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Well, thus ends the semester... Now to wait to see how badly I failed to achieve the necessary mark. But... Now I can take some stress off and get back to writing again! Yay!!!

@Sinfulwolf I’m glad you had fun with it. Despite that hard turn left that, this story was meant to be exactly that: just kinda stupid and fun, but with atmosphere. To be fair, I understand why someone wouldn’t like Extany. He’s an asshole. A special variety of asshole I adore and find fun to write. Though I try to make them redeemable, ‘redeemable’ is so subjective. Thank you for the review!

Dunno about you all, but even aside from the hectic tasks to prepare for the holidays, I’m just tired of writing. I have plenty of things I want or need to be writing (I’m six weeks behind in a writing class) but I can’t seem to concentrate for more than an hour or so on writing. Nodding off is the first symptom. I usually get some done on the actual days of the holidays as we just have a quiet meal, our big feast is the 24th and then we relax. Are you managing to get anything done right now, or are you in a hiatus?

I’m crossing my fingers, hoping that nobody uses my stories as a blueprint for a religious society.

We are all bitches on this blessed day. (ps Happy Solstice to the religious folks who do that one! For the rest of us it’s “Yay! Days start getting longer again from today!)

Ah, the joys of old posts, and disappearing posters. Trust me, I’m sure I’d know it if you were seriously bitching me out, and I’d probably deserve it because, well, I can be a bitch!

@Desiderius Price That’s fair. I wasn’t overly lost through it, which is a good thing, and impressive seeing as how connected all your stories really are. Surely more impactful for those that have read everything, but I could still easily follow the story only missing the more subtle cues. @CloverReef Well, I’m a little sick in the head, so even that hard left turn was fun. I’m glad you love it. I want to work more in this world at some point. Whether that means a fully fledged story, or keep showing Lydia’s journey through side characters. I also have the soft spot for witchy characters, and I don’t write them enough (I say that about a few things...). But thank you about the comments on the writing style. I could always use a few ego pumps.

Is it a particular topic or fandom? My worst block on stories come when I’m trying to force a story and refusing to work on something else. I feel bad for stuck stories, but getting mad makes it worse. Most often I break block by working on a new story, often silly/satire. I have to be careful that these side stories don’t take a life of their own as I have too many active stories. I get really stuck when I think I SHOULD work on my more meaningful big stories and then I get stuck across the board. My muse just gets bored, frustrated, and doesn’t like being told what it should do by planning. Right now I’m doing cleanup on all the drafts I did for NaNo and one plot bunny sticking Vader in something like Quantum Leap (no Al) taht is running short and fast. Write anything, even a blog journal, to get the words moving...

Thanks for the review. Unlike Jello, nearly every character in this story was recurring, so they already had some characterizations behind them, this includes the Santa Fitz confided in. Like Sister Iris’ reaction to the knowledge of who Dale’s father was (a point that gets explored in Dale’s Game). Whereas Megan, Dustin, and her family were all new characters (Baris, though, is a recurring character, and I’ve mentioned Melvin in Jefferey). As I’m portraying the religiousness of the society through snapshots across the stories, it’s not fully explained, which gives me plenty of wiggleroom for future stories The general picture I’m portraying is a society that’s gone conservative, and is heading for a full theocracy in the coming decades (it’s defacto there in a lot of its elements); but still with its idiosyncrasies (such as cheerleaders). Baris is simply my favorite agent (ie, refered to as “pengus” by a certain group of people) to write in from the US Department of Homeland Morality, charged with overseeing and promoting the general spiritual welfare of society. For a priest abusing his authority, Father Jordan’s a strong character to use. But Albuquerque isn’t the only place experiencing this in my universe, which I show in a number of the other stories. As a result of Father Jordan’s proclamation, Fitz will struggle, and keep struggling, in his acceptance/relationship with Jarred. As a whole, Fitz will be a net positive here, but he’s got his flaws, as all characters should have.

Thanks for the review. Sounds like I really made Fitz realistic with a distinct personality (that can be difficult when writing). Fitz is a functioning alcoholic here, so yeah, he’ll resort to drinking to self-medication, which is a fairly common trait in today’s society, just like blaming others for their own frailties. That Father Jordan played up on Fitz’s homophobia to the point that Fitz nearly murders his son, well...it’s a low point in Fitz's life that I had intended to get to in Dale’s Game, before I accidentally ended the story a chapter or two early. I’m tempted to add those chapters in (guess who learns about this secret?)

