I've actually started writing almost twenty years ago as an outlet for my creative juices, such as they were. I wrote mostly bad poetry (basically a hundred variations of life sucks), kept a journal ( sample entry: Boy, does my life suck), and tried to accomplish what used to be my big dream: writing screenplays that one day would become Academy Award winning hits (a common theme in my screenplays: characters struggling with a life that sucks). I don't know if anyone remembers the show Project Greenlight, which was a contest where Matt Damon and Ben Affleck (Batman!) would take someone's submitted screenplay and make a movie out of it. When I first heard about the show, I thought it would be my chance to write a great screenplay and send it in for my big break. Of course, I found out that writing a cohesive and awe-inspiring screenplay is tough to do. I came up with some colorful characters, but finding a good story to put them in wasn't that easy. I did end up writing a couple of screenplays that I thought were decent, along with a few that were horrible, but by then Project Greenlight was long gone. (Speaking of which, I wonder whatever happened to everyone who won?)I pretty much given up on my writing dream until I started reading all these articles about people self publishing their own books. It sounded like a fun thing to try, and if I couldn't write a decent book, well, at least I gave some semblance of an effort to actually becoming a real writer. My first idea for a book was to dust off one of my old screenplays and convert it into book form. That wasn't such a bad idea, in fact, there is one screenplay that had so much voice over narration in it that it probably should have been a book in the first place. I am currently updating it and writing it as my first novel. While brainstorming for other book ideas, I went back to words of advice that I've heard many times from many writers: "Write what you know." And that's how I got my idea for my first book.
I've realized that in my life I'm annoyed a lot. I was more of an angry and moody person when I was younger, but as I got older, I've mellowed from anger to annoyance. So, while I'm not pissed off all of the time, I am certainly annoyed most of the time, and the thought just entered my head: that's the book, right there, write about everything that annoys you. Pick any subject, I'll find annoying stuff about it, from music, TV, movies, sports, politics, religion, people, places, things, animals, children, everyday life, childhood, and even my own annoying self. I thought that this was an unique idea, and if I wrote about everything in a humorous, satirical way, I could get an entertaining book out of it.
The thing is, I've got a very twisted and sick sense of humor. I figured if I was going to write a book about all my annoyances, I might as well go over-the-top in doing so. I used extremely foul language, wrote about some graphic topics, said many terrible and horrible things, and generally just let loose. I found out that a lot of the rants in the book were the same things I complained about to my family and friends for years, with a ton of exaggerations for even more comedic effect. Then, if something annoying happened to happen to me during the course of everyday life, it went right into the book, with some embellishments, of course. In fact, the book comes across to me as almost like a series of stand up comedy routines. Kind of like George Carlin, only not as funny, but still pretty funny. After almost two years of writing, rewriting, editing, and laughing my ass off at my own material, I finally self published I Am Annoyed: One Man's Rants Against This Annoying World on Amazon in December 2013. I must say I'm a little bit proud of myself and my book. No matter if the book ends up as a bestseller or if it collects virtual dust on the electronic bookshelf, at least I can say I actually wrote a book, which is pretty cool and not annoying at all. Well, this ends the self-indulgence for now, if this post about my book interested you in any way, you can click on the book cover on the right side of my blog and purchase my book right now. (How's that for a shameless plea for book sales?)
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