in his final bout.  I didn't realize it until last night. This photo symbolizes me leaving my boots ...

I should be working on my newsletter right now, but I wanted to blog instead. I'm actually multitasking; I'm listening to an interview with an author friend as we speak. As fate would have it, I found an unpublished draft on here from March. Wouldn't you know it, this is exactly what I want to address here and now.  I often look at people and wonder what drives them. What makes them great? What makes them different? What makes them keep going?  The answer is usually considered a positive trait. Determination, focus, love, desire. While all of this holds true for me, those answers also come from a dark place.  The primary one is fear. Fear of losing. Fear of failure. Fear of being inadequate. Most people know I deal with High-Functioning Anxiety and Depression. Imagine caring too much about what's not important and not enough about what is. Imagine sabotaging yourself and then falling to pieces when you lose. That's the genesis of it.  The term "neurospicy"...

Until a few minutes ago, I couldn't decide which project to work on tonight. As I sat here with the ESPN bowl games acting as background noise, I wondered ' Do I work on the continuation of my Core Memories sexy romance series? ' (Yes, I can say the word sexy here. It's my blog. I'm not going to ban myself). ' Do I revisit my full-length work-in-progress that feels empty to me? '  Don't get me wrong. The latter is going to be a wonderful story once I decide to continue writing it. I just don't feel comfortable penning a straight fiction novel right now, even though one of my dear friends insists (and I'm paraphrasing here) "There's something uniquely special about a Brian Scala book." I can't shake this feeling that it needs to be something more than what it is. Romance, Horror, Suspense, maybe all of the above. I need a niche. People want horror or romance, or both. That's partially why I decided to dive into the romance th...

This past weekend, I had the pleasure of visiting the new state-of-the-art studios of 88.7 FM, WNHU. It was impressive seeing new equipment being put to use in a renovated house. The annual alumni meeting was held in a nice, newly- constructed basement. It was a far cry from the old days where I spent the majority of my four years in a dilapidated basement. Allegedly, a deceased janitor walked the halls and ghosts of old orphans from the 1950s bounced dodgeballs in the bowels of the building. We were encouraged to share our experiences and stories of the past. It's hard to encapsulate four years of memories in an email without the reader losing his or her focus. I did my best to summarize my life at WNHU to the new station manager. Here's what I wrote: In September of 1994, I walked through those glass doors in the basement of Maxcy Hall and began the greatest four years of my life at WNHU. I loved sports and new alternative music, two distinct entities that garnered the la...

My friend Matt Mentone likes to tell the story of how he first met Jim. He walked into the WNHU studios, down in the bowels of dingy Maxcy Hall, one day back in 1995. The man extended his hand and said, "Hi. Jim Abbott, like the pitcher." I suppose there could have been more than one Jim Abbott in this world, but the one we would come to know and love was one-of-a-kind. This made it all the more sad when Matt texted me last night. He'd heard from a mutual friend that Jim Abbott passed away on June 11th at the age of 59. I later found out that he'd suffered a stroke in January and never fully recovered. When I walked into my first sports department meeting in 1994, I was a little punk with long hair who loved alternative music and sports. I'd previously met Jay McEnaney, WNHU's Sports Director and play-by-play man at the time. Next to him was a young Scott Criscuolo, whom I would later bond with over anything Mets and wrestling-related. Then, there was this...