From JayDee on December 19, 2018 Outreach It feels like Vaneris’s feelings for iteration pi are not entirely healthy... It was interesting. Lots of hints at wider lore as with the Halloween story and that momentous things have happened, but here’s a couple folks just lying together on a holiday. And, hey, Bread can be hard to get right! A relationship is hard enough without a vast power imbalance between two beings. The nearly unfettered power on their home turf means even a mild temper tantrum by a godling can be absolutely apocalyptic. Love often blinds those with it of the faults of their beloved. the result of a dalliance between a fertility goddess and a god of pestilence is Vaneris.Its not by accident that the name is similar to

It could still be our universe … I mean, it’s possible. It’s mildly futuristic, so I’ve assumed a “genetics in a box” here, tuned for those markers of sexual orientation – there are spots in the chaptered stories where I refer to the “Great President (censored)”. (Does that fuel your nightmares?) I do like to bring the characters back, just like Mr. Baris in the previous story (he’s recurring too). It gives continuity to the the universe and familiarity. For this story, it’s backstory to something that gets alluded to in Dale’s Game, and would’ve been the subject of the final chapter if I didn’t accidentally end the story early (in fact, I kinda need to address that). It was a fast/fun write, and not every story has death in it (things would get really stale if they did). As I’m trying to make this a plausible/semi-realistic universe, deaths ought to be fairly rare things. BTW, thanks for the review.

Well guys, as I sit down to write this update, I almost don’t even know where to start its been so long since we talked. I guess the first and most obvious thing, is that I’ve just posted Billion Dollar Harem chapter 36! So, yay for BDH not being dead! 36 picks up on day 40, or the very next day where chapter 35 left off. I don’t want to give to much away in the forum, but several big things get set in motion. Things which will play out in upcoming chapters. It sees an end to Bella’s session in the punishment potty, a new form of corruption, a potential rekindling of an old romance, a brief glimpse at the harem’s reaction to having a new pet, and a teaser for upcoming things with Chloe. I didn’t quite get to the much much much promised scene with Emma and Cara, but I promise it will happen soon. I plan for it to be in the next chapter, but I’ve said that before…. However, this time I’m going to try really really really hard to mean it lol…. Well that’s enough about chapter 36, I guess its on to me… First off, I want to apologize for my extended absence. There were several contributing factors that I’d like to share with you guys. As I talked about in my past couple posts for a while there, things at work were pretty crazy. There for a couple months I was working a ton of hours and being put into some stressful situations and I found it hard to concentrate on writing even when I had the time to do so. More than that though, since right about the time I posted chapter 35 I was struggling with depression. For me this is a problem that comes and goes I’ll go long periods where I feel fine, and then I’m stricken with it and will be almost immobilized for weeks on weeks. Its not really something I like to talk about, but it effects my confidence and my drive to work on anything, much less my writing. Anyway, this bout was particularly tough for me to overcome as things in my RL, (not just work) weren’t exactly great and I just sort of felt very underappreciated in everything I was doing. In addition to my mental health, I was also struggling financially and considered giving up BDH in order to work on writing that I might be able to make money off of. I worked briefly on that Hogwarts Harem project while I thought about my options… In the end though, I started to feel better and decided why not do both? I began working on an e-book. For the past two months or so I’ve been brainstorming and sample chapter writing ideas for a short novel that I could market on Amazon. This story would, of course, feature original characters and a brand new storyline with brand new characters and some brand new, for me at least, fetishes to play around with. Right now, that book is in its very early stages and I plan to give some brief updates as progress on it advances. In the mean time I don’t really want to let you guys down, I did after all promise to finish Billion Dollar Harem. So, as of right now, I’m moving forward with the following plan. I’m going to try to put out 1 chapter of BDH every month, although from here on out I’ll be aiming for a soft chapter page limit of around 15 pages instead of 20. If I can write a shorten chapter in 2 weeks, that will leave me 2 weeks to work on my e-book. Its my hope, that in a year or so I’ll have BDH finished, and an e-book ready for publishing. Now, I’m notorious for missing deadlines, so that timeline is definitely not set in stone. But I’m a man who likes to have a plan...and for now that is it lol! Lastly, I’d like to take a moment to thank everyone who wished me well or who thought about me over the holidays, or who reread a chapter of Billion Dollar Harem (or any of my stories really) while they waited for my return! You guys are so amazing and as I’ve said on multiple occasions the reason this story even exists as it does today. Without all of you I would have given up a long time ago. I won’t address individual comments, but I wanted to assure you all, everyone who made them, I saw them and they helped me when things were hard for me. They gave me a little light to help move forward and I’m not sure I would have found my way out if not for knowing you all would be here to support me on the other side! Billion Dollar Harem is your story as much as it is mine and I look forward to finishing it for all of us! Its not quite the new year yet, but, I’m raising a glass (Diet Pepsi, not liquor, I don’t drink) to all of you for a great year ahead and to not looking back on the failures of the past. Thanks to all of you! I’m out! Till next time, -Mal

“I wanted to do a show about a character that was and innocent, and so I focused on a sea sponge because it’s a funny animal, a strange one, I thought he was a funny, nerdy, squeaky-clean square.” RIP Stephen Hillenburg